non-Jewish Women Research Articles

(Un)spoken Histories: The Second World War and Yugoslav Jewish Women

Abstract The article discusses the experiences of Yugoslav Jewish women during the Second World War and the Holocaust. It presents little known texts (fictional, paraliterary and documentary works) written by Jewish women (Hilda Dajč, Elvira Kohn, Lea Abinun, Ženi Lebl, and Gina Camhy), one non-Jewish woman (Milojka Mezorana), and one Jewish man (Đorđe Lebović), during or after the Second World War. The main aim of the analysis is to draw attention to the specificity of Jewish women’s narratives in the (post-)Yugoslav cultural space, the contextual framework in which they function, and the risk of their mis- or overinterpretation. The analysis presents also the spectrum of possible readings of texts created during or thematizing the Second World War which are either written by or refer to Jewish women—a group which remained unduly marginalized in the official memory of the Second World War and its aftermath.

The risks of breast and ovarian cancer associated with the Ashkenazi Jewish founder allele BRCA2 6174delT.

Approximately 1% of the Ashkenazi Jewish population carries the BRCA2 6174delT (c.5946del) pathogenic variant. It is important to have accurate knowledge of the risks of breast and ovarian cancer associated with this specific variant so that women may be counseled accordingly. In this prospective study, we estimated the risks of breast and ovarian cancer associated with the 6174delT variant compared with the risks for other pathogenic variants in the BRCA2 gene. The annual risk for developing breast cancer was significantly lower in 246 women who carried the 6174delT variant compared with 721 non-Jewish women who carried a variant at any other locus in BRCA2 (1.2% per year vs. 2.4% per year, p=0.003). We estimated the cumulative risk of breast cancer from age 30 to 70 to be 39% for carriers of the BRCA2 6174delT variant and 61% for carriers of other BRCA2 variants. The annual risk for ovarian or fallopian tube cancer was 0.51% per year for the 233 women who carried the 6174delT variant compared to 0.22% per year for the 1128 carriers of other BRCA2 variants; the difference was not significant. Lower risks for breast cancer associated with 6174delT may not impact screening and prevention choices, however, the discussion should be based on accurate risk assessment.

Israeli demography: a composite portrait of a reproductive outlier

ABSTRACT With a fertility rate twice higher than the OECD average, Israel is a world outlier in terms of fertility. This article puts together a composite portrait of this exceptional reproductive landscape. Within a comparative framework, it offers context-specific illustrations showing that considered vis-à-vis women in the Former Soviet Union (FSU) and Jewish FSU immigrants to the U.S., FSU immigrants to Israel had higher fertility. Inside Israel, all non-Jewish women have decreased their fertility rate in the past two decades, whereas Jewish women of all strata, but ultra orthodox women, have increased their fertility rate. Given the material challenges of child-rearing in Israel, the article concludes with some questions and preliminary answers regarding Israel’s exceptional fertility rates.

The impossible quest of Nasreen Qadri to claim colonial privilege in Israel

ABSTRACT Nasreen Qadri is an Israeli pop singer of Palestinian-Arab origin whose professional achievements came in return for her loyalty to Israel. Successfully crossing cultural lines, Qadri claims Mizrahi identity, challenges the Ashkenazi-Zionist definition of Jews and Arabs as antagonistic ethnonational binaries, and helps Mizrahim reclaim their Judeo-Arabic heritage. However, following her controversial attempts to convert to Judaism, she fell short of crossing into religious-national privilege in Israel-Palestine. Qadri’s failure to overcome colonial segregation testifies to how Israeli racism is based on a perceived religious blood community, which is anchored in state laws and to which non-Jewish women are mostly exposed. Qadri’s case demonstrates how racialized politics of conversion are related to demographic considerations that show the fragility of the Zionist settler-colonial project. Finally, this article suggests that Palestinians in Israel may face elimination, if they seek racial and religious equality with Jews based on a shared Arab culture with Mizrahim.

