Search

Nekomeh-nemer was a Yiddish play commemorating the heroes of the Jexvish Resis-tance in France and celebrating their willingness to engage in violent combat. The play's protagonists embody the "NewJew" who leaves religions tradition behind to forge a new Jewish future. But this well-known trope is too narrow to capture the experience of the war and its aftermath. This essay explores the overflows of the ideological frame within and outside the play, focusing on text, performance, and audience reception. It reflects on what revenge might mean, beyond the call for retribution, and examines the dynamics of Jewish loyalties. The Jews are never within just one world or just one group, even their own. The larger aim of this essay is to suggest a religious dimension in what we are accustomed to call the secular, present through the very inability to fit Jews simply within a nationalist frame, either their own or that of others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We regard nothing as more abominable than a policy based upon a double-entry bookkeeping. --Robert Weltsch, as quoted in Hans Kohn, Living in a World Revolution In all matters relating [...]

This article focuses on territorialism from its beginnings in the 1880s, through its conversion into an organized political power in the early twentieth century, and up to its decline in the 1950s. Because territorialist ideology is multilayered, this article focuses on two central pairs of issues that stand at the heart of territorialism and Jewish discourse in the first half of the twentieth century. The first is the idea of the negation of exile and the catastrophic worldview that characterized territorialist thinking. The second is the position of the territorialists toward the Land of Israel and the native Arab population already residing there. In exploring these two issues, we examine the sources of the territorialist idea and argue that they constitute a mirror image of the Zionist movement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the specific version of Zionism developed in Central Europe by examining the life and work of Robert Weltsch. Born in Prague in 1891, Weltsch was the editor of the official journal of the German Zionist federation, the Jüdische Rundschau, from 1919 until 1938. I trace the impact of German nationalist ideology and politics on Weltsch's thinking, arguing that he developed an ambivalent concept of Jewish nationalism that cannot be identified as either ethnic or civic. Weltsch criticized liberal ideology and affirmed völkisch ideas of national community while rejecting national chauvinism and embracing universal humanity. Weltsch's Zionism was an attempt to fulfill the cultural aspirations of völkisch nationalism and yet to avoid its political consequences. His ideas remained an unsolved contradiction and, though supported by many German Zionists, were thus not able to shape the politics of the Zionist movement and the political reality in Palestine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes the public discourse and debate in the early 1950s over the shaping of the new Israeli citizen. Thai discussion included the concept of "pioneering" (halutsiyut) as a leading tenet that would ensure citizenship not only as a set of entitlements but first and foremost as an obligation. Educators, public figures, adolescents and young adults, and Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion all tackled questions that dealt with various aspects of citizenship and the challenges of citizenship education. The debate centered on the question of the very possibility of creating a "pioneer-citizen." The article examines the earliest criteria of good citizenship in Israel, which did not settle for the perfunctory duties of voting, paying taxes, and abiding by the law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Cold War liberals constituted a cosmopolitan anticommunist intelligentsia. Many of them were of Jewish origin, so they had to negotiate between their European homelands, Jewish nationalism, and cosmopolitan ideals. Out of their national dilemmas emerged novel visions of liberal pluralism, but the tensions between liberalism and nationalism were also a source for ambiguities and, occasionally, blunders. This article focuses on five intellectuals, illustrating the spectrum of positions on the Jewish Question among West European Cold War liberals: Raymond Aron (1905-83), the French patriot; Isaiah Berlin (1909-98), the liberal pluralist; Karl Popper (1902- 94), the cosmopolitan anti-Zionist; Manes Sperber (1905-84), the Jewish cosmopolitan; and Jacob Talmon (1916-80), the Zionist. Increasingly identifying themselves as Jewish, timidly promoting a Jewish agenda, and recognizing a stake in the Zionist project, the Cold War liberals reflect a major transformation in the identities of the West European Jewish intelligentsia in the aftermath of the Holocaust and Israel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

