Semitism Have

ANTI-SEMITISM IN POSTCOMMUNIST CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE Hannah Starman Institute for Ethnic Studies, Ljubljana

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Introduction 1 Europe,5 relying mainly on data gathered by A number of high-profile gatherings on anti- several research centers that monitor anti- Semitism have been organized in Europe Semitism around the world, maintain over the past two years.2 With some databases of anti-Jewish incidents, and 6 variations in focus, they all addressed the publish studies and country reports. wave of anti-Jewish incidents that spread Judging by the findings of the controversial7 across the European Union member states in EUMC report on Manifestations of Anti- recent years, reaching its climax in the Semitism in the EU 2002-2003, anti-Jewish spring of 2002 when several synagogues and incidents in Western Europe have been other Jewish institutions in Paris, Brussels, connected to extreme nationalist and Berlin, and London were burned, Jewish fundamentalist response to the Israel- cemeteries profaned, and individual Jews Palestinian conflict and committed attacked.3 The European Monitoring Centre predominantly by “disaffected young on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) commissioned three reports on anti- Semitism in Europe in the past two years: 5 Šumi, Irena and Hannah Starman (2004) Manifestations of Anti-Semitism in the EU Evaluation of available data on Anti-Semitism in 2002-2003;Perceptions of Anti-Semitism in the 10 candidate countries of Eastern and the European Union;4 and Evaluation of Central Europe : EUMC Report. Ljubljana: INV. 6 available data on Anti-Semitism in the 10 For example, the Stephen Roth Institute for the candidate countries of Eastern and Central Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism at Tel Aviv University, The Coordination Forum for Countering Anti- Semitism, The Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism, Zentrum 1 I would like to thank Dr Irena Šumi for a für Anti-Semitismusforschung Technische thorough reading of the first draft of this article. Universität Berlin, La Ligue Internationale 2 The OSCE Conference on Anti-Semitism was Contre le Racisme et l’Antisémitisme, and held in Vienna in June 2003 and in Berlin in others. April 2004. The European Commission 7 The EUMC was at the center of controversy organized a seminar on Anti-Semitism in Europe when it was accused by European Jewish leaders in Brussels in February 2004, and the UN of trying to shelve an original report which Conference on Anti-Semitism was held in June pointed to young Muslims and pro-Palestinian 2004, to name just a few. groups as the main perpetrators of the attacks. 3 For a list of Anti-Semitic incidents (with links The report that was finally published concludes to full accounts) see that “the largest group of the perpetrators of anti- http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt. Semitic activities appears to be young, jhtml?itemNo=169625&contrassID=2&subContr disaffected white Europeans,” and adds that “a assID=15&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y. further source of anti-Semitism in some 4 Both reports are available at the EUMC countries was young Muslims of North African website: http://eumc.eu.int/eumc/index.php. or Asian extraction.” Muslims” of North African or Palestinian The situation in Central and Eastern Europe origin (EUMC 2004: 20). The volatile mix is different in several regards that I propose of anti-Jewish and anti-Israeli hostility to discuss in this article. In contrast to transmitted through new means of Western Europe, where the Holocaust has communication such as the Internet8 has been incorporated into public conscience become known in the wider media as the and has thus delineated the contours of ‘new anti-Semitism’ and has gained enough acceptable public discourse about the Jews, currency to claim several monographs9 and the collapse of communism in an “area numerous articles to its name.10 Anti-Jewish basically devoid of democratic traditions incidents perpetrated in Western European and traditions of tolerance and pluralism” countries such as Belgium, France, the (Braham 1994: 9) has engendered a fierce Netherlands, Germany, and Great Britain xenophobic, nationalist reaction, which have attracted considerable attention and endorsed anti-Semitic pronouncements as an raised great concerns, both because of the acceptable feature of public discourse. It is unprecedented violence of the attacks, and important to note that those who promote the shift of public perception of their anti-Jewish discourse would not recognize perpetrators from neo-Nazi skinheads to their pronouncements as anti-Semitic, which young Muslim immigrants. As noted above, has led to what Volovici called a the responses of national public authorities, “paradoxical situation” (1994: 4) of international organizations such as the “antisemitism without Jews and without OSCE, and of the European Commission antisemites” (Cornea 1993). 11 have been swift. Another notable difference between anti- Semitism such as it was displayed in recent

