Avineri: Questioning the Legitimacy of Israel is in Effect Questioning the Legitimacy of the Jewish

Shlomo Avineri, dean of the Hebrew University’s Faculty of Social Sciences, declared here that those who question the legitimacy of the State of Israel are the new anti-Semites because they were in effect also questioning the legitimacy of the Jewish people. His remarks came during a discussion on post-Holocaust anti-Jewishness at the “International Scholars Conference on the Holocaust–A Generation After.”

The four-day conference at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, in which some 40 scholars from North America, Europe and Israel participated and which was sponsored by the Institute of Contemporary Jewry of the Hebrew University and the United Jewish Appeal, drew widespread attention.

Avineri, who is presently a visiting professor at Cornell University, said he does not agree with some Jews in Israel and the diaspora who accuse non-Jews who criticize Israel as being anti-Semites and Jews who criticize Israel as suffering from “self-hatred.” But he stressed the “single most important ingredient to Jewish self-identity” in the diaspora today is identification with Israel, and that “denying the Jew his right to determine his own Jewish identity” was denying him his right to exist.

JEWS ARE POWERLESS IN THE DIASPORA

However, Richard L. Rubenstein, professor of religion at Florida State University, said the legitimacy of Israel is not based on the acceptance of Jews as such but whether the State of Israel has the military and political power to maintain its existence. He said the reason there is a great deal of talk about Israel holding on to Arab territory and nothing about the Soviet Union’s annexation of the Baltic countries is because the Soviet takeover is legitimatized by Soviet power.

Rubenstein said that as a result of the Holocaust, Jews can only strive for power by going to Israel. He said there is no possibility of Jews having power in the diaspora. He said there is no possibility of Jewish communal life because the Holocaust has shattered the 2000-year-old diaspora agreement that by submitting to the authority of the State, Jewish existence will be guaranteed.

Yehuda Bauer, head of the Institute of Contemporary Jewry, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the purpose of the conference was to bring together scholars on the Holocaust, most of whom have never met, to discuss the issues and material. He said the long-range hope is that the discussions will be translated into books and course material which will influence students for years to come and keep the memory of the Holocaust alive. The conference also marked the 30th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camps.

Bauer said the fact that the UJA was participating was of vital importance for the long-term educational process. He said the UJA was the only organization to which all Jews belonged and it is important that it is moving into the field of Jewish education.