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Glossary entry

French term or phrase:

alliés d'appartenance israélite

English translation:

Our allies of the Jewish faith

Added to glossary by Yolanda Broad
Aug 27, 2021 07:07
2 yrs ago
39 viewers *
French term

alliés d'appartenance israélite

French to English Social Sciences History Online site sales
The whole sentence is: (Avant de connaître les Polonaises, j'avais cru que Auschwitz, ou Oswiecim, n'était qu'un camp d'extermination pour nos alliés d'appartenance israélite.

I do not fully grasp the tone (friendly, hostile, sarcasm) of this expression and thus cannot translate it. I would appreciate any ideas.
Proposed translations (English)
4 -1 Our allies of the Jewish faith
4 +3 Our allies of the Jewish faith
4 Jewish people
4 Jewish people
2 +1 allies of Hebrew pedigree
3 -2 semite friends
Change log

Aug 29, 2021 22:24: Yolanda Broad changed "Edited KOG entry" from "<a href="/profile/89747">Stephen Rifkind's</a> old entry - "alliés d\'appartenance israélite"" to ""Our allies of the Jewish faith""

Discussion

Lisa Rosengard Aug 30, 2021:
The question wrote:
'Before meeting Polish people, one believed that Austwich or Oswiecim was nothing but a death camp for those allies of Israeli belonging.' I expect allies are acquaintances who are not exactly friends, though they could be associates. There's been a reference about Nazi occupation and Jewish heritage in eastern Europe, with all the horrors it entailed. Does it signify from the past or forewarn an obliteration? Is Israeli or Israelite the same as Jewish? Strictly speaking we should avoid the question on religion and religious debates and think about what it means to us now?
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 28, 2021:
contd. https://www.theholocaustexplained.org/life-in-nazi-occupied-...
The Nazis defined anyone with Jewish ancestors as Jews, even if someone who only had one grandparent who had converted from Judaism to Christianity as a child. This made lots of people who had previously not thought of themselves as Jewish, or those who no longer practiced Judaism, potential targets of persecution.

The second [...] the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honour. This law banned marriages and sexual intercourse between Jews and ‘Aryans’, and forbid the employment of ‘Aryan’ women under the age of 45 in Jewish households.

These two laws aimed to racially cleanse and protect German people of true ‘Aryan’ descent. For Jews and people of Jewish descent, they were terrifying. The laws marked a new period of persecution in Nazi Germany.
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 28, 2021:
@ Asker "allies" has a particular meaning in WW2 and the context of wars so is wrong here. It's more a feeling of fellowship implied here. Also "of Jewish faith", while I offered it as an alternative in my own answer, implies everyone sent to extermination camps were practising devout Jews. This is not true. The Nazis rounded up anyone they suspected of having Jewish blood, sometimes just on the basis of names or appearance. See added note and link.
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
Further clarification As theh comments don't seemn to appearing here, I would like to express my conclusion. I am seriously considering "allies of the Jewish faith" in this case because it is neutral and fits the connotation. If anybody strongly believes that this is incorrect, please let me know why.
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
Further clarification As theh comments don't seemn to appearing here, I would like to express my conclusion. I am seriously considering "allies of the Jewish faith" in this case because it is neutral and fits the connotation. If anybody strongly believes that this is incorrect, please let me know why.
Libby Cohen Aug 27, 2021:
Stephen or Phil's suggestions Agree with you, Stephen: need the term "allies" in the translation. On that note - Shanah Tovah u'metukah!
Libby Cohen Aug 27, 2021:
Use Phil's suggestion - Jewish allies Hi Stephen and company. My mom was in a similar camp as a child, ended up after in Israel and finally Canada. Given what she has told me - that the horrors were (frustratingly) not a topic readily discussed much post-War, whether in polite society, social circles, or even among close relatives (people just wanted to "move on and not dwell") through the 1950s and 1960s, it's not wonder that there are some oddities in vocabulary used by those not familiar with what really went on there, or with the nomenclature (Israelite vs. Israeli vs. Jew or someone of th Jewish faith). Given the context of the sentence in which this is spoken (the author admitting his original ignorance about one of the main targeted groups for that camp), and the meaning of the word "alliés," I think Phil's suggestion here in the discussion is right on: "Jewish allies."
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
Further clarification As theh comments don't seemn to appearing here, I would like to express my conclusion. I am seriously considering "allies of the Jewish faith" in this case because it is neutral and fits the connotation. If anybody strongly believes that this is incorrect, please let me know why.
Mollie Milesi Aug 27, 2021:
@ Yvonne I think you have misread my answer. I suggested using "our allies of the Jewish faith" in English and was simply explaining the origin and meaning of the term 'israélite'.
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 27, 2021:
@ Mollie, I think you are completely wrong suggesting "Israelites" be used in English
Apart from its use for biblical times all I think off is the reggae song from the 60s neither of which fits the context!
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 27, 2021:
@ Tony 2 answers and comments back again. Really don't understand what happened!
Tony M Aug 27, 2021:
@ Yvonne ProZ is hosted on multiple servers; I suspect perhaps sometimes they get out of sync with each other?
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 27, 2021:
@ Tony First thing I did! Several times. I am not seeing your comments here at all?? Just as email notifications?
Tony M Aug 27, 2021:
@ Yvonne Maybe try just refreshing your page?
Yvonne Gallagher Aug 27, 2021:
@ Tony really don't know what's going on. Got your new message, but it's not showing on my second answer , the only one I can see. The first one disappeared! And I wasn't given any warning about putting in a duplicate answer either so really strange!
Mollie Milesi Aug 27, 2021:
@Stephen Stephen, I'm glad my memories from the early '70s have helped. I don't think the expression "d'appartenance israelite" is still in use as often today, but I did hear it fairly often 50 years ago. Kol tuv!
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
Thank you, mollie, that clears up matters. It is hard for a non-resident to be sure of connotations.
Mollie Milesi Aug 27, 2021:
@Stephen While I may not be able to document my opinion as strongly as I would like to, I don't think the author is being sarcastic or hostile.

