War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East

War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East

Wednesday at 12:00pm PDT

Join noted historian and journalist Gershom Gorenberg in conversation with AJU's Michael Berenbaum for the real story of how the Nazis came within an inch of conquering the Middle East during World War II. Gershom's latest book, War of Shadows, began with a conversation in Jerusalem that set off years of searching through archives for long-secret documents, through attics for lost papers, through streets in Cairo, Rome, London – seeing facts unravel and new ones take shape. Gershom's obsessive hunt led to the discovery of a Nazi source in British headquarters in Cairo and his book tells the story of the race for information in the North African theater of World War II, set against intrigues that spanned the Middle East. 

Buy the book HERE. 

Gershom Gorenberg is the author of War of Shadows: Code Breakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East. Based on documents that remained classified for decades, War of Shadows demolishes myths of World War II and solves the mystery of the spy affair that nearly brought Rommel’s army and SS death squads to Cairo and Jerusalem. Gorenberg’s previous books include The Unmaking of Israel, a provocative examination of Israeli history and the crisis of Israeli democracy; The Accidental Empire: Israel and the Birth of the Settlements, 1967-1977, a strikingly new picture of Israel’s post-1967 history, of major Israeli leaders, and of Israel-U.S. relations; and The End of Days: Fundamentalism and the Struggle for the Temple Mount, a close look at the role of religious radicalism and apocalyptic visions in the Mideast conflict. He co-authored The Jerusalem Report’s 1996 biography of Yitzhak Rabin, Shalom Friend, winner of the National Jewish Book Award. Gershom is a columnist for The Washington Post and a senior correspondent for The American Prospect. He has written for The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, the New York Review of Books, The New Republic, and in Hebrew for Ha’aretz. 

Michael Berenbaum is a Professor of Jewish Studies and Director of the Sigi Ziering Institute at the American Jewish University. He is a writer, a scholar and a creator of Museums. His work has been recognized by the Emmys and Academy Awards.