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The Iranian Jewish communities had undergone tremendous transformations in the 20th century, essentiality, moving from the social and geographical periphery of Iran into the core of the middle and upper middle classes in the span of less than four decades. The 1979 revolution interrupted the trajectory. However, significant parts of the Jewish communities supported the revolutionary movement to varying degrees. The Islamic Republic that was established in the aftermath of the revolution presented new challenges to the life and existence of Jews in Iran. This talk analyzes the place Iranian Jews claim in the Islamic Republic of Iran, especially against the backdrop of the revolution, the Iran-Iraq War, the conflict with Israel, and the Middle East more broadly.

Lior Sternfeld is the William J. and Charlotte K. Duddy University Endowed Fellow in the Humanities and Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at Penn State University. Sternfeld is a social historian of the modern Middle East with an emphasis on Iran and the Jewish communities of the region. He is the author of Between Iran and Zion: Jewish Histories of Twentieth Century Iran (Stanford University Press 2018) and the co-author of Jews of Iran: A Photographic Chronicle (Penn State University Press 2022). His current research focuses on the Iranian-Jewish diaspora communities in the US and Israel.

Sponsored by: Judaic Studies, Harrison Ruffin Tyler Department of History, and the Asian and Middle Eastern Studies