After Gaza, American Jews Are Increasingly Divided
Over Zionism and Israel
ALLAN C. BROWNFELD
Issues
WINTER 2024
Recent events in Gaza have revealed growing divisions within the American Jewish
community with regard to their relationship with Zionism and the state of Israel.
Many Jewish voices are speaking out on behalf of Palestinian victims of Israel’s
assault upon Gaza. In their view, while expressing shock over the brutal attack
by Hamas, the mass killing of civilians in Gaza violates humane Jewish moral and
ethical values.
Sara Roy, senior research scholar at the Center for Middle East Studies at
Harvard University, whose parents survived the Holocaust while 100 members of her
family were killed in Poland, wrote an open letter to President Biden (London
Review of Books, Nov. 2023)
She writes: “when does the death of a Palestinian child become unacceptable? Or
perhaps I should ask the question this way: when will you assign a Palestinian
life the same sanctity you assign an Israeli one? Yesterday, Israel bombarded
the Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza. Part of the camp was destroyed and at least
100 people were killed or injured. My friend the poet Mosab Abu Toha, his wife
and children moved to Jabaliya recently after Israel warned them to leave their
home in Beit Lahiya, a city north of the camp, because Beit Lehiya would be
shelled. It was and Mosab’s house was destroyed. I have just heard from him
after two days of frantic worry. ‘The bombing in Jabilya Camp was just 70 meters
away from us,’ he said. ‘A whole neighborhood was wiped out.’”
Largest Of Gaza’s Refugee Camps
Dr. Roy writes that, “Jabilya is a familiar place to me…It is the largest of
Gaza’s eight refugee camps, with 26 schools, two health centers and a public
library. More than 116,000 are in an area of 1.4 square kilometers. Do you have
any idea what it means to crowd over 100,000 into half a square mile? I must
also tell you that as a Jew and child of Holocaust survivors, I was welcomed into
every home I visited in the camp. In fact, I was embraced…I don’t know if my
friends are among those murdered or injured by Israel. But I do know that this
is not the first atrocity, and it won’t be the last if the barbarity continues to
be justified by you and the others with the power to stop it. You call for a
‘humanitarian pause,’ which I do not understand. What does a pause mean in the
middle of the carnage? Does it mean feeding people so they can survive to be
killed the next day? How is that humanitarian? How is that humane?”
Professor Emeritus Yakov M. Rabkin of the University of Montreal, author of the
book “What Is Modern Israel?” provides this assessment (Pressenza, Nov. 1, 8,
2023): “The new state of Israel placed Palestinian Arabs under military rule,
which lasted nearly two decades. Refugees and exiles who tried to return to
their homes were killed, expelled, or arrested…The murderous attack of Oct. 7,
2023, obviously enraged most Israelis. But instead of taking pause, military and
political leaders immediately subjected Gaza to massive bombardment followed by a
ground invasion. This caused a humanitarian crisis.”
In Rabkin’s view, “Vengeful demonization of the Palestinians has become common.
Even the soft-spoken president of Israel claimed that there were no ‘innocent
civilians’ in Gaza. Meirev Ben-Ari, a parliamentarian from Yesh Atid, which in
Israel passes for a liberal centrist party, said in reference to thousands of
Palestinian children killed by Israeli bombardment, ‘The children of Gaza have
brought this upon themselves! We are a peace-seeking nation, a life-loving
nation.’…Many Jews…have been trying to come to terms with the contradiction
between the Judaism they profess to adhere to and the Zionist ideology that has
taken hold of them. A new variety of Judaism has taken root in Israel: National
Judaism…Among its most fervent followers one finds the assassin of Prime Minister
Yitzhak Rabin, who had attempted to find an accommodation with the Palestinians,
and prominent members of today’s Israeli government.”
“Does Israel Really Keep Jews Safe?”
In an article, “Does Israel really ‘Keep Jews Safe?’,” (Truthout, Dec. 11, 2023),
Carolyn Karcher, professor emerita at Temple University, writes that, “In the
wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel, many supporters of Israel have doubled
down on the idea that Jews can only be safe in a state whose government they
control through majority rule and laws favoring Jews over non-Jews. This idea—-a
fundamental tenet of Zionism, first articulated by Theodor Herzl in ‘The Jewish
State’ (1896) —-is what led the U.N. to vote for creating the state of Israel in
1948, despite the united opposition of Palestinian and Arab spokespersons…How has
this belief held up in the light of the past 75 years? Have even the most
draconian methods succeeded in stamping out the resistance of the indigenous
Palestinian population to military rule and forced displacement?”
