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The Ideal of Peace in Judaism

Peace is a concept that is central to Judaism. Along with truth and justice, it is one of the three key Jewish values.

Peace, according to the Jewish sages, is the ultimate purpose of the whole Torah: “All that is written in the Torah was written for the sake of peace.” Tanhuma Shoftim 18

Peace is what will save the Jewish people: “God announceth to Jerusalem that they [Israel] will be redeemed only through peace.” Deuteronomy Rabah 5:15 The Jewish people’s desire for peace has been expressed for thousands of years in our prayers and in biblical and rabbinic sources.

In the words of the prophets (Isaiah 2:4 and Micah 4:3) And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.

In the Ethics of the Fathers Hillel says: “Be among the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace…” (Ethics of the Fathers 1:12)

In the Midrash Great is peace since all other blessings are included in it. (Vayikrah Rabbah 9) The only reason that the Holy One, blessed be He, created the world was so that there would be peace among humankind. (Bamidbar Rabbah 12A)

In the Amidah (Daily Standing Prayer of 19 blessings) Grant peace, welfare, blessing, grace, lovingkindness, and mercy unto us and unto all Israel, your people.

In Israel’s Declaration of Independence We extend our hand to all neighboring states and their people in an offer of peace and good neighborliness, and appeal to them to establish bonds of cooperation … with the sovereign Jewish people settled in its own land. The State of Israel is prepared to do its share in common effort for the advancement of the entire Middle East.

In the prayer for the State of Israel Please bless the State of Israel…spread over it the shelter of Your peace. Grant peace unto the land, lasting joy to its inhabitants. Remove from us all hatred and hostility, jealousy and cruelty. And plant in our hearts love and friendship, peace and companionship. Speedily fulfill the vision of Your prophet: “Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.”

The Hebrew word for peace, ‘SHALOM,’ comes from a root meaning ‘completeness’ and ‘perfection’. So when there is peace in Jewish terms, that means things are perfect: there is calm, security, prosperity and a general feeling of physical and spiritual well-being. It doesn’t just mean there is no war.

In Hebrew, to ask someone how they are (“How are you?”) we say “Ma shlomcha?” ‘Shlomcha’ literally means ‘your peace’, so we are actually asking them “How’s your state of peace?” This shows how important living in a state of peace is in Jewish thinking.

The Jewish obligation to pursue peace

Peace is so important a concept in Judaism that Jews have a religious obligation to pursue it. “Seek peace, and pursue it’ ‑ seek it in your own place, and pursue it even to another place as well.” Leviticus Rabah 9:9

We are told that “He who establishes peace between man and his fellow, between husband and wife, between two cities, two nations, two families or two governments…no harm should come to him.” Mekhilta Bahodesh 12

And even that “one may deviate from the truth for the sake of peace…it is permissible to utter a falsehood for the purpose of making peace between a man and his fellow.” BT Yevamot 65b and Derekh Erez Zuta.

Lynda Ben-Menashe 2007

National Pacifism

There are those who would argue that if you defend yourself with violence, you perpetuate an endless cycle of violence. It sees non-violent protest as a way of ending this cycle.

This view is not new; indeed, some pacifists trace this idea to a passage in Josephus’ The Jewish War (Book II chapter 16). In a speech by Agrippa, (the Jewish king during the Jewish revolt of 66 CE), he exhorts the crowd, which wants to revolt against the Roman Governor Florus, to be patient. He tells them: “Now nothing so much damps the force of strokes as bearing them with patience; and the quietness of those who are injured diverts the injurious persons from afflicting.”

This view can also be called the ‘shveig shtill’ (‘stay quiet’ in Yiddish) view of pacifism; it assumes that people will receive goodwill if they remain meek, passive and useful. Indeed, the Talmud (Gittin 57a) considers the Jewish revolt a tragic mistake, resulting in an immense loss of life in the face of overwhelming power. The tactic of ‘shveig shtill’ was often the refuge of Jews in antisemitic societies, where they found it best to avoid making waves, and to offer complete cooperation to those in authority. Basically it is the pacifism of the powerless.

There is a well known Jewish joke that illustrates this point. Two Jews are about to be executed by a firing squad. As they are handed their blindfolds, one of the Jews refuses to put his on. The second Jew, mortified by this act of rebellion, turns to his friend and says, “Please, don’t make trouble!”

Non-Violent Resistance

It is often argued that non-violence, by virtue of its moral authority, can be a successful form of resistance to oppression. The classic example is the success of Gandhi in getting the British to leave India through non-violent protest. However, as Michael Walzer points out in his book Just and Unjust Wars, Gandhi succeeded because a country with a massive population was opposing an empire tired and weakened after World War II, and an empire with a tradition of respect for human rights. For the 6,000,000 Jews getting murdered in Europe, Gandhi had no practical advice. He advised Rabbi Leo Baeck, the leader of German Jewry during the Holocaust, that he should get all German Jews to commit mass suicide; this he said would focus the world’s attention on Hitler’s inhumanity. To this Baeck replied that “we Jews know, that it is God’s singular commandment, to live.” Non-violent protest would, of course, have achieved nothing.

Self-Defence

There is no tradition of individual pacifism as a value in Judaism. Rather there is an obligation for the individual to protect his / her life – even by force.

“If a thief is caught breaking in and is struck so that he dies, the defender is not guilty of bloodshed; but if it happens after sunrise, he is guilty of bloodshed.” Exodus 22:2.

The law explains that if someone breaks into a home at night, the victim may assume his life is in danger and is allowed to kill the criminal; if the aggressor confronts the victim by daylight, there are other options of self-defence.

The commentator Rashi comments: The life of the aggressor and victim are not equal. If only one will survive, it is our obligation to make certain it is the victim.

The “law of the pursuer” (Talmud, Sanhedrin 72a) requires a person to save the life of any potential victim (3rd party), even by killing the aggressor, if necessary (if the aggressor can be stopped by less, only as much force as necessary is allowed). This is the basis of pre-emptive defence, individual and national.

There are two rationales for allowing self-defence. The first is practical; without the ability to use lethal force to stop the actions of aggressors, anarchy would reign (Chinuch 600). The second rationale challenges the moral assumptions of non-violence. It asserts that it is impossible to equate the lives of the aggressor and the victim; we have as a rule “that God’s quest is the interests of the hunted” (Ecclesiastes 3:15). The life of the aggressor and the victim are not of equal value; if only one will survive, it is our obligation to make certain that it is the innocent person, the victim, who will survive (Cf. Rashi to Exodus 22:1).

Conscientious objection

Deuteronomy provides an exemption for those likely to be a liability in combat:

“Then the officers shall add ‘Is any man afraid or fainthearted? Let him go home so that his brothers will not become disheartened too.’” Deuteronomy 20:8 However, there is no basis for a conscientious objector to claim he has the right to not fight based on a personal principle of pacifism in face of his national responsibility.

© Sandy Hollis 2006

Peace and Repairing the World

‘Shalom – Peace’, was one of the first words I learnt as a child, because my late father always greeted family and friends with the words “Shalom Aleichem” – “Peace unto You” and the recipient of the greeting would reply “Aleichem Shalom” – “Unto you Peace”.

This traditional greeting, “Shalom Aleichem”, used when two Jews meet, is also the name of the song that begins the Shabbat meal every Friday night. By singing this song of ‘shalom’, derived from the Hebrew word ‘shalem’, which means ‘complete’, we are asking G-d to bless our home with peace; that there should be no conflict between friends or family, especially on Shabbat.

It is also the essential conclusion of the blessing from the Hebrew Bible which Jewish parents pronounce over their children every Shabbat evening (weekly) and congregations pronounce on significant occasions – the blessing of Aaron the High Priest and brother of our teacher Moses, which originates in about 1,400 BCE.

“May the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up His face upon you and give you Shalom – Peace” (Numbers 6:24-26)

It is a theme which reflects the immortal words of the Hebrew prophet Isaiah (as above and here again below), inscribed above the entrance to the United Nations building in New York:

“And they shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not take up sword against nation. And they shall not know war any more.” (Isaiah 2; 3)

When Isaiah wrote these words at the beginning of the seventh century BCE, the ten tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel had been lost, deported by the Assyrian conqueror, and Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem was under threat. Isaiah spoke for a people longing for a universal peace, very similar to the United Nations ideal of peace under international law, in which nations would live in harmony under a divine system of justice.

“And the many peoples shall go and say: ‘Come, let us go up to the Mount of the Lord, to the House of the God of Jacob, That he may instruct us in his ways And that we may walk in his paths’ For the Law shall come from Zion And the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Thus he will judge among the nations And arbitrate for the many peoples.” (Isaiah 2: 3-4)

Isaiah 11.4 is another image of peace which has captured the world’s imagination:

“The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the lion …together.”

The Jewish concept also recognises that true peace is part of a totality which includes justice and compassion, reflected in the idea of ‘Tikkun Olam’ – the imperative to ‘repair the world’. This concept, originally formulated by Rabbi Isaac Luria in sixteenth century Safed, northern Israel, reflects the Jewish values of Justice (tzedakah), Compassion (chesed) and Peace (shalom), and it has now come to symbolize a quest for social justice, freedom, equality, peace and the restoration of the environment. It is a call to action – to repair the world through social action. It recognizes that each act of kindness, no matter how small, helps to build a new world.

“Justice, justice shall you pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:18-21:9)

The speech delivered by Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin on the occasion of the signing of the Israeli-Palestinian Declaration of Principles at Washington, DC, on 13 September 1993 gives some indication of Jewish feelings:

“President Clinton, Your Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen,

We have come from Jerusalem, the ancient and eternal capital of the Jewish people. We have come from an anguished and grieving land. We have come from a people, a home, a family, that has not known a single year – not a single month – in which mothers have not wept for their sons. We have come to try and put an end to the hostilities, so that our children and our children’s children will no longer have to experience the painful cost of war, violence, and terror. We have come to secure their lives, and to ease the sorrow and the painful memories of the past – to hope and pray for peace…

We, like you, are people who want to build a home, to plant a tree, to love, live side by side with you – in dignity, in empathy, as human beings, as free men. We are today giving peace a chance and again saying to you: Let us pray that a day will come when we will say, enough, farewell to arms…

We say to you today in a loud and clear voice: Enough of blood and tears. Enough… It is customary to conclude our prayers with the word ‘Amen’. With your permission, men of peace, I shall conclude with words taken from the prayer recited by Jews daily, and I ask the entire audience to join me in saying ‘Amen’:

‘May He who makes peace in His high heavens grant peace to us and to all Israel. Amen.’”

