Yehuda Bauer |
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Bauer in 2008 |
| Born | (1926-04-06)6 April 1926
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| Died | 18 October 2024(2024-10-18) (aged 98)
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| Alma mater | Cardiff University
Hebrew University |
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| Thesis | British Mandate of Palestine |
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| Discipline | Holocaust studies |
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| Institutions | Hebrew University |
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Yehuda Bauer[a] (April 6, 1926 – October 18, 2024) was an Israeli historian specializing in the Holocaust.
Life
Bauer was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia. Bauer was a professor of Holocaust Studies at the Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Death
Bauer died on October 18, 2024 in Jerusalem, Israel at the age of 98.[1]
Views
The Holocaust
Jewish resistance
Bauer specialized in the Holocaust, antisemitism ‒ a word that should be written unhyphenated[2] ‒ and the Jewish resistance movement in the Holocaust. In Bauer's view, resistance to the Nazis comprised not only physical opposition but any activity that gave the Jewish people dignity and humanity in the most humiliating and inhumane conditions.
Furthermore, Bauer disputed the popular view that most Jews went to their deaths passively ‒ "like sheep to the slaughter".[3] He argued that, given the conditions in which the Eastern European Jews had to endure, what is surprising is not how little resistance there was, but rather how much.
Holocaust uniqueness
Bauer disagreed with those who argue that the Holocaust was just another genocide. Though he agreed that there were other genocides in history, he argued that the Holocaust was the worst single case of genocide in history, where every member of a nation was selected for annihilation.
Holocaust memory preservation
Bauer believed that Holocaust memory had been preserved badly, with "misunderstandings, wrong conclusions and wrong analyses", by Israeli politicians.[4] He claimed that they had interpreted the Holocaust nationalistically and instrumentalized it.[4]
Bosnian genocide
Bauer claimed that the Srebrenica massacre was an "act of mass murder, but not genocide".[5][6] This caused some to accuse him of Bosnian genocide denial.[6]
Works
Books
2010s
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Publications
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- The Jews – A Contrary People. LIT Verlag, 2014, ISBN 978-3-643-90501-7
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2000s
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Publications
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- Rethinking the Holocaust. New Haven, Yale University, 2001
- A history of the Holocaust. New York: Franklin Watts, 1982, 2001
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1990s
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Publications
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- The Impact of the Holocaust. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1996
- Jews for sale?: Nazi-Jewish negotiations,. New Haven: Yale University Press, October 1994
- The significance of the Final Solution. 1994
- Antisemitism in the 1990s. 1993
- The Wannsee "Conference" and its significance for the "Final Solution". 1993
- Antisemitism as a European and world problem. 1993
- On the applicability of definitions — Anti-Semitism in present-day Europe. 1993
- Vom christlichen Judenhass zum modernen Antisemitismus — Ein Erklaerungsversuch. 1992
- The tragedy of the Slovak Jews within the framework of Nazi policy towards the Jews in general, 1992
- Holocaust and genocide. Some comparisons. 1991
- Who was responsible and when? Some well-known documents revisited. 1991
- The Holocaust, religion and Jewish history. 1991
- The Brichah: Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1990
- La place d'Auschwitz dans la Shoah. 1990
- Is the Holocaust explicable? 1990
- World War II. 1990
- Antisemitism and anti-Zionism — New and old. 1990
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1980s
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Publications
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- Out of the Ashes. Oxford, Pergamon Press, 1989
- Résistance et passivité juive face à l'Holocauste. 1989
- Jewish reactions to the Holocaust. Tel-Aviv: MOD Books, 1989
- ed., Remembering for the future: Working papers and addenda. Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1989
- The mission of Joel Brand. 1989
- Out of the ashes: The impact of American Jews on post-Holocaust European Jewry. Oxford: Pergamon Press, c. 1989
- ed., Present-day Antisemitism: Proceedings of the Eighth International Seminar of the Study Circle on World Jewry under the auspices of the President of Israel, Chaim Herzog, Jerusalem 29–31 December 1985. Jerusalem: The Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, The Hebrew University, 1988
- Antisemitism in Western Europe. 1988
- Antisemitism today: Myth and reality. Jerusalem: Hebrew University. Institute of Contemporary Jewry, 1985
- Jewish survivors in DP camps and She'erith Hapletah, Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1984
- Jewish foreign policy during the Holocaust. New York: 1984
- American Jewry and the Holocaust. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee,. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1981 ISBN 0-8143-1672-7
- The Holocaust as historical experience: Essays and a discussion, New York: Holmes & Meier, 1981
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1970s
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Publications
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- The Jewish emergence from powerlessness. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979
- The Judenraete: some conclusions. [Jerusalem]: [Yad Vashem, 1979]
- The Holocaust in historical perspective. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1978
- Trends in Holocaust research, Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1977
- The Holocaust and the struggle of the Yishuv as factors in the establishment of the State of Israel. [Jerusalem]: [Yad Vashem 1976]
- My brother's keeper: A history of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1974
- Rescue operations through Vilna, Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1973
- They chose life: Jewish resistance in the Holocaust. New York: The American Jewish Committee, 1973
- Flight and rescue: Brichah. New York: Random House, 1970
- From diplomacy to Resistance: A history of Jewish Palestine. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1970. Translated from Hebrew by Alton M. Winters.
- The initial organization of the Holocaust survivors in Bavaria, Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1970
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Book chapters
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Publications
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| List (year in descending order)
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Edited conference papers
1990s
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Publications
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- Yehuda Bauer (ed.), The danger of Antisemitism in Central and Eastern Europe in the wake of 1989–1990. Jerusalem: The Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem: 1991. ISBN 965-222-242-9 (Based on a conference held 28–29 October 1990, in Jerusalem)
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1980s
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Publications
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- Menachem Z. Rosensaft and Yehuda Bauer (eds.), Antisemitism: threat to Western civilization. Jerusalem: Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1989. ISBN 965-222-126-0. (Papers based on a conference held at the New York University School of Law, 27 October 1985).
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References
- ↑
- "Prominent Holocaust historian Yehuda Bauer dies at 98". The Times of Israel. October 18, 2024. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- Eichner, Itamar (October 20, 2024). "'Antisemitism danger to humanity', Bauer said". Ynetnews. Retrieved June 12, 2025.
- "Yehuda Bauer, Czech-born Israeli historian of the Holocaust who redefined Jewish 'resistance'". The Telegraph. October 29, 2024. Retrieved June 12, 2025.
- "Yehuda Bauer, 98, Scholar Who Saw Jewish Resistance in Holocaust, Dies". The New York Times. October 29, 2024. Retrieved June 12, 2025.
- ↑ "Problems of Contemporary Antisemitism" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on July 5, 2003. Retrieved July 5, 2003. Lecture by Yehuda Bauer, 2003. Jewish Studies at UC Santa Cruz
- ↑ Bauer, Yehuda. Interview with Amos Goldberg. 18 January 1998. 22 July 2007 [1]
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Summers, Charlie (August 4, 2023). "Historian Yehuda Bauer: Israel's own politicians add to global Holocaust distortion". The Times of Israel. Retrieved June 12, 2025.
- ↑ "The Srebrenica massacre – the worst war crime in Europe since 1945". The Jerusalem Post. July 26, 2020. Retrieved June 12, 2025.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 "Professor Bauer: There was no genocide in Srebrenica". Kosovo Online. April 21, 2024. Retrieved June 12, 2025.