Jakob Augstein
It's starting to dawn on me how important Gunter Grass's poem is. The naysayers predictably took their first loud shots against it (and him), that's to be expected. But the pushback has hardly begun and what remains unclear is the overall reaction of the public both within German society and internationally.
Commenter LeaNder alerted us to this prescient article in Spiegel Online by influential German columnist and political analyst Jakob Augstein (check out his bio, no slouch), who nails it in his article Why We Need an Open Debate on Israel.
Gideon Levy
Gideon Levy has also weighed in: Israelis can be angry with Gunter Grass, but they must listen to him. While both journalists are critical of Grass, they capture what I believe will be remembered as the lasting impact of his poem.
Augstein writes "the Netanyahu administration has the entire world holding its breath" and "Israel has thrust an ultimatum on the world". How many people feel like this? And who is speaking for us?
Then he asserts, "A much-delayed dialogue has begun". Let's hope so. Would it even be possible to have an open bi continental or global conversation about the fear engendered by the threat Israel represents with the prospect of another war? Augstein:
A great poem it is not. Nor is it a brilliant political analysis. But the brief lines that Günter Grass has published under the title "What Must Be Said" will one day be seen as some of his most influential words. They mark a rupture. It is this one sentence that we will not be able to ignore in the future: "The nuclear power Israel is endangering a world peace that is already fragile."
It is a sentence that has triggered an outcry. Because it is true. Because it is a German, an author, a Nobel laureate who said it. Because it is Günter Grass who said it. And therein lies the breach. And, for that, one should thank Grass. He has taken it upon himself to utter this sentence for all of us. A much-delayed dialogue has begun.
...................
Now, backed by a US in which presidents must secure the support of Jewish lobby groups in the run-up to elections as well as by a Germany in which historical penance has assumed a military component, the Netanyahu administration has the entire world holding its breath: "Netanyahu's Israel has dictated the global agenda as no small state has ever done before," writes the Israeli daily Haaretz. From oil prices to terrorism, there are plenty of reasons for the world to fear a war between Israel and Iran.
.....
Israel has thrust an ultimatum on the world. It doesn't want to supply evidence that Iran has a bomb. Nor does it want to provide proof that Iran is even building a bomb. Israel's stance is simple: It doesn't want Iran to reach the "zone of immunity." Accordingly, Israel is threatening to launch an attack before the Iranians can bury their atomic facilities so deep in the granite that even the largest bunker-busting American bombs can no longer reach them.
.............
At the moment, Iran is feeling the pressure of sanctions. But the time has finally come to put some pressure on Israel, as well. Mind you, whoever says such a thing is not trying "to relativize the guilt of the Germans by making the Jews into perpetrators," as Mathias Döpfner says. In this case, we're not talking about German history. We're talking about the world. And we're talking about the present.
"Because it is true". There, he said it. Even if one does not believe Israel will use those weapons the power over the psyche of ordinary people with this constant conversation about whether Israel should or should not attack Iran (with or without the US), cannot be denied and it is too much to bear. If it haunts me, just imagine what it would feel like being the target of that kind of animosity.
Levy, writing from Israel, extracts the same essential message from Grass's poem: we need to listen and express ourselves.
Grass' "What Must Be Said" does contain things that must be said. It can and should be said that Israel's policy is endangering world peace. His position against Israeli nuclear power is also legitimate. He can also oppose supplying submarines to Israel without his past immediately being pulled out as a counterclaim. But Grass exaggerated, unnecessarily and in a way that damaged his own position. Perhaps it is his advanced age and his ambition to attract a last round of attention, and perhaps the words came forth all at once like a cascade, after decades during which it was almost impossible to criticize Israel in Germany.
That's the way it is when all criticism of Israel is considered illegitimate and improper and is stopped up inside for years. In the end it erupts in an extreme form.
.....
After we denounce the exaggeration, after we shake off the unjustified part of the charge, we must listen to these great people. They are not anti-Semites, they are expressing the opinion of many people. Instead of accusing them we should consider what we did that led them to express it..
