Reaching the quiet mountain town of Yaotsu in central Japan is no easy journey. From Kani, the nearest city with a hotel, the route winds through smaller rural towns and rice paddies before climbing into the forested green folds of Gifu Prefecture. The air cools, the roads narrow. After a thirty-minute taxi ride, one finally arrives at a cedar building on a hill overlooking the valleys of the Hida and Kiso Rivers, home of The Chiune Sugihara Memorial Hall. The museum opened in 2000. It has served since as one of the main platforms for teaching about the Holocaust in Japan.
Sugihara (1900-1986) was the son of a provincial doctor and a mother who encouraged his education. After studying at Waseda University, he joined Japan’s Foreign Ministry and served in its imperial outposts of the 1930s, first in Japanese-occupied Harbin, Manchuria, where he mastered Russian and the ins-and-outs of diplomacy, and later in Finland, after his entry into the Soviet Union as Japan’s special envoy was denied.
In 1939, Sugihara was appointed vice-consul to Kaunas, Lithuania, a republic squeezed between Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Soviet Union. There, in the summer of 1940, he faced the decision that would define his life.
When the Soviets occupied Lithuania and German forces advanced eastward, desperate Jewish refugees gathered outside the Japanese consulate, pleading for transit visas that might carry them through the Soviet Union and on to safety in Japan or beyond. Tokyo’s orders were unequivocal: no exceptions. But Sugihara, moved by the pleas of families, began to issue visas anyway. Day after day, he issued visas. His wife Yukiko helped him record them by hand. When he was ordered to leave the consulate in February 1941, he continued to write from his hotel, and when his train departed Kaunas for Berlin, he passed the last documents through the window to waiting hands. He issued 2,139 visas, saving an estimated 6,000 Jews in total. Their descendants number today as many as hundreds of thousands of people.
After the war, Sugihara returned to obscurity. Back in Japan in the spring of 1947, he was summoned by the Foreign Ministry and asked to resign, under the pretense of a lack of available positions in the ministry. In fact, he was summarily dismissed for insubordination; the resignation allowed the ministry to not appear to be punishing someone who had rescued Jews from certain death by providing Sugihara an option of retaining his honor despite his disobedience.
His career in shambles, Sugihara supported his family as a translator of Russian and salesman. For decades, few in Japan knew what he had done. It was the Jews who had crossed Siberia with his visas who eventually tracked him down in the 1960s and 1970s, visiting his modest home to express their gratitude.
In 1984, Yad Vashem named Sugihara as a Righteous Among the Nations, the only Japanese citizen ever to receive that title. He died two years later, still largely unknown in his own country.
In the years since, Sugihara has become Japan’s most recognized humanitarian of the Second World War, his story retold in museums, textbooks, and films. The Chiune Sugihara Memorial Hall represents the culmination of that remembrance. Inside, visitors move through exhibits chronicling Sugihara’s life: his childhood, diplomatic postings, and the famous “visas for life.” A reconstruction of Sugihara’s Kaunas office features his wooden desk, a pen poised above blank visa forms, and a single lamp casting light on the documents that changed thousands of lives. It is in this recreated office where visitors are encouraged to contemplate how they would have acted under similar circumstances: do nothing, or act with courage, even when the price is high?
The Memorial Hall’s current director, Yuko Ito, who has been in her position since April 2025, was clear in our conversation as to the answer she desires: “When we think about Sugihara, we are left with the thought of ‘we can do it, we can do it individually.’ Sugihara was a diplomat, but even if you are not, you can do something […] as human beings, as people, do something, don’t just look on.”[1]
The Memorial Hall was established through the funding of the Chiune Sugihara Memorial Fund and the Japanese government, which allocated funds to municipalities in the country to support various projects, including in Yaotsu. Operated by the town and staffed by town employees, in 2024 the museum received almost 20,000 visitors, mostly Japanese families and schoolchildren, but also some Israelis, Americans, and Europeans.[2]
The museum’s record number of visits, 52,000, was registered in 2015 following the release of the film Persona Non Grata, a Japanese-Polish biographical drama about Sugihara’s life directed by Cellin Gluck. The film’s success sparked Sugihara’s broader resurgence internationally and in Japan’s popular culture and consciousness. The film was screened widely, textbooks incorporated Sugihara’s biography into ethics education sections, and television networks aired documentaries exploring his correspondence with survivors.[3] The number of visitors then declined, averaging 31,600 annually until COVID-19 hit.[4]
Like the film, the Memorial Hall’s exhibits emphasize universal lessons of peace, courage, and humanity, often framed in the language of harmony that anchors Japan’s postwar pacifist ethos. This is both the museum’s strength and its limitation. The Holocaust becomes a lesson in global morality, a call for empathy detached from the particularities of Jewish suffering. In Yaotsu, Sugihara’s defiance is recast as an expression of Japanese virtue; a humanitarian act grounded in compassion rather than rebellion. Only passing mention is made of Japan’s alliance with Nazi Germany.
This translation has profound consequences. By centering on Sugihara, Japan positions itself within global Holocaust memory not as a bystander, let alone as an assistant to perpetrators, but as a rescuer. This distortion enables Japanese engagement with the Holocaust while sidestepping its own contribution to Nazi evils. Sugihara thus becomes a mirror through which Japan affirms its identity as a peace-loving nation and enables Japan to recast its wartime legacy and rebrand itself as a nation embodying humanitarian values.[5]
This is apparent in the trilingual displays in Japanese, English, and Hebrew introducing the Second World War in Europe and the Holocaust. Divided into two, the top half of the displays traces the fate of the Jews in Europe who did not escape and were murdered, starkly juxtaposed to the bottom half retelling the parallel story of Jews’ rescue through Sugihara.
When asked if she was concerned that visitors will only see the Holocaust through the eyes of Sugihara, Ito expressed that the museum is trying to do both: show the people who were saved and those who were not, and that there were good people who did act. She explained that “the tragedy of the Holocaust is also a universal lesson. Most people were not good. What makes Sugihara so special is that there were hundreds of diplomats from other countries who did nothing to save Jews.”[6]
A 2025 essay contest for high school students in the Gifu Prefecture who had visited the Memorial Hall asked pupils to write on the theme of “do the right thing” in the context of reflecting on Sugihara’s decision. According to Ito, essays were largely insular, focused on school life and personal life within a Japanese context, and with no broader considerations. Of the more than 200 essays submitted, not a single pupil wrote about the Holocaust, the Second World War, or making an ethical decision that helps people in desperate need.
***
The Holocaust Education Center (HEC) in Fukuyama, just north of Hiroshima, occupies a distinctive position within Japan’s commemorative topography. Established in 1995 by the Reverend Makoto Otsuka, a pastor and long-time leader within the pro-Israel Christian Beit Shalom association, the HEC was the first museum in Japan devoted solely to the Holocaust. From inception, its mandate was educational and child-centered: to render the Holocaust comprehensible to Japanese schoolchildren through small, graspable particulars rather than through abstraction and inspire them to think and act independently to create peace.[7]
The HEC’s establishment owes to Otsuka’s formative encounter in 1971 with Otto Frank, the father of Anne Frank, in Netanya, Israel, and to his subsequent visits to Yad Vashem. Otsuka kept in close contact with Frank, who shared his memories and presented Otsuka with various personal and family effects while encouraging him to be a person who does something to create peace.
Frank was aware of the popularity of his daughter’s diary in Japan. First translated in 1952, it became a postwar staple of moral education, generated cultural adaptations, such as in manga novels, and culturally resonated through the prism of “a kinship of victims,” through which Anne’s voice was mapped onto the nation’s engagement with the experience of nuclear devastation.[8]
Fifteen years after Otto Frank’s passing in 1980, Otsuka established the HEC and dedicated it to the memory of the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust. The museum focused on exhibitions at children’s eye level. It privileged photographs and artifacts over long texts and sought to connect Japanese children to the Holocaust mainly through the story of Anne Frank.[9]
Demand quickly exceeded the capacity of the original center, and in 2007, the HEC moved into a larger facility of roughly twenty thousand square feet on the city’s edge. New installations included a reconstructed hiding space, a model of the Amsterdam attic associated with Anne Frank, and galleries that organize the administrative machinery of genocide around ordinary objects – a suitcase, a shoe, a garment, a form – meant to index a life interrupted rather than to overwhelm the novice viewer.[10]
The design is calibrated to its audience, which is overwhelmingly scholastic. The HEC receives 7,000-8,000 visitors annually, of which 3,000 to 4,000 are Japanese schoolchildren. These numbers dropped significantly during COVID-19 and have now just returned to pre-COVID-19 levels. Other visitors are predominantly Japanese and Israeli adults, with Americans and Europeans also visiting, but in fewer numbers.[11] Perhaps if the HEC was more centrally located, more Japanese schoolchildren would visit it and its impact would be more formidable.
According to current HEC Director Akio Yoshida, high school students in Japan can graduate without knowing about the Holocaust or the Second World War beyond the most basic details, if at all, due to the structure of the curriculum and that the topic is not included on final exams.[12] As a result, most of the children who visit the museum know little to nothing about the Holocaust, or even about Sugihara, something the HEC tries to overcome by providing educators with an 18-minute video for students before they visit.[13]
As in Yaotsu, pupils are brought by teachers who have chosen to make the Holocaust part of their curriculum, either because they had previously visited the museum, because of their personal interest in the Holocaust, or because of their religious conviction.
The HEC leadership is aware of the risk of transforming the Holocaust into a generalized humanist lesson. It organizes encounters around concrete evidence and insists upon the Jewish specificity of Nazi persecution, thereby resisting the drift toward an undifferentiated pacifism.
The museum’s Christian sponsorship adds a further layer to its significance. Japan’s Jewish population is small. The HEC is thus not a communal repository but a chosen practice of remembrance by Japanese Christians in dialogue with Israeli and Jewish institutions.
This connection dates to the 1930s. Sitting in the HEC’s offices, speaking in a combination of Japanese, English and Hebrew, Rev. Otsuka related his deep love of Israel and the Jewish people owes to the inspiration of his teacher, the Rev. Takeji Otsuki, who said he had a vision from God in the 1930s in which he was commanded to pray for the establishment of the state of Israel, the peace of Jerusalem and the coming of Messiah.[14] Rev. Otsuki founded the Beit Shalom and inspired generations of Japanese Christian Zionists; Rev. Otsuka, through his life and the HEC, has dedicated himself to that same mission.[15]
***
Japan is one of several countries with designated museums or special exhibitions dedicated to the Righteous Among the Nations who saved Jews from the Nazis and their allies. In Brněnec, Czech Republic, the Museum of Survivors opened in May 2025 on the grounds of the factory where Oskar Schindler (1908-1974) employed and thereby saved an estimated 1,200 Jews.[16] For decades, the building lay abandoned, its brick walls pocked with age, its beams dark with soot.
Daniel Löw-Beer, a descendant of the factory’s prewar Jewish owners that had turned it into a profitable and important European wool factory, led the project to reclaim the site as both a memorial and a reckoning with a shattered past. Inside, glass-walled galleries open onto unrestored factory floors, the ghosts of machinery still visible beneath the new construction. The architecture itself enacts a moral dialectic – restoration and ruin held in tension.
In 1938, the factory was seized by the Nazis from the Löw-Beer family. Six years later, as the Nazi’s Eastern Front collapsed amid the advance of the Soviet Red Army, Schindler, who was born in Svitavy, a town just north of Brněnec, relocated his factory from Poland, bringing with him more than 1,000 Jews he employed. He convinced the Nazis that the labor of those Jews was critical to supporting the German war effort.[17]
Only four buildings remain on the site: the now renovated spinning mill, part of which is the museum; Schindler’s office; the barracks of the SS troops; and Schindler’s Ark, the building where the Jewish prisoners lived and worked. The museum features displays on Schindler, the Löw-Beer family, and the testimonies of survivors, as well as spaces for exhibitions, lectures, and film screenings.
Schindler’s act of rescue unfolded within an economy of theft. His decency cannot be disentangled from the profits of war, a moral entanglement and contradiction that Löw-Beer’s curatorial vision does not shy from. The museum, which currently only opens on select days, is aimed at educating secondary school children from the Czech Republic and surrounding countries, including Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, and Germany.[18]
Across the Atlantic, in Martin, Tennessee, another institution centers on the saviors of Jews. The University of Tennessee at Martin’s 2024 exhibition, Righteous Among the Nations, occupies a modest space at the university’s J. Houston Gordon Museum in the Paul Meek Library.[19] Among the 22 Righteous individuals featured in the exhibition are Sugihara and one of only five Americans to have received the honor, Roderick “Roddie” Edmonds (1919-1985) of Knoxville, Tennessee.[20]
Edmonds was a non-commissioned officer who was captured in the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944 and sent to a German prisoner of war camp, first to Stalag IX-B at Bad Orb and then to Stalag IX-A in Ziegenhain.[21] The ranking officer in camp at Ziegenhain, Edmonds was responsible for more than 1,200 American POWs. When the camp commandant ordered Jewish soldiers to report themselves the morning after their arrival in camp in order to be separated and identified, Edmonds ordered all American soldiers to appear in formation. Enraged when he saw all the Americans without racially-based exceptions, the camp commandant demanded Edmond give up the Jewish soldiers, to which he replied, “We are all Jews here.”[22] That refusal to collaborate, spoken at gunpoint, saved roughly two hundred men.
Save for the exhibit and the efforts of Edmond’s son to preserve the memory of his father’s heroism, Edmonds’ story remains largely unknown. Recognized in 2015 by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations, the US government and US Army have not recognized him, and a 2022 effort to award him a Congressional Gold Medal failed to secure enough votes, though efforts continue.[23]
If Tennessee grounds righteousness in duty, Dubai turns it into a language of intercultural encounter. In 2021, within the Crossroads of Civilizations Museum, curator and former Emirati parliamentarian Ahmad ‘Ubayd al-Mansuri inaugurated the “We Remember” Holocaust memorial exhibition, the first and thus far only permanent exhibition on the Holocaust in the Arab world.[24] The exhibition includes information on the persecution of European Jews by Nazi Germany from Kristallnacht to the implementation of the Final Solution, photos and exhibits commemorating the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust, and personal testimonies of Holocaust survivors.
Al-Mansuri believes the history of the Holocaust should be conveyed primarily through the stories of heroes who fought evil. Panels present the Mishna verse “Whoever saves one life, it is as if he has saved all mankind” and its Quranic equivalent, and digital displays narrate the rescue of European Jews by Muslims. The exhibition introduces the story of the hundreds of Jews who found refuge in Albania in 1943 and were welcomed by its majority-Muslim population. It also tells the story of individual heroes, including Muhammad Hilmi (1901-1982), an Egyptian physician who lived in Berlin and, at great personal risk, saved the life of a Jewish friend, Anna Boros, and several members of her family. Hilmi was the first Arab to be recognized by Yad Vashem as “Righteous Among the Nations.”[25]
Across the continent in Shanghai, a city once divided by foreign concessions, another museum tells a quieter story of rescue through bureaucracy. The Jewish Refugees Museum, housed in the restored Ohel Moshe Synagogue in the Hongkou District, originally opened in 2007 and reopened in 2020, chronicles the extraordinary flight of over twenty thousand Jewish refugees to Shanghai between 1938 and 1941.[26]
One small gallery is dedicated to Dr. Feng Shan Ho (1901-1997), the Chinese consul in Vienna who, defying both Nazi and Chinese directives, issued over 1,900 visas to Austrian Jews.[27] His consular seal, displayed on several passports and visas he provided, has become a modest relic of moral administration like that of Sugihara. The exhibition situates Ho within a broader narrative of humanitarianism, seeking to create “a community of a shared future for mankind.”[28] Panels describe how Shanghai, one of the few open ports in the world, became a refuge when most nations had closed their borders.
Far to the northwest, on Ķīpsala Island in Riga, Latvia, the Žanis Lipke Memorial Museum offers a different form of intimacy. Completed in 2012, the building, designed by architect Zaiga Gaile, resembles a dark, steep-roofed wooden ark, its exterior weathered. Lipke (1900-1987), a dockworker, and his wife Johanna, rescued more than fifty Jews whom they smuggled from the Riga Ghetto during the Nazi occupation by hiding them in a bunker beneath their home, providing them with food and arranging for them false documents to flee the country.[29]
The memorial’s architecture embodies concealment. Windowless, narrow passages and dim lighting reproduce the fear and claustrophobia of hiding. The engaging and passionately administrated museum pays tribute to the Lipkes’ heroism. For Latvian students, hundreds of whom visit each year and who comprise much of the audience, guides emphasize the Lipkes’ courage. They do not entirely obscure the participation of some Latvians in Nazi crimes. However, they do so through the lens of heroism and courage, telling an incomplete story.
While over 400 Latvians have been recognized for saving Jews, the majority was indifferent. Worse still, the extermination of Latvian Jews was largely done by local collaborators with exceptional ruthlessness and brutality. These were Latvians who turned on their neighbors under Nazi auspices.[30] The main museum through which Latvians learn about the Holocaust thus conveniently highlights the exception rather than counters the dark truth.
In the small Bulgarian town of Kyustendil, the Dimitar Peshev Museum stands as a testament to one man’s courage and moral conviction. Housed in the rebuilt home of Bulgaria’s former deputy speaker of parliament, the museum commemorates Peshev’s (1894-1973) pivotal role in halting the planned deportation of 48,000 Bulgarian Jews in March 1943. When he learned of the government’s intentions, Peshev mobilized parliamentary protest and enlisted the support of both the Orthodox Church and King Boris III, actions that successfully prevented the deportation of Jews within Bulgaria proper. Tragically, his intervention could not save the more than 11,000 Jews from Bulgarian-occupied Thrace and Macedonia who were sent to their deaths, a haunting reminder of the limits of individual agency under a complicity-ridden regime.[31]
Opened in 2002, visitors to the museum encounter photographs of Peshev’s petitions alongside maps of deportation routes, tracing both the geography of salvation and the pathways of loss.[32] For decades, Bulgaria emphasized the “rescue of the Bulgarian Jews” as a national virtue, often overlooking its more troubling chapters of collaboration and displacement. The Kyustendil museum confronts this selective memory, offering a nuanced narrative in which acts of conscience emerge amid complicity, and heroism is inseparable from the moral ambiguities of the time. It is both a memorial to bravery and a space for reflection on the complex interplay of courage, responsibility, and historical accountability.
Taken together, the museums and exhibitions dedicated to the Righteous Among the Nations form a global presence of moral geography. Each translates the same impulse to remember, commemorate, and advance the legacy of different heroes into a local context.
Yet the focus on the righteous in those museums and exhibitions, including, in particular, those who are singular in dealing with the Holocaust in their countries or regions, also carries risks. The Holocaust is mainly a story of human cruelty and criminality, not one of heroism and virtue. While it is important to highlight and praise the roles of the righteous individuals who risked their lives and resisted evil, it should be remembered that their stories are the exception, not the rule. The historical roots of European and German antisemitism, the cruelty and cynicism of the Nazis and their allies, the indifference to Jewish life that abounded among entire publics, the suffering of the victims, the elimination of entire communities – they should forever remain the focus of any engagement with the Holocaust.
***
Visits to Holocaust memorial museums around the world trigger historical-philosophical questions. In Japan, I could not help wondering how Germany would remember Nazism today, if in the 1930s and 1940s it was the same failed fascist, militaristic expansionist ideology, yet devoid of antisemitism and its murderous consequences.
In the heart of Tokyo, tucked behind the torii gate and shaded by gingko trees, the Yasukuni Shrine presents a scene of ritual, commemoration, and quiet that belies the intensity of the memory it holds. The venerable Shinto shrine, established in 1869 during the Meiji Restoration, is dedicated to those who died in service to the country. Some 2.5 million souls are enshrined, including over one thousand war criminals, among whom are fourteen Class-A war criminals convicted of “crimes against peace” during the military tribunals commonly known as the Tokyo Trials that followed the Second World War who were quietly added to the shrine in 1978.[33]
On the same grounds stands the Yushukan Museum, a military-history museum that traces Japan’s imperial wars from the Meiji Restoration to the end of the Second World War. Its two floors are filled with gleaming exhibits dedicated to demonstrating the sacrifices and heroism of Japan’s war dead.
The shrine and museum have become central to Japan’s contested relationship with its wartime past, offering a lens through which to view deeper questions of memory, responsibility, victimhood, and the politics of commemoration in Japan’s Second World War legacy.
Visiting the Yushukan museum, one is confronted with a narrative of war that does not begin with the rise of Japanese militarism and aggression. Rather, it informs that Japan’s modernization under Meiji, the threat of encroaching Western colonial powers, and the desire for Asian solidarity set the scene for a war of tragic necessity.
Upon entering, visitors are greeted by a Zero fighter plane, the highly maneuverable, long-range Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft that dominated the skies of the Pacific early in the war, and a Class C56 steam locomotive from the Thai-Burma Railway with a panel noting it had “been commandeered to the south for the Greater East Asian War” and “played an important role in Thailand.” The modest explanation fails to mention the tens of thousands of Allied prisoners of war and Asian laborers forced by the Japanese to build the “Death Railway,” with some 100,000 dying during its construction.[34]
Inside, the museum is divided into two floors. The tour begins on the second floor, dedicated to relating Japan’s military history from the Meiji period through the Second Sino-Japanese War (referred to as the “China Incident”), before returning visitors to the first floor, dedicated to the Second World War (referred to as the Greater East Asia War). Throughout the museum, exhibits of uniforms, flags, swords, personal letters, pictures, and other effects are accompanied by displays relating the history of Japan’s military conflicts, all presented in a historical narrative of “Japan under threat,” “duty to Asia,” and “tragic national sacrifice.”
A display addressing America’s entry into the Second World War suggests that the Roosevelt administration took a confrontational approach to Japan, abrogated the US-Japan Trade and Navigation Treaty, and imposed an oil embargo (Japan was overly dependent on American oil imports at the time). That, according to the display, triggered the war. It further argues that diplomatic negotiations in 1941 failed because of the harsh terms demanded by the United States. Not seeing any room for compromise, Japan concluded that war was inevitable and ordered the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
The Yushukan Museum embodies one of three broad narratives that shape Japan’s historical memory of the Second World War: revisionism. The revisionist narrative, which has gained traction in the country since the 1980s in nationalist and conservative circles, promotes a reinterpretation of Japan’s wartime past, depicting Japan as an Asian liberator that fought the American aggressor and resisted Western colonialism. It highlights narratives of self-sacrifice and self-defense while downplaying or omitting Japanese imperialism, colonial exploitation, and the atrocities and war crimes it committed in East Asia.[35]
Thus, the museum speaks of the “China Incident” and not the “Rape of Nanjing” in which the Imperial Japanese Army massacred over 200,000 Chinese civilians, non-combatants, and prisoners of war. Any mention is omitted of atrocities committed by Japan during the Second World War, such as sexual slavery (so-called “comfort women”) and the human experimentation that was part of the development of chemical and biological weapons by Unit 731 in the puppet state of Manchukuo on mainland China.
The revisionist narrative intersects and conflicts with the two other predominant Japanese narratives around memory of the war: victimhood and pacifism. These narratives are embodied at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park and Hiroshima Peace Museum.
The skeletal Atomic Bomb Dome (Genbaku Dōmu) stands at the Peace Memorial Park along the Motoyasu River. It is a ruin of August 6, 1945, when an American B-29 bomber dropped the atomic bomb “Little Boy” at 8:15 am, destroying the city and killing an estimated 140,000 people. The Peace Museum features testimonies and is filled with thousands of artifacts from the survivors and the destruction. It conveys the horror of nuclear war in immediate, visceral form.
Hiroshima’s memory is one of civilian suffering, nuclear devastation, and pacifist hope. The story told is about a nuclear bomb that indiscriminately killed and wounded tens of thousands of people. It is about horror and inhumanity that must be related so that there are “no more Hiroshimas.”
The memory that Hiroshima projects is one of victimhood and pacifism rather than reckoning with the Japanese responsibility for the start of the war that led to the bombing.⁷ Hiroshima is taught primarily as a symbol of suffering inflicted onJapan, not of Japan’s role in waging the war that preceded the bombing.
The inscription on the cenotaph in the Peace Memorial Park reads “Let all the souls here rest in peace … for we shall not repeat the evil.” Broadly interpreted, it is a pacifist call for all humanity against war; narrowly interpreted, a pacifist call against the use of nuclear weapons. Such lessons are admirable, but the narrative of the memorial omits the agency and culpability of Japan in the war and events that led up to that fateful, destructive moment.
The narratives of victimhood and pacifism dominate Japanese historical memory, extending beyond the tragedies of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to cast Japan as the victim of fire-bombings, intense conventional bombings, invasion, and defeat. Suffering is acknowledged, but agency and responsibility are not.
The pacifist narrative emerged strongly in the immediate postwar era. Japan’s 1947 Constitution renounced war, and the new identity of a “peace nation” (shugoku) took hold. The Hiroshima Peace Museum and Peace Memorial Park undergird this narrative, making war something to reject and militarism something to repent. Yet, together with the narrative of victimhood, the narrative of pacifism frames Japan only as a victim, not an aggressor. It is selective: it remembers Japanese suffering more readily than Japanese violence.
The three narratives do not align neatly. They often conflict. The victimhood narrative wants Japan to be seen as innocent and wronged; the pacifist narrative seeks a break with militarism; the revisionist narrative seeks dignity without apology.
The question emerges: how should Japan remember the war in the Pacific, and how should memorials function? It is linked, more broadly, to the question of how Japan should remember the war in Europe and the Holocaust, or should it at all?
The controversies surrounding the Yasukuni Shrine reveal the difficulties Japan faces in reconciling its national pride with its wartime guilt. In Germany, the Holocaust serves as an organizing principle for remembrance. It anchors the nation’s moral reckoning with its Nazi past. Japan does not have a similar anchor. Even the Nanjing Massacre and the sexual enslavement of “comfort women” remain contested in public discourse.[36] This divergence has led historian Ian Buruma to suggest that Germany’s memory culture is structured around guilt, while Japan’s is structured around loss.[37] The contrast is striking. In the Japanese narrative, war is a tragedy rather than a crime.
If one removes the Holocaust from the equation, can Japan’s war be equated in moral terms with Germany’s? Were the Japanese as “evil” as the Germans in the Second World War – or perhaps as culpable as Germany in the First?
The questions, uncomfortable as they may be, expose the moral hierarchy that structures the memory of the twentieth century. The answer must be careful and considered. Nazi Germany and Japan were very different in kind, though similar in dimensions of violence, ideology, and empire. The challenge is not moral ranking but moral recognition.
The Holocaust, which industrialized the mass murder of six million Jews, established an absolute moral benchmark; any nation that did not partake in the extermination of Jews appears, by contrast, less malevolent. Yet this comparative logic risks obscuring Japan’s own record of atrocity during the Second World War: The massacre of civilians in China, biological and chemical warfare, and human experimentation by Unit 731, the starvation and torture of prisoners of war, and the systemic enslavement of women across Asia.[38] These acts did not seek the total extermination of a specific people, but they did embody a racial ideology that positioned Japan as the superior power in Asia, a parallel, if not an equivalent, to the racial hierarchies that underpinned Nazi thought.
***
When reporters asked President Franklin D. Roosevelt from where bombers had taken off for the April 12, 1942, Doolittle Raid on Tokyo, named after Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle, he quipped, “Shangri-La,” invoking the mythical Himalayan paradise from James Hilton’s Lost Horizon (1933). Two years later, the joke became literal: Doolittle’s wife Josephine christened a carrier in honor of the imaginary airfield.
On September 16, 1945, following the Japanese surrender, the USS Shangri-La CV-38 entered Tokyo Bay, anchoring off Yokohama just south of Tokyo. Its operational history was brief yet important. It joined the Pacific Fleet in April 1945 after traversing the Panama Canal, completing further training at Pearl Harbor, and launching strikes against Okinawa and then on Honshu and Hokkaido during the war’s final months. By late summer, the ship was part of Task Force 38 that raided Tokyo’s outskirts as Japan teetered on collapse in July 1945.
One of the sailors on board, commissioned on September 15, 1944, was a twenty-year-old farm boy from Marion, Nebraska, who turned Navy Fireman. His name was Edward Yonker. He was my grandfather.
Grandpa Ed never liked to talk much, not even about his days of heroism. When he did, he tended to discuss facts, not emotions. I do not remember much of what he told me about the war. I do remember his story of how he had to get his mother’s permission to enlist because two of his brothers were already in combat.
As I traveled across Japan, learning about local perspectives of the Second World War and the Holocaust, I realized for the first time what an immense debt of gratitude my generation owes to that of my grandfather. I understood for the first time the meaning of the cliché that freedom must never be taken for granted and that some things are worth fighting for, whatever the price. And I felt, as I haven’t felt for a long time, how much I miss my grandfather.
I dedicate this study in loving memory to Edward Yonker.
Policy Proposals
Educators, for the sake of history and justice – stay focused. Commendable as they are, museums and exhibitions dedicated to the Righteous Among the Nations, or paying equal attention to evildoers and rescuers, risk distorting both the study of the Holocaust as a historical event and the discussion about its moral lessons. Schools and other institutions that attend those museums are advised to do so only after their pupils have gained thorough and unsparing knowledge about the roots of modern antisemitism, the rise of Nazism as an ideology and practice, and how the murder of six million Jews was enabled and facilitated.
Emphasize the exceptionality. Museums, exhibits, and educational material on Righteous Among the Nations worldwide should emphasize and make clear the exceptionality of the individuals represented, stressing that when Jews and other minorities were sent to their deaths, most people did not act and stood by, while others actively participated in the murder.
Let Israelis Know. As a form of Hakarat Hatov and as a lesson in courage and the importance of the universal values of human rights and dignity, Israeli schoolchildren should be required to learn about and engage with the story of one Righteous Among the Nations every year.
Dr. Carl Yonker, Project Manager and Senior Researcher at the Center
[5] See Rotem Kowner, “A Holocaust Paragon of Virtue’s Rise to Fame: The Transnational Commemoration of the Japanese Diplomat Sugihara Chiune and Its Divergent National Motives,” The American Historical Review 128, no. 1 (March 2023), pp. 31-32, 51-56.
[33] “Hirohito Quit Yasukuni Shrine Visits Over Concerns about War Criminals,” The New York Times, April 26, 2007, https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/26/world/asia/26iht-japan.1.5447598.html; David Kenley, “History and Memory: The Role of War Memorial Museums in China and Japan,” History, Literature, and the Construction of “Memory” in Asia 14, no. 1 (Spring 2009), p. 10; and Higurashi Yoshinobu, “Yasukuni and the Enshrinement of War Criminals,” nippon.com, November 25, 2013, https://www.nippon.com/en/in-depth/a02404/.
[34] John Breen, “Yasukuni Shrine: Ritual and Memory,” The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus 3, no. 6 (2005), p. 3.
[35] Kenley, “History and Memory,” p. 5; and Akiko Takenaka, Yasukuni Shrine: History, Memory, and Japan’s Unending Postwar (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2015), pp. 11, 164-166.
[36] John W. Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon, 1986), pp. 47-49.
[37] See: Ian Buruma, The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan (New York: The New York Review of Books, 2015).
[38] See, for example, Yuki Tanaka, Hidden Horrors: Japanese War Crimes in World War II (New York: Routledge, 2018), pp. 45-66, 92-99, 135-156.
France: A Trial Still in Session
Carl Yonker
On July 12, 2025, the Élysée announced that France would annually mark July 12 as a national day of commemoration for Captain Alfred Dreyfus.[1] On that day in 1906, the Court of Cassation annulled the conviction that had sent Dreyfus to Devil’s Island on charges of treason. The new commemoration day will stand alongside France’s four other main civic and military national holidays: Bastille Day (July 14); Labour Day (May 1); Victory in Europe Day (May 8); and Armistice Day (November 11).
President Emmanuel Macron said that the annulment of Dreyfus’ conviction was a historical milestone that reflected “the victory of justice and truth against hatred and antisemitism.” Macron warned that today, more than ever, “we must always show vigilance and perseverance against these old antisemitic demons,” as “the lineage of the heirs of the anti-Dreyfusards, anti-Republicans, and antisemites of the early and mid-20th century has never been extinguished.”[2]
Macron’s announcement followed another symbolic political act. On June 2, 197 members of the National Assembly voted unanimously to posthumously promote Dreyfus to the rank of brigadier general in a parliamentary motion of reparation 130 years in the making. Portrayed as an important symbolic step in the fight against antisemitism in today’s France, the bill was put forward by former French prime minister MP Gabriel Attal, the leader of President Macron’s liberal-centrist Renaissance party (RE).
The vote was swift and broadly supported across the political spectrum. In November 2025, the French Senate approved the promotion and Macron and French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu signed it into law.[3] MP Charles Sitzenstuhl of Macron’s Renaissance party, who praised the promotion as an act that “will go down in history,” went further and suggested that Dreyfus be entombed in the Panthéon in Paris, the mausoleum where France’s greatest heroes are buried.[4]
Not everyone was happy, though, with what Le Monde described as the “symbolic and highly politicized return of the Dreyfus Affair” to public discourse.[5] The centrist Democratic Movement party (MoDem) abstained, warning that the gesture risked offering the far right a “certificate of honorability” on antisemitism without forcing it to confront its anti-Dreyfusard legacy and that it would not participate so as “not to allow some people to buy cheaply” such a certificate at Dreyfus’ expense.[6]
MP Gabriel Amard from the left-wing La France Insoumise party (LFI) was even more blunt, taking direct aim at the National Rally (RN), the far-right party established in 1972 (known from then until 2018 as the National Front) by Jean-Marie Le Pen. After RN MP Thierry Tesson expressed support for the initiative, citing it as a response to rising antisemitism across France and the importance of defending the principles and unity of the Republic, Amard castigated the RN for “double-talk” on antisemitism. He warned that antisemitism was still rife within the RN and the legacy of the Dreyfusards was not the RN’s.[7]
That a nineteenth-century judicial scandal still commands the energy of the Fifth Republic reveals much. The Dreyfus Affair, more than any other episode in modern French history, functions as a drama through which France tests its ideals of justice, equality, and citizenship, and the distance between those ideals and reality. The Affair serves as a mirror and moral barometer, re-examined and re-engaged with at times when France doubts its self-image and identity.
The Affair endures and does so, as historian and literary scholar Maurice Samuels observed in an interview with the Report, because it dramatizes a key moment “in the guerre franco-française [the Franco-French war], a kind of internal war between the left and the right that started during the French Revolution.”[8] On one side, a universalist France, open and civic, rooted in the Enlightenment and the Revolution’s promise of liberté, égalité, fraternité; on the other, a blood-and-soil France, Catholic, ethnically and culturally exclusive.
“That’s a battle that continues to play out,” Samuels explained, “and the Dreyfus Affair was the key moment in that battle, because it came at a time when the so-called ‘Jewish question’ – rising with the arrival of Jews in large numbers from Western Europe and [the intensification of the debate] about who belongs in France – came to the fore.”[9]
***
In October 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a young Jewish officer on the French General Staff, was accused of passing military secrets to the German embassy. The evidence was tenuous: a single, clumsily forged memorandum, the bordereau, wrongly attributed to Dreyfus. In December that year, following a secret military trial steeped in antisemitic prejudice, Dreyfus was convicted of treason unanimously in a court-martial, stripped of his rank in a humiliating ceremony at the École Militaire, where he was degraded with chants of “Death to Judas, death to the Jew,” and exiled to Devil’s Island, a penal colony in French Guiana, to serve a life sentence.[10]
His guilt was less a matter of proof than of societal bias. In fin-de-siècle France, to be Jewish was enough to provoke suspicion, and “many French people leapt to the twin conclusions that a traitor in the army must be a Jew and that a Jew in the army must be a traitor.”[11] Such a conclusion challenged a fundamental core of Republican universalism, which held that one’s identity and origin should have no bearing on determining one’s citizenship.[12]
The Affair might have ended there, had the real culprit, Major Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy, not been exposed in 1896 by Colonel Georges Picquart, an intelligence officer. When the army attempted to suppress Picquart’s discovery, a small group of intellectuals and politicians transformed the affair into a moral crusade and national drama, dividing France not only over one man’s guilt, but over the soul of the Republic itself.
At the forefront of the public debate was French novelist, playwright, and journalist Émile Zola, whose open letter “J’Accuse…!” in the liberal and socialist Parisian newspaper L’Aurore in January 1898 publicly condemned the army and the state as being complicit in framing Dreyfus and attempting to silence debate.[13] Zola himself would be charged and convicted of libel. He was forced to flee into exile in England to avoid imprisonment.[14]
France became bitterly divided. The Republic split into Dreyfusards, an alliance of republicans, radicals, Jews, Protestants, and secular intellectuals, and anti-Dreyfusards, including monarchists, Catholics, nationalists, and antisemites, who claimed to defend the army and the nation from “cosmopolitan corruption.” The Dreyfusards believed they were defending the ideals of truth, equality, and justice, upholding the universalist values of the Republic; the anti-Dreyfusards viewed claims of Dreyfus’ wrongful conviction as an assault on the army, on the state, and on tradition.
In September 1899, Dreyfus returned from Devil’s Island and was brought to trial again in Rennes. Despite growing awareness of Esterhazy’s probable guilt, the military court once more convicted Dreyfus, sentencing him to ten years in prison, albeit with “mitigating circumstances.” Abroad, protests broke out, including in London, New York, and Berlin. Yet inside France, the mobilization was principally urban, intellectual, journalistic, confined to large cities like Paris.[15] The government’s response to Dreyfus’ new guilty verdict was politically astute, if morally ambiguous, as it attempted to restore public order. President Émile Loubet intervened and granted Dreyfus a presidential pardon, but did not overturn the guilty verdict.[16]
The most dramatic turning point came in 1906, after further investigations and pressure, when the Court of Cassation annulled the Rennes verdict without remand, declaring that Dreyfus’ condemnation had been “by error and in an unjust manner.” Parliament then promoted Picquart to brigadier general and reinstated Dreyfus to the army with promotion to chef d’escadron (major) and awarded him the Legion of Honor in the very courtyard of the École Militaire where he was stripped of his rank and subjected to the antisemitic taunts of “Death to the Jews.”[17]
But the restoration was incomplete. Although declared innocent, Dreyfus never rose above the rank of lieutenant-colonel as he deserved for his service during the First World War, ultimately dying in relative obscurity on July 11, 1935.
The court’s eventual reversal in 1906 closed the judicial case but did not provide real justice. Moreover, its cultural and political significance was never resolved. The Affair became a template for French political and moral discourse throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, “a proxy for the question of what kind of nation France is,” as described by Maurice Samuels.[18] It has been a trauma perpetually revived, each time reinterpreted through the anxieties of the age and serving as a mirror through which France can scrutinize and self-reflect.
Despite Dreyfus’ vindication, the forces that had condemned him reemerged. The French author and politician Charles Maurras (1868-1952), the ideologue of the monarchist and nationalist political movement Action Françaiseand virulent critic of Dreyfus, framed the Affair as the triumph of anti-France forces, presenting Dreyfus’ exoneration as an anti-Catholic, anti-militarist, and anti-patriotic national defeat.[19] This Maurrassian narrative appeared during the Second World War under the Vichy regime, which repurposed anti-Dreyfusard rhetoric to justify collaboration and persecution, portraying such rhetoric as a moral correction of the Republic’s supposed failures.[20] Under Vichy, mention of Dreyfus was expunged from French textbooks and antisemitic material was disseminated. Still, anti-Dreyfusard rhetoric was not central to the Vichy regime’s propaganda.[21]
When Maurras was arrested and convicted for conspiring with the enemy after the fall of the Vichy regime, he declared his life sentence was “Dreyfus’ revenge!”[22]
After the Second World War, the Dreyfus Affair largely faded from public discourse and was muted. Under Charles de Gaulle, stories of internal division and institutional failure contradicted the national narrative of heroism and moral clarity. Priority lay in national reconstruction, colonial struggles, and the broad narrative of Resistance and Liberation. The Dreyfus Affair, too divisive, too tied to the fissures of secularism, the army, antisemitism, and Jewish identity, was ill-suited for constructing such a national story. Dreyfusard interpretations of history were dominant, but consensus regarding his innocence and the miscarriage of justice still did not prevail, particularly on the right.
Into the 1970s and 1980s, Dreyfus remained a marginal presence. The naming of a school after Dreyfus in Rennes was refused. Films on the subject faced censorship or institutional roadblocks. Intellectual talk shows, a popular genre in France, avoided the Affair.[23] A proposal in the 1980s by French President François Mitterrand to erect a statue of Dreyfus at the École Militaire ignited a fierce controversy. Even Mitterrand’s Defense Ministry opposed the idea.[24]
***
The Affair’s return to prominence in the 1990s coincided with the surge of the French far right, which continued to circulate violently anti-Dreyfusard works, including at National Front gatherings where tracts denying Dreyfus’ innocence and accusing Jews of conspiring against France and the Church were openly distributed. These texts, drawing on long-standing antisemitic and conspiratorial traditions, presented the Affair not as a miscarriage of justice but as evidence of a Masonic and Jewish plot to undermine national and Catholic values.
The culmination of such rhetoric occurred in January 1994, when Sirpa Actualité, a French Army weekly magazine, published an article by Col. Paul Gaujac, a reservist serving as head of the army’s Historical Service. It cast doubt on Dreyfus’ innocence by suggesting it was simply “a thesis now generally accepted by historians.” Dismissive of Dreyfus’ wrongful conviction and ignoring the French army’s attempts to cover up the Affair, Gaujac considered the controversy to have been an assault by leftists and radicals on the army that led to the dismantling of French military intelligence and defunding the armed forces.[25]
The backlash was immediate and reignited public debate. The New York Times noted how strange it was “that French army historians should again cast doubt on [Dreyfus’] innocence in a study published to mark the centenary of his arrest.”[26]Le Monde pointed to numerous blunders of fact and misrepresentations in the article.[27] Jewish organizations, human rights groups, and historians denounced the article as an act of historical revisionism by what they described as elements within the military still unwilling to acknowledge the institutional antisemitism that had condemned Dreyfus a century earlier.[28]
The scandal was an embarrassment to the French military. The Defense Ministry disavowed the publication, and Defense Minister François Leotard fired Gaujac. Nevertheless, the damage was done, and the controversy revealed how unsettled the affair remained within France’s armed forces, and how close to the surface and present the bitter disagreement between the Dreyfusards and anti-Dreyfusards was in French society.
Gaujac’s dismissal was criticized by the National Front, one of whose members suggested it reflected “the misfortunes” of France.[29] The following year, as France prepared to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the liberation of the camps, the episode forced the nation to reconsider whether it had ever truly reckoned with its past, paving the way for the moral reckoning that President Jacques Chirac would undertake.
When Chirac stood before the Vel d’Hiv memorial in July 1995, a mere two months after taking office, his words marked a decisive rupture with decades of official silence. For the first time, a French president acknowledged that the crimes of Vichy were committed “by the French, by the French state.”[30]
The phrase shattered the Gaullist myth that had neatly separated the Republic from the collaborationist regime that rounded up ten thousand Jews on July 16-17, 1942, in Paris and sent them to their deaths. “France, land of Enlightenment and Human Rights, land of hospitality and asylum,” Chirac said, “France, on that day, committed an irreparable act.”[31] He invited the nation to look backward without illusion on its complicity in the Holocaust, and, by implication, to reexamine the Affair that had once exposed the Republic’s deepest contradictions. Dreyfus returned to public discourse not as distant history but as a living moral template, a warning of how easily institutions could betray justice when animated by fear and prejudice.
Three years later, in January 1998, on the occasion of the centenary of Émile Zola’s “J’Accuse,” Chirac sealed Dreyfus’ return to the civic canon. He denounced the trials prosecuting Dreyfus as “charades” and the Affair as “a dark stain, unworthy of our country and our history, a colossal miscarriage of justice and shameful compromise of state.”[32] Chirac made clear that Zola was a hero for standing up for Dreyfus, whose only crime was being Jewish. He said Dreyfus and Zola should be recognized for giving full meaning to the values of liberty, dignity, and justice, and for demonstrating “love of the fatherland against intolerance and hatred.”[33]
Chirac’s words encapsulated the transformation of a national trauma into a moral asset. Only by confronting its failures, Chirac suggested, could France affirm its faith in Republican values, the same faith Dreyfus and Zola had demonstrated through their deep love of the country. Liberté, égalité, fraternité were now tied to the exoneration of Dreyfus; the Affair became the Republic’s moral turning point and its permanent test, a story of betrayal and injustice redeemed by the courage of men who embraced the values of the nation and the Republic.
In July 2006, on the centenary of Dreyfus’s rehabilitation, Chirac returned to the École Militaire, the same courtyard where Dreyfus’ sword had been broken and he had been publicly shamed, to honor him in a national ceremony.[34] In his remarks at the ceremony, Chirac reinforced the legacy of those who “refused the conspiracy of injustice and fought the battle of honor and truth in the face of adversity,” and thanks to whom the plot against Dreyfus was exposed. [35] He emphasized that the French Republic emerged from the low point of the Affair stronger than before, as it served “as the crucible through which the humanist values of respect and tolerance were finally developed.”[36]
For Chirac, Dreyfus’ rehabilitation should be remembered as a national victory. It represents the unity of the Republic, the rejection of racism and antisemitism, the defense of human rights, and the primacy of justice. France, he asserted, must not take this heritage for granted and remain vigilant in the fight against injustice, intolerance, and hatred, which is never definitively won.[37]
Chirac’s appeal to unity came amid renewed social tensions. During his presidency, debates over immigration, headscarves, and the place of religion in public life were already fracturing the supposed harmony of the Republic. Nicolas Sarkozy, who entered the Élysée in 2007, inherited Chirac’s moral script on the Affair but with a nuance. He considered it an argument in defense of a robust, secular Republic and against what he portrayed as the encroachment of religious extremism.
In doing so, he echoed arguments that surfaced in the public debate that led to the strict separation of state and religion in 1905. At the time, Samuels argued, “laïcité became a way to punish the Catholic Church for its role in the Affair, for fomenting right-wing nationalism and opposing Dreyfus. The [original] meaning of secularism was that the three major religions in France, Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism, should be treated equally. [Following the Dreyfus Affair], the meaning was expanded and secularism meant that the public sphere should be free of religion and that French Republican universalism demands the suppression of minority difference.”[38]
François Hollande, in his turn, returned to Chirac’s path. In 2012, marking the 70th anniversary of the Vel d’Hiv roundup of Jews, Hollande echoed his predecessor’s first official admission of French culpability in the Holocaust under the Vichy regime, declaring: “The truth is that the crime was committed in France, by France.”[39] Though not explicitly mentioning Dreyfus, Hollande invoked the Affair at different times throughout his presidency, highlighting, like Chirac did, Zola and other citizens who had the courage to stand for truth and justice.
One such citizen was Jean Jaurès, a French socialist leader and member of parliament at the time of the Affair, who was one of Dreyfus’ most outspoken supporters. Hollande praised Jaurès’ commitment to justice, a core Republican value, which led him “to defend Dreyfus in the face of indifference and sometimes even hostility.”[40]
In 2016, Hollande inaugurated the Maison Zola in Médan, west of Paris, turning Zola’s home into a place of remembrance and tribute to the author’s life work and his courage in defending Dreyfus. The renovation of the house was a decade-long labor of love by the industrialist Pierre Bergé, and the first part of a larger project to establish a museum dedicated to Dreyfus as well on the property.[41]
Hollande described Dreyfus as “a patriotic soldier, victim of pure injustice […] of antisemitism, of the worst humiliation.”[42] Zola’s lesson, according to Hollande, is that everyone has a choice in a moment of adversity, that there is always a ray of hope in the darkest night, and that one voice can change the destiny of history by standing up for justice and sharing the same convictions that Zola and Dreyfus shared.[43]
***
Between 2020 and 2025, President Emmanuel Macron’s invocation of Dreyfus evolved from memorial ritual to republican catechism. More so than his predecessors, Macron made the Affair a reference for civic moral instruction on Republican values and the fight against antisemitism, one cited often.
When in October 2021 Macron inaugurated Maison Dreyfus at Médan beside Zola’s restored home, he declared that doing so was to “right an injustice.” Almost 500 artifacts fill the museum’s rooms: photographs, court documents, personal objects, and press articles, connected to the Affair.
According to museum director Louis Gautier, the exhibition aims mostly at hosting schoolchildren and informing them of the issues of “antisemitism, racism, justice, the role of media and social networks, and the place of intellectuals in democracy.”[44] The museum attracted tens of thousands of visitors already in its first year, proof that history, when properly staged, could still command moral attention.
For Macron, the symbolism of establishing the first museum dedicated to Dreyfus at Zola’s house was “to say that the Republic only holds together through the struggles of women and men. Never a given, always to be reconquered.”[45] Commemorating the Affair through Zola and Dreyfus, thus, was a lesson to teach the Republic to look at itself and remember that it only endures through struggle; it is not to be taken for granted.
When asked if he would posthumously appoint Dreyfus to the rank of general, Macron deferred, arguing that such a “repair” needed to be made by the French military, not the president. His reasoning – to avoid trouble and controversy and not to set a precedent of presidential intervention in promoting or demoting military officers.[46]
Yet controversy was anyhow unavoidable, as always when it comes to the Dreyfus Affair. For France’s far right, the Affair has remained a moral battlefield rather than a closed case. This was demonstrated in 2020, when far right polemicist Éric Zemmour, a Jew educated in private Jewish schools, claimed on national television that Dreyfus’ innocence was not so clear, calling the affair “murky” and suggesting it would never be possible to know whether the allegations against him were false.[47]
Zemmour’s revisionist comments were a deliberate provocation, designed not to reopen the judicial question but to reopen a cultural one. His France was a besieged republic, victimized by liberal elites and moral censors who were weakening the Republic and undermining its identity and pride as Dreyfus and the Affair had done.
His statement that “the innocence of Dreyfus is not obvious” functioned, moreover, as a coded appeal to those who felt dispossessed by the multicultural republic, particularly on the far right. “It was a dog whistle,” Samuels remarked, “a way of saying, I’m with you; I think this is a white Christian nation – even though he himself is Jewish.”[48]
Such words about Dreyfus remain appealing among the far right and ultranationalists in France, but French politicians and intellectuals are concerned that once relegated battles over identity and history may resurface more intensely and legitimize hate and exclusionary policies contrary to the values of the French Republic.[49]
During 2025, the concerns grew stronger. France was thrown into a period of political crisis following the snap legislative elections of the summer of 2024, announced by Macron in response to the success of National Rally in the European Parliament elections. The national elections resulted in an impasse of three major blocs: a left-wing New Popular Front alliance, Macron’s centrist alliance Ensemble, and the far right National Rally. Difficulties in building coalitions abounded, and by October 2025, three governments had collapsed, shaking France’s social, political, and economic stability.[50]
At the same time, antisemitic incidents once again became an imposing, widespread phenomenon in French life, in particular in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 attack. In 2024, the Service de Protection de la Communauté Juive (SPCJ) recorded 1,570 antisemitic incidents across France, compared to 1,676 in 2023, 436 in 2022, and 589 in 2021.[51]
Macron and the French government unequivocally and forcefully condemned Hamas’ October 7 attacks and affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself. However, the massive number of civilian Palestinian casualties and growing concerns within French society about Israel’s handling of the war prompted Macron to recalibrate his policy, maintaining a balance between France’s moral rhetoric, strategic calculations, and domestic political pressures.
The French government, while declaring Israel’s fight just, called for humanitarian pauses in fighting, reaffirmed its support for a two-state solution, and urged Israel to act responsibly. That was still not enough for some on the French left.
It is within this context – one of instability, uncertainty, and frustration over domestic and international issues – that the acts regarding Dreyfus were undertaken in the summer of 2025. While it is, to use Samuels’ words, “complicated to tease out Macron’s motivations and not possible to know for certain” why he declared a national day for Dreyfus and why his party ultimately advanced Dreyfus’ rank promotion in parliament, it has nevertheless been suggested he did so as a way to counterbalance France’s recognition of Palestinian statehood through a gesture to the Jewish community.[52]
No definitive evidence points to this being the motivation, nor does such motivation contradict the clear message Macron sought to convey by marking the date upon which “the spirit of the Enlightenment, the principles of 1789, and the republican promise finally triumphed.”[53] One way or another, the message the President sent was clear. In the guerre franco-française, the victory of the universalist France, open and civic, rooted in the Enlightenment and the Revolution’s promise of liberté, égalité, fraternité, must be defended and prevail.
***
The legacy of the Dreyfus Affair was very much present in Paris this summer, with the exhibition Alfred Dreyfus: Vérité et Justice, which ran from March to August 2025 at Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme (MAHJ). The exhibition returned not just to a historic scandal, but also to the uneasy moral conscience of the French Republic itself.
Curated by Isabelle Cahn and Philippe Oriol, the exhibition placed Dreyfus, the man, the soldier, back at the center of his own ordeal. Letters written from Devil’s Island, fragments of the uniform torn from his shoulders, and the haunting precision of his prison notebooks were shown beside paintings by Pissarro, Vallotton, and Carrière, artists whose works once mirrored the fractures of a nation.[54]
The museum’s intent, as director Paul Salmona explained, was not remembrance for its own sake but a confrontation with the present, a reminder that the mechanisms of injustice are never entirely past. The objective of the museum was to continue to raise awareness and train a new generation of students in the values of citizenship, truth, justice, and secularism.[55]
The exhibition’s design moved deliberately from the intimate to the public, tracing Dreyfus’ journey from his Alsatian childhood through the frenzy of accusation and the slow, bureaucratic violence of exile. The small desk where Dreyfus wrote to his wife Lucie, the stark isolation of his cell, and the riotous front pages of La Libre Parole were staged. In one of the rooms stood Tim’s Hommage au capitaine Dreyfus, a monumental resin cast of the 1988 bronze statue depicting the officer upright, sword broken, eyes fixed on some invisible horizon.[56] It was an image of steadfastness rather than martyrdom, suggesting that Dreyfus’ greatest act of defiance was his endurance. “I want the light,” he wrote from his prison, a phrase that now reads less like a plea than a civic principle.
On the last day of the exhibition, tickets sold out. “Why the great demand? Do we have anything there that has not been seen before?” one of the guards was asked. He shrugged his shoulders. “Not really. But this is Dreyfus, and it is always a big deal here in France.”
Policy Recommendations
Context of Remembrance. Whatever the motivations were, France and its President should be congratulated on establishing an annual national day that commemorates the Dreyfus Affair. When the commemoration is put into practice, it is essential for the following to be recognized: there are many lessons to be learned from the Affair, and all are valid and important. Yet its teaching must never lose sight of the root cause of the ordeal: the rise of modern antisemitism, which the Affair manifested, and whose ultimate tragedy it anticipated.
Journalists and Democracy. In a world where freedom of the press is increasingly threatened and the distinction between facts and fiction is more pervasive, education about the Affair must serve, across the world rather than only in France, also to highlight the essentiality of independent, fearless, and fact-based press.
Experiential Learning. Building on the Maison Dreyfus and the MAHJ exhibition, France should increase funding for immersive, curriculum-integrated educational programs that use museums, archives, and digital tools to teach students about the Dreyfus Affair as a case study in justice, prejudice, and Republican values.
Dr. Carl Yonker, Project Manager and Senior Researcher at the Center
[19] Knobel, “The Dreyfus Affair,” and Maurice Samuels, Alfred Dreyfus: The Man at the Center of the Affair (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2024), pp. 160-161.
[20] Henry Rousso, The Vichy Syndrome: History and Memory in France since 1944 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991), pp. 6-7.
[51] “Data: Antisemitic Incidents Worldwide 2023,” Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2023 (Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, Tel Aviv University, April 2025), p. 18, https://cst.tau.ac.il/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/AntisemitismWorldwide_2023.pdf; Uriya Shavit and Carl Yonker, “Voices from the Field: Neither Here. Nor There – Is There Any Place Where French Jews Can Still Feel Safe?,” Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2023 (Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, Tel Aviv University, April 2025), pp. 27-32, https://cst.tau.ac.il/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/AntisemitismWorldwide_2023.pdf; and “Data: Antisemitic Incidents Worldwide 2024,” Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2024 (Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, Tel Aviv University, April 2025), p. 16, https://cst.tau.ac.il/antisemitism-worldwide-report-for-2024/.
[54]Dossier de presse, Alfred Dreyfus: Vérité et justice, Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme, 2025, pp. 4–6.
[55] Paul Salmona, Dossier de presse, Alfred Dreyfus: Vérité et justice, Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme, 2025, pp. 22-23.
[56]Dossier pédagogique, Alfred Dreyfus: Vérité et justice, Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme, 2025, p. 17.
The United Kingdom: Defender of All Faiths
Noah Abrahams
On January 27, 2025, the International Holocaust Remembrance Day that marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, an impressive group of royal dignitaries participated in a commemoration event at the former Nazi extermination camp. These included the Crown Princess of Sweden and Crown Prince of Norway, the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, the Kings of Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Belgium – and King Charles III of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and other realms.
Joining Holocaust survivors, King Charles lit a candle to remember the murdered victims of the Holocaust and was taken to a reconstruction of the “Death Wall” where thousands of political prisoners were executed. Earlier during his day in Poland, he visited the Jewish Community Center Krakow, inaugurated in 2008.
Reflecting on his visit to Auschwitz, the first by a British Monarch, the King wrote in the visitors’ book: “Remembering what took place here and those who were so cruelly murdered is a duty; a sacred duty that must be protected. Being here today, hearing the stories of those who experienced its horrors, seeing the shoes of children whose lives were taken when they’d just began, and walking the paths upon which such cruelty was inflicted, is something I will never forget.”[1]
Charles’ words had a special meaning not just because he is one of the most recognized people in the world, but also because his visit came at a time when antisemitism raised its ugly head in the United Kingdom following the Hamas October 7, 2023, attack on Israel. In 2023, The Community Security Trust, the main voluntary Jewish organization in Britain for combating antisemitism, recorded 4,103 antisemitic incidents, including 273 of assault; of these, 1,389 were recorded in October alone. In 2024, 3,528 incidents were recorded, including 201 incidents of assault.[2] With Jews attacked in unprecedented numbers on the streets of England merely for being visibly identifiable as Jews, there was some comfort in knowing that the Monarch is committed to the remembrance of the Holocaust and its lessons – even if his voice was not strong and particular enough in condemning present-day manifestations of Jew-hatred.