David Goodblatt's Elements of Ancient Jewish Nationalism is one of a number of recent studies to stress the ancient Jewish origins of modern nationalism. This article challenges the effort to equate modern and ancient nationalism by briefly exploring contrasts between the two, including the differing resonances of antiquity itself in modern and ancient contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reexamines the complexities and difficulties associated with the formation of an Israeli identity and an Israeli life among the Soviet Jews who made aliyah in Israel of the 1970s through the prism of immigrant cinematography. I focus on the career of Mikhail Kalik, a celebrated Soviet filmmaker who immigrated to Israel in 1971, as representative of misdirected expectations. Reframing the historical moment of Kalik's repatriation, I suggest that his motivation, a uniquely 1970s Soviet Jewish identity construct that hinged on discursive belatedness—was no longer in sync with Israeli society and was thus his undoing. A close reading of Kalik's two post-immigration films, Shloshah ve-ahat (The Three and the One) and I vozzvraschiasetsia veter (And the Wind Returneth), reveals their paradoxical aesthetic dependence on socialist-realism as a means of delivering an ideologically inflected message, as well as their ultimately damaging misreading of the new host society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a Jewish social study by Jay Geller entitled "Spinoza's Election of the Jews: The Problem of Jewish Persistence." It states that the study is based on the third chapter of Spinoza's Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, and that the chapter argues that the claim that the Jews are God's chosen people is no longer valid. Spinoza's examination of the divine election causes Jewish persistence converge on a text that refers to as "Spinoza's Testament." The Testament had large effects on the perception of those relations and identities that were molded by the emergence of nationalism in the late eighteenth century.

This article focuses on the success of the Zionist movement in creating a Jewish identity that bridges the gap between physical and mental space. In the introduction to "A Historical Atlas of the Jewish People," Eli Barnavi claims that the Jewish consciousness constantly shifts between awareness of physical spaces. There have been growing tendencies to view Israeli culture as reflecting a tension between a nomad and a native's identity.

The article presents information on the emergence of the Jewish national culture in Palestine. It informs about the dynamics of Yishuv sector and the Jewish Diaspora. The interwar period that caused tensions in Palestine and the Jewish world and it caused many other social and political developments. It reflects that the Zionist thought implies a radical transformation in the relationship between the Jewish Diaspora and the projected Jewish center in Palestine and the undoing of exile became the goal of this movement. It envisioned the complete elimination of Jewish Diaspora. But at the same time the Diaspora is no longer suffer the ailments of exile due to the demographic changes. These changes underscores the implications for the nature of Jewishness in the modern world. More over the Diaspora itself was undergoing dramatic political, economic and demographic changes. The Jews once being a small group of emigrants in the Ottoman Palestine started making their impact felt in the entire land and their movement began to emerge as a nascent national entity with an identifiable culture.

The article presents a research on the influence of the electronic media on Jewish culture. It reflects on the role of the Palestine Broadcast Service in inventing Hebrew radio, which paved the way for creating awareness about the Jewish culture among the people. The radio has done a role in transmitting Jewish culture. The trend was common in the western world during a period between the two World Wars of the twentieth century. In these period the cultural systems of the western world were challenged by radio, along with cinema. This change has given concerns to Zionist project also. Like other nationalist movements in the mid-twentieth century in the growth of this movement also the radio played an important role. The leaders used radio as a tool for the nationalization of the masses. The founders of Hebrew broadcasting in Palestine treated radio as an equal partner to journalism and formal education. in Radio was also meant to be a source of general social and scientific knowledge. They were aiming to establish a radio net work in the western world to unite their people starting the Hebrew broadcasting in Palestine and then in the state of Israel.

This article analyzes English Zionist leadership by examining three sequential problems: mobilizing political Zionism; the effort to capture Anglo-Jewish communal institutions; and the transition from ideology to pragmatism. English Zionism, given the collective quality of its leadership, needed more than its share of good luck. The hard core of the ideologically committed remained very small. English Zionist leaders resembled their non- and anti-Zionist peers in most respects. Zionist leaders evoked an ideology that asserted a fundamental incompatibility of Jew and Diaspora culture.

