Immigration and Ethnic Formation in a Deeply Divided Society: The Case of the 1990s Immigrants from the Former Soviet Union in Israel »

Majid Al-Haj, Ph.D. (1984) in Sociology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is Professor of Sociology and the Head of the Center for Multiculturalism at the University of Haifa. He has published extensively on demography, ethnicity and education including Education, Empowerment and Control: The Case of the Arabs in Israel (SUNY, 1995).

This book deals with the ethnic formation among the 1990s immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Israel, in light of both domestic changes, and developments in the Israel- Arab conflict. Based on a broad variety of quantitative and qualitative methods, the book presents a detailed analysis of identity patterns among these immigrants, their orientation in matters of religion, society, culture and politics, and their relationships with all the constituent groups in Israeli society – including the Palestinian minority.
The book provides a new critical perspective on questions of immigration, ethnicity and society in Israel. The analysis is placed in a global theoretical context that challenges the dominant approach in the sociology of immigration in Israel, which is based on the Zionist paradigm.