...Professor Boyd digs the epipaleolithic, the transition to agriculture, the rise and decline of the sedentary-but-non-agricultural Natifian culture, a culture that disappeared from the face of the earth 13,000 years ago - 10,000 years before the rise of the Davidic kingdom.

Can you imagine how extremely difficult it must have been to find an archaeologist working in Israel who digs in such a way that it is inconceivable that he should happen upon an artifact with any Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or even Babylonian or Assyrian connections?

The Natufians are fascinating, no doubt, but most people would see little relationship between Paleolithic artifacts and contemporary politics. Never fear. The Columbia Anthropology Department has hired a scholar of the Paleolithic who manages to use his Natufian expertise to make scholarly statements on Israel and gay identity politics.

Among Professor Boyd’s specialties are "queer theory" and "cultural politics in Israel and Palestine."...