He is No More: A Case Study of Yizkor Literature and the Israeli Commemorative Tradition, 1967-1973
Master’s Thesis
Presented to
The Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies Ilan Troen, Advisor Eugene Sheppard, Advisor ChaeRan Freeze, Advisor
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for
Master’s Degree
By Adam Eisler
May 2013
Copyright by Adam Eisler © 2013
Acknowledgements
This thesis would have never materialized without the help of my friends, family, and professors. It is truly a daunting task to thank everyone. I extend a sincere and loving thank you to Adina, Aron, Roni, and Alon Shorr for graciously hosting me and providing me with moral support during my two month research trip in Israel. The same gratitude goes to Martin and Tamar Shacham-Barr for helping me coordinate my visits to the Golani Brigade Archive and Museum and hosting me during my many weekend hafsakot in the Galil. In addition, thank you to Noam Lekach, my friend and roommate, for providing so much moral support and helping me translate ideas and emotions that were seemingly untranslatable. I am indebted to Professor Ilan Troen for drawing my attention to the existence of Yizkor literature. Without this suggestion I may never have stumbled onto this treasure trove. Thank you to Professors Maoz Azaryahu and Uri Bialer for meeting with me in Israel to organize my ideas, Professor Yael Zerubavel for pointing me in the direction of background material, and Professor Kanan Makiya for his continued support and friendship. Last but certainly not least, a warm thank you to Professors Eugene Sheppard and ChaeRan Freeze for the countless meetings, revisions, notes, and guidance throughout the writing of this thesis.
Most importantly, this thesis is dedicated in its entirety to Jacob Eisler, my father and best friend, for his solidarity and inspiration.
iii
Abstract
He is No More: A Case Study of Yizkor Literature and the Israeli Commemorative Tradition, 1967-1973
A thesis presented to the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Waltham, Massachusetts
By Adam Eisler
Commemorative practices within Israel have received considerable scholarly attention yet remain limited and understudied. These studies focus overwhelmingly on the commemoration of Israel’s founding myths without exploring the impact of subsequent historical events on the myriad of commemorative modes. This thesis analyzes arguably the most central of these modes, Yizkor [memorial] literature, following the watershed October War of 1973 while consistently referencing Yizkor books from the Six-Day War (1967). Given the October War’s far reaching effect on Israeli society, one should naturally assume that Yizkor literature would reflect the social mood on the eve of the war however this is not necessarily the case. An analysis of similarities in the structure and content of memorial books for over 25 combat soldier, challenges popular conceptions of Yizkor literature as a private mode of commemoration while raising important questions about the nature of the commemorative genre as a whole. Against this backdrop, the thesis explores ostensibly rare instances where commemorative narratives go “off script”, expressing pain, disillusionment, and bereavement. Finally, I argue that memorial literature’s ability to remain largely insulated against the post-war discourse lies in its inherent structure.
iv
Preface
So the nation, in tears of amazement, will ask: And even on that Friday I was informed of his “Who are you?” death, before going to identify him, very lonely, And they will answer quietly: wandering across lawns, between university “We are the silver platter on which the Jewish buildings, under a fierce sun, even then I began State was given to you.” to think of you, of the things I should say to you, This was their answer as they fell back into the how out of my private sorrow a common truth shadows would illumine us all … And the rest will be told in the history of Israel. A.B. Yehoshua “Early in the Summer of 1970”2 Natan Alterman, “The Silver Platter”1
My journey toward this research topic may be more interesting than the thesis itself.12I grew up knowing that my father had been in the Israeli army. I was certain that he had fought in a war, though I’m not sure that he ever explicitly told me this. When I think back to our relationship, I can’t seem to overcome how preoccupied-- perhaps even obsessed—I was with my father’s military service. I remember playing with an army of toy soldiers, imagining my father as the hero of the battle, an act that is captured on a dusty VHS tape somewhere in my childhood home.
At a certain point in my youth, I became acutely aware that my father had seen something during his military service that had profoundly impacted his life trajectory.
Though wholly disinterested in the politics and history of Israel, these topics began to slowly creep into my consciousness. My father would become enraged at Israeli political events. This was always in Hebrew and always at the dinner table. One of my father’s
1 Yehoshua, Abraham B. Early in the Summer of 1970. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1977. 2http://jpress.org.il/Default/Scripting/ArticleWin.asp?From=Archive&Skin=TAUHe&BaseHref=DAV/1947/1 2/19&EntityId=Ar00205&ViewMode=HTML. v most recurrent expressions, “this is why we are here” appeared more and more frequently. And while I can’t remember ever probing the value of his decision, Israel nevertheless held a dear place in both of our hearts. Jumping ahead in the timeline, I became familiarized with the lore surrounding the Six-Day War and Yom Kippur War. I learned that my father had served in the latter and also that he did not want to discuss this at all.
During my undergraduate years, I grew increasingly interested in the history of
Israel and the Middle East. Alan Dershowitz’s A Case for Israel, a gift from my father, sparked an interest that subsists to this day. I began to ask my father questions about his military service which in retrospect may have been invasive. His repeated refusals to share his experiences with me did little to allay my fascination. I continued to delve deeper into the Arab-Israeli conflict, even deciding to enroll in a semester abroad at Tel
Aviv University, yet I could not seem to satisfy my curiosity.
Finally, during a 2008 Passover Seder, my father unexpectedly opened up to my sister, mother, and myself about everything that had happened to him during October
1973. His experiences, which I have no right or permission to share with the reader, are unimaginable. What remains is a date and location: October 22, 1973 and Fayid
Airbase. My father endured something that should not be part of the human experience.
And yet, generation after generation endures these experiences. Some people integrate them into their overall life story, as if only an unpleasant but necessary stage in life.
Others carry this trauma on the surface of their consciousness. My father is somewhere
vi in between these two categories, outwardly discounting the war’s traumatic effect on him while also admitting to its profound influence on his life trajectory.
Rather than presenting a sense of closure, my father’s story only inspired more questions. I contacted the IDF Archives, read through military histories and personal memoirs from the Yom Kippur War, and spent hours scouring the internet for any pictures or stories that might clarify what I had heard from my father. The IDF Archive, still under strict censorship, could not release any information concerning Fayid Airbase on October 22. The more I struggled to understand my father’s experience the less this struggle seemed possible. In the end, I was left with an interpretation of the Yom Kippur
War as a disruptive, traumatic event which pushed my father to relocate our family to the
United States. In no uncertain terms, it is this complex relationship between memory and history which has inspired this study.
My research began with the assumption that memorial literature following the
Yom Kippur War would reflect the same feelings of disillusionment and betrayal that were foundational to my father’s interpretation of the war. The prominence of these reactions in Israel’s post-war protest movement was matched by Israel’s leading visual artists and poets, strengthening my resolve that I would be able to locate these feelings in many of the Yizkor books. After a cursory examination, I discovered that in fact most of them remained faithful to the preexisting national narrative. My problematica thus shifted to accommodate the marginal position of deviant narratives.
By dissecting the structure and content of Yizkor books, I discovered that narratives which I had originally interpreted as deviant were in fact integral to the overall
vii structure of memorial literature. I dissected the structure and thematic content of Yizkor literature revealing that seemingly critical narratives were all directed at abstract conceptions of God or land. Motti Ashenkazi’s famous placards calling for the resignation of Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan, and other ministers during the winter of 1974 never find expression in Yizkor literature.3 Instead, each book follows a standardized format, never fully allowing any deviation from the traditional national narrative. In this way, the Yizkor book resembles the military cemetery with its rows of uniform headstones. The changing national discourse vis-à-vis patriotic sacrifice and national service after the Yom Kippur War would present a challenge to Yizkor literature and inevitably result in its gradual marginalization.
3 Weiss, Bracha, “Motti Ashkenazi: The Pioneer of the Yom Kippur War Protest,” The Marker, March 21, 2012, http://cafe.themarker.com/post/2570803/. viii
Table of Contents
ABSTRACT ...... iv
PREFACE ...... v
INTRODUCTION ...... 1 The Evolution of Yizkor literature ...... 4 Source Base ...... 12 A Brief Overview of Memory Theory ...... 15 Israeli National Memory and Commemoration ...... 19 Mourning, Loss, and War in Israel ...... 25
CHAPTER I: Narrative Structure and Thematic Continuity ...... 28 Structure of Yizkor Literature ...... 30 Common Tropes ...... 34 Narratives of Land Attachment...... 34 Narratives of Military Service and War ...... 39 Narratives of Death and Personal Sacrifice ...... 44
CHAPTER II: Tearing the Commemorative Fabric ...... 53
CHAPTER III: The Commemorative Bilingualism of Yizkor Literature ...... 66 Remembering in Two Languages ...... 69
BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 76
APPENDIX ...... 78
viii
Introduction
Yizkor literature is a symphony of independent voices making up a synchronous roar. For centuries it served as a documentary response to Jewish loss and trauma- from early memorial books following the first Crusades to the post-Holocaust yizkher bikher.
In the Israeli context, Yizkor literature serves as a safeguard against the passing of time and the people that pass along with it. As one of the primary modes of commemoration for fallen soldiers, the dedication to compiling Yizkor books seems almost frenetic, as if each cease-fire initiates a new struggle against collective amnesia. It is a vessel for the legitimate and sanctioned expression of powerful human emotions such as grief, loss, and pain. On the whole, Yizkor literature presents an opportunity to articulate one’s grief privately within a normative national commemorative tradition. This perceived sense of privacy, coupled with a strong sense of commemorative tradition, makes Yizkor literature an invaluable historical tool for uncovering how “private” commemoration interacts with social change.
By analyzing the Yizkor books of twenty-five fallen soldiers from the Yom
Kippur War, this thesis offers a new understanding of Yizkor literature as a whole.
Applying a comparative approach, I will offer a close reading of Yizkor books from the
Six Day War (1967) and Yom Kippur War (1973) that were dedicated to soldiers from the Golani Brigade. The first chapter will analyze the Yizkor books in terms of their
1 structure and content with close attention to similarities between books dedicated to the fallen of 1967 and those of 1973. In chapter two, I will examine instances where the commemorative narrative seems to go “off-script,” exposing exceptional deviations. On the whole, these rare commemorative deviations demonstrate that widespread feelings of disillusionment that emerged in the immediate post-war period did not find expression in the commemorative literature as explicitly as has previously been assumed.4 In fact, this study will argue that Yizkor literature remained largely insulated against changing social tides in part due to its adherence to the rigid structure of the genre and in part due to its reluctance to challenge the normative Zionist narrative of patriotic sacrifice and heroism.
As a form of memorial, Yizkor books are literary monuments intended to leave a lasting and accurate portrait of a hero. Though frequently dedicated to one individual, they may commemorate collective groups based on their shared place of upbringing, military unit, background and so forth. Collective Yizkor books are typically assembled and funded by an umbrella organization and contain brief biographies of the individuals.
Consider the example of a Yizkor book published by Israel’s largest bank, Bank Leumi, for employees who had lost sons in battle or another published by the Northern town of
Beit HaShita for its fallen soldiers. The latter, entitled Pene haverai (The Faces of Our
Guys) opens with a one-page poem about the ten soldiers who will be commemorated in the following page- a poetic table of contents. On the second page, Natan Alterman’s ha’aish ha’hai (The Living Man) sets the tone for the rest of the book by reminding the reader that it is through the dead that one is able to continue living. “And don’t say: I
4 Sivan, Emmanuel, Private Pain and Public Remembrance in Israel. In Winter and Sivan, War and Remembrance in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge, U.K.; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 177-205; Shamir, Ilanah. Hantsahah ve-zikaron: Darkhah Shel Ha-hevrah Ha-Yiśra;elit Be-yitsuv Nofe Ha-zikaron (Tel Aviv: am oved, 1996). 2 come from ashes. You come from he who has fallen under you.”5 Over the next thirty- three pages, each individual is introduced with a single black and white picture next to the information that one might expect to find on a military gravestone.
Alon Eilat Son of Shoshana and Abraham Born in Beit HaShita 9th of Tevet 5713, December 29, 1952 Fell in battle in the Suez Canal Yom Kippur 5734, October 6, 19736
A biography, various eulogies, and correspondence do their best to present the reader with a full picture of the fallen hero. This format is repeated for each soldier. Finally, the book concludes with a description of the war: “The Yom Kippur War was a cruel and terrible war— concentrated, intense, and fatal— that put all of ours sons to the test. And the IDF stood up to this test and we are here.”7
Even larger in scale Israel’s Defense Ministry published and also the most ambitious of collective Yizkor books is. The first of these books, which often appear in multiple volumes, commemorates the lives of fallen soldiers during Israel’s War of
Independence from November 29, 1947 until March 10, 1949. The second series of book begin on March 11, 1949 and includes all fallen soldiers up until June of 1967. The
Defense Ministry continued to publish memorial volumes until April 1993 when official
Yizkor commemoration was faded out. Similar to other modes of institutional commemoration, these volumes maintain a rigid format. Resembling traditional newspaper obituaries, eulogies rarely exceed one page and contain a single I.D.-sized photograph.
5 Beit Hashitta. Pene ḥaverai (Bet-Hashiṭah: Ḳibuts ha-me’uḥad, 1974), 5 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid. 33 3
Compensating for the stenciled format of the Defense Ministry memorial volumes, Yizkor books commemorating a single soldier are funded and assembled spontaneously by family or friends as an attempt to keep their grief and memories separate from those of the collective. They have the potential to be profoundly personal and often contain a wealth of ephemera, pictures, and drawings that are a testament to the lost lives. Words strip away anonymity in a manner that is simply far more explicit, sentimental, and private than the average planted tree, stone structure, or nondescript gold-plated eulogy in the local synagogue. The tragedy and brutality of war is not spared on the reader. Interspersed between pages of unsent letters, woeful poetry, and fond memories are photographs of the individual at various life stages; they lament a life cut short. Beyond their aesthetic value, assembling a Yizkor book offers a potentially therapeutic quality that would be difficult to find in other commemorative practices. As
Emmanuel Sivan argues: “unlike wakes in other cultures, the Israeli one is likely to end up in a written and edited product…the therapeutic potential of the activity primes it all.”8
The Evolution of Commemorative Literature
Tracing the historical development of Jewish commemorative literature takes one across many centuries and borders. Beginning with the memorbuch of 1296 until the modern Yizkor book of the present day, Yizkor literature has undergone significant shifts.9
To be sure, applying the term Yizkor to the original Jewish commemorative booklets would be an anachronism. According to an entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1906, the
8 Sivan, Emmanuel. Private Pain and Public Remembrance in Israel. 179. 9 For a much more detailed account of the development of Yizkor books up until Israel’s War of Independence, see Sivan, Dor Tasha"ḥ: Mitos, Dyoḳan ṿe-ziḳaron, 172-175. 4 title of the first known commemorative book derived its name from the biblical Sefer ha-
Zikaron or Sefer ha-Zikaronot but gradually adopted the secularized German term memorbuch, or memory book.10 This first book, The Nuremberg Martyrology of 1296, features the names of prominent community members, benefactors, and martyrs, dating back to 1096. As if to compensate for too many lost lives, this anthology put to paper the names and deeds of individuals who had hitherto been commemorated orally during religious services.11 While not quite on the level of saintly commemoration in
Christianity, the encyclopedia also suggests that due to its completeness and organization, the first memorbuch must have followed a model of commemoration developed by the church.
