Bruce Maddy-Weitzman

Professor (Emeritus) Bruce Maddy-Weitzman (Ph.D, Tel Aviv University, 1988),  is a Senior Research Fellow at the Moshe Dayan Center, and taught in the Department of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University.

His latest book, Amazigh Politics in the Wake of the Arab Spring, was published by University of Texas Press in 2022. A review of the book was published in Oxford Middle East Review.

He is also the author of A Century of Arab Politics: From the Arab Revolt to the Arab Spring, published by Rowman & Littlefield in 2016. His book, The Berber Identity Movement and the Challenge to North African States (University of Texas Press, 2011), was awarded the “L. Carl Brown Book Prize” for outstanding new book in the field of North African Studies, by the American Institute for Maghrib Studies, in October 2013.


Recent publications:

"Mobilized Diasporas: Kurds and Berbers in Comparative Perspective," co-authored article (with Ofra Bengio), in Kurdish Studies, Vol. 1, No. 1 (October, 2013).

"The Arab League and the Arab Uprisings," in The Arab Spring and Arab Thaw: Unfinished Revolutions and the Quest for Democracy, John Davis, ed. (Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2013).

"Israel and The Middle East in the wake of the Arab Spring", in Judaísmo E Cultura: Fronteiras Em Movimento, Helena Lewin (coordenação), (Rio de Janiero: Imprimatur, 2013).

"State Cohesion in the Middle East: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives," co-authored with Asher Susser, in Inglorious Revolutions: State Cohesion in the Middle East After the Arab Spring, a book which he co-edited with Brandon Friedman  (Tel Aviv: The Moshe Dayan Center, 2014), pp. 13-36.

"Narrating The Past, Serving the Present: The Berber Identity Movement and the Jewish Connection", in Nationalism, Identity and Politics: Israel and the Middle East. Studies in Honor of Prof. Asher Susser, a book which he co-edited with Meir Litvak (Tel Aviv: The Moshe Dayan Center, 2014).

"On the Backroads of Morocco," The American Interest, August 31, 2015.

"A Turning Point? The 'Arab Spring' and the Amazigh Movement," Ethnic and Racial Studies, Vol 38, Issue 14 (November 2015), pp. 2499-2515.

"Berbers", The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity, and Nationalism,  December 2015.

"Is the ethnic genie out of the bottle?  Berbers and the 'North African Spring' five years on." Studi Magrebini [Special issue, “North Africa Transition and Emerging Actors: Berber Movements, Gender Mobility and Social Activism,” Anna Maria Di Tolla and Ersilia Francesca (eds.)]. Vol XIV-XV, 2016-17, pp. 243-63.

"Berbers and the Nation State," The Oxford Research Encyclopedia on African History, July 2017.

"Challenging the State, Redefining the Nation: The Contemporary Amazigh Movement in Turbulent Times," Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict, 2017, Vol. 23, no. 4. pp. 413-430.

"L’insécurité en périphérie : les revendications socio-économiques et le mouvement Amazigh au Maroc," in Les revendications amazighes dans la tourmente des <printemps arabes>, Thierry Desrues and Mohand Tilmatine (eds.), (Rabat: Centre Jacques Berque, 2018), pp. 195-213.

"The Berbers", Routledge Handbook of Minorities in the Middle East, Paul S. Rowe (ed.), (London: Routledge, 2018), pp. 313-325.

"Arab Spring Redux? Takin' it to the Streets in Algeria and Morocco," The American Interest, April 25, 2019.

"Domestication or Transformation? Modern Amazigh identity in the Shadow of the Authoritarian State," Routledge Handbook on Citizenship in the Middle East and North Africa,  Roel Meijer and James Sater (eds.),  (London: Routledge, 2020), pp. 275-90.

"Morocco: Social Unrest and Political Stability - For Now," Elie Podeh and On Winkler, (eds.), Between Stability and Revolution: A Decade to the Arab Spring (in Hebrew), (Jerusalem: Carmel Publishing, 2021), pp. 342-361.

"מרוקו: תסיסה חברתית לצד יציבות פוליטית", ב - בין יציבות למהפכה: עשור לאביב הערבי, בעריכת אלי פודה ואון וינקלר (ירושלים, 2021).

"Amazighité vs. 'Uruba – Ethnicity in the Maghrib", Routledge Handbook on the Modern Maghrib, George Joffé (ed.), (London: Routledge, 2023), pp. 208-224.

