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Salem-News.Com, Oregon
May 2 2014
Resistance Growing To Zionism's Corrupting Influence
Allan C. Brownfeld Salem-News.com
Narrow nationalism, in recent years, has corrupted this humane Jewish tradition
(WASHINGTON DC) - Zionism, the philosophy of Jewish nationalism which
believes that Israel is the "homeland" of all Jews and that those
living outside of Israel are in "exile," has distorted American Jewish
life and is driving large numbers of young people away from what is
becoming an increasingly intolerant community.
Many synagogues fly Israeli flags and have replaced God with Israel as
the virtual object of worship, a practice akin to the idolatry
practiced in the worship of the Golden Calf. In 1999, the Union for
Reform Judaism adopted a resolution declaring that Israel, not God,
"is central to our religion." Emigration to Israel---"aliyah"---was
encouraged as the highest form of religious expression.
Sadly, the organized Jewish community has turned itself, in effect,
into a defense attorney for Israel, defending actions by the Israeli
government which are vigorously opposed at home. When it comes to
separation of church and state, Jewish groups have led legal battles
even against voluntary, non-sectarian school prayer. Yet, in Israel,
they embrace a society with no separation of church and state, one
which is, in real terms, a theocracy. Non-Orthodox Jews have fewer
rights in Israel than any place in the Western world. Non-Orthodox
rabbis cannot perform weddings or funerals in Israel, and their
conversions are not recognized.
Religious Freedom
Do these Jewish groups really believe in religious freedom in the U.S.
as a matter of principle----or do they take this position as a
minority defending its self-interest? When Thomas Jefferson and James
Madison promoted the Virginia Declaration of Religious Freedom, their
advocacy was based on their belief in religious freedom as an
essential element of a free society. Jefferson and Madison were part
of a protected majority---but opposed a state-supported church of any
kind. The same cannot be said for American Jewish defenders of
Israel's theocracy.
Defending whatever a sovereign state does is hardly the expression of
a religious worldview, hardly the Judaism of the prophets, who called
for justice for men and women of every race and nation. What was the
Anti-Defamation League thinking when it opposed a congressional
resolution commemorating the Armenian genocide? Turkey, as it turns
out, was then an ally of Israel, and would have been offended by such
a resolution. The ADL's concern was with Israel-Turkish relations, not
with the victimized Armenians. And how does the ADL explain its
opposition to the construction of a mosque in New York City. Surely
something other than a commitment to religious freedom was on its
agenda.
The Israel which American Jewish groups defend---whatever the
issue----may be far different than the one many American Jews
envision. NEW YORK TIMES columnist Thomas Friedman (April 16, 2014)
writes: "We're not dealing anymore with your grandfather's Israel, and
they're not dealing with your grandmother's America either. Time
matters, and the near half-century since the 1967 war has changed both
of us in ways neither wants to acknowledge."
More Religious Society
Israel, Friedman points out, "has become a more religious society---on
Friday nights in Jerusalem now you barely see a car moving on the
streets in Jewish neighborhoods, which only used to be the case on Yom
Kippur---and the settlers are clearly more brazen...there are a
growing core who are armed zealots, who will fight the IDF if it tries
to remove them. You did not go to summer camp with these Jews. You did
not meet them at your local Reform synagogue. This is a hard
core...There are now about 350,000 Jews living in the West Bank. It
took 50,000 Israeli police to remove 8,000 settlers from Gaza , who
barely resisted. I fear the lift in the West Bank to make peace there
is now just too heavy for conventional politics and diplomacy."
With regard to Secretary of State John Kerry's efforts to mediate a
peace settlement, Friedman is not optimistic: "The truth is Kerry's
mission is less an act of strategy and more an act of deep friendship.
It is America trying to save Israel from trends that will inevitably
undermine it as a Jewish and democratic state. But Kerry is the last
of an old guard. Those in the Obama administration who think he is on
a suicide mission reflect the new U.S. attitude toward the region. And
those in Israel who denounce him as a nuisance reflect the new Israel.
Kerry, in my view, is doing the Lord's work. But the weight of time
and all the changes it has wrought on the ground may just be too heavy
for such an act of friendship. If he folds his tent, though, Israelis
and Palestinians will deeply regret it, and soon."
An article in THE NEW YORK TIMES (April 13,2014) asked the question,
"Are Iran and Israel Trading Places?" The authors, Israel
Waismel-Manor, a senior lecturer at the University of Haifa, and Abbas
Milani, who heads the Iranian studies program at Stanford, note that
while Islamic extremists appear to be in retreat in Iran, religious
extremism in Israel is on the ascent.
They write: "As the winds of change blow across Iran, secular
democrats in Israel have been losing ground to religious and
right-wing extremists who feel comfortable openly attacking the United
States, Israel's strongest ally. In recent months, Israel's defense
minister, Moshe Yaalon called Secretary of State John Kerry 'obsessive
and messianic,' while Naftali Bennett, Israel's economy minister,
labeled Mr. Kerry a 'mouthpiece' for anti-Semitic elements attempting
to boycott Israel. Israel's secular democrats are growing increasingly
worried that Israel's future may bear an uncomfortable resemblance to
Iran's recent past."