Tragically, towards the end of the year, Charles III had another opportunity to demonstrate his commitment to the cause. On October 2, Yom Kippur, a 35-year-old British subject of Syrian origin, Jihad al-Shami, drove his car into pedestrians before stabbing worshippers at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation Synagogue in Higher Crumpsall, a suburb of Manchester, the city with the second-largest Jewish population in England.
Two men were killed as a result of the terror attack, both Jewish: 53-year-old Adrian Daulby and 66-year-old Melvin Cravitz.
Al-Shami, who was shot by a policeman and died later of his wounds, was arrested earlier in the year on suspicion of alleged rape. One of the three wives he was married to told The Guardian that in the months before the attack, he was “glued to his phone” watching Arabic news channels, but did not appear to be on the path to terror.[3]
Eighteen days after the attack, the 76-year-old King, who is being treated for cancer, paid a visit to the Heaton Park synagogue on a rainy, cold day. With a blue kippah on his head, he described the attack as “a terrible shock” that “saddened the nation” and shared his “heartfelt condolences.” The surprise visit, an unusual gesture from a man whose schedule is set for months ahead, was a show of solidarity intended to send a clear message against antisemitism.
The King spoke with witnesses of the attack, asking them patiently and compassionately about the tragedy as well as about Jewish rituals. He gave the congregation a gift: a bottle of whiskey to enjoy during the Shabbat morning service. In return, he was presented with a framed print of the memorial event the synagogue held for the late Queen Elizabeth II.
Writing in Hamevaser, a Hebrew-language Israeli daily representing the small Hasidic courts in the country, Asher Klein offered an insider’s view of how the visit was seen by members of the community. Typical of the genre of accounts on royal visits, Klein depicted trivial gestures with pathos and pomp, showing that the ultra-Orthodox are no less vulnerable to the magic of royalty than other people are.
According to Klein, the King was greeted at the entrance of the synagogue by the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, Sir Ephraim Mirvis, and by Daniel Walker, the Chabad rabbi of the community since 2008. Together with other worshippers, Walker held the doors of the synagogue and stopped the attacker, who was wearing a fake suicide belt, from storming inside with his knife and killing more people.
The King was informed by Rabbi Walker about how the attack unfolded and how the congregation deals with the pain and concerns in its aftermath. Walking across the synagogue, he was introduced to Yehuda Marks, who has served as the congregation’s Chazan for 35 years. He asked Marks what the duties of a Chazan are and how one learns to become one. He also asked Marks where he stood when the attack occurred. Towards the end of his visit, the King appeared to admire the synagogue’s Holy Ark and then silently listened to the Chazan singing El Male Rachamim as the rain was pouring on the windows.[4]
Yoni Finlay, a member of the congregation who was wounded in the attack while barricading the doors of the synagogue, and who spoke with the King during the visit, told the Jewish Chronicle: “To see the King come and say how proud he was of the Jewish community is just really something, it’s just lovely to hear. And for the King to say that he’s here to help us in just a small way is just a bit mind-blowing and quite surreal really. The King is here in Manchester, at our community, walking up the steps coming into our synagogue, and talking to us […] to say he’s glad to help. It’s just surreal to me. And it’s not in a small way that he’s helping, believe me. It means a great deal.”[5]
King Charles’ commitment to the defense of minorities is not new. Already in 1993, the then Prince of Wales made clear that the religious freedom of Jews, and members of other minority faiths, would be as important for him as that of Anglicans. In an interview with Jonathan Dimbleby, he said that in a desire to reflect Britain’s religious diversity, he would be defender of faith rather than Defender of the Faith, the traditional title of the King in his capacity as head of the Anglican Church.
For a while, there were suggestions that the coronation oath might be altered. That did not happen. In 2015, in an interview with BBC Radio 2, Charles said he had been misinterpreted yet emphasized his commitment to religious pluralism as a part of British life, noting: “As I tried to describe, I mind about the inclusion of other people’s faiths and their freedom to worship in this country. And it’s always seemed to me that, while at the same time being Defender of the Faith, you can also be protector of faiths.”[6]
Making good on these words, in 2017, Charles was made patron of World Jewish Relief (WJR), the main Jewish overseas welfare charity, founded under a different name in 1933.
The King’s affection for Judaism and his participation in the fight against antisemitism have roots in his family. His paternal grandmother, Princess Alice (great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria and mother of Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth II’s husband), wrote herself into Jewish history when she sheltered Jewish widow Rachel Cohen and her daughter in her Athens residence during Nazi Germany’s occupation of Greece in the early 1940s. On several occasions, the deaf Princess fooled suspecting Gestapo agents by pretending not to understand their questions about rumors that she was hiding Jews. She provided two trustworthy liaisons who helped Rachel Cohen maintain communication with the outside world, enabling her to discover that one of her sons had not managed to flee and his life was at grave risk. He, too, was given shelter on the third floor of the Princess’s home.
Yad Vashem recognized Princess Alice, posthumously, as a Righteous Among the Nations in 1993, and in 1994, Prince Philip travelled to Israel to honor his mother, who died in 1969 without possessions and was interred in 1988, finally in accordance with her will, in the Church of Mary Magdalene on the Mount of Olives. When the King visited Israel in 2016 to attend the funeral of former Prime Minister and President Shimon Peres, he paid his respects at his grandmother’s grave, too.
The King’s affectionate relationship with Judaism is also attributed to his personal biography. Like his father, he was a (often miserable) pupil at the Scottish Gordonstoun School, founded and shaped in the mold of Kurt Hahn, the anti-Hitlerian Berlin-born German-Jewish educator who fled to Scotland in 1933. Hahn sought to correct some of the damaging aspects of modernity, as he saw it, and based his schools’ philosophy and practices on adventurism, teamwork, tough reckoning with failures, a sense of duty to others, and the mixing of privileged pupils with non-privileged.
Particularly important was the King’s close relationship with Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from 1991 to 2013. Sacks, born as the King was in 1948, is believed to have guided him on faith and moral-related matters. “[What made this friendship] wasn’t that Sacks was Jewish, but that he understood all aspects of religion, as indeed Charles does himself,” explained Ingrid Seward, editor-in-chief of Majesty Magazine, the primary publication for fans of the monarchy for more than four decades. “The King is a true believer in God and always held a deep respect for Sacks. When he [Sacks] died, Charles was profoundly upset.”[7]
Jews around the world have a historical debt of gratitude to the House of Windsor, the symbol of British heroic and lone resistance to Hitler at the most critical of all times, when the Continent was preyed upon by the Nazis and their allies, the Soviet Union collaborated with evil, and the United States insisted on staying on the sidelines. Yet it is not a coincidence that a reigning British Monarch is yet to visit Israel. The initial support Britain granted Zionism, which made its actualization possible, was later retracted, and following the establishment of the State of Israel, British governments opted for neutrality in the Arab-Israeli conflict, in part for fear of the wrath of the oil-rich states. Despite the profound impact Britain had on the development of Israeli society and institutions, the Jewish state was never a serious candidate to join the Commonwealth. Royal weddings and funerals attain massive viewership when broadcast on Israeli national networks, but other royal news is usually ignored by mainstream media.
King Charles visited Israel three times, all as Prince of Wales and not on official royal visits. The funeral of Yitzhak Rabin, the prime minister assassinated by a Jewish militant three decades ago, was his first visit. Peres’ funeral in 2016 was his second, and in 2020, he came to attend the World Holocaust Forum marking the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
The latter was, in retrospect, an unfortunate event that did not accord with the values for which the King and Britain stand – or, for that matter, anyone who cares about democracy and loyalty to historical records. To date, the only member of the Royal family who has been to Israel on an official visit is Prince William in 2018. His charm and good manners did Britain’s image good, but also highlighted the decades-long snubbing of Israel by the Crown.
Policy Recommendations
There cannot be a stronger statement against antisemitism than a first official visit of a British monarch to Israel. Such a visit by King Charles III will also reflect pride in Britain’s historical legacy at a time when it is needed. While it can also involve a visit to the Palestinian Authority and give voice to Britain’s critical approach to Israel’s current policies, an official visit will send a clear message that, for Britain and the Commonwealth, the right of the Jews to a national home is non-negotiable.
While solidarity following deadly antisemitic attacks is appreciated, the real task of British society and government is to prevent such attacks from happening. The King, like the rest of Britain, should more profoundly reflect on a reality that preceded October 7, 2023. While all religious minorities are subject to expressions of bias and hate, only Jewish houses of prayer, community centers, and schools are forced to be subject to intensive security measures, which tragically cannot be hermetic, and which even when effective impose a sense of exceptionalism and fear.
Noah Abrahams, Associate Editor at the Center
[1] Joe Little, “Sacred Duty,” Majesty vol. 46, no. 3, 2025, p. 36.
[2] “Data: Antisemitic Incidents Worldwide 2024,” Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2024 (Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, Tel Aviv University, April 2025), p. 18-19, https://cst.tau.ac.il/antisemitism-worldwide-report-for-2024/.
Despite the decline in their usage for the practical traditional purpose of sending mail, stamps remain instruments of public messaging and, as such, serve as windows to nations’ ideological orientations. In issuing stamps, state postal authorities carefully select images, symbols, and inscriptions to present to domestic and international audiences themes they wish to commemorate, honor, and promote. They always say something about the politics of their issuers.[1]
The process of stamp production varies from one country to another and may involve a range of governmental and non-governmental bodies, including ministries of communication, postal authorities, and civil stamp advisory committees. While stamps do not always constitute a direct expression of government rhetoric, they are subject to official regulations that are defined and influenced by politicians.[2]
Large communities of collectors still take eager interest in new stamps issued. For some nations, in particular small ones, the production of stamps remains a rewarding source of income.[3]
The global philatelic market is currently in the billions of dollars annually. According to a recent analysis by Coherent Market Insights, the stamp collecting market was projected to reach 3.75 billion dollars in 2025 and to grow to 5.68 billion dollars by 2032. Key factors driving this growth include increased global access to online stamp-collecting supplies, as well as rising interest among younger generations in cultural and historical artifacts, particularly in China and India. Yet, in other regions, the collector base continues to age.[4]
Stamps related to Judaism represent one of the most vibrant and diverse thematic fields in philately. Collectors of Judaica (understood by some in a narrow sense as artifacts relating directly to Judaism, and by others more broadly to include all Jewish-related themes) focus on biblical stories and heroes, synagogues, sites in the Holy Land, the Holocaust, and other historical and contemporary representations of Jews and Judaism. Over the years, countries with Jewish legacies – glorious and tragic, major and minor – have issued stamps featuring Judaica.[5]
According to Itzik Avital, a collector specializing in Judaica stamps, three main motivations are at play in the issuance of stamps. The first is the status of Jewish communities. Countries with large, influential Jewish populations tend to issue more Jewish-themed stamps, especially when state authorities seek to strengthen Jews’ sense of national belonging through appreciation for their contribution to the nation’s collective past and present.
Countries that desire to emphasize their pluralistic or multicultural character also tend to show greater openness toward minority representation in their stamps, including Jewish themes, regardless of the size or influence of their local Jewish communities.
A second motivation for issuing Judaica stamps is commercial. Stamps featuring Jewish traditions and history have been popular in particular among American Jews who see their purchase as an expression of attachment to Judaism and Zionism. Globally, the number of active Judaica collectors is estimated at several thousand. With potential profits high, even some small nations, for example, in the Pacific or Africa, with no Jewish history or significant contemporary Jewish communities, have issued Jewish-themed stamps.
A third, though less significant, motivation is the desire to enhance diplomatic relations with Israel, expressed through joint Jewish-themed stamp issues.[6]
The Gaza War did not markedly affect the overall scope of Judaica stamps issued in Europe and North America. Nine days after the October 7, 2023, attack, the Spanish postal service of Andorra issued a stamp (announced already in September) dedicated to celebrating the country’s Jewish community and presenting the Jewish symbols of the Menorah and Magen David.
There was no Jewish presence in the microstate until the Second World War, when neutral Andorra became a refuge for French Jews fleeing the Vichy regime. Only a handful remained in the country after the war. A second wave of immigration came in 1967, when Moroccan Jews fled to Andorra following the Israeli triumph in the Six Day War. Today, despite regulations that ban non-Catholic places of worship, Andorra hosts a Jewish cultural and religious center serving its approximately 75 Jewish residents.[7]
Unlike Andorra, Greece is home to one of the oldest Jewish communities in Europe. In April 2024, the Hellenic Post (ELTA) issued a series of commemorative stamps featuring synagogues from across the country. The six stamps depict synagogues in Athens, Thessaloniki, Larissa, Trikala, Ioannina, and Rhodes.
The stamps were unveiled at a joint event organized by ELTA and the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece (KIS). ELTA expressed its gratitude to KIS, the Jewish Museum of Greece, and the local Jewish communities for providing photographic material that contributed to this series. It also acknowledged the Cultural Affairs Office at the Embassy of Israel in Athens for assisting in transcribing texts into Hebrew. The chairperson of the Greek Postal Company, himself a Hebrew-speaking Jew and Technion graduate, possibly played a role in encouraging the issuance of the series.[8]
In October 2024, the Belgian postal service issued a stamp featuring the synagogue of Arlon, part of a five-stamp series dedicated to the city’s main squares. Arlon, the capital of the Belgian province of Luxembourg and one of the country’s oldest cities, has a Jewish community that dates to 1818. At the time, the community represented about two percent of the city’s population, but today, only around 30 to 40 Jews have remained.
The synagogue, completed in 1865 after two years of construction, was the first to be built in Belgium. Designed in a neo-Romanesque style, with two slender side towers and a high central arch above the entrance portal, the building stands prominently in the heart of the city and is considered one of its architectural landmarks. Designated as a protected heritage site in 2005, it underwent a five-year restoration and was reopened to the public in 2019.[9]
In December 2024, Germany issued a special postage stamp titled “SchUM,” commemorating the medieval Jewish communities of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz, which formed a powerful alliance during the Middle Ages and became a cradle for Ashkenazi Judaism.
The stamp incorporates traditional Jewish symbols alongside Hebrew inscriptions. According to a statement by the German postal service, the cities, with their Jewish community institutions inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage Sites, are “testaments to the rich history of Jewish communities in Germany and Europe.”[10]
Several Jewish intellectuals have also recently received philatelic recognition. In July 2024, Austria issued a stamp commemorating Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) as part of its “Literature from Austria” series. The Austrian postal service noted that Zweig “was born in Vienna in 1881 as the son of a Jewish industrialist,” and that his literary work was influenced by Sigmund Freud. Already in 1981, an Austrian-issued stamp marked the centenary of Zweig’s birth. [11]
In April 2024, Hungary issued a commemorative stamp marking the centenary of Iván Szenes (1924–2010), a prolific Jewish writer, songwriter, and playwright credited with more than 2,000 songs, 200 plays, and dozens of television and film works, and a distant cousin of Hanna Szenes. The official statement regarding the stamp did not note that Szenes was Jewish.[12]
Also in 2024, Serbia issued a commemorative stamp as part of its “Prominent Serbs” series honoring Enriko Josif (1924–2003), a composer, pedagogue, and member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Born in Belgrade to a Jewish family as Hayim Yosif, he became one of the country’s leading musical figures, celebrated for works such as Sonata Antika and Concerto for Piano and Orchestra. The official release highlighted Josif’s Jewish background, noting his Sephardic origins and that he is buried in the Jewish Cemetery in Belgrade.[13]
In September 2025, the United States Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp honoring Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and tireless advocate for human rights, as the 18th honoree in the Distinguished Americans series. The stamp highlights not only Wiesel’s role in Holocaust remembrance but also his broader contribution to the American ideals of justice, resilience, and compassion. “As a journalist, as an author, as an activist, and most importantly, as a teacher, Elie Wiesel chose again and again to speak for those who had no voice,” noted Ronald A. Stroman, a member of the Postal Service Board of Governors, at the dedication ceremony.[14]
Several recent stamps paid tribute to non-Jews recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations. In June 2024, the Polish postal service issued a stamp in the series “Poles Saving Jews,” honoring the Kurpiel family from Leoncin that was murdered by the Germans in 1944 for sheltering Jewish families. Yad Vashem recognized the Kurpiels in 2013 as Righteous Among the Nations. The issue followed a number of other stamps issued by Poland since 2021 dedicated to Polish men and women who risked their lives in helping Jews during the Nazi occupation.[15]
In July 2024, Portugal’s postal service (CTT) issued a postal stationery (postcard with an imprinted stamp) commemorating Aristides de Sousa Mendes, a Portuguese diplomat named by Yad Vashem in 1966 as Righteous Among the Nations. The issuance coincided with the inauguration of Casa do Passal – the Aristides de Sousa Mendes Museum. Mendes, who served as Portugal’s consul in Bordeaux during the Second World War, defied his government’s orders by issuing an estimated 30,000 visas to Jews and other refugees fleeing Nazi persecution, risking both his career and his family’s future to save lives. This philatelic tribute forms part of Portugal’s broader commemoration of his legacy.[16]
In August 2025, Germany issued a commemorative stamp in its series “Women in Resistance against National Socialism,” honoring Donata Helmrich (1900–1986). Together with her husband, Helmrich sheltered and assisted Jews during the Holocaust by securing false papers and arranging safe housing. The support network she created in Berlin helped up to 300 people. In recognition of her efforts, she was posthumously named Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in 1986.[17]
The 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, which marks the liberation of Auschwitz, inspired in 2025 a wave of philatelic activities dedicated to Holocaust remembrance.
In January 2025, the UK’s Royal Mail marked the International Holocaust Remembrance Day with a special nationwide postmark bearing the words “For a Better Future.”[18] The initiative aimed to raise public awareness of Holocaust remembrance and continued a tradition first introduced by the Royal Mail in January 2020.[19]
In February 2025, San Marino marked the 80th anniversary with a pair of stamps. The images depict displaced persons, symbolizing the suffering of thousands fleeing war, and bread, representing sustenance and the human fraternity demonstrated by San Marino’s inhabitants. San Marino provided refuge to thousands who fled the Nazis during the war, including Jews, a source of pride for the small republic that, in the words of the official postal release, “transformed a moment of crisis into a universal example of solidarity.”[20]
In April 2025, France’s La Poste issued a commemorative stamp entitled “Liberation of the Camps.” The design portrays barbed wire against an open sky, symbolizing both the weight of oppression and the hope of freedom.[21]
Also in April, the Sovereign Military Order of Malta (SMOM), a Catholic order with a unique sovereign status that issues its own stamps, released a commemorative stamp marking the 80th anniversary of Auschwitz’s liberation. It honors the victims while also reflecting the Order’s mission of “building a society based on the values of dialogue and peace.” The image depicts memorial candles lit during the official ceremony at Auschwitz on January 27, 2025, that was attended, among many other dignitaries, by the Order’s Grand Master.[22]
Since 1996, Hanukkah stamps have become a cherished tradition in the United States, used for sending holiday greetings and highlighting the Jewish community as an integral part of the nation’s social fabric. In September 2024, the US Postal Service celebrated Hanukkah with yet another new stamp. “This stamp… reminds us – as Americans – that we are joined in our diversity,” said Michael Gordon, the Postal Service’s government liaison director.
Describing the stamp, the USPS official website wrote that “the story of Hanukkah stems from a struggle for religious liberty and human rights. It is a tale centered on the Maccabees, a small army of Jewish warriors, fighting for the right of all Jews to practice their religion freely.” Around 167 B.C., “Emperor Antiochus IV engaged in a brutal campaign to force Jews to convert to Greek polytheists. The outnumbered Maccabees revolted, and against all odds, prevailed over the much bigger armies of the emperor.”[23]
In November 2024, Canada Post issued its seventh Hanukkah stamp since 2017. The postal authority explained that the stamp symbolizes “Canada’s cultural diversity” and commemorates the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem. The stamp features a photograph of a peacock-themed Menorah crafted in the 19th century in Poland and believed to have survived Kristallnacht in 1938.
Recovered and preserved at the Aron Museum in Westmount, Quebec, the Menorah stands as a symbol of faith and resilience. The stamp sheet further highlights this message with colorful Hanukkah candles and trilingual inscriptions in English, French, and Hebrew, quoting the traditional blessing: “These Hanukkah lights we kindle in honor of the miracles and the wonders.”[24]
Joint issues of stamps are used in philately to symbolize friendship and enhance cooperation between two nations. In April 2024, Romania and Israel issued a joint stamp dedicated to the Hora, a traditional Southeast European dance.
The Romanian postal authority highlighted that the dance, introduced in Israel by Romanian Jewish immigrants, symbolizes human reunion and a “cultural bridge” between the countries. It also noted that Israel’s national anthem, Hatikva, has Romanian roots, with Naphtali Herz Imber starting its composition in Iași in northeast Romania in 1876–1878.[25] The Israeli postal authority, on its part, emphasized the enduring historical bond between the two countries and the role of Olim from Romania in creating that bond.[26]
In February 2025, India and Israel released joint twin stamps celebrating the festivals of Holi and Purim. Their issuance was originally scheduled for February 2024, but postponed due to the Gaza war. The delay was likely related to political considerations on the Indian side, with the eventual issuance taking place during the January-March 2025 ceasefire period.
This was not the first joint Indian-Israeli issue. In 2012, the countries released a commemorative stamp celebrating their festivals of lights, Jewish Hanukkah and Hindu Diwali.
Official X accounts reported in 2025 that the stamps were launched in New Delhi in the presence of India’s Minister of Commerce and Israel’s Minister of Economy and Industry. According to Israel in India, an X account operated by the Israeli Embassy in New Delhi, the joint issue reflects the growing friendship and deepening cultural ties between the nations, as both Holi and Purim “symbolize resilience, joy, and the triumph of good over evil – values that unite our nations.” Reuven Azar, Israel’s Ambassador to India, noted that the launch coincided with 33 years of diplomatic relations and honored the “unique traditions and the deep bond between the nations and their peoples.”[27]
Policy Recommendations
Stamps are a catchy, artistic, and age-transcending means to learn history and the difference between history and historiography. Teachers are advised to use them, including in teaching Jewish history and the history of the Holocaust. They are also encouraged to organize themed-stamp competitions as a means of creative engagement with historical events, personalities, and concepts.
Despite the temptation to issue stamps commemorating the known and the celebrated, stamps can play a more meaningful educational and public role, including with regard to Jewish-related themes, in giving presence to the neglected and forgotten who deserve recognition. Establishing a digital archive of Judaica stamps would provide an important research and educational resource while preserving the visual record of Jewish life across continents.
Israel and its diplomatic missions should strengthen engagement with foreign postal authorities and relevant government ministries to encourage the publication of stamp issues commemorating local Jewish history and to promote joint releases that highlight shared heritages. Such initiatives can enhance Israel’s soft-power and improve its image beyond political contexts.
Jewish communities worldwide are invited to promote Judaica philatelic issues in their countries, engaging with relevant authorities to highlight their historical presence and contributions within local societies. Such efforts can foster positive representations of Jewish life and support social inclusion.
Philately is a space of cultural exchanges and recognition of the humanity that is in others. Young people joining the aging tradition of collecting stamps are actually joining something much bigger. So have them join.
Dr. Ofir Winter, Senior Researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies, Tel Aviv University. The author thanks Itzik Avital and Yoram Lubianiker for their invaluable advice.
[1] Stanley D. Brunn, “Stamps as Messengers of Political Transition,” The Geographical Review 101, no. 1 (2011), pp. 19-36; Stanley D. Brunn, “Stamps as Iconography: Celebrating the Independence of New European and Central Asian States,” GeoJournal 52 (2000), pp. 315-323.
[2] Einat Lachover and Dalia Gavriely Nuri, “Israeli Stamps 1948-2010: Between Nationalism and Cosmopolitanism,” Israel Affairs 19, no. 2 (2013), pp. 321-337.
Roundtable: Stefan Zweig – The Confusion of Feelings
Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) reflects the triumph and tragedy of European Jewry. Born to an affluent Viennese Jewish family, he became the most popular German-language author of his time. Mentored by Theodor Herzl, whom he admired, he nevertheless rejected Zionism and instead advanced a concept of Judaism that has the world entire as its home. In 1942, he committed suicide alongside his second wife, Lotte, in Brazil, where he found refuge from the Nazi regime.
Zweig was a son of his times who transcended time. In recent years, he enjoys a renaissance in Israel. New translations of at least 20 of his works were released over the past decade, mostly by Tesha Neshamot and Modan publishing houses.
Some of Zweig’s correspondences are archived in the National Library in Jerusalem, including his suicide note, in which he wrote: “I greet all my friends! May they live to see the dawn after the long night. I, all too impatient, am going before.”
The following conversation explores Zweig’s literary and intellectual legacies. The participants are Harel Cain, the most prolific of Zweig’s translators to Hebrew; Dr. Stefan Litt, Director of European Language Holdings in the Archives Department and Curator of the Humanities Collection at the National Library in Jerusalem, and editor of a much-praised collection of Zweig’s correspondences on Judaism and Zionism, Stefan Zweig:Briefe Zum Judentum (2020), recently published in a Hebrew translation (Carmel, 2024); and Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry at Tel Aviv University and editor-in-chief of the For a Righteous Cause Report. The conversation was edited for clarity and length.
Prof. Shavit: Will it be correct to say that Stefan Zweig has been the bestselling translated author in Israel in recent years? For sure among non-contemporary authors.
Mr. Cain: I think it is correct. Certainly, since 2012, when the copyrights for his works expired, there is a renaissance. Not only in Israel, but in other countries as well, although not so much in the German-speaking countries. I don’t have exact sales figures, but look in all sorts of online forums for book lovers; every couple of days, someone asks for a recommendation for a Zweig book. And there are so many responses, and so many people say that they love him.
Some of his novels are really evergreen. I guess that is part of the reason for their success. They engage with eternal topics that don’t get old. The psychology of growing up, for example, in Burning Secret (Brennendes Geheimnis, 1913). Even if the values of society change, the appeal of the theme is everlasting.
I care mostly about my translations, which are of his novellas. Back in the 1970s, 1980s, I think his biographies were more popular. One recent exception is the biography of Magellan (Magellan, Der Mann und seine Tat, 1938), whose new translation was a huge bestseller (Modan, 2021).
Prof. Shavit: It’s an amazing book. I watched the new Magellan movie (Lav Diaz, 2025) at the Jerusalem Film Festival. What a terrible, terrible movie. It reminded me once again that a great story doesn’t necessarily make for great storytelling, for great art, and how big Zweig’s achievement was.
Mr. Cain: To my shame, I haven’t read the book. I know very well the books I translated, but I haven’t read a lot of other things. Translations are kind of a competition. I don’t read other translators’ works. To my shame, I haven’t read Magellan in Hebrew or in German yet, but I have to do it.
Prof. Shavit: If it was just the issue of copyright, then you have dozens of well-known authors whose copyrights have expired, so that’s too easy an explanation for Zweig’s recent popularity. So is the explanation that he is popular in Israel because he is Jewish. There are not a few renowned authors from his time who are Jewish and are all but forgotten today.
I want to propose an alternative thesis. And I say in advance: I enjoy reading Stefan Zweig, and I also don’t like, in general, the patronizing argument that if a book is enjoyable and sells well, then it means the book is not good. Often, the contrary is true.
Having said that, I feel that Zweig is currently so successful in Israel because his in-between positioning fits the spirits of the few people in Israel who still read books, and who do want an experience with some measure of depth, but whose patience is more limited than it used to be. His works offer drama that borders on melodrama but usually does not cross the line. They combine 19th-century naturalism and very coherent time-lined plots with touches of 20th-century subtle psychoanalysis. They are outdated in a way that provides escapism, but are also not too far removed from present-day realities. And they are never too long. The reader gets the satisfaction of having read a literary work from cover to cover, but is never exhausted.
Has Zweig been that successful in other countries recently?
Dr. Litt: His literature still works very well in France. It works in Spain, in Italy, and even in South America.
In Germany, if you go into a large bookshop, then you have this table where you have all the nice, very thick editions of the complete works by Kafka, Tolstoy, and other canonical authors, and you will find Zweig there. So he is among the authors considered to be a good fit for this kind of entrepreneurship.
But he is by far not as popular in Germany as he is in Israel. In Germany, other authors appeal more to readers who are not nostalgic about the good old days. And let us not forget that the reality described in his books is mostly an Austrian reality. I believe he is more popular in his homeland.
The so-called Salzburg edition, the scientific annotated seven volumes of his complete works (edited by Werner Michler and Klemens Renoldner and published by the Salzburg-based Stefan Zweig Center, 2017-2023), shows that the urge to engage with his works, to come up with something new, even if it is not really new, is still out there. The only comparable thing in Germany is the annotated edition (Oliver Matuschek, Fischer, 2020) of The World of Yesterday: Memoires of a European (Die Welt von Gestern: Erinnerungen eines Europäers, 1942). It is a very helpful edition that offers some new insights, and it is really too bad that it has not been translated into Hebrew yet.
Prof. Shavit: The thing is that in Israel, unlike in Germany, Zweig has never been seen as the sentimental author for high school kids who are not yet ready to read more demanding literature.
Dr. Litt: Yes. I can say with certainty that it is not possible to write a PhD thesis in Germany about Zweig. He is regarded there as entertainment-literature. As too flat. I totally disagree. I don’t think he is flat. But of course, he is also not Thomas Mann. That is pretty clear when you compare the two, right?
Mr. Cain: I have this kind of weird guess that might also explain why Zweig is not as popular in German-speaking countries. And I have nothing to back it up. And Stefan may say it is nonsense. But maybe the reality of Zweig being driven out of Austria and his books being banned and his committing suicide in Brazil – maybe that’s a deterrence for some readers in Germany and Austria, just like his Judaism may make him more popular in Israel.
Prof. Shavit: I would beg to differ, because if being forced into exile by Nazism was a deterrence for present-day readers in German-speaking countries, then this would apply to Thomas Mann as well.
I want to ask something about your translations. They are masterful. What I find remarkable about them is that the Hebrew is very much present-day Hebrew. And yet somehow, the German is vividly present. I cannot explain this achievement, but it is there.
Mr. Cain: I think that trends and fashions in translating into Hebrew changed over time. Back in the 1960s and until the 1990s, there was this intentional drive to use very literary Hebrew, very high language, including, oftentimes, when it was really not necessary. So fashions have changed, certainly. I started translating books from German 10 years ago, and I was already part of this new kind of style in translation that rejected the high language.
Another thing is that my native language is Hebrew. I think that translators should translate into their native tongue. People sometimes wonder if I also translate into German. Not a chance! I wouldn’t be able to do that.
I learned German not as some of the old-style translators, who grew up in Germany and Hebrew was sort of their second language. They obviously had a very good ear for German. You would think that that helped them. But unlike them, I learned my German at the Goethe Institut and then at the Department of German Literature at the Hebrew University. So most of my acquaintance with German literature is with old classical authors. And when I read Zweig, I don’t have this feeling of, “oh, this is very old-fashioned German, oh, that’s high language,” that maybe native German speakers have. Zweig feels natural to me.
Prof. Shavit: Am I right that you are also unique in that this is somewhat of a hobby for you? I mean, you are in high-tech.
Mr. Cain: I actually don’t know if I am unique, because I know of at least one more very gifted translator who works in tech, Erez Volk, who translates from, I don’t know, a dozen languages. A very, very gifted translator.
Of course, it is very hard to live off a translator’s fees, but doing it part-time kind of gives me the privilege of just picking the translation jobs that I want, and I was lucky to be offered to translate Zweig, although I wasn’t some kind of Zweig fan before. But I kind of felt almost intuitively that translating him would be great, and that he would sell well.
By the way, in Israel, your compensation is not based on sales. In Germany, it is. But it’s a good feeling to know that my translations of Zweig are being read by many people. I translated something by Rilke one or two years ago; I think it sold around 50 copies.
Prof. Shavit: There is something that puzzles me about Stefan Zweig. The abundance is just… I just cannot make sense of it. I cannot understand how it is humanly possible.
Within approximately 40 years, he wrote dozens of novels and short stories. And here’s the thing. Most of them, at least those that I have read, are written with inner passion and intent. And care for detail. I almost never have the impression that he promised someone 5,000 words for a nice paycheck and wrote a story just in order to deliver.
Magellan – well, other gifted authors would have had to spend years just on the research. And it is just one of several undertakings of his that required incredible dedication for research.
Mr. Cain: He was not claiming to be a historian. He wrote historical fiction. I don’t think that he even tried to be scientifically accurate, not even about names and dates necessarily. He was just a very good storyteller. So maybe all the research that writing Magellan took from him was, I don’t know, to read two scientific biographies.
Prof. Shavit: But I would say that to be able to write about anything so vividly, it has to come from a very inner place. And you cannot reach that inner place in writing about historical events unless the events you want to write about have been really immersed in your mind as real and alive. I don’t think you reach that point through reading one or two works written by scholars.
Mr. Cain: And that is what people like. That is why they buy his books. You want to listen to his story.
Dr. Litt: I think we have in Zweig the very rare example of someone who was very much gifted and whose passion was the gift that he had.
He was not dependent on his success because he was very well-positioned economically even before starting his writing career. So he was able to transform his hobby into a kind of profession in a rather relaxed manner. He did not need to have a speedy success; perhaps that helped him have one.
Prof. Shavit: The point about his life of comfort, well, that makes his diligence even more impressive. Think of Balzac, the bankrupt Balzac, whom Zweig admired and whose biography he wrote. If Balzac didn’t write so much, he’d be financially ruined. So he wrote. Which didn’t help him much.
Mr. Cain: Compare Zweig to his friend Joseph Ruth. His good friend Joseph Ruth. A heavy drinker who was always short of cash. And Zweig was this rich, spoiled kid who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, who was raised in a really affluent family, a family that had servants alongside even on vacations.
Dr. Litt: Apparently, he was really like Mozart. There is a legend that Mozart told a friend that his new symphony was ready, and he just needs to write it down on paper. I think the same was true for Zweig. Maybe his ideas were all so well set up already when he sat down to write them on paper.
Eva Alberman is the last living niece of Zweig’s secretary-turned-second wife, Lotte. She is in her mid-90s and active in the preservation of his legacy.
She stayed with Stefan and Lotte for holidays in their house in Bath, England; she was really part of the family and part of the business. And she saw exactly how Stefan Zweig worked, so her memories are instructive if we want to understand how he managed to be so prolific.
So, his manuscripts were handwritten. Lotte typed the texts in four copies using carbon paper. And Zweig took one of the typed copies and went through it and made some changes, amendments, and additions. Then he gave that copy back to the secretary, who embedded the corrections in four new copies. He didn’t produce many drafts. He actually once said that he produces only one and then comes the biggest fun of the writing process, what he called the ‘shrinking it together.’
I read once that the original first draft of the manuscript of the historical biography of Marie Antoinette, which is quite a remarkably thick book compared to Zweig’s other books, comprised almost 1,000 sheets! That means that he threw away half of it, more or less. He said that it gives him much pleasure to see how he can improve his own texts by kicking words out.
Mr. Cain: He believed that texts cannot have any superfluous parts. Everything has to be very compact and concise. I am actually not sure he always kept that promise. I think his style is characterized by sentences that kind of follow each other and repeat each other with variations. He was an advocate of being very concise, but I think he is not necessarily a good example of being concise.
Prof. Shavit: Think of other prolific authors – let us think again of Balzac or Thomas Mann. Unlike them, with Zweig you don’t find those three or four pages describing garments or furniture, these cut-and-paste, or long artificial, uninterrupted speeches delivered by one of the characters. I do admire that about him. Perhaps his interest in Balzac was motivated by a sense of pride, pride in resisting the temptation to write-by-the-pound.
Mr. Cain: Well, I think after you translate a lot of stuff by Zweig, you kind of start to see his method; actually, he can devote a whole chapter to describing, I don’t know, the hands of the gamblers in the casino in 24 Hours in the Life of a Woman (Vierundzwanzig Stunden aus dem Leben einer Frau) or, I don’t know, he quotes, kind of semi-quotes, a long speech about Shakespeare in Confusion of Feelings (Verwirrung der Gefühle). But I agree that he doesn’t dedicate much effort to just describing the scenery or just kind of what people like or what they wear.
Dr. Litt: Indeed, you do have those repetitive elements, or those lengthy descriptions in his works, but this is not what we remember after we read them, okay? And this is what we definitely remember after being through a very long and exhaustive novel by Thomas Mann. Which is full of spirit, of course, and very intellectual and has so many different layers and blah blah blah, but it is hard to read, while Zweig’s works are not hard to read. You have an amazing experience reading them, even though they are sometimes sad.
I admit that there are certain novels by Thomas Mann that I stopped reading in the middle because reading them was not an amazing experience.
Prof. Shavit: That is quite a confession.
Dr. Litt: Yes, but there are two or three that I really found thrilling. Still, I had the feeling, wow, this was hard work.
Prof. Shavit: Perhaps it is also because when you are compelled to read something for the Abitur (state matriculation exams), it is automatically categorized as, you know, not fun.
I have to say something in defense of Thomas Mann. I sometimes wonder whether the really dense, very boring and unnecessary parts in his novels are, in fact, necessary in order to lead you, to those incredible climaxes that the same novels have. Where there is greatness in his books, well, there are few authors who reached the heights Mann did.
Mr. Cain: I tend to agree. Maybe you need all of this fluff, all of what you call the boring parts, to get to the climax.
Prof. Shavit: When I read about Zweig’s main hobby, I couldn’t help thinking about a famous quote by an Israeli football player. He was once asked, “Do you have any hobbies other than football?” and he answered, “English football.”
Zweig’s career was made of words, a total dedication to words. And then, what was his hobby? Collecting autographs and manuscripts. Football, and then English football. And I always thought that to be a great author, you have to have some passion that is external to writing, or else, what will your writing draw from?
Dr. Litt: I think that Zweig did have at least one major hobby, and that was music, but to the best of my knowledge, he hardly dared to write something about it. I would have really liked to read a biography by him of, say, Bach or Tchaikovsky.
Still, he was extremely attracted to the musicians of his time. He was in very, very good contact with Arturo Toscanini. He hardly missed any concert that took place around where he was living, and there were quite a number of them in Salzburg, of course, although he tended to escape the famous Salzburg Festival because too many people would knock on his door and he couldn’t stand that. But otherwise, he was deeply into music.
He was also somewhat intrigued by the developments in the field of psychology and was quite good friends with Sigmund Freud. They had thorough discussions.
Very often today, I hear female readers of Zweig who say, “Well, there’s hardly any man I can think of who so perfectly understood the psychological world of women like he did.”
Prof. Shavit: Why was he so passionate about obtaining the original manuscripts of masterpieces? I mean, what do you gain from possessing Balzac’s original manuscript?
Mr. Cain: I think he was fascinated with the act of creation, with the creation process, basically. With how others create.
He started with collecting autographs and moved on to obtaining original manuscripts. He liked to collect. He had, you know, Beethoven’s desk and such things.
One recurring theme in his novellas is the character of the monomaniacal genius. Another recurring theme is the character of the obsessed person. Obsessions are a big obsession in his writing.
Think about the book collector in Buchmendel (1929) – that man is a living catalogue of books, but doesn’t really know the content of the books. His brain is a library catalog, but he is only familiar with the metadata. Zweig was fascinated with people who could do one thing, but would do that one thing very, very well. And maybe words were the thing he could do very, very well. Words in the broad sense of the word, writing letters, corresponding.
Prof. Shavit: And he was a Jew. So here’s a fact that emerges from Stefan’s masterful annotated collection of letters in which Zweig related to Judaism and to Zionism: these themes were far from a main preoccupation for him.
I understand that he wrote approximately 25,000 letters and postcards in his lifetime. And the edited compilation presents just 120 correspondences located that engage with Judaism and Zionism. So in the end, if his letters and correspondences are any guide, Judaism and Zionism preoccupied around one percent of his time.
Dr. Litt: One percent of his writing time, let’s put it like that.
Prof. Shavit: Since writing was more or less his life, it is fair to say one percent of his being.
Dr. Litt: There were long discussions with friends and acquaintances, which we are unable to reconstruct. We have no idea what was said in those discussions about Judaism, about Zionism, and to what extent.
By the way, you seem impressed with the scope of his correspondences, so I should note that most of his famous contemporaries, to mention again Thomas Mann, or Hermann Hesse, they wrote approximately the same amount of letters. So he was not an exception. And if you sum up all the emails that we write, I think the numbers are quite the same.
Prof. Shavit: Well, my emails are never two pages long.
Dr. Litt: He very often wrote a very short message on a postcard. Postcards were so common then.
Anyhow, I am far from being able to say that I have read the majority of his letters. I have seen and read maybe 5,000 or 6,000 or so, which is quite a number, but it is still far away from the totality of the corpus. And I am not certain that we will ever be able to reconstruct the complete corpus because correspondences got lost or, at best, still wait to be discovered.
Even today, I am sometimes approached by a colleague in the library who is cataloging a very tiny archive of a totally forgotten Yiddish writer from, say, Ukraine. And even there, we find two more letters by Stefan Zweig, which are sometimes not so overwhelming, but still contain new findings.
Having said that, the bottom line is that we do have a good sample because I can claim to have read about a fifth of the corpus of his correspondences. And that gives me a kind of indication about the extent to which Zweig discussed Judaism and Zionism with others.
So, we can say that he was intrigued by these issues, but as you said, there are many more letters in which they are not addressed at all. It is clear that his main focus is the literary world, publication. That was his preoccupation.
When analyzing the corpus of correspondences that engaged with Judaism, I see that definitely in the years of the Weimar Republic, between 1919 and 1932, he was engaged mainly with literary-creative aspects of Judaism, and less engaged with antisemitism or Zionism, which he turned to, of course, after 1933.
Mr. Cain: I am much less of an expert on this compared to Stefan, but I want to say that I found striking what I read in the biography of Zweig by Oliver Matuschek – by the way, I think it is a good biography, Drei Leben (2006, S. Fischer). His parents were not observant Jews, but they did go to synagogue on the high holidays. What was even more striking to me is that their friends were all Jews. They didn’t really socialize with non-Jews.
Zweig, on the other hand, kind of broke away from this. He had this network of connections all over Europe, and most of them were not Jewish. And I doubt that he ever went to a synagogue. So, in his self-perception, of course, he knew he was Jewish, but he really kind of left the Jewish milieu of Vienna that his family belonged to. Maybe his biographer is wrong, I don’t know. But I was surprised by this aspect of Zweig.
You said that one percent of his correspondences were about Judaism. There is more Judaism in his literary writing. Of course, The Buried Candelabrum (Der begrabene Leuchter, 1936). The Buchmendel, who is a very charming Eastern European Russian Jew. The woman courted by the baron in Burning Secret.
Prof. Shavit: She’s Jewish, you say! Never noticed that.
Mr. Cain: And a very beautiful Jew, yes. It is mentioned at the beginning of the novella. For someone who we feel was so detached from his Jewish identity, well, you can still see him talking about Jews.
Prof. Shavit: On the other hand, if you are living in and writing about early 20th-century Vienna and the German-speaking literary and cultural worlds, there will be Jews there whether you are a Jewish author or not.
Mr. Cain:The Buried Candelabrum is one of the texts I enjoyed the least translating. I think it is no fault of Zweig. I felt the text was written for a non-Jewish public to kind of explain the Jewish story. You have in that story wrong quotes from the Siddur that I tried to correct.
Prof. Shavit: It’s not his greatest work, indeed.
Mr. Cain: It’s not one of the best, but beyond that, I felt that for me, as an Israeli Jew, being kind of spoon-fed this introduction to Jewish history, well, I didn’t need it.
Prof. Shavit: I find it interesting that you didn’t mention Jeremiah (1917), the play that Zweig wrote while serving as a non-combative soldier in the First World War. It was staged in the young Yishuv in Hebrew at the Ohel Theatre in Tel Aviv in 1929.
Mr. Cain: I didn’t read it. I know it exists.
Dr. Litt: It didn’t work well on stage. It was long, way too long. The Hebrew version was shorter, per Zweig’s request. But ironically, the original version was a bestseller as a book. People loved reading it. That is very unusual. You know, to read a play… I mean, that’s not usually easy and enjoyable. Maybe you remember that from our school days…But in this case, it worked, and it was a bestseller. And that’s maybe also the reason why you can locate today Jeremiah very, very easily in second-hand bookstores.
Prof. Shavit: The play is essentially about the end of the Second Kingdom, the end of Jewish sovereignty, and accepting the end of Jewish sovereignty as Jewish fate. Zweig was mainly interested in the Prophet, whereas the translator, Avigdor Hameiri, was mainly interested in the fate of the nation.
Which brings me to the next point. Zweig reminds Israeli Zionists of a very uncomfortable truth. He reminds them of just how marginal Zionism was as a political movement, let alone as a practical mission, when it got started.
When Zweig was in his teens at the end of the 19th century, only a small minority of Jews in the world were active Zionists. A year after Herzl died, in 1905, Max Nordau lamented how, despite the massive grief and the great publicity of Zionism, only about one in 60 Jews in the world is a Zionist.
So on that fateful day in 1901 when the almost 20-year-old Zweig, the aspiring young writer, was accepted for a meeting with Theodor Herzl, then in his fifth year as the leader of political Zionism, Herzl was the exception in the Jewish world, and Zweig, who was not an active Zionist or even an expressed sympathizer of the movement, was the norm.
The vast majority of Jews were not Zionists. Some were hostile, some were indifferent, and some were undecided. The reason why Zweig was so anxious to meet Herzl was not that Herzl was the charismatic leader of Zionism, the so-called King of the Jews, but that he was one of the leading editors in the most important German-language newspaper, Die Neue Freie Presse.
What a meeting! It is described in The World of Yesterday. Who could be as theatrical as Herzl in creating a dramatic suspense before giving the young man, on the spot, what he never dreamed of having – the ultimate approval in the form of accepting his contribution for publication? And who could better describe this single life-changing moment, this father-and-son scene that synthesized regal patronization and noble generosity, than Stefan Zweig?
And yet – while Zweig admired Herzl and recognized to his last day the good that he had done him, he never became a Zionist.
Mr. Cain: Growing up in Israel, you learn that Herzl was the Neue Freie Presse correspondent in Paris who reported about the Dreyfus Trial and came up with the idea of a Jewish state. But nobody tells you that he was the editor of the literary supplement of that newspaper. And that was a very influential role for literary aspirants in Vienna.
Prof. Shavit: Reading The World of Yesterday, as well as Zweig’s correspondences about Zionism, I sense a great deal of apologetics, and not very convincing ones, as to why he did not become an active Zionist or, at the very least, an expressed advocate.
One argument he presents is that he felt that to be involved in something, he would have to be fully dedicated to it. Thus, because his focus was writing, and because he saw himself as a man dedicated to universal values, he could not become a Zionist.
The other argument, perhaps a more profound one, is ideological. Zweig was against the transformation of Judaism into a nationalist movement. For him, Jews had a specific vocation in the world; they were a people of a Weltgeist. Their role was to counter nationalism and to spread about universalism. Their loss of sovereignty, their homelessness, their being above the notion of territorially-based nationhood, was part of their identity, a part that should be accepted by them. I should note that these notions were not exactly original; Moritz Güdemann, the Chief Rabbi of Vienna and an opponent of Herzl, said the same already in 1897.
Dr. Litt: Zweig’s position regarding Zionism was probably encouraged by his lifestyle, that he enjoyed so much his frequent travels and felt that he was at home in different places, whether London, Paris, Milano, or Buenos Aires, as much as one can be at home when not. Since he was an acclaimed author and a rich man, he was always welcome everywhere. When you are in that position, it is easy to feel comfortable in universalism; to feel that the big world is your home. Take away the success and the money, and you won’t make it that far.
Also, he was maybe a bit repelled by the reality that Zionism was largely a movement of poor Jews. The rich Jews didn’t usually support it back then. He was somehow fascinated by the Ostjuden, to whose world he was first exposed during the First World War, as did so many other Austrian and German Jews, but he clearly understood that their world is not his world, and was not a world he wanted to be part of. Perhaps he did not appreciate that his great mentor, Theodor Herzl, was doing business with those guys; perhaps he was not comfortable with that. That is just an assumption.
Prof. Shavit: In The World of Yesterday, Zweig describes how he accidentally ran into Herzl in Vienna, in a park, several months before Herzl died. Herzl felt Zweig was shying away from him and invited him to a meeting. Zweig never came. He explains in the book that because of his appreciation for Herzl, he didn’t want to bother him, but reading between the lines, it is a tough sale. It seems that Zweig tried to avoid Herzl.
And tried for a reason. In a letter he wrote to Rabbi Alfred Wolf, who studied his writings (February 4, 1937) Zweig admitted that he originally engaged with Zionism as a debt to the confidence Herzl placed in him, but that because he always rejected narrow-mindedness, he never thought of Zionism as the one solution, with a definite article, for the problem of the Jews; that while Zionism is a blessed ideology, he would not like to see the universal, supra-national Judaism confined in between the walls of the Hebrew language and nationalism.
Dr. Litt: Zweig, as a person, was sitting on the sidelines. He was observing and never ceased to observe.
In the 1930s, he was good friends with Chaim Weizmann, and I think that the same story happened there. Okay, so he was fascinated by the leader and the intellectual Weizmann. He even gave him some advice about the writing of his autobiography. But again, he basically told Weizmann, I see you are doing this business called Zionism. I am not part of it, yet it is still fascinating to see you doing that.
Prof. Shavit: One of his letters informs that he entertained the option of collecting material to write the great epic novel about the Zionist Yishuv. But the letter reads quite clearly that this wasn’t a plan that was ever meant to be realized, and in any case, that even in the context of thinking about realizing it, Zweig did not consider a visit to Palestine (letter to Egon Zweig, April 14, 1930).
By the way, I really like his sarcastic comment against 14-day tours in faraway lands by American authors, although there is at least one great book by Mark Twain that counters it.
Dr. Litt: I think Zweig was mainly explaining in that letter to Egon, his Zionist cousin, who was already there, in Palestine, why it was absurd to think that he could accept the suggestion that he, the famous author, should write the story of the Yishuv and, in doing so, tremendously help its efforts. Zweig refused the idea suggested by Egon very elegantly and very politely and said, Okay, to do so, I will have to research the life stories of so many people and to shrink them together to one very condensed story, which could have been fascinating to do, if only I had the time.
Mr. Cain: Walter Benjamin was offered by Gershom Scholem, who was certainly a Zionist and was here in Jerusalem and was his best friend, to come here and save his life. And you can see in the correspondence between them, which I happened to translate, that Benjamin just could not imagine himself living in what was then Mandatory Palestine; what would he do there? It was too small for him.
In the case of Zweig, it must have been even worse. He was this cosmopolitan citizen of the world. What would he do in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem, or Petah Tikva, of the 1930s? These places just were not appealing to him on a personal level. So maybe he was curious about this weird movement of Jews, but for him personally, no, he was not interested.
Prof. Shavit: Well, let’s not forget that Herzl visited the Land of Israel only once. And he wasn’t that impressed with what he saw.
Mr. Cain: Think about other German literary figures who did end up in Israel, like Else Lasker-Schüler or Arnold Zweig, and others whose names I cannot remember. They were something back in Germany, and nothing here.
Prof. Shavit: All of this reinforces the question of why Zweig wanted his correspondences, of whose historical value he was very much and somewhat arrogantly conscious, to be archived in the National Library in Jerusalem. That, at the very least, indicates faith in the endurance of the Zionist enterprise, and perhaps more than faith, perhaps also a sense of belonging, after all.
Dr Litt: I think there are a number of motivations that we have to consider regarding his gift.
When I first met this collection of letters, comprising a bit more than a thousand letters which he donated in the early 1930s, I was wondering, how did he make the selection? Because there were large parts of his collection that he didn’t send to the National Library. So I wondered, what were the criteria? What did he choose to send?
At first, I was thinking too simplistically that maybe he sent the letters he received from Jews. But this was not the case. He provided the archive with letters by Thomas Mann on the one hand, and on the other hand, he did not provide letters that he received from Martin Buber, Max Brod, or Agnon.
I don’t have a 100 percent answer, but I have an idea. In one of his postcards to Hugo Bergmann, the director of the National Library at the time, sent when the process of delivering his archive was ongoing, Zweig wrote that he had already sent the National Library all the letters from the deceased correspondence partners. So, basically, it was a matter of storage space. When he was leaving Austria and had to restrict himself to like 20% of the space that he had before, then he had to make tough decisions. One was that he should give away correspondences with people who were no longer alive and with whom he did not have an ongoing dialogue anymore; people who belonged to the past.
That explains one portion of the correspondences he provided the National Library. The second portion were correspondences with people who were still alive at the time yet were very openly expressing their anti-fascist, anti-Nazi points of view. The assumption – it is not mine originally, but unfortunately I cannot recall who was the scholar who shared it with me – is that maybe Zweig was thinking that these letters must not fall into the hands of the Gestapo. Where could they be hidden? The best place is where no one would assume Zweig would send them to. And that’s the National Library in Jerusalem.
Prof. Shavit: But if that was the motivation, why the National Library in Jerusalem and not, say, Harvard University?
Dr. Litt: Maybe the answer is given in a letter that he wrote to Hugo Bergmann on December 11, 1933. He wrote Bergmann that he thought that his donation would be a tremendous addition to “your library – our library.” So you see that indeed, at that very moment, he saw himself as being part of the Jewish intellectual world, which finds its manifestation in the National Library in Jerusalem. And he wanted to be part of it.
That was actually the only time that he really gave a considerable amount of his personal papers to any institution during his lifetime. He never did that again. Not before, not after. With one exception: he donated the handwritten draft for The World of Yesterday to the Library of Congress in Washington. But that is it. He donated some of his autographs that he collected, but these were not his own works.
Prof. Shavit: That almost feels, you know, as the aging Jew who starts attending a synagogue. That a spark was there, as the cliché goes.
Dr. Litt: Yes, that sentiment was there.
As Zweig wrote several times very openly in his letters, he never hid the fact that he was Jewish. For him, this aspect of his identity was sometimes there, sometimes not so much so. Sometimes it was in addition to a certain point of view. Sometimes it disturbed him or confused him. And I think that in this he was not so different from many other people then, and maybe also now.
So definitely he saw himself as part of what was happening in the Yishuv, but to a point. There is one letter, I think it is included in the collection I edited (letter to the Viennese Zionist Dr. Marek Scherlag, June 22, 1920) where Zweig wrote that he had rejected Jewish nationalism because after two thousand years in which the Jews had plowed the world with their blood and ideas they could not restrict themselves to being again a tiny nation in an Arab corner.
Prof. Shavit: There is a wonderful story in the compilation of correspondences, a rather romantic one. How the lady by the name of Hanna Yakobson from Bat Yam rang the National Library one summer day in 2016. She is the step-daughter of Hans Rosenkranz, a now all but forgotten author and publisher. As a young man, he corresponded with Zweig, who was already a famous author at the time, yet answered his queries with great respect and thoroughness.
Yakobson offered 30 of those letters between Zweig and her stepfather to the National Library. Now, I have to admit the story would be even more romantic if those letters were not known before. But still.
In The World of Yesterday, Zweig describes how Herzl, 20 years his senior, told him that had he not sojourned in Paris, he would have never come to the idea of Zionism. He explained how important it is for a young man to move outside his comfort zone. Zweig gave the young Hans Rosenkranz the same advice (December 10, 1921). He wished for him to spend some of his young years outside Germany in a country where the ‘Jewish question,’ as he referred to it, is not so intense. Yet he did not encourage Hans to travel to the Land of Israel; quite the opposite, he emphasized how important it is not to be preoccupied with the ‘Jewish question’ and that people who were preoccupied with it – he gave the example of Arthur Schnitzler – never fully grasped it. A year later, after Hans specifically asked him about going to Palestine, Zweig wrote in his reply (November 6, 1922) about a 17-year-old pioneer who died there of malaria, and his father, whom Zweig still occasionally met, was heartbroken. In that letter, Zweig reminisced about a conversation in which Herzl tried to persuade him to become an active Zionist, and the young Zweig declined. His explanation was that he had to be fully committed to what he was doing, and since he was committed to art, he could not commit to Zionism. Zweig advised Hans that he should not become an active Zionist as an escape from his disgust with Germany, but only if he fully believed in that ideology.
What can we make of all of this? That not only was Zweig skeptical about Zionism, he also discouraged others whom he cared about from joining the movement, and yet, apologetically so. His relationship with Zionism was not an easy one.
The chain of mentoring is also fascinating. Herzl and Zweig understood, and told their admirers, the intrinsic meaning of ‘no man is a prophet in his own town’; that to revisit reality and then change it, you have to travel somewhere else. Yet their sojourning led them to such different positions, and led them to lead others to such different positions.
It is the greatest of ironies that the correspondences that document all these thoughts are safely preserved today in Jerusalem.
Mr. Cain: Compare it to the ending of The Buried Candelabrum. When the menorah, the real menorah, ends up being buried somewhere in the Land of Israel, until the day comes when the children of Israel ingather in the land and find it. So while Zionism was not a practical thing for Zweig, it was a kind of ideal, a distant future mythology.
Prof. Shavit: With one difference; we know where the letters are. We don’t know where the menorah is.
Mr. Cain: Indeed. I said before that I didn’t like that story; that it is spoon-feeding the reader with some kind of introduction to Jewish history, et cetera, but you cannot ignore a kind of very idealized myth of Zionism that is there. He could have chosen another ending.
Prof. Shavit: In writing about antisemitism, Zweig is very conscious of its dangers. He was not naïve; he did not think it would go away. But he does not search for a solution. His position in a letter to young Hans Rosenkranz, dated to the summer of 1921, resembles the ultra-Orthodox one: being persecuted is our destiny as Jews. Our tragedy is our fate; it is who we are. So here we have a man with a sense of history, but so passive about history.
Mr. Cain: I don’t know if there is a reference in his literary works to antisemitism of the modern European variety. Even in Chess Story (Schachnovelle, 1942), the one text where Nazism is mentioned by Zweig, the victim is not Jewish.