The article discusses the relationship between the Zionist project of nation-building and the establishment of the first philosophy department at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Discussions focused on the opposing conceptions concerning the central mission of Zionism and the disagreement regarding the appropriate framework within which the battle for independence should take place. Moreover, suggestions were given regarding the role of philosophy and the department in the nation-building project.

The article presents an introduction to the study of modern Jewish political thought. Modern Jewish political thought began in Diaspora where two events have marked its emergence, the pogroms of 1881 and the Dreyfus Affair. Early Zionist socialists used the ideal of Hebrew labor to dominate Jewish through the creation of a distinct and labor-oriented infrastructure for immigrant absorption. Some Zionists also built an institutional network in Palestine in the 1920's which comprised an array of economic enterprises, banks, labor exchanges, health care and education systems.

The article presents a focused discussion on gender and shaping of modern Jewish identities. It tells of the construction of modern self in accordance with the social standards and values of the larger Christian society and the prevailing social and cultural norms. It explains that basing at the modern period, it is certain that a "woman" or "gender" question emerged as an aspect of the creation of modern Jews and Judaism. The attitudes of contemporary Jewish women was an issue as important as their status in Jewish tradition.

The article presents a focused discussion on the consent, descent and the ironies of Jewish identity. It tells of blood logic to modern Jewish identity narratives, social mechanism for both private and public naming and claiming of Jews by other Jews. It states that part of a larger study of strategic Jewish self-fashioning and the uses of social science in the twentieth century will be examined relative to the secular social and institutional practices that have perpetuated the dualism. It mentions that Jewhooing is the social mechanism for both private and public naming and claiming of Jews by other Jews.

This article examines the description of the beginnings of the Jewish nationalist movement in the articles written by Jacob Katz. Although Katz's research on Jewish nationalism was limited to the Zionist movement, it was impressive in the literature and journalism that it produced and in ideological essays that it inspired. Among those who took an active part in the nationalist movement of the 1860s were Joseph Zevi Duenner, Natan Friedland, and Joseph Natonek. Common fears among early nationalists was that Jewish ethnic collective was in danger of deterioration. This national awakening was motivated by a concern that Jewish national identity would be lost as a result of the rise of liberal social movements within Jewish society and the modern state's demand to relinquish Jewish collective identity as a prerequisite for emancipation.

The article discusses the attitude of American Jewish writers in the United States toward Jewish literature and Israel. It presents criticisms of Harold Ribalow stating that most American Jewish writers lack interest in cultivating Jewish literature and depicting Jewish lives in their works. Their writings do not have any engagement to Israel thus their works shows Americanization among American Jews. It also mentions that most Jewish writers do not see the significance of their Jewishness that is why their works do not reflect their culture and Zionism.

The article presents an essay discussing the works of Philip Roth, an American Jewish writer. It states that Roth's fictions such as the "Portnoy's Complaint" and "Sabbath's Theater" reflects Roth's career and character as a Jew in the United States. His novels depict the changes in the Jewish status and identity in the country as the years go by. It also mentions developments in Roth's career as a writer, describes his style in writing which is often criticize by his fellow Jews and the cultural influences of his works.

The article discusses Jewish nationalism in George Eliot's book "Daniel Deronda". It presents several criticisms and analysis of the book's nationalistic message including arguments by Bernard Semmel, Susan Meyer and Bryan Cheyette, focusing on the role of a character from the book named Julius Klesmer. Cheyette sees Klesmer as the one who disrupts the author's concept of Jewish idealism while Meyer underestimates Klesmer's role stating that it represents alternatives to the author's ideals of nationalistic and racial separation which the novel promotes.

