Colt,

Last summer I bought new paperbacks of Exodus and The Haj, then reread Exodus and read The Haj for the first time. They're both great, as are all the Uris' books I've read, which includes all but two or three.

In Exodus Uris does a great job of showing the path many Jews took to Israel after WWII and before, then the immediate need to take up arms as the Arabs continued their efforts to attack the Jews and prevent a Jewish state, then to destroy it after its founding.

If you haven't read The Hope and The Glory by Herman Wouk, you'd probably enjoy those also, though I think his presentation of some aspects of the Yom Kippur War might be dated, particularly in view of some comments I recall your making in past LGF posts.