Prof. Shavit: How do you explain that there is no rebellion, no resistance; that there is this acceptance of fate as if Jewish action cannot change it?
Dr. Litt: When Zweig wrote about something Jewish in his literature, he tried to place it on a meta-level. That contrasts with his contemporaries, for example, his good friend Max Brod. Now, you cannot compare Brod’s quality of writing to that of Zweig’s, but you have to appreciate that Brod never feared to put the cards on the table and say explicitly that there’s Zionism and there’s antisemitism, and we as Jews face a lot of dangers in our society and have to find a good solution.
Zweig, on the other hand, never, never, never tried to propose some politically concrete idea in his writings. I think he somehow feared that once he did, he would be burned as a very popular author; that his position as a sophisticated cultural figure that was above politics would be damaged. Politics was the last thing he wanted to be part of.
But he was not always passive. Hannah Arendt wrote a grim and unpleasant review about The World of Yesterday, in which she accused Zweig of having had such an easy life and never doing anything for the Jews. Actually, she didn’t know the whole story.
One of the findings in the letters I had edited is that Zweig indeed tried somehow to intervene in the face of Nazism, not as a single person, but as part of a group, and on a very high-class intellectual level. Yet apparently, it was not really easy to bring 15 or 20 famous and outstanding personalities from the European Jewish society to sign a manifesto against antisemitism.
Prof. Shavit: Stefan, I want to say a word about that proposed manifesto as it is presented in a letter in the compilation you edited (May 7, 1933).
Zweig went out of his way to emphasize that he did not want whining. What he wanted was a manifesto in which German-writing Jewish authors defend their contribution to German culture, how they served it in a spirit of cooperation, how they added to its glory across the world. He was hanging on to something that by that point had vanished.
It is difficult to read that letter; you realize how little power intellectuals have in the face of evil, especially if they were not loud enough on time.
It is intriguing that the developments in Germany did not change his basic view of Zionism. They did not lead him to think that maybe, after all, Zionism was the solution.
Dr. Litt: Yes, but even at the moment he decided to commit suicide, in early 1942, it was totally unclear what would happen in Palestine. Things could have turned out very differently if the Nazis had managed to conquer Palestine. Note also that he killed himself just one month after the Wannsee conference, well before the extermination of European Jewry began in earnest.
Prof. Shavit: I was always curious, why did he commit suicide? Why the impatience to wait for the tide to possibly turn? I mean, he was a man who felt comfortable away from home. Is there still a mystery to crack here?
Dr. Litt: Zweig suffered from time to time from depressions. When the circumstances did not support his being and his well-being as an author and a cosmopolitan, it may have added to his depression.
I once read that he may have decided to kill himself after Brazil joined the anti-Hitler coalition. Perhaps he felt that his efforts to find a safe haven failed, that there was no place to go. He was really deeply frustrated about how efficiently and successfully the Germans were marching on. He and his wife committed suicide a year before Stalingrad [was won]. There was not a single sign that the Nazis would be stopped any time soon.
Prof. Shavit: So he could have committed suicide, you know, 10 days before the Nazis take over the United States and drive inward to South America.
Dr. Litt: Well, I don’t know. It was a dramatic decision. It made a dramatic impression across the world. His suicide note is in our library. You know, there are phrases that he crossed out there. He was really a man of style until the last moment.
Mr. Cain: I base what I say on movies and books, not on first-hand research. But I feel that he was too lonely in Brazil. He was kind of fed up with everything. He wasn’t that young. We say 60 is young, but back then, it wasn’t that young. He felt that his career was behind him, that he wouldn’t see the liberation of Europe in his lifetime.
We can only speculate that maybe if he had made Aliyah and came to Israel, the energy of the Zionist movement would have uplifted his spirits. But alone there in Persepolis…I don’t think there was even a very big German-speaking intellectual circle around him there.
Prof. Shavit: The World of Yesterday, which he wrote shortly before he committed suicide, is not a bitter book. Reading it, you don’t sense a person who is very depressed or alienated from the life that he left behind him.
Dr. Litt: But it is also not a very nostalgic book. It is just a good autobiography. Actually, not so much a biography, more a picture of his times.
To write a proper autobiography, he would have had to address personal issues. His wives are not mentioned in The World of Yesterday, correct? He was dealing with the macro, not the micro.
Prof. Shavit: I guess that has to do with the spirit of the time. You don’t really write about personal issues directly. Well, it’s not as if Germans or Austrians today are very comfortable discussing their personal lives.
Mr. Cain: He wrote to Walter Benjamin to tell him that he had divorced his first wife. He mentioned it in a kind of a postscript at the end of a very long letter, kind of, oh, by the way, I divorced my wife.
Prof. Shavit: When people reconstruct their lives, they write from the point of view of the present. Yet in The World of Yesterday, Zweig doesn’t understand his Judaism differently than he did before the rise of Nazism. When you read his letters from before the rise of Nazism, he insists on a very internationalist, almost elusive definition of Judaism. He does not want Judaism to define him and confine him. I am curious that towards the end of his life, when he reflected upon his adulthood, he did not revise or critically reflect upon his understanding of what it meant to be a Jew.
Dr. Litt: He created an aura around himself, and he had a name to lose. He was by no means seeking this opportunity, this final deed, to Judaize himself publicly.
You can see that even in the last letter that I included in the book (September/October 1941), sent to a reform rabbi in Rio de Janeiro, Henrique Lemle. Zweig gently thanked him for the kind invitation to take an active part in a Yom Kippur prayer in his synagogue, but noted that his modest education in religious matters, which he described as typical to Austrian Jews, made him too insecure to participate. He declined the invitation.
Prof. Shavit: Stefan, what is your favorite Zweig story?
Dr. Litt: His best work is, in my opinion, the novel he never intended to publish that was published posthumously in 1982 – The Post Office Girl (Rausch der Verwandlung).It is better, in my opinion, than the novel he did publish, his longest work, Beware of Pity (Ungeduld des Herzens, 1939).My favorite short story is Letter from an Unknown Woman (Brief einer Unbekannten, 1922). I really love it because I see something very personal there from Zweig, and maybe a kind of confession, an unpleasant confession, about his own behavior when he was a young, rich, and spoiled gentleman. He wrote it when he was in his early 40s, and I think he was reminiscing about his behavior as a young man. The author who gets the letter from the woman is 41; I don’t think that is a coincidence.
Mr. Cain: I also like Letter from an Unknown Woman, which I happened to translate when I was 41. I want to choose two more. One is Burning Secret. This 12-year-old child with his mother in this posh hotel may be Zweig kind of remembering his childhood. And this baron, who tries to court the woman, maybe Zweig sees himself in him. It is a very good psychological novella about growing up, realizing what the world of adults is about.
The other one that I like a lot is very different from all his other works, and influenced by Herman Hesse, The Eyes of the Eternal Brother (Die Augen des ewigen Bruders, 1922). India was trendy back then. And I find the legend beautiful.
Prof. Shavit: We cannot end without a short literary experiment. If Zweig was alive today and landed in Vienna, how would he feel?
Dr. Litt: I am not an expert on present-day Vienna. Still, my feeling is that the mindsets of the big cities in Austria are still very much related to a reality that has long gone. Vienna definitely still has the spirit of being the capital of an empire; an empire that isn’t there anymore.
Prof. Shavit: Not even the best place in the world for an Apfelstrudel, if my experience is any guide.
Mr. Cain: I think that if Zweig had to choose between present-day Austria and present-day Israel, he would choose Austria, obviously.
Prof. Shavit: What would Zweig think of Tel Aviv if our resurrecting machine worked? I think that for someone who was so interested in humanity, in human weaknesses and obsessions, Tel Aviv could be an interesting place.
Mr. Cain: It is a very political question nowadays, and it’s very hard to answer now with what’s going on in Gaza. But if we go back to better times, we can speculate that he would have been proud of Israel’s achievements in science, or Agnon winning the Nobel Prize.
Dr. Litt: Perhaps he would have come to the conclusion that the concern he articulated in one of the letters we addressed before was realized. That it is impossible for the Jews, after all they had done in the world and for the world, to become a tiny nation in an Arab corner. My feeling is that this is exactly what is happening. Unfortunately, I see that there are so many efforts by the state to limit the intellectual world of this country to a very tiny level, focused on itself, not part of something bigger, which in fact we are. And that there are more and more parts of the population in this country that follow this path.
Prof. Shavit: Stefan, if that resurrection machine brings Zweig to Tel Aviv, I would like the three of us to sit with him at “Stefan,” the small and flourishing Viennese Café on Tchernichovsky Street, opened by an Austrian who fell in love with an Israeli and settled here. There is so much to discuss. It can be a great start for a thrilling short story, especially if Zweig were to write it.
Europe: The Lost Continent
Uriya Shavit
Since October 7, 2023, there have been marked differences between how European countries have approached the Gaza conflict. A number of European governments, which do not form a distinguishable bloc on any other issue, have taken particularly hostile stances toward Israel. These manifested in the speed of the shift of those countries from post-October 7 sympathies to harsh criticism of Israel and their positioning at the forefront of demands to penalize Israel for its Gaza policies.
The anti-Israel group included Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Slovenia, and Spain. It singled itself out as a distinctly anti-Israel voice on May 17, 2025, when it issued a joint, unequivocal statement about the need to pressure Israel more to change its policies: “We will not be silent in front of the man-made humanitarian catastrophe that is taking place before our eyes in Gaza […] we call upon the government of Israel to immediately reverse its current policy.”[1] Belgium was a leading voice in the group until a change of government and prime minister in February 2025 moderated its criticism at a time when anti-Israel sentiments intensified almost everywhere else. The change resulted in deep frictions within its government.
The emergence of an Israel-skeptic bloc of European governments and publics (henceforth: the P-8) in the immediate aftermath of October 7, 2023, is anything but self-explanatory. Why has Slovenia become so much more critical of Israel than Croatia? Why Spain and not Portugal? Iceland and not Denmark? Norway and not Finland? Malta and not Greece? Ireland and not the United Kingdom? Belgium and not Switzerland? Luxembourg and not Austria?
Our investigation of this riddle involved data and discourse analysis as well as interviews with more than 30 European politicians, diplomats, journalists, and scholars. It cautions against easy, simplified overarching explanations as to what drives Israel-skeptic policies. It suggests that what most Israelis believe to be the core reasons for critical European agendas against their country – are not. It informs about direct links between distinct histories, present local realities, and the Middle Eastern policies taken by governments.
A word about what was at stake is in order. By the spring of 2025, Israeli military operations already ensured that the existential threat the country faced following October 7, 2023, was defeated, even if not eliminated entirely. At that point, a majority of Israelis wanted to see an end to the war, and Israel lost the support not only of a majority of Europeans, but also of the majority of the American public.
Yet a year earlier, an end to the war would have had different implications, for Israel and for the world. If the war had ended then, the leadership of Hamas would have survived, victorious. The vast majority of its jihadists would have remained alive and mongering. The Hamas regime would have been kept completely intact, preparing for the next round, with hundreds of millions of admirers recognizing that it was able to defeat the Zionists where far superior forces have failed.
Since its foundation at the start of the first Intifada in 1987, Hamas unequivocally and consistently opposed a two-state solution, leaving no room, not even theoretically, for a peaceful territorial compromise. Liberal Europe, which considers the two-state formula as the only just and enduring resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, should have been the first to demand and act for the destruction of the Islamist group. It never did, not really.
Hamas could at no point hope to match Israel’s military strength. It was, however, wise in identifying its soft spots, and those of the liberal West. On the side of Israel, the extreme sensitivity of its citizenry to hostages – even more so in the case of soldiers than civilians. On the side of the liberal West, the sensitivity to civilian casualties. The war machine Hamas built aimed at those soft spots: to bring Israel to its knees by taking a large number of hostages, and then tie its hands through the cynical, cold-blooded usage of Palestinian civilians as human shields and total indifference to their well-being.
When historians analyze the Gaza war in a hundred years from now, they will probably argue that the main strategic mistake by Hamas on October 7, 2023, was that it could not overcome its sadistic thirst for Jewish blood. Had Hamas settled for the killing and kidnapping of soldiers, Israel would still have casus belli, but may not have had an American and a majority-European carte blanche to storm Gaza in 2023 and 2024 the way it did.
Yet if the wheel of world diplomacy had been stirred by the P-8 European states, Israel may well have been forced to stop short of crushing Hamas in 2023-2024, despite the war crimes the Islamist group had committed and its continued declared determination to seek Israel’s annihilation. During the early months of the war, that is, when the United States and the major European powers still stood by Israel, statements and gestures by P-8 leaders harshly condemned Hamas, yet at the same time compared its war crimes to the actions taken by the IDF and practically pressured Israel to end its military operations with the Islamist regime fully and victoriously in power.
For example, already a week after the October 7 attack, then Spanish Social Rights Minister Ione Belarra stated that Israel was conducting a “genocide attempt” in Gaza. The Spanish Foreign Ministry defended the legitimacy of her statement.[2] Also within a week of October 7, Luxembourg’s Minister for Foreign and European Affairs, Jean Asselborn, issued a statement in which, alongside a strong condemnation of Hamas and a call for the unconditional release of the hostages, he called for de-escalation and the immediate cessation of hostilities and expressed concerns about the humanitarian situation created by Israel’s military actions.[3] Not a month went by since the war began, and the Icelandic parliament issued a condemnation of Hamas and in the same breath a condemnation of “all subsequent actions of the Israeli government in violation of international humanitarian law, including untold suffering, loss of life, civilian casualties and destruction of civilian infrastructure,”[4] while the Belgian government questioned, alongside its condemnation of Hamas, the legality of some Israeli airstrikes, condemned what it termed the Israeli collective punishment of the Palestinian population, and called for targeted sanctions and accountability for those responsible.[5] Less than two months into the start of the war, while visiting Israel, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and his Belgian counterpart, Alexander De Croo, lauded the temporary cease-fire in the Gaza Strip and called for it to be made permanent, de facto asking to impose defeat on Israel.[6]
Four months into the war, in February 2024 (when thousands of Gazan civilians had already been killed), the Prime Ministers of Spain and Ireland, Pedro Sánchez and Leo Varadkar, implored EU leaders to take action over the situation in Gaza and demanded an immediate assessment of whether Israel is complying with human rights obligations that are stipulated in its trade deal with the bloc. They noted that they “are deeply concerned at the deteriorating situation in Israel and in Gaza, especially the impact the ongoing conflict is having on innocent Palestinians, especially children and women.”[7] The same month, the Foreign Minister of Malta, Ian Borg, called shortly before his country assumed the rotating presidency of the United Nations Security Council, for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. He vigorously condemned the October 7 massacre, yet noted that Palestinian civilians should not be killed because of it.[8]
In May 2024, Spain, Ireland, and Norway became the first European countries since the start of the war to recognize Palestine as a state, followed by Slovenia the next month (Iceland offered a similar recognition already in November 2011; it was followed by Sweden in 2014). The symbolic recognitions were intended as a show of support for the two-state solution,[9] but served as a means to pressure Israel to end the war in Gaza. The statements that accompanied them failed to explain how a two-state solution and just peace could ever be achieved if Hamas remained in power. In January 2024, Slovenia supported the genocide case against Israel that South Africa submitted to the International Court of Justice. Spain followed suit in June 2024; Ireland in January 2025.
During 2024, the United Nations’ General Assembly voted 17 times on Israel-related issues. Israel-specific issues preoccupied the biased General Assembly more than those of any other state in the world, and similar to all of them combined. The voting coincidence of P-8 countries with the pro-Israel United States (with which Israel had a 90% voting coincidence) was almost as low as that of anti-Israel countries such as Pakistan and Turkey (and, in the case of Malta, was astonishingly even worse): 17% in the case of Belgium, Iceland, Ireland, and Norway, 13% for Luxembourg, Slovenia, and Spain, and 7% for Malta.[10]
Where data are available, they suggest that the hostile approach to Israel of P-8 countries aligned with public opinions. According to YouGov, in May 2024, as well as in May 2025, the net favorability of Israel in Spain was as low as -55,[11] while Pew Research found in the spring of 2025 that 75% of the Spanish public viewed Israel negatively.[12] In Iceland, in the fall of 2024, 72.5% of the public sympathized more with the Palestinians than with Israel. A mere 9.5% expressed the opposite sentiment, with 53.6% demanding a severing of diplomatic relations.[13] In Ireland, a survey (highly-biasedly phrased) conducted three months after the October 7 attack found that 71% of the public holds that the Palestinians live under an apartheid system.[14] Philippe Poirier, a political scientist from the University of Luxembourg who has been tracking attitudes toward Jews and Israel in the Grand Duchy for the past decade, suggested that by 2025, some 80% of the population identified more with the Palestinians than with Israel.[15] Roger Strickland, the Honorary Consul of Israel (and the Philippines) in Malta, a Catholic and offspring of a legendary Maltese prime minister, informed that public opinion in the country has turned overwhelmingly against Israel. “I tell people here, thank God we have Israel to protect the Eastern Mediterranean. Maltese don’t really sympathize with this. They look at me and they say: ‘Are you crazy?’ The younger generation, I think, is 100% on the Palestinian side. I have a 22-year-old daughter who is a lawyer, and she refuses to talk to me about Israel and my role as honorary consul. Her friends are all on the same page.”[16]
Is it antisemitism? The most immediate explanation for the intensity of P-8 criticism against Israel blames antisemitism. It is a favorite of Israeli politicians because it provides an ultimate and overarching defense of Israeli policies.
The linkage between antisemitism and a political climate that applies double standards to Israel makes sense, regardless of which is the chicken and which is the egg. However, as an explanation for P-8 diplomatic conduct, it is extremely weak.
As readers of this Center’s publications know, antisemitism is a tricky concept to define, and has become trickier in recent years. It is obvious why hatred directed verbally or physically against Jews as individuals, communities, or as a people because of their Jewish identity is antisemitism. It is also obvious that harsh criticism of Israel, even if misinformed, is not antisemitism. It is, however, difficult in some cases to credibly determine when double standards applied against the State of the Jews, or delegitimizations of the right of the State of the Jews to exist, are clear-cut antisemitism. The risk of cyclicality is ever-present: labelling criticism of Israel as antisemitism and then explaining antisemitism as the reason for the criticism.
Yet, whichever criteria are applied, none of the P-8 countries shine, in comparative European perspective, as particularly antisemitic.
To be sure, the overall trend has been of an increase in antisemitism following October 7, 2023 also in some P-8 countries. Antisemitisme.be, a nongovernmental organization that records antisemitic incidents in Belgium, reported an increase from a record 117 antisemitic incidents in 2023 to a new record of 129 in 2024.[17] In Spain, the Observatorio de Antisemitismo en España, established in 2009 by the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain (FCJE), recorded 170 incidents in 2024 compared to 60 in 2023 and 35 in 2022.[18] In Norway, the average annual number of anti-Jewish crimes recorded by the police more than doubled in 2023 to 50, while declining to 45 in 2024.[19] In 2023, the nongovernmental organization Research and Information on Antisemitism in Luxembourg (RIAL) reported the occurrence of 105 antisemitic incidents compared to 65 in 2022. Seventy of these involved verbal abuse in connection to the war in Gaza.[20]
Still, the trend of an increase in antisemitic incidents was not different, and in some cases was more pronounced, in countries that vigorously supported Israel during the early phases of the war, including Germany and Austria in Europe, and Argentina in South America.[21] Moreover, with the exception of Norway, Jewish organizations and activists in P-8 countries have not reported in recent years a sense of growing insecurity due to antisemitic attacks or complained about governmental indifference to their concerns. In our conversation, the Executive Director of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain, Carolina Aisen, emphasized the good communication of the communities with law enforcement agencies,[22] and cautioned against exaggerated evaluations of the scope of antisemitic threats in the country.[23] The newly-appointed Chief Rabbi of Madrid, Moisés Chicurel, shared a similar sentiment in an interview with the Haredi newspaper Yated Neeman. He said that he had never faced any hostility while walking around Madrid visibly identifiable as Jewish, and praised the local and national police forces for their protection of the community.[24] In Antwerp, where about two-thirds of Belgium’s Jews live, members of the Jewish community noted the city as a positive exception to the general trend of antisemitism in Europe.[25]
One reason why the number of antisemitic attacks in P-8 countries is relatively small is that their Jewish populations are relatively small. Of the eight, only Belgium has a significant number of Jewish citizens, almost 30,000, although even there they comprise approximately only 0.25% of the population. In Iceland, Malta and Slovenia, there are only several dozen Jews respectively, in Luxembourg about 1,200 according to the more generous estimations, in Norway, some 1,500, and in Ireland, approximately 3,000. In Spain, Jews comprise less than 0.1% of the population.
However, also on the notional-abstract level, there is no evidence to suggest that the publics in P-8 countries hold distinctly deep-seated hateful or prejudiced views against Jews that drive their governments to adopt agendas that are hostile to Israel. None of the P-8 countries has a political party with a past or a present of expressly antisemitic views as a significant political force. Those of the P-8 included in recent surveys about public attitudes towards Jews have not emerged as more antisemitic than several of the most pro-Israel countries in Europe.
The Global Index on antisemitism published by the Anti-Defamation League highlights the share of respondents who answered “definitely true” or “probably true” to six or more of what it defines as 11 negative stereotypes about Jews. The Index published in early 2025 found Norway to have one of the lowest scores, with only 8% of respondents identifying with the majority of antisemitic falsehoods, compared to 49% in Eastern Europe and 24% in the Americas (and 97% in the West Bank and Gaza).[26] The survey released in 2023 showed that while Spain (26%) and Belgium (22%) scored higher than non-P-8 West European countries surveyed, including France (15%) and Germany (12%), they scored lower than the most pro-Israel country in the European Union, Hungary (37%), as well as lower than Poland (35%).[27]
A comparative survey by the Pew Research Center from 2018 of 15 European countries showed publics in Norway (95%) and Belgium (89%) to have particularly high contention rates with a prospect of Jews as members of their families. The shares in Ireland (70%) and Spain (79%) were lower – but still higher than in the pro-Israel Germany and Austria. They were also higher than the shares of respondents in Ireland and Spain who were content with having a Muslim as a member of the family (60% in Ireland, 74% in Spain).[28] Significant minorities in Spain, Belgium, and Norway agreed with the statements that Jews overstate their historical suffering and pursue their own interests rather than those of the countries where they live, but so was the case for Italy and Portugal, and to a lesser extent for Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and France.[29]
A long but crucial digression: There developed fatigue in Europe about what some hold to be the simplification, overstretching, and politicization of the fight against antisemitism. The problem is that the fatigue involves not only conscious antisemites, but also people who are highly critical of Israel but are not antisemites, as well as long-time friends of Israel and the Jewish people. It injures the prospects for informed dialogues that can clear misunderstandings, and it risks hurting the struggle against the actual and dangerous growth in old-fashioned Jew-hatred across the world.
Reverend Prof. Stefan Attard, the Dean of the Faculty of Theology at the University of Malta, still remembers fondly the four months he spent at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem more than twenty years ago. “You see everything. The people you meet, the cultures, the museums, the sites, every day something was happening.” A suicide attack on a bus he witnessed left its mark. “When you are there, you do get the Israeli perspective. When you are not, well, then you might just hear of some kind of explosion that happened.”[30]
On June 26, 2025, the Senate of Attard’s university issued a strong condemnation of Israel’s policies in Gaza. “These recurring breaches of international law, cumulatively amounting to ethnic cleansing and genocide, can under no circumstances be explained as self-defense,” the statement read.[31]
Attard embraced us with fatherly priestly warmth in his office two months later, together with members of his faculty. “I always get the feeling that when it comes to the discourse on antisemitism, there’s too much of this rhetoric,” he said. “Like, you get the impression that Israelis, and Jews, are automatically, by default, seeing themselves as being victims of persecution, victims of antisemitism, and so on. Of course, this is coming from real instances of such cases. But then, when the rhetoric is constantly [about antisemitism], I think it has an adverse effect.”[32]
Dr. George Vital Zammit, a political scientist from the same university, opened our conversation aggressively: “Let me start by clarifying something important. I do not agree that there is antisemitism in the countries you are studying,” he said, before being asked about the topic. “For me, criticizing Netanyahu is not antisemitism, just as criticizing Putin for the war in Ukraine does not make someone anti-Russian. Western leaders, when faced with images of destruction in Gaza, will inevitably voice criticism. This is a political reaction, not a cultural or religious prejudice.”[33]
Yves Cruchten, 50, is a senior member of parliament for the Socialist Party of Luxembourg (LSAP) that is currently in the opposition. One of his colleagues described him to us as “mega anti-Israel.” He called for the suspension of the trade agreement between the EU and Israel.
On a pleasant summer day, the bearded and soft-spoken Cruchten, a former Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, welcomed us at his office in the center of Luxembourg City in short pants and a warm smile. He emphasized outright his condemnation of the October 7 attack and that his criticism of Israel’s response was never against the Israeli people but against their government. “Of course [Israel] had to react. Of course [Israel] had to protect [its] population. [It had] to make sure that things like October 7 never, never, never happen again, and to punish those who have committed those crimes. It was obvious that there [would have to be] a strong response, a military response. I don’t say that [what happened in the war] is totally wrong, but between the [initial] reaction and what [happened later], I think we were in another situation.”[34]
Cruchten stressed it was unjust to describe him as antisemitic because of his conviction that Israel was committing war crimes. “You shouldn’t be labeled as such; you should not be put with the worst of the worst, only because you are critical of the Israeli government. That is something that hurts me big time. I just spoke two weeks ago with a rabbi about this, and he understood me. He said, ‘Yeah, I feel you.’ The problem is that the definition we have for antisemitism, the IHRA definition, you can put so many things [under it].”[35]
Is it Muslim migration? The equally popular explanation for P-8 hostility to Israel highlights the influence of Muslims across the continent. The argument, often preached with an unconcealed sense of schadenfreude, is that Europe has been “taken over” by Muslim migrants, who change its character and, among other impacts, push its political leaderships to anti-Israel positions.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed this sentiment explicitly in his Sparta Speech in September 2025. He said that “limitless migration” has resulted in Muslims becoming a “significant minority – very vocal, very, very belligerent.” He claimed that Muslim citizens are pressuring European governments to adopt anti-Israel policies.[36]
The generalizing and ever-casual way labels are put on “Muslim migrants” would have had Israeli officials cry out, and rightly so, about antisemitism had such statements been applied against Jews. Attributing European governments’ stance on the war in Gaza to the influence of Muslim minorities is misleading in two ways: there did not develop in Europe, on continental or national levels, a unified religious-grounded “Muslim vote”; and the political impact of citizens of Muslim faith in Europe has remained, to date, marginal – including in the majority of P-8 countries.
Not all Muslims across the continent contextualize their identity primarily through religion, and the majority of those who do, do so through a plethora of ethnic-national and ideological frameworks that reflect contesting interpretations of Islam. There are no European or state-level Islamic institutions that advance communal political goals. The emergence of a religio-legal corpus on Muslim minorities that described voting as a religious duty and tied that duty to assisting Muslim causes globally had not led in any European country to the rise of communal shari‘a-based electoral powerbrokers whose instructions are heeded. With rare anecdotal exceptions, all attempts to establish political parties with Islamist agendas ended with embarrassing failures, including when running in districts with significant Muslim minorities. Few politicians of Muslim faith have made it to top positions in European governments, and those who did were not religiously radical, if religious at all.
Already before October 7, statements of support for the Palestinian cause and collections of donations for Gaza were commonplace during Friday congregational prayers in European mosques. Yet for a variety of reasons, including fears of the reactions of police and intelligence agencies, mosque leaderships tend to moderate the tone when broaching explicit political issues. As strange as this may sound, mosques provide a safer environment for Israelis than certain university campuses.
The share of Muslims in Europe has steadily grown since the 1980s, with the more generous estimations putting it in EU countries at approximately six percent. Still, residence should not be confused with citizenship, and only the latter provides a right to vote in national elections. Excluding non-naturalized refugees and others, the actual number of Muslims who have a political say in Europe is significantly smaller than their shares of different national populations.
Minority voters in Europe do not hold the national-level political sway they potentially hold in the United States. In Michigan in 2024, Kamala Harris underperformed President Biden in 2020 in part because of protest votes regarding their administration’s Gaza policy[37] (although it is far from obvious that Harris would have won Michigan even if a war in Gaza had not broken out, and would have anyhow lost the elections even if she had won that state). The importance of the Muslim (and Christian-Arab) vote in Michigan is, however, a product of the unique and distorting American electoral college system: A swing state where every tiny electoral group has the capacity to determine the outcome for the entire Union. There is no equivalent of that distortion in Europe, including where variations of the first-past-the-post system are applied.
If the presence of Muslim citizens was a key factor in governments’ taking a harsh anti-Israel stance, one would expect to see at least some correlation between the share of Muslims in the national populations, their political impact, and the direction of Middle Eastern policies. However, the opposite is the case.
Six of the P-8 countries have negligible Muslim minorities or ones that are smaller than the European average. In Iceland, the European country that has become the most steadfast in opposition to Israel’s policies, approximately only 1% of the population is Muslim. Only a minority of those Muslims attends one of the three mosques in the capital Reykjavik in the viciously divided Islamic scene that developed in the country, and that has distinguished itself more for petty internal struggles than for common action.[38]
In Spain, slightly less than 5% of the population is Muslim, but no more than half of the Muslims have citizenship.[39] One member of the current government, Sira Abed Rego, was born in Valencia to a Spanish mother and a Palestinian father. A member of the European Parliament since 2019, she was nominated Minister of Youth and Children in November 2023, despite addressing the October 7 massacre by emphasizing the right of the Palestinians to resist Israel.[40] Other than her, only one politician known to be Muslim has ascended on the national stage, although for a short time – Muhammad Chaib Akhdim, of Moroccan descent, who served in parliament representing the Socialists’ Party of Catalonia in 2018-2019. Only a few Muslim politicians left an imprint on regional-level politics. “The left-wing parties have not been successful in incorporating Muslim candidates, even though they often speak in favor of inclusion. There is a kind of symbolic multiculturalism, but when it comes to real representation, it remains almost absent,” said Pablo Biderbost, a political scientist from the University of Salamanca.[41]
In Slovenia, the share of Muslims is less than 3% of the population, and most are from Bosnia and Albania. No member of the parliament is known to be Muslim.
In Malta, Muslims comprise approximately 4% of the population (the percentage of citizens is smaller). “We don’t have a Muslim vote here,” said Honorary Consul Strickland. “It has absolutely no relevance whatsoever.”[42] No member of the Maltese parliament is known to be Muslim.
In Ireland, Muslims comprise approximately 2% of the population – a sharp increase from a decade ago, yet they are still a small minority, and a highly ethnically diverse one that lacks political weight. Not a single member of the current Irish parliament is a Muslim.
In Luxembourg, Muslims comprised approximately 3% of the population four years ago, though their share of the population may have increased recently.[43] “The Muslim community has grown lately because of many refugees that we have taken in, but it is still a small community. It has no electoral power. It is not an organized community politically. If there is the fear that Muslim communities are influencing the political sphere here, I must say it is absolutely wrong,”[44] said MP Cruchten. He noted that his blunt criticism of Israel was unlikely to win him or lose him a single vote in the next elections.
Norway and Belgium stand out among P-8 countries regarding the political influence of Muslim migrants – but only just. Norway, with a population of some 5.6 million citizens, had almost 200,000 people registered in Muslim religious communities in 2025.[45] Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life projected that by 2030 the percentage of Muslims in Norway will be 6.5%.[46] The current representation of Muslims in parliament approximately reflects their share of the population, but to date, only two Norwegian Muslim citizens have made it to prominent political positions. These are Abid Raja, who served as Minister of Culture, Sports and Equality for almost two years in 2020-2021, and Hadia Tajik. Born to parents who migrated from Pakistan, she served in 2012 as Minister of Culture for a year, and a decade later as Minister of Labor and Social Inclusion for half a year. On October 8, 2023, Tajik posted a condemnation of Hamas, albeit far from a strongly worded one.[47]
In Belgium, Muslims account for approximately 7% of the population. In the capital Brussels, as many as one-fifth of the residents are Muslim. The number of representatives who are known to be Muslim in the current parliament is close to their share of the population. Muslim voters ushered in the electoral rise of the Marxist-leaning and anti-Zionist “The Workers Party of Belgium,” which currently holds 10% of the seats in parliament. It is in the opposition, yet its strong anti-Israel views pressure more mainstream socialists who compete for the same votes, including the Flemish social democrats (Vooruit), who are in the current coalition, to escalate their rhetoric against Israel. Still, Belgian Marxists did not need the encouragement of Muslims to present a strongly-worded agenda against Israel and the United States; and Belgium is the only one of the P-8 countries that shifted toward a more balanced approach regarding the conflict as the war in Gaza progressed.
What is it, then?Our study identified six aspects that are common to the P-8 countries and encouraged particularly hostile approaches to Israel since October 7, 2023. None of these aspects independently explains the intensity of anti-Israel views and policies there, yet their accumulation might. None is unique to the P-8 countries in the European context, yet their combination and depth is.
These are: (a) left-oriented coalition governments; (b) the minimal role of antisemitism and Holocaust remembrance in political discourse; (c) national narratives receptive to identification with the Palestinian cause; (d) pre-existence of deep-seated anti-Israel views; (e) the meager international and national implications of diplomatic decisions regarding the Middle East; and (f) modest scopes of pro-Israel public diplomacy.
European socialists and other left-leaning parties are distinctly more critical of Israel than conservative and populist ones. Their dominance of governing coalitions in the majority of P-8 countries is one explanation why those countries adopted a vigorous anti-Israel line during the war.
Of the P-8, leftist, left-center, or broad coalitions led by leftist politicians have been in power during the war in Spain, Ireland, Iceland, Malta, Norway, and Slovenia. Ireland elected in October 2025 by a landslide 63% a radical leftist and particularly anti-Israel politician, Catherine Connolly, as its new President, a ceremonial role.
Belgium and Luxembourg are exceptions that do not disprove the rule. Belgium had seen since 2020 coalitions led by the center-right. In Luxembourg, a coalition alliance of greens, socialists, and liberals was replaced in 2023 by a coalition led by the conservatives and joined by the centrist liberals. However, in neither country was a strictly conservative or conservative-populist coalition formed. In Belgium, a shift towards a more conservative coalition in January 2025 (albeit not a strictly conservative one) resulted in a change of approach favoring Israel. In both, the governments would have been far more hostile to Israel had the left been in power.
There are a number of reasons for the leftist anti-Israel bent. One is that Israeli politics have been dominated for almost half a century by conservative coalitions, and since 2022, by a coalition with a distinct radical-religious and populist bent. The priorities and the political vocabulary of Israeli officials have become alienating for left-leaning European politicians. The more that disparity brought Israel closer to European conservatism and populism, the more the chasm with Israel became a defining feature in European domestic politics. Some leftist European activists and leaders, who in their youth grew up on the ethos of Israel as a socialist utopia and a sheep overcoming wolves, and even experienced the utopia firsthand as volunteers on kibbutzim, have grown personally frustrated and angry with what has become of it. Post-Six Day War Israel is a personal broken dream for them.
Another reason are the expectations from Israel as democracy and a close European partner to maintain certain human rights standards, and the sense of some leftist European politicians that in the case of Israel, unlike that of countries that are more distant from the European system, criticism can actually make a difference. Asked why he has been so much more vociferous against Israel than against other countries that do not uphold his standards of human rights, Luxembourgian MP Cruchten told us: “We see Israel as a Western country that shares a lot of our values. And therefore it is even twice more painful to see it committing crimes against humanity.” When asked why he had never called for trade sanctions against other countries with far from unblemished records on human rights, for example, China, a crucial economic partner of Luxembourg, there was a long silence, after which Cruchten replied in a way untypical of politicians: “I have no answer to that. It’s a difficult one. I understand that. It’s a very legitimate question.” After some more contemplation, he added: “We have to also be critical of China, but China is not starving children at the moment.”[48]
Yet another reason for the anti-Israel bent is that the emphasis put by European leftists on human rights has been receptive to and distorted by critical theories, primarily those imported from American academia, that see weakness and victimhood as inherent representatives of justice, and power and affluence as inherent representatives of injustice. While guided by the intention to expose the hidden interests and structures that shape politics and human relations at large, these theories have ironically demonstrated a tendency to lead to one-dimensional analyses of social and political phenomena. Seeing Israel as the ultimate villain no matter what is one such one-dimensional analysis.
The anti-Israel leftist bent in Europe owes in part also to the roots of some members of leftist parties in Marxist movements, including such that have historical links with Palestinian groups, and their lingering anti-American sentiments. That some of Europe’s biggest supporters of Putin’s fascist Russia’s unprovoked war and crimes against humanity in Ukraine also happen to be the biggest antagonists of Israel speaks for itself. Their passion is not for human rights as a universal concept, but for seeing a weakened United States; not for the improvement of the liberal international system, but for its total destruction.
Spain, the largest of the P-8, has been governed by the most radical leftist coalition of the group. “The Spanish left has always been deeply anti-American, against NATO and the US bases. Israel has been seen as Washington’s outpost in the Middle East, while Palestine became the anti-imperialist cause. The left in Spain speaks about Israel through symbols – imperialism, resistance – but without concrete proposals. It’s more about identity than policy,” said Manuel Jesús García Martin, former provincial executive with the Spanish Socialists’ Workers Party (PSOE).[49] Daniel Fernández de Miguel, scholar of contemporary history at Universidad Complutense de Madrid, explained: “Spain’s current government is the most left-wing in Europe. [Its anti-Israel policy was designed] to demonstrate independence from Washington and the Western bloc, so it aligned with the Global South and Arab countries.”[50]
The fragile base of the governing coalition in Madrid helped fuel those long-existing sentiments. “The current government was trying to divert attention from domestic problems and build an international image that would help its electoral prospects,” said Víctor Blázquez Martín, associate professor of political science at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.[51]“Pedro Sánchez has been using the Palestinian issue as a cover for his internal crises. It is a political calculation. He is not moved by conviction, but by how his [policy regarding the conflict in Gaza] serves him internationally,” said Prof. Alfonso Ballesteros Soriano, a scholar of the philosophy of law at Universidad Miguel Hernández de Elche. [52]
With some irony, in the case of several P-8 countries the political strength of the anti-Israel camp may have been helped by the relatively negligible demographic presence of Muslim migrants. Some European countries where migration has become a hotly debated issue have seen the rise of populist parties, with Germany and France being the primary examples. Some of these parties tend to stress their support for Israel as an ally and a model in the fight against Islamism and for the preservation of Judeo-Christian values. They do so in part as a means to fend off allegations that they have fascist and antisemitic roots. Their popularity, which comes in part from traditional socialist electoral bases, shrinks anti-Israel coalitions even where those coalitions win power, and increases the Palestinian-skeptic voices on the political spectrum.
The only two P-8 countries where populist parties have had modest yet sustained political success are Spain and Norway. In Spain, the pro-Israel migration-skeptic Vox, founded in 2013, won 12.4% of the votes in the 2023 elections, a decline from their 2019 record and short of frustrating the formation of a leftist coalition. In Norway, the migration-skeptic Progress Party won 11.7% of the votes in the 2021 elections and a record 23.9% of the votes in the September 2025 elections. That achievement did not deprive the incumbent socialist-led coalition of its majority and thus did not facilitate a turnaround in the approach to Israel, but it added pro-Israel voices to the parliamentary opposition, where Progress members dominate the Friends of Israel caucus.
The role of antisemitism and the Holocaust in public discoursesis the most ironic of the explanations for hostility toward Israel in the P-8 countries.
The Second World War exists today in Europe as a topical issue. It lingers over cultural and social debates, rings alarm bells, and supports political demands for gratitude, condemnation, and revisionism.
There are states whose role during the Second World War is a source of national pride. This small list includes Britain, Denmark, and Albania. There are states for which the Second World War is a source of shame and reflection. This list includes Germany, Austria, and, to a far lesser extent, Italy. A third category are states for whom the Holocaust plays complex, sensitive, and very publicly present political and cultural roles due to mixed legacies of being under Nazi occupation on the one hand and having had large antisemitic segments of the population that collaborated with the Nazis on the other. These include, among others, France, the Baltic states, and Poland.
P-8 countries belong (and are not unique in that) to two other categories. They either played no significant role in the Holocaust, commendable or shameful, as is the case of Ireland, Iceland, and Malta, or played a mixed role that is today subject to some public discussion, but has not become a centerpiece of school education, political discourse, and painful debates regarding national history and identity.
The latter category includes Spain, which cooperated with Nazi Germany and fascist Italy, but gave refuge to thousands of Jews.[53] It includes Slovenia, where, under Nazi German and Italian occupations, the majority of Jews were murdered, but that as a nation never fully reckoned with its pro-Nazi collaborators. It includes Belgium, where almost half of the Jewish population was murdered in the Holocaust, and which witnessed both collaboration and the underground heroism of saviors. It includes Norway, where about half of the Jewish population was heroically saved with the help of the resistance movement, and the other half was murdered, including through the assistance of Norwegian collaborators.[54] It includes Luxembourg, where the vast majority of the 3,500 Jews present before the Holocaust were murdered, including those who escaped to France, and whose history involves the righteous acts of citizens who gave shelter to Jews and those who collaborated with the Nazis in hunting down the last Jew.[55]
While present, in none of these countries has the Holocaust become a fiercely discussed and debated national wound or a major topic for study and contemplation at schools. It is remembered; it does not dominate the public memory. That difference provides a partial explanation for the intensity of the criticism against Israel in P-8 countries.
A comparison between Spain and Germany is instructive. A Staatsräson of the Federal Republic is that Germany bears a unique responsibility for the continued existence and security of the State of Israel, and thus the alliance with Israel is a core national interest. Criticism of Israel or of Jews is an exceptionally sensitive issue in German politics and culture. Israel has active strongholds of almost unconditional support in the country, including in friendship associations with thousands of members and in the largest media group, Axel Springer. Israelis who have spoken to a German audience on topical issues will recall how much hesitation and apologetics precede any question about Israeli policies that may ring critical.
These sensitivities and sentiments are completely absent from Spanish public discourse.
The aforementioned Pew Research Center poll conducted in the spring of 2025, which informed that 75% of the Spanish public holds unfavorable views of Israel, also informed that no less than 64% of Germans share the same view. This is, perhaps, the most damning and alarming of all the data about attitudes toward Israel published in the recent year.
Yet there are important nuances. First, whereas the unfavorable majority formed in Germany after almost two years of war included only 15% who described themselves as holding a “very unfavorable” view regarding Israel, in Spain, that majority included 46% who identified as holding a “very unfavorable” view. The anti-Israel camp in Spain is thus more radical and passionate in its opposition, whereas, even with the turnaround of public opinion, most Germans who are critical of Israel are more hesitant in expressing that sentiment, with 49% satisfied with stating that they hold a “somewhat” unfavorable view.[56]
Second, whereas the broad unfavorable public opinion in Germany gradually crystallized in response to the humanitarian situation that developed in Gaza, in Spain it existed already before and in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 attack, as indicated by YouGov surveys. In August 2021, when Israel had a centrist government, it was at -32% net favorability in Spain, compared to -12% in Germany. In November 2023, the net favorability of Israel in Germany was a mere -4%; in Spain, it was -50%.[57] The Spanish public, like its government, did not sympathize with Israel even in the immediate aftermath of October 7 and did not need an ongoing humanitarian disaster in Gaza to turn against it.
The different historical sentiments were reflected in policies. While the German government ultimately criticized Israel for its policies and issued a limited arms embargo, these actions stirred a fierce debate within the ruling conservative party, and were followed by a statement from Chancellor Friedrich Merz that “we have a clear compass: Germany is committed to Israel’s existence and security.”[58] Merz threatened that Germany would withdraw from the Eurovision, should the Spanish-led push to expel Israel succeed, describing the very entertainment of this initiative as “scandalous.”[59] As strong as the public unease about the situation in Gaza was, it led Germany in a very different direction than Spain.
In other large European countries where the Holocaust maintains a looming presence in national discourses and for which data are available, these nuances are less pronounced than in Germany, yet the existence of a more restrained public opinion in comparison to Spain is evident. The share of those holding a “very unfavorable” view toward Israel in Poland in the spring of 2025 was less than half that in Spain at a mere 22%; in France, it was 29%, and in Italy, 37%.[60] The net favorability of Israel was also considerably better than in Spain, although grim, at -25% in France and -37% in Italy (data for Poland were not available).[61]
All politics are local. This observation is associated with a former speaker of the American House of Representatives, Tip O’Neill. It is valid globally.
Nations, as do individuals, tend to identify with situations that remind them of themselves. Their pride. Their fears. Their struggles. The layers that make a national ethos.
The third aspect common to Israel-hostile P-8 countries is national narratives that are receptive to identification with the Palestinian cause.In the case of six of them, their historical memory is of independence acquired through laborious struggles and of being a weaker side coveted by stronger forces. That memory encourages perceptions of the Palestinians as a David whose struggles are reminiscent of their own, and of Israel, or what Israel has grown to become, as the Goliaths from which they were liberated.
There is little need to explain why, in the Republic of Ireland, which gained independence after centuries of brutally imposed British rule, such sentiments are strong, let alone given the crucial role British imperialism played in the creation of Israel. Perhaps there is also no need to explain why this is the case in tiny Malta. With 315 square kilometers, one of the smallest countries in the world achieved independence from Britain only in 1964, after centuries in which it exchanged hands between Muslim and Christian invaders and had not experienced a moment of independence. It forsook its relations with the Crown only in 1974.
Other historical memories receptive to Palestinian narratives are less familiar or expected. For example, Luxembourg.
Willem III, almost two meters tall, not always happy, not always glorious, reigned over the Netherlands as King, and, separately, over Luxembourg as Grand Duke. In the former he allowed liberalization, in the latter he kept power for himself. His erratic behavior, despotic tendencies, and scandalous addiction to sensual pleasures made him unpopular. Linguistically German and historically part of the Reich, Luxembourg’s shrunk borders under his rule were the outcome of a complicated arrangement intended to establish a buffer zone between France and Prussia and prevent an all-out European war. France coveted the territory during his reign, but he secured its independent status and neutrality.
Willem III died in 1890. He was survived only by a daughter, Wilhelmina. The laws of Luxembourg, unlike those of the Netherlands, did not allow for a woman on the throne. A very distant cousin from the House of Nassau-Weilburg was offered the crown. The Grand Duchy was saved. But the peace did not last long.
We learned about the complicated history of the Grand Duchy and its long path to independence and security from the German-Luxembourgian journalist Thomas Klein, deputy head of the political department at the Luxemburger Wort. Ahead of the October 2025 abdication of the 70-year-old Grand Duke Henri, Klein published a series of articles on the pan-European politics that led to Luxembourg becoming a Grand Duchy, the only one of its kind in the world.
Klein explained that a history that involves borders shrunk by bigger powers, brutal occupations, and a right to exist as an independent sovereign state that was anything but obvious, encourages some in Luxembourg to compare their past struggles for liberation to those of the Palestinians.
“There is a saying here, Wir wollen bleiben, was wir sind – we want to remain who we are. For most of history, there was a question whether Luxembourg is viable as a state. The French said they would take over Luxembourg. And the Belgians, and the Dutch, and so forth,” he said. In the 20th century, Germany swiftly occupied Luxembourg twice – in the First World War and the Second World War. The Grand Duchy survived all the assaults, but its public developed an appreciation that independence should not be taken for granted, coupled with sympathy with those who do not have it, and thus, when citizens of the Grand Duchy see the Palestinians, “they think that this could have been them.”[62]
Prof. David Howarth, a Canadian-British political scientist from the University of Luxembourg, who has lived in the Grand Duchy since 2012, said: “Luxembourg is a country that lost considerable territory over the years. When the Nazis occupied it, they marched in a boom and said, ‘Well, you are all Germans now.’ That might help understand why many in Luxembourg are alert to the problems of the Palestinians.”[63]
A national narrative receptive to identification with stateless nations struggling for dignity and independence can be also found in Slovenia. Home to slightly more than 2.1 million people on a territory almost equal in size to that of Israel, it is associated today with winter sports, basketball, and stalactite caves. Few outsiders remember that the former Yugoslav republic gained independence in the summer of 1991 following a 10 Day War of independence against the Serbian-dominated Yugoslav military. Belgrade aimed to prevent the disintegration of what, not long before, seemed the model for the possibility of a multi-ethnic, multi-religious state. In that war, the Slovenians overcame Yugoslav armored and air superiority through careful planning, massive secret mobilization, and clever use of asymmetric guerrilla warfare. David prevailed. In 1948, a national ethos grounded in that image would easily identify with the young Zionist state. In 2025, the Slovenians saw themselves in the Palestinians.
Norway is today a symbol of stability and peace; it is thus easy to forget that it gained full independence (under an imported Danish royal) only in 1905, after a century in which Sweden crushed its independence ambitions and imposed on it a union following a military campaign.
Iceland, approximately five times the size of Israel with less than 5% of its population and no military force, is another beacon of complacent serenity and secured independence that seems today to have always been so. Yet it gained independence from Denmark only in 1918, after six centuries of Danish rule, most of which direct, and fully detached from the Danish crown only in 1944.
The alignment of Palestinian narratives with Belgian and Spanish national narratives is more complicated. As Luxembourg, Belgium twice experienced brutal German occupation. The liberation from which, and the vulnerability it exposed, are part of the national ethos. Belgium is also a fragile federal union, at a graver risk of disintegration than any other EU country. That renders the right of collectives of people to self-determination a theme of interest and utility for some. A history of imperial power responsible for particularly heinous crimes with which it has never fully reckoned or made amends also plays a role; it encourages strong anti-colonial sentiments and deflections of those sentiments elsewhere.
Spain is home to several separatist groups, primarily the Catalans and the Basques, who share with the Palestinians an ethos of an oppressed nation denied the right to self-determination, and enthusiastically support their cause. The specter of international institutions or great powers imposing the creation of new independent states is horrifying for the mainstreams of Spanish politics, which is why the Kingdom has, for example, remained one of a few countries in Europe that have yet to recognize the independence of Kosovo. However, the current socialist government is dependent on the support of Catalan separatists as well as that of the radical, Marxist-inclined left. It cannot satisfy their core ambitions, making a deflection to an independence struggle far away, on which there is consensus on the left, a desired option.
Because of the Spanish civil war, some, particularly on the left, are receptive to a distorted understanding of the Palestinian-Zionist conflict as a binary struggle between the oppressed and the oppressors, in which the cause of freedom worldwide is at stake. That analogy is receptive to the historical lesson that the oppressors are certain to lose unless aided by external righteous forces.
“Spanish society has a special sensitivity shaped by our Civil War and dictatorship about violations of human rights. Since the 1930s, the Spanish left has seen itself on the side of the oppressed. That’s why there’s sympathy for Palestinians as victims,” said José Manuel Rivas Otero, a professor at the University of Salamanca who specializes in conflict studies and comparative politics.[64] “The Spanish left has always had a kind of romantic idealization of the Palestinian movement influenced by the armed struggle against [Franco’s] dictatorship. [The Palestinian struggle] was seen as a fight against oppression, so there was identification with it,” explained Manuel Jesús García Martin.[65]
Indeed, while they have speedily deterioratedsince October 7, 2023, Spanish attitudes toward Israel were far from rosy already before the war in Gaza. This takes us to the fourth shared aspect of P-8 countries: They have distant or more recent legacies of bias for the Arab side. Their pro-Palestinian stance did not emerge two years ago. When the October 7 attack occurred, their governments, and a majority of their publics, already had Israel framed as an ultimate villain and the Palestinians as the ever victims. That frame was too strongly embedded for the horrors of October 7 to put it in question.
In the case of Spain, relations with Israel were almost never without complications. Under Franco, it cultivated good relations with Arab countries, in part because of its dependency on oil and other supplies. The anti-Israel policy continued also during the early phases of transition to democracy. In September 1979, Adolfo Suárez became the first European president to receive the leader of the PLO, Yasser Arafat. Spain recognized Israel only in 1986.
While the intensity of the Spanish support for the Palestinian cause has had its highs and lows since then, the core commitment remained intact, and often a step ahead of other European countries. Already on November 18, 2014, the Congress of Deputies overwhelmingly approved a non-legislative proposition presented by the Socialist Parliamentary Group in favor of the recognition of Palestine as an independent state. At the time, the prospective recognition was conditioned by the existence of consensus on the matter in the EU.[66]
The Maltese affinity for the Palestinian cause has been equally strong. The founding prime minister of the tiny country, Dom Mintoff, emerged since 1973 as a harsh critic of Israel and a fierce advocate for Palestinian rights, granting the PLO official status in Malta and repeatedly condemning what he termed as Israeli aggression. One result of the close relations he formed with Libya in the 1970s in his quest to find rich allies and assert a nonaligned, anti-colonial position was that thousands of Maltese found work there and were acquainted with the more radical Arab points of view on the conflict, which they later transferred home.
While relations with Israel had a good start after Malta gained its independence, were maintained even in strained days, and were enhanced in the 2000s, the core Maltese sympathy for the Palestinian cause never dwindled. During the Israeli siege on Yasser Arafat’s compound in 2002, Maltese President Guido de Marco phoned him on a daily basis and sent personal messages through European leaders, urging Israel not to harm the Palestinian leader.[67] In 2019, then-Maltese President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca visited Israel and the Palestinian Authority, where she laid a wreath at the grave of Arafat in Ramallah and spoke about the unmitigated Maltese support for the right of the Palestinians to self-determination. The visit has not had the impact her Israeli hosts hoped for; today, no longer in office, she is one of the fiercest anti-Israel voices in Europe.
Ernest Hemingway said he went bankrupt in two ways: gradually, then suddenly. Several P-8 countries that did not have a long pro-Palestinian history have witnessed in the 2010s a fundamental anti-Israel shift. What happened there was, at the time, dismissed by arrogant observers as anecdotal, rather than what it really reflected: small tides forecasting a heavy storm.
If you desire an assured triumph at a boring dinner party, try the next trivia question: Who was the first foreign head of state to address the Knesset?
It was Ásgeir Ásgeirsson of Iceland, on March 28, 1966. Ásgeirsson spoke about the support of the Icelandic people for the establishment of the State of Israel and the importance of advancing the cooperation between the countries, while the Speaker of the Knesset, Kadish Luz, spoke about the unique friendship between the Israeli and Icelandic peoples, and their shared advancement of welfare policies and parliamentary democratic institutions.
In recent years, that diplomatic honeymoon became all but forgotten history as Iceland embraced a particularly hostile agenda against Israel. Becoming the first European state to recognize a State of Palestine in 2011 was the cornerstone. Four years later, in September 2015, the City Council of Reykjavik, where more than a third of the island’s population lives, passed a resolution banning all Israeli-made products (Israeli at large, rather than produced beyond the 1967 borders). The resolution, passed by a 9-to-5 majority, was proposed by Councilwoman Björk Vilhelmsdóttir, who said that she intends to spend the rest of the year doing humanitarian work in the Palestinian territories.
Another resolution by the City Council acknowledged the rights of the Palestinians to independence and a sovereign state of their own. It criticized what it called the Israeli government’s “racist apartheid policy.” Councilwoman Vilhelmsdóttir explained: “I believe that the city is sending a clear message that it will not purchase products from Israel while Israel oppresses another people on the basis of ethnicity and race and continues having the wall inside Palestine.”[68]
The boycott resolution was largely symbolic, as the City Council has no authority on diplomatic issues and had no trade relations with Israel. A week after its passage, it was retracted by the same Council, following a heated debate attended by BDS activists. Independence Party MP Björn Bjarnason argued that the boycott resolution should have clearly stated that it would only affect products from the occupied regions of Palestine, and not from Israel as a whole.[69]
The fiasco may have seemed, at the time, a victory for Israel. Yet a crucial question was not broached: how did it happen that in a relatively quiet year in the Middle East, the local leaders of a European capital that is home to a small number of Arabs and Jews, in a country that had little involvement in the conflict before and has no national interests in the Middle East, developed such passionate, activist anti-Israel sentiments?
The joke tells of a turtle that sits on the back of a galloping tiger. When they reach their destination, the turtle proudly exclaims: “How fast we run!”
There is a grain of truth in almost every joke, and the one in this brings us to the fifth shared aspect that explains P-8 hostility toward Israel. P-8 countries have in common not only a passion for the Palestinian cause, but also a limited capacity to influence Middle Eastern politics. The scope of their bilateral economic, defense, and other ties with Israel implies that, unlike in the cases of Germany, France, or the United Kingdom, they have few levers to affect its policies directly. The structure of European institutions that requires consensus or close to consensus in decision-making implies that even in unity of purpose and action, they cannot, unless joined by others, make a difference.
Another political condition shared by P-8 countries is that they are, at present, less reliant on the United States than most other European countries. They are not at the forefront of the expansionist ambitions of fascist Russia as are Finland, the Baltic states, and the East European members of the EU. They do not court American goodwill to prevent the disintegration of NATO, as Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy are embarrassingly forced to do. They are not embroiled in delicate regional issues that require or have the potential to require American mediation and support, as are the Balkan states, Greece, and Cyprus. Unlike Denmark, they have not found themselves in a bizarre territorial dispute with an erratic, ill-intending American administration.
The combination of relative immunity from American wrath and relative incapacity to affect Middle Eastern politics placed the P-8 countries in an awkward win-win situation. Their hostile views regarding Israel had little direct impact, yet involved few risks. Where their demands regarding the reaction to the war were not heeded, P-8 leaders benefited from basking in virtue signaling. Where ultimately embraced, P-8 governments were able to enjoy the sensation of running like a tiger. This does not mean that they were not concerned at all about diplomatic repercussions. Of the eight, only Belgium, under its new right-leaning government, is yet to recognize a State of Palestine. Yet it is possible that the four P-8 states that entertained through much of 2025 recognizing a State of Palestine without actually going the extra mile until France and the United Kingdom did, took a cautious path because they feared punching above their actual diplomatic weight.
The final aspect shared by P-8 countries is particularly frustrating to those who think Israel is not being treated fairly. The eight are characterized, although for different reasons, by weak pro-Israel public diplomacy (known in Hebrew as hasbara).
