The Crisis Of Zionism

Download or read book The Crisis of Zionism written by Peter Beinart and published by Melbourne Univ. Publishing. This book was released on 2012 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A dramatic shift is taking place in Israel and America. In Israel, the deepening occupation of the West Bank is putting Israeli democracy at risk. In the United States, the refusal of major Jewish organisations to defend democracy in the Jewish state is alienating many young liberal Jews from Zionism itself. In the next generation, the liberal Zionist dream, the dream of a state that safeguards the Jewish people and cherishes democratic ideals, may die. In The Crisis of Zionism, Peter Beinart lays out in chilling detail the looming danger to Israeli democracy and the American Jewish establishment's refusal to confront it. And he offers a fascinating, groundbreaking portrait of the two leaders at the centre of the crisis: Barack Obama, America's first 'Jewish president', a man steeped in the liberalism he learned from his many Jewish friends and mentors in Chicago; and Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister who considers liberalism the Jewish people's special curse. These two men embody fundamentally different visions, not just of American and Israeli national interests, but of the mission of the Jewish people itself. Beinart concludes with provocative proposals for how the relationship between American Jews and Israel must change, and with an eloquent and moving appeal for American Jews to defend the dream of a democratic Jewish state before it is too late.

Download or read book The Fragile Dialogue written by Stanley M. Davids and published by . This book was released on 2017-11-15 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book wrestles with and attempts to frame the very fragile dialogue surrounding Zionism and Israel in the 21st century Progressive Jewish community. Written from a multiplicity of views, the collection explores the many lenses through which this varied community approaches Zionism, not only set apart by political differences but also by geographical diversity, religious divisiveness, socio-economic policies, gender issues, the use and abuse of power, and more. The Fragile Dialogue is a conversation starter, meant to provide the challenging yet vital basis for narrowing the rifts in our dialogue around Zionism today.

Download or read book From Empire to Empire written by Abigail Jacobson and published by Syracuse University Press. This book was released on 2011-08-04 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of Jerusalem as traditionally depicted is the quintessential history of conflict and strife, of ethnic tension, and of incompatible national narratives and visions. It is also a history of dramatic changes and moments, one of the most radical ones being the replacement of the Ottoman regime with British rule in December 1917. From Empire to Empire challenges these two major dichotomies, ethnic and temporal, which shaped the history of Jerusalem and its inhabitants. It links the experiences of two ethnic communities living in Palestine, Jews and Arabs, as well as bridging two historical periods, the Ottoman and British administrations. Drawing upon a variety of sources, Jacobson demonstrates how political and social alliances are dynamic, context-dependent, and purpose-driven. She also highlights the critical role of foreign intervention, governmental and nongovernmental, in forming local political alliances and in shaping the political reality of Palestine during the crisis of World War I and the transition between regimes. From Empire to Empire offers a vital new perspective on the way World War I has been traditionally studied in the Palestinian context. It also examines the effects of war on the socioeconomic sphere of a mixed city in crisis and looks into the ways the war, as well as Ottoman policies and administrators, affected the ways people perceived the Ottoman Empire and their location within it. From Empire to Empire illuminates the complex and delicate relations between ethnic and national groups and offers a different lens through which the history of Jerusalem can be seen: it proposes not only a story of conflict but also of intercommunal contacts and cooperation.

Download or read book My Promised Land written by Ari Shavit and published by Random House. This book was released on 2013-11-19 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW AND ECONOMIST BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR “A deeply reported, deeply personal history of Zionism and Israel that does something few books even attempt: It balances the strength and weakness, the idealism and the brutality, the hope and the horror, that has always been at Zionism’s heart.”—Ezra Klein, The New York Times Winner of the Natan Book Award, the National Jewish Book Award, and the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award Ari Shavit’s riveting work, now updated with new material, draws on historical documents, interviews, and private diaries and letters, as well as his own family’s story, to create a narrative larger than the sum of its parts: both personal and of profound historical dimension. As he examines the complexities and contradictions of the Israeli condition, Shavit asks difficult but important questions: Why did Israel come to be? How did it come to be? Can it survive? Culminating with an analysis of the issues and threats that Israel is facing, My Promised Land uses the defining events of the past to shed new light on the present. Shavit’s analysis of Israeli history provides a landmark portrait of a small, vibrant country living on the edge, whose identity and presence play a crucial role in today’s global political landscape.

Download or read book Einstein on Israel and Zionism written by Fred Jerome and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2009-05-26 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Albert Einstein thought and wrote extensively not just on the most difficult problems in physics, but also in politics. For the first time, this book collects his essays, interviews, and letters on the Middle East, Zionism, and Arab-Jewish relations. Many of these have never been published in English, and all of them contradict the popular image of Einstein as pro-Zionist. He was offered and refused the Presidency of Israel, but had he taken it, he may have said things the Zionists didn't want to hear; he favored a non-religious state that would welcome Jew and Palestinian alike. One person's letters, even Einstein's, cannot resolve the crisis in the Middle East, but decades later, when horrors of the conflict in the Middle East are familiar to everyone, the reflections of one of the twentieth century's greatest thinkers are a signpost, showing his commitment to social justice, understanding, and friendship between Jew and Arab.

Download or read book Parting Ways written by Judith Butler and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2012-07-24 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Judith Butler follows Edward Said's late suggestion that through a consideration of Palestinian dispossession in relation to Jewish diasporic traditions a new ethos can be forged for a one-state solution. Butler engages Jewish philosophical positions to articulate a critique of political Zionism and its practices of illegitimate state violence, nationalism, and state-sponsored racism. At the same time, she moves beyond communitarian frameworks, including Jewish ones, that fail to arrive at a radical democratic notion of political cohabitation. Butler engages thinkers such as Edward Said, Emmanuel Levinas, Hannah Arendt, Primo Levi, Martin Buber, Walter Benjamin, and Mahmoud Darwish as she articulates a new political ethic. In her view, it is as important to dispute Israel's claim to represent the Jewish people as it is to show that a narrowly Jewish framework cannot suffice as a basis for an ultimate critique of Zionism. She promotes an ethical position in which the obligations of cohabitation do not derive from cultural sameness but from the unchosen character of social plurality. Recovering the arguments of Jewish thinkers who offered criticisms of Zionism or whose work could be used for such a purpose, Butler disputes the specific charge of anti-Semitic self-hatred often leveled against Jewish critiques of Israel. Her political ethic relies on a vision of cohabitation that thinks anew about binationalism and exposes the limits of a communitarian framework to overcome the colonial legacy of Zionism. Her own engagements with Edward Said and Mahmoud Darwish form an important point of departure and conclusion for her engagement with some key forms of thought derived in part from Jewish resources, but always in relation to the non-Jew. Butler considers the rights of the dispossessed, the necessity of plural cohabitation, and the dangers of arbitrary state violence, showing how they can be extended to a critique of Zionism, even when that is not their explicit aim. She revisits and affirms Edward Said's late proposals for a one-state solution within the ethos of binationalism. Butler's startling suggestion: Jewish ethics not only demand a critique of Zionism, but must transcend its exclusive Jewishness in order to realize the ethical and political ideals of living together in radical democracy.

Download or read book The Founding Fathers of Zionism written by Benzion Netanyahu and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Before the state of Israel became a reality in 1948, a group of thinkers advanced the idea; five of these men would become icons of the Zionist movement, and today, renowned history professor Benzion Netanyahu (himself a significant figure) has profiled The Founding Fathers of Zionism.