Something tells me Grass's poem could be the gift that keeps on giving. Open the floodgates and let the real conversation begin. Let's hope Jakob Augstein is right and Grass's poem marks a rupture, allowing more of us to express ourselves moving forward.
>> A great poem it is not. Nor is it a brilliant political analysis.
I agree.
>> But the brief lines that Günter Grass has published under the title “What Must Be Said” … mark a rupture. It is this one sentence that we will not be able to ignore in the future: “The nuclear power Israel is endangering a world peace that is already fragile.”
I agree.
I read that there were inaccurate translations from the German,so maybe the measurement of it as a good poem was lost in translation.
But its accuracy is bulls eye.
>> I read that there were inaccurate translations from the German,so maybe the measurement of it as a good poem was lost in translation.
The “quality” of poetry is very subjective, and I find most poetry to be (pretentious and/or self-indulgent) crap. So, while a better translation might make Mr. Grass’ poem more palatable to someone else, I suspect I still wouldn’t like it. ;-)
>> But its accuracy is bulls eye.
I agree.
— how sad.
So, most songs, choral works and Shakespeare plays are such “crap”? Or does setting such “crap” to music somehow liberate poems from their pretentiousness and self-indugance?
>> — how sad.
Not nearly as sad as believing that a poem is good just because someone tells you it’s good.
>> So, most songs, choral works and Shakespeare plays are such “crap”?
I consider songs, choral works and plays to be in a separate category from poetry. However, like poetry and art, the quality of those things is also subjective.
eljay,
The poet Percy Shelley famously said that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of their time”.
Gunter Grass is not considered a poet: he is an author who occasionally writes ‘prose’ poetry. And his controversial poem does indeed ‘legislate’ our political time and concerns.
I hesitate to say this but you (like most of humanity) must write terrible poems if you think that the art of poetry is “crap” and “pretentious”. However, unfortunately, the art of poetry does attract loonies, charlatans and poetasters who easily can give that impression to the inexperienced poetry reader.
You ask any great author or playwright and they will all tell you that the highest and purest form of writing is the art of poetry – it’s also the most difficult to ‘perfect’.
Too bad you’re unable to connect to it’s soulful source. Your negative statements are really a reflection on you and not on the art of poetry.
There is a point in judging poetry that is NOT subjective. For instance you can say a sonnet by Shakespeare is a good poem but you personally don’t like it – which tells us that you ARE objective.
There is only good poetry, eljay – the bad ‘versions’ are not considered poetry in the slightest.
As the great Spanish poet Lorca said: ” we bury ourselves to the waist in mud to help those looking for lilies”.
The above quote is neither “crap” nor “pretentious”. But if you can prove otherwise, then I will tip my hat to you and eat my 2000 books of poetry page by page.
>> … you (like most of humanity) must write terrible poems …
>> There is only good poetry …
>> … the bad ‘versions’ are not considered poetry in the slightest.
If there is only good poetry, terrible poems cannot exist. But that doesn’t stop you from deciding that they can, or that bad poems are not poetry at all. You may want to reflect upon the highly-subjective nature of your assertion. :-)
>> As the great Spanish poet Lorca said: ” we bury ourselves to the waist in mud to help those looking for lilies”.
>> The above quote is neither “crap” nor “pretentious”. But if you can prove otherwise …
1. That quote is one phrase long. It’s not a poem.
2. That quote represents an interesting observation. Observations – such as the one Grass recently made – are no less interesting or correct or breathtaking or beautiful when written in prose.
3. I never said all poetry is crap or pretentious. You’re being overly-sensitive.
Eljay,
There are good poems and bad poems but only good POETRY – what ‘looks’ like a poem on the page isn’t necessarily ‘poetry’. A lover of poetry will understand this and clearly, you are no poetry lover.
A beautiful line in a poem can easily be taken out of a poem and it would be a poem in and of itself for it’s power and resonance, hence Lorca’s line.
I don’t expect you to understand any of the above, after all you did say: “I find most poetry to be (pretentious and/or self-indulgent) crap”. I mean your use of the word “most” is clearly philistine and “subjective”. You appear to hardly know what poetry is – and you have NOT read every single poem on earth to make THAT assertion.
