Israel Studies Review

The positive feedback we have received since the appearance of the first issue of the (renamed) Israel Studies Review last May has exceeded our expectations, and we are grateful to everyone who responded. Of course, we have built on the work of the previous Editorial Board and the support of the Association for Israel Studies. We are appreciative that the innovations we introduced, including the Forum section and the review essays of books published in a particular field in Hebrew, have received such approbation. We encourage all of our readers and friends to continue sending us more ideas for topics, sections, and issues to deal with.

When Scholarship Disturbs Narrative: Ian Lustick on Israel’s Migration Balance Comment by Sergio DellaPergola

Leaving the Villa and Touching a Raw Nerve Response by Ian S. Lustick

The cultural crisis that Israel is experiencing today derives largely from the concept of isolation, which is based in Jewish theology (Halevi). The concept itself stems from the 'illegitimacy claim', already present in rabbinic literature, which developed into the firm halakhic practice of separating Jews from non-Jews. Although rabbinic Judaism contains an alternative, universalistic current (Maimonides) that was influential in the Middle Ages, Israel's Religious Zionist educational system is based on the 'isolationist' system expounded by Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook. Proponents of the latter include both religious Jews and secular Israelis, who defend it as part of Israel's Jewish heritage. These tendencies not only prevent dialogue with Israel's neighbors but also fragment Israel's Jewish public. This rejection of the 'Other' as belonging to the 'sons of darkness' is largely responsible for the cultural crisis pervading the country. Israel should reorient itself toward the universalistic stream represented by philosophers such as Buber, Rosenzweig, and Levinas.

This article discusses the links between military knowledge production and the cultural representations of war based on the Israeli experience during the past two decades. It argues that the locus of military knowledge production has moved from what can be described as 'forging knowledge' to 'deciphering knowledge'. This transition is linked to a crisis in the classic representation of war, which is based on the congruence between three binary signifiers: enemy, arena, and violence. The article asserts that the blurring of these three signifiers has created a Bourdieuian field of military knowledge production in which symbolic capital is obtained from the production of knowledge that deciphers the new uncertainty. The article follows the relations between the binaries and the types of knowledge that have been imported and translated in the IDF with regard to four major operational settings: the Oslo redeployment, the Second Intifada, the disengagement from Gaza, and the aftermath of the Second Lebanon War.

This article offers an analytical review of the research on gender and the military in Israel since the 1970s. I argue that the research in this field has undergone a paradigmatic shift that is based on five analytical transformations: (1) a move from a binary gendered conception to intersectionality analysis; (2) a shift from a dichotomous perception of the military organization to an analysis based on 'inequality regime' theory; (3) an emphasis on women as agents of change and resistance; (4) a focus on men and militarized masculinities; and (5) macro-analysis of the significance of women's service in a militaristic society. The article concludes with a discussion of the current political dynamics and conflicts that shape both the construction of the military gender regime and the production of the research in this field.

In this article we investigate the unique position of intra-military social research units in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). These units, associated with the IDF's Behavioral Sciences Department, have conducted social research on a vast range of topics for more than five decades. By analyzing developments in the studies on reserve service over the years, we have identified three phases of research. Each phase reflects changes in research questions, theoretical concepts, and definitions of issues to be explored. According to our analysis, researches conducted during the first two phases have similar characteristics and derive from the same theoretical discipline and research paradigm. It is mainly during the third phase that theoretical and paradigmatic changes are evident. The researches carried out in this most recent phase are rooted in critical episte- mology, which enables us to discuss the implications of critical intra-social research within the military and in comparison to the academic world.

The Zionist ethos is commonly described as pro-rural and anti-urban, with the imagined Zionist space perceived as being rural and the Zionist drama as a reflection of the life of the pioneers in Palestine. Recent studies of early Hebrew cinema shared this view. This article analyzes two Jewish films from inter-war Palestine, Vayehi Bimey (In the Days of Yore) (1932, Tel Aviv) and Zot Hi Ha'aretz (This Is the Land) (1935, Tel Aviv), to suggest a more complex view of the Zionist ethos and spatial imagery in the context of the relationship between the urban and the rural. A thematic and formal analysis of the films shows their sources of Soviet influence and reveals the presentation of the city as a nationalist space.

Official negotiations between parties in ethno-national conflicts too often result in a deadlock. In such cases, the initial consent of opposing parties to sit together at the negotiating table is considered, retrospectively, to be merely a technical and ultimately futile achievement. The numerous failures of negotiations in such conflicts highlight the importance of studying the relationship between the prenegotiation process, which initially brings the parties to the negotiating table, and the results of subsequent formal negotiations, especially in view of the basic premise of the conflict resolution field's 'process school', that is, that effective execution of prenegotiation functions is critical for successful negotiations. This article examines the prenegotiation phase in two recent cases: the dispute over Cyprus in 2004 and the 'Annapolis process' of 2007-2008.

Orit Abuhav, In the Company of Others: The Development of Anthropology in Israel [in Hebrew] (Tel Aviv: Resling Publishing, 2010), 331 pp.

Esther Hertzog, Orit Abuhav, Harvey E. Goldberg, and Emanuel Marx, eds., Perspectives on Israeli Anthropology (Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 2010), 732 pp.

Menachem Mautner, Law and the Culture of Israel Review by Gad Barzilai

Nadav G. Shelef, Evolving Nationalism: Homeland, Identity, and Religion in Israel, 1925–2005 Review by Ilan Peleg

Susan A. Glenn and Naomi B. Sokoloff, eds., Boundaries of Jewish Identity Review by Kirsten Fermaglich

Arieh Bruce Saposnik, Becoming Hebrew: The Creation of a Jewish National Culture in Ottoman Palestine Review by Nina S. Spiegel

King Abdullah II, Our Last Best Chance: The Pursuit of Peace in a Time of Peril Review by Saliba Sarsar

Leslie Stein, The Making of Modern Israel: 1948–1967 Review by Pierre M. Atlas

Joyce Dalsheim, Unsettling Gaza: Secular Liberalism, Radical Religion, and the Israeli Settlement Project Review by Myron J. Aronoff

Beverley Milton-Edwards, The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: A People’s War 180 Review by Raphael Cohen-Almagor