The article presents a focused discussion on the impact of the January 1895 Dreyfus affair on French Jews' ethnic identity. It tells of the background of the incident, features of the established Franco-Judaism, French Jews' association with the articulation of French republicanism in France, Jews' aspiration for assimilation, and factors that helped create Jewish identity. It mentions that during the Dreyfus affair the leaders of the French Jewry did not become involved in the name of being Jews, but as French citizens.

The article presents an imaginary conversation which concerns the identity problems of the Jews. The conversation shows and demonstrates the ability of the Jews to assimilate and mingle with other people. It illustrates the real-life situations among the Jews and the discriminations and biases that they are experiencing with other nationalities. It also reflects on the distinction of the Jews in terms of ethnicity or group identity, looks, speech, rites and customs, and resemblance with other nations.

The article discusses the history of Jewish culture. Among the topics are the deconstruction of Judaism and the implications of substituting Jewish culture for Judaism. Other issues pertain to the distinction between the terms 'Jew' and 'goy', sexuality in the Jewish culture and the vision of Zionism and Zionist movement. The explanations and confessions of historians on the basis for a Jewish identity in the modern world including the traditions of the Jews and their myths about the past are also discussed.

The article presents a comparative approach to the study of Jewish nationalism. Jewish nationalism takes place with the historical context of Jewish peoplehood which concerns a broad scope of material to be mastered including languages of antiquity, and literature ranging from the Bible to Josephus to the Talmud to Maimonides to the Zohar to Zionism. A comparative approach provides an argument to be made in comparing Jewish nationalism to other forms of nationalism and useful negative checks concerning the Jewish political tradition.

The article discusses about the Jews' responses to German antisemitism. Focus has been given on the Jewish responses to the movement launched by Otto Böckel, Germany's first antisemitic Reichstag deputy. The Böckel movement was part of the imperial German politics' racist ideology that culminated in National Socialism. Jewish responses as a whole characteristically focus on ideological responses, like Zionism. Also, with their small number, more Jews have taken the matter with legal defense.

The article discusses the adaptation of the Jewish community to the changing circumstances in Argentina. While the country is turning into democratization led by President Raul Alfonsin and the Union Civica Radical, the need of the Jewish communities to adapt is necessary for them to survive. It also discusses some behaviors in the past that need new responses to help evolve a good relationship between the Jewish and the Argentine. While, secularism rejects religion and religious considerations, Zionism, which has been the religion of Latin American Jews during the absence of a firm religious impulse, inspires youth groups, prayer fundraising, and publication. Centralism, by which powers of the government is centralized, is also challenged by a turn toward religion.

The article focuses on the factors and the degree of support to the Russian Zionist Movement from 1901 to 1903 including the social, economic and religious factors. Accordingly, the Russian Zionist Movement was the main component of the Zionist Federation for it has the largest membership of the whole Zionist Movement and constitutes a larger contribution than the other parallel movements. However, the movement lacks the needed adequate support due to the social, economic and religious factors that differently recognized various groups in Russian Jewry. In this regard, a quasi-model of the distribution within the country where Zionist Leagues were formed were constructed to know the groups in the Jewish society that supported the movement.

The article discusses the views of David Ben Gurion and Chaim Weizman on the establishment of Palestine as a Jewish Commonwealth. Accordingly, on knowing that the British Mandatory has continued supporting the restrictive immigration quota and did nothing to divide the Jewish to fight Adolf Hilter, Gurion proposed a two-fold program of action. The program called for his associates to support Palestine which includes forming a Jewish army and demanding independence which would bring millions of European Jews to their national homeland after the war. Meanwhile, as a Zionist, Weizman agreed to the plan of Gurion and had persuaded the U.S. government to support the plan to gain funds for postwar activities.

The article discusses the present condition on the literature of modern Jewish identity. It offers a comparison on the different types of literature of modern identity from impressionists who focused on the psychological and social dynamics of an individual as well as the community's understanding of themselves. It also points out different approaches on the study of Jewish identity bearing in mind the history of modern antisemitism and the Holocaust and Zionism. The article also analyzes the reasons of the current state of affairs that is being done on Jewish identity.

