Niels Nielsen · 1970
Niels Nielsen reviews Atlas of Israel: Cartography, Physical Geography, Human and Economic Geography, History, published by the Survey of Israel and Elsevier in 1970, with approximately 550 maps and extensive commentary. Its thematic coverage extends to the ceasefire lines with Syria and Jordan and includes Gaza but excludes Sinai, roughly matching the 1920 Palestine Mandate. Nielsen considers this scope geographically useful while noting uneven statistics and potential political objections. He outlines the atlas's account of cartographic development, from the Medeba mosaic through Jacotin and British surveys to mapping continued and completed by the Survey of Israel, and praises its technical resources and qualified contributors, particularly David Amiran. Freshwater supply receives special attention within its broad physical-geographical coverage; short observation series and uncertain effects of interventions limit assessment of the water system. Nielsen also discusses the atlas's treatment of nearly two million Jewish immigrants, their differing backgrounds, and changes in settlement, irrigated agriculture, urbanization, industry, transport and social conditions, alongside political conflict and successive wars. He values its consolidated account of these changes and reads them in the context of Ottoman rule, the British Mandate, the formation of Israel, and international interests in oil and the Suez Canal.
W. Witt · 1971
This review evaluates the second, revised English edition of the Atlas of Israel, published in 1970 after the earlier Hebrew edition of 1956–1964. The compressed edition incorporates Judaea, Samaria, the Gaza Strip, and the Golan Heights, which had been under Israeli administration since the 1967 Six-Day War, while excluding the Sinai Peninsula because of scale limitations and insufficient data. The reviewer assesses the atlas in terms of thematic organization, evidentiary transparency, and cartographic technique, highlighting its extensive sections on history and the history of cartography as well as its treatment of relief, geology, climate, land use, agriculture, trade, settlement, and global Jewish population patterns. Particular strengths include the representation of temporal change alongside contemporary conditions, attention to sharp spatial contrasts, statements concerning map accuracy, explicit source citations, enlarged regional details, broader geographical contextualization, and substantial explanatory texts with bibliographies. The review concludes that the atlas combines scientific precision with innovative and highly distinctive cartographic design. Its integrated portrayal of Israel’s complex physical, historical, human, and economic geography gives it an exceptional position among national atlases and makes it significant both for its substantive coverage and for its methods of thematic representation.
Norman Bentwich · 1971
This review evaluates the 1970 English edition of the Atlas of Israel, focusing on its scope, cartographic methods, and historical-political framing. Using multicolored maps, charts, photographs, and sequential representations of change, the atlas comprehensively documents Israel’s physical geography, population, settlement, economy, culture, and military history. It is particularly effective in depicting topographic and climatic diversity and transformations in land use, and is praised for its rich information and outstanding production. However, significant omissions include the British Mandate period, the boundaries of the mandated territory, and Israel’s pre-1967 border with Syria. Some maps of cultural facilities and tourism also appear of limited scholarly value. The review concludes that, despite being an exceptional reference work, the atlas reveals editorial bias in its historical selections and territorial representations.
