The Wandering Who [Paperback]

Gilad Atzmon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 16, 2011

An investigation of Jewish identity politics and Jewish contemporary ideology using both popular culture and scholarly texts. Jewish identity is tied up with some of the most difficult and contentious issues of today. The purpose in this book is to open many of these issues up for discussion. Since Israel defines itself openly as the ‘Jewish State’, we should ask what the notions of ’Judaism’, ‘Jewishness’, ‘Jewish culture’ and ‘Jewish ideology’ stand for. Gilad examines the tribal aspects embedded in Jewish secular discourse, both Zionist and anti Zionist; the ‘holocaust religion’; the meaning of ‘history’ and ‘time’ within the Jewish political discourse; the anti-Gentile ideologies entangled within different forms of secular Jewish political discourse and even within the Jewish left. He questions what it is that leads Diaspora Jews to identify themselves with Israel and affiliate with its politics. The devastating state of our world affairs raises an immediate demand for a conceptual shift in our intellectual and philosophical attitude towards politics, identity politics and history.

Editorial Reviews

Review

It is a scholarly and truly monumental work, deeply profound and, of course, controversial. (Alan Hart, British Journalist and covert diplomat in Middle East, ITN's News at 10, BBC's Panorama) A seriously funny writer and the wittiest musician since Ronnie Scott. We're lucky Gilad Atzmon is around. (Robert Wyatt, musician and founding member of Soft Machine)

About the Author

Atzmon is a world-acclaimed jazz saxophonist and composer, a member of the Blockheads and fronts the Orient House Ensemble. He has published numerous political and cultural essays. See: www.gilad.co.uk www.myspace.com/giladatzmon www.jazzaproductions.squarespace.com

Product Details

• Paperback: 177 pages
• Publisher: John Hunt Publishing (September 16, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1846948754
• ISBN-13: 978-1846948756
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (46 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #40,636 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

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

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "The Wandering Who" - A study in small group dynamics..., December 26, 2011

By 

Steve Naidamast "Black Falcon" (Mineola, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Wandering Who (Paperback)

"The Wandering Who" is a difficult piece to review since it immediately stirs up many defensive positions in those that see anything negatively said or written about the Jewish Community or Israel as racist and\or anti-Semitic vitriol. However, if one were to actually understand what Gilad Atzmon has written it would be found to be a rather impartial, well-written but commonplace sociological analysis of the group-think-dynamics of insulated groups; in this case using the Israeli Jewish Community as its basis. What is presented in "The Wandering Who" is more or less an erudite discussion of what happens to a small group of people when under the constant influence of community leaders that have agendas of their own that do not necessarily accommodate the best interests of the community at large.

There is nothing mysterious about Atzmon's writings since most of what he discusses is fairly common knowledge within Israel and the Zionist community itself. What's more it is well documented primarily by Israeli historians, sociologists, and even in parts of the mainstream, Israeli press.

And the idea of "Jewish Identity" politics has no differing symptoms than any other nationalistic fervor that grips a small group or even a large one in many respects. For example, the myth of American Exceptionalism is as much a similar dynamic as that of the concept of "choseness" by the Jewish Community which is fiercely supported by Israeli political endeavor. Both came about for the same exact reasons where the American symptom was provided for by early, fervently, religious Protestants who came to the American shores in the 17th century while the Jewish\Israeli symptom was provided for by their own Judaic belief system.

Nazism is another classic example of a group-dynamic that came about due to the growing power of the German national socialists that used the terrible economic situations in 1930s Germany to invigorate nationalism within the German populace to a degree that it eventually turned on itself by attacking a long and prosperous Jewish Community that not only saw themselves as Germans above all else but provided part of the foundation for an economically viable Germany. The Zionists have done the same to themselves and it is getting worse as increasingly discriminatory legislation is passed in Israel along with increasing censure of free-speech. However, where the Nazis saw their situation as a result of defeat in the first world war, Zionists saw it first as a reaction to the consistent anti-Semitism in Eastern Europe and Russia and then later the destruction of European Jewry during World War II.

Both situations had\have definitive underlying causes that gave rise to extremist views, the first leading to a second world conflagration, the second, an increasingly belligerent Israeli nation that began life with a war crime.

Many would argue that Israel is right to take such a position but unfortunately, the facts, which are well documented and available for anyone who wants to research them, will refute such a position.

However, Gilad Atzmon is not writing about specific facts that have already been widely discussed and debated, with the promoters being constantly defamed but instead about a way of thinking that in of itself will eventually destroy the Israeli nation outright since much of what Israel and its Zionist supporters are promoting is based upon sheer fantasy. This fantasy is also nothing exceptional in the realm of national mythology. All such nationalistic development is fed, influenced, and encouraged to believe in realities that simply never occurred. It is unfortunate but it is also a basic flaw in the Human condition. Everyone wants to believe they are something special, which in essence is an extension of every individual seeking their place in an extremely large universe.

