New book: Khattab et al, Socioeconomic Inequality in Israel

Khattab, Nabil, Sami Miaari, and Haya Stier, eds. Socioeconomic Inequality in Israel. A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.

 

 

This volume addresses different aspects and areas of inequality in Israel, a country characterized by high levels of economic inequality, poverty, and social diversity. The book expands on the mechanisms that produce and maintain inequality, and the role of state policies in influencing those mechanisms.

 

Table of Contents

The Correlates of Household Debt in Late Life
Lewin-Epstein, Noah (et al.)
Pages 13-40

Household Inequality and the Contribution of Spousal Correlations
Plaut, Pnina O. (et al.)
Pages 41-57

Religious Schooling, Secular Schooling, and Household Income Inequality in Israel
Kimhi, Ayal (et al.)
Pages 59-72

First-Generation College Students in an Expanded and Diversified Higher Education System: The Case of Israel
Ayalon, Hanna (et al.)
Pages 75-96

Ethno-Religious Hierarchy in Educational Achievement and Socioeconomic Status in Israel: A Historical Perspective
Friedlander, Dov (et al.)
Pages 97-121

Overqualification and Wage Penalties among Immigrants, Native Minorities, and Majority Ethnic Groups
Khattab, Nabil (et al.)
Pages 123-149

The Gender Revolution in Israel: Progress and Stagnation
Mandel, Hadas (et al.)
Pages 153-184

Gender Earnings Gaps in Ethnic and Religious Groups in Israel
Kraus, Vered (et al.)
Pages 185-204

The Role of Peripheriality and Ethnic Segregation in Arabs’ Integration into the Israeli Labor Market
Schnell, Izhak (et al.)
Pages 207-224

Horizontal Inequality in Israel’s Welfare State: Do Arab Citizens Receive Fewer Transfer Payments?
Shalev, Michael (et al.)
Pages 225-252

 

New Article: Seeman, Jewish Ethiopian Israelis

Seeman, Don. “Jewish Ethiopian Israelis.” The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity, and Nationalism Chichester: Wiley, 2016.

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781118663202.wberen321
 

Abstract

Ethiopian Jews are the descendants of an ethnic and religious community known as Beta Israel or Falasha. Historically concentrated in the highlands of northern Ethiopia (Gondar and Tigre) they were in some cases denied the right to hold land unless they converted to Christianity. In modern times, intense Christian missionary efforts paradoxically helped to bring Ethiopian Jews into closer contact with foreign Jewish communities. In the past half-century nearly the whole Ethiopian Jewish community has migrated to Israel, where they have faced significant challenges and opportunities. Questions about their status under Jewish law have led to political conflicts of various kinds. In addition, the most recent groups of immigrants includes many whose ancestors converted to Christianity but have sought to return to Judaism in the context of migrating to Israel. The community has integrated into Israeli life but has also simultaneously taken its place as part of the global Ethiopian cultural diaspora.

 

 

 

New Article: Guetzkow & Fast, Symbolic Boundaries and Social Exclusion: A Comparison of Arab Palestinian Citizens and Ethiopian Jews

Guetzkow, Josh, and Idit Fast. “How Symbolic Boundaries Shape the Experience of Social Exclusion. A Case Comparison of Arab Palestinian Citizens and Ethiopian Jews in Israel.” American Behavioral Scientist (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0002764215607581

 

Abstract

Symbolic boundaries, understood as the conceptual distinctions used to demarcate in-groups and out-groups, are fundamental to social inequality. While we know a great deal about how groups and individuals construct and contest symbolic boundaries along lines of class, race, ethnicity, religion, and nationality, less attention is given to (a) national belonging as a component of symbolic boundaries distinct from citizenship and (b) comparing how distinct symbolic boundaries shape individuals perceptions of, and reactions to, instances of stigmatization and discrimination. To examine these issues we compared two marginalized groups in Israel, Arab Palestinian citizens and Ethiopian Jewish immigrants. Analyzing 90 in-depth interviews, we find that exclusion based on boundaries of nationality engenders different ways of interpretating and responding to stigmatizing and discriminatory behavior, compared with exclusion based on racial and ethnic boundaries. While Ethiopians see everyday stigmatizing encounters as part of their temporary position as a recently immigrated group from a developing country, and react accordingly with attempts to prove their worth as individuals and ultimately assimilate, Palestinians view the line between them and the Jewish majority as relatively impermeable and attempts to fully integrate as mostly useless, viewing solidarity and education as a means to improve their group’s standing.

