Israel

Reflecting the intense struggle of generations not only for survival but also for the establishment of a new social order, Israeli psychoanalysis is intertwined with modern Israeli history, the reestablishment of a nation. After the publication of the 1917 Balfur Declaration, which provided the basis for establishing a Jewish state in Palestine, the British Zionist Commission was appointed. Among its members was David Eder, the first secretary of the British Psychoanalytical Society, founded in 1913. He stayed in Palestine from 1918 to 1922, during which time he urged cooperation between Jews and Arabs and proposed extending medical and social services to all segments of the population. Together with A. Feigenbaum, who immigrated to Palestine from Vienna in 1920, he worked with teachers and educators, applying psychoanalytic theories.

After both had left Palestine, there was little or no active psychoanalytical work in Palestine until the arrival of Max Eitingon (1881-1943) in Jerusalem in 1933, following Hitler's rise to power. He proceeded to found the Palestine Psychoanalytic Society (later the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society) with the help of other refugees who, like himself, came to Palestine via Berlin (Moshe Wulff, Ilja Schalit, Anna Smelianski, Gershon and Gerda Barag, Vicky Ben-Tal, Ruth Jaffe, and others).

Eitingon hoped to set up the first chair of psychoanalysis at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where Freud had been a member of the first board of governors. But the university authorities considered the inclusion of psychoanalysis in the university setting to be premature, as a chair of psychology had yet to be established. On December 5, 1933, Freud wrote to Judah Magnes, the rector of the university, "The plan to establish a chair for psychology indicates a barely disguised rejection of psychoanalysis and the University of Jerusalem would thus have followed the example of other official teaching institutions. It is then comforting to bear in mind that Dr. Eitingon is determined to pursue the practice of psychoanalysis in Palestine also independently of the University." Nonetheless, the attempt to introduce psychoanalysis into the university was a historic first.

Eitingon then decided to create an independent psychoanalytic institute modeled after the Berlin institute. In 1934 he founded a polyclinic and the Palestine Institute of Psychoanalysis, which became the eleventh member institute of the International Psychoanalytical Association. As in Berlin, the purpose was to offer treatment, training and supervision, and a forum for discussing psychoanalytic theory. The Israeli clinic still functions according to this model to the present (2004).

Eitingon served as president of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society (Hachevra Hapsychoanalytit be Israel) during its first ten years. The formative years of the society and the institute were characterized by idealism, devotion, and hard work, often overshadowed by political and economic difficulties. Eitingon's spirit continued to prevail after him, and within a few years there were twenty analysts practicing in Palestine. Three groups were formed in the three major cities, and all three participated in the institute. Eitingon's concern and compassion for those who needed psychoanalytic treatment was maintained and handed down from one generation of analysts to the next (the first pioneer group even raised a small fund called the "Institute's Loan Fund" to offer needy patients a daily meal, as an empty stomach is not conducive to analysis). It should be noted that in the first ten years the language used at meetings was German, and for a while later as well, some analyses were carried out in a language in which either the analyst, the patient, or both were not fluent, and they sometimes even used different languages. Eitingon left a legacy of interdisciplinary and multicultural relations and interests that made the institute a vibrant intellectual and cultural center.

The second president of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society was Moshe Wulff (1943-1953). Wulff was born in 1878 in Odessa, Russia, and later settled in Tel Aviv. He made many important contributions to psychoanalysis, one of them being "Fetishism and Object Choice in Early Childhood" (1946). On the basis of his findings, Wulff formulated a theory about the transition from infantile narcissism to the first genuine libidinal cathexis of an outside object. He also promoted the acceptance of analysis in Israel, especially in educational circles. After Wulff, the presidency of the society rotated for almost twenty years between Heinz Winnik, founder of the Israel Annals of Psychiatry and Related Sciences and a pioneer of psychiatric education in Israel, and Erich Gumbel, the first graduate of the institute.

