90 results for "History"

Beyond chutzpah: on the misuse of anti-semitism and the abuse of history

Finkelstein, Norman G.
In this long-awaited sequel to his international bestseller The Holocaust Industry, Norman G. Finkelstein moves from an iconoclastic interrogation of the new anti-Semitism to a meticulously researched exposé of the corruption of scholarship on the Israel-Palestine conflict. Bringing to bear the latest findings on the conflict and recasting the scholarly debate, Finkelstein points to a consensus among historians and human rights organizations on the factual record. Why, then, does so much controversy swirl around the conflict? Finkelstein’s answer, copiously documented, is that apologists for Israel contrive controversy. Whenever Israel comes under international pressure, another media campaign alleging a global outbreak of anti-Semitism is mounted. Finkelstein also scrutinizes the proliferation of distortion masquerading as history. Recalling Joan Peters’ book From Time Immemorial, published to great fanfare in 1984 but subsequently exposed as an academic hoax, he asks deeply troubling questions here about the periodic reappearance of spurious scholarship and the uncritical acclaim it receives. The most recent addition to this genre, Finkelstein argues, is Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz’s bestseller, The Case for Israel. The core analysis of Beyond Chutzpah sets Dershowitz’s assertions on Israel’s human rights record against the findings of the mainstream human rights community. Sifting through thousands of pages of reports from organizations such as Amnesty International, B’Tselem, and Human Rights Watch, Finkelstein argues that Dershowitz has misrepresented the facts. Thoroughly researched and tightly argued, Beyond Chutzpah lifts the veil of controversy shrouding the Israel-Palestine conflict.
University of California Press 2005-08-28 332 pages

Theodor Herzl: Excerpts from His Diaries

Herzl, Theodor
""Theodor Herzl: Excerpts From His Diaries"" is a collection of personal writings by the founder of modern political Zionism, Theodor Herzl. The book offers an intimate look into Herzl's thoughts, experiences, and struggles as he worked tirelessly to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine. The diary entries span from 1895 to 1904, covering the period leading up to and following the publication of Herzl's seminal work, ""The Jewish State."" Readers will gain insight into Herzl's personal relationships, his political maneuvering, and his unwavering commitment to the Zionist cause. The book also includes an introduction by the editor, providing historical context and background information on Herzl's life and work. Overall, ""Theodor Herzl: Excerpts From His Diaries"" offers a unique and valuable perspective on one of the most important figures in modern Jewish history.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.
Kessinger Publishing, LLC 2006-07-25 148 pages

The Zionist ideas: visions for the Jewish homeland--then, now, tomorrow

Gil Troy
"The most comprehensive Zionist collection ever published, The Zionist Ideas: Visions for the Jewish Homeland --Then, Now, Tomorrow builds on Arthur Hertzberg's classic The Zionist Idea, showcasing more than 170 visionaries and shedding light on the surprisingly diverse and shared visions for realizing Israel as a democratic Jewish state"--
University of Nebraska Press 2018-04-01 538 pages

Zionism: the birth and transformation of an ideal

Viorst, Milton
"From serving as the Middle East correspondent for The New Yorker to penning articles for the New York Times, Milton Viorst has dedicated his career to studying the Middle East. Now, in this new book, Viorst examines the evolution of Zionism, from its roots by serving as a cultural refuge for Europe's Jews, to the cover it provides today for Israel's exercise of control over millions of Arabs in occupied territories. Beginning with the shattering of the traditional Jewish society during the Enlightenment, Viorst covers the recent history of the Jews, from the spread of Jewish Emancipation during the French Revolution Era to the rise of the exclusionary anti-Semitism that overwhelmed Europe in the late nineteenth century. Viorst examines how Zionism was born and follows its development through the lives and ideas of its dominant leaders, who all held only one tenet in common: that Jews, for the first time in two millennia, must determine their own destiny to save themselves. But, in regards to creating a Jewish state with a military that dominates the region, Viorst argues that Israel has squandered the goodwill it enjoyed at its founding, and thus the country has put its own future on very uncertain footing. With the expertise and knowledge garnered from decades of studying this contentious region, Milton Viorst deftly exposes the risks that Israel faces today. "--
Thomas Dunne Books/ St. Martin's Press 2016-07-19 318 pages

