The Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry, Tel Aviv University, and the Department of History, Bielefeld University, hereby invite scholars to submit contributions for an edited, peer-reviewed volume on the relations between sports and religious doctrines and practices in Judaism, Christianity and Islam from late antiquity to the present.
Sporting cultures have challenged religious creeds and establishments in a number of ways: by emphasizing the physical rather than the spiritual; distracting believers from their duties; establishing rituals that substitute religious ones; and involving behaviors deemed immoral or undesired. In addressing those challenges, theologians and religious establishments have chosen one of two paths: accommodation – infusing religious meaning and hierarchies into sports; or rejection – defining religiosity through its total or partial opposition to sports.
The edited volume does not seek to answer one specific research question and does not draw on one discipline or methodology. Rather, by bringing together diverse case studies of Jewish, Christian and Muslim attitudes to sporting institutions and activities at different historical periods, it aims to present a rich perspective on how the three monotheistic religions have treated challenges different sporting activities have presented, and how they have utilized these challenges to define and re-define their essences.
Contributions already included explore, for example, how early versions of tennis played in medieval monasteries were interpreted by Christian theologians as manifestations of God’s presence in the world; the emergence of the understanding of sports as antithetical to “true” Judaism as a backbone of ultra-Orthodox Jewish creeds; and the transformation of debates on religio-legal norms regarding sports into a definer of Muslim religious identity in the West, and how these contributed to changes in Western sporting culture.
Contributions are welcomed from scholars of all relevant disciplines. Contributions from early-career scientists are encouraged. Contributions should be original, written in English, and between 7,000 to 10,000 words.
Abstracts (not more than 300 words) of proposed contributions and CVs should be sent to the editors by August 1, 2025. Decisions on potential suitability will be sent to authors within two weeks. Submissions of articles will be required by no later than January 10, 2026.
In early 2024, Amazon offered for sale an English translation of the novel The Thorn and the Carnation by Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’ leader in Gaza and the mastermind behind the October 7 attack and war crimes. Sinwar authored the novel in Arabic almost two decades earlier, when he was still a relatively unknown Hamas operative serving a life sentence in an Israeli prison for the murder of Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel.
The sale of Sinwar’s translated work on Amazon sparked protests from pro-Israel organizations and was halted within days. The protesters argued that its content incited violence, was full of antisemitic rhetoric, and promoted terrorism. They also expressed concerns that the profits from its sale would ultimately fund Hamas.[1]
After Sinwar was killed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in October 2024, becoming a “martyr” in the eyes of his supporters, his novel gained renewed attention and was marketed by sympathizers as his final testament. The novel was re-published in Arabic and was translated into Turkish, Kurdish, and Chinese. Within months, The Thorn and the Carnation became the top-selling book at book fairs in Amman, Jordan; Sulaymaniyah, Iraq; and Idlib, Syria. It also did well at book fairs in Kuwait, Algeria, and Egypt.[2]
The English translation was sold in bookstores in Switzerland, Germany, and the United States. Connolly Books in Dublin, which was founded in 1932 and describes itself as “Ireland’s oldest radical bookshop,” regarded the selling of the novel as a political mission. The store’s website praised the author, describing Sinwar as someone who was “martyred while bravely fighting against Israeli genocide in Gaza.” Potential readers were invited to “traverse the corridors of his mind, where the seeds for the heroic ‘al-Aqsa Flood’ operation initiated on October 7, 2023, were sown.”[3]
The book and its author also received positive reviews in media across the world. A month before Sinwar was killed, Sõzarn Barday, a lawyer with an interest in human rights in the Middle East, wrote in the South African weekly Mail & Guardian that the novel is “an intimate and heart-wrenching perspective on the Palestinian resistance.” She portrayed Sinwar as demonstrating leadership “through the escalating violence and genocide.”[4]
In Turkey’s Yeni Şafak daily, Selçuk Türkyılmaz wrote that “for us, reading and reflecting on [Sinwar’s] book is a duty.” He portrayed Sinwar as a “great warrior” who secured his place in history by sacrificing his life defending Muslim lands. He further described Sinwar’s biography as a source of inspiration for “Palestinians and those living in the heart of the Islamic world.”[5]
Indeed, Sinwar’s novel, largely overlooked by Hamas researchers before and oddly enough also after October 7, represents a unique attempt by a Hamas leader to provide a literary expression of his movement’s ideology.
Hamas, the “Islamic Resistance Movement in Palestine,” was founded in the Gaza Strip in late 1987 following the start of the First Intifada. It was headed by Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, a charismatic Palestinian theologian confined to a wheelchair who was inspired by the teachings of Egypt’s Islamist Muslim Brotherhood. It emerged as the self-declared Palestinian branch of the Brotherhood, aiming to offer an Islamist alternative to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).[6]
The strategic vision of Hamas, as outlined in its August 1988 charter, considers Palestine an endowment belonging to all Muslims. It calls for the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea and for the destruction of the Jewish state of Israel. It declares (article 15) that this goal can only be achieved through an armed jihad, and views jihad as a personal duty, i.e., a religio-legal duty incumbent upon every Muslim.
Permanent peace agreements with Israel are framed in the charter (Article 11) as a betrayal of Islam. Therefore, it states that no Arab state or leader has the right to relinquish even an inch of it.
The charter is an antisemitic document envisioning a world without Jews at the End of Days (Article 7). It depicts Jews as a collective as the enemy of Muslims (Article 32) and describes them as Nazis (Article 20). Echoing The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the charter accuses Jews of controlling world media and orchestrating through financial means conspiracies against humanity in general and Muslims in particular, including instigating the French Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution and forcing the start of the First World War and the Second World War (Article 22).[7]
Over the years, Hamas leaders translated these ideological tenets into a political terrorist, annihilationist program. When Yasser Arafat engaged in negotiations with Israel and signed the Oslo Accords in 1993, establishing mutual recognition and endorsing at least rhetorically the two-state solution, Hamas vowed to thwart the diplomatic process by force at any cost. The movement launched a violent terror campaign that included suicide bombings, kidnappings, shootings, and stabbings, killing hundreds of Israeli men, women, elderly, and children.
Hamas justified the killing of Israeli civilians on religious grounds, arguing that Israeli society was militaristic, rendering every Israeli a de facto soldier whose blood was permissible to spill.[8]
In 2006, following Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, democratic elections were held for the Palestinian Legislative Council, in which Hamas won. The following year, the movement forcibly seized control of Gaza, becoming the enclave’s ruling authority. Since then, the Palestinian territories in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have been divided between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, respectively.
The Middle East Quartet, the international body overseeing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, comprising the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, and Russia, set three conditions for Hamas in 2006 to be recognized as a legitimate political actor: recognizing Israel, renouncing terrorism, and accepting previously signed agreements between Israel and the PLO.[9] Hamas flatly rejected these conditions, arguing that it would not abandon its core principles or disregard the will of the Palestinian electorate who voted for the movement.[10]
In the years that followed, Hamas solidified its rule in Gaza. However, between 2013 and 2017, it faced strategic difficulties due to strained relations with Egypt. The Egyptian government accused Hamas of supporting terrorism in the Sinai Peninsula, which had claimed the lives of thousands of Egyptian security personnel.[11] Cairo tightened border restrictions at the Rafah crossing, increased efforts to uncover and destroy smuggling tunnels between Gaza and the Sinai, and even threatened to classify Hamas as a terrorist organization.