All nations have taken such developments to the extreme and have given rise to terrible atrocities against other peoples. It does not matter if the country is the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia or any of the other host of countries that have risen to economic and military prowess down through the centuries. All of them have committed crimes against Humanity.

The fact that Israel is coming under debate and attack in the public domain now is a result of the fact that it has for no good reason denied a people their rights as Human beings let alone the fact that they have been the indigenous people of Palestine for centuries. And the Palestinian people have not been known for any crimes against their Jewish neighbors until the 1920s when Eastern European and Russian Ashkenazi Jews started to descend on Palestine with the idea that that they were going to return to their "ancient roots"; something which was all part of the planned national mythology since Eastern European Jews and Russians never had any roots in the mid-east (Current genetic studies which are touted to dispute this contention are ambiguous at best and negatively conclusive at worst...).

"The Wandering Who" attempts to demonstrate why this situation initially occurred and how it is being encourage and re-enforced today through an understanding of group dynamics which has its foundation in how people think and react to psychological, economic, and political stimuli. In this respect, "The Wandering Who" addresses the issue using the basis of "fear mongering" by the Israel\Zionist leadership to maintain the current Israeli status-quo. There is nothing unique here given that ever since the end of World War II every US administration has provided US citizens with the same sense of fear-mongering. First it was the Communists and today it is the terrorists. The idea that Atzmon uses of Pre-TSD can be applied in similar fashion to the United States. In Europe a similar form of fear-mongering is appearing in the guise of Islamists taking over European culture. In Poland it is the still latent intense dislike for Jews, though probably only a single Jew currently lives in all of that country.

What Atzmon is trying to accomplish and does rather well is demonstrate that when narrowly focused individuals and supporting groups come to power they use similar tactics to maintain their control. Again, it is nothing unique or out of the ordinary.

Those who would use the shriek of anti-Semitism to label Atzmon's work not only unethical but irrelevant are attempting to promote the idea that Israelis and Zionists are somehow different from the rest of Humanity which would mean that they are in effect separate from the Human race in particular. I doubt this is possible.

In closing it should be remembered that one of the visions of the Israeli state was to become a nation like all other nations. Well, Israel has succeeded. When it comes to hate and prejudice, Israelis and Zionists are no different from the rest of the Human species. They shouldn't argue with success...

89 of 136 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Last Jewish Prophet, September 16, 2011

By 

William T. Hathaway - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Wandering Who (Paperback)

The Wandering Who? chronicles Gilad Atzmon's journey away from his Jewish identity, and by extension away from all exclusive identities, into an inclusive humanness. It's a painful journey, a brutally honest self exploration of these internalized tribal impulses. He emerges from the struggle deracinated but emancipated, freed of a destructive load of cultural baggage.

As the poet Allen Ginsberg said, "If you want to be a prophet, you have to tell your secrets." By being brave enough to expose himself in writing, Atzmon has become a prophet, and his prophecy, as I see it, is a completion of the Mosaic journey, but this time as a mass exodus from Jewishness and all other ethnic bondings that split humanity. After 40 centuries of wandering in the desert of chosenness and separation, Jews and Gentiles alike can finally enter the full humanness of one world family, a secular promised land free of divisive group identities.

Jews have been at the forefront of every progressive movement for the past 160 years, and now it's Atzmon's turn. The atrocities of nationalism, both Jewish and non-Jewish, have forced him to the forefront of a movement to abolish all these tribal groupings, starting with his own.

The Wandering Who? is a threat not only to Zionism, but to all religious, ethnic, national, and even gender identities to which people cling. It's a book of radical liberation and as such dangerous to every orthodoxy and structure of power that separates us into antagonistic camps. Atzmon is a true subversive. Much needed.

Now the survival of our species demands that also Christians, Muslims, Americans, Britons, etc. break out of their group mentalities. We can't suddenly erase these categories, but we can relegate them to the background where they no longer determine our identity. Our sense of self can then be based on qualities that unite humanity rather than divide it.

Thanks for showing the way, Gilad.

65 of 104 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Review of the Wandering WHo, September 28, 2011

By 

Bill - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Wandering Who (Paperback)

A Review of The Wandering Who
William A. Cook
"The Wandering Jew, like Cain, is Everyman. We are what we will to be: Cain or Abel, with a soul or without one, sympathetic to our fellows or indifferent, human or non-human."
(William A. Cook, "The Eternal Jew Goes on Forever," 24/08/09).
Gilad Atzmon's insight into the organism created by the Zionist movement in his book, The Wandering Who, is explosive; it tears the veil off of Israel's apparent civility, its apparent friendship with the United States, and its expressed solicitude for western powers--Britain, Canada, Australia, France and Germany--exposing behind the veil, the assassin ready to slay any and all that interfere with its tribally focused ends. In February of this year, Atzmon characterized Islam and Judaism as tribally oriented belief systems rooted not in "enlightened individualism," but rather in "...the survival of the extended family." These belief systems have nothing to do with personal liberties or personal rights; they have to do with securing the realm of their respective "ways of life." But unlike tribalism in Islam, tribalism in Judaism "can never live in peace with humanism and universalism" (4). "Both religions stand as systems that provide thorough answers in terms of spiritual, civil, cultural and day to day matters." In this regard, "...both Islam and Judaism are more than just religions: they convey an entire `way of life,' and stand as a thorough attempt to answer crucial questions regarding being in the world..."