Jabotinsky: a life

Halkin, Hillel
Vladimir Jabotinsky (1880-1940) was a man of huge paradoxes and contradictions and has been the most misunderstood of all Zionist politicians--a first-rate novelist, a celebrated Russian journalist, and the founder of the branch of Zionism now headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. This biography, the first in English in nearly two decades, undertakes to answer central questions about Jabotinsky as a writer, a political thinker, and a leader. Hillel Halkin sets aside the stereotypes to which Jabotinsky has been reduced by his would-be followers and detractors alike. Halkin explains the importance of Odessa, Jabotinsky's native city, in molding his character and outlook; discusses his novels and short stories, showing the sometimes hidden connections between them and Jabotinsky's political thought, and studies a political career that ended in tragic failure. Halkin also addresses Jabotinsky's position, unique among the great figures of Zionist history, as both a territorial maximalist and a principled believer in democracy. The author inquires why Jabotinsky was often accused of fascist tendencies though he abhorred authoritarian and totalitarian politics, and investigates the many opposed aspects of his personality and conduct while asking whether or not they had an ultimate coherence. Few figures in twentieth-century Jewish life were quite so admired and loathed, and Halkin's splendid, subtle book explores him with empathy and lucidity
Yale University Press 2014-05-27 246 pages

The idea of Israel: a history of power and knowledge

Pappé, Ilan
"Since its foundation in 1948, Israel has drawn on Zionism, the movement behind its creation, to provide a sense of self and political direction. In this groundbreaking new work, Ilan Pappe looks at the continued role of Zionist ideology. The Idea of Israel considers the way Zionism operates outside of the government and military in areas such as the country’s education system, media, and cinema, and the uses that are made of the Holocaust in supporting the state’s ideological structure.
Verso 2014 346 pages

Genesis: Truman, American Jews, and the origins of the Arab/Israeli conflict

Judis, John B.
"A probing look at one of the most incendiary subjects of our time--the relationship between the United States and Israel. There has been more than half a century of raging conflict between Jews and Arabs--a violent, costly struggle that has had catastrophic repercussions in a critical region of the world. In Genesis, John B. Judis argues that, while Israelis and Palestinians must shoulder much of the blame, the United States has been the principal power outside the region since the end of World War II and as such must account for its repeated failed efforts to resolve this enduring strife. The fatal flaw in American policy, Judis shows, can be traced back to the Truman years. What happened between 1945 and 1949 sealed the fate of the Middle East for the remainder of the century. As a result, understanding that period holds the key to explaining almost everything that follows--right down to George W. Bush's unsuccessful and ill-conceived effort to win peace through holding elections among the Palestinians, and Barack Obama's failed attempt to bring both parties to the negotiating table. A provocative narrative history animated by a strong analytical and moral perspective, and peopled by colorful and outsized personalities, Genesis offers a fresh look at these critical postwar years, arguing that if we can understand how this stalemate originated, we will be better positioned to help end it"--
Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2014 432 pages

Zionism and the Palestinians

Flapan, Simha
This book is a study of the roots of present day Israeli policy towards the Arabs. The point of departure is that Israeli olitical thinking was moulded during the pre-state period and in its crystallisation made a ritual of several basic concepts: gradual build-up of an economic and military potential as the basis for achievement of political aims: alliance with a great power external to the Middle East: noon-recognition of the existence of a Palestine national entity: Zionism's civilising mission in an undeveloped area: economic, social and cultural regregation as prerequisited for the renaissance of Jewish national life; the concept of 'peace for strength'. Part one of the bood describes the attitudes of the Zionist leaders in the pre-state period of 1917-48 towards the Arab national movement in general and towards the Palestinian Arabs in particular. Part two deals with the application of these attitudes in a number of critical situations which constituted turning points in Jewish-Arab relations: the Arab Revolt and the Zionist struggle for partition in 1936-8; the "White Paper' policy 1939-45 and the 1948 war in Palestine.
Croom Helm [etc.] 1979 361 pages

The other side of the wall: three novellas

Shaham, Nathan
"Israeli writer Shaham explores the beams and pilings of a special mode of Zionist life--that of the kibbutz--and, especially in the first and third novellas here, lays out the psychologies of some of the pioneers with almost case-file (if undramatic) precision. In "S/S Cairo City," a delegate to a 1939 Geneva Zionist convention writes a series of letters to a lover, another delegate, who has left (disastrously) to return to Poland. As Hitler throws shadows which many of the Zionists are not yet ready to accept, they are nevertheless grateful to jam aboard a Palestine-bound Egyptian ship out of Marseilles; on the ship, Shaham probes the skepticisms of men-ideologues being turned into plain victims by what they're fleeing. ("Kuperberg spoke about the congress. He was not at all impressed with certain speeches that I found deeply moving. He said Zionism tends to be like manna. It gives the Western Jew a taste of Yiddishkeit, while to the Eastern Jew it holds forth a promise of Europe.") The last novella--"The Salt of the Earth"--is about an old kibbutznik's first trip to America--and seems like an ironic variation on the opening story; New York literally kills, the old man, hostile to every vision of social life for which he's striven back at home (and knows he's losing there, too). And the central, title novella is where Shaham shows his hand at deeper narrative: a bookish young kibbutz woman becomes erotic guardian over her married neighbor's clandestine love life--as the situation of universal daily sharing builds up such an edifice of public virtue that private weakness becomes downfall, destruction. Like Amos Oz, whose subject matter is similar, Shaham is delicate, historical, unillusioned, undogmatic; Oz's poetry is lacking here, but Shaham may have the edge in social perspicacity."-- Kirkus
Jewish Publication Society of America 1983 281 pages