Shift Toward Orthodoxy
The authors believe that, "Israel's shift toward orthodoxy is not
merely a religious one. Since the vast majority of Orthodox Jews are
also against any agreement with the Palestinians, with each passing
day, the chances of reaching a peace deal diminish. Nor is time on the
side of those who want to keep seeing a democratic Israel. If Israel
continues the expansion of settlements, and peace talks serve no
purpose but the extension of the status quo, the real existential
threat to Israel will not be Iran's nuclear program but rather a
surging tide of economic sanctions...One of Israel's most popular
singers, the Iranian-born Rita Jahanforuz, laments on her recent
album, 'In this world, I am alone and abandoned, like wild grass in
the middle of the desert.' If Iran's moderates fail to push the
country toward reform, and if secular Israelis can't halt the
country's drift from democracy to theocracy, both Iranians and
Israelis will increasingly find themselves fulfilling her sad
prophecy."
In Israel, racism and religious intolerance are growing---with targets
ranging from Palestinian Muslims and Christians to Africans seeking
political asylum to Bedouin tribesmen to non-Orthodox Jews. In
response, American Jewish organizations have been silent.
Israeli Jews who are concerned about their country's escalating
intolerance have expressed dismay with this silence on the part of
their American counterparts. Daniel Blatman, a history professor at
Hebrew University in Jerusalem, wrote an article in HA'ARETZ (March 7,
2014) headlined, "If I were an American Jew, I'd Worry About Israel's
Racist Cancer." The article's subhead read, "Amid the awareness that
Israel is sliding toward an apartheid regime, the silence of Jews
worldwide is deafening."
In Blatman's view, it is not "the Iranian threat that endangers
Israel's survival, it's the moral and ethical collapse of its
society...The racist cancer after 47 years of occupation and
domination of another people has spread deep into Israeli
society...World Jewry must help Israel be cured of it. It must speak
out and act...and cooperate with the shrinking groups of Israelis who
have not yet lost hope that it's possible to stop this downside toward
the abyss."
"The King's Torah"
Consider the reality of contemporary Israel, which American Jewish
groups completely ignore. The year 2009 saw the publication of Torat
Ha'Melech ("The King's Torah"), which the Israeli newspaper MA'ARIV
described as "230 pages on the laws concerning the killing of
non-Jews, a kind of guidebook for anyone who ponders the question of
when it is permissible to take the life of a non-Jew."
According to the authors, Rabbis Yitzhak Shapira and Yosef Elitzur,
non-Jews are "uncompassionate by nature" and may have to be killed in
order to "curb their evil inclinations."
The commandment "Thou shalt not kill," the rabbis argue, refers only
to killing other Jews. In their opinion, "There is justification for
killing babies if it is clear they will grow up to harm us, and in
such a situation may be harmed deliberately and not only during combat
with adults."
Torat Ha'Melech was written as a guide for Israeli soldiers and army
officers seeking rabbinical guidance on the rules of engagement.
According to the authors, all enemy civilians---including women and
children---can be killed. The rabbis also justify the murder of Jewish
dissidents, a philosophy which emerged from the settlement of Yitzhar
in the occupied West Bank, where Shapira helps lead Od Yosef Chai
yeshiva.
Shapira studied under Rabbi Yitzchok Ginsburgh, who defended seven of
his students who murdered an innocent Palestinian girl by asserting
the superiority of "Jewish blood." In 1994, when the American-born
Jewish extremist Baruch Goldstein massacred 29 Palestinian worshippers
at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Ginsburgh lionized Goldstein
in a lengthy article entitled "Baruch Hagever" ("Baruch, The Great
Man").
Funds From Israeli Government
These views are not those of just a few extremists. Instead, Od Yosef
Chai has received funds from both the Israeli Ministry of Education,
as well as from a U.S. tax-exempt group called the Central Fund for
Israel.
Extremist rabbis, it seems, are part of Israel's religious
establishment. Dov Lior, the chief rabbi of Hebron, for example, has
achieved considerable influence inside the military. In 2008, when the
Israeli army's chief rabbi, Brig. Gen. Avichai Ronski, brought a group
of military intelligence officers to Hebron for a special tour, he
concluded the day with a private meeting with Lior, who presented his
views on modern warfare, which includes collective punishment of
Palestinians. Ronski himself has overseen the distribution of
extremist tracts to soldiers, including "Baruch Hagever," and a
pamphlet stating, "When you show mercy to a cruel enemy, you are being
cruel to pure and honest soldiers."
Ovadiah Yosef, the Shas party spiritual leader and Israeli chief
rabbi, declared, "It is forbidden to be merciful to Arabs. You must
send missiles to them and annihilate them. They are evil and
damnable."
There is much turmoil in contemporary Israel as the state plans to
remove Bedouin from their traditional lands, continues to build
settlements in the occupied territories and confronts black African
asylum seekers, largely from Eritrea and Sudan, who had heard that
there was a Jewish state across the Sinai peninsula that claimed to
embrace the lessons of the Holocaust. One of those lessons was that
you don't turn away refugees when they might be slaughtered when they
return home.
55,000 Asylum Seekers
Today, there are 55,000 asylum-seekers in Israel. Knowing how bad
deporting them all would look, Israel instead is "inviting" them to
Holot, a desert facility built to "concentrate" refugees claiming
status in Israel. At anti-refugee rallies, right-wing politicians have
called them a "cancer" who threaten "the white man's country." Since
last December, Israel has ordered more than 3,000 asylum-seekers, all
of whom have resided in the country for more than four years, to
report to Holot.
Because it is not described as a prison, regular rules involving
trials, judges and juries do not apply. According to Allison Deger's
report in MONDOWEISS (March 28, 2014), however, "The facility is a
wasteland encircled in a trench of sun-dried sewage, off a dirt road
where the only nearby structures are another prison, an army base and
a crumbling abandoned gas station...Africans are allowed to leave the
jail---comprised of small temporary structures made from shipping
containers, resembling trailer-offices on construction sites---for a
few hours. Still, the inmates must check in with guards three times a
day and are locked in at night."
