Edito

This week we return to our series exploring the landscape of antisemitism across Europe, in partnership with DILCRAH, and turn our eye to the ongoing struggle against antisemitism in Germany as both a historical and modern issue. Monty Ott draws on philosophical perspectives, emphasizing the need for societal authority and the use of power to confront it. In light of the resurgence of antisemitic violence following Hamas’ attacks in October 2023, Ott explores the tensions surrounding the state’s role in combating this threat. This first part of a two-part investigation delves into controversies, including accusations of political instrumentalization and criticisms of Germany’s response, highlighting the complexity of addressing antisemitism through both legal enforcement and societal dialogue. As Germany grapples with its past, the fight against antisemitism becomes a litmus test for the strength of its democracy.

Not so long ago, antisemitism manifested itself with obvious clarity: “Death to the Jews” shouted men with shaven heads tattooed with swastikas. Things now seem to have become so opaque that the characterization of antisemitism gives rise to endless polemics. The university, in particular, is a regular scene, with many Jewish students perceiving the atmosphere surrounding anti-Zionist mobilizations as threatening to them, but struggling to convince the administration of the accuracy of this perception. And after all, the question thrown back at them is a legitimate one: why are you so certain that this is antisemitism, when no one is talking about targeting Jews as such? To shed light on this problem, Valérie Boussard, professor of sociology at Paris Nanterre, conducted a survey among Jewish students who feel less and less at home at university.

Does the State of Israel need the permission of the nations to exist? At least, that’s what Emmanuel Macron is said to have hinted at in the Council of Ministers. If we insist on remembering that Israel owes its birth to a UN decision, it’s because we think that its existence is conditional on the goodwill of the international community. This is not only a diplomatic error, but also a failure to understand this state and the history of which it is the product. Gabriel Abensour, fired up by the foolishness of our President, made a point of reminding us that the realization of the Zionist project precisely meant the possibility of a Jewish existence that did not depend on anyone’s goodwill.

The last words people leave behind often carry profound meaning, revealing the deepest truths about their lives, relationships, and identities. In times of final reckoning, the human desire to be remembered becomes a testament to our existence, weaving personal histories into a broader tapestry of family and collective memory. In Last Words, Philip Schlesinger delivers a deeply personal reflection on his parents’ lives and their legacies, anchored by the poignant moments of their final conversations. As Jewish refugees who escaped Nazi persecution in Austria, Béla and Martha Schlesinger’s life stories are marked by exile, loss, and survival. A powerful meditation on memory, identity, and the legacies we inherit from those who came before us.

The Jews’ point of entry into political modernity, their emancipation à la française, is marked by doubt and ambivalence: will they be able to integrate into the nation without renouncing their obstinate particularism? We know that it was the Count of Clermont-Tonnerre’s perspective that ultimately triumphed over that of Father Grégoire: yes, they could, because they would integrate as individuals. But we know that the hesitation was not definitively resolved… It is on this future, which raises the question of the relationship between the Jews and the Republic, that historian Pierre Birnbaum has chosen to return. What perspective emerges from the history of Jewish emancipation in France, when viewed from the perspective of current problems?

While it is vital that social and political criticism be expressed in our democratic societies, there is also a tendency for this criticism to go astray, in a way that is surprisingly regular. What characterizes this deviation of criticism is that it replaces the normative support it lacks with an evil intentionality. If it is necessary to criticize, but we no longer know in the name of what, then nothing is more convenient than to target monstrous entities. The text by Balázs Berkovits that we are resharing this week contradicts those who would like to excuse this conspiratorial tendency, on the pretext that it is the inevitable, if not legitimate, manifestation of salutary criticism. For to reason in this way is to forget, or not to want to see, that within the list of providential culprits, the Jews always end up as champions. But what explains this bitter victory? Could it be a kind of inability to conceive of Jewish agency, if not as synonymous with crime?

As the first anniversary of October 7 is being discussed everywhere in the media. we asked ourselves how we could commemorate it. What’s left to say that hasn’t already been said a thousand times? Not much, it seems to us, and that’s why we’ve opted for sobriety: one text on October 7, no more. But we’d also like to point out that it didn’t take us long to find out clearly and distinctly what there was to say and think about it: here we publish “Reflections from October”, a text adapted from a lecture given by David Seymour at the end of November 2023. It deals with the evil double of Western modernity, and the possibility that what was revealed by October 7 was the permanence of the Jewish Question.

A debate was launched by Gabriel Abensour in K. last February. He deplored the lukewarmness and disarray of Franco-Judaism, which he explained by the neglect of its spiritual heritage, particularly Sephardic. In April, David Haziza responded, lamenting the fact that efforts had been made to make Judaism modern and presentable, to the detriment of its vitality. And now Julien Darmon has added his take to the discussion, expressing astonishment that it is apparently so difficult for us to appreciate the achievements of Franco-Judaism where they have actually taken place. Why look abroad when French Jewish scholars and intellectuals have done so well? And where should we turn our gaze today, if we are to hope for renewed vitality in Franco-Judaism?