Passing Acts of Resistance on Postwar Bodily Battlegrounds: Comparative Vulnerabilities in the Autobiographical Works of Hans Massaquoi, Ruth Klüger, and Anonymous/Marta Hillers

This essay chronicles the postwar survival tactics in the autobiographical writings of Hans Massaquoi, an Afro-German who lived during the British occupation of Hamburg; Ruth Klüger, an Austrian-born Jew who fled the death marches out of the concentration camps directly prior to the war's end; and Anonymous/Marta Hillers, a white German, non-Jewish woman who maneuvered Soviet-occupied Berlin. In this article I probe the comparative vulnerabilities of these three subjects vis-à-vis their lived experiences of performing resistance to racialized, sexualized, nationalized, and/or gendered violence, as each recounts them. These subjects narrate how they pass as, pass through, and pass among different postwar actors who inhabit the space of Germany. By attending to the intersections of embodied experience and relational performativity through the act of passing, my analysis renders a complex understanding of how power produces comparative vulnerabilities in violent wars waged on bodies.

Other Writings/Traditions

Other Writings/Traditions Thomas Hieke, Christopher T. Begg, and Fred W. Guyette Thomas Hieke Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz Christopher T. Begg Catholic University of America Fred W. Guyette Erskine College and Seminary 2475. [Seductive Biblical Women in Rabbinic Perspective] Yuval Blankovsky, "Verführung um des Himmels willen: Verführerische biblische Frauen aus Sicht der Rabbinen," Rabbinische Literatur, 263-78 [see #2537]. B. elaborates on a hitherto unnoticed pattern of interpretation in rabbinic literature that praises non-Jewish women and criticizes men. Secondly, B. tries to explain the reason for the emergence of this pattern: Why should the rabbis praise non-Jewish women? B. presents some examples from the Midrash Bereshit Rabbah (Judah and Tamar; Tamar and the wife of Potiphar: both do what they do "for heaven's sake"; Lot and his daughters). Next, B. interprets the sugia in b. Hor. 10b dealing with Lot and his daughters, Tamar vs. Zimri (Num 25:14), and Jael and Sisera. These two works have different reasons for praising the seductive women. In Bereshit Rabbah, the rabbis ascribe seduction to biblical women for the sake of heaven, in order to convey the patriarchal message that sexual intercourse is appropriate for the purpose of procreation and that gentile women desire Jewish men because they recognize their cultural superiority. The Talmud, on the other hand, shows a concern with situating the concept of sin for heaven's sake, as suggested by the biblical Jael story, in the context of Levirate marriage. Therefore, the sugia also mentions Lot's daughters and Tamar, but not Ruth, because, according to rabbinical understanding, Ruth did not commit any sexual sin. The above women use their sexuality for the benefit of the Jewish group, and this pattern exemplifies the rabbinic idea that sins committed with good intentions are legitimate to some degree.—T.H. Google Scholar 2476. [Bibliography of Jewish Intertestamental and Early Rabbinic Literature] David W. Chapman and Andreas J. Kostenberger, "Jewish Intertestamental and Early Rabbinic Literature: An Annotated Bibliographical Resource Updated Again (Part 1)," JETS 63 (3, 2020) 559-60. This publication builds on the authors' initial bibliography for the corpora cited in their title that appeared in JETS 43 (2000) 577-618 and was itself updated in JETS 55 (2012) 235-72, 457-88. As they note in their opening remarks concerning the present contribution (p. 560): "Part 2 of this annotated bibliography is due to appear in the next issue. The structure of these two articles is Part 1: 1. General Reference Tools; 2. OT Versions; 3. Apocrypha; and 4. Pseudepigrapha; Part 2: 5. Dead Sea Scrolls; 6. Individual Authors (Philo, Josephus, Pseudo-Philo, Fragmentary Works); 7. Rabbinic Literature; and 8. Other Early Works from the Rabbinic Period."—C.T.B. Google Scholar 2477. [Priestly Violence; Zeal for Yhwh; Genesis 34; Test. Lev. 5–7] Enric Cortès, "Del sacerdoci gratuït a la violència del 'zel per YHWH'. De la Torà a la literatura intertestamentària: TestLev 5–7 [From Gratuitous Priesthood to Violence Committed Out of 'Zeal for Yhwh': From the Torah to Intertestamental Literature: Test. Lev. 5-7]," RCT 45 (1, 2020) 9-39. My article aims to discern how priestly election in ancient Israel came to be regarded in the Pentateuch and subsequently in extrabiblical testamentary literature as something [End Page 911] due to the Levites or priests who engaged in acts of violence in the name of zeal for God that resulted in their being awarded the priesthood. In this connection, I review the essay of J. Kugel in HTR 85 (1, 1992) 1-34 on the role of Levi as a priest in Test. Lev. 5–7 vis-àvis the presentation of the Levi figure in Genesis 34. My article, I believe, offers a better understanding of the related issue of circumcision, especially as this features in Jubilees, Philo, and the Book of Judith. My article also pays special attention to the midrashic elaboration of Test. Lev. 5–7 [Adapted from published abstract—C.T.B.] Google Scholar 2478. [Epistle of Barnabas 4; Hesiod, Works and Days 106–201] Kylie Crabbe, "The Generation of Iron and the Final...

