Delusions About International Panacea

By Philip
Slomoyitz

Contributed to Tragedies of Holocaust

The Late Isaac Deutscher — the Role of an Un-Jewish
Jew and His Hope for Socialist Millenium

Isaac. Deutscher was the great authority on Russia and -Commu-
nism. As biographer of Lenin and Trotsky, as evaluator of • the role of
the Russian dictators, especially Stalin, he was the distinguished his-
torian who not only knew his native land but was able to transmit bril-
liantly his views to the English-reading peoples, and to those who
could read him either in Russian or in whatever langnages his writings
were translated.
He died in 1967 at the age of 60, and his wife, Tamara Deutscher,
has collected a number of his essays and speeches and has incorporated
them in a book entitled "The Non-Jewish Jew and Other Essays" by
Isaac Deutscher, published by Oxford Press with an introduction by the
widow that adds great merit to this book.
Mrs. Deutscher's introductory essay is on the subject "The Educa-
tion of a Jewish Child," and from it we learn much that is necessary
for an understanding of the "non-Jewishness" that is incorporated into
the title of the book.
Actually, the late Mr. Deutscher was more un-Jewish than non-
Jewish; and he certainly can not be judged as anti-Jewish because
that would deprive a man of the right to differ—as he did—or to
criticize—which also was one of his basic characteristics. But be
was not non-Jewish, since that would imply a complete negation of
a Jewish interest that was deeply imbedded in his works even if
he rebelled against Jewish traditions and practices and rejected the
Zionist hopes.
Mrs. Deutscher knew and understood her husband well, and she
certainly was well acquainted with his background and was fully aware
Of his childhood experiences that were rooted in the Hasidic training of
his family. He was a genius, and he knew his Jewish lore well, and he
was a rebel who defied customs, who yielded to a challege by a Chris-
tian friend, before his 14th birthday, to eat a buttered ham sandwich on
Yom Kippur, after being enticed from the synagogue to the gate of the
Jewish cemetery. It left its mark—not of guilt because it was, as Mrs.
Deutscher explains, "a long drawn process toward atheism—but be-
cause "on that evening (when his father wanted to feed him first of all
after the fast day) it was not God who was mocked but his parents who
were deceived. That was what made the young offender choke with
food, shame and tears."
It is in this episode that the reader will find a most impressive
lesson, yet one wonders upon reading all of the Deutscher essays
whether it was ever fully learned by the defectors, by the defiant
humanists and internationalists who believed as many still do, and
as the impression is gained from the writings about Jews by Deut-
scher, that the solution to all Jewish problems, the panacea for
those who hope for a better world and for true justice on earth, is
in the international socialist dream.
This really is the major factor in the Deutscher ideal and the basic
thing to be studied and re-examined: re-examined because it was this
very hope and dream that kept millions of Jews, under the influence of
the Bund and other Socialist elements, from joining the efforts of Jew-
ish self-liberation. They shunned Zionism, they believed in the fulfill-
ment of the dream of a socialistic society. Zionism was anathema to
them, therefore they stood in the way of the Zionist cause.
From the lesson of the buttered ham sandwich also comes a re-
minder about the need that arises for Jewish solidarity, the urgency in
time of need for Jews not to separate themselves from the unified Jew-
ish community. Linked to the atheism that caused a young genius like
Isaac Deutscher to defect from Jewish ranks also was a denial of the
principle that says "separate not yourself from the Jewish community."
This needs to be said in view of an admission that was made
by Deutscher in an article in the Reporter magazine in 1954 upon
his return from a visit to Israel. (Purely Commentary discussed it
at that time in a special reference to that article, in view of its
undeniable significance). In that article he wrote: "Israelis who
have known me as an anti-Zionist of long standing are curious to
hear what I think about Zionism. I have, of course, long since
abandoned my anti-Zionism, which was based on a confidence in
the European labor movement, or, more broadly, in European
society and civilization, which that society and civilization have not
justified. If, instead of arguing against Zionism in the 1920s and
1930s I had urged European Jews to go to Palestine, I might have
helped to save some of the lives that were later extinguished in
Hitler's gas chambers."
Need anything else be said about the realism that is so vital to a
proper approach to the currents which have engulfed the Jews and to
the prejudices the poisons of which have made complete international-
ism impossible? Yet, as time progressed, after the Six-Day War, there
were new doubts, and Deutscher, shortly before his death, began to
question the Jewish role, posing the very words now used by the New
Left about Jewish imperialism, Israelis as agents of capitalism, etc.—
but he did say in an interview on June 23, 1967, that the Jewish role is
"altogether lamentable;" that "they are placed once again in the posi-
tion of potential scapegoats."
Deutscher spoke at the June 1967 interview about "a phony mili-
tary legend" in Israel and about the role of Dayan, of Begin and right-
wing Zionists, and there is this rather disturbing inclusion:
"On a deeper historical level the Jewish tragedy finds in Israel
a dismal sequel. Israel's leaders exploit in self-justification, and
over-exploit Auschwitz and Treblinka; but their actions mock the
real meaning of the Jewish tragedy.
"European Jews paid a horrible price for the role they had
played in past ages, and not of their own choosing, as representa-
tives of a market economy, of 'money,' among peoples living in a
natural, money-less, agricultural economy. They were the conspicu-
ous carriers of early capitalism, traders and money lenders, in pre-
capitalist society. The image of the rich Jewish merchant and
usurer lived on in gentile folklore and remained engraved on the
popular mind, stirring distrust and fear. The Nazis seized this
image, magnified it to colossal dimensions, and constantly held
it before the eyes of the masses.
"August Bebel once said that anti-Semitism is the 'socialism of
the fools.' There was plenty of that kind of 'socialism' about, and all
too little of the genuine socialism, in the era of the Great Slump,
and of the mass unemployed and mass despair of the 1930s. The
European working classes were unable to overthrow the bourgeois