The Wandering Who is a personal journey of a man born in Jerusalem, raised in the Jewish `way of life,' infused with the myths of the founding of the Jewish state; "Supremacy was brewed into our soul, we gazed at the world through racist, chauvinistic binoculars. And we felt no shame about it either" (5). Inducted into the Israeli military during the 1980s he served in Lebanon, and, in his late teens, experienced an epiphany caused in good measure by careful listening to voices beyond the wall that encircled him in the ghetto that is the Israeli state. This epiphany forced a distinction in identity versus identifying, between self-reliance and obedient servant to an ideology, a distinction that recognized Jews as people, Judaism as a religion, and Jewishness, an ideology that determines identity politics and a resulting political discourse.

What, then, characterizes a Jew? Atzmon distinguishes among those who follow the Judaic religion; those who regard themselves as a human being who happens to be of Jewish origin; and those who put their Jewishness over and above all other traits. Chaim Weizman, the first Israeli President and a Zionist, identified being a Jew as a `primary quality' above citizenship, occupation, head of household, indeed "Jewishness becomes the key element and fundamental characteristic of one's being." Vladimir Jabotinsky wrote "...the nucleus of his spiritual structure will always remain Jewish, because his blood, his body, his physical racial type are Jewish" ("A Letter on Autonomy," 1904). It is this identifying principle that Atzmon sees as corrosive, not only to Judaism, but to the safety and security of the Jewish people, their friends and their neighbors. "...probably then and there I left Chosen-ness behind to become an ordinary human being" (6). "For me to be Jewish is, above all, to be preoccupied with overcoming injustice and thirsting for justice in the world, and that means being respectful toward other peoples regardless of their nationality or religion, and empathetic in the face of human suffering whoever and wherever victimization is encountered" ("On Jewish Identity," 1/15/2011).

Significantly, Atzmon turns to the ancient tale of the wandering Jew to reap the complexities inherent in the contradictions that beset Judaism in today's world: tribalism versus universalism, chosen-ness versus democratic equality, rule by defiance of law versus nations ruled by law, control of government by Zionist controlled ideology versus responsiveness to the voice of the citizenry, and tribalistic morality where morals are fabricated for political utilitarian ends versus the inalienable rights of all endowed by nature.

The legend's primary symbolic value resides in its identification of `otherness,' the unique concept of `chosen-ness,' that separates the Jews from the rest of humanity resulting in an ideological and psychological isolation that becomes a strategic tool used by the Zionists and the Neo-Cons to manipulate the Jewish people and the formation of the Jewish state. Jabotinsky and Weizmann's "primary quality" of Jewishness prevents assimilation, thus forcing the Jew to remain always an alien wherever he or she resides. Personal identification can only exist in the tribe, a virtual and absolute commitment to Jewishness, making possible the use of Jews around the world as "sayanims" (assistants) to further the goals of the Jewish state (17). "The sayan is a person who would betray the nation of which he is a citizen out of devotion to a notion of a clannish brotherhood" (17).

There are thousands of sayanim around the world. In London alone, there are about 2,000 who are active, and another 5,000 on the list. They fulfill many different roles. A car sayan...running a rental agency, could help the Mossad rent a car without having to complete the usual documentation. ... a bank sayan could get you money if you needed it in the middle of the night, a doctor sayan would treat a bullet wound without reporting it to the police...The idea is to have a pool of people available when needed who can provide services but will keep quiet about them out of loyalty to the cause (17).
"In Zionist eyes Jewishness is an international network operation...to be a Jew is a deep commitment that goes far beyond any legal or moral order" (19). Atzmon identifies a functioning organism controlled by Zionist ideology and Neo-Con sayanim in the United States that has yoked Israeli interests to those of the United States using a document titled the USA Defense Planning Guidance Report for fiscal years 1994-1999. "In the Middle East and the Persian Gulf, we seek to foster regional stability, deter aggression against our friends and interests in the region, protect U.S. nationals and property, and safeguard our access to international air and seaways and to the region's oil. The United States is committed to the security of Israel and to maintaining the qualitative edge that is critical to Israel's security." (22). This manipulative strategy "transformed the Jewish tribal mode into a collective functioning system." It also transformed "the American and British armies into a Zionist mission force" as Israel and the Neo-Cons manipulated the governments of the UK and the US to attack Israel's enemies in Iraq while imposing sanctions on Syria and defending its occupation and oppression of the Palestinians and its wanton destruction of Lebanon in 2006 and Gaza in 2008-2009.

There's more to this review on the Internet should you be interested.