The distinctly religious and exclusivist character of early memorbuchs highlights an important first stage in Jewish commemorative literature. Of primary importance, the first wave of memorial literature served as an anthology of exemplary individuals whose example could be followed by the community at large. While directly linked to the service of God, the Nuremberg Martyrology also intended to demonstrate proper communal behavior. Preceding the list of dead is the Hazkarat Neshamot prayer urging
God to remember the souls of all those who have died. Names were accompanied by the individual deeds of the deceased or the amount of money they had donated to the community. However, with an increase in waves of persecution, the memorbuch began to include the names of persecuted communities spanning across Europe.
As the martyrological tradition laid its roots in many of Europe’s most prominent
Jewish communities it was also subjected to internal social changes. It should come as
10 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia, s.v. “Memor-Book” accessed April 15, 2013. http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/10613-memor-book 11 This work is alternatively referred to as the Memor-book of Mayence and Memorbuch of Nuremberg. 5 no surprise then that commemorative literature, as such an integral aspect of Jewish historiography, would begin to reflect the growing secularization of many European
Jews. Memorial books gradually shed their liturgical character by deviating away from the transcendent and moving toward a more comprehensive portrayal of the local community as an organic entity independent of the divine. This is demonstrated by the gradual prominence of communal histories, or pinkes, often centered upon administrative records. In sum, this new adaptation alluded to the scrupulous record keeping of sixteenth century European municipalities and focused on chronicling communal destruction.
On the whole, the destruction of Jewish communities in Europe during the
Holocaust added an unprecedented urgency to commemoration that transformed the
Yizkor literary genre. Centuries of persecution that had necessitated Yizkor commemorations reached a point of critical mass following the war. The totality of destruction is expressed by the sheer breadth of Holocaust Yizkor books, preserved in
Holocaust museums and libraries all around the United States. Often, these books are the only remaining histories of entire communities that were decimated. Taking this into consideration, these Yizkor books grasp at each detail in an attempt to fully recreate the community that existed prior to destruction. While Holocaust memorial literature is outside the scope of this paper and has indeed received considerable scholarly attention a brief analysis of one Holocaust Yizkor book reveals the extent to which memorial literature became a primary vehicle of Jewish historiography.12
12 For scholarship on Holocaust Yizkor literature see: Hartman, Geoffrey H. Holocaust Remembrance: The Shapes of Memory.(Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1994); Horowitz, Rosemary, Memorial Books of Eastern European Jewry: Essays On the History and Meanings of Yizker Volumes (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2011).; Kugelmass, Jack, and Jonathan Boyarin. From a Ruined Garden: The Memorial Books of Polish 6
The Kostopol Yizkor book follows the standard format for Holocaust literature, beginning with the community’s establishment and maintaining a strict timeline that takes the reader into the post-war era.13 Immediately, one should notice that the book was written in Hebrew, published in Israel, and released in 1967.14 While many
Holocaust Yizkor books are indeed published in Hebrew, this is certainly not the rule.
Within the first pages, historical details overwhelm the reader. A hand-drawn map of the community, including the location of private homes, schools, graveyards, churches, synagogues, sports facilities, are recalled from memory. Interspersed between poetry and private anecdotes from community members is a brief history of the town. Census information dating back to 1847 reminds the reader of the sheer breadth of destruction.
Historical details give way to personal memories and testimonies taken from Holocaust survivors who had moved to Israel following the war. Spanning nearly 400 pages, the book includes dozens of sections detailing daily life from Passover celebrations to military service; from the local gentiles to the town rabbi; from eating habits to dentistry and everything in between. As a whole, the book is organized according to the following chapters: Kostopol of the Past, War and Revolution, Hebrew Education in Kostopol, In the Day of Polish Control, The Russians are Coming, The Holocaust, Survivors Speak,
From the Stories of Wanderers. The book closes with a Yizkor section dedicated to the lives of Kostopol community members and their descendants who died in Israel.
Jewry (New York: Schocken Books, 1983); Young, James Edward. The Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials and Meaning (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993). 13 Kostopol is a town in Poland (present day Ukraine) that was first occupied by Soviet forces in 1939 and later by German forces in 1941. Of the roughly 3,920 Jews in Kostopol before the war, only 240 survived. 14 Though there were in fact Yizkor books published immediately following the war—the first published in 1943-- much of the Holocaust commemorative genre emerged years, if not decades, after the war. A serious examination of the Holocaust only emerged in Israel after the Eichmann Trial of 1962. Holocaust commemoration was thus slow to gain momentum leaving many survivors with a tremendous amount of emotional baggage. 7
On the whole, the Kostopol Book is victorious in its resistance against collective amnesia. Like the entire Yizkor genre, it fights time’s destructive effect by constructing an image of what was. Though the reflected image merely a reflection, it succeeds in preventing time’s destructive influence. Yizkor commemoration’s original focus on the sacred relationship between the Jewish community and God was promptly superseded by a communal history that expresses a curious tension. The historical timeline projected by the Kostopol Book, ending with stories of community members in the Land of Israel, embodies Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi’s concept of “an aching nostalgia for a vanished
Jewish past.”15 Throughout the Kostopol Book, remembering teeters between “repulsion and attraction, rejection and a sense of loss, iconoclasm and grief”.16 And while this tension runs rampant in Israeli Holocaust commemoration, Yizkor’s relocation to the
Zionist framework would add a new layer of complexity inherent in the tension of memory.
Accompanying the waves of Jewish immigration to Palestine during the Second and Third Aliyah (1904-1914 and 1919-1923, respectively), memorial literature entered a new distinctly Zionist phase. The first Yizkor book to appear in the Land of Israel was published in 1911 to commemorate the lives of eight Jews that had been killed in confrontations with Arabs. Though Zionist pioneer Yehoshua Radler-Feldman originally conceived the commemorative volume, contributors included Alexander Ziskind
Rabinovich and Yosef Chaim Bsrenner.17 The Second Aliyah’s significance in forming
15 Yerushalmi, Yosef Hayim. Zakhor, Jewish History and Jewish Memory (New York: Schocken Books, 1989), 97. 16 Ibid. 17 Rabinovitz, Alexander Siskind. Yizkor: Matsevat Zikaron Le-ḥalale Ha-poʻalim Ha-ʻIvrim Be-Erets Yiśraʾel. (Yafo: Defus A. Atin, 1911). 8 the prevailing Zionist ideology makes the 1911 Yizkor book particularly significance. In the words of the Jonathan Frankel:
The importance of the Yizkor book published in 1911 lies in the fact that nowhere else, perhaps, is it possible to observe in so concentrated a manner, the process by which members of the Second Aliya were developing ways of thought and speech suffused with mythological motifs… provid[ing] an ideal forum for those who felt driven at that time to create a pantheon of heroes, or perhaps a martyrology, for the movement. Inevitably, the enterprise aroused the strongest possible emotions and called forth a broad range of reactions, both ideological and personal, involving different views of the past, the present, and the future of the Jewish people.18
The reworking of a Jewish tradition to fit the needs of the Zionist movement was both typical of the movement and established a martyrological precedent that would prove difficult to shake. Commemoration was transformed into an arena in which opposing ideological groups battled for ideological supremacy in an infantile society struggling with an identity crisis.
The language of commemoration used in the 1911 Yizkor book established an iconography that was both familiar and unique, connecting imagery that would have a deeper spiritual resonance with a secular, nationalist movement. Connections to the land of Israel are described in existential term, as if Eretz Yisrael and the Jewish individual are inseparable halves of one whole. The relationship between land and person emerges as a dominant theme of the Yizkor book as violent death symbolizes a blood oath between he who dies fighting for the land. Again, the editors of the Yizkor book articulate bloodshed in the land of Israel as if the earth demanded blood-sacrifice. In his contribution, K.L.
Silman writes:
18 Frankel, Jonathan. The “Yizkor” Book of 1911: A Note on National Myths in the Second Aliya. In Religion, Ideology, and Nationalism in Europe and America, 355-384 (Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Center for Jewish History. 1986). 9
Blood, Blood. Beautiful is its color and the earth in which it sinks is cherished and dear to us. As the body needs blood, so too does the entire nation and the earth. The rock on which their blood boiled remains there for the book of memory but more than this, it is the earth. Its memory is with us from generation to generation. And if it were not for the spilling of blood on this soil, our thoughts would not be fructified with life…And if we had no irrigated the land with our blood, we wouldn’t be standing on it today.19
In this eulogy, Eretz Yisrael is the divine, transcendent force. As God demanded the sacrifice of Isaac, the land of Israel demands the spilling of blood. Commenting on this phenomenon, Boaz Neumann argues that in the language of the halutzim bodily fluids, of which blood is central, was often described as crucial for the transformation of the physical land in Palestine to become the land of the halutzim, or the land of Israel.20
Blood, sweat, and tears were essential to the dissolution of boundaries between land and man.
The connection between man and God, characteristic of the crusader Yizkor books, is replaced by the transcendental connection between man and Earth. Boaz
Neumann argues that this rhetoric must not be perceived as rhetorical or allegorical. On the contrary, the language of the halutzim whom Neumann describes as the “paradigmatic
Zionists” must be taken at face value if one is to fully grasp the extent of their existential
“being-in-the-land.”21 When put into writing, this affinity was translated as a central component of Zionism’s national ethos. Familiarizing oneself with Israel’s physical landscape – knowing each rock or tree – was central to the Zionist experience and could not be achieved from a distance.
19 Rabinovitz, Alexander Siskind. Yizkor: Matsevat Zikaron Le-ḥalale Ha-poʻalim Ha-ʻIvrim Be-Erets Yiśraʾel. 50. 20 Neumann, Boaz. Land and Desire in Early Zionism (Waltham, Mass.: Brandeis University Press, 2011), 57. 21 Neumann, Land and Desire in Early Zionism. 1-2. 10
Surrounding the symbolism of the 1911 Yizkor book is the forthright message that martyrdom, achieved through violent confrontations with the enemy, is not only integral to national redemption, but constitutes a holy act. The opening lines of the book implore the Jewish people, rather than God, to remember those that were killed doing their “holy work.”22 Continuing, the dead are described as “lines of holy-pioneers”
(halutsim-kadoshim). National sacrifice and the settlement of the Land of Israel are thus articulated as holy, rather, than secular acts. While I do not doubt the secular character of the Zionist pioneer movement, it bears mentioning that the emerging Zionist national ethos, as expressed through commemoration, was not devoid of spirituality or existentialism. The blossoming national ethos, seeping from each page in the 1911
Yizkor book, set a commemorative precedent that would ebb and flow during each following phase of Yizkor literature. As Jonathan Frankel notes:
Images of blood and soil, of sheer heroism as the negation of Galut and guarantee of Geulah; of the new man as direct heir to the warriors of ancient times…[were] rendered still greater because they had taken hold particularly in the Poale Zion party which was to produce so many of the dominant leaders of the labor movement and the Yishuv.23
Commemoration, though only one factor, contributed to the solidification of a distinct
Zionist national ethos. Similarly, as part of a broader domination of Israeli social and political life by these figures, Yizkor literature would naturally accompany Israeli society during each historical milestone.
The 1948 War of Independence marked an integral stage in the development of
Yizkor literature and what would become the Israeli commemorative tradition. While the
Yishuv was the predominant benefactor of commemoration prior to 1948, the war’s
22 Rabinovitz, Alexander Siskind. Yizkor: Matsevat Zikaron Le-ḥalale Ha-poʻalim Ha-ʻIvrim Be-Erets Yiśraʾel., iv. 23 Frankel. The “Yizkor” Book of 1911: A Note on National Myths in the Second Aliya. 384. 11 devastating impact on Palestine’s Jewish population- particularly among young men (19-
21) -- resulted in a collective state of mourning that inspired a new commemorative approach.24 As a direct result, much of the post--1948 commemoration became though still reliant on pre-war commemorative traditions. Of these, Yizkor literature was able to best capture the collective mood following the war. As Emmanuel Sivan explains:
The emergence of ‘booklets of commemoration’ highlights the Israeli cult of the fallen and the centrality of the 1948 experience. Patterns of this cult were shaped in the years just after the War of Independence and spread throughout society, helped by the impact of some Yizkor books which became best-sellers.25
Yizkor books such as “Friends Talk About Jimmy” and the overarching involvement
Israel’s new social and ideological elite made Yizkor literature into something of a status symbol. Moreover, the accessibility of the Yizkor book in terms of cost and availability, coupled with the Zionist establishment’s virtual nod of approval, made Yizkor literature uniquely popular. Of the roughly 4,000 soldiers killed in 1948, 32 percent were commemorated “unofficially”. By 1973, this number would almost double.
Source Base
In a poll recently conducted in Israel, the Golani Brigade ranked as the most sought after infantry brigade among new recruits, a fact that has not always been true.26
Owing in large part to its reputation as comprised of fiercely brave soldiers that have been at the frontlines of every Arab-Israeli conflict, many new Israeli recruits see Golani as the most direct way to prove their patriotism and loyalty to Israel. In the first decades
24 See Sivan. 1948 Generation: Myth, Profile,and Memory. 25 Ibid., 182. 26 Lappin, Yaakov. “Golani Brigade Top Choice for New Recruits.” Jerusalem Post. 29 October 2012. Web. 11 April 2013. 12 of statehood, though, the Golani Brigade was a standard, non-volunteer infantry brigade that lacked the prestige of the Israeli paratroopers, reconnaissance battalions, or air force.
As a result, physically fit recruits were typically filtered into Golani after being denied acceptance to many of the most prestigious, volunteer units. However Golani’s successful recapturing of Mt. Hermon during the Yom Kippur War and the subsequent media frenzy contributed to the brigade’s current reputation as the IDF’s spearhead [ḥad ha’ḥanit] in battle. In fact, the percentage of new recruits expressing a desire to serve in Golani doubled between 1974 and 1980.27
Of primary importance to this study is the aura of equality that Golani represented. Golani: Family of Warriors, a brigade history published in 1980, places considerable emphasis on the unit’s heterogeneity.28 Several testimonies are included by high ranking officers describing the high level of equality and comradery that transcended Israeli social fissures. One officer mentioned how it was only during his military service that he met “the second Israel,” while another claimed that the many stereotypes applied to certain ethnic groups were dispelled during his service.29 It is precisely this fact that makes this brigade the perfect case study for commemoration as it reflects the entirety of Israeli society (barring the ultra-Orthodox and Muslim minority).
Of the 127 Golani soldiers who fell in 1973, roughly 63% were from urban areas while
36% were from kibbutzim or moshavim. Death did not discriminate in battle and therefore one would certainly come across Sabras and immigrants, traditionalists and secularists, Ashkenazim and Mizrachim, and even Druze among the casualty lists. In
27 Gal, Reuven. A Portrait of the Israeli Soldier (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1986), 64. 28 Beṭelhaim, Avi. Golani: Mishpaḥat Loḥamim (Mifḳedet Ḥativat Golani, Ḥinukh be-siyuʻa Ḳetsin ḥinukh rashi, ʻAnaf hasbarah be-emtsaʻut Misrad ha-biṭaḥon, 1980). 29 Ibid., 13-14. 13 light of this data and reputation, the Golani Brigade offers a unique opportunity to uncover how the different strata of Israeli society commemorated their loved ones-- irrespective of ethnic ties, religious involvement, or location within Israel.