American Jewish groups in the forefront of promoting immigration
reform in the U.S. have been silent. As journalist David Sheen, a
Canadian living in Israel whose stay there has led to his
disillusionment with Zionism, points out, "In all of 2013...the
Anti-Defamation League did not have one word to say about Israel's war
on African refugees. It wasn't just ADL---it was every single Jewish
American mainstream group across the board. None of them had anything
to say in criticism of the Israeli government as it moved to kick out
all African asylum-seekers. And it's so ironic because here in the
U.S., these mainstream Jewish groups, there's wall-to-wall support for
immigration reform."
Ignoring Plight of Palestinians
Peter Beinart, a liberal Zionist who is concerned about American Jews
ignoring the plight of Israel's non-Jewish population, notes that,
"Groups like AIPAC and the Presidents' Conference patrol public
discourse, scolding people who contradict their vision of Israel. Not
only does the organized American Jewish community mostly avoid public
criticism of the Israeli government, it tries to prevent others from
leveling such criticism as well."
But if the organized Jewish community persists in its defense
attorney-like relationship with Israel, more and more American Jews
are disassociating themselves from that posture.
In its religion column by Mark Oppenheimer, THE NEW YORK TIMES (Feb.
14, 2014) highlights a group of men and women it describes as "devoted
to Jewish observance, but at odds with Israel."
In the case of Charles H. Manekin, an Orthodox Jew who is philosophy
professor at the University of Maryland, Oppenheimer finds one who
"believes that his Orthodox faith calls him to take stands against
Israel. Prof. Manekin, 61, became Orthodox in college and became an
Israeli citizen in the 1980s. Yet...he denounced Israel's occupation
of the West Bank. Although not a member of the American Studies
Association, he was pleased when the group voted in December not to
collaborate with Israeli academic institutions...'As a religious Jew,'
he said, 'I am especially disturbed by the daily injustices
perpetrated against the Palestinians."
"They Are Human Too"
Another person featured is Stefan Krieger, who teaches law at Hofstra
University. He refrains from work on the Sabbath, keeps kosher, and
studies pages of the Talmud every day. When it comes to Israel, he
recalls that, "My parents were very sensitive to the issue of
Palestinians. My mom had a book called 'They Are Human Too,' and my
memory is she would take it off the bookshelf, as if this was some
sort of scandalous tract she was showing me, and show me pictures of
Palestinians in refugee camps...I think nationalism and religion
together are toxic."
Daniel Boyarin, who teaches Talmud at the University of California,
Berkeley, attended Orthodox synagogues for 30 years. He believes that
Zionism was always flawed: "The very concept of a state defined as
being for one people was deeply problematic and inevitably going to
lead to a moral and political disaster. Which I think it has."
Corey Robin, who teaches political science at Brooklyn College and is
a regular at a Conservative synagogue, says that, "There are lots of
ways to be Jewish, but worshiping a heavily militarized state seems
like a bit of a comedown from our past. I love being Jewish. I just
don't love the state of Israel."
Skepticism Toward Zionism
Columnist Mark Oppenheimer points out that, "Skepticism toward Zionism
used to be common. Before World War II, Reform Jews tended to believe
that they had found a home in the United States, and that Zionism
could be seen as a form of dual loyalty. Orthodox Jews generally
believed, theologically, that a state of Israel would have to wait for
the Messiah's arrival (a view some ultra-Orthodox Jews still hold). In
the 1930s and 40s, the persecution of European Jews turned many
American Jews into Zionists...'When Hillel was founded, it took a
clear non-Zionist position,' said Noam Planko, who teaches Jewish
history at the University of Washington. 'What you see is a shift in
the American spectrum: from non-Zionism with a few Zionists, to a
situation, by the 1960s, where the assumption is that any American
Jewish organization is also going to be clearly Zionist."
As the 21st century proceeds, Oppenheimer believes, that assumption is
more and more open to question. In the case of Hillel Foundations on
college campuses, censorship of views critical of Israel has led to an
open rebellion. Hillel CEO Eric Fingerhut declares that,
"Anti-Zionists will not be permitted to speak using the Hillel name or
under the Hillel roof, under any circumstances." Mr. Fingerhut seems
unaware of the long history of Jewish opposition to Zionism and seems
not to understand that Hillel was established to promote Judaism---not
Zionism.
Early in 2013, the Progressive Student Alliance at Harvard University
launched an effort, Open Hillel, to challenge Hillel's guidelines.
It's petition was signed by more than 800 Jewish students from diverse
perspectives. In December, Swarthmore College Hillel declared itself
to be the first "Open Hillel"---that is, the first Hillel to reject
the guidelines established by Hillel International concerning
discussions about Israel. These guidelines, students at Swarthmore
asserted in a resolution passed Dec. 8, 2013, present a "monolithic
face pertaining to Zionism" and "stifle healthy debate."
Burg Barred At Harvard
Even Israeli speakers who are critical of that government's policies
have been barred from Hillel. At Harvard, in November 2013, Avraham
Burg, former speaker of Israel's Knesset and now a sharp critic of its
occupation policies, spoke in an undergraduate dormitory after being
barred from speaking at Harvard Hillel. "It's such a shame that
Harvard Hillel would not allow an open discussion about Israel to take
place within its walls," said Sandra Korn, who helped organize the
talk. "Hillel should be a space for students to engage with Jewish
issues regardless of religious or political beliefs."
