Eitan Y. Alimi

‘Occupy Israel’: A Tale of Startling Success and Hopeful Failure

In between the Arab Spring and the US Occupy movement, Israel has had its share in demonstrating the peoples power against unjust authority in general and socioeconomic wrongs in particular. This paper analyzes the context, rapid growth and yet swift abatement of the Israeli protest-tent summer of 2011. I argue that the reasons for the shortly lived Israeli protest summer related more to difficulties in coping with intra-movement challenges, framing alignment and a relatively ‘closed’ political environment, and less to the omnipresent security complex and militarized political culture, which has repeatedly been suppressing other episodes in Israels history.

The effects of opportunities on insurgencies

There are several overlooked aspects of the 1987 Palestinian intifadah. This article focuses on its specific time context and offers an alternative theoretical framework for explaining it: the political process model. This model addresses the when question of social movements, and specifically, why it was that the Palestinian public participated at such an unprecedented level during the period of the intifadah. Comparison is made with collective behaviour and resource mobilization models.

The Relational Context of Radicalization: The Case of Jewish Settler Contention before and after the Gaza Pullout

Why is it that social movements engaged in contention sometimes experience radicalization of member factions? This article argues that relational practices of contacts, ties, exchange of information and bargaining among the contending parties mediate the influence of violence-prone ideologies as well as impulses, incentives and motives for aggression on actual engagement in political violence. A mechanism-based comparison of two similar yet different-in-outcome episodes of Jewish settler contention demonstrates the mediating role of relational mechanisms, the combined influence of which is conceptualized and operationalized as an Infrastructure of Coordination (IOC). Despite ample environmental stimuli and widespread violence-prone ideologies present in both episodes, in the Gaza Pullout radicalization was impeded through high levels of coordination established between and within the contending parties. Conversely, in the dismantling of the Amona outpost the disintegration of the IOC propelled radicalization. Supportive evidence is provided from a multi-method research design, including in-depth interviews, content analysis and contention—repression data over a series of critical events.

Discursive Contention: Palestinian Media Discourse and the Inception of the “First” Intifada

The framing process of political opportunity to act contentiously is examined as a unique type of interaction between news media and social movements, where media institutions act as a forum for reflecting and constructing oppositional views to unfolding political processes. The case of Palestinian contention during the run-up to the “first” Intifada is employed to illustrate the role of “mobilized print media” in framing of opportunity to act contentiously. Findings from content analysis data suggest that (a) during 1987, there is a significant, gradual increase in calls for action and (b) a converging process between various newspapers, representing various political factions within the Palestinian movement, develops regarding a shared framing of ripe political conditions to increase mobilization.

Making sense of ‘Price Tag’ violence: changing contexts, shifting strategies, and expanding targets

Abstract Writings on the fringe Jewish settler grassroots network known as the Hilltop Youth have proliferated in recent years, following the increase in violent activism associated with the network. But knowledge on this violent activism, called Price Tag, has remained conflicting and problematic. Central questions persist: What is the meaning of Price Tag violence? What explains the increase in the rate and salience of Price Tag violence? What are the social-political implications of Price Tag violence? This article argues that Price Tag violence represents a new strategy of contention taking shape in the context of a fundamental reconfiguration of relations within Israel’s institutional and non-institutional radical Right, and that it represents a highly consequential social and political phenomenon with destabilizing and destructive effects nationally and regionally.

Price Tag Violence and the Dwindling Prospects for Peace in Israel-Palestine

POLITICAL INSIGHT • SEPTEMBER 2018 T he prospects for peace in the Middle East have seldom seemed so remote. Along the Gaza border violence has risen, as has the death toll. In the West Bank there are growing signs of a Palestinian leadership losing ground. In Israel, meanwhile, the government seems to show neither the interest nor the ability to revive the peace process. In fact, the current and past Israeli governments have been building strategically in the occupied territories in order to either render a two-state solution impossible, or to severely circumscribe in geographic and functional terms any future Palestinian state. Jewish settlements are often cited as among the biggest obstacles to peace between Israel and Palestine. Settler leaders have been increasingly important in Israeli politics. At the same time, there has been a marked rise in so-called ‘Price Tag’ violence among radical grassroots settlers. Eitan Y. Alimi and Chares Demetriou report. Price Tag Violence and the Dwindling Prospects for Peace in Israel-Palestine

“Struggling to Remain Relevant”: Why and How Radicalization Was Impeded in the Struggle against the Gaza Pullout: Nonviolence in the Struggle against the Gaza Pullout

The role of cognitive mechanisms in processes of radicalization cannot be overestimated. However, focusing solely on violence-prone values and ideologies without examining how they gain and lose consequentiality in the context of relational dynamics, hampers our understanding of the shift from support for, to actual engagement in political violence. Using a case of nonradicalization-the predominantly nonviolent struggle of Jewish settlers against the Gaza Pullout (2004 to 2005)-this paper accounts for the process whereby despite the presence of violence-prone values and ideologies we observe little engagement in political violence. Findings from a mechanism-based, mixed-method design that includes content analysis, in-depth interviews, network analysis, and contention-repression data, reveal how the combined operation of the reversals of relational mechanisms mitigate the salience of cognitive mechanisms and, consequently, impede radicalization on the part of militant Jewish settler organizations. The contributions of the findings to a relational theory of radicalization are discussed in the conclusion.