Angry people, tribes with flags

The last ten days have been very un-christmassy. Downtown San Francisco has been filled with shoppers, travellers, and very angry people. Ever since Israel started hitting back at Gaza for firing rockets at civilians, crowds of angry young men have gathered at Powell and Market to scream and shout.

I really cannot understand what they're on about. They're here, aren't they? The bombs are not falling on them. But they seem to want to kill people in revenge here in the Bay Area.

Back of the hill writes about them in this post:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2008/12/jew-hate-in-sf-demonstration-in-front.html
and mentions that he was at a dangerous protest here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2009/01/sabbath-off-to-rocky-start.html

Go ahead, read him. He's got it good. He's ranting. He's not been entertaining at all for over a week.

So instead I have been reading Tribes With Flags by Charles Glass. Because I'm trying to understand what the heck is going on over there.

The book stinks. The author is an egomaniac who can't write.... but does his non-writing very well, and at a fast clip. He doesn't make the whole thing any easier to understand, but I now know more about him than I want to. If any one knows a better and shorter book that explains the Middle-East, please let me know.
I've also been looking up things on wikipedia, but really, some of those entries are nonsense.