If I were you, I wouldn’t discuss topics I didn’t understand or throw around sweeping statements on unstudied subjects.
But you are permitted to have an opinion, as uninformed as it maybe. And it’s worth? Not much if you come across like a “pretentious and/or self-indulgent crap” merchant.
You know, what finally got me to see poems as a brilliant art form…were poets with brilliant delivery…or readers who delivered the words in a brilliant manner.
Now, if you really want to rock your world…listen to some of the sexy poems of the 1600′s put to music and sung by sultry jazz/soul artists.
Trust me…you will see poetry in a whole new, vibrant light.
>> Taxi @ April 9, 2012 at 11:54 am
I have never once verbally attacked you on this site, but here you are all in my face just because I don’t like poetry. What a strange thing. Anyway, I won’t return the favour and attack you for liking poetry. That would be “philistine”.
>> You appear to hardly know what poetry is …
Appearances can be deceiving. :-)
>> … and you have NOT read every single poem on earth …
I never claimed to have read every single poem on earth.
>> If I were you, I wouldn’t discuss topics I didn’t understand …
I’m very well informed on the topic of what I like and don’t like. Perhaps you’d better take your own advice and refrain from discussing my (subjective) preferences.
>> You know, what finally got me to see poems as a brilliant art form…were poets with brilliant delivery…or readers who delivered the words in a brilliant manner.
CigarGod, I don’t dispute that – as with art or sculpture or song or architecture – there are some great poems out there. Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is perhaps my favourite.
And Iron Maiden’s song of the same name pays wonderful homage to it. :-)
The poetry of life.
It’s much better than Grass’ poem, IMHO. :-)
Eljay,
I like you and still do. I wasn’t “attacking” you, just critiquing your critique of poetry, your sweeping generalization.
You shoulda really said ‘most of the poetry I’ve read is pretentious and crap’, not “most poetry is pretentious and crap”. See what I mean my friend?
I really like you, really really really do, but I just had to put the record straight here cuz you were damning a muse you’ve never met.
Poetry is everywhere, it doesn’t have to be written to exist.
>> I wasn’t “attacking” you, just critiquing your critique of poetry, your sweeping generalization.
>> You shoulda really said ‘most of the poetry I’ve read is pretentious and crap’, not “most poetry is pretentious and crap”.
Well, why didn’t you just say so?! ;-)
But you’re right, I should have confined my dislike of poetry to “most of the poetry I’ve read”…and, for that matter, most of the poetry I’ve written, although some of it is damned good (in my subjective and very humble opinion).
And I like you lots, too. :-)
Well, eljay, strictly he formulates it as a question, not as a statement.
Does the nuclear power of Israel
endanger the already delicate world peace?
>> Well, eljay, strictly he formulates it as a question, not as a statement.
Fair enough. And, in which case, I’ll just say: Good question. :-)
Today, Israel has declared Grass a persona non grata. He is barred from entering the country again. I think that’s a shot in their own foot. The more they cry ‘wolf’ the more interest they generate in what Grass has said.
thanks klaus, i read about this after writing the article and inserted the haaretz link right before publication. it’s embedded in the first paragraph(naysayers).
Interesting line from the Haaretz article on Grass’ being banned:
In the translations I’ve read – four of them – the words “nuclear reactor” do not appear. Such terms as these do, in order of appearance:
first strike
a bomb is being built
growing nuclear potential
no testing is available
concealment of these facts
all-destroying warheads
a single atomic bomb
the nuclear power of Israel
an unhindered and permanent control
Of the Israeli nuclear potential
And the Iranian nuclear sites
(from Heather Horn’s translation for The Atlantic)
Were the Haaretz authors, Ophir Bar-Zohar and Barak Ravid, legally constrained from mentioning Israeli nuclear weapons in the article, thus forcing the inaccurate term, “nuclear reactor”?
wow, good question. btw philip, i rec bandolero’s comment in this thread wrt the translation.
link to mondoweiss.net
@ Philip Munger,
This constant dishonesty in ‘mis-translating’ and ‘mis-quoting’ phrases and words is backfiring. Without much consequences yesterday, but a growing awareness today and [most likely] coming full-circle tomorrow.