Yidishe tates forming Jewish families

Jewish communities often do not endorse the idea of intermarriage, and Orthodox Judaism opposes the idea of marrying out. Intermarriage is often perceived as a threat that may jeopardise Jewish continuity as children of such a relationship may not identify as Jews. When a Jewish woman marries out, her children will in any case become Jewish by halakhah – the Jewish law – by which Judaism is inherited from mother to child – and thus usually faces less difficulties over acceptance in Jewish communities. Even though the Torah speaks of patrilineal descent, in post-biblical times, the policy was reversed in favour of the matrilineal principle, and children of Jewish men and non-Jewish women must therefore go through the conversion process if they wish to join a Jewish congregation according to most Jewish denominational requirements. The aim of this article is to analyse what happens when Jewish men, who belong to Finland’s Orthodox communities, marry out. Do they ensure Jewish continuity, and raise their children Jewish, and how do they act as Yidishe tates – Jewish fathers? If yes, how do they do so, and what problems do they face? These questions are answered through an analysis of thirteen semi-structured in-depth interviews conducted with male members of the Jewish Community of Helsinki and Turku in 2019–20.

MarriageorProfession? MarriageandProfession? Marriage Patterns Among Highly Successful Women of Jewish Descent and Other Women in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century German-Speaking Central Europe

AbstractThis study analyzes the marriage patterns of five hundred highly successful women in modern German-speaking Central Europe. Among the women at the very top of their professions, women of Jewish descent were more likely than non-Jewish women to marry while they pursued their careers. The results of our quantitative study—67.6 percent of women of Jewish descent married versus 51.6 percent of non-Jewish women—provide a unique body of data that complements and contributes to other research that identifies distinctive aspects of Central European Jewish life patterns: the high number of Jewish women university students, the importance of women of Jewish descent in a number of fields, and Jewish families as early adopters of a modern family form with a small number of children and intensive investment in each child.

Magical American Jew: The Enigma of Difference in Contemporary Jewish American Short Fiction and Film

Magical American Jew: The Enigma of Difference in Contemporary Jewish American Short Fiction and Film

‘To Speak for Those Who Cannot’: Masha Rol’nikaite on the Holocaust and Sexual Violence in German-Occupied Soviet Territories

