On Monday, the distinguished literary critic Marjorie Perloff died at the age of ninety-two. Born Gabriele Mintz to Jewish parents in Vienna, she and her family fled to Switzerland and then the U.S. after the Nazi takeover. Her 2016 book Edge of Irony deals with six great Austrian modernist writers—five of whom were born Jews. In this 2019 interview, Jeremy Sigler spoke to Perloff about this book and her own childhood:

JS: Moments of your book are comedic, but all in all, it’s very upsetting.

MP: Why?

JS: Because it deals with anti-Semitism. And the struggles of so many writers, some who were themselves Jewish and yet blatantly anti-Semitic. It’s all very troubling. One day (before World War I) they were living in a fairly liberal, and very Jewish society, and then came this unprecedented backlash into Nazism.

MP: Well, the Jews like Karl Kraus certainly flourished in the pre-World War I period. But even in the early 20s, as Joseph Roth shows in many of his short stories, there were already swastikas everywhere and the brochures of summer resorts had already made it clear that Jews were not to be admitted. . . .

I keep hearing today about this or that microaggression. And I want to respond, “You know what’s worse than a microaggression? A macroaggression.”

For some time, opponents of U.S support for Israel have been urging the White House to end the war in Gaza, or simply calling for a ceasefire. Douglas Feith and Lewis Libby consider what such a result would actually entail:

Ending the war immediately would allow Hamas to survive and retain military and governing power. Leaving it in the area containing the Sinai-Gaza smuggling routes would ensure that Hamas can rearm. This is why Hamas leaders now plead for a ceasefire. A ceasefire will provide some relief for Gazans today, but a prolonged ceasefire will preserve Hamas’s bloody oppression of Gaza and make future wars with Israel inevitable.

For most Gazans, even when there is no hot war, Hamas’s dictatorship is a nightmarish tyranny. Hamas rule features the torture and murder of regime opponents, official corruption, extremist indoctrination of children, and misery for the population in general. Hamas diverts foreign aid and other resources from proper uses; instead of improving life for the mass of the people, it uses the funds to fight against Palestinians and Israelis.

Moreover, a Hamas-affiliated website warned Gazans last month against cooperating with Israel in securing and delivering the truckloads of aid flowing into the Strip. It promised to deal with those who do with “an iron fist.” In other words, if Hamas remains in power, it will begin torturing, imprisoning, or murdering those it deems collaborators the moment the war ends. Thereafter, Hamas will begin planning its next attack on Israel:

Hamas’s goals are to overshadow the Palestinian Authority, win control of the West Bank, and establish Hamas leadership over the Palestinian revolution. Hamas’s ultimate aim is to spark a regional war to obliterate Israel and, as Hamas leaders steadfastly maintain, fulfill a Quranic vision of killing all Jews.

Hamas planned for corpses of Palestinian babies and mothers to serve as the mainspring of its October 7 war plan. Hamas calculated it could survive a war against a superior Israeli force and energize enemies of Israel around the world. The key to both aims was arranging for grievous Palestinian civilian losses. . . . That element of Hamas’s war plan is working impressively.