In large part, this study is based almost on Yizkor books that were printed immediately following the Yom Kippur War and Six-Day War for Golani Brigade soldiers. Though I tried to be as thorough as possible, it is impossible to be certain that I have looked at every piece of commemorative writing for Golani soldiers from these periods. In fact, the Golani Archive and Museum and Defense Ministry were unable
(perhaps unwilling) to provide me with a comprehensive list of Golani’s casualties during the Yom Kippur War and Six Day War, let alone a comprehensive list with details revealing how each soldier was commemorated.30
Admittedly, my research began somewhat haphazardly. After looking through a public memorial list that contained the names of every Golani soldier that fell from 1948 to the present, including their date of death, I began to compile two separate casualty lists for 1967 and 1973. To create a general sketch of each soldier’s background information, including how they were commemorated after the war, I looked up each name in the two volume Yizkor book released by the Defense Ministry. What emerged was an enlightening, albeit general, prosopography for each war’s casualties, though this will be discussed in greater detail later. In compiling the prosopography, I was able to get an idea of how many soldiers were commemorated via Yizkor literature versus other means, as listed earlier. Out of the 127 soldiers that were killed during the Yom Kippur War, 61 were featured in some form of commemorative literature. This proportion stands in stark
30 My visit to the Golani Archive and Memorial took place in early June 2012. During this visit, the manager of the archive cited his moral and professional responsibility to the families of fallen soldiers as his reason for not providing me with memorial materials. 14 contrast to the 34 out of 50 soldiers that were featured in some form of commemorative literature following the Six-Day War.
While a majority of commemorative literature could be found in the National
Library of Israel, I was still unable to locate a Yizkor book for each soldier listed by the
Ministry of Defense as having received one.31 Nevertheless, as I will demonstrate, the distinct narrative trends present in the available literature from 1967 and 1973 imply that even the books that were untraceable would likely follow a similar pattern. Indeed, it would be hasty to make any definitive claim as to why these books may not have been submitted however one wonders whether these families elected to keep their commemoration explicitly private out of a sense of embitterment or disaffection.
A Brief Overview of Memory Theory
Despite being a fairly recent hot topic in the academic world, theories of collective memory have been undeniably influential across many disciplines and borders.
It should come as no surprise, then, that scholarship on Israeli collective memory builds upon many of the most canonical writings concerning ideas of collective memory and commemoration from Maurice Halbwachs to George Mosse. As such concentrated expressions of memory, an analysis of Yizkor literature should naturally heed these studies. This section will touch upon what I consider to be the most important writings on collective memory for the purposes of this study.
31 The National Library of Israel is home to the largest collection of Hebraica and Judaica literature. Interestingly enough, all printed material is submitted to the library by law. All Yizkor literature is cataloged according to the last name of the soldier. It is thus interesting that some of this literature was untraceable. 15
The idea that individual memory is intrinsically linked to one’s social framework can be traced back to Maurice Halbwachs. According to his theory, individual acts of remembering naturally occur within a given social framework and are therefore held up to the light of the present. Society is the site of every facet of memory from the moment the event occurs to the later recollection, recognition, and localization of the event. The act of remembering continuously negotiates with an existing collective memory and ultimately becomes subservient to it. Halbwachs also points out that memories are continuously recalled by the individual in light of a constantly changing collective memory. Collective memory thus uses the social framework “to reconstruct an image of the past which is in accord, in each epoch, with the predominant thoughts of the society.”32
Using Halbwach’s scholarship on collective memory as a theoretical framework,
Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War must be interpreted against the backdrop of
Israeli collective memory. Like all nation states, the Zionist establishment invested considerable energy to shape a collective memory that binds individuals together and legitimates future goals. Commemoration, a fundamentally nostalgic act, cannot be separated from the social framework in which it takes place. In this sense, Halbwach’s placed too much emphasis on the influence of social context.
It is impossible to overstate the significance of Pierre Nora’s essay Between
Memory and History for the study of collective memory. Nora interprets memory as being in a constant struggle with history. History encroaches upon the act of remembering though is itself influenced by the multiplicity of memories in a given
32 Halbwachs, Maurice, and Lewis A. Coser. On Collective Memory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 40. 16 society. He argues that the result of this interaction is an invented landscape of memory
[lieux de memoire] that becomes an integral part of a society’s collective memory. This lieux de memoire stands in opposition to the real environments of memory (milieux de memoire) while also taking its place. In essence, Nora asserts that history has replaced memory.
Is Yizkor literature then a secretion of pure memory, uninhibited by Israel’s collective memory, or is it merely part of the vast lieux de memoire? In a sense, Yizkor literature replaces the act of remembering. In a short and concentrated burst of remembering, inspired by intense feelings of grief and loss, an individual is projected into the vast landscape of collective memory. This act heeds the national call to remember and reinforces the idea that “without commemorative vigilance, history would soon sweep them away.”33 Yizkor literature can thus be thought of in terms of its place in
Israel’s lieux de memoire. Moreover, the commemorative genre is consciously and continuously reinforced by society in an effort to immortalize death and protect against the destructive nature of time.
Jan Assman’s theory of cultural memory builds upon Halbwach’s theory of social conditioned memory.34 Assman argues that if collective memory perpetually negotiates the formation of the individual memory, cultural memory is the passing down of a much more immense temporal conception. Cultural memory is the degree to which individuals connect to the past, are sustained by its significance, but are equally as instrumental in its own sustenance. Finally, cultural memory is not static and is continually shaped generation after generation.
33 Nora, Pierre. “Memory and History: Les Lieux de Memoire”. Representations 26, 7-24. (1989),12 34 It is only fair to mention that despite appearing under Jan Assman’s name, he credits Aleida Assman with helping conceive of this theory. 17
Assman’s analysis of Halbwach’s conception of collective memory indeed has much to contribute to the present study. His idea of communicative memory, or narrative memory, complements Halbwach’s conception of a memory shaped by social interactions, but emphasizes the importance of interpretative factors. This point holds significant weight when considering the act of remembering, through memorialization, an individual killed in battle. Interpretative factors play a significant role in the representation and commemoration of the individual in Israeli society. In this way, commemoration communicates memory within the Neitzschean concept of society as a straightjacket, ultimately subverting it into an act that supports communal goals and functions.35
Paul Connerton reiterates the concept of social or collective memory in How
Societies Remember. He states that experiences are always placed in a social context to ensure that they are intelligible to other members of the collective. Commemoration, as a function of collective remembering, is also placed within the social context in an effort to convey values that legitimate national aspirations. Connerton refers to commemoration as an explicit reference to “prototypical persons and events” but is clearly alluding to the commemoration of national figures (forefathers, national heroes, etc) and national events
(i.e. memorial day or independence day).36 While this is undoubtedly applicable to
Israeli society, Yizkor literature represents the linkage of a community of heroes with the community of fallen. Each soldier is transformed into the prototypical person by virtue of his personal sacrifice for the sake of the homeland.
35 Assmann, Jan and Rodney Livingstone. Religion and Cultural Memory: Ten Studies (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press. 2006), 6. 36 Ibid. 18
Another way of conceptualizing Yizkor literature is based on Laurence Kirmayer’s theory of the metaphorical landscape of memory. According to Kirymayer's definition, landscapes of memory constitute a multiplicity of memories that hold personal and social significance and contribute to the way one remembers a significant event. Echoing the theories of Assman and Halbwachs, Kirmayer states that landscapes of memory are culturally constructed.37 Trauma narratives become part of this landscape of memory if the event is recognized and integrated into the collective identity, though never unconditionally. Kirmayer emphasizes that trauma narratives are placed in a "moral quarantine" wherein they are restricted by the social order. Deviation often leads to social ostracism and delegitimization thus having a considerable impact on the formation of these narratives. The content of Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War should be thought of then as conforming to the moral quarantine of Israeli society.
Israeli National Memory and Commemoration
Born out of the fire of war and continuing until the present day, Israelis often perceive their national story as a relentless cycle of tragedies, victims, and sacrifices.
Popular representations of Israeli national history are steeped in what Salo Baron referred to as the “lachrymose conception of Jewish history”. This perception has been channeled into an extensive network of commemoration that is simply part and parcel of the Israeli national identity. On one hand, it is manifested in the physical landscape of Israel through monuments, bulletin boards, placards, and literature. On the other, it is firmly entrenched in Israel’s temporal structure, demarcated by national days of remembrance
37 It should be useful to note that Kirmayer’s study focuses on the parallel trauma narratives among Holocaust survivors and child-abuse victims. 19 and commemoration. Even before 1948, the emergence of a “cult of the fallen” set a commemorative precedent that would be followed during each violent rupture. It would also become a yardstick by which Israel’s national ethos could be measured.38 Though
Yizkor literature is only one means of memorialization, it occupies an important place in the Israeli commemorative tradition.
Scholarly approaches to Israeli collective memory have been largely interdisciplinary and interconnected. They are in large part inspired by scholarship on
European collective memory and apply a similar methodology to the Israeli context. In a sense, studies on collective memory work in tandem – that is to say, as each respective scholar examines the Israeli national memory from a different field, the entire subject benefits. And while a brief overview of memory theory was no doubt beneficial, other works related to collective memory on an international scale, while still important, are outside the scope of this paper, which will focus on scholarship related to Israeli collective memory.
The creation of a distinctly Israeli collective memory naturally began prior to the establishment of the state in 1948 and thus occupies a prominent role in the literature. In
Yael Zerubavel’s Recovered Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli
National Tradition a handful of Israel’s most important national myths, manifested in popular culture and mainstream education, are meticulously deconstructed. Using the cases of Bar-Kokhba, Tel Hai, and Masada, Zerubavel highlights how the predominant
38 George Mosse coined this term In Fallen Soldiers: Reshaping the Memory of the World Wars, referencing the intensive commemoration of German soldiers. Mosse links the commemoration of French soldiers during the Napoleonic War and the German Wars of Liberation. This network of commemoration serves as a constant reminder of the glory of war and national sacrifice even during times of peace. Moreover, the cult of the fallen soldier masks the cruelty and brutality of war in an effort to justify future conflict. 20 commemorative narrative used selections from Jewish history to create a shared past and legitimate future. According to Zerubavel’s interpretation, this process was not inventive but rather selective in its reading of history. The interaction between remembering and forgetting, between inclusion and exclusion is in its very essence central to the Israeli commemorative tradition.
Another important work is Emmanuel Sivan’s 1948 Generation: Myth, Profile, and Memory which examines in on the commemoration of soldiers from the 1948 War of
Independence with a special focus on Yizkor literature. Taking some of the most widely held myths concerning the war and its causalities, Sivan demonstrates the extent that
Yizkor literature contributed to the way the 1948 war is categorized. The study begins with the widely held notion that 1948 was the bloodiest war in terms of its death toll and that the casualties consisted primarily of young men between the ages of 18 and 25 and women. However according to Sivan, the heavy toll exacted upon the civilian population was neglected and is therefore outside the scope of commemoration. Moreover, he grapples with the popular misconception that in 1948, an entire generation of young
Sabras was wounded [nifga] during the war and as a result, the Yishuv and the future state of Israel suffered a considerable loss in terms of future leaders and elite. Once again, a more nuanced examination reveals that the death toll among Sabras was actually more or less identical to that of recent immigrants and Jews that had grown up in Palestine, though Sabras overwhelmed the post-war commemoration. If nothing else, Sivan’s study emphasizes the potential of Yizkor literature in contributing to Israel’s collective memory while at the same time functioning as an extension of social trends.
21
Eight years after the publication of 1948 Generation, Sivan expanded his analysis of Israeli war commemoration in an essay entitled Private Pain and Public Remembrance in Israel By analyzing the commemorative trends following the War of Independence,
Six Day War, Yom Kippur War, and Lebanon War, Sivan argues that in fact, commemoration and in particular Yizkor literature echoed the social and political dialogues during each respective conflict. If Sivan’s argument is to be followed, Yizkor literature is an active agent in the creation of Israel’s collective memory. It must be assumed, therefore, that Yizkor literature following the Yom Kippur War not only reflected the broader societal feelings of betrayal and doubt over the meaning of war and sacrifice but contributed to the prominent position of these feelings in the Israeli national narrative. As a whole, Yizkor literature embodies a process of remembering, mourning, and healing that occurs on a small, personal level but becomes a national act.
The integration of Yizkor literature into the Israeli commemorative network coincided with a period of intensive negotiations between the state and bereaved families.
Maoz Azaryahu traces the development of different commemorate patterns following the
War of Independence, with a focus on military parades, military graveyards, headstones, and Yizkor literature. Through an active negotiation between state institutions and bereaving families, the commemoration of fallen soldiers took on a distinctly patriotic element. Azaryahu rightly draws attention to the expressed obligation of the state towards bereaved families and demonstrates how commemoration becomes “symbolic compensation” to the families. The bereaved family is transformed into a separate societal unit through its relationship with the state and comes to embody national sacrifice. It is precisely this dynamic that, according to Azaryahu, played a significant
22 role in Israeli society’s reaction to bereavement. The formulation of Yizkor literature thus becomes an extension of this relationship, though we will see that this is not always the case.
A central component to Israel’s national commemorative tradition is the symbiotic relationship between its “cult of the fallen” and commemorative style. Though we have already seen how memorialization stirred up a significant debate among Zionist leaders prior to the War of Independence, 1948 crystallized many of the most popular notions of heroic sacrifice: the few versus the many, and the notion that individual heroism can lead to military victory. The War of Independence also articulated the social obligation to pay homage to those who “in death, commanded us [the community] to live”, as the popular expression goes. Commemoration assumed the leading role in linking these violent deaths to the nation and its survival thereby glorifying military service and national sacrifice. While Yizkor books certainly reflected these commemorative patterns, they were much more prevalent in institutional forms of commemoration.
Against this backdrop, the stories of Masada and Bar Kokhba, the focus of
Zerubavel’s study, assume a startling new relevance. These narratives transformed the fallen of 1948 into a community immune to the passing of time that “rests on the patterns of thinking and sophisticated mechanisms of commentary that existed in the Hebrew- native tradition that developed in Israel.”39 National sacrifice becomes characteristically mythological and is fueled by stories of individual acts of heroism in battle. It should thus be point out, that heroism becomes a function of violence, confined to the battlefield
39 Azaryahu, Maoz, and Merkaz le-moreshet Ben-Guryon. Pulḥane Medinah: ḥagigot Ha-ʻatsmaʾut ṿe- hantsaḥat Ha-noflim, 1948-1956 (Ḳiryat Śedeh-Boḳer : [Beersheba]: ha-Merkaz le-moreshet Ben-Guryon, 1995), 116. 23 and violent death. Despite the tremendous resolve of civilians to continue functioning throughout the 1948 war, they were largely excluded from commemoration.40
Though Yizkor literature offers an excellent insight into how the Israeli national ethos is articulated, it can also be used as an ideological map Zionist ideology’s gradual development. Focusing on the Yizkor book of 1911 – indeed the first Yizkor book published in the Yishuv- Jonathan Frankel argues that “nowhere else, perhaps, is it possible to observe in so concentrated a manner, the process by which members of the
Second Aliya were developing ways of thought and speech suffused with mythological motifs.”41 This Yizkor book set the commemorative precedent that elevated violent death over passive death and infused it with mythological imagery. Equally as important, the
Yizkor book of 1911 exhibited the degree to which this rhetoric was met with opposition from other community members. And yet regardless of the dominant narrative that emerged out of this ideological clash, this was certainly not the last time that commemoration became the sight of ideological disagreements.
