Citizens of the Whole World

Praise

“As more American Jews join the ranks of those calling for a world free of the institutions that wield Judaism and antisemitism as a means to justify and entrench genocide, Benjamin Balthaser offers a deep dive into the roots of today’s Jewish anti-Zionist left.”
—Sumaya Awad, co-editor of Palestine: A Socialist Introduction

“Finally, thanks to Benjamin Balthaser, the Jewish left has a voice which has been suppressed in the face of the Israeli genocide in Gaza.”
—Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States

“Citizens of the Whole World is in a class by itself. Bracingly original, edgy and provocative, witty and cerebral, Balthaser’s tour de force provides a stunning rebuke to the myth that the twenty-first century alignment of radical Jews with Palestinian self-determination is discontinuous with the past. His punchy amalgam of social movement history, oral inter­views, and readings of imaginative literature affords a coolly reasoned argument for a diasporic internation­alism with Jewish characteristics that is a fresh manifestation of a laudable tradition.”
—Alan Wald, author of Exiles from a Future Time

“Once, not very long ago, many Jews believed that our distinctive historical experiences and cultural traditions presented us both the opportunity and the obligation to practice a universal solidarity—a solidarity whose content was socialist, anti-colonialist, and anti-racist. Balthaser recovers this memory for us as it flashes in a moment of danger.”
—Gabriel Winant, author of The Next Shift

“Citizens of the Whole World soberly and expertly excavates ideas long marginalized, thereby enabling us to better understand the complexities of the Jewish past and the possibilities for a more variegated and robust Jewish future.”
—Shaul Magid, author of The Necessity of Exile