© Josie Lacey OAM 2006.

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Article contents

Culture, religion, war, and peace.

• Yehonatan Abramson Yehonatan Abramson Department of Political Science, Johns Hopkins University
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.013.44
• Published in print: 14 December 2013
• Published online: 30 November 2017

Religion and culture have historically been neglected in international relations (IR) theories and in political science more generally. It was only recently that IR began to consider the role of culture and religion in war and peace. Several main scholarly trends in the study of culture, religion, conflict, and peace can be identified, starting with the definitional problems that IR scholars had to deal with as they tried to incorporate culture and religion. The first major attempt in the IR field to understand war almost exclusively through the religious prism was that of Samuel Huntington, who in his Clash of Civilization (1993, 1996) identifies two main reasons why religion can cause war: first, religion can be considered as a primordial and immutable identity; and second, religion is a form of ideology rather than identity. The scholarly literature has also addressed themes such as religious fundamentalism and violence, the role of religious actors in international conflict, the practical use of religion and culture to promote peace via diplomacy, and engagement of religion and culture in existing peace theories such as democratic peace theory. Avenues for future research may include the relational and constantly changing aspects of religion; what, when, and how various religious interpretations receive political prominence in promoting conflict or peace; how religion can be used as an independent variable across cases; and the hidden set of assumptions that are embedded in the cultural and religion labels.

• international relations
• Samuel Huntington
• religious fundamentalism
• democratic peace theory

Introduction

Historically, international relations (IR) theories neglected ideational factors such as identity, religion, and culture. Although culture was a part of political science since Almond and Verba's seminal book in 1963 , IR's dominant schools of thought (Realism and Liberalism) overemphasized material, structural, and “objective” factors in explaining states’ behavior. Religion was ignored altogether not only in IR, but also in political science in general (Wald and Wilcox 2006 ; Bellin 2008 ). In recent years, IR began to consider the role of culture and religion. Culture as a variable appeared during the end of the Cold War together with the “constructivist turn” (Lapid and Kratochwil 1996 ; Checkel 1998 ; Finnemore and Sikkink 2001 ). Religion entered the field a decade later alongside a scholarly focus on ethnic and religious conflicts and religious-inspired terrorism (Fox 2001 :53; Philpott 2009 :184; Snyder 2011 :1).

This essay reviews the main scholarly trends in the study of culture and religion as sources for conflict and resources for peace. After a brief survey of the early works of political theorists regarding religion and war, this essay turns to review how the topic has been understood within IR. As the essay demonstrates, the attempt to deal with religion and culture as part of identity is a source of much confusion. In order to avoid confusion and reiteration of other comprehensive review essays on culture and IR (such as the essays titled “Culture and Foreign Policy Analysis” and “Nonrealist Variables: Identity and Norms in the Study of International Relations” in this work), this essay gives special focus to the topic of religion in studies of conflict and peace. In IR, religion is usually an independent variable that causes war or peace, or an intervening variable that shapes the probability of a conflict and its violent potential (Hasenclever and Rittberger 2000 :644–8). Some scholars focus on what religion says, while others research what religion does; some scholars deal with religion in the individual level, while others emphasize the societal and organizational aspects of religion (Haynes 1998 ). The next section reviews the ways IR scholars define culture and religion and suggests that religion should be viewed as a part of culture. The following sections discuss the clash of civilizations debate; the relationship between fundamentalism and violence; religion as a cause of war; religion and the intensity of war; culture, religion and diplomacy with some references to cross-cultural negotiation; and culture and the democratic peace with some references to the debate regarding religion and democracy. The essay concludes with suggestions for future directions for research.

Conceptualizing Culture and Religion in IR Scholarship

Despite some exceptions, such as Adda Bozeman ( 1960 ), Jack Snyder ( 1977 ), and to some extent Robert Jervis ( 1976 ), IR scholars did not realize the importance of culture and religion to the understanding of peace and conflict until the post-Cold War era and the introduction of constructivism. The first task facing IR scholars trying to incorporate culture and religion is the task of definition. The understanding that these concepts can be rather distinct, but at the same time intrinsically connected has been a source for much confusion and contention. As this section suggests, different IR scholars treat culture and religion in different ways and sometimes use these concepts interchangeably with other concepts, such as norms, identity, and ethnicity.

The first example for such confusion exists in the writings of IR scholars from the English School, who understand religion as the main component in a society's culture. To Bozeman ( 1960 , 1971 ), for example, culture means civilization, and what dictates the mode of thinking and the normative order in a civilization is religion. Similarly, as Buzan ( 1993 :333) and Thomas ( 2005 :153–4) describe, Martin Wight argues that international societies can be formed on the basis of shared culture, but underlines the role of religion in not only promoting such peaceful unity but also holy wars. This view of religion as the core component of civilization is also shared by non-English School scholars such as Huntington ( 1996 ) and some of the authors in the volume edited by Katzenstein ( 2010 ).

While English School theorists understand culture as part of religion, the constructivist theoretical framework does the opposite. In constructivist studies, culture includes religion as well as other concepts such as identity, norms, or ideas (Lapid and Kratochwil 1996 ; Katzenstein 1996 ; Checkel 1998 ; Desch 1998 ). Cohen ( 1997 :11–12), for example, defines culture as “an acquired unique complex of attributes of a society that is subsuming every area of social life,” and we can find a similar approach in Mary Adams Trujillo et al. ( 2008 ). For others, such as Avruch ( 1998 :17) and Abu-Nimer ( 2001 :687) who draw on Theodore Schwartz's definition, culture is a less homogeneous and static concept and it “consists of the derivatives of experience, more or less organized, learned or created by the individuals of a population, including those images or encodement and their interpretations (meanings) transmitted from past generations, from contemporaries, or formed by individuals themselves.”

Subsuming religion under culture kept the concept under-theorized. It is notable that a canonical constructivist text, Alexander Wendt's Social Theory of International Politics ( 1999 ), does not include “religion” in the index (Snyder 2011 :2). An exception is Kubálková ( 2000 ), who brings religion into the study of IR through rule-oriented constructivism. However, the increasing interest in communal conflicts, such as ethno-national wars, and especially the September 11th attacks, have led to a resurgence of religion in the study of world politics (Fox 2001 :53; Philpott 2009 :184; Snyder 2011 :1).

Religion presents further definitional problems. The definition must encompass numerous but exclude from other phenomena such as ideologies or cults (Philpott 2003 ). Some of the early studies that deal with religion and international conflict, such as Ryan ( 1988 ), Azar ( 1990 ), Gurr ( 1994 ), and Gagnon ( 1994 ), consider religion to be part of a larger concept of ethnicity, or communality. Seul ( 1999 :553) tries to explain “the frequent appearance of religion as the primary cultural marker distinguishing groups in conflict,” and concludes that religion often exists “at the core of individual and group identity” (Seul 1999 :558). For Rothschild ( 1981 :86–7), however, religion is subsumed under the concept of ethnic identity. Correlation of War (COW) data uses both religion and ethnicity in measuring culture (see Henderson 1997 :661). Finally, Anthony Smith traces modern nationalism to religious origins (Smith 1999 ; see also Brubaker 2012 ).

Haynes ( 1998 ) provides a brief discussion about the definition dilemma and draws on Aquaviva while offering two sociological definitions. One sees religion as “a system of beliefs and practices related to an ultimate being, beings of the supernatural,” and the other considers religion to be what is “sacred in a society, that is, ultimate beliefs and practices which are inviolate” (Haynes 1998 : 4). The latter kind of definition is sometime referred to as ‘civil religion’ (Liebman and Don-Yiḥya 1983 ).

Toft ( 2007 :99) lists the common elements in most definitions: “a belief in a supernatural being (or beings); prayers and communication with that being; transcendent realities that might include some form of heaven, paradise, or hell; a distinction between the sacred and the profane and between ritual acts and sacred objects; a view that explains both the world as a whole and a person's proper role in it; a code of conduct in line with that world view; and a community bound by its adherence to these elements.”

On one hand, this discussion provides us some indicators to distinguish between religion and culture: the first belongs to the realm of the sacred and involves a relatively stable doctrine that connects the individual with the transcendental, while the latter belongs to the realm of the profane and involves a malleable combination of practices, customs, and expectations in relation to the society. On the other hand, religion and culture are intrinsically connected by myths, practices, and moral judgments that make religion a part of culture.

War and Peace in the Works of Religious Scholars and Political Theorists

Almost all religious texts have references to war and peace – the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, the Quran, the Iliad and Odyssey, the Rig Veda, Mahabharata and Ramayana, Arthasastra, and so on. These references offer different treatments of war and peace. Some describe human nature as aggressive or as pursuing peace, some explain war and peace as a result of divine intervention and will, and some define the conditions in which war and peace can be achieved. Some references in sacred texts condition peace on the society's moral behavior. Other texts determine with whom, when, and how a war can be held and a peace treaty can be signed. Most of the sacred texts also have detailed historical narratives of war and peace, from which we can draw conclusions how the religion conceives war and peace. Religious figures and leaders are still creating new interpretations and commentary about peace and war, and this rich genre receives a lot of attention from scholars. In the Western world, books on Judaism and Christianity were written focusing on analyzing peace and war in the Hebrew Bible, in the New Testament, and in sermons, letters, and other external texts and exegeses (Arias 1533 ; Belli 1563 ; Benezet 1776 ; Heaton 1816 ; Dymond 1834 ). In the Muslim world, a similar attempt was made (Shaybani 1335 ; Ibn Khaldun 1377 ; Baladhuri 1866 ). This trend is still relevant in contemporary research today in Christianity (Faunce 1918 ; Barrett 1987 ; Swartley 2006 ), in Buddhism (Kraft 1992 ; Jerryson and Juergensmeyer 2010 ), in Islam (Khadduri 1940 ; Khadduri 1955 ; Kelsay and Johnson 1991 ; Abu-Nimer 2003 ; Mirbagheri 2012 ), in Judaism (Homolka and Friedlander 1994 ; Eisen 2011 ), in Hinduism (Banerjee 1988 ), and in some of them together (Jack 1968 ; Ferguson 1978 ; Smock 1992 ; Gort et al. 2002 ; Nelson-Pallmeyer 2003 ; Nan, Mampilly, and Bartoli 2012 ).

