‘A subject that is guaranteed to make you universally disliked’: Pankaj Mishra on writing about Gaza

There’s almost no conversation about Gaza without the Holocaust as a comparison, antithesis, or foil. To most institutions worldwide, the history between the days of Auschwitz and October 7, 2023 remains suspended. Talking about Palestine guarantees scarlet letters that spell antisemite. After all, victimhood was an Israeli right, no matter that the nation-state has gathered affirmation from all the institutions that help create the reality of the world in which we live: the media, the publishing houses, the universities, the democracies, the intellectuals.

In his latest title, The World After Gaza, the essayist, novelist, and public intellectual Pankaj Mishra examines how Israel and its supporters instrumentalised the memory of the Holocaust to justify its actions and silence criticism. Mishra draws heavily on the writings of intellectuals and survivors of the Holocaust, including Jean Améry, Primo Levi, and Hannah Arendt, to analyse the history of Zionism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the evolving relationship between the West and the rest of the world. Perhaps most significantly, he dismantles the inadequate linear assumptions that often guide our understanding of history, particularly the naive belief that the Holocaust was universally condemned immediately after the truth emerged. In reality, many who knew remained silent, much like some witnessing Gaza…

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