The history of the Jews and of Zionism have entertained a supremely ambivalent relationship with postcolonial studies. As Europeans’ most distinct and enduring ‘inner’ other, Jews were paradigmatic victims of colonialist practices and ideologies. Yet Zionism itself has often been accused of mirroring European colonialism. This immensely useful book brings much needed order to understand the tangled and ambivalent relationships between post-colonialism and the nationalist history of the Jews. More crucially, it shows that postcolonialism is a needed conceptual framework to further our understanding of the history and sociology of the Jews. This illuminating collection of texts will have a lasting impact on Israel and Jewish Studies.
