Richard Landes on Europe’s destructive Holocaust shame
Richard Landes has a piece in Tablet entitled “Europe’s Destructive Holocaust Shame: How the narrative of Israel as the new Nazis and Palestinians as the new Jews helps Western Europe avoid its culpability in World War II.” Here’s an excerpt:
And yet, in 2000, when the Western public sphere””now a global public sphere, itself an astounding creation””was split in two (right vs. left) by a civilizational crisis, both the public and the scholars whether they despised or admired Western history, showed astonishing incomprehension about the role of Jews””and Israel””in the creation and maintenance of a global civil society. If anything, the post-grand-narrativists, for whom the Western narrative is an ugly succession of oppression and injustice, see the national (autonomous) Jews (Israel) as the last remnant of the Western racist, imperial/colonial past. Israel ist unser Unglé¼ck (Israel is our misfortune). So instead of appreciating what these sovereign Jews were trying to handle (Jihad against infidels), they sought liberation from shame in embracing Palestinian terrorists, whom they welcomed as fellow victims of the vile, unbearably provocative behavior of the Jews.
For those unfamiliar with the work of Landes (who, by the way, is a friend of mine; I met him through blogging), I suggest they take a look at his blog Augean Stables and also his invaluable work in exposing the al Durah propaganda (website here). Landes is the person who coined the phrase “Pallywood,” and just about anything he writes is packed with thought and well worth reading.
Landes writes that European championing of the Palestinian cause and its equation of the Jews with the Nazis is actually a “get-out-of-Holocaust-shame-free card” for Europe. He recognized that fact long ago, and he was not alone.
The following quote on a related topic is from a post I wrote in 2006:
If the Israelis/Jews…are as bad as the Nazis and their European collaborators, this serves a double function: first, it norms Europe’s behavior during WWII (“see, there’s nothing special about the guilt of Europeans, move along now”); and second, it can even be seen as justifying the Holocaust, as well (“Jews are evil, so it was okay for us to cooperate in attempting to destroy them”).
Anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism not only both have a long history in Europe (the first phenomenon is an ancient one; the second has existed for centuries), but they both have a more recent function, and that it is to deflect and sooth European guilt.
The Landes article goes into this in much greater detail, and focuses on the function of sympathizing with the Palestinians, as well as the differences between guilt and shame and how both enter into the picture.
I would add that this desire to avoid the bad feelings inherent in either guilt or shame or both has long been part of human nature. the Roman historian Tacitus hinted at that when he wrote: ““It belongs to human nature to hate those you have injured.”
Unlike Richard Landes, I’m not a historian. So although I learned that quote long long ago, and was deeply impressed by it (I’ve seen it’s workings over and over again, and not just in politics, either), I’m unable to describe the context for the quote except that I’ve read that it comes from a book Tacitus wrote entitled Agricola, a biography written by Tacitus and dealing with “the life of his father-in-law Gnaeus Julius Agricola, an eminent Roman general and Governor of Britain from AD 77/78 – 83/84.” But my interpretation of the quote is that the motivation for that commonplace hatred of people we have wronged is a rage at the feeling of guilt and/or shame they engender in us, and a desire to escape from those feelings by blaming the victim. It’s the easy way out compared to soul-searching and redress of wrongs, and offers respite from a nearly intolerable burden. It’s no surprise that people jump at the chance.
[NOTE: In the case of Europe today, leftism has a big place in this process, as Landes also notes when he writes: “in 2000…the Western public sphere””now a global public sphere, itself an astounding creation””was split in two (right vs. left) by a civilizational crisis…”. That split has long existed, of course, but it widened considerably during the 21st Century. By the way, Landes’ professional field of expertise as a historian is Millennial Studies.]
One of the reasons Germany is so into Obama is because I think it allows them to show their superiority to the racist Americans. It drives me nuts.
Hating those they’ve wronged makes redemption impossible. And, it makes their ultimate fate deserved.
“We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.” Golda Meir
Landes uses the term “supersessionism” when talking about Israelis being considered the new Nazis and Palestinians the new Jews. I mostly think of it in relation to the claims of Christianity that Christians superseded the Jews in becoming God’s chosen ones.
