iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

In der Galerie Camera Work, Kantstraße 149, Berlin. #September11 #NeverForget

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Almost one week at the @dubnow.bsky.social behind me and glad to be spending two months here as a visiting fellow. I particularly value its interdisciplinary approach and its understanding of Jewish history as a seismograph of broader historical developments.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

In the shadow of the recent military confrontation between the United States and Iran, these are some of the people sentenced to death in Iran. They are very young, and this gives a sense of who took part in the January protests.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

According to The Economist, Anthropic's Claude draws on Kant and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as part of its constitutional framework. I wonder how AI would change if it also incorporated Adorno's Negative Dialektik and Probleme der Moralphilosophie. Article: archive.md/zTzSJ

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

My dissertation, The Nonidentical of Human Rights: The Individual and the Concept of Dignity after 1945, has been shortlisted for the Körber Foundation Dissertation Prize. I am very grateful to the jury for this recognition. Further information: t.ly/HrR1E #DeutscherStudienpreis #HumanRights

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

This is a really lovely insight into the indeed very famous Tel Aviv Central Bus Station. No hip party scene, but people from the neighborhood and volunteers who did an amazing job cleaning up the space. Video by unpacked.media

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

Photo by Avishag Shaar-Yashuv, taken in Tel Aviv on Monday morning.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

While we were sitting in the shelter in #Jerusalem last night, I was reading news from #Tehran. I don’t have an answer. But it is difficult to speak about this war without also thinking of the mostly very young Iranians whose lives are at stake.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

Something nice for a change today: alongside this image, Paul Celan's voice in Jerusalem, 1969: www.dichterlesen.net/veranstaltun...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

In 2012, Jürgen Habermas delivered the first Martin Buber Memorial Lecture at the Israeli Academy of Sciences and Humanities: "A Philosophy of Dialogue." He died today at 96, one of the last representatives of a generation that sought to rethink Germany's intellectual life after 1945. t.ly/uwQBT

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

Broad Jumper is still one of my favorite pictures for March 8. #InternationalWomensDay

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 01/03/2026

The sky over Jerusalem is beautifully blue this morning after a short night. News keeps arriving without pause: images of a destroyed building in Tel Aviv, an endless stream of commentary about what may come next. I do not know. And I cannot bring myself to say that this will inevitably end (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

Germany has never lacked narratives about itself. One of the newest – shared by the domestic far right and by transnational activist milieus – is that Germany has become a country of censorship. Yet many of the same actors still seek institutional support. Everyone wants to be an underdog. (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 17/02/2026

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about this event on HaGalil (www.hagalil.com/2025/12/mich...). The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities has published a short reel today showing the beginning of Michael Walzer's talk. A full recording is available here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=urSB...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

The mobilization by the European Iranian diaspora in #Munich was genuinely impressive. It should not be interpreted as the glorification of one individual, nor as an attempt to restore a Shah-style monarchy, but rather as an effort to build effective forces both inside and outside #Iran. (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 10/02/2026

I've never thought about it this way, but even the cultural boycott seems to have had an unintended positive effect: as a recent Haaretz article noted, it pushed the Israel Museum to open up its storerooms. The result looks pretty amazing. www.imj.org.il/en/exhibitio...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

What kind of deal can follow after a regime has killed up to 30,000 of its own civilians within just two days and continues to hold more than 40,000 people in prison, many of them facing execution? 😔 #Iran

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 31/01/2026

An Arte report traces Iran’s renewed uprising since late 2025. Protesters speak of fear, repression of unprecedented brutality, and the hope that drove them into the streets. It ends with their gaze toward the sky—waiting for international support. www.arte.tv/de/videos/12...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

I'm grateful to be included in this German-language edited volume, "Contested History: Interventions against the Reinterpretation of October 7," edited by Klaus Bittermann and Christoph Hesse, published by Edition Tiamat. My contribution is titled "In the Name of Morality. Academic Boycott Calls."

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

Grateful to contribute a short guest piece to the Wiener Library for the Study of the Nazi Era and the Holocaust (TAU) on Franz R. Bienenfeld's "The Religion of the Non-Religious Jews": from humanistic conviction to law, institutions, and Zionism after the Shoah. en-cenlib.tau.ac.il/wiener/archi...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

At the Hebrew U, as elsewhere across the country, banners calling to bring the hostages home were taken down after the remains of the last hostage, Ran Gvili, were brought back to Israel. More than two years had passed. The cats are still there, walking through the hallways alongside the students.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

Ulrich Gutmair berichtet in der heutigen taz über die Veranstaltung "Erinnern als Staatsräson?" am 20. Januar an der Gedenkstätte @wannseekonferenz.bsky.social, bei der neben Jacob Eder, Ronen Steinke, Mascha Wilke und Christian Heldt auch ich gesprochen habe. taz.de/Achtung-Staa...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 16/01/2026

This coming Tuesday, an event marking the 84th anniversary of the Wannsee Conference will take place at the @wannseekonferenz.bsky.social. Simultaneous German–English translation will be provided. It would be lovely to see some of you there. #HausderWannseeKonferenz #Erinnerungskultur #Staatsräson

