Cultures and Contexts: Modern Israel Fall 2010 MAP V55.0537 Monday/Wednesday 4:55-6:10am Prof. Ronald W. Zweig Fredrik Meiton Dan Tsahor Shayna Weiss Contents: 1. Things you need to know for the Cultures and Contexts: Modern Israel course 2. Text Books and Additional Resources 3. Course Outline and Reading List
1. Things you need to know about the course Your obligations: The reading of at least one item on the list for each lecture is compulsory, and from time to time there will be brief class tests during recitations to ensure that you don t slip behind on the bibliography. You will be expected to read approximately 50-100 pages per week. Note: readings listed in brackets and marked with also are optional readings, for those that want to delve deeper. Other listed readings are not optional. There will be two exams and one written paper, in addition to the class tests on the readings. The Midterm exam will be on Wednesday October 27 (normal class time and place), the Final at 6pm, Monday, December 20. The Midterm will be a multiple choice exam, covering half of the course (i.e., subjects covered in the half of the semester immediately before the exam). The Final exam will consist of a limited number of multiple choice questions on material covered in the second half of the semester, plus an essay section relating to the whole course. The written paper (5-8 pages, plus bibliography and footnotes) is due two weeks after the Midterm i.e., November 10. You will be able to choose a paper topic from a list of appropriate topics for the paper, or suggest a topic in consultation with your TA. (Topics not from the list of approved topics or approved in advance by your TA will not be graded.) Assistance with bibliographies and instructions on how to write a paper will be given during the recitations. These dates are final. Note: When preparing your paper, your task is to read widely about the topic you have chosen, and to formulate your own answer to a research question you yourself posed. Naturally, you will base your work on the published research of others but the synthesis, the argumentation and the writing must be yours. When quoting the opinions, the facts and the text of other writers you must cite your sources. Otherwise it is not possible to verify the accuracy of your opinions, and the ability to check facts and to verify them is the basis of all scholarly writing and scientific work. That is why your paper must include footnotes and a bibliography listing all the works you consulted, not only the works cited in the footnotes. Recycling the text of others without acknowledging that the text is borrowed is plagiarism, which is unprofessional (at best) and dishonest (at worst) and will have consequences. Consultation: The TAs will announce their office hours and email addresses during the recitations. My email is: rz11@nyu.edu and am always willing to meet to discuss any problems you are having with the course material by appointment, set up via email. 2
Grading: Midterm Exam: 15%, Final Exam 35%, Term Paper 30%, Recitation participation: 20% Class Cancellations: There will be no classes on Sept. 8 (Erev Rosh Hashana) and Sept. 22 (Erev Succot). There will be a make-up class on Sunday November 14 when we are organizing a half day MAP Modern Israel Film Festival of documentaries on Israel. These documentaries will form the basis for discussion in your recitations, and attendance is compulsory. 2. Text Books: 1. Alan Dowty The Jewish State. A Century Later 2. Benny Morris Righteous Victims. A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict 3. Avi Shlaim The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World 4. Charles Smith Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (any edition) [These books are readily available second hand. As there are multiple editions of Smith on the market, page references to documents used in class discussion from this collection will be given for all editions.] Additional resources: Additional articles and chapters of other books will be posted on Blackboard for those that want to read more. About halfway through the semester, you will be asked to follow the Israeli press (in English!) available online. The links are: www.haaretz.com (English edition of Ha aretz) (www.haaretz.co.il for the Hebrew edition) www.jpost.com The Jerusalem Post 3