Dr. Karcher notes that, “I would argue that the killing of approximately 1200
Israelis by Hamas on Oct. 7 actually shows the opposite of what many are
claiming. Rather than proving that the state of Israel keeps Jews safe, the
bloodshed shows that Israeli Jews cannot expect to enjoy security by imposing a
brutal siege, erecting walls, multiplying checkpoints, demolishing homes,
confiscating land, dehumanizing, imprisoning, or killing any Palestinians who
stand up for their rights, whether nonviolently or violently.”
Beyond this, argues Karcher, “Zionism triumphed with the creation of Israel as a
Jewish state. Palestinians paid a high price for the solution that the Western
world chose to compensate Jews for the Nazi Holocaust. Between 1947 and 1949,
Zionist militias drove 750,000 Palestinians, amounting to half the country’s Arab
population, out of their native land and destroyed more than 500 of their towns
and villages. The Jewish Israeli historian Ilan Pappe has called this ‘the
ethnic cleansing of Palestine.’…Never has the need to envision alternatives
seemed more urgent than now, as we face the horror of the genocide that Israel is
perpetrating on Palestinians—-with the full support of the U.S. and much of the
Western world…Consequently, increasing numbers of Americans—-Jewish and non-
Jewish alike—-are repudiating the unconditional championship of Israel that our
government is mandating.”
Recalling the American Council for Judaism
Recalling an earlier period of Jewish opposition to Zionism prior to Israel’s
creation, Karcher points out that, “The American Council for Judaism, founded by
Reform Jews in 1942, campaigned vigorously both to liberalize U.S. immigration
policy and to establish a ‘democratic, autonomous government in Palestine,
wherein Jews, Moslems and Christians shall be justly represented and endowed with
equal rights and equal responsibilities.’”
Prof. Wendy Pearlman, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Studies
Program at Northwestern University, wrote an article, “Collective Punishment in
Gaza Will Not Bring Israel Security” (New Lines Magazine, Oct. 30, 2023). She
writes, “The current siege of Gaza has shifted…to uprooting it entirely. Indeed,
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s declaration that Israel is fighting ‘human
animals’ points to an even more startling biological metaphor. It not only casts
all of Gaza as a fair target, but also deploys dehumanizing rhetoric of the kind
that scholars have long recognized as genocidal.”
Dr. Pearlman concludes: “Bombardment, siege, forced displacement and the denial
of humanitarian access might satisfy the desire for revenge, but these actions
cannot bring Israelis security. As long as self-determination is denied,
Palestinian resistance will continue. There is no military solution to the…
political problem of two peoples seeking to live with freedom and dignity on the
same small piece of land. Security requires peace, which can only be obtained
through a negotiations process grounded in respect for international law and the
human rights of all people.”
Zionism Is Incompatible With Judaism
Rabbi Alissa Wise of the Jewish Voice for Peace Rabbinical Council states:
“History will ask: what did you do to stop the Israeli genocide of Palestinian
people? Have an answer…Zionism is incompatible with Judaism. The point of
fasting today because of destruction and losses and trauma our ancestors suffered
is to prevent us from doing the same to others. Instead, the ‘Jewish’ state uses
the state to destroy and traumatize Palestinians. By design, under Israeli law,
Palestinians have an inferior status to Jews legally, judicially, politically.
This is apartheid.”
Rabbi Brant Rosen of Congregation Tzedek Chicago states that, “After the horrific
massacre of Israelis by Hamas…the collective Jewish world entered into an acute
and unprecedented period of mourning. Our hearts then cracked open again—-and
continue to crack open—-as thousands of Palestinians in Gaza are being killed by
Israeli bombs and an Israeli ground invasion…This latest violence did not occur
in a vacuum. It is but the latest manifestation of an injustice that Israel has
been perpetrating against Palestinian people for decades. We must shine an
unflinching light on the roots of this violence…For the past 75 years, Israel has
been violently dispossessing Palestinians in order to make way for a majority
Jewish state. And for just as long, the Palestinian people have been resisting
their dispossession…”
Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University declares that, “It is important to
note that opposing Israel’s war crimes has absolutely nothing to do with
antisemitism. This point has been made eloquently in an open letter by dozens of
Jewish writers. Netanyahu doesn’t speak for Judaism. The Israeli government
violates the most sacred of all Jewish injunctions, to protect life (Pikvach
Nefesh) and to love your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18). The message of
Jewish ethics is found in the words of the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 2:4) inscribed
on a wall directly facing the U.N.: ‘They shall beat their swords into
ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword
against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.’”