Political philosophy also includes religion in its scholarship. Religion, God, and faith exist in the writings of Hobbes, Machiavelli, Grotius, Rousseau, Locke, Kant, and other early Western political thinkers. All of them considered religion to be an inherent part of life and society that had to be accounted for in political analysis. Some perceived religion as a moral and ethical guideline for individuals and society, and some debated whether religion is an obstacle for government and society or an integral part of it. The relationship between religion and political life remains a vibrant subject of debate to this day (Eisenach 1981 ; Beiner 1993 ; Martinich 2003 ; De Vries 2003 ). Despite the richness of the contributions of religious scholars and of philosophers, these works have not yet offered a scientific theory regarding the role that religion plays in war and peace.

Religion and Conflict: The Clash of Civilization Debate

The first major attempt in the IR field to understand war almost exclusively through the religious prism was that of Samuel Huntington in his well-known article and book Clash of Civilization ( 1993 , 1996 ). Huntington, rejecting Francis Fukuyama's notion of the “End of History,” divides the world into seven or eight major civilizations that are fundamentally different from each other “by history, language, culture, tradition and, most important, religion” (Huntington 1993 :25). Instead of the traditional territorial nation-states, Huntington recognizes a world comprised of various identities that are not necessarily delineated by national boundaries. He argues that the end of the Cold War and the ideological battle between the West and the East will be replaced by a battle of civilizations, which is the broadest category of identification for individuals and is mainly determined by religious beliefs. More specifically, Huntington predicts that the main civilizational conflict will be between the Islamic civilization and the Judeo-Christian Western civilization, due to conflictual history from both sides, a large gap in values, the rise of Islamic extremists and fundamentalism, and a clash of identities as a result of Muslim immigration.

In sum, Huntington's view clarifies two main reasons why religion can cause war. First, religion can be considered as a primordial and immutable identity. The Manichean perception of ‘us’ versus ‘them’ that religion provides is a main source of conflict (Dark 2000 :4–5, 11). Second, globalization, which folds within it rapid economic development and an increase in interactions between individual groups, creates a clash between traditional customs and Western modernity (Fox 1997 :3; Thomas 2000 :5). The desire of other civilizations to maintain their core values and traditions, and to prevent the domination of Western culture lead Huntington to claim that civilizational differences will be the main source of future wars (Huntington 1993 :29–31, 40).

Huntington's thesis received a lot of interest in scholarly and political discourse, and his thesis was tested and criticized from many angles. Ajami ( 1993 ), Bartley ( 1993 ), and Weeks ( 1993 ), for example, argue that states are still the main actors in the international system and that the English-Western secular modern force is more powerful than Huntington thinks. Kirkpatrick ( 1993 ) claims that intra-civilizational conflicts are more common than inter-civilizational conflicts. Others, such as Tipson ( 1997 ), Pfaff ( 1997 ), and Said ( 2001 ), criticize Huntington's facts and methodology (for more comprehensive reviews of the clash of civilization debate see O'Hagan 1995 ; Fox and Sandler 2004 ; Fox 2005 ). Katzenstein ( 2010 ) rejects Huntington's conception of civilizations as homogeneous in favor of a pluralistic view recognizing internal diversity. Katzenstein ( 2010 ) further questions the Huntingtonian “clash” with the evident capacity for inter-and trans-civilizational encounters.

Scholars have also made quantitative attempts to test Huntington's theory. Russett, Oneal, and Cox ( 2000 ) examine inter-state wars between 1950 and 1992 and conclude that realist and liberal variables provide better explanations of these conflicts than civilizational factors. Henderson and Tucker ( 2001 ) examine international wars between 1816 and 1992 and find no connection between civilization membership and international wars. In addition, Henderson and Tucker find that conflicts within civilizations are more likely than conflicts between civilizations. More recent attempts also do not find support for the clash of civilization thesis (Chiozza 2002 ; Ben-Yehuda 2003 ; Bolks and Stoll 2003 ; Fox 2004 ; Henderson 2005 ). However, Henderson's ( 1997 :663) findings suggest that “the greater the religious dissimilarity between states, the greater the likelihood of war.” Similarly, Roeder ( 2003 ) examines ethnopolitical conflicts and finds support for Huntington's thesis. Fox, James, and Li ( 2009 ) bring a different angle to the clash of civilizations debate in examining international interventions on behalf of the same ethno-religious group in another state. Although they focus only on conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa, their findings show that Muslim states are more likely to intervene on behalf of other Muslim minorities. Moreover, ethnic conflicts with a religious dimension seem more likely to attract intervention than other ethnic conflicts.

Another view of religion as a cause of war sees religion as a form of ideology rather than identity. In this kind of approach, the emphasis is not on how clashing religious identities create conflict, but rather how religious ideas shape worldviews that justify or are consistent with conflict (see also Desch 1998 ). According to Beker ( 2008 ), for example, the Jewish notion of the “chosen people” has fueled many ideological conflicts between Jews and non-Jews. He further demonstrates how the battle over “chosenness” is evident in modern anti-Semitic discourse. Khadduri ( 1955 ) makes an analogous point with the concepts of dar al-harb (territory of war) and dar al-Islam (territory of Islam) in Islamic laws of war. Similarly, in examining Chinese thought and culture and their influence on Ming strategy towards the Mongols, Johnston ( 1995 :xi) finds that the non-militant ideas usually associated with Confucianism may be “inaccurate, misleading, or plainly wrong.” Juergensmeyer ( 2003 ) focuses on ideas that affect “cultures of violence.” Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, and others, Juergensmeyer claims, share a worldview of cosmic war between darkness and light (Juergensmeyer 2003 :13, 35). Because religious ideology is a defined non-negotiable set of rules, resolving a religious dispute peacefully is harder than with other disputes (Dark 2000 :1–2).

Religious Fundamentalism and Violence

The relationship between religious worldviews and war leads us to religious fundamentalism and violence. Of special note is the five-volume work by Marty and Appleby ( 1991 –5) that encompasses different approaches and case studies related to fundamentalism. Marty and Appleby ( 1992 :34) define fundamentalism as “a distinctive tendency – a habit of mind and a pattern of behavior – found within modern religious communities and embodied in certain representative individuals and movements … a religious way of being that manifests itself as a strategy by which beleaguered believers attempt to preserve their distinctive identity as a people or group.” They recount the ideological extremism in social, political, and structural conditions, such as social deprivation, repressive regimes, reaction to secularization, and economic crises. Marty and Appleby argue that religious ideas are not the goal for the fundamentalists, but rather they use religion as a means to achieve political ends. Fundamentalists use “old doctrines, subtly lift them from their original context … and employ them as ideological weapons against a hostile world” (Marty and Appleby 1991 :826). Fundamentalism, in this view, is a religious backlash against secular rule (see also Tibi 1999 ). Juergensmeyer ( 1993 ) shares this view but opposes labeling this religious fervor as fundamentalism due to the accusatory and ambiguous meanings of the term.

Eisenstadt ( 1999 ) agrees with Marty and Appleby that “contemporary” fundamentalist movements are thoroughly modern movements, but disagrees with the link they draw between religious force and fundamentalism. For Eisenstadt, contemporary fundamentalist movements rest on the same universal, utopian, totalistic, and secular claims of modernity that the Jacobins and the communist revolutions were based upon but “promulgate anti-modern or anti-Enlightenment ideologies” (Eisenstadt 1999 :1). The direction which a fundamentalist movement takes depends on its civilization, the political and social circumstances surrounding the movement, and the international setting (Eisenstadt 1999 ). Reviews of religious fundamentalism and violence include Gill ( 2001 ) and Ozzano ( 2009 ).

Religious Actors and International Conflict

Scholarship has gone beyond the clash of civilizations debate and the study of fundamentalism to explore further questions about how and under what conditions religion leads to war. One approach has been to consider individual values and mindsets in the lists of factors that affect decision making by leaders, including decisions about war. Brecher ( 1972 ), Jervis ( 1976 ), and Fisher ( 1997 ) focus on culture, while Fox ( 2001 ), Sandal and James ( 2010 ), and Warner and Walker ( 2011 ) focus specifically on religion. On the collective level, society's core values, conceptions, and assumptions about the world and the enemy can influence foreign policy outcomes (Booth 1979 ; Hudson and Vore 1995 ; Reeves 2004 ). Religious beliefs should not be dismissed as irrational or marginal, but should be included in the strategic calculations of leaders and states (Toft 2007 :129).

Religious affinities on the collective level are not confined to traditional territorial state boundaries. Transnational religious actors are another good example of the role of religion in conflict. Religious terrorist groups that have cells in different countries can initiate a conflict between states, and global riots can result from injury to religious sentiment, as in the Danish caricature case (Dark 2000 :5–10; Fox 2001 :67–9; Haynes 2001 ). These kinds of conflicts can be international, when religious diaspora is engaged in the conflict, or remain domestic (civil wars). Fox and Sandler show how local wars can capture the interest of members of transnational religious groups due to the possible involvement of holy sites (Fox and Sandler 2004 :63–82). Even without direct participation in violence, religious transnational movements and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) participate in global conflict by lobbying or protesting in order to encourage a state to intervene in a distant war between ethno-religious minorities (Fox, James and Li 2009 ).

Religion may also have an indirect effect on war since it can be used as a tool to mobilize people and to enhance legitimacy (Fox 2001 :65–7; Haynes 2004 :456; Snyder 2011 :11). This does not necessarily mean that political leaders actually hold religious beliefs but that such beliefs serve them in accomplishing their political interests. This view holds that the recent global resurgence of religion in various societies occurs as a result of instrumental use of religion by political elites (Fox 1997 :4; Hasenclever and Rittberger 2000 :643–6).

The question of whether religion is the cause of a conflict, or just a tool or a dimension of it was addressed in several quantitative studies. Gurr ( 1993 ) uses the Minorities at Risk data to examine mobilization and collective action in “communal conflicts.” His findings indicate that an essential basis for mobilization is a sense of group identity. Gurr measures group identity by using six indicators including religion, ethnicity, and social customs. Fox ( 1997 , 2002 ) tries to isolate conflicts between groups from different religions. Using the same data as Gurr, Fox concludes that in such cases “religious issues play, at most, a marginal role” (Fox 1997 :16). Henderson, however, using Correlates of War data, concludes that “cultural difference, especially in the case of religion, is positively associated with war” (Henderson 1997 :666). Durward and Marsden ( 2009 ) offer a more nuanced and developed understanding of how religious beliefs, discourses, and practices are politicized and used to trigger conflicts, justify military interventions, and facilitate resolutions.

Religion and the Intensity of War

Another trend in the study of religion and war asks whether religious conflicts are more violent than other conflicts and if some religions are more prone to use more violence than others. Fox and Sandler ( 2004 ), using Minorities at Risk data, conclude that “religious conflicts … are consistently more violent than nonreligious conflicts.” A study by Pearce ( 2005 ) using a different data set supports this conclusion.

