Belonging to the Outsider and Established Groupings:
Palestinians and Israelis in Various Configurations
PI: Professor Shifra Sagy (Ben Gurion University of the Negev), Professor Gabriela Rosenthal (Gottingen University, Germany), and Professor Mohammad Daoud Dajani (Wasatia, East Jerusalem). This project was supported by a grant from the DFG foundation (1225,000 Euro).
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This research group studied the present-day social relations and dynamics of interaction between minority and majority groupings within society in Israel and in the Palestinian Authority territories (West Bank). The study concentrated on the perspectives and experiences of Palestinians as members of different groupings in several social settings (Palestinian and Jewish Israelis, Muslim and Christian Palestinian Israelis in a local context of a Muslim or Christian majority and Jewish Israelis, Christian, and Muslim Palestinians interacting in the Palestinian Authority territories). In addition the study explored the relationships between Haredi - ultraOrthodox and national religious Jews in Israel. The general theoretical and empirical question of our joint research is: What is the impact of the different and multiple memberships in various ‘pairs’ of established-outsider configurations on the structures of social interaction between minority and majority members? Our inquiry was based on the use of different methods (biographical-narrative and thematically focused narrative interviews, participant observation, video analysis of social interactions, questionnaire) and their triangulation. This research conducted a careful and sensitive analysis of the everyday dimension of social and political conflicts in the Middle East. We found some insights which help us explore the possibilities of conflict resolution from the subjective perspectives of the individuals involved.
The Israeli research is part of a larger trilateral project: “Belonging to the Outsider and Established Groupings: Palestinians and Israelis in Various Figurations