WHEN Premier Ben-Gurion appeared on TIME'S cover on Aug. 16, 1948, it was as the head of the newly created state of Israel, victorious in battle over the Arab armies but facing all the uncertainties of a predictably difficult future. On Jan. 16, 1956 Ben-Gurion was on TIME'S cover again, back from a brief retirement to lead his nation at another moment of crisis, "a headlong man in a hurry," "a prophet who packs a pistol." This week, as David Ben-Gurion stood at the center of the diplomatic negotiations over the Middle East, he gave a TIME correspondent his own story of the troubled history of his people and their determined hopes for the years ahead. See FOREIGN NEWS, The Watchman of Zion.

WITH Ben-Gurion preparing to withdraw from Egyptian soil, the world's eyes swung to another defier of U.N. resolutions, Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser, whose country since 1951 has ignored a U.N. resolution to let Israeli ships through the Suez Canal. Would Nasser now agree to final clearance of the canal and negotiate an acceptable contract for its operation? Gamal Abdel Nasser is a man who once aroused universal admiration, then widespread concern. His brief career has now reached a fateful turning. For a new estimate of the 39-year-old dictator of the Nile, see FOREIGN NEWS, Nasser: The Other Man.

KING HENRY VIII not only had six wives but he was also an enthusiastic composer. One of his love songs appropriately titled Helas, Madame, will be performed in New York this week by a group known as Pro Musica Antiqua. The royal composer is only one of hundreds from Albeniz to Zandonai whose works are heard in New York every season in dozens of little halls and auditoriums far from Carnegie Hall and the Met. There out-of-the-way music groups, both amateur and professional, are giving Manhattan the kind of musical excitement that the booming off-Broadway theater has brought to its stage. See Music, Far From Mid-Manhattan.

WHEN Winthrop Rockefeller and the --State of Arkansas got together four years ago, things began to happen in the lives of both. By persuading Arkansans to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and lure in new industry, Rockefeller and the industrial commission he heads are working an economic revolution in the Razorback State. In the doing, the one-time playboy has found a cause--and a home. See BUSINESS, Arkansas Catalyst.

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