ABSTRACT During World War II, Palestine was one of the largest and most important centers of civilian and military life for Polish emigrants in the Middle East. This article examines the fate of emigrants from Poland (Poles and Polish Jews) in Palestine from 1939 to 1948. It explores the daily lives of Polish and Jewish refugees, their organizational activities, bilateral relations, and political sentiment before the establishment of the Jewish state. The policies of the great powers imposed a strong international context on Polish Jewish refugees, drawing their daily lives into the sphere of international politics. The article examines the relations between the refugees and representatives of the Yishuv, the authorities of the Polish Government in Exile in London, and the British Mandate.

Battle for the Jewish State: How Israel—and America—Can Win

The article presents a new conceptual framework for analyzing and ensuring the security of socio-technical systems based on the fundamental difference between functionally stable and evolutionarily dynamic systems. Unlike the former, which are organized around clearly defined functions, the latter are structured by ontological invariants and exhibit the properties of complex adaptive systems: nonlinear dynamics, emergence, self-organization, and path dependence. It has been shown that traditional approaches to ensuring the security of socio-technical systems: robustness, survivability, and resilience - are proving insufficiently effective in an era of growing complexity of such systems and increasing environmental volatility. These approaches are primarily focused on maintaining or restoring the initial state of the system, rather than ensuring the possibility of its fundamental transformation. The growing interconnectedness and dynamic nature of current socio-technical systems require new theoretical foundations capable of accounting for radical structural changes while preserving the identity of the system. Based on five key axioms of complex systems: non-locality and multiplicity of components, emergence, nonlinear dynamics and path dependence, self-organization and adaptation, the authors introduce the concept of transmorphance – the ability of evolving socio-technical systems to survive radical structural transformations while preserving the ontological invariants that define the identity of the system. Transmorphance conceptually surpasses existing approaches by offering a paradigm of adaptation through change of form rather than preservation. The concept is empirically confirmed by a comprehensive analysis of the evolution of Jewish statehood over nearly three millennia. The analysis reveals key mechanisms of transmorphance, including the evolution from centralized territorial structures to distributed networks of autonomous communities linked by common legal norms and symbolic codes. Comparative analysis allows us to distinguish transmorphance from related concepts, in particular from antifragility and adaptive capacity from resilience literature. While antifragility focuses on extracting benefits from volatility within existing structural forms, transmorphance implies fundamental morphological transformations. Unlike adaptive capacity, which usually implies gradual optimization, transmorphance involves discrete transformations similar to phase transitions that change the basic paradigm of the system's functioning. The proposed approach expands the theoretical foundations of socio-technical system security management and offers new adaptation strategies in an era of high systemic volatility. Practical implementation of the theory includes the need to increase the adaptive potential of such systems and develop adaptive mechanisms capable of using crises as opportunities for systemic evolution.

ABSTRACT This article revisits questions about the womb’s role in conferring Jewish identity in Israel. Judaism is transmitted matrilineally, yet orthodox rabbis increasingly view babies from non-Jewish eggs as requiring conversion. Through interviews with 25 orthodox Jewish-Israeli gestational surrogates who see surrogacy as an act of “loving-kindness” (chesed), we explore how they navigate halakhic uncertainty surrounding the Jewish status of babies they carry when non-Jewish donor eggs are used. Though the State recognizes their “Jewish womb” as determining the baby’s religious status, these surrogates resist acknowledging this power because they conceptualize themselves as merely “hosting” a child that belongs to others.

Yaacov Yadgar: To Be a Jewish State: Zionism as the New Judaism

The article traces the process of gradual transformation of Anglo-Arab and Anglo-Jewish relations in Palestine during the Mandate period. Considerable attention in the work is paid to the analysis of the national movement of Palestinian Arabs in the 1930s, which had an anti-Jewish and anti-British orientation. The situation in the Arab and Jewish communities of Palestine was investigated, the causes, course and consequences of the Arab uprising of 1936–1939 were considered. The ideological attitudes of the Arab and Jewish parties and organizations in Palestine during the Mandate period, their practical activities were revealed. The article covers the activities of the Royal Commissions in Palestine in the 1930s. It examines their recommendations for dividing Palestine into Arab and Jewish states, with Britain controlling part of the country. These plans were not implemented. The White Paper of 1939 recommended «freezing» the situation in Palestine for 10 years. All this testified to the crisis of the mandate system in Palestine and the inability of the mandatory country to control the situation in the country within the framework of the mandate.

