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The Role of Jews in Swiss Society
(Jewish Political Studies Review) Simon Erlanger - Numbering 18,000, Jews constitute a tiny fragment of Switzerland's population of 7.7 million. Nevertheless, Swiss public discourse is preoccupied with things Jewish. Rarely does a day go by without many, mostly negative, feature articles or news items on Jews and Israel. Jews in Switzerland have come to symbolize unwanted change and foreign influence. The medieval image of the Jew as the religious Other has transformed into the image of the Jew as the essential Other against which, for most of the twentieth century, Swiss identity was defined. The writer teaches Jewish history at the University of Lucerne.