THE S. MARK TAPER FOUNDATION
IMPRINT IN JEWISH STUDIES
BY THIS ENDOWMENT
THE S. MARK TAPER FOUNDATION SUPPORTS
THE APPRECIATION AND UNDERSTANDING
OF THE RICHNESS AND DIVERSITY OF
JEWISH LIFE AND CULTURE
The Invention and Decline of Israeliness
State, Society, and the Military
Baruch Kimmerling
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
Berkeley • Los Angeles • London
The publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous contribution to this book provided by the S. Mark Taper Foundation
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
London, England
© 2001 by the Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kimmerling, Baruch.
The invention and decline of Israeliness : state,
society, and the military / Baruch Kimmerling.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-520-22968-1 (cloth : alk. paper).
1. National characteristics, Israeli. 2. Jews—
Israel—Identity. 3. Israel—Social conditions—
20th century. 4. Israel—Ethnic relations.
5. Religion and state—Israel. I. Title.
DS113.3.K56 2001
306'.095694—dc21 00-067238
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper used in this publication is both acid-free and totally chlorine-free (TCF). It meets the minimum requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (R 1997) (Permanence of Paper).
To Diana—
Without whose lifelong support I would
have had nothing
Contents
1. The Mythological-Historical Origins of the Israeli State: An Overview
2. Building an Immigrant Settler State
3. The Invention and Decline of Israeliness
4. The End of Hegemony and the Onset of Cultural Plurality
6. The Cultural Code of Jewishness: Religion and Nationalism
7. The Code of Security: The Israeli Military-Cultural Complex
Acknowledgments
This book is a summary of an approximately ten-year process of professional and intellectual discussions, debates, and sometimes bitter controversies with friends, colleagues, students, and rivals. I have been fortunate enough to be surrounded by highly stimulating intellectual environments in the offices, faculty clubs, and corridors of the Hebrew University and the University of Washington at Seattle. I have also been supported and spoiled by a vivid global exchange through the wonders of the Internet and the electronic mail system. The names of those who have contributed to these environments are so innumerable that, with the exception of the late Dan Horowitz, I shall refrain from listing them. The final version was rewritten following very thoughtful, wise, and constructive comments of three anonymous peer reviewers of the University of California Press.
I would like to thank my devoted students and assistants who have aided me throughout all these years and made possible the implementation of this mission: Jon Simons, Matthew Diamond, Lauren Erdreich, Michal Laron, Hagit Schwartz, and Keren-Or Schlesinger. I also am pleasantly indebted to the Eshkol Center of Israel Studies and to the Silbert Center for Research of Israeli Society and Director Arieh Schachar for their generous support in funding the research demanded by the present volume. I am deeply grateful to Malcom Reed and Cindy Fulton of the University of California Press, who handled the manuscript so carefully, and special thanks to Peter Dreyer for his excellent editorial work.
Parts of this volume are based on previously published material. Chapter 2 is based on “State Building, State Autonomy, and the Identity of Society: The Case of the Israeli State,” published in the Journal of Historical Sociology 6, 4 (1993): 397-429. Chapter 4 partially relies on “Between Hegemony and Dormant Kulturkampf in Israel,” published in Israel Affairs 4, 3-4 (1998): 49-72. Part of chapter 5 derives from “The New Israelis: Plurality of Cultures without Multiculturalism,” Alpayim 16 (1998): 264-308 (in Hebrew). Chapter 6 is adapted from “Religion, Nationalism and Democracy in Israel,” published in Constellations 6, 3 (1999): 339-63. Finally, chapter 7's main source is an essay titled “Political Subcultures and Civilian Militarism in a Settler-Immigrant Society,” published in Security Concerns: Insights from the Israeli Experience, edited by Daniel Bar-Tal, Dan Jacobson, and Aharon Klieman (Stamford, Conn.: JAI Press, 1998), pp. 395-416.
I am grateful to all the publishers who so generously granted me the right to use the material. Nonetheless, all these papers served only as foundations for the present chapters of this volume. Most were completely rewritten to include (or sometimes exclude) new material and ideas and to present a coherent narrative.
Introduction
This book offers an overview and analysis of the construction and deconstruction of hegemonic, secular Zionist Israeli national identity from the early years of the Zionist movement to the present. Today, for better or for worse, Israel is a very different polity