2—Friday, January 3, 1969

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

capitalism
enough to, force an outlet for itself and focus on a scapegoat.
Among the lower middle classes, the lumpenbourgeoisie and the
lumpenproletariat, a frustrated anti-capitalism merged with fear of
communism and neurotic xenophobia. The impact of Nazi Jew-
baiting was so powerful in part because the image of the Jew as the
alien and vicious `blood-sucker' was to all too many people still an
actuality. This accounted also for the relative indifference and the
passivity with which so many non-Germans viewed the slaughter of
the Jews. The socialism of the fools gleefully watched Shylock led
to the gas chamber.
"Israel promised not merely to give the survivors of the Euro-
pean-Jewish communities a 'National Home' but also to free them
from the fatal stigma. This was the message of the kibutzim, the
Histadrut, and even of Zionism at large. The Jews were to cease
to be unproductive elements, shopkeepers, economic and cultural
interlopers, carriers of capitalism. They were to settle in 'their own
land' as 'productive workers.'
"Yet they now appear in the Middle East once again in the
invidious role of agents not so much of their own, relatively feeble,
capitalism, but of powerful western vested interests and as proteges
of neo-colonialism. This is how the Arab world sees them, not with-
out reason. Once again they arouse bitter emotions and hatreds in
their neighbors, all those who have ever been or still are victims
of imperialism. What a fate it is for the Jewish people to be made
to appear in this role! As agents of early capitalism they were still
pioneers of progress in feudal society; as agents of the late, over-
ripe, imperialist capitalism of our days, their role is altogether
lamentable; and they are placed once again in the position of poten-
tial scapegoats. Is Jewish history to come full circle in such a way?
This may well be the outcome of Israel's 'victories'; and of this
Israel's real friends must warn it.
"The Arabs, on the other hand, need to be put on guard against
the socialism or anti-imperialism of the fools. We trust that they
will not succumb to it; and that they will learn from their defeat
and recover to lay the foundations of a truly progressive, a socialist
Middle East."
At that late date, Deutscher sitll spoke of a socialist state, without
realizing that the people he appealed to already had "succumbed" to
the socialism of fools. One wonders whether Deutscher would, today,
have joined the New Left and the Communist cabal that has ganged
up, together with the Arab propagandists, in destructive campaigns
against Israel, or whether he would again have joined the progressive
forces to prevent another Holocaust in the Middle East.
It is always intriguing to read Deutscher, often to learn from his
writings; and in the present instance, as in the past, it is a cause for
deep regret that he had joined the elements that served an anti-Jewish,
later an anti-Israel, purpose; presently, as in Russia and Poland, under
the guise of anti-Zionism; always detrimental to justice. Somehow we
would like to believe that he would have been on the side of decency
and justice and would have rejected the New Left as vehemently as he
had rejected Stalinism.

*

*

Norman Thomas' Anti-Zionist Record

Deutscher's views have some relevance to the passing of the
eminent Socialist leader Norman Thomas. He was highly revered and
receives marvelous triubutes now. Like Deutscher, he held the view
that the panacea for all the world's ills is in an international society.
Like Deutscher he was misled in his extreme opposition
to Zionism. Like Deutscher he failed to see the emer-
gence of the millenium from the movements of broth-
erly love in an international setting. Instead, it is from
that area of dreams that most of the world's troubles
developed in the past half century.
Like Deutscher, if he had aided the Zionist cause
instead of battling it mercilessly, perhaps millions of
Jews might have escaped the crematoria. Thomas
Ironically, now that the Norman Thomas Endowment is being set
up at the New York School for Social Research, the list of sponsors
includes such names as David Ben-Gurion, Prof. Horace M. Kallen
and other noted Zionists.
Perhaps it is out of the despair that developed towards the begin-
ning of this century over the opposition of Socialists to the humanitar-
ian and libertarian hopes of Jews for an end to Jewish homelessness
through Zionism that the Labor Zionist movement (Poale Zion) move-
ment emerged to serve a great purpose. That's where Ben-Gurion and
his associates fitted in so marvelously. In spite of difference of opinion
they and the Norman Thomas crew were fellow Socialists and they
do not hesitate now to join in paying honor to his memory.

