Jews and the Military

Derek J. Penslar is the Samuel Zacks Professor of Jewish History at the University of Toronto and the Stanley Lewis Professor of Israel Studies at the University of Oxford. His many books include Shylock's Children: Economics and Jewish Identity in Modern Europe, Israel in History: The Jewish State in Comparative Perspective, and The Origins of Israel, 1882-1948: A Documentary History.

Shortlisted for the 2014 Sophie Brody Medal, Reference and User Services Association (RUSA) of the American Library Association "Penslar offers a deep perspective ... he enlivens his study with literary references and a wide-ranging history that offers revelations on nationalism, empire, and identity."--Anna Altman, New York Times Book Review "This work of meticulous scholarship, based on sources in seven languages, sets out to correct deeply ingrained myths concerning Jews and military service. Drawing on evidence from the 17th century onward, Penslar puts to rest the common notions that Jews were wholly unsuited to be soldiers--too physically feeble, inherently cowardly, and disinterested to fight for the countries where they happened to be living... This important book is balanced in its judgments and full of useful information."--Choice "Penslar shows very effectively that there was a lot of middle ground between Jews of the Mosaic persuasion who disavowed any special connection with their foreign coreligionists and ardent Zionists who denied that the Jews could ever really belong to a nation other than their own... Many [Jewish Historians] will no doubt be tantalized into pursuing the innumerable fascinating leads that Penslar provides."--Allan Arkush, Jewish Review of Books "Remarkable... [A] fascinating, meticulous survey."--Lawrence Freedman, Jewish Chronicle "It is wide-ranging, in history and in the coverage of countries... This is a very well-researched book, and the author has used publications in a number of languages."--Harold Pollins, Bulletin of the Military Historical Society "Jews and the Military is a thoughtful and very readable study... Penslar's work clearly demonstrates that the story of Jews in the military is not a case of all or nothing; the truth is somewhere in between."--Catherine D. Chatterley, American Historical Review "Professor Penslar's book treats Jews and the military, perhaps for the first time, as a coherent subject of study rather than a series of individual conflicts... To write a book on a single subject is challenge enough. To range across such a vast canvas of history and geography, through the prism of a coherent unity, is a remarkable achievement."--Jonathan Lewis, Jewish Historical Studies "This book offers remarkably new ways of thinking about the relationship between Jews and the military beyond the context of modern Israel. It also weaves Jewish history, which is so often disconnected from scholarship on the predominantly Gentile countries in which the vast majority of the world's Jews lived for centuries, into larger historiographies in a way that makes the text stimulating reading for specialists in a variety of fields."--Christopher Tozzi, The Journal of Modern History "Penslar's pioneering volume is certain to become a core work in the field."--David Rodman, Israel Affairs "[A] groundbreaking book."--Sheldon Kirshner, The Times of Israel blog "The book as a whole offers a radical reassessment of the Jewish diaspora's rich martial heritage. For the non-Jewish specialist or any military historian, there is much to learn here from its transnational approach, its sources, and its incisive analysis of conflicted loyalties, notably how they might be viewed by the state, the community, or the individual."--Mark Cornwall, Journal of Jewish Studies

• List of Illustrations vii Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 Chapter One - The Jewish Soldier between Memory and Reality 17* War in Premodern Judaism 19 * Premodern Jews in War 22 * Jews in the Tsar's Army: Conscription as National Tragedy? 27 Chapter Two - Fighting for Rights: Conscription and Jewish Emancipation 35* New Thinking about Jews as Soldiers in the Eighteenth Century 38 * Absolute Conscription: Jews and the Draft in the Habsburg Empire 41 * Willing Bodies: Jewish Soldiers in Western Europe 47 * The Jew as Rebel 56 * Integration and Accommodation of Jewish Soldiers 61 * Celebrating the Jewish Fighter 68 * Jewish Fighters at the Fin de Siecle: Proletarian Rebels and Shock Troops of Empire 74 Chapter Three - The Military as a Jewish Occupation 83* Jewish Military Officers as Social Barometers 84 * The Armed Juif d'Etat 94 * Lives Reconstructed: French-Jewish Officers at Home and Abroad 103 Chapter Four - When May We Kill Our Brethren? Jews at War 121 * Civil Wars within Civil Wars 122 * Jews and War Finance: Between Patriotism and Internationalism 145 * World War I: The End or Pinnacle of Jewish Transnationalism? 152 * Jewish Veterans as a Transnational Community 160 Chapter Five - The Jewish Soldier of World War I: From Participant to Victim 166 Chapter Six - The World Wars as Jewish Wars 195* The Jewish Legion and Palestine: The First Global Jewish War? 196 * Mobilized Jewish Internationalism: The Spanish Civil War 200 * The Second World War: Fighting Amalek 207 Chapter Seven - 1948 as a Jewish World War 225* The Global Battle for a Jewish State 226 *1948: The View from America 248 Epilogue 254 Notes 263 Bibliography 317 Index 337