The article discusses early Zionism in the U.S. and Canada. It was believed that with regards to Zionism, both countries provided settings for the development of Jewish nationalism in many respects. Zionism was at first more successful in Canada than in the U.S. The reasons for the difference in the development of Zionism in the U.S. are also mentioned in the article. The article also discusses the relationship of the Jewish communities in the two countries, shared aspects of life and the success of Zionism in both countries. It was believed that Zionist movement ranked among the least successful in the world.

The article discusses the social condition of the Jewish communities in India. The Jews have limited acquaintance with their Indian brethren. India is one of the countries in the world where Jews have never been exposed to antisemitism or religious persecution at the hands of their hosts while continuously maintaining their identity. This rare experience can be attributed on the one hand, to the relative tolerance of Hindu society which has a tendency to consider various minority groups almost as sub-castes and to the constraints against intermarriage present in most Indian religious communities which have prevented total assimilation.

The article examines the role of Palestine and Zionism in pre-1948 Jewish education in the U.S. The author discusses the ideological stances toward Palestine and Zionism as reflected in curricula and courses of study. They have also examined the patterns of adjustment of these various curricular stances in order to determine the emergent mainstream theory and practice of teaching Palestine and Israel in the Jewish school. They also mentioned the importance of the analysis of curricula and courses of study of American Jewish schools in the investigation.

The article focuses on the factors contributing to the return of the Jewish philosophy of Maimonideanism. The author discusses the stabilization of the process of secularization which begun with Spinoza, while showing no signs of abating, had evidently stabilized, and it now seems that religion, though battered and crippled, is not doomed. They have also mentioned the changes in the attitudes of contemporary philosophers to the approach of early thinkers. They also provide information about the impact of Zionism on Maimonideanism and the historical background of Maimonides.

The article discusses about German Zionism from 1882 to 1933, embodied by the Zionistische Vereinigung für Deutschland (ZVfD), the most influential branch of the World Zionist Organization (WZO). The offices of WZO were located in Cologne from 1905 to 1911 and in Berlin from 1911 to1920 in Germany, staffed by German Zionists. The support of the WZO makes the ZVfD resist attacks from German Jewish organizations like the Central-Verein deutscher Staatsbürger jüdischen Glaubens. The influence of the ZVfD within the WZO declined during World War I, which waned even further when the official headquarters of WZO was transferred to London, England after the war. Nevertheless, many of its members were still active in international Zionist institutions.

The article presents information related to the journal "Our Hope." The magazine was central element in the fundamentalist movement of the twentieth century. The focus of Arno C. Gaebelein, owner of the magazine, on the Jews and on Zionism itself influenced thousands of Christians in the United States. The magazine was first published in July 1894. Also, the magazine was written in English and intended to acquaint Christians with the importance of the Jews and their place in biblical prophecy.

The article offers information regarding the two conflicting ideologies of Zionism in Missouri. A major confrontation and split within the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) and the American Zionist movement happened. Information regarding the Missouri Jewish community's enthusiasm for the Keren Hayesod (KH) and the fund raising of the World Zionist Organization for the development of a national homeland in Palestine is offered. The activities of the Kansas City Zionist leaders and the comparison between KH and the Palestine Development Corp. of ZOA is featured.

The article focuses on anthropologist Isaac de la Peyrère's attitude toward the Jews. La Peyrère was born in Bordeaux, France in the year 1596. He believed that a new prophet would come and reestablish the Jewish nation in Jerusalem. He wrote the first draft of his interpretation of history and theology during the period 1640 to 1644. This draft was circulated in a manuscript. He anonymously published that part of the manuscript which focused on the future of the Jews. La Peyrère believed that the Jewish people played a major role in the history of mankind.

