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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Why doesn't David Becker get to congratulate Peter Kahn on getting power to the engine?

2. How does Ibrahim Arif support the defense effort?

3. What offense is committed by Miriam Bernstein?

4. How is the second onslaught by the attackers better done than the first?

5. Why doesn't Joshua Giddel attack the guest house that is the attackers' headquarters?

Short Essay Questions

1. How have the attackers improved their tactics for the second attack?

2. What is Peter Kahn's biggest concern throughout the ordeal?

3. What does Major Bartok find surprising about Nathan Burg's report of the incident?

4. What incentives do the young Ashbal fighters have that they did not have during the first attack?

5. Why does Jacob Hausner think it is better for Miriam Bernstein to cry and howl when she is suffering pain and grief?

6. Why does Benjamin Dobkin have a sense of deja vu when he enters by the Ishtar Gate?

7. Why does Dr. Al-Thanni remind Joshua Giddel of Archimedes?

8. How does Yigael Tekoah become a hero?

9. Why is Salim Tayid able to survive when none of the other Ashbals attacking the west bank do?

10. How does the guard recognize that Benjamin Dobkin is not an Ashbal?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Masada is important both as a cautionary tale and as a plan for the trapped defenders. Research the happenings at Masada and write an essay explaining its similarities and differences to the fictional situation in this story, and its importance in the minds of the characters.

Essay Topic 2

Rather than telling the story from a single character's point of view, DeMille uses the style of author omniscient, in which the author knows not only what many characters do and say but what they are thinking. In your essay, analyze the advantages and drawbacks of this author style. Consider, for example, that the author knows not only what the characters think but what the characters think of one another.

Essay Topic 3

Jacob Hausner comes to hope that Teddy Laskov will continue to be Miriam Bernstein's lover. This hope seems a strange one for a man in love. Why do you think that Jacob Hausner would want another man to take his place with the woman he loves? What personal characteristics would he need to feel that kind of hope? In your essay, describe the changes that the events in this story have caused in Jacob Hausner.

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