ABSTRACTFollowing the Hamas‐led attack on 7 October 2023, and subsequent Israeli bombardment and siege of Gaza, it was apparent that US mainstream media and political elites were slanted in favour of Israel, the long‐term US ally. This study aims to construe the relationship of cultural knowledge with mainstream media and elite US political discourse. It also seeks to discern linguistic features of this discourse. The researcher collected articles from five mainstream media sources and statements of four US presidents pertaining to the Palestine–Israel conflict. This research found that these discourse events embed dominant cultural models of Palestinians and Israelis, of political units and spaces, of Muslim militants and the sovereign ‘Jewish state’ and of the close relationship between the United States and Israel. Through examining news articles, this study demonstrates that these forms of dominant cultural knowledge guide the use of linguistic tools that, in turn, reproduce these cultural models.

Abstract The role that Saudi Arabia played in the earliest days of the conflict between the Arabs and Zionists in Palestine and later after the establishment of the State of Israel is highly contested. This article seeks to contribute to the ongoing dialogue of the Saudi role by exploring the question from the standpoint of the United States. An examination of the American documentary evidence demonstrates that Ibn Saud and Saudi Arabia were viewed as significant advocates for the Palestinian cause by successive Presidential Administrations in the 1940s and 1950s. The Americans at this time did not view the Saudis as partners to the establishment of a potential Jewish state. Instead, they viewed the Saudis as staunch supporters of the Palestinian cause who could potentially prove to be obstacles to American policy in the region. This included the eventual US position to support the partition of Palestine and recognition of the State of Israel.

Abstract: This essay reads Telassar, the hidden Ethiopian city at the heart of Pauline Hopkins's psychological-historical-occult mystery Of One Blood (1902–3), in relation to a better-known contemporaneous project for the regeneration of a diasporic people: Zionism. I argue that in Of One Blood , Hopkins, whose wide-ranging writing made her a key figure of early twentieth-century Black literary history, reworks elements of George Eliot's 1876 novel Daniel Deronda , which famously ends with its protagonist discovering his Jewish identity and setting off to establish a Jewish state in Palestine. Yet even as she adapts Daniel Deronda , Hopkins strikingly rejects its Zionist logic. Demurring from Zionism's colonizing project and its equation between Jewish community and the construction of a nation-state, Hopkins depicts Telassar less as a homeland than as a battery that will galvanize connections between Black people around the world. By excavating the presence of Zionism in Of One Blood , we glimpse how Hopkins made Zionist ideology a foil over and against which to formulate a countervailing vision of Blackness, deepening the history of American anti-Zionism and indicating its generative political possibilities.

ABSTRACT In this article, I explore the construction and reconstruction of Jewish ethnicity through the lens of the Israeli case. The ascent of a right-wing government in Israel following the 2022 election has prompted efforts to reshape the country's legal framework in accordance with the coalition's ideological values. A prominent legislative proposal advanced by religious Knesset members sought to eliminate the grandchild clause from the Law of Return. An analysis of this proposal, alongside similar initiatives in the past, demonstrates that ethnicity is not a static concept but one that is continuously being shaped and reassessed. These discussions place the spotlight on the conflict over the balance between religious and national elements in Judaism as reflected in the state's laws, as well as on the differing interpretations of Judaism and Jewish identity in general. The efforts to amend or eliminate the grandchild clause symbolize attempts to redefine Israel's ethnic identity. While it is widely accepted that Israel is a Jewish state, the specific interpretation of this designation within legislative and institutional contexts remains a subject of ongoing contention.

