ISRAEL
When you think of
Second Generation
Continued from Page 60
SIFTS. ..
think of Sherwood!
All Gifts & Accessories are
30% off thru July 3 1st
♦
♦
♦
♦
Elegant Accessories
Shower, Wedding, Birthday Gifts
Complimentary Gift Wrapping ♦ Bridal Registry
Unique & Unusual Selection
Fine Designer furniture, Gifts ek Accessories
WEST BLOOMFIELD
6644 Orchard Lake at Maple • 855-1600
M-Th-r 10-9 • Tu-W-Sat 10-6 • Sun 12-5
There's more than one
Way to use •
A Futon!
It's a Bed,
A Futon is a natural fiber filled
mattress, placed on a hinging,
solid wood frame.
The unique upholstery fabric
• covers are removable,
cleanable & changeable!
• Our Futon Mattresses are made in Michigan
• Solid hardwood - No particle board
••
••
10 to 35% OFF
All Tables,
Lamps, Artwork
& Accessories!
It's a Lounger!
SALE...
10% OFF
All Futons & Frames
Sale Runs July 15th - 26th
• ••
••
Natural Bedding and Home Furnishings
ROYAL OAK
306 S. Main St.
(313) 548-4422
NOVI TOWN CENTER
26164 Ingersol Drive
(313) 349-5040
NEW UTICA
-
7770 Auburn Rd.
(313) 254-9828
Advertising in The Jewish News Gets Results
Place Your Ad Today. Call 354-6060
62
FRIDAY, JULY 17, 1992
weighted step for many
Israeli children of survivors,
as for 2-Gs everywhere.
Israel's Second Generation
have a disproportionately
high number of single people
past their mid-30s. In
America, children of sur-
vivors who want to distance
themselves from their
parents' history may do so
by marrying Gentiles. In
Israel, this is often ac-
complished by marrying
Sephardim, who did not go
through the Holocaust, Mr.
Amit noted. Another reason
why 2-Gs often marry
Sephardim is because they
generally have large
families, which Second Ge-
neration children lost to the
concentration camps.
One characteristic of the
Israeli 2-G experience sur-
faced noisily and angrily on
the last day of the con-
ference. It touched on that
thorny issue of the sur-
vivors' passivity.
In his address, Aaron
Hass, author of "In the
Shadow of the Holocaust:
The Second Generation,"
noted that survivors who
came to the U.S. after the
war got little attention from
the American Jewish com-
munity, whose members
were indifferent, uncomfor-
table or ashamed at having
done little to save European
Jewry. In contrast, he said,
survivors who came to Israel
were "very cruelly rejected
by Israeli society." Israelis
saw them as "sheep who had
gone to the slaughter,"
Yiddish-speaking refugees
who symbolized meek
Diaspora Jewry, a reminder
of everything the strong,
suntanned, fighting sabras
of Israel wanted to put
behind them.
This is a consensus view of
what happened to the sur-
vivors on their arrival in
Israel. However, when I ask-
ed Mr. Hass if this history
had affected the Israeli Se-
cond Generation, if the chil-
dren who came of age here in
the 1950s had taken
society's cue and begun to re-
ject their own parents as
"sheep who had gone to the
slaughter," Shalmi Barmor,
head of education for Yad
Vashem and moderator for
Mr. Hass's address, objected.
"Israel did not reject the
survivors as people," he
said. "Israelis were
wholeheartedly full of them-
selves, and were not inter-
ested in the Holocaust be-
cause they didn't have time,
they were building a state.
But they didn't reject the
survivors as people."
"They did!" shouted
Israelis in the auditorium.
"Stop whitewashing!"
Mr. Barmor repeated his
defense and Mr.Hass turned
to him, asking, "What could
be more of a rejection than a
total lack of empathy for
their experience?" The au-
dience applauded.
Mr. Hass said he could not
answer my question, having
studied only American 2-Gs.
Mr. Amit noted that Israeli
children of survivors had
typically tried to out-sabra
the sabras, wearing shorts
and sandals all the time,
picking up the slang, prov-
ing that they were real
Israelis too. Were they
ashamed of their parents?
"There was a feeling of
shame among some, and the
shame was shown through
their silence," he said.
"Some wouldn't even admit
that their parents were sur-
vivors."
In recent years, however,
Israel has begun to look back
with embarrassment on its
caustic reception of the
Holocaust survivors. It is
beginning to realize that the
Jews' passivity was forced
upon them. This combined
with the upsurge of interest
in all aspects of the Holo-
caust, has led some Israeli
children of survivors to come
to terms with their legacy, to
begin, as Ms. Vardi put it,
"to come out of the closet." ❑
I NEWS 1""m"11
Swastika Art
Is Protested
Rome (JTA) — How did
artwork covered in
swastikas get included in a
community exhibition?
That's what an angry fes-
tival-goer tried to find out
when he encountered a ce-
ramic sculpture of a sail dec-
orated with 34 red swastikas
during an exhibition in the
Italian Riviera town of
Savona.
According to Italian press
reports, Dr. Yehudah Winer
tried to find out the identity
of the sculptor. But organi-
zers of the exhibition, which
was sponsored by Italy's
Democratic Party of the
Left, formerly the Commu-
nist Party, were "surprised
and embarrassed" to
discover that the name of the
artist could not be found.
Later the party's provin-
cial secretary, Carlo
Giacobbe, publicly apologiz-
ed for the exhibit and said it
would be removed.