Some Reflections on the October 7th Catastrophe in Historical Perspective

Some Reflections on the October 7th Catastrophe in Historical Perspective Aviva Halamish (bio) Keywords October 7, Israel, Hamas, The Black Saturday, Holocaust, Kishinev Pogrom, Zionist collective memory, Zionism, Jewish people The events on October 7, 2023 in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip, commonly referred to as "The Black Saturday", evoked associations, comparisons, and analogies to past occurrences. While the very fact that right away the adjective "Black" was affixed to that Saturday, probably out of lack of historical knowledge, is forgivable, the lessons of the original "Black Saturday", as well as of a few other past events associated with acts of pogrom, and Zionist reactions to them, are worth pondering. This article attempts to do so, with the first leitmotif being the outcome of such past events and of the "Black Saturday" of June 29, 1946—a Zionist readiness to compromise and redefine its goals in the face of changing circumstances. The second leitmotif is the current discourse on the Holocaust. Once the magnitude of casualties on that horrific day became known, it was noted that October 7, 2023, was the bloodiest day in Jewish history since the Holocaust, claiming the lives of the greatest number of Jews murdered in a single day since the end of WWII. And when only a partial depiction of the atrocities became known—the desperate situation of men, women, and children in the Kibbutzim, Moshavim, and towns attacked by Hamas brought to us—first over live broadcasts and later in survivors' testimonies—the catastrophic events of October 7th began to be widely referred to as a "Shoah". The spontaneous analogy to the Holocaust resonates with the fears of imminent annihilation of Israel on a Holocaust-like scale, in a manner similar to the experience during the "waiting period" before the Six-Day War (1967) and in the first days of the Yom Kippur War (1973). [End Page 89] When we compare events and rely on the past to better understand the present, we must look at both similarities and differences. Applying this rule to current events requires first a clear reminder of the meaning of the term Shoah—the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored killing of six million Jewish men, women, and children by Nazi Germany and its collaborators during World War II to achieve "the final solution to the Jewish question" by annihilating the Jewish people and its culture. A thorough understanding of the Shoah as a unique historical event, sui generis, disqualifies it from serving as a direct analogy for the October 7th catastrophe. The indescribable atrocities carried out by the fanatic, fundamentalist, Palestinian terrorist members of Hamas were perpetrated during a single day, within the territory of the sovereign state of Israel. Still, during that single day, people experienced and witnessed terrifying situations of helplessness, of abandonment, the kinds of situations experienced by Jews during the pogroms carried out against them in Europe and during the Holocaust. Another theme related to the Holocaust to be pursued in the article is the renewed allegations following October 7th regarding the decisive role the Holocaust played in the establishment of Israel and as the cause of the 1948 Nakba. THE OUTCOME OF THE KISHINEV POGROM, 1903: UGANDA INSTEAD OF PALESTINE Until the Holocaust, the Kishinev pogrom of 1903 was the archetype of modern anti-Jewish persecution, and it is the most remembered pogrom in Zionist collective memory. The terror lasted for less than three days, claiming the lives of forty-nine Jews. Other casualties were ninety-two gravely injured and over 500 lightly wounded; Jewish women were raped, and 1,500 homes were damaged, all by homicidal gangs stalking the streets, chasing down Jews and beating them to death. What made the Kishinev Pogrom a landmark in Jewish history were two poems by Hayim Nachman Bialik. The first, "On The Slaughter", was the poet's spontaneous reaction to the news about the pogrom. In that poem, Bialik coined the lesson quoted widely ever since up to these days: And cursed be the man who says:Avenge! No such revenge–revenge forthe blood of a little child–has yet beendevised by Satan. [End Page 90] In his poem "In the City...