In two P-8 countries, Luxembourg and Iceland, Israel is represented through neighboring Israeli embassies (Belgium and Norway, respectively). In two, Malta and Slovenia, it is represented through a non-resident ambassador (the same for both). In one, Ireland, Israel closed its embassy a year into the war in retaliation for the escalation of the anti-Israel position. In all of the abovementioned five, the Jewish and Israeli-Jewish communities are tiny, and pro-Zionist Jewish activism is, unlike in several other European countries, minimal and under the radar where it exists at all.
Only three P-8 countries have fully functional Israeli embassies – Norway, Belgium, and Spain. As is the case of the five countries without a fully functioning diplomatic mission, the Jewish and Israeli-Jewish communities are tiny relative to the size of the population (in Belgium, where the number of Jews is the highest of the P-8, the majority are non-Zionist ultra-Orthodox). The impact of the Jewish and Israeli-Jewish populations on the public debate on the Middle Eastern conflict is thus negligible.
The absence of in-person, on-the-ground public, well-informed public diplomacy costs.
Yes – in theory, social media can be influenced from any point on the globe. Yet while social media, and the internet at large, are global instruments, they are largely consumed in national and local contexts, and to have an impact on those contexts, one has to be familiar with them culturally, politically, and linguistically. To work from within them, based on intimate knowledge of them, and not from the outside.
Yes – traditional media have lost much of their clout. Yet they are still crucial for public diplomacy, especially among decision-makers. To have a dominant voice in that media, Zoom calls are not enough. Journalists tend to be more attentive to sources of information who meet with them in person, and television producers prefer interviewees who can make it to the studio.
Where one voice is not heard, another is. If ever the story of how Iceland has become one of the most anti-Israel countries outside the Muslim world is written, a chapter will surely be dedicated to Salman Tamimi. The Palestinian sailor and construction worker turned high-tech professional moved to Iceland in 1971 at the age of 16. At the time, approximately 20 Muslims lived in the country.
In 1987, Tamimi founded the Iceland-Palestine Association and became an outspoken campaigner for Palestinian causes. In 2011, his sister, Amal, five years his younger, became the first foreign-born person to sit in the Icelandic parliament, although for a very short spell.
In a press interview in 2004, Tamimi explained why he believed Iceland should cut off its ties with Israel: “This idea that Israel is a tiny country trying to defend itself from all sides is a myth. It’s the most powerful nation in the region militarily. Their policies against the Palestinian people are in many ways worse than those which South Africa imposed upon the majority of its own people.”[70]
At the time, the words sounded radical. Today, the Association prides itself on facilitating the Icelandic recognition of a State of Palestine in 2011.[71]
Kindhearted to guests, including Israelis, Tamimi was not an easy person. By his death in 2020, he had not only Israel on his list of rivals, but also some of his former partners in the mosque-scene he initiated in 1997 – and his sister. Yet the rival he despised the most never fought back. All through the decades in which Tamimi lobbied for the Palestinian cause in the Icelandic public, collecting donations, inviting lecturers, and sending volunteers, there was no counter-Israeli voice, no counter Iceland-Israel association to provide for a more nuanced public discussion.
Even non-aligned, moderate voices need to be echoed by similar voices, or else, biased pro-Palestinian extremism will flourish, establishing a threatening, imposing presence.
Corrine Cahen, born in 1973, is a member of the Luxembourgian parliament from the centrist Democratic Party that is in coalition. She is a former chairperson of her party, former Minister for Family Affairs and Integration, former manager of a small family shoe-shop chain, and former journalist. She is also a Jew who studied in the 1990s in Jerusalem in the high days of the suicide bus attacks, narrowly escaping one such attack. And she is a fierce critic of Benjamin Netanyahu, as she made clear early in our meeting.
The Christmas after the war began, the lively-spirited Cahen recorded a video for Instagram on the Middle East situation. “I will tell you what happened. I said in my message that I wanted peace and that in war, there are always two sides, and that the two sides have to decide to make peace. That a child is a child, and I don’t care if it is an Israeli child or a Palestinian child. That every human being matters.
“And then, after this was posted, I got this really, really hard shit storm on Instagram. What they wanted me to say was that Luxembourg should recognize Palestine, that Palestine should be freed from the river to the sea. I am completely secular. But my name is Jewish, I come from a Jewish family, so, you know, they immediately want me to say that Israel is wrong, and I didn’t say that.”
In his office in Valetta, Honorary Consul Strickland showed us with pride the front page of the Times of Malta, which he said his family owns. The just-published issue featured an extensive interview done through Zoom with the non-resident Israeli ambassador Ruth Cohen-Dar, one of the foreign office’s most seasoned diplomats.
We asked Strickland if that was not proof that efficient public diplomacy can also be done without a functioning, on-the-ground embassy.
He explained why Israel needs one in Malta. “If, say, I was a full-time ambassador here, and it was my full-time job, then Monday I would go have coffee with the Foreign Minister. Tuesday, with the French ambassador, she is completely pro-Palestine. Just have coffee, talk to her. Then with the Italian ambassador, the Spanish. Then with different ministers, with the Prime Minister, with the media. Speak for Israel around the clock. Organize a celebration on Independence Day. Meet up with the Chamber of Commerce. An honorary consul doesn’t have the time to do all these things. I have four companies, I have 170 employees, that is my first job.”
While Israel has not been playing all over the field in Malta, the Palestinians have. “Their public diplomacy is ongoing,” said Strickland. “They have an ambassador here [Fadi Hanania]. He is very active on social media. Somebody is funding him, and somebody is obviously paying for his suits and the nice cars, and his driver.”[72]
Strickland’s 18-year-old son plays for a first-division Maltese football team. He invited us to watch their second match of the season. Sliema Wanderers versus Mosta. The small stadium overlooks gold-lighted medieval churches.
Only several dozen fans were present. The atmosphere was somewhat sleepy. The Sliema Wanderers lost to the inferior competition despite being in full control for 90 minutes.
The budgets of both teams on the pitch are, combined, about ten percent of the top Israeli premier league teams. We did not notice a marked difference in quality between the leagues. Despite heavy investments, never-ending optimism and a good amount of nationalistic bravado, Israeli football has been advancing backward, drifting away from European standards, surpassed by smaller states including Kosovo, Albania and Iceland. It is particularly weak on the defense.
Europe liked Israel more when it was a David. Tiny, vulnerable, struggling to survive against all odds. Israel should not apologize that, through many sacrifices, it is no longer a David. It should also recognize that negligence and arrogance often befall the Goliaths.
Policy Recommendations
Drawing on clause 19 of the American 20-point plan for the resolution of the Gaza conflict, the next Israeli government should present a creative and well-intending plan that offers a realistic prospect, even if extremely cautious and distant, for a form of mitigated Palestinian independence, and an Israeli commitment to avoid infrastructural actions that render such a prospect impractical. The Israeli plan should demand continued American and European commitments for the elimination of Hamas as a political and armed faction, an unequivocal Palestinian recognition of Israel as the national home of the Jewish people, and the intensive de-radicalization of Palestinian schools. In the short rather than long term, the absence of such a plan will make Israel a pariah state in most of Europe, not just among the P-8 countries. It may lead to a similar result in the United States sooner rather than later.
Israeli officials must reach out to the moderate elements of European social democracy, especially among the young, with both sides engaging in open dialogue that involves less preaching and more listening, and seeks common ground rather than virtue-signaling and confrontation.
Israeli officials should exercise more caution in labeling criticism and hostile diplomatic initiatives as antisemitism, even when these are harsh, unfair, hypocritical, and biased, and potentially legally justify these labels. Usage of that term should be preserved to clear-cut manifestations of Jew-hatred in order to maintain its credibility and avoid depleting it of meaning and effectiveness.
Israel must open fully functioning embassies in every European country. As the Maltese presidency of the UN Security Council during the war demonstrated, there are small and big states in Europe, but there are no unimportant states. The budget for this essential initiative should derive foremost from closure of the gratuitous and damning Ministry of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism, which, as our Center pointed to time and again, does a disservice to the causes it is tasked with promoting.
Every Israeli embassy in Europe should employ a full-time trained official responsible for communication with the traditional media and engagement with NGOs and Jewish organizations, and another full-time trained official responsible for social media and engagement with student and youth organizations.
Israel must significantly increase the number of influencers (journalists, bloggers, educators, junior politicians, community organizers, and artists) invited to visit the country, including from P-8 and other hostile countries. Contrary to the current policy, it should give visitors as free a hand as possible in seeing the country for themselves, as nothing more effectively dispels false narratives. Israel should also significantly increase the number of scholarships awarded to non-Israelis interested in attending Israeli institutions of higher education, in particular those training to be politicians, diplomats, and journalists.
– Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, with contributions from Antonio Peña and Dmitrii Sukhanov
[14] Amnesty International, “New Poll Shows an Overwhelming Majority of Irish People Believe Palestinians Live Under an Israeli Apartheid System,” amnesty.ie, January 18, 2024, https://www.amnesty.ie/israeli-apartheid-poll/.
[38] On the history and frictions of Islam in Iceland: Uriya Shavit and Fabian Spengler, Shar’ia and Life: Authority, Compromise and Mission in European Mosques (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2023), pp. 81-92.
[49] Interview by Antonio Peña, September 23, 2025.
[50] Interview by Antonio Peña, September 18, 2025.
[51] Interview by Antonio Peña, September 25, 2025.
[52] Interview by Antonio Peña, September 18, 2025.
[53] See the analysis of Israeli diplomat Raphael Schutz, former ambassador to Madrid: N. Markovitz, “The Diplomatic Inquisition [Hebrew],” Yated Neeman, September 29, 2025, p. 69.
[54] In 2012, then-Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg issued the first apology of its kind for the role Norwegians played in the murder of Jews: “Norway Apologizes for Deporting Jews during Holocaust,” BBC, January 27, 2012, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-16761558.
[55] “Luxembourg Says Sorry to Jews for World War II Government Collaboration with Nazi Occupiers,” World Jewish Congress, June 9, 2015, https://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/news/legislature-of-luxembourg-set-to-say-sorry-to-jews-for-world-war-ii-collaboration-with-nazi-occupiers-6-2-2015. In 2015, the parliament issued an apology following the work of a panel of historians commissioned by the government that revealed the scope of enthusiastic participation by the local authorities in deporting Jews during the Holocaust. An impressive monument at the center of Luxembourg City, created by Holocaust survivor and sculptor Shlomo Selinger in 2018, commemorates the murdered Jews of the Grand Duchy.
Religious Attitudes toward Religious Minorities in Comparative Perspectives
The Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry, Tel Aviv University, will hold an international conference on Religious Attitudes toward Religious Minorities on Wednesday, May 27, 2026, 12:00-19:00 (Gilman Building, Room 496).
Framework: All religions have complicated relationships with religious minority groups – whether these represent other religions, or groups within the same religion. The complexity results from tensions between concepts of ultimate truth and quests for domination on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the existence of pragmatic considerations, pluralistic inclinations, and concepts of self-defined exceptionalism. How these tensions have – and have not – been reconciled theologically, religio-legally, philosophically, and politically has much bearing on contemporary societies. Thus, studying religious attitudes toward religious minorities also has potential important policy implications.
Submissions: The Center welcomes proposals for 30-minute presentations, including those from early-career scientists and research students. Proposals should include a brief summary of the presentation (up to 250 words) as well as a CV. The deadline for submissions is February 15, 2026; the organizing committee will announce its decisions by March 1, 2026.
Subventions: Applicants arriving in Israel from abroad, who are early-career scientists or research students, may receive partial subvention from the Center to cover their travel costs. Request for a partial subvention should be noted in the application.
According to the polls, by June, Australia is likely to have a new Government with the leader of the Liberal Party, Peter Dutton, as Prime Minister. Dutton asked MP Julian Leeser, former shadow attorney general, to discuss with the editor-in-chief of the Report, Prof. Uriya Shavit, the reasons for the rise of antisemitism in Australia – and how a Liberal government plans to combat it
Prof. Shavit: Is there any intelligence to support the claims that foreign actors were involved in the wave of antisemitic incidents that Australia has witnessed since the October 7 attack?
MP Leeser: I think the Australian Federal Police have said this, the state police have said this, and some government ministers, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and others, have expressed concern about foreign actors. It was actually the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, Reece Kershaw, who raised this issue in a news conference last year after the Adas Israel Synagogue bombing in [December 2024 in Melbourne]. He first raised the prospect that there were potential foreign actors involved in the antisemitic attacks.
Is it Iran? Is it some of the other countries that have an interest in disrupting Australia and its social harmony? Is it Russia? Is it the PRC [People’s Republic of China]? There’s been no concrete evidence of any of that.
The most recent incidents, including the firebombing of a childcare center in [Sydney, January 2025] and attempted arson, appear to have been the work of hired criminals. These individuals used antisemitism not for ideological purposes but simply to cause disruption. In fact, there is a suggestion that the kingpin financing these crimes wanted these incidents to occur as a way to influence a potential sentence he is facing.
Prof. Shavit: So why target Jews?
MP Leeser: I can’t answer that definitively. I could speculate that it’s because of the increasing antisemitic incidents in Australia since October 7, particularly in December 2024, with the firebombing of Adas Israel and the firebombings of cars in Sydney and Melbourne. This is just adding fuel to the fire and causing further panic.
Prof. Shavit: Were you personally affected? As someone who frequents a synagogue?
MP Leeser: Yes. My conception of being a Jew in Australia has always been one of security. Jews have been in Australia since the First Fleet, and this is one of the few countries on Earth where there has never been state-sanctioned discrimination against Jews. Despite our small numbers, Jews have succeeded in every imaginable field. Australia has been uniquely welcoming to Jews. Australia took more Holocaust survivors per capita than any nation other than Israel. The Jewish community is generally well-liked.
This recent surge in antisemitism has shocked everyone and rocked our sense of what it is to be a Jewish Australian. When Adas Israel was firebombed, it deeply affected me. It was probably the first time I cried during this entire period.
My family came to Australia in 1849 to build a synagogue in Adelaide. Seeing a synagogue attacked in 2024 was something I never expected. The sense that, you know, we’ve gone from a country where my family came to build synagogues to a country where they’re burning synagogues. The images of the firebombing looked like something out of a Holocaust film or Kristallnacht, not something you’d ever expect to see in Australia.
Jews in Australia are now more concerned about their personal security. People are discussing making aliyah. Security has increased around Jewish schools and communal institutions, and people are paying more attention to security at their own premises and homes.
Prof. Shavit: Are you – plainly put – afraid for your safety now?
MP Leeser: No, I’m not afraid, but I am more conscious of security. We are taking more precautions than we otherwise would have.
Prof. Shavit: Your party published an action plan in January, calling for more severe penalties for antisemitic crimes.
MP Leeser: Since then, some of the items in our action plan have actually been made law, particularly regarding mandatory minimum sentences and hate crime legislation we forced the government into backing. In fact, the most shameful minister in the government, in my view, is the Attorney General, Mark Dreyfus, who is actually Jewish. He has dragged his heels and opposed much of this legislation, but the Prime Minister ultimately forced him to support it.
Prof. Shavit: Your party is unique, perhaps in the entire history of democracies, in having a candidate for Prime Minister who is a former police officer. That is why I was all the more disappointed that the action plan did not emphasize the need for more policing.
MP Leeser: What we have said very clearly in relation to policing is that we will direct the Australian Federal Police, the AFP, in two ways.
Firstly, we are going to put together a multi-unit task force. Unlike what the government has done – just relying on the AFP itself – there is a real issue with coordination between the AFP and state police. Additionally, there hasn’t been enough input from security agencies, such as our domestic security agency, ASIO, or the financial transactions authority, among other security agencies.
Secondly, we will direct the AFP to prioritize dealing with antisemitism. That is, in terms of police responsibilities, us saying to the police: this is the first order of business.
But indeed, if you were to say to me, “Look, we’ve seen this [policy] here or there, and it has had a greater effect in terms of getting arrests and prosecutions,” I’m all ears. Because not only do I, as a Jewish Australian, take this seriously, but my leader does as well.
And the shameful thing for both the federal and state governments is that it really took the firebombing of the Adas Israel Synagogue for them to start making arrests and setting up police operations.
We argued – when I say “we,” I mean the opposition, the party led by Peter Dutton, and the Jewish community – that there should have been arrests on the 8th and 9th of October 2023, both the hate preachers in Western Sydney who called October 7 a day they had been waiting for and the protesters at the Sydney Opera House. Everything that has occurred since then has been a direct result of the government’s failure to set boundaries and strictly enforce them.
Prof. Shavit: You are predicted to win the elections.
MP Leeser: We are doing better in the polls, and we have a chance of winning, but history is against us. There hasn’t been a one-term government in Australia since the Great Depression.
But one of the reasons we are in a strong position is that ordinary Australians look at the level of crime, particularly antisemitic crime, and feel that the government has lost control of our streets.
This issue has been particularly frustrating because both the opposition and the Jewish community have been calling on the government to take action for 18 months. When the government finally set up police operations at both the state and federal levels, it did make a difference and helped stem some of the crime; but it came very late. The measures had to be quite significant and extreme because they had allowed the situation to spiral out of control.
For example, in New South Wales, state police have deployed helicopters over Jewish suburbs. There has been a significant increase in police presence; it’s almost like being in a police state in areas with high Jewish populations. These measures became necessary because, night after night, there were firebombings, mass graffiti attacks, and other incidents.
Prof. Shavit: But why were they so slow? Obviously, the Prime Minister isn’t antisemitic. So why?
MP Leeser: So, in the Labour Party, it’s different from the Prime Minister and the state premier. But let’s just focus on the federal political scene. The Labour Party is wedged in two ways. Firstly, it’s competing with the extreme left Greens vote in the inner cities for who can be the most woke and anti-Israel. And then, in Western Sydney, the seats there are large Muslim constituencies.
Indeed, some of those Muslim constituencies have been so upset with the way in which the government is seen to have [supported] Israel that they have set up their own party, called The Muslim Vote, to challenge sitting Labour MPs. So, the government is wedged on both sides and therefore, they responded to the whole event – the whole events of October 7 and, indeed, the antisemitism that followed – with a lack of moral clarity.
They couldn’t mention antisemitism without also mentioning Islamophobia. Now, Islamophobia is bad, and when it occurs, it needs to be called out. I have called it out both before and after October 7. But there was only one community that was in the gun from October 7, and that’s been the Jewish community. So there’s been a failure to recognize that.
Secondly, I think there’s been a failure to properly understand what my leader understands, what my party understands, and what our community understands: that you have to crack down on this early and hard because we’ve seen it all before, and we know where it goes. I don’t think he [Prime Minister Albanese] has any sense of that. His affinity is not with the Jewish community.
He was a pro-Palestinian activist for many, many years. He’s been in Parliament since 1996, and even as late as the mid-2000s, he was still attending pro-Palestinian rallies. [Still, when ] the Greens in his own constituency started to move pro-Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions resolutions, to his credit, he fought some of those within his own local council in his electorate. But his natural sympathies are not with the Jewish community. He’s not an antisemite – I don’t think he’s that – but he doesn’t wake up in the morning with an innate understanding of who we are and where this goes.
And I think, you know, for the last 20 years, there has been, within the Labour Party, an increasing number of increasingly anti-Israel resolutions passed through their conference. The political philosophy of the Labour Party at the federal level is very hostile to Israel, and that hostility has ended up going hand in hand with hostility toward our community.
Prof. Shavit: Let’s say someone vandalizes a synagogue. And let’s say, hypothetically, it’s not because that person is an antisemite. What difference does it make? It’s still a criminal offense.
MP Leeser: That’s right. The federal police used a very unhelpful phrase when they spoke about those Sydney January incidents. We called them a terrorist event. I was one of the first people to call them a terrorist event because I think they met the definition of terrorism.
But the state police [in New South Wales] said it wasn’t a terrorist event. Instead of doing as you suggested and calling it a criminal event, they called it a “hoax.” And when you call an event like that a hoax – when it involves our community – you couldn’t have chosen a poorer word.
That’s because it downplays what was a very serious incident that caused the same amount of fear as a declared terrorist event would have.
There are people who just don’t get it.
Prof. Shavit: Or they pretend not to, which is, in a way, worse.
MP Leeser: No, I think they genuinely don’t get it. I think there are ministers in the federal government who do get it, but they are deeply conflicted because of their own constituencies.
Prof. Shavit: Because we see similar trends in Canada – similar failures of appropriate treatment by law enforcement…
MP Leeser: And universities.
Prof. Shavit: It makes me wonder whether the problem is that those two countries – Australia and Canada – have unresolved issues with their own colonial legacies, and Israel becomes a convenient deflection for some people.
MP Leeser: Look, this woke philosophy has spread through universities from the United States to Canada, and the USA is not much better either. These societies, Australia, Canada, and the USA, were all British colonies.
Within academia, starting in America and unfortunately spreading elsewhere, this narrative has emerged about power and privilege; the idea that you’re either born with power, or you’re not. The worst kind of privilege is white privilege. And the easiest way to start dismantling white privilege is by targeting Jewish privilege.
So, yes, that sick philosophy is definitely being taught in universities. But it’s not the only reason for what’s happening.
I think too few people recognize patterns in history. When you’re in the bubble, it’s easy to think everyone thinks like you. But they don’t.
The Shoah is such a key event for the Jewish people, and we’ve tried for a long time to engage in Holocaust education in this country, as they have in Canada and the USA. But clearly, it’s not enough. People do not recognize the broader tropes of antisemitism, its conspiratorial nature, and the cyclical patterns it follows.
And then, the anti-Israel activity on university campuses is just the modern manifestation of antisemitism.
Prof. Shavit: It’s ironic, though – having Australian college students condemn Israeli “colonialism.”
MP Leeser: Yes, of course. The Israelis fought the British. They are the last people who should be called a colonial power.
Prof. Shavit: Australian soldiers helped take over the land from the Ottomans.
MP Leeser: Including my great-grandfather. So yes, there’s an irony there. But I don’t think we should overplay it [when discussing the reasons for antisemitism in Australia].
It’s part of the explanation for what’s happening in academic circles. But more broadly, I think it’s a failure to recognize history, a failure of moral clarity, and a failure to crack down on extremism early.
We’ve been asleep at the wheel. Not just Australia, but the Jewish community more broadly. While we’ve been complacent, our strategic adversaries, both domestic and international, have become much more organized.
Prof. Shavit: Students of history who watched the Trump-Zelensky meeting were reminded of 1938. And very troubled. Do you share that sentiment as a party or as an individual?
MP Leeser: Well, look, the first thing to say is that when we were in government until 2022, Australia was the largest non-NATO financial contributor to Ukraine. We gave them Bushmasters, sent financial aid, and strongly supported President Zelensky. We’ve been very critical of the current government because it has failed to send munitions, failed to reopen the embassy for two years, and, despite Ukraine freezing, failed to send coal, even though we have large coal deposits. Again, this is due to internal domestic political reasons.
Now, suddenly, the Prime Minister is talking about committing troops to Ukraine, but many on my side don’t take him seriously. He has dragged his feet on everything else. If troops were sent, they wouldn’t be engaged in peacemaking or peacekeeping.
That being said, most Australians, both on the right and in the broader community, see Ukraine as the front line in the war on Western civilization. What baffles me is that some of those same people don’t see Israel as the front line, too. That disconnect makes no sense to me.
The bipartisan disgust [we have] for Putin, particularly in relation to Ukraine, is partly due to the 2014–2015 downing of a Malaysian Airlines flight over Ukraine by Russian forces. Many Australians were on that flight, which adds another dimension to our view of Putin.
The Ukrainian community here is relatively small, about 40,000 people, but I always contrast their activism with the pro-Palestinian protests. Both groups want to influence foreign policy. The Ukrainian community organizes concerts, holds public meetings, and earns respect. Meanwhile, the pro-Palestinian protests are violent and call for people’s deaths.
Prof. Shavit: That’s a very good point. No one ever thought to attack an Orthodox church because of what Russia is doing, or a mosque because of what Iran is doing, yet somehow, people take it as a given that synagogues are attacked because of what Israel is doing.
MP Leeser: Exactly.
And that’s the key point. The events of this summer have shown that the rise in antisemitism in Australia wasn’t just a reaction to October 7; it merely provided an outlet for something that was already there.
Again, the government’s response has been utterly inadequate. Instead of cracking down hard and early, law enforcement stood by. In my state, the police literally escorted protesters from one end of the city to the Opera House while telling Jews not to enter the city that night. Law-abiding citizens were not protected.
Prof. Shavit: Are people actually making aliyah, or just considering it?
MP Leeser: People are seriously discussing it. It’s not a mass exodus, but no one wants to be the last one left.
Prof. Shavit: I am reminded of a famous front-page headline, although with regard to a potential Labor victory in another country.
MP Leeser: Do I think this is the most consequential election in my lifetime? You’ll think, “Oh, I’m just a shill for my side of politics.” But if you talk to other community leaders here, they will say the same thing. I think if Labour is returned, and this is the key thing to know, it won’t be returned in its own right. It will end up being in a coalition with the Greens and some independents, which we call the TEALS because they wear teal-colored clothing. Many of them, though not all, are hostile to Israel, even though they now represent seats with significant Jewish populations.
Prof. Shavit: Contrary to the common perceptions, there wasn’t an increase in the number of antisemitic incidents in 2024 compared to 2023 in all Western countries, but Australia “shines with shame,” if I may use that phrase.
MP Leeser: It shines with shame. It shines.
Prof. Shavit: And it’s not a country associated with intolerance.
MP Leeser: No, it really isn’t. But we had appalling incidents. The university vice-chancellors, really, they are among the worst people. They just wanted to wash their hands of this, to keep the peace.
And there are things the Prime Minister said, like on October 10, 2023: “We stand by Israel. Always will.” And yet, you know, the underfunding.
The Foreign Minister here, Penny Wong, is just sinister. The fact that she went to Israel and didn’t go south [the Gaza Border]. The fact that she compared Israel with Russia and China.
The leadership of the far left in this country has so much to answer for. We believe it is this leadership that has given a sort of wink and a nudge to people who want to do bad things.
You know, I wore my kippah in Parliament for a week in 2023 because school students felt uncomfortable wearing theirs.
One of the things I did this year was write a letter to Jewish school students going back to school because I just wanted them to know that they need to crack on with their studies, and that, you know, we’re going to do our best to deal with these issues and so on.
And my big focus has been dealing with antisemitism on campuses because it’s all about the future of the country. It’s about, you know – can they enjoy the Australia that we’ve enjoyed? And that’s what I want them to do, and that’s what I’m working to achieve.
You know, I love Israel, I want to be there, I love going, and I support it very strongly, but I want to live here in Australia, and I want my kids to have that choice, too.
Prof. Shavit: I’m curious, if there were another referendum today, would you be on the republican side?
MP Leeser: Oh no, I’m a very strong constitutional monarchist. Always have been. I was very involved in the 1999 campaign to defeat the republican push here.
One of the great things about the Crown is that constitutional monarchies tend to be freer. They tend to respect rights more. However much ambition a politician like me might have, there is at least one office we can’t get our hands on: the Crown. It provides stability and continuity. There is less republican sentiment in Australia today than at any time in recent history.
The United States: The Making and Unmaking of a Racist
Dr. Carl Yonker
Derek Black was once the heir apparent to lead the white nationalist movement in the United States. Born in 1989 into an infamous white nationalist family, Derek was considered a prodigy in the movement. He had his own radio show and a website that targeted young people and worked to make white nationalism more palatable to a mainstream audience. In 2013, however, he publicly renounced his white nationalist beliefs. It was a watershed moment in a gradual awakening, which in 2024 turned into a national crusade against racism.[1]
Derek’s journey from being a leading young voice of the white nationalist movement to being one of its most vocal opponents offers valuable insights into the mechanisms of how white nationalism is propagated and what makes it appealing and suggests pathways for how people can escape its grip. His story demonstrates that people can change their views, but doing so is not easy and can be isolating. It highlights the power of community, engagement in dialogue, education, and empathy in challenging racist ideologies.
These insights form the core of Derek’s recently published memoir, The Klansman’s Son: My Journey from White Nationalism to Antiracism – A Memoir (Abrams Books, 2024). They were expanded on in an interview he gave last summer for the For a Righteous Cause Report.
In the memoir, Derek came out as transgender while not considering that aspect of identity crucial to a remarkable political transformation. Today, Derek uses they/them and she/her pronouns. This article will use masculine pronouns in discussing Derek’s years as a leading racist activist.
White nationalism is a social movement with an ideology that promotes the belief that white people constitute a distinct and superior racial group. It advocates for the preservation of white cultural and political dominance. It considers race a biological category that divides humanity into distinct groups and predicts their behaviors and capabilities. It sees Jews as non-white and in control of global media and finance, propagates the notions that white culture and “whiteness” are under attack and must be defended and preserved, and, in some of its manifestations, calls for the establishment of a white-only nation or the segregation of races, based on the perceived threat of multiculturalism and immigration to white identity.
Like other extremist ideologies, white nationalism draws people in through a combination of psychological and sociopolitical factors. One of its key attractions is the sense of community, belonging, identity, and meaning it offers. It appeals in particular to young white men who feel alienated and increasingly isolated and seek to find unambiguous answers to their pressing questions about the world that are not provided by their existing communities or the ones in which they were raised.[2]
These young men gravitate toward white nationalism because it gratifies their ego with little effort on their part. It infuses in them a sense of value by creating a shared identity with other disaffected white men through the belief that only they and their look-alike are worthy, only they understand reality for what it is, and only they are willing to make the necessary sacrifices for civilization to survive.[3] White nationalists believe they are working to bring about an “apocalyptic future they all believe is inevitable” and are no longer passive participants in the world.[4]
However, the factors that usually draw people to the movement were experienced in an entirely different way by Derek Black – an insider in the white nationalist movement, not an outsider drawn to and joining it. Derek was immersed in the culture of supremacist racism from an early age, internalizing its beliefs, participating in its community, and becoming a key figure in the movement.
Derek’s father, Don Black, is a former leader of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), one of several organizations that claim the mantle of the infamous 19th-century organization, and the founder of Stormfront, the first major white nationalist website, which has served as a hub for racists, neo-Nazis, and other far-right extremists since the early 1990s under its motto “white pride world wide.”[5] Derek’s godfather is David Duke, the former founder and leader of the Knights of the KKK, and his father’s oldest friend.[6]
Actually, Duke was more than just a “godfather.” He was also a mentor and even a second dad to Derek. Duke and Don Black met as teenagers in the white supremacy movement in the 1960s, and they became close friends. While Don attended the University of Alabama, Duke attended Louisiana State University, where he met and married Chloe Hardin, a fellow believer in racial segregation and white supremacy. They had two daughters before divorcing.
After the divorce, Chloe reconnected with Don Black, and with Duke’s blessing, they began dating, eventually marrying in the late 1980s, with Duke as the best man. Derek was born shortly after, and the families merged. Duke frequently spent holidays with the Blacks, and both men worked together to advance their white nationalist agenda and educate Derek.
Derek was raised in West Palm Beach, Florida, a diverse town with a sizable Jewish population and Haitian and Hispanic immigrants, where Chloe was born. After Derek finished third grade, Chloe and Don pulled him out of the public school system, concerned it would corrupt his beliefs, and he was homeschooled through high school.[7]
At school, Derek had been friends with Black, Jewish, and Hispanic kids, always polite, friendly, and pleasant in personal interactions. Derek recalled that it seemed very normal to be living in a community with so many Jews and getting holidays off in the fall, despite his family being “obsessed with Jews…this Jewish conspiracy that the world is run by Jewish people.”[8]
However, he maintained a distance and separation – no Jewish or non-white friends visited his home, while his white nationalism was kept separate from his interactions with those friends.[9] This duality – separating between parts of his life that stood at complete odds, essentially cultivating two identities – would characterize Derek’s life until he left the movement.
For Derek, being born into and growing up in the movement was akin to growing up in a religious community – most are very comfortable in the environment in which they were raised, not really questioning the worldview, beliefs, and understandings that define it. Yet, unlike the ability to be passively part of a religious community, being part of the white nationalist movement is “a fundamentally activist” form of affiliation.[10] Derek went beyond basic active participation and “ended up leaning very hard into the activism aspect of it, becoming a spokesperson, running for office, and becoming more publicly visible” than others who grow up in the movement whose parents are major activists.[11]
Don Black never forced his son into the spotlight. But by the time Derek arrived at university in 2010, he had spent more than a decade transforming into an internationally recognized celebrity in the white nationalist movement his parents and Duke helped create. At age 10, Derek set up the website Stormfront for Kids and, several years later, established a radio show, first on Stormfront and then on an AM station that broadcasted in South Florida.[12] The deep involvement strengthened his confidence in his family’s and the movement’s ideology and strengthened his conviction he would one day lead it.[13]
Critical to Derek’s and Don’s efforts to grow the movement was to constantly refine the message of white nationalism so that it would have broader appeal. They rebranded it as a more mainstream and intellectual movement. Eschewing the use of overtly racist language, epithets, and threats of violence, Don and Derek sought to present their ideas as legitimate intellectual debates about culture, demographics, and the future of Western civilization. Under the veneer of intellectualism and rationalizations, they also framed their ideology not as one of hate and violence, but as a defensive, rational, data-driven argument about preserving cultural heritage and identity.
For Derek and Don, it was about fighting for the rights of whites and protecting white heritage, not fighting against minority rights.[14] Derek reflected how he was “drawn to and affirmed by going to conferences and white nationalist events with [my] dad [featuring] tenured professors who are credentialed in ways that anyone in society theoretically respects and says, ‘oh, that’s an expert’ […] So I felt I was the person… who had all this factual support behind [my ideology].”[15]
In 2008, Derek won a seat on the Palm Beach County Republican Executive Committee, winning 167 of 287 votes in his precinct after canvassing the neighborhood, going door to door asking for votes using all the movement’s talking points. Yet, in the end, the Republican party refused to seat him because he declined to sign a loyalty oath to the party. However, it was a moment that reaffirmed in Derek’s and Don’s minds that mainstreaming their ideology within the Republican party was the correct approach.[16]
And then, a shift occurred. It wasn’t a sudden awakening, far from that. The turning point in Derek’s journey as heir apparent to Don’s legacy began when he arrived at New College of Florida in Sarasota in the fall of 2010 to complete his bachelor’s degree.
Derek had been unsure about attending college, but his mother insisted. Initially, he enrolled in a community college. After seeing his high grades, his parents encouraged him to transfer to a four-year school, believing a degree would bolster Derek’s bonafides as a white nationalist intellectual.
New College of Florida is known for being affordable, highly ranked, and an eccentric haven for non-traditional students, especially homeschooled ones like Derek, who were accustomed to self-directed learning. There, Derek studied German and medieval history. Despite New College’s liberal and multicultural reputation, Derek’s parents were unconcerned and unworried about its potential to change or challenge Derek’s white nationalist beliefs. On the contrary, they believed it was Derek who would impact and influence the thinking of people on campus.[17]
They were wrong.
At the small liberal arts school, Derek, at the time 21 years old, began more closely interacting with people of diverse backgrounds and worldviews, building new relationships and a community separate from his family and white nationalist ones.
Initially, Derek also kept his white nationalist beliefs hidden. In his first semester in the fall of 2010, he bonded with another student, a Peruvian immigrant named Juan, who had transferred from a community college. He also bonded with an Orthodox Jew named Matthew Stevenson over a shared love of music. He even briefly dated a Jewish girl.
Derek recalled that despite arriving at New College with deeply antisemitic views, he discarded his anti-Jewish beliefs quickly, ceasing to see Jews and Judaism as something alien or strange while maintaining his other white nationalist beliefs.[18] He also recalled the disconnect he felt when realizing that the Jewish global conspiracy, which he and his family believed existed, never manifested itself or seemed real on a day-to-day basis and personal level.[19]
But his ability to keep his two identities and lives separate changed dramatically in early 2011 when he was “outed” on the university’s online forum as a racist white nationalist while studying abroad in Munich. At that point, Derek’s worlds collided, and he was confronted by his friends’ confusion, hurt, and questions.
After his views were exposed, peers and friends at New College openly grappled on the Forum with how best to address the situation, the debate open for him to see. Some thought outing him was inappropriate; some hoped New College could be the source of transformation for him. Some argued Derek should be ostracized, urging their classmates to consider how his presence on campus could affect the experience of minority students.[20] The final point impacted Derek the most – it made him uncomfortable to think he was harming a community and people he genuinely cared about, and it hurt him to see people he knew and cared about recoil from him and not come to his defense.
Despite this, Derek’s white nationalist convictions remained largely unmoved. He believed he could navigate and weather the storm, remaining part of both communities that held nothing in common but to which he was deeply committed. When Derek returned to campus in the fall of 2011, some ostracized him, but some did not.
Two Jewish New College students, Stevenson and Moshe Ash, made a decision to engage Derek directly. They did so regularly, inviting him to Shabbat dinners and other social gatherings. These interactions were not framed as debates or attempts to convert him but rather as opportunities for him to engage with others as a person, not as an ideology. The first dinner set the framework for those that followed – Derek joined Stevenson, Ash, and Juan at Stevenson’s place on campus, where they ate and discussed an array of topics they shared an interest in, from mundane campus gossip to class schedules, studying abroad, music, religious history, theology, and history.
This is not to say Stevenson and Ash were not prepared to discuss ideology; they were, having read more than 4,000 of Derek’s posts on Stormfront and listening to episodes of his radio program. Yet they were convinced a non-confrontational, relational approach would be most effective at chipping away at Derek’s beliefs.[21] Stevenson believed that by not getting into arguments, Derek would keep returning and stay engaged. It wasn’t about building a case to convince Derek, but building a relationship that made Jews and other minorities more human to him and thereby dismantle his racist, conspiratorial views.
To those who criticized his decision not to confront Derek, Stevenson countered that the dinners and relationship-building themselves were subversive acts that would undermine his worldview. Another friend, Allison, took a more direct approach but also did so in a respectful and relational manner. She directly engaged Derek in ideological discussions and challenged his core convictions. Allison initially opposed Stevenson’s idea to engage with Derek and invite him to Shabbat dinners. However, she eventually changed her mind and became the most engaged in challenging his views in their conversations.
It’s rare and challenging to change people’s minds by presenting arguments or telling them they are wrong. The real difficulty lies in getting them to reconsider who and what they care about. Through the meetings with his friends, Derek realized his belief system was not based on facts or logic but was tied to a deep commitment to his family and to a community that cared about him and that he cared about in return.[22]
Coming to terms with this was destabilizing because Derek had always considered himself someone who formed beliefs based on reason and was open to changing his mind. This caused his commitment to the white nationalist community to waver, and he became more open to the arguments Allison and others were posing.
At first, Derek remained active in the white nationalist movement, even organizing a large conference. With time, however, he slowly became less active. He stopped posting on Stormfront and neglected his co-hosting duties with his father on their radio program.
Derek’s “slow disaffiliation from white nationalism” continued as his sense of personal responsibility grew for the harm and hurt he had caused. He recognized that his involvement in the white nationalist movement had contributed to a culture of hate and division, and he felt a moral obligation to make amends.
The most painful realization for Derek was knowing that by renouncing his beliefs, he was necessarily separating himself from his family and community. Indeed, up until Derek’s public rebuke of white nationalism in August 2013, he had “been unwilling to drive a wedge between [himself] and [his] family.”[23]
This was the most difficult part of leaving the movement, more so than realizing his beliefs and community were wrong. In our conversation, Derek noted, “It was a really traumatizing thing to ultimately separate from my family and the community, but the individual facts, the arguments [of white nationalism] didn’t feel dangerous to contradict. I attribute it to [feeling like], ‘well, I was raised in a community and I didn’t come up with these things or seek them out,’ so finding out they were wrong was not earth shattering.”[24]
Derek’s experience highlights the complexity of disassociating from deeply rooted ideologies, especially when family and community ties are involved. His story demonstrates the need for both preventative measures and support systems for those affected by extremist ideologies. Change is possible but requires intentional community involvement and institutional support.
Beyond the lessons that can be drawn about leaving white nationalism, Derek’s life story also warns of the broader societal danger of the mainstreaming of white nationalism. The white nationalism of Derek Black, Don Black, and David Duke is dressed in a suit and tie, made to look respectable and intellectual rather than overtly racist in order to appeal to more moderate and conservative listeners. Cloaking extremist views in palatable rhetoric, Derek and other white nationalists sought to normalize the movement’s talking points on immigration, multiculturalism, and race in the mainstream political discourse of the conservative movement, overtaking it from within.
The past several years have unfortunately borne witness to the efficacy of this strategy as white nationalists like Don observe with pleasure how their ideas have seeped into the mainstream, advanced by influential conservatives like Tucker Carlson and others.
After leaving the movement, Derek initially remained silent, believing he had caused too much harm by speaking publicly in the past and would only exacerbate that harm by speaking in the future.
However, hearing the white nationalist rhetoric seep into the rhetoric of the Republican party and the January 6 insurrection sparked a conviction in Derek that he needed to share his story, shed light on the dangers of white nationalism, and actively fight hate, oppression, and injustice. The racists are encroaching on the mainstream of American politics, making Derek’s crusade for the righteous cause even more crucial.
[24] Interview by the author with Derek Black, August 22, 2024.
Britain and the United States: The Newfound Identity of Jewish Youth
Following October 7, Jewish educators in Western countries faced difficult challenges. One was the direct antisemitism Jewish children encountered, which for some was a first-of-its-kind experience. Another was that children who grew up in a world where Israel’s existence was a given, providing them confidence and moments of pride, had to cope with a new realization that the Jewish State was still existentially threatened. Yet another was that because of the accessibility to social media, children were exposed to traumatic images. The more they were engrossed with events, the more horrific documentation they saw.
Complicating matters further are, on the one hand, the culture of regulated speech, which makes moral clarity almost impossible, and on the other hand, the culture of manufactured emotions, which makes distinguishing authentic sentiments from artificial ones difficult.
One result of the troubling times was that some Jewish kids grew closer to their Jewish identity and particularly developed a greater sense of affinity to Israel, as suggested by conversations with three Jewish educators in London and in California. Yet the conversations also alerted about the ethical dilemmas the war in Gaza presented and about the danger that rallying against hate and a sense of victimhood would become the only definers of modern secular Jewish identity.
Yehuda Fink, from North London, is the Director of Education at StandWithUs UK, the British branch of the international, nonpartisan education organization that promotes instructional and informative programs on Israel and on fighting antisemitism for teachers, schoolchildren, and university students.
A former high school teacher, Fink, married and in his thirties, taught junior high school and high school Hebrew and history, with a focus on Jewish history. As the Director of Education at StandWithUs UK his primary duty is overseeing the contents offered to schoolchildren and university students, but he often delivers classes himself.
According to Fink, October 7 was a transformational moment for some young Jewish Brits. “The first reaction from pupils was asking what they could do to help. We did not hesitate to show them what had happened, and their response was a realization that they needed to take ownership.
“In the past, it has been difficult to educate and engage Jewish children with Israel. However, post-October 7, there has been a hunger from the vast majority of Jewish kids to understand why Israel is relevant to them. The engagement among Jews has increased. There seems to be a greater level of interest and more of a desire to be present in a safe Jewish space.”[1]
The interest in the events in the Middle East also involved doubts about the way Israel has conducted the war. “Some children have asked me why so many people are being killed on both sides and how any killing can be justified. For some, this is their first real experience of war. What we once saw from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was really quite limited. We didn’t have social media and so we didn’t see graphic videos of people being killed.
“There is a lot of anger among various communities. We tell children that we must not allow this war to become a new normal and that we must not get used to hostages being held in Gaza. We focus on trying to be brave enough to raise awareness. Most importantly, Jewish educators are more heavily highlighting that we must all act in a dignified manner.”[2]
Rabbi Motte Fradkin is a 43-year-old youth community rabbi and Judaic teacher at Chabad’s San Diego-based Hebrew Academy, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish school and high school with 350 pupils. A father of four children, he was born and bred in California before moving to New York City for yeshiva and to France and Australia for rabbinical training. His brother, Rabbi Josef Fradkin, is the Chabad Hebrew Academy Head of School; his father was the founder; his wife is the Judaic Principal.
Fradkin says the war impacted all of his students. “Unlike the previous years of peace between communities here in California, since October 7, all of my students have either witnessed antisemitism or have fallen victim to it. Never in all of these years have I had to ask my students if they feel genuinely safe. In the past, students have been almost completely unaware of the concept of antisemitism; year after year, we have had discussions about Jew-hatred, but the students have always told me how unrelatable it felt.
“One young male high school student, a ‘cool kid’ with a lot of friends, told me about his non-Jewish friends posting hateful antisemitic content. He approached me looking upset but later told me that his confidence was reassured after he spoke to one of his friends and changed his mind. I had taught this boy for two years, but that conversation on having to tackle antisemitism will remain the one I remember.”[3]
A challenge for Fradkin was how to educate his students not to allow the rage over October 7 to overcome their humanity. “It is important to remember that the Jewish people are not about hate. I always reflect with my classes on the words of Golda Meir. She taught us that we, as Jews, do not want fighting. The first lesson I teach to new classes is that if our enemies put down their arms, there would be peace in a second.
“To ensure my students respect others and avoid confrontation, I make it fundamentally clear that we, as Jews, have nothing against any other communities. To hate is not who we are. The lesson I teach to my students is that people are people, and humans are humans. I have these conversations over and over again with students of all ages. I have not experienced any Jewish student inflicting hate.
“The bigger problem here is that some people are ignorant. We work towards making sure that our youth are not. We put steps in place to add to our existing classes [on the conflict] and use the study of portions of the Torah to teach peace-induced values.”[4]
“Life will never be the same for our youth, but I am seeing a trend where school children are prouder than ever to be Jewish. There are a few kids who are neutral in their stance towards this war, but it is impossible to stay neutral forever.”
Thirty-six-year-old Rabbi Zevi New, the father of three, founded, in 2012, together with his wife Musy, the Youth Action Movement (YAM), an organization dedicated to empowering and energizing Jewish teenagers from San Diego to develop their understanding of what it means to live with a sense of purpose and commitment to Jewish values. The organization advocates mainly in-person and through lectures and seminars in high schools. Each week, YAM hosts Teen Community Shabbats, where educators have the opportunity to reach out to teenagers and impart advice, knowledge, and coping strategies for the current political and social climate. The Judaism he advances emphasizes religious practices in a way some Jewish families will not identify with.
He believes October 7 was a game changer. “The perception of what Israel means to students is the biggest change I have seen since October 2023. Israel is no longer just a place on the map but a place deep in students’ hearts. This tiny little country has really unearthed a component of Jewish life that is so important. I watch as students defend a place that they don’t know.
“San Diego represents the prime location for secular Judaism. In my teaching, I want to change the game and place a new cover on an old book. When Jewish students take their Stars of David outside from underneath their shirts, I consider them taking a giant leap. They become more passionate and find their identity.
“Already prior to October 7, I was so pleased to hear about a group of Jewish students challenging a high school newspaper publication that featured anti-Israel rhetoric. The students organized a march in protest and met with the school principal. Post-October 7, I’ve seen that style of thinking completely skyrocket. Every single student has become more in tune with their Jewish identity.
“The teens have taken to heart the defacing of posters of the hostages. That is easily the issue that I am most commonly encountered with by them. A casual joke about the Holocaust is very regular for the Jewish students, but the defacing have caused outrage.
“A former student of mine was studying at Stanford University and was in the class where the professor wanted to segregate Jewish students. The student told me that she would now always visibly wear her Star of David so that others on her campus feel represented.”[5]
I attended a Shabbat dinner organized by Rabbi New and learned how present the conflict in the Middle East has been in the lives of some Jewish high school students. A 16-year-old girl who studies in a non-Jewish school told me about her inability to control her emotions post-October 7. “If I see anyone supporting Palestine, I scream at them,” she said. “I was in school and shouted at another girl wearing a pro-Palestine sticker. I was so angry.”[6]
A 15-year-old boy born in Israel, also studying in a non-Jewish school, said he had approached a girl who spoke against Israel and asked her if she “supported Hamas.” That question was enough to result in his brief suspension, but he does not regret what he did.[7]
Another 15-year-old boy recounted that he reported a classmate for painting a swastika in the school bathroom. “The school principal personally thanked me,” he said.[8]
– Noah Abrahams
[1] Interview by the author with Yehuda Fink, August 20, 2024.
Historical Decline: An Interview with Sir Max Hastings
Sir Max Hastings is one of the leading historians of the Second World War. His many bestsellers include All Hell Let Loose: The World at War 1939-1945, Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1944-1945, Finest Years: Churchill as Warlord 1940-45, Nemesis: The Battle for Japan 1944-1945, and most recently, Operation Biting: The 1942 Parachute Assault to Capture Hitler’s Radar. He also published studies on The First World War, The Korean War, The Vietnam War, and The Falklands War, as well as a biography of Yonatan Netanyahu. A former international correspondent with the BBC, he later served as the editor-in-chief of the Daily Telegraph and the editor of The Evening Standard.
In a special interview for the For a Righteous Cause Report with the Head of the Center, Prof. Uriya Shavit, that is certain to stir controversy, Sir Hastings (b. 1945) presented unorthodox views about the teaching of the history of the Holocaust in schools. He also expressed grave concerns about the fighting abilities and willpower of the Western World. Portions of the interview were edited for clarity and style.
You’ve lamented the downgrading of the teaching of history, not just military history, but history in general.
Well, there’s an irony: in Europe and the United States, books about history continue to sell pretty well, but the teaching of history is at a pretty low ebb. I’m appalled that I have a teenage grandson who’s at a very expensive private school, and this year, he’s doing almost no history at all. They’re all busy doing computer studies and gender studies, and God knows what, but they’re not studying history the way we did. Now, what one has to accept, I think, is that the way we were all taught in my generation, which is the linear approach – that you start with the Romans and you work through the Dark Ages, the Middle Ages, and so on – nowadays I don’t think you can expect school children or even university students to engage in history taught in that way. Nonetheless, having that sense of the span of history does seem enormously important.
I make myself very unpopular sometimes when I say, well, of course, the business of white or black slavery was a terrible business that reflected a deep discredit on European civilizations. But the whole of human history is a story of the exploitation of the weak by the strong. And if you look, for instance, so much is being taught now about white-on-black slavery. I think people should learn a bit more about other forms of slavery, for example, in the Industrial Revolution and the conditions in which millions of industrial workers [were employed], especially in the United States and Britain, and also agricultural workers. It was something very close to slavery, and it existed for centuries. It just seems to me terribly important that one has that sense of context of trying to look at some broad span, which nobody is trying to do [anymore].
And you are also unhappy with the way the Holocaust is taught.
Holocaust studies are very big in Britain, the United States, and so on. And God knows one is not suggesting that the Holocaust should not be taught. But again, the business of context seems enormously important. First of all, the study of what? I would like to see the teaching of the Holocaust framed in the context of, for instance, what Stalin had been doing in Russia, and what Mao did in China at the same time; there were huge genocides taking place in other places. Up to 1942, let’s say, Stalin undoubtedly killed more of his people than Hitler had tried to do at that stage. And, of course, most historians of China believe that Mao was responsible for far more deaths than Hitler.
Now, I know you won’t suppose for a moment that one is seeking here to downgrade the Holocaust. I was thinking about this when I was walking my dogs this morning. I think it is true to say that the Holocaust is the only example in human history where camps served as death facilities that were explicitly created to kill people on the scale that they were at Auschwitz. But also, I have imprinted on my mind the memory of the number of non-Jewish Poles who were killed in Auschwitz alongside Jews. One is always thinking about the Armenian massacres by the Turks. And again, one has to keep repeating this mantra – none of this is to downplay the Holocaust. It’s just trying to see the Holocaust again in the context of what human beings have done to each other in other circumstances. And God knows I have actually read several of the books about what the Turks did to the Armenians, and that, in itself, is an unspeakable story, as I am sure you know.
The Holocaust is an exceptional crime in the annals of history. Can’t we acknowledge and teach its exceptionalism as well as teach about other genocides?
Of course. But, my point is that as things stand at the moment… For example, I would say that most reasonably well-educated schoolchildren believe that the Second World War was about Jews, and, of course, it wasn’t. The Second World War was about power and territorial conquest in the original, and the whole business of the Holocaust was an act of insanity.
One particular aspect of the insanity is, to me, to have diverted the resources that the Nazis did to killing Jews in the middle of the war when logic might have told Hitler that if he could only achieve military dominance first, then he could do whatever he liked to the Jews, or for that matter to anybody else. But to divert resources in the middle of the war? It’s something that still puzzles me because the whole business of the Holocaust and the killing of the Jews was an act of such stupendous irrationality as well as wickedness. It’s almost impossible to look for rationality in the midst of it, but nonetheless, one is always interested in these questions.
I often wonder, and so does my Jewish wife: If Britain had been occupied by the Nazis, would the British people have behaved better than, let’s say, the French did in [failing to] protect Jews? And the answer is we can’t know, we can’t be sure. We have to accept the fact – this is another point that I’m always strongly in favor of being taught – that antisemitism remained well into my lifetime a real factor. Not in the violent sense; I don’t mean that British people wanted to see Jews taken away in cattle trucks. But casual social antisemitism is something that one has seen in my lifetime among all sorts of circles of people who should know better. I’ve spent a lot of time studying the issue of the French and their behavior, and it is absolutely terrifying to see what they did.
But I think one good thing is that we have become more aware, and even the French have become more aware of how appallingly the French behaved. And some other nations too, as we know, that the Dutch did not behave entirely impeccably towards their Jews and so on…
Well, that is an understatement. You know, there is more teaching of the Holocaust than ever before, and there is more antisemitism than at any given time after the Second World War, so does that perhaps say that there is little point in studying history because the lessons are not learned?
Again, another difficult issue on which it’s easier to pose the issue than to come up with answers is the degree to which antisemitism and anti-Zionism have become entangled. And of course, I don’t think there’s any secret about the fact that all my life, I’ve loathed Bibi Netanyahu, who I used to know in my younger days. And, of course, for him and people like him, it always suited their interests to seek to entwine antisemitism and opposition to the policies pursued by him and his kind.
It is sometimes genuinely very difficult to disentangle, and it’s still difficult in the dialogue in Europe to disentangle antisemitism from opposition to the Israeli Government’s policies. So, I’m just not sure if there is more antisemitism. I mean, I think the evidence, for example, attacks on synagogues and so on in Europe, I think the evidence probably is that there is more antisemitism, but I think one thing that’s very difficult… this issue is not an easy one. It would be stupid to deny that what’s gone on in Gaza has obviously dramatically increased antisemitism as well as anti-Zionism. But where one…
When a synagogue is attacked in London, that is antisemitism. They attack it because it’s Jewish; they have no idea if the people there are for or against the Israeli government. But to go back to my previous question, what’s the point of studying history if it doesn’t impact the way young people think?
The study of history does not provide answers because if it did provide answers, each generation would not go on repeating the same mistakes in many countries. But what it can do is at least teach you to be aware of the questions that one should ask. And I’d be the first to say that I don’t think the fact that I’ve devoted a lot of my life to studying history has made me a fount of wisdom. But it has made me more aware of how difficult many questions are, whereas, of course, one of the things that goes on, and always goes on, especially with the kids and the young, is they always want simple answers, and the answers are never simple.
For example, I often say in lectures that in international affairs, the word “solution” should be barred from the discourse because in all difficult issues, above all, in the Middle East, there is no solution. What you’re always discussing is how you can manage very difficult problems. When people start using the word solution, it means they expect that there will be satisfactory answers. And one thing one can certainly say about everything to do with the Middle East is that there can’t possibly be a solution. It’s a question of how you achieve some tolerable way of managing [the conflict]. But I don’t see how, for a start, one could possibly hope to have an intelligent conversation, whether statesmen or ordinary citizens, about what happens in the Middle East without knowing the history of the 20th century.
History should always be taught with humility, with no grown-up historian professing to be telling students the truth. We are all – each generation – making a guess at truth, a grab at truth. But humility, I think, is terribly important. I think I’ve written some decent books, but never for a moment would I make the claim that what I’ve written is the truth about the events I’m describing, because it’s not like that. Each generation passes its own judgments. But to me, it’s shocking that there should be a belief now that it’s only the present and the future that we need to concern ourselves with. How can one possibly make intelligent judgments about what the present looks like, never mind the future, without knowing something about where we’ve come from?
One reason why schools focus on teaching the history of the Holocaust, including in Israel, is that everything else became so controversial. The Holocaust has remained the one thing where there is consensus about what is evil and what is righteous.
I think that is an extremely valid point. I think that’s an extremely shrewd comment, and I would go along. I was one of the first historians in Britain to quite prominently write about the Bengal Famine. I’m sure you were aware that this was the great blot on Churchill. At least a million and perhaps more Indians died in the Bengal Famine when India was under British control.
There’s no doubt that Churchill’s behavior over that [period] was very ugly. But I think one should also desperately try to teach children, which they don’t do at the moment, that we can only judge each age by its own standards. We cannot judge them by ours. And with Churchill, when people say Churchill was a racist, I say, of course, he was a racist. Everybody of his age group, of his generation, young cavalry officers in India, were racists. That’s what they were. This is awful to us now, but this was how people behaved. In the same way, they hanged homosexuals. We don’t think this is a good thing now, but this is how they thought. So I think that would be one of my foremost pleas in teaching history, teach people that each generation must judge its own generation.
Bottom line, if you were appointed Secretary of State for Education tomorrow, how would you like the Second World War and the Holocaust to be taught in schools?
It’s all a matter of nuance. A French philosopher said in the early 19th century [that] all the great truths in life are to be found in nuances. This is also true of the teaching of the Second World War. I would love to think that, of course, any schoolchild must learn about the Holocaust. But I think it’s important they should also know about the Nazi-Soviet Pact. They should also know about what happened in the 1930s.
I would say that at the moment, if you ask most British schoolchildren to write an essay saying what [they] know about the Second World War, they’ll probably say, “The Second World War was about Jews.” Well, it was a little more complicated than that.
So that there is no misrepresentation of your thoughts, I just want to clarify that you do think that every European schoolboy and schoolgirl should learn about the Holocaust in depth.
Yes, I think it is critically important that every child is taught about the Holocaust. I just wish to God they learned about some other things as well.