3. Course Outline and Readings Readings not from the textbooks will be available on Blackboard 1. Zionism, Palestine, Israel origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict (to 1948) Morris, chapts. 2-4; Shlaim, pp. 41-53 2. War of 1948: Independence and Nakba; Creating a Jewish State: Declaration of Independence Morris, chapt. 5; and Dowty, chapt. 4; (Also: Friling and Troen, "Proclaiming Independence, Israel Studies, 3(1) :170-194, Spring 1998) 3. Mass Immigration: Holocaust survivors, Eastern Europe, Iraq and North Africa Sachar, History of Israel, chapt. 15 (Also: Gat, M. Between terrorism and Emigration: the case of Iraqi Jewry Israel Affairs, 7(1) :1-24) 4. State and Religion: Dowty, chapt. 8 5. Law of Return and Law of Citizenship Hacohen, D, The Law of Return as an Embodiment of the Link between Israel and the Jews of the Diaspora, Journal of Israeli History, 19(1): 61-90, 2003 6. Relations with Diaspora Jewry Liebman, C, Diapora Influence on Israel: The Ben-Gurion/Blaustein Exchange and Its Aftermath, Jewish Social Studies, 36(1): 271-280, 1974 (also: Urofsky, M, American Jewry and Israel: the First Decade and Its Implications for Today, in Lucas & Troen Israel s First Decade, chapt. 33) 4
7. Foreign Policy Orientation: Between East and West, relations with U.S.A. Bialer, U. Israel Between East and West, 1949-1956, chapt. 1-3 8. German Reparations Auerbach, Y. Ben-Gurion and Reparations from Germany, in Zweig (ed.) David Ben-Gurion and Political Leadership in Israel 9. Border Wars and the Palestinian Refugee issue Morris, chapt. 6 (also: Zaki Shalom Strategy in Debate: Arab Infiltration and Israeli Retaliation Policy in the Early 1950s, Israel Affairs, 8(3):104-117, 2002) 10. Israeli Arabs, the Military Government, and Land Policy Dowty, chapt. 9 (Also: Peretz, D. Early State Policy Towards the Arab Population, 1948-1955. New Perspectives on Israeli History, 1991 82-102. Rekhess, E. Initial Israeli Policy Guidelines Towards the Arab Minority, 1948-1949. New Perspectives on Israeli History, 1991 103-123.) 11. Suez War, 1956 Morris, chapt. 6 or Shlaim chapt. 4 12. Political Parties and the Sephardi Protest Movements Dowty, chapt. 7, and Rebhun/Waxman, chapt 3: Sammy Smooha Jewish Ethnicity in Israel (also: Yaron Tsur, Carnival Fears: Moroccan Immigrants and the Ethnic Problem in the Young State of Israel, Journal of Israeli History, 18(1): 73-104, 1997) 5
13. Aftermath of Holocaust: Kastner assassination; trial of Adolf Eichmann Ofer, D. History, Memory and Identity Perceptions of the Holocaust in Israel, in Rebhun/Waxman, chapt. 17 14. Six Day War Morris, chapt. 7 and Shlaim Chapt. 6 15. The War of Attrition 16. Gaza and West Bank under Israeli Occupation, to December 1987 (1st Intifada) Dowty, chapt. 10 (also: Sachar, chapt. 22) 17. The Origins of the Settler Movement Sprinzak, E., The Ascendance of Israel s Radical Right, chapts 3-4 18. Yom Kippur War (1973) Morris, chapt. 9 19. Sadat and the Peace Treaty with Egypt Morris, chapt. 10 or Shlaim chapt. 9 (also: Kenneth Stein, "Continuity and change in Egyptian-Israeli relations, 1973-97." Israel Affairs 3(3+4): 296-320, 1997) 20-21. First Intifada (1987), recognizing the PLO and the Oslo Agreements (1993), Second Intifada Smith, C. Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, chapts. 10-12 6
Shlaim chapt. 13, Morris chapt. 13 (also: Itamar Rabinovich, Waging Peace, chapts. 1-2) 22. Arabs, Druze and Beduin in contemporary Israeli Society Dowty, chapt. 9 (also: Rekhess, E. The Evolution of the Arab-Palestinian National Minority in Israel, Israel Studies, 12(3): 1-28, 2007) 23. Modern Israel: Religious-secular divide, Ashkenazi-Mizrachi divide Dowty, chapt 8 24. Gaza and the West Bank relations with the Palestinians since 1993; Wye, Hebron, Camp David II and Taba. 25. The Second Intifada and After 26. Current issues in the Peace Process: Jerusalem, refugees, borders, settlements and security Readings for topics 24-26 will be issued during the semester. 7