Search results

By revisiting the past hundred years of shared Palestinian and Jewish-Israeli history, Baruch Kimmerling reveals surprising relations of influence between a stateless indigenous society and the settler-immigrants who would later form the state of Israel. Shattering our assumptions about these two seemingly irreconcilable cultures, Kimmerling composes a sophisticated portrait of one side's behavior and characteristics and the way in which they irrevocably shaped those of the other.Kimmerling focuses on the clashes, tensions, and complementarities that link Jewish, Palestinian, and Israeli ident

This thought-provoking book, the first of its kind in the English language, reexamines the fifty-year-old nation of Israel in terms of its origins as a haven for a persecuted people and its evolution into a multi- cultural society. Arguing that the mono-cultural regime built during the 1950s is over, Baruch Kimmerling suggests that the Israeli state has divided into seven major cultures. These seven groups, he contends, have been challenging one other for control over resource distribution and the identity of the polity. Kimmerling, one of the most prominent social scientists and political analysts of Israel today, relies on a large body of sociological work on the state, civil society, and ethnicity to present an overview of the construction and deconstruction of the secular-Zionist national identity. He shows how Israeliness is becoming a prefix for other identities as well as a legal and political concept of citizen rights granted by the state, though not necessarily equally to different segments of society

Front Matter -- Half Title Page -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- PREFACE -- Content -- The Crystallization of the State and the Struggles Over Rulemaking: Israel in Comparative Perspective -- Before the State: Communal Politics in Palestine Under the Mandate -- Citizenship, Nationality and Religion in Israel and Thailand -- Jewish Organized Labor and the Palestinians: A Study of State/Society Relations in Israel -- Children's Perceptions of Minority Rights: Israelin a Cross-National Perspective -- The Social Meaning of Alternative Systems: Some Exploratory Notes -- The State of Israel as a Theological Dilemma -- The Structure and Dilemmas of Israeli Pluralism -- Between ''Alexandria-On The-Hudson" and Zion -- Boundaries and Frontiers of the Israeli Control System: Analytical Conclusions -- Back Matter -- CONTRIBUTORS -- INDEX.

What is Sharon's plan? It is nothing less than the politicide of the Palestinian people: a combined military, political, diplomatic, and psychological process that has, as its ultimate goal, the dissolution of the Palestinians' existence as a legitimate socially, politically, and economically independent entity.

Contends that Israeli Prime Minister Sharon is attempting to end the Palestinians' existence as a legitimate independent entity. Sharon is portrayed as following the traditional Labor Zionist philosophy of trying to attain the maximum amount of land with the minimum number of Arab inhabitants. It is argued that most Israelis have the conflicting goals of wanting to incorporate land from the West Bank into Israel, while ensuring that a majority of the country's citizens are Jewish. Israel's military reaction to a massive suicide bombing in 2002 is portrayed as the beginning of a process of "politicide" of the Palestinians. The prime minister's goal in launching this retaliation is identified as the destruction of the Palestinian regime as well as Palestine's national institutions and infrastructure. It is argued that Sharon is dismantling Israeli settlements from the Gaza Strip so that Israel will be able to keep numerous settlements in the West Bank and complete the construction of a border fence. In the process, the Palestinian state would be denied territorial contiguity. It is concluded that the Sharon government is attempting to lower the expectations of the Palestinians so that they will submit to Israeli demands.