 

 

New Article: Karayanni, Israel’s Palestinian-Arab Millets

Karayanni, Michael. “Tainted Liberalism: Israel’s Palestinian-Arab Millets.” Constellations (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-8675.12186

 
Extract

The purpose of this article is twofold. First, it offers a thesis explaining why the religion and state discussion in Israel has historically been Jewish-centered. This part of my thesis dwells on the constitutional attributes of the jurisdiction accorded to the Palestinian-Arab millets, which has been characterized as liberal in nature and seen as a measure of the tolerance of the Jewish state towards non-Jewish religious minorities. However, as I shall show, this was not the dominant perception or concern when rabbinical jurisdiction was established. For various political reasons intertwined with Israel’s nature as a Jewish nation state, rabbinical jurisdiction was conceived of as a necessity. Indeed, in terms of liberalism, rabbinical jurisdiction is generally regarded as illiberal or even coercive. This ontological difference in the nature of the jurisdictional authority of rabbinical courts (as a necessary illiberal concession) on the one hand, and the Palestinian-Arab religious communities (as a generous liberal accommodation) on the other hand, is what makes the mixing of both analytically unfeasible. But how much of the jurisdictional authority granted to the Palestinian-Arab religious communities is in fact liberal and tolerant in nature? My second argument in this article seeks to show that this seemingly liberal attitude is an illusion. Building on newly discovered archival materials as well as on international legal instruments that pre-date the establishment of the state of Israel I will argue that the central motivations behind the recognition accorded to the Palestinian-Arab religious communities were primarily driven by the interests of the Israeli establishment rather than by a concern for the well-being of the minority communities, and so the liberalism that was the perceived justification as to why Israel recognized in the Palestinian-Arab millets is certainly of a tainted form.

This article is divided into five main sections. Section One gives an overview of Israel’s constitutional nature as a Jewish nation-state and identifies the existence of two major paradigms that govern the jurisdictional authority of the various religious courts. The four subsequent sections are historical in nature and outline the factors that motivated the Israeli establishment when considering the recognition of the Palestinian-Arab religious courts. Section Two highlights the importance of maintaining the Palestinian-Arab millets to Israel’s foreign policy, especially in the decade that followed the state’s establishment, when international recognition and support were crucial for the state’s effort to subsist. Section Three reveals how the establishment of the Palestinian-Arab millets was used by Israel to divide and conquer its minorities. Section Four focuses on the importance of religious endogamy in preserving Jewish identity. Section Five relates to the interests of the Palestinian-Arab community in preserving the existing millet system, which was not invented by Israel — it existed under Ottoman rule for centuries.11 In the overall analysis, however, although this factor undoubtedly overlaps with the preceding three, it was not equally significant.

 

 

 

New Article: Bar, The Nexus of Enmity: Ideology, Global Politics, and Identity in the Twenty-First Century

Bar, Eyal. “The Nexus of Enmity. Ideology, Global Politics, and Identity in the Twenty-First Century.” CrossCurrents 65.3 (2015): 392-400.

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cros.12148

 

Extract

The discourses that framed nationalist movements, as soon as they proved useful tools for political power, became tools that could be wielded in a violent fashion under the guise of liberal equal rights. As the French case of laïcité demonstrates, the liberal urge for equal rights is already parasitic on an identity chauvinism that works to assimilate, homogenize, and manage various life worlds. In the name of freedom, these approaches advance constraints on the possible social and political imaginings that we might conjure. Through these ideologies of identity, the demand that Muslims renounce Daish can appear seemingly reasonable. Similarly, the blame cast on Jews the world over for the policies of the Israeli government are strengthened by the presumptive affiliation between Judaism and nationalism. In either case, the identity politics appears necessary for modern-day nationalism to function within an era of so-called globalization. Without recourse to identity, the imperative to manage and maintain power-political hierarchies through the division of the sociopolitical terrain (i.e., nationalism) would be rendered impotent. The first step toward eliminating the recent forms of prejudicial political violence is the recognition that modern identity politics militates against a world where physical barriers, political boundaries, and discursive networks are rapidly reorganizing.

 

 

 

 

Lecture: Mirsky, Sovereign States, Sovereign Selves

Dr. Yehuda Mirsky will explore the deeper historical dynamics driving contemporary controversies over “Who is a Jew” and Israel’s character as a Jewish Nation-state.

