This handbook provides a comprehensive overview of contemporary Israel, accounting for changes, developments and contemporary debates. The different chapters offer both a historical background and an updated analysis of politics, economy, society and culture. Across five sections, a multi-disciplinary group of experts, including sociologists, political scientists, historians and social scientists, engage in a wide variety of topics through different perspectives and insights. The book opens with a historical section outlining the formation of Israel and Jewish nationalism. The second section examines contemporary institutions in Israel, their developments and the contemporary challenges they face in light of social, economic, political and cultural changes. The third section explores geopolitics and Israel's foreign relations, exploring conflicts, alliances and foreign policy with neighbours and powers. The fourth section engages with Israel's internal divisions and schisms, highlighting questions of identity and inequality whilst also outlining processes of integration and marginalization between groups. The final section explores matters of culture, through the social and demographic shifts in contemporary music, poetry, and cuisine, along with the struggles for inclusion and the impact of globalization on Israeli culture. The Routledge Handbook on Contemporary Israel is designed for academics along with undergraduate and postgraduate students taking courses on Israel, Israeli politics, and culture and society in modern Israel.

This Handbook provides a comprehensive overview of contemporary Israel, accounting for changes, developments and contemporary debates. The different chapters offer both a historical background and an updated analysis of politics, economy, society and culture. Across five sections, a multidisciplinary group of experts, including sociologists, political scientists, historians and social scientists, engage in a wide variety of topics through different perspectives and insights. The book opens with a historical section outlining the formation of Israel and Jewish nationalism. The second section examines contemporary institutions in Israel, their developments and the contemporary challenges they face in light of social, economic, political and cultural changes. The third section explores geopolitics and Israel’s foreign relations, exploring conflicts, alliances and foreign policy with neighbors and powers. The fourth section engages with Israel’s internal divisions and schisms, highlighting questions of identity and inequality while also outlining processes of integration and marginalization between groups. The final section explores matters of culture, through the social and demographic shifts in contemporary music, poetry and cuisine, along with the struggles for inclusion and the impact of globalization on Israeli culture. The Routledge Handbook on Contemporary Israel is designed for academics along with undergraduate and postgraduate students taking courses on Israel, Israeli politics, and culture and society in modern Israel.

Israel is a country made up of contradictions. A lively democracy in a multicultural society but within a state promoting a strong national identity; a thriving economy in an unequal society; a culture open to modern trends but drawing on the Hebrew past and preoccupied with the Holocaust and the Arab-Israeli conflict; a sovereign member in the international arena, whose existence is still contested in the Middle East. The Routledge Handbook of Modern Israel provides a comprehensive profile of the intricacies of contemporary Israel, offering a unique, in-depth survey of the country. Organised thematically, a full range of topics are discussed, including: Politics and international relations The foundation of the Israeli state The birth and development of the Israeli economy Israeli culture Israel's role in the Middle East Bringing together more than thirty notable contributors from across the globe, this Handbook sheds light on the multifaceted reality of modern Israel in order to better understand, beyond clichés, this complex society.

The Routledge Handbook on Israeli Security provides an authoritative survey of both the historical roots of Israel’s national security concerns and their principal contemporary expressions. Following an introduction setting out its central themes, the Handbook comprises 27 independent chapters, all written by experts in their fields, several of whom possess first-hand diplomatic and/or military experience at senior levels. An especially noteworthy feature of this volume is the space allotted to analyses of the impact of security challenges not just on Israel’s diplomatic and military postures (nuclear as well as conventional) but also on its cultural life and societal behavior. Specifically, it aims to fulfill three principal needs. The first is to illustrate the dynamic nature of Israel's security concerns and the ways in which they have evolved in response to changes in the country's diplomatic and geo-strategic environment, changes that have been further fueled by technological, economic and demographic transformations; Second, the book aims to examine how the evolving character of Israel's security challenges has generated multiple – and sometimes conflicting – interpretations of the very concept of "security", resulting in a series of dialogues both within Israeli society and between Israelis and their friends and allies abroad; Finally, it also discusses how areas of private and public life elsewhere considered inherently "civilian" and unrelated to security, such as artistic and cultural institutions, nevertheless do mirror the broader legal, economic and cultural consequences of this Israeli preoccupation with national security. This comprehensive and up-to-date collection of studies provides an authoritative and interdisciplinary guide to both the dynamism of Israel’s security dilemmas and to their multiple impacts on Israeli society. In addition to its insights and appeal for all people and countries forced to address the security issue in today’s world, this Handbook is a valuable resource for upper-level undergraduates and researchers with an interest in the Middle East and Israeli politics, international relations and security studies.