In fact, the entire premise of Israel’s national ethos rests on the unequivocal connection between antiquity and modernity. This supposed link “continuously negotiates between available historical records and current social and political agendas” in an unending search for legitimacy.42 Through an elaborate network of commemoration, the Israeli national ethos became integrated into schools, youth movements, and most other facets of public life through universalized education and
40 See Sivan, Dor Tasha"ḥ: Mitos, Dyoḳan ṿe-ziḳaron. 41 Frankel. The “Yizkor” Book of 1911: A Note on National Myths in the Second Aliya. 357. 42 Zerubavel, Yael. Recovered Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli National Tradition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 5. 24 memorialized days."43 There can be no doubt that state efforts towards creating a cohesive national culture were tremendously successful. As we will see in chapter two,
Yizkor literature retained a seemingly unbreakable connection with the national ethos, even during periods of social upheaval.
Mourning, Loss, and War in Israel:
Israel’s history of protracted conflict has had an immense impact on the way that
Israeli’s respond and interpret death. Commemoration, though extremely important in the articulation of these responses, is equally as dependent on expressions of bereavement. Studies of bereavement and social responses to war are relatively recent phenomena in Israel though the topic has unquestionably demanded attention. This section highlights some of what I found to be the most relevant and important scholarship on mourning, loss, and war in Israel. Many of these studies have emerged within the field of psychology though I will focus primarily on the elements that are related to bereavement, loss, and war as expressed through commemoration.
The prominent place of war and death in the Israeli collective experience touches upon Emile Durkheim’s notion of altruistic suicide. Israel’s culture of conformism during the first decades of statehood, though still persisting to various degrees into the twenty first century, creates an environment in which altruistic sacrifice flourishes.
Within this environment, the social needs of society are transformed into moral obligations. In cases where war is perceived as a primary component of societal sustenance, national sacrifice becomes a moral national obligation. As Whitney Pope
43 Ben-Amos, Avner and Bet-El, Ilana. Holocaust Day and Memorial Day in Israeli Schools: Ceremonies, Education, and History. Israel Studies 4 (1, 1999), 258. 25 notes in her analysis of Durkheim, “compliance yields honor and glory; failure to comply, disgrace.”44 Yizkor literature is the quintessential reflection of this process though it is merely one component among many. The soldier is transformed from a passive agent into a national model by willingly sacrificing himself for the nation.
A significant part of the scholarship on bereavement and commemoration in Israel touches on the interaction between the collective and the individual. As demonstrated by
Yoram Bilu and Eliezer Witztum, the interconnectivity of personal and collective bereavement has a powerful effect on the dynamics of commemoration. Bereaving families, which constitute a more exclusivist “family of bereavement, are expected to contextualize their loss and articulate it in terms of the national ethos. While they are not denied their intense feelings of grief, the central position of patriotic death and sacrifice in Israeli society has shaped the way families express. As the national ethos is scrutinized, bereavement is subjected to greater assertions of individuality. Bilu and
Witztum therefore claim that changing conceptions vis-à-vis national values invariably affects the way bereavement is expressed.
Meira Weiss picks up on this dynamic and emphasizes the standardization of death through the appropriation of bereavement and commemoration by the collective.
The state infuses bereavement with political utility and social mobility thereby transforming death-in-battle into the embodiment of national principles. At the same time, families that have experienced the loss of a loved one in battle become inseparable members of an exclusive subgroup in Israeli society that is afforded considerable respect and leverage. Furthermore, public commemoration depersonalizes the individual in order to reinforce national values. And while this ideology may be challenged, Weiss makes
44 Pope, Whitney. Durkheim's Suicide: A Classic Analyzed (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976), 20. 26 clear that public commemoration still reinforces a collective identity that continues to be held in a critical light.45
Bereavement within Israeli society has also been the focus of extensive research from a clinical perspective. While this is certainly outside the scope of this paper, many of the findings have important implications for the study of commemoration in Israel.
After counseling 102 parents that had lost a son in the Yom Kippur War or Lebanon War, a fascinating picture emerged: the loss of a son in war left a powerful existential feeling that continued unabated for upwards of fifteen years.”46 These findings clearly indicate that the social pressures on many bereaving parents to put their loss within the context of national sacrifice have little remedial effect.
45 Weiss, Meira. “Bereavement, Commemoration, and Collective Identity, in Contemporary Israeli Society” Anthropological Quarterly, 70 (2, 1997), 91-100. 46 Rubin and Dicterman, Teguvot horim shekholim l’nepilat ben b’milkhama of Malkinson, Ruth, Simon Rubin, and Eliezer Witztum. Ovdan U-shekhol Ba-ḥevrah Ha-Yiśre’elit (Yerushalayim : [Tel Aviv]: Kanah, 1993), 54. 27
Chapter One
Narrative Structure and Thematic Continuity
Omer Grynsztein and Yehuda Amichai stand shoulder to shoulder: Grynsztein in a black and white photo and Amichai in a five line poem. Omer peers over black rimmed glasses which subtly betray his date of death. Beneath this standard military photograph are just two dates and a name: “Omer Grynsztein Born: December 20, 1953” “Fell:
October 22, 1973.” Amichai’s words begin where the picture ends:
Even those who never knew him love him after his death love him: now there is a space an empty place whose form is his form whose name is his name.47
This format is repeated time and again in the Israeli commemorative landscape, signifying the opening of a Yizkor book. Titles declaring the contents of the book are simply unnecessary. Over the next thirty three pages, Omer’s life is revealed in careful detail. Accompanying photographs of playful infants and smiling youth are descriptions of Omer’s childhood that cannot hide their motherly voice. His weight at birth and weight upon leaving the hospital stream into an ocean of precise details marking the archetypal beginning of many Yizkor books.
As the book progresses, the reader becomes immersed in personal expressions of
47 Grynsztein, Omer. Yizkor books will henceforth be cited simply by the last and first name of the fallen soldier. 28 grief and nostalgia. The narratives of Omer’s friends and comrades connect to those of his parents inspiring a complex web of memories. Battle stories sprout naturally from tales of high school tiulim [hikes] in the Israeli frontier. Scattered amongst these tales are impossible attempts at consoling Omer’s parents.
This chapter will examine the Yizkor books on two fronts: the first will analyze the narrative structure shared by this particular commemorative genre. In other words, it will examine the representation of a Golani soldier's life in a specific chronological order from infancy until his death in the Yom Kippur war, which highlights certain milestones and achievements. The biography of the soldier, narrated in this highly standardized structure, at once emphasizes the individual's personal uniqueness and his belonging to a broader national story. The latter element forms a second layer of the Yizkor books. That is to say, the underlying national discourse becomes embedded not only in the structure of the collective narrative but also in the language of masculinity and national identity.
The compilation of a standard Yizkor book necessarily entailed the cooperation of family, friends, and the state. In most cases, tensions between the individual story and collective narrative are carefully sublimated and masked. There however are a few striking moments in which these unresolved contradictions erupt while remaining firmly within the narrative structure of the book.
Finally, I will analyze common thematic elements tying together each book while consistently referencing Yizkor commemoration from the Six-Day War. The significance of the Yizkor book’s content is compounded in light of the unlimited number of memories that were not included in this book. As Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson argue, people first find pieces of information that are worth sharing with others and then “select a
29 context which will justify that hope: a context which will maximize relevance.”48 The result is that each narrative, however seemingly banal or parenthetical, contributes to a complex, multidimensional construction of heroism existing within the Israeli collective consciousness.
Structure of Yizkor Literature
Structurally, Yizkor literature maintains a rigid chronological format that maps the trajectory of the individual’s life. Each book typically begins with a maternal eulogy or anecdote describing the subject’s infancy or childhood. In some cases, a narrative from someone closest to the soldier replaces the maternal narrative. These narratives naturally emanate from the immediate family and focus on the individual’s relationship to the place in which he grew up. As the Yizkor book unfolds, contributors become increasingly disassociated with the individual’s immediately family. The commemorative narrative swells, radiating outward to include friends, teachers, neighbors and comrades-in-arms.
The structural uniformity, while on the one hand reflecting the typical life trajectory of an Israeli male, standardizes a particularistic conception of Israeli life that culminates in a heroic death. The subject is born, goes to school, joins a youth movement or hikes with his friends, and upon completion of high school, volunteers for service in a combat unit. When the inevitable war breaks out, the soldier dies in battle defending his comrades and homeland. For reservists, this chronology is expanded to accommodate earlier wars, travels, and employment. War punctuates the subject’s historical timeline
48 Sperber, Dan, and Deirdre Wilson. Relevance: Communication and Cognition (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986), 142 30 creating a feedback loop which is seemingly inescapable. The structure of the Yizkor book provides a temporal restriction in which death in battle is projected as the peak of the individual’s life by virtue of its prominence within the book.
To illustrate the prototypical structure of Yizkor literature, take the example of
Moshe Timsit, commemorated as part of a Yizkor book to the relatives of Bank HaPoalim workers. Though relatively brief, Moshe’s commemoration retains a heavy emphasis on his military career. Towering above a nine-line summary of his life is the slogan: “the soldier who wanted to hoist the flag on Mt. Hermon.” To the right is a photograph of
Moshe staring coldly in his military beret and uniform (fig. 1). In lieu of family photographs, poetry, or a somber eulogy is a brief in biography: “Moshe (Morris) Timsit was born in Morocco. When he was nine years old, he immigrated to Israel and settled with his family in Kiryat-Shmona.”49 The introduction summarizes where Moshe attended school, what he studied, his military trajectory, and finally the circumstances surrounding his death on October 22, in the battle to recapture Mt. Hermon. The next section, entitled “To Moshe’s Character” reveals how Moshe was perceived by his friends and comrades. One learns that, among other things, Moshe loved carpentry and repair work, chose his friends carefully, and was the first to give up his seat to the elderly in the bomb shelter. The last section, “The Story of the Battle” recounts in greater detail how Moshe was killed while shielding a friend who had run out of ammunition (fig. 2).
Perhaps mirroring the abruptness of Moshe’s death, the final line of his commemoration reads: “At the very moment, [Moshe] was hit in the neck with a bullet and fell.”
49 Timsit, Moshe. 31
Moshe’s commemoration exemplifies the tension presented by Yizkor literature’s structural rigidity. Contributors appear restrained by the prototypical structure of Yizkor literature and are thus unable to find the balance between commemorating Moshe ‘the brother’ or ‘the son’ and Moshe ‘the hero’. As a result, each section reads as if directed outward toward the national collective rather than his closed circle of friends and family.
The overwhelming focus on his military service and death in battle, juxtaposed with the absence of personal eulogies directed at Moshe’s pre-military life, projects the image of youth as a mere precursor to death in battle. In this way, the structure is an integral component in the enforcement of heroic narratives. Even still, a sharper analysis of
Yizkor literature reveals a collection of individual narratives which are informed by, and inform, the commemorative narrative.
On the whole, individual narratives can be considered contributions which relate to specific moments in the subject’s life. They mirror the temporal structure of the commemorative narrative and generally begin with the moment when the contributor met the individual. Broadly speaking, individual narratives conclude at the moment when the contributor discovers that the subject has been killed. This format is maintained in the
Yizkor book of Ehud, an officer who died in the Golan Heights. Dorit, a childhood friend, recalls meeting Ehud in kindergarten in a transcribed conversation between what one assumes is Ehud’s closest group of friends. Her three-paragraph anecdote impresses upon the reader a sense that Ehud is a polite, caring individual with strong familial and kinship bonds. Her narrative is then interrupted and passed on to another contributor.
Finally, toward the end of the Yizkor book, Dorit recounts the moment when she discovered that Ehud had been killed:
32
When we heard on the radio about more than 600 killed, we understood that they probably wouldn’t release the names of anyone. I sat and waited by the telephone that they might notify who died, but they didn’t notify anyone. I went to sleep with a calm heart. The next day, my mother-in-law told me that they called from Beit-Keshet and told me that Ehud was killed.50
Dorit’s narrative ends with the news of Ehud’s death. Yizkor literature, as such, is a continuous juggling act between distinct individual narratives.
Adding an additional layer of complexity to Yizkor literature’s narrative structure, one can conceptualize individual narratives as functioning within two commemorative spaces: the private and the national collective. In the private commemorative space, family and friends memorialize the subject by recreating his life through a multiplicity of personal testimonies related to a given life stage. Within this level, individual narratives are merely biographical thus emphasizing the subject’s humanity. For example, Shai
Plati was born in Kibbutz Maoz Haim on October 28, 1952. He was active in youth movements, enjoyed hiking, and volunteered for the Golani Brigade’s Special Forces because he wanted to challenge himself. Photographs, poetry, and correspondence are all employed to familiarize the readership with the fallen soldier. Upon opening Shai’s
Yizkor book, one finds a picture of him as a baby, peering curiously at the camera during a section of the book dedicated to his childhood. Another picture shows Shai and a friend, perhaps already teenagers, standing posed in front of a building. The agency involved in choosing each biographical detail rebuffs the standardized conception of death that is reinforced by institutionalized commemoration. Gravestones, military burials and the average page long eulogy included in the Department of Defense Yizkor anthology may not be perceived as sufficient in memorializing a loved one. As a result,
50 Ben-Gara, Ehud. 33 individual narratives frequently maintain complete honesty in an attempt to recreate the subject in all of his insecurities.
When individual narratives are placed in the national collective commemorative space, individual narratives articulate commemoration through an institutional language, demonstrating the extent to which the Israeli national ethos permeates commemoration and the bereavement process. In this space, individual narratives articulate memory in a way that can successfully radiate outward and become meaningful to the collective. To be sure, this does not imply distinct narratives. On the contrary, each contribution functions simultaneously within each commemorative space.
Common Tropes
Setting aside the predominantly monolithic structure, common tropes also serve as a point of unification for Yizkor literature. Of the many similarities, the most common thematic elements to emerge out of Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War were narratives of land attachment; military service and war; and death and personal sacrifice.
In one sense, the ubiquity of these thematic elements problematizes an interpretation of
Yizkor literature as a private mode of commemoration, free from the normative guidance of institutional commemoration.
