Historisk tidskrift 125:4 • 2005
Innehåll (Contents) 2005:4
Uppsatser (Articles)
Politiskt bruk av Förintelsen i karikatyrer i israelisk dagspress
på minnesdagen för Förintelsen 1959–1993
Mikael Tossavainen
Fulltext (pdf)
Summary
Political Use of the Holocaust in Caricatures in Israeli
Press on Holocaust Memorial Day 1959–1993
The Holocaust has had, and continues to have, a considerable
influence on Israeli society and it casts its shadow over practically
every aspect of societal life in the Jewish state. Even though
the influence is strong, it is not uniform and it has changed
over time. One of the fields in which this can be discerned is
in the Israeli political discourse. The Holocaust has from time
to time been used as a tool in political arguments by both the
Left and the Right, justifying various policies with different,
and frequently clashing, lessons drawn from the Nazi genocide
of European Jewry.
Even though the use of the Holocaust is multifaceted
and shifting, one can see a general development of roughly three
stages. These three stages of the political use and shifting
interpretations of the Holocaust in the Israeli press are connected
to the political developments in the state of Israel and in the
Middle East and have nothing to do with the Holocaust per se.
The first stage, characterised by statism and a strong propensity
to look forward and to stress the difference in the status of
the Jewish people after the establishment of the state of Israel,
lasted from the inception of the state in 1948 until the Six
Day War in 1967. The second stage, lasting from 1967 until 1982,
was dominated by a growing sense of threat. During this period,
the previous strong distinction between then and there versus
here and now, was weakened and warnings of a renewed Holocaust
became more common. The last stage, from the invasion of Lebanon
in 1982 until the start of the peace process with the Palestinians
in 1993, is characterised by deeper divisions and a loss of consensus
regarding the interpretation of the Holocaust.
Analysing the
caricatures in the Israeli press on Holocaust Memorial Day, one
is struck by how clearly they reflect these three stages of the
development of the use of the Holocaust in Israeli political
discourse.
|
|