Sabine Falch, Moshe Zimmermann, eds. Israel--Öƒ–sterreich: Von den AnfÖƒ¤ngen bis zum Eichmann-Prozess 1961. Innsbruck: Studien Verlag, 2005. 241 pp. EUR 26.00 (paper), ISBN 978-3-7065-1954-0.

Yves Pallade. Germany and Israel in the 1990s and Beyond: Still a 'Special Relationship'? Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2005. 598 pp. EUR 86.00 (paper), ISBN 978-3-631-54203-3.

Reviewed by Tracey J. Kinney (Department of History, Kwantlen Polytechnic University)
Published on H-German (October, 2006)

Of Heimat and Exile, Identity and

In October 1943, the governments of the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and China issued a joint declaration renewing their commitment to the creation of a cooperative international association, pledging their determination to root out all vestiges of fascism in Italy, and promising to judge and punish any German officers and men and women of the Nazi Party who had perpetrated atrocities during the course of the war. The declaration also noted that Austria, "the first free country to fall a victim to Hitlerite aggression,"[1] would be returned to independent, democratic rule. This recognition of Austria as the first victim of Nazi aggression served to complicate profoundly the relationship between Austria and Israel. If Austria was a victim, relations between the two nations should have developed quickly and relatively easily; if, on the other hand, as many believed, Austria was complicit in the crimes of the Nazi era, the postwar relationship between the two nations would likely be a difficult one.

This relationship, and the underlying theme of Austria as both victim and aggressor, is the topic of a new collection of essays edited by Sabine Falch and Moshe Zimmerman. This volume is the third in a series of works published by StudienVerlag that probe the complex relationship between Israel and Austria, and Austrians and Israelis. The first volume in this series, edited by Thomas Albrich (1998), analyzed the flight of eastern European Jews through Austria to Palestine between 1945 and 1948. The second, by Evelyn Adunka (2002), examined the experiences of Austrian Jewish exiles, most of whom fled to Palestine in the 1930s, focusing on questions of identity, acculturation, and assimilation. Volume 3 returns to these questions, as well as analyzing the evolution of the diplomatic relationship between the two countries.

Effectively encompassing the era from the Anschluß to the Eichmann trial, the essays in this monograph provide a valuable addition to the burgeoning literature on the formation of identity, the experience of exile and the evolution of diplomatic relations between Israel and other states. As the editors note in the preface, the relationship between Germany and Israel has attracted considerable scholarly attention; yet the relationship between Austria and Israel has been little researched.[2] The essays in this collection aim to fill a gap in the existing scholarship, while raising new questions for further research. The essays are loosely organized into two sections: the first part examines questions of identity and acculturation, with particular emphasis on the relationship between Jews born in Palestine and newly arrived Austrian exiles; the second section looks at the evolution of the diplomatic relationship between Israel and Austria in light of the events of the recent past. All of the essays are impeccably documented.

The monograph opens with Dieter Hecht's examination of the Austrian-Jewish exodus after 1938 and the process of integration into Israeli society by the 1960s. Hecht pays particular attention to the role of various agencies, in particular the Hitachdut Olej Austria (Vereinigung österreichischer Einwanderer), in facilitating the integration of the largely middle-class Austrians forced into exile by the Anschluß, for whom, according to Hecht, Palestine held little initial appeal. Hecht concludes that, although many exiles did overcome barriers of status, language, and culture to integrate successfully, others simply could not and opted instead to return to Austria--a return facilitated by the notion that Austria had itself been a victim of Nazism.

Helga Embacher next examines the reality of life on a kibbutz for young Austrian-Jewish exiles (most of them aged thirteen to seventeen). Like Hecht, Embacher notes that the decision to leave Austria was a difficult one, undertaken with minimal preparation, and, at best, a passing familiarity with Zionism. Thus life on a kibbutz, with its ideology of equality, communal living, and building a new nation from the soil could be tremendously difficult. Embacher's research, drawn from interviews and autobiographies, reveals that, far from its egalitarian ideal, kibbutz society was profoundly hierarchical, with Palestine-born "pioneers" dominating. Below them Austrian and German exiles clashed with each other, yet both discriminated against Eastern European exiles. Embacher argues that nonetheless it was this generation of young exiles that, drawing on their experiences in the kibbutzim and in the British army, would forge the identity of the 1948 Israeli state. The essay concludes on a cautionary note, however. The ideology of the "generation of 1948" grew increasingly irrelevant as years passed and Israel's identity was remade by capitalism and by the ongoing conflict with Palestinians.