8 years in Western Europe and that of the A special OSCE meeting explored the former communist Europe is that the latter’s relationship between racist, xenophobic, and sometimes vehement anti-Jewish rhetoric, anti-Semitic propaganda on the Internet, and hate crimes (Paris, June 2004). and the absence of any political correctness 9 Chesler, Phyllis (2003). The new anti-Semitism: with regard to Jews and the Holocaust, the current crisis and what we must do about it. seldom translates into overt and violent San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; Iganski, Paul and manifestations of anti-Semitism (Braham Barry A Kosmin (2003). The new Anti- 1994). Instead, anti-Semitic and anti-Jewish Semitism?: debating Judeophobia in 21st- remarks are used in various contexts, century Britain. London: Profile; Foxman, ranging from political (‘unmasking’ political Abraham (2003) Never Again? The Threat of the opponents as Jewish, for example) to New Anti-Semitism. San Francisco: Harper; economic, ideological, national, theological, Taguieff, Pierre-André (2004). Rising from the etc. (Volovici 1994). The break with Muck: The New Anti-Semitism in EU. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee Publisher (original title: La Nouvelle communism in Eastern Europe in many judéophobie); Drad, Raphaël (2001). Sous le cases produced “a specific reinvention of signe de Sion : L’antisémitisme nouveau est anti-Semitism without Jews in which Jews arrivé. Paris : Michalon ; Goldnadel, Gilles remain categorically alien, a threat” (Luthar William (2001). Le Nouveau bréviaire de la and Šumi 2004: 30). As Yehuda Bauer put haine. Paris : Ramsay; Finkielkraut, Alain it, “the non-existent Jews have become a (2003). Au nom de l’Autre : Réflexions sur l’antisémitisme qui vient. Paris : Gallimard ; Attal, Sylvain, 2004, La plaie : Enquête sur le liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP), was forced nouvel antisémitisme. Paris : Editions Denoël. to resign after voicing anti-Semitic remarks in 10 See also a discussion on new anti-Semitism in August 2002. In December 2001, an the EUMC report Manifestations … (pp. 24-25). international spat has developed over disparaging 11 The Hessian CDU politician Martin Hohmann comments about Israel ("that shitty little country was promptly expelled from his parliamentary Israel"), allegedly made by the French group for his anti-Semitic remarks in November ambassador to London at a private dinner party, 2003. Jürgen Mölleman, deputy chairman of the to give just a few examples. major issue in public discourse” (Bauer legacy of organized or systematic forgetting 1992: 8). and deflective negationism of the Holocaust, In some fringes of domestic politics, Jews and the legacy of anti-Zionism/anti- 13 were openly held responsible for both Israelism. communism and the hardships caused by its The “state-organised forgetting” (Shafir collapse (unemployment, decline of living 2002: 4) that marked the former communist standards, etc; see Braham 1994). The latter regimes’ uptake on the Holocaust was sentiment was further exacerbated in some characterized by “de-Judiazation of the cases by the debates connected to the atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis and/or restitution of Jewish property (Levin 1998; their local emulators or official elites” Karadjova 2004), while the former often (Shafir 2002: 4). As Peter Novick (1999) figured prominently in propaganda persuasively claimed, de-Judaization of the campaigns of extremist parties that Holocaust was also present in the post- incorporated “traditional anti-Semitic and WWII United States where it was employed Jewish-conspirational themes” focusing on to achieve two immediate and closely linked the communist-Jewish linkage (Braham political goals: the fight against 1994:11), but also on capitalist-Jewish communism, and rehabilitation of Germany. linkage that culminated in the concept of Both foreign policy priorities rested on a globalization as the ‘new Jewish world conceptualization of WWII that represented order’ (Vago 2002). Furthermore, the Nazi atrocities as an inherent aberration manifestations of anti-Semitism generally of totalitarian regimes, and ignored the intertwined distortions or denial of the specificity of the Nazi assault against Holocaust, and various efforts at deflection European Jewry. The purpose of this of responsibility for the local persecution of conceptual move was to pave the way for Jews (Luthar and Šumi 2004; Shafir 2002; Germany’s rehabilitation by essentially Braham 1994), as well as ‘history cleansing’ representing it as a victim of totalitarianism, (Braham 1994; Vago 