The Fatal Embrace: Jews and the State [Paperback]

Benjamin Ginsberg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 15, 1999 | ISBN-10: 0226296660 | ISBN-13: 978-0226296661 | Edition: 1

In this provocative book, Benjamin Ginsberg examines the cycle of Jewish success and anti-Semitic attack throughout the history of the Diaspora, with a concentrated focus on the "special case" of America. For Ginsberg, the essential issue is not anti-Jewish feeling, but the conditions under which such sentiment is likely to be used in the political arena. The Fatal Embrace identifies the political dynamics that, historically, have set the stage for the persecution of Jews.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ginsberg's inquiry into the rise of anti-Semitism in the United States is sensitive, unflinching and lucid. He predicts that the "unthinkable" could happen--a political alliance of radical populists and respected conservatives who make vigorous use of virulent anti-Semitic themes to attack liberal Democrats. A Johns Hopkins political science professor, Ginsberg bases this conclusion on a broad analysis of Jews' shifting relationship to state power, from the Civil War through the New Deal to the collapse of the Jewish/Republican alliance as the Bush administration downgraded the importance of the state of Israel in U.S. foreign policy. The opening chapter shows how Jews have played key roles throughout history in building liberal, absolutist, monarchist and socialist regimes, offering their services and skills in exchange for protection and opportunity--a sometimes "fatal embrace" that, in Ginsberg's analysis, often provokes organized anti-Semitism.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

According to Ginsberg (political science, Johns Hopkins), the state has been both a protector and betrayer of the Jews in modern times. Ginsberg claims that Jews have traditionally measured their progress in American society by the degree to which they have been heeded and accepted by the governing powers. The Jews have achieved their greatest success under liberal administrations. But with the questioning of liberalism, the political influence of the Jews has waned, and currents of anti-Semitism seem to be surfacing more frequently. All in all, Ginsberg's book is a troubling one. Some will find his arguments a little shaky, and even Jewish readers will disagree on the degree of danger. Libraries with strong current affairs sections will want to add this book.
- Paul Kaplan, Dakota Cty. Lib., Eagan, Minn.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 293 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press; 1 edition (January 15, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226296660
• ISBN-13: 978-0226296661
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.8 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #754,611 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 34 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Jewish Power and Anti-Semitism: A Catch-22 Situation? June 13, 2007

By Jan Peczkis

Format:Paperback

Ginsberg advances the notion that the Jewish-state embrace, designed to ameliorate the effects of anti-Semitism, has, paradoxically, exacerbated the latter: "Thus, over the past several centuries, Jews have played important roles in the construction of absolutist, liberal, and socialist states as well as major parts in movements seeking to reform or supplant regimes to which they were unable to obtain access. Jews have traditionally offered their services to the state in exchange for the regime's guarantee of security and opportunity. Ironically, however, precisely this relationship between Jews and the state has often sparked organized anti-Semitic attacks." (p. 57). Owing to the breadth of this topic, this review focuses on only a few of Ginsberg's many points.

Considering the attention given to the numerus clausus in certain 1930's Polish universities, one may be surprised to learn of the existence of quotas limiting Jewish enrollment in American universities (pp. 96-99), sometimes as recently as the early 1960's (p. 2). Ginsberg also discusses the Jewish prominence in the ACLU (pp. 1-2, 100-101), including the deliberate use of gentile plaintiffs and attorneys, done in order to avert an anti-Semitic backlash, in the eventually-successful prayer-opposition lawsuit.

Jews played major roles in assisting the Hohenzollern rulers (p. 17), and in events leading to the unification of the German state under Bismarck (p. 18). No wonder that subjugated Poles commonly thought of Jews as their co-oppressors!

Unlike some modern authors (e. g., Jan Tomasz Gross), Ginsberg is exceptionally forthright about the extent and significance of the Zydokomuna (Jewish Communism). Beginning with Soviet Communism, he writes: "As we saw earlier, in the aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution, Jews played an extremely prominent role in the Soviet regime." (p. 53). "Three of the six members of Lenin's first Politburo--Trotsky, Kamenev, and Zinoviev--were of Jewish origin...If the distinctive contribution of Jews to the absolutist state was in the realm of finance, and their singular role in liberal regimes was the mobilization of opinion, the special contribution of the Jews to the Bolshevik state involved the organization of coercion...During the 1920's and 1930's, Jews were a major element in the secret police and other Soviet security forces...Jews were also important in the Red Army...Another domain in which Jews were particularly visible was the Soviet cultural and propaganda apparatus." (pp. 30-31). "In twentieth-century Russia, Jews commanded powerful instruments of terror and repression." (p. 57). "During the Second World War, Jews played prominent roles in the Soviet government, particularly in the realms of propaganda and foreign relations." (p. 54).