Narratives of Land Attachment
Early Zionist writings on the land of Israel convey an existential attachment to the physical land. Boaz Neumann argues that this rhetoric must not be perceived as
34 rhetorical or allegorical. On the contrary, the language of the halutzim whom Neumann describes as the “paradigmatic Zionists” must be taken at face value if one is to fully grasp the extent of their existential “being-in-the-land.”51 When put into writing, this affinity was translated as a central component of Zionism’s national ethos. Familiarizing oneself with Israel’s physical landscape – knowing each rock or tree – was central to the
Zionist experience and could not be achieved from a distance.
Among my sampling of Yizkor literature, commemorative narratives emphasizing the subject’s personal connection to Israel’s physical landscape occupy an important position. Given that familiarity with the land can only be achieved through exploration, hiking (or tiulim) is the primary activity of choice that ties together so much of the Yizkor literature from both 1967 and 1973. Expressions of attachment to the physical land of
Israel range in their descriptions from marginalized anecdotes to the main focus of the
Yizkor book. Daniel Vardon, part of Golani's elite reconnaissance, is an example of how this theme is subtly incorporated into commemoration. Among the detailed, often grizzly, accounts of battle that take pride of place in Daniel Vardon's commemoration is just a few sentences highlighting Daniel's relationship to Israel's physical landscape. In two paragraphs, following pages of battle descriptions, Daniel's friend, Gidi, describes the details of their hikes. When their bodies had reached physical maturity, they naturally began to explore Israel's landscape, reaching familiarity by virtue of physical immersion.
Together, they covered great distances, with Daniel in the lead due to his “wide steps and agility”.52 The sights they encountered “astounded [Daniel's) heart and mouth in their rugged expression”, surprising the two when the landscapes validated what they had
51 Neumann, Land and Desire in Early Zionism, 1. 52 Vardon, Daniel. 35 previously studied on maps. While physical immersion in the land of Israel is impressed upon the reader as a natural, national pastime, Daniel excels at it.
Gidi's recollection, however sparse, creates a link between Daniel’s heroism, displayed in battle, and his existential connection to the land told through stories of hiking. In this case, the connection manifests itself in stories of bonding between the two men. In other Yizkor books, however, the connection between Israeli-Being and physical connections with the land takes pride of place.
One of the most concentrated examples of this phenomenon appears in Avi’s
Yizkor book, the same Avi who was described above according to his dislike the military establishment. Even before opening the book, the cover reveals a serene sand dune sloping upward, away from Avi’s name, printed in the top left of the cover. Footsteps follow the sloping dune into the horizon, their owner invisible to the observer, but presumably Avi’s. The opening pages carry this theme forward with poetic anecdotes of a young Avi proclaiming his love for nature.
It was the hour of the setting sun. The sight was exciting. The child stood enchanted looking over the sea, over the sunset, and called: “Behold the wonderland”. Already at a young age, he discovered a special love for the beauty of nature.53 As Avi matured, his affinity for nature grew, making him increasingly reclusive and closed off to other people in favor of an independent life lived in the wild. While Avi did not lack friend and loved ones, his reclusiveness is often juxtaposed with his love for nature. Following the typical temporal trajectory of other Yizkor books, Avi’s love for nature becomes dominates the commemorative narrative as the book progresses. Pictures
53 Yaakov, Aviezer (Avi). 36 of bare-chested, tan young men wielding pick axes and shovels accompany stories of Avi leading groups of tourists through the Sinai desert. Whereas Daniel embraced Israel’s landscape as a facet of his Israeli Being, Avi’s existence was synonymous with the physical land of Israel, integral and irrevocable.
The prominent role of physical space in Israeli commemorative narratives stretches across temporal boundaries, creating a link between the earliest Zionist Yizkor books and those from the Yom Kippur War. Given the physical demands of the Golani
Brigade, it may be tempting to underestimate or write-off the connection between Israeli- ness and physical land. After all, it would be natural to assume that individuals with an affinity for nature and physical activity, particularly hiking, would make quality infantrymen. Examining the Yizkor book of a non-Golani soldier, side by side with those of a soldier from the Golani Brigade puts this point into perspective. Dani Berenheim, a kibbutznik in the artillery corps, was killed while attempting to evacuate his wounded comrades on October 20, 1973 during an Egyptian rocket barrage. He left behind a wife and infant daughter. Dani Berenheim’s Yizkor book, perhaps more than any other, demonstrates the extent to which Yizkor books utilize a language familiar to the collective.
Covering Dani’s Yizkor book is a black and white photograph of Israel’s national flower, the cyclamen [rakefet]. Opening to the first page, Dani’s mother recounts the story of how one day, Dani returned home from an artillery exercise with a large bag on his back. When his mother asked him about the contents of the bag, he responded that during the exercise, they had blown up rocks with heavy explosives. When the
37 explosions subsided, the soldiers saw that scattered throughout the field were cyclamen that had been growing between the rocks. As Dani’s mother recounts:
When everyone went to relax, Dani took a large bag and meticulously collected the cyclamen bulbs until the sack was full, for Dani’s heart hurt at the destruction of nature caused by the explosion. Here, look through the window of our house and you will see these bulbs growing in our garden – here they are.54
The cyclamen could not be left to lie strewn throughout the field. As the Yizkor book progresses, additional personal anecdotes reinforce the portrayal of Dani, the sensitive, reluctant warrior. A picture of a young, smiling Dani next to a black and white puppy accompanies another story recounted by his mother, explaining Dani’s love for domesticating and caring for animals. Setting aside the heartbreaking imagery in these stories, there is a subtle message complementing the commemorative narrative of his
Yizkor book. Behind the man who sacrificed his life attempting to save his comrades is a compassionate, sensitive person.
The prominent position of physical land in each commemorative narrative is tightly connected with ideals of heroism. Dani’s Yizkor book may not explicitly heroicize him on the biographical level yet it is nevertheless implicit. Each contributor to the book frames Dani as a gentle, sensitive, selfless individual, the culmination of which is his death in battle. At surface level, these memories are nostalgic reflections by bereaving parents. When placed within the broader commemorative genre, it is difficult to ignore the extent to which bereaving friends and family remember their loved ones through a familiar lexicon. This analysis should not be misconstrued as undermining the authenticity of the bereaving families. Instead, examining commemoration through the
54 Berenheim, Dani, 2. 38 lens of social change and collective memory sharpens one’s understanding of how even commemoration can become a venue for the expression of national values.
Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature negotiates between the familiar language of the halutzim and the social reality of seventies. As other forms of commemoration, namely personal and group monuments, began to reflect the changing social atmosphere, Yizkor literature maintained a similar tone to years past.55 Perhaps because of the centrality of
Yizkor literature within the Israeli commemorative tradition and the familiarity of its language to the Israeli public, deviations from the norm are exceptional and stand out as such.
Narratives of Military Service and War
The military in Israel represents the meeting point between the individual and the collective. It is a social mechanism that at once equalizes and discriminates. It is no secret that Israel’s political and economic elite are drawn largely from military roles deemed as prestigious or elite. On the other hand, it has often been argued that minority groups who do not serve in the military are not entitled to equal social capital and are thus unequal. In this sense, military service is the yardstick by which one’s social value is measured and deemed part of the collective.
A definitive, perhaps unsurprising, thematic element tying together Yizkor books in my sampling is the expression of dislike for the military as an institution. It may be
55 Ilana Shamir has explored this topic in detail in her book Commemoration and Memory. Shamir argues that monuments reflected dominant social moods after the Yom Kippur War, Lebanon War, and First Intifada. Applying this approach to Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War, however, would be misguided. 39 tempting to interpret these narratives as unpatriotic or deviant however the opposite is in fact true. Expressions of dislike for the military as an institution are consistently juxtaposed with the subject’s strong sense of civic responsibility thus lending an element of credibility to the idea of patriotic sacrifice. The Israeli combat soldier emerges as a reluctant warrior who, while uneager to fight, is ready to fill his moral responsibility to the nation.
Nimrod Bin was born in a kibbutz to two Holocaust survivors. When it came time to enlist, he volunteered for a combat unit, but as his narrative suggests, not out of love for the military. Unlike the rebellious, warring Nimrod of Genesis, Nimrod Bin enlisted with the understanding that life in Israel necessitates fighting. There is simply is no free will in this matter. According to an unidentified contributor:
In the depths of his heart, Nimrod was not a military man and didn’t love this. However, the responsibility, the obligation, and the recognition made him into an elite soldier, part of an elite unit – effective, active, and volunteering to the best of his ability.56 This narrative, at its core, projects the military as an institution that should not appreciated in and of itself. Instead, the tacit understanding that one must fight to defend his homeland buttresses the need for the military. When Alon, a family friend, takes this point further and maintains that Nimrod “hated the army, war and murder” [emphasis added], his determination to volunteer for an elite unit becomes all the more virtuous and selfless.
Aviezer (Avi) Yakov, an Ashkenazi kibbutznik who began his service in the paratroopers, only later serving as an officer in one of Golani’s battalions, disliked the
56 Bin, Nimrod. 40 military inasmuch as he was described as introverted and misanthropic. Contrary to
Nimrod Bin who at times seems like the archetypal Israeli, Avi rejected his structured kibbutz lifestyle and any attempts by family and friends to dictate his future. Throughout his Yizkor book, Avi is described as a compassionate yet introverted individual who was deeply attached to the freedom he found in nature. From an early age “he could not put up with ‘authority’ and had a difficult time conforming to life in a fixed framework”.
However, when Avi was a student at an agricultural school, his mother noted that he completed tasks out of a sense of “collective responsibility” rather than obligation. The tension between Avi’s rebelliousness and his responsibility to the collective is compounded when he reaches the age of eighteen and must enlist.
Similar to the narratives found in the other Yizkor books, Avi’s dislike of the military is repeatedly woven into the larger narrative emphasizing his willingness to fight. At times these assertions even appear as superfluous. Avi is projected as a one who “never liked the army and hated wars” but then again, who does? Another testimony from his teacher recalls his reactions to Avi’s enlistment in the army: “When Avi enlisted in the army, I asked myself more than once: Avi is capable of being a soldier? His whole being was contrary to that of a soldier. I couldn’t imagine Avi holding a gun!”
The narrator’s incredulity at the idea of Avi becoming a soldier should strike the reader as unusual. Kibbutzim are well-known producers of combat soldiers so it seems unlikely that this is incredulousness is genuine. In fact, two lines after his mother acknowledges his sense of “collective responsibility”, she recounts how Avi, “together with many of his friends volunteered for the paratroopers [emphasis added]”. In light of traditional Zionist ideals that place such a strong emphasis on military service, what is the function of this
41 narrative?
Narratives describing a reluctance to fight or disdain for the military define, or perhaps redefine, the image of heroism in Israel. On the one hand, the hero is transformed from the superhuman into the human. This definition distracts from traditional Western images of the hero as an aggressive, macho alpha male and reinforces the idea that in Israel, heroic deeds are the natural response to conflict. These narratives suggest that one’s dislike for the military legitimates national sacrifice. Yizkor literature may portray their subjects as the unlikely soldier who hated the military yet their decision to volunteer for a combat unit is seen as a natural course of action.
Reflecting the optimistic social environment, commemorative narratives from the
Six-Day War are naturally less likely to express negative feelings toward the military. As we have seen, this does not necessarily imply complete uniformity however, as one should expect, Yizkor literature emerging after the Six-Day War seems to accommodate expressions of love for the military. At times, these expressions are parenthetical, perhaps a brief mention of the individual’s pride for the military inserted into the general jubilee following the war. In others, love for the military dominates the biographical and collective narratives, detracting from the Yizkor book as a private expression of grief and nostalgia.
Though not emblematic of all Yizkor literature from the Six Day War, many Yizkor books devote an overwhelming majority of the commemorative space to the valorization of the military. In the commemoration of Arieh Ambern, his military service is the axis of his Yizkor book and therefore comes off as the essence of his life. The Yizkor book
42 reveals little information about Arieh’s personal relationships and instead focuses almost exclusively on his military service, death, and overall appreciation for the military. His wife recalls a story told to her by Arieh’s mother, in which a five-year-old Arieh observed soldiers training near their home. Staying on the topic of Arieh’s love for the military, his wife recalls childhood pictures in which, at the age of fourteen, Arieh stood holding a machine gun near a Golani military base. Three years later, he even tried to volunteer for military service before the mandatory age of enlistment. Much to his chagrin, his parents blocked him. As the Yizkor book continues, Arieh’s love for the military is expressed in personal quotes rather than personal stories. “He dedicated his entire life to his duty” writes his wife, “he would always say: ‘Every member of my family is so dear to me however the army and state always come first.’”57 The centrality of Arieh’s military service reveals the extent to which the commemorative narratives can become more about national values than the private pain.
Whereas commemorative narratives from the Yom Kippur War seem more at ease in their dislike for the military, many of the narratives from the Six-Day War engage the military establishment in a way that is surprisingly resonant with Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature. These narratives cast light on the effects of the military on the individual and the way in which he responds to the challenges of military life. Moshe Pinkas, a
Bulgarian immigrant who made Aliyah at the age of three, may not have loved the military, however within the scope of his commemoration, this point is irrelevant. What is relevant, however, is that the Yizkor book conveys the message that upon joining the army, “Moshe did everything in his power to fill what was incumbent upon him to the
57 L’Zeher Kadishim (Acco Municipality). 43 best of his ability.”58 All of this, of course, was in spite of the overwhelming physical and mental challenges imposed by the military. One contributor writes:
He was sent to Golani, one of the most difficult units to serve in the Israeli army and he never complained about it…he left, together with many others, to fight for the defense of the homeland.59 Military service is presented as a transformative component of the Israeli experience which presents a challenge that is easily overcome by the love for the homeland.
Though many of the commemorative narratives from the Six-Day War may not be as forthright as Arieh’s commemoration, there is a discernible optimism that varies in intensity from narrative to narrative. The commemoration of Dani Vardom, whose service in Golani’s Special Forces was consistently connected to his love of land, may never state outright that he loved the military; however this message is delivered through a multiplicity of personal anecdotes related to his military service. Dani embraced his military service, acting as “a leader among other new recruits, member of all the military sports teams, loved by all of the instructors, and leading every sing.”60 The military is alluded to as an extension of one’s teenage years, described by one comrade-in-arms as a
“continuation our youth movements”. Within this framework, the focus on Dani’s experience in the military, the ease with which he took each experience and his excellence projects an image of the military that is radically different than many of the commemorative narratives from the Yom Kippur War.
Narratives of Death and Personal Sacrifice
Undoubtedly the most central component of Yizkor literature, tying together
58 Katufim b’evam, Pinkas, Moshe, 74. 59 Ibid. 60 Vardom, Dani, 21. 44 commemoration from both the Yom Kippur War and Six Day War, is the focus on selflessness and personal sacrifice. In some cases, this is stated outright while in other books it is tightly wrapped in layers of personal anecdotes, poetry, correspondence, and more. In both cases, however, the individual’s willingness to sacrifice himself for the collective becomes the axis of the commemorative narrative. Framing death in battle as a selfless act of personal sacrifice softens the severity of death while placing it within a broader more coherent framework. While Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature inherited the commemorative traditions of previous years, one can also detect subtle shifts in the overarching narrative tone, though these deviations will be the primary focus of chapter three. The present section will therefore outline how personal sacrifice and selflessness, two terms that are often interconnected, are framed in Yizkor literature from the Six-Day
War and Yom Kippur War.
