Virginia Tilley is chief researcher and coordinator of the Middle East area of the Governance and Democracy Program of the Human Sciences Research Council of Pretoria, South Africa. Author of countless articles and works on Israel and Palestine, including the series of essays published in Counterpounch and on this book in The London Review of Books. As an expert in comparative politics and international relations, she has concentrated her work on ethnic conflict and national construction processes. In the area of comparative studies he has researched extensively in the politics of indigenous peoples, having published Seeing Indians. A Study of Race, Nation and Power in El Salvador (2005) and countless articles in the Journal of Latin American Studies.