The Dilemma: To Remember or Not to Remember a Massacre?
Power structures suppress uncomfortable truth about Tantura
In 1998, Teddy Katz, a graduate student at the University of Haifa in Israel, spent two years researching a thesis based on interviews with 135 people, half Palestinian and half Israeli. His research concluded that a massacre occurred in the coastal town of Tantura in 1948, claiming the lives of 250 people.
Katz’s work exposed a potential historical injustice, challenging a prevailing narrative. However, the ensuing events highlight the tension between truth and power. The pressure Katz faced from the interviewed soldiers, likely veterans with institutional influence, and the university’s subsequent actions demonstrate how established power structures can suppress uncomfortable truths.
In 2000, a journalist published a report based on Katz’s thesis, sparking controversy. The Israeli interviewees, most of them former soldiers, pressured Katz to retract his claim of a massacre. Under this pressure, the university confiscated Katz’s degree, removed his thesis from the library, and destroyed it. These actions effectively destroyed Katz’s academic career. He also experienced his first stroke in the wake of the controvarsy. subsequent strokes left him paralyzed.
The Israelis…
