Overview

Is the destruction of Gaza only a consequence of the October 7, 2023 attack, or is it also the outcome of a long process of dispossession and eradication? Do Palestinians have the right to resist the occupation? Is talking about genocide anti-Semitism? Enzo Traverso goes to the root of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by calling history into question and offers a critical interpretation that overturns the one-sided perspective from which we have become accustomed to observing what is happening in Gaza. Israel is usually described as a democratic island in the middle of an obscurantist ocean, and Hamas as a movement inspired by bloodthirsty fanaticism. The destruction of Gaza is reminiscent of the golden age of colonialism, when the West perpetrated genocides in Asia and Africa in the name of its civilizing mission. Its essential assumptions remain the same: civilization versus barbarism, progress versus intolerance. Alongside the ritual statements about Israel's right to defend itself, no one ever mentions the Palestinians' right to resist decades-long aggression. But if a genocidal war is unleashed in the name of fighting anti-Semitism, it is our own ethical values and political norms that are tarnished: the assumptions of our moral conscience - the distinction between oppressor and oppressed, perpetrators and victims - risk being turned upside down. The October 7 attack was terrifying, but it must be analyzed and not just condemned. And we must do so by summoning all the critical tools of historical research. Should the war in Gaza end in a second Nakba, Israel's legitimacy will be permanently compromised. In that case, neither American weapons nor Western media, nor the distorted and outraged memory of the Holocaust will be able to redeem it.

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Reviews

“In this somber and eloquent book, Enzo Traverso situates the atrocities of October 7, and Israel’s destruction of Gaza, in a historical sequence that encompasses both the Shoah and the Nakba, the crimes of Nazism and the crimes of colonization. The result is a work of erudition and moral gravitas, offering a devastating indictment of the rhetorical subterfuge by which Israel and its supporters in the West have justified Gaza’s slaughter.” —Adam Shatz, author of The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon Praise for Revolution: An Intellectual History:   “Brilliant and beautiful. Now this book exists, it’s hard to know how we did without it.” —China Miéville, author of October “A monumental achievement, and should be a touchstone for today’s left. We can’t build a future beyond capitalism without coming to terms with the challenging history it confronts.” —Jacobin

“Enzo Traverso delivers a stinging riposte, rigorously anchored in his mastery of European Jewish history, to the virtually unanimous sanctification by Western elites of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, and their dishonest weaponization of anti-Semitism (in some cases by true anti-Semites on the far right) to attack supporters of Palestinian rights.” —Rashid Khalidi, author of The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine “In the face of a massive attempt at distortion of facts comes this lucid analysis that explains, among other things, why the West is unable and unwilling to stop arming Israel, how the memory of the Holocaust is utilized in the defense of Israel, and how Israel succeeds in posing as the victim while destroying Gaza under a hail of bombs and much much more.” —Raja Shehadeh, author of We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I and What Does Israel Fear from Palestine? “One of the world’s leading exemplars of the virtues of thinking with history, Enzo Traverso offers a uniquely important voice of critique: his latest intervention, impassioned and searching, could not be more timely.” —Mark Mazower, author of Dark Continent: Europe’s Twentieth Century “In this somber and eloquent book, Enzo Traverso situates the atrocities of October 7, and Israel’s destruction of Gaza, in a historical sequence that encompasses both the Shoah and the Nakba, the crimes of Nazism and the crimes of colonization. The result is a work of erudition and moral gravitas, offering a devastating indictment of the rhetorical subterfuge by which Israel and its supporters in the West have justified Gaza’s slaughter.” —Adam Shatz, author of The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon “Hard-hitting and urgent, Gaza Faces History blends political acumen and historical insight to offer a critical account of the public debates that have taken place since October 7, 2023. Traverso’s ‘contrapuntal’ approach challenges the common sense around questions of antisemitism and anti-Zionism, victims and perpetrators, and political violence. Without minimizing the complexities of the crisis in which we find ourselves, the book concludes with a necessary binational vision—the only way forward.” —Michael Rothberg, author of The Implicated Subject: Beyond Victims and Perpetrators “This wide-ranging essay by master historian Enzo Traverso presents a courageously unsparing analysis of the debate about Gaza. Ranging from the tension between universalism and orientalism in the West, the role of national myths and appropriate historical analogies, to the efficacy of anticolonial and revolutionary violence, Gaza Faces History challenges the shibboleths that distort understanding of conflict in the land between the river and the sea. It will, I suspect, make for difficult, if necessary, reading for some.” —A. Dirk Moses, author of The Problems of Genocide Praise for Revolution: An Intellectual History:   “Brilliant and beautiful. Now this book exists, it’s hard to know how we did without it.” —China Miéville, author of October “A monumental achievement, and should be a touchstone for today’s left. We can’t build a future beyond capitalism without coming to terms with the challenging history it confronts.” —Jacobin