Maria Ecker contributes an essay based on the findings of an oral history project. Ecker interviewed ten women (both Austrian and Czech exiles), each of whom had been imprisoned in a concentration camp prior to arriving in Palestine/Israel between 1945 and 1949. Ecker's article is most valuable in its inclusion of lengthy excerpts from her interviews with these ten women. Their accounts reveal a range of motives in leaving their homes, but few held Zionist convictions, and some had no choice whatsoever, as their husbands had determined that their destination would be Palestine. For each woman the process of assimilation and acculturation was a difficult one. The remainder of Ecker's analysis draws upon the theory developed by Ronit Lentin, who argues that "[t]he others arrived, broken, ill, in the uncomprehending Israel of the 1950s. Their new home. Where I and my generation refused to hear their stories.... Not only that in constructing itself as a 'new Jewish identity' did Israel construct itself as masculine thereby 'feminizing' Jewry and the Shoa" (p. 78). According to Ecker, life in Israel thus became an "us" (the new Jews who accepted their new identity) versus "them" (the Jews of the old world) struggle. Only those women who fully accepted the new identity stood a good chance of complete integration. Ecker appends a case study of one such "new" woman, Chava Kohavi, in order to bolster her claims. In many ways, Ecker's is the most ambitious of the essays in this collection, and no doubt the most contentious. It does, however, highlight the strengths and weaknesses of oral history, as well as revealing numerous avenues for further study.

The final essay in the first section of the book, by Falch, looks at the question of identity through the issue of citizenship, specifically the new Israeli citizenship law of 1952. The citizenship law, which granted that "every Jew living in the land on this day automatically become a citizen of the land" (p. 103), also required the renunciation of prior nationality (unless the person was deemed stateless), thus bringing questions of identity into sharp relief. Falch notes that the response of Austrian Jews reflected a mixture of pragmatism and idealism; citizenship was offered even as the Israeli state's economic crisis worsened. Thus material concerns also had to be factored in to the broader political and ideological considerations. In the end, 551 persons returned to Austria at this time.

As noted, the second half of the collection examines the development of a formal diplomatic relationship between Israel and Austria, beginning with Austria's de facto recognition of Israel in March and April 1949. De facto recognition and, in particular Israel's reaction to this decision, is the topic the essay by Yotam Hotam. Hotam reveals that the initial Israeli reaction was one of ambivalence, most likely due to the realization that it was not simply a political question. Rather, the moral dimension of establishing diplomatic relations with Austria, a nation that many saw as a willing partner in the crimes of the Third Reich, was to dominate the early responses. Nonetheless, a strong belief persisted in Israel that the establishment of 'normal' relations with other countries would be a key element of Israeli state-building. Viewing Austria as a victim of National Socialist aggression could potentially facilitate the creation of a normal relationship. Hotam concludes that further study will be required in order to determine whether Israel's hesitation represented a Machiavellian ploy or truly reflected the difficulty of reconciling the political and moral dimensions of the decision facing the state.

Eyal Gertmann examines the contribution of sport to the development of diplomatic relations between Israel and Austria. Gertmann argues that the study of sporting relationships (a form of Alltagsgeschichte) can reinforce and supplement more conventional historical studies. In this case, Austrian Jewish sporting associations--most notably the Hakoah Wien soccer club--facilitated both the development of new sporting associations in Israel (Verein Hakoah in Israel) and the re-establishment of sporting exchanges between the Israeli and Austrian states. Many of the 5,000 members of Hakoah Wien had immigrated to Palestine and were active in the new state. Old ties thus contributed to the relatively speedy re-establishment of sporting relationships. Gertmann argues that these relationships also contributed to the normalization of diplomatic relationships, too.

In the penultimate essay in this collection, Winifried Garscha examines the overall impact of the Eichmann trial in Austria, concluding that it was "an irritation, not an earthquake" (p. 186). Despite tremendous Austrian media interest in the trial and the renewed attention placed on Eichmann's Austrian connections and accomplices, Garscha argues that few profound changes resulted from the process. Education changed little, though many new research institutes opened in Austria, including the Simon Wiesenthal center in Linz. Official policy continued to emphasize Austria's role as victim, rather than perpetrator. Even the trials which took place in Austria produced generally unsatisfactory results. Eichmann's transportation coordinator, Franz Novak, for example, was eventually sentenced to only seven years in prison, while Fritz Ertl and Walter Dejaco, designers of the Auschwitz-Birkenau crematoria, were acquitted.

