Recorded on January 17, 2024.
Dr. Geoffrey Levin from Emory University discussed his new book detailing a new history of the American Jewish relationship with Israel focused on its most urgent and sensitive issue: the question of Palestinian rights.
Purchase Dr. Levin's Book:
yalebooks.yale.edu/book/97803...
About the Book:
American Jews began debating Palestinian rights issues even before Israel’s founding in 1948. Geoffrey Levin recovers the voices of American Jews who, in the early decades of Israel’s existence, called for an honest reckoning with the moral and political plight of Palestinians. These now‑forgotten voices, which include an aid‑worker‑turned‑academic with Palestinian Sephardic roots, a former Yiddish journalist, anti‑Zionist Reform rabbis, and young left‑wing Zionist activists, felt drawn to support Palestinian rights by their understanding of Jewish history, identity, and ethics. They sometimes worked with mainstream American Jewish leaders who feared that ignoring Palestinian rights could foster antisemitism, leading them to press Israeli officials for reform. But Israeli diplomats viewed any American Jewish interest in Palestinian affairs with deep suspicion, provoking a series of quiet confrontations that ultimately kept Palestinian rights off the American Jewish agenda up to the present era. In reconstructing this hidden history, Levin lays the groundwork for more forthright debates over Palestinian rights issues, American Jewish identity, and the U.S.‑Israel relationship more broadly.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Geoffrey Levin is an assistant professor of Middle Eastern and Jewish Studies at Emory University in Atlanta and the Director of Undergraduate Engagement at Emory’s Tam Institute for Jewish Studies. Prior to joining Emory's faculty, Levin was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University's Center for Jewish Studies. He holds a PhD in Hebrew & Judaic Studies/History from New York University and studied international relations at Michigan State University, the University of Haifa, and Johns Hopkins University. Originally from Wheeling, Illinois, Levin is a recipient of the Association for Israel Studies' Kimmerling Prize and co-chairs the Israel Studies Division of the Association for Jewish Studies. His writings have appeared in the scholarly journals Israel Studies Review, Arab Studies Journal, American Jewish History, Israel Affairs, Shofar, and the Journal of Jewish Identities (forthcoming) as well as in The Forward, The Daily Beast, and The Atlantic. Our Palestine Question: Israel and American Jewish Dissent, 1948-1978, published by Yale University Press in November 2023, is his first book.
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17 янв 2024
