Archive | 2015/11/23

“Die Welt”: Terroryzm w wierszach polskiej noblistki

Nov23
“Die Welt”: Terroryzm w wierszach polskiej noblistki

Katarzyna Domagała

Wisława Szymborska (1923-2012)
Polen Wislawa Szymborska

Warszawski korespondent „Die Welt” rozpoczyna od wiersza „Zamachowcy“, który ukazał się w 2005 roku po zamachach w Nowym Jorku i Madrycie. Zauważa, że wiersze Wisławy Szymborskiej traktują najczęściej o „banałach“, o „sprawach powszednich“. Utwór „Zamachowcy“ nie jest tu wyjątkiem. Opisane w nim osoby „jedzą“, „modlą się, „telefonują“, „żartują“, „popijają”, „śpią”. „Tylko jedna cecha wyróżnia je od masy: niewidoczne myśli o zabijaniu“, analizuje Gerhard Gnauck i zauważa, że „myśli te z całą siłą stały się widoczne w Paryżu”, „wkroczyły w nasze życie codzienne”.

„Szymborska nie wskazuje, kto jest zamachowcem“, kontynuuje „Die Welt”. Tytułowi zamachowcy to dla niej zwyczajni „obywatele dobrobytu jak my wszyscy”. Jedynie „popijanie soków cytrynowych“ zamiast piwa, wina czy wódki może być aluzją do muzułmanów. Poza tym – analizuje Gnauck – są „świetnie zintegrowani”, „nie są zamaskowani”. Są jak najbardziej „współobywatelami”, tylko „mają inne myśli w głowie”.

Szymborska wcześnie już zainteresowała się terroryzmem jako tematem swoich wierszy, zauważa Gnauck. Jeszcze na długo przed 1989 rokiem napisała wiersz „Terrorysta – on patrzy“, a po zamachu w Nowym Jorku utwór „Fotografia z 11 września“.

„Polska jest obecnie – nawet jeśli o tym nie wie – szczęśliwym krajem“, konstatuje „Die Welt”. „Terror, który tam panuje, jest zaledwie natury werbalnej”, wyjaśnia Gnauck. Zauważa, że z wierszy polskiej noblistki przemawia też „rola zdumionego świadka pokojowego Wschodu wobec wydarzeń na Zachodzie”.

„Die Welt” nawiązuje także do wiersza innego polskiego noblisty, Czesława Miłosza. W „Rue Descartes“ Miłosz wspomina swój pobyt w Paryżu. „Przypomina sobie, jak studiowali tam młodzi mężczyźni z całego świata, by potem w swojej ojczyźnie zabijać w imię pięknej uniwersalnej idei”, pisze Gnauck i dodaje: „wówczas komunizm, dzisiaj islamizm”. Kończy stwierdzeniem: „wspólnym mianownikiem pozostaje zabijanie“.

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Student Feature: Lindsay Shapiro

Nov23
Student Feature: Lindsay Shapiro

The Weiss-Livnat International MA Program in Holocaust Studies at the University of Haifa Blog

My name is Lindsay Shapiro, and I was born and raised in Tampa, Florida. I graduated from New York University in 2012 with a BA in History/Hebrew and Judaic Studies. While a student at NYU, I worked at the Bronfman Center for Jewish Life, Bar Ilan University, Interfaith Living Museum, and Center for Jewish History. I also worked as a Lipper Fellow at The Museum of Jewish Heritage: A Living Memorial to the Holocaust, teaching middle- and high-school students about the Holocaust, both in the Museum and in schools. I recently made aliyah after living in the United States for the first 25 years of my life. I live in Tel Aviv with my husband, Liran, and Jack Russell-mix dog, Pizza.

There were many factors that led me to the Weiss-Livnat MA program in Holocaust Studies. For one, I grew up fascinated with the Holocaust- reading books, watching movies, asking about it in school from a pretty young age. Before college, I had a very emotional education of the Shoah; one of victimhood and fear. While at NYU, at the beginning of a course on the Third Reich and the Jews, my professor told everyone, “If you’re here to see gruesome pictures and hear sad stories, this is not the class for you. We will be looking at this subject objectively, to figure out how a society could exterminate 12 million people in less than a decade, half of them Jews. We are going to learn the facts.” The idea of looking at the Holocaust from a scholarly and objective, point of view was eye opening and very appealing.

So far, my first semester in the MA program has been great. Coming to study in Haifa was a big change from studying at NYU. The campus feel here is something I hadn’t really experienced before. The mountain and sea views of Haifa are much different than the skyscrapers of NYC, and it’s something I think I can get used to!

