“If you don’t condemn Israel, I won’t publish your book on the Holocaust.” And the publisher pulls it

Rafael Medoff, founder of the David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies in Washington, had planned to publish “Cartoonists Against the Holocaust”, a collection of cartoons that appeared in American newspapers in the 1930s and 1940s. However, the book – which would have examined what the American public knew about the persecution and extermination of European Jews whilst the Holocaust was underway – was cancelled after the author refused to include, at the publisher’s insistence, a condemnation of Israel in the introduction.

Medoff said he had refused to publish what he believed to be falsehoods demanded by Dark Horse, one of America’s most famous comic book publishers. “Historians should be free to write about history without being subjected to political scrutiny,” Medoff said, comparing the alleged behaviour to a “new form of McCarthyism”. Dark Horse had previously published two other books by Medoff: "Whistleblowers" and "Cartoonists Against Racism". Following Hamas’s invasion of Israel on 7 October 2023, Dark Horse’s management began demanding that Medoff denounce Israel as a condition for the publication of his new book on the Holocaust. “A country populated by a religious ethnic group that was immorally and horrifically tortured and killed in the Holocaust because of its ethnicity is led by a prime minister for whom the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity,” wrote the publishing house’s then director, Craig Yoe, a former creative at The Muppets and himself a cartoonist. Davide, you’re in the clear!

The writer Dina Rubina has cancelled an event that was due to take place at Pushkin House in London after the organisers asked her to “state her position” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Last week, Pen America, the organisation founded to defend freedom of expression, published an article describing the “isolation and exclusion” that Israeli and Jewish writers have faced since 7 October. The authors report having been blacklisted by publishers, boycotted by activists, pressured to downplay their Jewish identity and targeted in online witch hunts. Deborah Harris, the literary agent who represents many Israeli authors including David Grossman, had described the impossibility of selling any work of fiction by these authors on the American market following the attacks of 7 October. “The standard line is: ‘I wouldn’t know how to publish this author at the moment’,” said Harris. Then there are those who do not want their works translated into Hebrew. An Israeli publisher wanted the rights to the latest books by Kamila Shamsie, an award-winning and highly regarded British writer. Her first books were published in Israel in 2010 by Keter. Shamsie’s response was: “I would be very happy to be published in Hebrew, but I don’t know of any Hebrew-language publisher that isn’t Israeli.” 

Two days ago, pro-Palestinian activists organised a demonstration in Stockholm, recreating the entrance gate to Auschwitz with the word ‘Gaza’ in place of ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’. Medoff could have used it as the cover. The book would already be on display.