The term 'israélite' was used in France as a legal/legislative synonym for 'Juif' or 'juif' from the Revolution through most of the 19th century. [example: Achille-Edmond Halphen, Recueil des lois : décrets, ordonnances, avis du conseil d'État, arrêtés et règlements concernant les Israélites depuis la révolution de 1789, Paris, Bureaux des Archives israélites, 1851, 511 pages ] and I seem to remember in France in the early 1970s hearing the expression 'il est d'appartenance juive' or 'elle est d'appartenance israélite' as a neutral way of saying that a French citizen was Jewish in the religious sense, as opposed to being Catholic, for example, but was a French citizen nonetheless. "C'est un Juif" is, to my mind, more "othering" rather than inclusive.

I think of organizations such as "L’alliance israélite universelle", which was well-known for its educational work in France and the Mediterranean from 1860 on, and used 'israelite' as a translation for '"Kol yisroel".

I would try to translate this expression as "our allies of the Jewish faith"
Helen Shiner Aug 27, 2021:
@Stephen I guess you will be able to see from the text whether he favours working for other groups, such as the Roma and Sinti or left-wing French opponents of Nazi-occupied / Vichy France or not. Still so hard to tell from one sentence.
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
The author is Catholic, to be precise. HIs work was for deportees in general, not Jews specifcially.
Helen Shiner Aug 27, 2021:
@Stephen Since the author was active in matters of compensation for deported Jews and presumably for the families and heirs of Jews murdered in the Holocaust, the convoluted way in which he has chosen to refer to Jews at the end of the sentence is probably not sardonic or sarcastic. I imagine he means that until meeting Poles and finding out that many of them were also maltreated and killed regardless of whether they themselves were Jews, he had a limited understanding of what happened at Auschwitz. Auschwitz is Auschwitz and there is more recently a tendency in some quarters to occlude what it was by using the name of the town, Oswiecim, instead, which is and was a separate entity to the Nazi camp. But I doubt this is his intent in the early 1960s. I can see how with contemporary ears this sentence reads oddly. We would need to see far more of the text to really get a sense of overall tone.
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
The writer is an activists in a group that was active in attaining compensation from the Germans for French deportees.
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
That is quite possible but I wanted to make sure that I was not missing anything as I was not familiar with this phrasing.
philgoddard Aug 27, 2021:
But why do you think it might be hostile or sarcastic? Doesn't it just mean Jewish allies?
Stephen Rifkind (asker) Aug 27, 2021:
It is a journalistic article from the early 1960's about the process involved in getting compensation to the vicitms of the Nazi medical experiments, in particular the Poles. It is not from a Jewish perspective.
Tony M Aug 27, 2021:
@ Asker It would be easier for us to help you if you told us more about your overall document and its tone!

