The Dialectic between Confrontation and Commitment: Religious-Zionism and the Settlement Project

Abstract

Religious Zionists have been the driving force behind the settlement project in Israel for the past 40 years. They often see settling in the Greater Land of Israel as a messianic activity. It might be thought that when state policy clashes with radical messianic movements, the result would be violent, bloody confrontations. This study seeks to explain why this has not been the case in Israel despite the dismantling of settlements in the Sinai and Gaza and the controversial Oslo process. Although there has been turmoil and resistance, most religious Zionists have refrained from serious violence. We suggest that a “theological-normative balance” prevents all-out de-legitimation of the state and life-threatening violence against it.

The communitarian attitudes of religious Zionist female adolescents to democracy in Israel

“…The students in this study live in a pluralistic and diverse country, but through the ideology of their high schools, most envision an ideal of a monolithic political community (Gross, 2008; Fischer et al, 2012). For the majority of participants, if democracy is identified as a set of values—of pluralism, individual rights, and freedom—then they identify democracy with liberalism, which they encode as dangerous, secular, and ultimately responsible for the lack of Israeli commitment to the complete Land of Israel (Hellinger et al, 2016).…”

“…They believed that the religious precepts relating to the Land of Israel were more important than the civil law, which had to be opposed through political activism. They argued that democracy was not a value in and of itself, but rather a tool which they must use to reach their pre-defined religious and messianic goals (Aran, 1986; Fischer, 2012; Fischer et al, 2012; Hellinger et al, 2016; Hotam, 2017; Inbari, 2012). They supported the expansionist approach and envisioned an ideal, monolithic, political community, in which the People of Israel would be fully committed to religious Zionism.…”

“…It seeks to protect the rights of the individual yet also emphasizes the common values of the society. Communal democracy sees the implementation of the rights of the individual within the framework of a group where there is an obligation to take care of the liberty of communities (Elazar, 1995; Hellinger et al, 2016). Ethnic democracy consolidates the nation-state, where the state is subservient to a single ethnic nation.…”

The Froman Peace Campaign: Pluralism in Judeo-Islamic Theology and Politics

“…This lofty idealism has profound roots in Froman's religious Zionism. In his youth, Froman was close to Rabbi Zvi Yehuda Kook, an influential figure for the right-wing religious-Zionist settler movement (Hellinger et al 2016). Since then, Froman remained committed to his teachings and those of his father Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865Kook ( -1935, the famous Chief Rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine (Little 2007, 355-56).…”

Nation-Statist Soteriology and Traditions of Defeat: Religious-Zionism, the Ninth of Av, and Jerusalem Day

“…We will approach this question by retracing the ways in which a political ideology that self-identifies as an instance of religious nationalism—proclaiming, that is, to uphold a commitment to nationalism or nation-statism that views itself as an embodiment and fulfilment of religious tradition itself—negotiates the tension that arises when the message entailed in this tradition conflicts with the nation-statist soteriology. The ideology at play is Religious-Zionism (Schwartz 2008; Inbari 2012; Don-Yehiya 2014; Hellinger, Hershkowitz, and Susser 2018; Sagi and Schwartz 2018; Hadad 2020; Katsman 2020; Yadgar and Hadad 2021), and the specific tradition (or element of Jewish tradition) at hand is that of the commemoration of the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, the end of Jewish (rather: Judean) self-rule, and the onset of exile in antiquity, marked by fasting and mourning in the Ninth of Av. As we will show below, the message traditionally propagated by the story of the Ninth of Av and the rituals commemorating and propagating it—a story of sin, divine punishment, catastrophe, and a hoped-for eschatology of ultimate redemption—directly contradicts some of the most foundational elements of Zionist nationalism and the political mythology of Israeli nation-statism.…”