Gaza As a Ghetto
Writing in The New Yorker (Dec. 9, 2023), the Russian Jewish author Masha Gessen
notes that, “For the last 17 years, Gaza has been a hyper densely populated,
impoverished, walled-in compound where only a small fraction of the population
had the right to leave even for a short amount of time—-in other words a ghetto…
like a Jewish ghetto in an Eastern European country occupied by Nazi Germany. In
the two months since Hamas attacked Israel, all Gazans have suffered from the
barely interrupted onslaught of Israeli forces. Thousands have died. On
average, a child is killed in Gaza every ten minutes. Israeli bombs have struck
hospitals, maternity wards, and ambulances. Eight out of ten Gazans are now
homeless.”
Gessen writes that, “The term ‘open-air-prison’ seems to have been coined in 2010
by David Cameron, who was then British Prime Minister. Many human rights
organizations have adopted that description. Presumably, the more fitting term
‘ghetto’ would have drawn fire for comparing the predicament of besieged Gazans
to that of ghettoized Jews. It also would have given us the language to describe
what is happening in Gaza now. The ghetto is being liquidated…The Nazis claimed
that ghettos were necessary to protect non-Jews from diseases spread by Jews.
Israel has claimed that the isolation of Gaza, like the wall in the West Bank, is
required to protect Israel from terrorist attacks carried out by Palestinians.
Nazi claims had no basis in reality while Israeli claims stem from actual and
repeated acts of violence. Yet both claims propose that an occupying authority
can choose to isolate, immiserate—-and, now, mortally endanger an entire
population of people in the name of protecting its own.”
The evidence that Jewish Americans are now in the process of re-thinking their
relationship with Israel is all around us and is receiving growing attention.
How Core Is A Connection To Israel To Being Jewish?
A report in The Washington Post (Dec.18, 2023) carried the headline, “Gaza War
Opens Rifts for Reform Jews.” It notes that, “…the Israel-Gaza war…spotlighted
rifts about not just how to address Israel’s military campaign but also about
what the word Zionism means and how core a connection to Israel should be to
being Jewish…. U.S. Jews’ connection with Israel has been shifting, the Pew
Research Center found. Fifty-eight per cent of U.S. Jews say they feel very or
somewhat attached to Israel, but that number drops to 48 per cent for Jews ages
18 to 29. Forty-five per cent of U.S. Jews say that caring about Israel is
essential to being Jewish; 35 per cent of Jews 18 to 29 say that. But how the
past two months will affect those questions is impossible to predict, experts
say.”
More and more Jewish voices are being heard objecting to Israel’s bombing of
civilian targets in Gaza. Thousands of Jewish and Israeli artists, writers and
activists have signed a letter demanding an immediate cease fire in Gaza,
allowing aid into the besieged city and “the end of complicity of our governing
bodies in grave human rights violations and war crimes.”
The letter dated Oct. 19, 2023) declared: “Silence at this urgent time of crisis
and escalating genocide is not a politically neutral position. Over the last few
years there have been significant steps to institutionally address social justice
and inequality…There is ample evidence that we are witnessing the unfolding of a
genocide in which the already precarious lives of Palestinians are deemed
unworthy of aid, let alone human rights and justice….We reject violence against
all civilians, regardless of their identity and call for ending the root cause of
violence, oppression and the occupation.”
Among the signatories were Nan Goldin, Judith Butler, Eyad Weizman, Rachel
Kushner, A.L. Steiner and Adam Bromberg.
Appeal By Staff Members Of Jewish Organizations
More than 500 staff members of Jewish organizations appealed to President Biden
to call for a cease-fire. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency (Dec. 8, 2023) reported
that, “Hundreds of staffers for 140 Jewish organizations signed a letter to
President Biden and Congress urging them to press Israel to agree to a cease-
fire…The letter is the latest sign that differences among American Jews regarding
Israel’s response to Hamas’s deadly Oct. 7 invasion are becoming more public and
pronounced. A number of Jewish Congress members now back a cease-fire, after
having initially presented a unanimous voice in support of Biden’s backing for
Israel.”