Indeed you did see different messages in Augstein’s column than I saw, Annie; I see them now that you have spotlighted them.
I was blinded by what I considered — and still consider — to be untrue and inflammatory statements that Augstein made about Iran in the first paragraphs of his article .
It seemed to me that Augstein found it necessary to shift some of Israel’s burden of bad acts onto Iran. It’s an illogical position to take — there is no moral equivalence between Iranian rhetoric — which Augstein got wrong — and Israel’s and the US’s acts of sanctioning-to-(hoped for) starvation of the Iranian people –which are acts of war; assassinations–which are acts of war; and repeated, unprovoked and unjustified, and possible-to-be-carried-out actual threats by those in a position to perform them, that “all options are on the table.”
It’s great that you drew attention to an additional message that Augstein communicated; kudos to you and MW.
Nevertheless, I stand by my original critique. When Sanam Anderlini told conferees at OccupyAIPAC , “You speak for 73 million Iranians” whose voices are not heard, and who are very afraid, she was (seemingly) speaking directly to me. I have and will continue to call attention to every demonization and distortion of the reality of Iran. In my view, Augstein distorted the reality of Iran.
i know, you read it as “in the first paragraphs of his article ” and i read it as in the fourth paragraph presented after 3 power packed paragraphs (albeit, the first bolded as the byline). by the time we came to the iran paragraph it was previously expressed:
*some of his most influential words.
*mark a rupture.
*we will not be able to ignore
*Israel is endangering a world
*triggered an outcry.
*it is true.
*one should thank Grass.
*He has taken it upon himself to utter this sentence for all of us.
* A much-delayed dialogue has begun.
and only after that did he do what journalists commonly do, he thru in a bone to the opposition. so i weigh all that when i read an article. note levy’s caveat process in his opening, note the caution.
the overall thrust of augstein’s op ed is very clear, powerful and courageous. in fact there’s a cavalier-ness about it that reveals the impression he’s not impacted by the kind of pre-established pattern he writes about wrt how debates in germany about israel are followed. i think he’s just naturally brave but look at the footsteps he’s following too. as i mentioned he’s no slouch. of course i know nothing else about his politics or other writing. these are just my first impressions. but it’s a powerful clear voice, he doesn’t equivocate, i like that.
how can you say he doesn’t equivocate when he did equivocate?
ps. I wrote the Gideon Levy comment (at 1:11) before reading your comment, above.
i read no equivocation wrt the thrust of his argument. he was very clear:
will one day be seen as some of his most influential words
not ‘may’ be seen.
we will not be able to ignore in the future
no equivocation. very clear.
Because it is true
i like his definitiveness. i get it you disagree. take the last word, i’m done defending why i think this is an important article.
Surely, by now, everyone knows that translation of “wiped off map” was deliberately wrong and deceitful?
CloakAndDagger :
We have known that long time, but our ziobot avtomat machines repeat this again and again.
Yes, it’s wrong and entirely deceitful. But we should be clear, the origin of the mistranslation was with the Islamic Republic News Agency (see link below). They produced the erroneous translation and Israel and the West immediately seized it – just too good an opportunity for propaganda to pass on.
See: link to antiwar.com
PS. Not that impressed with Gideon Levy’s back-of-the-hand “defense” of Gunter Grass.
Journalists know that most readers don’t make it past the first few lines. Those who do, frequently stop absorbing information after the first paragraph, maybe two.
In bold on Levy’s Haaretz article was this subhead:
After we denounce the exaggeration, after we shake off the unjustified part of the charge, we must listen to the condemnation of these great people.
-denounce
-exaggeration
-shake off
-unjustified
-condemnation
The first sentences –
-harsh
-infuriating
-vilifications
-’few steps too far and too mendaciously’
and then the blooper, in the second sentence: “Israel will not destroy the Iranian people.”
Well then why the f*&k do they keep threatening to do so, Gideon?
