A Breakdown of the Pro-Israel Consensus Within American Jewish Community: What's Emerging Now.
It has been the mass murder of 7 October 2023, an event that deeply affected global Jewish populations like no other occurrence since the creation of Israel as a nation.
Within Jewish communities the event proved deeply traumatic. For the Israeli government, it was deeply humiliating. The whole Zionist movement was founded on the presumption which held that Israel would ensure against such atrocities occurring in the future.
Some form of retaliation appeared unavoidable. Yet the chosen course undertaken by Israel – the widespread destruction of the Gaza Strip, the deaths and injuries of many thousands ordinary people – was a choice. This selected path made more difficult the way numerous American Jews understood the attack that precipitated the response, and it now complicates the community's commemoration of the anniversary. How can someone grieve and remember a tragedy affecting their nation during a catastrophe being inflicted upon other individuals in your name?
The Complexity of Mourning
The difficulty surrounding remembrance stems from the reality that there is no consensus about what any of this means. Indeed, within US Jewish circles, this two-year period have seen the disintegration of a decades-long agreement about the Zionist movement.
The origins of pro-Israel unity within US Jewish communities extends as far back as an early twentieth-century publication written by a legal scholar and then future Supreme Court judge Justice Brandeis named “Jewish Issues; Addressing the Challenge”. But the consensus became firmly established following the Six-Day War in 1967. Previously, Jewish Americans maintained a delicate yet functioning parallel existence between groups that had different opinions regarding the necessity for Israel – Zionists, neutral parties and anti-Zionists.
Previous Developments
Such cohabitation persisted through the 1950s and 60s, within remaining elements of Jewish socialism, through the non-aligned American Jewish Committee, in the anti-Zionist American Council for Judaism and comparable entities. For Louis Finkelstein, the chancellor of the theological institution, pro-Israel ideology had greater religious significance rather than political, and he prohibited singing Israel's anthem, the Israeli national anthem, during seminary ceremonies during that period. Nor were support for Israel the centerpiece for contemporary Orthodox communities prior to the 1967 conflict. Jewish identitarian alternatives existed alongside.
Yet after Israel overcame neighboring countries in the six-day war that year, seizing land such as the West Bank, Gaza Strip, the Golan and East Jerusalem, the American Jewish relationship to the country underwent significant transformation. The military success, along with enduring anxieties about another genocide, produced a developing perspective regarding Israel's vital role within Jewish identity, and generated admiration in its resilience. Language concerning the extraordinary nature of the outcome and the “liberation” of areas assigned Zionism a spiritual, potentially salvific, significance. In those heady years, considerable the remaining ambivalence toward Israel disappeared. During the seventies, Publication editor Podhoretz declared: “Everyone supports Zionism today.”
The Unity and Its Limits
The Zionist consensus left out the ultra-Orthodox – who generally maintained a Jewish state should only be established by a traditional rendering of redemption – however joined Reform, Conservative, Modern Orthodox and nearly all secular Jews. The predominant version of the consensus, what became known as liberal Zionism, was founded on the idea in Israel as a democratic and free – while majority-Jewish – nation. Many American Jews saw the control of Arab, Syria's and Egypt's territories after 1967 as provisional, believing that an agreement was imminent that would maintain Jewish population majority in pre-1967 Israel and neighbor recognition of the nation.
Multiple generations of American Jews grew up with Zionism a fundamental aspect of their Jewish identity. The nation became a key component of Jewish education. Israel’s Independence Day evolved into a religious observance. National symbols adorned religious institutions. Summer camps integrated with Hebrew music and education of modern Hebrew, with visitors from Israel instructing US young people Israeli culture. Visits to Israel grew and reached new heights through Birthright programs during that year, providing no-cost visits to the country was offered to Jewish young adults. Israel permeated nearly every aspect of the American Jewish experience.
Changing Dynamics
Paradoxically, in these decades post-1967, American Jewry became adept at religious pluralism. Acceptance and dialogue across various Jewish groups expanded.
Yet concerning support for Israel – that’s where tolerance found its boundary. Individuals might align with a rightwing Zionist or a liberal advocate, however endorsement of the nation as a majority-Jewish country was a given, and challenging that narrative categorized you beyond accepted boundaries – outside the community, as Tablet magazine described it in writing recently.
Yet presently, under the weight of the ruin in Gaza, food shortages, young victims and anger regarding the refusal within Jewish communities who avoid admitting their involvement, that unity has disintegrated. The centrist pro-Israel view {has lost|no longer