In July 2015, after the assassination of Egypt’s attorney general by jihadist operatives trained in Gaza, the Egyptian government intensified its campaign against Hamas, branding it the “military wing of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Hamas found itself increasingly isolated both regionally and internationally, facing financial hardship and eroding public support among Palestinians.
Against this backdrop, Hamas began reconsidering its policy and rhetoric to ease external and internal pressures, even drafting a new charter. Following internal debates, the movement retained the 1988 charter while publishing a supplementary ideological vision called the “Document of Principles” in May 2017. This document did not replace the original charter, which remained officially intact. Still, it favored more secular-nationalist terms such as “armed resistance”; denied any formal ties to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood; distanced itself from explicitly antisemitic rhetoric by claiming that “the struggle against the Zionist enterprise is not a religious struggle against Jews”; and expressed willingness to accept a temporary Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital based on the 1967 borders, without recognizing Israel, the Oslo Accords, or any permanent settlement based on the two-state principle.[12]
While this document did not facilitate reconciliation with the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, it paved the way for tactical understandings between Hamas and Egypt. However, the document offered no substantive change regarding its stance toward Israel. Hamas leaders had proposed since the late 1980s a temporary hudna (ceasefire) in exchange for a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, but never shifted away from their ultimate goal of liberating all of Palestine from the river to the sea, rejection of Israel’s existence, and opposition to any permanent peace agreements.[13]
Sinwar played significant roles during formative periods in Hamas’ history, both in its early days and during the challenging transitional phase of consolidating its rule in Gaza after his release from prison. Born in 1962 in Khan Yunis to a family of refugees from Majdal (Ashkelon), he studied Arabic at the Islamic University of Gaza in the early 1980s. He was arrested by Israel in 1982 and 1985 for his student activism and sentenced to short prison terms.[14]
With the establishment of Hamas, Sinwar was responsible for its internal security apparatus, al-Majd, which was tasked with identifying and killing collaborators with Israel. From this unit, the movement’s military wing later emerged. He was arrested again in 1988 and convicted in 1989 of murdering four Palestinians.
During his imprisonment, Sinwar learned Hebrew, engaged in translation from Hebrew to Arabic, wrote two so-called research books, and authored The Thorn and the Carnation, which he smuggled out of Eshel Prison in Beersheba in late 2004.
According to testimonies from Israeli prison guards, Sinwar instilled fear in fellow Palestinian inmates and acquired a special status among them. After his release in the 2011 Gilad Shalit deal, he rapidly climbed Hamas’ ranks and was elected the movement’s leader in Gaza in 2017 and 2021. Following the assassination of Hamas’ political bureau chief, Isma‘il Haniyya, by Israel in July 2024 in Tehran, Sinwar was chosen as his successor, a role he held until he was killed in a confrontation with IDF forces in Rafah in October 2024.
The Thorn and the Carnation is a fictional novel, yet there are clear parallels between the author’s life and his characters. The blend of fiction and reality is anchored in the novel’s chronological storyline, which transitions between real milestones in the conflict with Israel, including wars, agreements, intifadas, and terror attacks.
The book tells the story of a Palestinian family uprooted from its home in 1948, migrating to the Gaza Strip and struggling with life in the al-Shati refugee camp under Israeli occupation. The mother raises alone three children and two nephews who are separated from their fathers against their will. The sons are divided between different Palestinian resistance factions and disagree on their paths. Ahmad, the first-person narrator, is a science student who gradually leans toward Hamas, influenced by his cousin Ibrahim. The latter is the novel’s second protagonist, symbolically named after both Sinwar’s father and future son. Ibrahim is a Hamas operative and a student at the Islamic University of Gaza, working to instill the movement’s ideology among those around him.[15]
The Thorn and the Carnation is primarily a political essay, an ode to the violent struggle against Israel rather than an antisemitic manifesto designed to incite hatred toward Jews as such. However, precisely for this reason, the Jew-hatred that emerges from many of its pages is so revealing. It reflects, unintentionally, the deep immersion of antisemitic perceptions into Hamas’s discourse and ideology, and indeed, among a significant portion of the Palestinian public that supports the movement.
The antisemitic motifs expressed through the novel’s characters include depicting Jews as the eternal enemies of Muslims, attributing to them inherent, vile characteristics, and calling for their killing, even their annihilation.
A common antisemitic motif in Islamist discourse is the portrayal of Jews as the eternal enemies of Muslims, linking Muhammad’s 7th-century conflict with the Jews of the Arabian Peninsula to Hamas’s present-day struggle against Jews in Israel. A particularly popular Islamic tradition that recurs throughout Sinwar’s book is the Battle of Khaybar in 628, during which Muslims defeated the Jews of the city and forced them to surrender half of their property to avoid conversion to Islam.
In descriptions of violent clashes between Palestinians and the IDF, the book repeatedly invokes the chant “Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, Muhammad’s army will return!” in various contexts: Gaza youths celebrating after damaging the tires of Israeli military vehicles;[16] Arab and Muslim demonstrators rallying in support of the intifada in their capital cities outside Palestine;[17] and a young man named Muhammad, preparing for a suicide attack in Gush Etzion, calling his proud mother for a final farewell and leaving his cellphone line open so she could witness the moment of his martyrdom:
He shouted ‘Allah Akbar, I am heading to Khaybar’ and threw his bombs one by one. Then he stormed the main hall, firing… A firefight ensued, with the forces rushing to the scene. Muhammad fell and repeated: ‘I testify that there is no God but Allah, and I testify that Muhammad is His messenger.’ Then a wail escaped his mother’s lips as she said: ‘Praise be to Allah, who honored me with his martyrdom.’[18]
The book presents the inherent and unchanging evil of Jews as an explanation for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, selectively drawing from Islamic sources. For example, Baruch Goldstein’s 1994 massacre of 29 Muslim worshipers in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron is depicted as representative of Jewish behavior rather than as an individual act of terrorism that was widely and unequivocally condemned in Israel at the time.
According to the novel, Goldstein’s attack occurred just after the imam recited a Quranic verse condemning Jewish violence and evil from the days of the First and Second Temples: “We decreed to the Children of Israel in the Scripture: ‘Twice you will spread corruption in the land and become highly arrogant’” (Quran 17:4). The moment after, the novel describes how a settler, “a tall man with a wild, dirty beard,” snuck into the mosque and opened fire on the worshipers.[19]
The novel’s opposition to the Oslo Accords is also justified through the alleged treachery that characterizes Jews as a whole. In one debate between the protagonists, Hassan, a Hamas supporter, challenges Mahmud, a Fatah supporter: “Since when have [the Jews] honored agreements and treaties?” He then cites a verse from the Quran, commonly interpreted as referring to the Jews’ betrayal of their covenant with Muhammad and their support for the infidels: “How is it that whenever they make a covenant or pledge, some of them throw it away? In fact, most of them do not believe” (Quran 2:100).[20]
Mahmud, however, refuses to be convinced, accusing Hassan of irrationality and of conflating the Jews of the past with those of today. In response, Hassan asserts that it is only a matter of time before Fatah members realize that Jews have deceived and manipulated them, just as they did to Muslims in the early days of Islam, when they “killed innocent people and fought against Allah and His messenger.” He insists:
This is what Allah has told us about them. We know them, their souls, and the way they operate. They do not honor covenants or agreements… Do you not understand that history repeats itself, and the Jews are the Jews? You will see, Mahmud. You will see, and I will remind you—if we survive.[21]
The terms “Jews” and “Israel” are used interchangeably throughout the novel. However, the hatred toward Jews does not stem solely from their role as representatives of the oppressive and occupying “Zionist entity,” which has allegedly violated Palestinian national rights. Instead, it is rooted in their very religious identity.