Jewish Community leaders at Wesleyan University issued a statement on
April 2, 2014 standing with the Open Hillel movement. Hillel's
policies of censoring dissenting views, they declared, "have resulted
in barring speakers from groups such as Breaking the Silence and the
Israeli Knesset from speaking at Hillels and has resulted in Jewish
Voice for Peace and other Jewish organizations not being welcome under
the Hillel umbrella...At Wesleyan, values of inclusion are central to
our identity both as Jews and as participants in the larger Wesleyan
community..In Hillel's guidelines, Jewish plurality gives way to
Zionist unanimity, and we are acutely aware that many individuals have
formed robust, meaningful Jewish identities that do not comport with
traditional Zionist ideas."
The students argue that efforts at censorship violate basic Jewish
values: "We believe that dialogue and critical engagement are central
Jewish values. Our community is founded on texts that are meant to be
interpreted, argued over, and debated endlessly... Hillel draws its
name from the great rabbinical sage who believed that all should be
able to learn, and that discourse should be free and unbound by
guidelines imposed from above...We believe Hillel International's
deviation from these principles alienates members of our community and
strays from Jewish tradition." Among those signing this statement were
former Wesleyan Jewish Renaissance Fellows Danny Blinderman, Becca
Caspar-Johnson, Sydney Lewis and Hannah Plum.
Resignation From Hillel
In Florida, in March, Rabbi Bruce Worshal, writing in the FLORIDA
SUN-SENTINEL/JEWISH JOURNAL, announced his resignation from an
honorary Hillel board to protest the bar on free speech. He declared:
"It is with a heavy heart that I write this column. I have long been a
supporter of the Hillel movement on college campuses...I also played a
significant role in obtaining funding for the Hillel building on the
Florida Atlantic University campus. I have served on the board of
directors of my local Hillel of Broward and Palm Beach...I am publicly
declaring that I am getting off the Hillel bandwagon."
Rabbi Worshal noted that, "Hillel is no longer the Hillel of yester
years. In 2010 the national Hillel issued guidelines as to what is
permissible dialogue at Hillel...This has essentially banned all
liberal Jews who love Israel but disagree with the current Netanyahu
government from Hillel involvement...I refuse to let my Zionism
dominate my Judaism. The love of Israel is only part of Judaism. The
Zionist movement is only 150 years old; Israel is only 65 years old.
Judaism has existed for thousands of years without both.
Unfortunately, for too many years, American Jewry has made Israel the
major part of its Judaism. It's a part, but not the major part."
Voices of dissent within the Jewish community are increasingly vocal.
In his book, "Breakthrough: Transforming Fear Into Compassion," a
former militant Zionist, Rich Forer, writes that, "Zionism, in its
current manifestation, is out of control....It is the ideological
force that enables the stealing of another people's land and enslaving
them in a virtual prison...Israel does not represent Judaism or
traditional Jewish values. Its Zionist foundation distorts the very
essence of Judaism...The dynamic of the victim mutating into the
victimizer has been a frequent feature of conflict throughout history.
After the trauma of their European experience, it is a tragic irony
that the Jewish people did not guard against this paradigm, that their
leaders would become committed to safeguarding their people's future
through a movement that required the subjugation of another people."
Reverence For Human Life
Forer expresses the hope that, "One day...Jews will realize that
Judaism's most sacred tenets extol reverence for human life more than
an emotional attachment to land, no matter how holy they believe that
land to be." He cites Rabbi Schlomo Yitchaki, better known by the
acronym Rashi, the most famous biblical commentator of the Middle
Ages, who taught: "Where the Torah tells about the creation of the
first human being...the earth from which Adam was formed was not taken
from one spot but from various parts of the globe. Thus, human dignity
does not depend on the place of one's birth nor is it limited to one
region."
Anna Baltzer, author of "Witness in Palestine: A Jewish American Woman
In The Occupation," grew up in a secular, unaffiliated Jewish
household. She recalls that, "I knew where my allegiance lay. I saw
Israel as a victimized country that simply wanted to live in peace but
couldn't because of its aggressive, Jew-hating Arab neighbors...I
first confronted an alternative narrative while traveling through the
Middle East. I was taken in by families of Palestinian refugees, who
told me their stories, They recounted tales of displacement, destroyed
villages, land confiscation, imprisonment without trial and torture.
When I first heard these accusations, I didn't want to believe them.
In fact, at first I didn't...I set out to do some research to prove
them wrong and quickly realized how little I actually knew about the
situation."
What she discovered, notes Baltzer, "shocked me beyond anything I had
read or heard. I witnessed a system of complete segregation. There was
one kind of road for Jews living in the West Bank and another for
Palestinians. I saw Jewish Israelis paid to leave Israel and move to
the West Bank, pushing off my Muslim and Christian neighbors simply
because of their ethnicity and religion. I visited a Palestinian
village that had been intentionally covered in raw sewage, forcing
inhabitants to leave and clearing the surrounding area for subsequent
Jewish-only settlement...The human rights violations I witnessed in
Israel/Palestine are profoundly contrary to the basic tenets of
Judaism. There is nothing Jewish about occupation and discrimination,
and there's nothing anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic about recognizing and
examining these practices; in fact, it's in line with a Jewish
tradition of social justice."
Passivity and Indifference
Poet and essayist Irina Klepfisz was one of the organizers of the
Jewish Women's Committee to End the Occupation of the West Bank and
Gaza. Her father, Michal Klepfisz, belonged to the Jewish Fighters
Organization in the Warsaw Ghetto. He was killed in 1943 while
protecting other Jewish fighters who were trying to escape during an
uprising against the Nazis. Explaining why she was driven to seek
justice for the Palestinians, Klepfisz said: "Knowing that the world
was passive and indifferent while six million Jews died, I have always
considered passivity and indifference the worst of evils. Those who do
nothing, I believe, are good German collaborators. I do not want to be
a collaborator."