As for the relationship between a specific religion and violence, Pearce's ( 2005 :349) results show that Judaism and Hinduism are more violence prone, but this may be due to a small number of cases. Fox and Sandler's ( 2004 :132) results demonstrate “conflicts involving Islamic groups are more violent than conflicts not involving Islamic groups,” and conflicts within the Islamic civilization “are slightly more violent” than conflicts between civilizations. Due to the fact that there are many Muslim states, but only one Jewish state and one Hindu state that are each experiencing protracted conflict, it is still unclear whether specific religions are more violent than others, or whether it is a false image created by the uneven numbers of religious groups. The finding that Islamists were involved in 81 percent of the religious civil wars between 1940 and 2000 led Toft ( 2007 ) to eventually conclude that “overlapping historical, geographical, and, in particular, structural factors account for Islam's higher representation in religious civil wars.” More importantly, her theory suggests that religious aspects are an instrument by political elites for gaining more legitimacy in order to survive, or to achieve another objective (Toft 2007 :97–8, 128).

The degree of religious violence does not have to be related to a specific religion, but rather to the type of regime or degree of state power. Thomas ( 2000 :14–15) suggests that the appeal for religious ideas grows larger especially in weak states. Fox ( 1997 ) shows an increase in religious discrimination and grievance in autocratic states compared with democratic regimes. When a transition to democracy happens, the chances of such communal violence rise due to the diminishing power of the regime and an ease of autocratic repression (Gurr 1994 ).

Culture, Religion, and Diplomacy

Scholars have also been interested in the practical use of religion and culture to promote peace. Discussing culture specifically, Kevin Avruch ( 1998 ) suggests that culture is a significant variable in conflict resolution as each negotiator comes with his or her own subculture (class, region, ethnicity, and more). In contrast, Zartman ( 1993 :17) gives culture little substantive significance and argues that it is as relevant as the breakfast the negotiators ate. Fisher ( 1980 ) and Cohen ( 1997 ) occupy the middle ground suggesting that culture matters together with other variables. For a good introductory review regarding these approaches, see Ramsbotham, Miall, and Woodhouse ( 2011 ).

Cultural gaps may involve language barriers, create problems of interpretation, and disrupt the transfer of information (Gulliver 1979 ; Fisher 1980 ; Faure and Rubin 1993 ; Cohen 1997 ; Berton et al. 1999 ). The dichotomy, made by Hall ( 1976 ) between high-context cultures and low-context cultures, is useful in explaining these cultural obstacles in international negotiation. High-context cultures are generally associated with collective societies in which communication is less verbal and more indirect, emphasizing the context in which things are said and done. High-context cultures require communicators to pay attention to nuances and body language. Consequently, those from such cultures are more sensitive socially, they try to please their audience, and they see great importance in small talk and group consensus. Low-context cultures, on the other hand, are individualistic in character, and communication is direct and with a clear message. Accuracy in the written or spoken word is very important in low-context culture, and less attention is paid to context, body language, and facial expressions (Cohen 1997 ; Rubinstein 2003 ). When two societies from the two different types of culture meet around the negotiation table, potential pitfalls are evident. This line of research has specific practical implications. The US Institute of Peace published a series of works analyzing different negotiating styles and behaviors to equip negotiators with a better understanding of cultural differences. Examples include Wittes ( 2005 ), Solomon and Quinney ( 2010 ), and Schaffer and Schaffer ( 2011 ).

As for structure and the process of negotiation, culture can play an important role in the degree of trust between the sides, which can define negotiation strategy and whether there is a need for mediation. These factors can also influence the size of the delegations, the different roles within the delegation, the degree of unity within the delegation, negotiating procedures, seating arrangements, and public announcements (Berton et al. 1999 :3–5).

This vast literature regarding culture and diplomacy has little to say about religion. As former United States Secretary of State and international relations scholar Madeleine Albright confesses, diplomacy, conflict resolution, negotiation, and peace were all conceptualized in secular terms with no room for religion and faith prior to the terror attacks of September 11th (Albright 2006 :8–9). Indeed, most of the IR studies on culture and diplomatic practices to promote peace were written during the 1980s and 1990s. Only after September 11th did religion and faith become a primary topic.

Many scholars agree that the same power that religion has in inciting conflicts can also be used to promote peace (Gopin 1997 ; Appleby 2000 ; Broadhead and Keown 2007 ). Some works continue the trajectory of previous studies on cross-cultural negotiation and focus on a specific religion. In the case of Islam, Alon ( 2000 ), Alon and Brett ( 2007 ), and Pely ( 2010 ) focus on Muslim perceptions of conflict resolution, values of honor, and the institutional mechanism of sulha (reconciliation). Other studies consider how peace can be achieved with an emphasis on shared religious values, such as empathy, forgiveness, mercy, compassion and the Golden Rule to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you” (Gopin 1997 ; Gopin 2001 ; Cilliers 2002 ; Carter and Smith 2004 ). Similarly, Albright ( 2006 :73) mentions the religious notion that “we are all created in the image of God” as a common ground. Shore ( 2009 :2) shows how “Christianity played a central role in South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission,” and how values of forgiveness and justice were important in South Africa's peaceful transition to democracy. Similarly, Gopin ( 2002 ) argues that in the Israeli-Palestinian case, the marginalization of religious aspects was crucial in the failure of the Oslo agreement. He adds that by putting religion in the middle of the reconciliation process, and with dialogues between key religious figures from both sides, peace in the Middle East can be achieved.

While traditional realpolitik diplomacy has had difficulties coping with religion-inspired conflicts, non-state actors, such as religious leaders and members of religious NGOs, had more success in promoting peace in different forms – whether peacemaking, peacebuilding, peace enforcing, or peace keeping (Little 2006 :102). Cynthia Sampson ( 1997 ) overviews the various roles and methodologies used by religious-motivated institutional actors in the process of peacebuilding. She provides manifold examples of conflict intervention by religious institutional actors that advocate (such as during the Rhodesian war of independence), intermediate (such as in the 1972 Sudanese peace process), observe (such as during the 1991 Zambian elections), and educate (such as in Northern Ireland). Appleby ( 2000 ) offers a similar approach focusing on religious actors and their roles.

The vast examples of religious involvement in peacebuilding have led Johnston and Sampson ( 1997 ) and Johnston ( 2003 ) to conceptualize this type of diplomacy as “faith-based diplomacy,” which takes place through track II channels (the informal and unofficial negotiations). In general, the Catholic Church receives more scholarly attention than other religious institutions in mediating disputes. Examples include the 1968–89 internal dispute in Bolivia (Klaiber 1993 ) and the Beagle Channel dispute between Argentina and Chile (Garrett 1985 ; Lindsley 1987 ; Laudy 2000 ). Bartoli's analyses of the reconciliation process in Mozambique specify how religion plays a role in conflict resolution. He demonstrates that religion does not replace or transform the political process of negotiation, but rather provides motivation, organizational capacities, legitimacy, and flexibility (Bartoli 2001 , 2005 ; see also Toft, Philpott, and Shah 2011 ).

The volume edited by David Little ( 2007 ) offers a different perspective that focuses on individual religious figures, rather than institutions, as peacemakers. Examples from El Salvador, Israel/Palestine, Kosovo, Northern Ireland, and Sudan highlight the grassroots efforts by religious individuals to promote peace. Using religious texts, rituals, and networks these individuals increase global attention, help find common ground, provide moral justification, and facilitate face-to-face communication between the warring sides (see also Smock 2008 ; for more on the topic of diplomacy and religion see “Diplomacy and Religion”).

Recently, there is a growing interest in challenging the secularist assumptions of United States foreign policy. Hurd ( 2008 ), for example, demonstrates that the perceived separation between religious and secular political authorities is a result of a political process and is socially constructed. By identifying two trajectories of secularism – a laicist one and a Judeo-Christian one – she shows how religion and secularism were never apart. Thus, instead of characterizing religion as a threat, diplomats and decision makers should realize that there are various political representations and interpretations of religion and should make more room for non-Western forms of politics (Hurd 2007 ). From a different perspective, Farr ( 2008 ) calls for rejecting the American narrow version of religious freedom that focuses on humanitarian violations in favor of a more tolerant and broader version that builds and encourages different versions of religious freedom in different regimes. Philpott ( 2013 :31) supports Farr's conclusions by highlighting how religious freedom is a “critical enabler of peace.”

Culture, Religion, and the Democratic Peace

Another research theme in IR tries to engage religion and culture in existing peace theories. The main example is democratic peace theory, by which liberal democracies tend not to fight each other. One of the explanations for democratic peace argues that shared cultures, values, and norms favoring compromise and peaceful solutions lead liberal democracies to solve disputes peacefully (Maoz and Russett 1993 ). But the traditional cultural explanation for democratic peace focuses on political culture and not on other elements such as ethnicity, language, and religion. Henderson ( 1998 ) tests the theory with those elements included and concludes that religious similarities within democratic dyads decrease the likelihood of war, while ethnic and lingual similarities increase this likelihood.

The connection between peaceful behavior and regime type led scholars to examine the connection between specific religions and democracy as a way to better understand the conditions for democracy and presumably for peace. After Huntington's theory and the events of September 11th, Western scholars tested Bernard Lewis’ hypothesis that Islamic religion conflicts with democracy (Midlarsky 1998 :486). This topic was researched from different angles. Some argue that Muslim resistance to modernity is an obstacle to democracy (Sivan 1990 ); some argue that lack of sufficient economic development holds back democracy; others claim that the possession of oil and the concept of the ‘rentier state’ hinder democracy (Ross 2001 ; Fish 2002 ); and some claim that the ideas grounded in Islamic thought and religion are incompatible with democracy (Huntington 1984 ; Lewis 1996 ). On the other hand, Esposito and Piscatori ( 1991 ) and Esposito and Voll ( 1996 ) argue that Islam is not necessarily hostile to democracy, and urge us to remember that Islam, like democracy, has a variety of interpretations, meanings, and political practices. Midlarsky ( 1998 ) tries to test the relationship between Islam and democracy using a political rights index (measuring procedural democracy) and an index of liberal democracy (measuring liberal freedoms). He finds that Islam, measured by the percentage of population that is Muslim, has a negative correlation with liberal freedoms but does not necessarily rule out democratic procedure. Recently, Hunter and Malik ( 2005 ) offer an antithesis to this view and demonstrate how military, colonial, international economic, and domestic economic factors prevented the creation of a civil society that is crucial for democracy. Sonn and McDaniel's chapter in the same book demonstrates how modern Islamic thought is quite similar to Western values, including rationality and tolerance.

