Ethnic Politics in Israel

The Margins and the Ashkenazi Centre

This book offers an analysis on contemporary Israeli democracy, examining in particular society and politics from the perspectives of the different ethnic groups outside of the Ashkenazi mainstream.

The book explores the political expressions of the secondary groups in Israel (Mizrahim, Religious, Russians and Palestinian-Arab) and how these groups where treated by the Ashkinazim as a threat to its hegemony over the state. Looking at the instability created by the struggle of these marginal groups against the state, and the discrimination policy practiced by the Ashkenazi 'hegemonic ethnic state' regime against the other, non-Ashkenazi, groups, the book illustrates how this has contributed to the failure to establish an ‘Israeli people’.

Ethnic Politics in Israel will be of great interest to students and researchers in the fields of Middle East, Palestinian, Arab, Jewish and Israeli studies, political science, sociology and psychology.