 

New Article: Katz, Religion and Ethnicity in Israeli National Dolls

Katz, Maya Balakirsky. “Dressing Up: Religion and Ethnicity in Israeli National Dolls.” Religion & Gender 5.1 (2015): 71-90.

 
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.18352/rg.10108  [PDF]
 

 
Abstract

This article considers Israel’s national image both at home and abroad through the framework of Israeli costume dolls, looking specifically at the way that gender played a role in Israel’s national image as it travelled from domestic production to international reception. Initially, predominantly female doll makers produced three main types of Israeli dolls, but over time the religious Eastern European male doll triumphed in the pantheon of national types. Produced for retail sale to non-Hebrew speaking tourists by immigrant woman, the Eastern European religious male doll came to represent Israel abroad while the market pushed representations of the Middle Eastern Jewish woman and the native sabra child to the side-lines. This article examines the shift from the multi-ethnic collection of dolls as representative of the nation’s idea of itself to the privileging of the male Eastern European doll as representative of the normative image of Israel abroad.

 

 

New Article: Ehrlich, Israel’s Hegemonic Right

Ehrlich, Avishai. “Israel’s Hegemonic Right.” Socialist Register 52 (2016).

 

URL: http://socialistregister.com/index.php/srv/article/view/25600

 

Abstract

All the political parties in Israel, apart from Arab and ultra-Orthodox, define themselves as Zionist. The right in Israel identifies itself strongly as Jewish either in a religious or ethno-nationalistic sense or, more amorphously, in terms of the ‘politics of belonging’. In today’s political parlance in Israel, ‘Judaism’ is not a religion but a political ideology, best termed ‘political Judaism’, which claims the powers of religion: veracity, certitude, absoluteness and the polarity of good versus evil. To be a Jew according to the right means firstly not to be an Arab. To be on the left is tantamount to being an Arab because people on the left support Arabs. The right aspires to Jewish supremacy in Israel and says so explicitly. To be a Jew is not only to fulfill the religious qualification of being born to a Jewish mother; Jewish belonging is now expressed in primordial, essentialist, mystical terms. The politics of identity, of political Judaism, adds a McCarthyist rancour and an exclusionary dimension of banishment from the community to political divisions. To belong now requires unqualified loyalty.

 

 

New Article: Petty, The Concept of ‘Religion’ in the Supreme Court of Israel

Petty, Aaron R. “The Concept of ‘Religion’ in the Supreme Court of Israel.” Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities 26.2 (2015): 211-68.

 
URL: http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/yjlh/vol26/iss2/2
 
Extract

In this Article, I suggest that “religion,” both as it is commonly understood, and as it is understood and applied by courts as a legal term of art, refers chiefly to belief. This understanding of “religion” is incorrectly, if tacitly, assumed to be both neutral and broadly applicable. Building on previous work focusing on British courts, I now turn to investigating how Israeli courts understand the concept of religion. And, as before, I focus on cases addressing the question “who is a Jew?” as a window into how courts understand religion and membership in a religion more generally.
[…]
To set the legal issues in context, in Part II, I briefly trace the emergence of the State of Israel. Part II.A discusses the early Zionist movement with particular attention to the philosophy of Theodor Herzl. Part II.B traces the early legal foundations of the State of Israel from the Balfour Declaration through the Proclamation of the State. Part III concerns the legal system created by the State. Part III.A introduces the legal structure of the state of Israel. Part III.B details the function and authority of the courts within that structure. Part III.C addresses the legal status of religion in the state, and Part III.D looks at the Law of Return, a unique feature of Israeli law applicable only to Jews (and certain relations). Part IV concerns the substantive debate on “Who is a Jew” under Israeli civil law. Part IV.A discusses in detail three seminal cases addressing the legal relationship between Judaism and the State-Rufeisen (also known as Brother Daniel), Shalit, and Beresford-along with significant legislation passed in the wake of Shalit. Part IV.B attempts to reconcile these decisions and tease out the factors that the Israeli Supreme Court has considered significant and the assumptions that it has made in adjudicating issues of religious identity.
Part V turns to the historical validity and neutrality of the understanding of “religion” applied by the Israeli Supreme Court. Part V.A offers an overview of the Christian origins of the modern concept of “religion” as primarily a matter of belief. Part V.B reflects on how the Jewish state, through its secularist Supreme Court, could have come to a Christian understanding of religion. Finally, Part VI takes a step back to place the findings in the wider debate on secularization. Part VI.A provides the necessary background on this secularization paradigm, and Part VI.B suggests that these cases may point to a useful refinement. Part VII offers a brief conclusion.