Aside from narratives describing war and the military, Yizkor literature commonly frames selflessness as a natural precursor to patriotic sacrifice, often occurring during childhood. Stories that may not appear to carry any discernible message reinforce the high value placed on sacrifice and altruism. Avi’s mother recounts a story of a young
Avi receiving a chocolate bar from his aunt one rainy, winter day. Avi’s aunt and mother sat immersed in conversation, unaware that Avi had in fact left the house in a seemingly irrational attempt to share the chocolate bar with an unknown friend name. After realizing that Avi had disappeared, they eventually found him lying in mud near the local kindergarten. “ ‘Avi’, we asked him, why did you go by yourself in the rain? ‘I wanted to give Nitzah chocolate,’ he answered emotionally.”61 Under the circumstances of Avi’s
61 Yaakov, Avi, 2. 45 death, the imagery in this story is especially powerful. Images of soldiers crawling in mud are often employed in literature, poetry, and vernacular to portray the grit and struggle of military life. By choosing this story among a perhaps innumerable number of stories from Avi’s childhood, his mother connects the image of Avi the child and the Avi hero. The focus of the story shifts away from the bizarre story of a young boy laying the mud during a winter storm in an attempt to share his chocolate and becomes focused on this extreme act of altruism. Selflessness and personal sacrifice are values born early on.
In Avi’s case, these values are identified early on and are transferred directly to the final moments of his life.
Reflecting on the connection between acts of selflessness and personal sacrifice,
Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War often places a specific emphasis on the conduct of soldiers prior to the actual war. The surprise and shock of the Yom Kippur
War meant that in many cases, soldiers were unable to locate their specific unit and were therefore forced to fight in ad hoc units made up of random soldiers. In the case of Yosef
Abutbul, a relatively short commemorative space within a broader Yizkor book dedicated to all of the fallen soldiers from Golani’s First Breachers Battalion is used to emphasize his individual selflessness translating into his heroic death in battle. In a narrative that resonates with much of the Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War, the emphasis is on Yosef’s decision to volunteer for service with his unit before he received any official order to join his unit. “He turned to the officer in charge of local recruitment on the pressing matter of joining his unit but was met by a negative answer. After he found the location of his unit, he decided to arrive on his own accord to the battlefield.”62
62 Lo Ha’Milim Midabrot al ha’Mavet. Avi Betelheim. 46
Ultimately, this decision cost Yosef his life, however this decision does not factor negatively into the commemoration. On the contrary, Yosef’s death in battle is emblematic of his willingness to sacrifice his life. He defied the orders of an officer in order to find his unit and defend his nation. The significance of this decision is not lost on the reader.
The varying portrayals of personal sacrifice and selflessness that are presented during descriptions of pre-army life coalesce into a uniform expression of heroism in battle. Regardless of how each individual is cast as a child or teenager, death in battle is cast as the ultimate demonstration of personal sacrifice. Yosef Abutbul, who is projected as selfless even before his death, becomes the paradigm of personal sacrifice when he gives his life in order to maintain connection with military headquarters during the final assault on Mt. Hermon. Similarly, Avi’s selflessness, manifested in assorted stories scattered throughout his entire Yizkor book, reaches a crescendo when he dies in battle.
In most other Yizkor books, sacrificing oneself in battle oscillates between hyper- nationalistic expressions and ostensibly scripted expressions of support for the individual’s decision to sacrifice his life for the nation.
Regardless of the different responses to the Six-Day War, personal sacrifice and selflessness still receive pride of place in the Yizkor literature from this period. Similar to
Yizkor literature from 1973, embodying the value of personal sacrifice is often traced back to selflessness as a child. In Moshe’s case, this value is incorporated into his broader personality. “Moshe was a little shy but was full of love for others and was ready
47 to help at any moment.”63 By June 9, 1967, when Moshe was killed fighting to capture a hill from the Syrian army, his readiness to sacrifice his own life for a “superior goal” culminates in his death. In an extraordinary selection of words, a friend writes:
“Moshe’s friends from the battalion told us how he ran forward in the battle on Tel-Faher without asking questions, knowing that he must do this and beyond.” If this story- and
Yizkor literature as a whole for that matter- is to be interpreted as a subconscious expression of national values then one should be struck by the emphasis on the unquestionable readiness to die. Moshe’s courage in battle was not defined by the ferocity of the fight in him; it was his unquestioning faith in the “supreme goal” and his willing to die for it. Emphasizing this point, Moshe’s friend writes: “What could Moshe have been if he wasn’t cut down by an enemy’s bullet? Indeed, the best are always the first to go against the fire.”64 The ease with which these narratives rationalize Moshe’s death as a demonstration of his selfless patriotism is startling.
On the whole, the prominent position of war in Israeli life necessitates a constant justification. Yizkor literature reiterates the self-perception that Israeli existence is a protracted struggle for survival. The abundance of literature on Israeli militarism may disagree about whether or not Israeli society can, in fact, be considered militaristic however there is little disagreement over the extent to which the military and conflict have shaped Israeli collective memory. Within the realm of Yizkor literature, this self- perception is, sometimes, situated within the broader Jewish struggle for existence. In others, the Israeli collective experience is defined by war. On the whole, war is projected as an unfortunate prerequisite to life in the Land of Israel. War, heroism, and death are
63 Katufim b’evam, Pinkas, Moshe, 74. 64 Ibid, 76. 48 thus transmitted as unavoidable products of this reality.
As part of the commemorative narrative of Yizkor literature, war is frequently dislodged from the distinctly Israeli experience and integrated into the broader trajectory of Jewish history. In the case of Yoram Vasserman, a kibbutznik serving in one of
Golani’s elite reconnaissance units, his death in battle becomes emblematic of the struggle for Jewish survival. As the son of Holocaust survivors, this perceived struggle for survival is lent a degree of credibility that is absent in other Yizkor books. In a selection of prose opening the Yizkor book, a contributor named Abraham A. articulates the tension between the uncertain, perhaps unsafe, life of Jewish exile and the redemption of settlement in Israel. “Refugees of the Holocaust, the homes of our forefathers were destroyed in the lands of exile. We came to build our homes here, in the land of our forefathers, and our enemies still seek to destroy our homes.”65 At first glance,
Abraham’s commentary undermines the conception of Eretz Yisrael as redemptive. The persecution and hardships, characteristic of exilic life, are far from alleviated upon moving to Israel. However, Abraham’s conception of Jewish history as a chain of struggle and tragedy is followed by a familiar rhetoric of survival necessitating armed struggle. He continues: “We go out, along with the sons we gave birth to, to meet our enemy, lest they destroy our home. So simple and sad is this story.”66 The violent reality of Israeli life is projected as a natural extension of Jewish life. Though I do not sense any hostility in Abraham’s narrative, his narrative suggests a reluctant acceptance that Yoram is a casualty in a struggle that preceded his death and will continue long after it. For
Abraham, it seems that this lachrymose conception of history is actually cathartic.
65 Vasserman, Yoram. 66 Ibid. 49
Moreover, Yizkor books place a greater emphasis on the tragedy inherent in
Israel’s violent reality. The commemoration of Nimrod Bin demonstrates the extent to which war and death are standardized as part of the overall Israeli experience. One eulogy entitled “To the Memory of Nimrod Who with his Blood Bequeathed Us with
Life” begins with the cynical declaration that “once again the people of Israel fight for their existence and pay the price in the blood of their sons.”67 A preceding narrative begins: “It is a terrible disaster that the existence of the Land of Israel depends on the death of so many of our good young.” Adding an additional layer of tragedy, one contributor wonders: “Why must war exist in the world? It is difficult to come to terms with the idea that children are born into this world to be slaughtered in a thousand terrible ways.” Whereas the commemorative narrative of Yoram’s Yizkor book suggests a certain glory inherent in the Jewish struggle for freedom, Nimrod’s Yizkor book highlights the cruelty of war.
Despite the shift in focus, heroism is consistently interpreted as the natural outcome of Israel’s unfortunate reality. As such, the commemorative narrative continuously negotiates between the inherent cruelty of war and the individual’s demonstrated heroism within this reality. One contribution, in the form of a letter to
Nimrod’s mother, proclaims, “It is because of Nimrod and his friends that we live and exist. Our nation will continue to exist for eternity.” In trying to console her, the same letter implores Nimrod’s mother to be strong and raise her other children to the glory of the state of Israel. On the following page, another letter to Nimrod’s mother from a childhood friend and Yom Kippur War veteran is dramatically different in tone.
67 Bin, Nimrod. 50
The feeling of just how cruel war can be grows inside me. I’m sorry that I had to write a letter like this but I simply needed to put into writing the feeling I had toward Nimrod…I hope that there won’t be any more difficult times like this in the future.68 Indeed, this narrative deviates from the predominantly heroic narratives that characterize
Yizkor literature. This example is particularly conspicuous in light of the narrator’s apology to Nimrod’s mother, as if his somber tone detracts from the overall commemoration.
Juxtaposing Yizkor literature from the Yom Kippur War with Yizkor literature published immediately after the Six-Day War reveals how reactions to war and death were hardly affected by trauma of 1973. To emphasize the extent of this continuity, consider the commemoration of a Golani soldier in a Yizkor book published by Kibbutz
HaMeuchad entitled Asher Naflu b’Milhama (Those Who Fell in War). Prior to commemorating any individual soldier, Those Who Fell in War set the tone of the book by addressing the heavy price demanded by Israel’s threatened existence. The soldiers who gave their life in battle, “ceased to exist for the sake of existence and thus existence became more expensive.” In a narrative vocabulary that resonates with typical Zionist commemoration, the opening narrative proclaims that in dying, “they command the
Jewish people [Beit Yisrael] to live.” Even in death, they continue to guard the
“threatened existence” of the Jewish people.69
The commemoration of Arieh Ambern, a soldier from Acco, perhaps more than any other Yizkor book I came across, accepts Israel’s violent reality and projects heroism as the proper response. During the first years of Arieh’s service, which happened to be at
68 Bin, Nimrod. 69 Asher Naflu b’Milhama (Kibbutz Ha’Meuchad). 51 a time when cross-border raids from Palestinian terrorists were at a peak, his wife notes that he participated in almost every retaliatory operation. And though his family was certainly important to him, “the military and the state always came first.” Indeed, it would be unnatural to expect commemoration to deal with the politics behind death – after all, the commemoration is often done by loved ones who are first and foremost mourning – however Arieh’s commemoration gives one the impression that his death is in fact celebrated, rather than mourned. In the final paragraph of his wife’s eulogy she writes:
Arieh fell on June 5, 1967 while filling his duty on the Northern border. Two days before, while visiting, he said to me: ‘You know, you only die once, and if a man must die, it is better to die for the sake of the homeland.’ Indeed, his wish was filled and he was successful in sanctifying the land he loved so much with his blood. Heroism, more than any other detail concerning Arieh’s life, dominates his commemoration. In place of recollections that humanize Arieh, one only learns that “he was never afraid to sacrifice himself if the nation so demanded this of him.”70
Biographical details are totally subservient to the commemorative narrative that must explain his death in battle through the lens of heroism.
70 All quotations related to Arieh Ambern from Ambern, Arieh. 52
Chapter Two
Tearing the Commemorative Fabric
Despite Yizkor literature’s overwhelming retention of the traditional commemorative language from 1967 to 1973, that is to say the language of the state, individual narratives which were seemingly at odds with this tradition rose to the surface. In a few rare instances, contributors veered off script, expressing their frustration with the normative politics of commemoration. Deviations are manifested in disparate narratives that never succeed in dominating the overarching commemorative narrative. Instead, these rare deviations appear as conspicuous assertions of private grief within a broader framework of healing.
Deviations in Yizkor literature are typically manifested in narratives which challenge the position of war and death in the Israeli experience. To be sure, this does not suggest a direct connection between the hypercritical language of
“demystification” that could be found elsewhere in Israeli society. However, within the rigid parameters of Yizkor literature, even the most subtle deviations take a powerful stand against the standardization of death. Moreover, by challenging war and death as necessary and heroic, these deviant narratives fundamentally challenge the intricacies of the Zionist ethos.
One critical approach adopts the traditional Zionist language to challenge ideals of self-sacrifice. The insatiability of The Land in early Zionist discourse is
53
appropriated and subverted in order to articulate a voice that is weary of war and desires an end to violence. Whereas traditional Zionist language frames death-- and in particular violent death-- as part of The Land’s insatiable bloodlust, Yom
Kippur War Yizkor literature inspires a shift in the discourse on the of this perceived brutal blood sacrifice. The same contributor who struggled to imagine Avi Yaakov as a soldier taps into this language:
Oh precious land! Haven’t you had enough of our dear, beloved men? Is there a way to atone for the spilling of this pure, precious blood? Are there condolences for the family?71
Another narrative, harkening back to Avi’s love for the desert and Sinai, creates an inseparable connection between the unbearable grief of a mother and Avi’s nearly existential connection to the physical landscape:
In his last postcard on October 24, 1973 – the day Avi fell during the Suez Battle – he wrote: ‘I’m leaving to broaden my knowledge of geography’… Here it is the glorious Sinai, from the days of Dahab and Nubia, clear and blue, raise up my silent screams.72
The silent screams of Avi’s mother reach a deafening peak, becoming nearly uncontainable as she concludes her narrative. Integrating biblical Hebrew into her narrative, she exclaims: “The city of Jerusalem and the Judean Desert; every place, every quiet corner, and every site where Avi’s food stepped – Raise up my sorrows, my love, and my happiness that I was privileged to be his mother. “73 Indeed, Avi’s
Yizkor book contains some of the strongest expressions of grief among any Yizkor book I have come across.
71 Yaakov, Aviezer. 72 Ibid. 73 Ibid. 54
The application of a familiar Zionist lexicon to critical expressions at once problematizes the critique and makes it more understandable to the collective. In one sense, the inability, or perhaps unwillingness, on the part of the contributors to shake off the language of the halutzim, even when criticizing the very ethos itself reveals the inextricable link between ethos and commemoration. Nevertheless, it is precisely this framework that allows for the successful transmission of deviant narratives. In the case of Yoram Vasserman, his mother seems to find her voice in the metaphorical language of the tree.
I observe what is cast off from the hazelnut tree which my son and his father planted together. The leaves have fallen and so the tree stands nakedly in all its sadness. But I know that by spring, the tree will sprout new leaves, young and invigorated. But my son, who blossomed and developed just like this tree, will never be restored; he has no continuity.74
The image of penetrating the soil in order to give life to it establishes an unbreakable bond with the land.75 Vasserman’s mother moved to the Land of Israel to escape the pains of exile. She planted her family, raising a son like she raised the walnut tree. But while the tree must lose its leaves, she refuses to accept that her own son must be a part of this cycle. The image of a soldier as a fallen leaf from a tree which must continuously shed its leaves infuses the traditional Zionist conception of land with an unprecedented morbidity. Throughout her narrative, the ecstatic, transcendental relationship between the individual and the physical land is twisted to reflect changing emotions. The flooding of emotions associated with the
74 Vasserman, Yoram. 75 Neumann, Land and Desire in Early Zionism. 92-93. 55 grief consistently returns to the image of the tree: “And outside—behold the tree that was planted and the tree that was trimmed.”76
A second approach to expressing private grief that is perhaps more subtle and accessible is adopted through casting a more doubtful or suspicious light on the national ethos. Much like the range of traditional narratives examined in the previous chapter, expressions of doubt range from the assertive to the questioning.