Future Research

In the study of war and peace, religion long played a marginal role. Both sacred texts and Western canonical philosophical works contain religious references to war and peace, but none of the main theoretical works in IR address religion. Since the end of the Cold War and the growing attention to ethnic conflicts, new interests in culture and religion emerged. Scholars first explored the interplay of culture, war, and peace focusing on decision making, negotiation, national character, and the cultural construction of friends and foes. Then, as a result of the growing attention to ethnic conflict and terrorism, there was a resurgence of interest in religion in IR scholarship. Treated both as a central component of social identity and as an overarching ideology, religious international violence is understood by some scholars as a reaction to global population flows, modernization processes, and secularization.

Religion, as a social phenomenon, is also able to help us understand the growing power of actors outside the traditional boundaries of the state. Transnational actors that share religious beliefs with each other can pursue different, and sometimes contradictory, goals from those of the nation-state. Such actors can ignite conflicts, but can also help in mediating negotiations and promoting peace. Diplomats have learned to use key religious figures in their reconciliation attempts and they try to emphasize common values and diminish differences between religions.

The rediscovery of religion in IR scholarship has produced many studies that try to theorize the role of religion in conflict and peace. Thus far, these studies treat religion either as a political tool used by agents for their own interests or as an essentialist ideological scheme that informs actors’ behavior. Future research may focus on the relational and constantly changing aspects of religion and show what, when, and how various religious interpretations receive political prominence in promoting conflict or peace. Moreover, IR scholarship could use more theorization of how religion can be used as an independent variable across cases. How can one compare the religious passions animating the Crusades, with the religious passions during the Thirty Years War, or with modern fundamentalist terrorism? The definitional problems, mentioned earlier, provide difficulties in that regard.

A new way to look in more depth at religious and cultural elements of international politics is to use them as interpretive tools. Culture can be conceptualized as the “practices of meaning-making,” and thus open an opportunity to investigate the ways in which meanings are created within a society (Wedeen 2002 ). For example, examining political rhetoric can help us understand how meanings become inscribed within a society and how changes in rhetoric can lead to changes in foreign policy (Krebs and Jackson 2007 ; Krebs and Lobasz 2007 ). Another beneficial way to engage the elusive concepts of culture and religion is to trace the hidden set of assumptions that are embedded in the cultural and religion labels. What does “democracy” or “freedom” mean to different cultural or religious groups? What types of behavior are expected from a negotiator who is labeled Muslim or Buddhist and how does it affect the negotiation process? Moreover, how does popular representation of different religions shape these hidden assumptions?

IR literature will probably continue to engage culture and religion in its research, but in order to develop the field and avoid academic stagnation, it is important to enable scientific pluralism that will force us to reconsider how we treat religion and culture. A deeper understanding of different religions and cultures will open our understanding of the different “worlds” within “our world” and will identify the values that drive these worlds.

Acknowledgments

I wish to thank Renée Marlin-Bennett for her valuable guidance and comments, and Andrew Mark Bennett for his meticulous assistance.

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Links to Digital Materials

Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs. At http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/ , accessed August 21, 2013 . The Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs, based at Georgetown University, is an educational and a research center for the study of religion in relation to various international phenomena, such as globalization, human rights, ethnics of war, negotiation, and more. The website also includes data regarding international religious freedom.

The Institute for Cultural Diplomacy (ICD). At http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/index.php?en , accessed August 21, 2013 . The ICD is an international NGO whose main goal is to enhance the intercultural relations between peoples and areas in the world. The ICD offers reports and publications researching various aspects of cultural diplomacy – definitions, efforts, implementation, and future directions. The institute combines academic development of the field with practical programs and educational resources.

Minorities at Risk (MAR). At http://www.cidcm.umd.edu/mar/ , accessed August 21, 2013 . The MAR project, located at University of Maryland, collects data regarding active conflict between communal groups. Among other variables, the MAR data measures religious characteristics of the conflicting groups.

Religions and Ethics in the Making of War and Peace Project. At http://relwar.org/ , accessed August 21, 2013 . The project on Religion and Ethnics in the Making of War and Peace, based at the University of Edinburgh, is an academic and practical forum to discuss the relationship between military and religious ethics. The publication section includes several articles on that topic.

Religions for Peace. At http://religionsforpeace.org/ , accessed August 21, 2013 . Religion for Peace was founded in 1970 as a coalition of representatives from the world's major religions dedicated to promote peace. The website offers guides and resources aimed to help religious leaders decrease violence and encourage development and peace.

United States Institute of Peace. At http://www.usip.org/ , accessed August 21, 2013 . Beside various books dealing with negotiation styles of different cultures, the United States Institute of Peace offers panels, initiatives, reports, and other publications dealing both with culture and religion in diplomacy and in war.

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Judaism is a monotheistic religion, believing in one god. It is not a racial group. Individuals may also associate or identify with Judaism primarily through ethnic or cultural characteristics. Jewish communities may differ in belief, practice, politics, geography, language, and autonomy.  Learn more about the practices and beliefs of Judaism.

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There is a wide variety of acceptance and observance of the following practices by denominations and individual Jews.

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• Israel-Hamas War

A Path Forward for Peace in the Middle East

W e live in a time of darkness, surrounded by frightening echoes of the past and, since October 7, horrific barbarism defended by many of those claiming an Orwellian moral high ground. But tragic moments can also be historic turning points. It is entirely possible that the brutal attacks and the Israel invasion of Gaza may in fact unleash events that finally lead to comprehensive Middle Eastern peace. And for enemies of such an outcome in Tehran and elsewhere, October 7 may have been a miscalculation of the highest order, a “catastrophic success” that sealed the defeat of their sinister aims.

Whether overtly or implicitly, many experts believe the attacks were likely launched in part because of the suddenly real prospect of a trilateral agreement among Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United States, which would have offered the kingdom an American security guarantee, a strategic disaster for Hamas and Islamic Jihad’s masters in Iran. While any such formal agreement may now be on the backburner, the carnage highlighted both how dangerous Iran and its proxies, including the Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Shia militias who regularly launch rockets at American troops, are and how much they fear such an alliance. Indeed, the Saudis and Americans have publicly stated their continued desire for such a deal, now linked to a clear pathway to a Palestinian state. This should not be surprising given that behind closed doors, Israel, the strongest power in the region, is viewed as a strategic ally against the serious threat of Iran and its extremist, nihilist proxies across the region. What leaders in many Arab states say privately is quite different from public statements, a dynamic mostly not understood by the public. They in fact desire for Israel to do what the Egyptians, with their long experience with the Muslim Brotherhood, counseled several years ago: destroy Hamas and its nihilist ideology’s capabilities to its very roots.

Hamas also did what seemed recently unthinkable: they united an Israel being pulled apart internally. It was, after all, fighting among the Jews of Roman times that led to two millennia of exile. Now, the cohesion of Israeli society is beyond question and its single most divisive figure, Benjamin Netanyahu, seems unlikely to survive in office for long after the greatest Israeli intelligence failure ever. Overseas, within days the dark antisemitism of the hard left showed its moral bankruptcy on university campuses, in elite institutions and on the streets, as those claiming to be progressive justified the slaughter of babies, the taking of hostages from thirty countries, and the use of Palestinian civilians as human shields. The unmasking of an antisemitism, cloaked in ethical superiority yet openly calling for genocide, has left young diaspora Jews betrayed, and some have embraced a feeling heretofore unknown: Zionism. A unified, well-led Israel with strong overseas support is a necessary condition for peace.

How would peace break out in the aftermath of a painful but ultimately successful ground incursion into Gaza? Israel left the Gaza Strip almost two decades ago and, followed by a violent coup by Hamas, watched as the terrorist group diverted humanitarian aid to tunnels and offshore bank accounts, deprived its citizens, and barraged Israel with rockets. But once Hamas’s fighters have been largely eliminated, so too may be the existential fear that any future Palestinian state in the West Bank will also become a “Hamastan.” For those who continue to claim that you cannot root out organizations like Hamas and Islamic Jihad based on terrorist ideologies, they should look at the current state of both al-Qaeda and ISIS, of which the same was said. It is for good reason that Hamas’s approval rating is lower in Gaza than in the West Bank, where they are not in power. Gazans will be fortunate to see them gone.

Following the operation, Israel will once again certainly leave the poison chalice that is Gaza, which the Americans have called to be initially policed and rebuilt by a coalition of Arab states. For peace to be viable, another rebuilding would have to take place within the Palestinian Authority, whose ruling party Fatah has for decades been plagued by corruption and an unwillingness to renounce its public support for terrorists. A leadership vacuum in Gaza provides an opportunity to finally confront cynical obstructionism and give power to new faces and voices at the PA willing to engage in meaningful dialogue with Israel, a message delivered in person by Secretary of State Blinken to President Muhammad Abbas. The true imperative for the Western democracies and moderate Arab states is to counter Iran, which even right now continues to wreak havoc across the region, its Hezbollah proxies firing into the north of Israel, the Houthis in Yemen disrupting international shipping in the Red Sea , and continuous attacks on American and allied forces from Shiite militias. Facilitating and pressuring for the two state solution needed for the grand alliance to come into being is not lost in the halls of power in Washington, Riyadh, and elsewhere.

Optics will matter: Palestinian leaders will have to be empowered who do not have Israeli blood on their hands, willing to renounce the cult of martyrdom destroying their society, but also with ironically enough anti-Israel credentials to have the credibility to negotiate. Such leaders do exist. The close but quiet cooperation with the PA security forces and Israel is well known nor do Fatah officials forget their comrades hurled from Gazan rooftops in 2007 by Hamas. As for the Israelis, polls have consistently shown that they desire a two-state solution if they indeed had a real partner and real security. The Abraham Accords have demonstrated that significant portions of the Arab world can live in friendship with their Jewish neighbors. Remarkably, Hamas’s attacks were denounced by leaders in the UAE, Bahrain, and elsewhere across the region, and the Arab Street has been far more quiet (including Israeli Arabs) than performative marchers in the West.

