Yom Hashoah: it’s a pain to remember

I did not intend to write about Yom Hashoah this year. Sometimes you feel you’ve said all there is to say. And in the case of the Holocaust, I am really tired of seeing the memories kicked around in the name of political ideology. I cringe when visiting heads of state are taken to Yad Vashem rather than schools for gifted children, places like Neve Shalom and innovative hi-tech companies; I am appalled when I hear that (non-Israeli) Jewish teenagers who don’t know the difference between Genesis and Judges, can’t speak Hebrew and have never heard about the 500 year history of the Jews in Spain are nonetheless able to recite names of concentration camps; and I am disgusted when I read comparisons between the Palestinian-Israeli armed conflict and the death camps. Lately, a lot of people have made me feel like yelling, “Shut up and have some respect, moron.” (Bert has a more intelligent response, here). But I was raised in Canada, so I am polite. Usually.

There’s no denying that we Jews are still grappling with a collective trauma that is visited unto the third generation - and probably beyond. Today, for example, I read about a man who walked into a Tel Aviv tattoo parlor to have his father’s concentration camp number copied onto his own forearm. And right now I’m reading Daniel Mendelsohn’s The Lost, which is reviewed here.

Last year my mother sent over “my library” - 15 boxes of books that I’d collected over the decade I lived in New York and then left behind when I went off gallivanting around the world. As I unpacked them eight years later, it was almost embarrassing to see how many of those books were novels and historical accounts about the Holocaust. Wait, didn’t I have a whole bunch of books on ancient Rome, existentialist philosophy, Baroque music and contemporary architecture? Um, apparently not so much. There I was, thinking that I was this secular, worldly, urban type, but my boxes of books told the truth: From Judtith Kerr’s When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit to Tom Segev’s The Seventh Million, I was just as obsessed and bent over under the burden of memory as the next Jew.

Yesterday afternoon on Rothschild Boulevard I saw another piece of installation art that attempts to address this issue of collective memory. (I’m hoping the artist will replace the turf at some point!).

It is called “Broken Jew: Memory as a Genetic Scar.”

The anonymous artist left the following explanation tied to the railing with a yellow ribbon - to match the yellow star, a replica of the one German and Austrian Jews were forced by the Nazis to wear. Translation below.

BROKEN JEW

(Memory as a Genetic Scar)

Plaster orthopedic mould for the rehabilitation of back problems as a reflection of a society with post-traumatic stress disorder.

The heavy weight of memory on our spine.

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10 Comments so far (Add 1 more)

I guess that we are all obsessed somehow with the Holocaust. Here’s the most obsessed person that I know:
http://kusit3g.blogli.co.il

Yohay: I’ve been reading Kusit’s blog, off and on, for at least a year. She’s an amazingly talented writer, and mostly I agree with her opinions, but - geez! - talk about not pulling any punches. Sometimes I wish she’d be a little, um, softer. One day I really want to translate one of her posts. Lisa

1. Yohay
on May 1st, 2008 at 3:58 pm
On Holocaust Day

How do we measure
memories,
laid end to end,
across creation’s timelessness?
One by one
into the face of enternity.

2. jfrancishill
on May 2nd, 2008 at 3:46 am
You’re appalled? I’M appalled. “Cringe when visiting heads of state are taken to Yad Vashem rather than schools for gifted children”? Wow, have you totally missed the point?

There are schools for gifted children and hi-tech companies in every Western country. What makes this country unique is the memory of the Holocaust.

We still have many Holocaust survivors here. It is very likely that the existence of this country is ‘owed’ to the Holocaust. And we still see genocide around the world, in 2008.

I work in a company in Tel-Aviv with many foreigners, including many who are not Jewish. But when the siren sounded at 10am yesterday, everyone stood up and paid their respects.

Like it or not, the Holocaust’s effects are still being felt.

So I couldn’t disagree more. This day, and this remembrance, are VERY important, both in this country and in the world.