One example presented in the book is an attack in Gaza on an Israeli military vehicle, which later turned out to have been manned by Israeli Druze soldiers. Although Druze are described in the book as violent and immoral, having allegedly abused young Palestinian women, the Hamas adherents in the story express disappointment and sorrow when they realize they had targeted Druze instead of Jews. “If only they had been Jews!!” Ibrahim sighs to himself as he watches the victims’ mothers, sisters, and wives weeping on television.[22]
The novel’s portrayal of Jews as the perpetual enemies of Muslims, depicted as inherently vile and incapable of peaceful coexistence, leads to a desire for their mass extermination. Toward the book’s conclusion, just before Israel assassinates him, Ibrahim recalls “The Promise of the Stones and the Trees,” a Prophetic tradition cited in Hamas’ charter that encourages the killing of Jews on Judgment Day: “The Prophet of Allah said: The Hour will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews, and the Muslims will kill them, until the Jews hide behind stones and trees, and the stones and trees will say: ‘O Muslim, O servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him,’ except for the Gharqad tree, for it is the tree of the Jews.”[23]
This tradition, ultimately, was Sinwar’s personal wish and mission.
The seeds of devastation sprout from the pages of the novel, where literary expressions align with the operational agenda that materialized on October 7: the glorification of sacrificing life in the path of jihad against Israel as a sacred value and a supreme goal, despite its high costs; the aspiration to kill as many Israelis as possible, indiscriminately targeting soldiers and civilians alike; approval of kidnapping and hostage-taking attacks as a means to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners; and the ambition to thwart peace and normalization agreements between Israel and its Arab neighbors through violent means, while rejecting the political path associated with the Palestinian Authority.
Hamas named the October 7 attack, directed primarily against southern Israel, as the “al-Aqsa Flood.” By placing Jerusalem at the forefront, Hamas sought to give the campaign a religious-Islamic character, expressing its vision and ultimate strategic goal: recruiting Arabs and Muslims to the liberation of the entire sacred land of Palestine, with al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam, at its heart, through an uncompromising religious war.
This ideology is fully reflected in Sinwar’s novel. The narrator shares a formative event from his youth as a high school student in Gaza, when he first visited al-Aqsa Mosque in the late 1970s, at a time when access from Gaza to Israel was largely unrestricted. The tour was organized by the “Islamic Bloc,” later Hamas’ student movement, and was guided by cousin Ibrahim.
On the way to Jerusalem, their bus stopped in the Latrun area, where Ibrahim, teary-eyed, lifted a handful of soil, claiming it was soaked in the pure blood of the Prophet Muhammad’s Companions, who, according to tradition, fought there in 637 under the command of Abu ‘Ubayda Ibn al-Jarrah during the conquest of the land. He expressed his wish that the soil would mix with the blood of today’s Palestinians, the rightful successors of those ancient Muslim warriors, until liberation was achieved.[24]
The peak of the journey came, of course, when the students entered al-Aqsa Mosque. They prayed at the site, listened to the Friday sermon, visited the Dome of the Rock, and heard the story of the Prophet’s night journey to the city.
While absorbing the sanctity of the place, they noticed an intolerable injustice: Israeli soldiers controlled the access to the site, deciding who could enter and who could not. At that moment, they were filled with rage, wondering how the enormous Islamic nation that stood behind the Palestinians, despite its wealth and armies, had failed to liberate the al-Aqsa from the “gangs” that had seized it. Then, the narrator testifies, they realized that “the struggle had other dimensions than we had known. It was not just about territory and displaced people, but a war of faith and religion.”[25]
For the protagonists of the novel, the outrage over the oppression in al-Aqsa and what they call Palestine had to be translated into violent action, into jihad for the defense of the holy site and the liberation of the land, with a willingness to sacrifice life in the footsteps of Islam’s heroes, from the Prophet Muhammad’s time, through Saladin during the Crusades, to the present day.[26]
At times, the ideal of sacrifice took on faces and names, such as when a friend or relative of Ibrahim and Ahmad lost their life in the struggle against Israel. In one case, the grief over the death of a friend named Yasser was mixed with joy that God had honored him with martyrdom (shahada), and the mourning tent was filled with ululations, sweets, and large, colorful posters of the fallen fighter.[27] In another instance, Ibrahim’s wife is described as having “a smile that never left her face” upon receiving the news of her husband’s assassination by an Israeli airstrike.[28]
For Sinwar, Palestinian lives, let alone Israeli lives, are not sacred. In fact, the October 7 massacre pales in comparison to some of the fantasies voiced by the characters in The Thorn and the Carnation. The book describes how, during the 1991 First Gulf War, there was anticipation in Gaza that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would launch chemical warheads and wipe out half of Israel’s population (about five million people at the time). Thus, when the air raid sirens first blared, Palestinians cheered for the Iraqi leader: “With spirit and blood, we will redeem you, O Saddam… O Saddam, beloved, strike, strike Tel Aviv.” However, when they learned that the missiles carried only conventional explosives, frustration set in: “It was as if ice water had been poured over us.”[29]
Having been disappointed in their hopes of killing millions of Israeli civilians with chemical weapons, the characters in Sinwar’s novel settled for smaller-scale murders, yet their objective remained the same: to make the occupiers “curse the day they came to our land and took over our sacred sites.”[30]
The novel glorifies a series of shooting, bombing, and suicide attacks from the early Oslo years through the Second Intifada, including the shooting of a father and his children at a hitchhiking station in the West Bank as they traveled to a religious school in Jerusalem;[31] the October 1994 bombing of Dan Bus Line 5 on Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv, which killed 22 and injured 104;[32] the January 1995 Beit Lid junction bombing, which killed 22 and wounded 66;[33] the June 2001 Dolphinarium nightclub bombing in Tel Aviv, where 21 young people were killed and about 120 injured;[34] the Sbarro restaurant bombing in Jerusalem, where 16 were killed and 140 wounded; and the first mortar and Qassam rocket attacks on settlements in the Gaza Strip and Israeli communities surrounding it.[35]
The Palestinian attacks deep inside Israel’s territory, including major cities like Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Netanya, and Ashdod, are portrayed in the book as proof of Palestinians’ ability to inflict heavy damage on their enemy despite its military superiority. According to the narrator, these attacks resulted in many achievements: they sowed panic among the occupiers, deepened divisions in Israeli society over the peace process, emptied Israeli streets, shuttered shops, and left cafés and restaurants deserted. Only a handful of Israelis dared use public transportation. Sandbags appeared in shopping centers, making Israeli cities resemble military outposts with checkpoints and thousands of soldiers and police officers.[36]
Anyone looking at the devastation in Gaza following the October 7 War may wonder whether Sinwar would have carried out the massacre had he known its consequences in advance. Based on his novel, the answer seems to be positive.
