REMEMBERING AND REBUILDING: THE WORLD JEWISH CONGRESS,IN THE SHADOW OF THE HOLOCAUST

In this essay I expand on the role of the World Jewish Congress (WJC) in the 1940s and 1950s. Its mode of operation during the two decades that followed World War II was markedly different from those that characterized other sections of American Jewry. What set the WJC apart from other Jewish organizations was that its leaders sought not merely to institutionalize the relationship between Israel and American Jewry, but involved themselves in the Jewish world as a whole and in Europe in particular, where they vigorously worked to rehabilitate the post-Holocaust Jewish diaspora and to assist those survivors who wished to do so to reintegrate themselves into Europe.     

THE FINAL CHAPTER IN THE STRUGGLE FOR CULTURAL AUTONOMY

This article describes the efforts made by Yiddishist intellectuals to rehabilitate Yiddish culture after the Second World War and turn it into an organising element of the ethnic identity of diaspora Jewry—especially in America. The article investigates the efforts to establish a world organisation for Yiddish culture and make Yiddish the lingua franca of diaspora Jewry. In addition, it traces the renewed discussion in Yiddish journals in America, especially Di tsukunft, on the status of Yiddish worldwide as the language of the Jewish people, focusing on the rising status of Palestine and the establishment of the State of Israel as a central component of this discussion. The emphasis here will be on the importance that this debate attributed to the status of Yiddish in Israel.     

The New Anti-Semitism in Europe: The Islamic Dimension of,and Jewish Belonging in,the EU

This article examines the sense of Jewish vulnerability and exclusion in Europe that has resulted from manifestations, and Jewish perceptions, of the “new anti-Semitism,” and the role of Islamic communities in Europe in propagating this form of hatred of Jews. First emerging in 2000 with the outbreak of the second Palestinian Intifada, and tied in with the Middle East conflict, anger at Israel is directed at Diaspora Jewish communities. This “new anti-Semitism” targets the Jewish collective with the characteristics of anti-Semitism previously aimed at individual Jews. The article focuses on the wave of anti-Semitism that erupted as a result of the 2014 Israeli–Hamas War. Based on an analysis of European Jewish communities, it considers the active part played by European Muslim communities in perpetrating the new anti-Semitism. Using an analysis of survey data, emigration statistics and newspaper opinion articles by leading European Jewish intellectuals, the article considers how the new anti-Semitism is adversely affecting Jewish–Muslim relations and the concomitant sense of “belonging” of European Jewry. The article considers what is required to overcome the new anti-Semitism propagated by Muslim communities to restore a greater sense of Jewish belonging to, and identification with, Europe.     

Beyond keeping active: concomitants of being a volunteer in old-old age

This study examines concomitants of volunteering in the context of other lifestyle activities. Investigating formal volunteering in old-old age, the authors analyzed data of 148 volunteers versus 1,195 nonvolunteers in a national sample of the Israeli Jewish population aged 75-94. As hypothesized, being a volunteer related (whether as a cause or effect) to more positive functioning on psychosocial markers and prospectively resulted in reduced mortality risk even when other activity outlets (physical activity, everyday activities, having a hobby) were controlled. These findings suggest that the benefits of volunteering in late life are not reducible to those of other activities.     

Is there still a “Jerusalem School?” Reflections on the state of Jewish historical scholarship in Israel

This essay examines the study of Jewish history in Israel at the juncture of two currents: the ongoing expansion of an international community of Jewish studies scholars and the waning interest in the field in Israel itself. Mindful of the latter trend, it is easy to adopt a declensionist narrative, according to which the “Jerusalem School,” with its monolithic and Palestinocentric view of the past, has run its course. And yet, that framing occludes a number of novel tendencies in Israel, arising in the present “post-post-Zionist” moment, that expand the contours of Jewish historical scholarship in productive ways. They include: the well-known and controversial work of the “New Historians;” the work of a succeeding generation of scholars who have brought new intellectual and methodological openness to the study of Zionism; the work of Israeli scholars who have introduced a new measure of reflexivity through careful examination of the history of Jewish historiography; and the work of Israeli scholars who have eschewed the once-regnant view of an “immanent causality” in Jewish history. In conclusion, the article suggests that kernels of these trends were present in the founding generation of scholars at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, though the current generation of scholars is both more critical toward the Zionist nationalist narrative and more global in its orientation.     