And here I thought “Europe’s Destructive Holocaust Shame” would be about how Europe’s left-wing Jews have used the Holocaust to guilt trip Europeans into going along with the the immigration policies that are undermining them.
Turns out it really means the Europeans don’t feel guilty enough. Who knew?
I once read a statement somewhere the ‘Germany would never forgive the Jews for the holocaust’.
That about sums it up.
I once read a statement somewhere the ‘Germany would never forgive the Jews for the holocaust’.
That about sums it up.
That’s all nice and ironic but have the Jews forgiven the Germans for the Holocaust? Will they ever? Because the vast majority of Germans today weren’t even alive when it happened and they’re still required to feel guilty about it.
interesting timing..
look what happened today…
1972: During the Olympic Games in Munich, Germany, Palestinian terrorists storm the apartment housing Israeli athletes, killing two and taking nine hostage. The terrorists demand the release of over 200 Israeli-held Palestinian prisoners, but the Israelis refuse to negotiate. Five terrorists – and all hostages – are killed when German police attempt to ambush the kidnappers
Song For the Deaf, your point doubly applies to the civil war and the rhetoric now as most blacks do not have a lineage to slavery, and most whites have zero connection to the civil war with huge numbers of them coming in the diasporas AFTER the war brought about by the industrial revolution…
Song:
I am not aware that Germans born after 1945 are required to feel guilty about the Holocaust by any force other than post-1945 German law. Blame the Germans. And why should Israelis be forgiving modern Germany when there is clear evidence of rising anti-Semitism in Germany and the rest of Western Europe?
Neo:
You write “the motivation for that commonplace hatred of people we have wronged is a rage at the feeling of guilt and/or shame they engender in us, and a desire to escape from those feelings by blaming the victim.”
I am not at all sure that is correct unless you invoke the unconscious. A rage of guilt and/or shame should surely be perceptible to those who hate their victims, but I have never seen it divulged. I was quite angry about “having” to divorce my first wife, but felt no guilt/shame whatsoever until, about a year later, I slowly realized I too had been a SOB and thus a major contributor to the marriage’s failure.
Frog,
Their own culture requires them to feel guilty, and European Jews have a played a huge role in shaping that culture. Just like they played a huge role in shaping pre-WWII culture.
And why should Israelis be forgiving modern Germany when there is clear evidence of rising anti-Semitism in Germany and the rest of Western Europe?
Why does this statement of yours elide the fact that the vast majority of anti-semitism in Europe these days comes from the Muslim immigrants that Jews played such a huge role in pushing on the Europeans? Why would Israel hold it against Europe that most of the anti-Semites there are Muslim? Does it even matter to Jews that the anti-Semite there aren’t European?
Artfldgr:
See this.
The video is no longer available at YouTube, however (at least, not with the audio).
One of the things that was so terrible about the Munich terrorist attack was the incredible ineptitude of the Germans in their attempts to deal with the situation, as well as the almost immediate return of the captured terrorists:
And see this.
Song For the Deaf:
As far as I’m concerned not a single German alive today need feel guilty about the Holocaust unless that person was a participant in it, or is currently an apologist for it.
The problem is that, in their eagerness to avoid a repetition, German authorities and educators have made younger Germans feel guilty, too, which causes resentment. One of the ways the older Germans who in fact were Nazis or Nazi supporters (and not all Germans were, by any means) can get any burden of guilt (or shame) off their backs is to champion Palestinians and say the Jews in Israel are the new Nazis. Younger Germans who have been made to feel guilty or to feel shame over the Holocaust even if they had nothing to do with it can attempt to get the guilt or shame off their backs in the same way.
Song For the Deaf:
And of course, according to you, it’s all the Jews’ fault that Europe is letting in so many Muslims.
By the way, there is a ton of non-Muslim anti-Semitism in Europe today. You are either ignorant of the fact or purposely lying about it.
Song:
So it’s the the liberal European Jews who are encouraging the flood of MENA Muslims into Europe? I would have never suspected such perfidy. Were they also working to set up the No Go areas in France, Belgium, and The Netherlands? Not too many European Jews survived the Holocaust in those countries so the must be pretty powerful, i.e., those who survived or their descendants. And of course there are those Nordic countries, Sweden for example, who seem to be having problems with Muslims, sans European Liberal Jews. Must be a power exerted over a distance without an actual presence, how awesome. No it’s just liberal Europeans.
