Alternation of identities in Israeli literature: Ashkenazi and Orientals

Abstract

"Ashkenazi," as a term referring to the majority of Jews who came to Israel from Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries, denotes, in the present context, the desire of members of the "Eastern" Israeli Jewish group (Mizrachi/Sephardic Jews) – in the 1960s – to label the other group in the country for the purpose of criticism and disapproval, and to blame them for their deprivations and the discrimination they suffered. Ashkenazi and Eastern Jews in Israel are two cohesive and distinct entities, and their mutual relationship is experienced as that of two different ethnicities. This article will address how literature deals with the alternation of identities within the ethnic group labeled as inferior, which strives to present itself as belonging to the hegemonic group in order to avoid stigmatized identities and take advantage of the opportunities and privileges reserved for them. Becoming Ashkenazi is an identity performance that Eastern Jews assumed as a way of responding to the national discourse of assimilation, the demands of the melting pot policy, and the liberal claim of guaranteed equality of similarity and uniformity. However, the transition between identities points to ambivalent and deceptive characteristics: they are a consequence of subversion and resistance and a sequela of the cancellation of the ethnic self. This condition of cancellation caused a rebound effect, and the annulment of the old identity came to be seen as unacceptable, resulting in a painful deconstruction of Ashkenaziness and its rejection. The theme will be addressed in the novels Molcho, by A. B. Yehoshua (1987) and Amzaleg (2019), by Yossi Sucary.