Just finished a well-researched and well-written book titled A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel by Allis and Ronald Radosh. It is contains , among others, detailed descriptions of all the machinations surrounding the creation of the State of Israel, the unrelenting pressure exerted even then by oil-rich Arab nations on the fledgling United Nations, the “separate but unequal” policy pursued by the U.S. State Department which constantly undercut U.S. Presidential policy and almost succeeded in preventing the creation of Israel.
But the most important part of the book was, for me, the revelation of the character of the man himself, without whose steadfastness Israel would have never come to be. It is almost certain that FDR would not have had the fortitude to stand fast the way Truman did, and for that, the world’s Jewry owes him eternal gratitude.