Frog:
In response to your comment at 9:37 PM—
Yes, I do invoke the unconscious in some instances. In others, the hatred is a preventative measure—to block any feelings of shame or guilt that might arise.
Why yes, om, as a matter of fact they are encouraging it. It’s called, “A multi-cultural Europe is less of a threat to us Jews, so we’re going to push it on the Europeans even if it’s bad for them.” Of course, they never stopped to consider that Muslims hate them even more than they hate Europeans. They openly talk about it.
And just to show how ignorant you are: Sweden, for example, “sans European liberal Jews”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85BKDj_1vVU
Barbara Spectre’s Paideia organization is one of the prime movers in Sweden pushing for immigration.
neo,
By the way, there is a ton of non-Muslim anti-Semitism in Europe today. You are either ignorant of the fact or purposely lying about it.
I’m not ignorant of the fact. But I am aware that most of the European anti-semitism comes from the Left, not conservatives, and the lion’s share of anti-semitic violence -according to the Jewish victims themselves- is perpetrated by Muslims, not Europeans.
Song For the Deaf:
I agree that the majority of the non-Muslim anti-Semitism (and anti-Israeli sentiment, for that matter) in Europe is the province of the left. It has been for decades.
Just as in the Iranian Revolution, the left is allied with the Islamicists. The left in Iran thought they could use and control the mullahs. They were sadly mistaken.
neo,
One of the ways the older Germans who in fact were Nazis or Nazi supporters (and not all Germans were, by any means) can get any burden of guilt (or shame) off their backs is to champion Palestinians and say the Jews in Israel are the new Nazis.
Post-war Europe has adopted the Left’s fixation on victims and oppression and that fixation is largely a Jewish creation. It’s silly and ignorant to claim that Jews had no cultural power in post-1945 Europe. The Holocaust is a bottomless mine of guilt-based cultural authority for the group that suffered it.
Unfortunately for the Israelis, Europeans have taken that fixation and applied it to their enemies. The logic is: “You never learned the lesson of the shtetls! You’re oppressing the Palestinians the same way we oppressed you!” Left-wingers say this all the time. Charges of hypocrisy are inevitable.
Song For the Deaf:
You are making some incorrect and blanket statements about “the Jews” of Europe. I’ll assume, for the moment, that you aren’t doing this through anti-Semitism, but through ignorance.
Of course there are individual “Jews” (that is, completely secular Jews, for the most part) who are on the left. As with most leftists, they are in favor of Muslim migration. That makes them no different from other leftists. Other than that, it is very difficult to get any facts or figures on Jewish support or non-support for Muslim immigration in Europe compared to the support of non-Jews. I have not been able to find even a single poll that breaks it down by religion. I did find this article claiming that quite a few French Jews supported Le Pen, particularly the relatively large group of Jews who emigrated to France from the Arab world. Not only that, but most of the Jews of France who are religious are Orthodox, and the Orthodox tend to be far more to the right than Reform Jews are. Lastly, a lot of Jews are emigrating from France because of the rise of anti-Semitism. I very much doubt they support the entry of Muslims to France.
In short, you are making assertions without proof, and those assertions are a favorite trope of anti-Semites on the right.
By the way, I am sick and tired of people such as, for example, George Soros standing in for the generic “the Jews.” What George Soros does is not what “the Jews” do. He is one person, born nominally Jewish but not religious at all and raised as an anti-Semite, by his own admission:
Soros is not “the Jews.” Leftists in Europe are not “the Jews.” And “the Jews” are not responsible for what leftists in Europe do.
Song;
“The Holocaust is a bottomless mine of guilt-based cultural authority for the group that suffered it.”
Astounding. Fantastic. (look up the word, genius). Loathsome.
om:
By the way, there are anti-Semites who believe the Holocaust didn’t kill that many Jews, and the ones who were killed were killed at the behest of the Jewish community.
I kid you not. Here’s how it goes:
Most foul and pernicious. But anti-Semitism is full of that sort of thing.
Our little guest, “Song For the Deaf,” is an anti-Semite on the right. But he’s not nearly as creative as most anti-Semites.
