As a City Besieged: Place, Zionism, and the Deforestation of Jerusalem

Abstract

Environmental disputes in Israel reflect the pervasive metanarrative of Zionism, and are frequently about friction over symbols of national identity and meaning. Currently, actors engaged in a conflict over a small forest at the margins of Jerusalem harness nationalism/Zionism, and ‘other’ their opponents, as they seek to enlist support beyond their natural constituency. Fieldwork with Green groups and an analysis of their public and internal documents show that municipal officials who are converting the area of the forest to commercial development are cast as (Arab) attackers of the city. Municipal officials also tap national tropes and a security discourse, and claim to be defending Jewish control of Jerusalem. In this paper I show that theories of space, place, and resistance must be supplemented with a contextual and rounded analysis of the master cultural narratives that form the symbolic grounds of these conflicts. It also reveals the complexity of resistance narratives, as the weak seek to benefit from discourses they share with their opponents.