Tomer Persico - Santa Fe Distinguished Lecture Series

Over the last three decades major changes have transformed the Jewish religious and social field in Israel, facilitating the liquidation of traditional barriers and the formation of novel ways of conceiving and expressing Jewish Identity. Secular Zionism has lost its cultural and social hegemony, while Religious Zionism and Ultra-Orthodoxy are in a crisis of identity. Correspondingly, Jews in Israel have developed an individualistic interest in their tradition, creating what is referred to as the "Jewish Renaissance", while others have constituted a Jewish identity anchored in Ethnicity and Nationalism. We shall analyse the current trajectories of Jewish identity in Israel, and observe their ramifications for Israeli politics and for the connection between Israeli and US Jewry.