Key authors
Michael Barnett, GWU
Dov Waxman, Baruch College
Israeli sociologist Oz Almog
• Creator of People-Israel
website
Israeli identity politics and foreign
policy
• Remember Kehr’s argument that foreign policy has
“not only an antagonist in front of it but a homeland
behind it”?
• This framework may be applied to the internal
politics of culture and identity as much as the politics
of economic interests.
• What is “identity”?
– “An identity is an understanding of oneself in relationship to others.
Identities, in short, are not personal or psychological; they are social
and relational . . . “ (Barnett, p. 62)
• Do cultural politics matter for US foreign policy?
• “What is Israel’s identity”? This highly contested
question “was first raised by Zionist ideologues . . .
before Israel’s founding” (Waxman, “From
Controversy to Consensus,” 76).
Israeli identity politics and foreign
policy
• Background on Zionism—YouTube College:
Prof. Z. Lockman, “A Brief History of Zionism”
“A Shamelessly brief history of Zionism.”
“Alfred Dreyfus Affair, Theodor Herzl and Zionism”
Theodor Herzl vs. Ahad Ha’am
Theodor Herzl, 1860-1904
• Founded the Zionist
political movement (in
Basel, 1897)
• His novel Altneuland,
trans. into Hebrew as
“Tel Aviv,” envisioned a
progressive, secular,
culturally-European,
multi-lingual society.
Ahad Ha’am (Asher Ginsberg),
1856-1927
• See Waxman book, 1819.
• Founded “cultural
Zionism.”
• Envisioned a Jewish, if
secular, “spiritual
center” in Palestine.
• Contra Herzl, he strove
for a “Jewish state, not
a state of Jews.”
The “Balfour Declaration”
The British Mandate in Palestine, ~1920-1948
Zionism in British Palestine
• Since ~1930 the labor movement assumed a
hegemonic position in the Zionist movement and
among the Jewish “Yishuv” in Palestine.
• The “Yishuv” built institutions that would serve the
foundation for a future state: communal settlements
(Kibbutz, Moshav), a strong labor union, a Hebrew
University, paramilitary formations (the Haganah;
“Palmach”). See Almog.
• The Yishuv’s (labor) leadership was largely drawn from
a small cadre of “pioneers” who arrived in Palestine
between 1904-1914 (the “second aliyah”).
Degania, the first Kibbutz (b. 1909)
Take David Ben-Gurion, for example
(1886-1973)
• Emigrated from Russia to
Palestine in 1906.
• Worked initially as an ag.
laborer.
• Hebraized his name from
“Grün.” Hated speaking
Yiddish.
• An avid bible reader, yet
thoroughly secular.
• From ~1930, undisputed
leader of the “Yishuv,”
then Israel’s first PM
Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky,
1880-1940
• “Revisionist Zionism, led
by Jabotinsky, was labor
Zionism’s chief ideological
rival(Waxman book, 20).
• Advocated “territorial
maximalism, insisting
upon the Jewish right to
the whole territory of
Eretz Israel” (Rynhold and
Waxman, 14).
• Today’s Likud party is a
descendent of the
Revisionist movement
Oz Almog, The Sabra: The Creation of the New
Jew (U. of Calif. Press, 2000)
• Synopsis: “This book
provides a comprehensive
portrait of the Sabras (the
state of Israel's first
generation, born between
the 1930's and 40's) . . . It's
an interesting look at the
creation of a new Jewish
identity, and the reasons
why Israeli Jews have
become so different from
their Diaspora forefathers.”
Israel’s Identity: from hegemony of the New Jew
(“Sabra”) to current “tribalism”
• The Other to which the New Jew, the Sabra, was
counterpoised was the old “Diaspora” Jew more
than the Arab residents of Palestine.
• As Almog explains, from the 1930s to the early
1960s the term “Hebrew” (or Israeli) was central
to Zionist cultural discourse. “Jewish” was
marginalized.
• The “Canaanites” were an extreme manifestation
of this vision (Almog, 6-7; Waxman book, 27-8)
Poet Yonatan Ratosh, leading
Canaanite (Almog, p. 6)
The “Palmach”
Palestine/Israel: the “Green Line” (L); the
1947 UN Partition Plan (R)
The internationalization of the 1948-49 war
(Israel’s “war of independence”)
The New Jews: Sabra farmer-warriors
epitomized by Moshe Dayan (1915-1981)
Yitzhak Rabin, 1922-1995. Israel’s first
Sabra PM
Ariel Sharon, 1928-
Identity politics in Israel
• The “New Jew” vision viewed Israel as a
largely-secular state of Jews, more Israeli than
Jewish.