 

 

New Article: Patierno, Palestinian Liberation Theology

Patierno, Nicole. “Palestinian Liberation Theology: Creative Resistance to Occupation.” Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09596410.2015.1080896

 

Abstract

The ongoing Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories has widely affected the Christian population in the region. This study focuses narrowly on the diminishing minority of Palestinian Christians, and how their position under occupation has led to the development of Palestinian Liberation Theology and practices of creative resistance. It begins by acknowledging the unique position of Palestinian Christians as liminal yet indigenous members of society. It then explores their complex collective identity, demonstrating how specific facets of their historic identity (i.e. denominationalism, Arabism, and political station) have been preserved, and how these inform their theological and practical responses to the changing socio-political landscape. It goes on to probe the degree of consensus around Palestinian Liberation Theology, as well as prominent manifestations of the ideology in response to occupation. Ultimately, this study finds that Palestinian Liberation Theology represents a creative and valuable contribution to the national struggle for liberation, providing a shared ideology and culturally specific blueprint for revolutionary collective action guided by plurality, nonviolence, and collaboration.

 

 

New Article: Freas, Christian versus Muslim Employment in Mandatory Palestine

Freas, Erik Eliav. “Christian versus Muslim Employment in Mandatory Palestine.” Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations (early view; online first).

 

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09596410.2015.1041258

 

Abstract

During the British Mandate in Palestine, there existed among the majority Muslim Arab population a perception that the British favoured Christian Arabs for administrative positions. While such a preference was arguably justifiable during the early years of the Mandate, inasmuch as Christian Arabs were initially more qualified from an educational standpoint, over the ensuing years, the number of Muslim youths with a suitable, secular-based education very quickly increased. There nonetheless persisted a perception of Christian favouritism – that is, that Christians still enjoyed preferential treatment with respect to government employment – and this soon came to define a significant Muslim grievance, one that would periodically prove divisive between Muslim and Christian Arabs, not least within the context of the Palestinian nationalist movement. This article seeks to ascertain whether, on the basis of a statistical analysis of the actual numbers of Muslim and Christian Arabs employed by the British Mandatory government and their respective educational qualifications, Christian Arabs did in fact constitute a privileged group. Also considered (in light of certain sociological concepts regarding group and national identity) are the ramifications of such a perception – regardless of whether reflective of the actual reality – with respect to Muslim–Christian unity, the shaping of Palestinian Arab national identity and the relationship between Arab national identity and Islam.

Reviews: Shemer, Identity, Place, and Subversion in Contemporary Mizrahi Cinema

Shemer, Yaron. Identity, Place, and Subversion in Contemporary Mizrahi Cinema in Israel. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan Press, 2013.

 

 

Reviews

• Belinfante, Randall C. “Review.” Jewish Book Council, n.d.
• Sokoloff, Naomi. “Cinema Studies/Jewish Studies, 2011-2013.” AJS Review 38.1 (2014): 153-4.
• Bashkin, Orit. “Review.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 47.2 (2015): 395-7.

 

 

 

New Article: Drucker, The Alliance Israélite Universelle and Moroccan Jews

Drucker, Peter. “‘Disengaging from the Muslim Spirit’: The Alliance Israélite Universelle and Moroccan Jews.” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 11.1 (2015): 3-23.

 

URL: https://muse.jhu.edu/journals/journal_of_middle_east_womens_studies/v011/11.1.drucker.html

 

Abstract

The project of the French Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU) in Morocco in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—to win social and political equality for Jews through European enlightenment—was intertwined with the French imperial project. Moroccan Jewish women were assigned, as mothers and wives, a special role in the AIU’s efforts: to help Jewish boys and men pursue commercial or professional careers in French-dominated society The AIU schools set out to win Moroccan Jews away from despised Muslim gender and sexual norms by Europeanizing Jews’ marriage patterns and family forms, combating prostitution, eliminating women’s traditional head coverings, and reining in what the AIU saw as men’s promiscuity and homosexual tendencies. Ultimately, the AIU helped further estrange Moroccan Jews from Muslims but failed to secure Moroccan Jews’ smooth integration into French secular culture. Moroccan Jews in Israel today, faced with persistent discrimination, largely cling to religiously based, conservative gender norms.