The volume concludes with a brief article by Edwin Schmidl, who evaluates the military relationship between the two nations. Schmidl once more draws attention to the notion of Austria as victim and the degree to which this notion facilitated military cooperation between the two nations, including the stationing of Austrian 'blue helmets' in the Golan Heights as part of the 1974 U.N. Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF).

The strengths of this collection are many. The portraits are nuanced and built on solid evidence--in most cases interviews with survivors and their families--rather than theoretical hypotheses regarding identity formation. The authors demonstrate that the experience of exile could be both positive and negative, as old identities were reshaped, lost and sometimes reclaimed over time. At the same time, common themes do emerge from among the very disparate approaches of the authors. Austrian exiles tended to be quite different from their German counterparts in that their exile was motivated for the most part by the trauma of the Anschluß, leaving them little time to prepare for or even to contemplate the nature of a life in exile. Language became perhaps the most important obstacle facing the newly arrived exiles--it divided them from the Palestinian-born Jewish population and on occasion from younger generations of their own families, who tended to learn Hebrew more quickly and more thoroughly than their parents had. Exile was further complicated by an alien climate and culture, the loss of status and occupations and the shock of agricultural life. While many Austrian Jews overcame their culture shock and became leading members of Israeli society--"the generation of 1948"--the authors remind us that many others could not find a home in Israel and opted to return instead to an uncertain future in the land of their birth.

Despite the volume's many strengths, however, a few caveats need to be mentioned. Some thematic inconsistency can be found in the essays. Not all focus directly on the Israel-Austria or Israeli-Austrian relationship. Ecker's article, for example, draws heavily on the experiences of Czech exiles, though her concluding case study does indeed focus on the experience of an Austrian exile. The very brief concluding essay on the Israeli-Austrian military relationship seems somewhat out of place in comparison to the far more detailed studies contributed by the other authors. Finally there is some inconsistency in dates throughout the work. The Moscow Declaration on "Austrian victimhood," for example, is referred to as having been drafted in November 1943 (p. 7), when it was actually signed on October 30, 1943. Likewise, on occasion, the individual authors provide differing dates for key events such as the 1949 de facto recognition of Israel by Austria. These remain, however, minor criticisms of an important collection of essays that, taken together, reveal the tremendous variety of experiences among Austrian Jewish exiles to Israel and the complex process of building a formal diplomatic relationship between the two countries.

Zimmermann and Falch note at the outset of their work that, unlike their subject matter, a great deal of research exists on the relationship between Germany and Israel. Nonetheless, this complex relationship continues to fascinate social scientists and lay readers alike. The essence of this relationship forms the subject matter of Yves Pallade's monograph.

On July 1, 2006, Reuters reported that the German government had removed the final barriers to the sale of Dingo 2 armored transport vehicles to Israel. It also announced that the sale of two Dolphin submarines (for one billion euros) should be approved within the month. These announcements seem to reinforce the thesis developed in Pallade's monograph: that the two countries enjoy a "staunchly 'special'" relationship (p. 489) characterized, among other factors, by close cooperation in a multitude of areas, reciprocal openness and strong mutual needs and expectations.

Eschewing what he refers to as a "purist historical approach" (p. 77)--that is, a purely primary source approach--Pallade bolsters his argument by drawing upon interviews, press reports, government briefings, and secondary literature in order to examine every aspect of the relationship between Germany and Israel in the 1990s and early 2000s, including security relations, political, economic, financial, scientific, social, cultural, and professional connections. Insofar as it is possible, the author examines the relationship from both sides, thereby providing additional insight into its complexities. As befitting a published dissertation, the book contains both a discussion of the existing theories regarding the concept of a "special relationship" and a longer, analytical section in which the essential elements of the relationship between the two nations is examined. The book also includes a lengthy bibliography (some 107 pages), a detailed table of contents, and is carefully annotated throughout. It does, however, lack an index, which would be very useful for navigating a text of this size.

Pallade's conclusion in reviewing existing theories is that no academic consensus whatsoever has been reached on the question of which nations enjoy a "special relationship" or even what constitutes a "special relationship." However, by combining the two dominant interpretations, those of Alex Danchev and Lily Gardner Feldman, Pallade establishes his own definition. According to Pallade, in order to enjoy a special relationship, two nations must enjoy mutual openness in their dealings (Danchev's notion of transparency); they must also recognize their relationship as special, frequently fulfill mutual needs and expectations, provide preferential treatment, provide compensation when expectations are disappointed, develop secret cooperative ventures, build substantial social networks, and rapidly overcome events which threaten to destabilize the relationship (p. 477).

