Mizrahi haredism and Holocaust commemoration in Israel – a dynamic of critical national partnership

ABSTRACT

This article deals with the haredi position regarding the national memory of the Holocaust in Israel. The attitude of Mizrahi haredism to the Holocaust reflects a position of critical partnership in relation to Israel’s national symbols and, in fact, in relation to Zionist Israeli nationalism. On the one hand, it adopts the haredi world view with regard to national symbols in order to negotiate its place within Israeli nationalism. On the other, it employs the consensual messages embedded in national symbols to express a critical view in its negotiation for the place of Mizrahi haredism within Israeli society in general, and haredi society in particular.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Nissim Leon is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Bar-Ilan University. He is the author of Harediyut rakah (Soft ultra-Orthodoxy): Religious Renewal in Oriental Jewry in Israel (Jerusalem, 2010) and a number of articles on related topics.

Notes

1. Yazdim Synagogue, August 5, 2000.

2. Adam Baruch (2000). Maariv, Sabbath supplement, August 11. “I was comparing the martyrs of the Holocaust to the Ten Martyrs; I am deeply sorry if this was misunderstood.” The Ten Martyrs were saintly and learned Jewish sages who, according to midrashic sources, were executed at the command of the Roman Emperor to expiate the guilt of the ten sons of Jacob who sold their brother, Joseph, into slavery.

3. For instance, we might consider the case of the Rebbe of Sanz-Klausenburg, whose position is described by Brown (2014).

4. For more on the haredi political media see Fund (2010, 54–160).

5. An example of a serious scholarly study that is part of this counter-historiography is Farbstein (2007).