The signers of the letter stated that, “We are individuals who work for a wide
variety of Jewish organizations across the United States, coming together across
the broad range of beliefs, practices, backgrounds, and identities that make up
the rich fabric of the American Jewish community. We are uniting together in
this moment to call for a cease-fire, the release of all hostages, and a
commitment towards a long-term political solution that ensures the freedom and
collective safety of Israelis and Palestinians.”
The letter suggested to the President that vocal Jewish groups that have opposed
the war are representative of a wide number of American Jews. Among the
organizations represented are Bend the Arc, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice,
Workers Circle, IfNotNow, and Jewish Voice for Peace. There are also staff
members from groups which have opposed a cease-fire, including J Street. There
are staff members from synagogues and the Reform and Conservative religious
movements.
“False Narratives About Israel” In Jewish Schools
A Boston area rabbi, Tovah Spitzer of Dorsey Tzedek, a Reconstructionist
synagogue in Newton, Massachusetts, said, “For the sake of defeating the…ideology
of Hamas, for the sake of returning all of the hostages, for the sake of the
well-being of all of the Israelis and Palestinians caught up in this war, I urge
the Biden Administration to do all it can to bring about a ceasefire as a first
step to a lasting, political solution to the conflict.”
Rep. Becca Balint (D-VT), whose family members were victims of the Holocaust,
wrote: “Thousands of Palestinians, including thousands of children, have been
killed. Many more have been displaced, without water, food, medical supplies and
fuel. This is inhumane. What is needed is a negotiated bilateral ceasefire that
ensures the release of all hostages and paves a path toward peace, security and
safety for Israelis and Palestinians.”
Controversy was stirred when graduates of the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School
in the Maryland suburbs outside of Washington, D.C. said that their education was
defined by “false narratives” about Israel and called upon other alumni to join
them “to help break the cycle of ‘no matter what’ support for Israel.”
“Feeling Alienated By Unequivocal Support for Israel”
According to The Forward (Dec. 19, 2023), the letter signed on Dec. 12 by roughly
130 graduates of the school, declared, “If you are similarly struggling,
questioning or feeling alienated by the unequivocal support for Israel that
continued to be upheld by the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School as an
institution and by the broader Jewish community that raised us—-you are not
alone.”
The letter noted that the signatories’ “critique of Zionism and Israel is neither
antisemitic nor a betrayal of Judaism or Jewish community; rather, these profound
critiques stem from our commitment to Jewish values.” Describing Israel’s war on
Gaza as “fueled by genocidal intent,” they said they were “struggling to
reconcile “the unquestioned support for Israel’s brutal assault with the Jewish
values they were taught.”
The Forward notes that, “Almost all of those who signed the letter taking the
school to task graduated in the 21st century. Their relative youth reflects a
larger pattern among American Jews, with younger generations taking a far more
critical view of Israel…The letter critical of the day school is the latest
example of a segment of American Jews rejecting the unconditional support for
Israel they were raised with. That’s the theme of the 2023 documentary film
‘Israelism,’ which features Simone Zimmerman. A graduate of Kadema Day School…
Zimmerman is cofounder of IfNotNow, an organization which describes itself as
working ‘to end support for Israel’s ‘apartheid system.’ In 2017, IfNotNow
launched a campaign on social media called ‘You Never Told Me,’ in which young
Jews said their Jewish education ignored the history and experiences of
Palestinians. Writing about the campaign in 2017, Reconstructionist Rabbi Sarah
Brammer-Shlat said: ‘As a generation, we were betrayed by the institutional
Jewish world which told us stories of Israel’s glories but no stories of the
horror and impact of occupation on Palestinians.’”
A Deeply Misleading Narrative
Columnist Ruth Marcus, writing in the Washington Post (Nov. 22, 2023) makes the
point that, “…the narrative of Israel’s founding that Jewish children of my
generation were offered in Hebrew school and on trips to Israel was deeply
misleading at best, tinged with anti-Palestinian bias at worst. This account
utterly failed to acknowledge the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes in
1948 or consider Palestinians’ legitimate claims to a homeland. The tenor of our
rabbi’s sermons, the discussions in my childhood home, were that Israel could do
no wrong.”