After “Is your German Hebrew?”, “Krawuri: my third identity card” and “My father’s sukkah”, Ruben Honigmann continues the intimate exploration of his questions – ironic and profound – that we are always happy to publish in K. The source of his new essay is a class photo showing him in 1995 among his classmates at the Aquiba school in Strasbourg. What happened to the people in the picture? And how does he make the link between who he was almost thirty years ago and who he is today?

On the eve of World War II, three million Jews lived in Poland. The vast majority were murdered by the Nazis. Most of those who survived in hiding or, more likely, in exile in the Soviet Union, emigrated to the West. Many of those who had been communists before the war returned to Poland to try to build an egalitarian society. Yet the Party failed to combat deeply entrenched antisemitic attitudes, and at times exploited them for political gain, leading to successive waves of out-migration. The result is that perhaps 15,000 Jews live in Poland today, one of the most ethnically and religiously homogeneous societies in the world. Arlene Stein spoke to Anna Zawadzka, Polish sociologist, who examines the changing forms of antisemitism in Polish culture and how Poland’s history of antisemitism is a key element of the contemporary political culture.

Do you remember Andersen’s fairy tale The Emperor’s New Clothes? Recently, in Israel, reality caught up with the fairy tale. Benjamin Netanyahu, who thought he could improve his image after the hostages’ deaths by appearing alongside the bereaved parents, experienced what it’s like to be a naked king in public. For a moment, the father of a deceased hostage shattered the dignity in which Netanyahu was trying so hard to drape himself, by reminding him of his responsibility for the tragedy facing Israel. This week, Noémie Issan-Benchimol analyzes this political event, which, although microscopic, nonetheless reveals the cleavages running through Israeli society, and the way in which the legitimacy of power is currently being challenged.

If a cat speaks when a parrot is eaten, is it enough to say “Jewishness” to understand what we are talking about? European Judaism, and French Judaism in particular, is a mixed reality, inherited from disparate socio-political contexts and traditions, which fit together as best as they can. However, this reality is all too often viewed from an Ashkenazi-centric perspective, which makes Yiddish with a Polish accent the marker of Jewish identity par excellence, and prefers – one wonders why – stuffed carp to the sweetness of North African pastries. The arrival of a free-thinking cat on the French cultural scene has righted some wrongs in this respect. Paying tribute to Joann Sfar’s brilliant comic strip Le Chat du rabbin, Ewa Tartakowsky takes the opportunity to question the colonial situation in which Algerian Jews became French, and the way in which it continues to fuel inequalities within the Jewish world.

The Editors

Last week, we mentioned the case of Hungary, where Viktor Orbán is a friend of the Jews, at least when he manages to involve them in his reactionary political project. Looking deeper into this oxymoronic phenomenon, David Nirenberg’s lecture, “Anti-Judaism, Critical Thinking, and the Possibility of History,” examines how anti-Jewish ideas have shaped Western thought and culture over centuries. Nirenberg explores how influential thinkers—from the ancient world to modern times—have used Judaism as a symbol of everything they oppose in their quest for universal truth. By exposing these patterns, Nirenberg challenges historians to recognize the biases that shape historical narratives and to rethink the possibilities of history itself.

The reputation of a saintly man is now crumbling under the weight of public opinion. It’s a fitting turn of events, since it appears that Abbé Pierre, far from being an apostle of the universal right to housing, did not hesitate to make it conditional on a sordid sexual barter. But, as Danny Trom points out, the public attribution of pardon or opprobrium obeys mysterious laws. For this was not the only time our Abbot went back on his profession of faith, and refused shelter to those who had none…

Mitchell Abidor visited the New York Jewish Museum’s exhibition exploring the long and fascinating history of the Sassoon family. A story that takes us from Iraq to England, via India and China. The Sassoons proclaimed themselves descendants of King David, were described as the “Rothschilds of the East”, spoke Judeo-Arabic as well as Hindustani before converting to English civilization. Through a rich selection of works collected by members of the family over the years, the exhibition tells the story of the gradual integration into Europe of an Iraqi Jewish family who turned into British aristocrats. 

Wonderful times we live in. Did you dream it was possible to be an ultra-Zionist, a great friend of Netanyahu, and at the same time antisemitic and revisionist? To attack the cosmopolitan cabal of George Soros and his henchmen in the European Union, accusing them of being antisemitic? Viktor Orbán, self-proclaimed friend of Israel and the Jewish people, has done just that, and it’s hard not to see the toothy grin behind this outstretched hand. This week, in partnership with DILCRAH, János Gadó takes us on a tour of the parallel reality of contemporary Hungary. There, the assertion of “zero tolerance” of antisemitism does not prevent the rehabilitation of Nazi collaborators and the dissemination of hackneyed antisemitic tropes: only political opponents hate Jews anyway. Gadó’s analysis leaves us with the certainty that, really, there are some friendships we could have done without. And it’s not the least fault of the Netanyahu government to nurture them.

