‘For the Honor and Glory of the Jewish People‘: Arendt’s Ambivalent Jewish Nationhood

Observers of German-Jewish political theorist Hannah Arendt often disagree on her politics, yet many view her as a staunch early critic of Zionism. Whereas her criticism of Israel rendered her unpopular in the American-Jewish and Israeli communities for many decades after 1948, commentators more recently have come to see her perspective as a prescient assessment of the ills of Jewish nationalism. This interpretation, however, fails to grasp the complexity of Arendt‘s political views of Zionism in particular and of Jewish nationhood in general, which evolved over time and remained ambivalent from her early to her late works.     

Socio‐spatial mix and inter‐ethnic attitudes: Jewish newcomers and Arab‐Jewish issues in the Galilee

Urban and regional planners tend to recommend spatial mix of socially diverse populations as an appropriate strategy to achieve social equity and improve inter‐group relations. However, the actual impact of such a mix on social relations in general, and inter‐ethnic attitudes in particular, has been subject to on‐going, yet inconclusive, debates among social scientists. This paper adds to the study of these issues by examining the inter‐ethnic attitudes of residents in Jewish ‘new settlements’ (elsewhere termed ‘community settlements’, or ‘mitzpim'), which were established some 15 years ago among the Arab villages of Israel's central Galilee region. We found that despite certain strands of ethnocentrism, most Jewish settlers hold significantly more moderate views on Arab‐Jewish issues than: (a) the general (non‐Galilee) Jewish public in Israel; and (b) the region's Arab population. The influence of the socio‐spatial mix on the moderation of hostile attitudes, at least among the Jews, is analyzed and explained by comparing our data with the findings of previous research on the topic. On the basis of that comparison we conclude that the Arab — Jewish mix in the Galilee, along with socio‐economic characteristics of the Jewish population and the existence of a ‘penetrating group phenomenon’, have combined to moderate Jewish attitudes in the study region. Planners are called upon to use this knowledge.     

Why Aren’t Jewish Women Circumcised?

From Hellenistic to modern times, in the eyes of Jews and non-Jews alike, circumcision is a sign that marks the boundary between Jews and non-Jews. Jews are circumcised, gentiles are not. What, then, of Jewish women? Why are they not marked with a bodily sign attesting to their place within the covenant? Cohen argues that the Jews of antiquity seem not to have been bothered by this question probably because the fundamental Otherness of women was clear to them. Jewish women were Jewish by birth, but their Jewishness was assumed to be inferior to that of Jewish men. Jews and Christians, however, who opposed circumcision, used the non-circumcision of women as one of their supporting arguments.     

The Jewish diaspora and Israel: belonging at distance?

The involvement of diasporas in the advent of modern nationalism is not a new phenomenon: already in the 19th century some diasporas wanted to ‘normalise’ their national existence by building a state of their own. However, with the growing globalisation trend in the 199'0s , especially in the areas of transportation and communication, Benedict Anderson put forward the idea of long‐distance nationalism (LDN), as a new way of linking diasporas and the national project and thus creating a more intense sense of belonging. LDN has been characterised by him as having two main features: its unaccountability which allows for intense political radicalism, and its instrumental function for strengthening ethnic identity in the diaspora and thus a sense of belonging. I will test those hypotheses in the case of the archetypal Jewish diaspora.     

Attempts at an Arab‐Jewish agreement in Palestine during the thirties

The article argues that a central aspect of Israeli-Polish relations before 1967 was their tripartite nature, involving the two states and Polish Jewry. The main goal of Israeli diplomacy in Poland, to which it subordinated a variety of interests, even those that were central to Israel's foreign policy, was the immigration to Israel of Polish Jewry. The three elements of the triangular relations (Israel, Poland, and Polish Jewry) influenced one another through their policy and behavior, monitored each other, interpreted each other's actions, and reacted accordingly. The aliyah from Poland engendered a new dynamic in the relations. Israel was able to implement its nation-building policy through the immigration of a desired element, and the Polish authorities, by allowing emigration of an unassimilable ethnonational minority, homogenized the nationalizing Polish state. After the massive emigration of the Jews, another element connecting and reshaping the three sides of the triangle emerged: the competition to represent the memory of Polish Jewry, conceived, too, as an instrument in the nation-building process of both states.     

East and West in Jewish nationalism: conflicting types in the Zionist vision?

ABSTRACT. This article analyses the ethnic and civic components of the early Zionist movement. The debate over whether Zionism was an Eastern‐ethnic nationalist movement or a Western‐civic movement began with the birth of Zionism. The article also investigates the conflict that broke out in 1902 surrounding the publication of Herzl's utopian vision, Altneuland. Ahad Ha'am, a leader of Hibbat Zion and ‘Eastern’ cultural Zionism, sharply attacked Herzl's ‘Western’ political Zionism, which he considered to be disconnected from the cultural foundations of historical Judaism. Instead, Ahad Ha'am supported the Eastern Zionist utopia of Elchanan Leib Lewinsky. Hans Kohn, a leading researcher of nationalism, distinguished between ‘Eastern’ and ‘Western’ nationalist movements. He argued that Herzl's political heritage led the Zionist movement to become an Eastern‐ethnic nationalist movement. The debate over the character of Jewish nationalism – ethnic or civic – continues to engage researchers and remains a topic of public debate in Israel even today. As this article demonstrates, the debate between ‘Eastern’ and ‘Western’ Zionism has its foundations in the origins of the Zionist movement. A close look at the vision held by both groups challenges Kohn's dichotomy as well as his understanding of the Zionist movement.     

Between nation and land in Zionist teaching of Jewish history, 1920–1954

The article discusses the representation of Jewish history in the Zionist school system of the Yishuv and the early State of Israel (1920–1954). In the Yishuv period the history curriculum was centered on “shifting Jewish centers” in the spirit of historian Simon Dubnow, an approach that also integrated Jewish and non-Jewish history. From the 1930s, Ben Zion Dinur and the Teachers' Council of the Keren Kayemet le-Yisrael (Jewish National Fund) attempted to make the Land of Israel the central axis uniting Jewish history, a focus that downplayed non-Jewish history. Because of the opposition to this approach within the education system, this change, which Dinur regarded as essential for the integration of the new immigrants from the Muslim countries into Israeli society, was implemented only after he was appointed minister of education in the early 1950s.