Inclusion through exclusion: how young immigrant Israelis in the nationalist Yisra'el Beitenu party read Israeli citizenship

Besprochen in: Rundbrief Begegnungszentrum für aktive Gewaltlosigkeit, 1 (2019)

How do young people from immigrant families become engaged in politics? Anja Schmidt-Kleinert examines the case of young Israelis who are actively engaged with the nationalist Yisra'el Beitenu party, led by the Israeli minister of defence, Avigdor Lieberman. She explores how the activists present Israeli citizenship in a way that is exclusionary to non-Jewish citizens and analyses their strategy to actively construct a sense of belonging to Israeli society or, more precisely, to the Jewish collective by (re-)producing the ethno-nationalist discourse.

Frontmatter 1 Acknowledgement 5 Contents 7 List of Figures 11 1.Introduction 13 2. The Grounded Theory Methodology 23 3. Theoretical Sensitivity I: Pre-Concepts and Pre-Knowledge 31 4. The Data Material 41 5. A Coding Paradigm of Belonging 53 6. Theoretical Sensitivity II: Framing the Study 73 7. The Interviewees' Objective Position in Israeli Society: Jews, Russians, Israelis? 103 8. Talking about Civic Engagement: "The Dirty Game of Politics" 117 9. Serving the Country: "The State of Israel Demands" 127 10. Loyalty to the Jewish State: "We are [...] a [...] Pitskalle" 139 11. Palestinians as Quasi Non-Citizens: "They Will Stab me in the Back" 149 12. The Claim of Citizen's Rights: "I Came Here to Live Among Jews" 161 13. A Grounded Theory of Belonging: "All [Jewish] Israelis, Unite!" 179 Bibliography 195