The analytical portion of the monograph next provides a wealth of evidence demonstrating each of the factors above at work in the German-Israeli relationship. For example, Pallade provides detailed evidence of the security relationship between Germany and Israel, demonstrating convincingly that the relationship is one of unusual transparency (here he cites the ability of the Mossad to work freely in Germany), comparable aims and sustained, ongoing cooperation, especially in research and development. This cooperation has been sustained through political and ideological shifts in Germany and over the opposition of Israelis who argue that the events of the Shoah should necessarily limit cooperation between the two nations.

Turning to political relations, Pallade notes that Israel has always placed greater expectations on Germany due to memories of the Shoah. Germany was expected never to interfere with the security of Israel and was seen to have a historical responsibility to provide moral and material support. In turn, by the 1990s Germany expected Israel to reduce its opposition to reunification (despite Ariel Sharon's injunction that a united Germany could not be trusted) and to German relations with Iran. Here again, Pallade demonstrates that even in the face of crises caused by Sharon's condemnation of a united Germany, or the perceived increase in antisemitism in German newspapers, the relationship survived and grew stronger throughout the decade. Current Prime Minister and then Minister of Industry and Trade Ehud Olmert noted in 2002 that Germany was the "least hostile" of the European nations and commended Helmut Kohl's past support of Israel (p. 364).

With respect to economic and financial relations Pallade again concludes, based on a wealth of evidence, that financial aid to Israel has been more favorable than that to any other country. Hidden payments and mutual cooperation have also provided tremendous benefits. Bilateral trade, however, has not developed to the level that one might expect, due to regional instabilities and German fears of Arab boycotts. Nonetheless, Pallade argues that parts of the Israeli business community were already familiar with German goods due to in kind payments from Germany to Israel (such as those made under the 1952 Luxembourg Agreement). This acquaintance led frequently to the purchase of German goods, rather than those of other European nations.

The book concludes with a relatively short section on scientific, social, cultural, and professional connections between the two nations. Here Pallade sees a level of interaction bordering on "mutual preoccupation" (p. 474). A wealth of private connections supplement those developed by official governmental agencies such that the interconnections among Germans and Israelis are stronger than ever before.

A final summary conclusion draws together all of the evidence on security cooperation, political, economic, financial, and socio-cultural relations. Pallade argues that this relationship demonstrates all of the indicators of a "special relationship" though current events, perhaps more than ever before, will present a challenge to the continuation of the relationship in its present form.

Pallade's supervisor at the University of Düsseldorf, Ulrich von Alemann, commends this work as "an extremely consistent, colourful, and detailed panorama of German-Israeli relations in the 1990s."[3] It is certainly highly detailed and consistent in its approach to the topic and its focus on the criteria established for a "special relationship." Moreover, Pallade analyzes a number of situations during which the relationship has been challenged and determines the ways by which those challenges were overcome. Though Pallade's topic is the 1990s and beyond, the book would perhaps have been accessible to a wider audience if it had also included a brief overview of the evolution of the German-Israeli relationship, in addition to (or even instead of) the lengthy theoretical section. Nonetheless, this is an excellent reference work, especially with respect to security cooperation and political relations between the two nations. The sections on economic and financial relations and socio-cultural connections are not as detailed as those on security and politics, but nonetheless cover a substantial amount of material.

Notes

[1]. "Joint Four-Nation Declaration," available at < http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/wwii/moscow.htm >, accessed May 28, 2006.

[2]. The editors note that their impetus came from the publication of Otto Dov Kulka and Erika Wienzierl's collection of essays, Vertreibung und Neubeginn. Israelische Bürger österreichischer Herkunft (Vienna: Böhlau, 1998). For further reading on this topic see also Mosche Fischl, Wiener--Jude--Israeli. Jüdische Familiengeschichte in Österreich und Israel 1928-1964 (Konstanz: Hartung-Gorre, 2002); and Evelyn Adunka, Exil in der Heimat (Innsbruck: StudienVerlag, 2002).

[3]. Peter Lang Publishing Group, < http://www.peterlang.de/index.cfm?vID=54203&vLang=E&vHR=1&vUR=2&vUUR=1 >, accessed May 3, 2006.

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Citation: Tracey J. Kinney. Review of Falch, Sabine; Zimmermann, Moshe, eds., Israel--Öƒ–sterreich: Von den AnfÖƒ¤ngen bis zum Eichmann-Prozess 1961 and Pallade, Yves, Germany and Israel in the 1990s and Beyond: Still a 'Special Relationship'?. H-German, H-Net Reviews. October, 2006.
URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=12389

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