Walking Israel: A Personal Search for the Soul of a Nation [Hardcover]

Martin Fletcher says he was tired of Israel's bad press, and so in 2008 he undertook to trek 110 miles along the country's coast in search of positive, uplifting, real people stories that would show the Israelis as they are: quirky but generally hospitable peace seekers. That's the elevator pitch, but what he found -- and what the reader soon surmises -- is that the coast of Israel is not the Cinque Terre, and he can only fill so much space with his descriptions of sandy beaches, heavy backpacks, and oppressive heat. He can't even make it through the initial segment of his journey without embarking on his first digression. By the time he's halfway through the book, he outright confesses: "My plan for Walking Israel was to walk the cost, but not to limit myself to people and events on the coast; I would follow issues that arose wherever they should take me." With that, he heads inland to Jerusalem to meet up with an Israeli Arab, leaving me to wonder why he even bothered to use the walk as a framework for the book.

That quibble aside, the book is mildly interesting for its portrayal of various characters. Fletcher has a whole crew of them eager to relate their anecdotes. Most of the stories are not particularly memorable, and because the narrative makes so many jumps in place and time, never missing a chance to go off on another tangent, the reader who is looking for clarity and understanding may instead find her/himself ensconced in a verbal bath of giggles, groans, and warm fuzzies.

Conversely, Fletcher's self-portrayal is both poignant and somewhat repellent. We see a man who is haunted by the realization that he may be past his prime. His descriptions of his physical condition are merely sad; his forays into Tel Aviv nightclubs to try to recapture his youth and his clumsy attempt to flirt with a not-quite-single woman made me cringe.

Fletcher is not a bad writer, but as a foot soldier/road warrior he lacks energy. The exceptions: two lively chapters that show the reporter in his element. The first, Remaking Utopia, is an account of the rise, fall, and reinvention of the kibbutzim. The other, We're All in This Together, is a vivid portrayal of his experience in Ashkelon, a city under siege. (Both chapters are based on events that occurred months after he finished his walk!)

The reader who makes it to the Gaza-ish end of the walk will be rewarded with Fletcher's platitudinous take on the country's predicament. He likes the people; the politics he's not so sure about. All in all, not a bad journey, but one that barely begins to fulfill the expectations established by the subtitle.

Martin Fletcher in his new book "Walking Israel" sets out, on a coastal walk, visiting seaside communities from the Lebanon border to the tip of the Gaza Strip. His goal was to get away from the narrow focus of his "daily grind as a news reporter" stopping at interesting places and visit with the interesting people along the way. His reasoning is that "The farther you move from the centers of power, and the closer you get to the real people, the less their stories fit the political platitudes." To get a better look at what life is really like in Israel, he wants to "avoid officialdom and talk randomly with Joe Shmo." His travels are filled with history as well as a personal reminiscing from memory lane. This is a good read. He fills this with life lessons learned from observing Israeli Arabs, Holocaust survivors and life with the kibbutzniks. He even offers his own personal ideas on a two-state solution. The questions of Israel's right to exist and survival are answered. "Israel is no longer seen as a country fighting for its survival. It has survived." Israel certainly will face many issues as the old guard is being replaced with a new generation of Israelis. Martin Fletcher has provided an interesting look into today's Israel. This is well worth the read and addition to the history/political shelf.

Subtitled "A Personal Search for the Soul of a Nation" this author, who is a special correspondent for NBC News based in Israel, decided to take a vacation and spend several weeks walking the 100-mile coastline from Lebanon to Gaza. He walked along the beaches, visited the towns, interviewed a wide variety of individual people along the way and gave a lot of personal opinions.

I usually love books that share personal experiences of far-away places. I think of myself as an armchair traveler and usually identify with the writer. This was not true for me in this book. Mr. Fletcher is a professional foreign correspondent and this professionalism, instead of drawing me into the book, kept me at a distance. He had a recorder with him and recorded interviews with Arabs who lived in Israel, both Arabs and Jews who had their homes destroyed, members of the modern Kibbutz communities, holocaust surrivors and soldiers in the Israeli army. But he never stayed long enough to get personally involved in the communities. His stories were mostly other people's stories and the few things he said about himself didn't make me like him.

For example, he actually stole what he thought was an artifact from a small museum of plundered Arab goods. He also interviewed his friend's sons who were in the Army but never mentioned one word about if his son was in the army or not. He is a British citizen whose Jewish parents escaped the Holocaust and he is married to an Israeli woman who rushed to his side when he thought he was getting a heart attack from the stress of the 100 mile journey. But this didn't stop him from flirting with an Israeli woman and actually giving her his phone number when she told him she was looking for open relationships.

That said, I did get a lot out of this book. It brought all the ancient history and the ancient conflicts to light; it taught me about small towns where Arabs and Jews lived together in peace. It made me think about displacement of both Jews and Arabs. And it brought me right into the most recent war with scud missiles being dropped regularly. This was an Israel away from the big cities, although he did spend some time in Tel Aviv, where he tried to recapture his youth by going to the clubs but, now in his 60s, he realized that those days were gone forever.

This is a short book, only 290 pages long, but there were defiantly parts that dragged and the interviews were short and with such a large variety of people that I never got to know any of the people in depth. He also managed to bring out the conflicting loyalties of the people as well as the feeling that this kind of conflict has been going on for thousands of years and it doesn't look like it will stop. I am sure there are other books about Israel that are better than this one but this book did spark my interest in learning more.

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