Jonathan Glazer Is Only Comfortable with a Jewishness of Victimhood

Due to a long-standing tradition, I was not watching the Academy Awards ceremony last night. But it was hard to avoid seeing the clip of Jonathan Glazer’s despicable acceptance speech. For those who missed it, the director of The Zone of Interest had this to say upon receiving an international-film Oscar for a film about the commandant of the Auschwitz death camp:

Much of the attention last night was on the “refute their Jewishness” part of his comments, with Glazer’s defenders arguing that it was grossly unfair to just cite that aspect of his remarks without the “hijacked” section. Either way, it was an odd formulation. If Jewishness means a lot to you, why would you ever utter the words “we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness” in any context? If you think others are exploiting a religion and its history, you’d think you’d want to focus on other people’s use of Jewishness. As a proud and unapologetic Jew, for instance, I might say, “I refute Jonathan Glazer using his Jewishness and hijacking the memory of the Holocaust to score anti-Israel points at an award ceremony.” But I would never include any combination of words that would be anywhere in the neighborhood of making it appear as if I were refuting my own Jewishness.

About the Author

Philip Klein

Philip Klein is the editor of National Review Online.

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Due to a long-standing tradition, I was not watching the Academy Awards ceremony last night. But it was hard to avoid seeing the clip of Jonathan Glazer’s despicable acceptance speech. For those who missed it, the director of The Zone of Interest had this to say upon receiving an international-film Oscar for a film about the commandant of the Auschwitz death camp:

Much of the attention last night was on the “refute their Jewishness” part of his comments, with Glazer’s defenders arguing that it was grossly unfair to just cite that aspect of his remarks without the “hijacked” section. Either way, it was an odd formulation. If Jewishness means a lot to you, why would you ever utter the words “we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness” in any context? If you think others are exploiting a religion and its history, you’d think you’d want to focus on other people’s use of Jewishness. As a proud and unapologetic Jew, for instance, I might say, “I refute Jonathan Glazer using his Jewishness and hijacking the memory of the Holocaust to score anti-Israel points at an award ceremony.” But I would never include any combination of words that would be anywhere in the neighborhood of making it appear as if I were refuting my own Jewishness.