Masha Rol’nikaite’s diary and novels, published in Soviet times, offer a unique perspective on German-occupied Lithuania, yet her oeuvre is virtually unknown in the English-speaking world. The books give a vivid account of the destruction of Jewish families and their survival, and of gendered and sexual violence against Jewish and non-Jewish women, effectively confronting a double layer of silence and taboo that unnamed the destruction of Soviet Jewry and of sexual violence for decades. Furthermore, the author explores how female survivors struggled to live on with the repercussions of Nazi violence and the ethical quandaries they had been exposed to during war and occupation. Foregrounding individual experiences, Rol’nikaite traces the breakdown of communal and familial networks in the face of extraordinary violence as well as its aftermath. Her work is firmly grounded in personal experiences, suggesting that the writer consciously blurs the line between historical and literary representation. The fictionalization of the genocide of the Jewish population and of brutal sexual assaults challenges Soviet portrayals of the war that focused on military confrontation, victory, and rebuilding. The article draws on Rol’nikaite’s oeuvre, several interviews with her, archival material as well as newer scholarship on the destruction of Soviet and Lithuanian Jewry and sexual violence and its perception, to illustrate and contextualize Rol’nikaite’s emphasis on interlocking violence that shaped the lives of young Jewish women under the German occupation regime.

Is There Gender Discrimination in Acute Renal Colic Pain Management? A Retrospective Analysis in an Emergency Department Setting

BackgroundPain is a widespread problem, affecting both men and women; studies have found that women in the emergency department receive analgesic medication and opioids less often compared with men. AimsThe aim of this study was to examine the administration and management of analgesics by the medical/paramedical staff in relation to the patients' gender, and thereby to examine the extent of gender discrimination in treating pain. DesignThis is a single-center retrospective cohort study that included 824 patients. SettingsEmergency department of tertiary hospital in Israel. Participants/SubjectsThe patients stratified by gender to compare pain treatments and waiting times between men and women in renal colic complaint. MethodsAs an acute pain model, we used renal colic with a nephrolithiasis diagnosis confirmed by imaging. We recorded pain level by Visual Analog Scale (VAS) scores and number of VAS examinations. Time intervals were calculated between admissions to different stations in the emergency department. We recorded the number of analgesic drugs administered, type of drugs prescribed, and drug class (opioids or others). ResultsA total of 824 patients (414 women and 410 men) participated. There were no significant differences in age, ethnicity, and laboratory findings. VAS assessments were higher in men than in women (6.43 versus 5.90, p = .001, respectively). More men than women received analgesics (68.8% versus 62.1%, p = .04, respectively) and opioids were prescribed more often for men than for women (48.3 versus 35.7%, p = .001). The number of drugs prescribed per patient was also higher in men compared with women (1.06 versus 0.93, p = .03). A significant difference was found in waiting time length from admission to medical examination between non-Jewish women and Jewish women. ConclusionsWe found differences in pain management between genders, which could be interpreted as gender discrimination. Yet these differences could also be attributed to other factors not based on gender discrimination but rather on gender differences.

Reproducing the national family: kinship claims, development discourse and migrant caregivers in Palestine/Israel

This article probes the politics of the migrant caregiver/citizen-employer relationship in Palestine/Israel as it unfolds within the Jewish-Israeli home. Based on interviews with migrants from the Philippines, Nepal, India and Sri Lanka and their Jewish-Israeli employers, I examine how Israel’s ethno-racially hierarchical citizenship regime and the transnational gendering and racialisation of carework manifest in this relationship. I begin by situating migrant women working as caregivers within the legal and political context of Palestine/Israel, delineating how gendered constructions of the Jewish-Israeli woman uphold the borders of the nation and paint non-Jewish migrant women as reproductively threatening. I then analyse two common tropes among citizen-employers in describing migrant caregivers. The first, what I term the ‘kinship trope’, characterizes them as ‘one of the family’, obscuring the ethno-racial basis of the state. I show how this trope contrasts sharply with Zionist settler colonial rhetoric portraying Jewish-Israelis as ‘one big family’. The second trope represents migrant women as individual agents of economic development and Israel as a market-driven, neoliberal society that is equally a state for all its citizens. By depicting Israel as a ‘modern’, ‘progressive’ state that is an exemplar of gender equality, this trope again masks the ethno-racial basis of citizenship, as well as gender disparities. Finally, I argue for a feminist approach to migrant carework that accounts for the ways neoliberal labour formations are mediated by gendered racisms specific to a particular state’s racial nation-building project.

