Rising From the Ashes
1 Comments Published by Tom Gara on Tuesday, December 16 at Tuesday, December 16, 2008.
A long, intense interview in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz between the journalist Ari Shavit and Avraham Burg, the former speaker of the Knesset. The subject is Burg's book, which was tentatively titled Hitler Won but has been released as The Holocaust is Over, We Must Rise From Its Ashes:
I'm fairly pessimistic on the current state of Israel, and its future. But one thing that sets it so clearly apart from its neighbours is the quality of its intellectual discourse - conversations like this, happening in major national newspapers, not cursing the evils of its enemies but instead looking deep within and asking unimaginably difficult questions. Along with being a vastly more open society than any of its neighbours, this is what makes the country the strongest in the region, not nuclear weapons or the backing of the US.
The end may be optimistic, but throughout its entire course the book repeatedly equates Israel with Germany. Is that really justified? Is there sufficient basis for the Israel-Germany analogy?The whole interview is just riveting, if you are into this stuff. You can watch the author talk more about his new book in this great inteview on bloggingheads.
"It is not an exact science, but I will describe to you some of the elements that go into the stew: a great sense of national insult; a feeling that the world has rejected us; unexplained losses in wars. And, as a result, the centrality of militarism in our identity. The place of reserve officers in society. The number of armed Israelis in the streets. Where is this swarm of armed people going? The expressions hurled publicly: 'Arabs out.'"
Do you really believe that the racist slogans which, appallingly, do indeed appear on the stone walks in Jerusalem are akin to the slogans of the 1930s in Germany?
"I see that we are not weeding out those utterances with all our might. And I hear voices coming out of Sderot .... We will destroy and kill and expel. And there is a transferist discourse in the government .... We have crossed so many red lines in the past few years. And then you ask yourself what the next red lines that we cross will be."
....
I will tell you frankly. I think we have serious moral and psychological problems. But I think that the comparison with Germany on the eve of the rise of Nazism to power is baseless. One example: There is a problem with the place of the army in our lives and with the place of the generals in our politics and in the relations between the political echelon and the army. But you are likening Israeli militarism to German militarism, and that is a false comparison. You describe Israel as a Prussian Sparta living by the sword, and that is not the Israel I see outside. Certainly not in 2007.
"I envy your ability to read the situation as you read it. I very much envy you. But I think we are a society that in its feelings lives by the sword .... It is not by chance that I make the comparison with Germany, because our feeling that we are obliged to live by the sword stems from Germany. What they deprived us of in the 12 years of Nazism necessitates a very large sword. Look at the fence. The separation fence is a fence against paranoia. And it was born in my milieu. In my school of thought. With my own Haim Ramon. What is the thinking here? That I will erect a big wall and the problem will be solved because I will not see them. You know, the Labor movement always saw the historical context and represented a culture of dialogue, but here we have terrible pettiness of soul. The fence physically demarcates the end of Europe. It says that this is where Europe ends. It says that you are the forward post of Europe and the fence separates you from the barbarians. Like the Roman Wall. Like the Wall of China. But that is so pathetic. And it is a bill of divorce from the vision of integration. There is something so xenophobic about it. So insane. And it comes just at a time when Europe itself, and the world with it, has made such an impressive advance in internalizing the lessons of the Holocaust and has fomented a great advance in the normative behavior of nations."
The truth is that you are a salient Europist. You live in Nataf but you are all Brussels. The prophet of Brussels.
"Completely. Completely. I see the European Union as a biblical utopia. I don't know how long it will hold together, but it is amazing. It is completely Jewish."
I'm fairly pessimistic on the current state of Israel, and its future. But one thing that sets it so clearly apart from its neighbours is the quality of its intellectual discourse - conversations like this, happening in major national newspapers, not cursing the evils of its enemies but instead looking deep within and asking unimaginably difficult questions. Along with being a vastly more open society than any of its neighbours, this is what makes the country the strongest in the region, not nuclear weapons or the backing of the US.
I'm fairly pessimistic on the current state of Israel, and its future. But one thing that sets it so clearly apart from its neighbours is the quality of its intellectual discourse - conversations like this, happening in major national newspapers, not cursing the evils of its enemies but instead looking deep within and asking unimaginably difficult questions. Along with being a vastly more open society than any of its neighbours, this is what makes the country the strongest in the region, not nuclear weapons or the backing of the US.
This is pretty much exactly how I feel.