Israel’s Pick to Head Holocaust Memorial Stirs International Uproar

JERUSALEM — For years, his title was synonymous with intolerance and right-wing extremism.

So when Israel’s conservative-led authorities nominated Effie Eitam to be chairman of Yad Vashem, the nation’s official Holocaust memorial and one its most hallowed establishments, it prompted an uproar.

Mr. Eitam, a 68-year-old retired brigadier basic and former minister, has spent the final decade within the non-public sector. However his provocative statements from the early 2000s advocating the mass expulsion of Palestinians from the occupied West Financial institution and barring Israel’s Arab residents from politics linger on the public record.

The appointment might have “devastating penalties,” mentioned Israel Bartal, a professor of contemporary Jewish historical past on the Hebrew College of Jerusalem, who mentioned he could be compelled to chop all contacts with Yad Vashem’s analysis institute after years of cooperation. “An institute headed by an individual with such excessive opinions and controversial human values won’t ever be taken significantly throughout the world tutorial neighborhood,” Mr. Bartal mentioned.

Holocaust survivors, Jewish organizations and a world array of historians have denounced the appointing of such a contentious determine to move Yad Vashem. They are saying that along with recognizing the Nazi genocide of six million Jews as a novel occasion, the establishment can also be accountable for upholding common ethical values and educating individuals about anti-Semitism and racism.

But regardless of the pushback, a authorities appointments committee vetted and authorized Mr. Eitam’s candidacy in mid-November. Solely a cupboard vote now stands between him and the put up.

“That is greater than a colossal mistake — it’s a tragedy,” mentioned Deborah E. Lipstadt, a professor of contemporary Jewish historical past and Holocaust research at Emory College in Atlanta who has written a number of books on the topic. “Appointing Eitam to this place could be a blot on Yad Vashem’s fame and Yad Vashem’s file.”

Mr. Eitam and Yad Vashem declined to touch upon the appointment.

However Mr. Eitam’s defenders say he’s the sufferer of a kneejerk left-wing marketing campaign purely as a result of he’s right-wing and non secular. They view him as a conflict hero and an skilled supervisor who might steer Yad Vashem out of a extreme monetary disaster that has been compounded by authorities finances cuts and a drop-off in donations due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The upshot is that Yad Vashem, an nearly sacred establishment that world leaders are anticipated to go to whereas in Jerusalem, has gotten caught up within the political and tradition wars of a polarized nation the place the dominant right-wing battles the liberal left and is more and more at odds with the extra liberal streams amongst world Jewry.

Worse, specialists say, it comes at a time when anti-Semitism is resurgent and far-right forces in different components of the world are selling Holocaust denial.

“You don’t play politics with the Shoah, and that is enjoying politics with the Shoah,” Professor Lipstadt mentioned, utilizing the Hebrew time period for the Holocaust.

She is certainly one of 750 historians, Jewish research specialists and cultural figures who signed a petition protesting the appointment, which was submitted to Yad Vashem’s board of trustees and Israel’s Parliament this month.

Yad Vashem’s present chairman, Avner Shalev, 81, is a revered, apolitical figurehead. He introduced in June that he was stepping down after a 27-year tenure.

Zeev Elkin, the minister with accountability for Yad Vashem from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conservative Likud get together, selected Mr. Eitam with Mr. Netanyahu’s full help.

Nonetheless, authorities approval is probably not imminent. Due to coalition infighting, all senior appointments are frozen, and Benny Gantz, who leads the centrist Blue and White get together in Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition, is prone to block Mr. Eitam’s development by denying him a majority if it involves a cupboard vote.

However Mr. Elkin and Mr. Netanyahu insist that he’s nonetheless their sole candidate.

Mr. Eitam, a resident of a settlement within the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, grew up as a secular Jew and have become observant after the 1973 Center East conflict.

He was adorned for his function in one of many conflict’s most determined battles and later took half in a raid to free primarily Israeli hostages in Entebbe, Uganda. Mr. Netanyahu’s older brother, Yonatan, a legendary determine in Israel, was killed whereas main the raid.

However Mr. Eitam once compared Israel’s Arab residents to a most cancers and a “ticking bomb” and said Israel would finally need to expel most Palestinians from the West Financial institution.

In the course of the first Palestinian rebellion within the late 1980s, when he was a brigade commander, a few of his troopers had been prosecuted for beating a Palestinian man to loss of life. The troopers mentioned they’d beat him on the commander’s orders.

Finally, Mr. Eitam obtained a extreme reprimand, and his promotion to the rank of brigadier basic was lengthy stalled. But his army profession spanned almost three many years.

Mr. Elkin, the minister accountable for Yad Vashem, denounced what he known as an “ugly” and “hypocritical” marketing campaign spearheaded by political forces who by no means objected to appointments from the left wing of the political spectrum.

“True, he made a couple of unsuccessful remarks,” Mr. Elkin mentioned of Mr. Eitam in a phone interview, “however that was 15 or 20 years in the past.” Mr. Elkin additionally mentioned that a few of these statements had been taken out of context.

Mr. Elkin cited as a reference level Joseph “Tommy” Lapid, a Holocaust survivor and acerbic chief of a liberal, secular, centrist get together who went on to grow to be chairman of Yad Vashem’s advisory council. Mr. Lapid as soon as mentioned that Palestinians “may start to assume” of the results if 10 automobile bombs had been to go off in 10 Palestinian cities and kill 500 Palestinians.

“That’s a extra surprising assertion to my thoughts,” Mr. Elkin mentioned, “and no one opposed his appointment.”

One chief of the marketing campaign towards the appointment is Colette Avital, a former Israeli diplomat and Labor get together lawmaker who now chairs the Heart Organizations of Holocaust Survivors in Israel, an umbrella group for 58 Holocaust organizations. She mentioned she had urged various candidates to Mr. Elkin from the political proper.

“There are individuals who don’t signify the left however can mission a picture of tolerance, understanding and moderation,” she mentioned. Relating to the claims towards Mr. Lapid, she mentioned, “Two wrongs don’t make a proper.”

Different apolitical our bodies have criticized Mr. Eitam’s nomination, together with the Anti-Defamation League and a few Yad Vashem donors.

“Yad Vashem ought to keep above Israeli politics and maintain its irreproachable file and ethical excessive floor,” Joel Herzog of the Swiss Pals of Yad Vashem wrote in an electronic mail.

Critics are baffled as to why Mr. Elkin settled on Mr. Eitam. But it surely may sign a desired shift that might deliver the establishment extra consistent with the federal government after some latest run-ins.

In 2018, Yad Vashem issued a stinging critique of a joint assertion by the prime ministers of Israel and Poland that was meant to resolve a rift between the international locations over a Polish law criminalizing some statements on the Holocaust. Complicating issues, Yad Vashem’s chief historian, Prof. Dina Porat, was concerned in drafting the joint assertion, apparently in a non-public capability.

Supporters of Mr. Eitam mentioned that he might mission a extra muscular, Jewish and Zionist-centric picture from Yad Vashem for Israel’s battle towards anti-Semitism. Mr. Elkin mentioned Mr. Eitam’s complete military profession had been dedicated to the lesson of the Holocaust summed up by the phrase “By no means once more.”

“That’s one thing basic in his character, the essence of his character,” Mr. Elkin mentioned.