Journal for the Study of Antisemitism

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History and format

The journal was established in 2009. Its founding editors were Steven K. Baum and Neal E. Rosenberg. An issue of the journal typically features five or six major articles, several essays and reviews. [1] [2]

Controversy

The inaugural issue of the journal edited by Michael Berenbaum was mired in politics when an article critical of the Berlin Centre for Antisemitism Research led to the temporary dismissal of editorial board member Clemens Heni. Several other board members resigned, but returned when Heni was reinstated. [3]

Related Research Articles

Antisemitism is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. This sentiment is a form of racism, and a person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Though antisemitism is overwhelmingly perpetrated by non-Jews, it may occasionally be perpetrated by Jews in a phenomenon known as auto-antisemitism. Primarily, antisemitic tendencies may be motivated by negative sentiment towards Jews as a people or by negative sentiment towards Jews with regard to Judaism. In the former case, usually presented as racial antisemitism, a person's hostility is driven by the belief that Jews constitute a distinct race with inherent traits or characteristics that are repulsive or inferior to the preferred traits or characteristics within that person's society. In the latter case, known as religious antisemitism, a person's hostility is driven by their religion's perception of Jews and Judaism, typically encompassing doctrines of supersession that expect or demand Jews to turn away from Judaism and submit to the religion presenting itself as Judaism's successor faith—this is a common theme within the other Abrahamic religions. The development of racial and religious antisemitism has historically been encouraged by anti-Judaism, though the concept itself is distinct from antisemitism.

New antisemitism is the concept that a new form of antisemitism which developed in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, tends to manifest itself as anti-Zionism and criticism of the Israeli government. The concept is included in some definitions of antisemitism, such as the working definition of antisemitism and the 3D test of antisemitism. The concept dates to the early 1970s, although the identification of anti-Zionism with antisemitism has "long been de rigueur in Jewish communal and broader pro-Israel circles".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the Jews in Sweden</span> Aspect of history

The history of Jews in Sweden can be traced from the 17th century, when their presence is verified in the baptism records of the Stockholm Cathedral. Several Jewish families were baptised into the Lutheran Church, a requirement for permission to settle in Sweden. In 1681, for example, 28 members of the families of Israel Mandel and Moses Jacob were baptised in the Stockholm German Church in the presence of King Charles XI of Sweden, the dowager queen Hedvig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp, and several other high state officials.

Manfred Gerstenfeld was an Austrian-born Israeli author and chairman of the steering committee of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. He founded and directed the center's post-Holocaust and anti-Semitism program.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert S. Wistrich</span> Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1945–2015)

Robert Solomon Wistrich was the Erich Neuberger Professor of European and Jewish history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and he was also the head of the university's Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism. Wistrich considered antisemitism "the longest hatred" and viewed Anti-Zionism as its latest incarnation. According to Scott Ury, "More than any other scholar, Wistrich has helped integrate traditional Zionist interpretations of Jewish history, society, and fate into the study of antisemitism." Other researchers have reproduced much of his work without questioning its founding assumptions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brian Klug</span> British philosopher

Brian Klug is Honorary Fellow in Social Philosophy at Campion Hall, Oxford and an emeritus member of the philosophy faculty at Oxford University. He is also an honorary fellow of the Parkes Institute for the Study of Jewish/non-Jewish Relations, University of Southampton and fellow of the College, Saint Xavier University, Chicago.

Kenneth S. Stern is an American attorney and an author. He is the director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate, a program of the Human Rights Project at Bard College. From 2014 to 2018 he was the executive director of the Justus & Karin Rosenberg Foundation. From 1989 to 2014 he was the director of antisemitism, hate studies and extremism for the American Jewish Committee. In 2000, Stern was a special advisor to the defense in the David Irving v. Penguin Books and Deborah Lipstadt trial. His 2020 book, The Conflict Over the Conflict: The Israel/Palestine Campus Debate, examines attempts of partisans of each side to censor the other, and the resulting damage to the academy.

Holocaust trivialization refers to any comparison or analogy that diminishes the scale and severity of the atrocities that were carried out by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust. The Wiesel Commission defined trivialization as the abusive use of comparisons with the aim of minimizing the Holocaust and banalizing its atrocities. Originally, holocaust meant a type of sacrifice that is completely burnt to ashes; starting from the late 19th century, it started to denote extensive destruction of a group, usually people or animals. The 1915 Armenian genocide was described as a "holocaust" by contemporary observers.

David Hirsh is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at Goldsmiths, University of London, and co-founder of Engage, a campaign against the academic boycott of Israel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anti-Zionism</span> Opposition to Jewish ethnonationalism

Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism. Although anti-Zionism is a heterogeneous phenomenon, all its proponents agree that the creation of the modern State of Israel, and the movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the region of Palestine—the biblical Land of Israel—was flawed or unjust in some way.