Jews and Muslims are two of the most dissimilar groups in Canada society in terms of their sociodemographic characteristics. Layered on top of those differences is antagonism over the Israel-Palestine conflict. Yet this report, based on a January 2025 web panel survey of 2,821 Canadian adults, shows that Jews and Muslims have some things in common. Notably, a considerable number of Canadians have negative attitudes toward both groups. Negative attitudes toward Jews and Muslims are correlated with more general racist sentiment. And although more Canadians express negative attitudes toward Muslims than Jews, negative attitudes toward both groups are stronger than the Canadian average in Montreal and especially Quebec City. They are weaker than the Canadian average in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, and especially Winnipeg. However, intercity differences fail to reach statistical significance at standard levels once other factors are taken into account. In other words, the reason some cities have populations with more negative attitudes toward Jews and Muslims is that they have a greater percentage of people who have other characteristics associated with these negative attitudes. Specifically, the non-Jewish Canadians most likely to have negative attitudes toward Jews say have had negative experiences with Jews. They tend to be Quebecois and place themselves on the right of the political spectrum. They are likely to lack even a single Jewish acquaintance and to be relatively young. They are unlikely to support the New Democratic Party and they tend to identify as male. Similarly, the non-Muslim Canadians who are most likely to have negative attitudes toward Muslims say have had negative experiences with Muslims and are likely to place themselves on the right of the political spectrum. They, too, tend to be Quebecois. There is a disproportionately large number of Conservative Party supporters among them. Finally, they lack even a single Muslim friend. Compared to the general population of Canada, individuals on the political left tend to have less negative attitudes towards Jews and more negative attitudes toward Israel. Leftists often claim they are not antisemitic, but most Canadian Jews disagree because strongly negative attitudes toward Israel effectively deny Jews a core part of their identity as Jews, namely support for a Jewish state. One of the key findings of this survey is that even Muslim respondents who say they have had good experiences with Jews tend not to have negative attitudes toward Jews, while even Jews who say they have had good experiences with Muslims tend not to have negative attitudes toward Muslims. The report ends by considering the implications of this finding for Jewish-Muslim relations in Canada.

<i>To Be a Jewish State: Zionism as the New Judaism</i> by YaacovYadgar (New York: New York University Press, 2024), vi + 218 pp.

ABSTRACT This qualitative study explored ethical perceptions in primary school homeroom teaching, focusing on ethical caring. Forty semi-structured interviews were conducted with Israeli homeroom teachers (grades 1–2) in Arab (n = 20) and Jewish (n = 20) state primary schools (39 women). Thematic analysis identified four themes that represent various facets of emotional and instrumental caring of these educators in the professional context, encompassing both in-role and extra-role commitments. The first theme, ‘care without limits,’ shows teachers’ deep emotional connections beyond formal duties. The second, ‘emotional care,’ reflects empathy integrated into assigned tasks. The third, ‘care for promoting academic success or socialization,’ describes caring as a tool to enhance learning and socialization. The fourth, ‘contractual care,’ portrays a task-oriented, minimal approach. The study suggests teachers could benefit from training on ethical dimensions, schools should support navigating ethical dilemmas, and policymakers can use these findings to enhance teacher evaluation and professional development, ultimately improving education quality.

ABSTRACT ‘Normalization of the Jews’ was an axiomatic notion in modern European thought held by both non-Jews and Jews, an operative expression of the so-called Jewish emancipation. Meant was that Jews should undergo socioeconomic and cultural changes to justify their integration into European society. Such a normalization, besides being based on negative stereotypes about Jews, ran against major socioeconomic trends of the modernising West. Jewish society soon developed various approaches regarding normalization, expressing different trends in modern Jewish life. The topic has not disappeared in our days, especially after the massacres of 7 October 2023. Most of the questions and tensions of old remain unchanged and relate now mainly to Israel, the Jewish state.

This study examines representations of the Palestinian Arab “other” in Eran Riklis’s 2014 film A Borrowed Identity, an adaptation of Sayed Kashua’s acclaimed novel Dancing Arabs. The film’s protagonist, Eyad Barhum is a Palestinian teenager navigating identity and belonging within Israeli society after transferring to a Jewish prep school in Jerusalem. Through Eyad’s network of relationships, the film illustrates his identity production through Palestinization, Israelization, and eventual Judaization, as he progressively distances himself from his Palestinian roots to assimilate into Israeli Jewish society. Using frameworks of representation, nationalism, and identity, the study highlights how Eyad’s transformation reflects the complexities of identity production within a society marked by systemic oppression rooted in ethnic binaries. The film critiques but ultimately reinforces the boundaries of the Zionist vision of Israel as a Jewish state–rather than a state of all its citizens– by portraying Eyad’s erasure of his Palestinian identity as the only path to equality and acceptance. This tragic conclusion underscores the impossibility of acceptance without assimilation in a society structured by ethnic hierarchies.