Her children, Marcus points out, “…grew up in a different environment—-more
honest about the contours of the conflict, more complex in the nature of the
political discussion, and more fraught. They have scarcely known an Israel
without Netanyahu, which is to say an Israel whose aggressive settlement policy
that has made a two-state solution increasingly unattainable, and an Israel that
fails to treat Palestinians with fairness and dignity….Perhaps the bond of young
American Jews with Israel, already frayed, has irretrievably severed with Oct. 7
and what many view as an Israeli response that has killed too many innocent
civilians.”
Another Washington Post columnist, Dana Milbank (Nov. 1, 2023) used the headline,
“What a lonely time to be a Jew in America.” He wrote: “I’m as horrified as
everyone else by the killing of so many innocent civilians in Israel’s air
strikes in Gaza…the vast majority of American Jews have no use for the corrupt
Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his regime—-or its racism,
authoritarian power grabs and settlement and reckless settlement policy designed
to undermine a two-state solution…Five years ago, I argued that if Israelis
planned to follow Netanyahu to ‘an ultranationalist apartheid state, American
Jews have a duty to tell Israelis that support cannot be sustained here nor
should it be.’ ‘People are filled with anguish,’ my rabbi Danny Zemel said.
‘It’s become very, very lonely to be a progressive, Enlightenment-believing
Jew.’”
Political and Economic Marshall Plan
Once Hamas is defeated, writes Milbank, “…there must be a political and economic
Marshall Plan for the Palestinian people that will build an independent
Palestinian state…It’s well past time for the long-suffering Palestinians to have
their own state.”
Rabbinical student Josie Felt told the Israeli magazine 972 (Nov. 3, 2023) that,
“Over the past 3 1/2 weeks, a record number of U.S. Jews have taken action to
protest the ongoing Israeli military assault on Gaza. Thousands of Jews are
publicly rejecting the premise that Jewish safety comes at the expense of
Palestinian liberation. We are taking to the streets to show our elected
officials that we will not be silent while they exploit our grief to provide
unsanctioned military support for the genocide of Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
Palestinians are asking, ‘Are you with us?’ American Jews are showing we are.
As a rabbinical student, I am taking action alongside thousands to challenge the
idea that Jewish safety must come at the expense of Palestinians.”
Rabbi Bernard Steinberg, who served as executive director of the Harvard Hillel
Foundation from 1993-2010, wrote an article for the Harvard Crimson (Dec.
29,2023) with the headline, "For the safety of Jews and Palestinians, stop
weaponizing antisemitism.” He writes, “As an elder leader, with the benefit of
hindsight, I feel compelled to speak to what I see as a disturbing trend gripping
our campus and many others: the cynical weaponization of antisemitism by
powerful forces who seek to intimidate and ultimately silence legitimate
criticism of Israel and American policy on Israel.”
Jewish Students Urged To Be “Boldly Critical” of Israel
Steinberg states that, “I am particularly alarmed by today’s McCarthyist tactic
of manufacturing a scare which, in effect, turns the very real issue of Jewish
safety into a pawn in a cynical political game to cover for Israel’s unpopular
policies with regard to Palestinians.” He urges Jewish students to be, “…boldly
critical of Israel—-not despite being Jewish, but because you are. There is no
tradition more central to Judaism than prophetic truth-telling, no Jewish
imperative more urgent than bravely criticizing corrupt leadership, starting with
our own…It is not antisemitism to demand justice for all Palestinians living in
their ancestral lands…. If Israel’s case is just, let it speak eloquently in its
own defense. It is very telling that some of Israel’s own supporters instead go
to extraordinary lengths …to silence the other side. Smearing one’s opponents is
rarely a tactic employed by those confident that justice is on their side…If
Israel’s case requires branding its critics antisemites, it is already conceding
defeat”.
Even respected theologians who were once Zionists, have abandoned that position.
Professor Daniel Boyarin, who taught Talmud to generations of students at the
University of California at Berkeley, has written a book setting forth his views,
“The No-State Solution: A Jewish Manifesto” (Yale University Press). He says
that, “I was a Zionist in my youth. In those years I thought of myself as a
left-wing Zionist. I was active in Habonim (a socialist Zionist youth movement).
