Founded by the American Jewish Committee in 1945 as a monthly journal of "significant thought and opinion, Jewish affairs and contemporary issues," Commentary magazine has through the years had a far-reaching impact on American politics and culture. Commentary in American Life traces this influence over time, especially in creating the neoconservative movement. The authors of each chapter also consider the ways the magazine shaped and reflected major cultural and literary trends in the United States. The end result offers a full accounting of one of the most important journals of American political thought, providing insight into the development of American collective politics and culture over the last six decades.

Since the early 1960s, some 1.3 million Jews from the Soviet Union and its successor states have immigrated to the West, primarily to Israel and the US. Largely due to the imaginative and skillful mobilization efforts of Jews and their friends throughout the world, this great exodus had important ramifications for US relations with the Soviet Union/Russia and Israel. In addition, the success of American Jews in mounting and sustaining this lobbying effort represented a coming of age for the community, which only a few decades before had been unable to extricate millions of Jews from Europe and the Nazis. This book, part history, part celebration, combines essays by scholars with memoirs and first-hand accounts to chronicle this extraordinary rescue mission. CONTRIBUTORS: Zvi Gitelman, Marshall I. Goldman, Douglas Kahn, William Korey, Nehemiah Levanon, Micah H. Naftalin, Walter Ruby, Richard Schifter, Myrna Shinbaum, Steven F. Windmueller, and the editors