GAY MARTYRS,JEWISH SAINTS AND INFATUATED YESHIVA BOYS IN THE NEW ISRAELI RELIGIOUS QUEER CINEMA

Popular mainstream cinema often sensationalizes, stigmatizes, and even ridicules religions, faiths, congregations, and the religiously observant. The (mis)representation of religious communities is sometimes even more negative in films that centre on religious gay men, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people, and their presumably homophobic congregations. This article offers an initial exploration of a new kind of Israeli film at the beginning of the third millennium, defined here as the New Israeli Religious Queer Cinema. These films, mostly created by religious filmmakers who are members of sexual minorities, are intended to promote tolerance and greater acceptance of homosexuality by the Jewish Orthodox communities in Israel. This research, particularly focused on Chaim Elbaum's acclaimed short film And Thou Shalt Love (2008) [Ve'ahavta], examines the cinematic attempts to reduce hostility towards sexual minorities among religious believers, and problematizes the portrayal of the young protagonist's angst and this new cinema's politics of martyrdom and victimhood. The article also analyses the creation of a sort of Jewish version of Saint Sebastian, the ancient Christian martyr who is often perceived as a gay icon, and this new cinema's genuine attempts to explore homoerotic subtleties in Jewish tradition.     

Tel Aviv Mizrah

Before immigrating to Israel, first-generation Iraqi Jews were deeply attached to their identity as Mizrahi Jews. Their mother tongue was Arabic and they had grown up in an oriental environment. Therefore, it was not easy for them to adopt the Euro-Israeli identity that the dominant Ashkenazi-European stratum in Israel compelled them to accept. Despite strong Westernizing tendencies in Israeli society, the first generation of Iraqi Jewish immigrants maintained strong links to the Iraqi customs and traditions they had acquired in Iraq, particularly with regard to the musical folklore and oriental cuisine. On the other hand, second-generation Iraqi Jews were more familiar with Israeli society than their parents; they grew up in Israel and learned Hebrew in Israeli schools along with Ashkenazi Jews and other ethnic groups. This paper establishes connections between the historical realities of Iraqi Jewish immigrants and the literary representation of their world in the trilogy Tel-Aviv Mizrah (Tel Aviv East) written in 2003 by the Iraqi Jewish author Shimon Ballas, through a comparison of Ballas's literary vision with the historical realities of Iraqi Jewish identity in Israel over the course of two generations.     

THE SECULAR HERO

This article examines the ideas of a number of leading Israeli intellectuals on basic questions of secularism and the link between secular Jews and their Jewish heritage. The secular Jews at the focus of the intellectuals’ thinking are individualists, men and women of outstanding personality and aptitude. Most of the article discusses their trend towards individualism (which is often only implied). The last part of the article tries to classify the reasons for that trend—some of which are rooted in the political tension inherent in questions of identity and tradition in Israeli society, and others that are the apolitical legacy of spiritual Zionism.     

The Montreal Jewish Community and the Holocaust

In 1933 Hitler and the Nazi party came to power in Germany. At the same time, in Canada in general and in Montreal in particular, anti-Semitism was becoming more widespread. The Canadian Jewish Congress, as a result of the growing tension in Europe and the increase in anti-Semitism at home, was reborn in 1934 and became the authoritative voice of Canadian Jewry. During World War II the Nazis embarked on a campaign that resulted in the systematic extermination of millions of Jews. This article focuses on the Montreal Jewish community, its leadership, and their response to the fate of European Jewry. The study pays particular attention to the Canadian Jewish Congress which influenced the outlook of the community and its subsequent actions. As the war progressed, loyalty to Canada and support for the war effort became the overriding issues for the community and the leadership and concern for their European brethren faded into the background.     