Liminal and Transmodern Female Voices at War: Resistant and Healing Female Bonds in Libby Cone’s War on the Margins (2008)

When addressing marginal experiences during the Second World War, the German occupation of the Channel Islands deserves pride of place, as very few writers have represented that liminal side of the conflict. One of these few writers is Libby Cone, who published War on the Margins in 2008, a historical novel set on Jersey during this occupation and whose main protagonist encounters various female characters resisting the occupation from a variety of marginal positions. Drawing from Rodríguez Magda’s distinction between “narratives of celebration” and “narratives of the limit”, the main claim behind this article is that liminality is a general recourse in transmodern fiction, but in Cone’s War on the Margins it also acts as a fruitful strategy to represent female bonds as promoters of empathy, resilience and resistance. First, this study will demonstrate how liminality works at a variety of levels and it will identify some of the specific features characterizing transmodern war narratives. Then, the female bonds represented will be examined to prove that War on the Margins relies on female solidarity when it comes to finding resilient attitudes to confront war. Finally, this article will elaborate on how Cone uses these liminal features to voice the difficult experiences that Jewish and non-Jewish women endured during the Second World War, echoing similar conflictive situations of other women in our transmodern era.

A protocol for ovulation delay in women who cannot use estrogen, including Jewish women with Niddah issues and a pilot study

Orthodox Jewish women abstain from sexual intercourse from the commencement of menstruation until seven days after the end of menstrual bleeding at which point they can immerse themselves in a ritual bath and recommence relations. For women who ovulate prior to commencing intercourse this results in religious infertility. The traditional treatment for religious infertility is oral estrogens in the early follicular phase to delay ovulation. However, certain groups of women have contraindications to oral estrogens. In this group, no treatment options have existed until now. In this study we proposed a treatment protocol substituting the use of gonadotropin releasing hormone-antagonists in the early follicular phase for the oral estrogens. In a small pilot study, we demonstrate that these two protocols have similar outcomes in terms of ovulation delay (p = 1.0) and likelihood of ongoing pregnancy (p = 1.0). This protocol for ovulation delay also has applications in non-Jewish women who need to delay ovulation due to life constraints.

‘Mixed Marriage’ – Admission and Readmission – Report to the Jewish Community of Berlin

After the end of the war, the Jewish Community of Berlin, like other Jewish communities in Germany, discussed the problem of mixed marriages extensively. I want to point out that according to Jewish law and to Jewish perspectives of all religious directions, that is to say, of orthodox, conservative, and liberal circles, no mixed-marriage problem exists, and in fact, it cannot exist either. The term ‘mixed marriage’ refers to the marriage of a Jewish man to a non-Jewish woman or a Jewish woman to a non-Jewish man, following civil laws and the regulations of the country in which the ceremony has been performed. It is well-known, however, that the laws of the countries do not concern themselves — as is to be expected and to be hoped — with the religious affiliation of two persons applying to be regarded as a married couple under state law. Therefore, then, there can be no so-called mixed marriages from the perspective of state law, since, as already noted, civil law does not take the religious affiliation of the married couple into account. Of course, the perspective of National Socialist law, which is no longer applied and which we have always rejected in any event, is exempt from these findings of the facts.

Balancing Act: Identity and Otherness among Latin American Immigrants and their Food Practices

