ABSTRACT
The Acco Theatre Center’s2 five-hour-long theatrical tour de force, Arbeit macht frei MiToitland Europa (or Work liberates from the deathland of Europe), premiered in the northern Israeli city of Acco in 1991 and remained in the company’s repertoire for more than seven years. Its importance derived from the bold and self-critical manner in which the performance portrayed the memory of the Holocaust as one of the formative forces in Israeli consciousness, whilst challenging its use in justifying the denial of the right to freedom and self-determination to the Palestinians.
