Second generation of immigrants from German speaking countries ("Yekkes")

Gershon Ballhorn grew up in moshava Kinneret at the Sea of Galilee and went to school in Tiberias. Between 1966 and 1969 he performed his military service, afterwards he got a BA-degree in Economy at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In 1972 he travelled through Europe, then from 1973 he studied Business Administration and Marketing in California. In 1977 GB became a police inspector, he fought against white-collar crime in Tel Aviv. From 1978 until 1985 he worked for the Ministry of National Infrastructures. Between 1980 and 1982 he took a training to become a travel guide. GB has an interest in archeology and is currently working as travel guide in Israel and Germany. ; GB never thought about Yekkish influences that influenced him before the interview, he concentrated on his own character (he calls himself an Ashkenazi). A kind of Central European milieu is pleasant to him. At home GB's parents still speak German, his father says he is still proud to be an old Prussian. GB's first language was German, although he didn't speak it with his German speaking grandparents. Nowadays he speaks English much better than German. His sister, who is five years older, heard much more German from her grandparents and speaks it much better. For GB it's difficult to read German. His parents were assimilated Jews, his father had two aunts who married Christians. GB considers the religious and political background of a person as rather irrelevant in Israel. When he looks back at history though he recognizes its importance (e.g. 1/3 of all German Nobel prize winners were Jewish). GB's mother attended school in Jerusalem towards the end of the 1930s. GB's grandfather on his mother's side (Nussbaum, painter and director of the Academy of Arts in Frankfurt) was a Zionist, therefore he emigrated very early, in 1933. He was a famous supporter of the Zionist movement, but a secular Jew. He considered the political solution as the only way to solve the Jewish problem. GB describes the close relationship of his mother to her father. ; In contrast to his sisters, GB never had a feeling of being excluded as a “Yekkes' child”. He thinks that Yekkish secondary virtues (punctuality, love of order etc.) exist and considers them as good. He describes his childhood as a carefree, positive “German” world, in which the Holocaust seemed to be a distant accident. The Holocaust is not comprehensible to GB. He does not feel resentments towards Germany. He notices a “social filter”: in Israel he only meets the “good” Germans. GB first visited Germany at the age of 24. He remembers he watched some invalids there - he imagined them as victims of the war. He respects the so-called “normal, legitimate, patriotic soldiers”. He discusses individual and collective guilt, tacit support and resistance. There were no discussions about this among his family members, but his father is rather willing to talk about it. His mother's younger brother refused to speak German from the very beginning. GB tells about an experience with former neighbors of his mother during a visit to Frankfurt. It seems strange to him that the Germans considered the Americans as the “evil” ones. He has many friends in Germany, their lifestyle is familiar to him. Because of his many visits to Germany, he is used to the local lifestyle. He notices that nationalism is deprecated in Germany nowadays and that many Germans are humorous people. His German passport is very helpful during his journeys through Europe. ; GB thinks the Israeli melting-pot-mentality is primarily supported by the young generation. He describes an impression from his journey through Canada: he appreciates the great liberality of the Canadian society. He only wants to look at individuals, not at their nationality.