The outline of an eventual deal that would be palatable to both sides is no secret, and one that has been known to all those involved who sincerely want a two-state solution.  It is a plan that both the Americans and the Saudis have long espoused and so likely to be the basis for deal they hope to use their weight and power to broker.  As Ehud Barak has said, it will be microscopically different from what he proposed and Yasser Arafat rejected at Camp David in 2000. The gist: minor land swaps to align settlement blocks to realities on the ground, a Palestinian capital in east Jerusalem and international recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s, the Holy Sites under international supervision, and a demilitarized Palestinian state (a concepr recently endorsed by Egyptian President Sisi) in the West Bank and Gaza with the IDF deployed along the Jordanian border to ensure security.  A symbolic number of Palestinian refugees will be allowed to “return,” the rest compensated monetarily, ending a bizarre, three-generation refugee crisis. The Jews expelled from Arab states in 1948 will get nothing and many Jewish settlers will have to be uprooted, as they were in Gaza.  But Israel will then at long last be recognized by Saudi Arabia and most of the remaining Arab states.  The ones then isolated will be the mullahs in Iran and their proxies.

If such a deal happens, distracting theater will accompany its negotiation, with Arab states calling upon Israel to vacate “occupied” land and Palestinian leaders decrying years of displacement. The Israelis will need to wait a requisite time lest it seem to be rewarding Hamas’s actions and undermine the deterrence power that it is now reasserting. But the substance, not the rhetoric, will be what matters. For those who question the possibility to live in harmony after years of bloody discord, look no further than the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, which ended a conflict as bitter as any and recently celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary. And lest we forget how war itself can be a prelude to peace, almost fifty years to the day before Hamas’s atrocities, Egypt launched the Yom Kippur War. And yet, just a few years later, Menachem Begin and Anwar Sadat concluded their historic peace treaty which stands to this day.

It is hard to see it now, but the horrors of October 7 may be viewed as the tragic moment that led to peace and sent a war-torn region down the road to finally realize the vision of the prophet Isaiah, that “they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, and nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.”

A terrible price to have paid, but a prize worth reaching for.

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From the book the concept of peace in judaism, christianity and islam.

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Middle East crisis — explained

The conflict between Israel and Palestinians — and other groups in the Middle East — goes back decades. These stories provide context for current developments and the history that led up to them.

Photos: Jerusalem's sacred crossroads endures in a time of war

Ayman Oghanna

Christians hold a candlelight procession in Jerusalem outside the Church of All Nations, also known as the Church of Gethsemane, on March 28. This year, Easter, Purim and Ramadan overlapped for the first time in three decades. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Christians hold a candlelight procession in Jerusalem outside the Church of All Nations, also known as the Church of Gethsemane, on March 28. This year, Easter, Purim and Ramadan overlapped for the first time in three decades.

JERUSALEM — Jewish revelers in a Purim parade pass protesters holding placards marking the days since hostages from Israel have been held by Hamas. Outside the church of Gethsemane, Christians clutching candles march after Mass on Maundy Thursday. At Damascus Gate, tens of thousands of Muslims step down stone slopes, carefully watched by Israeli security forces.

It is in Jerusalem where the ancient Jewish Temples stood, and billions of faithful believe Jesus was resurrected and the Prophet Muhammad ascended into paradise.

Amid the war in Gaza and tensions over access to major holy sites, this complex, ancient and diverse city that's central to Judaism, Islam and Christianity has remained largely peaceful.

"The present-day city contains so many religions, ethnic groups, ideologies, national identities ... all rubbing up against each other, but all very separate," says Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman, a former president of Rabbis for Human Rights, an Israeli organization. "Jerusalem holds out the promise of peace, of a shared space. I believe that God has called on all Jews, Christians and Muslims, Palestinians and Israelis ... to find a way to live together and share this holy city."

Over the centuries, Jerusalem has withstood invasions, sieges, attacks, division, reunification — and despite ongoing tensions, it endures as a city where people are able to practice and express their different and deeply held faiths, while adhering to strict rules and restrictions imposed on worship in this shared space.

Tension at Al-Aqsa Mosque is deepening with each day of the Israel-Hamas war

This spring, for the first time in three decades, Ramadan, Easter and Purim — holidays in Islam, Christianity and Judaism — all overlapped within a month-long period. With war raging in Gaza following the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel, fresh restrictions on Palestinians' access to holy sites, and powerful challenges to longstanding rules about Jewish prayer at the Al-Aqsa compound, there were fears that tensions might flare uncontrollably and ignite violence in Jerusalem.

But the holidays passed with few incidents. Here are images showing the city during a holy month, and some of the people living, visiting and worshiping there.

Orthodox Jews pray at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City on March 25. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Orthodox Jews pray at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City on March 25.

Demonstrators hold signs urging the government to reach a deal for release of hostages taken from Israel by Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, as they and Israeli security forces watch a parade through Jerusalem for the Jewish holiday of Purim. Despite the war in Gaza, the city hosted an official Purim parade for the first time in more than 40 years, among muted crowds and protesters. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Demonstrators hold signs urging the government to reach a deal for release of hostages taken from Israel by Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, as they and Israeli security forces watch a parade through Jerusalem for the Jewish holiday of Purim. Despite the war in Gaza, the city hosted an official Purim parade for the first time in more than 40 years, among muted crowds and protesters.

A float in a Purim parade in Jerusalem, March 25. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

A float in a Purim parade in Jerusalem, March 25.

Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman stands outside his synagogue in West Jerusalem on March 6. "No one religious tradition has a monopoly on truth. Every religious tradition has, at its core, a vision of peace for all humanity," Weiman-Kelman says. "We need each other to find a way to live together. Sadly, since Oct. 7, this dream feels further away than ever." Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Rabbi Levi Weiman-Kelman stands outside his synagogue in West Jerusalem on March 6. "No one religious tradition has a monopoly on truth. Every religious tradition has, at its core, a vision of peace for all humanity," Weiman-Kelman says. "We need each other to find a way to live together. Sadly, since Oct. 7, this dream feels further away than ever."

Jerusalem as seen from the Mount of Olives. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Jerusalem as seen from the Mount of Olives.

The Dome of the Rock on the Al-Aqsa compound before Friday prayers during Ramadan in Jerusalem, March 22. It is a sacred site in Islam where the Prophet Muhammad is believed to have ascended into paradise. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

The Dome of the Rock on the Al-Aqsa compound before Friday prayers during Ramadan in Jerusalem, March 22. It is a sacred site in Islam where the Prophet Muhammad is believed to have ascended into paradise.

Israeli security forces in the Old City of Jerusalem before Friday prayers during Ramadan, March 22. Israel has long ensured Al-Aqsa Mosque remains a Muslim place of worship, with Jews allowed to pray at the Western Wall. But Israel's far-right national security minister urged religious Jews to enter the Al-Aqsa compound in the last 10 days of Ramadan, which many feared would lead to violence. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Israeli security forces in the Old City of Jerusalem before Friday prayers during Ramadan, March 22. Israel has long ensured Al-Aqsa Mosque remains a Muslim place of worship, with Jews allowed to pray at the Western Wall. But Israel's far-right national security minister urged religious Jews to enter the Al-Aqsa compound in the last 10 days of Ramadan, which many feared would lead to violence.

Men prepare for Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa compound during Ramadan in Jerusalem. It is a sacred site in Islam, where the Prophet Muhammad is believed to have ascended into paradise. Despite severe restrictions on Palestinians entering from the Israeli-occupied West Bank, more than 1.5 million worshipers visited the Al-Aqsa compound during the holy month of Ramadan, Jerusalem police said. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Men prepare for Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa compound during Ramadan in Jerusalem. It is a sacred site in Islam, where the Prophet Muhammad is believed to have ascended into paradise. Despite severe restrictions on Palestinians entering from the Israeli-occupied West Bank, more than 1.5 million worshipers visited the Al-Aqsa compound during the holy month of Ramadan, Jerusalem police said.

"Jesus was not born in Texas, he wasn't from Europe, he is not from Africa. He is from Palestine. Christianity started from Jerusalem," says Rafi Ghattas, a scout leader and coordinator for Palestinian Christian youth, in Jerusalem on March 28. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

"Jesus was not born in Texas, he wasn't from Europe, he is not from Africa. He is from Palestine. Christianity started from Jerusalem," says Rafi Ghattas, a scout leader and coordinator for Palestinian Christian youth, in Jerusalem on March 28.

A boy prepares palms while Christians hold a procession on the Mount of Olives outside Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

A boy prepares palms while Christians hold a procession on the Mount of Olives outside Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.

A woman lights a candle in the Tomb of the Virgin in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, March 24. The war in Gaza deterred many visitors and pilgrims from visiting Jerusalem during Easter. Palestinian Christians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank were among those affected by Israeli restrictions on Palestinian travel into Jerusalem. Men had to be age 55 and older, and women had to be 50 and over. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

A woman lights a candle in the Tomb of the Virgin in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, March 24. The war in Gaza deterred many visitors and pilgrims from visiting Jerusalem during Easter. Palestinian Christians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank were among those affected by Israeli restrictions on Palestinian travel into Jerusalem. Men had to be age 55 and older, and women had to be 50 and over.

Christians hold a procession on the Mount of Olives outside Jerusalem on Palm Sunday on March 24, commemorating the day that Christians believe Jesus entered Jerusalem and was greeted by followers waving palms. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

Christians hold a procession on the Mount of Olives outside Jerusalem on Palm Sunday on March 24, commemorating the day that Christians believe Jesus entered Jerusalem and was greeted by followers waving palms.

A woman kisses the Stone of Anointing on March 24, inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Christians believe the body of Jesus was prepared for burial. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

A woman kisses the Stone of Anointing on March 24, inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Christians believe the body of Jesus was prepared for burial.

An Orthodox Jew prays at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City on March 25. Above the Western Wall is the compound revered by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and by Jews as the Temple Mount. Ayman Oghanna for NPR hide caption

An Orthodox Jew prays at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City on March 25. Above the Western Wall is the compound revered by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and by Jews as the Temple Mount.

World Brief: U.S. Weighs Ending Aid to Israeli Military Unit for Alleged Human Rights Abuses

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U.S. Weighs Ending Aid to Israeli Military Unit for Alleged Human Rights Abuses

The potential move has sparked alarm among top israeli officials..

• Human Rights
• United States
• Christina Lu

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at potential U.S. decision to cut off aid to an Israeli military unit, Germany ’s arrest of three suspected spies for China , and crumbling relations between the United States and Niger .

Sign up to receive World Brief in your inbox every weekday.

Alleged human rights abuses  .

Top Israeli officials were caught off guard by reports that Washington is considering cutting off U.S. aid to an Israeli battalion accused of committing human rights abuses in the West Bank before the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7 , 2023. If that occurred, it would mark the first time that Washington has announced such measures against an Israeli military unit.

