Acknowledgments
Many people have assisted in putting this book together. Well over a hun-dred people agreed to be interviewed or to provide information, despite their busy schedules. I am extremely grateful for their openness. I espe-cially appreciate the many talented individuals who helped me by review-ing different sections of the manuscript, in particular, Rochelle Adam, Azariah Alon, Dror Amir, Dror Avisar, Gideon Biger, Valerie Brachya, Michael Cohen, Noah Efron, Brock Evans, Michael Graber, Noam Gressel, Yerahmiel Kaplan, Rene Karschon, Arthur Kessler, Uri Marinov, Stuart Masters, Danny Orenstein, Uzi Paz, David Pargament, Yisrael Peleg, Berry Pinshow, Aviva Rabinovich, Oren Rosenthal, Ruth Rotenberg, Menahem Sachs, Yoav Sagi, Uriel Safriel, David Saltzman, Dianne Saxe, Stuart Schoenfeld, Eilon Schwartz, Benny Shalmon, Uri Shanas, Hillel Shuval, Bill Slott, Emily Silverman, Josef Tamir, Gil Troy, Danny Yoffe, Reuven Yosef, Amotz Zahavi, and Dan Zaslavsky.
No one could enjoy better editorial support than that provided by Technion professor Dr. Yonina Rosenthal, my marvelous and assiduous mother. While she was not always successful in getting me to downsize gratuitous ten-dollar words, she brought her wisdom and considerable technical writing skills to the task, and it shows. As always, my father, Dr. David Tal, provided constant encouragement, fervent opinions, and understanding about the technical aspects of environmental issues. All of those mentioned above offered thoughtful suggestions and flagged many mistakes. Of course they could not catch them all, and those remaining are my own.
The Conanima Foundation's support is gratefully acknowledged. While it shuns recognition, many of us know just how much this institution has contributed over the years to Israel's environmental progress. Dr. A. Joshua
I cannot say enough about the faculty and staff of the Otago University Law School, whose Kiwi hospitality was truly “good as gold” even prior to our arrival in Dunedin. Dean Richard Sutton's support and Dr. Jim Allan's good humor (and even better jump shot) helped me keep the project on pace. During my stay in New Zealand, Dalit Ucitel was a resourceful and devoted research assistant back in Tel Aviv. More recently, Arava Institute students Shirly Riceman and Jennifer Lorenzen offered excellent and cheerful assistance.
Three remarkable organizations also have my undying gratitude. First, I salute Adam Teva V'din, the Israel Union for Environmental Defense, in Tel Aviv, and its devoted staff, with whom I worked from 1990 to 1997. I shall always be especially grateful to its first three workers: Irit Sappir, Tirtseh Keinan, and Ruth Yaffe, as well as the eight magnificent founding board members, headed by the ever brilliant and supportive Eilon Schwartz. They have been companions and colleagues of mine for almost a decade. Much of what appears in this book we learned together. In addition, kudos and grat-itude to the staff and faculty at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies at Kibbutz Ketura, to Miriam Ben Yosef, Cecil Rimer, and Sharon Benheim, who have been partners in the endeavor from the beginning. Special thanks got to Dr. Noam Gressel, who covered for me there so effec-tively during my Kiwi voyage and subsequently remained a wonderful friend and “boss.” During the past two years I have been privileged to work with Life and Environment, the umbrella group for Israel's environmental organizations. Josef Tamir, the organization's founder, and his granddaugh-ter, Orr Karassin, its present director, have taught me a great deal about Israel's environmental history and about its future.
I am of course indebted to the University of California Press and its staff. My gratitude goes to Howard Boyer, who believed in a very prolix manu-script, brought it on board, and helped me start the painful process of slim-ming it down. Doris Kretschmer has been a most thoughtful editor who has shepherded this book masterfully through its many phases, along with her
For permission to use Reuven Rubin's evocative painting on the cover, I would like to thank Carmela Rubin (curator and director) and Shira Naftali of the Rubin Museum Foundation, as well as my friend, public transportation advocate Rachel Horam, for facilitating the connection. Many institutions and individuals graciously granted rights to print the photographs that appear in the book, and I am grateful to them all.
Without my wife, Robyn's, encouragement, support, and comments, the book would not have happened. She knows how much I admire and de-pend on her. My sisters and brother, Gabriella Tal, Aliza Stark, and Oren Rosenthal, were there for me during the vicissitudes of the book's prepa-ration, as they always are. Bill Slott's wit and wisdom have been precious to me since I was nine, but never more so than during the past two years. I should close by thanking Mika and Hadas Tal, who over the years never complained about their father's frequent absences. For months they faithfully monitored the manuscript's progress during dinnertime conversations in New Zealand. More recently, Zoe has joined us, and her intermittent cooperation and constant good spirits helped me to complete the editorial revisions. Perhaps, Zoe, when you are old enough to get through this book, you will understand why I liked reading The Lorax to you so much.
A. T.