Historian Avi Shlaim describes the devastating effects that rigid nationalism has on hybrid cultures, such as the Jewish Baghdad of his early childhood.
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Amin Shlaim’s memoir “Three Worlds” challenges conventional understandings of Zionism and the relationship between Jews and Arabs. Shlaim grew up as an Arab Jew in Baghdad, where Jews and Muslims lived together in a hybrid culture. However, the creation of Israel disrupted this world and soured relations between Iraqi Jews and Muslims. Shlaim argues that Zionism was not always beneficial for Jews outside Israel and that the movement sometimes resorted to violence in places like Baghdad to encourage emigration. While Shlaim initially embraced Israeli culture, he has grown proud of his Arab heritage and now advocates for a single democratic state in Israel/Palestine with equal rights for citizens of all backgrounds.
His memoir aims to recapture the lost cosmopolitan world of Arab Jews and show that Jews and Arabs can still live harmoniously.
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