New Babylonians : a history of Jews in modern Iraq / Orit Bashkin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bashkin, Orit, 1974-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Jews--Iraq--History--20th century.

Jews.

Jews--Iraq--Identity.

Jews--Iraq--Intellectual life.

Iraq--Ethnic relations--History--20th century.

Iraq.

Iraq--History--Hashemite Kingdom, 1921-1958.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (325 p.)

Place of Publication:

Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press, 2012.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Although Iraqi Jews saw themselves as Iraqi patriots, their community—which had existed in Iraq for more than 2,500 years—was displaced following the establishment of the state of Israel. New Babylonians chronicles the lives of these Jews, their urban Arab culture, and their hopes for a democratic nation-state. It studies their ideas about Judaism, Islam, secularism, modernity, and reform, focusing on Iraqi Jews who internalized narratives of Arab and Iraqi nationalisms and on those who turned to communism in the 1940's. As the book reveals, the ultimate displacement of this community was not the result of a perpetual persecution on the part of their Iraqi compatriots, but rather the outcome of misguided state policies during the late 1940's and early 1950's. Sadly, from a dominant mood of coexistence, friendship, and partnership, the impossibility of Arab-Jewish coexistence became the prevailing narrative in the region—and the dominant narrative we have come to know today.

Contents:

Brothers and others : Iraqi identity and Arab Jewishness

Nationalism and patriotism : visions of the nation

The effendia : questions of secularism and Judaism

Friends, neighbors, and enemies : fascism, anti-Semitism, and enemies

Red Baghdad : Iraqi Jews and the ICP, 1941-51

An end? : Iraqi Jews and the Iraqi state, 1946-51.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780804782012

0804782016

OCLC:

808215755