Max Brod

Max Brod, who died Dec. 20 at
the age of 84, in Tel Aviv, was one
of the great literary personalities
of our time. He was the biographer
and popularizer of Franz Kafka:
As a dedicated Zionist, he contrib-
uted significantly to the literature
of the Jewish libertarian move-
ment. If not for him, the Kafka
works might not have been known,
and "The Trial" and "The Castle"
might have been hidden from pub-
lic eye. Kafka's "Letter to His Fa-
ther" owes its publication to Brod.
Brod's "Reubeni" was one of the
great novels about the false mes-
siah and the Messianic movement-
So much is to be recorded in
praise of the creative efforts of
Max Brod that the few words in
this reference to him serve merely
to assure that the name won't be
forgotten and that an eminent Zi-
onist and writer will receive due
recognition.

•

1,

*

John Steinbeck's Legacy

Vastly different was the attitude
of John Steinbeck. The winner of
Nobel and Pulitzer prizes wrote
thrilling articles describing his
visit in Israel a
in 1966. His
"Grapes of
Wrath" had
been branded
"Jewish prop-
aganda, by
the bigots, and
the handled
them with dig-
nity in an ex-
'change of let-
ters with the Steinbeck
late Dr. L. M. Birkhead, who head-
ed Friends of Democracy. The
two letters formed what this com-
mentator called "The World's
Shortest Book," a publication that
was issued by the late Rev.. Birk-
head, one of this nation's bravest
libertarians.
In one of his reports from Israel,
in April, 1966, Steinbeck wrote:
"The present-day Israeli nation
. . - is up to a point an exact rep-
lica of America up to the immigra-
tion laws of 1928. Here have come
and been welcomed the hungry,
the hurt, the driven peoples from
nations, not the best but the worst,
at least from the viewpoint of
their places of origin . . - Israel
has one thing America never had
in its developing nationhood. Israel
is ringed with enemies, not the
enemies invented by dictators to
keep their peoples afraid and de-
fensive, but real enemies, armed
and poised, enemies whose often
and always stated purpose is the
destruction of the Israeli state.
. . - In defeat, the Israelis have
no place to go, no corridor of re-
treat. Their most often repeated
statement is: 'Israel's secret weap-
on is—No Alternative.' "
The heirs of the Steinbeck name

(Continued on Page 5)

Insane, Uncivilized, Brutal Attacks on An Enemy's Civilians

And they keep talking about Deir Yasin!
Premeditated murder of civilians in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and the settlements of farmers on their bor-
ders; the hijacking of a plane, contrary to establishedinter-national regulations; now a brutal, insane attack
on passengers in an Israeli pine! and the Arabs call this warfare!
Is this another reason for even-handedness, Mr. William Scranton?
They call it warfare!

Perhaps that's permitted in the minds of the demented who now have taken the law into their own
hands and who seek to turn the Middle East into a jungle, but there are human beings in that area who are
transforming the jungle into a place of honor and dignity and terror will not be tolerated: that's Israel's an-
swer to Fedayeen, El Fatah and the so-called Palestine Liberation Committee which claims the right to ter-
rorize and to murder civilians.

We are confident that Israel won't be deterred from its path of humanitarianism. Never before in the
history of warfare—and the Six-Day War is far from ended !—have the conquered been given so much free-
dom, even unto the point of traveling freely among the civilized within Israel. Perhaps it is because of
this freedom that armed bandits have invaded Jewish areas, murdering, pillaging, molesting. But the pol-
icy of freedom persists. Let it be a lesson to those who pledged help to Israel and are dilly-dallying; and to
Scranton who claims to have learned so much in five days in the Middle East that he wants even-handed-
ness!
It is tragic that the one country Israel had little conflict with—Lebanon—should be involved in the new
reprisal. But Israel has the proof that terrorists have have been harbored in Lebanon then the act was just-
ified !

And the one impressive fact to remember is that not a single life was lost in the attack on the
Beirut airport and the El Fatah attack in Athens was on a plane with 13 women and four children !
Israelis are not out to murder. They sought reprisal and retribution and got it—and meanwhile the UN
acted unilaterally—taking, as usual, account of Israel's acts while ignoring the crimes of the Arabs !
The terrors of the past have not frightened Israel. The terrors of now are not frightening them. May this
lesson of fearlessoss gert in firmly, i4 all, jexish ranits, so that the fighter s for justice and liberty and self-
i
preservations should know that we stand ready to sack them up in the liours of serious tribulations! - -