The article presents the views of sociologist Beatrice Webb about Judaism and Zionism. Webb says that it was correct to provide religious training to Jewish children in schools. She was not surprised by Jewish objections to Christianity. According to Webb, Zionism was a morally, culturally and politically dangerous movement. She objected to the imperialist exploitation of the Jews.

The article examines Jan Christiaan Smuts' attitude towards Zionism. He becomes known in the historical records as the most outstanding "Gentile Zionist" whom the Zionist movement has ever known. His championship of Zionism has been motivated by a Christian-rooted belief in the great historic justice of the Zionist cause. However, he prove that he is not anymore a savior of Jewish refugees fleeing from Nazi antisemitism. Smuts compromises himself severely against the background of popular antisemitic pressure.

The article offers information regarding the Zionist movement in Australia from 1850 to 1948. It discusses the origins of the movement. It describes Australian Zionism as to some degree a microcosm of European Zionism. It offers reasons for the growing population of Jewish immigrants during the period, which also reflect the numerical strength of the Jewish settlers in Australia. Other information related to the relationship between Zionist leaders and members and the Australian government is offered.

The article offers information regarding the different views of Myron C. Taylor and James G. McDonald on Zionism and the Jewish state. It discusses the involvement of Taylor and McDonald in Jewish refugee affairs during the pre-holocaust and holocaust years. Taylor joined the opponents of a Zionist solution when the Jewish refugee problem became smaller. On the other hand, McDonald continued to support the Zionist demands for the abolition of the White Paper, the opening of the doors of Palestine to the Saving Remnant and for the subsequent establishment of a viable Jewish state in Palestine.

The article examines the practice on non-Zionism in Jewish communities in the U.S. in the period from 1917-1941. It was stated that as an alternative to Jewish nationalism on the one hand and assimilation on the other, non-Zionism deserves a better fate. The focus of non-Zionist doctrine was the American Jewish Committee during the interwar period. There was a determined anti-Zionist resistance in the Committee as a result of the Balfour Declaration and the capture of Palestine by Great Britain. The American non- Zionist members of the Administrative Committee of the Jewish Agency have displayed a grave dissatisfaction with the way the Jewish Agency had been run since its inception and insisted that the non-Zionists had never had sufficient power.

The article focuses on the role of the dissidents at the Hebrew Union College in New York City in promoting the cause of Zionism. Theodor Herzl published his Judenstaast in 1896 which provided Herzl's plan for creating a Jewish state arrived at after contemplating other solutions as well as providing the practical program of Zionism. Isaac M. Wise and Moses Mielziner were both categorically opposed to the Zionist ideology and the Balse Program. Caspar Levias, a Semitics scholar trained in America universities and appointed to the college teaching staff in 1895, was a Zionist.

The article examines the Jewish identity of teenage students in Israel. Simon N. Herman, was the initiator of this study, this study will determine the cultural future of country. Herman took a nationwide sample of 16 and 17 year old high-school students, he found out that one distinctive personality be weaker among nonreligious students than among religious ones. The study has explored on the relationship between Jewish identification and attitudes towards emigration. In this study it found out that intergenerational decline in religious being especially pronounced among children of traditional parents.

The article deals with the Balfour Declaration of the British government in 1917, which supported the Zionist plan to create a national home for the Jews in Palestine. Zionists living in England supported the declaration and they embarked on massive campaign to popularize the idea of a British Palestine. But the declaration has coincided with the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks in Russia which raised the concern of the British government that they might conclude a separate peace. The British government was worried that it would nullify the economic blockade of Germany.

The article deals with the German-Zionist relations during the First World War. Documents of the German Ministry for Foreign Affairs prove that the German government was in no position to emulate the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917. However, it was because of Germany's forceful intervention that the danger which involved Palestinian Jews in 1917 was prevented. Had it not been for the singular determination of Alfred Zimmermann, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, nothing would have prevented Djemal Pasha, Commander of the Ottoman Fourth Army, from attacking the Yishuv.