Tel Aviv Review

Dr Eddy Portnoy, Senior Researcher and Director of Exhibitions at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, discusses his book Bad Rabbi and Other Strange But True Stories from the Yiddish Press, a compendium of stories that is at once a quirky and piercing window into the pre-WWII Jewish culture of New York and Warsaw. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Dr. Adam Rovner, an Associate Professor of English and Jewish Literature at the University of Denver in the United States, recently had his book In the Shadow of Zion: Promised Lands before Israel published by New York University Press. Dr. Rovner speaks to host Gilad Halpern about the step-siblings of Zionism – six different attempts to establish a Jewish political entity in the 19th and 20th centuries – and why they all failed. This episode originally aired September 4, 2015.

Adi Gordon, professor of Jewish and European intellectual histories at Amherst College, discusses his new book Towards Nationalism's End, an intellectual biography of 20th-century nationalism scholar and lapsed Zionist official Hans Kohn. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Jonathan Sarna, professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University, author of numerous books including, very recently, Lincoln and the Jews: A history, which he co-edited with Benjamin Shapell. The book, which was published by St Martin's Press, recounts the relationship of the 16th president of the United States with a then still small and relatively uninfluential ethnic group, based on hundreds of archival items, some of them newly unveiled. This episode originally aired August 2, 2015.

Ron Hassner, professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley, discusses his book Religion on the Battlefield, which explores the place occupied by religious faith and practices in modern warfare. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Prof. Alon Confino discusses the Nazi desire to remove the Jews not only from the present and the future, but also from the past.

Eran Kaplan, Israel Studies professor at San Francisco State University, discusses his book Beyond Post-Zionism, a critical analysis of an intellectual fad that took the Israeli political and intellectual debate by storm in 1990s, and seems to have disappeared, since then, into thin air. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Dr. Lee Perlman, a research fellow at Tel Aviv University's Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research discusses his new book, "But Abu Ibrahim, We're Family!", exploring several theater productions, all with a joint Jewish-Arab component, as a potential backdrop for peace building. This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Dr. Rachel Harris, professor of Israeli literature and culture at the University of Urbana Champaign, discusses her new book Warrior, Witches, Whores: Women in Israeli Cinema. How do the evolving representations of women relate to broader changes in Israeli society and culture? This season of the Tel Aviv Review is made possible by The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, which promotes humanistic, democratic, and liberal values in the social discourse in Israel. Tel Aviv Review is also supported by the Public Discourse Grant from the Israel Institute, which is dedicated to strengthening the field of Israel Studies in order to promote knowledge and enhance understanding of modern Israel.

Dr. Stefan Ihrig, a historian and post-doctoral fellow at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, recently had his book Atatürk in the Nazi Imagination published in English by Harvard University Press. He tells host Gilad Halpern how rising Turkish nationalism in the wake of WWI served as valuable inspiration for the Nazis in the early Weimar years and beyond. This episode originally aired July 17, 2015.