THE JEWISH LEGIONS IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR AS A LOCUS OF IDENTITY FORMATION

Based on life‐writing material, this article sheds light on the process by which the Jewish Legions in the British Army in the First World War, composed in large part of Jewish volunteers from Canada and the United States, contributed to the development among its legionnaires of a sense of belonging to their respective North American countries. The notion that formerly displaced immigrants were fighting for the Promised Land, and the consistency of this notion with the overall aims of the allies in the First World War, promoted the development of a unique identity as Jewish “citizen‐soldiers”.     

THE AUSTERITY POLICY AND THE RULE OF LAW: RELATIONS BETWEEN GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC IN FLEDGLING ISRAEL 1

This article examines the concept of the rule of law as perceived by the Israeli public and decision‐makers during Israel’s early years. The purpose of the article is to examine the relationship between policy‐makers and the general public in the early stages of Israeli statehood. The “rule of law” is employed to facilitate greater understanding of the weaknesses or even failures of the austerity policy and to unveil some of the mechanisms leading to public disobedience, during times of nation‐building fervour. The roles of the public, policy‐makers, law enforcement apparatus and adjudicators in shaping the social order and economic reality is addressed.     

After the Shoah: Continuity and change in the postwar Jewish community of the Netherlands

The Dutch Jewish community is part of Western European Jewry and as such is part of what Bernard Wasserstein describes as the vanishing Diaspora. The community is one of Europe's smallest and it was also the Western European Jewish community most heavily damaged by the Shoah; it lost 75% of its population. It is surprising that the community still exists. It has gone through many changes, most notably in the 1960s. Progressive Judaism and the Lubavitcher Habad movement have made considerable inroads in the religious community, but the population has become largely secular, and new secular Jewish networks have been established. Dutch Jews have redefined their identity, shifting from “Dutchmen of the Israelite religion” to “Jews” or “people with a Jewish background,” belonging to a social and cultural minority. A small population exchange has taken place between Israel and the Netherlands. The brief baby boom after the Shoah and the newly formed networks outside the religious framework have revitalized the community. But most Jews in the Netherlands are married to non-Jews, and in spite of unique efforts to integrate the Israelis into the community, the future seems uncertain. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

FORCES OF TOMORROW

This article examines the social experience of belonging to the British section of the international Socialist Zionist youth movement, Hashomer Hatzair. The study is based on interviews conducted with 10 former activists across four generations and focuses primarily on the movement in London. It will be argued that Hashomer Hatzair represented a unique alternative youth culture based on a model developed by the movement's founders in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This model synthesized Robert Baden-Powell's Scouting, the Jugendkultur of the German youth movements, Socialist Zionism and Marxism. Imported to Britain by young German and Austrian refugees from Nazism, this youth culture was reproduced initially in the English countryside, and after the war plugged into the pre-existing politics of Jewish radicalism in London and the general Zionist fervour that anticipated the establishment of Israel. Hashomer Hatzair emphasized autonomy from adult society. By creating autonomous youth spaces, the movement opened a portal for young Jews to shape their own identities. Through a process of politicization and education, the movement's adherents would identify life on Israeli kibbutzim as an ideal future in adulthood. In tandem with the projection of heroic Jewish role models, this process encouraged Hashomer Hatzair's followers to define their Jewishness in secular and existential terms, in opposition both to contemporary consumerist and urbanized capitalism, and to the traditional communal associations of the past.     

