on war and its dehumanization bernard-henri lévy

ON WAR AND ITS DEHUMANIZATION BERNARD-HENRI LÉVY interview by olivier zahm and aleph molinari portraits by giasco bertoli TRANSLATION BY STEVEN B. KENNEDY   OLIVIER ZAHM — Philosophers are not known for putting themselves in contact with war. It is quite rare. With the exception of war reporters, people run away from war. And you run toward it. Why, as a philosopher, do you have this inclination to go into the field and become engaged in conflicts? Because it is indeed for engagement; it is not simply journalism. BERNARD HENRI LÉVY — First, why do I go into the field? By temperament, no doubt. But also because I was trained in a school of philosophical thought — phenomenology, Husserl, etc. — that has as one of its commandments the need to return to the essence, the thing. This philosophical practice par excellence was the encounter between the concept and the…