Israel's Holocaust and the Politics of Nationhood

Abstract

The ghost of the Holocaust is ever present in Israel, in the lives and nightmares of the survivors, and in the absence of the victims. In this compelling and disturbing analysis, Idith Zertal, a leading member of the new generation of revisionist historians in Israel, deals with the ways Israel has appropriated and used the memory of the Holocaust in order to define and legitimize its existence and politics. Drawing on a wide range of sources, many of them new, the author exposes the pivotal role of the Holocaust in Israel's public sphere, in its project of nation-building, its politics of power, and in its perception of the conflict with the Palestinians and military occupation of their territories. Zertal argues that the centrality of the Holocaust in Israeli life has led to a culture of death and victimhood which permeates Israeli society, its rituals, and its self-image. This is an important and penetrating book which offers an entirely new perspective on Israel, its history, and the construction of national identity.

The “Never Again” State of Israel: The Emergence of the Holocaust as a Core Feature of Israeli Identity and Its Four Incongruent Voices

“…Numerous historians and social scientists have dealt with perceptions of the Holocaust in Israel and how it has affected Israelis (e.g., Bar‐Tal, ; Grodzinsky, ; Liebman & Don‐Yihya, ; Ofer, , ; Segev, ; Shapira, ; Yablonka, ; Zertal, ; Zuckerman, ). As noted by Shapira (), from 1945 until the 1961 Eichmann trial the Holocaust was not a defining feature of Israeli collective identity.…”

“…This point of view, however, cast retrospective blame on the Holocaust victims and the survivors who failed to come to Israel when this was still possible. From this perspective, the Holocaust confirmed and even reinforced the image of Diaspora Jews who went to their death “like sheep to the slaughter” (e.g., Zertal, ).…”

The Roles of Religion in National Legitimation: Judaism and Zionism's Elusive Quest for Legitimacy

“…The only theme that is largely beyond contestation in Zionist discourse is the Holocaust. Its omnipresence in the Jewish, and Zionist, collective memory and public discourses is particularly acute during moments of crisis and distress (Ofer 2004;Segev 2000;Zertal 2005). It has effectively become an axis for Israeli identity and its Zionist underpinning.…”

After the Genocide: Psychological Perspectives on Victim, Bystander, and Perpetrator Groups

“…For example, the Armenian Genocide Resolution, recently passed by the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs, has led to tensions in American−Turkish relations (McKinnon & Champion, ); and the Katyn Forrest massacre remains the greatest obstacle in Polish−Russian relations, for example, shaping Polish reactions to the recent air disaster in Smolensk (Hunter, ). These are only two of many cases in which collective memories of genocide and cultural trauma in general (Alexander, Eyerman, Giesen, Sztompka, & Smelser, ) shape collective identities and political responses of ethnic groups and nations, such as in Israel (Zertal, ), Germany (Fulbrook, ), or Armenia (Miller, ). National identities are built around symbolic commemorations of the past and the narratives of victims as well as of perpetrators.…”