His protagonists justify the heavy toll paid by Palestinians for their terrorist acts during the Second Intifada. At one point, Ibrahim scoffs at calls for Hamas to lay down its arms and allow Palestinians to live in peace, joking that after Israel assassinated Hamas operatives, invaded Palestinian cities, and left them in ruins, the only thing left for Israel to do was rebuild them, so it would have something to destroy again in the future.[37]
Another issue that draws a direct line between the novel and the October 7 attack is Sinwar’s keen interest, as expressed in his book written while in prison, in hostage-taking and bargaining attacks to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners. The Jibril deal, in which 1,151 Palestinian prisoners were released in 1985 in exchange for three IDF captives in Lebanon, is described in the novel as a moment of joy in the Palestinian territories, as well as a boost to the national struggle.[38]
The novel also provides a detailed account of two kidnapping operations for which Hamas was responsible: the 1992 abduction of Border Police officer Nissim Toledano, intended to secure the release of Sheikh Yassin, which ended in Toledano’s murder and the expulsion of 415 Hamas operatives to Lebanon;[39] and the 1994 kidnapping of soldier Nachshon Wachsman, aimed at securing the release of 500 Palestinian prisoners, including Sheikh Yassin, which ended in a failed IDF rescue operation.[40]
One of Sinwar’s objectives in launching the October 7 attack was to derail the normalization agreement that was on the verge of being signed between Israel and Saudi Arabia.[41] The agreement was expected to grant Israel recognition from the country where Islam originated, draw additional Arab and Muslim states into the circle of peace, and shatter Hamas’ hopes of uniting the Muslim nation in a struggle to eliminate the Jewish state.
The novel Sinwar authored extensively addresses the divide between the Arab-Palestinian strategic choice of peace on one end and Hamas’ unwavering commitment to armed struggle and rejection of any permanent settlement with the Jewish state on the other. The roots of this divide trace back to the peace initiative of Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat. According to the novel’s account, the speech delivered by Sadat at the Knesset in November 1977 sparked shock and opposition among the Palestinian people. In an act of protest, Palestinian terrorists assassinated Egyptian journalist Yusuf al-Siba‘i, a close associate of Sadat who had accompanied his delegation on the visit to Israel.[42]
Several of the novel’s conversations depict the intense debate between PLO activists, seeking peace agreements with Israel for pragmatic reasons, and Hamas activists, who adamantly reject political compromises and prefer to establish a sovereign reality not bound by permanent agreements that go beyond hudna. They state: “Israel is an oppressive state that was established on our land and should cease to exist.”[43]
The novel’s protagonists categorically reject the claim that the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian entity necessitates acceptance of Israel’s existence. In a conversation between Mahmud, a PLO supporter, and Ibrahim, the latter insists that a Palestinian state can be established without recognizing Israel’s territorial rights over any part of the land.
Several years before the Israeli implementation of the disengagement plan and Hamas’ takeover of Gaza, Ibrahim, one of the novel’s protagonists, had already predicted that the killing of hundreds of Israelis by Palestinian resistance will pressure Israel into a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza and the West Bank, paving the way for a Palestinian state in the liberated territories, without requiring Palestinian recognition of the Jewish state.[44] When Mahmud asks about the difference between a withdrawal conditioned on recognizing Israel and an unconditional withdrawal, Ibrahim replies that if Israel leaves the Palestinian lands without an agreement and under the pressure of resistance, the door to continuing their struggle will remain open whenever circumstances allow.[45]
Not accidentally, Sinwar does not mention in the novel the names of Yasser Arafat or other Fatah leaders, and ignores events such as their dramatic return to the West Bank and Gaza, while mentioning Hamas leaders like Ahmad Yassin and Yahya ‘Ayyash and the major terror attacks carried out by the movement. The Egyptian columnist Sami al-Buhayri wrote in January 2025 in this context that reading The Thorn and the Carnation “proved to him beyond any doubt that Hamas, like all extremist ideological organizations, will not accept any [Palestinian] partner in governance.” [46]
The novel also demonstrates Hamas’ refusal to accept the agreements signed between the PLO and Israel and the authorities granted to the Palestinian Authority based on those agreements. The technical argument presented in the book by Hamas-affiliated characters for this position is that Palestinian opposition factions do not consider themselves bound by agreements they did not sign, especially since the PLO did not consult them before signing or approve them through a public referendum.[47]
According to the novel, this argument adds to Hamas’ fundamental rejection of the agreement’s terms, which include ending violent resistance, establishing relations of cooperation, coordination and security liaison with Israel, and, worse of all, recognizing the so-called Zionist entity’s right to control most of Mandatory Palestine under broad international guarantees.[48] In one episode, Ibrahim is summoned for interrogation at the Palestinian Preventive Security offices. An official explains the new reality in which there is one legitimate Palestinian Authority, which has signed internationally backed agreements with Israel, and warns him that he will be arrested if he does not comply with its regulations. In response, Ibrahim accuses the official of collaborating with Israel’s scheme to divide the Palestinians into two groups: one committed to the agreements and the other to the resistance. At the same time, he emphasizes that Palestinian national goals will not be achieved through negotiations but only through armed struggle, as “our enemies understand only the language of the rifle and fire.”[49]
In one of the debates presented in the novel, Mahmud, the PLO supporter, accuses Hamas of carrying out attacks in order to take unjustified credit for prospective Israeli territorial withdrawals enabled by the Oslo Process. The response he receives is that there is no reason for Palestinians to wait for an Israeli withdrawal based on bilateral agreements since the Zionists are bound to “flee under the pressure of resistance” from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank anyway.[50]
When examining the ideological continuity between the novel and the October 7 massacre, one concludes that the seeds of that attack were sown not only in Sinwar’s operational planning but also in his literary work. Thus, to the series of failures by Israeli decision-makers, intelligence agencies, and academic researchers before October 7, one must add the insufficient attention given to literary texts that could have served as a stark warning.
That a novel written by a murderous antisemitic psychopath is being sold and glorified today on the streets of European capitals without any penalty is another warning sign that is being ignored.
Dr. Ofir Winter, with contribution from Niv Shayovich
[2] “Yahya Sinwar’s Novel ‘The Thorn and the Carnation’ is a Best Seller at Jordan Exhibition after His Martyrdom [Arabic],” Masr Times, October 19, 2024, https://www.masrtimes.com/448127, and Nizar
al-Rihani, “Translated into Turkish: The First Edition of Yahya Sinwar’s Novel is Sold Out [Arabic],” Bawabat Tunis, April 29, 2024, https://tinyurl.com/2whm6spt.
[10] Gilead Sher, Liran Ofek, and Ofir Winter, “The Hamas Document of Principles: Can a Leopard Change Its Spots?,” Strategic Assessment 20, no. 2 (July 2017), 85-98.
[11] Jony Essa and Ofir Winter, “On the 40th Anniversary of Israel’s Withdrawal from Sinai: Is the Peninsula Becoming Integrated into Egypt?,” INSS Special Publication (May 19, 2022), https://www.inss.org.il/publication/sinai/.
[12] Sher, Ofek, and Winter, “The Hamas Document of Principles,” 85-98.
[13] Shavit and Winter, Zionism in Arab Discourses, 53-54.
Hundreds of leading media organizations across the globe and in Israel covered last week our Annual Antisemitism Worldwide Report, authored jointly by the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, both at TAU. Many media organizations noted that the Report, now in its 25th year, is considered the most cited and authoritative publication of its kind. We take the opportunity to thank again the research team and all involved in working on this flagship TAU study.
On Wednesday, March 5, 2025, the Center hosted Rabbi Zamir Isayev, the Chief Rabbi and Chairman of the Sephardi Jewish Community of Baku, Azerbaijan. Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, and Dr. Carl Yonker, the Center’s Senior Researcher, discussed various topics related to Jewish life in Azerbaijan. They touched on the rich history of Jews in Azerbaijan and on community life in the country today, including education in Jewish schools and the makeup of the community, estimated at 30,000.
Ethnic or Religious?
