Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumIn Israel, Holocaust obsession prevents real change
http://972mag.com/when-holocaust-discourse-becomes-uncontrollable/87100/One of the most important articles ever to be published in Israel was The Need to Forget. In his 1988 op-ed, Yehuda Elkana, who was carried off to Auschwitz as a boy of 10 and survived the Holocaust, wrote:
Lately I have become convinced that the deepest political and social factor that motivates much of Israeli society in its relations with the Palestinians is not personal frustration, but rather a profound existential angst fed by a particular interpretation of the lessons of the Holocaust and the readiness to believe that the whole world is against us.
And he was right.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)lostincalifornia
(3,639 posts)something like this doesn't happen again. The truth is the world has NOT been particularly kind to Jews
King_David
(14,851 posts)Imagine posting this shit on DU ?
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Among adolescents in Israel, the common interpretation of history goes something like this: They hated us throughout history in Egypt, in Spain, in Russia, and then came the final strike, the Holocaust and they also hate us now. It is us, the Jews, against the world.
lostincalifornia
(3,639 posts)R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Perhaps he will answer you in full.
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)Your post prosed the question, you can attempt one
Violet_Crumble
(35,993 posts)'So I guess the antisemitism expressed against the Jews was never real?' is a fucking stupid question and nowhere in the article did the author say that.
Of course anti-Semitism is a real thing, as was the Holocaust itself. What the author is saying is that the Holocaust is used as a weapon by right-wingers in Israel, and they're correct. If I could find it again, I'd post a clip of a Hebron settler attacking a Palestinian woman and calling her a Nazi (my bet is this law would still allow Israeli settlers to fling terms like 'Nazi' at Palestinians, just not at each other, which is what happened during the Disengagement). There's also been plenty of articles posted here where RW Israeli politicians invoke the Holocaust when talking about the I/P conflict. Despite these, I oppose banning the use of terms from the Nazi era, and I also oppose the law created by the same gang that outlaws Israelis from speaking out in support of boycotts of Israel. Israel doesn't have the same free speech thingy enshrined in a constitution as the US, but those two laws cross the line even for a country that doesn't have a constitution thing about free speech...
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)If you don't like the answer it's really not my problem.
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)you directed people to Nir. If Nir wants to join DU, I will gladly ask him, but the fact is, YOU did not answer, even Violet Crumble made more of an attempt than you did.
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)The author has a place for comments.
King_David
(14,851 posts)Holocaust obsession is not only a "Jewish thing" I might add .
David Duke has written pages on it and Ahmadenerjst was obsessed too .
A lot of bigots deny it too .
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)one from this OP please
King_David
(14,851 posts)It was a general fact about the topic of the Holocaust .
Not only do Jews obsess over it but so do a lot of their enemies.
Hamas and Ahmerdunejet are a couple of examples , David Duke and Stormfront are others .
And then I said some people use it as a powerful tool by Denying it - there are major conferences on this attended by world bigotry ,such as the one they had in Iran a few years ago. ( the current foreign minister of Iran has attempted to make amends of course )
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)when that is hardly the case
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)you recieve no response the I guess you are correct in your assessment .
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)with the Israeli-born author and attempt to berate him for having the courage to cover a topic that some find untouchable.
aranthus
(3,385 posts)azurnoir
(45,850 posts)and about a recently passed law in Israel
As I wrote, the Holocaust became a tool that is used in order to keep us, the Jews, in a position of eternal victimhood and to blind us from seeing what is happing in Israel. The Holocaust is now the most effective ingredient in a grand mechanism of denial. Thus, could this new law be the first step on a road leading to an Israeli society that is less obsessed with the Holocaust? Absolutely not.
The real motivation behind the new law is simple: its not about building a less exclusive, less paranoid and less Holocaust-obsessed Israeli society. Its about keeping the Holocaust sacred; its about taking the Holocaust out of petty fights between conservatives and liberals where everyone calls each other a Nazi.
Right-wing Israeli politicians understand that if people are brainwashed with the Holocaust, they will see it everywhere and all the time. That is a problem. For these politicians, the Holocaust should always separate us, the Jews, from all the others. It should not be a part of the endless internal political battles between Jews in Israel. After all, the Holocaust has become the most effective tool to unite Israeli Jews under a common assumption: they have always hated us, and nothing has changed since, beside the fact that now we have a Jewish army. The new laws role is to keep the Holocaust as the sacred uniter in a society consumed by fear.
***l
bemildred
(90,061 posts)noticed that too?
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)I'm not interested in being pulled into petty arguments by some. I thought that it was an interesting article.
azurnoir
(45,850 posts)an articles point can be seen almost without reading the article
R. Daneel Olivaw
(12,606 posts)Kick in to the DU tip jar?
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