In April, THE FORWARD asked its readers if the spending priorities of
American Jewish charities match those of American Jews. The paper
reported (April 18, 2014): "Judging by an informal but highly
revealing poll of Forward readers, the answer is no. As in NO. As in:
spend more money on education, culture and community, about the same
on general advocacy and much less on Israel. The Forward's poll grew
out of our groundbreaking series on the Jewish charitable network, in
which we analyzed newly released tax documents filed by 3,600
not-for-profit organizations to better understand an ecosystem with
assets of roughly $26 billion. The largest share of donor money
outside the federation system goes to organizations that focus on
Israel, with health care and social services second and education
third. But when we asked readers to register their choices...(they)
responded with a dramatically different list of priorities. Education
leaped to the top, while Israel dropped to fourth place."
A long time donor to Jewish causes who has chaired federation and
Israel Bond campaigns expresses concern about efforts to silence
critics of Israel within the Jewish community. Larry Gellman, in an
article headlined "A Donor Laments the Dwindling Size of the Tent"
(Forward, April 11, 2014) writes: "I am saddened and frustrated by the
recent decision of Federation and Hillel of Greater Philadelphia to
co-sponsor a divisive film screening that demonizes a fellow Jewish
group---in this case, J Street...The film 'The J Street Challenge,' is
nothing more than a lengthy political advertisement, featuring
testimony from like-minded right-wing pundits, and funded by
well-known J Street detractors who are trying to move from the fringe,
to defining the parameters of what can be discussed in our community."
Gellman points to the fact that, "Our community has a vibrant
diversity of opinion, and we should embrace that...If we disagree
about the proper course for Israel to take, we should debate those
differences openly instead of slinging mud...As a person who has
worked so hard and invested so much in building our Jewish
communities, it saddens me profoundly to see so many of the very
organizations and people whom I believed shared common Jewish values
and a commitment to open respectful conversation suddenly behaving in
such destructive ways."
"Israel Right Or Wrong"
Those who have sought to enforce a code of "Israel, right or wrong"
within the American Jewish community appear to be in retreat, which
may be the cause of their increasingly desperate attempts to enforce a
standard of orthodoxy upon all discourse regarding Israel. They are
being challenged by those who believe that free speech and open
discussion is an important Jewish value. Many of those engaged in that
challenge may not be aware that Zionism---and the notion that Israel
is, somehow "central" to Judaism---is a somewhat recent phenomenon.
Historically, Zionism has been a minority view within Judaism, and is
likely to become a minority view in the future.
In 1841, at the dedication ceremony of Temple Beth Elohim in
Charleston, South Carolina, Rabbi Gustav Poznanski declared: "This
country is our Palestine, this city our Jerusalem, this house of God
our temple."
In 1885, under the leadership Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, the Union of
American Hebrew Congregations, meeting in Pittsburgh, issued a
statement of principles which declared: "We consider ourselves no
longer a nation, but a religious community, and therefore expect
neither a return to Palestine, nor a sacrificial worship under the
sons of Aaron, nor the restoration of any laws concerning the Jewish
state."
As one of the leading Jewish theologians and philosophers of the 20th
century, Abraham Joshua Heschel, said: "Judaism is not a religion of
space and does not worship the soil. So, too, the State of Israel is
not the climax of Jewish history, but a test of the integrity of the
Jewish people and the competence of Judaism"
American Council for Judaism
Since 1942, the American Council for Judaism has advanced the
philosophy that Judaism is a religion of universal values, not a
nationality, and has maintained that Americans of Jewish faith are
Americans by nationality and Jews by religion, just as other Americans
are Protestants, Catholics or Muslims. Current developments and trends
show us the prophetic vision of its founders.
Among the Council's founders was Rabbi Morris Lazaron of Baltimore. He
had been an early Zionist, captured by the romantic vision of the
movement. After visiting Nazi Germany and seeing the effects of its
nationalism, Lazaron became convinced that nationalism, a force
leading the world to destruction, could not serve as an instrument for
Jewish salvation. For Lazaron, the mixture of religion and state
spelled disaster.
Judah Magnes, chancellor of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, wrote
a letter endorsing the Council's statement of principles: "It is true
that Jewish nationalism tends to confuse people not because it is
secular and not religious, but because this nationalism is unhappily
chauvinistic and narrow and terroristic in the best style of Eastern
European nationalism."
Challenging The Zionist Consensus
The intolerance of the organized Jewish community was reaffirmed in
April when the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations voted to deny membership to J Street, the dovish
lobbying group which has been critical of some Israeli policies. THE
NEW YORK TIMES (May 1, 2014) noted that, "A poll conducted last year
by the Pew Research Center found that a plurality of American Jews did
not believe the Israeli government was making a sincere effort to
reach a peace settlement....The president of J Street, Jeremy Ben-Ami,
said the vote sent a 'terrible message' to those who have concerns
about aspects of Israeli policy...'It sends the worst possible signal
to young Jews who want to be connected to the Jewish community, but
also want to have freedom of thought and expression.'"
Recently, the number of Jewish voices challenging the Zionist
consensus which has emerged in organized American Jewish life is
growing. There is a new understanding that the idolatry of the state
of Israel has led to the distortion of a rich religious heritage. The
founders of Reform Judaism, in particular, rejected the notion of a
God confined to a particular "holy" land, embracing instead a
universal God, the Father of all men, and a religion of universal
values as relevant in New York, London or Paris as in Jerusalem.
