Threatened Hence Justified: Jewish Israelis’ Use of Competitive Victimhood to Justify Violence Against Palestinians

Noor

Abstract

We theorized that competitive victimhood – the tendency to see one’s ingroup as having suffered more than the outgroup as a result of a prolong conflict– may function strategically as a psychological mechanism to justify violent actions against the outgroup under high (versus low) realistic threat. Focusing on the Jewish-Israeli perspective in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the present study supports this argument by demonstrating the positive relationship between competitive victimhood and justifying both direct and structural violence against Palestinians following high (vs. low) realistic threat. Theoretical and applied implications for conflict resolution are discussed.

Citation

Noor. (2020). Threatened Hence Justified: Jewish Israelis’ Use of Competitive Victimhood to Justify Violence Against Palestinians. Asian Journal of Social Psychology, https://doi.org/10.1111/ajsp.12433

• Acceptance Date: Aug 26, 2020
• Publication Date: Oct 12, 2020
• Journal: Asian Journal of Social Psychology
• Print ISSN: 1367-2223
• Publisher: Wiley
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ajsp.12433
• Keywords: Competitive victimhood, Direct violence, Integrated threat theory, Structural violence, Threat
• Publisher URL: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ajsp.12433