Political Islam in an Ethnic Jewish State: Historical Evolution, Contemporary Challenges and Future Prospects

Abstract

This paper argues that, although the shared and universal ideology of the Islamic revival movements was adopted by the Islamic movement in Israel, the movement has been trying to embody it in diverse and distinctive ways. In principle there is a conflict between commitment to the principle of Islamic revivalism on the one hand, and being so committed in the specific context of the ethnic Jewish state, on the other. The Jewish context of the State of Israel continues to bedevil the development of the Islamic movement in Israel. Since the 1930s, Islamic revivalism in Palestine has undergone five phases of development: the Egyptian, Israeli, Palestinian, and the two phases of ‘adaptation’ and ‘post-adaptation’. These phases reflect ideological developments, rather than simply a historical evolution. They are also the outcome of three sets of constraints: structural, ideological and domestic.