Christian Worship at the Tomb of the Prophet Samuel on Mount Joy

One of the exceptionally interesting examples of a living biblical tradition, maintained by Christian, Muslim and Jewish pilgrims for over sixteen hundred years, is the history of St. Samuel monastery on the Mount of Joy. The shrine was founded in the Byzantine period, but its heyday falls on the period of the Crusades. It was from here, after the murderous journey, that the troops of the First Crusade saw Jerusalem for the first time. The knights were followed by more and more pilgrims. On the hill, called Mons Gaudii, the Premonstratensians built their monastery, which in time became a real pilgrimage center. Based on the preserved traces, the author reconstructs the Christian chapters of the history of Nabi Samuel. He recalls people, events and traditions related to it, and also the accounts of pilgrims coming here.Christians left the Mons Gaudii probably at the end of the 12th century. Worship of the prophet Samuel were taken over by Muslims and Jews. For the latter the Tomb of Prophet Samuel became one of the most important places of pilgrimage, in some periods even more important than Jerusalem itself. There were numerous disputes and conflicts about holding control over this place, there were even bloody battles. In 1967 this place was taken by the Israeli army. Over time, a national park was created in the area around the mosque, in the mosque itself was established a place of prayer for Jews, and a synagogue in the tomb crypt. A slightly forgotten sanctuary began to warm up emotions anew.

Hard traveling: unemployment and road infrastructure in the shadow of political conflict

If political circumstances are an important cause of unemployment in the Middle East, does this tend to attenuate the influence of economic infrastructure? I approach this question by building a geospatial dataset of the West Bank, an area with high unemployment arguably linked to political problems. I find Israeli army road obstacles, deployed during the Second Intifada, obstructed peri-urban Palestinian commuters from accessing commercial centers and border crossings, inflicting employment losses that were substantially offset by employment gains among their more centrally located Palestinian competitors. The findings suggest that marginal economic interventions, such as removing obstacles or paving roads, have a good chance of altering the spatial distribution of unemployment, but may struggle to reduce overall unemployment levels absent political reform.

Avoiding Conscription in Israel

This chapter tackles Zionism as a modern manifestation of nationalism that included religion as an essential component of national identity. Positing from a feminist perspective that national identity is synonymous with masculinity, the author searches for the women's place in the Zionist movement, particularly through the prism of military service. The Israeli army had a major role in the creation of a Zionist national ethos, and the concept of a people's army, where women should be equal participants shaped the country as the only western democracy that conscripted women. With the establishment of the state, conscription to the IDF was made mandatory for both men and women. However, women's conscription met bitter opposition from religious Orthodox circles. This chapter analyzes how orthodox women were political pawns in the hands of religious leaders. The author claims that they were robbed of their right to choose military service and as such to be an equal part of Israel's diverse society.

Personality disorders and cause-specific mortality: a nationwide study of 2 million adolescents

Background Personality disorders are prevalent in 6–10% of the population, but their risk for cause-specific mortality is unclear. The aim of the study was to assess the association between personality disorders diagnosed in late adolescence and all-cause as well as cause-specific (cardiovascular-related, external-related) mortality. Methods We performed a longitudinal study on a historical prospective cohort based on nationwide screening prior to recruitment to the Israeli army. The study participants were 16–19-year-old persons who attended the army screening (medical and cognitive, including screening for psychiatric disorders) between 1967 and 2006. Participants were followed from 1967 till 2011. Results The study included 2 051 606 subjects, of whom 1 229 252 (59.9%) were men and 822 354 (40.1%) were women, mean age 17.36 years. There were 55 508 (4.5%) men and 8237 (1.0%) women diagnosed with personality disorders. The adjusted hazard ratio (HRs) for coronary, stroke, cardiovascular, external-related causes and all-cause mortality among men with personality disorders were 1.34 (1.03–1.74), 1.82 (1.20–2.76), 1.45 (1.23–1.71), 1.41 (1.30–1.53) and 1.44 (1.36–1.51), respectively. The absolute rate difference for all-cause mortality was 56.07 and 13.19 per 105 person-years among men and women, respectively. Among women with personality disorders, the adjusted HRs for external-related causes and all-cause mortality were 2.74 (1.87–4.00) and 2.01 (1.56–2.58). Associations were already evident within 10 years of follow-up. Conclusions Personality disorder in late adolescence is associated with increased risk of cardiovascular, external- and all-cause mortality. Increased cardiovascular mortality is evident before the age of 40 years and may point to the importance of lifestyle education already in youth.

SANTA CLAUS SOLIDARITY FOR PALESTINE: A SEMIOTIC ANALYSIS OF THE MOHAMMAD TOROKMAN’S PHOTOJOURNALISM

Mohammad Torokman is a photojournalist with the Reuters News Agency. Torokman's photojournalism is chosen as "Picture of the Month: December" Reuters in 2017. The photo shows a picture of protesters dressed as Santa Claus throwing stones at the Israeli army when Palestinian protest against unilateral claims by the United States to make Jerusalem the capital of Israel. Torokman's photojournalism not only just evidence of a mere protest, but it has a message and a deeper meaning. This research discusses the denotation and connotation meaning of Torokman’s photojournalism using the semiotics theory of Roland Barthes. This research is descriptive qualitative. This research concludes that Torokman's photojournalism has two meanings: solidarity and resistance. In the first level of analysis, Torokman's photojournalism shows the protestor's opposition to the Israeli army. On the second level of analysis shows the meaning of solidarity, which is shown through joint struggle without regard to religion and belief to maintain its territory in Jerusalem.

Illegally Blonde: The Racialisation of Blondness and Visual Representations of Palestinian Activist Ahed Tamimi in American and Canadian Media

Informed by theories of media representation, Orientalism, and settler colonialism, this research endeavours to contribute to the discussion on the impact of media representation within a specific political context. It intends to reveal the power dimensions and ideological positions embedded in dominant media discourses in North America. Five news videos, three from Canadian, and two from American online daily media sources, are selected carefully during December 2017 and July 2018 when the Israeli army arrested Ahed Tamimi. In terms of methodologies, adopts Chouliaraki's (2011) multimodality model to analyse the visual and semiotic choices made by the news editors and draws on Fairclough's (1995) conception of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) for its contextual analysis. The findings suggest that through different discursive and representational strategies, the media frame Tamimi and the Palestinians as violent initiators. Moreover, Tamimi's blondness and her ‘Western’ look are marked as ‘fake’ and ‘propaganda’, thus establishing the new norm of representing ‘Otherness’. These strategies echo accepted values in American and Canadian societies and their foreign policies in the past decade. The results also achieve the purpose of legitimising the use of state violence on colonised bodies, which ultimately reflects settler-colonial history in North America.

When a Sense of “We” Is Lost: Investigating the Consequences of a Lost Common Identity Among Druze in Israel

Research shows that inclusive identities are effective for improving intergroup relations. Little work, however, asked what happens once a sense of common identity is formed, but then lost. Given increasing diversity and integration attempts that might fail, this question is realistic and timely. We studied a religious minority in Israel, Arab-Druze ( N = 178), constituting 1.6% of the population. Druze have always had strong common ties with the Jewish majority, particularly younger Druze who serve in the Israeli army. We surveyed Druze in the aftermath of the nationality bill, which was considered by many to be highly exclusionary toward non-Jews. Drawing on research on minority exclusion, we expected that for younger Druze, a sense of common identity loss will predict radical forms of action. This was supported by our cross-sectional data and remained stable after controlling for more classic predictors of violent and nonviolent action.