I think I ultimately caught the leftism and socialism more than the Zionism. And
when it became clear to me that I had to make a choice, I finally realized I had
to let the Zionism go. That choice came when Yitzhak Rabin stated that the
Israeli Army should break the arms and legs of Palestinian kids who threw stones
at soldiers.”
Dr. Boyarin recalls that, “I asked at the time, what is this cruel idea of
breaking the arms and legs of little boys? And somebody explained to me that
this was necessary in order to maintain the state. And I said if that’s
necessary to maintain the state, then the state is clearly a wrong thing…I had
been moving gradually into a more critical position vis-a-vis the behavior of
Israel, but that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I remember the first
time I wanted to say I was an anti-Zionist. I couldn’t even pronounce it…That’s
how hard it was for me…For me, the dilemma is how to maintain a truly vital,
authentic…Jewish cultural life without falling into the kinds of nationalism and
ethnocentrism that we find all over the world today.”
“Counter-Zionism”
Shaul Magid, Distinguished Fellow in Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College, has
written a book, “The Necessity of Exile: Essays From A Distance” (Ayin Press),
which he calls “counter-Zionism.” He notes that, “If liberal Zionists are now
forced to support an illiberal state, why not construct a new way to affirm
Jewish self-determination, a path for supporting liberalism rather than being
forced to support an ideology that runs counter to our basic values.” He
declares, “I offer counter-Zionism as a way to think otherwise about the complex
web of Jewish history, identity and politics…. Israel without Zionism may have
the chance of truly becoming a just and equitable polity of all its citizens.
The Jewish diaspora may flourish without Israel as its necessary center.”
Writing in The Forward (Dec. 26, 2023), Emily Tankin provides this assessment: “I
thought he was asking American Jewish readers to do something hard: to imagine
who we are, as Jews, outside Zionism, or Israel. What makes us Jewish?”
In the wake of developments in Gaza, Peter Beinart, a professor of journalism and
political science at the City University of New York and an editor of Jewish
Currents, wrote an article in the New York Times (Oct.15, 2023), “The Moral
Rebuilding Must Begin Now.”
He writes: “Hamas …has committed an unspeakable horror that may damage the
Palestinian cause for decades to come. Yet when Palestinians resist their
oppression in ethical ways—-by calling for boycotts, sanctions, and the
application of international law—-the U.S. and its allies work to ensure that
those efforts fail, which convinces many Palestinians that ethical resistance
doesn’t work, which empowers Hamas.”
Ending Palestinian Oppression
In Beinart’s view, “The savagery Hamas committed…has made reversing this
monstrous cycle much harder…It will require a shared commitment to ending
Palestinian oppression in ways that respect the infinite value of every human
life…It will require a shared commitment to ending Palestinian oppression in ways
that respect the infinite value of every human life…It will require new forms of
political community…built around a democratic vision powerful enough to transcend
tribal divides…the effort may fail. It has failed before. The alternative is to
descend, flags waving, into hell.”
Over the years, notes Beinart, “Israel, with America’s help…has repeatedly
undermined Palestinians who sought to end Israel’s occupation through
negotiations or nonviolent pressure…As part of the 1993 Oslo Accords, the PLO
renounced violence and began working with Israel…because they thought it would
deliver them a state…The 1996 election of Mr. Netanyahu and the failure of Israel
and its American patron to stop settlement growth, however, curdled Palestinian
sentiment…Like many others who care about the lives of Palestinians and Jews, I
have felt in recent days the greatest despair I have ever known…A Palestinian
friend sent me a note of consolation. She ended it with the words ‘only
together.’ Maybe that can be our motto.”
Two far-right members of Israel’s cabinet, Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich
called to depopulate Gaza. They called for most Gazan civilians to be resettled
in other countries. The war, said Ben Gvir, presents “an opportunity to
concentrate on encouraging the migration of the residents of Gaza, facilitating
Israeli settlement in the region.”
Facing Up To Israeli Extremism
In a column, “America Must Face Up To Israel’s Extremism,” New York Times (Jan.
5, 2024), Michelle Goldberg writes: “The Biden administration has joined
countries all over the world in condemning this naked endorsement of ethnic
cleansing. But in doing so, it acted as if Ben Gvir and Smotrich’s provocations
are fundamentally at odds with the worldview of Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, to whom America continues to give unconditional backing…Rep. James
McGovern, a Democrat, has called for a cease-fire and said, ‘It must be clear
that America will not write a blank check for mass displacement.”
