CJH-Fordham Lecture Series in Jewish Studies: Martin Saps, “From Pious Asceticism to Chauvinistic Nationalism: The Rise of Right-Wing Politics in the Haredi Diaspora”

Since the Enlightenment, Hasidic Judaism has opposed modern liberal nationalism, seeing it as antithetical to pious Jewish life. After the Second World War, as the Hasidic diaspora reconstituted itself in new shtetls like Williamsburg and Stamford Hill, leaders attempted to separate the community from the societies around them, with external dealings being approached transactionally.

Since Donald Trump’s election in 2016, however, Hasidic Jews in London and New York have begun to develop a distinct political identity: a unique brand of Heimish Populism squarely aligned with ethnonationalist right-wing movements in the U.S. and Europe. This turn also reshapes attitudes toward Zionism, as growing numbers of young Haredim express admiration for Jewish power and messianic Religious Zionism. This lecture examines how digital media, intergenerational change, a crisis of leadership, and the populist turn in mainstream politics have transformed the younger generation’s approach towards nation, state, and God.

Martin Francisco Saps is a PhD student at King’s College, London, in the geography department. His work explores the intersection of global politics and everyday urban life. Saps’s PhD thesis, “Our Golden Calf: Haredi Jews and the Decline of Zionism, Liberalism, and the Secular World”, studies how the global politics of nationalism, secularism, and multiculturalism are experienced by the Haredi community of Stamford Hill, London. The project draws on years of ethnographic fieldwork in the area and online, drawing on Hebrew, Yiddish, and English language sources to understand this insular community at a pivotal time.