Prof. David Ohana’s latest book, "Neither Canaanites nor Crusaders," (Hebrew) presents pioneering research that seeks to decipher the "mythical order" of the Israeli "community of common experience."
The book is the latest entry in Shalom Hartman Institute’s Israel and Judaism series, which aims to reevaluate the tension, contradiction and rupture between Jewish and Israeli existence.
The two most daring readings of "Israeliness" in recent years by scholars and critics have been the " Canaanite movement " of the 1940s in pre-state Palestine, and the " Crusader narrative " of current times that has been raised in Muslim fundamentalist and some left-wing circles.
The Caananite movement created by pre-state Hebrew speakers advocated the abrogation of the Jewish religious tradition and the adoption of a "Hebraic" identity based on a pan-Mesopotamian culture steeped in ancient Semitic heroic myths.
The mythological structure of Zionism as a modern crusade described Israeli national essence as a Western colonial project destined to failure. The Crusades metaphor, used by critics of Zionism, implies that Jewish settlement in the Middle East is a modern manifestation of the ancient Christian Crusades bereft of real ties to the new land could never take root.
Efrat Gal-Noor cover illustration for Prof. David Ohana’s book , ‘Neither Canaanites nor Crusaders’
The cover illustration by Efrat Gal-Noor includes a mirror image of the figure of Nimrod with Zionist symbolism in the background. The image of Nimrod is taken from the famous and controversial sculpture, "Nimrod," by Yitzhak Danziger .
The sculpture became the emblem of the the Canaanite movement, which advocated the abrogation of the Jewish religious tradition and the adoption of a "Hebrew Identity" based on ancient Semitic heroic myths like Nimrod’s. The name of Gal-Noor’s picture is a word play on a line from the national anthem, "Hatikva." All these elements add irony and depth to the cover picture.
– Laura Major, Coordinator of Publications, Shalom Hartman Institute
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