This article deals with the identity construction of Latin American immigrants in Israel through their food practices. Food is a basic symbolic element connecting cultural perceptions and experiences. For immigrants, food is also an important element in the maintenance of personal ties with their home countries and a cohesive factor in the construction of a new identity in Israel, their adopted homeland. Food practices encode tacit information and non-verbal cues that are integral parts of an individual’s relationship with different social groups. In this case, I recruited participants from an online group formed within social media platforms of Latin American women living in Israel. The basic assumption of this study posits that certain communication systems are set in motion around food events in various social contexts pertaining to different national or local cuisines and culinary customs. Their meaning, significance and modifications and how they are framed. This article focuses on the adaptation and acculturation processes because it is at that point that immigrants are faced with an interesting duality of reconstructing their unique cultural perceptions to either fit the existing national collective ethos or create a new reality. In this study, the main objective is to compare two different immigrant groups: Jewish and non-Jewish women from Latin America who came to Israel during the last ten years. The comparative nature of the research revealed marked differences between ethnic, religious and cultural elements that reflect coping strategies manifested in the cultural production of food and its representation in two distinct domains: private and public. In the former, it is illustrated within the family and home and how they connect or clash with the latter in the form of consumption in public. Combining cultural studies and discourse analysis, this article offers fresh insight into new models of food practices and reproductions. The article’s contribution to new food research lies in its ability to shed light on how inter-generational and inter-religious discourses are melded while food practices and traditions are embedded in a new Israeli identity.

Fútbol, Jews, and the Making of Argentina by Raanan Rein

Reviewed by: Fútbol, Jews, and the Making of Argentina by Raanan Rein Sandra McGee Deutsch Fútbol, Jews, and the Making of Argentina By Raanan Rein. Translated by Martha Grenzeback. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2015. 226 pp. Jewish Latin American history is moving in exciting new directions. Historians once concentrated on studying Jews affiliated with religious or communal institutions. Now, however, they are likely to research unaffiliated Jews, who constitute the majority of Jewish Latin Americans. Instead of focusing solely on men, their gaze includes women. Specialists are exploring Jewish engagement with the larger Latin American society, rather than Jewish membership in [End Page 101] what were seen as isolated and closed communities. Antisemitism is no longer a major focus, although when scholars find it, they interrogate it carefully. The formation of Latin American as well as Jewish identities is an important topic, as is the comparative study of different subsets of Jews, and of Jewish and non-Jewish Arabs. Raanan Rein has been a leading contributor to this innovative scholarship. The first major work on Jewish Latin Americans and football (soccer), his new book embodies all these currents. Rein focuses on the Atlanta Athletic Club, situated in Villa Crespo, a neighborhood in Buenos Aires, and its intersections with Jews. This characteristically porteño (of Buenos Aires) working- and lower-middle-class neighborhood inspired many tangos and sainete plays, and it was known for its lively social and cultural scene and its devotion to football. It was a center of the textile industry and textile unions, and the owners, workers, and union militants were largely Jewish during the interwar period. People of diverse national and ethnic origins, including Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews, lived in Villa Crespo. While they formed only a minority of its population, Villa Crespo became the barrio with the most sizable number of Jews in the city. Jewish food stores, cafes, and communal organizations established themselves here, and eventually Atlanta did as well. Founded in 1904, this football organization moved from one barrio to another before it found a permanent home in Villa Crespo in the 1920s. The author argues that the team became identified as Jewish by the 1940s or 1950s. The Jewish presence in Villa Crespo promoted this identification, as did the Jewish president who reigned over the club from 1959 to 1969 and the significant numbers of Jews on its board by the late 1950s. Atlanta’s long search for a site and playing field, like that of a gypsy or “wandering Jew,” also may have strengthened this image. So too, perhaps, did the team’s marginality and many ups-and-downs. Its frequently precarious financial status, location in a neighborhood with a strong Jewish Communist contingent, and several Communist directors gave it a leftist—and Jewish leftist—tinge. Further tightening the association, Atlanta has played in Israel and has attracted fans there. Curiously, while the Club Atlético River Plate has had more Jewish players and fans than Atlanta, it lacks any such Jewish connotation. In turn, Jews—Ashkenazi and Sephardi, Zionist and non-Zionist—became Argentines in part by rooting for Atlanta, thus joining the Argentine imagined community through their shared passion for the national sport. Becoming fans united Jews of diverse backgrounds and helped maintain Jewish identities and family traditions. [End Page 102] The Atlanta Athletic Club not only appealed to men or promoted football. It created a variety of activities for its members over the years, and Jewish and non-Jewish women engaged with many of them. They participated in basketball, dances, musical events, and a host of celebrations at the club. Jewish women listened to Atlanta football on the radio, attended matches in the Atlanta stadium, and became dedicated fans. At least one teacher practiced Yiddish with her students by discussing Atlanta games. The team’s custom of throwing flowers at the stands heightened its popularity among women. Several sections of the book are particularly revealing of Jewish Argentines. In the first two chapters, which insert Jews into the larger social history of Buenos Aires and Villa Crespo, vivid quotations of observers make Jewish experiences in these places come alive. Chapter 7 discusses how...

