Israel Bartal is Avraham Harman Professor of Jewish History, and former Dean of the Faculty of Humanities at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2006-2010). Professor Bartal is one of the founders of Cathedra, a leading scholarly journal on the history of the Land of Israel, and since 2006 has been Chair of the Historical Society of Israel. His numerous publications include To Redeem a People: Enlightenment and Nationalism in Eastern Europe (Hebrew, 2013); Cossack and Bedouin: Land and People in Jewish Nationalism, (Hebrew, 2007); The Jews of Eastern Europe. 1772-1881 (2005, 2006, published also in Russian and German); and, with Magdalena Opalski, Poles and Jews: a Failed Brotherhood (1992).