Loathsome, indeed.
om,
You gotta have more than ad homs if you expect me to care.
neo,
In short, you are making assertions without proof, and those assertions are a favorite trope of anti-Semites on the right.
You haven’t asked me for proof.
You’re making the same argument that people like Abe Foxman and the ADL like to make: “Hollywood isn’t run by Jews, it’s run by people who happen to be Jewish.”
Well, that doesn’t really work if those people share the same cultural background, the same historical narratives, the same tribal concerns, etc. I never posited any sort of cabal on European Jews’ part, nor do I need to. The only thing needed is for me to point out that the policies Jewish organizations and individuals (80% of whom happen to be left-wing) push for are aimed at defending Jewish interests at the expense of gentiles’. No conspiracy was stated or implied.
neo,
Our little guest, “Song For the Deaf,” is an anti-Semite on the right. But he’s not nearly as creative as most anti-Semites.
I stick to the facts and most of my sources are Jewish. Unlike Muslims.
I don’t see why you guys are so het up about this. There’s nothing wrong with pointing out Jewish power, Jewish hostility to whites or the fact that Jews perceive their interests as conflicting with white people’s is there?
Who’s up for some sources?
Song For the Deaf:
Among other things, you have yet to give a link for anything you say. Your defense is that I haven’t asked you for proof? How stupid do you think people are? As though no one gives sources unless they are invited to?
And your feigned innocence isn’t fooling a single person here. Or probably anywhere else.
Ah, a troll hijacks a thread!
Impossible or pointless to comment on original post.
“the Muslim immigrants that Jews played such a huge role in pushing on the Europeans?”
What is your evidence for this? And if Jews have such great influence over European politics why haven’t they been able to get European governments and the EU to be more pro-Israel?
♥ neo-neocon‼
Shame an ignorant troll is trying to spoil these comments.
What everyone used to know about “the Jews” was ‘their’ intention to “forgive, but never forget”. Israel has held fast to that.
My old avatar that’s popped up was the Iranian air force.
Ignore the comment on the avatar, please. Apologies.
neo-neocon Says:
September 6th, 2017 at 10:13 pm
Song For the Deaf:
As far as I’m concerned not a single German alive today need feel guilty about the Holocaust unless that person was a participant in it, or is currently an apologist for it.
***
Can we extend that to the negative aspects of American history and the Crusades (actual or alleged) — with the additional proviso that any complainant has to accurately define the “it” that triggered the complaint.
Well, part of the problem is that Barbara Spectre has done no one any favors. I’ve addressed this before by watching her entire interview at length, and noting a somewhat different thrust to her remarks than were apparent in some widely promoted videos.
Nonetheless, what she says is problematical since in viewing the bare propositions , even with some context, she claims in effect, to be acting not as a leftist who happens to have a Jewish background, but as someone who is consciously and programmatically working as a Jew toward implementing what she apparently views as an intrinsically left-communitarian social order implicit in Judaism. I don’t know how you get to be an official Jew and spokesman for their destiny, but apparently she sees herself as having achieved it.
Thus, she implies she is acting on behalf of the Jew and in furtherance of some world-historical role and authority she believes they possess; and she seems to be glorying in what she sees as a historically confirmed moral privilege to shape the lives of others granted her by her understanding of the “role” of ‘Jews’ on the earth.
This role of course cannot be so much the instruction found in the Torah as Christians might understand the Torah; as it is a 19th century secularized Talmudism: a kind of Jewish socialist version of manifest destiny. It cracks me up: it is a type of socialist cultural imperialism seen as authorized by God, and promoted by persons who don’t anymore believe in their God who chose them … but still figure that the conclusion somehow follows from the discarded premiss.
I backed out a possessive form ” ‘s” on editing and did not reinsert it before submitting.
Read as,
“Thus, she implies she is acting on behalf of the Jews …”
An temporary edit function would be helpful for those times you see a misfired edit sail off as you press the button.
“An temporary” , as if to prove the case …
thanks neo…
[i thought it was important to remember, now if the jews would only help remember others too… but hey, half rememberance is better than leftist liberal stalinist erasure]
John Jay Ray on BOOT
[boot wrote horrid piece… funny, but the quickets retort to that piece would be “you complain? this is your bed, we have to lie in it, stop making more of a mess pretending otherwise”]
if its covered otherwise or i missed it, just move this to the right thread… sorry
FOAF:
He has no evidence for it.