Goldberg, who points out that she grew up in a “liberal Zionist home,” points out
that, “…we’re writing a blank check to a government whose leader is only a bit
more coy than Ben Gvir and Smotrich about his intentions for Gaza…The Times of
Israel says, ‘The ‘voluntary’ resettlement of Palestinians from Gaza is slowly
becoming a key official policy of the government, with a senior official saying
that Israel has held talks with several countries for their potential
absorption.’…Israel is making most of Gaza uninhabitable…Disease is rampant…
hunger almost universal…After Hamas’ sadistic attack…Israel was justified in
retaliating…But there is a difference between the war Israel’s liberal supporters
want to pretend the country is fighting in Gaza and the war Israel is actually
waging.”
Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, condemned calls
for the emigration of Palestinians from Gaza. He noted that his movement’s
opposition to Smotrich and Ben Gvir predates the war. He declared, “We condemn
Israeli ministers’ call for ethnic cleansing. Along with most major American
Jewish leaders, we have refused to meet with them to sanction their political
beliefs.”
“Grossly Disproportionate” Response
In early January, Sen. Bernie Sanders (Ind.-VT) called on Congress to block
additional funding to Israel: “While we recognize that Hamas’s barbaric terrorist
attack began this war, we must also recognize that Israel’s military response has
been grossly disproportionate, immoral and in violation of international law.
Enough is enough. Congress must reject that funding. The taxpayers of the
United States must no longer be complicit in destroying the lives of innocent
men, women and children in Gaza. Israel has the absolute right to defend itself…
They do not have the legal or moral right to kill thousands of innocent
Palestinian men, women and children.”
The idea that anti-Zionism equals antisemitism has been promoted by the Israeli
government and by American Jewish groups such as the Anti-Defamation League.
The U.S. House of Representatives resolved in December that, “Anti-Zionism is
antisemitism.” This notion has been widely refuted. Writing in the Washington
Post (Jan. 7, 2024), Pulitzer Prize winning author Benjamin Moser headlined his
article, “Anti-Zionism is not the same as antisemitism. Here’s the history.”
Mr. Moser writes that, “When learning of this (Congressional) vote, many people
familiar with Jewish history might have suppressed a sardonic laugh. Anti-
Zionism, after al l, was a creation of Jews, not their enemies. Before World War
11, Zionism was the most divisive and heatedly debated issue in the Jewish world.
Anti-Zionism had left-wing variants and right-wing variants—-religious variants
and secular variants—-as well as variants in every country where Jews resided.
For anyone who knows this history, it is astonishing that, as the resolution
would have it, opposition to Zionism has been equated to opposition to Judaism—-
and not only to Judaism, but to hatred of Jews themselves. But this conflation
has nothing to do with history. Instead, it is political, and its purpose has
been to discredit Israel’s opponents as Racists.”
Jews Have Been “At Home” In America From The Beginning
Zionism claims that Israel is the “homeland” of all Jews and that those living
elsewhere are in “exile.” Mr. Moser declares that Jews have been “at home in
America from the beginning, thanks.” In 1841, he points out, in the dedication
of the nation’s first Reform synagogue in Charleston, South Carolina, Rabbi
Gustavus Poznanski declared, “This country is our Palestine, this city our
Jerusalem, this house of God our temple.” A century later, Rabbi Samuel Schulman
of Temple Emanu-El in New York stated that “the essence of Reform Judaism for me
is the rejection of Jewish nationalism.” Moser notes that, “Many Jews believed
that talk of a ‘diaspora,’ even a ‘Jewish people,’ resembled the calumnies of
antisemites…They noticed that many antisemites were fervently pro-Zionist: the
better to get rid of the Jews.” Never has the debate about Zionism within the
Jewish community “been louder than it is now,” in Moser’s view.
The American Jewish community, with a number of notable exceptions, once seemed
united in its support for Israel and its embrace of Zionism. That is no longer
the case. While establishment Jewish organizations may persist in their embrace
of whatever policies the Israeli government pursues, these groups appear
increasingly unrepresentative of the larger Jewish community. Before Israel’s
creation, Zionism was a minority view among Jewish Americans. It appears now to
be in the process of becoming a minority view once again. *
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