Project MUSE®: Antisemitism Studies - Latest Articles
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747
Project MUSE®: Latest articles in Antisemitism Studies.daily12026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00text/htmlen-USVol. 1 (2017) through current issueLatest Articles: Antisemitism StudiesTWOProject MUSE®Antisemitism Studies2474-18172474-1809Latest articles in Antisemitism Studies. Feed provided by Project MUSE®Hamas: The Quest for Power by Beverley Milton-Edwards and Stephen Farrell (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987554
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In June 2024, eight months after the worst anti-Jewish massacre since the Holocaust, Beverley Milton-Edwards and Stephen Farrell published a revised and updated version of their 2010 book Hamas: The Islamic Resistance Movement now titled Hamas: The Quest for Power. Beverley Milton-Edwards was formerly Professor of Politics at Queen's University Belfast and is now a Senior Non-Resident Fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, based in Doha. The Council's website lists her as an occasional advisor to the Qatari Minister of Foreign Affairs. She is the author of Islamic Politics in Palestine (1996), which recounts the prehistory and history of Hamas based on interviews with 34 Palestinians. Stephen Farrell
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallHamas: The Quest for Power by Beverley Milton-Edwards and Stephen Farrell (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USHamas: The Quest for Power by Beverley Milton-Edwards and Stephen Farrell (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®127922026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15How the West Became Antisemitic: Jews and the Formation of Europe, 800–1500 by Ivan G. Marcus (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987555
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Over the course of his career, Ivan Marcus has shaped and sharpened our view of Jewish childhood experiences and medieval pietism in the Middle Ages. Yet the title of this latest book suggests that Marcus is using his perceptions of the medieval world to reveal a compelling theory on the history of antisemitism—the broad irrational movement of hatred that has continually morphed and today threatens the integrity of the West in a fundamental way. He argues he can accomplish this mainly by using the same Hebrew sources that he has used in his previous works—Jewish chronicles, rabbinic responsa and Hebrew exempla or moralistic tales, which reveal social and cultural settings in which Jews and Christians, from all
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallHow the West Became Antisemitic: Jews and the Formation of Europe, 800–1500 by Ivan G. Marcus (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USHow the West Became Antisemitic: Jews and the Formation of Europe, 800–1500 by Ivan G. Marcus (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®184912026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Cartoons and Antisemitism: Visual Politics of Interwar Poland by Ewa Stańczyk (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987556
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The pioneering publication by Ewa Stańczyk, titled Cartoons and Antisemitism: Visual Politics of Interwar Poland, provides a thorough examination of the role of antisemitic cartoons in interwar Poland. The book is an interdisciplinary study of the Polish satirical press, its editorial policies, and its relations with the government, which it further situates within the broader context of regional, domestic, and international politics at the end of the 1930s. The author utilizes the discourse surrounding cartoons as a conduit to delve into a profound examination of antisemitism's role as a rhetorical instrument within the intricate tapestry of interwar Polish politics at all levels. The book offers a meticulous
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallCartoons and Antisemitism: Visual Politics of Interwar Poland by Ewa Stańczyk (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USCartoons and Antisemitism: Visual Politics of Interwar Poland by Ewa Stańczyk (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®120822026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Prologue to Annihilation: Ordinary American and British Jews Challenge the Third Reich by Stephen H. Norwood (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987557
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What could the United States or Britain have done to prevent the Holocaust? Could they have pressured Hitler to ease up on his anti-Jewish campaign? Could they have opened their doors to allow in more refugees? Could they have slowed or stopped Hitler's rearmament drive? Many Jews at the time in both countries hoped their governments would take these steps. The organized efforts of Jews to influence their nations' leaders to take concrete action against Hitler is the subject of Stephen Norwood's book, Prelude to Annihilation: Ordinary American and British Jews Challenge the Third Reich. Those efforts, we know, were unsuccessful. Few significant steps were taken to oppose, much less prevent, the Holocaust. Looking
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallPrologue to Annihilation: Ordinary American and British Jews Challenge the Third Reich by Stephen H. Norwood (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USPrologue to Annihilation: Ordinary American and British Jews Challenge the Third Reich by Stephen H. Norwood (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®179712026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Conspiracy and Power by Donatella Di Cesare (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987558