2002). Last but not equivalent to that practiced in the Soviet least, Central and East European countries’ Union (i.e. communism). heritage of anti-Zionism and criticism of The treatment of the Holocaust in Israel (Sekelj 1997) lent itself nicely to a communist Central and Eastern Europe was channelling of anti-Semitism to virulent also subject to serious political 12 criticism of Israel. consideration, albeit with a different spin to Legacies of communism and patterns of it. It was characterized by two main features: anti-Semitism in postcommunist Central on the one hand, the Jewish victims were and Eastern Europe denied their Jewishness and were aggregated Among the many legacies of communism in in the count of local victims, and on the Central and Eastern Europe that have been other hand, local perpetrators were studied in the abundant literature on post- conveniently assimilated to the ‘Nazi socialism, two are of particular importance aggressor.’ Jewish victims were thus for the subject under scrutiny here: the incorporated in the general category of victims of fascism (Deák 1994: 118), while the own-nation participation in the persecution of Jews was minimized 12 The best approach to distinguish between anti- Semitism and legitimate criticism of Israel that I (represented as insignificant and marginal) have come across was proposed by the Former and externalized (transferred to members of Swedish Deputy Prime Minister Per Ahlmark other nations, namely Germans). Michael who said: “The line is crossed when people Shafir (2002) offers several examples of begin to use anti-Semitic terminology to describe Israel’s actions” (quoted in Yair Sheleg, “A Campaign of Hatred,” in Ha’aretz, May 5, 13 Authors mostly use the terms anti-Zionism and 2002). anti-Israelism interchangeably. both. Boris Tepulchowski’s book History of communism as a bulwark against fascism, the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945) which and represent their countries as the only true passes as representative of post-Stalinist victims of the fascist aggression. István Soviet historiography, for example, provides Deák’s remarks (1994: 111) on the situation a telling illustration of the former: referring in Hungary could apply across the board in to the gas chambers in Auschwitz, Central and Eastern Europe: “World War II Maidanek, and Treblinka, the author never was officially remembered as the era when once mentions that they were constructed ‘communists and other progressive mainly to physically eliminate the Jews; elements’ had struggled against, or became instead, he wrote that six million “Polish the victims of, ‘Hitlerite and Horthyte citizens” had been murdered by the Nazis fascism.’ Somehow, there seemed to have (Vidal-Naquet 1995). Similarly, the been no Jews among these heroes and monument that was erected at Auschwitz in victims; instead, all were ‘anti-fascist the 1960’s carries the inscription “Four Hungarians.’” Considering the fact that the million people suffered and died here at the great majority of Jews perished in the hands of the Nazi murderers between 1940 territories of Central and Eastern Europe and and 1945.” Jews were subsumed under other that their annihilation was also “made nationalities, and – due to the Polish term possible by crimes initiated and committed for Jews14 – came last on the alphabetically at the order of Nazi-allied authorities; by ordered list (Steinlauf 1996). The example those initiated and perpetrated by local of the Jedwabne massacre15 of 1,600 Jews fascists; or by collaboration, indeed the killed by their Polish neighbors in July 1941 effective participation in their perpetration (Gross 2001) provides an eloquent by individuals from among the populations illustration of the deflection of guilt to the conquered by the Reich” (Shafir 2002: 24), Nazis. Although the facts of the massacre coming to terms with the WWII past was a were not unknown in the first decade of particularly delicate issue in the Poland’s communist rule (Fox 2001) and postcommunist period. reports that some of the Jedwabne According to Shafir’s typology of deflective perpetrators had been put to trial and even negationism which characterized both the convicted in 1949 and 1953, the monument communist and the post-communist era, the that was erected on site by the communist guilt for the Holocaust was either deflected authorities in the 1960’s claimed that “Jews onto the Nazis (as the Jedwabne case were burnt alive by the Gestapo and illustrates) or a nation other than one’s own, 16 Hitlerite gendarmerie” (Fox 2001: 90). to the non-representative and marginal Both the denial of the victims’ Jewish ‘fringe’ that committed ‘aberrations’ “in the identity and minimization/externalisation of country’s otherwise spotless history of responsibility for their persecution helped relations with the Jews” (Shafir 2002: 37), the communist leaders to