Overview

The book celebrates Jewish radicalism from the Tsarist Empire to Poland and Germany, from London to New York. Fighting oppression and exploitation took numerous political forms, including left Zionism, Bundism and revolutionary Marxism. This inspiring radical tradition was ultimately checked by the callous indifference of capitalist governments to refugees and the horror of Auschwitz. However, its lessons must be passed on to inform working-class and anti-imperialist struggles in a world in crisis. This book recovers some of that long-neglected history. Before the Second World War, the majority of Jews were working-class and part of a wider struggle alongside their non-Jewish comrades on the left. To illuminate this background, the issue of Jewish identity is analysed along political, cultural and sociological lines. This is essential because, today, the claim of Israel and its apologists to represent Jews everywhere, the growth of the antisemitic far right and the approach of the left to the Jewish question are central issues. A knowledge of the breadth of Jewish resistance aids understanding of these debates.

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9781836741756

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Reviews

This timely book is an excellent antidote to any attempt to de-historicise conflicts such as the one raging in historical Palestine. Pre-Zionist Jewish life and culture invalidates the absurd attempt to equate Zionism with Judaism and anti-Zionism with antisemitism. -- Ilan Pappé, author of <i>The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine</i> As the authors say, 'The battle for memory is also a battle for the present.' The Zionists don't want us to know there is a different answer to antisemitism than the Israeli state. The ruling class doesn't want us to know there are ways to defeat their divide and rule scapegoating. The Radical Jewish Tradition sets the record straight. -- Clare Fester, Associate Director Los Angeles-based Jewish cultural organization Yiddishkayt A thought-provoking history of Jewish radical movements sounded as an appeal for modern political liberation. * Kirkus Reviews *

This timely book is an excellent antidote to any attempt to de-historicise conflicts such as the one raging in historical Palestine. Pre-Zionist Jewish life and culture invalidates the absurd attempt to equate Zionism with Judaism and anti-Zionism with antisemitism. -- Ilan Pappé, author of <i>The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine</i> As the authors say, 'The battle for memory is also a battle for the present.' The Zionists don't want us to know there is a different answer to antisemitism than the Israeli state. The ruling class doesn't want us to know there are ways to defeat their divide and rule scapegoating. The Radical Jewish Tradition sets the record straight. -- Clare Fester, Associate Director Los Angeles-based Jewish cultural organization Yiddishkayt

Author Information

Donny Gluckstein is the son of an anti-Zionist Jewish Palestinian refugee father and Jewish South African mother. He is the author of several works that touch on the subject matter of this book, including The Nazis, Capitalism and the Working Class, A People’s History of the Second World War, The Western Soviets and The Tragedy of Bukharin. He edited Fighting on all Fronts: Popular Resistance in the Second World War. Donny lives in Edinburgh (UK) and continues to write books on revolutionary and socialist topics while in retirement. Janey Stone’s mother sought refuge in Australia from Polish antisemitism in the 1930s. Janey is a lifelong socialist and political activist; she has been a union delegate and participated in the student, anti-Vietnam war and women’s liberation movements. As an anti-Zionist Jew, she has written and presented about resistance to the Nazis in Germany and Poland, and by Jews, and many other topics including women workers, sexual politics, the Middle East and the radical Jewish tradition. Janey is retired and lives in Melbourne (Australia). She has a leadership role in Interventions, Australia’s only independent not-for-profit radical publishing company.

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