Going back to the utility of teaching history, some Israeli intelligence officers are well educated, academically, about the history of the Middle East. It did not help much on October 7.
Again, I do not believe that the knowledge of history means that you automatically come up with the answers, but it should at least empower one to ask the right questions.
I suppose I’ve lived for many years steeped in the history of the Middle East. Recently, I haven’t been there very much; I think 2007 was the last time I was there. But when I was younger, I used to travel a lot all over the Middle East, and one couldn’t make any sense of anything in the Middle East unless you had some knowledge of history. So it seems to me knowing some history does not, as I said, make you a fount of wisdom, but at least it should prevent you from making some of the worst mistakes.
I remember, actually, when I was dealing with the Netanyahus all those years ago in the late 1970s, I remember they were always giving me copies of books about Israel’s right to the West Bank and all that sort of stuff. I read them all in those days, and I’ve still got some upstairs. Some of them are pretty mad books about Israel’s claims of a Greater Israel from those days. Although this may sound odd to you, while those books that they gave me in those days were pretty mad, I’m not sorry I read them because you need to know. It helps me understand, even today, what goes on in the minds of some of those people in the Israeli cabinet alongside Netanyahu.
I’ll share with you something personal. Whenever I’m in London and stand in front of Westminster, I have tears in my eyes, and I’ll tell you why. There was a moment in history when pure evil was about to take over the world, and there was this one island that stood alone against it. And I, as a Jew, would not be alive and having this conversation with you had it not been for that Island. And I feel you are frustrated that the heroism, courage, and endurance that, in the end, Britain manifested and was alone in manifesting at that crucial moment in history is not conveyed to schoolchildren today.
I’m passionate, as you know…. There are a lot of historians these days who are very much against the great man theory of history or the great person theory of history. They believe that the pattern of events is decided by great movements, not by the doings of individuals. I am, on the whole, inclined to disagree with that. I think there have been [great men who changed history]. Among many reasons I revere Churchill so much is that I think Churchill almost alone convinced the British people, or certainly convinced the British Parliament, that we could and should continue to resist [Nazi Germany]. There’s no doubt in my mind that under a different British leader, Britain would have sought some sort of deal with the Nazis.
I’m always very struck by an early opinion poll in Britain, Mass Observation, the first sort of system of opinion polling in Britain that started in about 1936 or 1937. Mass Observation did a poll in November 1939 about attitudes to the war. And this was during the so-called phony war before Hitler invaded the West. This poll found that a lot of British people couldn’t understand why we were going on with the war; that we’d gone to war to save Poland, and Poland was gone.
The British and French armies were confronting the Germans in the West, but they didn’t seem to be getting any place, and many people interviewed by the Mass Observation poll said that they hoped some deal could be stitched up with Herr Hitler sooner rather than later. And of course, this was also true of the City of London, where a lot of the most prominent businessmen and so on in the winter of 1939, early 1940, desperately wanted a compromise peace.
Now, what changed was that in the summer of 1940, when Hitler started raining bombs down on Europe and then on Britain, he actually did Churchill the biggest favor because the British people were forced to confront the fact that there were only two choices: one was to give in, and the other was to resist.
And if Hitler had been smart, which, thank God, he was not, he would have just left Britain alone to rot in the summer of 1940. He would have turned east if he wanted to turn east. He could have done stuff in the Mediterranean, which we need not go into in detail. But if he’d simply left the British to rot [it is not certain that] Churchill could have kept control of the agenda and so on.
So I personally believe, going back to your point, that that was one of those moments in history where the fact that Britain continued to resist owed almost everything to Churchill’s extraordinary personality and to what he did. And most of the rest of them would have given in. Everybody says there was this cabinet meeting, I forget the exact date, May the 28th, I think, at which Churchill persuaded the cabinet to carry on, but any idea that the appeasement camp was sort of over after that, [well,] it wasn’t. There were still many people saying in corners, why can’t we just make a deal because there’s no rational way of keeping this going. So this is why I’m almost, I won’t quite say, a worshiper of Churchill, but nonetheless, why my admiration for him is almost unbounded.
Other than Churchill, there were hundreds of thousands who sacrificed their lives for the cause; I mean, they…
Most of them, I mean, well, I don’t know. It’s a very long conversation. Those four years during which Britain [was under attack], most British people this day don’t realize how fortunate we were by comparison to the peoples of Europe, who were either occupied or remained…one does understand this huge Russian sense of resentment that we don’t give sufficient credit to the fact that the Russians took this stupendous toll of casualties while we were sitting in relative comfort in Britain. And there is still this huge resentment in Russia about that.
If you say, what about the Nazi-Soviet Pact? Well, of course, they [the Russians] know nothing about the Nazi-Soviet Pact and so on, but nonetheless, the British people still don’t realize how extraordinarily fortunate we were.
A lot of British people study the Battle of Britain, but [not] the plight of the peoples of occupied Europe. I don’t just mean those who were sent to concentration camps or to death camps, but to be occupied by people of such unspeakable cruelty as the Nazis and to endure what they did.
Even though I’m about to be 79 and I’ve been writing books about all this for a very long time, I never cease to be awed by what people endured and suffered. And I’m never surprised by the moral compromises that a lot of them made. Yes, one is still dismayed and surprised by the attitude of the French to their Jews, but I’m not surprised by the degree of collaboration. I suspect the same would have happened in Britain.
When I observe European politics today, it always fascinates me how much the Second World War is still present. Whether it’s debating migration policies or Russia’s aggression, it’s as if the Second World War has ended just yesterday. Also, on bookshelves, and your works are evidence of that, I think there are more books on that period than on any other. There are far more books published on the Second World War than, say, the Great War. Why is that?
I think it’s because there’s still a belief among Europeans, rightly or wrongly, that the two wars were of a morally different order. Most people in Britain grow up, in my view, in many ways wrongly believing that we should not have gotten involved in the First World War and that we could have somehow stayed out of it.
They don’t see the Kaiser’s Germany as an evil remotely comparable with Hitler’s Germany, and they’re sort of half right about that. I mean, nobody in their right mind would compare the Kaiser’s Germany with Hitler’s Germany in terms of the evil of the Nazis, but I think they’re very naive in supposing that we could have stayed out of the First World War.
Be that as it may, they are still pretty confident the Second World War was “the good war,” whereas they’re much less confident about the First World War in that way. And in a way, they’re half right because, thank God, they do realize that the Second World War had to be fought. They do realize that Hitler was an evil with whom and with which there could be no possible compromise.
But again, I go back to the fact that to me, at the heart of Churchill’s genius is his understanding that there could be no compromise with the evil of Nazis at a time when there was still an enormous number of people, far more than we would care to think today, who did believe that there could be some sort of compromise with evil.
Going back to your question about the First and Second World Wars, I don’t think it’s too surprising. [Aside from believing it was a just and essential war, there are other reasons why it is studied so extensively]. It sounds like a frivolous thing to say, but the Second World War was an unspeakable experience for everybody engaged in the Eastern Front almost from beginning to end, but for a lot of people in the West, by comparison to the First World War, it wasn’t so bad. I mean, the casualties were not nearly so ghastly, and people find redeeming interests and excitements in the story of the Second World War. [Also], the First World War, they feel all the battles were the same. They were all bloodbaths in which nobody ultimately prevailed.
In America, you’ve got Midway on the Coral Sea; people see redeeming quality, and actually, they’re wrong to see that. There’s a great phrase and I’m trying to quote this from memory, but which is always imprinted on my brain; it was said by a Norwegian resistance hero, and I’ve quoted him in my books. But again, I’m forgetting his name for now. I think his name was Hansen. He wrote in his memoirs in about 1948 that “although wars bring adventures that stir the heart, the true nature of war is composed of innumerable personal tragedies and sacrifices, wholly evil and not redeemed by glory.”
And I think one has to… In my books, I keep repeating, even though I write all those books about these things, that any idea that there is any sort of redemption to be found in war is deeply flawed and that, in the end, wars are ghastly. I always remember most of the men in my family had, dare I say it, rather enjoyable wars and exciting wars. They won decorations, and they did exciting things, and so on. One of my cousins was in the SAS. So my mother used to say to me when I was a child, “Don’t listen to your father and his cousins talking about the war and saying what an exciting time they had.” She said that war was absolutely ghastly. And, of course, my mother was absolutely dead right.
Going back to this business of context, when I started writing books, which was a very long time ago, I was stupid enough to think that the history of war is mostly about men, the protagonists, and the soldiers. And actually, it’s not. Soldiers are always a relatively small minority in all wars. In the end, if one’s going to write the true story of any war, it must be about victims, and especially women. But it took me years to understand that. And I think one of many things I understand in the 21st century, which I did not understand [earlier in my career], is that for my books to have any value at all, they need to address the predicament of victims, the predicament especially of women, as well as what young men did.
Another phrase of one of my heroes among historians is by Professor Sir Michael Howard, who died some years ago. Michael, who himself fought in the [Second World] War, used to say that it’s amazing how many young men will do stupidly brave things on the battlefield. When you’re 20 years old, there’s almost no act of stupidity you won’t commit to win a military cross, and he won a Military Cross when he was 20 years old. And that remark of Michael’s made a great impression on me, too.
So, when I’m lecturing or writing about war now, I think I am doing so in a very different spirit from when I was young. I’ll go back to Israel’s history. I was a correspondent in 1973 in Israel. And at that time, I was in love with the idea [of war]. And because Israel was in such chaos in 1973, I was able to get much closer to the action than one ever normally can in Israel’s wars. I got to the Golan, and later, I was down at Suez. Looking back, I wrote in almost adulatory terms about what I’d seen the IDF doing, especially up on the Golan. I look back, and I was so young then and so stupid. I did see a glory in war, which I’m rather ashamed to look back on. And you know, one should have been more grown up and had a better sense of person.
Well, the other side of the coin is this: my impression when I speak with young Europeans today, also young Brits, is that the idea that they might have to at some point wear a uniform to defend their independence and freedom – it’s not even that it’s terrifying for them, it’s incomprehensible, it’s bizarre.
It’s absolutely true and certainly it goes for my children and grandchildren. I grew up with a sense of romance about military affairs, which again was entirely and deeply flawed. And I look back in embarrassment. But the worst aspect today is that there is resistance throughout Europe, including Britain, to the need for adopting a military means to defend oneself and protect oneself.
I’ve often raged in my columns in The Times about the gulf between European promises to Ukraine and the reality of what’s been delivered. That again and again, the words have been cheap. That many successive British prime ministers have pledged undying support for Ukraine, but the actual deliveries of weapons have fallen far, far behind, and I’ve repeated many times that without the Americans, Ukraine would be toast and its…
That’s very dangerous, isn’t it?
Incredibly dangerous. I write in The Times about once every couple of months arguing that unless we start to take defense seriously, we, or our children or grandchildren, are going to be terribly, terribly shocked by what aggressors are capable of doing to us. Putin thinks that we are decadent and thus vulnerable.
Why are young Europeans today so averse to the lessons of history, which are that sometimes you have to fight if you want to remain free?
Hard to say, but again, I went too far the other way when I was young; I saw the romance I felt when I was briefly attached to our Parachute Regiment, and I thought that parachuting and, you know, wearing the red beret, and so on, that this was something very romantic and exciting. I look back now, and I went far too far in that direction. I used to think that to show oneself a real man when one was young, one had to do dangerous things and probably be shot at. And nowadays, very sensibly now, my children or grandchildren don’t think that, of course. They don’t understand there is a middle ground between my stupidity in one direction when I was young and their stupidity in another direction today.
The difficulty of mustering any political support for a serious defense policy is worse in Europe. You know, I mean, I’m constantly looking at the statistics, and the Europeans are doing almost nothing about defense. I never believed that the Germans would make good on those pledges [they made to Ukraine], and of course, they haven’t, and especially now that the German economy is in considerable trouble.
Again, why?
Politics is mostly about telling electorates what they want to hear. The idea of leadership of the kind that Churchill displayed is deeply unfashionable, and there is a great unwillingness among national leaders, except in the Nordic countries [to support Ukraine].
Nordic countries are behaving much more intelligently and there is a much more real understanding there of how serious the threat from aggressors, especially the Russians, is. But we are, I fear, probably after I’m dead, headed for some terrible, cruel shocks when we discover that to abandon violence, to abandon the use of force, it requires two people. And it’s no good us saying, well, we’ve decided that [using violence is] a barbaric practice.
The other thing that we don’t learn, of course, is that having appeased Hitler in the 1930s, we were phenomenally lucky in 1940. From 1940 to 1944, Britain was able to rearm. In a book I’m writing at the moment, I’ve said it’s quite extraordinary that Britain and the Americans were granted four years to repair to return to fight Hitler on the continent. Four years of doing almost nothing.
Now people say but we were fighting in the Mediterranean or in this, that or the other, but this was on a tiny scale compared with what was going on elsewhere. We were granted these four years to rearm and prepare to engage the German army on terms that suited us. Well, in real life, in normal circumstances, you do not get granted that much time to prepare.
There’s no chance now that we will be given anything like that sort of time [in future conflicts]. The state of preparedness of the British Army [today] is almost moribund. I mean, we sent most of our effective weapons systems to aid Ukraine, and they have not been replaced since the Ukraine war started. One big contract has been placed with British firms for 155mm artillery ammunition to replace stocks sent to [Ukraine]. One contract. I frequently ask my military friends if that has changed. Have any more contracts been signed? And the answer is no.
Again, I write in The Times probably about every two months saying we have to get real about defense and rearmament, not just on a British scale, but in Europe too, but there is just not the will to listen.
People nod and say, “Oh, good article in The Times, Max.” But of course, no one will do anything about it. And the politicians are overwhelmingly preoccupied and it’s what I call – I referred earlier to that poll – the “bomb problem.” Because no bombs are falling as they weren’t in November 1939, people can’t see why they need to do anything. It’s only when bombs are falling that people tend to get real about defense.
If I were a populist, I would say it’s TikTok’s fault; that it’s a spoiled generation. But the fact is, 90 years ago, people made the same mistake in England as they do today.
I agree with you totally. And I hate to think how many words I’ve expended talking about and writing about this. And there are, of course, other people [who write this]. I don’t mean I’m all alone. I mean, there are people like me who have some knowledge of history and defense.
The one thing Trump is right about, big time, is that the Europeans have had a free ride since the 1950s in terms of defense and security, which the Americans have looked after. And again, a point that we ought to make, is that the time is over when the Americans are prepared to do our defense for us and pay for our defense. We’re going to have to do it ourselves, and there is no real will or understanding of this in Europe. This is very depressing.
If Argentina was to invade the Falklands tomorrow, would there be a will to fight back and reclaim it? And then, even if there is the will, is there the ability?
I don’t think so. I think that the Falklands was a one-off, and it was an extraordinary war. All wars are political, but the Falklands was completely [political]. The Falklands was an act of madness, and most of us who were down there understood at the time that this was mad because Britain had no real strategic interest in the Falklands at all.
The South Atlantic was meaningless in those days of the Cold War, and in those days, most of the armed forces, as well as most of the body politic, thought that, frankly, it was a lost cause. In the end, the best reason for fighting the war was that it empowered Margaret Thatcher to do many very good things for Britain in the decade that followed.
But at the time, I remember many conversations I had down South with the people who were f ighting the war, and most of us realized it was, in a sense, a ridiculous war. But it sort of did good things. It did good things morally.
I mean, at the time we went down South, the British people were terribly resigned to failure – economic failure, political failure, and so on. Well, the terrific lift that it gave, I mean, the mood when they came back, the triumphalism. In fact, Michael Howard said to me a few years before his death – because he was violently opposed to Brexit, to Britain’s departure from the European Union, as I was, as I am – he said, “such a pity about victory in the Falklands. Just at the time when the British were getting realistic about our diminished place in the world, we go and win this little war down South, and we convince ourselves that we’re a great imperial power again.”
I see that war differently. It brought down a murderous junta and it reestablished the principle that liberal democracies fight back, and I don’t know if the entire wonderous decade of the 1980s, the revolutions across the world, would have happened if Thatcher were not there.
Of course, you’re right. You’re absolutely right. I’ve written that, too. I’ve always said we owe a great debt to the Argentine junta… they did wonderful things for Britain.
Gibraltar: Dilemma on the Rock
Prof. Uriya Shavit and Dr. Carl Yonker
The war crimes committed by Hamas on October 7, 2023, and the immediate wave of anti-Zionist activism they unleashed across the world, forced large and small Jewish communities to decide if and how to manifest their identity and their support for Israel. Gibraltar, where the relative number of Jews is larger than in any other country except for Israel, is an example.
On March 18, approximately 300 pro-Hamas Gibraltarians, some Arab in traditional attire, participated in a demonstration rally organized by the Gibraltar for Palestine group across Main Street, the commercial and political hub of the tiny British Overseas Territory. They waved Palestinian flags and called to “free Palestine” and for a ceasefire that would land the terror group a crucial victory in its long-term effort to destroy Israel.[1]
Demonstrations, let alone such that export far-away conflicts, are a rarity in the prosperous and culturally harmonious territory that has an elected parliament and government, but where the British-appointed Governor is more than a symbolic figure. The Jewish population, comprising approximately 1,000 Gibraltarians, including around 200 Israeli citizens, faced a dilemma. To mobilize for Israel risked escalating tensions, in particular with the approximately 1,000 Gibraltarians of Arab extraction. To keep silent would project cowardice and concede the fight for public opinion.
At first, the community decided not to launch a counter-demonstration in order to send a “powerful message of unity and peace” from Gibraltar to the world. Its managing board (MBJC) described deep concern about the pro-Hamas rally, which, it stated, had “challenged” Gibraltar’s “defining trait” of setting aside cultural differences to unite for a common purpose. The MBJC stated that “practically every member in the Jewish Community is closely connected to someone in Israel directly affected by the massacre of October 7, whether killed, injured or currently held hostage in Gaza.” It also noted that “we have been confronted with words and chants in Gibraltar that we have never imagined would echo through our streets, chants that suggest the annihilation of the Israeli people and the destruction of their state” and which are not “merely slogans; they are war cries that have, around the world, incited acts of violence and discord.” Still, the MBJC recognized “the potential consequences: a series of demonstrations, however peaceful in intention, can inflame tensions further and contribute to an escalation.”[2]
The initial Jewish decision not to respond to the pro-Hamas demonstration was supported – or, perhaps, encouraged – by the Gibraltarian leadership, including its Governor, Vice Admiral Sir David Steel, and its Chief Minister, Fabian Picardo. Regrettably, an anti-Western terror organization that led a massacre and a democratic state defending itself were seen as two equal sides to a conflict.
The Jewish olive branch was not well received. When two months later, the pro-Hamas activists decided to march again, emphasizing without a shred of self-consciousness that they oppose an ideology and not a religion, members of the Jewish community decided, following some internal debate, to organize a public response, under the banner “bring them home now.” They stated that until the hostages taken by Hamas are released, any talk of peace “lacks legitimacy.”
And so, on May 20, Main Street witnessed an unprecedented sight: several dozen Jews and pro-Israel demonstrators waving Israeli flags in front of several dozen marching anti-Israel protestors whose cynical concern for human rights precludes Israeli Jews.[3]
Contrary to the concerns of some, the dual demonstration did not involve physical attacks or direct verbal assaults. The day not only ended peacefully, it was also the last of its kind. Ever since there have been no pro-Israel or anti-Israel events held in the territory. Posters were hanged by both parties in different locations, and graffiti was painted. Only a few, supporting the Palestinians, are still visible.
In September 2024, we spoke with 11 Gibraltarian and Gibraltar-based Jews about the demonstrations and the broader impact of October 7 on their identity and activism. “Things calmed down because people like it quiet in Gibraltar,” said Dan Hassan, a banker, 11th generation in the territory, who was on his way to take his young son to his Saturday football match with Maccabi Gibraltar.[4]
Moses Benady, a solicitor whose family has lived in Gibraltar for 250 years, explained that the local Jews demonstrated only once because “we didn’t want to bring the problems of the Middle East” to Gibraltar. The counter-demonstration, which focused on the call to release the hostages, was for him a moment of pride: pride that Jews stand quietly in solidarity with the hostages in the face of the shouting and jeering of the pro-Palestinian demonstrators, and pride that some non-Jews joined them, including some encouraged by local Catholic churches. He said that following the start of the war, he was surprised at what he heard about Jews, including from people he thought he knew well. Still, there was not a single antisemitic attack in the territory.[5]
Joshua Lhote, a 42-year-old lawyer, was born in Israel, where he studied in a Yeshiva in his teens. He grew up in France and in Gibraltar, where his parents were envoys of the Jewish Agency. He is the founder of the think tank Understanding Gibraltar. The history of the territory and Jewish thought are his great passions.
A modern Orthodox French-Ashkenazi married to a Sephardic Gibraltarian and a firm critic of Itamar Ben Gvir and the type of Judaism he represents, Lhote said that living in France as a child, he got into fights with Muslims almost on a daily basis because of the kippah on his head. Arriving in Gibraltar as a teenager, “I saw a place where Jews live in peace. I saw Jews who are friends with Christians, friends with Indians.”
Lhote was one of the Gibraltarian Jews who hesitated whether holding a counter-demonstration was the right thing to do. “Because Jews live here in peace, we need to give careful thought to what we do. The way [the counter-demonstration] turned out was good. But it was not good, at first, that some Jews distinguished between us, the Gibraltarians, and them, the Arabs who oppose Israel. The reality is that some Gibraltarians [who are not Arab] oppose Israel, and some Arabs [in Gibraltar] do not support Hamas.” He believes the demonstrations against Israel were led by Gibraltarians of Moroccan extraction who are not confident about their identity and assert it through expressing hate toward the Jewish state.[6]
According to Lhote, Gibraltar should serve as a role model for humanity at large for religious and ethnic coexistence. He believes that it also provides a lesson for Jews about what it takes from them to survive under unfavorable conditions: they need to be essential for the majority society.
Perhaps he makes too much of the singular story of a miniature entity. Yet, for sure, the survival of Jews in Gibraltar was unlikely, and Gibraltar would not have survived without them.
The British Empire is a historical abnormality. It continues to exist after it ceased to exist. King Charles III is today the non-constitutional head of a British Commonwealth that comprises 56 countries, as well as the sovereign of 15 realms, including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Jamaica, and 14 Overseas Territories that enjoy varying degrees of self-governance, including the Pitcairn Islands, populated by the descendants of the Mutiny on the Bounty, the Falkland Islands, the theater of the last British imperial war – and Gibraltar.
You need to see this phenomenon of nature, this phenomenon of politics, to believe it is real. A territory with its own government, parliament, flag, national anthem (“May you be forever free, Gibraltar! Gibraltar, my own Land!”), a daily newspaper, and a national football team – yet with just over 34,000 residents who live on a rock that rises above a bay of some 15 kilometers in length separating Europe from Africa, as well as on a narrow stretch of land underneath that rock. Within the rock are massive tunnels dug by the Royal Canadian Engineers during the Second World War and one of the world’s most beautiful stalactite caves. On top of it is a natural colony of dozens of adorable monkeys, who are funny, except when they want your food, or handy. At the bottom is the Jews’ Gate Cemetery, which dates back to 1726 at least and closed in 1848. There is a reason why it was located there, relatively far (although not really far) from mainland Spain.
The rock, strategically important because of its command of the naval movements to and from the Mediterranean, was taken over from Spain by a British-Dutch fleet in 1704 during the War of the Spanish Succession. Following its conquest, several dozen Jewish merchants from Morocco settled in Gibraltar.
In the Treaties of Utrecht (1713), Gibraltar was officially conceded to Britain. The concession was, however, not without conditions. Article X stated in words that could not be clearer that “Her Britannic Majesty, at the request of the Catholic King, does consent and agree, that no leave shall be given, under any pretense whatsoever, either to Jews or Moors, to reside or have their dwellings in the said town of Gibraltar.”[7]
In a lecture he delivered to the Jewish Historical Society of England in 1963, Sir Joshua Hassan – remember that name – explained why and how Article X was repeatedly ignored and a permanent and prosperous settlement of Jews in Gibraltar developed. Because Spain was reluctant to accept the concession of the rock to a Protestant Kingdom from day one, the staying power of the British garrison relied on supplies from Morocco. The Sultan, Isma‘il b. Sharif, fourth in the dynasty that still rules Morocco today and has been known for its good relations with the Jewish minority, was adamant that he would only provide Gibraltar with the goods it desperately needed if the territory remained open to the Jewish and Muslim subjects who settled there after the 1704 conquest.[8]
Consequently, while Britain kept reassuring Spain that it would respect Article X and expel the Jews from Gibraltar, it also kept finding excuses for not doing so. In 1724, the first synagogue was established in the territory – Sha‘ar Hashamayim (The Gate of Heaven). It still exists today. By August 1725, there were 1,113 civilian inhabitants in Gibraltar, including 137 Jews and 113 Brits; the largest groups were Genoese (440) and Spaniards (414).[9]
In 1728, following a Spanish blockade of the territory, Britain issued an eviction order for the Jewish and Muslim residents of Gibraltar; yet seeing that Spain would still not allow the transport of goods from the mainland to the territory and that they remained dependent on Morocco, the order was delayed. A year later, Britain and Morocco signed an agreement that gave Jews and Muslims the right to reside in Gibraltar for a temporary period of no more than 30 days while specifically denying their right to reside on the rock permanently. Once a legal footing, however narrow, for the Jewish presence in the territory was established, their expulsion was off the table. By the time Spain besieged the rock again in 1779 in what came to be known as the Great Siege, already some 1,000 Jews lived in the territory – similar to their number today.[10]
By the mid-19th century, the Jewish population reached its peak, comprising as many as one-third of the territory’s mix of ethnicities, religions, and languages that began to develop their own identity. During the Second World War, Britain managed to maintain its control of the rock, saving its Jews from the hands of the Nazis and their allies. Yet hundreds were evacuated to other countries, along with non-Jewish subjects, to make room for soldiers, and only a minority returned when the war was over.
The Jewish contribution to Gibraltar was not just in economic development. The most influential Gibraltarian public figure in the second half of the 20th century was a Jew. Joshua Hassan’s studies of the history of the Jews on the rock were only a hobby. Born in 1915 in Gibraltar to a Sephardic family and a trained lawyer, he was one of the few Gibraltarians not evacuated from the territory during the Second World War and served as a gunner in the local defense force. In the early 1940s, he entered public life as one of the leaders of The Association for the Advancement of Civil Rights in Gibraltar, a political party that sought greater autonomy for the territory. In 1955, he was elected the first mayor of Gibraltar. In 1964, he was elected its first Chief Minister (the equivalent of prime minister), a role he held with only a three-year break until 1987.
As the dominant Gibraltarian following the breakdown of the Empire, Hassan secured two complementary processes. On the one hand, self-governance in internal affairs, which helped Gibraltar become one of the most prosperous political entities on earth, combining a strong economy that relies on finances, shipping, and tourism (GDP per capita for 2024 was 85,614 pounds). On the other hand, firm rejection of Spanish aspirations to reunite the rock with the mainland.
In a referendum held in September 1967, Gibraltarians were given two options: become Spanish territory or remain a self-governing British territory. The results, following massive displays of British patriotism, were taken from the Assad family guidebooks: 12,138 (99.98%) wanted to remain under Britain, while only 44 desired reunification with Spain.[11] The territory’s first constitution, adopted in 1968, which Hassan took part in drafting, was unequivocal about the right of the small population to determine its future.
Hassan died in 1997. His political legacy has lived on. In a referendum held in November 2022, 98.97% of the participants rejected a proposal by the British government for shared sovereignty with Spain. While Madrid has not given up its demand to terminate the Utrecht treaty, which it claims Britain breached, and while there are concerns in Gibraltar that Britain is tiring of the last remains of its colonial responsibilities, a change of the status of the territory is very unlikely, at least in the next few decades.
Hassan had two daughters. Fleur Hassan-Nahoum, who made Aliyah in 2001, served as deputy mayor of Jerusalem from 2018 to 2023, representing a liberal party, Awakening. Marlene Dinah Esther Hassan-Nahon, a historian and journalist, served in the Gibraltarian parliament from 2015 to 2023 and, in 2018, formed a new social-democratic and socially progressive political party, Together Gibraltar.
Jews and Judaism are very much visually present in Gibraltar, although perhaps less than what some tour guides suggest. Their prosperity is evident in the number of Jews wearing kippahs walking along Main Street and the number of shops that announce their closure on Saturday and Jewish holidays. Saturday is the busiest commercial day, with thousands of tourists flocking Main Street.
With few exceptions, the community is Orthodox. It is predominately Sephardic, although mixed marriages and migration from England and Israel are changing its composition. There are four synagogues, one kosher supermarket, one kosher café, a Jewish preschool and school, a kollel, a mikveh, and the Maccabi Club. The synagogues are secured, but not heavily. Secular Israeli-Jews, some of whom commute daily from Spain, are not part of the community.
Lhote and others told us a few Hebrew words entered the spoken Gibraltarian language, which combines English with some Spanish. For example, ma‘ot (money or coins) is used for cash. “You’ll tell a taxi driver I don’t have ma‘ot with me,” explained Lhote. It is worth mentioning that in Israel, using this word in a taxi is unlikely to take you far.
Lhote believes the community is relatively cohesive and its Jewish identity remained intact because of its shared religiosity. “In the 1970s, you could see a Jewish man married to a non-Jew attending synagogue three times a day. You would never see this in France. Then came a less liberal rabbinic leadership. The sons of mixed marriages, for example, were not permitted to be called up to the reading of the Torah. Perhaps the conservatism helped preserve the community.”[12]
The combination of a somewhat libertarian capitalist economy and a generous welfare society, coupled with a spirit of multiculturalism and the absence of pronounced manifestations of antisemitism, has made Gibraltar attractive for its Jewish population. Still, for some, Israel is a second homeland, and a potential land of promise.
Gabriel Benady, Moses’ son, said that while he avoided publicly campaigning for Israel, “We pray for Israel every day.” He has visited Israel seven or eight times already. This is where he feels he belongs and would like to settle down ultimately.
Lhote said he saw his future in Gibraltar, but that his 16-year-old son is pondering about his ultimate destination. “For me, Gibraltar is a universal role model. For him, it is just a small village. He takes what Gibraltar has to offer for granted, and it offers a lot. He intends to travel to Israel and volunteer for the IDF in two years. It is something he has been talking about for a long time, already before October 7.”[13]
[1] Eyleen Gomez and Brian Reyes, “Around 300 People March for Palestine and Peace,” Gibraltar Chronicle, March 19, 2024, https://www.chronicle.gi/around-300-people-march-for-palestine-and-peace/.
[2] Chronicle Staff, “Gibraltar’s Jewish Community Focuses on ‘Unity and Peace’ after Monday’s Pro-Palestine March,” Gibraltar Chronicle, March 21, 2024, https://www.chronicle.gi/gibraltars-jewish-community-focuses-on-unity-and-peace-after-mondays-pro-palestine-march/.
[3] Gabreilla Peralta, “Dual Demonstrations Spotlight Polarized Views on Gaza, amid Fears of Community Division,” Gibraltar Chronicle, May 20, 2024, https://www.chronicle.gi/dual-demonstrations-spotlight-polarised-viewson-gaza-conflict-amid-fears-of-community-division/.
[4] Interview by the authors with Dan Hassan, September 29, 2024.
[5] Interview by the authors with Joshua Lhote, September 29, 2024.
[7] Sir Joshua Hassan, The Treaty of Utrecht 1713 And the Jews of Gibraltar (London: The Jewish Historical Society of England, 1970; text of a lecture delivered in London on May 15, 1963), 1.
[11] Gareth Stockey, Gibraltar, ‘A Dagger in the Spine of Spain?’ (Brighton and Portland: Sussex Academic Press, 2009), 231, and “From the Archives: Gibraltar Votes to Remain with Britain – 1967,” The Guardian, September 11, 1967, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/11/gibraltar-votes-to-remain-with-britain-archive-1967.
[12] Interview by the authors with Joshua Lhote, September 29, 2024.
The 2024 film scene was dominated by movies dealing with the memory of the Holocaust, reinforcing the problematics of the Shoah and its aftermath being remembered through cinematic images, including cynically commercialized ones.
The Report hosted a special panel discussion about the thin lines between memory and distortion, featuring Prof. (emeritus) Moshe Zuckerman, Tel Aviv University, a scholar in the philosophy of ideas and science, Dr. Shmulik Duvdevani, the movie critic of Ynet and lecturer in cinema at Tel Aviv University, Prof. Giacomo Lichtner, Victoria University of Wellington, expert on Holocaust cinema, and Prof. Uriya Shavit, Tel Aviv University, Head of the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Human Rights and Justice
Prof. Shavit: I’d like us to start with three or four of the main critical arguments that have been made about Holocaust movies. Moviemakers, and not just commercial ones, often have the inclination to end up with a happy ending or at least some kind of positive message. It’s almost inescapable. I think it was Stanley Kubrick who said that the problem with Schindler’s List (1993) is that it deals with six hundred Jews who were saved, whereas the Holocaust is about six million Jews who were murdered.
Think of the Oscar-winning Hungarian film Son of Saul (2015), which is known as the harshest and bluntest Holocaust movie. In the end, at least the way I understood it, it also finishes with a positive tone.
Dr. Duvdevani: First of all, I’m not sure that cinema, in general, aims to please the audience. It depends on which films, where they are made, and what they are dealing with. Although Kubrick is one of my favorite filmmakers, I’m not so sure that I agree with his comment about Schindler’s List. There’s a lot to say about Schindler’s List, but I’m not sure the main argument against the film is that it deals with the survival of Jews and not the extermination of Jews.
We should bear in mind that Kubrick himself wanted to make a film about the Holocaust called “The Aryan Papers.” He already had a screenplay, and once he heard that Steven Spielberg was making Schindler’s List, he decided to set this project aside, although I don’t know why. He and Spielberg were very good friends. They remained so even after he made that comment.
But I’m not sure that, in general, Holocaust films are about happy endings. For example, Son of Saul ends with the death of the protagonist, and it deals with many ethical questions regarding the representation of the Holocaust.
Even in films with a so-called happy ending, much of what is happening until the end is tragic. These are not feel-good movies.
I think the most important question is not how movies deal with the Holocaust narratively, but how they deal with it ethically and aesthetically.
Prof. Zuckerman: On a more personal note, I’m the son of an Auschwitz survivor, so I can say that the Holocaust has contaminated my life from the very beginning. At home, we dealt with the Holocaust right from the beginning. We are one of those families who were talking about the Holocaust all the time. Dealing with it from the very first moment of my existence has devastated my life.
This is why, in the first part of my life, I watched many documentaries and movies made about the Holocaust and gained a lot of knowledge, so to speak, about the Holocaust, including from the artistic works about it.
But I’m approaching this academically from the Frankfurt School of thought, and this is the more profound thing I want to say about the issue you just raised. There is one very famous saying from the end of the 1940s and the beginning of the 1950s by Theodor Adorno: “After Auschwitz, to write a poem is barbaric.”
Another person not talking about the Holocaust directly, but talking about Nazism and aesthetics, was Bertolt Brecht. In his poem “A Bad Time for Poetry,” he says there are two forces fighting in him: the beauty of the blooming apple tree and the presentation of the painter. The painter being Hitler, of course. And Brecht said only the painter is pushing him to write.
There are times when aestheticism is not a proper means to deal with reality. Adorno later took back his saying against writing poems after the Holocaust after he read Paul Celan’s “Todesfuge.” What Adorno said then was that we should not think that after Auschwitz, everything done aesthetically is barbaric just because culture has joined barbarity. Yet he also emphasized that suffering has to be represented in a way that gives the one who is tortured the right to scream, and thus, the role of art is to make suffering more presentable to people.
Of course, the question was how to do that. Adorno presented the ethical question of the extent to which art is able to represent reality, and that goes not only for the Holocaust. In the end, whether a direct or indirect reflection of reality, art is a representation and not the reality itself. I am reminded of Magritte’s painting where the pipe on the canvas is, of course, not a real pipe.
Going back to what Uriya said, Adorno said that every kind of work of art, even if it’s dealing with the most unpleasant things and is dissonant or even ugly, every kind is something from which you gain some kind of pleasure. This is one thing that got me to think about the fact that in most of the films I saw about the Holocaust, the audience gained some kind of pleasure. And you cannot deal with the Holocaust this way. You should not.
If you remember, there was a shower scene in Schindler’s List. When I saw it, I kept thinking that I knew that scene from somewhere. Where did I know this combination of shower and horror? All of a sudden, I remembered Psycho by Hitchcock, in which we have that shower scene. Then I compared some of the images that Spielberg used to those used by Hitchcock, and I was horrified to see that Hollywood had struck again.
Schindler’s List had a “Hollywoodian” way of doing it. I’m talking about the suspense moment: whether the shower will be lethal or not. I don’t need that in learning about the Holocaust, in a movie about the Holocaust. I know how things ended. So yes, the thing about gaining some pleasure, whether it’s a suspense pleasure or an aesthetic pleasure, seems to me one thing that most of the Holocaust movies were permitting.
Prof. Lichtner: I agree with Shmulik that I’m not sure that a film, in general, has to please its audience. I think the problem is more that historical cinema has to provide an experience that audiences can relate to; that’s where the problem arises. The problematic of Holocaust movies is the pursuit of empathy that actually can only deliver the illusion of empathy.
This is where the shower scene from Schindler’s List comes in very neatly because it’s a scene that’s shot in constantly shifting perspectives. So, it’s designed to give the audience the experience of being in a shower that could be a gas chamber, but also of surviving it. That’s something that actually quite a few representations of gas chambers have done in recent years, and I agree that that’s ethically very problematic.
Regarding endings, particularly, filmmakers are clearly aware of the expectations for positive endings, and there are quite a few examples of films that try to deal with it by giving you at least two endings. One egregious example is Life is Beautiful (1997). I remember watching it as a 20-year-old when it first came out. It gives you an evocative ending with the off-screen death of the protagonist, but then it has to give you the happy ending the audience wants.
There are quite a few other examples, but there’s a film that came out immediately after Life is Beautiful called Train of Life by Radu Mihăileanu (1998). It is not as well-known, but it is wonderful. It also has a double ending, but the endings are reversed, so the happy ending comes first, and the real ending comes second. That order makes all the difference. My point is that it matters in which order you put the endings.
Prof. Zuckerman: Like what you just said, Giacomo, I think there is a structural problem, ethics-wise, that begins with our definition of the Holocaust. What is the Holocaust? Is it a series of dramatic moments and events, or is it, as some have understood it, “the chasm of civilization,” meaning that it is not an event that you can grasp through the order of a summary of events?
We have to understand the Holocaust as something that industrialized an annihilation of men, being bureaucratically performed and administratively directed according to ideology. Right from the beginning, it made men fungible.
The question is: can a movie, which is an art form that relies on pictures and on narratives, cope with representing what happened?
I can hardly imagine that intellectual writing is able to cope with the Holocaust. I’m sure that cinema is not able to do that.
Prof. Lichtner: I completely agree. Some of the essential parts of what makes the Holocaust what it is, things like dehumanization, are also some of the hardest to represent.
I want to be provocative and say that maybe because of what you said, Moshe, about the intellectual discourse and its limitations, maybe we have to think that sometimes only cinema or only art in general can actually get close to describing the Holocaust because of their power to evoke without describing, without trying to understand and explain. It depends on the case, but I don’t think cinema is intrinsically less capable than other forms of language.
Dr. Duvdevani: I completely agree with Giacomo because I think two of the films I find the most important and that are the most profound in dealing with the Holocaust are actually documentaries, Night and Fog by Alain Resnais (1956) and Shoah by Claude Lanzmann (1985), and, by the way, Lanzmann could have never made Shoah had it not been for Resnais. I think these films actually deal with two major issues: image and testimony.
First, the issue of the image: what images can you show when you are dealing with the Holocaust, with death, with the extermination camps?
Secondly, Shoah, especially, deals with the crisis of testimony, which is exactly what the Holocaust caused. Giorgio Agamben, the Italian philosopher, speaks a lot about it. Primo Levi writes a lot about it.
Prof. Shavit: I want to continue from here and discuss the second main criticism about Holocaust movies. Generally, the argument is that it’s good that so many movies about the Holocaust are produced because they ensure that people will never forget and that they will learn from history.
So, three points on this. First, the Holocaust never made it into popular culture before 1978, with the miniseries Holocaust: The Story of the Family Weiss, which aired first on primetime American television and then on German, European at large, and Israeli television.
Yet I’m not sure that people in the 1960s and the 1970s knew about the Holocaust less than they know today, and I’m not sure the lessons of the Holocaust were less profoundly ingrained in public minds in the 1970s and the 1980s than they were in the 1990s and the 2000s, after the Holocaust became so big in our culture. The genocide in Rwanda took place well after Family Weiss and other movies were watched by tens of millions of Americans, and that didn’t exactly motivate the United States to intervene.
The second point is that, in the end, anything you do in cinema is fiction. Even documentaries are a form of fiction. There is an unavoidable problem, which is that movies about the Holocaust turn the Holocaust into fiction. This is simply inescapable.
The third issue takes me to a personal experience. I was in Auschwitz just once, and at a very late age, not as a school kid or as a soldier.
The thing I took from there is that if I was a Holocaust denier, nothing I saw in Auschwitz would convince me otherwise.
So, the problem with Holocaust denial is not so much about knowledge but about whether you accept the confirmed sources of knowledge in our day and age. If you don’t, if you think everything school and other establishments teach you is part of one big conspiracy, is a bunch of lies, then even watching fifteen Holocaust movies with graphic depictions from extermination camps will not change your mind.
I think it’s also important to note that Lanzmann’s Shoah was far more effective in teaching people about the Holocaust than Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. There is no footage from the actual Holocaust there. It’s people testifying. Maybe this idea that we need the visual to be convinced that something really happened and to immerse it within our souls and minds is a myth.
Prof. Lichtner: It’s a big question and an important one. I’m going to continue from my last comment about the potential, the promise of cinema. I’m going to defend the idea that just because all films are fictional, that does not automatically turn the Holocaust when represented in movies into fiction.
The relationship between truth and fiction is complex, and different films handle it in different ways. The American historian Robert Rosenstone talks about true invention and false invention. It’s a problematic dichotomy, in my view, but it’s useful for us in terms of thinking about the role that invention, that inaccuracy, can have in cinematic constructions of historical arguments.
In principle, I think invention is a tool. It’s a tool to maybe encourage people to learn or to find out more. Sometimes, I think it is a tool to teach.
I love Shoah. I worked on it a lot quite a few years ago. True, it doesn’t use documentary footage, but it certainly uses artifice and invention. There are a couple of moments that I’m going to pick out. One is the use of point-of-view camera work. Putting the camera on the front of the van as it drives through the forest puts you in the driver’s seat of a gas van, in theory. So, Lanzmann did not find footage of a gas van from 1942 or 1943; instead, he used creative reconstruction.
The second moment is the one that’s perhaps best known. It is with survivor Abraham Bomba, who did not speak to Lanzmann in the way that Lanzmann wanted him to. Bomba, the barber from Treblinka, would not relive the trauma. So, Lanzmann interviewed Bomba in New York, he interviewed him elsewhere, and in order to get him to relive the trauma, he brought him back to Tel Aviv. He put Bomba in a barber shop, and he got him to reenact the cutting of hair.
It is one of those moments that are very abusive. But it’s one of those moments that makes audiences break through, not so much to understand the experience, but to understand that you can’t understand it. And that’s a crucial step.
Prof. Zuckerman: Uriya, I would like to refer to two of your arguments. The first one: There was an incident right after Schindler’s List featured back in 1995, where a group of black youngsters was roaring in laughter every time they saw an atrocity on the screen, and people thought that it was antisemitic or black antisemitism, which was very curious because, in the 1960s, Jews and blacks used to work together in order to fight for human rights.
Then, some historians and psychologists interviewed those young black men, and it turned out that their laughter when watching the movie had nothing to do with the Holocaust and nothing to do with antisemitism. They had thought it was an action movie.
For them, it was an action movie, and this goes back to what I said from the beginning. The moment that you want to represent one of the most unspeakable and unrepresentable things in human history with the means of the culture industry, you end up with just that – with people saying, it’s an action movie!
A member of my family who lives in America was on the actual Schindler’s list; he was in the Holocaust. I want to affirm what you said, Uriya. After the movie was released, he was invited to a lot of roundtables and a lot of panels to discuss his experiences. I remember he came to Israel and showed us one of the invitations to a roundtable, where I could see it read: “You’ve seen the movie; now come and see a survivor.”
I was completely shocked and asked him if he really let them do that to him. And he asked me: “What’s the problem? This is the way that we can pass on what happened in the Holocaust!”
I have to say that I did a little survey among Holocaust survivors, not something that I could scientifically present. Some of them said it was good that the movie was done because what happened to them was similar to what was shown in the movie. But it was very few of them. Some said, what are you talking about? What does Schindler’s List have to do with the Holocaust?
And the vast majority said they don’t care about movies. You can’t grasp the Holocaust by watching movies, they said. This is what the vast majority of the Holocaust survivors I spoke with told me.
I had to take it seriously because I understand one thing, and I’ll say it in terms of Walter Benjamin, who asked himself back in the 1930s how we could go about the fact that art had become so abstract that we are losing the masses. We are losing the audience. He said we have to find a way to include some kind of kitsch to win over the hearts of the people. He said that the only medium in art that was able to do that, taking all the kitsch of the 19th century and putting it into modern terms, is cinema.
And this, of course, brings us to the question of whether movies are indeed able to do it. But not by representing reality; by doing something that you called fiction, but not in the bad sense, in the positive sense.
Art is always representation. Art is never reality. It is always a representation of reality as if it was reality. To fictionalize reality in that way means that you have to produce something that is able to win over the people without losing the message. If you win over the people, who indulge in the kitsch and the happy endings we are talking about, we are losing the one thing we intended to do, the information and the values we intended to convey.
By the way, Shmulik, you are right in what you said that this is a crisis generally, but on the other hand, I think the only way that you can deal with it is not by giving up and providing an artificial narrative but by letting the people talk. For Lanzmann, it took being a little bit postmodern and many perspectives in a documentary, but Shoah has become one of the most important films.
Prof. Shavit: The problem is that although fiction is never reality, most people see most of reality through fiction. That’s a reality we cannot change. I have to share with you, Moshe, that my Schindler’s List experience was not as horrific as yours, but the fact that it’s vivid in my head after so many years, well, I think it is telling.
I was watching it at the Ayalon Mall in Ramat Gan, and behind us sat a young person with popcorn and a Pesek Zman waffle bar, and during the break, I remember him telling his friend while sucking on the popcorn and the Pesek Zman what a difficult movie it was to watch. And I still have this so vivid in my head.
Dr. Duvdevani: I want to refer to some of your assumptions. First of all, regarding the TV series about the Weiss family, by the way, with the young Meryl Streep. Anton Kaes, professor of cultural studies at Berkley, expressed concern that Americans would think that the Holocaust looked exactly like its representation in that series, that the series’ narrative would become the main narrative of the Holocaust for millions of Americans. Well, I don’t think millions of people actually think the Holocaust is exactly like what you see in a movie.
I can just give an example. Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds (2009) implied that the Holocaust of the Hungarian Jews never occurred because Hitler was murdered in a theater before that, before June 1944. Well, I don’t think that people who see Quentin Tarantino’s film actually think that that’s the way Hitler died, and that’s the way the war ended, and that nothing happened in Hungary. They will understand the film just as Tarantino wanted them to understand it: as a film that is historical fantasy. Let’s fantasize that Hitler was murdered, and that would be a “happy end.” The kind of happy end that you are talking against, Uriya. But Tarantino was doing it very intelligently, knowing what cinema is capable of doing when dealing with history.
Now, I completely agree that Lanzmann’s Shoah is a much more appropriate text than Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List.
There was a film, a horrible film, called The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (2008). I still have goosebumps when thinking about it. The kid of the Nazi commander of the camp is going to the gas chambers along with his little Jewish friend. Okay, what are you saying here, that Nazis were exterminated in the gas chambers?
Yet there is one thing we should bear in mind: that many more people watched Spielberg’s film than watched Shoah. Let’s be frank about it. Not many people around the world actually watched Lanzmann’s Shoah, and most of them were highly educated.
Pauline Kael was a very important film critic for The New Yorker, and she was the only one who “dared” to write a bad review of Shoah. She said it was too long. You have to take into account how many people actually watched it when considering its contribution to the memory of the Holocaust, to the learning of its lessons.
Prof. Zuckerman: I would like to go back to Uriya’s question. What do people learn from Schindler’s List? Before having seen it, what did they know about the Shoah?
In Germany, one thing that was criticized was not that the Nazi was the hero, but that a capitalist Nazi was. I just said that any kind of art is always some kind of fantasy because it is some kind of illusion. The question you need to ask about Tarantino is: what is the point of the fantasy? What does it actually say? How appropriate is it in context?
Prof. Shavit: Perhaps, Moshe, we can say that if Oskar Schindler is also part of the story of the Holocaust, and that there were also good Germans, the problem with Schindler’s List is that it became the Holocaust movie. It’s shown to school children, and they, including German school children, think they learn about the Holocaust, not about a minor aspect of the Holocaust.
Dr. Duvdevani: I think this is the problem. The problem is not the movie. The problem is what teachers, for example, are making of that film, especially if this is the only one they have pupils watch.
Prof. Shavit: Yes, but Spielberg was Spielberg already when he directed Schindler’s List, and he could have chosen a different project. He knew he was making the Holocaust movie by merit of him being Spielberg.
Prof. Zuckerman: Before we move on, I want to say I remember that I was a sociologist in the Israeli Air Force when the Holocaust TV series about the Weiss family aired, and I had the opportunity, being a sociologist in the military, to have my people do research with soldiers by command. You know, if you are a sociologist and can question people by command, they have to cooperate.
I had a group of some thirty people. There was only one television channel in those days, and everyone watched the miniseries about the Weiss family, and I got to ask the young soldiers what they thought of it.
I will never forget the one young officer who stood up and said to me it was a very good thing that we watched the series on TV because it connected him emotionally to the Holocaust.
At first, I really thought, well, the culture industry is effective. He was connected emotionally! It took me two days to be troubled. What did he mean by “emotionally connected to the Holocaust?” What does it say about your personal emotional need to have some kind of catharsis? What does it mean in relation to the real historical event?
And I have to admit that for many people, the way they engaged with Schindler’s List was not a means of coping with the Holocaust but a means of having some kind of catharsis.
And I think that the Holocaust is the one thing that you should not have catharsis through. I think that you always have to have a very tension-filled relation to it.
Prof. Shavit: That actually brings us perfectly to the third point of criticism, which I am very curious what Giacomo would have to say about. It is, in a word, the cynicism of it all.
I want to make the following point: I have a suspicion that the reason why we have so many movies about the Holocaust is not because of the complexity of the topic, the challenges the topic involves, or the importance of the topic. Rather, it is because of two cynical considerations.
One, the Holocaust is perhaps the only major historical-political issue about which there is still consensus, at least within the mainstreams of Western societies. So, it’s the safest serious subject to deal with in an age when everything else has become so controversial.
The other thing, which is even more cynical, and here, Roberto Benigni and Spielberg enter, is that it wins you those awards. For some reason, despite the fact that, well, at least I think these awards are largely meaningless, movie directors and actors are so keen to win Oscars and other trophies. And the thinking, at least subconsciously, is: let’s do one about the Holocaust and get recognition as classy, serious, deep directors or actors!
I think the most deplorable moment in the history of Hollywood, and there are so many of them, is Roberto Benigni jumping on those chairs and being so outrageously happy without taking even the slightest second to think how inappropriate all of this is given the subject matter of Life is Beautiful.
Now, to be clear, Spielberg never actually thanked the six million when he won his Oscar. If you hear what he actually said, he wasn’t explicitly thanking the six million. But the fact that so many people remember that he thanked the six million has to do with his speech, that moment he waited for so long, looking as if he was thinking about the people he wanted to thank for helping him with the movie and his career and the six million in the same breath. Oh, boy!
Prof. Lichtner: There’s an episode in Ricky Gervais’ Extras where Kate Winslet plays an actress who’s playing a nun in a Holocaust movie, and she expresses this cynicism on set wonderfully. She says: “Oh, look, I’ve done Titanic, if I don’t win an Oscar with this one…”
Today, the thing that makes a film popular is to make a Holocaust movie and then say that it wasn’t about the Holocaust. We see it with Zone of Interest (2023), and in fairness, it’s been done for some time now. Alain Resnais said that Night and Fog was never about the Holocaust, but was always about Algeria, which is blatantly not true. So, of course, there is a commercial calculation there. Why shouldn’t there be? Cinema is a commercial medium, and it has to sell.
Prof. Shavit: If that wasn’t a rhetorical question, I want to answer it. Why shouldn’t it be? Because some things in life should not be approached cynically. Because if that’s your motivation, to win the Oscars, then that’s wrong.
Prof. Lichtner: I agree. But at the same time, making a product that’s going to have broad appeal is not something that we can resent filmmakers for. So, the question is broader. Like, why is it that the Holocaust holds this special place in the public consciousness so that we flock to watch Holocaust movies, so that we immediately and somehow automatically gravitate to a film that deals with the Holocaust?
I’ll give you a different example from Italian cinema, which I think is really telling. There is a film called Unfair Competition by Ettore Scola (2001), master of Italian cinema. In it, there is a competition between two tailors, one Jewish and one Gentile, in Rome at the outset of the fascist racial laws in 1938. The scene shows how a friendly banter that was not really so friendly becomes antisemitism and racial hostility. It’s an interesting film. The most interesting thing is that when Scola drafted the idea, it was not set in 1938. It was set in contemporary Italy. The shopkeepers were a white Italian man and a recent African immigrant. Scola ultimately decided that it was safer to place it back in 1938.
Across Europe, there’s a history where the Holocaust was first the uncomfortable topic that we don’t want to deal with, and then it became the comfortable topic that we deal with instead of dealing with contemporary racism. That is the question that you have to address if you want to understand why cinema, cynically or conveniently, seeks out the Holocaust to make money or to win awards.
At the same time, just because there is this cynicism or instrumentalism, it doesn’t mean that all Holocaust cinema is cynical. It comes back to a point I think Moshe made earlier on, which is a really important, really complex point about the definition of the Holocaust. I’m not going to try, but the Holocaust is a really difficult event to define. It defies definition.
And so you have a genre: Holocaust cinema is treated as a genre. We write about it as a genre, but actually, it’s a cross-genre. I think there are Holocaust films that cut across all genres, and if you boil it down, most Holocaust films are not really about the Holocaust. They’re about other things, and that was always Benigni’s defense. He said, this isn’t a film about the Holocaust, it’s a film about the love between a father and a son, a film about the power of imagination.
Dr. Duvdevani: First of all, I think that saying that all of it is cynicism is a big generalization. I completely agree with you about Benigni’s reaction. But at least, when he got the Oscar, he never thanked the six million.
Prof. Shavit: I watched his act again yesterday. He was actually closer to thanking the six million than Spielberg was.
Dr. Duvdevani: Indeed. But you’re completely right that Spielberg actually never thanked the six million. He mentioned them in his thank you speech, but he never thanked them. Believe me, Spielberg knows what he’s doing.
Anyway, yes, there is cynicism in Holocaust movies. However, there is also cynicism when you are making a film like The Green Book (2018) about the relationship between a black pianist and his white chauffeur in the 1950s. And there is a cynicism when you are making a film like Twelve Years a Slave (2013). So, in a way, when we are dealing with the award season, cynicism is quite common.
We should bear in mind that there are many other films we have not discussed yet. For example, there is a film that we still haven’t mentioned, and I think it is a very important film: The Pianist (2002) by Roman Polanski.
Prof. Shavit: Which also, in the end, is a feel-good movie.
Dr. Duvdevani: You know, Władysław Szpilman survived, but I can’t say that when I see the way that they are clearing the ghetto and killing the Jews, I had a feel-good reaction.
Prof. Shavit: Well, you know that the experience of the audience is mainly determined by the fate of the protagonist, not what’s in the background, and in the end, if the protagonist survives and plays the piano, it’s a happy ending.
Dr. Duvdevani: But I don’t think it’s a feel-good movie. It’s a film about survival. And yes, I am very happy that he survived, but he experienced a very traumatic event.
As we speak, in half an hour, we’re going to have three hostages released from Gaza, and I’m not sure that today is a feel-good day. They survived. So, I think survival is not the point.
Prof. Shavit: Well, the media treats it as a feel-good day.
Dr. Duvdevani: Yes, so the media is wrong. What can I say? But you cannot suspect Polanski, for example, who himself was a Holocaust survivor, to have thought that he was making a feel-good movie.
By the way, in my opinion, the actual film that Roman Polanski made about the Holocaust was not The Pianist. It was a film that he made two decades earlier, The Tenant (1976), in which he himself played someone who is being persecuted. I think that this is the real film, metaphorically speaking, that he made about the Holocaust. It’s very interesting to note that in Polanski’s autobiography, he deals extensively with other films, but The Tenant is discussed only in three pages.
Going back to the question, I think we should remember that there are also European films and also American films that won the Academy Award and are really dealing with the Holocaust in a profound, harsh way.
Prof. Zuckerman: Spielberg probably didn’t talk about the six million Jews, but I remember a video that I saw from a post-award celebration, where someone came in with a real big cake, the way the Americans like it, and they had something written on the cake. What was it? Shoah.
Prof. Shavit: I can’t believe this.
Prof. Zuckerman: I saw it. I am not making this up.
I am always distinguishing between the work of art and its creator. The creator may be a bad person but still make a very important work of art, and it can be the case that a very good person will create very poor art.
So, I am not interested in what motivated Spielberg, whether his motivation was cynical or commercial. The question is: what is the structural moment within the work that is putting us into dilemmas, ethical dilemmas, aesthetical dilemmas, and moral dilemmas?
I think that most of the Holocaust movies are not able to really result in a message that is humanistic, that is going beyond the Holocaust. As I said before, the Holocaust itself is still an enigma to us. We are still not able – I am seventy-five years of age now and even I am still not able – to understand it, and as I said before, it’s been in my life from the very beginning.