Elad: I do not understand what you “couldn’t disagree more” with. Based on your comment, I can only assume that you either did not read past the first paragraph of this post; or that you did not understand what I wrote. I certainly did not write or imply that I thought Yom HaShoah was unimportant. Lisa

3. Elad
on May 2nd, 2008 at 12:21 pm
What Elad (and many other people) don’t understand (or don’t want to understand) is the point that the Holocaust is being used to justify every appalling act that Israel does, and to dismiss the unsavory circumstances of its existence. This does not mean that we should forget the Holocaust. This does not mean that Jews are not traumatized by the Holocaust. But the victimhood that Jews (both Israeli and diaspora) have accepted under the cover of the Holocaust leads them to convince themselves that they can do no wrong, that every activity in the territories is merely to prevent another Holocaust, and that any criticism of Israel is either anti-Semitism or the rantings of a self-hating Jew (although I admit that many anti-Semites and self-hating Jews themselves hide under the cover of pro-Palestinianism).

At least, I’m assuming that that’s your point: not that the Holocaust or Yom Hashoah should be abolished, but rather how sickened you are by how they are exploited for ideological purposes: to the point that the Holocaust has become one of the most important defining characteristics of Jewish and Israeli identity, to the exclusion of more positive characteristics (viz. the Jewish non-Israeli teenagers in your example).

Which seems to be related to Kusit’s points. Is a day really enough to remember the Holocaust? Shouldn’t we be remembering it every day of the year? And what good is Yom Hashoah if we’re not learning the right lessons from it, anyway?

4. Tamouz
on May 2nd, 2008 at 7:10 pm
I can understand why you would have so many books. It’s a process. As a kid, we are all blissfully unaware, then we become aware in the abstract, then we become aware that these are OUR people and family and that this is personal. Then comes the obsession stage when we all suck in every detail we can, read every book, memorize every picture and try to imagine ourselves in that world. I think most people have that collection.

On the other side, I get you. The memories are critical. It is important never to forget, and to learn from history and to, honor the dead both by memorializing them and living better in their names.
On the other hand, an entire industry and fetish have also arisen. The Jewish nation is so much MORE than the holocaust. The Shoah is part of our history, but not all of our history, and it should guide us, not define us. And some people are allowing their obsession to define them and that is not good.

5. lisoosh
on May 2nd, 2008 at 8:45 pm
I agree with you that the ‘remembrance’ every bloody single instance when someone just dare to try to look at other things has become a carnaval. Specially since many of the Holocaust survivors themselves are living under the poverty line here in Israel (and ONLY in Israel).

However when that siren sounded I could not help myself and cried. We HAVE TO stick to where this IS all about: those very many people that were slaughtered just for who they were and nothing, NOTHING else.

(It’s me, Tsedek I have closed my blog and started on a different path, LOL)

6. beachdiary
on May 3rd, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Once again, Lisoosh: what she said.

I remember learning that Israel is relatively new to holocaust education (relative to the diaspora). That part of reinventing Jewish meant eschewing scenarios of victimhood.

And it’s true: I know more names of concentration camps than I do of great Jewish thinkers and activists. More of tragedy and fear than of pride. This is a fundamental question - one about how we balance our children’s education and our own identity.

7. adina
on May 4th, 2008 at 5:14 am
Segev’s book is excellent.

8. niqnaq
on May 4th, 2008 at 8:42 am
Don’t forget the ולגבורה part.
Remebering also the uprising makes this day a very impressive and uplifting event.
As someone who grew up in Germany, I was raised with the feeling of being the victim. In Israel this is not the case.

9. Manuel
on May 4th, 2008 at 11:55 am
“What makes this country unique is the memory of the Holocaust.”

Is that all? Didn’t the founding pioneers seek to create a national identity built on the positive force of Jewish civilization rather than the “Jew as victim”?

Herzl would spin in his grave at such a thought.

10. Peter S
on May 5th, 2008 at 4:43 pm