• EX: the “Law of Return”.
• From the 1930s to the 1960s, the “New Jew”
identity was hegemonic. The swift victory of
1967 was its high tide; its decline was
precipitated by:
– The shock of the 1973 Yom Kippur war.
– Demographic and political changes in Israeli
society
The six day war, June 1967
From Sabra (New Jew) hegemony to
“tribalism”
• Sabra, Labor hegemony gave way to cultural
fragmentation or “tribalism.” By the 1990s,
“Israeli society was no longer seen as united
by as rife with internal divisions (between, for
example, religious and secular, Ashkenazim
and Mizrahim, Jews and Arabs).” (Waxman,
“From Controversy to Consensus,” p. 79)
• Who are the major cultural “tribes” of
contemporary Israel?
Whatever happened to the old, hegemonic
elite?
• Tel-AviIt became a “tribe,” epitomized by Tel-Aviv.
Largely Ashkenazi.
• Tel-Aviv’s state of mind: party time; secular; high
tech; looking outward toward Europe and the U.S.
• Individualism supplanted Zionist collectivism. The
high tech entrepreneur succeeded generals and
farmers as the cultural role model.
• Identity: a [democratic] state of Jews, a modern,
secular, Western state . Or even a “Hebrew state,” a
“secular, civic, Israeli melting pot” (Ha’aretz editorial,
March 3, 2011)
• In the early 1990s, this vision was articulated by then
PM Yitzhak Rabin (see Barnett, 75).
Hadag Nachash, “Zionist” hip hop
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJveW0D
5ZfQ&feature=related
• Reflects a common theme in “Tel-Aviv’s”
contemporary state of mind. The state we
have is not what we dreamed of. It has
become too militaristic; too religious. We
want Paris.
Tel-Aviv, 2004 Gay Pride Parade
Tel Aviv: streetlife and nightlife
Israel’s “tribes: the Arab citizens
• Do not fit comfortably within a “state of Jews,”
let alone a “Jewish state.”
• Might fit more comfortably within:
– A communist state
– A Canaanite state
– A “secular, civic, Israeli melting pot” (Ha’aretz
editorial)
– “A state of its citizens” (sort of like the U.S.)
– An Islamic state?
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3TTnuCD
Ua8
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4oTO2py
XKw&feature=relmfu
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fP46pXaP
XfY&feature=related
Israel’s “tribes”: the Sepharadi Jews (or
Mizrahim)
The Mellah in Sefrou, Morocco
Iraqi Jews arrive in Israel ~1950 (L)
“Ma’abara” (R)
Ashdod
The Sepharadim/Mizrahim (See
Waxman book, 40-41)
• “Mizrahi Jews tended to be more traditional than their
Ashkenazi counterparts, and their Jewish identity
tended to be stronger.”
• “When secular Israeliness . . . dominated in the
definition of Israeli national identity . . . the Mizrahim’s
ability to belong in this Israeli nation was highly
tenuous and conditional”
• The Mizrahim gravitated toward the Likud party and
were partly responsible for its rise to power in 1977—
Menachem Begin’s “emphasis upon Jewishness and the
Jewish tradition appealed to the Mizrahi public.”
Israel’s tribes: the “ultra-Orthodox”
•
•
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rQjhNCU-Cw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cc8XwamA1t0
• Historically hostile to Zionism
• Were devastated by the holocaust
• Were expected by the Zionist leadership to
become extinct—expectations were
confounded by history
• Don’t care for a “state of Jews.”
Knitted kippahs and black hats
Me’a Shearim, Jerusalem
Beitar Ilit, an ultra-orthodox settlement
Israel’s tribes: the national-religious bloc
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqVDpKY
OnIA
• Was a junior partner of the hegemonic elite
• Became awakened by the 1967 victory
• Want a Jewish state in Greater Israel
• The core of the settler movement
Settlement of Shilo, near Ramallah
Settlers demonstrating against PM Sharon in 2005
The newest tribe: the “Russians”
The Oslo Peace Process Timeline
• July 1992: Yitzhak Rabin (Labor) elected PM
• 1993: secret talks begin between Israel and the PLO in Oslo,
resulting in the Oslo accords (signed in Washington).
Provide for mutual recognition and establishment of
Palestinian self-government in parts of the West Bank and
Gaza Strip. PLO leadership, headed by Yasser Arafat,
allowed to return to Gaza.
