The Zionist Bible: Biblical precedent, colonialism and the erasure of memory

Professor Nur Masalha (Historian and Professor of Religion and Politics and Director of the Centre for Religion and History and Holy Land Research Project at St. Mary's) has just published this new book. The Zionist Bible focuses on the Bible, nationalism. collective memory and the politics of modern archaeology. It explores the ways in which modern political Zionism used the Bible to justify settler-colonialism in Palestine and the renaming of sites in the Holy Land. The book examines how the birth and growth of the State of Israel has been shaped by this Zionist reading of the Bible, how it has refashioned Israeli-Jewish collective consciousness and renamed indigenous, multi-layered Palestinian toponymy. The book also explores how new critical responses to this reading have challenged both Jewish and Palestinian nationalism.