It’s an old lie pushed mostly by the white supremacist wing of the right.
It’s interesting to me that anyone who is of Jewish ancestry is a Jew, whether they practice the religion or not, but the same standard is not applied to Christianity or any other religion to the same extent.
Jews are certainly not a race. Judaism is a religion just like any other religion, but a bit older than most. At one time one might have said that they were an ethnic group, but even there, since the diaspora, the variations have become so great that it hardly holds water. Even Jews who have converted to Christianity often call themselves Messianic or Christian Jews.
There are at least 3 major and several minor branches of Judaism just in the U.S. and the differences between them are so vast that it’s hard to call them the same name. One major branch of Judaism in the U.S., Reform Jews, are not even considered Jewish for many purposes in Israel.
So when I’m told that Jews in America, or anywhere else, do one thing or another, or feel one way or another, I take it with a grain of salt. Usually it’s people picking and choosing from that group of “Jews” that makes their point.
We would be a lot better off if we quit putting labels on people and started judging them solely by their actions. I’m pretty sure that if the government quit dividing people up by races and ethnic groups there would be a lot less racial and ethnic strife. After all, the number of people of pure racial or ethnic lines is so small that they hardly qualify as a group.
I have not answered questions about race or ethnicity on government forms, including census forms, for many years and I know a lot of others who do the same. Now that’s a movement I could get behind.
(Sorry I wandered a bit on this but I was a teacher well known to my students for birdwalking.)
Irv — no, Jews are not just a religion. That is why, as you said, “anyone who is of Jewish ancestry is a Jew, whether they practice the religion or not, but the same is not applied to Christianity or to any other religion to the same extent. ‘
Judaism is a religion, Jews are a people. This is not that unusual — anyone born or naturalized in the U.S. is a U.S. citizen, whether they believe in the principles of the Constitution or not.
However, you are quite right that Jews believe all sorts of things, and that one cannot say “the Jews” do any particular thing.
Richard – I’m not sure what you mean by a ‘people’. What does that term entail? What other groups do you apply it to? How does a group go about becoming a people and when do they no longer qualify for that label? I know about religions, ethnicities, countries, groupings by physical characteristics and such but I’m not sure what qualifies a group as a ‘people’. It appears to me that it is an arbitrary term with an indefinite meaning, easily abused.
As to Jews being a distinct ethnic group, from Wikipedia:
A study published by the National Academy of Sciences stated that “The results support the hypothesis that the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population, and suggest that most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora.”[12] Researchers expressed surprise at the remarkable genetic uniformity they found among modern Jews, no matter where the diaspora has become dispersed around the world.[12]
Moreover, DNA tests have demonstrated substantially less inter-marriage in most of the various Jewish ethnic divisions over the last 3,000 years than in other populations.
Something Song for the Deaf said intrigued me.
The only thing needed is for me to point out that the policies Jewish organizations and individuals (80% of whom happen to be left-wing) push for are aimed at defending Jewish interests at the expense of gentiles’.
Usually that would be phrased “at the expense of America.”
Later you relate it to interests of whites.
But assuming you meant gentiles, what is so strange about that? Isn’t that universal among ethnic groups? My ancestry is English, and I have a natural affinity to England.
I can both be interested in the well being of America and England.
White supremacists make that seem so conspiratorial.
“part of the problem is that Barbara Spectre has done no one any favors”
Who?
BrianE:
Just what exactly are “Jewish interests.” And how do they differ from political, social, or economic interests? Are there “Catholic,” “Pentacostal,” “Eastern Orthodox,” “Greek Orthodox,” “LDS,” “Buddist,” “Hindu,” interests? “Wiccan” interests? Just curious how one group seems to be of interest to singers of songs and other Sierenes.
OM,
I was quoting Song for the Deaf.
“The only thing needed is for me to point out that the policies Jewish organizations and individuals (80% of whom happen to be left-wing) push for are aimed at defending Jewish interests at the expense of gentiles’.” – Song for the Deaf
A Jew is a member of an ethnic group, in addition to being a religion.