In the 1950s Israeli analysts became increasingly involved in education and training. Heinz Winnik and Ruth Jaffe were the first psychoanalysts to head psychiatric hospitals. Erich Gumbel led an effort that began a three-year program in psychotherapy for non-analysts, and it still continues in 2004. Analysts began teaching at the School of Medicine in Jerusalem.

In the 1960s New Yorker Mortimer Ostow set up a group in the United States of corresponding members of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society. These American analysts maintained a special relationship with the Israeli society through visits, symposiums, and financial assistance.

Almost as a rule, members of the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society have been continuously involved in social issues. A topic of special interest to analysts is the special conditions under which children were raised in kibbutzim. Shmuel Golan, a leading theoretician and practitioner in the kibbutzim, based his educational and developmental theories on psychoanalysis (1959). Shmuel Nagler, another psychoanalyst involved in work with kibbutzim, wrote of his clinical observations of kibbutz children (1963).

In the Six-Day War (1967), Yom-Kippur War (1973), Lebanon War (1982), and Gulf War (1991), psychoanalysts assumed a significant role in treating and researching combat-stress reactions and the consequences of social violence (Raphael Moses, Gad Tadmor). Other societal issues of great interest to Israeli analysts were the Israeli-Arab conflict, immigration, and survivors of the Holocaust and their children (Hillel Klein, Shamai Davidson, Raphael Moses, Dan Hertz, Ilani Kogan, Shalom Robinson, Martin Wangh, and Yolanda Gampel). The Israeli Psychoanalytic Society and the Freud Center cosponsored conferences and dialogues between Israeli and German analysts. Prominent in this dialogue was Hillel Klein, a survivor of Auschwitz. This dialogue has evolved into a working conference held under the title "Germans and Israelis: The Past and the Present."

In 1977 the International Psychoanalytical Association held its thirtieth congress in Jerusalem. This was the first IPA congress held outside Europe. At this time, after efforts by numerous analysts throughout the world, among them Martin Wangh, Hebrew University established a chair of psychoanalysis, thus realizing Freud's dream. Joseph Sandler was the first person to hold this chair. He stayed in Jerusalem with Anne-Marie Sandler, his wife, and contributed greatly to the further development of psychoanalysis in Israel. After Sandler, a number of distinguished psychoanalysts were appointed to this chair, including Albert Solnit, who developed psychoanalytical thought in the Ben Gurion University Medical School. In the 1990s the chair was held by Shmuel Erlich, a senior psychoanalyst and academician.

Over the past twenty years, among those who made major theoretical and clinical contributions to psychoanalysis through the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society were Pinchas Noy (who contributed to psychoanalysis in the fields of art and creativity), Rivka Eiferman, Rina Moses-Hrushevski, Emanuel Berman, Ruth Stein, and Shmuel Erlich. Those who contributed to the development of child analysis in Israel include Naomi Weiss, Eliezer Ilan (who was the director of the child guidance clinic in Jerusalem), Yecheskiel Cohen (who directed a residential treatment center where boys receive psychoanalytic treatment and education), Raanan Kulka, and Yolanda Gampel.

A theme that Israeli psychoanalysts are very involved with is the consequences of social violence. Psychoanalysis at the political border (Rangell and Moses-Hrushovski, 1996), presents, among other topics, the contributions of Israeli psychoanalysts to compelling issues confronting groups and nations.

In 2004 the Israeli Psychoanalytic Society has more than 100 members, and the Israeli Psychoanalytic Institute, as it is now called, has more than 70 candidates. The number of applicants has been five times higher than can be accepted. Throughout the years, analysts who completed their training in different institutes have immigrated from Argentina, France, Holland, and the United States, bringing different outlooks and perspectives from a variety of paradigms in psychoanalysis. If influence initially emanated from European, especially classical Freudian Berliner and Viennese, psychoanalysts, current major influences are Melanie Klein's model and Heinz Kohut's ideas. During the mid-1990s Donald Winnicott's and Wilfred Bion's concepts have achieved prominence in teaching and discussion in the society. The society and institute are growing and developing creatively; its members hold leading positions in psychiatry, psychology, and particularly academia.

YOLANDA GAMPEL