“In this somber and eloquent book, Enzo Traverso situates the atrocities of October 7, and Israel’s destruction of Gaza, in a historical sequence that encompasses both the Shoah and the Nakba, the crimes of Nazism and the crimes of colonization. The result is a work of erudition and moral gravitas, offering a devastating indictment of the rhetorical subterfuge by which Israel and its supporters in the West have justified Gaza’s slaughter.” —Adam Shatz, author of The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon “Hard-hitting and urgent, Gaza Faces History blends political acumen and historical insight to offer a critical account of the public debates that have taken place since October 7, 2023. Traverso’s ‘contrapuntal’ approach challenges the common sense around questions of antisemitism and anti-Zionism, victims and perpetrators, and political violence. Without minimizing the complexities of the crisis in which we find ourselves, the book concludes with a necessary binational vision—the only way forward.” —Michael Rothberg, author of The Implicated Subject: Beyond Victims and Perpetrators Praise for Revolution: An Intellectual History:   “Brilliant and beautiful. Now this book exists, it’s hard to know how we did without it.” —China Miéville, author of October “A monumental achievement, and should be a touchstone for today’s left. We can’t build a future beyond capitalism without coming to terms with the challenging history it confronts.” —Jacobin

“Enzo Traverso delivers a stinging riposte, rigorously anchored in his mastery of European Jewish history, to the virtually unanimous sanctification by Western elites of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, and their dishonest weaponization of anti-Semitism (in some cases by true anti-Semites on the far right) to attack supporters of Palestinian rights.” —Rashid Khalidi, author of The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine “In the face of a massive attempt at distortion of facts comes this lucid analysis that explains, among other things, why the West is unable and unwilling to stop arming Israel, how the memory of the Holocaust is utilized in the defense of Israel, and how Israel succeeds in posing as the victim while destroying Gaza under a hail of bombs and much much more.” —Raja Shehadeh, author of We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I and What Does Israel Fear from Palestine? “In this somber and eloquent book, Enzo Traverso situates the atrocities of October 7, and Israel’s destruction of Gaza, in a historical sequence that encompasses both the Shoah and the Nakba, the crimes of Nazism and the crimes of colonization. The result is a work of erudition and moral gravitas, offering a devastating indictment of the rhetorical subterfuge by which Israel and its supporters in the West have justified Gaza’s slaughter.” —Adam Shatz, author of The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon “Hard-hitting and urgent, Gaza Faces History blends political acumen and historical insight to offer a critical account of the public debates that have taken place since October 7, 2023. Traverso’s ‘contrapuntal’ approach challenges the common sense around questions of antisemitism and anti-Zionism, victims and perpetrators, and political violence. Without minimizing the complexities of the crisis in which we find ourselves, the book concludes with a necessary binational vision—the only way forward.” —Michael Rothberg, author of The Implicated Subject: Beyond Victims and Perpetrators Praise for Revolution: An Intellectual History:   “Brilliant and beautiful. Now this book exists, it’s hard to know how we did without it.” —China Miéville, author of October “A monumental achievement, and should be a touchstone for today’s left. We can’t build a future beyond capitalism without coming to terms with the challenging history it confronts.” —Jacobin

Author Information

Enzo Traverso was born in Italy and taught history and political theory in France for almost twenty years. Since 2013, he is Professor in the Humanities at Cornell University. He is the author of several books, including The End of Jewish Modernity, Fire and Blood: The European Civil War, Left-Wing Melancholia, The New Faces of Fascism, Singular Pasts: The “I” in Historiography, and Revolution: An Intellectual History, which have been translated into many languages. He regularly writes for Jacobin in the United States, Il Manifesto in Italy, and French and Spanish-language magazines. He has also taught as visiting professor in several countries of Europe and Latin America. Willard Wood grew up in France and has translated more than thirty works of fiction and nonfiction from the French. He has won the Lewis Galantière Award for Literary Translation and received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Translation. He lives in Norfolk, Connecticut.

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