Reclaimed Pasts: Intermarriage and Remembrances of National Socialist Racial Stigmatization by Jewish and non-Jewish Spouses and Mischling Children

One of the ways in which the National Socialist state sought to achieve its linked aims to consolidate German unity in preparation for war and to exclude Jews from every aspect of German life was by the reinterpretation of family histories using its taxonomy of difference. This effort is a less commonly recognized aspect of the Blood Protection Law and its subsequent clarifications; the orientation toward future marriage regulations required a revision of past marriages and what they meant. This article argues that post-war narratives from individuals whom the regime targeted because they were intermarried need to be read as reassertions of narrative authority that directly challenge the way National Socialism recast such families in German history. Specifically, the experiences were diverse and informed by memory as well as context. The article posits that the variability of memory is evident in the memoirs written by Heinz Freudenthal, who was Jewish and married to a non-Jewish woman; Brigitte Steiner, who was non-Jewish but married to a Jewish man; and Elsbeth von Ameln, who was the daughter of a man the state classified as Jewish and a non-Jewish woman.

Personal Action as Collectivist Reconciliation: Children of ‘Aryan’ Citizens of Nazi Germany Living in Israel

The purpose of this research was to promote an emic understanding of the dynamics that led a group of second-generation German ‘Aryans' to tie their fate to that of the people targeted and persecuted by their parents’ generation. We interviewed 15 non-Jewish German men and women who are permanent residents or citizens of Israel and who were born in 1929 or later to parents born in 1921 or earlier. Qualitative data analysis revealed that our interviewees depicted the intergenerational transmission of the parental experience of victimhood. Our respondents, colored by their love for their parents, accepted their parents’ narratives in which they depict themselves as bystanders or passive, subjugated accomplices of the Nazi regime. However, for most of our respondents, living with that inherited national identity had become a torturous burden. Many of our respondents had arrived in Israel with a humble and apprehensive interest in the survivors of their nation's crimes. Most of them seemed to believe that they could correct wider historical injustices through interpersonal acts of benevolence. Their immersion in Israeli society and romantic involvement with Israeli partners was associated with an identity conflict that, for many, resulted in the ultimate form of reconciliation: conversion to Judaism and the establishment of a Jewish family in Israel.

Jewish on their own terms: how intermarried couples are changing American Judaism

Over half of all American Jewish children are being raised by intermarried parents. This demographic group will have a tremendous impact on American Judaism as it is lived and practiced in the coming decades. To date, however, in both academic studies about Judaism and in the popular imagination, such children and their parents remain marginal. Jennifer A. Thompson takes a different approach. In Jewish on Their Own Terms, she tells the stories of intermarried couples, the rabbis and other Jewish educators who work with them, and the conflicting public conversations about intermarriage among American Jews. Thompson notes that in the dominant Jewish cultural narrative, intermarriage symbolizes individualism and assimilation. Talking about intermarriage allows American Jews to discuss their anxieties about remaining distinctively Jewish despite their success in assimilating into American culture. In contrast, Thompson uses ethnography to describe the compelling concerns of all of these parties and places their anxieties firmly within the context of American religious culture and morality. She explains how American and traditional Jewish gender roles converge to put non-Jewish women in charge of raising Jewish children. Interfaith couples are like other Americans in often harboring contradictory notions of individual autonomy, universal religious truths, and obligations to family and history. Focusing on the lived experiences of these families, Jewish on Their Own Terms provides a complex and insightful portrait of intermarried couples and the new forms of American Judaism that they are constructing.