Social Anthropology
Current Project
I am a cultural anthropologist studying the West Bank settlement project. My work lies at the intersection of political anthropology, settler-colonial studies, anthropology of religion, and political theory. I am currently writing a book based on almost two years of anthropological fieldwork during which I lived in an illegal Jewish outpost settlement in the Judean Desert. On one level, Between Two Messiahs is a study of how a settler-colonial process takes place. Literally. As in how settlers grab more land and establish settlements against Palestinian resistance. By studying this process from the ground up, my work challenges some of the established axioms within the settler-colonial paradigm, particularly concerning the West Bank settlement project. On a second level, by focusing on a particular strand of outpost settlers, this book will be about how political radicalism unfolds in the aftermath of messianic fervor. From this angle, my work deals with what I understand as post-ideological radicalism.
Publications
2025 "The Settler-Colonial Ethical Outlook in the West Bank Settlement Project: Or, How a Settler-Colony Fell Apart When Money Entered the Frontier." HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 15, no. 1 (2025): 146-160.
2025 "Detachment from the Metaphysical and the Turn to the Concrete: Religious Transformations Among Religious-Zionist Settlers in the West Bank." Journal of the American Academy of Religion (2025)
2024 “Nomos-Aversion and the Art of Being Somewhat Governed among Jewish Outpost Settlers in the West Bank.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.14203
2023 "Zrima: The Colonial Flow." History of the Present 13, no. 2 (2023): 219-243.
2023 "Settler-Colonialism in the West Bank from the Standpoint of its Mizrahi settlers." Ethnic and Racial Studies 46, no. 7 (2023): 1314-1334.
2023 “Dangerous Mimicry in the West Bank” In Anthropological Approaches to ‘Settler-Indigeneity’ in the West Bank. Edited by Rachel Feldman and Ian McGonigle. McGill University Press (April 2023).
Major Prizes, Fellowships and Grants
2023-2025 Martin Buber Society of Fellows Postdoctoral Fellowship, Hebrew University, Jerusalem
2023 New Perspectives in Jewish Studies Award, Columbia University
2021 Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship. [Declined]
2021-22 Mellon/American Council of Learned Sciences, Dissertation Completion Fellowship
2020-21 Mellon Committee on Globalization and Social Change, CUNY Graduate Center Dissertation
Fellowship
2019 Wenner-Gren Foundation, Dissertation Fieldwork Grant
2018-19 Social Science Research Council, Mellon International Dissertation Research Fellowship.
2012 Tel Aviv University, History Prize for Outstanding Academic Achievement.
SELECTED CONFERENCES AND INVITED TALKS
2024 “From the Land of Israel to its Soil.” Haifa University, The Anthropology and Sociology Department Workshop, December.
2024 “The End of the ‘Situation:’ On the Aftermath of October 7th in the West Bank.” Northwestern University, Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies, October.
2024 “Meolam le’olam: From One World to the Other: On Post-Messianic Theology and Material Anthropology.” Tel Aviv University, The Anthropology and Sociology Department Workshop, May.
2024 Invited Talk. “From Eretz Yisrael to Adamah: On Metaphysical Detachment and the Turn to the Concrete Among West Bank Settlers (or: What Drives Settlers to Grab More Land), Columbia University, Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, April.
2023 “Israel’s Judicial Overhaul and Nomos-Aversion Among West Bank Settlers.” New York University, Association for Israeli Studies (AIS), June.
2023 “Activating Doubt Among Outpost Settlers in the West Bank.” American Ethnological Association (AES). Princeton University, March.
2022 “Stuck in Time – Expanding Into Space.” Association for Jewish Studies (AJS) Annual Conference. December.
2022 “The Time of Place, The Place of Time: The Time West Bank Settlers See.” Mansfield College, Oxford, European Association of Israeli Studies (EIAS). September.
2022 “The West Bank Settlement Project from the Standpoint of its Mizrahi Settlers.” Bar-Ilan University, Association for Israeli Studies (AIS), June.
2022 “God is in the (Material) Details: Macramé and the Messianic Process.” Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Baltimore, Maryland, November.
2021 “Living Without a Banister: On the Desire for Grounding among West Bank Outpost Settlers.” University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Association for Israeli Studies (AIS), June.
2020 Paper accepted, “Messianic and Post-Messianic Things: On Inter-Generational Shifts of Temporal Understanding among Settlers in the West Bank”, The University of Texas at Austin, American Ethnological Society (AES), March 2020 [Conference canceled]
2019 “From Messianic Tools to Post-Messianic Artifacts”, Charles University, Prague, European Association of Israeli Studies (EIAS). September.
2019 “Redemptive Hi-Tech”, Kineret College, Kineret, Association for Israeli Studies (AIS), May.
2018 “After the Messiah: How West Bank Settlers face the end of the End?”, University of California, Berkeley, Association for Israeli Studies (AIS), June.
2018 “Once as Tragedy Second Time as Farce – the Reincarnation of the Wandering Jew in the West Bank”, SOAS University of London, European Association of Israeli Studies (EIAS), September.
2017 “Messianism and its Aftermaths Among Second-Generation Settlers,” Wroclaw University, European Association of Israeli Studies (EAIS), September.
Courses Taught
Colonialism, Gender, and the Nation
Introduction to Cultural Anthropology
Anthropology of Religion
Power and Politics
Theory in Cultural Anthropology
Myth and Folklore
Witchcraft and Magic