How many times has the world heard Netanyahu or some other Israeli leader say, “when Ahmadinejad says Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth, we should believe he means it, and we shouldn’t allow such irrational actors the weapons to actually do it?”
Goose and gander — How many times has Israel said that Iran should be be attacked; “strangled,” and all the other means of being destroyed that Nima Shirazi has catalogued – Hurting, Hanging, Suffocating & Starving: The Inhumanity of Iran Threat Rhetoric. If they don’t mean it, why do they say it, and more importantly, why does AIPAC lobby for and US representatives legislate for, and UNSC resolve for actions calculated to “hurt, hang, suffocate, and starve” Iranian people?
Ephraim Sneh told a cheering AIPAC crowd that “Iran’s leaders should be forced to worry about their ability to feed their 70 million citizens.” Did he say that just for the laugh-line? Is the fact that US Congress subsequently passed even harsher sanctions on Iran a clue that Sneh was looking for action calculated to “destroy” Iran, not cheers?
What if McCain had hummed “Bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb ISRAEL?”
What is the takeaway from those powerful words?
Exactly what “exaggeration” was Levy talking about?
When rhetoric is backed up by means, motive, opportunity, and a pattern of bad acts, to blithely assume that “Israel will not destroy the Iranian people” is a “mendacious” “exaggeration” that go “a few steps too far.”
I agree. (Too bad there isn’t an “I agree” counter).
Agree, Without Walls.
Even worse: Israeli opinions in this are not that relevant. Grass wrote to Germans, and the world. No need to put Levy in the headline (Anything from Beinart yet?).
Augstein: “Israel’s stance is simple: It doesn’t want Iran to reach the “zone of immunity.” Accordingly, Israel is threatening to launch an attack before the Iranians can bury their atomic facilities so deep in the granite that even the largest bunker-busting American bombs can no longer reach them.”
Israel wants absolute immunity and impunity and an Iranian bomb would tend to reduce that. (USA/AIPAC grants it, largely.)
As to the visit of students from Friends Seminary in NYC to “Israel/West Bank region” and Abraham Foxman’s response to it, I wrote to Foxman “Go yourself to the OPTs. Learn what Israel is. We know an artisan by his works. ”
Grass’s warning is apt and timely: we will not wish to be saying, all too soon, “Go yourself to Iran. Learn what Israel is. We know an artisan by his works. “
The Financial Times Deutschland has an on-line poll on its front page about Grass.
It says:
“The statements by Grass are …
- insane 8%
- dangerous 4%
- antisemitic 4%
- worth discussing/arguable 27%
- correct 57% ”
Till now the number of people who voted is 9700.
The respondents who see Grass’ statements as correct or at least arguable: 84%.
I think in the general German public the approval of Grass is even higher than this poll reflects. This will have political consequences in the longer term. As for now, the establishment is overwhelmingly distancing itself from Grass.
klaus, can you link to it please?
link to ftd.de
It’s “www.ftd.de” or just google Financial Times Deutschland
I guess it is not accessible from the US…
i just found it here
link to google.com
it’s now up to 10284 respondents. same percentages tho.
It’s easy. Just type in “www.ftd.de” The poll is on the right hand side of the homepage. When you click on Grass’ picture you get to the page where you can click your vote: “irrsinng/insane – gefährlich/dangerous – antisemitisch – diskutabel/worth discussing – richtig/correct”
Thanks!
I voted also : Richtig ;)
Annie,
The 10284 respondents you note are evidence that the poem is as important as you suggest.
Almost over night the attention that was focused on Iran has instead shifted to Israel and in a very deep and meaningful away that warns of the danger of Israel’s nuclear arsenal which is as real as Iran’s is theoretical.
I checked the site of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the newspaper that had the guts to print the poem, and found the following:
Basically all professional writers, as journalists, etc. are, damn Grass one way or another in a flood of hypocracy.
On the other hand about 80% of private comments are in his favour, many voicing a reliefe that at last someone said “what had to be said”.
The first reaction of german politicians were dripping in hypocracy, now I am very curious what will happen, after all, there are elections coming up and the nation may want to shake off the chaines imposed on them by the zionist propaganda of “remember the Holocaust”.