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Conspiracy and Power is the English translation of Italian philosopher Donatella Di Cesare's book Il complotto al potere, originally published in 2021. As Di Cesare notes, there has been a "growing mass of 'conspiracy studies' in recent years" (3), which she categorizes into two main groups: one that views belief in conspiracies or plots primarily as a "psychic pathology," requiring cognitive re-education, and another that treats belief in conspiracies as a "logical anomaly" that requires debunking and similar countermeasures. Di Cesare distances herself from both, instead interpreting conspiracism as a "political problem." As she writes, "[i]t is not so much about truth as it is about power" (4).However, these
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallConspiracy and Power by Donatella Di Cesare (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USConspiracy and Power by Donatella Di Cesare (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®163212026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Antisemitism Before the Holocaust: Re-Evaluating Antisemitic Exceptionalism in Germany and the United States, 1880–1945 by Richard E. Frankel (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987559
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The discourse on the distinctiveness of German antisemitism has been a prominent feature of postwar discussions concerning Germany and Nazism. A popular view within that debate posits that a convergence of cultural, historical, and societal elements, with origins potentially traceable to the Reformation or to the medieval period, cumulatively generated an antisemitism of unparalleled brutality and lethality, culminating in the Holocaust. Despite the many challenges mounted by historians to counter this perspective, it has retained a certain appeal, as evidenced by the commercial success of Daniel Goldhagen's 1996 publication Hitler's Willing Executioners, in the United States, which presented a sweeping portrayal
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallAntisemitism Before the Holocaust: Re-Evaluating Antisemitic Exceptionalism in Germany and the United States, 1880–1945 by Richard E. Frankel (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USAntisemitism Before the Holocaust: Re-Evaluating Antisemitic Exceptionalism in Germany and the United States, 1880–1945 by Richard E. Frankel (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®182412026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Poisoned Wells: Accusations, Persecution, and Minorities in Medieval Europe, 1321–1422 by Tzafrir Barzilay (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987560
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In the opening decades of the fourteenth century, a pernicious rumor spread through the towns and villages of Western and Central Europe, fueling mistrust of minorities and provoking violence against them. Starting in 1321, and peaking during the first outbreak of the Black Death pandemic in 1347–1350, the accusation that lepers, Jews, Muslims, and others conspired to poison water sources and cause mass death among Christians resulted in arrests, investigations, executions, and expulsions of marginalized groups and individuals. From the perspective of modern scholars, the well-poisoning accusation seems so preposterous that Gavin Langmuir (1990), a well-respected historian of medieval antisemitism, attributed this
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallPoisoned Wells: Accusations, Persecution, and Minorities in Medieval Europe, 1321–1422 by Tzafrir Barzilay (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USPoisoned Wells: Accusations, Persecution, and Minorities in Medieval Europe, 1321–1422 by Tzafrir Barzilay (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®135662026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Vanishing Vienna: Modernism, Philosemitism, and Jews in a Postwar City by Frances Tanzer (review)
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987561
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There has always been something slightly uncanny about the transformation of Austrian identity from the interwar period, when it barely existed, to the strong, national, even nationalist identity it has gained during the postwar period. Central to the strangeness of this transformation was what happened to the Jewish presence in Viennese and hence Austrian culture, and to Austria's identity as a "German" nation. Frances Tanzer has provided us with a most elegant and convincing picture of the "missing link" that led from the one to the other between 1938 and 1945 and after. It is in some respects a surprising story, in others a deeply cynical and ironic one, with tragic repercussions concerning antisemitism and
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallVanishing Vienna: Modernism, Philosemitism, and Jews in a Postwar City by Frances Tanzer (review)2026-04-15text/htmlen-USVanishing Vienna: Modernism, Philosemitism, and Jews in a Postwar City by Frances Tanzer (review)2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®222132026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Anti-semit-ism: When and Why was the Term Coined and Embraced? Is it Still Useful?