Follow the link to YouTube video provided by Song of …
There you will see excerpts of her speaking, taken from a longer interview originally included as part of a documentary on the migrant crisis in Europe.
I cannot recall at the moment where the full documentary was originally featured or broadcast.
Many of her remarks when excerpted and taken as categorical statements, seem to project an incredibly self-satisfied, tone deaf, and patronizing attitude which is even conceivably hostile to Europeans and to European culture and values.
I don’t think that the original documentary conveyed exactly that impression.
However, the link which “Song of …” has provided has supplemented the more negative impression provided by the excerpts with additional screen shots from what looks to be her twitter site.
I have not confirmed that these are real. If they are, it does not bode well for the brighter take.
Of course even liberal web news organizations or feature providers have added fuel for the fire. Vice (or was it an individual?) famously, or notoriously, featured an American interviewer who was Jewish himself investigating a belief supposedly held by some Jews, that Gentiles exist or are destined to “serve the Jews”.
He was stupefied and shocked by the response he got from some fringe types in Israel; which amounted to, “Yes, the statement is in the “Oral Torah” but is misunderstood, because it means something good, not bad.”
The “Oral Torah”, a term I was unfamiliar with, despite studying Jewish intellectual history in a class taught by a famous rabbi, is apparently some part of the Talmud, and not what most of us would recognize as the putative “word of God” found in the Pentateuch/Torah.
Finding the original will be tedious as it has been all but buried under videos made by Neo-pagan and Nazi race conflict peddlers who stole excerpts from it and the breathlessly flogged them as click bait
This may be the original by Corey Gil-Shuster. Probably nothing originating on “Vice”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ji_Y7YEbKY
It has been mined by all kinds of fanatics for the obvious reasons.
Gil-Shuster’s YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCc4iogeOUXNw1RZSNTOlMeg
BrianE
So is a ethnic Jew (by virtue of DNA) who is an atheist still a member of the Jewish religion?
om,
I think you’re asking the wrong question.
Does God still have a plan for his chosen people? The Old Testament is a history of rebellion, repentance and redemption. That part hasn’t changed.
As a Christian, I understand that the Messiah foretold in the Old Testament was revealed in the person of Jesus. Many Jews rejected him and continue to reject him today.
At some point in the future that will change. In the meantime God’s plan includes gentiles.
BrianE
We agree that the Jews are His Chosen People. God is faithfull, unchanging, and keeps his covenants.
Anti-semitic screeds from the left or right are loathesome, not “interesting” to me.
DNW, still I ask “who”. I never heard of her. Is she even as significant as say, David Duke, whose minimal significance is greatly exaggerated by the left for political purposes?
Neither had I as far as I recall … though her name probably came up in a tangential context when I was researching the Swedish Parliament’s decision [made decades ago] to transform Sweden into an officially poly-ethnic and pluricultural state.
I am pretty sure it was part of a discussion here. Perhaps 18 months or so ago.
She lives in Europe and her Paideia institute is located in Stockholm, so I cannot say what her significance is generally apart from her – what appear to be officially recognized – activities touching on the government there.
I would guess however, that her influence is considerably more significant than Duke’s in the polities in which she dwells, and that her views and aims have considerably more programmatic governmental sanction.
However, as I initially stated, her remarks when taken in their fullness, seemed not to justify the hysterical reactions of the torchlight parade crowds as they viewed excerpts.
Apparently this furor has been going on for some years now in areas we, or I at least, do not frequent.
Here are some links. Form your own opinion.
I cannot tell at this point if she has an active twitter account or not … there’s so much noise surrounding her name that a search becomes a real trial of patience.
https://twitter.com/paideiausa
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Lerner_Spectre
Neo
As far as I’m concerned not a single German alive today need feel guilty about the Holocaust unless that person was a participant in it, or is currently an apologist for it.
Its not only Germain who done the horrible things, but most of Europe were treated Jews in very inhuman way for decade.
The fact is Israelis, even they have case to secure and protect themselves lariles
Shimon Peres, in Memoir, Takes On Israel Past and Future
Breaking: Israeli Security Cabinet Secret Transcripts Part II, The Accidental Occupation