Netanyahoo may be losing his iron grip on the most important nation in Europe. If Germany turns against the zionist terror, other nations quickly will follow.
For those who understand german:
http://www.sueddeutsche.de
Now the ftd.de site has an article up about the extremely negative reaction in Germany to Israel’s prohibiting Grass from entering Israel: Israel erntet Empörung für Grass-Einreiseverbot [Israel Reaps Outrage With Its Entry Ban on Grass]
if you read the comments from other european press on the subject, there is a pretty consistent criticism of the israeli decision, one of the themes being the apparent hypocrisy of israel barring an intellectual from travel when it is whining about BDS calls for boycotting israeli intellectuals who support/are supported by israeli apartheid policies. more generally, commenters are complaining about criticism of israel being the ‘third rail’ of analysis, any critic of israel necessarily being an anti-semite (in this case a full-fledged ‘nazi’. interesting that one can never renounce membership in a political party, if grass was ever an enthusiastic ‘nazi’.)
ich habe auch abgestimmt. ‘richtig’.
“diskutabel”
“I think in the general German public the approval of Grass is even higher than this poll reflects.”
I agree. It’s only a financial magazine where readers/voters are more political correct.
“As for now, the establishment is overwhelmingly distancing itself from Grass.”
It would be political suicide otherwise, even if Grass is right.
i agree too, it’s up over 2000 votes from this morning (over 11,500) and the percentages have remained exactly the same. not too likely.
Saturday’s US edition of the Financial Times discussed the poem with an emphasis on its critics in Germany and Israel. It went out of its way to avoid mention of Germans who agreed with the content of the Grass poem.
That same Financial Times Deutschland (FTD) tries to nullify six themes from the poem in a fact check. To me it looks like the reporter, Raniah Salloum, distorts the facts before answering the check. Also the checker reads a very positive rational peaceloving Israel war-mind (a fact that can easily be unchecked first).
FTD, 07 April 2012
I wrote them a letter saying that if what Grass wrote was just poetic fiction with no basis in strategic reality – why all the fuss about it?
I added a quote from an AP article (yesterday) :
“The dispute with Grass … also focused unwelcome light on Israel’s own secretive nuclear program.” – their ‘nuclear ambiguity’.
Maybe the reason for the FTD- fact check is, they were irritated that 57% of the respondents of their on-line poll clicked “richtig/correct” what Grass had said. I just took another look, the poll is still on their homepage, the number of respondents is now 14,200. The percentages are still the same, only “antisemitic” went up from 4 to 5%. Because of rounding the percentages now ad up to 101%. The percentages will not change als long as the respondents come from the same social category.
Pardon that Juan Cole posted this YouTube on his site back near the end of February. It has a direct bearing upon the discussion here, it is the poetry, the world of those in the gun-sights of the purveyors of war. If you cannot be moved, your heart is certifiably dead.
link to youtube.com
Juan Cole’s post: link to juancole.com
For Facebook users, please show support for Herr Grass: link to facebook.com
Rupture after rupture after rupture. Awareness grows. Yet nothing changes on the ground. Illegal settlements keep growing.
And yes Israel’s nuclear,biological and chemical weapons that go undeclared, not inspected are a threat to peace in the middle east and have been for decades. Leaders from that part of the world have been writing the IAEA for decades about that persistent threat.
Have folks seen this?
link to miamiherald.com
Israel bars German author over poem critical of its nuclear arsenal
By Joel Greenberg
McClatchy Newspapers
JERUSALEM — Israel’s interior minister declared the celebrated German author Gunter Grass “persona non grata” on Sunday, barring his entry to the country, in response to a new poem in which the Nobel laureate called Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal a threat to world peace.
No too impressive a ban. Did he want to travel? Oh, and here is another ban.
Would that be a cultural boycott of Grass, of the kind Israel regularly denounces and gets very heated about when applied to it – and not just for poems people disagree with, but political and economic crimes against the people of the region. So it’s ok when they do it, but when others do it……
It would be an honour to have done something to get on that P.N.G. list
My firedoglake diary on this:
link to my.firedoglake.com
Thanks to Annie and to Klaus Bloemker for valuable information.