Turning to another part of the world, Renan Antônio da Silva and Eric Heinze inspect Brazil’s complex relationship with its Jewish community and its relationship to Zionism. With comments comparing the Gaza war to the Shoah by the once beloved Lula and with Bolsonaro’s prior ultra-Zionist stance, the Jewish community has felt increasingly alienated from its country’s leadership. Brazil, once a refuge for Jews and Arabs, is now facing rising divisions over the Israel-Palestine conflict, the country’s shifting policies and its antisemitic past rising to the surface again.

German philosopher Jürgen Habermas recently celebrated his ninety-fifth birthday. Bruno Karsenti took advantage of the occasion, in an article that is also a tribute, to examine a work that is, as he writes, “the most solid foundation of European construction as a carrier of the universal”.  A work that is both German and European, or German and then European. Indeed, Jürgen Habermas was the first to understand that it was only by facing up to German crime and guilt that we could, as he did, relaunch a European political project. But Jürgen Habermas did not confine himself to this task. Focusing on some of his lesser-known texts, Bruno Karsenti also shows that Jürgen Habermas not only never turned his eyes away from the uniqueness of the crime – even when some of his colleagues began to defend its necessity – but also recalled the specifically Jewish contribution to German philosophy. A contribution that Bruno Karsenti details here, restoring its importance, certainly for today’s Europeans, but also for Jews who have moved away from Europe.

Over the past year or so, you may have noticed Israel’s extraordinary ability to find itself at the center of the world and its problems. Since we will undoubtedly continue to wrestle with this tendency, it would be useful to clarify why it seems so suspicious. If Israel’s rightful place is not at the center of the world (even if it is Jewish), then where is it? This is the question at stake in the text written by Noémie Issan-Benchimol and Gabriel Abensour, who set out to map diasporisms. Dismissing religious Zionism and the neo-diasporism of those intellectuals who idealize exile from their American campuses, they point to a way out of their political impasse. If Israel is to be grasped as a political reality that can be criticized and improved, it must be stripped of its character as a metaphysical exception, whether thought of as redemption or damnation. In other words, it must be reinscribed in the political situation of the Jews: “there is no outside exile”.
Have you ever wondered whether anti-Zionism might not be our best hope of escaping planetary destruction caused by global warming? No? Then you haven’t read Andreas Malm, whose eco-Marxist theories and call to disarm the fossil fuel industry have found a wide echo in activist circles. Malm places the Palestinian cause at the heart of the ecological struggle, not hesitating to draw inspiration from the “sabotage” of Hamas and to suggest that it would be necessary to destroy Israel in order to put an end to greenhouse gas emissions. Sylvaine Bulle, who takes the defense of political ecology to heart, unfolds for K. the logic of this green anti-Zionism, and shows that this focus on the “Zionist entity” reflects the failure of ecological thinking, making the prospect of emancipation unthinkable.
To close this back-to-school issue, we publish two short pieces by our esteemed collaborator Karl Kraus: “Matters viewed (Jewishly)”. Unfortunately, stupidity never takes a vacation, so he had to stay on the ball and spend the summer tracking it down, even in the scribbles of a bad joker. But this need to stay on the lookout, this impossibility of letting the mind take a vacation in a world that seems to know only the logic of the worst, is tiring. In this fatigue, everyone can easily recognize themselves.

Dear readers,

The last week of our summer break is upon us, and we’ll be resuming our usual rhythm of publications with the next issue. However, the editorial team decided at its back-to-school meeting that it needed to express its views on current events in Israel. The discovery of the summary execution of six hostages by Hamas has inflamed the political situation there, leading to a massive mobilization of society against the government’s conduct of the war. In “Israel held hostage”, we look back at what is at stake for Israel at this moment, both as a traumatic repetition of the event that opened the sequence in which it has found itself locked for the past eleven months, and as an injunction to finally give itself the means to get out of it.

Since a return from summer and the soon to be arriving new Jewish year bring a degree of introspection and reflection with it, our latest summer feature looks at the complexity of Jewishness – whether through Ivan Segré’s examination of the bipolarity of Jewish identity, Mona El Khoury’s fiction piece on grappling with history and our past, Ruben Honigmann’s recurring confrontation with amazement at hostility, an analysis of the get (Jewish traditional divorce) and legal pluralism by Astrid von Busekist or Noémie Issan-Benchimol’s analysis of what Jewish thought has to say about hostage redemption, this week’s feature provides a plethora of food for thought and maybe even some answers for ourselves. 

During this summer break, the magazine is pausing its regular publications. Until the new season arrives, we’re offering our readers a weekly feature exploring a theme that has often engaged us. It’s an opportunity to discover the article you missed, to rediscover the one that caught your eye, and to share some of K.’ s publications with friends who don’t yet know us. As a reminder, our archives are open, and we invite you to browse through the hundreds of texts we’ve already published over the last three and a half years, all of which bear witness to the magazine’s ambition: to move between topicality and historical depth, to report on contemporary issues that call for reflection on the situation of European Jewry.