Jews and Muslims in the Arab World

Jews and Muslims in the Arab World highlights the effects of historical memory on the Arab-Israel conflict, demonstrating that both Jews and Arabs use stories of distant pasts to create their identities and shape their politics. Whether real or imagined, the past filtered through their collective memories has had and will continue to have enormous influence on how Jews and Arabs perceive themselves and each other.

Jews and Muslims in the Arab World highlights the effects of historical memory on the Arab-Israel conflict, demonstrating that both Jews and Arabs use stories of distant pasts to create their identities and shape their politics. Whether real or imagined, the past filtered through their collective memories has had and will continue to have enormous influence on how Jews and Arabs perceive themselves and each other.Jews and Muslims in the Arab World describes the ways in which the past is absorbed, internalized, and then processed among Jews and Arabs. The book stresses the importance of historical imagination on the current evolving political cultures, but does not claim that explanations from an ancient past shed light on every aspect of contemporary events.

Chapter 1 Introduction: The Uses and Misuses of the Past
Part 2 The Arab World: Imagining the Past, Defining the Present, Anticipating the Future
Chapter 3 The Arab Nation-State: Marking Modern Identities by Embracing Pasts Real and Imagined
Chapter 4 Defining Arab Palestine: Historical Geography, Imagined Polities, and Sacred Space
Chapter 5 "My Land [Biladi]": The Formation of Palestinian National Consciousness and the Quest for a Modern Nation-State
Chapter 6 The Call to Arms: A Mark of Palestinian Nationhood
Chapter 7 The Islamic Movement: Traditional Islam and Palestinian Nationalism after 1987
Chapter 8 Haunted by the Past: The Islamists and the Peace Process
Part 9 The Modern State of Israel: Integrating Pasts Real and Imagined
Chapter 10 A Lexicon of Near Eastern Identities: The Jewish People by Various Names and Foundational Narratives
Chapter 11 Jews, Arabs and Modern Biblical Scholarship: Academic Politics and the Politics of National Consciousness
Chapter 12 The Emergence of Zionism: A Secular and Humanist Narrative
Chapter 13 Return, Reclaim and Reconstitute
Chapter 14 Accommodation with the Arabs of Palestine
Chapter 15 Epilogue