The speech delivered in Munich by the American Vice-President J. D. Vance made one thing clear – at least to the fringe of the European conscience that has managed to remain lucid: Europe, which has been lethargic for years now, and this despite the looming threats that Vance only had the dubious merit of pronouncing aloud, must pull itself together. However, pulling itself together – and however important it is to reflect on a common European defense policy – cannot be limited to taking realpolitik into account. On this point, we must be sensitive to the diagnosis in the form of a snub that Vance addressed to us, deploring the supposed divorce of Europe from the democratic values and freedom of expression so dear to the United States, even as the Trumpist regime is taking the path of open authoritarianism and systematic censorship. In the absence of a strong conception of Europe and its political vocation, there is a risk that the same path will be followed. That the lethargy of a liberalism that has long since ceased to reflect on the political basis of its existence will be succeeded by the very real nightmare of a sovereignism subservient to the great powers and playing “democracy” against the law.
In the very short term, that of the decisive federal elections that will take place in Germany this weekend, this nightmare has a name: AfD. We are therefore publishing a text by Monty Ott on the history of this movement, and the democratic cataclysm that…
>>> Read more
The German federal elections – which will take place this Sunday, February 23, 2025 – are of decisive importance for the future of Europe. With this in mind, Monty Ott delivers for K. an investigation into the history of the AfD, which is growing strongly. Now supported by Trump and Musk, and championing Russian interests, since its creation about ten years ago this party has undergone a process of radicalization leading it towards increasingly anti-European and far-right positions. A dive into the networks and ideology of German sovereignism.
What has happened to Odessa, once dubbed the “Star of Exile” by Isaac Babel, since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine? Joseph Roche gives us his account of how the Jewish community is trying to survive there, despite the war and the departures.
What does it mean for a nation to exist? Taking as his starting point the position of Milan Kundera - who died exactly a year ago - and the movement of cultural resistance to the dissolution of Soviet totalitarianism, Danny Trom questions the difference between nationalist dreams of power and the irreducible claim to a national (and European) spirit. Is there not something at stake here for the future of Israel?
The truce concluded between Israel and Hamas has given rise to a deplorable spectacle. On the Hamas side, they are shouting “victory” over a field of ruins and corpses, with no regard for the fate of the Gazan population for whom the group has no other plan than that of martyrdom. On the Israeli side, Netanyahu is delighted with the parodies of “solutions” announced with incredible levity by President Trump. Here, K. shares a Palestinian voice, that of Ihab Hassan, first published in Liberties, who thinks in the only politically viable terms: those of a conflict between two equally just national claims, pointing to the horizon of a two-state solution.
Levinas’ thinking is above all rooted in an ethical concern, which seems to lift him to heights beyond the political fray. Yet at certain key points in his work, we find bold political considerations that can enlighten our action in the present. Here, Jean-François Rey introduces us to this side of the philosopher that is too often overlooked.
An artist, criminal and provocateur who lived and died on the fringes. Mitchell Abidor traces the journey of the Belgian-Jewish artist Stéphane Mandelbaum, who fused his Jewish identity, dyslexia, and obsession with both outcasts and perpetrators into creations that challenge and unsettle.
The documentary work of Ruth Beckermann (b. 1952) has played an important role in shaping Austria’s relationship with its past. In this interview with the Viennese filmmaker and writer, Liam Hoare and Beckermann discuss some of the documentaries in her rich filmography, and how they blend political activism and Judaism, in the context of a gradual rise of the far right and a taboo on the fate of Jews during the war.
Why do some historians of antisemitism absolutely reject any analogy between October 7 and historical anti-Jewish persecution? Matthew Bolton situates this debate, with its far-reaching political implications, on an epistemological level, explaining why “historicists” refuse to conceive of antisemitism as “eternal hatred”. In return, he exposes the flawed nature of their method, which ends up dissolving the very concept of antisemitism by obliterating its historical necessity.
As the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz is commemorated, and the last survivors are summoned to compensate for the inadequacies of a memory that never seems to be able to take root, Ruben Honigmann reflects in this text on the possibility of recounting the Shoah. In his personal text, this attempt resembles a never-ending search, the meaning of which is never certain.
To commemorate the 80th anniversary of the discovery of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp by the Red Army, we are publishing a special feature bringing together texts published in K., dealing with the history and memorial challenges surrounding this place which symbolizes, more than any other, the horror of the Shoah. In particular, you’ll find a reflection on antisemitism “because of Auschwitz”, a clandestine manuscript written by Jewish prisoners of the camp who were already worried about the way in which the representation of the Shoah would be distorted, and several contributions confronting precisely these distortions and the difficulties in constituting a memory of the genocide.
Bruno Karsenti and Danny Trom examine the implications of this ceasefire agreement, which, while returning Israel to the sense of its historic mission, leaves the threat of Hamas unresolved and calls the form taken by the military operations carried out for over a year into question.
In the name of what promise, and what law, is the conquest of the promised land justified? Ivan Segré proposes a reading of the book of Judges, whose structure reveals the need to put to death the phallic, warmongering impulse that, yesterday as today, alienates Israel from its foundation.
Join us
With the support of:
Thanks to the Paris office of the Heinrich Böll Foundation for their cooperation in the design of the magazine’s website.