Moynihan's moment: America's fight against Zionism as racism

Troy, Gil
On November 10, 1975, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution declaring Zionism a form of racism. The move shocked millions, especially in the United States-- the country largely responsible for founding the UN. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the American Ambassador to the UN, denounced this attack on Israel as an anti-Semitic assault on democracy and stood up to the Soviet-backed alliance of Communist dictatorships and Third World autocracies that supported the resolution. His eloquent stand brought him celebrity in the U.S., but ultimately shortened his tenure at the UN by alienating American allies, adversaries, and much of the foreign policy establishment--including Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Nevertheless, Moynihan's moment was a turning point: a harbinger of a shift in American culture and politics that would culminate in the Reagan Revolution. Moynihan paved the way for a more muscular, idealistic, neoconservative foreign policy and for a new style of defiant "cowboy" diplomacy. In this book, Gil Troy argues that America's idea of itself--still torn, in the mid-'70s, between post-Vietnam and -Watergate defeatism and a growing sense of optimism--changed with Moynihan, altering both the left and the right in ways that continue to play out in the 21st century. Much of the rhetoric of this era survives in domestic foreign policy debates and the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, suggesting that Moynihan's struggle has much to reveal about American politics and its position on the world stage--Publisher's summary.
Oxford University Press 2013 357 pages

Israel on the brink: eight steps for a better future

Pappé, Ilan
"In this timely book, historian Ilan Pappé argues that with the 2022 election of the most right-wing government in Israel's history, the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, and the subsequent Israeli war on Gaza, political fractures inherent in the Jewish state have expanded dangerously - and will potentially lead to Israel's collapse. With the goal of working towards a transition that is as peaceful as possible, Pappé sets out his thoughts about the risks and opportunities emerging from this historical moment. Eight "mini-revolutions," he argues, will be necessary for this more hopeful future to emerge, including: Relocating the Right of Return of the Palestinian refugees to the center of the future vision; Establishing a new definition for the Jewish collective in historical Palestine; Finalizing a plan for the future of the Jewish settlements built in the West Bank since 1967; and Creating a new strategy for a united Palestinian national movement. Pappé concretely envisions a more just future - a democratic decolonized state for both Palestinians and Israelis - and how we might get there" -- publisher's description.
Oneworld 2025-09-18 288 pages

The Jews of Vienna in the age of Franz Joseph

Wistrich, Robert S.
Analyzes the communal organization, political affiliations, and cultural contributions of Vienna's Jews from 1848 to World War I. After 1848, Jewish emancipation became an issue in party politics. Jews identified with the Austrian Liberal Party, with the Emperor and Germanism, in all of which they saw safeguards of Jewish emancipation. Analyzes the antisemitism of Schönerer's Pan-German Party, which found many adherents at the University of Vienna, and of Lueger's Christian Social Party. Describes the cautious reactions of Jewish officials, who supported the Liberal Party even in defeat and in the face of that party's desertion of the Jewish cause; the more nationalist faction led by Rabbi Joseph Samuel Bloch, a member of the Austrian parliament from 1884-95 and a militant fighter against antisemitism; and the Austrian Israelite Union set up in 1886 to encourage pride in Jewish identity and combat antisemitism. Surveys the role of antisemitism in the rise of Zionism. Suggests that the surge of antisemitism in Vienna, rather than the Dreyfus case, was responsible for Herzl's concern with the "Jewish question". Analyzes the Jewish self-hatred of Karl Kraus and Otto Weininger, and the role of Jewish identity and antisemitism in the life and work of Freud, Schnitzler, and other Austrian Jewish writers.
Published for the Littman Library by Oxford University Press 1989-01 696 pages

Re-inventing the Jewish past: European Jewish intellectuals and the Zionist return to history

Myers, David N.
David Myers' book explores a fascinating and untold chapter in modern Jewish intellectual history: the role of the first generation of Jewish scholars at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem in establishing Jewish studies within framework of a jewish national university. committed to rewriting jewsh history according to zionst standarts, these "jerusalem scholars" richly reflect the tensions that attended their dual allegiances, to both zionism and the discipline of history
Oxford University Press 1995-11-30 278 pages

51 documents: Zionist collaboration with the Nazis

Lenni Brenner
With the Nazi era being one of the most discussed periods in history, there are still many people who are unaware of collaboration between Zionism and the fascist regimes of Hitler and Mussolini. Now in paperback and featuring an updated article on the Iron Wall' by Vladimir Jabotinsky, 51 Documents brings to light the immense disservice the Zionists did to many other Jews during this period.'
Barricade 2009 342 pages