Shai Plati’s Yizkor book, oscillating between critical and conformist narratives, begins with a quoted selection of commemorative writing by renowned Israeli writer and poet, Yoram Kaniuk.77 Despite being included in Shai’s Yizkor book, the included selection was actually written and published less than a month after the war’s conclusion for a soldier related to Kaniuk. The narrative, written in beautiful prose which nearly defies translation, begins with the image of a smiling child who sees things that are inconceivable to those around him. “[The child] fights like a wounded animal for the world though he never bothers describing this to others.
What did he see there among the terror?”78 The image of the Israeli soldier fighting desperately, like a wounded animal, for something that others do not understand stretches the notion of heroism to its limits.
As Kaniuk’s narrative progresses, ideals of personal sacrifice are further problematized. Shrouding his critical voice in layers of complex metaphors, Kaniuk recounts a Japanese allegory about a boy’s love for “the apple”. Though this love is indeed great, the boy doesn’t understand that in order to love the apple he must first
76 Vasserman, Yoram. 77 Aside from being a renowned writer, Kaniuk fought with the Palmach during Israel’s 1948 war and is politically active. 78 Kaniuk, Yoram. “Keta’im” of Plati, Shai. 56 cut at its heart. Following the allegory, Kaniuk asks rhetoically: “how can these young men become so saturated with love and devotion without the knife, during such bitter fighting.”79 Does the story of the young man and the apple suggest that each young man must be ready to kill in order to full love the land? Is it their readiness to kill that makes them heroes? Kaniuk’s answer is a resolute no.
Are the identities of these soldiers born in battle? It is hard for me to believe. We simple do not know them. When we were young and went to die in battle, we didn’t even know ourselves, let alone our parents. Those, those young men, paid the price for us with the same language, with the same coin. They went to die without even being totally understood. This is consolation- this is revenge- for any interpretation that we give to their heroism will just be a self- justification.80
Kaniuk casts the Israeli soldier as one who, in the final moments of his life, understands something about the nature of war, death, and sacrifice that others do not. In no way is he denying that the fallen are heroes. On the contrary, he is forthright in declaring that “they gave their lives so that we may continue to live”.
Nevertheless, he demands that the collective national narrative stop twisting the memory of individual into some nondescript, indistinguishable ideal of heroism.
Kaniuk implores the nation to remember the fallen as individuals. This command, while perhaps not unprecedented, contradicts the expressed aims of official, state commemoration which states that Yizkor books “for the sake of maintaining and preserving as a historical and educational model of excellence for our People and the coming generations”, as was the official policy of the Department for the
79 Ibid. 80 Ibid. 57
Commemoration of the Fallen.81 Perhaps unable, unwilling, or uncomfortable expressing their dissatisfaction with traditional Yizkor commemoration, Yoram
Kaniuk gave Shai’s parents a voice.
When commemorative narratives are primarily focused on the soldier as a hero, it is not uncommon for deviant narratives to appear apologetic and timid. As we saw in the previous chapter, Nimrod Bin’s Yizkor book follows a strictly traditional approach to commemoration. Thus the overwhelming majority of contributors portray Nimrod as the prototypical Israeli hero, who loved nature, disliked war and militarism, and died for the land, however even in this case deviant narratives are permitted. Fifteen days after Nimrod’s death, his brother Yehuda suggests that upon finding out about Nimrod’s death, he admits that he was unable to write to write a letter of condolence. “The news about Nimrod’s death hit me hard”, Yehuda writes, “the feeling grew inside me just how cruel war can be.”82
Surely acknowledging the cruelty of war should not be considered deviant though
Yehuda feels differently.
I am sorry that I needed to write a letter like this but I simply needed to put in writing what I felt toward Nimrod. That’s all for now, I hope that there will be no more sad times like these in the future.83
The relative lack of critical tone in this letter problematizes Yehuda’s apology. Is hoping for an end of war so radical? Is a personal letter focusing on one’s grief toward losing his brother so subversive? Yehuda’s apology suggests that in fact it is.
81 Shamir, Ilanah. Le-val Yiheyu Ke-lo Hayu: Ha-yeḥidah Le-hantsaḥat Ha-ḥayal Be-Miśrad Ha-biṭaḥon U- misud Defuse Ha-zikaron Ha-mamlakhtiyim (Tel Aviv: Miśrad ha-biṭaḥon, 2003), 97. 82 Nimrod, Bin. 83 Ibid. 58
Retaining a relatively passive voice, many other narratives approach their deviations with a discernible uncertainty. Joshua (Yehoshua) Viater’s Yizkor book-- which will be explored in much greater detail later in the chapter-- presents a fascinating tension between deviant narratives that are assertive and those that are passive. From the start, it bears mentioning that this commemoration appears within a battalion Yizkor book rather than one dedicated solely to him. Aside from a brief two paragraph biography of Joshua a majority of his commemorative space is occupied by dated diary entries written by Joshua’s mother (Shoshana). In an entry dated July 4, 1965, Shoshana relates Joshua leaving home in order to join a military academy prior to his mandatory enlistment. “Stranger they are to one another, not knowing exactly what waits for them” Shoshana notes ominously.
A swift split from their parents. Yet who is the split more difficult for, the youth (Na’arim) or the parents? In the hearts of the parents there are doubt and fears. Is this really the best way for a child to grow up?84
Shoshana chooses to highlight an event that is familiar to every Israeli parent. This choice establishes an intimate bond between her and the rest of the broader community of bereaving and non-bereaving parents. In a sense, it is precisely this intimate, unbreakable connection that makes her final question so understandable and legitimate to the collective.
The chronological structure of Shoshana’s narrative lends the reader a window into her changing relationship with the state. Though it may be tempting to trust that each diary entry was indeed written on their marked dates, she seems to intentionally include hints that her narrative has been carefully crafted to make a
84 Lo Ha’Milim Midabrot al ha’Mavet ed. Avi Betelheim. Viater, Joshua. 59 statement. In the entry dated 1965, Shoshana notes that each child leaving the home at the time of enlistment would go on to become “pilots, company commanders, or other command positions during the Yom Kippur War.”85 It is obvious that this entry was not written in 1965. Instead, Shoshana seems to be constructing a narrative about her changing perception of the state. The Yom
Kippur War divides her reality into life before the war and life after. Following the
Six-Day War, Shoshana mocks the jubilee of the war and the reactions by Israelis who were too young to fight; youth who were “angry that they were born two years too late, that they ‘missed’ the war.”86 Before the war, her suspicions and doubts life in Israel, the military, and war were merely suspicions. After the war, these suspicions turn into convictions. Her question: “is this really the best way for a child to grow up” receives a resounding no in the remaining pages of Joshua’s Yizkor book.87
In cases where normative heroic narratives are unable to acquiesce feelings of disillusionment and grief, deviant narratives appear at their most assertive and angry. Indeed these narratives are as fascinating as they are rare. The first manifestation of this disillusionment is found in narratives expressing anger toward the Zionist ethos. Ironically, it is within this collective Yizkor book that some of the most radically deviant narratives are put forth. From the beginning one senses a tension -- rather, a precise and sharp anger-- that surpasses any Yizkor book that
85 Ibid. 86 Ibid. 87 Ibid. 60 has hitherto been examined. His mother describes Joshua’s funeral almost one year later:
Officers at a meeting of grief- honor guards- on the back of the command car. Bereaving parents. Brother. Family. Friends. Commanders. Subordinates and Comrades-in-arms. One big grieving family. The funeral procession beyond the burial plot. The honor guard. Memorial prayer. Kaddish. Eulogy. Wreath laying88
Her staccato sentences simultaneously filter out any emotion while also filling her description with a seething anger. She then directs her anger at Natan Alterman’s poem The Silver Platter:
They are the silver platter on which the Jewish state was given” wrote Alterman in ’48. “Was given?” asks Moshe Shamir in ’73. “Is given. Repeating itself, it is given again and again, year after year. Generation after generation. Fathers and sons and their sons and their sons.89
His mother’s anger is both absolute and unrelenting. When describing the funeral procession, she chooses to repeat honor guard as if asking: what honor? Her narrative demands the collective reshaping of the Zionist lexicon. Alterman is irrelevant, she suggests, for look how our boys keep dying.
Moving past her critique of Zionist ideology, Joshua’s mother directs her anger toward God in a way that resonates with other deviant narratives seen in
Yizkor literature. In the final diary entry, written on the anniversary of Joshua’s death, his mother ties together all of grief and anger. First, she explains how Joshua never lived to see the Golani flag waving on Mt. Hermon as so many newspapers glorified in the days following its conquest. Instead, Joshua’s mother reminds us that after the war had ended, Joshua continued his war in the hospital.
88 Ibid. 89 Ibid. 61
For days he struggled for his life but was unsuccessful. The minister of death subdued him. God is full of compassion…and like this Amichai wrote in one of his songs: ‘If not for God being full of compassion There would be compassion in the entire world and not just in him I, who gathered flowers on the mountain and gazed upon all the valleys, I, who brought all the corpses from the hills know that the world is empty of compassion.90
With this poem, her narrative ends. Her anger at God, perhaps even her disbelief, is inseparable from her anger toward the Israeli establishment. For Joshua’s mother, there are no angels of death, only ministers. Deferring her final feelings of anger to famous Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai, she ends her narrative by declaring that there is no compassion, only God.
Expressions of anger toward God range in their forthrightness but are typically delivered with a discernible ferocity. In most other Yizkor books, where the tone of the commemorative narrative is predominantly heroic and traditional, disillusionment finds expression in subtle, sparse anger toward God. These range from uncertain expressions of anger such as, “if there is a God in the sky, he certainly takes the best men away from us” to forthright declarations which tear down the image of portrayal of death as salvation.91 Whereas Joshua’s mother combined her anger at the political establishment with her anger toward God, Yoram Vasserman’s mother experiences grief as a continuation of her nightmarish experiences in the
Holocaust. “There is nothing after this grave, no world-to-come, like that which sustained me in my childhood. There isn’t even any logic in this idea!”92 On one
90 Ibid. 91Bin, Nimrod. 92 Vasserman, Yoram. 62 hand, her narrative disentangles of the image of God and the Land of Israel. The land doesn’t give as much as it takes. “This is the land that swallows our children” she declares.93 “I passed through the hell of Hitler and was left alone – and I didn’t respond, I was apathetic to everything around me. And now, in the taking of my dear son from me…I have no words.”94 The anger in this narrative is tired yet focused. Yoram’s mother is angrier with God then with man for in her eyes, God seems to be the only culprit for what in her eyes is a chain of unrelenting tragedy.
A final thematic shift in Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature stems from Israel’s unpreparedness and perceived failure during the first days of the war. In many instances, this frustration is articulated through expressions of exhaustion with
Israel’s violent reality or through an undermining of national rhetoric, among others. While this may seem like a logical reaction, we have already seen how the acceptance of this reality takes pride of place among many commemorative narratives. Nevertheless, some commemorative narratives following the Yom
Kippur War seem content with questioning war. Noting this thematic change,
Emmanuel Sivan argues that before 1973, descriptions of battle tended to be
“matter of fact” and “laconic.”95 On the other hand, Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature does not shy away from recounting battles in every gory detail. Indeed
Sivan is correct in pointing out the magnitude of this shift, though there are Yizkor books from the Six-Day War which also emphasize the gore and harsh reality of war.
Nevertheless, the disregard toward sugarcoating battle narratives creates a
93 Ibid. 94 Vasserman, Yoram. 95 Sivan, Emmanuel. Private Pain and Public Remembrance in Israel. 196-197. 63 discernible distance between ideas of heroism and warfare that is complemented by other deviations.
One of the more salient examples of this phenomenon was expressed in Avi’s
Yizkor book. One will remember that Avi is portrayed as a misanthropic nature lover who nevertheless filled his duty toward the collective by fighting in the Six-
Day War and Yom Kippur War. Avi’s individuality outside of battle was actually used to reinforce the narrative that heroism and individualism are not in conflict.
And while the commemorative narrative does not deviate from this message, individual narratives that are seemingly at odds with this message are still given freedom of expression. Relating to Avi’s service in the Six-Day War and Yom Kippur
War nearly one year after his death, two family friends suggest that during both wars, Avi only reluctantly went to fight. He did not seek glory in battle and was tortured by the obligation to defend his homeland and his self-identified pacifism.
Under the heading, “In the Memory of Avi- Friend and Warrior”, expressions of grief that are visible in other Yizkor books gives way to an unprecedented criticism of the Israeli army’s management during the war. The narrative keeps to the traditional description of the Israeli hero as one who is an excellent soldier despite his disdain for the military. The narrator reveals that Avi had little regard for ranks and uniforms and even rejected a promotion. When confronting Avi’s experience during the war, the narrator draws attention to the shortcomings of the military during the war.
[Avi] arrived to the war desperate, claiming that he came without equipment though when he speaks like this we understand that he arrived without his “pekel”, i.e. his books and coffee. I was with Avi during the first days of fighting. He wore sandals and wasn’t happy when he heard that logistics did 64
not have boots for him. He was always anxious that the war was continuing for too long.96
It is difficult to interpret this narrative as resentful or angry at the military. The narrator jokingly refers to Avi’s distress about arriving to the front without his books or coffee yet complaints about military unpreparedness dominated post-war criticism. Unwilling to fully exploit the creative space in the Yizkor book to criticize the military, the contributor understands that this narrative cannot be contained within the domain of Yizkor literature and therefore backs off.
In approaching this phenomenon, Sivan argues that public criticism of the military created a “feedback loop” which affected commemorative literature.97 Until the Yom Kippur War, Yizkor literature’s historical trajectory never reflected institutional criticism that may have existed in the ‘Israeli street.’ As Sivan notes, complaints were sent through their proper channels and were respectful. When the government and military’s handling of the war became an object of intense public criticism, Sivan claims that Yizkor literature shifted to mirror this criticism. Despite exaggerating the extent to which Yizkor literature reflected these complaints, he is indeed correct in arguing that “the very fact that these themes were now expressed through a genre the aim of which had been to cope with loss shows how profound was the ‘October Earthquake’, privately and collectively.”
96 Yaakov, Aviezer. 97 Sivan, Emmanuel. Private Pain and Public Remembrance in Israel, 199. 65
Chapter Three
The Commemorative Bilingualism of Yizkor Literature
Examining Yom Kippur War Yizkor literature with an eye for common tropes and deviations has exposed a thematic and structural uniformity that is paradoxical. On the one hand, remaining ostensibly outside the state’s sphere of influence while on the other hand, riding the line between the ideologically fueled language of state commemoration and that of private mourning. Until now, I have presented a close reading of Yizkor literature following a watershed event in Israeli history. By looking at these Yizkor books through the prism of a microhistory, one gains a far deeper understanding of the commemorative genre as a whole. Furthermore, in light of Yizkor literature’s salience as a distinctly private mode of commemoration, a microhistory reveals an explanation as to how Yizkor literature remained at worst, apathetic, and at best, neglectful of changing social discourse.
