From Anti-Semitism to Anti-Zionism (JPM553)

* Please note that because of the ongoing pandemics, until further notice, this course will be taught online via ZOOM (https://cesnet.zoom.us/j/98235435552) *

Lecturer: Dr Hana Kubátová

Office Hours: online via ZOOM

Contact: hana.kubatova@fsv.cuni.cz

Moodle Course Site: https://dl1.cuni.cz/course/view.php?id=7757

Course requirements

Please note that this is a pass or fail course, and its successful completion results in a credit. In order to pass this course, students need to earn at least 80% of course requirements.

Those students who need a final grade are required to submit a research paper by the end of the course on top of their other obligations. Following my evaluation of your paper, I can provide you with a written confirmation of your grade, which you will then need to present to your home university.

With this being said, course requirements are as follows:

§ active participation (stress is on active rather than participation) 70%;

§ one in-class presentation 30%;

§ if you are a degree-seeking student, you will also need to submit a 15-pages research paper, due two weeks after the course completion. Please check with me regarding the topic.

Active participation involves reading all required readings. In-class presentations should be 10 to 15 minutes long. Team presentations (of maximum three students) are allowed if the size of the class exceeds the number of topics. Presentations consist of critical interpretations of either a scholarly article or an academic book on one of the class topics. Students should consult their reading of choice with the instructor.

Please note that students are allowed to have two absences only.

Course Schedule

Week 1: Introduction, Syllabus Reading, Distribution of In-Class Presentations

Week 2: Traditional Anti-Judaism

Required reading: Joshua Trachtenberg, The Devil and the Jews: The Medieval Conception of the Jew and its Relation to Modern Antisemitism, Skokie, Illiniois: Varda Books, 2001, pp. 11-31.

Presentation reading: Miriam S.Taylor, Anti-Judaism and Early Christian Identity: A Critique of the Scholarly Consensus. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 1995, pp. 7-21.

Week 3: Origins of Racial Anti-Semitism

Required reading: Richard Levy, Antisemitism in the Modern World: An Anthology of Texts, Lexington: DC Health and Company, 1990, pp. 49-93.

Presentation reading: William Brustein, Roots of hate: Anti-Semitism in Europe before the Holocaust ,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 2010, pp. 1-48.

Week 4: Zionism and Anti-Semitism: Road to Anti-Zionism?

Required reading: Anita Shapira, Anti-Semitism and Zionism, Modern Judaism, 15:3 (1995), pp. 215-232.

Presentation reading: Henry J. Cohn, Theodor Herzl’s Conversion to Zionism, Jewish Social Studies, 32:2 (2010), pp. 101-110.

Week 5: How German was Nazi Anti-Semitism?

Required reading: Oded Heilbronner, “German or Nazi Anti-Semitism?”, in Dan Stone (ed.), The Historiography of the Holocaust, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004, pp. 9-23.

Presentation reading: Ian Kershaw, The Nazi Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, London: Bloomsbery, 2015, Chapter 1.

Week 6: Postwar Anti-Semitism

Required reading: Pieter Lagrou, Return to a Vanished World: European Societies and the Remnants of their Jewish communities, 1945-47, in David Bankier (ed.), The Jews are Coming Back. The Return of the Jews to their Countries of Origin after WWII. Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 2005, pp. 1-24.

Presentation reading: Joanna Tokarska-Bakir, Cries of the Mob in the Pogroms in Rzeszów (June 1945), Cracow (August 1945), and Kielce (July 1946) as a Source for the State of Mind of the Participants, East European Politics & Societies. 25:3 (2011): 553-574.

Week 7: Trivialization, Revisionism, And Denial

Required reading: Michael Shermer – Alex Grobman, Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It?, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 2000, pp. 39-74.

Presentation reading: Raphaela Cohen-Almagor, Facebook and Holocaust Denial, Justice, 57 57 (2016), pp. 10-16.

Week 8: The Establishment of the State of Israel and the Origins of the Conflict

Required reading: Gregory Harms – Todd M. Ferry, The Palestine-Israel Conflict: A Basic Introduction, London: Pluto, 2005, pp. 87-116.

Presentation reading: Walter Laqueur, “Zionism and Its Liberal Critics, 1896-1948,” Journal of Contemporary History, 6:4 (1971): 161-182.

Week 9: Anti-Zionism

Required reading: Jonathan Freedland, Is Anti-Zionism Antisemitism?, Jewish Quarterly, 50:2 (2013), pp. 9-14.

Presentation reading: Charles Glass, Jews against Zion: Israeli Jewish Anti-Zionism, Journal of Palestine Studies, 5: 1-2 (1975 - 1976), pp. 56-81.

Week 10: Anti-Semitism in the Arab World and in Europe Today

Required reading: Robert Wistrich, Muslim Anti-Semitism: A Clear and Present Danger, New York: American Jewish Committee, 2002, pp. 5-10, 43-47.

Presentation reading: Edward H. Kaplan – Charles A. Small, Anti-Israel Sentiment Predicts Anti-Semitism in Europe, The Journal of Conflict Resolution, 50: 4 (2006), pp. 548-561.

Week 11: The Misuse of Antisemitism

Required reading: Norman G. Finkelstein, Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005, pp. 21-31.

Presentation reading: David Hirsh, Contemporary Left Antisemitism, London; New York: Routledge, 2018, pp. 95-134.

Week 14: Final Paper Due for Grade-Seeking Students