The anti-Jewish violence in Central and Eastern Europe following the retreat of Nazi German occupational forces and the arrival of the Soviet Red Army – during the latter stages of World War II – was linked in part to postwar anarchy and economic chaos exacerbated by the Stalinist policies imposed across the territories of expanded Soviet republics and new satellite countries. The anti-semitic attacks had become frequent in Soviet towns ravaged by war; at the marketplaces, in depleted stores, in schools, and even at state enterprises. Protest letters were sent to Moscow from numerous Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian towns by the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee involved in documenting the Holocaust.

Antisemitism in Canada is the manifestation of hostility, prejudice or discrimination against the Canadian Jewish people or Judaism as a religious, ethnic or racial group. This form of racism has affected Jews since Canada's Jewish community was established in the 18th century.

The February Revolution in Russia officially ended a centuries-old regime of antisemitism in the Russian Empire, legally abolishing the Pale of Settlement. However, the previous legacy of antisemitism was continued and furthered by the Soviet state, especially under Joseph Stalin. After 1948, antisemitism reached new heights in the Soviet Union, especially during the anti-cosmopolitan campaign, in which numerous Yiddish-writing poets, writers, painters and sculptors were arrested or killed. This campaign culminated in the so-called Doctors' plot, in which a group of doctors were subjected to a show trial for supposedly having plotted to assassinate Stalin. Although repression eased after Stalin's death, persecution of Jews would continue until the late 1980s.

Antisemitism in Turkey refers to acts of hostility against Jews in the Republic of Turkey, as well as the promotion of antisemitic views and beliefs in that country.

The Jewish community in Sweden has been prevalent since the 18th century. Today Sweden has a Jewish community of around 20,000, which makes it the 7th largest in the European Union. Antisemitism in historical Sweden primarily manifested as the confiscation of property, restrictions on movement and employment, and forced conversion to Christianity. Antisemitism in present-day Sweden is mainly perpetrated by far-right politicians, neo-Nazis, and Islamists.

Catherine Chatterley is a Canadian historian, specializing in the study of modern European history, the Holocaust, and research on antisemitism, and is the Founding Director of the Canadian Institute for the Study of Antisemitism (CISA). Chatterley is Founding Editor-in-Chief of Antisemitism Studies, the first scholarly journal devoted to the study of antisemitism. It is published by Indiana University Press. Chatterley appeared in the documentary called "Unmasked: Judeophobia" (2011), where she was one of the scholars interviewed. That same year, she was invited as an expert scholar to participate in the Canadian All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism, which produced the Ottawa Protocol.

The "three Ds" or the "3D test" of antisemitism is a set of criteria formulated by Israeli human rights advocate and politician Natan Sharansky in order to distinguish legitimate criticism of Israel from antisemitism. The three Ds stand for delegitimization, demonization, and double standards, each of which, according to the test, indicates antisemitism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steven K. Baum</span>

Steven K. Baum is a genocide scholar, gerontologist with an MA in psychopharmacology from New Mexico State University (2010). He has written several books including The Psychology of Genocide, Antisemitism Explained, and with co-editors Florette Cohen and Steven L. Jacobs, Antisemitism in North America: New World, Old Hate (Brill). He founded with N. E. Rosenberg and is chief editor of the Journal for the Study of Antisemitism (JSA). Baum practices psychology in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

There have been instances of antisemitism within the Labour Party of the United Kingdom (UK) since its establishment. Notable occurrences include canards about "Jewish finance" during the Boer War and antisemitic remarks from leading Labour politician Ernest Bevin. In the 2000s, controversies arose over comments made by Labour politicians regarding an alleged "Jewish lobby", a comparison by London Labour politician Ken Livingstone of a Jewish journalist to a concentration camp guard, and a 2005 Labour attack on Jewish Conservative Party politician Michael Howard.

The working definition of antisemitism, also called the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism or IHRA definition, is a non-legally binding statement on what antisemitism is, that reads: "Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities." Accompanying the working definition, but of disputed status, are 11 illustrative examples whose purpose is described as guiding the IHRA in its work, seven of which relate to criticism of the Israeli government. As such, pro-Israeli organizations have been advocates for the worldwide legal adoption of the definition.

References

  1. Locally Produced Journal Addresses Anti-Semitism Archived 2012-07-12 at the Wayback Machine , Jewish Exponent , December 7, 2011
  2. Attorney has made the study of antisemitism his passion, Jewish Community Voice, May 5, 2010
  3. Weinthal, Benjamin (March 7, 2010). "German center dismisses pro-Israel scholar". The Jerusalem Post . Retrieved April 27, 2019.