Synopses & Reviews
Long-awaited,
War Against the People is a powerful indictment of the Israeli state’s “securocratic” war in the Palestinian Occupied Territories. Anthropologist and activist Jeff Halper draws on firsthand research to show the pernicious effects of the subliminal form of unending warfare conducted by Israel, an approach that relies on sustaining fear among the populace, fear that is stoked by suggestions that the enemy is inside the city limits, leaving no place truly safe and justifying the intensification of military action and militarization in everyday life. Eventually, Halper shows, the integration of militarized systems—including databases tracking civilian activity, automated targeting systems, unmanned drones, and more—becomes seamless with everyday life. And the Occupied Territories, Halper argues, is a veritable laboratory for that approach.
Halper goes on to show how this method of war is rapidly globalizing, as the major capitalist powers and corporations transform militaries, security agencies, and police forces into an effective instrument of global pacification. Simultaneously a deeply researched exposé and a clarion call, War Against the People is a bold attempt to shine the light on the daily injustices visited on a civilian population —and thus hasten their end.
Review
"Superb ... Graham builds on the writings of Mike Davis and Naomi Klein who have attempted to expose the hidden corporate and military structures behind everyday life." Edwin Heathcote
Review
"Cities Under Siege is a detailed and intense forensics of new urban frontiers, laboratories of the extreme where experiments with new urban conditions are currently being undertaken. In this fascinating new work Steven Graham has created a novel concept of the city, looking at war as the limit condition of urbanity and calling for an alternative urban life yet to come." Financial Times
Review
"Roll over Jane Jacobs: here's urban geography as it looks like through the eye of a Predator at 25,000 feet. A fundamental and very scary report from the global red zone." Eyal Weizman, author of < i=""> Hollow Land <>
Review
"A brilliant critique of the deadly embrace of military violence and contemporary urbanism. Steve Graham writes with immense power and lucidity, layering detail over detail and image over image to expose the shadows that are falling across cities around the world. This is not a dystopian future but the present, and Graham compels us to open our eyes to the dangers military urbanism poses to contemporary democracy." Mike Davis, author of < i=""> Planet of Slums <>
Review
“Military and security organizations are rebuilding the social and political space in which we live. Anyone who wants to understand this process should read this book. It is not only a key to deciphering Israeli policies in Palestine, but also one of the clearest explanations that I have ever read on how important Israel/Palestine is in the world….Jeff Halper's book addresses with clarity and structure one of the most complex and yet extremely important topics of the securitization of our society. His book has opened my eyes, and was a fascinating read.”
Review
Praise for previous work: “An inspiration. His voice cries out to be heard.”
Review
“This is an important book for anyone who cares about peace, the plight of the Palestinian people, and the role of Israel in the world of war. Halper’s fascinating thesis places the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories at the heart of its role in the transnational military-industrial complex and what he calls the pacification industry. A brave, analytical, and innovative book from an admirable activist and thinker.”
Review
“Halper's essay on Israel's 'matrix of control’ is classic, even canonical. Now, in War Against the People, he radicalizes the argument to develop a deeply disturbing vision of what he calls 'securocratic wars in global battlespace.' A rare combination of theoretical imagination, empirical sensitivity, and political passion.”
Review
“In this cogently written and extremely informative book, Jeff Halper explores Israel's key role in the ‘global pacification industry.’ The resulting alliances not only enable Israel to perpetuate the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip; the latter's function as a human laboratory for Israel's ‘matrix of control’ additionally makes the occupation indispensable to Israel's security industry and global positioning. War Against the People is an excellent, revealing, and accessible examination of Israel's ‘security politics’ and the changing nature of pacification worldwide in the twenty-first century.”
Review
“A brilliant book whose depth of political insight is driven by the spirit of one of the world’s most inspiring political activists. It lays out the way in which Israel’s war on the Palestinians has become both a model and the laboratory for a global war against the people.”
Review
“This profoundly important and well-researched study serves as a reminder that US-backed Israeli militarism and its devastating humanitarian impact are neither unique nor to be seen in isolation. Halper convincingly argues that it is part of an even more disturbing global phenomenon that goes well beyond Israel which threatens the lives and civil liberties not just of Palestinians, but of people around the world.”
Synopsis
A powerful exposé of how political violence operates through the spaces of urban life.
About the Author
Cities are the new battleground of our increasingly urban world. From the slums of the global South to the wealthy financial centers of the West,
Cities Under Siege traces the spread of political violence through the sites, spaces, infrastructure and symbols of the world’s rapidly expanding metropolitan areas.
Drawing on a wealth of original research, Stephen Graham shows how Western militaries and security forces now perceive all urban terrain as a conflict zone inhabited by lurking shadow enemies. Urban inhabitants have become targets that need to be continually tracked, scanned and controlled. Graham examines the transformation of Western armies into high-tech urban counter-insurgency forces. He looks at the militarization and surveillance of international borders, the use of ‘security’ concerns to suppress democratic dissent, and the enacting of legislation to suspend civilian law. In doing so, he reveals how the New Military Urbanism permeates the entire fabric of urban life, from subway and transport networks hardwired with high-tech ‘command and control’ systems to the insidious militarization of a popular culture corrupted by the all-pervasive discourse of ‘terrorism.’