On Friday, February 14, 2025, the Center, together with the Friends Association of Tel Aviv University and Think & Drink Different, hosted a seminar, Ethnic or Religious? The Path of Israeli Politics from “The National Camp” to “The Faith Camp.” The seminar commemorates the publication of Prof. Uriya Shavit’s (Head of the Center) new book, The Jewish War (Yedioth Books, 2025 [in Hebrew]). The event was held in Hebrew.
In the News: For A Righteous Cause 2025
On Monday, January 27, 2025, the Center released its fourth annual For a Righteous Cause Report. The report documents and analyzes some of the past year’s most important developments and initiatives to preserve Jewish heritage, teach about the Holocaust, and combat antisemitism and other forms of racism. It has been widely covered in the press in Israel and abroad, including being the featured article in the Jerusalem Post’s Weekend Magazine and the Report’s cover serving as the cover of the Magazine as well. Below are links to some of the coverage the report has received.
On January 9, 2025, the Center, together with the Chaim Weizmann Institute for the Study of Zionism and Israel, hosted a seminar commemorating the publication of Prof. Orit Rozin’s new book, “Emotions of Conflict: Israel 1949-1967” (Oxford University Press, 2024).
In the News: Antisemitism Worldwide Report
Hundreds of media organizations in Israel and across the world have reported in depth on their frontpages, homepages, and editorials on the Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2023, published by TAU’s Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and The Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Human Rights and Justice.
Below are some highlights as provided by TAU’s media office.
From February 21-23, 2024, a group of young researchers from Israel and Germany came together in Dresden to discuss, compare, and advance research on hate. The conference aimed to better understand the phenomenon of hate, its forms and context of origin, and to situate it politically, socially and culturally. It further strove to provide a space to form relationships and inspire further study on the topic of hate.
The three-day conference was a joint initiative of the German Israeli Foundation (GIF), our Center at Tel Aviv University, and the Technical University of Dresden (TUD). It received additional support from the Science Ministry of the State of Saxony and the Mercator Forum Migration and Democracy (MIDEM). The primary organization for the conference were made by PD Dr. Jörg Sonntag of TUD and Dr. Maik Herold of TUD and MIDEM, who invested several months in planning to ensure the workshop’s success.
The opening ceremony began with speeches from Prof. Dr. Ursula Staudinger, the Rector of TU-Dresden, Sebastian Gemkow, the Minister of Science of the State of Saxony, Dr. Eric Zimmerman, the Director of the German-Israeli Foundation, Mr. Thomas Feist, the Representative for Jewish Life in Saxony, Prof. Dr. Hans Vorländer, the Director of MIDEM, and PD Dr. Sonntag of TU-Dresden.
Their opening remarks were followed by a lecture by Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, titled “Where is all this hate coming from?” In his lecture, Prof. Shavit identified three major reasons for the increased visibility of hate: cognitive dissonance, a gap between life and its perception; the unfiltered world of social media with algorithms that promote echo chambers, and the focus of politics on polls and surveys, which, in consequence, promotes centrism and excludes alternative voices from mainstream politics.
Participating researchers came from different academic disciplines like philosophy, political science, sociology, and literature, leading to a wide array of approaches to the central topic. The focus of the lectures ranged from Francesco Petrarca and Plutarch to an analysis of the delegitimization of political enemies, huaman shields in Islam, and the rise of Kahanism in Israel.
The workshop was divided into four sessions, each of which examined different themes related to the main topic. The first session explored historical and philosophical perspectives on hate that provided a framework for the sessions that followed. The second session focused on antisemitism, the oldest hatred, exploring its historical and contemporary manifestations. The third session broadened the discussion on hate beyond antisemitism to explore global perspectives on the politics of extremism in different contexts. The final session of the workshop featured lectures focused on contemporary manifestations of hate in the Middle East.
Beyond the stimulating lectures and discussions in the seminar room, the schedule also included several excursions. A tour of Dresden’s beautiful old town included stops at the Frauenkirche, the hub of Lutheranism, destroyed in the firebombing of the city at the end of the Second World War and rebuilt in the early 2000s, and the Green Vault, a museum housing Europe’s largest collection of treasures in Dresden Castle. The tour concluded with an opening dinner at a cellar of an Italian restaurant in Dresden. The following day, participants took a guided tour of the concentration camp Buchenwald where they learned about its history and the history of concentration camps in Nazi Germany during the Second World War. The final excursion included a visit to Königsstein Fortress in the national park of Swiss Saxony where participants had a guided tour and learned about the important role the fortress played in the history of the region.
On Sunday, December 8, 2024, Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, spoke to the education department of Yad Vashem, The World Holocaust Remembrance Center, on antisemitism in the Muslim World and the challenges of teaching the history of the Shoah in Muslim societies and communities.
Call for Papers – Hate
Call for Papers – Hate
Workshop, TU Dresden, 21-23 February 2024
General Framework
Hate has become a strong currency in contemporary liberal democracies. Its growing presence is reflected in the rise of radical groups that thrive on intolerance, racial prejudice and resistance of liberal values, in the prosperity of conspiracy theories, and in the popularity of political rhetoric of anger, despair and conflict.
Where is all this hate coming from, and why now? Which expressions does it utilize, which societal contexts and historical roots does it draw on? What can be done to limit its destructive effects? The purpose of the three-day seminar is to promote a better understanding of the phenomenon of hate through interdisciplinary, comparative discussion by young and promising German and Israeli scientists.
This workshop has resulted from a joint initiative of the German-Israeli Foundation (GIF), Tel Aviv University (TAU) and the Technical University of Dresden (TUD). The aim is to better understand the phenomenon of hatred, its forms and contexts of origin, and to situate it politically, socially and culturally. To this end, we invite young German and Israeli researchers to Dresden in February 2024.
Rational and Scope
The workshop has two points of departure. First, hate is an integral part of the human experience and social reality, yet under certain conditions and contexts, its manifestations expand and its disruptive and destructive impacts grow.
Second, understanding hate-phenomena calls for an interdisciplinary approach that examines in historical, comparative and integrated perspectives a plethora of psychological, sociological, cultural, political, technological and judicial developments.
For example, the understanding of the role social media platforms play in disseminating hate speech in our time should be informed by analyses of the role other technological transformations played in the past in facilitating similar phenomena, the psychological functions new technologies serve in comparison to traditional ones, the social and political conditions in which the affects of those technologies take place, and the suitability of existing legal frameworks to address new challenges they create.
We hope that a better, integrated and comparative understanding of hate phenomena will have practical implications and encourage fresh thinking about the means to moderate and eradicate existing expressions and actions.
The aim of the workshop is to constitute a group of young scholars from different disciplines and backgrounds who can inspire each other about the study of hate. The publication of the workshop presentations in a special issue of an international journal is planned.
Call
The organisers welcome applications from young scholars from various disciplines, including history, philosophy, political science, psychology, education, gender studies, criminology, media studies, law and migration studies. We particularly appreciate research papers with comparative or interdisciplinary approaches. Papers will be scheduled for 20 minutes, followed by 30 minutes of discussion.
While we will welcome also presentations of case-studies, priority will be given to scholars who intend to present research that involves comparative or interdisciplinary approaches.
The language of the workshop will be English. Travel and accommodation costs will be covered. In addition, an accompanying programme is planned, including a guided tour of the historical monuments of Dresden and a visit to the Buchenwald concentration camp.
We kindly ask you to send us an abstract (up to 600 words) and a short academic CV with contact details (e-mail, telephone, postal address). Please send your applications to: hass-workshop@tu-dresden.de by 30 November 2023.