• Sept. 1995: Arafat and Rabin reach Taba agreement,
expanding Palestinian self-rule and allowing Palestinian
elections. Arafat is elected president of Pal. Authority.
• Nov. 1995: Rabin is assassinated by Yigal Amir, a member of
the national-religious “tribe.”
• 1996: Binyamin Netanyahu (Likud) elected PM
Oslo Peace Process Timeline (cont’d)
• 1996: Binyamin Netanyahu (Likud) elected PM
• Jan. 1997: Israel hands over 80% of Hebron to the PA.
Israeli-Pal. talks continue but the peace process falters.
• 1999: Ehud Barak (Labor) elected PM.
• 2000: Barak pushes hard for a summit with Arafat to
reach a final peace accord. The Camp David Summit
ends in deadlock.
• Sept. 2000: the 2nd Palestinian Intifada begins.
• Feb. 2001: Ariel Sharon (Likud) elected PM. Would later
initiate a unilateral disengagement from Gaza (see
Rynhold and Waxman)
Signing the Oslo Peace Accords, 1993
The Divisiveness of the Oslo Accords (see Barnett
chapter; Waxman, “From Controversy to Consensus”)
• Israel “went, or was dragged, to Oslo as two nations”
(Waxman, 76)
• Rabin’s vision: “we want a [democratic] state of Jews”
(Quoted by Barnett, 75). “Israel as a modern secular, Western
state . . . with a prosperous Israeli nation living in peace with
its neighbors” (Waxman, 80)
• Rabin’s coalition included “Tel-Aviv,” elements of the Mizrahi
“development towns,” elements of the new “Russians,” with
outside support of (for the only time in Israeli history) the
Arabs.
• Still, “The Rabin government could not secure a public
consensus behind its policy . . . The margin of [popular]
support was very narrow.” The Knesset “was barely able to
ratify” the Oslo agreements (Waxman, 76-77).
The Divisiveness of the Oslo Process
(cont’d)
• Rabin’s vision clashed with “a vision of Israel as a Jewish state
with a Jewish nation loyal to its heritage and living in its
ancestral homeland” (Waxman 80).
• Settler leader: “Holding on to YESHA [Judea, Samaria, and
Gaza] and building it forces a particular identity on the nation,
one which emphasizes the uniqueness of the Jewish people”
(Waxman, 78)
• Globalization, consumerism, Americanization, “generated a
growing cultural unease, especially among the religious and
traditionalist Jewish public” (Waxman, 79)
• As noted above, Rabin was killed in 1995 by a member of the
“national-religious” tribe.
Unilateral Disengagement from Gaza,
2005 (see Rynhold and Waxman)
• On October 26, 2004, the Knesset approved PM Sharon’s
plan to remove all Jewish settlements from the Gaza
Strip.
• Vote tally: 67 in favor; 45 opposed; 7 abstentions; 1
absent (illness)
• Who were the 67? Labor; Shinui; roughly half the Likud
(Sharon’s own party). Who do they represent in Israeli
society? The forces who supported Rabin (centering on
“Tel-Aviv”), minus the Arab parties, plus half the Likud.
• Who were the 45 opposed? Half the Likud; the National
Religious Party (knitted kippahs); the Ultra-Orthodox
Ashkenazi parties; Shas (Ultra-orthodox Sepharadi); the
National Union.
Unilateral Disengagement from Gaza,
2005 (see Rynhold and Waxman)
• The disengagement was made possible by ideological
change within “the Likud Party and the secular Israeli
right”—the abandonment of a . . . commitment to
maintainting Jewish control over Eretz Yisrael. . . The
value of Eretz Israel was effectively demoted in order
to preserve a more fundamental value—Israel’s
continued existence as a democratic Jewish state with
a Jewish majority.” (p. 12)
• After the disengagement, Sharon and other Likud
leaders left the party and created the centrist “Kadima”
party, currently led by Ms. Zippi Livni (from a rockribbed revisionist family; p. 24).
• “Separation was a centrist alternative that
incorporated elements from the approaches of both
the Left and the Right to the issue of the territories. It
took the policy of territorial withdrawal from the Left,
and the Right’s skepticism about the possibility of
achieving Israeli-Pal. peace . . . Separation emerged as
a ‘third way’ approach to the territories (Waxman,
From Controversy, 89)
• While the concept of territorial withdrawal now enjoys
a substantial majority (unlike the 1990s), the cultural
conflict over Israel’s identity remains unresolved.