Language:
English
Year of publication:
2019
Titel der Quelle:
Middle Eastern Studies
Angaben zur Quelle:
55,4 (2019) 570-589
Keywords:
American University of Beirut
;
Zionism
;
Jewish students
;
Arab-Israeli conflict 1917-1948, British Mandate period
Abstract:
The American University of Beirut's emergence as a hub of Arab national and cultural identity in the first half of the twentieth century has been well documented by historians. The simultaneous Zionist presence on campus has been largely overlooked. Zionist ideas were predominantly promoted by Palestinian Jewish students who formed a small but vocal minority at AUB prior to 1948. Faculty and non-Jewish students also regularly collaborated with and traveled to Zionist institutions in Palestine for academic, athletic, and leisure purposes. For Arab students on campus, therefore, Zionism was not an abstract concept, but rather a national identity embodied by fellow classmates and friends on campus. As the conflict in Palestine increased in the 1930s and 1940s, so too did political activism and tensions on campus between Zionist and Arab nationalist students. This article analyzes this unique period of exchange, collaboration, and friction at AUB, which came to a swift end with the outbreak of the 1948 War. By focusing on the interactions between Arab and Zionist Jewish students at AUB, I seek to extend the "relational" approach towards Jewish-Arab contact beyond Palestine's borders.
DOI:
10.1080/00263206.2018.1560272
URL:
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