Coordination
Prof. Dr. Uriya Shavit (Head of the Center for Contemporary European Jewry Studies, the Cotler Institute for Democracy, Human Rights and Justice and the SDU-TAU Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies)
PD Dr. Jörg Sonntag (Interim-Chair for Medieval History, Institute of History, TU Dresden)
Dr. Carl Yonker (Project Manager of the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry, TAU)
Dr. Maik Herold (Senior Researcher at Mercator Forum Migration and Democracy, Institute of Political Sciences, TU Dresden)
The Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Human Rights, Democracy and Justice invite you to watch our seminars on Israel at war:
Israel at War (1)
Strategic Perspectives and Practical Tools in Fight for International Public Opinion
Prof. Uriya Shavit, Tel Aviv University: Hamas – What they Want and Why They Endanger Civilization
Gen. (Ret). Danny Yatom, Former Head of the Mossad: Israel at War – A Strategic Perspective
Dr. Carl Yonker, Tel Aviv University: Using Social Media to Help Fight Evil
Israel at War (2)
Fighting 21st-Century Nazism
Prof. Uriya Shavit, Tel Aviv University: The War – Social and Political Implications
Gen. (retired) Danny Yatom, Former Head of the Mossad: The War So Far – A Strategic Perspective
Dr. Carl Yonker, Tel Aviv University: The Ideology and Strategic Ambitions of Hizballah
Israel at War (3)
Noah Abrahams, Former BBC Journalist: Why I Resigned from the BBC
Dr. Hay Eytan Yanarocak, MDC-Tel Aviv University & JISS: Turkey, Hamas, and the War against Israel
Shiven Nath, Former Irwin Cotler Institute Fellow, Tel Aviv University: India – Official and Public Opinion on the War
Dr. Carl Yonker, Tel Aviv University: The American Radical Right and the War
Q & A
Israel at War: The Challenges for Jewish Communities
Opening Words
Prof. Youval Rotman, Tel Aviv University
The Challenges for Jewish Communities: Introductory Remarks
Prof. Uriya Shavit, Tel Aviv University
Speakers
Dr. Mia Spiro, University of Glasgow
Prof. Arieh Dubnov, George Washington University
Dr. Aleksandra Gliszczyńska-Grabias, Polish Academy of Sciences
Mr. Ronen Bahar, Head, Jewish Community of Oslo
In the News: Antisemitism Worldwide Report
On Monday, April 17, 2023, the Center released its annual report on the state of antisemitism worldwide. The publication of the report has been widely covered in the international and Israeli press. Below are links to some of the coverage the report has received in English, Hebrew, and other languages.
On Thursday, January 26, 2023, the Center published its annual For a Righteous Cause Report . The report documents and analyzes some of the year’s most important developments and initiatives to preserve Jewish heritage, teach about the Holocaust, and combat antisemitism and other forms of racism. The publication has been widely covered in the press in Israel and abroad. Below are links to some of coverage the report has received.
Center Concludes Its Academic Year with Gil Hovav’s Inspiring Lecture
The Center concluded its activities for this academic year and its International Identity Seminar with a real treat – an inspiring, humorous and instructive lecture delivered by Gil Hovav, great grandson of the reviver of the Hebrew Language, Eliezer Ben Yehuda. Hovav, an author and television personality, shared the personal family stories that are behind one of the greatest cultural achievements of the modern era.
The Identity Seminar, which began in May, engaged students with the “big questions” Israeli society faces through field trips and discussions. Among other destinations, the students visited the Sea of Galilee and Gan Hashlosha, Kibbutz Lohamei Ha-Getaot and the Beit Shean National Park.
The program was attended by 25 international students from diverse disciplines and countries, including India, Peru, South Sudan, Italy, Poland, Britain, Ethiopia, Mexico, South Korea, the United States, Argentina, Kenya, Slovakia, Canada, China, Germany and Guatemala. Mauricio Robles Cortes, a Security and Diplomacy Master’s student from Mexico, said that the trips and discussions were a “great experience” that enabled him and others to gain a “broader perspective of Israel which cannot be understood without knowing the historical places we visited.”
Another student, Uwar Mathew Donato from South Sudan, noted that the seminar trips provided him the opportunity to learn more about Jewish history and about the different voices that define Jewish identity in modern times.
A view of Gan HaShlosha
Tour of Beit Shean National Park
Center Concludes Pioneering So The World May Know Seminar
On August 3, the Center concluded its pioneering So the World May Know Seminar with a group of Tel Aviv University international students from across the globe, including Ecuador, India, Ethiopia, Mexico, Germany, Kenya, and Argentina. The two-month Seminar, serving as a pilot for a broader program currently under development, explored central topics related to the Holocaust and antisemitism, and provided participants with practical tools to organize and give workshops in their home countries on the means to fight antisemitism and racism at large.
Reflecting on his experience, Mateo Maya, a Security and Diplomacy Master’s student from Ecuador, said that the lectures he attended provided “a unique experience to understand in a more detailed way some aspects of Jewish history, the Holocaust, and testimonies of Holocaust survivors.” Similarly, Anusha Datta, a documentary filmmaker from India pursuing her master’s degree in film at TAU, said the seminar was “an enriching experience that was successful in condensing an expansive scope of history in a format that made it accessible to international students.”
As several other participants, Mateo and Anusha have already begun working on the workshops they intend to give this fall to university students, educators and officials in their home countries.
Jewish Sports Clubs in Germany Before and After the Holocaust
Over the course of the academic year, Dr. Yoval Rubovitch, the recipient of our 2022 research grant, has worked on a project on Jewish sports clubs before and after the Holocaust.
Dr. Rubovitch’s work highlights, among other things, similarities and differences between the current German-Jewish sports association “Makkabi Deutschland” and its predecessor “Deutscher Makkabikreis,” which existed before the Holocaust.
Before the Second World War, Makkabi took upon itself the role of granting Jewish youth a refuge from antisemitism through sports, giving them a sense of Jewish nationhood, a Zionist education, preparing them for emigration to Palestine/land of Israel, and ultimately, the saving of thousands of Jewish lives by helping to organize this emigration through cooperation with other Jewish movements.
Today, Makkabi Deutschland is open to all, Jews and non-Jews alike. The more universalistic approach reflects the vastly different circumstances of German Jews today compared to the 1920s and 1930s, and differentiates it from its predecessor.
However, as in the past, antisemitism remains a threat in Germany, which affects the association’s aims and objectives. Fighting antisemitism is a core part of the association and distinguishes it from other clubs and associations. It seeks to fight antisemitism in Germany – first, by identifying the reasons it exists in German society, particularly among football and sports clubs, and second, by combatting it through education and sports activities.
In addition, Zionism and Zionist ideology still play a major role in Makkabi Deutschland’s identity. The association actively cultivates connections to the state of Israel but, in contrast to the old Deutscher Makkabikreis, does not actively try to convince and prepare young Jews to make Aliyah.
An End to Antisemitism!
An End to Antisemitism!
An End to Antisemitism! is a five-volume series published by De Gruyter that brings together more than one-hundred internationally renowned experts to address different aspects of the problem of antisemitism. The studies published in the collection resulted from an international conference held in Vienna, Austria, in 2018 that was organized by the University of Vienna, New York University, Tel Aviv University, and the European Jewish Congress. Prof. Dina Porat, the Center’s Founding Head, served as co-editor of the volumes together with Armin Lange, Kerstin Mayerhofer, and Lawrence H. Schiffman.