Proposed translations

-1
22 hrs
Selected

Our allies of the Jewish faith

I don't know why my entire answer, with the agreements expressed by other members, has disappeared. The gist of my argument is in the discussion section.
Note from asker:
"Allies" was preferred because the two groups shared the same goal, i.e, to get the Germans to pay reparations, but were not necessary friends.
Peer comment(s):
neutral writeaway : it's still there
3 hrs
disagree Yvonne Gallagher : "allies" has a particular connotation in the 1940s abnd in war context. Also I offered "of Jewish faith" but not all those rounded up by Nazis were practising Jews and some just of very minimal Jewish origin
8 hrs
neutral Tony M : It is pretty much irrelevant that the term was used in France even up till quite recently: the key point is that has NOT been used thus in contemporary EN, which is the target language here. Also, I don't believe it was ONLY people of actual Jewish faith.
9 hrs
Something went wrong...
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Thank you."
-2
4 hrs

semite friends

Hello

This is the word I would have expected in French and is probably the most likely to be used in English in such a context.

Like the asker, I can't work out why " israélite" was used instead of "sémite"


As for "alliés", I think "friends" fits best here (who goes there, friend or foe). I don't think we thought of Israelis much at that time as Israel had not yet been created and so they were not in the allied forces

But writers are just like translators and may use a wrong word or make bad choices at times so that is a possibility too.

PS Please don't read into this post any view positive or negative that I may have about Israel and Semites. I'm trying to give a translator's view, not a political one. Thanks in advance for this
Note from asker:
See Mollie's comment about "Israelite". I believe it applies here.
Peer comment(s):
neutral Tony M : I think the writer is expressing themselves in the '60s, so Israel as a country was well-established by then. 'Semite' is inappropriate, since the semitic ethnic group also includes non-Jewish nationalities.
4 mins
Thanks I wonder if "semite" is going through a semantic change to mean only "Jewish" as if you are "anti-semite", that means against Jews or israel or zionism or whatever, but the term today does not mean anti-arab/Islam as well.
disagree Mollie Milesi : Please, please see my comments as to how the term 'israelite' was used in France and French legislation from the Revolution up until at least the 1960s. You are all going down an erroneous path, as this has nothing to do with semites or anti-semites.
5 hrs
Hello Mollie. I've read it but it is so hard. The situation is in the 1940s, the book written in the 1960s and the translation is in 2021. What to do???
disagree Helen Shiner : No, this has to do with faith, and the correct term would, therefore, be Jewish.
6 hrs
Something went wrong...
7 hrs

Jewish people

or our Jewish friends/allies but I think "people" fits better here

You could also stick more closely to the French by saying "people of Jewish appearance"

I definitely would not use "Israelite" as it refers to the ancient tribe descended from Jacob
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/israeli...
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Israelite

Yes, many other people were exterminated at Auschwitz but it is associated mostly with the extermination of Jews

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auschwitz_concentration_camp



I don't believe Israelite would be appropriate here as it has a specific meaning.
Peer comment(s):
neutral Tony M : Yes, Yvonne; but I have to take issue with your I'm sure mistaken use of 'appearance', which apart from being dodgy in terms if history, also isn't a good translation of 'appartenance'
23 mins
yes, OK I know it means "belonging to" (appartenant) but basically the Nazis were picking up everyone who looked in any way Jewish (or Roma). But it isn't my preferred translation anyway which is in the HEADER
Something went wrong...
8 hrs

Jewish people

my earlier answer seems to have disappeared?

"appartenance"

youcould also say
"those of the Jewish faith" since Tony admonished me for saying of Jewish appearance

which means I have to go look for my refs again...

Israelite just won't work imo
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Israelite
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/israeli...


--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 8 hrs (2021-08-27 15:59:26 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

the extermination camps were used for others too but everyone associates Auschwitz in particular with Jewish people as the Nazis were particularly adept at rounding them up from all over Europe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auschwitz_concentration_camp

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 8 hrs (2021-08-27 16:04:51 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

I visited Auschwitz some years ago, and while the Roma, communists, resistance and a heroic priest are mentioned briefly, the main emphasis is on the Jews who perished there. I have never seen the word "Israelites" used in English in this connection

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 9 hrs (2021-08-27 16:32:29 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

I also think using "allies" or "friends" here doesn't really work.

