Using the Holocaust in Israeli politics

Childhood and the Army• 15-16yo• 18-20yo Witnesses in Uniform• About two thirds of Israelis

Witnesses in uniform

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfv3jsLGzL0 from 1:54

IAF Jets fly over Auschwitz, Commemorate Holocaust VictimsSeptember 2003 – Jerusalem Post

Three Israeli Air Force F-15 fighter jets thundered over the Auschwitz death camp Thursday afternoon in a display of modern Jewish might.

As the jets zoomed by at 300 knots an hour, formation leader Brig.-Gen. Amir Eshel read out the following statement, which was broadcast on the ground: "We pilots of the Air Force, flying in the skies above the camp of horrors, arose from the ashes of the millions of victims and shoulder their silent cries, salute their courage and promise to be the shield of the Jewish people and its nation Israel."

The Israeli F-15s, originally invited to Poland to celebrate the Polish Air Force's 85th birthday, were escorted during the flight by two Polish air force fighter jets…

In the cockpits, the Israeli aircrews carried the names of all those recorded murdered in Auschwitz on this date exactly 60 years ago. They had picked the names out of the records at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem prior to flying to Poland last week…

"They are passing over this most awful place on earth, a place where the allies did nothing to even show they were even trying to save us," said Prof. Shevach Weiss, Israel's ambassador to Warsaw.

Around the world• March of the Living; AISH, JRoots, LJCC…; Birthright

• Pennsylvania & Southern New Jersey Chapter of the Friends of the Israeli Defence Forces“To celebrate 65 years of Israeli independence and express our gratitude and support for the soldiers who defend the Jewish homeland, FIDF offers an exclusive delegation that will begin in Poland and end in Israel. This emotional and inspiring journey will include participating in official IDF "Witnesses in Uniform" ceremonies in Poland, marching into Auschwitz with IDF officers, flying from Poland to Israel via an Israeli Air Force (IAF) plane, taking part in IDF military exercises and a celebratory IAF show, marking Israel´s Memorial Day and 65th Independence Day in state ceremonies, meeting soldiers and commanders, hearing first-hand experiences from the frontline, exploring Israel and touring its unique and extraordinary sites, and meeting with Israel’s leaders.”

The government• 2006. Netanyahu (PM of Israel) at the Plenary session of North American general

assembly of North American federations (1000s in attendance): “It’s 1938 — and Iran is Germany. And Iran is racing to get atomic weapons.”• 2010. Rabbi Bran Rosen blogpost “Playing politics at Yad Vashem”

This is what I call cynically using the Holocaust for political purposes: Netanyahu recently used the opening of a new exhibit at Yad Vashem as an opportunity to denounce the Iranian regime,

saying: “There is a new call to destroy the Jewish state, it’s our problem, but not only our problem. This is a crime against the Jews, and a crime against humanity, and it is a test of humanity. We shall see in the following weeks whether the international community deals with this evil before it spreads.”

• 2011. JRoots (UK) funding proposal document to sponsor Jewish visits to Poland. Uses blue and white colour scheme, frequently uses “Am Yisrael Chi” These programmes usually have Israeli government funding.

Yad Vashem• Existed since 1952. Only gained significant popularity after 1967’s Six Day War where public speeches on

Holocaust Memorial Day first drew links to the current political situation.

• “…the number of visitors increased. More and more groups of soldiers came to Yad Vashem (or were brought there). These visits served the purpose of helping the soldiers to identify with the past events by give meaning to their present battle. The history of the Holocaust was used to mobilize society. In theses debates the battles against the Nazis merged with the battle for independence and the wars in 1948, 1967 and also 1973, forming one single battle for the survival of the Jewish people.”

• “In official speeches in Yad Vashem a direct connection was also made between the National Socialists and some Palestinian groups which were described as students of Streicher and Himmler. The Holocaust served the purpose at that time of forming a national identity. Before we judge the inappropriateness of this, we should consider that it also indicates how alive the memory of the Holocaust still was at this time. The memory was not something abstract and far away – it imposed itself as a precursor of a concrete threat of a new destruction. It seemed like history was repeating itself.”

-The Politics of Memory in Germany, Israel and

the United States of America by Matthias Haß

Poland/Germany and IsraelGermany

• Trade: Israel's largest trading partner, after the US. 2011: Israel is Germany's fourth largest trading partner in the Middle East region. 2011: Israel to Germany $2billion, Germany to Israel $4-5billion. ̴ ̴

• Politics: On the German Foreign Office page on Israel the first paragraph is “Germany has a special relationship with Israel owing to its responsibility for the Shoah, the systematic genocide of some six million European Jews during the National Socialist dictatorship.”

• Other: Work and volunteering exchanges reaching thousands of youth in each country; arms trading; nuclear cooperation; sister cities; scientific developments cooperation.

• But Germany abstained in the UNESCO Palestine vote in 2012.

Poland

• Trade: Israeli investments in Poland >$1.5billion. Israel-Poland trade >$500million

• Politics: Poland voted against the Goldstone Commission Report at the UN, boycotted 2009 Durban Conference, and stayed out of the UN General Assembly hall during Ahmadinejad’s 2012 address.

• 2012, Polish PM Tusk: “Poland will certainly not vote for a resolution which would directly jeopardize Israel’s security.” In Jerusalem: Israel “can always count on Poland.”

• 2008, Tusk: “There is no more reliable and loyal adherent of your stance and aspiration for a better and a fairer world order in the European Union than Poland.”

Why dead bodies? Thinking points.• Visibility and invisibility of a corpse

• This is our dead so this is our community(?)• Being Jewish – burial – Jewish ritual

• Tattoos – unable to practise – gas/cremation, mass graves – religious degradation. Problems for those remembering.

• Lack of burial – no closure – reconfigure time by regularly reburying the non-corpse. Reburial of ancestors of Israel.

• Kinship. Sephardi/Ashkenazi/West/East Europe. Move from Orthodoxy to secularism in Israel and the world.

• Shiva: 6 million x 7 days = 42 million days = 115 000 years of mourning.• Israel and Ashkenazi cultural dominance vs Sephardic and Arab Jews• Cultural memory in Israel by Israelis ↔ rejection of memory in Germany and

Poland. National identity: German Jew or Jewish German? Then and now. Standing up for fascism/standing up for Israel?• Reconfiguring space and time: reconfigure to reaffirm a right to exist as well

as a Right to Exist.

Discussion points• Is Israel’s existence due to the Holocaust?

• Why is it so important to link Israel’s existence to the Holocaust?

• Why are politicians linking Iran to Nazi Germany?

• Why do Poland and Germany forge close and publicised ties with Israel?

• Why should Israeli citizens feel personally linked to Holocaust victims?

• Why should non-Israeli Jews feel the link between the Holocaust and Israel? Why do they fly Israeli flags in the camps?

• Polysemy (spoken for/as by many but still seeming to have only one voice)

• Multivocality (words/ideas put in their voice)

• Ambiguity (the dead are open to interpretation and assignation of ideas)