We have to distinguish not only between the intention of the creator or the producer and the work of art; within the issues or topics of the artwork itself, we have to distinguish between coping with the actual historical event and the reception of the work decades later.
Prof. Shavit: I want to move on to the next and final point of criticism, which is Holocaust movies and porn. Now, there are two issues here. The first is that you have a lot of nudity in Holocaust movies, at least in some of them, especially in the ones that are more, I would say, “realistic.”
At least in my generation, for most kids, the first authorized seeing of a naked body of the opposite sex was when watching a Holocaust movie.
That’s the definition of disturbing.
The second point is that in the end, when you have those documented visuals from concentration camps, from extermination camps, and you show naked victims, identifiable naked victims, that does not dignify them. The question is, don’t they deserve the dignity of not being shown to the world like this? And when they are denied that dignity, and so casually so, is that not a statement that they are lesser humans, that we accept their being classified as such?
Dr. Duvdevani: First of all, I am not sure that most or even many Holocaust movies have nudity. And I am not sure that I would associate only Holocaust movies with nudity. I do think that there were films back in the 1970s that dealt with the Holocaust and had nudity. This was part of the provocation; they sought a way to deal with Holocaust representations and with Holocaust memory.
There are two films, both of them Italian, which I think are very interesting in this regard: Seven Beauties by Lina Wertmüller (1975) and The Night Porter by Liliana Cavani (1974). I think that these are masterpieces because they combined sheer provocation, not cynicism, with issues of representation and with issues of memory.
They are meant to disturb you. They were made by women. Women are those who usually do not take a side in history, and by this, I mean that history is not being told by women. Films were mainly made by men, especially in the 1970s. So, what I think the directors were aiming to do was to give a certain kind of a new perspective, a provocative perspective on the whole idea of masculinity.
Seven Beauties is a film about masculinity and the crisis of masculinity when dealing with the Holocaust. And in The Night Porter, sex, I mean real sex and actual sex, takes place in order to cover the trauma.
Still, I do not think nudity is part and parcel of Holocaust films. But I think in both these films, nudity was used as an issue or as an aesthetic tool to deal with the trauma and the crisis of masculinity that was caused by the Holocaust.
Prof. Lichtner: I want to draw a distinction between literal porn in movies connected with the Holocaust, a horrible sub-genre that came out in the 1970s, which I’ll leave aside, and voyeurism.
The presentation in some movies of gas chambers, in particular, is troubling. I am thinking about The Grey Zone, for instance, by Tim Blake Nelson (2001). I think it has a genuine, almost pornographic voyeurism in the shooting of the gas chamber scene where he puts you in the position of a girl following her mother into the gas chamber. Then, it has the luxury of dragging you out at the last minute. That shift of perspective is voyeuristic, it is unethical.
Back to nudity, I am thinking of the British documentary German Concentration Camps Factual Survey, which was produced by Sidney Bernstein with the help of Alfred Hitchcock in 1945, but released only in 2014 after having been shelved for seven decades. By the way, aside from technical issues and the fear of alienating the German-occupied population, one possible reason why it was originally shelved by the British was their fear that it would help the Zionist movement.
When it was eventually completed and released in 2014, the Imperial War Museum curated it and took it to Sydney and various other places to premiere it. In Sydney, the curators were challenged about the way that the cameramen deployed in 1945 by the British military were shooting women showering, without any sense of decency. I mean, they just shot them in frontal nudity.
And the curators responded, well, these are French Jewish survivors who were showering with hot water for the first time after God knows how long. It’s about hygiene. It’s about the return to humanity. And the audience challenged this, saying, these women did not consent. It is their body. So, I think that even in something that’s not fictional, nudity is an immediate dilemma.
Prof. Shavit: Even more so when it’s not fiction.
Prof. Lichtner: Yes, you’re absolutely right. In the same footage, but not included in the film, there’s a different kind of approach to pornography, though not with respect to nudity, but with respect to death. There’s a moment quite late in the liberation of Belsen when the army film unit sent footage with notes to London saying that today, the commanders decided to use the bulldozers to scoop up the corpses and put them in the graves.
This is a really poignant moment, and they film it. But they can’t film it close up, so they put the camera behind two survivors who were watching a British Sergeant on a bulldozer scooping up bodies. You can just see the bodies falling out and going underneath the bulldozer itself. Yet you see it out of focus because the thing that’s in focus is the shoulders of the two women watching it. That’s the same technique that László Nemes used in Son of Saul.
Prof. Zuckerman: The question of the Holocaust and nudity stirred a little political crisis in Israel some 20, 25 years ago when an ultra-Orthodox politician toured Yad Vashem and said about one of the biggest photos, which was, of course, the naked women on the way to their extermination, that this was unacceptable. And then he said, we need our own Yad Vashem. This ultra-Orthodox politician said we need our own Yad Vashem; your Yad Vashem cannot be ours.
The question is, what kind of gaze, or what kind of view, does this Haredi politician have when he recognizes in this naked woman something erotic or something sexual? And so on. But he related to it quite clearly, quite well, when asking: “If it were your grandmother, how would you react to the photo?”
Well, if you want to be a good historian, you have to admit that there are moments in history where pornography being the pornography of death, being the pornography of eroticism, being the pornography of the sheer reality of being, is part of everyday life.
If I may add something here that has nothing to do with sex and nudity. My father remembered a scene that he had experienced in Auschwitz, and there, of course, we lost a major part of our family, some 80% were exterminated, but he remembered that he was in some kind of hole where he was working. There was some sort of assessor who came and saw my father, and all of a sudden, he flung him a bun. And my father, who was not able to speak about the Germans without saying, “May they all burn,” remembered that. He remembered this moment as something, some kind of glimmer of humanity even in this hell. Even the assessment man had this humanistic moment when throwing him the bun.
I think the need to combine the Holocaust with sexuality, and I’m not talking about nudity, comes from the place where you need to have something to hold on to because if you are showing all the time only the everywhere presence of death, you cannot do anything with it. Not intellectually and not artistically, and certainly not cinematically.
Prof. Shavit: Certain B movies, where you have concentration camps with women enslaving a man or the other way around, their production is actually revealing something very deep about the Holocaust itself: that there were people taking pleasure in doing all those things. And that there are now people taking pleasure in watching people who took pleasure in doing all those things is part of the story of the Holocaust. It helps us understand how it could have happened.
So perhaps in an awkward way, we learn more about human nature through those distorted B movies than through mainstream and legitimate movies.
Just as a final point, there was a period, I think it was like 20 years ago, when the London Dungeon and these kinds of facilities were very popular. They featured all sorts of terrible medieval torture instruments and epidemics and other catastrophes.
I remember hearing someone asking whether they would have a Holocaust dungeon in 500 years and will people treat it as some kind of entertainment. Because, in the end, what we were entertained by when going to the London Dungeon was people being tortured. And tormented.
I would like to move on to asking the three of you three different questions about different countries and Holocaust movies.
I want to start with Moshe and discuss two major German films, which I am sure you’ve watched. One is Der Untergang (2004) and the other is Napola (2004). What I found very disturbing in both is the narrative of the Nazis as some kind of aliens that came to Germany from outer space and took over until they were defeated. How troubling did you find this when you watched either?
Prof. Zuckerman: Yes, I was troubled that a certain part of coping with the past in Germany was exactly like what you said.
There were a few paths to deal with the history of Nazism. The first one was Germans who said that they were kidnapped by a bunch of criminals. And it was what is known in German as “the twelve years of Hitler. ” How 80 million people could be kidnapped by a bunch of these people is another question, but it was very soon that the post-war Germans didn’t go on with that.
Another way of coping was to focus on the German opposition to Hitler, the opposition that collapsed.
The third way, which started in the 1980s, was to engross with everyday life Nazism. Maybe you remember the series of films Heimat by Edgar Reitz (starting in 1984). It was very interesting to see in those films how Nazism infiltrated into remote villages and how it became a part of them.
So, in that respect, Der Untergang, in which Hitler is shown as a psychopath – and he was very ill at the end, and we can, of course, make a caricature of him, and I’m not saying Bruno Ganz’s performance as Hitler was bad; his performance was excellent – but that film was indeed some kind of escape from the real question. The real question is not how Hitler was at the end, but how could it be that until the very end, there hardly was any opposition to Hitler.
Prof. Shavit: Hitler is so external to the reality of the ordinary Germans in that movie.
Prof. Zuckerman: This is exactly what I am talking about. This is a way of not coping with your own guilt when you are showing him as something coming from somewhere else. Having said that, I have to admit that the one country that tried to cope with this past in Europe, when I compare it to the way that the British and the French cope with their colonial past –
Prof. Shavit: Or the Dutch with their Nazi past.
Prof. Zuckerman: Yes, or the Dutch with their Nazi past, and the Dutch with the colonial past as well.
Prof. Shavit: The Italians with their fascist past. But I would not compare the Nazi past to colonialism.
Prof. Zuckerman: The one country that did some kind of work of coping with the past is Germany. The question was, what path did they take? And they took, as I just tried to show it, several paths.
I think that by the end of the 1960s and 1970s, the Germans began to reflect on fascism more seriously. But, and this is a big but, they ended up with a very good explanation for fascism and even for Nazism, but not for the Holocaust. They basically concluded that they cannot cope with the Holocaust, neither historiographically nor through cinematographic works.
And in that respect, the Germans are in the same situation as others. I don’t think that others can cope better than the Germans. The Germans used to think that the only ones who were really pure and clean and without any crimes were those serving in the Wehrmacht. And then, it turned out that the Wehrmacht was one of the major promoters of war crimes against the Jews.
I think that the problem is that the Germans had a special problem coping with the Holocaust because these were, as the Polish Government rightly said, these were German concentration camps. Although Ukrainians, Poles, and so on collaborated, the concentration camps were German.
Prof. Shavit: Giacomo, my question for you is about perhaps the most contentious debate when it comes to Holocaust movies, which you have already referred to and somewhat hinted at where you stand, but I’m not sure I understood correctly. We are twenty years after that debate, so there is a bit of the benefit of retrospect or at least of a broader, longer perspective. Roberto Benigni and Life is Beautiful. Where do you stand in this debate?
Prof. Lichtner: I feel like I’ve made a career out of criticizing Life is Beautiful. I was an undergraduate when I first saw it, and I kept watching it, and each time I watched it, I liked it less. But I do remember the first time I saw it in the cinema at Christmas. Life is Beautiful was a Christmas release. And the posters advertising it showed Benigni and his wife, who’s also his on-screen wife, Nicoletta Braschi, smiling on a beautiful navy blue background with snowflakes falling.
I remember being really struck by the catharsis at the end of the movie, being moved, crying, and then each time I watched it, I liked it less.
Prof. Shavit: Why?
Prof. Lichtner: Because I think the second half is so false. You know, it’s not just inaccurate; it’s false. It’s entirely driven by the motivation of providing catharsis.
The first half is actually quite brave. It is brave because it breaks a big silence. The big silence in Italian culture is not antisemitism and the Holocaust. That’s something Italians, in the end, deal with quite easily because they just blame the Germans for it.
The big silence is Africa and what we Italians did in Ethiopia and in the other African colonies before the war. And Benigni has a way in that first half of the movie of criticizing fascist culture very subtly, including with things like the Ethiopian-themed party and so on.
There’s a critique of homemade antisemitism in the racial laws that’s actually rare in Italian cinema. The only other noticeable example I can think of is maybe Vittorio De Sica’s film The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970), which acknowledged that Italy passed racially discriminating laws by itself well before the Second World War started, before Hitler demanded that they do so.
So, the first half of Life is Beautiful is quite brave, and the second half falls on its own premise. Benigni wants to carry on with this idea that life is beautiful, but once you take the characters into the concentration camp, it is, in my opinion, simply not possible anymore to keep that narrative going.
Prof. Shavit: Your criticism of that movie – how far will you take it? Will you say this is a movie that people should not watch, or will you say this is an effort that failed?
Prof. Lichtner: I think it’s an effort that failed. There are very few movies that I think people shouldn’t watch. Maybe Uwe Boll’s Auschwitz (2011), which was actually banned in Germany and is hard to get a hold of. Maybe that and then just a few others.
No, I definitely wouldn’t censor Life is Beautiful. I just think it’s an effort that failed, partly because Benigni is good at talking about what he knows about, which is not the Holocaust.
There’s a fantastic work by Ruth Ben-Ghiat about the film, where she says, look, forget about the Holocaust. The film is about Italy. The catharsis is the catharsis of Italy being liberated by the Americans.
And this is what infuriated some historians about the movie, the idea that Italian Jews go to this imaginary camp and then are liberated by the Americans instead of the Russians. It infuriated historians because Italian Jews, for the most part, including my grandfather, his mom, and his brother – they were all in Auschwitz – they were liberated by the Soviets. Mind you, Benigni’s father was imprisoned in Bergen-Belsen, which was not liberated by the Soviets. It was liberated by the British.
Prof. Shavit: Going back to the cynicism, however, it’s not an effort that failed from Benigni’s point of view. He won the Oscar that he wanted to win.
Prof. Lichtner: From his point of view, he did it well. I think it fails because it doesn’t understand the essential elements of the history of the Shoah, the things that Moshe was talking about at the beginning: the systematic nature, the industrial nature, and the modernity of the Holocaust as a standalone event. He doesn’t understand that. How could he?
Prof. Shavit: I want to ask Shmulik about Israeli cinema now. In 2024, four major Israeli movies were released about the memory of the Holocaust; about how you deal with the memory of the Holocaust. Four! But not about the Holocaust itself.
And then, I look at the list of movies that have been produced since 1948, and there are hardly any Israel-produced films about the actual Holocaust. How do you explain that? In other words, why are there so few movies about the Holocaust, as opposed to the memory of the Holocaust?
Dr. Duvdevani: I think that there are three reasons why there were so few Israeli films that actually dealt with the Holocaust itself.
First, asking Israeli actors to play again the role of the victims and especially maybe asking Israeli actors to play Nazis, was difficult.
Second, Israeli cinema, at least in its early years, referred to the trauma of Holocaust survivors as one that can be remedied through fresher traumas, which were the focus of its attention.
The third problem is political; what analogies, whether ill-intended or not, will people draw from direct depictions of the Holocaust? Some Israeli moviemakers were reluctant to deal with the Holocaust directly because they feared the response of their peers in other countries, at least subconsciously.
Prof. Shavit: There was perhaps a technical impediment, which is, you know, you need access to certain sceneries if you want to adapt the novels of, say, Aharon Appelfeld to the big screen.
Dr. Duvdevani: Well, I know about at least one Israeli film that is being made at the moment in Yiddish and is being shot, I am not sure where; they wanted to shoot it in Ukraine, but it’s not shot there. And it’s actually a film dealing with the Holocaust.
Prof. Zuckerman: I think that there are no Israeli movies dealing directly with the Holocaust, but only with the memory of the Holocaust, because Israel, whatever the public opinion is, was never interested in the Holocaust. Israelis were always very interested only in the memory of the Holocaust as part of the ideologization of the Holocaust, in terms of Zionism being the solution and being the answer to the Holocaust. This is why, by the way, we don’t have proper research on antisemitism.
I’m thinking about research, proper research on antisemitism in terms of social, psychological, economic, and other aspects.
Prof. Shavit: Well, you know, Moshe, as someone who has dealt so much with memory and with history, you know that history is a work in progress. In the end, people learn history to justify the present and the future.
And now, very final questions calling for short answers. Shmulik, did The Brutalist deserve the Oscar for best movie it didn’t get?
Disclosure: I wish I thought this movie is bad. It is not, I thought worse of it. It’s banal; it does not say anything new or interesting about any of the complicated topics it broaches. As a commentary about the roots of American decline, it manifests the decline in not being able to add something inspiring to the discussion. Sorry for the Spenglerian tone. Anyhow, do you think it deserved the Oscar?
Dr. Duvdevani: Yes.
Prof. Shavit: Why?
Dr. Duvdevani: Because I think it is major movie making. It is a very long epic, though a very intimate epic, about antisemitism, Zionism, memory, architecture, and capitalism, and it deals with all these complicated issues creatively, coherently, and with much substance.
Prof. Shavit: Moshe, if a German high school teacher told you he could show his class, let’s say of 12th graders, just one movie about the Holocaust, which would you recommend?
Prof. Zuckerman: I would recommend Lanzmann’s Shoah in a shorter version. You don’t need the whole eight hours, but in a shorter version, I would recommend it.
Prof. Shavit: You’re optimistic that high school students today can deal even with a shorter version.
Prof. Zuckerman: No, I’m not optimistic at all. You asked me what I’d recommend, not what could actually work.
Prof. Shavit: Giacomo, same question but for New Zealand high school students.
Prof. Lichtner: High school students? I mean, the smart answer is Jojo Rabbit (2019).
Prof. Shavit: Why is that your recommendation?
Prof. Lichtner: Because it’s a New Zealand film by director Taika Waititi, who’s half-Māori, half-Jewish. He made Boy (2010) for his Māori father. He made Jojo Rabbit for his Jewish mother, and it’s a film that is obviously, evidently fantastical, so you don’t have to deal so much with the fear of people coming out of it thinking they understand the Holocaust now. It’s approachable.
Prof. Shavit: And for Italian high school students, will the recommendation be the same?
Prof. Lichtner: No, for Italian students, I would probably get them to watch Kapo by Gillo Pontecorvo, which was made in 1960. This movie is so important to the history of the representation of the Holocaust in cinema. The way it approaches certain imagery – the barbed wire, for instance, became a trope that then got quoted over and over again in Holocaust movies.
I think that in this movie you can see a Jewish prayer in Hebrew for the first time in the history of Italian cinema. At least, it is one of the first times. The Shema are not quite the final words in the movie, but are the final words of the protagonist. And then she dies. It is quite a powerful film. Problematic in all sorts of ways, but powerful.
Prof. Shavit: Why would you offer New Zealander and Italian high school pupils different movies?
Prof. Lichtner: Well, they need to learn different things.
With contribution from Amarah Friedman
Lithuania: The Political Rise of an Antisemite by Dr. Carl Yonker
The October 2024 parliamentary elections in Lithuania marked a shift in the country’s political landscape. The Social Democratic Party of Lithuania (LSDP), under the leadership of Vilija Blinkevičiūtė, secured 52 out of 141 seats in the Seimas, the parliament, ending the four-year tenure of the center-right government led by Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė and her Homeland Union (TS-LKD), which managed to obtain only 28 seats.[1]
While the rise of the Social Democrats and the decline of the Homeland Union was expected, less so was the success of Nemunas Dawn, a newly established populist party led by a politician known for his openly antisemitic statements, Remigijus Žemaitaitis. Nemunas Dawn, which Žemaitaitis formed in 2023, secured 20 seats and finished third in the elections. An even bigger shock was the decision by the Social Democrats to form a coalition with Žemaitaitis and his party despite pre-election statements it would not do so.
A lawyer by training, Žemaitaitis first entered the Seimas in 2009 as a member of the Order and Justice party, a conservative right-wing party championing anti-establishment views, winning his local constituency of Šilalė–Šilutė.[2] He served as its chairman from 2016 to 2020 when Order and Justice merged with two other parties to form the Freedom and Justice party, a center-right conservative party with liberal economic positions.
Known for his inflammatory rhetoric and populist tactics throughout his political career, Žemaitaitis gained notoriety in 2023 for a series of antisemitic social media posts accusing Jews of historical crimes against Lithuanians, distorting the history of the Holocaust, and making antisemitic comments about Israel.
The resulting scandal led to his suspension from the Freedom and Justice party and an April 2024 ruling by Lithuania’s Constitutional Court that he had violated his parliamentary oath and Lithuania’s Constitution by inciting hatred. This ruling led to his resignation from the Seimas to avoid impeachment.
In doing so, Žemaitaitis ensured his ability to remain a candidate in Lithuania’s May 2024 presidential election and return to the Lithuanian parliament in October 2024 as a leader of a radical new force. Indeed, despite his antisemitic remarks and controversies surrounding his historical revisionism, he maintained a strong support base among certain nationalist and far-right voter segments, as well as rural voters. He did so by portraying himself as a defender of “Lithuanian sovereignty” and a victim of elites trying to silence him from telling the truth about Jews, the Holocaust in Lithuania, and Israel.
Žemaitaitis has had a troubled relation to facts and decency when Jews or Israel are concerned. In early May 2023, reports emerged that Israeli authorities, carrying out a court order, demolished a European Union (EU)-funded Palestinian school near Bethlehem. The Israeli court found that the school had been constructed illegally in 2017 and that the structure was unsafe and in danger of collapsing.[3]
The demolition was condemned by the EU and the Palestinian Authority (PA).[4] Žemaitaitis added his voice to the criticism of Israel’s destruction of the school in two Facebook posts commenting on the incident, where he cited a well-known Lithuanian folk song with deep-seated antisemitic lyrics.
In his first post, he wrote, “Apparently, there are animals in this world besides Putin, Israel […] After such events, no wonder there appear sayings like this: ‘A Jew was climbing the ladder and accidentally fell off; take a stick, kids, and kill that little Jew.’ What else must happen for Israel to realize that such provocations and such actions only stir more anger and hatred against Jews and their people.”
In a second post made shortly thereafter, Žemaitaitis repeated the antisemitic children’s rhyme urging “Israeli Jews” to apologize to the Palestinians and the EU for “your nasty little actions in a foreign country.”[5]Several days later, he continued to make a public spectacle, apologizing as a “European, a member of the Seimas” to the Palestinian people for the Israeli actions; his post received over one thousand likes.[6]
Žemaitaitis’s inflammatory posts provoked a swift backlash and led to calls for disciplinary action against him. The embassies of Israel, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States and the World Jewish Congress condemned the statements and called on Žemaitaitis to publicly apologize.
Faina Kukliansky, chairwoman of the Lithuanian Jewish Community (LJC), noted that Žemaitaitis’s statements were crafted not for Jews but for a Lithuanian audience, exploiting nationalist sentiments and historical grievances to promote his political agenda.[7] Žemaitaitis’s party, Freedom and Justice, expelled him, although he dismissed this as an illegal act and accused his former colleagues of supporting “a terrorist state – Israel.”[8] The Seimas’s Ethics and Procedures Commission launched an investigation into his conduct, and the Vilnius District Prosecutor’s Office initiated a pre-trial investigation into his possible incitement of ethnic discord.[9]
Žemaitaitis remained defiant, refusing to apologize for his remarks and instead portraying himself as a victim of political persecution and arguing that he was exercising free speech. He doubled down on his use of the antisemitic rhyme, saying he did so intentionally to argue that the state of Israel was causing antisemitism to rise around the world through its policies. He further warned that any impeachment efforts against him would be challenged in the European Court of Human Rights.[10]
A month later, in June 2023, Žemaitaitis expanded his antisemitic rhetoric to include historical revisionism in another series of inflammatory Facebook posts that distorted the Holocaust. He suggested Lithuanians suffered more than Jews in the Second World War and blamed Jews for crimes against Lithuanians. Targeting then-Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė while she visited Israel, Žemaitaitis condemned her visit and falsely claimed that Lithuanian Jews and Russians committed the June 1944 massacre in Pirčiupiai, which was actually perpetrated by a Nazi SS unit.[11] Demanding the government care more about Lithuanians allegedly murdered by Jews between 1941 and 1944, he continued,
How much longer will our politicians kneel down to the Jews who killed our people and contributed to the oppression and torture of Lithuanians and the destruction of our country? There was a Holocaust of the Jews, but there was an even larger Holocaust of the Lithuanians in Lithuania! So, if our joker politicians apologize to the Jews in Israel, when will the Jews apologize to us?[12]
Over the following days, including the June 14 Day of Mourning and Hope, which commemorates Soviet deportations of Lithuanians to Siberia, Žemaitaitis continued his tirade in several other posts. Addressing the deportations, Žemaitaitis stated: “We, the Lithuanian people, must never forget the Jews and the Russians who very actively contributed to the destruction of our nation!”[13] He further argued that the “descendants of those NKVD and KGB,” meaning Jews, rule over Lithuanians today and that June 14 should be commemorated as the national day of the “Lithuanian Holocaust.”[14]
In another post, he published a list of Jewish individuals who he falsely accused of orchestrating Soviet deportations of Lithuanians in 1941, writing, “Even after 80 years have passed, one ‘subspecies’ group of Jews is still not able to admit that in this tragedy of Lithuania their representatives played a very important role.”[15]
Žemaitaitis’s claims equating Soviet-era deportations and repressions with the Holocaust, framing Lithuanians as the true victims of genocide, and minimizing Jewish suffering and historical evidence of Lithuanian complicity in Holocaust crimes were not original or uncommon. They echo known revisionist narratives that seek to relativize the Holocaust by emphasizing the suffering of non-Jewish populations under Soviet rule and the antisemitic depiction of Jews as collaborators with the Soviet regime.
As other countries in Europe, Lithuania confronts a complicated past. The nation was a victim of injustice but also the perpetrator of injustice and was occupied by the Germans and the Soviets. The contested manner in which Lithuanians engage with their complicated past is captured by, among other things, the Museum of Occupations and Freedom Fights, which this author visited in the summer of 2023.
Located in the former KGB building in Vilnius, between 1940 and 1941, it was the prison of the NKVD/NKGB before serving as the headquarters of the Gestapo, Sicherheitsdienst (SD, SS intelligence), and the SD’s Sonderkommando (special squad, YB) of local Lithuanian volunteers who participated in the slaughter of Lithuania’s Jews from 1941-1944. It was then reoccupied by the KGB in 1944. However, until 2011, there was not a single exhibit in the museum about the Holocaust or about Lithuanian complicity in Nazi crimes. The “genocide” the museum dubiously referred to was that of non-Jewish Lithuanians murdered by the Soviets. Moreover, some Lithuanians who helped the Nazis perpetrate the Holocaust, that is, in murdering their fellow Lithuanians, were lauded and praised for resisting the Soviets.[16]
Žemaitaitis’s remarks reflect the difficulty Lithuania has had in confronting its complicated past. Žemaitaitis claimed he was merely exposing historical truths about Jewish involvement in Soviet crimes in an attempt to justify himself. Yet, as several critics and historians noted, Žemaitaitis distorts historical facts and essentially is willing to say anything that will make him popular among the disaffected, the poorly educated about the crimes of the Holocaust and those who are, simply put, antisemites.[17]
The Lithuanian Jewish Community expressed its deep concern and sadness over Žemaitaitis’s rhetoric, emphasizing that such statements had not appeared in mainstream Lithuanian discourse for years.[18] That Žemaitaitis’s diatribe coincided with Lithuania’s commemoration of the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto (June 1943, which SS Chief Heinrich Himmler ordered) made the timing of his statements even more painful for Lithuania’s Jewish community.
The government response to Žemaitaitis’s statements during 2023 was mixed. Leading figures, including then-Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė and then-Speaker of Parliament Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen, condemned his remarks, and Speaker Čmilytė-Nielsen suggested Žemaitaitis should be impeached and removed from parliament.
The ruling coalition demanded an apology for his antisemitic remarks before the NATO summit in Vilnius in July, but opposition parties refused to support the motion. Some opposition parties also refused to support efforts to impeach and remove him from parliament, signaling a reluctance to take a firm stance against antisemitism.[19]
For his part, Žemaitaitis remained defiant, asking what exactly he should apologize for. He threatened that if impeachment proceedings were started against him, he would appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, local courts, and society.[20]
Lithuanian Prosecutor General Nida Grunskienė stated that the legal proceedings against Žemaitaitis would depend on expert assessments of whether his statements constituted incitement to hatred. Given Lithuania’s legal framework, which includes laws against hate speech and ethnic incitement, a possibility existed that he could face criminal charges.[21]
While the international condemnation of Žemaitaitis’s remarks, coupled with domestic calls for accountability, suggested broad opposition to such rhetoric, the political resistance to Žemaitaitis’s removal from parliament raised questions about the extent to which there was the will to hold him accountable for his antisemitic statements.
In September 2023, the Lithuanian Parliament established a commission to investigate Žemaitaitis’s antisemitic statements on Facebook and determine whether he should be impeached. Initially, opposition parties viewed the commission as a politically motivated effort by the ruling conservative party to remove an opposition MP.
Following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, Žemaitaitis justified the war crimes committed by the Islamist terrorists, stating, “There are two ends to the stick; now the Israeli barbarians must suffer for murdering Palestinians.” These words encouraged a stronger push for his impeachment. As a result, 88 members of parliament voted in favor of continuing proceedings against him, while only two opposed and two abstained.[22]
Despite the establishment of a special impeachment commission to review the case, Žemaitaitis repeatedly failed to appear at meetings. On one occasion, Commission Chairman Arūnas Valinskas stated: “We won’t undertake additional measures. We will simply send an access link to all meetings we hold in the future and will provide the member of parliament the chance to connect and explain his position.” Valinskas further noted that Žemaitaitis’s refusal to present his own explanations could be perceived as a deliberate attempt to discredit the commission’s work, possibly exploiting loopholes in parliamentary statutes.[23]
While the commission continued its work, Žemaitaitis behaved as though he had done nothing wrong. No longer a member of the Freedom and Justice party, in January 2024, Žemaitaitis registered Nemunas Dawn as a party and announced his candidacy for the May 2024 presidential elections.[24]
His announced presidential bid coincided with Lithuanian Prosecutor General Nida Grunskienė’s request for parliament to strip Žemaitaitis of his parliamentary immunity, citing his repeated posting of content on Facebook in May and June 2023 that allegedly mocked, belittled, and incited hatred against Jewish people. Grunskienė informed parliament that “the information collected in the pre-trial investigation lends credence that member of parliament Žemaitaitis […] posted texts on his social media pages which might have mocked, belittled, and encouraged hate publicly against the group of people of Jewish ethnicity.”[25]
While Žemaitaitis admitted to posting the comments during an interview with prosecutors, he insisted that he was merely expressing his opinion and denied engaging in hate speech. The following month, in February 2024, the Lithuanian parliament approved the removal of Žemaitaitis parliamentary immunity in response to allegations of antisemitic statements, opening the door to criminal prosecution.
As the criminal investigation into his antisemitic social media posts continued, efforts to remove Žemaitaitis from parliament received a boost in April 2024 from the Lithuanian Constitutional Court, which ruled that Žemaitaitis’s statements violated his parliamentary oath and the Constitution. The court found that his social media posts contained “degrading descriptions of Jewish people and Holocaust denial,” which amounted to a “gross violation” of the country’s fundamental law.
The court elaborated that his statements “[contained], among other things, degrading descriptions of people belonging to an ethnically distinct group and [quoted] a counting-out rhyme […] depicting violence against Jewish people, mocking them.” Furthermore, the ruling emphasized that Žemaitaitis’s statements incited intolerance between ethnic minorities and demonstrated hatred toward an ethnically distinct group.[26]
On these grounds, the Lithuanian parliament had legal grounds to call a vote to impeach and remove Žemaitaitis. Such a vote never occurred after Žemaitaitis, who called the ruling “unjust,” chose to resign from parliament rather than face an impeachment vote. In avoiding impeachment, Žemaitaitis ensured his ability to run in the upcoming presidential election and parliamentary elections.[27] He found a loophole.
Elected through a two-round system, a candidate in the presidential race must secure an absolute majority in the first round to win; otherwise, a runoff between the top two candidates is necessary. In the 2024 election, incumbent President Gitanas Nausėda, an independent supported by the Social Democratic Party of Lithuania and the Lithuanian Regions Party, sought re-election against Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė of the Homeland Union.
No candidate achieved an absolute majority in the first round, necessitating a runoff. President Nauseda won 44%, while Šimonytė took second place with 20% of the vote and Žemaitaitis came in fourth with 9.28% of the vote (more than 132,000 total votes).[28]
At one point, before election results from cities had been counted, Žemaitaitis polled in second place, an achievement that surprised even him. Though ultimately falling to fourth place, winning over 9% of the vote despite his known antisemitic statements suggested such views are applauded or at least are considered legitimate by a segment of the electorate.
Žemaitaitis ultimately gave his support to the incumbent Nausėda in the second round, who secured a decisive victory with 75.29% of the vote, the largest margin in Lithuania’s presidential election history since its independence in 1990.
Following his failed presidential bid, Žemaitaitis turned his attention to parliamentary elections slated for October 2024. As part of his parliamentary campaign, he portrayed himself as a victim of “cancel culture,” claiming he was being persecuted for expressing views on Israel and Jews that were unpopular with the political elite. “I feel it is my duty to fight for the right to have an opinion and to express it. And not only for myself. Above all, for the people of Lithuania not to be afraid to speak out and criticize the government,” Žemaitaitis stated.[29] He went so far as to petition the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to investigate whether Lithuanian authorities had violated his freedom of expression.
While Žemaitaitis played the victim in a vulgar yet not unique demonstration of how civil liberties can be cynically abused by hate-mongers, efforts to hold him accountable for his antisemitic rhetoric continued. In September 2024, the Vilnius Regional Court began hearing a criminal case against him for inciting hatred. Prosecutors charged him with hate speech, Holocaust denial, and inciting hostility toward Jews. The indictment referenced his claim that “Lithuanian Jews orchestrated mass deportations of Lithuanians in 1941.” Prosecutor Justas Laucius stated that “The evidence clearly shows a pattern of deliberate antisemitic rhetoric aimed at fostering division.”[30] Žemaitaitis denied the charges, asserting that his words were taken out of context.
As criminal proceedings began, Lithuanian politicians began to debate the broader implications of Žemaitaitis’s rhetoric openly. Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis called for a “cordon sanitaire” to prevent radical parties from gaining power after the upcoming parliamentary election, warning that history shows the tragic consequences of pandering to such radical forces.[31]
To avoid such an outcome, Landsbergis and his ruling conservative Homeland Union party appealed to the Social Democratic party to engage in talks about forming a “unity” coalition. The Kaunas Jewish Community warned that any political party willing to form a coalition with Žemaitaitis and Nemunas Dawn would be complicit in normalizing hate speech. “We cannot erase nor forget that he [Žemaitaitis] used antisemitic rhetoric as a springboard for his election,” said Gercas Žakas, chairman of the Kaunas Jewish Community.
Their warnings and pleas fell on deaf ears.
The Social Democrats’ success in the elections, winning an additional 13 seats under the leadership of Vilija Blinkevičiūtė, was driven by public dissatisfaction with the government’s handling of key issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the influx of migrants from Belarus, which had sparked a considerable amount of political unrest.[32] Despite Lithuania’s economic stability, with robust growth and low inflation, the incumbent center-right government, led by Prime Minister Šimonytė’s Homeland Union, failed to maintain voter support.[33] Žemaitaitis’s Nemunas Dawn’s winning of 20 seats, an impressive achievement for a new party, owed, in part, to its promises of tax breaks for large families as well as its reassurances that it supports Ukraine in its war against fascist Russia, albeit through rhetoric that criticized the American involvement in the conflict.[34]
During the campaign, the Social Democrats pledged not to cooperate with Nemunas Dawn and initially appeared to adhere to their word. They entered into negotiations with the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union (LVŽS) and the Union of Democrats “For Lithuania.” The two had won eight and 14 seats, respectively. Negotiations with the LVŽS failed, at which point the Social Democrats reneged on their pledge and engaged Nemunas Dawn in coalition talks.
While the potential inclusion of Nemunas Dawn in coalition negotiations sparked controversy due to the legal proceedings against Žemaitaitis and his known antisemitic remarks and historical revisionism, the talks proceeded and resulted in the formation of a three-party coalition – Social Democrats, Nemunas Dawn, and For Lithuania, holding a parliamentary majority with 86 seats. As part of the agreement, Nemunas Dawn received three of the 14 cabinet positions in the new government: the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Energy, and the Ministry of Justice.
The coalition’s formation was met with considerable opposition, both domestically and internationally. Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda called the coalition a “mistake” and made it clear that he would not appoint any ministers from Nemunas Dawn. Nausėda kept his pledge in principle, as Nemunas Dawn, instead of nominating party members for the cabinet positions, endorsed three independent candidates who the president confirmed. But the President did not keep his promise in spirit, as he de-facto permitted an antisemite to become kingmaker and a dominant force in the cabinet.
Noting the coalition agreement was already causing a problem for the country internationally, as important allies like the United States, Germany, and Israel expressed their misgivings and frustration, Nausėda questioned, “What self-respecting person would want to identify with the leader of this party?”[35]
During the first session of the new parliament and the swearing in of new members, protests against Nemunas Dawn and Žemaitaitis were held outside and in the cities of Kaunas and Tauragė, while opposition MPs (those who the previous year had worked to impeach him) left the parliament hall when Žemaitaitistook his oath of office.[36]
The Lithuanian Jewish Community (LJC) voiced strong concerns over the implications of the coalition. It expressed its dismay over the inclusion of a party led by a person who had made antisemitic remarks and was the subject of an ongoing criminal case for inciting ethnic hatred. LJC Chairwoman Faina Kukliansky strongly condemned Žemaitaitis’ comments, describing them as deeply offensive and harmful. The LJC warned that the coalition would damage Lithuania’s international reputation and harm the country’s democratic principles. This sentiment was echoed by opposition leaders, who argued that Lithuania’s democracy was at stake if hate speech was tolerated within the highest levels of government.
As the coalition government took shape, Žemaitaitis continued to face legal scrutiny for his antisemitic statements. In December 2024, Lithuania’s Prosecutor General formally requested again that the parliament strip Žemaitaitis of his immunity so that his criminal case could proceed. The request was approved, with 101 votes in favor and none against or abstaining.
Žemaitaitis, as always, dismissed the charges as politically motivated, claiming that the case was a form of “political persecution.”[37] At the time the Report went to print, criminal proceedings against Žemaitaitis were ongoing and the coalition remained intact.
Žemaitaitis’s political success can be attributed to his ability to harness populist rhetoric and capitalize on the dissatisfaction of certain segments of the Lithuanian electorate, particularly in rural areas. Žemaitaitis has sophisticatedly positioned himself as a populist outsider, offering a critique of the political elites in Vilna, including the Social Democrats and the more established conservative parties.
Žemaitaitis’s rhetoric often focuses on attacking the political establishment, which he portrays as corrupt and out of touch with the needs of ordinary Lithuanians.[38] His historically revisionist statements and legal battles helped Žemaitaitis frame himself as a victim of the system and become the leader of the third-largest party in parliament.
Yet, for Žemaitaitis and his party to become members of a governing coalition, more was needed: a mainstream party willing to renege on its pre-election pledges not to join forces with an openly antisemitic populist. The Social Democrats made a compromise that favored power over principles and, in the process, legitimized that which should never be legitimized again in Europe.
[38] Samoškaitė, “Sneering at Israel, Swearing at Elites.”
The United States: Seinfeld Returns to the Chronicles
Prof. Uriya Shavit
Seinfeld was not a show about nothing. Neither did it stand out from other popular sitcoms just because of Larry David’s “no hugging, no learning” formula and the cynicism and anti-social behavior it displayed. Its best episodes, and there are dozens of them, have the psychological and philosophical depth of great literature, transforming depictions of daily routines into cultural canon. They hilariously and troublingly convey how the abundance of cultural references, the ease of duplication and imitation, and the breakdown of traditional institutions impose the Freudian unheimlich, the uncanniness generated by the familiar becoming unfamiliar, on urban souls. The carefree yet anxious, detached lives of the fabulous four reflected a zeitgeist without ever intending to, and, a moment before smartphones and social media took over, prophesied deepening crises.
I saw Jerry Seinfeld in real life just once, at a press conference in Tel Aviv in November 2007. He came to promote a now all-but-forgotten movie. Real-life John Cleese is as different from Basil Fawlty as any person can be. What struck me about Seinfeld was how much he was the exact same Seinfeld from the series. He was not acting on the set. He was himself.
The real Jerry Seinfeld grew up in Long Island, attended Hebrew school, had a Bar Mitzvah, and volunteered in Kibbutz Saar in northern Israel at the age of 16. Yet in his thirties, at the height of the series’ success, there wasn’t anything manifestly Jewish about him, and there wasn’t anything manifestly Jewish about his fictional self, other than that they liked telling jokes for a living, which for some reason is considered a Jewish trait. The Seinfeld persona was made of all-American and New York icons and traditions, from baseball to cornflakes to Superman. No Star of David, no lighting of the candles when others have Christmas trees, no Yiddish phrases, no Hebrew, no rallying for Israel, no comical gigs inspired by Archie Bunker 1970s style prejudice directed against him.
In the series, his best friend, George, is questionably Jewish on his mother’s side (search “was George Costanza…” and see how Google completes the sentence). There are plenty of Jewish characters throughout, from the distant relative who had a pony in Poland to the mohel with the shaking hands to the rabbi who cannot keep a secret to the dentist who converts so that he can tell jokes about Jews. They all comically pale compared to other supporting actors and are all very much external to the reality of fictional Jerry’s life (or real Jerry’s life), which at the time was devoid of Jewish symbols, sentiments, politics, or texts as a natural reflection of being bereft of any mature or serious commitments to anything but his comedy.
Being a Jew and an American was, in the 1990s, one and the same for the fictional Seinfeld, just as it was for the real one. Rather than the old deliberate distancing from one’s roots for social gain, Seinfeld’s casual approach to his roots was enabled by a social transformation: the emergence of secular Jews who felt fully accepted in American society.
True to its New York environment, the series was rich with ethnic characters, from Pakistanis (the unforgettable Babu Bhatt, played by the Jewish actor Brian George) to South Koreans to Puerto Ricans. Seinfeld and his gang often clashed with them because of cultural differences or because they were mean, but this was never a clash between a member of one minority group and a member of another. It was clear that the easy-going Jerry was master of the domain called New York, even when tricked or embarrassed by people with funny accents. There was no meaningful substance to Seinfeld’s Jewishness in the 1990s because society made it possible for him not to be concerned with identity issues.
To appreciate how anything but obvious this positioning of an American Jew was, consider one of the most influential books in the history of Migration Studies, Nathan Glazer’s and Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s Beyond the Melting Pot, published in 1963.
The term “melting pot” was popularized in the early 1900s through a play by the same name written by the British-Jewish author Israel Zangwil, the leader of Territorialist Zionism. It depicted the integration-drama of a Russian-Jewish survivor of a pogrom in the United States.
Beyond the Melting Pot explored five ethnic groups in New York through field studies: African Americans (that is not the name they used), Puerto Ricans, Italians, Irish, and Jews. The main argument was that assimilation is a far-fetched concept and that hyphenated identities in America are more endurable than what people tend to think. According to Moynihan and Glazer, fourth- and fifth-generation Americans with migratory backgrounds were still attached, for various reasons, to their origins and a community that represented those origins.
In the 1990s, Seinfeld – and Seinfeld – confidently suggested that secular, urban Jews have become the pot itself in which others may or may not melt; that Jews stand for what America is and what being American is. For Jews who grew up in the days when golf clubs shunned them and family names were changed so they didn’t ring Jewish, this was a revolution. For Jews who grew up in America of the 1970s, it seemed natural.
Israel is mentioned only twice in the series and only once directly by Seinfeld. The episode “The Cigar Store Indian” (74, aired December 1993, written by Tom Gammill and Max Pross) is one of the strongest and earliest warnings about the danger that political correctness would get out of hand. In one of the scenes, a mailman of Chinese extraction is upset with Jerry for asking him if there is a good Chinese restaurant in the neighborhood, precisely at the moment when Jerry tries to convince the Native American woman he wants to date that he is very much politically correct, very aware about identity issues.
Reflecting on this encounter hours later, Jerry laments to George that everyone is becoming too sensitive, adding, “somebody asks me which way is Israel, I don’t fly off the handle.” Israel is on his mind as something that belongs to him, but only as a distant abstraction, a jesting reference. Political correctness is strange to him because he feels secure in the place his ethnicity acquired in American society in a way the Chinese mailman or the Native American are still not.
In the one-before-final episode in the series, the Puerto Ricans march, and Seinfeld and his gang end up stuck in traffic jams on their way home. Seinfeld does not march in the series with his people on Israel’s Independence Day. He does not feel he needs to.
***
There is no better demonstration of Seinfeld’s and Seinfeld’s confident and carefree detachment from the burdens of the Jewish hyphen and Jewish memory during the 1990s than the treatment of the Holocaust and antisemitism in the series. That treatment offers astute observations about totalitarianism, neo-Nazism, and Holocaust education. Yet, in line with Seinfeld’s general alienation at the time from rootedness of any sort, let alone one that calls for political commitment, it also testifies to how convinced Seinfeld was, at the time, that the past is no particular concern of his, how unburdened he was.
“The Soup Nazi,” one of the most celebrated Seinfeld episodes (116, aired November 1995, written by Spike Feresten), is a shrewd comment about how easily people resign to submissive, herd behavior and how one free spirit can destroy an entire tyrannical order. The conformist Jerry follows the bizarre and condescending procedures imposed by the eccentric and masterful owner of a soup stand, just like his nemesis Newman does. Kramer, the outcast and conspiracy theories fan, not only submits, but also identifies with the dictator. George is more than willing to submit after his chutzpah fails him at first and is satisfied that giving up his pride for a brief culinary delight is worth it. In contrast, Elaine stands alone, just, in insisting there are bigger things in life than soup, such as dignity and freedom of expression. When a rare act of kindness by the authoritarian soup maker inadvertently lands her his secret recipes, his entire regime collapses and he flees to another country.
One of the things that made this episode iconic within weeks of its airing was that it was based on a real soup stand and a real-life character, the Persian-American Ali Yeganeh, who was furious with the cast rather than happy with the glory that befell him and its potential rewards. Whether or not he was actually so rude has become a matter of controversy.
Funny as the “Soup Nazi” may be, there is a caveat. Seinfeld was not the first great comedian to make a joke of Nazism. Yet whereas in Mel Brook’s The Producers the comical usage of Nazism was essential for the movie’s sub-textual comments about the concealed fascist essence of musicals and popular culture at large and about the thin line between being a joke and making a joke, and whereas in Fawlty Towers’ episode “The Germans” the usage of Nazism was essential to make the point about Britain’s desperate hanging to its past, the “Soup Nazi’s” take on despotism and submissiveness would have worked well also without the vendor’s depiction as a Nazi.
Seinfeld did not introduce the use of “Nazi” as a joking pejorative term for everyday life situations involving rude, meticulous, and imposing personalities. Still, the unfortunate cultural impact of the episode was that it legitimized the comical, casual usage of the term in popular culture. This could not have happened unless for Seinfeld, at that time, the term was just another taboo to break. That mainstream television, and a Jew, were so comfortable with such a usage meant everyone might legitimately feel the same.
“The Limo” (19, aired February 1992, story by Marc Jaffe and teleplay by Larry Charles) has George pretending to be the never-seen-in-public-before Donald O’Brien, the leader of the Aryan Union and author of the antisemitic manifesto “The Big Game.” The childish trick is played so that he and Jerry can enjoy a free ride in a limousine from the airport.
This was the first Seinfeld episode with a sophisticated, dark plot, an urban-legend bent, and an unheimlich scent, as George turns out to be comfortable as an impostor of a neo-Nazi leader, and the four friends display how little they actually know about the other and how little trust they have in each other. As the “The Soup Nazi,” the episode is a sharp social commentary, exposing the intellectual laziness and fetishism of American white supremacists. The scene where Eva, a member of the party, passionately flirts with George is one of the best in the series, and so is the one where George receives the draft of the anti-Jewish speech he is supposed to deliver shortly.
One thing missing, however, is a direct reference to Jerry’s Jewishness in all of this. He finds the neo-Nazis in the limo funny at first and then, when things get out of hand, is terrified by them. But he is not terrified as Jerry the Jew. It is remarkable that in an episode that almost begs that reference, Seinfeld’s Judaism is only in the background.
“The Raincoats,” a double-episode (82, 83, aired in April 1994, written by Tom Gammill, Max Pross, Larry David, and Jerry Seinfeld), centers on Aaron, a close-talker dating Elaine, who is exceptionally selfless and kind-hearted. Jerry’s Jewish parents are staying over, making it impossible for him to make out with his Jewish girlfriend. He finally manages to fool around with her in the darkness of a movie theater while watching Schindler’s List, which they go to only because his parents insist it’s a must-watch. His shame is exposed by his nemesis, Newman. (In that news conference in Tel Aviv I attended, asking Seinfeld questions about Seinfeld was strictly forbidden. One journalist nevertheless asked whether the Jerry Seinfeld who just visited Yad Vashem was the same Jerry Seinfeld who made out during Schindler’s List. The crack was too good for Seinfeld not to appreciate).
As in the “Soup Nazi” and “The Limo,” in “The Raincoats,” too, there is more sophistication than first meets the eye. The episode can be interpreted as a well-deserved criticism of the transformation of the memory of the Holocaust into symbolic capital. “The must-watch movie” about the Holocaust, which does not really represent its horrors, is the currency through which “the must-be-earned prize” is awarded, the six million are thanked and parents and educators are satisfied that they took care of heritage-education for their children, even though they did not.
The fictional Seinfeld appears so sincere in his lack of interest in Schindler’s List. The reason does not seem to be that he is fed up with learning about the Holocaust or because it is too painful for him to learn about it at all. Fictional Seinfeld doesn’t care about Holocaust movies because he doesn’t care about anything; because that is the core of his personality. The episode and the real Seinfeld were more than content with telling the world that indifference to the memory of the Holocaust is no different than not caring about anything that rings serious in general.
The scriptwriters could not resist drawing a comical comparison between Aaron, the selfless close-talker, and Oscar Schindler, the righteous among the nations. The joke is not funny not only because it is too blunt and artificial, but also because there is a fine line between sticking a pin in the balloon of virtue signaling and the memory of the Holocaust itself. That fine line could not have been blurred if the Jerry Seinfeld of the mid-1990s, that is, the real Jerry Seinfeld, was not the American comedian who just happened to be Jewish.
***
After Seinfeld ended in 1998, Seinfeld got married and seemed content with the realization that he would never achieve anything bigger in life. One would think that the time had come for him to leave behind the persona of the adolescent and use his fame and money for good causes – for example, as Christopher Reeve did. While it was not his favorite superhero who said so, it is still true: with great power comes great responsibility.
That did not happen. Throughout the first two decades of the new millennium, Seinfeld the husband, the father, the celebrity, said almost nothing meaningful about any global or local cause, including Middle Eastern affairs and the state of Israel. He could not bring himself even to say something about the Trump phenomenon (good, bad, mixed, something). He supported a post his Jewish wife, the author of several cookbooks, Jessica, published against antisemitism on Instagram in 2022, but did so in the most unemotional, cautious way, celebrating its lack of aggressiveness. “I am just a comedian” was his unofficial slogan. It seemed helpless; Seinfeld and Seinfeld would always remain on the bench.
All of that makes what happened with Seinfeld after October 7 all the more remarkable.
Discussing the abundance of antisemitic attacks in America following the Gaza War and their impact on Jewish families, Franklin Foer wrote in The Atlantic that “the golden age of American Jews is ending.” For several generations, he argued, Jews in America enjoyed safety, prosperity, and political influence without having to relinquish their identity. “But that era is drawing to a close” in the face of growing extremism and mob behavior from both left and right, raising alarm about the future of Jews in America – and the future of America itself.[1]
Witnessing the comeback of antisemitism and feeling under threat, some American Jews have begun to engage more profoundly with their roots and identity and have vowed to take action. Bret Stephens of the New York Times wrote about “The Year American Jews Woke Up.” For years, he argued, American Jews knew that antisemitism and prejudice against them still existed, but only “after October 7, it became personal,” transforming them into “October 8 Jews” who are forced to reckon with the prevalence of hate against them.[2]
This depiction fits Seinfeld well.
On October 10, 2023, Seinfeld released the following post on Instagram: “I lived and worked on a Kibbutz in Israel when I was 16 and I have loved our Jewish homeland ever since. My heart is breaking from these attacks and atrocities. But we are also a very strong people in our hearts and minds. We believe in justice, freedom and equality. We survive and flourish no matter what. I will always stand with Israel and the Jewish people.” Attached was a poster of a girl covered with the Israeli flag and the banner “I stand with Israel.”[3]
Seinfeld also joined in the immediate aftermath of the attack some 700 people from the Hollywood entertainment industry in signing a strong-worded open letter condemning Hamas and calling for the immediate release of the hostages held in Gaza. It asked the entertainment community to speak out forcefully against the Islamist terror organization, to support Israel, and to refrain from sharing misinformation about the war. There were some big names there, but none was as big as Seinfeld’s.[4]
Two months later, Seinfeld, accompanied by his wife, visited Israel in a show of solidarity. He traveled to Kibbutz Beeri on the Gaza border and met with family members of hostages. He expressed his horror and reiterated his commitment to the people of Israel and to spreading the truth about what happened around the world. He mainly listened and talked little, as American guests tend to do in formal visits, often to the surprise of their Israeli hosts. There was no hugging, it seemed, but there was some learning.[5]
Then came what was probably the most overflowing public display of emotion in his life, when Seinfeld was on the verge of tearing up while reflecting on his visit to Israel in an interview on Bari Weiss’ Honestly podcast series. He described the tour as “the most powerful experience of my life.” Unable to explain the experience in words, his broken voice and struggle to control himself spoke instead.[6]
The reaction to his unequivocal pro-Israel position could only be expected. The heckling, the booing, the allegations that he supports genocide. For some, it wasn’t just his fame that made his involvement so outrageous, but his decision to finally take a side in a public debate regarding a conflict they believed was nuanced. Seinfeld did not back down or offer any yes-but rhetoric intended to make everyone happy.
You’d expect the Jerry of the 1990s, the fictitious and the real, would have. In an interview with GQ, he said that while he was aware antisemitism existed before October 7, it never crossed his mind, just as it never crossed the minds of other Jews from his generation, that people would ever treat him based on his Judaism and in antisemitic language. He made clear he did not regret speaking his mind and that his feelings were very strong.[7]
But he also made clear that he was not the champion of a cause, and pretended – or did he? – that he was surprised people aim at him, as if the words of a comedian like him carry any importance. I watched the commencement address he gave in May 2024 at Duke University. He was noticeably apolitical and avoided controversy. He did not make up his mind whether he wanted to be funny or inspirational, and ended up being neither, with sentences like “Don’t think about having, think about becoming.”[8] A few students, who probably could not tell the river from the sea, left in protest when he was invited to speak, booing. Seinfeld seemed nervous, but it appeared to be not because of the faint pro-Hamas demonstration, but because of the posh setting (what is it about professors with funny hats that makes people tremble? Roger Federer, another usually cool guy, gave a commencement speech at Dartmouth in June 2024, and also seemed a nervous wreck).
People do not change in old age. Seinfeld celebrated his 70th birthday in April 2024, half a year before the October 7 attack. His transformation owed to the gravity of the circumstances. He could not remain a cynical observer when the foundations of what allowed that position in the first place – the confidence in the place Jews acquired in American society, the confidence that Israel will always be there for them, just in case – were shattered. Thus, the discarding, even if hesitant, of the identity of the all-American comedian who just happened to be Jewish and the reemergence as a Jewish-American comedian, a proud Jewish-American comedian, who stands with his people and explains his doing so by the phrase, “I’m Jewish.”
There is a troubling aspect to all of this. The circumstances in which Seinfeld became manifestly and publicly Jewish reinforce the old question of whether secular American Jewishness can exist and thrive as a meaningful identity without antisemitism or Israel as rallying causes. Is there anything else? It’s got to be about something.
[5] Uri Sela, “Seinfeld Visited Beeri: Devastated from What I Saw, but Uplifted from the Sturdiness of the Inhabitants [Hebrew],” Walla, December 19, 2023, https://e.walla.co.il/item/3629923.
During the Second World War, about 75% of Jews in the Netherlands were murdered, the highest percentage in Western Europe. This high number was attributed in part to the obedience of Dutch civil servants to Nazi commands and the efficiency in implementing them. In a post-war interview, Adolf Eichmann said about the Netherlands that the transports there were running so smoothly that it was “a pleasure to watch.”[1]
In March 2024, following years of planning and construction, a National Holocaust Museum opened in Amsterdam. The museum was designed with the explicit aim to teach schoolchildren and others “how the Holocaust could happen, about its victims and perpetrators,” and most importantly, to teach “how to prevent it all from happening again.”[2] Its establishment was a milestone in the Dutch commitment to inform about the darkest times in European history, and as such, is commendable.
Yet soon after its inauguration, the museum sparked a controversy, raising questions about historical memory and responsibility and a dilemma not unique to the Dutch case: how should countries occupied by the Nazis engage with the vicious and massive crimes committed through the cooperation and, in some cases, initiative, of their own people against the Jewish population?
Israeli columnist Chaim Levinson, who visited the museum shortly after it opened, argued in Haaretz, the leading Israeli liberal newspaper, that Dutch perpetrators and collaborators are “completely absent” from the museum’s exhibition.
Levinson raised very good questions: “Moving on to the question of responsibility – how, in fact, did the Holocaust take place in the Netherlands? Why did they see the Jews, who were their allies and flesh of their flesh, as an enemy that should be destroyed and eliminated? What were the opinions and worldviews behind the Holocaust of Dutch Jews? Could it have taken place in England, too?”[3]
According to Levinson, a visitor to the Dutch Holocaust Museum will not walk away with answers to these questions and won’t learn anything about the role or responsibility of Dutch perpetrators in the Shoah.
Christophe Busch, director of the Hannah Arendt Institute in Mechelen (Belgium), observed that only one section of the museum, called “wallpaper of crimes,” is dedicated to the Nazis and their collaborators. That section sheds light on the perpetrators in all their diversity, albeit briefly and without much explanation. He noted that this part of the museum touches on a complexity that the museum’s curators believe should be tackled in a thorough and nuanced way only within its educational work rather than through exhibitions.[4]
Similar criticisms were offered regarding a Dutch historical television drama about the Jewish Council that was broadcast around the time of the museum’s opening. The Jewish Council was formed by the Nazis in the Netherlands in order to utilize the country’s Jewish leadership to organize deportations with the least resistance. Although the series was widely praised for representing the dilemmas of the Council, it failed to present two critical historical factors that explain the Council’s tragedy: the context of the isolation of the Dutch Jewish community by 1942 and the cooperation of Dutch civil servants in the persecution of the Jews.
