ABSTRACT
Perdition thereby presents itself both as a universalist warning against the dangers of neo-Nazism and antisemitism, while at the same time rewriting history to show that Israel and the Zionists are continuing this criminal legacy. For the notion that Jews are somehow immune to criticism or that there was a conspiracy against the play by a wealthy, powerful Jewish clique behind the scenes is the very stuff of which antisemitism is made. Rodinson is another matter. He agrees with most of Allen’s points against Zionism, having for many years written along similar lines with far greater authority and talent. He rejects in some detail the equation of anti-Zionism and antisemitism. But he does point out that some of the statements in the play are schematic, that there were Jewish resistance groups, including Zionist ones, and that very few Zionists went as far as Abraham Stern in advocating a common struggle of Nazi Germans and Zionist Jews.
