The word Muslim settled in Israeli culture and literature through Ka-Tzetnik’s Holocaust writing

Evidence

What does this mean? Along with the fact ofKa-Tzetnik’s popularity, it simply means that the Muslims are, again, everywhere in Ka- Tzetnik’s work, that is to say, everywhere in the Hebrew imagination of the Holocaust. By this I do not mean to claim that they are “present,” but rather that the word “Muslim,” however translated and transliterated, however readable and unreadable, is a word that has “settled” in Israeli culture and literature. I want to conclude with this settlement of the Muslims-and this only. I am quoting from Kar’u lo piepel (They Called Him Piepel), a novel translated as Piepel, but also as Moni: A Novel of Auschwitz, and even as Atrocity. The English editions include a “map” entitled “The Hierarchy at Auschwitz” that runs from the S.S. Camp Commandant, Rudolf Hess all the way down to “camplings” and to “Mussulmen.” This hierarchy is also a sexual one, as the text makes very clear. — Gil Anidjar, The Jew, the Arab, 725

Categorization

• XREF: Directly anchors the antisemitism-Islamophobia bridge: the camp slang ‘Muslim’ (Muselmann) transferred onto ‘the Arab’ as modern enemy. Connects to Levi’s ‘Muselmann’ and Agamben’s homo sacer readings.
• QUESTION: Track how the Nazi-camp ‘Muselmann’ appellation crossed over into Israeli writing about the Arab enemy — the precise etymology and transfer point is worth pinning down.