Dutch historian and professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Johannes Houwink ten Cates, said: “With the exception of a few professors and their students in Leiden and Delft, and later the churches, hardly anyone stood up for the Jews […] why is this not mentioned earlier in the series?” Moreover, “during the first three hours of this historical television drama, there is absolutely no reference to the cooperation of Dutch civil servants in the persecution. Cooperation in registering as Jews, in enforcing segregation, in removing Jewish children from education, in issuing identity cards (marked with a J for ‘Jew’), in arrests (also by the Amsterdam municipal police) and in transports to the transit camps on the way to the East. In my opinion, this is a serious lack of historical context, because the help of Dutch civil servants in the persecution and the transports was more important to the occupiers than that of the Jewish Council […] The official collaboration went unpunished after the liberation. So many non-Jewish villains and their accomplices […] went free.”[5]
Although Dutch co-responsibility for and complicity in the deportation of the country’s Jews has been discussed, researched, and publicly acknowledged in the Netherlands, there is no unanimous agreement on the extent to which this topic should be broached in the national memory of the Second World War.
Responding to the criticism, the National Holocaust Museum’s chief curator, Annemiek Gringold, argued that the museum does not overlook the complicity of the Dutch in the deportation of the country’s Jews. She pointed out that the museum does explore “this very dark part of the Netherlands’ history, as well as antisemitism in Dutch society before, during, and after the Shoah.” She refers to the museum’s “wallpaper of crimes” as “one of its most prominent sections,” explaining that it exhibits Nazi artifacts of both German and Dutch origin and offers more than 50 digital portraits of perpetrators. “About one-third of the portraits are of Dutch collaborators,” she argued. “They include Dutch Jew hunters, both civilians and police officers, Dutch SS officials, Dutch guards at concentration camps and Dutch volunteers in the German Einsatzgruppen that rounded up and shot Jews and others in Eastern Europe in their millions […] In addition to these accomplices’ acts of betrayal, looting, abuse, and deportation, the exhibition also provides dozens of personal accounts of Jewish victims.”[6]
The Director of Amsterdam’s Jewish Cultural Quarter,[7] Emile Schrijver, clarified that one of the museum’s main intentions was to focus on the victims and “to return humanity to those who were deprived of their humanity by zooming in on individual lives” and telling individual stories through personal artifacts.[8]
The construction of memory inevitably involves contestation. Memory scholars have established that there will always be multiple memories of the same event and that struggles and negotiations take place between them.[9] This is also the case in the Netherlands, after decades of self-reflection and a gradual attempt to commemorate the persecution of Jews in the most proper way.
The rather belatedly established National Holocaust Museum is the Netherlands’ first museum solely dedicated to the persecution of the Jews in the country. It complements a string of other places of commemoration that keep the memory of the Second World War alive, the main ones being the Amsterdam Resistance Museum, the Anne Frank House, the Auschwitz Monument, the Westerbork transit camp, the Amersfoort concentration camp, and the Hollandsche Schouwburg, the Amsterdam theater that the Nazis used as an assembly space for nearly 50,000 Dutch Jews before they were deported to transit Camp Westerbork in the east of the country and then to the concentration and extermination camps in Eastern Europe. Younger Jewish children were assembled in the nursery across the street from the theater, and most of them were murdered. After the war, the Hollandsche Schouwburg, with its haunting memories, was left deserted and abandoned for years until finally, in 1962, the auditorium of the theater was dedicated as a memorial to the Dutch victims of the Holocaust.[10]
The new National Holocaust Museum is located across the street from this memorial, in the “Hervormde Kweekschool” – a former Protestant seminary that had a garden adjacent to the nursery where the Jewish children were gathered. The seminary was a crucial part of a rescue operation in which its directors, students, and employees, in cooperation with the Dutch resistance, managed to save about 600 Jewish children from the nursery and transfer them to places of hiding with Dutch families all over the country. The rescue operation was led by Johan van Hulst, who later became a senator and was named Righteous Among the Nations. He died in 2018, aged 107. Also involved in the efforts were Henriëtte Pimentell, the director of the nursery who was murdered in Auschwitz in September 1943, and Walter Süskind, a Jewish council member who died in February 1945 in or near Auschwitz.
The choice of location for the Holocaust Museum raises the question whether its curators sought to highlight this story of resistance against the dark background of the persecution of Dutch Jewry that is presented in the museum itself. This question is especially worth raising given the tendency in the Netherlands, certainly in the past, to give resistance and hiding the more prominent place in the national commemoration of the Second World War.
This was especially true in the first decades after the war when the perception prevailed that everyone in the Netherlands had had it bad; some suffered more than others, but everyone was more or less equal in their suffering. Resistance during the war was glorified and amplified to inaccurate proportions.
From the 1960s onwards, public consciousness of the Shoah increased, accompanied by feelings of bewilderment and shame, as the public was confronted with the first classic historical works and television documentaries on the fate of the Dutch Jews. This was followed by intensive scientific research on the topic.
In the 1980s and 1990s, it was widely recognized in the Dutch public discourse that an obedient Dutch administrative apparatus had significantly contributed to the efficiency of the deportations in the Netherlands; that from top to bottom, Dutch civil servants, railway personnel, and police officers had actively participated in the preparations and facilitation of the persecution of Jews, while the population passively watched.[11]
Officials began to publicly recognize the Dutch complicity in the deportation of the Jews. Queen Beatrix addressed the Knesset in March 1995 and cautiously noted that the Dutch who saved Jews were the exception during the years of occupation, while not directly recognizing that there were those who willingly cooperated with evil.[12]
Her speech was followed by various initiatives for compensation and restitution schemes.[13] On the National Remembrance Day of May 4, 2020, King Willem-Alexander publicly acknowledged that his own grandmother, Queen Juliana, may not have done enough for her subjects who were in need, who “felt abandoned, not heard enough, not supported enough, even if only with words.”[14] In the same year, Prime Minister Mark Rutte publicly apologized for the role of the Dutch government in the persecution of the Jews.[15] This was followed by the unveiling of the Holocaust Names Monument in Amsterdam in 2021 and, finally, the opening of the National Holocaust Museum in 2024.
Memory and heritage scholar David Duindam observed that the self-critical view of the Holocaust reflected a broader political tendency to acknowledge the painful and embarrassing parts of Dutch national history. Another aspect of this tendency is the way the Dutch colonial past has been extensively addressed over the last decade. There is an urge to make room for these histories that used to be marginal and to present them to a large audience in national places.[16]
However, Dutch historian Johannes Houwink ten Cate notes that this fixation on injustice, characteristic of the present “age of apology,” also has a converse effect. With regard to the Second World War, he argues, the new tendency to trivialize resistance and to present collaboration as if it was the norm is being resisted by large segments of the Dutch public.[17]
Ten Cate observes that feelings of guilt and shame about the Holocaust have been disappearing from the public debate. For example, it is common to express the idea that the Dutch lack of solidarity with the Jews is a myth. Likewise, the distinction between good and evil has become blurred. Dutch writer and artist Chaja Polak identifies this as part of a broader tendency to manipulate history and a dormant forgetting of the Shoah.
According to historian Frank van der Vree, who recently published his volume The Netherlands and the Memory of the Persecution of the Jews 1945-2024, a common sentiment in the Netherlands remains that “this was done to the Netherlands as a nation. The Dutch are not collectively looking away from the Holocaust, and the persecution of the country’s Jews is not denied or repressed, but at the same time, the specific character of the mass murder of Jews receives little attention.”[18]
According to a study by the Claims Conference published in January 2023, only 44% of Dutch Millennials and Gen Z and only half (50%) of all Dutch respondents support recent efforts by Dutch leaders to acknowledge and apologize for the Netherlands’ failure to protect Jews during the Holocaust; 39% of Dutch Millennials and Gen Z and 31% of all Dutch respondents opposed such acknowledgments and apologies, while 17% of Dutch Millennials and Gen Z and 19% of all Dutch respondents said they were not sure.
The same study showed shortcomings in historical knowledge about the Holocaust in the Netherlands, especially among young people. Twelve percent of all respondents believe the Holocaust is a myth or the number of Jews killed has been greatly exaggerated, while 9% are unsure. These numbers are higher among Dutch Millennials and Gen Z, where 23% believe the Holocaust is a myth or the number of Jews murdered has been greatly exaggerated, while 12% are unsure. More than half of all respondents (54% of all respondents and 59% of Millennials and Gen Z) do not know that six million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust.[19]
This reality is accompanied by an ongoing controversy surrounding Holocaust education and sensitivities involving the wars in the Middle East, which conflated in an unfortunate way at the opening of the National Holocaust Museum on March 10, 2024.
During the inauguration, a crowd of anti-Israel demonstrators gathered in the street, demonstrating against the war in Gaza as well as the arrival of Israeli President Yitzhak Herzog, who attended the opening of the museum. At this vulnerable moment for the last survivors of the concentration camps, the Hitler salute was seen several times. Palestinian flags were waved, and “From the River to the Sea” was chanted.
The shouts of the crowd even drowned out the words of the King of the Netherlands, who was trying to address local television reporters. The demonstrators’ verbal attacks on a Holocaust survivor and his great-granddaughter who received the honor of attaching a mezuzah to the museum’s entrance and who were then rushed through a small opening in the angry crowd with their heads bowed evoked painful memories of something the museum is trying to educate against.
In the aftermath of the event, the Dutch Jewish community expressed its shock at the public aversion against Jews in front of this symbolic museum. It raised the question of how long Dutch civil society and the city’s leaders “will continue to accept the demonization of Jews” and when they would finally take a stance to protect the Jews.[20] This call is a stark echo of the past, when most Dutch Jews felt entirely abandoned by their leaders and fellow citizens in the Second World War.
Historian David Wertheim, Director of the Menasseh ben Israel Institute for Jewish Studies, commented: “The fear is very existential. It stems from the traumatic experiences of the Shoah: the idea that the Jewish community thought it was safe and it wasn’t.”[21] Levinson, in his Haaretz column, touched on these feelings by asking: “Why were the Jews considered such a disturbance to this calm and pleasant life, both then and today?” and “Why is the most heavily guarded building in central Amsterdam a Holocaust museum?”[22]
[1] Pim Griffioen and Ron Zeller, “The Netherlands: The Highest Number of Jewish Victims in Western Europe,” Anne Frank House publication, https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/netherlands-greatest-number-jewish-victims-western-europe/.
[2] See the official website: https://jck.nl/en/location/national-holocaust-museum.
[3] Chaim Levinson “Missing at Amsterdam’s New Holocaust Museum: The Dutch Collaborators,” Haaretz, August 19, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/2024-08-19/ty-article/.premium/one-thing-is-missing-at-amsterdams-new-holocaust-museum-dutch-collaborators/00000191-6a71-db7c-afdf-fe713eec0000.
[4] Christophe Busch, “The Janus face of the National Holocaust Museum [Dutch],” Historisch Nieuwsblad, April 30, 2024, https://www.historischnieuwsblad.nl/de-januskop-van-het-nationaal-holocaustmuseum/.
[5] “The Jewish Council is once again the scapegoat [Dutch],” Historisch Nieuwsblad, April 2, 2024, https://www.historischnieuwsblad.nl/de-joodse-raad-is-toch-weer-de-zondebok/.
[6] Annemiek Gringold, “Dutch Collaborators Do Play a Prominent Role at Amsterdam’s New Holocaust Museum,” Haaretz, August 26, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2024-08-26/ty-article-opinion/.premium/dutchcollaborators-do-play-a-prominent-role-at-amsterdams-new-holocaust-museum/00000191-89cc-d954-add7-8fdec4870000.
[7] The National Holocaust Museum and the recently renovated memorial in the Hollandsche Schouwburg are part of the so-called “Jewish Cultural Quarter” (JCK) in Amsterdam that also includes the Jewish Historic Museum, the Children’s Museum, and the Portuguese Synagogue with its historic Jewish library Ets Haim.
[8] “National Holocaust Museum full of stories [Dutch],” Benjamin, March 27, 2024, https://joodswelzijn.nl/benjamin/nationaal-holocaustmuseum-vol-verhalen/.
[9] Alon Confino, “Collective Memory and Cultural History: Problems of Method,” The American Historical Review 102, no. 5 (1997), 1398.
[10] For two in-depth studies, see: David Duindam, Fragments of the Holocaust: The Amsterdam Hollandsche
Schouwburg as a Site of Memory (Amsterdam University Press, 2018) and Site of Deportation, Site of Memory:
The Amsterdam Hollandsche Schouwburg and the Holocaust, ed. David Duindam, Hetty Berg, Frank van Vree
(Amsterdam University Press, 2018).
[11] Margreet Fogteloo, “Finally Room [Dutch],” De Groene Amsterdammer, no. 17, April 24, 2019, https://www.groene.nl/artikel/eindelijk-ruimte.
[12] For the text of Her Majesty’s speech on March 28, 1995: https://m.knesset.gov.il/EN/activity/Documents/SpeechPdf/Beatrix.pdf.
[13] Rianne Oosterom, “Why the Netherlands is only now getting a National Holocaust Museum [Dutch],” Trouw, March 8, 2024.
[14] Speech by King Willem-Alexander, National Remembrance Day [Dutch], May 4, 2020, https://www.koninklijkhuis.nl/documenten/toespraken/2020/05/04/toespraak-van-koning-willem-alexander-nationale-herdenking-4-mei-2020.
[15] Speech by Prime Minister Mark Rutte at the National Commemoration at the Auschwitz Monument, Amsterdam, January 26, 2020, https://www.government.nl/documents/speeches/2020/01/26/speech-by-prime-ministermark-rutte-at-the-national-commemoration-at-the-auschwitz-monument-amsterdam.
[16] Oosterom, “Why the Netherlands is only now getting a National Holocaust Museum.”
[18] Oosterom, “Why the Netherlands is only now getting a National Holocaust Museum.”
[19] Claims Conference Netherlands Holocaust Poll, January 2023, https://www.claimscon.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Claims-Conference-Netherlands-Dual-Topline-1.pdf.
[20] Naomi Italiaander, “Enough is Enough [Dutch],” Jonet, March 12, 2024, https://jonet.nl/de-maat-is-vol-columnnaomi-italiaander/.
[21] “Don’t Say: You are an Antisemite. But: What You Said is Antisemitic [Dutch],” Nederlands Dagblad, November
6, 2023.
[22] Haim Levinson “Missing at Amsterdam’s New Holocaust Museum: The Dutch Collaborators.”
It Happened One Day by Noah Abrahams
Beyond the statistics about antisemitic attacks are shattered communities, threatened existences – and real people. Noah Abrahams, Associate Editor at the Center for the Study of Contemporary Jewry, documented six of their stories
Marcia Zimmerman (65, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States)
Marcia Zimmerman became the Senior Rabbi at Temple Israel in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 2001, becoming the first woman to lead a synagogue congregation of more than 2,000 families after serving as Assistant Rabbi since 1988. Responsible for Minnesota’s largest Jewish congregation, with more than 6,000 members, Zimmerman is a respected figure in the American Midwest, known for her work alongside former US President Barack Obama touting his health care bill among religious communities in 2010.
Founded in 1878, Temple Israel is the oldest synagogue in Minneapolis.
On December 16, 2024, at 7:20 am, Temple Israel was vandalized with painted swastikas defacing its exterior doors and pillars, one of the darkest chapters in the synagogue’s history.[1]
Zimmerman recalled: “For December, it wasn’t the kind of cold morning you would usually expect for Minneapolis. We had just had our security guard make a round, and then all of a sudden, on the cameras, one of our custodians saw the swastika being sprayed.
Just ten minutes before we spotted the vandalism, our cameras captured a white Honda Civic and a man getting out, spray painting a swastika on one of our pillars. We have five pillars and five doors at the front of the historic part of our building. On one of our doors, there was another swastika. The perpetrator then got back in his car and fled the scene.
“Temple Israel is 146 years old, and we have been in our current building for 96 years. The front of this building faces a very busy street called Hennepin Avenue. Hennepin is a congregational row of downtown churches and mosques. The front of our building was designed to look like the Lincoln Memorial because we wanted to express freedom of religion. The five doors symbolize the ghettos of Vienna, where synagogues traditionally had five windows and five doors. There is no name on the doors because, in the 1920s, Minnesota was the capital of antisemitism in the United States. Interfaith dialogue over time has made life better here for the now 66,000-strong Minnesota Jewish community.
“The swastikas appearing in that very area, where we wanted to open doors to interfaith dialogue and fight antisemitism, was extremely painful. This incident has seen us regress historically instead of progress. It took us a long time to identify the vandal because most people don’t come through our historic entrance. Our cameras didn’t capture the license plate of the perpetrator. However, we did eventually identify the person.
“I am a texting friend of the Minneapolis Chief of Police and was personally informed that the person who defaced our synagogue fled the country to avoid justice.
“The heightened antisemitism people have felt here since October 7 is real. The level of recent antisemitism has taken a generation by surprise. Parents of young kids here thought that antisemitism was something that only happened in the past. Now, they are confronted with it. There is an anger that we are going backward.
“This is the first time in 38 years I have seen anything like a swastika on our building. It felt particularly intense and violent. As a community, we spoke about the upsetting reality of the world we live in today but took comfort in the authorities and even the FBI, who gave us the all-clear of not being in any further danger.
“We are proud of our Judaism, and that won’t go away because of an act of hate. Our Jewish connections here are strong. Minnesota senators are Jewish, our Mayor, Jacob Frey, is Jewish, and the Attorney General of the District of Minnesota is a member of Temple Israel. We have strong leaders here in our community.”
Henry “Hank” Topas (74, Dollard-des-Ormeaux, Quebec, Canada)
Henry “Hank” Topas has been the Cantor at his local synagogue, Beth Tikvah, for 49 years. Founded in 1964, Beth Tikvah is located in a small, predominately English-speaking southwestern suburb of Montreal called Dollard-des-Ormeaux. The Beth Tikvah synagogue has been firebombed twice since October 7 – November 7, 2023, and December 18, 2024; Hank was the spokesperson for the synagogue after both incidents.[2]
On November 7, 2023, exactly one month after the October 7 atrocities, we were hit with the first firebombing overnight. It caused damage other than awakening the community. It showed that these levels of terror are not just reserved for the Middle East.
“Services in our synagogue begin at 7 am. These are our weekday morning services. That means that some people are showing up as early as 6:30 am to open the doors. [On the morning of November 7], one member detected a faint odor of something that did not belong in our lobby and alerted me. We opened the door and realized that there were remnants of a Molotov cocktail in front of the front door of the synagogue and that there were scorch marks over the wooden panel of the door.
“Someone had thrown a bottle that was on fire at the doors of our synagogue. The incident probably happened after midnight in the early hours of November 7. At that point, I called the Montreal Police Department’s Hate Crimes Unit, and they immediately responded with [all their] investigative powers. Sadly, they have not brought anyone to justice.
“November 7 was spent with me and others being interviewed by various members of the Press, in French and in English. I was pleased to greet the local parish priest from the Saint Luke Catholic Church up the street, who came down and gave me a big hug.
“I was not pleased that members of the mosque that I had gone to console, along with other rabbis, when there was a murder in a Quebec City mosque, failed to show. There have been good relations between the two communities in our suburb for many years, and for thirty years, we have run a charity bazaar to help the Muslim community. When disaster has struck and there have been blood drives [to aid struggling Muslims], I have given blood. But no one showed up, not on October 7, not on November 7.
“The person behind the November 7 attack is unknown; we do not know who did it. The cameras did not pick up anything.
“My community is not a part of Montreal but of a self-regulated suburb, yet we share Montreal’s police services. Those police services, we believe, are somewhat restrained. Even though they [the police] have been there for us and are doing the best they can…We have said so publicly. The effect of that has led to unbridled permission for people to protest night after night in the streets of Montreal, with the flags of Hamas, swastikas, and symbols from every other terrorist organization. It’s free speech, they say.”
Following the November 7 firebombing, the Beth Tikvah Synagogue invested in better security cameras and was more vigilant. However, in the early hours of Wednesday, December 18, 2024, terror struck Beth Tikvah once again when a firebomb caused internal damage to the synagogue.
“December 18 was certainly the most grievous attack on our synagogue,” Hank explained.
“The incident happened overnight at approximately 2:00 am. Our improved cameras captured an image of the fellow [who attacked the synagogue], and we have more information that the police will put to good use, hopefully. The man approached the front of the synagogue and threw something through the glass, shattering our windows. It was some form of Molotov cocktail that was thrown into the vestibule separating the doors and the lobby.
“The fire that broke out was so hot that items on the vestibule’s walls melted. Thank God a neighbor reported the incident after she saw the flames. She called the local police, and officers on their morning patrol responded, using their own fire extinguisher to break down the doors and extinguish the flames before the fire department arrived.
“That morning, I was getting out of the shower, and I heard about [the firebombing] on the news. I was a little bit surprised that I had not yet heard about it. The synagogue was notified, and by the time we got there, the police would not let us enter the building because they wanted to ensure an undisturbed crime scene. It was not until the arson investigators arrived at approximately 9:30 am and had checked everything that we were allowed back into the building.
“Eventually, the Chief of Police, Fady Dagher, showed up, and I spoke with him and his number two in-command for some time. The police have been very supportive, and Mr. Dagher has already held two Zoom calls with me and others from the community, fielding questions. When I go to visit the station, I always bring a platter of danishes and food for the officers.
“I was a little disturbed that the smashed glass from the attack was repaired on the same day.
“Why was I concerned? The incident occurred on a Wednesday, and we were hoping to have a solidarity Shabbat with politicians and our members that weekend. The synagogue was packed. Now, for the two weeks before Christmas, that was unusual because the place is usually half empty. I wanted that piece of glass to serve as a token for people to look at, but it was gone.
“The physical damage was that items on the walls were melted. The thermostat, for example, was melted, and other things were covered with heavy soot from the smoke. The lighting fixtures in the ceiling were all melted and have to be replaced. The structure of the ceiling and the sheetrock also need to be replaced.
“We can’t only look at our congregation but at attacks on Jewish buildings and people across the country. In Montreal, there have been schools that have been shot at, and in all of these cases, we have not seen anyone prosecuted or incarcerated. Since October 7, there has not been a single incarceration related to an attack on a Jewish building.
“I send a weekly email to the local precinct commander to let them know what time candle lighting is and how long the walk home will be for those going back in the dark afterward. I carry a police baton on me because we don’t know what will happen.”
Dov Forman (21, London, United Kingdom)
Dov Forman is a 21-year-old history student at University College London (UCL) but is perhaps best known as a New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author. The great-grandson of the late Holocaust survivor, educator, author, and social media influencer Lily Ebert, Dov dedicates his life to sharing Lily’s story of surviving Auschwitz-Birkenau and to fighting antisemitism. For his contributions to the memoir Lily’s Promise: How I Survived Auschwitz and Found the Strength to Live (HarperCollins, 2022), Dov was praised by King Charles III for demonstrating “a determination to share his great-grandmother’s story with a global audience.”
Dov receives daily antisemitic abuse at its most extreme.
“In university, both because I am known for being an anti-antisemitism activist, but also because I am just a proud, loud Jew who wears a kippah and a hostage necklace, people target me and shout at me. People chant ‘Free Palestine’ or worse, because I am Jewish and because I speak up to defend the Jewish people and our narrative.
“University is supposed to be the time for people to speak up and develop political ideas within the confines of the law. When I am in the library and I hear people chanting outside, or when people say things directly to me, it makes life extremely difficult and it is hard to feel as though university is a safe space where you can learn just like everyone else.
“When we were lighting the Hanukkiah [at UCL], people put up Palestinian flags in response. There we were on a cold, gloomy English night, lighting the candles while a cohort of young people in their twenties were waving their Palestinian signage.
“Fellow students have called me ‘Dirty Jew’ [noticing me]. They know I am Jewish because I wear a kippah or perhaps because they saw me on the news. I have also been called a genocide apologist.
“We have to have security outside of our university Jewish Society and outside other Jewish events. It is not only other students at British universities who terrorize Jews; antisemitism also comes from professors.
“I sit in a classroom of 100 people, and I am singled out because I am the only outwardly apparent Jew or perhaps even the only Jew in the room. I study history, and professors not only distort the past but compare the Holocaust to what Israel is doing in Gaza. This is entirely unfair.
“I have to sit in these lectures where students point at me and make me feel uncomfortable. It is hard to come to terms with the fact that these lecturers are grading my work.
“My great-grandmother was a force of nature until the very last moments. She fought to teach people the dangers of unbalanced and unchecked hatred. Because of her work, particularly on social media and on TikTok, where her story has reached over a billion social media users, we received terrible antisemitic abuse.
“Every single day, especially in the aftermath of October 7, I woke up to thousands of antisemitic messages. It has now died down, and those messages come only in their hundreds.
“But, to wake up every single day and open my phone and read comments like ‘your great-grandmother, I wish she was raped like the girls on October 7,’ or ‘Hitler missed one,’ or that ‘we know you live in London and we are going to come to find and kill you and rape you,’ or things like ‘you and your great-grandmother are going to be kidnapped,’ well, it’s disgusting.
“[My great-grandmother and I] never spoke about politics; we rarely spoke about Israel. Rather, we educated others and told her story to share a message of hope, tolerance, love, and how to rebuild from the greatest darkness.
“Unfortunately, there have been just so many incidents of antisemitism that they are hard to individualize, and repeating them could put me at risk. It is all terrifying, and I have had to get extra security and help. But, I take strength from my great-grandmother, who taught me that, because of the hate, we have to keep going and fighting back.
“I think we are incredibly lucky to be living as Jews in London, in a place where we do have the CST [Community Security Trust] and various organizations looking out for us.
“Thankfully, there haven’t been incredibly violent attacks against Jewish people on the streets, but of course, words can lead to actions. I do think, on the whole, that London is a safe place for Jews; however, some areas are not safe, especially on Saturdays, when thousands of people scream for violence against Jewish people, not just in Israel but here in the UK.
“We are now at a crossroads where people have to speak up and decide if they want to change the current course or if they want to allow the situation to get worse. It is now the time for people to stand up and take serious, meaningful action.
Moshe (70, Johannesburg, South Africa)
Moshe is not the actual name of the Rabbi who asked to remain anonymous due to safety and security concerns. Originally from the United States, Moshe has been a resident of South Africa since 1984, where he spends time in several different synagogues across the Johannesburg area, serving a diverse mix of Jewish communities and denominations.
As a volunteer rabbi, Moshe makes his income as a small business owner, volunteering with Chabad and other synagogues on high holidays and the occasional Shabbat. On a November afternoon in 2023, on the outskirts of Johannesburg, the visibly Jewish Moshe was targeted and attacked.
“It was a warm, sunny Friday afternoon on November 10, 2023, and I was meeting a client. I was driving in my car and approaching the end of the highway, leaving a Jewish area called Sandton and heading for a different suburb. As I got off the four-lane highway, the exit forked, and a car coming from the left side tried to go into my lane.
“I swerved to the right around him and went forward. The guy seemed to have some serious road rage. He didn’t like the fact that I was able to swerve around him and get in front of him, so he came up beside me and stared at me. The man was visibly Muslim, between 35 and 40 years old. He was driving a Renault Kwid, and I was in a much bigger Nissan Sentra Sedan.”
When the man looked at the Rabbi, he got out of his car and started shouting at him, using brutally obscene language to swear and curse him referring to his Jewish identity.
“He told me to get out of my car so that he could beat the… out of me. I did not get out of my car because it would have been too dangerous; he could have had a weapon or something. The traffic light was red, and as soon as he saw that I wasn’t going to get into a confrontation with him, he got back in his car, drove directly in front of me, and reversed. He rammed the rear end of his car into the front of my car and then continued to do so. I immediately knew I had to get out of there.
“I drove off, but he chased after me, following me all around the area, frantically trying to ram my car. I got back on the highway, got off the highway, and even drove against traffic and through lights to get away from him. I returned to the highway, where he tried to hit me from the side.
“In the end, I knew that I had to get off the highway, and I pulled into a BP petrol station. He came chasing after me in the garage and banged on my window with his fist. I didn’t leave the car because that was my protection. He ripped my windshield wiper off and banged on my window, trying to smash it.
“While all of this was going on, people started to realize what was happening, and they held the guy down. This gave me the chance to call the local security company, which escorted me home, where I had an opportunity to look at the pictures I had taken of him.
“I sent the images to the police, and they opened a case. I even managed to take down his registration number, assuming the license plates would link to an address. But, somehow, the police have found nothing.
“The Jewish community organization here has a private investigator for these things, and to cut a long story short, we spent time with the police investigating, but catching this guy would have meant going to court. I was genuinely worried about exposing myself and my address, concerned that he would find where I live.
“I was quite frightened for a long time, primarily because this guy mentioned during the attack that his brother was in the police department. What if the brother could use my registration number to find out where I live? For quite a while, we were really on tenterhooks, thinking he could come after me. Police patrol cars regularly checked on us, and every time I left the house, I looked right and left to see if he was there.
“Nothing ever happened. The police did say that they managed to get a hold of an address but couldn’t find anything.
“The bottom line is that this guy damaged my car, and it cost thousands to fix. Insurance may have covered most of it, but I still had to pay the excess. The damage to my car was significant, but thank God he didn’t smash me up. He was violent and very dangerous, like a raging bull out of control. We’ll leave it up to God to sort him out. What goes around, comes around. He’ll realize one day that he should have behaved himself.”
Kit Boulton (21, Norwich, England)
Kit Boulton is a psychology student at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norfolk County, England. Originally from just outside of North-West London in the heavily Jewish-populated town of Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, Kit is now in his second year of studies at a university with one of the fewest number of Jewish students in the country. The UEA has a Jewish Society (JSoc) of approximately 30 members.
Towards the end of May 2024, Kit was working as a bartender in the UEA Student Union bar, Bar SU. As ever for a Wednesday sports night when the weather is warm towards the end of the summer semester, the venue was busy and filled with students, mostly in their twenties.
“It was last summer, and I got a job at the student union bar. I was working there one night, and I believe that I served this guy, who was clearly hammered, the wrong drink. He then turned around to me and called me a ‘kike.’ He knew I was Jewish because I wear a Magen David around my neck, and it was clearly on display. My mates were right there. They told him that he couldn’t say that and called him out over it. You would hope everyone would do the same in that situation. Things got a bit heated, but eventually, the guy backed away and left.
“The Jewish situation here [at UEA] is that we have the JSoc, a very strong Jewish student association that is well run by an amazing committee. There aren’t many Jewish people on campus. If you saw a Jew on campus, you would be like, ‘Oh my God, you’re Jewish?’ Whereas at universities like Leeds or Nottingham, you would be less surprised.
“You expect antisemitism in London; it’s a lot more common. Here in Norwich, however, especially on a university campus, experiencing antisemitism was crazy to me. But, at the time, it didn’t feel like a big thing, so I didn’t report it. Had I reported this to my managers at the Student Union, I know they would have been all over it.
“It was a lot more stressful to be Jewish on campus towards the end of 2023, especially after October 7. But this past year, especially with the support of JSoc, it feels safe again to be a Jew on campus.”
Katrien Van Der Schueren (51, Los Angeles, California, USA)
Born and raised in the small Flemish-speaking town of Leuven, Katrien Van Der Schueren is a Los Angeles-based Belgian-American artist. The mother of two teenagers, born to Catholic Belgian parents and raised a practicing Catholic, Katrien discovered her Jewish heritage at the age of 47 through a DNA test trying to establish the identity of her biological father, who turned out to be a Belgian Jew. Since discovering her origins, she has dedicated herself to learning more about Judaism, her family history, and what it means to have a Jewish identity. She has also become active in her Hollywood Jewish community.
“I grew up in Belgium, where we didn’t really know any other Jewish people. In general, I did not encounter one Jewish person growing up. The only thing that people thought of when discussing Jews were the ultra-Orthodox Jews in Antwerp. People had no other notion of the religion or of Israel. There was no hope for Jewish people there. “After letting the world know that I was Jewish, I immediately was on the receiving end
of remarks like ‘You count your money’ and other preconceived notions that people have about Jews. Now, in the United States, most of the people I know are Jewish. On a recent trip back to Belgium, however, most of my friends and family were against Israel.
“I received messages from people who told me that I wasn’t a real Jew. I decided to order a t-shirt that said, ‘I’m that Jew,’ and I wore it in Belgium in order to start a conversation, however obvious it may have been that people did not want to have it.
“Everybody was surprised when they found out I was Jewish. Five years ago, there was a documentary on Jewish people in Belgium, and people were telling me to watch it as though they were referring to some strange species. [There’s a common perception in Belgium] that Jews are only ultra-Orthodox Jews. It’s just bizarre.
“Recently, I co-organized an event with people who survived the October 7 massacre. I invited the Belgian Consul and sent pictures to the Belgium Press – which I write for all the time. No one responded to my email. It is common for Belgian-Americans to say that Joe Biden lost the election over Gaza and that Jews are extremists. I find myself in a situation where I am frequently the only Jew in a group. I get into fights about Israel all the time.”
Katrien has become accustomed to hearing antisemitic comments in Belgium. However, when cycling back to her Hollywood home from Manhattan Beach in October 2024, a bright sunny day turned dark.
“I was cycling to my home in Los Angeles after a day at the beach. On the way back, I crossed over into a merger lane on my bike, and this white woman with blonde curly hair, also on a road bike, who looked in her mid-40s, started yelling at me, ‘Get out of the way, you fucking Jew.’ I was like, ‘wow.’ I couldn’t believe it. I felt two emotions. The first was proud to have been recognized as a Jew. Even though I don’t know how she knew I was Jewish. But the second thing I felt was my disappointment that ‘Jew’ is now a bad word used to insult people.
“For so long, I didn’t know my identity, but now I am so invested in Judaism. On the front of my studio building in Hollywood, I have posters for freeing the hostages. People are so uncomfortable with it; I don’t know why.
“I have been constantly targeted for being Jewish ever since my discovery. It has been so bad since October 7 in Los Angeles. And in Belgium, in the immediate aftermath of October 7, people would say to me, ‘Your people are killing people.’ Or they were saying that in American society, only Jewish people hold important posts and jobs.
I am so happy that I found out I was Jewish.”
[1] Howard Thompson, “Temple Israel in Minneapolis Defaced with Swastikas,” Fox9, December 16, 2024, https://www.fox9.com/news/temple-israel-minneapolis-defaced-swastikas.
[2] On the November 2023 firebombing see: Thomas MacDonald, “‘Deeply Disturbing’: Montreal Police Investigating Two Firebombings at Jewish Institutions,” Global News, November 7, 2023, https://globalnews.ca/news/10075973/ montreal-synagogue-firebombing/. On the December 2024 firebombing see: Kalina Laframboise, “Fire at Montreal Synagogue Prompts Police Probe, Widespread Condemnation,” Global News, December 18, 2024, https://globalnews.ca/news/10923867/montreal-jewish-synagogue-arson/, and Leora Schertzer, “Beth Tikvah Synagogue in D.D.O. Hit by a Firebomb,” The Montreal Gazette, December 18, 2024, https://www. montrealgazette.com/news/local-crime/article627196.html.
The Muslim World: Holocaust Memorial Museums in Indonesia, Dubai and Albania
Indonesia
Aryo Brahmantyo
I enter the small room that is the museum. The collection on display is impressive, with each piece carefully curated to educate and evoke knowledge and empathy. At the center of the room, a massive triple-decker wooden bunk bed that replicates the bunk beds used in Nazi concentration camps. A photo of Jewish prisoners living in horrible conditions, taken from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s website, is displayed on the middle bunk. Informational posters on the walls chronicle the rise of Adolf Hitler, the ideology of the Nazi regime, and the horrific crimes of the Holocaust. The posters feature several disturbing images, including black-and-white photographs of Nazi soldiers executing Jewish civilians and piles of corpses discovered in concentration camps.
None of this is unique in comparison to other Holocaust memorial museums. It is the location that makes this history museum historical in and of itself. The Indonesian Holocaust Museum, inaugurated in January 2022, is the first of its kind in the largest Muslim-majority country in the world, where the majority of the population either knows almost nothing about the crimes committed by the Nazis and their allies or, worse, entertains antisemitic notions and denies the Holocaust.
The founder of the museum is an Indonesian Rabbi, Ya‘akov Baruch. It is part of the complex of the Sha‘ar Hashamayim (The Gate of Heaven) synagogue, which Baruch opened in 2004 in Tondano, a secluded town with 68,000 residents on the island of Sulawesi in the predominantly Christian (67.3%) province of North Sulawesi in Indonesia.[1] Known for its natural splendor, the Province has a reputation for religious tourism and inter-faith tolerance.[2] The museum uses both Indonesian and English. Its construction took nearly three months.[3] The inauguration took place on International Holocaust Remembrance Day in a ceremony attended by the German Ambassador to Indonesia, Ina Lepel, and high-ranking local Indonesian government officials.[4]
Rabbi Baruch was born in 1982 in Jakarta to a Minahasan Protestant father and a Mongondow Muslim mother, Toar Palilingan. Raised a Christian, he only discovered his Jewish roots as a teenager in a conversation with his maternal grandmother, Sylvia van Beugen.[5] She revealed to him that his relatives on his mother’s side descended from a 19th-century Dutch Jewish immigrant named Elias van Beugen.[6] He also learned that up to 40 of his relatives perished in the Holocaust, including in Auschwitz and Sobibor.
Acting upon this knowledge and his grandmother’s wishes, Baruch adopted Judaism as his religion and took the initiative to open Sha‘ar Hashamayim together with Oral Bollegraf, a Jew living in Manado.[7] Since then, he has led a small congregation of Sephardic-Orthodox Indonesian Jews.
Baruch told me he decided to dedicate a museum to the Holocaust rather than to Judaism in general in order to highlight a universal message. The Holocaust, he said, serves as a stark warning to humanity about the dangers of hatred, racism, and religious intolerance that must never be forgotten.[8]
The synagogue complex where the museum is situated is guarded by metal fences that separate the site from the street, adding to its secluded atmosphere. A small black monolith resembling a guard post is situated near the entrance, while a handful of tiny surveillance cameras monitor the premises, ensuring the museum’s and synagogue’s security. The museum’s physical presence is complemented by its online presence on platforms like Facebook and Instagram.
Admission to the museum, which is private and does not receive public funding, costs approximately one American dollar. Opening times are from Monday to Friday, from ten in the morning until six in the evening, but they are not strictly adhered to. For instance, during my visit, the gates were occasionally sealed and padlocked. This is because Baruch, who oversees the complex, lives in Manado, a city a few hours drive away, where he also serves as a lecturer at a local university. He attends the synagogue mainly on Friday evenings to lead the Shabbat service, returning to Manado after Shabbat concludes. This irregular schedule means visitors who arrive without prior notice may find themselves waiting at the locked gate. Locals, familiar with the situation, are generally sympathetic and direct visitors to a nearby Christian neighbor, Mr. Alfons, who serves as the caretaker in the rabbi’s absence.
One particularly poignant experience for Baruch involved a group of conservative Muslim women in hijabs and niqabs. Upon seeing the photos of Jewish victims, they were moved to tears, unaware of the Holocaust before their visit.[9] Baruch recalled how deeply this experience impacted him, as it was a profound reminder of the museum’s power to educate and inspire empathy, as well as a reminder of Indonesians’ unfamiliarity with the Holocaust.[10]
Another group of Indonesian elementary school children also left a lasting impression on the rabbi. Although he felt uneasy introducing young children to the horrors of the Holocaust, he believed it was a vital part of their learning experience, even if they left the museum somber.[11]
In addition to educating visitors about the Holocaust, the museum also highlights the ongoing dangers of Nazi ideology. Several posters address modern manifestations of neo-Nazism, Holocaust denial, and the use of Nazi symbols. The posters avoid mentioning Israel, a decision that reflects the museum’s sensitivity to Indonesia’s official stance on the conflict in the Middle East.
The museum also features a collection of Judaica artifacts from the Nazi era. These include a Chanukiah from the Netherlands (1940), Shabbat candelabras, a 1940s shtreimel from Poland, and a memorial book listing the names of victims of Nazi persecution in the Netherlands, including those of the Rabbi’s family, the Van Beugens.
Despite the museum’s achievements, it faces challenges. Limited space has led to removing some exhibits, such as a video display featuring testimonies from Holocaust survivors. Additionally, the museum’s location in a small town means it is subject to occasional blackouts, and noise from the nearby street can disrupt the otherwise solemn atmosphere.
Visitor numbers have declined since the opening. To date, the museum has had as many as 2,000 visitors in three years of operation. After a busy start, the flow of visitors has gradually slowed from as many as 50 visitors a day to one visitor a day. Most visitors were from Indonesia, but others have come from Canada, the Netherlands, Australia, Singapore, the UK, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Israel. Baruch remains optimistic, stating that the message of the Holocaust has already reached many Indonesians.[12]
One visitor, Fernando Bororing, a Christian Minahasan from nearby Tomohon, told me he came because “I want to know the history.”[13] Bororing said he learned about the Holocaust through YouTube videos but had never visited a museum dedicated to the subject. He was awestruck as he walked through the exhibits, touching the wooden bunks and examining the displays. The words “impressive” and “amazing” escaped his lips. His visit, he explained upon leaving, allowed him to experience history beyond what he had previously seen online. “In my heart, I feel relief that I can experience it and not only watch it on YouTube,” he said.[14]
The establishment of the museum and its continued operation have more than symbolic importance. Discussion of the Holocaust in public, the media, and among academics has been pages of government-prepared history textbooks.[15] There are few Indonesian resources and experts on the Holocaust, making accessing and acquiring knowledge difficult. When raised in academic discussions on Indonesian campuses, the Holocaust is usually discussed as part of a broader context, rarely treated on its own.
The lack of proper education on the Holocaust has resulted, as well as was encouraged, by the proliferation of antisemitic propaganda. Antisemitism is not a new phenomenon in Indonesia. It predated the Republic’s founding, with influences reaching back to the colonial era.
In 1943, during the Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies, Sam Ratulangi, a teacher, journalist, and first governor of the Island of Sulawesi, considered today a “national hero” in Indonesia, introduced excerpts from The Protocols of the Elders of Zion in an article published in the journal Asia Raya. This publication, part of a Nazi-influenced Japanese propaganda campaign, marked the first time Indonesian readers encountered the notorious antisemitic forgery.[16]
Another Indonesian considered a “national hero,” the politician and diplomat Sukarjo Wiryopranoto, contributed to the spread of antisemitic ideas by depicting the Second World War as a conflict between Japanese collectivism (Hakko Ichiu) and Jewish individualism.[17] Fascist-inspired political parties like Parindra and Partai Fasis Indonesia (PFI) emerged in the 1930s, adopting symbols and practices from European fascism, including the infamous Nazi salute.[18]
After the establishment of Israel in 1948, antisemitism in Indonesia was grounded primarily in anti-Israel sentiments. As the newly-independent, Muslim-majority nation aligned itself with the Arab world, Indonesian Jews were viewed with suspicion, including as agents of Israeli interests. Criticisms of Israel devolved into antisemitic rhetoric, with some Indonesians failing to distinguish between Judaism, Zionism, and the state of Israel.
Consequently, Indonesian Jews, some of whom descended from European colonists, became targets of hostility, linked to both Israel and colonialism. Rabbi Benjamin Meijer Verbrugge, an Indonesian Jewish leader, lamented that “people call us bastards because our grandfathers occupied Indonesia.”[19]
In the 1980s and 1990s, antisemitism remained widespread, fueled by the revival of Islamist groups.[20] In 1992, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion was translated into Indonesian, and various adaptations of the text spread.[21] A republication of Ratulangi’s antisemitic article in 1993 underscored the persistence of these ideas, with Indonesian editors seemingly remaining unaware that the Protocols were an antisemitic fabrication.[22]
In the 2000s, antisemitic activities took new directions. From 2005 to 2006, Angkasa, a military and aviation magazine, offered Nazi-themed souvenirs like Iron Crosses and Waffen-SS keychains to attract readers to a trilogy of issues on Nazi military history.[23] Several years later, the Indonesian language version of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf was published after years of being banned. The book quickly became a bestseller, selling over 15,000 copies.[24] In 2013, the closure of the Beth Hashem Synagogue in Surabaya was forced by Islamist extremists protesting Israel’s military actions in Gaza during Operation Cast Lead.[25] Despite being a historic site, the oldest synagogue in the country, and a cultural landmark, it was targeted during anti-Israel demonstrations and was eventually demolished.[26] That same year, global attention was drawn to the Soldatenkaffe in Bandung, West Java, after the Jakarta Globe exposed its Nazi-themed décor, which included Swastika flags, portraits of Adolf Hitler, and servers dressed as SS officers. It turned out that the café had operated as a Nazi-glorification hub for two years. International outrage forced it to close down.[27] A survey conducted in 2014 found that 48% of the adult population at the time harbored antisemitic sentiments.[28]
Jews in Indonesia are too few to have a political impact. The origins of today’s Indonesian Jews can be traced to Ashkenazi Dutch and European Jewish migrants who came to the Dutch East Indies in the 19th century.[29] They were also joined by Jews from Iraq, Aden, and other areas of the Middle East.[30] The number of Jews in the colony already exceeded 2,500 in the late 1930s.[31] It declined sharply after the Second World War, and by 1963, only around 50 community members were left in Indonesia.[32] The small Jewish population that exists in present-day Indonesia is estimated at around 500 people in a country of over 270 million.
Indonesia has not ratified the Stockholm Declaration of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), and Judaism is not officially recognized as one of the country’s six major religions, complicating efforts to address the circulation of Nazi and other antisemitic texts.[33] Days after the Holocaust Museum was officially inaugurated, several Muslim organizations in Indonesia protested, calling for its closure. Sudarnoto Abdul Hakim, Head of Foreign Relations and International Cooperation of the Majelis Ulama Indonesia (MUI), the country’s top Islamic clerical body, voiced opposition: “We demand any exhibition to be stopped, and the Museum to be discontinued.”[34] He linked his disapproval to the suffering of Palestinians under Israeli occupation, arguing that Jewish communities worldwide, including those in Indonesia, should recognize what he described as the atrocities committed by Israeli Zionists against the Palestinian people since 1948.[35]
Leaders in the Islamist political party, Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (PKS), joined the criticism. Hidayat Nur Wahid (HNW), a senior PKS figure and Deputy Speaker of Indonesia’s parliament, the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR-RI), argued that the museum was part of an effort to whitewash Israeli crimes in Palestine.[36] He noted that the museum was opened in cooperation with Israel’s Yad Vashem, whose chairman, Dani Dayan, is a prominent supporter of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal by the United Nations.[37] Wahid claimed that the museum undermined Indonesia’s long-standing support for Palestinian independence and criticized it as counterproductive to the government’s efforts to advocate for Palestinian statehood.[38]
However, not all Indonesians shared these sentiments. Some offered more nuanced perspectives, emphasizing the educational value of the Holocaust Museum. Mukti Ali Qusyairi, Head of Lembaga Bahtsul Masail Nahdlatul Ulama (LBMNU), Jakarta, a branch of the world’s largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama, stated that having a Holocaust Museum was reasonable as long as it did not promote the political interests of any specific state. He stressed that the exhibition could offer important lessons about dehumanization.[39]
In North Sulawesi, the local community largely embraced the museum, viewing it as a nonpolitical initiative that conveyed universal humanitarian values. Steven Kandouw, the Vice Governor of North Sulawesi, expressed support, noting, “Mistakes of the past, especially regarding human rights, must be fought against.”[40] Sandra Rondonuwu, a politician from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDIP) and a member of North Sulawesi’s Regional House of Representatives, also voiced no objection to the museum, noting the importance of remembering dark chapters in history in a television interview.[41]
Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs chose to downplay the controversy. Ministry spokesman Teuku Faizasyah stated that the museum was a community’s social, cultural, and religious initiative and did not affect Indonesia’s position on the Israel-Palestine conflict. He emphasized that the country’s stance on Palestinian independence remained unchanged.[42]
The museum also received initially some positive media coverage, with national outlets like Kompas, tvOne, and TribunNetwork expressing surprise, pride, and curiosity at the development. However, as protests grew, media coverage shifted, using terms like “controversy,” “polemic,” and “rejection” to describe the public reaction. On social media, opposition intensified, with the hashtag #TolakMuseumHolocaust (Reject Holocaust Museum) trending on X.[43] Some Indonesians speculated that the museum’s inauguration was part of a broader effort to normalize relations with Israel. These suspicions fed into pre-existing antisemitic stigmas, further complicating the museum’s reception.
In response to the growing backlash, the news channel tvOne hosted a live debate on its program, Catatan Demokrasi, titled “Geger Museum Yahudi di Indonesia” (Jewish Museum in Indonesia Controversy).[44] Rabbi Baruch participated in the discussion, explaining his motivation for founding the museum, but was confronted with various forms of antisemitism and Holocaust denial.
One of the guests, Ustadz Haikal Hassan, made inflammatory remarks, calling the Holocaust “the greatest hoax” and claiming it was used to generate financial support for Israel. Hassan also questioned the historical accuracy of the confirmed historical depictions of the Holocaust. He presented distorted census data and said there may have been six million rats in Europe but not six million Jews.[45] He argued that supporting Holocaust education was equivalent to supporting Israel, reflecting the deep entanglement of the two issues in the minds of some Indonesians.[46]
Despite the initial heated opposition, tensions gradually subsided after Baruch engaged in dialogue with museum critics, including representatives from MUI. In a phone call with Sudarnoto Abdul Hakim, he clarified that the museum had no connection to Zionism or Israeli politics.[47] He invited MUI representatives to visit the museum to address any misunderstandings.[48] Abdul Hakim appreciated the gesture, calling it a positive step towards resolving the issue through dialogue. He also acknowledged the humanitarian message of the museum, stating, “The Holocaust is a crime against humanity that goes against all religions.”[49]
Gradually, the controversy faded. Baruch attributes this success to the role of dialogue in dispelling misconceptions and reducing antisemitic sentiment. He explains: “In Indonesia, we just need to sit together and talk heart to heart, and all the problems will be solved.”[50]
The United Arab Emirates
Prof. Uriya Shavit and Dr. Ofir Winter
In a year that witnessed the proliferation of antisemitic rhetoric in Arab countries, the continued existence of the Holocaust memorial exhibition entitled “We Remember” at the Crossroad of Civilizations Museum in Dubai was a source of encouragement. Opened in May 2021 following the signing of the Abraham Accords, the exhibition was – and, sadly, remains – one of its kind in the Arab world.
Its initiator, Ahmad ‘Ubayd al-Mansuri (b. 1971), served as a Member of Parliament from 2011 to 2015. A businessman who gives the impression of having landed in our era directly from Victorian times, he established the museum in 2012 as a private enterprise in a building provided by the authorities to present his eclectic, passionate collection, including a magnificent gallery rich with Islamic books and artifacts and an equally impressive gallery showcasing pearls and how their trade shaped the region.
The Center for Study of Contemporary European Jewry discussed the courageous exhibition on the Holocaust in its first For a Righteous Cause Report in 2022[51] as well as in an issue of Perspectives in 2023.[52] When we approached al-Mansuri in October 2024, he explained that it was and remains important to separate the teaching of the history of the Holocaust from politics, and emphasized the singularity of the crimes committed by the Nazis compared to other genocides.
It is not clear how many Arabs have visited the exhibition since it opened. When we visited the museum in the spring of 2022, we found in the guestbook almost only comments from Israelis: some emotional, some patronizing. In October 2024, al-Mansuri said that the war had caused a sharp decline in the number of Israeli visitors, but not in the number of other visitors.
Since the establishment of the exhibition, only one school has refused to visit it; al-Mansuri could not remember a single case of visitors leaving the exhibition in protest after seeing its contents. He estimated that, to date, some 2,500 people from the UAE and the Gulf at large have been to the exhibition, along with several thousand schoolchildren, but said it was hard to know how many of the latter are Arab because some schools in the UAE are mixed nationally. He holds that one of the most important contributions of the Museum are visits by Arab teachers, who know nothing or very little about the Holocaust.
Al-Mansuri told us that he did not receive a single demand or threat to close down the exhibition following October 7. It did result in one change of plans, as he decided not to hold Holocaust memorial events. He explained: “when Israel described what happened on October 7 as a Holocaust, it made my work more difficult. I deplore what happened [on October 7], I do not belittle it, but these statements mean that Holocaust memorial events will become politicized. The history of the Holocaust should be taught as history.”[53]
In the more than three years that the exhibition has existed, al-Mansuri faced a few unexpected questions, although not from Arabs. He was surprised when Jewish visitors from Tel Aviv asked him why he did not dedicate space to teach about the Nakba. Ironically, it was for him to tell them that the Nakba occurred within the context of a war between two national movements, whereas the Nazis murdered Jews for no other reason than to see their total annihilation. He was equally surprised when several American Jews told him they had no idea that Jews lived in Palestine already before the Holocaust.
The exhibition includes information on the persecution of European Jews by Nazi Germany from Kristallnacht to the implementation of the Final Solution, photos and exhibits commemorating the 1.5 million Jewish children murdered in the Holocaust, including Anne Frank, and personal testimonies of Holocaust survivors. At the center of the exhibition hall is a full-size figure of one of the most heartbreaking images of the Holocaust – the boy who raises his hands in surrender after the crashing of the uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto. The Mishnah saying “whoever saves one life saves the world entire ” and its Quranic (5:32) equivalent are presented on a poster. Another poster explains that Jews were the only group singled out for systematic annihilation by the Nazis. On a poster in a glassed cabinet to which a Star of David is attached, the eternal lines of the Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller: “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out – because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.”
Al-Mansuri believes the history of the Holocaust should be conveyed primarily through the stories of heroes who fought evil, and that this approach can be useful in Israel as well. The exhibition thus tells the story of the hundreds of Jews who found refuge in Albania in 1943 and were welcomed by its majority-Muslim population. It also tells the story of individual heroes, including Muhammad Hilmi, an Egyptian medical doctor who lived in Berlin and, at great personal risk, saved the life of a Jewish friend, Anna Boros, and several members of her family. Hilmi, who was helped by a German friend, Frieda Szturmann, was the first Arab to be recognized by Yad Vashem as “Righteous Among the Nations.”
A large, colorful mural created by Israeli and Emirati artists graces the museum courtyard. It shows two young men, an Emirati and an Israeli, chatting and drinking coffee together against the backdrop of a sunset and skyscrapers. Above them is the word “cousins” in Arabic and Hebrew. Al-Mansuri belongs to a small group, yet one that deserves more attention, of patriotic Arabs who believe that peace is something that requires constant effort and patience. The establishment and uninterrupted operation of his memorial exhibition could not take place in the UAE without the government’s consent, indicating the strength of the Abraham Accords.
Asked why the existence of the exhibition about the Holocaust has been received so well in the UAE, as opposed to the controversies a similar enterprise initially stirred in Indonesia, al-Mansuri explained that his country allows people to develop in different ways, but not to attack others based on their race or religion: “We have people from places of conflict, for examples Indians and Pakistanis, Russians and Ukrainians, who live here in mutual respect. Here, it is not acceptable for Arabs to attack Jews or for Jews to attack Arabs.”[54]
Albania
Premton Asllani
The Albanian government is currently funding and promoting the construction of two museums in the country, one in the capital Tirana and one in the coastal city Vlora, dedicated to the history of the Albanian Jewish community and the story of how Jews in Albania were saved during the Holocaust. Slated to open by 2026 and by 2027, respectively, the museums will celebrate the traditional honor code “Besa,” which highlights trust, faith, and keeping promises in all aspects of life, and motivated Albanians to protect Jews during the Second World War.
During the Second World War, Albania was invaded by fascist Italy in 1939 and occupied by Nazi Germany in 1943.[55] Throughout the war, Albanians, Muslims and Christians alike, risked their lives by refusing to turn over lists of Jews to the Nazis, providing fake documentation to protect Jews, and sheltering Jewish citizens and Jewish refugees from deportation to concentration camps. Because they did so, Albania was the only country in Europe in which the Jewish population increased during the Second World War rather than decreased.[56]
Protecting Jews was a matter of principle for Albanians. Their courage was grounded and born out of the centuries-old Besa code of honor.[57] Besa is rooted in the Kanun (Code) of Lekë Dukagjini, a 15th-century collection of customary laws that has governed Albanian society since.[58] Passed down through generations through proverbs and judgments until it was codified in the late 19th century, the Kanun serves as the foundation governing Albanian society and relationships between and among people, including sojourners and guests.
Under Besa, betraying a guest among Albanians is inviolable, as “the house of an Albanian belongs to God and to the guest.”[59] Moreover, according to the Kanun, “what is promised must be honored,” and giving one’s word forms an unbreakable pact. Failure to abide by this code of honor by disrespecting oaths or acting unfaithfully brings not only dishonor and shame but also community punishment on the one who transgresses.[60]
Announced by Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama in 2023, the Besa Museum in Tirana will be situated in the historic House of Toptans in Tirana.[61] The 19th-century residence belonged to the Toptani, a large noble Muslim landowning family in Ottoman and post-Ottoman Albania, several of whose members sheltered two Jewish families with whom they had no previous relationship, the Levis and the Altaracs, out of their commitment to Besa.[62] For their courageous act, Yad Vashem designated Atif and Ganimet Toptani as Righteous Among the Nations.[63]
Designed by Oppenheim Architecture and funded by the Albanian government and private donations, the museum aims to commemorate Albanians who sheltered and rescued Jews during the Holocaust in embodiment of the spirit of Besa, and to highlight the broader historical context of Albania’s relationship with the Jewish people and Jewish tradition, culture, and art.[64] Integrating the original architectural elements of the Toptani house with modern exhibition spaces, the museum will feature galleries that tell the story of Albanian hospitality, the concept of Besa, and the specific instances during which Albanians provided sanctuary to Jews.
