University of California, Berkeley history and Jewish studies Prof. Ethan Katz emphasized the use of history as a tool to unpack the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict at this year’s annual Manfred H. Vogel Memorial Lecture in Judaic Studies on Monday.
Hosted by the Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies, the lecture drew a crowd of roughly 150 to Norris University Center.
Katz, who researches modern Jewish and French history, discussed the interwoven intricacies between colonialism, Zionism, anti-Zionism and antisemitism, presenting both Jewish and Palestinian narratives to help audience members understand the future implications of the conflict.
“I hope (the audience) can see that, when we move away from polemics and we try to think about issues as knotty, complicated problems, we can understand much more of what’s really going on and have more opportunities for productive dialogue,” Katz said.
Three key “problems” guided Katz’s lecture: Zionism and colonialism, Jews and other marginalized groups, and anti-Zionism and antisemitism. When discussing the first topic, Katz argued Zionism was a national liberation movement entangled with colonial frameworks, particularly in the displacement of Palestinians during Israel’s founding.
Katz explored Jews’ contradictory position as they experience violent persecution while also achieving “upward mobility” that other groups, deemed “outsiders,” have been denied.
Katz distinguished between critical anti-Zionism — critiquing Israeli policies and Zionist ideology — and negationist anti-Zionism, which denies the legitimacy of Jewish self-determination and ties more closely to antisemitism. Katz said he hopes providing terms like these for dialogue will help the audience engage in more intellectual debates.
“I hope that the audience got some new vocabulary that they find useful for trying to talk about really complex issues where a lot of times people want terms but don’t have terms,” Katz said.
History Prof. David Shyovitz, director of the Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies, coordinated the event. Shyovitz said he hopes events like these “move the needle” toward more engagement and nuanced thinking with these issues.
“I think (in) inviting him, the explicit goal was, let’s make somebody who’s an academic, whose scholarly background is really strong but whose work is gonna address issues that a lot of people, I think, are clamoring for (a) more careful and serious perspective about,” Shyovitz said.
After the lecture, event attendees asked Katz questions primarily focusing on the connotations of phrases like “anti-Zionism” and “antisemitism,” addressing current campus discourse and the impacts of Zionism.
During the Q&A portion of the event, Katz emphasized the importance of fruitful dialogue and acknowledging the current reality when discussing future scenarios.
Katz said education and understanding the divide between intention and impact to effectively tackle perceived antisemitic actions are precursors to advancing discourse. At Berkeley, Katz said he advised students to educate organizers about the potential impacts of an event some Jewish students deemed offensive.
“Our goal, overwhelmingly, at the end of the day is that the more people understand, they will refrain from sentencing,” Katz said. “They will have greater understanding and allyship with Jews.”
First-year English Ph.D. candidate Aviva Waldman, who attended the event, said she enjoyed Katz’s discussion of diverse historical thinkers but disagreed with his framing of Gaza and Israel as experiencing equally existential stakes.
She argued against a perspective framed around “feelings” and pointed to vastly unequal impacts given material analysis.
“I’m glad that people (from the public) are here to hear that we should be a little bit more critical about how we define antisemitism,” Waldman said. “Because it has real consequences.”
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