From the particularistic to the universalistic: national narratives in Israel’s mainstream press, 1967–97

Abstract

The aim of this article is to study the development of the Jewish-Zionist national idea as expressed in the national narrative as it appeared in Israel's mainstream press during the years 1967±97, against the background of five critical events in the Israeli collective experience as well as in the wake of the Holocaust Memorial Days. This development is studied as a case of the immanent tension between nationalism's universalistic message and its particularistic application. The Jewish-Zionist narrative in Israel is found to be`shifting' from its particularistic towards its more universalistic pole. This development is discussed as a transition from a`purely national' to a`post-national' narrative, and is positioned in its local and global contexts.

Everybody’s team? The national narrative in the Hebrew press covering Israeli national soccer team matches

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Bent Twigs and Olive Branches: Exploring the Narratives of Dissident Israeli Jews

“…Yet the post‐Zionist discourse does not destroy the category of Us altogether, nor does it place it on a designated path to equality with the Other. Crucially, while post‐Zionism can talk about what should happen in the future, an endorsement of the Zionist project seems inherent in the depiction of its completeness (Nimni ; Silberstein ); it aims to ‘improv[e] the (national) status quo, neither revolutionising the existing order nor completely undermining it’ (Yadgar :64). In its efforts to invoke a less ‘ethnic’ imagining of the nation, post‐Zionism is nevertheless bound by a need or desire to legitimate the nation's ‘ethnic’ past.…”

National Narratives and Migration: Discursive Strategies of Inclusion and Exclusion in Jordan and Lebanon

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