Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-42gr6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T11:14:53.029Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Terrorism and the Rise of Right-Wing Content in Israeli Books

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2018

Tamar Mitts
Get access

Abstract

In the past few years the Western world has witnessed a rise in the popularity of right-wing political discourse promoting nationalistic and exclusionary world views. While in many countries such rhetoric has surfaced in mainstream politics only recently, in Israel, right-wing ideology has been popular for almost two decades. Explanations for this phenomenon focus on Israeli citizens’ attitudinal change in the face of exposure to terrorism but largely do not account for why such ideas remain popular over the long term, even after violence subsides. In this study I examine whether the long-lasting prominence of right-wing nationalistic politics in Israel is linked to the perpetuation of right-wing ideology in popular media. Analyzing the content of more than 70,000 published books, I find that content related to the political right has increased in Israeli books after periods of terrorism, a change that has become more pronounced over the years.

Type
Research Notes
Information
International Organization , Volume 73 , Issue 1 , Winter 2019 , pp. 203 - 224
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

I thank Chris Blattman, Page Fortna, Guy Grossman, Joshua Mitts, Suresh Naidu, and the anonymous reviewers for their comments. I also thank Shaked Doron for her valuable research assistance.

References

Adoni, Hanna, and Nossek, Hillel. 2013. The Cultural Divide: Book Reading as a Signifier of Boundaries Among Co-Cultures in Israeli Society. Israel Studies Review 28 (1):54–77.Google Scholar
Almog, Shulamit. 1997. Zechuyot Shel Yeladim [Children's Rights]. Tel-Aviv: Shoken.Google Scholar
Anderson, Benedict. 2006. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso Books.Google Scholar
Arian, Asher, and Shamir, Michal. 2008. A Decade Later, the World Had Changed, the Cleavage Structure Remained: Israel 1996–2006. Party Politics 14 (6):685–705.Google Scholar
Bar-Tal, Daniel. 1998. The Rocky Road Toward Peace: Beliefs on Conflict in Israeli Textbooks. Journal of Peace Research 35 (6):723–42.Google Scholar
Bar-Tal, Daniel, and Rosen, Yigal. 2009. Peace Education in Societies Involved in Intractable Conflicts: Direct and Indirect Models. Review of Educational Research 79 (2):557–75.Google Scholar
Berrebi, Claude, and Klor, Esteban F.. 2008. Are Voters Sensitive to Terrorism? Direct Evidence from the Israeli Electorate. American Political Science Review 102 (3):279–301.Google Scholar
Bertrand, Marianne, Duflo, Esther, and Mullainathan, Sendhil. 2004. How Much Should We Trust Differences-in-Differences Estimates? The Quarterly Journal of Economics 119 (1):249–75.Google Scholar
B'Tselem. 2017. Attacks on Israeli Civilians by Palestinians. The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, 11 November. Available at <http://www.btselem.org/israeli_civilians>..>Google Scholar
Central Bureau of Statistics. 2015. Statistical 148: Immigrants from the Former Soviet Union. Press Release, 27 September. Available at <http://www.cbs.gov.il/statistical/immigration_ussr_h148.pdf>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Central Bureau of Statistics. 2016. On the Eve of the Jewish New Year: 8.585 Million Residents in the State of Israel. Available at <http://www.cbs.gov.il/www/hodaot2016n/01_16_304e.pdf>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Citron, S. 2007. Ktav Ashma: HaSihsuch HaAravi-Israeli BePerspektiva Historit [The Israeli-Arab Conflict from a Historical Perspective]. Jerusalem, Israel: Gefen.Google Scholar
Gentzkow, Matthew, and Shapiro, Jesse M.. 2010. What Drives Media Slant? Evidence from US Daily Newspapers. Econometrica 78 (1):35–71.Google Scholar
Gera, Vanessa. 2015. In Right-Wing Shift, New Polish Parliament Has No Left Wing. Business Insider 28 October. Available at <http://www.businessinsider.com/ap-in-right-wing-shift-new-polish-parliament-has-no-left-wing-2015-10>. Accessed 11 Novermber 2017..+Accessed+11+Novermber+2017.>Google Scholar
Gershkoff, Amy, and Kushner, Shana. 2005. Shaping Public Opinion: The 9/11-Iraq Connection in the Bush Administration's Rhetoric. Perspectives on Politics 3 (3):525–37.Google Scholar
Getmansky, Anna, and Zeitzoff, Thomas. 2014. Terrorism and Voting: The Effect of Rocket Threat on Voting in Israeli Elections. American Political Science Review 108 (3):588–604.Google Scholar
Grossman, Guy, Manekin, Devorah, and Miodownik, Dan. 2015. The Political Legacies of Combat: Attitudes Towards War and Peace Among Israeli Ex-Combatants. International Organization 69 (4):981–1009.Google Scholar
Hayoun, Massoud. 2015. Charlie Hebdo Attack a “Windfall” for Far Right, French Muslims Say. Aljazeera America, 28 October. Available at <http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/1/7/charlie-hebdo-muslim.html>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Hetherington, Marc J., and Nelson, Michael. 2003. Anatomy of a Rally Effect: George W. Bush and the War on Terrorism. Political Science and Politics 36 (1):37–42.Google Scholar
Kashti, Or. 2015. Israel Bans Novel on Arab-Jewish Romance from Schools for “Threatening Jewish Identity.” Haaretz, 31 December. Available at <http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.694620>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Kaufmann, Chaim. 2004. Threat Inflation and the Failure of the Marketplace of Ideas: The Selling of the Iraq War. International Security 29 (1):5–48.Google Scholar