Gunter Grass is a great man. For those of you who have read his literature, you already know that. For the rest of you, here is his speech apropos being awarded the Noble Prize for Literature–it’s one I don’t think his German knee-jerk commentators understand in the slightest, especially the one who analogized a serious novelist in the vein of the great 19th Century novelists to a muscle-building man at the gym–it’s ironic that a German media pundit, arch liberal to the core, he thinks, would borrow from Goebbels to attack Grass for his poem, which states the obvious about Israel’s nukes, a matter that can’t be uttered in America by–even a great novelist: link to nobelprize.org
link to nobelprize.org
Just want to second what justicewillprevail said above. Apparently cultural boycotts are OK in some circumstances, but not others.
As seafoid points out regularly, the hasbara is collapsing under its own contradictions. In real time. Plain for all to see. Hopefully, soon to be followed by the Occupation it supports and perpetuates.
Israel’s tireless work at becoming the world’s first nation to have all its citizens listed as ‘personae non gratae’ will pay off one of these days.
The former Israel’s ambassador to Germany Avi Primor critizes Grass’ poem as well as the reaction by Israel’s interior minister to declare him a persona non grata. Primor writes that he believes that Yishai doesn’t understand anything about Germany. He also writes that he knows what he’s talking about when he says that Grass is not an antisemite.
link to tagesschau.de
Every Easter many German peace activists are protesting for peace. They support Grass and emphasize that preventive war is a crime.
link to n24.de
interesting. thanks talkback.
OT, but please MW, highlight new comments. All the ways you have tried in the last several days were great.
Will there be a meta thread on this pretty soon?
It is not the problem of Israel but of the West. The layers of hypocrisy accumulated during 70-80 years of struggle for Freedom, continuing the struggle for Civilization that occupied previous 100 years or so resemble what you see in Grand Canyon.
Grass asks what is a possible sane reason to equip Israel with most advanced submarines? In the meantime, Obama valiantly plods on an insane course of simultaneously alienating Russia and Pakistan, proceeding with very inflamatory course with Iran and supplying Israel with all necessary toys to light the fuse and get a conflagration that can have very humiliating outcome (with economic disaster as a bonus, or vice versa)?
Afghanistan is landlocked, and Pakistan seems to be quite pissed at USA and NATO, on the account of drone killing and some little indiscretions like help given to Baluchi separatists (Pakistani view with similar equanimity as Turks view aid to PKK. An act of war on Iran will most probably finish the supply route to Afghanistan through Central Asia. Then the only remaining method to supply our troops (or evacuate) would be by illegal overflights of Pakistan. In the same time, the scope of supplies to Afghan rebels, and the range of rebellion can vastly increase. That may spell Dien Bien Phu.
nuclear power israel is endangering more than an already fragile world peace, it’s endangering all life on earth.
I just watched On the Beach for the first time in several years. It is still one powerful movie. (Fred Astaire does a fantastic job of acting in it.)
Grass is barred from Israel – but “Jews stream back to Germany”
______________________________________________
In case someone is interested in Jews in Germany here is an article in the Forward,
“Jews stream back to Germany” by Donald Snyder (issue of April 13, 2012):
“According to a study by Dr. Sima Salzberg of Bar-Ilan University, 100,000 Israelis have applied for and received German passports.
—————-
“I fell in love with Berlin, its freedom, its great space” said Maya Nathan, a 33-year-old Israeli student with a German passport. Asked about the implications for her, as a Jew, of living in the country that unleashed the Holocaust, Nathan replied, “Our family was never anti-German.” But she said she does know Israelis who will never come to Germany.
Nadav Gablinger, 39, a tour guide, has lived in Berlin for 11 years. An Israeli with German citizenship, he and his Israeli wife have two children in German schools.
Noting that the history of the Holocaust is everywhere in Berlin, Gablinger said that present-day Germany is a very safe place for Jews.
“Today I can say, as a Jew, Germany is the safest place in the world,” he says, “Safer than in Israel.”’
