One hundred years after Allenby stepped into Jerusalem, Weintraub employs his charming style to re-narrate the successful campaign to restore Jerusalem “after 673 Years of Moslem Rule.” The biblical status of Jerusalem is inextricably mixed with the strategic alliance between Britain and the Zionist movement throughout The Recovery of Palestine, 1917: Jerusalem for Christmas. Due to the confluence of the “two heroes,” T. E. Lawrence and General Edmund Allenby, so argues Weintraub, Jerusalem was presented as a “gift for Christmas” to the dejected British masses in the war.

Keywords: Christmas; T. E. Lawrence; World War I; General Edmund Allenby; Jerusalem; autobiography; Britain.