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987562
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In the immediate post-WWII period, Jews and many non-Jews believed that the horrors of the Shoah had discredited antisemitism to such an extent that—beyond some unpleasant remnant—the phenomenon would disappear. Indeed, for several decades, this assessment seemed to be confirmed in the Western liberal world. Unfortunately, the term "antisemitism" has become increasingly relevant again. Therefore, in recent years centers and institutes for the study of antisemitism have been established in various countries, and many conferences dealing with the topic—academic ones and ones that are more practical focusing on means to combat antisemitism in its various forms—are convened. In view of the many scholars and activists
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallAnti-semit-ism: When and Why was the Term Coined and Embraced? Is it Still Useful?2026-04-15text/htmlen-USAnti-semit-ism: When and Why was the Term Coined and Embraced? Is it Still Useful?2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®528732026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Antisemitism and Anti-Feminism Today: Reflections on the Contemporary Relevance of the Authoritarian Personality
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987563
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The year 2025 marked the 75th anniversary of the publication of The Authoritarian Personality. This gives rise to reflections on the topicality of the authoritarian-anti-democratic syndrome, which Theodor W. Adorno, Else Frenkel-Brunswik, Daniel Levinson, and Nevitt Sanford identified as particularly virulent for late capitalist society. They introduced a combination of materialist social theory with psychoanalytical theorems and developed an innovative methodology that combined quantitative and qualitative analyses.1 The authoritarian syndrome that the authors diagnosed allows us to read antisemitism and ideologies based on gender and sexuality, such as anti-feminism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia, not as
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallAntisemitism and Anti-Feminism Today: Reflections on the Contemporary Relevance of the Authoritarian Personality2026-04-15text/htmlen-USAntisemitism and Anti-Feminism Today: Reflections on the Contemporary Relevance of the Authoritarian Personality2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®1217092026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Christian Nationalist Antisemitism in the United States: Past and Present
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987564
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The rise of populism has been a central feature of American politics, both on the Left and the Right, presenting new challenges to the country's democratic values, particularly since the election of Donald Trump in 2016. One such challenge is the populist rhetoric used by some right-wing and far-right politicians and activists that advances antisemitic narratives and tropes, which blame Jews for societal and political grievances and frustrations at home and abroad. These antisemitic narratives often take the form of conspiracies that provide comprehensive, albeit simplistic, explanations for what has gone wrong in American society, why Jews are responsible, and how the situation can be resolved.1 Those advancing
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallChristian Nationalist Antisemitism in the United States: Past and Present2026-04-15text/htmlen-USChristian Nationalist Antisemitism in the United States: Past and Present2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®2317992026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15The Grand Inquisitor of Plettenberg: Carl Schmitt and the Specter of Jewish Bolshevism
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987565
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"The big industrialist has no other ideal than that of Lenin—an 'electrified earth.' They disagree essentially only on the correct method of electrification. American financiers and Russian Bolsheviks find themselves in a common struggle for economic thinking.""The real enemy is the assimilated Jew."In October 1936, Carl Schmitt—then, at the pinnacle of his influence on Nazi jurisprudence—organized a symposium on the corrosive impact of Jewish intellect on German legal science under the auspices of the Reich Group of University Teachers of the National Socialist Association of Legal Professionals (NSRB), whose Reichsgruppenwalter or director was none other than Schmitt himself. The title Schmitt chose for the
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallThe Grand Inquisitor of Plettenberg: Carl Schmitt and the Specter of Jewish Bolshevism2026-04-15text/htmlen-USThe Grand Inquisitor of Plettenberg: Carl Schmitt and the Specter of Jewish Bolshevism2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®2013262026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15White Identity and Antisemitism in American Public Opinion During Donald Trump's First Presidency, 2016–2020
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987566
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The ideology of racial purity has been a mainstay of antisemitism since the late 1800s. In Europe, racial purity was often associated with nationalism and national identity, and the building of the modern nation state, most notably in Germany. There, Wilhelm Marr, who coined the term antisemitism in 1879, argued that Jews could not become part of the German nation because they were not Aryan. Marr's ideas later became important to Nazi ideology and were a rationale for the Holocaust.1In the United States, racial purity relates to the concept of Whiteness, a racial categorization scheme used to define who is White.2 Historically, in the US, Jews were not defined or viewed as White. In the early twentieth century
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallWhite Identity and Antisemitism in American Public Opinion During Donald Trump's First Presidency, 2016–20202026-04-15text/htmlen-USWhite Identity and Antisemitism in American Public Opinion During Donald Trump's First Presidency, 2016–20202026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®1478562026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15Editor's Introduction
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/987567
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White identity politics have re-emerged as a significant force in American life. This issue of Antisemitism Studies includes two articles on the subject. Jeffrey Cohen tests whether, during Donald Trump's first presidency, White identity affected attitudes toward Jews using three survey panels from the Voter Study Group, with parallel analyses of Blacks and Muslims. The results of his study indicate that White identity significantly affects attitudes toward Jews but the relationship for Jews is weaker than it is for Blacks and Muslims. Carl Yonker examines the resurgence of Christian nationalist antisemitism in the United States since the end of Trump's first presidency, a period marked by the rise of right-wing
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Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-13T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/747/image/coversmallEditor's Introduction2026-04-15text/htmlen-USEditor's Introduction2026-04-152026TWOProject MUSE®50512026-05-13T00:00:00-05:002026-04-15