Jewish Studies

Find authentic sources on Israel, Jewish life, and Israeli perspectives on the Israel-Hamas conflict. These dynamic lists are being assembled by members of the Association of Jewish Libraries and the National Library of Israel. More resources will be added as they are collected.

Online sources (articles, online guides, etc.)

• Hey Alma's Guide to the Israel-Palestinian Conflict
• Schusterman Center for Israel Studies Research Guide
• An Insider’s Guide to the Most Important Story on Earth (Matti Friedman)
• Center for Israel Education

Academic books

History of Israel

• Shapira, Anita Israel: A History (Brandeis, 2012)
• Engel, David, Zionism (Part of the A Short History of a Big Idea series) (Routledge, 2008)
• Essential Israel: Essays for the 21st Century (S. Ilan Troen and Rachel Fish, eds)
• Stanislawski, Michael. Zionism: a Very Short Introduction

• Additional scholarly works on different aspects of Israeli history are available from the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies.

History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

• Waxman, Dov. The Israeli Palestinian Conflict: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2019).
• James L. Gelvin, The Israel-Palestine Conflict: One Hundred Years of War
• Cohen, Hillel, and Haim Watzman. Year Zero of the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1929. 1st ed. Waltham: Brandeis University Press, 2015. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv102bh1n
• Dowty, Alan. Israel/Palestine. Fourth edition. Cambridge, England: Polity, 2017.
• One State, Two States: Resolving the Israel/Palestine Conflict by Benny Morris (2009)
• The Israel-Arab Reader: A Documentary History of the Middle East Conflict edited by Walter Laqueur and Barry Rubin (2016)
• Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881-2001 by Benny Morris (1999)
• Kessler, Oren. Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict. 2023.

Non-academic (for a broader audience readership)

• Sokatch, Daniel, Can We Talk About Israel? A Guide for the Curious, Confused, and Conflicted (ills by Christopher Noxon) (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021)
• Gordis, Daniel. A Concise History of a Nation Reborn (Ecco, 2016)
• Israel, A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth by Noa Tishby (Free Press, reprint 2022)
• Klein haLevi, Yossi, Letters to my Palestinian Neighbor. (Harper Perennial, Reprint 2019)

• See also the website, which includes responses from Palestinians: https://www.letterstomyneighbor.com/

• Fersko, Diana, We need to Talk About Antisemitism (Seal Press, 2023)
• Israel Denial: Anti-Zionism, Anti-Semitism, & the Faculty Campaign Against the Jewish State. Cary Nelson. Indiana University Press, 2019.

Love Your Neighbor Israel List: Part of the Love Your Neighbor series, which highlights children's books showcasing authentic experiences of Jewish life.

In addition, the UCLA Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies is providing resources and holding seminars, webinars and other educational opportunities.

This guide serves as a portal for resources for Jewish Studies. It contains links to a wide variety of e-resources, including reference sources like online encyclopedias and bibliographies; databases and indexes; e-book and journal collections; and news, cultural, and governmental sites. Please note that while some electronic resources are freely available, others are subscription services provided by the UCLA Library, so remote access may be necessary when accessing from off-campus.

The National Library of Israel (NLI) also provides access to online library catalogs, bibliographic databases, encyclopedias, historic and current periodicals and newspapers, and more, most of which is free for registered members. Membership is free.