The volumes are Open Access and available for download as PDF files on the De Gruyter website here. Printed copies can also be purchased from De Gruyter at the same link.
Pioneering Identity Field Workshop Launched
On May 1, the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry at Tel Aviv University launched its pioneering Identity Workshop, in which international students explore Israeli and Jewish histories and realities through field trips across the country.
The program is attended by 25 international students from diverse academic disciplines and countries, including India, Peru, South Sudan, Italy, Poland, Britain, Ethiopia, Mexico, South Korea, the United States, Argentina, Kenya, Slovakia, Canada, Germany, and Guatemala.
The first field trip included a guided visit to the Ghetto Fighters Museum in Northern Israel followed by a discussion of the socio-historical roots of Nazi barbarism; a meeting with the Christian-Aramean community in Gush Halav, in which its quest for recognition was debated; and a visit to the Sea of Galilee. More exciting and informative field trips and discussions will follow.
Participants at the Ghetto Fighters Museum
Hearing about Adolf Eichmann at the Ghetto Fighters Museum
Hearing about the Christian-Aramean community in Gush Halav
View of the Sea of Galilee
Participants at the Ghetto Fighters Museum discussing the Righteous Among the Nations
In the News: Antisemitism Worldwide Report
On Wednesday, April 27, 2022, the Center released its annual report on the state of antisemitism worldwide. The publication of the report has been widely covered in the international and Israeli press. Below are links to some of the coverage the report has received in English, Hebrew, and other languages.
Channel 13 News Update (Israel)Discussion on Antisemitism Worldwide report on Israel’s Kan network
Cyprus Top-Officials Attend Center’s First-of-its-Kind Seminar on Antisemitism
On March 15-16, our Center led a seminar and training for 25 high-ranking Cypriot law enforcers and other top Cypriot public officials in Nicosia. The seminar, which gained wide coverage in the local media, was initiated and organized by the Israeli Foreign Ministry and the Embassy of Israel in Cyprus, together with the Cypriot Ministry for Justice and Public Order.
Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, gave lectures on the history of Zionism and the reasons for the current-day proliferation of destructive conspiracy theories. Dr. Dina Porat, Founding Head of the Center, spoke about the history of antisemitism and the legal means of fighting it. Dr. Carl Yonker, Researcher and Media Director at the Center, discussed the Dark Web and antisemitism in the American and European far-right and far-left movements.
In the opening ceremony, Cyprus Minister of Justice, Stephie Dracos, emphasized racism and discrimination must be dealt with immediately and effectively. Stylianos Papatheodorou, Cyprus Police Chief, spoke on the importance of the seminar in raising awareness about the Holocaust among members of the police and relevant ministries and institutions in Cyprus. Israel’s Ambassador to Cyprus, Oren Anolik, noted that learning about the historical roots of antisemitism helps understand its manifestations today.
Prof. Shavit noted the recent public statement of the leading researches of the Center, who condemned the war crimes committed under the directives of Vladimir Putin, as well as Putin’s cynical distortion of the Holocaust.
The participants in this first-of-its-kind seminar expressed their deep appreciation for the opportunity to gain knowledge and tools to help them in their jobs as frontline law enforcers. Maria Efren from the Operations Office Nicosia stated that the seminar provided her with practical knowledge on identifying antisemitism, as well as techniques and tools for investigating online antisemitism. Michalis Angelides, the Safety and Security Officer of the Cyprus Football Association, expressed how important the seminar was to him in providing practical tools to apply in his current role.
At the end of the seminar, participants were awarded a certificate of participation by Themistos Arnaoutis, Chief Superintendent Director of the Cyprus Police Academy, and Noga Caspi, Deputy Head of Mission of the Israel Embassy in Nicosia.
Prof. Shavit thanked the Cyprus Police for their exceptional hospitality and keen interest. He congratulated the Israeli embassy in Cyprus on the superb organization of the seminar, and Ruth Cohen Dar, Director of the Foreign Office Department for Combating Antisemitism and for Holocaust Remembrance, for her dedicated efforts and pioneering initiative.
Prof. Uriya Shavit presents Themistos Arnaoutis, Chief Superintendent Director of the Cyprus Police Academy, with a gift
Israel’s Ambassador to Cyprus, Oren Anolik, makes opening remarks
Cypriot law enforcers and officials during one of the seminar sessions
Noga Caspi, Deputy Head of Mission of the Israel Embassy in Nicosia, presents one of the seminar participants with a certificate
Statement on Russian War Crimes and Holocaust Distortion
We condemn Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and the cowardly war crimes committed under the directives of Vladimir Putin.
The fascist-styled aggression stands against some of the most important moral lessons humanity should have learned from the Nazi period, including the sanctity of human life and the sovereignty of democratic, peaceful nations. Putin has the blood of thousands of victims, including children, on his hands. His policies pose an existential threat to world democracy, peace, and security.
To add insult to injury, in claiming that present-day Ukraine, with its Jewish president, is Nazi, Putin has trivialized the memory of the Holocaust. He entirely discredited his past commitments to fight antisemitism and placed himself among a notorious group of Holocaust distorters.
As a minority in all countries but Israel, Jews learned that fascist regimes often pose the gravest threats to their existence, and democracy is the best guarantee for their wellbeing.
As students of history, we know there is time for nuance and time for clarity. So let us be clear in standing up unequivocally against Putin’s war crimes, oppression, and threats.
The Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry at Tel Aviv University welcomes applications for its annual Identity Seminar. The Identity Seminar comprises three one-day study trips that will explore core historical, social, and cultural issues through visits to some of Israel’s most beautiful and interesting sites and meetings and discussions at those sites with leading scholars and public figures.
Among the issues addressed in the seminar: the tension between utopia and normalcy in Zionist thought; Biblical archeology; the role of the Holocaust in shaping contemporary Israeli society; Israel-Diaspora relations; the Christian communities of Israel; and the identity challenges of Arab-Israelis.
Along with lectures and discussions, the three study trips will include visits to Kibbutz Lohamei HaGetaot, the Dead Sea, the Sea of Galilee and Gan Hashlosha, the communities of the Ultra-Orthodox in Jerusalem and the Black Hebrew Israelites in Dimona, and several exciting archeological and religious sites.
The day-trips will take place on Sundays from 09:00 to 20:00. The scheduled dates for the seminar are May 1, May 29, and June 12.
Applications are open to TAU international students with public leadership potential at all levels, of all faiths, and of all nationalities.
Lectures, discussions, and instruction will be in English.
Participants will be awarded a letter of documentation. Participation is free of charge.
Applications (including a short CV and contact details) should be sent to Dr. Giovanni Quer, the Kantor Center’s Project Manager, by March 11, 2022: giovanniquer@tauex.tau.ac.il
The Center will accept up to 14 applicants.
Former Polish President Visits Center Amidst Crisis in Europe
On February 22, the Center hosted a distinguished delegation from the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center (BYHMC) led by the Hon. Aleksander Kwaśniewski, the former President of Poland (1995-2005) and member of the BYHMC’s Supervisory Board. The visit took place amid rising tensions in Ukraine, just hours before Russia began its military operations.
During the meeting, President Kwaśniewski spoke about the importance of commemorating the untold and forgotten story of the Holocaust in Ukraine and Babyn Yar as a symbol of what is known as the “Holocaust by Bullets.” President Kwaśniewski stressed that the projects at Babyn Yar are key to fighting antisemitism and racism while honoring the memory of the victims.
President Kwaśniewski expressed his hope to promote cooperation between the BYHMC and the Center.