The unit in question is the Israel Defense Forces’ Netzah Yehuda battalion, which was established in 1999 for ultra-Orthodox and religious nationalist soldiers. In one of Netzah Yehuda’s most public human rights controversies, U.S. officials called for an investigation into the unit’s role in the death of Omar Assad, a 78-year-old Palestinian American man, in 2022.

The potential move comes in response to a ProPublica article published last week that revealed that an internal U.S. State Department panel recommended months ago that Secretary of State Antony Blinken cut off U.S. aid to multiple Israeli military and police units due to credible allegations that they committed serious human rights abuses, but Blinken had taken no action. The panel, called the Israel Leahy Vetting Forum, is tasked with ensuring that U.S. aid to Israel complies with the so-called Leahy Laws, which require the United States to cut off aid to any foreign military or police units that are credibly accused of gross human rights violations.

Blinken said last week after the ProPublica report came out that he had “made determinations” based on the panel’s recommendations and that the details of his decision would be made public in the coming days. He did not specify which Israeli military or police units were being evaluated, but U.S. sources told Axios that although several were investigated, only Netzah Yehuda would be cut off from U.S. aid, as the other units had remedied their behavior. Media and human rights organizations have documented alleged abuses including sexual assault, torture, and extrajudicial killings committed by Israeli security forces other than Netzah Yehuda, including Yamam, an elite Israeli border police unit that carries out counterterrorism operations.

The reports of the potential aid cutoff to Netzah Yehuda have alarmed and angered Israeli officials, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posting on X that doing so would be “the peak of absurdity and a moral low” and vowing that the Israeli government will “act by all means” against such a decision. Benny Gantz, a minister in the Israeli war cabinet, also urged Blinken to reconsider the decision in a conversation on Sunday, Gantz’s office said.

Yet even as the United States weighs pausing aid to the battalion, the Biden administration still appears set to funnel billions more in military assistance to Israel. Over the weekend, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a foreign aid bill that would send Israel some $26.4 billion in aid, with some money allocated toward humanitarian aid for Gaza. The bill now advances to the Senate, where it is widely expected to pass.

Separately, on Monday, Israeli military intelligence chief Aharon Haliva announced that he would resign over his department’s failure to warn of the impending Hamas’s Oct. 7 assault. Haliva is the highest-ranking Israeli official to step down from his post since the attack. “The intelligence directorate under my command did not live up to the task we were entrusted with,” Haliva wrote in his resignation letter. “I carry that black day with me ever since, day after day, night after night. I will carry the horrible pain of the war with me forever.”

Today’s Most Read

• A Tale of Two Megalopolises by Jan-Werner Müller
• Why Arab States Haven’t Broken With Israel by David E. Rosenberg
• Forget About Chips—China Is Coming for Ships by Agathe Demarais

The World This Week

Monday, April 22: Russian President Vladimir Putin holds talks with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

Monday, April 22, to April 24: Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi pays a three-day visit to Pakistan.

Wednesday, April 24, to April 26: Blinken visits China.  

Friday, April 26: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz hosts NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg for talks.

What We’re Following

Spying for China? German authorities have arrested three German citizens who are suspected of spying for China since at least June 2022 , officials announced on Monday. The three individuals, whom authorities did not identify by their full names, are believed to have transferred sensitive naval data—and information on technology with military applications —to the Chinese government.

“At the time of their arrest, the accused were in further negotiations about research projects that could be particularly useful for expanding China’s maritime combat power,” German Justice Minister Marco Buschmann said in a statement. The arrests come just days after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz wrapped a three-day tour to China, during which he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Qiang.

Ecuador’s harder line. In a referendum on Sunday, Ecuadoreans overwhelmingly voted to grant President Daniel Noboa greater powers to crack down on ongoing gang violence. Ecuador reported a record 8,000 homicides last year—making it the most violent country in South America—and Noboa has ordered the military to “neutralize” the country’s gangs in what he declared to be an “internal armed conflict.”

The approved proposals would enable Noboa to enact harsher security measures, including establishing joint police-military patrols and introducing longer sentences for those convicted of drug trafficking and terrorism. “We have defended the country, now we have more tools to fight against crime and return peace to Ecuadorean families,” Noboa posted on Instagram. Some human rights groups have previously criticized his approach, alleging that it has resulted in abuses.

Breakdown in ties. The United States has agreed to withdraw more than 1,000 military personnel stationed in Niger, U.S. officials said on Saturday, raising questions about the future of the U.S. position in the region as a growing number of African nations draw closer to Russia. The announcement comes around a month after the ruling Nigerien junta said that it was ending the two countries’ military cooperation deal and ordered the departure of the U.S. troops.

U.S. policy toward Niger suffered from a “gap between rhetoric and reality,” Cameron Hudson, a senior fellow at Center for Strategic and International Studies, argued earlier this month in Foreign Policy. “In a region that now is defined as the epicenter of global terrorism, Washington is on the back foot, increasingly blind to the plans of jihadi groups and dangerously low on the goodwill required to maintain a foothold there, imperiling its vital strategic interests,” he wrote.

Odds and Ends

Emerson, a tubby elephant seal, has become something of a local celebrity at one beach in Victoria, British Columbia. But when wildlife officials tried to relocate him to another beach 125 miles away—out of concern for his and the public’s safety—they learned the hard way that it’s tough to keep stars away from their adoring fans. Emerson raced back to the beach, swimming some 20 miles per day, to keep the show going for his favorite followers.

Christina Lu is a reporter at Foreign Policy . Twitter:  @christinafei

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• 1 The Strategic Unseriousness of Olaf Scholz
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U.S. Weighs Aid Cuts to Israeli Military Unit Netzah Yehuda for Human Rights Violations

The strategic unseriousness of german chancellor olaf scholz, russia's shadow oil fleet unites greenpeace and nato, israel-iran tensions should not distract from famine in gaza, more from foreign policy, arab countries have israel’s back—for their own sake.

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A Tale of Two Megalopolises

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London police to meet with Jewish leaders as protests spark concerns about the safety of Jews

FILE - Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley speaks in London, Nov. 9, 2023. London’s police commissioner will meet with senior members of the Jewish community on Monday April 22, 2024 after the force bungled its apology for suggesting an “openly Jewish’’ man’s presence along the route of a pro-Palestinian march risked provoking the demonstrators. (James Manning/PA via AP, File)

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LONDON (AP) — London’s police commissioner will meet with senior members of the Jewish community on Monday after the force bungled its apology for suggesting an “openly Jewish’’ man’s presence along the route of a pro-Palestinian march risked provoking the demonstrators.

Amid calls for his resignation, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley is also expected to meet with London Mayor Sadiq Khan and Home Secretary James Cleverly, who together are responsible for law and order in the city.

“We remain focused on doing everything possible to ensure Jewish Londoners feel safe in this city,” the Metropolitan Police Service said in a statement Sunday. “We know recent events and some of our recent actions have contributed to concerns felt by many.”

The meeting comes as London police struggle to manage tensions sparked by the Israel-Hamas war , with some Jewish residents saying they feel threatened by repeated pro-Palestinian marches through the streets of the U.K. capital.

The marches have been largely peaceful. However, many demonstrators accuse Israel of genocide and a small number have shown support for Hamas, the group that led the Oct. 7 attack on Israel and which has been banned by the U.K. government as a terrorist organization.

The Metropolitan Police force has deployed thousands of officers during each of the dozen major marches as it seeks to protect the rights of the pro-Palestinian protesters and prevent clashes with counterdemonstrators and Jewish residents.

In addition to meeting with leaders of the Jewish community, senior police officers wrote to the man at the center of the latest controversy, offering to meet with him to apologize and discuss what more could be done to “ensure Jewish Londoners feel safe.″

Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, was wearing a traditional Jewish skullcap when he was stopped by police while trying to cross a street in central London as demonstrators filed past on April 13.

One officer told Falter he was worried that the man’s “quite openly Jewish” appearance could provoke a reaction from the protesters, according to video posted on social media by the campaign group. A second officer then told Falter he would be arrested if he refused to be escorted out of the area, because he would be “causing a breach of the peace.”

Metropolitan Police initially apologized for the language the officer used in describing Falter’s appearance, but said counterdemonstrators had to be aware “that their presence is provocative.”

The department later deleted that apology from its social media accounts and issued a second statement.

“In an effort to make a point about the policing of protest we caused further offense,” the force said on Friday. “This was never our intention. ... Being Jewish is not a provocation. Jewish Londoners must be able to feel safe in the city.”

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Why the World Still Needs Immanuel Kant

Unlike in Europe, few in the United States will be celebrating the philosopher’s 300th birthday. But Kant’s writing shows that a free, just and moral life is possible — and that’s relevant everywhere.

Credit... Illustration by Daniel Barreto

Supported by

By Susan Neiman

The philosopher Susan Neiman is the director of the Einstein Forum in Potsdam, Germany.

• Published April 17, 2024 Updated April 18, 2024

When I arrived in Berlin in 1982, I was writing a dissertation on Kant’s conception of reason. It was thrilling to learn that the apartment I’d sublet turned out to be located near Kantstrasse, though at the time I wondered in frustration: Why was there no James Street — Henry or William — in the Cambridge, Mass., I’d left behind; no streets honoring Emerson or Eliot? Were Americans as indifferent to culture as snooty Europeans supposed? It didn’t take long before I, too, could walk down Kantstrasse and turn right on Leibniz without a thought.

It’s harder to ignore the way Germany, like other European nations, sets aside entire years to honor its cultural heroes. This century has already seen an Einstein Year , a Beethoven Year , a Luther Year and a Marx Year , each commemorating some round-numbered anniversary of the hero in question. Federal and local governments provide considerable sums for events that celebrate the thinkers in question and debate their contemporary relevance.

Years before Immanuel Kant’s 300th birthday on April 22, 2024, the Academy of Science in Berlin, to which he once belonged, organized a conference to begin preparations for his tercentennial. A second conference published a report of the proceedings, but when I urged colleagues to use the occasion to create programs for a wider audience, I was met with puzzled silence. Reaching a wider audience is not a talent philosophy professors normally cultivate, but conversations with other cultural institutions showed this case to be especially thorny.

It wasn’t just uneasiness about celebrating “another dead white man,” as one museum director put it. The problems became deeper as the zeitgeist changed. “ Immanuel Kant: A European Thinker ” was a good title for that conference report in 2019, when Brexit seemed to threaten the ideal of European unification Germans supported. Just a few years later, “European” has become a slur. At a time when the Enlightenment is regularly derided as a Eurocentric movement designed to support colonialism, who feels comfortable throwing a yearlong birthday party for its greatest thinker?

