The Similarities And Differences In Jeffery Goldberg's The Lemon Tree

Jeffery Goldberg, an American Jew, traveled to Israel in the late 1980s. Like many other Jews, Goldberg came to Israel with the belief in zionism. Zionism is extraordinary important to his life, because it leads his path to Israel, his decision to join the IDF, and his mindset towards the Arabs. The way that Goldberg shares his story is through snippets of time; the setting changes periodically from from his early experience in Israel, his childhood, and times he spend in the prison talking to Rafiq. Rafiq is a dynamic character to the story because he clashes his Arab opinion with Goldberg’s Jewish opinion. Nonetheless, there is a sense of communion with each other and friendship emerges. The three areas I find most important about analyzing Goldberg’s story is his personal experiences and how that transformed his understanding of zionism, his connection with Rafiq, and the book’s similarities and differences from The Lemon
Tree.
His family was not a religious family, but participated in jewish traditions. From a young age he experienced bullying from his peers, because he was a Jew. He found refuge in libraries just to get away from anti-semitic bullying. Goldberg recalled a very significant moment one day in middle school. A bully named Harrington confronted Goldberg in the locker room. Like most bullies, Harrington pushed him against a wall to intimidate him. A bystander named Chuckie Greer saw the dispute and urged Goldberg to hit him (Prisoners 49). Everything in his body compelled him not to swing, but after repeated approval he did (Prisoners 49). Immediately the others fled. That day Goldberg learned that there is power through