Analysis: Israel's legitimacy wanes as Holocaust narrative fades in the West

Since Israel launched a brutal war on Gaza on October 7, thousands of people in the US, Germany, France and the UK have taken to the streets to express their support for Palestinians. European capitals have witnessed growing anger against Israel. In contrast, leaders in the European Union have largely ignored Israeli atrocities against Palestinians, throwing their weight behind Israel and going as far as implementing bans and restrictions on pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

The present public opinion highlights the widening gap between the political elite and the people in the West – with the latter finding it hard to stomach the “Holocaust narrative” of Israel. As the concept of finding “the Jewish homeland” in the aftermath of the Holocaust has been at the centre of Israel’s founding, Zionists have invested a lot of time and money for decades to programme the Jewish people into believing that every Israeli cause is worth fighting for so that they are “never again” exposed to mass slaughter reminiscent of Nazi genocide.

However, recent events and surveys have indicated growing scepticism, especially amongst Gen Z, towards the narrative of Israel’s historical trauma. An increasing awareness of Israeli atrocities against Palestinians has prompted questions about the morality of aligning with Israel. These factors are leading to pro-Palestine solidarity in European societies and generating academic discussions that transcend beyond Israeli propaganda as well as the inaccurate binaries drawn by Western media.

Goliath under David’s guise

Since 1948, Israel's foundational ethos has been centred on the idea of "survival" in the face of various "hostile powers," which have changed over time. Prior to the 1994 Oslo Accords, the primary adversaries were the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) and the Arab states that supported it. Subsequently, Palestinian resistance group Hamas, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Iran became the most visible opponents of Israel.

To be one of the strongest military forces in the Middle East, Israel has always benefited from the unconditional support of the US, to the point that this 75-year-old country, carved out of Palestine against the will of Palestinians, takes pride in its "invincibility" and "superiority," especially since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War.

As much as the Holocaust narrative was used to justify the Palestinian dispossession since 1948, the same narrative shielded the Israeli military, enabling them to escape international accountability for numerous incidents of human rights abuses and reported war crimes.

With Israel dithering on the two-state solution and constantly showing disregard for US-touted “rules-based order”, Palestinians living in occupied territories and besieged Gaza continued to shoulder the coffins of their loved ones killed by Israeli forces and illegal settlers with impunity. The surviving ones were robbed of basic needs – such as access to clean drinking water, or the right to seek education abroad. Every aspect of their life was dictated by Israeli occupation.

Prior to the October 7 attack by Hamas, Israel had been making reckless moves, especially for the past three years, attempting to enforce the so-called final solution – which aimed to forcibly remove every trace of Palestinians from the occupied territories so that illegal settlers could usurp their land and properties.

With Tel Aviv’s perception of military “invincibility” fuelling its overweening arrogance, the Hamas attack shook Israel’s colonial-style security establishment to its core, leaving it unhinged. It not only broke the status quo, which resulted in a rapid growth of illegal settlements in occupied Palestinian territories, but also plunged the US-led Western alliance into a deep moral crisis. The US faces serious scrutiny on the world stage, with many geopolitical analysts and thinkers questioning why Washington hasn’t condemned Israel’s carpet bombing of Gaza as it did Russia’s attack on Ukraine.

This visible fracturing of American morality in the era of social media makes it increasingly hard for Western media to paralyse public opinion into believing Israel’s state propaganda, often portrayed in light of the Holocaust. And steering the global opinion against Palestinians within the margins of America’s war on terror narrative, which criminalised ordinary Iraqis, Afghans, Syrians and Pakistanis, allowing US troops to get away with hundreds of thousands of civilian killings, has become equally difficult.

Just a week before the Hamas attack, Israel was busy feeding the narrative of its invincibility by taking pride in selling the Arrow-3 missile system to Germany for a record-breaking 3.5 billion Euros, a deal that quickly earned distinction as one of the significant military exports in history. But as paramotor-equipped Hamas fighters crossed the military fence, penetrating deep inside Israel, Tel Aviv’s carefully-crafted image of military invincibility came apart at the seams.

While the country has often embraced one of the most beloved Hebrew stories, David and Goliath, portraying itself as an underdog David facing a much bigger and stronger enemy in the form of Goliath – which in the Israeli context can be interpreted as Iran, Hezbollah or anyone they see as their adversaries – the Hamas attack and the subsequent discourse centred around Israel’s brutal war on Gaza have made Israel appear as a Goliath pretending to be David – a victim.

From silent generations to silenced generation

Another reason why Israel’s Holocaust binary is losing shine is the new generation in Europe. Unlike the previous two generations that witnessed the founding of Israel and the Arab-Israeli wars, the new generation has grown up with televised images of Israeli atrocities in Palestine.

Another reason the Holocaust narrative is failing to distract the new generation from the Israeli brutalities is the large Palestinian diaspora, one of the most widespread communities around the world, which has always been vocal and creative in informing the world about their sufferings while taking on the massive Israeli disinformation machine.

In the case of Germany, the older generations that witnessed the Holocaust have been silent on the issue. However, descendants of these generations have expressed their discontent with the constant reminder of the Holocaust. For example, according to the German Ministry of the Interior, a survey conducted in September 2014 found that 55 per cent of Germans "resent being reminded of Nazi crimes against the Jews" and 49 per cent "are tired of hearing about the crimes of the Nazis against the Jews".

Not only in Germany, but also in other Western countries, the Holocaust narrative is becoming increasingly less convincing for people. Several researchers revealed that Gen Z thinks Holocaust is “a myth”, “greatly exaggerated” or they simply lack knowledge on the topic.

Zionism as a mental ghetto

When the Jewish Question emerged in 19th century Europe, Zionism was promoted as the ideology of Jewish self-determination. This argument gained traction after the Holocaust as Jews felt their efforts to coexist with Christians in Europe had proved futile while the proverbial Jewish ghetto persisted in the minds of the Europeans. For this reason, the State of Israel was offered as the only safe haven for Jews.

Yet, this narrative has served the opposite for Israel so far. With its brutal policies against the Palestinians and more than seven decades of occupation, Israel continues to be in the mental ghetto of many Europeans.

Although all European countries recognise Israel as an independent nation state, Europeans have an overwhelmingly negative opinion on Israel. A recent survey conducted by Bertelsmann Stiftung revealed that only 20 per cent of Europeans displayed a positive attitude toward Israel.

The problem with Israel has always been a problem manufactured in the West. Zionism, an ideology exported to Palestine in the 19th century by European Jews, was, in many ways, Europe's attempt – approved and backed by the US – to address the Jewish Question at the cost of Palestinian lives.

While the Holocaust revealed the ugly face of Europe to the world and equipped future generations with vast knowledge about identifying hate at its infancy to avoid bloodletting on such a large scale, the European project of addressing the Jewish Question with Zionism betrays all the Holocaust victims. This betrayal is evident in how it normalised the killings and maiming of Palestinians on a scale that many argue mirrors the tragedy of the old European Jews.