Universal Faith
The Prophets preached a universal faith of ethical values for men and
women of every race and nation. Narrow nationalism, in recent years,
has corrupted this humane Jewish tradition. Today, more and more
American Jews are seeking to return to that tradition, a vindication
of the vision of those who have worked so hard to keep that philosophy
alive. The Zionist moment in American Jewish life seems to have
passed, although its retreat will be divisive and its assault upon
those who challenge its premises will be harsh. That, after all, is
how movements in retreat traditionally conduct themselves.
-------------------------
Allan C. Brownfeld is a nationally syndicated columnist and serves as
Associate Editor of The Lincoln Review and Editor of Issues. The
author of five books, he has served on the staff of the U.S. Senate,
House of Representatives and the Office of the Vice President.
http://www.salem-news.com/articles/may012014/zionist-corruption-ab.php
May 2 2014
Resistance Growing To Zionism's Corrupting Influence
Allan C. Brownfeld Salem-News.com
Narrow nationalism, in recent years, has corrupted this humane Jewish tradition
(WASHINGTON DC) - Zionism, the philosophy of Jewish nationalism which
believes that Israel is the "homeland" of all Jews and that those
living outside of Israel are in "exile," has distorted American Jewish
life and is driving large numbers of young people away from what is
becoming an increasingly intolerant community.
Many synagogues fly Israeli flags and have replaced God with Israel as
the virtual object of worship, a practice akin to the idolatry
practiced in the worship of the Golden Calf. In 1999, the Union for
Reform Judaism adopted a resolution declaring that Israel, not God,
"is central to our religion." Emigration to Israel---"aliyah"---was
encouraged as the highest form of religious expression.
Sadly, the organized Jewish community has turned itself, in effect,
into a defense attorney for Israel, defending actions by the Israeli
government which are vigorously opposed at home. When it comes to
separation of church and state, Jewish groups have led legal battles
even against voluntary, non-sectarian school prayer. Yet, in Israel,
they embrace a society with no separation of church and state, one
which is, in real terms, a theocracy. Non-Orthodox Jews have fewer
rights in Israel than any place in the Western world. Non-Orthodox
rabbis cannot perform weddings or funerals in Israel, and their
conversions are not recognized.
Religious Freedom
Do these Jewish groups really believe in religious freedom in the U.S.
as a matter of principle----or do they take this position as a
minority defending its self-interest? When Thomas Jefferson and James
Madison promoted the Virginia Declaration of Religious Freedom, their
advocacy was based on their belief in religious freedom as an
essential element of a free society. Jefferson and Madison were part
of a protected majority---but opposed a state-supported church of any
kind. The same cannot be said for American Jewish defenders of
Israel's theocracy.
Defending whatever a sovereign state does is hardly the expression of
a religious worldview, hardly the Judaism of the prophets, who called
for justice for men and women of every race and nation. What was the
Anti-Defamation League thinking when it opposed a congressional
resolution commemorating the Armenian genocide? Turkey, as it turns
out, was then an ally of Israel, and would have been offended by such
a resolution. The ADL's concern was with Israel-Turkish relations, not
with the victimized Armenians. And how does the ADL explain its
opposition to the construction of a mosque in New York City. Surely
something other than a commitment to religious freedom was on its
agenda.
The Israel which American Jewish groups defend---whatever the
issue----may be far different than the one many American Jews
envision. NEW YORK TIMES columnist Thomas Friedman (April 16, 2014)
writes: "We're not dealing anymore with your grandfather's Israel, and
they're not dealing with your grandmother's America either. Time
matters, and the near half-century since the 1967 war has changed both
of us in ways neither wants to acknowledge."
More Religious Society
Israel, Friedman points out, "has become a more religious society---on
Friday nights in Jerusalem now you barely see a car moving on the
streets in Jewish neighborhoods, which only used to be the case on Yom
Kippur---and the settlers are clearly more brazen...there are a
growing core who are armed zealots, who will fight the IDF if it tries
to remove them. You did not go to summer camp with these Jews. You did
not meet them at your local Reform synagogue. This is a hard
core...There are now about 350,000 Jews living in the West Bank. It
took 50,000 Israeli police to remove 8,000 settlers from Gaza , who
barely resisted. I fear the lift in the West Bank to make peace there
is now just too heavy for conventional politics and diplomacy."
With regard to Secretary of State John Kerry's efforts to mediate a
peace settlement, Friedman is not optimistic: "The truth is Kerry's
mission is less an act of strategy and more an act of deep friendship.
It is America trying to save Israel from trends that will inevitably
undermine it as a Jewish and democratic state. But Kerry is the last
of an old guard. Those in the Obama administration who think he is on
a suicide mission reflect the new U.S. attitude toward the region. And
those in Israel who denounce him as a nuisance reflect the new Israel.
Kerry, in my view, is doing the Lord's work. But the weight of time
and all the changes it has wrought on the ground may just be too heavy
for such an act of friendship. If he folds his tent, though, Israelis
and Palestinians will deeply regret it, and soon."
An article in THE NEW YORK TIMES (April 13,2014) asked the question,
"Are Iran and Israel Trading Places?" The authors, Israel
Waismel-Manor, a senior lecturer at the University of Haifa, and Abbas
Milani, who heads the Iranian studies program at Stanford, note that
while Islamic extremists appear to be in retreat in Iran, religious
extremism in Israel is on the ascent.
