Tribune. Setting up an exhibition on the “Jews of the East” was a challenge. Not because of the chosen theme, but because of the place where it takes place: the Institute of the Arab World (IMA). It is the first time that this venerable institution, which opened its doors in 1985, devotes an exhibition to a sensitive theme, likely to revive the dispute over the departure of Jews from Arab countries, not to mention the interminable Israeli-Palestinian conflict. .
Invited to join the scientific commission chaired by Benjamin Stora, the commissioner general to deal with the contemporary period, I reviewed and reread with the three commissioners of the IMA all that in the rooms and in the catalog concerned decolonization and Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a climate of remarkable mutual trust. The inauguration in the presence of the President of the Republic and the public and critical success of the exhibition were the crowning achievement of this exemplary cooperation.
Convinced that such an exhibition in such a place was a date to be marked with a milestone, I hypothesized during an interview given to the Jewish site Akadem, dedicated to Jewish culture and history. , that this one was a first fruit, on the cultural level, of the agreements of Abraham [signés en 2020 entre Israël et plusieurs Etats arabes]. However, it turns out that Jack Lang [président de l’IMA depuis 2013] had conceived the project as soon as he arrived. The assumption is therefore wrong, and I readily concede it. But, whether we deplore the signing of these agreements or rejoice, the exhibition takes place in this new context where Arab countries agree, after seventy years of boycott, to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. .
Unthought of the history of decolonization
I also argued that two Israeli institutions loaned thirty pieces to the IMA. Exactly six pieces were borrowed from the Israel Museum, the Ben-Zvi Institute and the Press Office, the twenty-four others from the private collection assembled by William L. Gross in Tel. Aviv. In this regard, the petition signed by a collective of Arab intellectuals exhaled a scent of the rear: it was a question of calling to order the IMA by arguing that solidarity with the Palestinian cause excludes any cooperation with Israel, whatever its size: one coin, six coins or a hundred coins are all the same. A question of principle erected as a dogma.
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