The Assault(p.38): The Irony of Justified hate

Mulisch explores a concept of justified hatred and demonstrates the irony of such a statement with the juxtaposition of light with love and dark with hate as well as the inverse effect of blurring of the traditional negative connotations of hatred and positive ones of love.  The woman wants to “compare love to the kind of light that you sometimes see clinging to trees right after a sunset”.  Thus she implies a majestic or “magical’ quality to this light, this love of which she speaks.

Yet, in a contradictory statement, she advocates the necessity to “hate the fascists” which she justifies on the basis that “we hate them in the name of light” and that “our hate is better than theirs.”  This statement  exposes a contradiction within her overall message. She advocates love like a light which is “magical” in its brilliance yet asserts that it must be fought for with hate, the very darkness against which this light rebels. 

The irony of this notion of justified hate is derived from the fact that her message of fighting for a higher cause that condones any acts of hatred or spreading of darkness sounds  very similar to the Nazis’ justification of their own acts of hatred against others in their pursuit of a supposed higher cause.  Thus Mulisch illustrates, through the woman’s rather obviously misguided reasoning, that there can be no justified hate for those claiming to strive towards a higher cause of light and love.  For to achieve such accomplishments, the means by with they come to pass must represent that which they stand for. When something great is achieved by means that must be forgotten in order to keep from marring the image of such an achievement, its supporters become confused by these contradictions within that which they have served loyally and thus experience a loss of identity as the woman in The Assault did.  Therefore Mulisch unifies humanity on both sides of the war by drawing parallels between all people in that they justify their hatred and wrongs with a higher cause that will supposedly wash away their sins against fellow man, just as the woman explains away the rebels actions to murder Ploeg and the ramifications it had of indirectly killing Anton's parents all because it was an act against the darkness of the Nazi regime, "for light".