consolidate or to the Jews themselves. The example of Romanian communist historians’ treatment of the massacre of 14 Żydzi in Polish. some 8,000-12,000 Jews carried out in Iaşi 15 For the first full account of the massacre that in late June 1941 by local authorities, the triggered the longest and the most important Romanian army, members of the Iron debate on the Holocaust in postcommunist Poland see Gross (2001); for an account of the Guard, and the SS (Shafir 2002) is debate see Michlic (2002). significant. These historians either deflect 16 It was not until 2001 that the Polish president the responsibility to the Nazis (Minei 1978: Aleksander Kwasniewski officially apologized 26; quoted in Shafir 2002), or claim that for the part played by Poles in the 1941 pogrom only “some stray Romanian soldiers” and unveiled a new monument: its inscription (Karetki and Covaci 1978: 75, quoted by remembers those who died, but refrains from Shafir 2002: 37), “some Legionnaires and naming their murderers. other declassed elements” (Simion 1979: variation on that theme claims that Zionism 132, quoted in Shafir 2002: 37) had joined prevented assimilation, the failure of which the perpetrators “at their own initiative” in turn provoked the Holocaust (Meštan (Karetki and Covaci 1978: 75, quoted in 2000). Shafir 2002: 37), and “organized a pogrom Another cluster of conspiracy-type in Iaşi over the head of the Romanian arguments focuses on the claim that Jews authorities, which has practically lost control forced Hitler into self-defense by boycotting over the town” (Simion 1979: 132, quoted in German goods, and driving towards the war Shafir 2002: 37). Examples of deflections to that Hitler desperately sought to avoid the ‘fringe’ are abundant (Braham 1994) and (Vidal-Naquet 1995), or that it was Jewish are on the increase since the collapse of disloyalty and even aggression that triggered communism, especially in countries that a defensive response. Shafir (2002) quotes sought to rehabilitate national leaders who several examples of the latter from collaborated with the Nazi Germany in the Romania, including the argument that war against the Soviet Union, namely Antonescu’s punitive measures were Marshal Jean Antonescu in Romania triggered by the alleged Jewish support for (Eskenasy 1994; Ioanid 1994), Father Josef the Soviet occupation forces in Bessarabia Tiso in Slovakia (Meštan 2000), and and northern Bukovina in 1940, and the Admiral Miklos Horthy in Hungary (Deák claim that the aforementioned Iaşi pogrom 1994). was a reaction to Jewish disloyalty vis-à-vis The guilt for the Holocaust is frequently Romanian and German forces.19 Similarly, attributed to the Jews themselves, and this the Slovak national uprising that started on particular type of deflection features an 29 August 1944 (it was crushed by the Nazis array of anti-Semitic affirmations. Although in October), and in which some Jews the deicidal justification according to which participated,20 was quoted as Jewish the Holocaust was the price that the deicidal aggression that provoked their deportation people had to pay for having crucified Christ (Meštan 2000). (Meštan 2000) has not yet lost its currency, The postcommunist modulation of the the most widespread arguments blaming the argument of Jewish antagonism and Jews for the Holocaust are grounded in disloyalty to the ‘host nations’ rests on the conspiracy theories that vary in widespread identification of Jews with sophistication and ingenuity. A Hungarian communism. This claim is “used to deny publisher of Mein Kampf, Aron Monus, for responsibility for national failures and example, argued in his book Les secrets de crimes during the fascist period, the war, 17 l’empire nietzschéen (1992) that the Jews and the communist period which followed paid Hitler to carry out the Holocaust, it” (Volovici 1994: 8). The equation Jews = portraying Hitler as a Zionist agent who Bolsheviks not only pertained to the Jews worked towards the creation of the State of who began to appear in public functions, in 18 Israel. Similarly, Arvéd Grébert’s politics, in the military and in the secret contribution to the volume An Attempt at a services after the war,21 but also to the Political Profile of Jozef Tiso (1992) argued “alleged Jewish culpability for the misdoing that the international Jewry and the Zionists supported Hitler and provoked the war in 19 order to bring about the establishment of the Allegedly, Jews signalled to enemy planes and Jewish state (quoted in Shafir 2002: 43). A spied for the Soviets. 20 Given that the internment in Slovakian camps started on 26 March 1942, thus before the uprising, Jewish participation in the uprising 17 Translated as Conspiracy: The Empire of could hardly have been massive (Hilberg 2003). Nietzsche. 