The decision of the United Nations in 1947 to partition Palestine into two Arab and Jewish states was a landmark moment in the postwar history of the Middle East and also a tough challenge for the communist movement, globally and in the Middle East. The support of the communist movement, including communist parties of Iran and the Arab world, for the partition and their relatively positive posture toward Israel in its early years has usually been studied in terms of the foreign policy machinations of the USSR. I counter this familiar narrative by analyzing the positions of Iranian communists, and their interaction with Arab and Israeli communists, as an instance of attempting to work out an internationalist line in the difficult circumstances of a ferocious national conflict.

Abstract: This article explores the mechanisms by which Ha-Matateh, a satirical theater company, created a sense of well-being among its audiences during a time of crisis in prestate Israel. The article focuses on a revue by Ha-Matateh, Ḥayim and Saʿadiah Are Going to the City , which premiered in May 1939. This production referenced the stressful reality of the time: extreme antisemitism sweeping across Europe, diplomats feverishly trying to prevent another war, and a new White Paper issued by the British government jeopardizing the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. This article shows how this stage presentation transformed the fears and anxieties that dominated the real world into humorous expressions of pleasure, social engagement, success, and a sense of security.

ABSTRACT Despite the devastating outcome of the Holocaust for Greece’s Jewish communities, the state’s immediate post-war policies remained heavily prejudiced towards the surviving Jews. Embroiled in the Civil War between the Greek national forces and the Greek Communist Party, the security authorities unleashed an intense pursuit of civilians with links to communism. In this context, the Greek Israelites were the usual suspects and the Aliens Bureaus monitored their activities in various ways – from how they voted to possible ties to terrorist actions. However, this behaviour wasn’t limited to the domestic sphere but also reflected in Greece’s relations in the Middle East. Regardless of Greece’s interests in the Arab world (Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria, Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, Greek community of Alexandria), the possibility of a Jewish state in Mandate Palestine was considered a communist threat for the country. This paper aims to study, through specific episodes from relevant archive research, the persistent discrimination against the Jews – whether Greeks or not – in both domestic and foreign policies. These policies combined antisemitism and anti-communism and had long lasting repercussions for Greece’s foreign relations at the diplomatic level with Israel.

Abstract: In order to be eligible for a marriage or divorce in Israel, one must meet the requirements of the relevant religious institution—which, for Jews, whether or not they are religiously observant, is the Rabbinical Court system. Although both men and women are equally required to prove their Jewish status within this system, the question of "who is a Jew" is really a question of "who is a Jewish woman," since, according to rabbinic law, Judaism is passed from a mother to her children. In recent years, the Israeli religious establishment's growing requirements for "proof of Judaism," especially towards FSU immigrants and their descendants, has led to media attention, social protest and petitions to the civil courts, raising legal questions regarding the authority of the Rabbinical Courts when they conduct investigations into Jewish status and the extent of private information the court can use as part of such an investigation. Investigations into Jewish status take place mostly at lifecycle events, such as marriage and divorce. The verdict is given by an all-male Rabbinical Court, yet the verdict impacts women more than men, because of the implications for their offspring and for some rights in the case of a Jewish divorce. Women in general, and women whose Jewish identity is in doubt in particular, do not belong to the hegemony that controls the religious establishment. This article will aim to understand the jurisprudence of Israel's rabbinical courts on this issue and its implications for women. After reviewing when proof of Judaism is required by the rabbinical court, with examples of Rabbinical Court rulings on this issue that affect women, it will strive to understand how a gender analysis and feminist perspective could impact on the age-old question of "who is a Jew" for matters of "proof of Judaism."

Abstract After Hamas's brutal October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, China appeared to side with the Islamists, as if its relationship with the Jewish state had deteriorated beyond repair. This was accompanied by an officially inspired wave of antisemitism and votes against Israel at the United Nations. Within a few months, however, the Chinese began to tone down their response and to repair what has become an important component in their Middle East policy. Israel was the first Middle Eastern government to recognize the People's Republic, though no diplomatic relations were established between the two until January 1992. The long delay was caused by Beijing's cultivation of ties with the Arab and Muslim worlds, which required enmity toward Israel. This had been expected to be a limited partnership. However, as this article shows, Israel has played a major role in China's regional strategy, somewhat in politics but much more in economic growth, defense modernization, technology, and innovation. In relative and, in some areas, absolute terms, Israel has proved to be as important to China as other regional states, and it has often won, implicitly and even explicitly, Beijing's appreciation—out of all proportion.