"Israel and Algeria: Protests, Politics, and Colonialism", Fikra Forum, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, July 28, 2023.

"Instrumentalizing Arabism: Morocco and the Inter-Arab System", The Journal of the Middle East and Africa, February 2024.

Recent Book Reviews:

"Forgotten saints: history, power, and politics in the making of modern Morocco," Sahar Bazzaz, Mediterranian Historical Review 28, no. 1 (2013): 86-89.

Encountering Morocco: Fieldwork and Cultural Understanding, David Crawford and Rachel Newcomb (eds.); Afterword by Kevin Dwyer (Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana University Press, 2013), for Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 50, No. 6 (October 2014), pp. 1032-38.

Everyday Arab Identity, by Christopher Phillips (London: Routledge, 2013), for  Bustan (5, 2014), pp. 55-62.

Picturing Algeria, Pierre Bourdieu (NY: Columbia UP, 2012), for The  European Legacy: Toward New Paradigms, Journal of ISSEI, Vol. 19 (published online, December 12,  2014), pp. 1-2.

The Rise and Fall of al-Qaeda, Fawaz A. Gerges, (Oxford University Press, 2011), for The European Legacy: Toward New Paradigms, Journal of ISSEI, Volume 20, Issue 4, May 2015, pp. 418-419.

Learning in Morocco: Language Politics and the Abandoned Educational Dream, Charis Boutieri (Bloomington & Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2016), Middle Eastern Studies (2016).

"Operation Mural: An Englishman and the Mossad in Casablanca," David G, Littman,  Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs (2016).

Two Arabs, a Berber, and a Jew: Entangled Lives in Morocco," Lawrence Rozen, (University of Chicago Press, 2015), for The American Interest (April 2016).

"We Are Imazighen: The Development of Algerian Berber Identity in Twentieth-Century Literature and Culture," Fazia Aïtel, Middle East Quarterly, Vol. 23, No.1 (Winter 2016).

Europe’s Relations with North Africa: Politics, Economic and Security, Adam Yousef (London, I.B. Tauris, 2017), Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs.

Popular Politics in the Making of the Modern Middle East, John Chalcraft (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), Review of Middle East Studies, Volume 51, Issue 2 (August 2017), pp. 273-275.

The Guardians: The League of Nations and the Crisis of Empire, Susan Pedersen (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), Fathom, Autumn/2017.

Algeria Revisited: History, Culture and Identity, Rabah Aissaoui, and Claire Eldridge (eds), (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017), Mediterranean Historical Review, Vol. 33, No. 1 (2018), pp. 125-28).

Berber Government: The Kabyle Polity in Pre-Colonial Algeria, Hugh Roberts, (London: I.B. Tauris, 2014), Middle East Quarterly. Vol. 25, No. 2 (Spring 2018).

Legacy of Empire:  Britain, Zionism and the Creation of Israel, Gardner Thompson (London: Saqi Books, 2019), Fathom, Autumn 2019.

The Invention of the Maghreb: Between Africa and the Middle East, Abdelmajid Hannoum, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021), Bustan, The Middle East Book Review, Vol. 13, No. 2 (2022), pp. 180-86.

Recent Conference Papers

"Insecurity on the Periphery: Socio-Economic Grievances and the Amazigh Movement in Morocco," panel on 'Human (In)security in the Maghrib', at the Middle East Studies Association, Washington, D.C., November 25, 2014.

"The Amazigh Spring Redux? The Arab Spring and the Amazigh Movement," panel on Berber issues at the international conference, ‘North Africa: Transition and Emerging Actors, 'Università degli studi di Napoli "L'Orientale," September 24-26, 2014.

"The Amazigh Spring Redux? The Arab Spring and the Amazigh Movement," panel on 'Les Amazighes Dans la Tourmente des 'Printemps Arabes'. Enjeux et Perspectives des Revendications Berbères en Afrique du Nord,' at the WOCMES quadrennial conference, Ankara, Turkey, August 18, 2014.

"To Be or Not to Be? The Arab Regional Order and the Arab Spring," at International Conference, 'The Relevance of Regions and Area Studies in a Globalized World', December 14-16, 2015, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

"Challenging the State, Redefining the Nation: Contemporary Berberism in the Maghreb," Middle East Studies Association annual conference, Boston, MA, November 17-20, 2016.

"The Current State of Relations Between Israel and Egypt," Symposium, "Israel in a Changed Middle East," Rubin Center for Research in International Affairs, IDC Herzliya, February 7, 2016.