21 Their ranks were subsequently purged of Jews, 18 A variant of this claim would have Adolf but this fact does not change the extent and the Eichmann pass for a Zionist agent. intensity of this belief. and disasters of the communist regimes” allegedly ordered the murders of Jews (Volovici, 1994:8). Marxism was and suspected of collaboration with the Nazis. continues to be presented as “a ‘Jewish’ The legacy of organized or systematic ideology, emanating from Judaism as a tool forgetting of the Holocaust, coupled with to rule the world and enslave other nations” post-1989 efforts to rehabilitate the (Volovici 1994: 8). The allegation that the nationalist leaders who collaborated with the Jews who rose to higher echelons of the Nazis or came to terms with the dark patches communist regimes and its security forces in of the national WWII pasts, produced the first years after the war used the patterns of anti-Semitism that range from repressive apparatus at their disposal to take minimalization and/or externalization of the 22 revenge against the local population is atrocities committed, deflections of especially well-suited for vilification of the responsibility to comparative trivialization,23 Jews because it puts a more immediate and and outright denial of the Holocaust. The personable spin on the issue. communist legacy of anti-Zionism and anti- Last, but not least, Jews were sometimes Israelism dates back to the 1967 Six-Day accused of executing their own annihilation. War when all the members of the Warsaw In his infamous book The Wasteland of pact (with the exception of Romania) broke Historic Reality (1989), Franjo Tudjman, the off diplomatic relations with Israel in protest first President of independent Croatia, went against ‘Israel’s imperialist policies towards a step further by claiming that the Jews the Arab states.’ Since the communist imprisoned in the Jasenovac concentration ideology “as a matter of principle rejected camp in Croatia during WWII assisted the anti-Semitism” (Fatran 2002), anti-Zionism Ustasha in perpetrating the Holocaust: “In and anti-Israelism became a convenient the Jasenovac camp the management was in disguise for anti-Semitism during the the hands of the Jews;” quoting a witness, communist rule. Poland’s thinly disguised Vojislav Prnjatovic, he wrote that the Jews ‘anti-Zionist’ campaign of 1967-1968 (Stola “managed to grab all the more important 2000), which resulted in the in the forced jobs in the prisoners hierarchy,” concluding exodus of most of the remaining Jews left in that “The Jew remains the Jew, even in the the country, some 15,000 to 20,000 people, Jasenovac camp … Selfishness, craftiness, is a telling example of anti-Zionism that was unreliability, stinginess, deceit, are their used as a pretext for anti-Semitic measures. main characteristics” (Tudjman 1989: 160, Although anti-Zionism and anti-Israelism 172-3; Sekelj 1997). Furthermore, Tudjman had the status of official communist foreign claimed that the Jasenovac concentration policy doctrine, the sources of its ideations camp in which several hundred thousand were clearly rooted in ‘old anti-Semitic’ Jews, Roma, and Serbs were killed, was a imagery, except that the Jew was replaced “myth” blown out of proportion to castigate by the collective incarnation – Israel.24 A the Croatian nation (Shafir 2002). Meštan (2000: 188) quotes other examples of similar claims, for example, the one put forth by 23 Shafir (2002: 60) defines comparative Gabriel Hoffman in a 1998 article for the trivialization as the “willful distortion of the Slovakian Zmena, where the author record and of the significance of the Holocaust, ‘revealed’ that the Sereì forced labor camp either through the ‘humanisation’ of its local was run by a certain “Hauptobersturmführer record in comparison with atrocities committed Zimmermann” who was no one else than by the Nazis, or through comparing the record of “the dreaded Simon Wiesenthal” who the Holocaust itself with experiences of massive suffering endured by local populations or by mankind at large at one point or another in recorded history.” 22 For a compassionate account of Jewish 24 For a discussion of anti-Zionism, anti- revenge against the Germans in occupied Poland Israelism and new anti-Semitism, see Klug see Sack 1993. (2003). new element is thus added to the ‘classical’ statement of popular belief that the existence conspiracy theories, that of “the malign and of a small and relatively well assimilated dominant role of Israel in present day Jewish community precludes anti-Semitism. conspiracy scenarios, especially in the work Dr Rupel’s statement at the conference and of the Mossad” (Volovici 1994: 4). With the his above-reported comment are significant collapse of communism, anti-Semitism to the extent that they reveal the scope of soared, while seriously biased and understanding of anti-Semitism in Central uninformed media reporting on the Israeli- and Eastern Europe in general, and in Palestinian conflict, and the official anti- Slovenia in