Kapos are one of the most controversial figures in the Holocaust. Many people are still fascinated by and want to better understand the kapos’ unique ethical dilemma. In her new article, The ‘Gray Zone’ in Cinema: Representations of the Kapo in Israeli Cinema, Dr. Yvonne Kozlovsky Golan writes that “while the kapos were also persecuted by the Nazis, they also benefited from certain powers and privileges – unlike their fellow Jews. These circumstances place them in a morally complex category within Holocaust narratives, their representation wavering between being seen as victim and as perpetrator.”
How have kapos been represented in society? Particularly in Israeli society, where most Holocaust survivors (including those who were forced into the role of kapo or members of the Jewish police) lived after WWII? Dr. Golan looks at the cinema for answers. Specifically, Dr. Golan’s article “explores the representation of the kapo figure in Israeli feature and documentary films, particularly the kapo’s ethical and moral characteristics. The research conducted focuses on how the disclosure of kapos’ personal or scripted versions in these films, as mediated by the director, reflects a gradual shift in Israeli public opinion regarding kapos and the role they played in the Holocaust.”
Dr. Golan is the Head of the MA Program for Film and Culture Studies at the University of Haifa
JHR went ‘behind the issue’ with Dr. Golan to gain further insight into this curious and perplexing topic.
JHR- Given that you call into question whether or not the filmmakers of Kapo “indeed succeed at obtaining their stated goal of creating an objective, non-judgmental account of the Kapo issue,” do you think it’s possible to present such a controversial figure in cinema without, inadvertently or otherwise, a moral judgment?
YKG- Cinema has great visual capabilities since, as a medium, it has the potential to connect past, present, and future. The camera’s range spans 360 degrees, and therefore it can provide more perspectives on a given situation than the human eye. Ostensibly, this capacity enables the film director to portray the subject matter objectively, as if perceived by a so-called “neutral eye.” However, inevitably the director’s views and agenda are mixed into the picture. However, there are complex issues, such as the case of the Kapos, where the director knows that taking a cinematic stance may prejudice the issue – for better or worse. Yet the director still cannot free himself from addressing the very fact that brothers rose to kill their own kind, even if this was done under horrific circumstances.
Therefore, in my opinion, the directors of the documentary Kapo made every effort to maintain a balance between the different interviewees (not always with great success) and to leave judgment to the viewers themselves. In other words, for us viewers, according to the interviewees’ answers: moral judgment and the position we should adopt concerning what we see and experience on the screen – is ours and not the director’s.
JHR- In your article, you explain that “entire segments of Israeli society did not experience the Holocaust and had not been exposed to its nuances and were thus unable to comprehend the horrific, cynical role imposed on select Jews by the Nazis and the terrible implications that came with it. They, therefore, instinctively viewed this function as immoral and performed out of choice.” And yet, interestingly, it was the survivors themselves who “demanded” that Jews be tried under the terms of the Nazis and Nazi Collaborators (Punishment) Law of 1950. To what degree, then, did the survivors’ condemnatory stance influence the wider public’s position on the subject?
YKG- The survivors’ influence was limited and also short-lived. Although lawsuits were filed against those identified as Kapos, the complexity of the issue made it difficult to adjudicate or to reach a decisive decision. On the other hand, the public was also not ready for this kind of discussion. First, because people were about to start a new life, second, the press, which realized it was dealing with a hot potato, pushed the discourse to the back pages of the papers. The young state preferred to focus on normality rather than occupying itself with the abnormal. From the public’s view, the issue was repressed and pushed beneath the surface for years. The debate was finally reignited in full through the media. The media had the means, power and capacity to clarify the issue in the most logical and objective manner possible.
JHR- You also cite the prohibition in halakha against turning over a member of the Jewish community to foreign authorities as a foundational reason for the ways Israeli society addressed the issue. Did this resonate beyond the religiously observant portions of Israeli society? Is it not somewhat surprising that halakha informed the debate in such a profound way?
YKG- More than a religious issue, it is a Jewish cultural practice that evolved over thousands of years of exile. Members of the Jewish community throughout the Diaspora looked after one another, and informing on other Jews or handing them over to Gentiles was regarded as a self-evident taboo. The Kapo case demonstrated the profundity of the Germans’ malice, by breaking Jewish solidarity, and making it be the Jews themselves – the Kapos and the Sonderkommando – who actually executed the Final Solution (of course involuntary). In Zionist Israel, at the time of the formation of the State, the Holocaust was incomprehensible in every sense. Both because of the general attitude of the Yishuv at the time towards the Holocaust survivors, viewing them as complicit victims who passively cooperated in their own murder; and because of fundamental historical ignorance. It was not until the Eichmann trial that Israeli society’s attitude changed regarding the complexity of the Holocaust.
JHR- What trends are perceptible in how contemporary Israeli society deals with this difficult subject? Has the debate shifted in a significant way in recent years? How have these films influenced those contemporary perceptions of the Kapo?
YKG- Let’s return to the first question and the cinema’s ability to tell a story and portray it in full. To this, we can add the cinema’s capacity to evoke feelings of love, hatred, and empathy, as well as its suggestive powers, all through compelling and sometimes even manipulative arguments. One of the main films that influenced public opinion and caused the public to reflect on the issue of the Kapos, beyond viewing the issue in terms of black and white, was Claude Lanzmann’s The Last of the Unjust (2013). Together with Israeli films with similar themes, the public received these films very well and even expressed interest in the issue. There were no public protests.
Quite the contrary, much compassion was shown for Holocaust survivors and the terrible circumstances these survivors endured. It was clear that public opinion was prepared for the documentary by Seton and Ben-Mayor in 1999, which has been screened almost every year since on Holocaust Memorial Day in Israel. Studies have shown that electronic and audio-visual media have a high impact on the viewer. And the acceptance of the films from 2015 onward proves this. My article elaborates on this issue in detail.
Read Yvonne Kozlovsky Golan’s full article in The Journal of Holocaust Research.
The Journal of Holocaust Research 