Critical Theory Between Gaza and Auschwitz: Critique from the Frontiers of Empire

This research takes as its point of departure Jürgen Habermas's statement of support for Israel during the war on Gaza, arguing that his position is not a mere aberration but rather exposes a structural deficit in Critical Theory's framing of modernity and memory. To deconstruct this, the study introduces the concept of critique from the frontiers of empire as a hermeneutic approach contributing to the Arab reception of Critical Theory. It employs this concept to interrogate the theory from standpoints such as Gaza and Namibia, revealing the limits of its universalism and its excluded imperial-colonial history. Furthermore, the paper demonstrates the impact of erasing colonial violence from Adorno and Horkheimer's understanding of the Holocaust, showing how Auschwitz was transformed into an exclusive moral centre. Consequently, Habermas's communicative universalism is ultimately reduced to an exclusionary ethnic solidarity. The study concludes with a call to overcome epistemic dependency by establishing an Arab mode of critical reception open to contemporary epistemologies of the South.