particular. The narrow definition Zionist and anti-Israeli pronouncements of anti-Semitism as violent anti-Semitic acts remained unchallenged. followed by criminal charges, radical Anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism, and Holocaust denial, and inadequate treatment treatment of the Holocaust in of the Holocaust in textbooks, underpins the contemporary Slovenia: some remarks belief that anything short of burning As the head of the Institute for Ethnic synagogues or assaulting Jews in the streets Studies’ Task Force for Jewish Studies and does not qualify as anti-Semitism. Given 26 Anti-Semitism, I was invited to accompany that there are no synagogues in Slovenia the Slovenian Minister of Foreign affairs, Dr and that Slovenian Jews have not retained Dimitrij Rupel, to the Organization for any external sign that would make them Security and Co-operation in Europe recognizable as such, even the narrow (OSCE) Conference on anti-Semitism that definition of anti-Semitism cannot apply, was hosted by the German Ministry of because the Jewish identity of the Foreign affairs in Berlin on 28-29 April hypothetical victim would be simply 2004. Dr Rupel delivered a speech that dismissed as irrelevant or even doubted. In assured his high-ranking audience that contrast to the situation in many other Central and East European countries, where no violent anti-Semitic acts by the ‘unmasking’ of political opponents has authorities or by the media have been an effective tool of political battle, been reported in Slovenia. There has Slovenia’s Jews have always been ‘masked’ also been no court case or charge for as non-Jews and their Jewishness a criminal act connected with anti- unrecognized or ignored. Public display of Semitism. It has to be stressed that Jewish ancestry of public figures is cases of radical, classical negation of discouraged in Slovenia and, even when the Holocaust are not detectable in prominent people of Jewish origin publicly Slovenian public discourses. acknowledge their ancestry, their Slovenian public school textbooks declarations are ignored or dismissed as present the Holocaust adequately.25 irrelevant (Luthar and Šumi 2004: 42). After his presentation, the Minister told me This is because of the deeply rooted belief that he did not deem it necessary to consult that Slovenia as a notoriously “ethnically me on the content of his speech because he homogenous” country is entirely devoid of had judged that Slovenia was not Jews, corroborated by the persuasion that immediately concerned with the issues Jewishness and Slovenianess are mutually discussed at the conference. He exclusive. Therefore, even Slovenians who substantiated his observation with the

25 Address by Dr Dimitrij Rupel, Minister of 26 There is an old synagogue in Maribor that is Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Slovenia, at today used as a cultural center, but does not the function as a place of worship, and there is a Berlin OSCE Conference on Anti-Semitism. prayer room in Ljubljana, located in an office http://www.osce.org/events/conferences/Anti- complex that bears no outside signs of Jewish Semitism2004/. presence. are halachically27 Jewish themselves often speakers. The fact that the majority of perceive their family genealogy as either Central and East European states, including belonging to such a distant past as to have Slovenia, do not have any specific no impact on their lives, or a datum that legislation that would even allow does not at all affect their “ethnicity.” prosecution on grounds of anti-Semitism30 Although it can sometimes be made into an (and therefore precludes any charges item of exotic personal charm, it is in turn connected to anti-Semitism that are always likely to be perceived as a pretentious cited as a proof of its absence), is as telling ‘monkeyshine.’ This range of postures as is the singularly unfortunate wording of testifies to the fact that the obliteration of the Dr Rupel’s observation to that effect (“There memory of the Jews after the deportations in is no specific anti-Semitic legislation in 1944 has been thorough,28 but also that the Slovenia”31). Furthermore, the treatment of externalization of Jews has been consistent: the Holocaust that is considered adequate in the Jews of Prekmurje were thus considered public schooling follows the strategies of primarily Hungarians, and the Jews from the denial, deflection, and comparative Gorenjska region were assimilated to trivialization described above. As is the case Germans. Conversely, non-Jewish of several other Central and East European Slovenians have very little or no notion at all states, Slovenia has some dark chapters in its about Jewishness and what constitutes it, as WWII history to deal with; however, all well as about other ‘things Jewish.’ official or otherwise influential discourses An average Slovenian would thus very had so far opted for a defensive, deflective likely consider, as did the Slovenian approach to the matter. Despite the fact that Minister of Foreign Affairs, that Jews and the Slovenian Homeguard movement was everything related to them – especially anti- molded after the Nazi party and therefore Semitism – are so remote from Slovenian explicitly anti-Semitic, featuring slogans concerns they are not even worth like “Jews are out to enslave the world,” and addressing. The following example “the [communist] partisans were drugged illustrates that: I participated in a lunch and sold to Jews in order to […] destroy the organized by a foreign ambassador to Slovenian nation” (quoted in Luthar and Slovenia, during which a Slovenian official Šumi 2004: 40), the defenders of Slovenian had to be reminded by his foreign collaboration both downplay the anti- counterpart that his statement “we do not Semitic component and trivialize what need the Jews, we have Gorenjci,”29 happened to Slovenian Jews by comparing intended to dissipate any concern about anti- the Holocaust to the post-war atrocities Semitism in Slovenia, was itself anti- committed by the communists. Semitic. The narrow definition of anti- Last but not least, the media reporting on the Semitism is thus coupled with a ‘natural’ Israel-Palestinian conflict that the IES’s proficiency in manipulating Jewish Task Force for Jewish Studies and Anti- stereotypes that is considered neither anti- Semitism has been monitoring very closely Semitic nor politically incorrect by the over the past year, has been extremely biased against Israel, and contains statements and expressions of opinion that 27 According to the Jewish law. are clearly anti-Israeli, even anti-Semitic: 28 The synagogue in Murska Sobota was leveled vilifying Israel, comparing it to Nazi by the communist authorities in 1954; the Jewish cemetery was left to decay, but remnants of the gravestones were later arranged into a memorial 30 See Šumi, Irena and Hannah Starman, park; and the Jewish cemetery in Beltinci also Evaluation of available data on Anti-Semitism in disappeared. the 10 candidate countries of Eastern and 29 Gorenjci are the inhabitants of the Gorenjska Central Europe : EUMC Report. Ljubljana: INV, region, represented in the popular culture as 2004. particularly stingy. 31.Address by Dr Dimitrij Rupel. Germany,32 openly glorifying Palestinian been gaining ground in Slovenia since its suicide bombers,33 etc. Very limited independence in 1991.35 knowledge of the Holocaust, of the Conclusion establishment of the State of Israel, and the This brief review of anti-Semitism in genealogy of the Israel-Palestinian conflict Central and Eastern Europe hopefully even among students of international demonstrated the existence of some general relations and history34 combined with the trends that partly stem from the common traditionally anti-Israeli media reporting add communist legacy, and partly from the to the negative appraisal of the Jews that can postcommunist national (and distinctly take the direction of various conspiracy- nationalist) projects. Despite the apparent theories, especially when coupled with commonalities that can be perceived at the esoteric, New Age anti-Semitism that has level of public discourse however, the analysis of anti-Semitism in the region begs several questions that will need to be addressed, both within the project Post- 32 See for example, Zlobec, Jaša, 2004, Ostre colony and post-socialism contexts in social sence dolgih nožev (Sharp shadows of the long scientific writing and teaching and within knives) in Mladina, no. 44. the ongoing research dealing specifically 33 Numerous articles by the daily Delo with anti-Semitism in the area: given the correspondent in Jerusalem, Barbara Šurk, depict disparities in the WWII experience, the Palestinian suicide bombers as national heroes, collective memory of the Jews, Jewish liberators of their nations, justified in their presence in the countries today, to name just actions, etc. The recent illness and death of a few, to what extent is it analytically Yasser Arafat led to a climax of journalistic lyricism that is familiar to the Slovenian productive to treat Central and Eastern audience from the times of Marshal Tito’s dying, Europe as one bloc? Where do ideations of endless speculations about his health, and his Jews come from in environments like eventual death on 4 May 1980. Tormented Slovenia, where the Jewish presence is eulogies written to commemorate Yasser systematically misapprehended? What are Arafat’s life and achievements have included the hypothetical scenarios of possible such poetic rambles as: “Over the last two weeks change of these ideations? we [journalists] counted his [Arafat’s] last hours The answer to the first question is a only to see him like a smiling ghost, in the dusty cloud rising from the debris of the Israeli categorical ‘no.’ This simple comparative destruction, rise his index and his middle finger perspective can serve as a starting set of into the letter V, as we were walking to his hypotheses for the forthcoming research on funeral” (Šurk, Barbara, Smo danes lahko vsi Jews and anti-Semitism, but is not in itself Palestinci (Can we all be Palestinians today?) in fruitful, because it is not analytical. The Delo, 12 November .2004, p. 1.). The aggregate Post-colony and post-socialism contexts in number of articles devoted to the Middle East social scientific writing and teaching conflict in three major daily newspapers rarely project’s main aim is thus a rethinking of the surpasses 15 per week. During the weeks of assumptions on which these comparative Arafat’s illness and his death, the number rose to claims rest, namely the existence of a an average of 50, reaching its peak in the week of November 7-13 when 64 articles were devoted relatively homogenous habitat called post- to Yasser Arafat alone. socialist context. With regards to anti- 34 I had the privilege to observe the level of Semitism in the region, the most often-cited acquaintance with the subject when I guest lectured at several faculties in Ljubljana. During one of the lectures on the Holocaust and the 35 It is featured, for instance, in the widely read creation of the State of Israel, one of the students monthly Aura magazine, namely in the form of had a sudden illumination that the creation of translations from the Swiss Zeitenschrift famous Israel happened only three years after the for its conspiratory analysis of world politics, Holocaust! especially in the Middle East. exception to the patterns of anti-Jewish Braham, Randolph L. 1994. Anti-Semitism attitudes is the example of Bulgaria, where and the Holocaust in the Politics of East all of the Jews were saved during the Central Europe in Braham, Randolph L. Holocaust (Todorov 1999), but also the (ed.) Anti-Semitism and the treatment of the above-sketched example of Slovenia Holocaust in Postcommunist Eastern indicates that a study of attitudes towards Europe. New York: Columbia University Jews needs to go beyond an analysis of Press, 1-30. political and media discoursers and explore Cornea, Andreai. 1993. Les deux paradoxes how these discourses are translated into de l’antisémitisme en Roumanie (Two people’s intimate understandings and paradoxes of anti-Semitism in Romania) in ideations of Jews. Gresh, Alain (ed.), A l’Est, les nationalismes The ongoing research project, based at the contre la démocratie ? (In the East, IES, is thus based on two hypotheses: that nationalisms against democracy ?) Brussels : Jews in the Slovenian territory have been Editions Complexe. marked by their physical absence, but that Levin, Itamar. 1998. The Last Chapter of the this ‘cryptic presence’ (Luthar and Šumi Holocaust? The struggle over the restitution 2004) did not preclude the every-day of Jewish property in Europe. Jerusalem: formation of ethnic ideation and Jewish Agency for Israel in cooperation with differentiation at all levels of public in a the World Jewish Restitution Organization. manner akin to what Paul Lendvai (1971) Deák, István. 1994. Anti-Semitism and the termed ‘anti-Semitism without Jews.’ The Treatment of the Holocaust in Hungary n project draws its primary empirical evidence Anti-Semitism and the Treatment of the in support of these hypotheses from a Holocaust in Postcommunist Eastern Europe, fieldwork research that consists of gathering ed. R. L. Braham, 99–124. New York: testimonies from three groups of informants: Columbia University Press. Jews who are nowadays citizens/residents of Slovenia and who have survived the Eskenasy, Victor. 1994. The Holocaust and Holocaust, and their offspring; ‘neighbors,’ Romanian Historiography: Communist and witnesses, rescuers, and bystanders who in Neo-Communist Revisionism in Braham, different ways remember the persecution of Randolph, L. (ed.) The Tragedy of Romanian Jews in their immediate vicinity; people Jewry, 173-236. New York: Columbia whose personal and family genealogies University Press. include Jewish ancestors, but who relate Fatran, Gila. 2002. Anti-Semitism in very differently to this ‘ancestral complex.’ Slovakia’s Political Development: The One of the main aims that the project seeks Viability of anti-Semitic Manifestations in to achieve is to determine the ways in which Anti-Semitism at the End of the 20th Century, the attitude towards Jews and everything pp. 125-137. Bratislava: Museum of Jewish deemed Jewish functions as a component of Culture. ethnic declarations in the relations that are Fox, Frank. 2001. A Skeleton in Poland’s based in construction of impassable, ethnic Closet: The Jedwabne Massacre in East differentiations on the one hand, and the European Jewish Affairs 31, no 1:77-94. relations of passable, cultural difference on Gross, Jan, T. 2001. 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