Nonetheless, this year’s ceremonies will officially commence on April 22 with a speech by Chancellor Scholz and a memorial lunch that has taken place on the philosopher’s birthday every year since 1805. Two days earlier, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier of Germany will open an exhibit at the presidential palace devoted to Kant’s writing on peace.

The start of the year saw special Kant editions of four prominent German magazines. A Kant movie made for television premiered on March 1, and another is in production. Four exhibits on Kant and the Enlightenment will open in Bonn, Lüneburg, Potsdam and Berlin. The conferences will be numerous, including one organized by the Divan, Berlin’s house for Arab culture.

But why celebrate the Kant year at all?

The philosopher’s occasional autobiographical remarks provide a clue to the answer. As the son of a saddle maker, Kant would have led a workman’s life himself, had a pastor not suggested the bright lad deserved some higher education. He came to love his studies and to “despise the common people who knew nothing,” until “Rousseau set me right,” he wrote. Kant rejected his earlier elitism and declared his philosophy would restore the rights of humanity — otherwise they would be more useless than the work of a common laborer.

Chutzpah indeed. The claim becomes even more astonishing if you read a random page of his texts. How on earth, you may ask, are human rights connected with proving our need to think in categories like “cause” or “substance?” The question is seldom raised, and the autobiographical remarks usually ignored, for traditional readings of Kant focus on his epistemology, or theory of knowledge.

Before Kant, it’s said, philosophers were divided between Rationalists and Empiricists, who were concerned about the sources of knowledge. Does it come from our senses, or our reason? Can we ever know if anything is real? By showing that knowledge requires sensory experience as well as reason, we’re told, Kant refuted the skeptics’ worry that we never know if anything exists at all.

All this is true, but it hardly explains why the poet Heinrich Heine found Kant more ruthlessly revolutionary than Robespierre. Nor does it explain why Kant himself said only pedants care about that kind of skepticism. Ordinary people do not fret over the reality of tables or chairs or billiard balls. They do, however, wonder if ideas like freedom and justice are merely fantasies. Kant’s main goal was to show they are not.

The point is often missed, because Kant was as bad a writer as he was a great philosopher. By the time he finishes proving the existence of the objects of ordinary experience and is ready to show how they differ from ideas of reason, the semester is nearly over. Long-windedness is not, however, the only reason his work is often misinterpreted. Consider the effects of a bad review.

Had Kant died before his 57th birthday, he’d be remembered by a few scholars for some short, early texts. He withdrew from writing them in 1770 to conceive and compose his great “Critique of Pure Reason .” After what scholars call his “silent decade,” Kant pulled the text together in six months and finally published in 1781. For a year and a half, Kant waited for responses. When one finally appeared, it was a hatchet job accusing him of being a Berkeleyan solipsist: someone who denies the existence of ordinary objects.

Any author can imagine Kant’s dismay, and most likely his rage. In haste to refute the distortion of his life’s work, Kant wrote a second edition of the “Critique of Pure Reason,” and more fatefully, the “Prolegomena .” Since the latter is much shorter than the main book, it’s read far more often, and this has skewed the interpretation of Kant’s work as a whole. If the major problem of philosophy were proving the world’s existence, then Kant surely solved it. (Richard Rorty argued that he did, and that philosophy has little more to offer.)

In fact Kant was driven by a question that still plagues us: Are ideas like freedom and justice utopian daydreams, or are they more substantial? Their reality can’t be proven like that of material objects, for those ideas make entirely different claims on us — and some people are completely impervious to their claims. Could philosophy show that acting morally, if not particularly common, is at least possible?

A stunning thought experiment answers that question in his next book, the “Critique of Practical Reason .” Kant asks us to imagine a man who says temptation overwhelms him whenever he passes “a certain house.” (The 18th century was discreet.) But if a gallows were constructed to insure the fellow would be hanged upon exiting the brothel, he’d discover he can resist temptation very well. All mortal temptations fade in the face of threats to life itself.

Yet the same man would hesitate if asked to condemn an innocent man to death, even if a tyrant threatened to execute him instead. Kant always emphasized the limits of our knowledge, and none of us know if we would crumble when faced with death or torture. Most of us probably would. But all of us know what we should do in such a case, and we know that we could .

This experiment shows we are radically free. Not pleasure but justice can move human beings to deeds that overcome the deepest of animal desires, the love of life. We want to determine the world, not only to be determined by it. We are born and we die as part of nature, but we feel most alive when we go beyond it: To be human is to refuse to accept the world we are given.

At the heart of Kant’s metaphysics stands the difference between the way the world is and the way the world ought to be. His thought experiment is an answer to those who argue that we are helpless in the face of pleasure and can be satisfied with bread and circuses — or artisanal chocolate and the latest iPhone. If that were true, benevolent despotism would be the best form of government.

But if we long, in our best moments, for the dignity of freedom and justice, Kant’s example has political consequences. It’s no surprise he thought the French Revolution confirmed our hopes for moral progress — unlike the followers of his predecessor David Hume, who thought it was dangerous to stray from tradition and habit.

This provides an answer to contemporary critics whose reading of Kant’s work focuses on the ways in which it violates our understanding of racism and sexism. Some of his remarks are undeniably offensive to 21st-century ears. But it’s fatal to forget that his work gave us the tools to fight racism and sexism, by providing the metaphysical basis of every claim to human rights.

Kant argued that each human being must be treated as an end and not as a means — which is why he called colonialism “evil” and congratulated the Chinese and Japanese for denying entry to European invaders. Contemporary dismissals of Enlightenment thinkers forget that those thinkers invented the concept of Eurocentrism, and urged their readers to consider the world from non-European perspectives. Montesquieu put his criticisms of French society in the mouths of fictitious Persians; Lahontan attacked European politics through dialogues with a Native American.

At a time when the advice to “be realistic” is best translated as the advice to decrease your expectations, Kant’s work asks deep questions about what reality is. He insisted that when we think morally, we should abstract from the cultural differences that divide us and recognize the potential human dignity in every human being. This requires the use of our reason. Contrary to trendy views that see reason as an instrument of domination, Kant saw reason’s potential as a tool for liberation.

He also argued that political and social relations must aim toward justice rather than power, however often those may be confused in practice. We’ve come to better understand how racism and sexism can preclude genuine universalism. Should we discard Kant’s commitment to universalism because he did not fully realize it himself — or rather celebrate the fact that we can make moral progress, an idea which Kant would wholeheartedly applaud?

In Germany, it’s now common to hear that the Enlightenment was at very best ambivalent: While it may have been an age of reason, it was also an age of slavery and colonialism. This argument ignores the fact that, like progressive intellectuals everywhere, Enlightenment thinkers did not win all their battles. It also neglects the fact that they fought for them anyway, despite the risks of censorship, exile and even death.

Significantly, many contemporary intellectuals from formerly colonized countries reject those arguments. Thinkers like the Ghanaian Ato Sekyi-Otu, the Nigerian Olufemi Taiwo, the Chilean Carlos Peña, the Brazilian Francisco Bosco or the Indian Benjamin Zachariah are hardly inclined to renounce Enlightenment ideas as Eurocentric.

The problem with ideas like universal human rights is not that they come from Europe, but that they were not realized outside of it. Perhaps we should take a lesson from the Enlightenment and listen to non-Western standpoints?

Arts and Culture Across Europe

Our theater critics and a reporter discuss the big winne r —  Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Boulevard” — and the rest of the honorees at this year’s Olivier Awards .

New productions of “Macbeth” and “Hamlet” in Paris follow a French tradition of adapting familiar works . The results are innovative, and sometimes cryptic.

The internet latched on to 16-year-old Felicia Dawkins’ performance as The Unknown at a shambolic Willy Wonka-inspired event . Now she’s heading to a bigger and scarier stage in London.

When activists urged Tate Britain in London to take an offensive artwork off its walls, the institution commissioned Keith Piper  to create a response instead. The result recently went on display.

The new National Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam has been in the works for almost 20 years. It is the first institution to tell the full story  of the persecution of Dutch Jews during World War II.

At a retrospective of John Singer Sargent’s portraits in London, where the American expatriate fled after creating a scandal in Paris, clothes offer both armor and self-expression .

Advertisement

London police apologize after threatening to arrest ‘openly Jewish’ man near pro-Palestinian protest

LONDON — London’s police force has been forced to issue two apologies after officers threatened to arrest an “openly Jewish” man if he refused to leave the area around a pro-Palestinian march because his presence risked provoking the demonstrators.

Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, was wearing a traditional Jewish skullcap when he was stopped by police while trying to cross a street in central London as demonstrators filed past on April 13.

One officer told Falter he was worried that the man’s “quite openly Jewish” appearance could provoke a reaction from the protesters, according to video posted by the campaign group. A second officer then told Falter he would be arrested if he refused to be escorted out of the area because he was “causing a breach of the peace.”

London’s Metropolitan Police Service on Friday afternoon apologized for the language the officer used in describing Falter’s appearance, but said counter demonstrators had to be aware “that their presence is provocative.”

The Met later deleted that apology from its social media accounts and issued a second statement.

“In an effort to make a point about the policing of protest we caused further offense,” the force said. “This was never our intention. We have removed that statement and we apologize.”

“Being Jewish is not a provocation. Jewish Londoners must be able to feel safe in the city.”

The episode highlights the challenges London police face amid the boiling tensions surrounding the war in Gaza, with some Jewish residents saying they feel threatened by  repeated pro-Palestinian marches  through the streets of the British capital.

While the marches have been largely peaceful, many demonstrators accuse Israel of genocide and a small number have shown support for Hamas, the group that led  the Oct. 7 attack on Israel  and which has been banned by the British government as a terrorist organization.

The Met has deployed thousands of officers during each of the dozen major marches as it sought to protect the rights of the pro-Palestinian protesters and prevent clashes with counter-demonstrators and Jewish residents.

Following Falter’s confrontation with police, the Campaign Against Antisemitism issued a call for Londoners to exercise their right to walk wherever they choose on April 27, when another pro-Palestinian march is scheduled.

In response, the Met emailed Falter about what it described as his intention to “protest” next week and offered to meet with him to discuss ways to “ensure we can police the event as safely as possible,” according an exchange of correspondence released by the campaign group.

Falter rejected the idea that he was staging a protest, saying he was planning to go for a walk as a “private individual” and others might choose to join him.

“Unfortunately @MetPoliceUK is missing the point,” he said on the social media site X. “This is not a protest or counterprotest. Anyone who wishes to walk around London on Saturday 27th April … is free to do so. Even if they are ‘quite openly Jewish.’”

The Associated Press