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

Seeing the shocking death toll in Iran, I understand why people in the diaspora call on Trump to intervene—despite the fears this entails. It echoes recent months in Israel: calling on a president who undermines democracy in his own country for help. The world is what it is.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 29/12/2025

Hillel Cohen's Army of Shadows will appear in German translation in spring 2026. It is a thought-provoking book. For readers seeking a concise entry into Cohen's argument, an interview with him from November 2024 is particularly illuminating and timely: blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-fantasy-...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 15/12/2025

A small and quiet Chag Sameach while waiting for the rain to stop.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 10/12/2025

I read a nice interview with Volker Weidermann about his new book on Mascha Kaléko's difficult return to Germany in the 1950s. It led me back to her poems, and it brought to mind this one, which feels perfectly attuned to this moment in my day. www.juedische-allgemeine.de/kultur/masch...

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 15/11/2025

Sometimes all it takes is one person who refuses to join a boycott. Yesterday, the American Archive of Public Broadcasting posted part of a November 14, 1997 interview with Ruby Bridges, in which she recalled how white parents boycotted the school when she became the first Black child (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

This is good news: The Max Planck Center for Democracy, Security and Human Rights is being established at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem — joining the network of only 19 such Centers worldwide. @maxplanck.de

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 18/10/2025

While Trump this week portrayed Hamas at one moment as some kind of security force—and the usual groups were quick to highlight Israel's alleged breaches of agreements without mentioning Hamas's failure to honor its own—I came across grassroots street installations in Jerusalem this morning (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 11/10/2025

And as I am reading this and that article during my last weekend in the U.S., I am especially drawn to the hopeful news from the region to which I will soon return — news of a peace deal and, at long last, the release of hostages. I could not have wished for a better note on which to leave. (3/3)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 11/10/2025

Over the last two years, while listening to comments — mainly from people in the academia and art world, and most recently at some GSA panels in Arlington — I began to wonder whether a new spectre is haunting Europe, this time bearing the name "antideutsch." (1/3)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 08/10/2025

Leaving this cute city of Madison. Big thanks again to Chad Goldberg for inviting me to the seminar “Politics, Culture, and Society”. I am also very grateful to the institutions that supported the event, and to everyone who attended and asked such thoughtful questions.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

As the saying goes, all good things come in threes—my third comment on the boycott topic today, this time from Germany. This appears to be another attempt to explain calls to boycott Israeli colleagues. Good luck in their efforts to foster constructive dialogue with supporters of the BDS movement.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

Just following up on my boycott comment from this morning — in this case, a boycott would have made total sense.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

When boycott calls have made sense.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

Sunflowers — a bit dry and tired — but still facing the Russian embassy in DC.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 01/10/2025

Many thanks to Jonathan Skolnik for inviting me to his undergraduate seminar "Representing the Holocaust" at @umasspress.bsky.social. My first time speaking to 70 students – on the Eichmann Trial, Arendt, and Sivan's tendentious documentary. Very grateful for the students' thoughtful questions.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Today marks my last day at the @robinsoninst.bsky.social, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. I am deeply grateful for almost three years in this academic home. A few more words in the screenshot.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

Merz weint, Schwerdtner lacht, Netanyahu befindet sich in Sparta, der Krieg geht weiter und der Alltag sowieso. Aber Mini-Bourekas sind mir heute in einer Bäckerei, eröffnet 1922, auf dem Heimweg aufgefallen – und in meinen Besitz übergegangen.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 25/08/2025

This is not too bad. It reminds me of Arendt quoting Kafka: "It is difficult to speak the truth, for though there is only one, it is alive and therefore has a living, ever-changing face."

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 03/08/2025

José Brunner: „Die Hamas könnte die Geiseln freilassen,(…).“

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 02/07/2025

Just writing on a paper about boycott calls after Oct7 – with every passing note like this, it feels increasingly in vain to me. Meanwhile, parts of Western academia believe they are being canceled. It's ridiculous. The decision of @isa-sociology.org is a disgrace. t.ly/r3VVE

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

This was last night at the Jaffa Port. The Star of David with the hostages symbol seems to be new - I hadn‘t seen it before. The muezzin‘s call in the background added the soundtrack to this unique corner of the city.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 26/06/2025

After two days of ceasefire, around 2,000 protesters gathered at Rabin Square in Tel Aviv, calling for the release of the hostages, an end to the war in Gaza and the dissolution of Netanyahu's government. A song by Ehud Banai – a renowned Israeli singer-songwriter from a Persian-Jewish family (1/2)

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

Yes, the rockets were heavy this morning in Tel Aviv, but hopefully this war will come to an end very soon now. There is this option, and I will stick to it for now. Not only Tel Aviv – the whole region could be so beautiful. Some have strong nerves: stop and go – buses are already back in service.

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Anne Rethmann @arethmann.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

"I'll be happy to answer any questions you have." Wednesday, June 18, 2025 1 p.m. ET @ushmm.bsky.social www.ushmm.org/online-calen...

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