Kibris, Arzu. 2011. Funerals and Elections: The Effects of Terrorism on Voting Behavior in Turkey. Journal of Conflict Resolution 55 (2):220–47.Google Scholar
Landau, Mark J., Solomon, Sheldon, Greenberg, Jeff, Cohen, Florette, Pyszczynski, Tom, Arndt, Jamie, Miller, Claude H., Ogilvie, Daniel M., and Cook, Alison. 2004. Deliver Us from Evil: The Effects of Mortality Salience and Reminders of 9/11 on Support for President George W. Bush. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 30 (9):1136–50.Google Scholar
Lin, Yuri, Michel, Jean-Baptiste, Aiden, Erez Lieberman, Orwant, Jon, Brockman, Will, and Petrov, Slav. 2012. Syntactic Annotations for the Google Books Ngram Corpus. Proceedings of the 50th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (July):169–74.Google Scholar
Lupia, Arthur, and Menning, Jesse O.. 2009. When Can Politicians Scare Citizens into Supporting Bad Policies? American Journal of Political Science 53 (1):90–106.Google Scholar
Macdonald, Dwight. 1953. A Theory of Mass Culture. Diogenes 1 (3):1–17.Google Scholar
Michel, Jean-Baptiste, Shen, Yuan Kui, Presser Aiden, Aviva, Veres, Adrian, Gray, Matthew K., Pickett, Joseph P., Hoiberg, Dale, Clancy, Dan, Norvig, Peter, Orwant, Jon, Pinker, Steven, Nowak, Martin A., and Aiden, Erez Lieberman. 2011. Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books. Science 331 (6014):176–82.Google Scholar
Natanzon, Roby, Itamar, Gazala, Lazer, Ron, Zemach, Mina, and Scheindlin, Dahlia. 2017. Where Is Generation Z Going? The Center for Political Economics and Friedrich Ebert Stiftung. Available at <http://www.macro.org.il/images/upload/items/54309529021720.pdf>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
National Library of Israel. 2016. Statistics [in Hebrew] Available at <http://web.nli.org.il/sites/NLI/Hebrew/library/depositing/statistics/Pages/default.aspx>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Newman, Marissa. 2016. Israel's Contentious New Civics Textbook Illuminates Country's Divisions. Times of Israel, 26 May. Available at <http://www.timesofisrael.com/israels-contentious-new-civics-textbook-illuminates-countrys-divisions/>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Ophir, Adi. 2001. Zman Emet: Intifadat El-Aqsa VeHasmol HaYisraeli [Real-time Al-Aqsa Intifada and the Israeli Left]. Jerusalem: Keter.Google Scholar
Philippov, Michael. 2010. Ex-Soviets in the Israeli Political Space: Values, Attitudes, and Electoral Behavior. Unpublished paper. Joseph and Alma Gildenhorn Institute of Israel Studies. Available at <https://cpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/blog.umd.edu/dist/b/504/files/2018/02/Philippov-Research-Paper-3-1tavjc5.pdf>..>Google Scholar
Podeh, Elie. 2000. History and Memory in the Israeli Educational System: The Portrayal of the Arab-Israeli Conflict in History Textbooks (1948–2000). History and Memory 12 (1):65–100.Google Scholar
Porat, Dan A. 2004. It's Not Written Here, But This Is What Happened: Students’ Cultural Comprehension of Textbook Narratives on the Israeli-Arab Conflict. American Educational Research Journal 41 (4):963–96.Google Scholar
Posen, Barry R. 1993. Nationalism, The Mass Army, and Military Power. International Security 18 (2):80–124.Google Scholar
Reeves, Philip. 2013. On Multiple Fronts, Russian Jews Reshape Israel. National Public Radio, 2 January. Available at <http://www.npr.org/2013/01/02/168457444/on-multiple-fronts-russian-jews-reshape-israel>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Sagi, Ariel. 2005. Hayorshim: Al Tafkido Shel Hador Hashlishi BeMedinat Israel [The Heirs: The Role of the Third Generation in the State of Israel]. Jerusalem: Academon.Google Scholar
Schnell, Izhak, and Hope, Micah. 2012. Emdot AhZibur HaYehudi Klapei Efsharut Shel Heskem Pshara Im HaPalestinim [The Jewish Population's Position Toward Negotiations with the Palestinians]. Thesis. Tel Aviv University: Walter Libach Institute for Arab-Israeli Cooperation.Google Scholar
Sherwood, Harriet. 2013. “Russian Vote” in Israel Integrates into Political Mainstream. The Guardian, 18 January. Available at <https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/18/russian-vote-israel>. Accessed 11 November, 2017..+Accessed+11+November,+2017.>Google Scholar
Skop, Yarden. 2016. Bennett's New Civics Book Meets With Israeli-Arab Furor. Haaretz, 12 May. Available at <http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.719053>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Snyder, Jack, and Ballentine, Karen. 1996. Nationalism and the Marketplace of Ideas. International Security 21 (2):5–40.Google Scholar
Strinati, Dominic. 2004. An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture. Abingdon, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
The Israel Democracy Institute. 2017. The Peace Index. Available at <http://www.peaceindex.org/indexMainEng.aspx>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
The Israeli National Election Studies. 2013. Election Studies Available at <http://www.ines.tau.ac.il/elections.html>. Accessed 11 November 2017..+Accessed+11+November+2017.>Google Scholar
Van Evera, Stephen. 1994. Hypotheses on Nationalism and War. International Security 18 (4):5–39.Google Scholar
Wolfsfeld, Gadi. 2014. Making Sense of Media and Politics: Five Principles in Political Communication. New York: Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Mitts supplementary material

Mitts supplementary material 1

Download Mitts supplementary material(File)
File 498.5 KB
Supplementary material: File

Mitts supplementary material

Mitts supplementary material 2

Download Mitts supplementary material(File)
File 46 KB