Antisemitism Then and Now. Three Years After October 7, 2023: An Evening of Remembrance

On the third anniversary of the October 7 massacre in Israel, White Rabbit’s Books invites you to an evening of remembrance and conversation about antisemitism — its history, its persistence, and the forms it takes in contemporary society.

How does antisemitism adapt to changing political, cultural, and intellectual environments? Why do ideas and prejudices that may seem to have faded return in new forms? And how can historical perspective help us understand the experiences of Jewish communities in the aftermath of October 7?

Our speaker for the evening is historian Maxim Matusevich, Professor of History and Department Chair at Seton Hall University. His talk, “The October 9th Jew: Professional Challenges and Moral Dilemmas of Academic Life after October 7th,” will focus on the experience of Jewish academics in the West in the years following the October 7 attack.

In the aftermath of the horrific October 7^th attack by Hamas on southern Israel and the ensuing bloody wars that continue to convulse the Middle East three years later, many Jewish academics in the West have been forced to face serious professional challenges and excruciating moral dilemmas. Quite often they found themselves confronted with the reality of their institutions and professional spaces becoming inhospitable to Jews, especially to those Jews who could be identified as “Zionist.” This hostility came as a shock to many, but probably less so to Jewish academics with immigrant backgrounds, especially those who grew up and came of age in the former Soviet Union. Historian Maxim Matusevich will share his personal experience navigating the post-October 7^th academia. He will also place the story of his personal and professional frustrations in its broader historical context and try and outline the historical genealogy of anti-Israel and antizionist activism among the intellectual elite class in the West.

About the speaker. Maxim Matusevich is Professor of History and Department Chair at Seton Hall University. He has published extensively on the history of the Cold War and Soviet-African encounters. He is also a fiction writer. His new collection of short stories and novellas, Six Trains of No Return, was published earlier this year by Academic Studies Press.

Admission: $10

Advance ticket purchase is required. Space at White Rabbit’s Books is limited, so please make sure to reserve your seat in advance.