“Two Jews walk into a Coffeehouse”: the “Jewish question,” utility, and political participation in late eighteenth-century Livorno

This article examines the distinct ways in which the Jewish condition was perceived during the Enlightenment in the port city of Livorno, arguing that the privileged status of certain mercantile Jewish communities could be a force for conservatism and not necessarily a trigger of emancipation. On the basis of literary and governmental sources, including the little-known ironic philosophical dialogue Les Juifs (Livorno, 1786), and an analysis of Tuscan municipal reforms, it appears that Livorno offers an alternative model of integration to the better-known Prussian and French cases. The Tuscan government and intellectual elite did not consider the useful Livornese minority in need either “to be improved” or better “integrated into society,” and thus the Enlightenment critiques of Jewish society typical of French and Prussian reformers and the calls for Jewish self-improvement that characterized the Haskalah are not applicable to Livorno. However, the notion of utility that defined the Livornese community during the Old Regime was not a station on the road to emancipation. Jewish utility in Livorno did not bring about greater civil rights for individual Livornese Jews. Rather in both function and perception, it contributed to the arrested political integration of Livornese Jewry in the 1780s compared to events in all other Tuscan Jewish communities     

DAVID BEN-GURION'S TELEOLOGICAL WESTERNISM

Until 1948, the westernism of the Jewish society in the Land of Israel was apparent and taken for granted, as the vast majority of Zionist immigrants who came to Palestine were of European origin, and they built a western society in the Middle East, socially, politically, culturally and economically. Only after the 1948 War and the immigration of hundreds of thousands of Jews from all over the Middle East and North Africa was Israel's westernism no longer obvious. And indeed, with the arrival of these immigrants from Muslim states, the Israeli government initiated a national-scale endeavour to acculturate the new arrivals to the norms and values of their new home. Scholars suggest various reasons for these actions of the Israeli government, but this article will pay special attention to David Ben Gurion's westernism. Israel's first Prime Minister attributed high importance to the maintenance of Israel's western and modern nature, and he did so not only with the intention of acculturating the newcomers. Based on his profound fear about the ability of the Jewish state to survive in the Middle East, Ben Gurion regarded Westernism and modernism as vital to its survival.     

Masculinity and Self‐Esteem in Israeli Jewish Professional Women 1

The literature suggests that while women experience unique challenges with self‐esteem and self‐acceptance, Jewish professional women in Israel face additional challenges in balancing majority culture values, ethnic traditions, and the socio‐historical‐political context of the country. The present study investigated differences in masculinity, femininity, locus of control, self‐esteem, and self‐acceptance among Israeli Jewish and other professional women, including professional women scientists. Masculinity scores were significantly lower for Israeli Jewish women, and self‐acceptance scores were significantly lower for Israeli Jewish women than for the group of professional women.     

THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BRITAIN

This article explores the theme of a purported lack of seriousness or superficiality in Anglo‐Jewish historiography. It begins with an analysis of the role this idea played as a catalyst for the first generation of organised or professionalising Anglo‐Jewish historians. It argues that the idea of “success”—whether economic, political or social—has been a thorn in the side of British Jewish historians since the late nineteenth century, and that the conceptualisation of Anglo‐Jewish history has been to a large degree a response to an ambivalence about Anglo‐Jewish “success”. After a consideration of early Anglo‐Jewish historians, the article turns to the work of contemporary historians of Anglo‐Jewry, and explores how this anxiety over success and seriousness has remained a spur, in both senses of the term: “Success” continues to be both an irritant and a catalyst for re‐interpretation.     

Sailing Through Troubled Waters: Palestinian Christians in the Holy Land

For many people the names "Arab Christians" and "Palestinian Christians" seem to be oxymoronic. Christianity was, however, born in the Middle East, in a little town called Bethlehem. This article explores the ways in which Palestinian Christians, a minority group in both Palestine and Israel, relate to both Jews and Muslims in Palestine and Israel. Though there is no covert persecution of Palestinian Christians, they face the same trials as other Arabs and Muslims in Palestine, due to the current policies and actions of the Israeli government and to the current "war on terrorism." In fact, Christians in Palestine become easy targets for both those enraged by and supportive of the US declaration of war. At the same time, they offer the world an example of healthy Christian–Muslim relations. Perhaps too, Palestinian Christians can be the bridge between the Jewish and Muslim communities in the Holy Land.