AP World History Summer Project 2015

Welcome to AP World History! This class is a lot of work but we’ll also have a lot of fun. This curriculum is very large and for that reason I am asking that you do some work over the summer to lessen our workload when school starts. Each of these assignments will be worth a test grade and will be due on the first day of school.

The Lemon Tree is a National Book Award Finalist written about a real life friendship between a Jew and a Muslim in Israel. In 1967, Bashir Al-Khayri, a Palestinian twenty-five-year-old, journeyed to Israel, with the goal of seeing the beloved old stone house, with the lemon tree behind it, that he and his family had fled nineteen years earlier. To his surprise, when he found the house he was greeted by Dalia Ashkenazi Landau, a nineteen-year-old Israeli college student, whose family fled Europe for Israel following the Holocaust. On the stoop of their shared home, Dalia and Bashir began a rare friendship, forged in the aftermath of war and tested over the next thirty-five years in ways that neither could imagine on that summer day in 1967.

The Lemon Tree Questions: Answers need to be eight to ten sentences long. They can be typed or hand written. The book can be purchased from any book dealer in paperback or digital form. There are also multiple copies at the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library that can be checked out for a two week time period. You are not required to purchase a copy of this book.

1. The book opens with the journey of Bashir and his cousins on a bus to their childhood homes in al-Ramla. What must have been going through their minds during that time? Can you imagine the internal dialogue in their heads, as they rode the bus, then walked around their old hometown? How would you have felt if you were Bashir, approaching the old home, and pressing the bell?

2. Dalia’s very existence, and her arrival as an infant to Israel in November 1948, is the result of remarkable circumstances that combined to save some 47,000 Bulgarian Jews from the Holocaust. How much importance would you put on the actions of Dimitur Peshev, the parliamentarian, or Bishops Kiril and Stephan—and how much to other factors? Finally, the book (p. 43) describes Dalia as carrying “an extraordinary legacy” with her to Israel in 1948. What was that legacy?

3. The Arab-Israeli war of 1948 is known as the “War of Independence” to Israelis, and the “Nakba,” or “Catastrophe,” to Palestinians. Chapter Four describes how Bashir’s family, and Dalia’s cousin, Yitzhak Yitzkaki, experienced the war. Take the point of view of Bashir, during the first several months of 1948, and tell the group how you experienced those times. Now, do the same with Yitzhaki.

4. Bashir and his family kept their focus on the “right of return,” as promised by U.N. Resolution 194, as their exile extended into the 1950s, and then the 1960s. Why was this such a singular focus for Palestinians during this time? If it were you who had been displaced, would you also demand to return home, or would you, at some point, decide it would be easier to live in peace, if also in exile?

5. Dalia describes herself as growing up in the shadow of the Holocaust (pp. 112-115). Even though her family escaped these atrocities, she nevertheless experienced a young Israel as deeply traumatized. At the same time, she grew up among a new community of Jews who were trying to re-form their identity. On pp. 118-120, a discussion of the Sabra, or “New Israeli Man,” describes a desire among many Israelis to “wash off that old Jew” and “stand tall for the first time.” How much of a role do you think the Holocaust, and reaction to it through the crafting of a Sabra identity, played in the formation of Israel’s national psyche?

6. The emerging trust between Dalia and Bashir was shattered in February, 1969, when a bomb exploded in a Jerusalem supermarket, killing three people. Bashir would later be convicted of complicity in the bombing and sentenced to fifteen years. Is your own view of Bashir transformed by the description of these events? How is this tempered, if at all, by the accounts of his torture and imprisonment? In the meantime, Dalia cuts off all contact with the family. Describe her state of mind during this time, and her own ambivalence about contacting Bashir.

7. After Dalia’s parents died, and Bashir got out of prison, Dalia did indeed get in touch with Bashir. Why? Describe her evolution from being “zealous in the defense of Israel” (p. 180) to meeting Bashir at the home of a Christian minister in Ramallah. At that meeting, Dalia offered to share the home in Ramla. What is the meaning of this gesture? What is the meaning of the agreement Dalia and Bashir forged that day?

8. In 1988, near the beginning of the intifada, Bashir was deported to Lebanon. On the eve of his deportation, Dalia wrote an open letter to Bashir that was published in the Jerusalem Post (pp 200-203). Weeks later, Bashir replied (pp. 216-220). Describe your reaction to both letters.

9. Bashir and Dalia finally meet again, in the midst of rising violence and political tensions, in Ramallah in 2004 (256-262). They find that their political differences are as great as ever, but that their personal relations are as warm as ever. How does one explain that?

10. Near the end of the book (p. 262), Dalia says, “Our enemy is the only partner we have.” What does she mean by that?

Continent Timeline

We are going to cover all the major events on all the major continents. To help you in this endeavor, we are asking that you purchase a reference guide. The Visual Reference Guides World History by Philip Parker is a very informative little book especially for the $8 price tag. http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/world-history-phillip-parker/1113855423?ean=9781435138957

Using this book you are going to pick a continent and create a 30 event timeline of the most important things that happened there. Please choose between the Americas, Europe, Asia, and Africa. Not enough goes on in the events of world history in Australia or Antarctica to justify including them on the list. For each event, you need a date, main people involved, and two sentences discussing the significance of putting it on your timeline. You also need to include 15 pictures over the course of your 40 item timeline. There needs to be a tie between the events and the picture that you choose. This project should be a physical product you bring in on the first day of school. You can hand draw the pictures or print out pictures from the Internet.

For example, if I was doing a timeline on Europe I would include the following event.

1517

Martin Luther nails his 95 Thesis to the door of a Catholic Church in Germany. This leads the way for many people to leave the Catholic Church for the newly formed Protestant Church.

If you have any questions about anything please feel free to email. My email is