One of my favorite parts of the program so far is getting to learn alongside my peers in our 2015-16 cohort. Everyone is coming to study from different parts of the world, different personal backgrounds and different fields of study, which adds a tremendous amount of depth to discussions in and out of classes. My professors are experts in their field, and are very passionate about what they’re teaching. It makes my days with almost 8 hours of lectures interesting.

I’ve recently become more interested in Holocaust research and diplomacy, and am excited to explore these ideas in the program. I’m very interested in relationships between Germany and Israel, as well as between Germany and the rest of the Jewish world. As I mentioned, I grew up in an American Jewish community, and was taught to treat certain countries with fear and hesitancy because of their actions during the Shoah. Having grown up and learned more about the Holocaust I don’t think this is fair, and I hope that my experience in the program can help me learn more about how to fix that perception in my home community. I believe that working together with countries like Germany and Poland on Holocaust research can improve future relationships between the citizens of these countries. As an olah and Zionist, I’m also interested in European Zionist movements, before and during the Second World War, and what their role may have been in survival rates amongst Jewish communities in Nazi-occupied countries.

Learning German here in Israel is especially meaningful. Even though my family was fortunate enough to come to America from Europe in the 1910s, the cities we discuss in class are cities they once lived in. On a personal level, I think the transition of the Jewish people from mass destruction to, 70 years later, the modern State or Israel is incredible.

At times, it’s difficult not to get too emotionally invested in the subject matter and to maintain objectivity. It’s painful to learn about the hundreds of destroyed communities in Eastern Europe, from where my great-great grandparents came, and know that ‘returning home’ to see my family’s roots will most likely lead to nothing; no traces of them, destroyed Synagogues and cemeteries, and an unfamiliar culture. Despite that odd sense of melancholy, it makes me happy and proud to think about Israel today, and to know that I’m learning about the Holocaust with non-Jewish students from these same places who came to study in Israel as well. I’m thankful that the State of Israel exists now, and I am hopeful that one day my peers and I will add to the immense amount of Holocaust research and work done here in Israel.

Interested in applying for our MA in Holocaust Studies Program? You can find the application and more information at our website:
logo2http://holocaust-studies.haifa.ac.il/

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New Video supports UT-Austin Israeli Studies Prof. after confrontation by protesters

Nov23
New Video supports UT-Austin Israeli Studies Prof. after confrontation by protesters

William A. Jacobson

Anti-Israel students scream at Israeli Studies Prof. Ami Pedahzur as he urges them to participate in event.

UT-Austin disruption speech Ami Pedhazur – Protesters Hallway
UT-Austin disruption speech Ami Pedhazur - Protesters Hallway 2

Yesterday morning we posted about an incident at UT-Austin, in which protesters from the Palestine Solidarity Committee (PSC), led by law student Mohammed Nabulsi, disrupted an event hosted by Professor Ami Pedahzur of UT’s Institute for Israeli Studies. The invited guest speaker was Dr. Gil-Li Vardi from Stanford University.

For full details, see Anti-Israel students target UT-Austin Israeli Studies prof after disrupting his speech.

Since then, the dispute has gone national with attempts by PSC and its supporters to get Prof. Pedahzur fired based on an edited video released by PSC.

The edited video, however, shows the protesters refusing to leave or to participate, and instead shouting down others and chanting “Long Live the Intifada.” The Intifadas have been the bloody series of uprisings which included suicide bombings (the Second Intifada which led to construction of the security barrier) and the current Knife Intifada which is ongoing. They also chanted “We want ’48, we don’t want two states” (a reference to the desire to undo the creation of Israel in 1948).

The edited PSC video does not show, contrary to PSC claims, an assault by Prof. Pedahzur; rather, it shows him trying to get the protesters to stop the disruption and to participate in the event.

Legal Insurrection has obtained exclusive video of the end of the event from the hallway outside which backs up Prof. Pedahzur’s account.

The video starts with the chants (shown at the end of PSC’s edited video). As the protesters move outside, they scream that pre-Independence Jews cooperated with the Nazis, and then they continue their chants. Prof. Pedahzur exits the room into the hallway and again asks the protesters to participate in the event, but they just scream at him some more.

The police then arrive, and the protesters continue screaming.

This is crucial evidence, because the protesters are claiming there was an assault and an unwillingness to hear their views. But in fact Prof. Pedahzur urges them to stop screaming and to participate.

This video again shows the protesters as being purely interested in disruption and interfering with the event.

There is a climate of intimidation and threats against Israeli and pro-Israeli speakers. We recently covered the disruption of a speech by an Israeli professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, and of an Israeli diplomat at the University of Windsor.

The UT-Austin academic leadership will have to decide whether it will continue to tolerate disruption of speeches and events through mob rule.

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