They write: "As the winds of change blow across Iran, secular
democrats in Israel have been losing ground to religious and
right-wing extremists who feel comfortable openly attacking the United
States, Israel's strongest ally. In recent months, Israel's defense
minister, Moshe Yaalon called Secretary of State John Kerry 'obsessive
and messianic,' while Naftali Bennett, Israel's economy minister,
labeled Mr. Kerry a 'mouthpiece' for anti-Semitic elements attempting
to boycott Israel. Israel's secular democrats are growing increasingly
worried that Israel's future may bear an uncomfortable resemblance to
Iran's recent past."
Shift Toward Orthodoxy
The authors believe that, "Israel's shift toward orthodoxy is not
merely a religious one. Since the vast majority of Orthodox Jews are
also against any agreement with the Palestinians, with each passing
day, the chances of reaching a peace deal diminish. Nor is time on the
side of those who want to keep seeing a democratic Israel. If Israel
continues the expansion of settlements, and peace talks serve no
purpose but the extension of the status quo, the real existential
threat to Israel will not be Iran's nuclear program but rather a
surging tide of economic sanctions...One of Israel's most popular
singers, the Iranian-born Rita Jahanforuz, laments on her recent
album, 'In this world, I am alone and abandoned, like wild grass in
the middle of the desert.' If Iran's moderates fail to push the
country toward reform, and if secular Israelis can't halt the
country's drift from democracy to theocracy, both Iranians and
Israelis will increasingly find themselves fulfilling her sad
prophecy."
In Israel, racism and religious intolerance are growing---with targets
ranging from Palestinian Muslims and Christians to Africans seeking
political asylum to Bedouin tribesmen to non-Orthodox Jews. In
response, American Jewish organizations have been silent.
Israeli Jews who are concerned about their country's escalating
intolerance have expressed dismay with this silence on the part of
their American counterparts. Daniel Blatman, a history professor at
Hebrew University in Jerusalem, wrote an article in HA'ARETZ (March 7,
2014) headlined, "If I were an American Jew, I'd Worry About Israel's
Racist Cancer." The article's subhead read, "Amid the awareness that
Israel is sliding toward an apartheid regime, the silence of Jews
worldwide is deafening."
In Blatman's view, it is not "the Iranian threat that endangers
Israel's survival, it's the moral and ethical collapse of its
society...The racist cancer after 47 years of occupation and
domination of another people has spread deep into Israeli
society...World Jewry must help Israel be cured of it. It must speak
out and act...and cooperate with the shrinking groups of Israelis who
have not yet lost hope that it's possible to stop this downside toward
the abyss."
"The King's Torah"
Consider the reality of contemporary Israel, which American Jewish
groups completely ignore. The year 2009 saw the publication of Torat
Ha'Melech ("The King's Torah"), which the Israeli newspaper MA'ARIV
described as "230 pages on the laws concerning the killing of
non-Jews, a kind of guidebook for anyone who ponders the question of
when it is permissible to take the life of a non-Jew."
According to the authors, Rabbis Yitzhak Shapira and Yosef Elitzur,
non-Jews are "uncompassionate by nature" and may have to be killed in
order to "curb their evil inclinations."
The commandment "Thou shalt not kill," the rabbis argue, refers only
to killing other Jews. In their opinion, "There is justification for
killing babies if it is clear they will grow up to harm us, and in
such a situation may be harmed deliberately and not only during combat
with adults."
Torat Ha'Melech was written as a guide for Israeli soldiers and army
officers seeking rabbinical guidance on the rules of engagement.
According to the authors, all enemy civilians---including women and
children---can be killed. The rabbis also justify the murder of Jewish
dissidents, a philosophy which emerged from the settlement of Yitzhar
in the occupied West Bank, where Shapira helps lead Od Yosef Chai
yeshiva.
Shapira studied under Rabbi Yitzchok Ginsburgh, who defended seven of
his students who murdered an innocent Palestinian girl by asserting
the superiority of "Jewish blood." In 1994, when the American-born
Jewish extremist Baruch Goldstein massacred 29 Palestinian worshippers
at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Ginsburgh lionized Goldstein
in a lengthy article entitled "Baruch Hagever" ("Baruch, The Great
Man").
Funds From Israeli Government
These views are not those of just a few extremists. Instead, Od Yosef
Chai has received funds from both the Israeli Ministry of Education,
as well as from a U.S. tax-exempt group called the Central Fund for
Israel.
Extremist rabbis, it seems, are part of Israel's religious
establishment. Dov Lior, the chief rabbi of Hebron, for example, has
achieved considerable influence inside the military. In 2008, when the
Israeli army's chief rabbi, Brig. Gen. Avichai Ronski, brought a group
of military intelligence officers to Hebron for a special tour, he
concluded the day with a private meeting with Lior, who presented his
views on modern warfare, which includes collective punishment of
Palestinians. Ronski himself has overseen the distribution of
extremist tracts to soldiers, including "Baruch Hagever," and a
pamphlet stating, "When you show mercy to a cruel enemy, you are being
cruel to pure and honest soldiers."
Ovadiah Yosef, the Shas party spiritual leader and Israeli chief
rabbi, declared, "It is forbidden to be merciful to Arabs. You must
send missiles to them and annihilate them. They are evil and
damnable."
There is much turmoil in contemporary Israel as the state plans to
remove Bedouin from their traditional lands, continues to build
settlements in the occupied territories and confronts black African
asylum seekers, largely from Eritrea and Sudan, who had heard that
there was a Jewish state across the Sinai peninsula that claimed to
embrace the lessons of the Holocaust. One of those lessons was that
you don't turn away refugees when they might be slaughtered when they
return home.
