Center for Israel Studies Vienna

TONIGHT
18:00h

Invitation - Einladung - הַזמָנָה

The Institute for Political Science, CeSCoS,
University of Vienna and the Center for
Israel Studies Vienna, supported by the New
Israel Fund and the Future Funds of the
Republic of Austria, invite you to an evening
lecture and discussion with

Prof. Dr. Yael Hashiloni-Dolev
“Choosing What to See: Collective Trauma
and Denial in Wartime Israel."

Welcome and Moderator:
Prof. Dr. Barbara Prainsack, University of Vienna, Director of CeSCoS
Date: 19 May 2026, 18:00h

Venue: Main Building, University of Vienna, Erika Weinzierl Saal
(Stiege 1, 1st Floor), Universitätsring 1, 1010 Wien

The lecture examines a specific phenomenon in Israeli liberal discourse: the silencing of people who
publicly condemn Israeli actions in Gaza by others who themselves recognise that these actions are wrong. Combining autobiographical experience with analysis of online discourse and activist testimony, the talk portrays a "sorry, but" mechanism. The "sorry" acknowledges moral awareness of wrongdoing, while the "but" denies the implications. A key driver of this dynamic is the collective trauma following October 7th. Trauma leads to emotional withdrawal, limits engagement, and prevents acknowledging the suffering of others. Trauma and denial thus reinforce each other.

Yael Hashiloni-Dolev is Full Professor of Sociology at the
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She has been the university President's advisor on gender equity (2023-2025), Co-president of the Society for the History, Philosophy and Sociology of Science (2018-2021), a member of the National Council on Bioethics (2013-2021), and a member of the Committee for the Promotion of Gender Equity at the Council for Higher Education. She works at the complex interface of sociology, family, bioethics, health and illness with gender and repro-technologies, and recently edited, with Sharon Orshalimy,
the collection: "A Body of One's Own: Medicine, S*x and Gender" (2025) published by Lambda, Open Uni. 2025.

Chag Pessach Sameach.

TONIGHT!

Invitation I Einladung I הַזמָנָה

Lecture
Prof. George Wilkes, University of Birmingham

„Strength and Peace:
What drove the Israeli religious peace movement after 1967?“

After the 1967 war, Religious Zionist peace activists mobilised to counter the nascent settler movement and to promote diplomacy in favour of a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace settlement. They soon created a distinctive peace movement, Strength and Peace (Oz veShalom), designed to counter extremism within the Religious Zionist population. The pioneers of the Religious Zionist peace movement have been overshadowed by the successes of their adversaries, and narrative histories have suggested they failed to win the argument against messianism that was always the focus of their activity. But Oz veShalom was also a remarkable initiative whose strengths and motivations are marked by the influence of the Religious Kibbutz movement, and particularly by a cohort of intellectual German Orthodox Zionists who set out in Weimar Germany to renew Orthodox political culture. This lecture reviews their history, raising questions of relevance to the challenges their grandchildren face in seeking to build a politics and a society drawing on their values and commitments.

Welcome
Univ. Prof. (em.) Dr. Mitchell Ash, President Center for Israel Studies Vienna

Dr. Stephan Wendehorst, Senior Scientist, Universität Wien, Juridicum, Institut für Rechts- und Verfassungsgeschichte

Moderator: Dr. Stephan Wendehorst

Where: University of Vienna, Juridicum, Seminarraum SEM20,
Schottenbastei 10-16, 1010 Wien
When: Monday, 15 December 2025
19:00h
The lecture will be delivered in English.

Please register: [email protected]

In cooperation with: Universität Wien, Juridicum, Institut für Rechts - und Verfassungsgeschichte, Team Wendehorst

Supported by: Zukunftsfonds der Republik Österreich