 Finkelstein received his Master 's degree in political science in 1980 , and later his PhD in political studies , from Princeton . His doctoral thesis was on Zionism . Before gaining academic employment , Finkelstein was a part @-@ time social worker with teenage <unk> in New York . He then taught successively at Rutgers University , New York University , Brooklyn College , and Hunter College and at DePaul University in Chicago . During the First Intifada , he spent every summer from 1988 in the West Bank , a guest of Palestinian families in Hebron and Beit <unk> . 