The museum experience is planned to be immersive, including interactive exhibits that engage visitors in understanding the cultural and ethical significance of Besa. While the museum’s construction has not garnered much press coverage to date, the Albanian government is firmly committed to its advancement as a means to highlight a proud historical moment for Albanians and pass its lessons on to the next generations.[65]
In Vlora, the Albanian government is establishing the country’s first Jewish Museum. Until the 1990s, the city was home to Albania’s largest Jewish community. The museum will be housed in the historic synagogue located in the city’s Old Town. Eneida Tarifi, the chairwoman of the Vlora Municipality’s Committee for Education, Culture, and Sports, told me that the museum will be part of a larger cultural complex in the historical center of the city near three other museums: the National Museum of Independence, the Historical Museum, and the Ethnographic Museum.[66]
Supported by the Albanian-American Development Foundation and the Albanian Jewish Community, and designed by the Israeli firm Kimmel Eshkolot Architects, the project has faced delays due to funding issues.[67] It will focus on the history of the Albanian Jewish community in the historical territory of Albania and the diaspora dating back to the second century, placing the Holocaust, Albanians’ role in protecting Jews, and the concept of Besa within the context of this broader, longer history.[68]
With the aim of becoming a cultural landmark, the Vlora Jewish Museum will highlight the long-standing coexistence of Jews, Christians, and Muslims in Albania, showcasing the good relations and the mutual respect that have characterized their interactions for centuries. Its exhibitions will include personal stories, historical documents, and artifacts that illustrate the shared history of Albanians and Jews. The museum will serve as a center for education and reflection, emphasizing the importance of preserving these historical memories and the values of tolerance and humanity.[69]
According to Tarifi, the local public has welcomed the project: “The Vlora Municipality, together with the Albanian people, will always be part of this cooperation [with the Albanian Jewish community], celebrating the connection between the two communities. We are very happy that this project will be in such a historic place as Vlora.”[70]
There are good reasons for Albanians to be proud of their relations with and protection of Jews during the darkest days in modern history. Protecting the Jews who lived in their country already makes Albania shine as a force for good among European nations in the shameful historical chapter of the Holocaust. Protecting the Jewish refugees who entered it makes it all the more of an exception.
Under the rule of King Zog (September 1928 – April 1939), before the Italian takeover in 1939, the Albanian government welcomed and assisted Jewish refugees from neighboring countries, integrating them into the local Jewish communities, granting them visas and citizenship, and serving as a safe point of transit.[71] By the eve of the Second World War, hundreds of Jews had found refuge in Albania, joining the country’s two-hundred-member community.[72] During the Italian occupation (April 1939 – September 1943), hundreds more Jewish refugees continued to arrive in the country, and Albanian authorities ignored Italian orders to repatriate them to their countries of origin.[73]
Under the Nazi occupation (September 1943 – November 1944), despite the risk and threat of death for anyone hiding Jews, Albanians remained steadfast in protecting and supporting hundreds of Jewish families and individuals. When upon the occupation, the Nazis asked for a list of Jews living in Albania, intending to deport them to concentration camps, the Albanian government refused.
The following spring, the Nazis demanded the Regent Mehdi Frashëri (head of the Albanian Government under their occupation) once again to list and to gather all the Jews. Jewish leaders in Albania, including Rafael Jakoel and Mateo Matalia, appealed to Frashëri, who directed them to the Interior Minister, Xhafer Deva. Deva refused the Nazis’ request, arguing it violated Albania’s sovereignty and meddled in the country’s internal affairs, both of which, he claimed, violated the country’s agreement with the Germans. Deva also assured the Jewish community of their safety and that they would not be deported.[74]
While reporting Jews to Nazi authorities was theoretically possible, in practice, it was not – disgracing one’s family and village was out of the question. Adhering to and being motivated by Besa, Albanian Muslims and Christians inside and outside the country committed themselves to protecting their fellow Jewish Albanians and Jewish refugees fleeing persecution.
When the Axis powers invaded and occupied Yugoslavia in April 1941, hundreds of Jews from the country’s northern regions sought refuge in the Italian-controlled southern ethnic Albanian regions, which were annexed to following the Axis invasion to Italian-controlled Albania, joining some 90 Jewish families who lived there at the time.
The following year, the Nazis ordered the arrest of all Jews in Kosovo, prompting Albanian authorities to urge Jews to relocate to Albania proper. Approximately 500 Jews relocated and settled in Berat and Krujë, where local Albanians sheltered them. Those Jews who remained in Kosovo were afforded protection by Albanians there, who provided them with shelter and false documents.[75]
Among those Albanians in Kosovo who helped the Jews were members of my mother’s family: Arif Alickaj, her grandfather, and Rexhep Cufë Lokaj, her great-uncle.
Arif Alickaj served as Executive Secretary in the Deçan Municipality and was one of the key collaborators in the effort to save Jews in Kosovo. His son, Skender Alickaj, recalled in our conversation that his father’s actions were driven by profound empathy and a deep sense of honor. Witnessing the brutal and senseless persecution of Jews, Arif Alickaj felt compelled to act. Guided by Besa, he undertook extraordinary measures to protect Jewish refugees arriving from Macedonia and Serbia.
Arif skillfully created fake identities and false documents, often assigning Muslim names to Jewish families. This clever disguise allowed them to blend in and avoid the watchful eyes of the Nazi forces, providing these desperate souls a chance to escape and survive.
In one of his documents, preserved by Skender, Arif wrote, “I provided identities to two, three Jewish families who came from Skopje, to hide from the Germans in the Roshkodol mountains.”[76]
Rexhep Cufë Lokaj’s nephew Musa was a young boy during the Second World War. In our conversation, he recalled how his family opened their doors to two Jewish families from Skopje that Arif Alickaj had sent to his uncle for protection. Despite the risks, his uncle and the entire Lokaj family treated the two families as their own and sheltered them for several years. At the time, Musa was the same age as some of the Jewish children who found shelter with them, and they spent time together. When the Nazi occupation became more brutal in the winter of 1943-1944, Lokaj decided to send the Jewish families he sheltered to the Roshkodol Mountains because it was an isolated location out of reach for the Nazis. All survived the war and went on to live in the Americas.
Reflecting on this family legacy, Musa said, “In our culture and tradition, religious differences do not exist when someone needs help. For Albanians, tradition, culture, and honor come first, then other aspects like religion. The most important thing is ‘Besa’ – to help and protect those in need and to welcome them into our homes as honored guests.”[77]
For their bravery, Arif and Rexhep are among those honored on the “Wall of Honor” in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. Located in Pristina’s City Park, the wall bears the name of the twenty-three families of the Albanians of Kosovo who sacrificed or risked their own lives to save Jews during the Holocaust.[78]
[1] Jon Emont, “A Small Holocaust Museum Springs Up in a Remote Town – and Stirs a Big Backlash,” The Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-small-holocaust-museum-springs-up-in-a-remote-townand-stirs-a-big-backlash-11644677414; “Number of Population of Minahasa Regency by District (Souls), 2020-2022 [Indonesian],” Badan Pusat Statistik Kabupaten Minahasa, November 3, 2023, https://minahasakab.bps.go.id/id/statistics-table/2/OTEjMg==/jumlah-penduduk-kabupaten-minahasa-menurut-kecamatan.html; and “Percentage of Population by Regency/ City and Religion, 2022-2023 [Indonesian],” Badan Pusat Statistik Provinsi Sulawesi Utara, September 12, 2024, https://sulut.bps.go.id/id/statistics-table/2/NzMyIzI=/persentase-jumlah-penduduk-menurut-kabupaten-kota-dan-agama-yang-dianut.html.
[2] “North Sulawesi Becomes the Proper Place for the Opening of a Holocaust Museum, Why? [Indonesian],” KumparanNews, January 29, 2022, https://kumparan.com/kumparannews/sulut-jadi-tempat-yang-pantas-untuk-pembukaan-museum-holocaust-kenapa-1xOzWiEWitO/full.
[3] Skivo Marcelino Mandey and Teuku Muhammad Valdy Arief, “Holocaust Museum is Built in Minahasa North Sulawesi, This Is Its Purpose [Indonesian],” Kompas, February 4, 2022, https://regional.kompas.com/read/2022/02/04/060700878/museum-holocaust-didirikan-di-minahasa-sulut-ini-tujuannya?page=all#page2.
[5] Rizali Posumah, “Rabbi Yaakov Baruch, a Dutch Jewish Descendant Who Grew Up in an Interfaith Family [Indonesian],” Tribun Manado, July 14, 2022, https://manado.tribunnews.com/2022/07/14/rabi-yaakovbaruch-keturunan-yahudi-belanda-yang-tumbuh-di-keluarga-beda-agama.
[6] Norimitsu Onishi, “In Silver of Indonesia, Public Embrace Judaism,” The New York Times, November 22, 2010, https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/23/world/asia/23indo.html.
[7] Interview by the author with Rabbi Ya‘akov Baruch, September 21, 2024.
[8] Interview by the author with Rabbi Ya‘akov Baruch, June 26, 2024.
[9] Interviews by the author with Rabbi Ya‘akov Baruch, June 26, 2024, and September 20, 2024.
[15] Martina Safitry, Indah Wahyu Puji Utami & Zein Ilyas, History [Indonesian] (Jakarta, Pusat Perbukuan Badan Standar, Kurikulum, dan Asesmen, Kementerian Pendidikan, Kebudayaan, Riset, dan Teknologi, 2021), https://static.buku.kemdikbud.go.id/content/pdf/bukuteks/kurikulum21/Sejarah-BS-KLS-XI.pdf, and “We Hope to Help Indonesian Teachers to Better Inform Their Students about the Holocaust and Genocide,” UNESCO, April 20, 2023, https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/we-hope-help-indonesian-teachers-better-inform-theirstudents-about-holocaust-and-genocide.
[16] Jeffery Halder, “Translations of Antisemitism: Jews, the Chinese, and Violence in Colonial and Post-colonial Indonesia,” Indonesia and the Malay World 32, no. 94 (Carfax Publishing, 2004), 292-313.
[18] Rahadian Rundjan, “How People Understand Hitler in Indonesia [Indonesian],” Deutsche Welle, February 7, 2018, https://www.dw.com/id/bagaimana-orang-orang-memahami-hitler-di-indonesia/a-42440753, and Yannick Lengkeek, “Parindra’s Loyal Cadres. Fascism and Anticolonial Nationalism in Late Colonial Indonesia, 1935-1942,” International Institute for Asian Studies The Newsletter 83 (2019), 22-23.
[19] Sebastian Strangio, “Opening of Indonesian Holocaust Museum Met with Islamist Backlash,” The Diplomat, February 4, 2022, https://thediplomat.com/2022/02/opening-of-indonesian-holocaust-museum-met-withislamist-backlash/.
[23] “The Superpower of Nazi Germany (1933-1945) [Indonesian],” Edisi Koleksi Angkasa, Angkasa, 2005; “The Nazi’s War Machines [Indonesian],” Edisi Koleksi Angkasa, Angkasa, 2006; “Nazi’s Special Forces Core Troops of Nazi’s Power [Indonesian],” Edisi Koleksi Angkasa, Angkasa, 2006; and “Angkasa: Doesn’t Subside Flying Across Time [Indonesian],” KumparanNEWS, February 9, 2017, https://kumparan.com/kumparannews/angkasa-tak-surut-terbang-lintasi-masa/full.
[24] Abdul Khalik, “ ‘Mein Kampf,’ ‘Das Kapital’ Free for Sale in Indonesia,” The Jakarta Post, August 7, 2008, https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/08/07/039mein-kampf039-039das-kapital039-free-sale-indonesia.html.
[25] Sudarto Murtaufiq, “Anti-Israel Demonstrators Seal Synagogue,” NU Online, January 8, 2009, https://en.nu.or.id/news/anti-israel-demonstrators-seal-synagogue-KHidG.
[26] Indra Harsaputra, “Group Protests Synagogue Demolition,” The Jakarta Post, September 17, 2013, https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2013/09/17/group-protests-synagogue-demolition.html.
[27] Ynetnews with AFP, “Indonesia: Nazi-themed Café Sparks Outrage,” Ynetnews, July 23, 2013, https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4408386,00.html.
[28] “Global 100: Indonesia,” Anti-Defamation League, 2014, https://global100.adl.org/country/indonesia/2014.
[32] Jordyn Haime, “Despite Unrest in Indonesia, a Jewish Community Finds Peace Among Other Faith Groups,” Jewish Telegraphic Agency, November 29, 2023, https://www.jta.org/2023/11/29/global/despite-unrest-inindonesia-a-jewish-community-finds-peace-among-other-faith-groups, and Rotem Kowner, “Indonesia’s Jews,” Inside Indonesia, June 20, 2011, https://www.insideindonesia.org/archive/articles/indonesia-s-jews.
[33] The People’s Consultative Assembly of the Republic of Indonesia, “HNW: Closing Holocaust Museum Proof of Indonesia’s Solidarity with Palestine [Indonesian],” MPR-RI, February 6th, 2022, https://www.mpr.go.id/berita/HNW:-Tutup-Museum-Holocaust-Bukti-Solidaritas-Indonesia–Dengan-Palestina; “Prosecuting Beliefs Indonesia’s Blasphemy Laws,” Amnesty International, 2014, https://www.amnesty.org/fr/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/asa210182014en.pdf; Indonesia’s Ministry of Religious Affairs – East Java, 1965, https://jatim.kemenag.go.id/file/file/Undangundang/owiz1398054257.pdf; and Johannes Nugroho, “Indonesia’s Jews Come Out,” Tablet, March 21, 2023, https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/indonesia-jews-come-out.
[34] Jordyn Haime, “Indonesia Muslim Groups Demand Closure of Country’s First-ever Holocaust Exhibition,” The Times of Israel, February 10, 2022, https://www.timesofisrael.com/indonesia-muslim-groups-demandclosure-of-countrys-first-ever-holocaust-exhibition/.
[36] The People’s Consultative Assembly of the Republic of Indonesia, “HNW: Stop the Holocaust Museum at Tondano [Indonesian],” MPR-RI, January 31, 2022, https://www.mpr.go.id/berita/HNW:-Stop-Museum-Holocaust-Di-Tondano.
[38] The People’s Consultative Assembly of the Republic of Indonesia, “HNW: Closing Holocaust Museum Proof of Indonesia’s Solidarity with Palestine [Indonesian],” MPR-RI, February 6, 2022, https://www.mpr.go.id/berita/HNW:-Tutup-Museum-Holocaust-Bukti-Solidaritas-Indonesia–Dengan-Palestina.
[39] Dedik Priyanto, “Polemic on Jewish Holocaust Museum in Minahasa, NU DKI Asks Not to Bring Interests of Certain State [Indonesian],” KompasTV, February 2, 2022, https://www.kompas.tv/nasional/257602/polemikmuseum-holocaust-yahudi-di-minahasa-nu-dki-minta-tidak-bawa-kepentingan-negara-tertentu?page=all.
[40] Devira Prastiwi, “The First Jewish Holocaust Museum in Indonesia is Officially Opened in Minahasa [Indonesian],” Liputan 6, February 3, 2022, https://www.liputan6.com/news/read/4876893/museum-holocaust-yahudipertama-di-indonesia-resmi-dibuka-di-minahasa?page=2.
[41] tvOne, “MUI Criticizes Holocaust Museum [Indonesian],” Kabar Petang, February 2, 2022, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwDPx_GLo1o&t=48s.
[42] Fathiyah Wardah, “The First Holocaust Museum in Indonesia is Opened at Minahasa [Indonesian],” VOA Indonesia,
January 29, 2022, https://www.voaindonesia.com/a/museum-holocaust-pertama-di-indonesia-dibuka-diminahasa/
6418015.html, and Larasati Dyah Utami, “Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Response to the
Attendance of German Ambassador in the Inauguration of the Holocaust Museum in Minahasa [Indonesian],” Tribunnews, February 3, 2022, https://www.tribunnews.com/nasional/2022/02/03/respons-kemenlu-ri-sikapikehadiran-dubes-jerman-dalam-peresmian-museum-holocaust-di-minahasa.
[43] Dhea Alifia Firdausi and Nuraeni, “The Fight of Diasporic Jews against Antisemitism through Indonesian Holocaust Museum [Indonesian],” Indonesian Journal of Religion and Society 5, no. 2 (2023), 96-111.
[44] tvOne, “Uproar over Jewish Museum in Indonesia [Indonesian],” Catatan Demokrasi tvOne, February 8, 2012, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdIB_gkuGvs.
[47] Fathiyah Wardah, “The Long Road Education Effort of Holocaust Museum [Indonesian],” VOA Indonesia, March 1, 2022, https://www.voaindonesia.com/a/jalan-panjang-upaya-edukasi-museum-holocaust/6464275.html.
[48] Interview by the author with Rabbi Ya‘akov Baruch, June 26, 2024.
[49] “Pro Contra of Holocaust Museum by Jewish Community in Minahasa [Indonesian],” CNN Indonesia, February 3, 2024, https://www.cnnindonesia.com/nasional/20220203062643-20-754330/pro-kontra-museum-holocaustoleh-komunitas-yahudi-di-minahasa.
[50] Interview by the author with Rabbi Ya‘akov Baruch, June 26, 2024.
[51] Ofir Winter, “Discovering the Past, Building a Future,” For A Righteous Cause, January 2022, 6-7, https://cst.tau.ac.il/for-a-righteous-cause/, and Uriya Shavit, “Notes From the Emirates,” Perspectives 23, April 2023, https://cst.tau.ac.il/perspectives/notes-from-the-emirates/.
[55] Bernd J. Fischer, Albania at War, 1939-1945 (Indiana: Purdue University Press, 1999), 5, 157.
[56] Harvey Sarner, Rescue in Albania: One Hundred Percent of Jews in Albania Rescued from Holocaust (California: Brunswick Press, 1997), 63-65.
[57] Yad Vashem, “Besa – A Code of Honor,” nd, https://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/besa/index.asp.
[58] Alma Kushova, “Besa,” OpenDemocracy.net, July 21, 2004, https://web.archive.org/web/20151117234832/https:/www.opendemocracy.net/arts/article_2114.jsp.
[59] Albana Mehmetaj, “Ernest Koliqi – Albanian Besa [Albanian],” International Seminar for Albanian Language, Literature and Culture Journal 37 (2018), 14, https://web.archive.org/web/20191014210448/https:/filologjia.uni-pr.edu/getattachment/Seminari/Seminari-37—v–2-(per-shtyp).pdf.aspx, and Tomer Misini, “Trust or Honor [Albanian],” Medium, February 16, 2019, https://medium.com/@tomor73/besa-ose-nderi-1b4724a50de1.
[60] Tonin Çobani, “Lekë Dukagjini [Albanian],” Kanuni.org, nd, https://kanuni.org/lek%C3%AB-dukagjini, and EltonVarfi, “Besa in the Canon of Lek Dukagjini [Albanian],” Kronika Shqiptare, June 12, 2011, https://eltonvarfishqip.blogspot.com/2011/06/besa-ne-kanunin-e-lek-dukagjinit.html.
[61] Interview by the author with architect Jurtin Hajro, August 5, 2024.
[63] Yad Vashem, “Atif and Ganimet Toptani,” nd, https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/righteous/4021521.
[64] Zvika Klein, “Albanian Gov’t Announces Museum Celebrating Albanians Who Rescued Jews in WWII,” The Jerusalem Post, March 1, 2023, https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-733034, and interview by the author with Jurtin Hajro, August 5, 2024.
[66] Interview by the author with Eneida Tarifi, August 8, 2024.
[67] Ibid. At present, the project has a 6.5-million-dollar budget.
[68] Zvika Klein, “Albania to Open Two New Jewish Museums in Vlora and Tirana,” The Jerusalem Post, June 8, 2023, https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-745686, and interview by the author with Eneida Tarifi, August 8, 2024.
[69] Interview by the author with Eneida Tarifi, August 8, 2024.
[71] Sarner, Rescue in Albania, 42-44; David Cesarani, Daniel Fraenkel, Guy Miron, David Silberklang, and Aharon Weiss, “Albania,” in Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, eds. Robert Rozett and Shmuel Spector (New York: Routledge, 2013), 104, and “Albania’s King Zog Extends Invitation to Jewish Settlers,” The American Jewish World, June 7, 1935, 3.
[72] Yael Weinstock Mashbaum, “Jews in Albania,” Yad Vashem, nd. https://www.yadvashem.org/articles/general/jews-in-albania.html.
[73] David Straub, “Jews in Albania,” in Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora: Origins, Experiences, and Culture, ed. Mark Avrum Ehrlich (Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO, 2009), 942-946.
[75] Qazim Namani, “The Jews of Kosovo between the Two World Wars [Albanian],” Izraeli Sot, January 3, 2023, https://www.izraelisot.com/2023/01/03/dr-qazim-namani-hebrenjte-e-kosoves-mes-dy-lufterave-boterore/.
[76] Interview by author with Skender Alickaj, July 4, 2024.
[77] Interview by author with Musa Lokaj, July 2, 2024.
[78] Sylejman Kllokoqi and Llazar Semini, “Kosovo Inaugurates ‘Wall of Honor’ for 23 Albanians who Rescued Jews from Holocaust,” Times of Israel, August 24, 2023, https://www.timesofisrael.com/kosovo-inaugurates-wallof-honor-for-23-albanians-who-rescued-jews-from-holocaust/.
A Historical Inflection Point by Prof. Irwin Cotler
We are witnessing and experiencing an unprecedented global explosion of antisemitism. Canada is one looking glass, but whether you look from Melbourne to Montreal or from Berlin to Berkeley, the trend is clear. There is an unprecedented global explosion of antisemitism, not only in terms of the incidents of antisemitism, but also because of the nature of the antisemitism itself.
The dramatic rise in antisemitic hate crimes and the intensification of sundry antisemitic hate speech – along with their convergence – underpins this unprecedented explosion. This comes against the backdrop of an international inflection moment that coincides with it – the intensification of what I call the “axis of authoritarianism,” consisting of Russia, China, and particularly Iran. These powers are working collaboratively, strategically, and in concert, incorporating the weaponization of antisemitism as part of their broader strategy of disinformation and misinformation. They contribute to the “antisemitic ecosystem,” now anchored within the axis of authoritarianism.
At the same time, we see an upending of the transnational Atlantic alliance. The United States, which was once the linchpin of the global rules-based order, is now itself destabilizing that order. We are witnessing, on the one hand, the upending of the community of democracies and an intensification of the axis of authoritarianism on the other. Antisemitism feeds off this larger ecosystem, and these dynamics are underpinning the unprecedented explosion of antisemitism.
This crisis escalated in the aftermath of October 7. It is sometimes forgotten that the unspeakable mass atrocities of that day, including mass murder, rape, mutilation, forcible abduction of hostages, and the execution of hostages in captivity, were not only perpetrated by Hamas as a terrorist organization under international law, but by an antisemitic, genocidal terrorist organization. This is not because I say so, but because Hamas itself affirmed it in its 1988 Charter and repeatedly since. Under international law and the Genocide Convention, incitement to genocide is a standalone breach of that convention, regardless of whether mass atrocities follow. In this case, genocidal atrocities directly followed genocidal incitement on October 7.
And it did not end there. On October 8, another antisemitic, genocidal terrorist group, Hizballah, joined in. Before long, seven fronts, each of them antisemitic, were acting in concert, led by the Iranian regime, which continues to receive a pass because attention remains focused on its proxies rather than the regime itself. When taken together, these forces create a critical mass of antisemitism that underpins this unprecedented explosion.
And the worst part of it? One would have thought that such unspeakable mass atrocities, carried out by a genocidal antisemitic organization that, after October 7, openly declared its intention to commit October 7 “again and again” until Israel’s annihilation, would have resulted in global condemnation and global action against antisemitism, against these genocidal antisemitic proxies, and against Iran, the head of the campaign. Instead, rather than being diplomatically isolated, Iranian diplomats and leaders continue to be received in Davos and elsewhere, chair United Nations (UN) human rights groups, and enjoy a disturbing level of international legitimacy.
I first coined the term “genocidal antisemitism” at the beginning of the 21st century, when Ayatollah Khamenei declared that there could be no resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict without the annihilation of the Jewish state (without even resorting to the euphemism of “Zionist regime”). That genocidal incitement by the Iranian regime has continued, unchallenged and without accountability. Thus, we have not only an explosion of antisemitism but also a culture of impunity that allows it to flourish. The coming together of these dynamics is the most disturbing.
Even before October 7, however, the embers of antisemitism were burning, but we were not paying attention. In 2021, at the end of my first year as Canada’s Special Envoy on Combatting Antisemitism, a role with a global mandate, I reported that the most disturbing finding was not just that we already had the highest levels of antisemitic incidents, hate crimes, and incendiary hate speech (all of which have since exploded) since reporting began in the 1970s, but that we were witnessing the normalization, mainstreaming, and legitimization of antisemitism in politics, culture, entertainment, sports, media, and particularly campus life.
Worse of all was an absence of outrage; a prevailing indifference and inaction to the rise in antisemitism prior to October 7. This reminded me of the words of my mentor, Elie Wiesel, who often said that indifference and inaction always mean siding with the antisemites, not with their targets and victims.
At this point, our responsibility is clear: we need a whole-of-government, whole-of-society approach to combatting antisemitism, with concrete actions taken country by country and internationally. We can no longer continue with complacency, indifference, and inaction because this leads to impunity, and impunity leads to an absence of accountability.
What is at stake here, and what continues to not be sufficiently appreciated, is recognizing this is not only a threat to the safety and security of Jewish communities, which should be reason enough to protect a vulnerable minority that is targeted by the longest, most enduring, most toxic, and most lethal of hatreds, but also the security of democracies themselves. It is a standing threat to the safety and security of citizens within those democracies because this metastasizing antisemitism is now evolving into antisemitic terror, and the next terrorist attack, possibly another mass atrocity terror attack, is just stalking around the corner.
Democracies must preemptively act to hold antisemites accountable and combat the normalization and mainstreaming of antisemitism across all cultural spheres. This is an urgent historical moment that demands equally urgent action domestically in each country, among the community of democratic nations, and at the highest levels internationally.
This brings us to the United Nations. As we approach the 80th anniversary of the UN Charter – a document intended to uphold human dignity, which birthed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and which spoke in its preamble of unspeakable atrocities that shock the conscience of humankind – we must confront the reality that antisemitism has not been eradicated. October 7 were the unspeakable atrocities that should have shocked the conscience of humankind, but did not. The explosion of antisemitism in the wake of October 7 should have shocked the conscience of humankind, but did not.
So, as we approach the 80th anniversary of the UN Charter and the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp, we are at a historical inflection point, with these two historical dates linked to the present by antisemitism. Auschwitz, the worst extermination camp of the 20th century, saw 1.3 million people deported there, 1.1 million of whom were Jews. Jews were murdered at Auschwitz because of antisemitism.
But antisemitism did not die at Auschwitz. It remains the bloodied canary in the mineshaft of global hatred and violence. And history has taught us, time and again, that while antisemitism begins with Jews, it never ends with Jews.
As we mark the 80th anniversary of the UN Charter, I recall the words of a former UN Secretary-General, who told me when I was Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada: “A United Nations that does not put the combatting of antisemitism at the forefront of its agenda is a United Nations that has betrayed its past and forfeited its future.”
This is the historical moment that the UN faces today. As a longtime supporter of the UN and its institutions like the International Criminal Court, I regrettably say that instead of leading the fight against antisemitism, the UN has often provided cover for it. Under the protective shield of international law, human rights advocacy, and anti-racism efforts, antisemitism has been laundered and, worse, weaponized.
International law is being weaponized to single out one member state – Israel, the Jew among the nations – in the international community for selective opprobrium and indictment.
This is not to say that Israel, like any other state, should not be held accountable for human rights and humanitarian law violations. The Jewish people and the State of Israel do not enjoy any particular privilege or preference because of the horrors of the Holocaust. No one should seek that Israel be above the law. But as the UN Charter proclaims, Israel is entitled to equality before the law and deserves equal respect. It must not be subjected to a different standard or singled out for disproportionate condemnation, but standards must be applied equally.
Human rights standards must be applied equally. The selective targeting of Israel, mirroring historic patterns of antisemitism, is itself a manifestation of contemporary antisemitism. This fuels a culture of impunity, allowing antisemitism to flourish unchecked.
At this inflection point, the international community must recognize that combating antisemitism is not just about protecting Jewish communities. It is a fundamental necessity for preserving democratic values and global security. The time to act is now.
Irwin Cotler is former Justice Minister and Attorney General of Canada
Call for Submissions – Sports and Religion
The Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry, Tel Aviv University, and the Department of History, Bielefeld University, hereby invite scholars to submit contributions for an edited, peer-reviewed volume on the relations between sports and religious doctrines and practices in Judaism, Christianity and Islam from late antiquity to the present.
Sporting cultures have challenged religious creeds and establishments in a number of ways: by emphasizing the physical rather than the spiritual; distracting believers from their duties; establishing rituals that substitute religious ones; and involving behaviors deemed immoral or undesired. In addressing those challenges, theologians and religious establishments have chosen one of two paths: accommodation – infusing religious meaning and hierarchies into sports; or rejection – defining religiosity through its total or partial opposition to sports.
The edited volume does not seek to answer one specific research question and does not draw on one discipline or methodology. Rather, by bringing together diverse case studies of Jewish, Christian and Muslim attitudes to sporting institutions and activities at different historical periods, it aims to present a rich perspective on how the three monotheistic religions have treated challenges different sporting activities have presented, and how they have utilized these challenges to define and re-define their essences.
Contributions already included explore, for example, how early versions of tennis played in medieval monasteries were interpreted by Christian theologians as manifestations of God’s presence in the world; the emergence of the understanding of sports as antithetical to “true” Judaism as a backbone of ultra-Orthodox Jewish creeds; and the transformation of debates on religio-legal norms regarding sports into a definer of Muslim religious identity in the West, and how these contributed to changes in Western sporting culture.
Contributions are welcomed from scholars of all relevant disciplines. Contributions from early-career scientists are encouraged. Contributions should be original, written in English, and between 7,000 to 10,000 words.
Abstracts (not more than 300 words) of proposed contributions and CVs should be sent to the editors by August 1, 2025. Decisions on potential suitability will be sent to authors within two weeks. Submissions of articles will be required by no later than January 10, 2026.
Gaza, Ireland: The Hour Will Not Come – Dr. Ofir Winter
In early 2024, Amazon offered for sale an English translation of the novel The Thorn and the Carnation by Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’ leader in Gaza and the mastermind behind the October 7 attack and war crimes. Sinwar authored the novel in Arabic almost two decades earlier, when he was still a relatively unknown Hamas operative serving a life sentence in an Israeli prison for the murder of Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel.
The sale of Sinwar’s translated work on Amazon sparked protests from pro-Israel organizations and was halted within days. The protesters argued that its content incited violence, was full of antisemitic rhetoric, and promoted terrorism. They also expressed concerns that the profits from its sale would ultimately fund Hamas.[1]
After Sinwar was killed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in October 2024, becoming a “martyr” in the eyes of his supporters, his novel gained renewed attention and was marketed by sympathizers as his final testament. The novel was re-published in Arabic and was translated into Turkish, Kurdish, and Chinese. Within months, The Thorn and the Carnation became the top-selling book at book fairs in Amman, Jordan; Sulaymaniyah, Iraq; and Idlib, Syria. It also did well at book fairs in Kuwait, Algeria, and Egypt.[2]
The English translation was sold in bookstores in Switzerland, Germany, and the United States. Connolly Books in Dublin, which was founded in 1932 and describes itself as “Ireland’s oldest radical bookshop,” regarded the selling of the novel as a political mission. The store’s website praised the author, describing Sinwar as someone who was “martyred while bravely fighting against Israeli genocide in Gaza.” Potential readers were invited to “traverse the corridors of his mind, where the seeds for the heroic ‘al-Aqsa Flood’ operation initiated on October 7, 2023, were sown.”[3]
The book and its author also received positive reviews in media across the world. A month before Sinwar was killed, Sõzarn Barday, a lawyer with an interest in human rights in the Middle East, wrote in the South African weekly Mail & Guardian that the novel is “an intimate and heart-wrenching perspective on the Palestinian resistance.” She portrayed Sinwar as demonstrating leadership “through the escalating violence and genocide.”[4]
In Turkey’s Yeni Şafak daily, Selçuk Türkyılmaz wrote that “for us, reading and reflecting on [Sinwar’s] book is a duty.” He portrayed Sinwar as a “great warrior” who secured his place in history by sacrificing his life defending Muslim lands. He further described Sinwar’s biography as a source of inspiration for “Palestinians and those living in the heart of the Islamic world.”[5]
Indeed, Sinwar’s novel, largely overlooked by Hamas researchers before and oddly enough also after October 7, represents a unique attempt by a Hamas leader to provide a literary expression of his movement’s ideology.
Hamas, the “Islamic Resistance Movement in Palestine,” was founded in the Gaza Strip in late 1987 following the start of the First Intifada. It was headed by Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, a charismatic Palestinian theologian confined to a wheelchair who was inspired by the teachings of Egypt’s Islamist Muslim Brotherhood. It emerged as the self-declared Palestinian branch of the Brotherhood, aiming to offer an Islamist alternative to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).[6]
The strategic vision of Hamas, as outlined in its August 1988 charter, considers Palestine an endowment belonging to all Muslims. It calls for the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea and for the destruction of the Jewish state of Israel. It declares (article 15) that this goal can only be achieved through an armed jihad, and views jihad as a personal duty, i.e., a religio-legal duty incumbent upon every Muslim.
Permanent peace agreements with Israel are framed in the charter (Article 11) as a betrayal of Islam. Therefore, it states that no Arab state or leader has the right to relinquish even an inch of it.
The charter is an antisemitic document envisioning a world without Jews at the End of Days (Article 7). It depicts Jews as a collective as the enemy of Muslims (Article 32) and describes them as Nazis (Article 20). Echoing The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the charter accuses Jews of controlling world media and orchestrating through financial means conspiracies against humanity in general and Muslims in particular, including instigating the French Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution and forcing the start of the First World War and the Second World War (Article 22).[7]
Over the years, Hamas leaders translated these ideological tenets into a political terrorist, annihilationist program. When Yasser Arafat engaged in negotiations with Israel and signed the Oslo Accords in 1993, establishing mutual recognition and endorsing at least rhetorically the two-state solution, Hamas vowed to thwart the diplomatic process by force at any cost. The movement launched a violent terror campaign that included suicide bombings, kidnappings, shootings, and stabbings, killing hundreds of Israeli men, women, elderly, and children.
Hamas justified the killing of Israeli civilians on religious grounds, arguing that Israeli society was militaristic, rendering every Israeli a de facto soldier whose blood was permissible to spill.[8]
In 2006, following Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, democratic elections were held for the Palestinian Legislative Council, in which Hamas won. The following year, the movement forcibly seized control of Gaza, becoming the enclave’s ruling authority. Since then, the Palestinian territories in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have been divided between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, respectively.
The Middle East Quartet, the international body overseeing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, comprising the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, and Russia, set three conditions for Hamas in 2006 to be recognized as a legitimate political actor: recognizing Israel, renouncing terrorism, and accepting previously signed agreements between Israel and the PLO.[9] Hamas flatly rejected these conditions, arguing that it would not abandon its core principles or disregard the will of the Palestinian electorate who voted for the movement.[10]
In the years that followed, Hamas solidified its rule in Gaza. However, between 2013 and 2017, it faced strategic difficulties due to strained relations with Egypt. The Egyptian government accused Hamas of supporting terrorism in the Sinai Peninsula, which had claimed the lives of thousands of Egyptian security personnel.[11] Cairo tightened border restrictions at the Rafah crossing, increased efforts to uncover and destroy smuggling tunnels between Gaza and the Sinai, and even threatened to classify Hamas as a terrorist organization.
In July 2015, after the assassination of Egypt’s attorney general by jihadist operatives trained in Gaza, the Egyptian government intensified its campaign against Hamas, branding it the “military wing of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Hamas found itself increasingly isolated both regionally and internationally, facing financial hardship and eroding public support among Palestinians.
Against this backdrop, Hamas began reconsidering its policy and rhetoric to ease external and internal pressures, even drafting a new charter. Following internal debates, the movement retained the 1988 charter while publishing a supplementary ideological vision called the “Document of Principles” in May 2017. This document did not replace the original charter, which remained officially intact. Still, it favored more secular-nationalist terms such as “armed resistance”; denied any formal ties to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood; distanced itself from explicitly antisemitic rhetoric by claiming that “the struggle against the Zionist enterprise is not a religious struggle against Jews”; and expressed willingness to accept a temporary Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital based on the 1967 borders, without recognizing Israel, the Oslo Accords, or any permanent settlement based on the two-state principle.[12]
While this document did not facilitate reconciliation with the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, it paved the way for tactical understandings between Hamas and Egypt. However, the document offered no substantive change regarding its stance toward Israel. Hamas leaders had proposed since the late 1980s a temporary hudna (ceasefire) in exchange for a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, but never shifted away from their ultimate goal of liberating all of Palestine from the river to the sea, rejection of Israel’s existence, and opposition to any permanent peace agreements.[13]
Sinwar played significant roles during formative periods in Hamas’ history, both in its early days and during the challenging transitional phase of consolidating its rule in Gaza after his release from prison. Born in 1962 in Khan Yunis to a family of refugees from Majdal (Ashkelon), he studied Arabic at the Islamic University of Gaza in the early 1980s. He was arrested by Israel in 1982 and 1985 for his student activism and sentenced to short prison terms.[14]
With the establishment of Hamas, Sinwar was responsible for its internal security apparatus, al-Majd, which was tasked with identifying and killing collaborators with Israel. From this unit, the movement’s military wing later emerged. He was arrested again in 1988 and convicted in 1989 of murdering four Palestinians.
During his imprisonment, Sinwar learned Hebrew, engaged in translation from Hebrew to Arabic, wrote two so-called research books, and authored The Thorn and the Carnation, which he smuggled out of Eshel Prison in Beersheba in late 2004.
According to testimonies from Israeli prison guards, Sinwar instilled fear in fellow Palestinian inmates and acquired a special status among them. After his release in the 2011 Gilad Shalit deal, he rapidly climbed Hamas’ ranks and was elected the movement’s leader in Gaza in 2017 and 2021. Following the assassination of Hamas’ political bureau chief, Isma‘il Haniyya, by Israel in July 2024 in Tehran, Sinwar was chosen as his successor, a role he held until he was killed in a confrontation with IDF forces in Rafah in October 2024.
The Thorn and the Carnation is a fictional novel, yet there are clear parallels between the author’s life and his characters. The blend of fiction and reality is anchored in the novel’s chronological storyline, which transitions between real milestones in the conflict with Israel, including wars, agreements, intifadas, and terror attacks.
The book tells the story of a Palestinian family uprooted from its home in 1948, migrating to the Gaza Strip and struggling with life in the al-Shati refugee camp under Israeli occupation. The mother raises alone three children and two nephews who are separated from their fathers against their will. The sons are divided between different Palestinian resistance factions and disagree on their paths. Ahmad, the first-person narrator, is a science student who gradually leans toward Hamas, influenced by his cousin Ibrahim. The latter is the novel’s second protagonist, symbolically named after both Sinwar’s father and future son. Ibrahim is a Hamas operative and a student at the Islamic University of Gaza, working to instill the movement’s ideology among those around him.[15]
The Thorn and the Carnation is primarily a political essay, an ode to the violent struggle against Israel rather than an antisemitic manifesto designed to incite hatred toward Jews as such. However, precisely for this reason, the Jew-hatred that emerges from many of its pages is so revealing. It reflects, unintentionally, the deep immersion of antisemitic perceptions into Hamas’s discourse and ideology, and indeed, among a significant portion of the Palestinian public that supports the movement.
The antisemitic motifs expressed through the novel’s characters include depicting Jews as the eternal enemies of Muslims, attributing to them inherent, vile characteristics, and calling for their killing, even their annihilation.
A common antisemitic motif in Islamist discourse is the portrayal of Jews as the eternal enemies of Muslims, linking Muhammad’s 7th-century conflict with the Jews of the Arabian Peninsula to Hamas’s present-day struggle against Jews in Israel. A particularly popular Islamic tradition that recurs throughout Sinwar’s book is the Battle of Khaybar in 628, during which Muslims defeated the Jews of the city and forced them to surrender half of their property to avoid conversion to Islam.
In descriptions of violent clashes between Palestinians and the IDF, the book repeatedly invokes the chant “Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, Muhammad’s army will return!” in various contexts: Gaza youths celebrating after damaging the tires of Israeli military vehicles;[16] Arab and Muslim demonstrators rallying in support of the intifada in their capital cities outside Palestine;[17] and a young man named Muhammad, preparing for a suicide attack in Gush Etzion, calling his proud mother for a final farewell and leaving his cellphone line open so she could witness the moment of his martyrdom:
He shouted ‘Allah Akbar, I am heading to Khaybar’ and threw his bombs one by one. Then he stormed the main hall, firing… A firefight ensued, with the forces rushing to the scene. Muhammad fell and repeated: ‘I testify that there is no God but Allah, and I testify that Muhammad is His messenger.’ Then a wail escaped his mother’s lips as she said: ‘Praise be to Allah, who honored me with his martyrdom.’[18]
The book presents the inherent and unchanging evil of Jews as an explanation for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, selectively drawing from Islamic sources. For example, Baruch Goldstein’s 1994 massacre of 29 Muslim worshipers in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron is depicted as representative of Jewish behavior rather than as an individual act of terrorism that was widely and unequivocally condemned in Israel at the time.
According to the novel, Goldstein’s attack occurred just after the imam recited a Quranic verse condemning Jewish violence and evil from the days of the First and Second Temples: “We decreed to the Children of Israel in the Scripture: ‘Twice you will spread corruption in the land and become highly arrogant’” (Quran 17:4). The moment after, the novel describes how a settler, “a tall man with a wild, dirty beard,” snuck into the mosque and opened fire on the worshipers.[19]
The novel’s opposition to the Oslo Accords is also justified through the alleged treachery that characterizes Jews as a whole. In one debate between the protagonists, Hassan, a Hamas supporter, challenges Mahmud, a Fatah supporter: “Since when have [the Jews] honored agreements and treaties?” He then cites a verse from the Quran, commonly interpreted as referring to the Jews’ betrayal of their covenant with Muhammad and their support for the infidels: “How is it that whenever they make a covenant or pledge, some of them throw it away? In fact, most of them do not believe” (Quran 2:100).[20]
Mahmud, however, refuses to be convinced, accusing Hassan of irrationality and of conflating the Jews of the past with those of today. In response, Hassan asserts that it is only a matter of time before Fatah members realize that Jews have deceived and manipulated them, just as they did to Muslims in the early days of Islam, when they “killed innocent people and fought against Allah and His messenger.” He insists:
This is what Allah has told us about them. We know them, their souls, and the way they operate. They do not honor covenants or agreements… Do you not understand that history repeats itself, and the Jews are the Jews? You will see, Mahmud. You will see, and I will remind you—if we survive.[21]
The terms “Jews” and “Israel” are used interchangeably throughout the novel. However, the hatred toward Jews does not stem solely from their role as representatives of the oppressive and occupying “Zionist entity,” which has allegedly violated Palestinian national rights. Instead, it is rooted in their very religious identity.
One example presented in the book is an attack in Gaza on an Israeli military vehicle, which later turned out to have been manned by Israeli Druze soldiers. Although Druze are described in the book as violent and immoral, having allegedly abused young Palestinian women, the Hamas adherents in the story express disappointment and sorrow when they realize they had targeted Druze instead of Jews. “If only they had been Jews!!” Ibrahim sighs to himself as he watches the victims’ mothers, sisters, and wives weeping on television.[22]
The novel’s portrayal of Jews as the perpetual enemies of Muslims, depicted as inherently vile and incapable of peaceful coexistence, leads to a desire for their mass extermination. Toward the book’s conclusion, just before Israel assassinates him, Ibrahim recalls “The Promise of the Stones and the Trees,” a Prophetic tradition cited in Hamas’ charter that encourages the killing of Jews on Judgment Day: “The Prophet of Allah said: The Hour will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews, and the Muslims will kill them, until the Jews hide behind stones and trees, and the stones and trees will say: ‘O Muslim, O servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him,’ except for the Gharqad tree, for it is the tree of the Jews.”[23]
This tradition, ultimately, was Sinwar’s personal wish and mission.
The seeds of devastation sprout from the pages of the novel, where literary expressions align with the operational agenda that materialized on October 7: the glorification of sacrificing life in the path of jihad against Israel as a sacred value and a supreme goal, despite its high costs; the aspiration to kill as many Israelis as possible, indiscriminately targeting soldiers and civilians alike; approval of kidnapping and hostage-taking attacks as a means to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners; and the ambition to thwart peace and normalization agreements between Israel and its Arab neighbors through violent means, while rejecting the political path associated with the Palestinian Authority.
Hamas named the October 7 attack, directed primarily against southern Israel, as the “al-Aqsa Flood.” By placing Jerusalem at the forefront, Hamas sought to give the campaign a religious-Islamic character, expressing its vision and ultimate strategic goal: recruiting Arabs and Muslims to the liberation of the entire sacred land of Palestine, with al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam, at its heart, through an uncompromising religious war.
This ideology is fully reflected in Sinwar’s novel. The narrator shares a formative event from his youth as a high school student in Gaza, when he first visited al-Aqsa Mosque in the late 1970s, at a time when access from Gaza to Israel was largely unrestricted. The tour was organized by the “Islamic Bloc,” later Hamas’ student movement, and was guided by cousin Ibrahim.
On the way to Jerusalem, their bus stopped in the Latrun area, where Ibrahim, teary-eyed, lifted a handful of soil, claiming it was soaked in the pure blood of the Prophet Muhammad’s Companions, who, according to tradition, fought there in 637 under the command of Abu ‘Ubayda Ibn al-Jarrah during the conquest of the land. He expressed his wish that the soil would mix with the blood of today’s Palestinians, the rightful successors of those ancient Muslim warriors, until liberation was achieved.[24]
The peak of the journey came, of course, when the students entered al-Aqsa Mosque. They prayed at the site, listened to the Friday sermon, visited the Dome of the Rock, and heard the story of the Prophet’s night journey to the city.
While absorbing the sanctity of the place, they noticed an intolerable injustice: Israeli soldiers controlled the access to the site, deciding who could enter and who could not. At that moment, they were filled with rage, wondering how the enormous Islamic nation that stood behind the Palestinians, despite its wealth and armies, had failed to liberate the al-Aqsa from the “gangs” that had seized it. Then, the narrator testifies, they realized that “the struggle had other dimensions than we had known. It was not just about territory and displaced people, but a war of faith and religion.”[25]
For the protagonists of the novel, the outrage over the oppression in al-Aqsa and what they call Palestine had to be translated into violent action, into jihad for the defense of the holy site and the liberation of the land, with a willingness to sacrifice life in the footsteps of Islam’s heroes, from the Prophet Muhammad’s time, through Saladin during the Crusades, to the present day.[26]
At times, the ideal of sacrifice took on faces and names, such as when a friend or relative of Ibrahim and Ahmad lost their life in the struggle against Israel. In one case, the grief over the death of a friend named Yasser was mixed with joy that God had honored him with martyrdom (shahada), and the mourning tent was filled with ululations, sweets, and large, colorful posters of the fallen fighter.[27] In another instance, Ibrahim’s wife is described as having “a smile that never left her face” upon receiving the news of her husband’s assassination by an Israeli airstrike.[28]
For Sinwar, Palestinian lives, let alone Israeli lives, are not sacred. In fact, the October 7 massacre pales in comparison to some of the fantasies voiced by the characters in The Thorn and the Carnation. The book describes how, during the 1991 First Gulf War, there was anticipation in Gaza that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would launch chemical warheads and wipe out half of Israel’s population (about five million people at the time). Thus, when the air raid sirens first blared, Palestinians cheered for the Iraqi leader: “With spirit and blood, we will redeem you, O Saddam… O Saddam, beloved, strike, strike Tel Aviv.” However, when they learned that the missiles carried only conventional explosives, frustration set in: “It was as if ice water had been poured over us.”[29]
Having been disappointed in their hopes of killing millions of Israeli civilians with chemical weapons, the characters in Sinwar’s novel settled for smaller-scale murders, yet their objective remained the same: to make the occupiers “curse the day they came to our land and took over our sacred sites.”[30]
The novel glorifies a series of shooting, bombing, and suicide attacks from the early Oslo years through the Second Intifada, including the shooting of a father and his children at a hitchhiking station in the West Bank as they traveled to a religious school in Jerusalem;[31] the October 1994 bombing of Dan Bus Line 5 on Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv, which killed 22 and injured 104;[32] the January 1995 Beit Lid junction bombing, which killed 22 and wounded 66;[33] the June 2001 Dolphinarium nightclub bombing in Tel Aviv, where 21 young people were killed and about 120 injured;[34] the Sbarro restaurant bombing in Jerusalem, where 16 were killed and 140 wounded; and the first mortar and Qassam rocket attacks on settlements in the Gaza Strip and Israeli communities surrounding it.[35]
The Palestinian attacks deep inside Israel’s territory, including major cities like Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Netanya, and Ashdod, are portrayed in the book as proof of Palestinians’ ability to inflict heavy damage on their enemy despite its military superiority. According to the narrator, these attacks resulted in many achievements: they sowed panic among the occupiers, deepened divisions in Israeli society over the peace process, emptied Israeli streets, shuttered shops, and left cafés and restaurants deserted. Only a handful of Israelis dared use public transportation. Sandbags appeared in shopping centers, making Israeli cities resemble military outposts with checkpoints and thousands of soldiers and police officers.[36]
Anyone looking at the devastation in Gaza following the October 7 War may wonder whether Sinwar would have carried out the massacre had he known its consequences in advance. Based on his novel, the answer seems to be positive.
His protagonists justify the heavy toll paid by Palestinians for their terrorist acts during the Second Intifada. At one point, Ibrahim scoffs at calls for Hamas to lay down its arms and allow Palestinians to live in peace, joking that after Israel assassinated Hamas operatives, invaded Palestinian cities, and left them in ruins, the only thing left for Israel to do was rebuild them, so it would have something to destroy again in the future.[37]
Another issue that draws a direct line between the novel and the October 7 attack is Sinwar’s keen interest, as expressed in his book written while in prison, in hostage-taking and bargaining attacks to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners. The Jibril deal, in which 1,151 Palestinian prisoners were released in 1985 in exchange for three IDF captives in Lebanon, is described in the novel as a moment of joy in the Palestinian territories, as well as a boost to the national struggle.[38]
The novel also provides a detailed account of two kidnapping operations for which Hamas was responsible: the 1992 abduction of Border Police officer Nissim Toledano, intended to secure the release of Sheikh Yassin, which ended in Toledano’s murder and the expulsion of 415 Hamas operatives to Lebanon;[39] and the 1994 kidnapping of soldier Nachshon Wachsman, aimed at securing the release of 500 Palestinian prisoners, including Sheikh Yassin, which ended in a failed IDF rescue operation.[40]
One of Sinwar’s objectives in launching the October 7 attack was to derail the normalization agreement that was on the verge of being signed between Israel and Saudi Arabia.[41] The agreement was expected to grant Israel recognition from the country where Islam originated, draw additional Arab and Muslim states into the circle of peace, and shatter Hamas’ hopes of uniting the Muslim nation in a struggle to eliminate the Jewish state.
The novel Sinwar authored extensively addresses the divide between the Arab-Palestinian strategic choice of peace on one end and Hamas’ unwavering commitment to armed struggle and rejection of any permanent settlement with the Jewish state on the other. The roots of this divide trace back to the peace initiative of Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat. According to the novel’s account, the speech delivered by Sadat at the Knesset in November 1977 sparked shock and opposition among the Palestinian people. In an act of protest, Palestinian terrorists assassinated Egyptian journalist Yusuf al-Siba‘i, a close associate of Sadat who had accompanied his delegation on the visit to Israel.[42]
Several of the novel’s conversations depict the intense debate between PLO activists, seeking peace agreements with Israel for pragmatic reasons, and Hamas activists, who adamantly reject political compromises and prefer to establish a sovereign reality not bound by permanent agreements that go beyond hudna. They state: “Israel is an oppressive state that was established on our land and should cease to exist.”[43]
The novel’s protagonists categorically reject the claim that the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian entity necessitates acceptance of Israel’s existence. In a conversation between Mahmud, a PLO supporter, and Ibrahim, the latter insists that a Palestinian state can be established without recognizing Israel’s territorial rights over any part of the land.
Several years before the Israeli implementation of the disengagement plan and Hamas’ takeover of Gaza, Ibrahim, one of the novel’s protagonists, had already predicted that the killing of hundreds of Israelis by Palestinian resistance will pressure Israel into a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza and the West Bank, paving the way for a Palestinian state in the liberated territories, without requiring Palestinian recognition of the Jewish state.[44] When Mahmud asks about the difference between a withdrawal conditioned on recognizing Israel and an unconditional withdrawal, Ibrahim replies that if Israel leaves the Palestinian lands without an agreement and under the pressure of resistance, the door to continuing their struggle will remain open whenever circumstances allow.[45]
Not accidentally, Sinwar does not mention in the novel the names of Yasser Arafat or other Fatah leaders, and ignores events such as their dramatic return to the West Bank and Gaza, while mentioning Hamas leaders like Ahmad Yassin and Yahya ‘Ayyash and the major terror attacks carried out by the movement. The Egyptian columnist Sami al-Buhayri wrote in January 2025 in this context that reading The Thorn and the Carnation “proved to him beyond any doubt that Hamas, like all extremist ideological organizations, will not accept any [Palestinian] partner in governance.” [46]
The novel also demonstrates Hamas’ refusal to accept the agreements signed between the PLO and Israel and the authorities granted to the Palestinian Authority based on those agreements. The technical argument presented in the book by Hamas-affiliated characters for this position is that Palestinian opposition factions do not consider themselves bound by agreements they did not sign, especially since the PLO did not consult them before signing or approve them through a public referendum.[47]
According to the novel, this argument adds to Hamas’ fundamental rejection of the agreement’s terms, which include ending violent resistance, establishing relations of cooperation, coordination and security liaison with Israel, and, worse of all, recognizing the so-called Zionist entity’s right to control most of Mandatory Palestine under broad international guarantees.[48] In one episode, Ibrahim is summoned for interrogation at the Palestinian Preventive Security offices. An official explains the new reality in which there is one legitimate Palestinian Authority, which has signed internationally backed agreements with Israel, and warns him that he will be arrested if he does not comply with its regulations. In response, Ibrahim accuses the official of collaborating with Israel’s scheme to divide the Palestinians into two groups: one committed to the agreements and the other to the resistance. At the same time, he emphasizes that Palestinian national goals will not be achieved through negotiations but only through armed struggle, as “our enemies understand only the language of the rifle and fire.”[49]
In one of the debates presented in the novel, Mahmud, the PLO supporter, accuses Hamas of carrying out attacks in order to take unjustified credit for prospective Israeli territorial withdrawals enabled by the Oslo Process. The response he receives is that there is no reason for Palestinians to wait for an Israeli withdrawal based on bilateral agreements since the Zionists are bound to “flee under the pressure of resistance” from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank anyway.[50]
When examining the ideological continuity between the novel and the October 7 massacre, one concludes that the seeds of that attack were sown not only in Sinwar’s operational planning but also in his literary work. Thus, to the series of failures by Israeli decision-makers, intelligence agencies, and academic researchers before October 7, one must add the insufficient attention given to literary texts that could have served as a stark warning.
That a novel written by a murderous antisemitic psychopath is being sold and glorified today on the streets of European capitals without any penalty is another warning sign that is being ignored.
[2] “Yahya Sinwar’s Novel ‘The Thorn and the Carnation’ is a Best Seller at Jordan Exhibition after His Martyrdom [Arabic],” Masr Times, October 19, 2024, https://www.masrtimes.com/448127, and Nizar
al-Rihani, “Translated into Turkish: The First Edition of Yahya Sinwar’s Novel is Sold Out [Arabic],” Bawabat Tunis, April 29, 2024, https://tinyurl.com/2whm6spt.
[10] Gilead Sher, Liran Ofek, and Ofir Winter, “The Hamas Document of Principles: Can a Leopard Change Its Spots?,” Strategic Assessment 20, no. 2 (July 2017), 85-98.
[11] Jony Essa and Ofir Winter, “On the 40th Anniversary of Israel’s Withdrawal from Sinai: Is the Peninsula Becoming Integrated into Egypt?,” INSS Special Publication (May 19, 2022), https://www.inss.org.il/publication/sinai/.
[12] Sher, Ofek, and Winter, “The Hamas Document of Principles,” 85-98.
[13] Shavit and Winter, Zionism in Arab Discourses, 53-54.
Hundreds of leading media organizations across the globe and in Israel covered last week our Annual Antisemitism Worldwide Report, authored jointly by the Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Justice and Human Rights, both at TAU. Many media organizations noted that the Report, now in its 25th year, is considered the most cited and authoritative publication of its kind. We take the opportunity to thank again the research team and all involved in working on this flagship TAU study.
On Wednesday, March 5, 2025, the Center hosted Rabbi Zamir Isayev, the Chief Rabbi and Chairman of the Sephardi Jewish Community of Baku, Azerbaijan. Prof. Uriya Shavit, Head of the Center, and Dr. Carl Yonker, the Center’s Senior Researcher, discussed various topics related to Jewish life in Azerbaijan. They touched on the rich history of Jews in Azerbaijan and on community life in the country today, including education in Jewish schools and the makeup of the community, estimated at 30,000.
Ethnic or Religious?
On Friday, February 14, 2025, the Center, together with the Friends Association of Tel Aviv University and Think & Drink Different, hosted a seminar, Ethnic or Religious? The Path of Israeli Politics from “The National Camp” to “The Faith Camp.” The seminar commemorates the publication of Prof. Uriya Shavit’s (Head of the Center) new book, The Jewish War (Yedioth Books, 2025 [in Hebrew]). The event was held in Hebrew.
How Does it Feel in War
On January 9, 2025, the Center, together with the Chaim Weizmann Institute for the Study of Zionism and Israel, hosted a seminar commemorating the publication of Prof. Orit Rozin’s new book, “Emotions of Conflict: Israel 1949-1967” (Oxford University Press, 2024).
In the News: Antisemitism Worldwide Report
On Monday, April 17, 2023, the Center released its annual report on the state of antisemitism worldwide. The publication of the report has been widely covered in the international and Israeli press. Below are links to some of the coverage the report has received in English, Hebrew, and other languages.