Chaim Weizmann

Reinharz, Jehuda
In the pantheon of modern Jewish leaders, Chaim Weizmann is a giant. One of the founding fathers of the State of Israel and its first president, he was also a president of the World Zionist Organization, and an eminent chemist, for whom Israel's renowned Weizmann Institute of Science was named. Yet, until now, there has never been an authoritative biography of Weizmann that removed the layers of myth obscuring our image of the man. Both a personal portrait of a fascinating man and a far-reaching history of the Jews in the modern world, this book, written by one of America's leading authorities on Jewish history, delves into the factors that shaped Weizmann's personality and worldview. Though the book focuses on the making of Weizmann as a Zionist leader, it also lays the foundations for understanding his extraordinary achievements as a scientist. This volume, the first of two that will cover his entire career, ends when, at the age of 40, Weizmann is thrust onto the center stage of world politics as a major negotiator for the Balfour Declaration.
Oxford University Press 1985 566 pages

Zionism: an emotional state

Penslar, Derek Jonathan
"Emotion lies at the heart of all national movements, and Zionism is no exception. For those who identify as a Zionist, the word connotates liberation and redemption, uniqueness and vulnerability. Yet for many, Zionism is a source of distaste if not disgust, and those who reject it are no less passionate than those who embrace it. The power of such emotions helps explain why a word originally associated with territorial aspiration has survived for so many years after the establishment of the Israeli State. Zionism: An Emotional State expertly demonstrates how the energy propelling the Zionist project originates from bundles of feelings whose elements have varied in volume, intensity, and durability across space and time. Beginning with an original typology of Zionism and a new take on its relationship to colonialism, Penslar then examines the emotions that have shaped Zionist sensibilities and practices over the course of the movement's history. The resulting portrait of Zionism reconfigures how we understand Jewish Identity amidst continuing debates on the role of nationalism in the modern world"--
Rutgers University Press 2023 321 pages

The founding myths of Israel: nationalism, socialism, and the making of the Jewish state

Sternhell, Zeev
The well-known historian and political scientist Zeev Sternhell here advances a radically new interpretation of the founding of modern Israel. The founders claimed that they intended to create both a landed state for the Jewish people and a socialist society. However, according to Sternhell, socialism served the leaders of the influential labor movement more as a rhetorical resource for the legitimation of the national project of establishing a Jewish state than as a blueprint for a just society. In this thought-provoking book, Sternhell demonstrates how socialist principles were consistently subverted in practice by the nationalist goals to which socialist Zionism was committed.Sternhell explains how the avowedly socialist leaders of the dominant labor party, Mapai, especially David Ben Gurion and Berl Katznelson, never really believed in the prospects of realizing the "dream" of a new society, even though many of their working-class supporters were self-identified socialists. The founders of the state understood, from the very beginning, that not only socialism but also other universalistic ideologies like liberalism, were incompatible with cultural, historical, and territorial nationalism. Because nationalism took precedence over universal values, argues Sternhell, Israel has not evolved a constitution or a Bill of Rights, has not moved to separate state and religion, has failed to develop a liberal concept of citizenship, and, until the Oslo accords of 1993, did not recognize the rights of the Palestinians to independence.This is a controversial and timely book, which not only provides useful historical background to Israel's ongoing struggle to mobilize its citizenry to support a shared vision of nationhood, but also raises a question of general significance: is a national movement whose aim is a political and cultural revolution capable of coexisting with the universal values of secularism, individualism, and social justice? This bold critical reevaluation will unsettle long-standing myths as it contributes to a fresh new historiography of Zionism and Israel. At the same time, while it examines the past, The 'Founding Myths of Israel' reflects profoundly on the future of the Jewish State.
Princeton University Press 1998-01 419 pages

Herzl: Theodor Herzl and the foundation of the Jewish State

Avineri, Shlomo
Theodor Herzl was born in 1860 in Budapest. He developed a successful career in journalism. As the Paris correspondent for Neue Freie Presse, Herzl followed the Dreyfus Affair, a notorious anti-Semitic incident in France in which a French Jewish army captain was falsely convicted of spying for Germany. Herzl came to reject his early ideas regarding Jewish emancipation and assimilation, and to believe that the Jews must remove themselves from Europe and create their own state. In 1896, he published 'Der Judenstaat' to immediate acclaim, attracting international attention. As a result, he met Kaiser Wilhelm II on several occasions, once in Jerusalem, attempted and failed to obtain support for a Jewish homeland from Pope Pius X, secured an offer from the British government to facilitate a large Jewish settlement in East Africa, and visited St Petersburg to confront the Russian threat to the Zionist movement. Herzl died suddenly in 1904, over 40 years before the creation of a Jewish state in Israel.
Phoenix 2014 274 pages