Later, the Zydokomuna admittedly became an important factor in the Soviet imposition of Communism upon Eastern Europe. Ginsberg comments: "A third area in which Jews played a particularly noteworthy role was the governance of the Soviet Union's Eastern European satellites after World War II. Indigenous Jewish Communists provided the Soviets with a useful leadership cadre in...Poland..." (p. 32). This can be generalized: "As indicated above, in the aftermath of World War II, Jews played major roles in the puppet governments established by the Soviets in Czechoslovakia, Poland, East Germany, Hungary, and Romania." (p. 55).

Some of Ginsberg's reasoning is dubious. In common with many authors, he attributes the Jewish over-involvement in Communism to the injustices that Jews had experienced in non-Communist societies (p. 28). But many other peoples (e. g., the Poles) were also downtrodden, yet they never supported Communism to any appreciable extent (a few Dzerzhinskys notwithstanding). Ginsberg does not explain this. Ironic to his argument, he also describes how, in the 1930's, Jews constituted about 500,000 of the ten million victims of Stalin's purges, including the majority of the politically most prominent victims (p. 53). Yet the Zydokomuna persisted. Ginsberg fails to answer the following question: If it was injustices that had driven Jews to Communism, then why didn't Communist injustices, especially those against Jews, drive Jews AWAY from Communism?

Ginsberg assesses the geopolitical fallout stemming from the actions of the Eastern European Zydokomuna: "This prominent Jewish presence allowed nationalist and religious forces to use anti-Semitic appeals to mobilize popular opposition to Communist rule in these nations." (p. 55). As an example of this, Ginsberg cites Polish Cardinal Hlond's statement that figured the Zydokomuna as a provocation leading to the Kielce Pogrom. Again, Ginsberg's reasoning is dubious. Soviet hegemony and Communism were almost universally hated by Poles, so there was no reason to mobilize public opposition against it, much less to introduce extraneous elements to do so! Second, Communism had been imposed on Poland on the heels of the "liberating" Red Army, and there never had been any realistic hope of overthrowing it. Furthermore, by the time of the (so-called) Kielce Pogrom, anti-Communist guerilla activity had already been largely repressed. The motive behind Hlond's comments had been rather prosaic: The western media had focused exclusively on the Jewish victims at Kielce (as indeed it does almost exclusively to this very day), but ignored (and still ignores) the reality of significant Jewish support for Poland's enemies.

5 of 8 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars An eye opener October 30, 2008

By M. Kramer

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I wish Benjamin Ginsburg would update this work. I learned a lot.

But, given the ferocity/ ethnic baiting of the 2008 election, the extreme leverage (PONZI scheme) of global banking, there has not been a whisper of anti-semitism (except in most veiled code) anywhere. Why is that?

Seems like a volume 2 is needed!

Anyway, I love reading this book. Who would have thought that Jewish people helped reconstruct the South after the civil war! The book is as much about power politics, as it is about any Jewish role in power. The book delivers a potent recipe for a segment of a minority who services those in power, make tons of money and gain power behind the scenes, and then is hatefully driven out of town by opposing power seekers. Have any groups other than Jews done this? If not, why not?

The latter brings up my major criticism of the book. I wish that the thesis would be broadened to other minorites. If it cannot be broadened, then we are stuck with the "singularity" of the Jewish people with regards to the dynamics of the Fatal Embraces. This begs for further elucidation.

regards,
Mark

10 of 23 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A good assesment, but some points missed January 23, 2004

By Seth J. Frantzman HALL OF FAME

Format:Paperback

This valiant effort to address the question of the danger of the Jewish alliance with government fails to pick out other important points. The basic argument here is that throughout history, since 70 A.D to be exact, Jews have tried to embrace government so as to be protected by it. As the weakest and more discriminated against people in Europe Jews frequently worked in the courts of Kings. When communism and socialism wee being Born this book shows how Jews worked to establish the Soviet in Russia and fought in the Spanish civil war. In America Jews quickly embraced the more tolerant state, aiding on both sides of the civil war and occupying a seat on the supreme court for more then a century.

The question this book asks is: Has the Jewish alliance with the state proved to be a fatal tactic? Examples of the expulsion from Spain in 1492 and the Stalinist purges of Jews in Russia seem to be prime example. But the book does not address the fact that in the middle eastern countries Jews had no status and frequently existed with no alliance to the state and yet the Jews of the middle east were also suppressed, pogromed, and sometimes expelled. Jews of the middle east, despite the fact that they were not visible were still hated and they were forced to wear distinctive embarrassing clothes and were restricted from riding horses and forced to work on the Sabbath. So the conclusion should be that it really doesn't matter whether Jews embrace or shun the state, either way we will be at risk and the reality is that at least by embracing the state Jews have gotten a measure of power to help influence government so that it is harder for government sanctioned anti-Semitism to take place.