Holocaust Consciousness Critics Chronicled, Countered

American Jewish Committee
Sunday, 9 December 2001

The greatest threat to the historical memory of the Holocaust comes not from Holocaust deniers, but from a relatively new group of commentators who are criticizing "Holocaust consciousness."

"These are writers who question not the facts but the prominence of the Holocaust in public consciousness and the motives of those who seek to perpetuate its memory," writes Alvin H. Rosenfeld in a feature article, "The Assault on Holocaust Memory," published in the just-released American Jewish Year Book 2001. The American Jewish Committee has just published the 101st edition of the Year Book.

"Holocaust memory at the outset of the 21st century finds itself under mounting attack," writes Professor Rosenfeld, who interprets the attacks as a symptom of a dangerous, yet increasingly common, attitude of disparagement and derision that questions the value of any efforts to remember the catastrophe.

The critics examined in the American Jewish Year Book article blame the prominence of Holocaust memory for the weakening of Jewish identity and religious knowledge, as well as the perceived failures to assist other groups. They argue that letting go of the emphasis on Holocaust memory would, in their view, enhance the vitality of Judaism and Jewish commitment to social justice.

Professor Rosenfeld challenges these critics by concluding that the consequences of forgetting "will be neither the return of the Jewish people to traditional religious practice nor to a higher ethical calling, but their return to the kind of vulnerability that preceded Auschwitz and helped bring it about."

Professor Rosenfeld, director of the Robert A. and Sandra S. Borns Jewish Studies Program at Indiana University, cogently maps the landscape of Holocaust memory criticism:

-- In both Israel and Germany, people face the dilemma of reconciling a duty to remember with a longing to forget. The debate in Germany was thrust into the public sphere in 1998, with the debate between author Michael Walser, who opposed the construction of a central Holocaust memorial in Berlin, and Ignatz Bubis, the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, who accused Walser of "spiritual arson." Israeli writers like Yehuda Elkana and Amos Elon argue that because Israelis remember too much and hold an exaggerated self-image as victims, they can't see Palestinians realistically and so are prevented from finding a reasonable political solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Rosenfeld maintains that both German and Israeli cultures have a "strong yearning for normalization" regarding the Holocaust and its legacy.

-- In the United States, widespread awareness of the Holocaust dawned with such seminal events as Israel's abduction and trial of Adolf Eichmann in 1961 and the Six-Day and Yom Kippur Wars of 1967 and 1973. At that time, there was an outpouring of writing about the Holocaust, in an effort by Jews to educate themselves and the public at large about the Nazi crimes. "That success," Rosenfeld writes, "made it inevitable that Holocaust consciousness would become subjected to the compromises and abuses that come along with the popularization, commercialization, and politicization of history."

Criticism of Holocaust memory, which started in the late 1970s, was constructive and specific. Writers such as Rabbi Arnold Jacob Wolf, Robert Alter and Jacob Neusner argued that an overemphasis on the Holocaust drew attention and resources away from other areas, especially Jewish religious life and the study of non-Holocaust Jewish history.

Beginning in the late 1980s, though, not only has criticism become extremely pointed, but critics have also begun attacking Holocaust consciousness to promote their own political and cultural positions.

-- In his 1995 book Why Should Jews Survive? Michael Goldberg argued that exaggerated Holocaust consciousness distorts Jews' self-definition and very existence. Goldberg, a rabbi, decried the erosion of Jewish faith. Professor Rosenfeld sees the causes of these ailments elsewhere. "It was not attendance at public gatherings commemorating the Holocaust that distanced American Jews from traditions of Jewish piety and learning," writes Professor Rosenfeld, "but rather the transforming influences of Americanization and secularization."

-- Secularists like Peter Novick and Philip Lopate argued that Holocaust consciousness erodes American Jews' social consciousness, thus making them insensitive to the suffering of others. The very use of the term "Holocaust" solely to describe Nazi atrocities against Jews, they maintain, diminishes — if not demeans — the mass slaughter of other people.

-- Two scholars of Native American history, David Stannard and Ward Churchill, state the case even more virulently, arguing that presenting the European Holocaust as unique denies the occurrence of other genocides committed against indigenous peoples of the Americas and throughout the world. Rosenfeld points out that Stannard, especially, is extremely polemical, "introducing a rhetoric of aggression that, until now, has rarely been seen outside of anti-Semitic literature."

"While it is true that the history of Native American peoples has been neglected over the years," Rosenfeld replies, "the fault lies not with scholars of the European Holocaust but with generations of American historians and political leaders who, for their own reasons, have not focused on some shameful chapters of their own country's past.

"The omission," he continues, "long predates the Holocaust."

-- Nevertheless, several writers, including New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, sociologist Zygmunt Bauman and Jewish theologian Marc Ellis, criticized Holocaust consciousness on political grounds, arguing that many governments use the Holocaust as a smokescreen behind which to pursue oppressive policies. In their views, the worst offender is Israel, which is employing the Holocaust to justify brutally subjugating the Palestinians.

-- Peter Novick describes Holocaust consciousness as a construct, chosen for its appeal to consumers, designed to prop up weakening American Jewish identity. For Novick, the parties responsible are American Jewish organizations and institutions, aided by Jews in the entertainment and news industries. This "selling" of the Holocaust has the additional benefit of garnering widespread political and economic support among American Jews for what is perceived to be a perpetually threatened Israel.

-- In 2000, Norman Finkelstein posited an even stronger version of this argument. In the most full-blown and vituperative attack to date, Finkelstein argues that Holocaust consciousness is perpetuated by a self-benefiting "Holocaust industry" made up of pseudo-scholars, Zionist ideologues, Israeli aggressors, phony survivors and so on; in short, a corrupt group that has ruthlessly exploited the Holocaust for individual economic and political gain, as well as to secure immunity for Israelis and their American supporters who oppress Palestinians. While Finkelstein's work has been discounted in the U.S., he has found an audience in Europe, especially among Holocaust deniers and in right-wing circles.

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