Israel and the European Left Between Solidarity and Delegitimization

Why has the European Left become so antagonistic towards Israel? To answer this question, Colin Shindler looks at the struggle between Communism and Zionism from the October Revolution to today. Is such antagonism in opposition to the policies of successive Israeli governments? Or, is it due to a resurgence of anti-Semitism? The answer is far more complex. Shindler argues that the new generation of the European Left was more influenced by the decolonization movement than by wartime experiences, which led it to favor the Palestinian cause in the post 1967 period. Thus the Israeli drive to settle the West Bank after the Six Day war enhanced an already existing attitude, but did not cause it.

AcknowledgementsForeword1.  The Revolution and the Jewish Question2. Lenin's Jewish Problem3. Zionists and Communists in Palestine4. Cultivating Arab Nationalism5. The New Dawn6. British Communism between the Wars7.  True Believers and the Revolutionary Imperative8. After the Shoah9. The Icy Streets of Prague10. The Resurrection of the Outcast11. Leon, Mandel and Cliff12. The Non-Aligned13. The Watershed of 195614. The Post-Stalinists and the Anti-Stalinists15. The Changing Face of the British Left16. The Campaign Against Normalization