Also, it doesn't really matter whether these people were practising their religion or not but were merely of Jewish origin.
Peer comment(s):
agree Tony M : I agree, Israelites has too much of a biblical / antiquity connection. My concern is only: do we know they were actually practising Jews? I understood many were exterminated just for having Jewish origins? Answer's still there OK!
14 mins
Thanks Tony. Yay! Finally seeing your comment here!
disagree Mollie Milesi : Please, please see my comments as to how the term 'israelite' was used in France and French legislation from the Revolution up until at least the 1960s. You are all going down an erroneous path, as this has nothing to do with semites or anti-semites, at a
1 hr
I saw your comments already. You are back in biblical times. I am not going to argue with you about France and French but the word does NOT WORK in English so a bit much that you are disagreeing as you're wrong
neutral Helen Shiner : I think this is too simplistic a translation which doesn’t reflect the French sentence. The author could, too, simply have said, in French, Jewish people, but he didn’t.
2 hrs
I disagree as it reflects the reality in ENGLISH. I offered "of Jewish faith or origin" as alternatives though no one seems to have noticed.
Something went wrong...
+3
10 hrs

Our allies of the Jewish faith

Given the discussion around this question and the erroneous paths we seem to be getting lost in, I think I should formalize and expand my previous discussion answer.

The term 'd'appartenance israélite' in the context of French society from the French Revolution and the emancipation of the Jewish population of France (granting of full citizenship, community institutions, etc.) in a secular French society is NOT negative. Au contraire! It simply means 'someone of the Jewish faith' as opposed to someone of the Catholic faith or the Protestant faith. OK, you will say, so why 'israélite' and not 'juive'? Well, 'd'appartenance juive' also exists, as 'israélite' has become a bit vetuste.

France is a secular country, nominally at least, and this was especially evident in the first half of the 20th century. The connotations are of citizens, French citizens, who happen to be Jewish in terms of their religious affiliation. It is not racial or ethnic. This stems from the emancipation movement, the Loi Crémieux, etc.

Notice the wording of the title of this book from the 1850s: Achille-Edmond Halphen, Recueil des lois : décrets, ordonnances, avis du conseil d'État, arrêtés et règlements concernant les Israélites depuis la révolution de 1789, Paris, Bureaux des Archives israélites, 1851, 511 pages, [archive]. Halphen was a significant French historian 'd'appartenance israélite' of the 19th century.

The well-known educational organization, L'Alliance universelle israélite, was founded in the 1860s, worked in France and in communities of the Mediterranean basin and the Middle East, spreading vocational education in French, including here in Israel, where it founded the first agricultural school.

It called itself "israélite" not only because this was the accepted term among emancipated Jews in France, but also as a translation of the biblical Hebrew expression "Kol Yisroel..." -- all Israel -- . The term "israélite" was a self-designation.

To the phrase in question, written in the 1960s. I know from personal experience that the expression was still used in the 1970s, because I described myself that way when asking to be absent from school for the High Holy Days. 'D'appartenance israélite' or 'd'appartenance juive' were interchangeable at that time and were polite ways of saying that you were a French citizen who happened to practice Judaism.

In conclusion, I would suggest "our allies of the Jewish faith".
Peer comment(s):
agree Helen Shiner
11 mins
agree writeaway
5 hrs
agree ph-b (X)
11 hrs
neutral Tony M : It is pretty much irrelevant that the term was used in France even up till quite recently: the key point is that has NOT been used thus in contemporary EN, which is the target language here. Also, I don't believe it was ONLY people of actual Jewish faith.
20 hrs
disagree Yvonne Gallagher : "allies" has a particular connotation in the 1940s and in war context. Also I offered "of Jewish faith" but not all those rounded up by Nazis were practising Jews and some just of very minimal Jewish origin
2 days 6 hrs
agree Libby Cohen
3 days 5 mins
Something went wrong...
+1
1 day 4 hrs

allies of Hebrew pedigree

- not necessarily practising or professing to the Jewish faith, but categorised as 'Non-Aryan' by the Nazis.

Semitic, as Tony M. rightly intimates, is also a linguistic label for a language group, including Arabic, Amharic of Ethiopia and the Aramaic language vs. Hebrew dialect of Jesus of Nazareth.
Example sentence:

Hitler Made Me a Jew | Gould, Nadia |

Reference:

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11977-pedigree

Peer comment(s):
agree Tony M
3 hrs
Thanks, Tony 'allies' with a small 'a' as opposed to the Allies and query: rather than 'kith + kin'.
Something went wrong...
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