The BYHMC’s Artistic Director Ilya Khrzhanovsky also discussed his important role in designing an immersive experience that takes visitors on an emotional and historically fact-based journey to commemorate and honor the victims of the Holocaust’s largest single-mass-shooting and the largest mass grave in Europe.
The discussion ended with a conversation on current events in Ukraine. President Kwaśniewski noted that the world finds itself in a dreamlike situation and in different times, and noted that Russian President Vladmir Putin was using dangerous rhetoric that declares that Ukraine is neither a state nor a nation. The President stressed the importance of limited terms in democracy, noting that long periods in power project negatively on leaders’ conduct and self-perception.
The Head of the Center, Prof. Uriya Shavit, said: “We are honored to host such a distinguished delegation, led by a European icon of democracy and tolerance, a man for whom the lessons of the past are a constant moral obligation.”
New Book: Contemporary Jewish Communities
This week, De Gruyter published Prof. Lilach Lev Ari’s new book, Contemporary Jewish Communities in Three European Cities: Challenges of Integration, Acculturation and Ethnic Identity. The Center was proud to support Prof. Lev Ari’s research that resulted in the publication of this new monograph, which expands and builds upon a report she authored for the Center in 2019. Contemporary Jewish identity, integration and acculturation in Europe has become an increasingly relevant topic amid rising incidents of antisemitism in Europe but reliable research on the present state of Jewish identity in Europe is scarce. In Contemporary Jewish Communities, Prof. Lev Ari, the dean of the Faculty of Graduate Studies and a lecturer at Oranim College, examines three ethnically diverse communities – Paris, Brussels, and Antwerp – to shed light on the identity and acculturation of the Jewish minority in Europe.
To purchase a copy of book the book, visit De Gruyter or Amazon.
In the News: For a Righteous Cause
On Thursday, January 27, 2022, the Center presented its inaugural report on encouraging legal, political, and cultural developments in the fight against antisemitism to the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog at a ceremony held at his official residence in Jerusalem. The publication and presentation of the report, titled For A Righteous Cause: Positive Trends in Fighting Antisemitism and Radicalization around the World, has been widely covered in the press in Israel and abroad. Below are links to some of coverage the report has received in English, Hebrew, and Swedish.
Prof. Dina Porat on Arutz Sheva discussing the report
Center Presents Inaugural Positive Trends in Fighting Antisemitism Report to the President of Israel
On a snowy Thursday in Jerusalem, a delegation from the Center, led by Prof. Uriya Shavit, the Head of the Center, presented its inaugural report on encouraging legal, political, and cultural developments in the fight against antisemitism to the President of Israel, Isaac Herzog. President Herzog was presented the report, titled For A Righteous Cause: Positive Trends in Fighting Antisemitism and Radicalization around the World, at a special ceremony held at his official Jerusalem residence on International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27), the day on which the Auschwitz death camp was liberated in 1945.
The report is the product of a six-month team effort by eight academic experts at Tel Aviv University from various fields and addresses positive developments in a number of different areas. The contributors include: Dr. Inna Shtasker, who wrote on the restoration of Jewish cemeteries in Eastern Europe; Dr. Ofir Winter and Dr. Giovanni Quer, who wrote on encouraging developments in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain; Prof. Dina Porat, who wrote on political and legislative developments in Europe and North America; Dr. Tomer Fadlon, who wrote on the efforts of sports organizations and clubs to combat antisemitism; and Adv. Talia Naamat, who wrote on legal developments in Europe and the United States.
In his opening remarks, Prof. Shavit addressed the impetus behind the report and the purpose in highlighting encouraging legal, political, and cultural developments in the fight against antisemitism. Noting that discourse on antisemitism typically focuses on troubling negative trends, Prof. Shavit stated, “[The Center] decided that a positive report, describing encouraging developments and activities, should also be published – for three reasons: expressing appreciation for those already active; impelling more governments and organizations worldwide to initiate similar activities; and promoting a discussion on concrete proposals for improving existing programs.”
Adv. Arie Zuckerman, the Chairman of the Center’s Board, spoke after Prof. Shavit and noted the rise in antisemitic incidents in the last several years, much of it fueled by conspiracy theories connected to the COVID-19 pandemic. This, in turn, has led to a growing sense of insecurity among Jewish communities across Europe and around the world. Nevertheless, as the Center’s new report shows, positive steps have been taken in the past year to fight against the rise in antisemitism. These efforts should be commended and others should be encouraged to follow their example.
Two of report’s contributors, Prof. Dina Porat, the Center’s Founding Head, and Dr. Tomer Fadlon, spoke briefly about their respective articles, highlighting political and legislative developments and developments in the world of sports in fighting antisemitism and radicalization. In addition, Dr. Carl Yonker, the Center’s Media Director, commented on the recent hostage crisis at the Colleyville synagogue in Texas and the need to encourage local Christian communities to more proactively engage with local Jewish communities to provide better support and create a sense of security.
In his closing remarks, President Herzog expressed his appreciation for the report and observed that while the crisis of global antisemitism is intensifying, so, too, are international efforts to fight against it. Indeed, stated President Herzog, “We are witnessing many initiatives for combating antisemitism around the world, and we must encourage and foster these positive trends. Strengthening the light is just as important as fighting darkness. I thank the Center for its dedicated research and faithful work in monitoring antisemitism worldwide.”
President Herzog also added, “I wish you much luck and I want to thank Tel Aviv University and the Center within it. I am an alumnus of the University, a friend of the University, and I think it’s a very worthy place. [The Center] is one of the most important Centers in Israeli academia and at TAU specifically.”
The Center is pleased to announce that Dr. Yoval Rubovitch is the recipient of our 2022 research grant. Over the course of the year, Dr. Rubovitch will conduct a research project on the connections, similarities, and continuities between Jewish sports clubs before and after the Holocaust, focusing primarily on the Maccabi clubs in Leipzig and Frankfurt. As part of his research, he will interview members of the Leipzig and Frankfurt clubs and the Maccabi sports association in Germany, and will also examine the current literature on this topic.
Dr. Rubovtich has a prolific research and publications record. He completed his doctoral studies at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg in 2019. His dissertation examined the debate on Zionism between Karl Kautsky and Eduard Bernstein, two of Germany’s leading theoreticians on social democracy. His book Marxismus, Revisionismus, Zionismus: Eduard Bernstein, Karl Kautsky und die Frage der jüdischen Nationalität (“Marxism, Revisionism, Zionism: Eduard Bernstein, Karl Kautsky and the Question of Jewish Nationality”) was published in August 2021 by Hentrich & Hentrich, a publishing house in Leipzig. He has also authored a biography of Bernstein (2019) and a book about the “Bar Kochba Leipzig” Jewish sports club (2020), both of which were published by the same publisher.
Honoring the Battle against Antisemitism
The Center is pleased to share the following news:
Prof. Dina Porat named Ramat Hasharon’s Honorary Citizen for 2021
Next year, the city of Ramat Hasharon will celebrate its 100th anniversary, commemorating its establishment in 1922 as Ir Shalom (City of Peace) on lands purchased from several Arab landowners. Originally a small moshav (an agricultural settlement), Ramat Hasharon became a city in 2002 with a population of over 50,000. Every year, the city council nominates four candidates as honorary citizens, from which the mayor selects a single honoree. This year, the Ramat Hasharon selected Prof. Dina Porat, the Founding Head of the Center, as the city’s honorary citizen in acknowledgment of all her contributions to fighting antisemitism and to the community she and her family have lived since 1976.