This Handbook provides an overview of the most contentious and protracted political issue in the Middle East. The editors have gathered together a range of the top experts on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. They tackle a range of topics from historical background, through to peace efforts, domestic politics, critical issues such as refugees and settler movements, and the role of outside players such as the Arab states, US and EU.

EU–Middle East relations are multifaceted, varied and complex, shaped by historical, political, economic, migratory, social and cultural dynamics. Covering these relations from a broad perspective that captures continuities, ruptures and entanglements, this handbook provides a clearer understanding of trends, thus contributing to a range of different turns in international relations. The interdisciplinary and diverse assessments through which readers may grasp a more nuanced comprehension of the intricate entanglements in EU–Middle East relations are carefully provided in these pages by leading experts in the various (sub)fields, including academics, think-tankers, as well as policymakers. The volume offers original reflections on historical constructions; theoretical approaches; multilateralism and geopolitical perspectives; contemporary issues; peace, security and conflict; and development, economics, trade and society. This handbook provides an entry point for an informed exploration of the multiple themes, actors, structures, policies and processes that mould EU–Middle East relations. It is designed for policymakers, academics and students of all levels interested in politics, international and global studies, contemporary history, regionalism and area studies.

Presenting the current debate about cities in the Middle East from Sana’a, Beirut and Jerusalem to Cairo, Marrakesh and Gaza, the book explores urban planning and policy, migration, gender and identity as well as politics and economics of urban settings in the region. This handbook moves beyond essentialist and reductive analyses of identity, urban politics, planning, and development in cities in the Middle East, and instead offers critical engagement with both historical and contemporary urban processes in the region. Approaching "Cities" as multi-dimensional sites, products of political processes, knowledge production and exchange, and local and global visions as well as spatial artefacts. Importantly, in the different case studies and theoretical approaches, there is no attempt to idealise urban politics, planning, and everyday life in the Middle East –– which (as with many other cities elsewhere) are also situations of contestation and violence –– but rather to highlight how cities in the region, and especially those which are understudied, revolve around issues of housing, infrastructure, participation and identity, amongst other concerns. Analysing a variety of cities in the Middle East, the book is a significant contribution to Middle East Studies. It is an essential resource for students and academics interested in Geography, Regional and Urban Studies of the Middle East.

This Companion explores the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from its inception to the present day, demonstrating the depth and breadth of the many facets of the conflict, from the historical, political, and diplomatic to the social, economic, and pedagogical aspects. The contributions also engage with notions of objectivity and bias and the difficulties this causes when studying the conflict, in order to reflect the diversity of views and often contentious discussion surrounding this conflict. The volume is organized around six parts, reflecting the core aspects of the conflict: historical and scholarly context of the competing narratives contemporary evolution of the conflict and its key diplomatic junctures key issues of the conflict its local dimensions international environment of the conflict the "other images" of the conflict, as reflected in public opinion, popular culture, the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement, and academia and pedagogy. Providing a comprehensive approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, this companion is designed for academics, researchers, and students interested in the key issues and contemporary themes of the conflict.

The self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi in Tunisia in December 2010 heralded the arrival of the ‘Arab Spring,’ a startling, yet not unprecedented, era of profound social and political upheaval. The meme of the Arab Spring is characterised by bottom-up change, or the lack thereof, and its effects are still unfurling today. The Routledge Handbook of the Arab Spring seeks to provide a departure point for ongoing discussion of a fluid phenomenon on a plethora of topics, including: Contexts and contests of democratisation The sweep of the Arab Spring Egypt Women and the Arab Spring Agents of change and the technology of protest Impact of the Arab Spring in the wider Middle East and further afield Collating a wide array of viewpoints, specialisms, biases, and degrees of proximity and distance from events that shook the Arab world to its core, the Handbook is written with the reader in mind, to provide students, practitioners, diplomats, policy-makers and lay readers with contextualization and knowledge, and to set the stage for further discussion of the Arab Spring.

One of the most striking phenomena in contemporary Israeli cinema is the number and scope of films dealing with past traumatic events - events that were repressed or insufficiently mourned, such as the memory of the Holocaust, traumas from wars and terrorist attacks, and the losses entailed by the experience of immigration.This book examines the complex and crucial role of Israeli cinema in remembering and restaging traumas and losses that were denied entry into the shared national past.