From Cravat to Khaki. Gender, Sexuality, and Change in the Immigration of Fritz Wolf to Mandate Palestine

This article offers an in-depth analysis of the relation between gender and change in the migration experience from National Socialist Germany to Mandate Palestine in the 1930s. Choosing a micro-perspective, this article draws on various unpublished writings of Dr. Jur. Fritz Wolf (1908–2006). Concentrating on Wolf’s first encounter with Palestine, this article considers the different stages of migration—journey, arrival and first year in a new homeland—to shed light on the crucial importance of gender in his observations, interactions, and self-perception in this process. While Fritz Wolf is at the center of this case study, gender will be used in this article as a relational category, relating his story to the experiences of German-Jewish immigrants in general, both male and female. Therefore, this article provides a discussion of changing gender-relations, different masculinities and femininities, and altered concepts of marriage and sexuality within the German-Jewish immigrant community in Mandate Palestine in general.

• The articlehas been accepted for publication and will appear in the Leo Baeck Institute Year Book in 2021.