Great Nadav, then please tell the same to other jews!!
It is time the zionist bury that Holocaust stigma.
50 years ago I have seen greater anti-semitism in Boston than you see today in Germany.
Deja vue or game changer? Augstein’s defense of Grass reminds me of what his father, Rudolf Augstein, in 1981, wrote in response to Begin’s ad hominem attack on former German chancellor Helmut Schmidt, defaming the latter as a former Nazi who had no right to criticize Israel. Same old trick, same old controversy. Sorry, in German only. Should nevertheless be read or at least registered by anyone who mistakenly believes that there is anything new about harsh German criticism of Israel’s aggressive foreign policy, or the hysteria that promptly follows
link to spiegel.de
addition, from 2001, in English. More of the same:
THE BLOND BEAST RETURNS
by Emanuel A. Winston, Mid East Analyst & Commentator
“Is there a little or perhaps a lot of the Nazi spirit alive and well among Germany’s so-called intellectuals? Publisher Rudolf Augstein of ‘Der Spiegel’ compares Prime Minister Ariel (Arik) Sharon to Adolph Hitler because Sharon is now defending Israel against Yassir Arafat’s terrorist attacks.(1) The basis of Augstein’s column was that Sharon’s hard-line toward Arab Palestinians was comparable to Hitler’s methods and, presumably, his goal of eliminating the Jews.
Mr. Augstein: How is any of this comparable to Sharon’s extraordinary patience and restraint in the face of numerous terrorist assaults? What you suggest is more in tune with former Nazi propaganda than a sound analysis. One is reminded of Hitler’s accusation – among other canards – that it was the Jews’ fault that Germany had collapsed financially in a flood of inflation. A lot of not so latent Nazism is once again rearing its ugly head in Germany.
Do we need to remind the reader of the six prior wars initiated by the Arab nations to eliminate the Jewish State of Israel and her Jewish citizens? Is it necessary to detail the terrorism originated by Arafat since 1964 and carried forward through today – every day?
For a respected intellectual in a flagship journal, ‘Der Spiegel’ to charge that Sharon had wiped out two decades of peace efforts by provoking war, is reminiscent of Herr Goebbels’ propaganda war against the Jews of Germany, Europe and Russia.”
link to netanyahu.org
antidote, i was reading up on Rudolf Augstein prior to writing this article, including the infamous spiegel scandal. he must have been a courageous man.
“he must have been a courageous man.”
Augstein seems pretty mainstream to me. I do remember him slamming Grass for lacking precisely this particular virtue, though. Augstein was no friend of Grass. Apart from differing political views and party affiliations, Augstein senior characterized Grass as having become a pompous, self-righteous a** after the success of the Tin Drum (which Augstein found way too long) and Nobel Prize went to his head. He wrote a favorable review of Grass’ Crabwalk but added that it was typical of Grass to tackle controversial or taboo subjects only once they’ve pretty much gone mainstream (in this case the view of Germans as victims of ethnic cleansing during the explusions at the end of WW II). A refugee from his native Danzig himself, Grass had for decades smeared everyone who complained about it as a right-winger, revanchist or neo-Nazi. Some see poetic justice in the fact that Grass is now at the receiving end of being told to shut up about what many people, and not just Israelis, don’t want to hear. As for Augstein’s point on Grass’ lack of courage or political opportunism one may think of Norman Finkelstein’s recent declaration that Israel bashing has become too easy? Finkelstein clearly does not lack courage. I’m not sure about Grass. Or even Augstein
I’ld like to recommend an analysis by Hamid Dabashi – Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University on Al Jazeera:
Günter Grass, Israel and the crime of poetry
link to aljazeera.com
While I don’t agree with everything in that analysis like:
- “The only people who are afraid of being called anti-Semites are the anti-Semites”
- “There is one, and only one, definitive resolution for that paradoxical consistency to come to an end: the one state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian dilemma”
- moving the poem from a stage of German-Israeli relations to European-Israeli relations
and a linguistic analysis part is missing,
the general analysis of Grass’ peom by Hamid Dabashi is quite thoughtful and I think it’s helpful.