Citizens of the Whole World: Anti-Zionism and the Cultures of the American Jewish Left

Citizens of the Whole World: Anti-Zionism and the Cultures of the American Jewish Left 

Author: Benjamin Balthaser
Publisher: Verso Books
Year Published: 2025
ISBN: 9781804291375
Pages: 320 pages
Price: RM149
Weight: 

Since October 7, 2023, the world has witnessed a massive American Jewish uprising in support of Palestinian liberation. Through sit-ins in Congress or Grand Central Terminal, through petitions and marches, thousands of Jews have made it known the Israeli state is not acting in their name. This resistance did not come out of nowhere. Citizens of the Whole World returns us to its roots in the "red decade" of the 1930s and, from there, traces the history of American Jewish radicals and revolutionaries to the present day. 

Benjamin Balthaser delves into radical Jewish novels and memoirs, as well as interviews with Jewish revolutionaries, to unearth a buried if nonetheless unbroken continuity between leftist Jewish Americans and the diasporic internation­alism of today. 

Covering more than just the politics of anti-Zionism, Citizens of the Whole World explores the Jewish revolutionary traditions of Marxist internationalism, Jewish solidarity with Third World struggles, and relations between Jewish and Black radicals during the Civil Rights era. 

Balthaser's book stages an intervention into current anti-Zionist politics, suggesting activists can learn from past struggles to help form a future politics in a world after Zionism.