While social changes were perhaps most visible in the post-war protest movements they naturally affected literature, poetry, art, and other expressive mediums.
While each of these topics deserves additional in depth scholarship, a cursory examination of the war’s manifestation in various other modes of expression will inform the broader discussion about Yizkor literature’s insulation against social change.
The effects of the Yom Kippur War created an indelible impression on Israel’s physical landscape. Relating to this phenomenon, Ilana Shamir argues that monuments 66 following the Yom Kippur War reflected the social mood by deviating from the normative Zionist ethos.98 These monuments, established largely by family, friends, and comrades in a spontaneous fashion, attempted to separate their private pain from the collective narrative. Of the 2,679 soldiers to fall during the war, 71 monuments emerged, carrying on the tradition of erecting a monument at the site of death. Shamir characterizes these monuments as breaking away from the typical heroic intonation.
Instead, the monuments are elegiac, bringing out the tragedy of war and death. Hence, a monument erected in 1970 presents a fighter jet ascending to the sky, leaving behind a jet stream, the message reading: “And he left like a lightning arrow.” A monument erected in 1973 portrays the actual damaged tail of a fighter jet, elevated off the ground. There are no words engraved in the face of this monument.99
In addition to focusing on the physical portrayals of grief and memory of Yom
Kippur War monuments, Shamir argues that much of the text accompanying the monuments revealed a shift in popular attitudes to war and patriotic sacrifice. Private grief typically found expression in assertions of primordial or personal bonds with the fallen. One is therefore more likely to stumble across accompanying plaques that declare: “to the memory of our son who fell”, “to the memory of our son, our brother, and friend who we will painfully remember forever”, or “to the memory of our admired friend and commander”. Going beyond this, Shamir notes that the traditional statement
“in death he commands us to live” – which appears numerous times in Yizkor literature – doesn’t appear at all in the monuments. And while Shamir also begins her analysis with the assertion that changes were most noticeable in post-war texts, it is clear that
98 Shamir. Hantsaḥah ṿe-zikaron: Darkhah Shel Ha-ḥevrah Ha-Yiśra;elit Be-ʻitsuv Nofe Ha-zikaron, 19. 99 Both of these monuments can be found in Pilot’s Forest at the entrance to Jerusalem. 67 monuments were much more successful in reflecting the social atmosphere than Yizkor literature.
Within the domain of Israeli literature and art, the Yom Kippur War also contributed to the fragmentation of many of the strongpoints of the Israeli national ethos.
Portrayals of the Sabra as a prototype of personal demeanor began to diminish in the seventies. Distinctly Sabra literature and poetry received unprecedented negative attention by way of satire and criticism. Focusing on portrayals of Israeliness and
Sabraness in the Israeli novel, Yosef Oren demonstrates how during the forties and fifties, images of the paradigmatic sabra were revered. During the sixties and seventies, this was replaced by ironic, mocking depictions of the sabra. Beginning with the Yom
Kippur War but reaching a crescendo during the eighties, depictions of the sabra were accompanied by an “elegiac and tragic tone” which ushered in an end to their era.100
Cutting across artistic boundaries, the Yom Kippur War galvanized the political trend in Israeli visual art that had already begun at the conclusion of the Six-Day War.101
Yigal Tumarkin’s provocative sculpture Hu Halach b’Sadot (He Walked in the Fields)
(1967), on the one hand expresses a defamiliarization of the collective language by touching on the classic literary work of the same name by Moshe Shamir. On the other hand, Tumarkin asserts the brutality and ugliness of war despite the prevailing triumphalism of the post-Six Day War period. The sense of betrayal and disillusionment from the Yom Kippur War pushed many politicized art exhibits into the limelight. Uri
Lifschitz, Aviva Uri, Yigal Tumarkin, Michal Neeman and the Bezalel artist collective known as “The Rebellion” led this wave. Summarizing the general atmosphere of
100 Oren, Yosef. Zionism and Sabraism in the Israeli Novel (Rishon Le-Tsiyon: "Yaḥad", 1990), 93. 101 Ginton, Ellen, and Muzeʾon Tel Aviv le-omanut. Ha-ʻEnayim Shel Ha-medinah: Omanut ḥazutit Bi- medinah Le-lo Gevulot (Tel Aviv: Muzeʾon Tel-Aviv le-omanut, 1998). 68
1970s Israeli art - which one can argue began after the Six-Day War and extended until at least the first Lebanon War – Ariela Azulai argues that “the seventies were characterized by extensive activity that dealt specifically with the connection between the artist and his society in a way that was innovative in its adaptation to Israeli art.”102 Unsurprisingly, many of these artists were actively involved in the post-war protests movements including “The Rebellion,” who were forced to give up their teaching positions as a result of their political involvement.
The trauma of the Yom Kippur War also became the focus of public discourse concerning the state and its institutions. Beginning in the first months of 1974, Israelis took to the streets in an unprecedented expression of disillusionment with the government’s management of the war, becoming known as the mehdal. The protests were first centered on security issues, though soon broadened to include calls for political resignations and greater parliamentary plurality.103 Almost two decades later, renowned
Israeli musician Haim Hefer related to the war as a humiliation, shock, and disappointment in Israel’s leading newspaper.104 Reactions to the war seemed to oscillate between expressions of outrage and grief or disillusionment and disappointment.
Remembering in Two Languages
On the whole, Yizkor literature is reserved as a closed mode of commemoration, so to speak, in which families can assert ostensibly private memories, grief, and
102 Azulai, Ariela. “Makoma shel Omanut.” Studio 40 (January 1993), 9. 103 Bar-On, Mordechai. In Pursuit of Peace: A History of the Israeli Peace Movement. (Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1996), 69-91. 104 Hefer, Haim. ”Yom Kippur War Section.” Yediot Aharonot, 28 Sept. 1990. from Liebman, Charles. The Myth of Defeat: The Memory of the Yom Kippur War in Israeli Society. Middle Eastern Studies 29(3), 399- 418. 1993.
69 emotions. However, embedded in the commemorative fabric of Yizkor literature is a narrative bilingualism. In Lacanian terms, the first is the paternal language of the national ethos, which shapes conceptions of war and death. It serves as a “normalizing” mechanism that conceals the cruelty and tragedy of war in the name of patriotic sacrifice, justifying future wars and losses. The second is the maternal language, which attempts to break free of the first by allowing expressions of grief, trauma, and personal loss. However, there are limits to the use of this latter language in the restricted space, a sanctified community of the fallen. Although not completely suppressed, the maternal language cannot overtly challenge the normative national narrative. When these deviations directly threaten one of the pillars of Zionism—namely patriotic sacrifice--the
Yizkor book becomes obsolete. That may explain why the prevalence of Yizkor literature as a prevailing mode of commemoration began to wane after the war.
Conceptualizing Yizkor literature as an expression of memory through two different commemorative languages builds on the scholarship of James Scott and Hannah
Naveh. In relating to the relationship between the powerful and powerless, James Scott, identifies the existence of public transcripts and hidden transcripts their encounters.
Public transcripts represent the exchange that takes place when the powerless are in the presence of the powerful. The hidden transcript indicates “the discourse that takes place
‘offstage,’ beyond direct observation of powerholders” and is intended for a different audience.105 To illustrate this concept, one is reminded of the Ethiopian proverb: When the great lord passes, the wise peasant bows deeply and silently farts”. The peasant is outwardly obedient but subtly deviant.
105 Scott, James C. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990), 5. 70
Separate but connected, Hannah Naveh demonstrates the duality of commemorative narratives within the framework of military cemeteries. Beginning with the assumption that military cemeteries are the site “where the institutionalized language of representation crystallizes,”106 Naveh differentiates between the language of the mother and the language of the father. Within this binary, the language of the mother undermines the clichés of collective grief and emphasizes distinctly personal loss while the language of the father places the loss in the context of the national order. By appropriating the body into an avowedly national space (which is also impersonal) she argues that the families are forced to articulate their grief in a way that resonates with the nation. However, the distinction between the two is problematic as private memories strengthen the national narrative while the national language itself is reproduced in the private expressions of grief.
Of the two commemorative languages embedded in Yizkor literature, the first articulates grief through the normative language of the Zionist national ethos. While other historians, namely Emmanuel Sivan, have asserted that Yizkor is a spontaneous, private mode of commemoration, differing from institutional commemoration, this language nevertheless dominates a vast majority of the memorial literature. The collective national narrative tying together a great majority of the Yizkor books challenges this claim with its recurring focus on the physical landscape of Israel, often manifested in a love of hiking; dislike for the military establishment and militarism as a whole, coupled with a profound sense of moral responsibility and volunteerism; and a tacit acceptance of war and death as central components of the Israeli experience all
106 Naveh, Hannah. “On Loss, Bereavement, and Mourning in the Israeli Experience.” Thousands, 18 (1998). 85-118. 71 receive pride of place. What emerges is a kind of “ideological chorus,” to borrow a term from Oz Almog.107 Almog applies this terminology to the writings of the halutzim and other prominent figures in early Zionist and Israeli history however this same ideological chorus dominates the commemorative literature from 1967 and 1973.
One of the main successes of the paternal language is in creating a powerful link between past and present. As Almog demonstrates “the similarity among Sabra writings extends to what is left out -- criticism, sarcasm, despair, and doubt.”108 Though criticism of the hegemonic institutions was not unheard of during the first decades of statehood, the cult of the fallen soldier occupies a holy space that rebukes criticism.109 When buttressed by the language and imagery of mainstream Zionist culture, the language of commemoration “became something like an oral law or an idealistic colloquy that again and again defined and reinforced a common identity.”110 One is reminded of the Yizkor book of 1911 whose major focus is on the primordial, existential connection between the
Zionist, the New Jew, and the physical land of Israel. Over sixty years later, Yizkor literature’s preoccupation with Israel’s physical landscape emerges nearly unchallenged.
In much the same way that Shamir relates to post-war monuments, this commemorative language is fueled by the fear of denying one’s loved one -- whether it be a comrade, friend, son, or brother -- their rightful place within the national memory.
By creating a bridge between the past and present, the paternal language assists in the normalization of conflict and patriotic sacrifice. In interviews with Yom Kippur War
107 Almog, Oz. The Sabra: The Creation of the New Jew (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), 56. 108 Ibid. 109 For scholarship on the relationship between the individual and the state in 1950’s Israel see Rozin, Orit. The Rise of the Individual in 1950s Israel: A Challenge to Collectivism / Orit Rozin; Translated By Haim Watzman. Waltham, Mass.: Brandeis University Press, 2011. 110 Almog, Oz. The Sabra: The Creation of the New Jew, 57. 72 veterans, Edna Lomsky-Feder discovered that the majority reaction to the traumas of war in Israeli society is in fact a denial that any trauma took place. Veterans describing their experience rarely describe the war as a disruptive element in their life trajectories. On the contrary, the war is perceived as a normal life event of little bearing on one’s worldview or behavior. The paternal language of Yizkor literature reinforces and reflects this interpretation by repeatedly confirming the normalcy of war and sacrifice in the Israeli context. This is not confined to any war in particular and emerges as a dominant feature of Yizkor literature spanning from 1911 onward. The Yom Kippur War tested the durability of this interpretation by adding an element of military failure and government betrayal which had previously been absent from any discourse concerning war and the military.
The maternal language of Yizkor literature often appears as antithetical to the first language, challenging its clichés, even though within the framework of Yizkor literature, both are deeply symbiotic (this will be discussed later). To be sure, the maternal language does not necessarily emanate from the subject’s mother. Rather, the maternal language of Yizkor literature denotes narratives which internalize the grief and trauma that the nation successfully stymies in favor of nationalistic or militaristic rhetoric. As philosopher Sara Ruddick asserts, the language of the mother stubbornly refuses to
“subordinate pain to tales of victory and defeat.” 111 Prior to the Yom Kippur War, Yizkor literature was almost completely devoid of these narratives, focusing instead on the glory of war and virtues of patriotic death. While deviant narratives appear as a minority within the commemorative genre, they are nevertheless significant in their innovation.
111 Ruddick, Sara. “Mothers and Men’s War”. Rocking the Ship of State: Toward a Feminist Peace Politics. ed. Harris, Adrienne, and Ynestra King. (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1989). 73
The language of the mother, which encapsulates the individual narratives discussed in chapter three, is in fact incorporated into the fabric of Yizkor literature. Just as Naveh argues that the ‘private’ language of the mother is appropriated by the state, so too is the maternal language reliant on the language of the state for its ‘private’ expressions. It is for this reason that commemorative deviations never reach the same level of ferocity as seen elsewhere. Rather, the maternal narrative contents itself with feelings of frustration, grief, or disillusionment aimed at everything except the state. As a result, one observes infrequent outbursts rather than an occupation of Yizkor literature’s commemorative space.
The scarcity of truly deviant narratives in a majority of the Yizkor books presents a curious irony. On the one hand, this language is given room to maneuver, albeit in a restricted way. The subject is described according to his personal interests, habits, and relationships which is itself a separation from the national commemorative style. Yizkor literature therefore fills its role as an outlet for the private performance of memory in the most literal sense. Commemoration is withdrawn from the domain of the state and reclaimed by the individual’s inner circle. Standardized grave stones, memorial ceremonies, and defense ministry publications persist while families grasp at the opportunity to present their loved ones in a personal fashion. As the content of Yizkor books suggests, going beyond personal descriptions and mourning is clearly viewed as too taboo for the commemoration of fallen soldiers. Public transcripts continue to reflect the paternal language of commemoration while in actuality the hidden transcript can only be inferred by the social context of 1973-1974. In appropriating the bereavement, memory, and grief of Yizkor literature into commemorative canon, Yizkor literature
74 becomes more reflective of the institutional commemoration than one may suspect.
Yizkor literature is, in its very essence, unable to contain the emotions that could be found elsewhere.
A significant side effect of Yizkor literature’s inability of Yizkor literature to contain truly subversive expressions of disillusionment is manifested in its increasing irrelevance after the Yom Kippur War. The increasing presence of other commemorative means, such as Torah scrolls and scholarships indicates a growing trend that would reach a pinnacle with the first Lebanon War (1982). After the first Lebanon War, when feelings of disillusionment far surpassed those of the Yom Kippur War, the Yizkor book became largely irrelevant. In this sense, the Yizkor book is very much the preferred commemorative mode of the ‘old-guard’. When the Yizkor book becomes obsolete, truly deviant narratives must find expression elsewhere.
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Appendix
Fig. 1 Cover page of Moshe Timsit’s Yizkor book. A photograph of Moshe Timsit is situated above his name, date of birth, and date of death. Beneath his date of death is the sentence “Brother of a bank worker Nissim Timsit.” On the following page, the heading “The Soldier who Wanted to Wave the Flag on the Hermon,” towers above an eleven line biography.
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Fig. 2 The second page of Moshe Timsit’s Yizkor book begins with a recollection of his death in battle. A photograph of Moshe and a friend in an military jeep complements the story.
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