55,000 Asylum Seekers
Today, there are 55,000 asylum-seekers in Israel. Knowing how bad
deporting them all would look, Israel instead is "inviting" them to
Holot, a desert facility built to "concentrate" refugees claiming
status in Israel. At anti-refugee rallies, right-wing politicians have
called them a "cancer" who threaten "the white man's country." Since
last December, Israel has ordered more than 3,000 asylum-seekers, all
of whom have resided in the country for more than four years, to
report to Holot.
Because it is not described as a prison, regular rules involving
trials, judges and juries do not apply. According to Allison Deger's
report in MONDOWEISS (March 28, 2014), however, "The facility is a
wasteland encircled in a trench of sun-dried sewage, off a dirt road
where the only nearby structures are another prison, an army base and
a crumbling abandoned gas station...Africans are allowed to leave the
jail---comprised of small temporary structures made from shipping
containers, resembling trailer-offices on construction sites---for a
few hours. Still, the inmates must check in with guards three times a
day and are locked in at night."
American Jewish groups in the forefront of promoting immigration
reform in the U.S. have been silent. As journalist David Sheen, a
Canadian living in Israel whose stay there has led to his
disillusionment with Zionism, points out, "In all of 2013...the
Anti-Defamation League did not have one word to say about Israel's war
on African refugees. It wasn't just ADL---it was every single Jewish
American mainstream group across the board. None of them had anything
to say in criticism of the Israeli government as it moved to kick out
all African asylum-seekers. And it's so ironic because here in the
U.S., these mainstream Jewish groups, there's wall-to-wall support for
immigration reform."
Ignoring Plight of Palestinians
Peter Beinart, a liberal Zionist who is concerned about American Jews
ignoring the plight of Israel's non-Jewish population, notes that,
"Groups like AIPAC and the Presidents' Conference patrol public
discourse, scolding people who contradict their vision of Israel. Not
only does the organized American Jewish community mostly avoid public
criticism of the Israeli government, it tries to prevent others from
leveling such criticism as well."
But if the organized Jewish community persists in its defense
attorney-like relationship with Israel, more and more American Jews
are disassociating themselves from that posture.
In its religion column by Mark Oppenheimer, THE NEW YORK TIMES (Feb.
14, 2014) highlights a group of men and women it describes as "devoted
to Jewish observance, but at odds with Israel."
In the case of Charles H. Manekin, an Orthodox Jew who is philosophy
professor at the University of Maryland, Oppenheimer finds one who
"believes that his Orthodox faith calls him to take stands against
Israel. Prof. Manekin, 61, became Orthodox in college and became an
Israeli citizen in the 1980s. Yet...he denounced Israel's occupation
of the West Bank. Although not a member of the American Studies
Association, he was pleased when the group voted in December not to
collaborate with Israeli academic institutions...'As a religious Jew,'
he said, 'I am especially disturbed by the daily injustices
perpetrated against the Palestinians."
"They Are Human Too"
Another person featured is Stefan Krieger, who teaches law at Hofstra
University. He refrains from work on the Sabbath, keeps kosher, and
studies pages of the Talmud every day. When it comes to Israel, he
recalls that, "My parents were very sensitive to the issue of
Palestinians. My mom had a book called 'They Are Human Too,' and my
memory is she would take it off the bookshelf, as if this was some
sort of scandalous tract she was showing me, and show me pictures of
Palestinians in refugee camps...I think nationalism and religion
together are toxic."
Daniel Boyarin, who teaches Talmud at the University of California,
Berkeley, attended Orthodox synagogues for 30 years. He believes that
Zionism was always flawed: "The very concept of a state defined as
being for one people was deeply problematic and inevitably going to
lead to a moral and political disaster. Which I think it has."
Corey Robin, who teaches political science at Brooklyn College and is
a regular at a Conservative synagogue, says that, "There are lots of
ways to be Jewish, but worshiping a heavily militarized state seems
like a bit of a comedown from our past. I love being Jewish. I just
don't love the state of Israel."
Skepticism Toward Zionism
Columnist Mark Oppenheimer points out that, "Skepticism toward Zionism
used to be common. Before World War II, Reform Jews tended to believe
that they had found a home in the United States, and that Zionism
could be seen as a form of dual loyalty. Orthodox Jews generally
believed, theologically, that a state of Israel would have to wait for
the Messiah's arrival (a view some ultra-Orthodox Jews still hold). In
the 1930s and 40s, the persecution of European Jews turned many
American Jews into Zionists...'When Hillel was founded, it took a
clear non-Zionist position,' said Noam Planko, who teaches Jewish
history at the University of Washington. 'What you see is a shift in
the American spectrum: from non-Zionism with a few Zionists, to a
situation, by the 1960s, where the assumption is that any American
Jewish organization is also going to be clearly Zionist."
As the 21st century proceeds, Oppenheimer believes, that assumption is
more and more open to question. In the case of Hillel Foundations on
college campuses, censorship of views critical of Israel has led to an
open rebellion. Hillel CEO Eric Fingerhut declares that,
"Anti-Zionists will not be permitted to speak using the Hillel name or
under the Hillel roof, under any circumstances." Mr. Fingerhut seems
unaware of the long history of Jewish opposition to Zionism and seems
not to understand that Hillel was established to promote Judaism---not
Zionism.
Early in 2013, the Progressive Student Alliance at Harvard University
launched an effort, Open Hillel, to challenge Hillel's guidelines.
It's petition was signed by more than 800 Jewish students from diverse
perspectives. In December, Swarthmore College Hillel declared itself
to be the first "Open Hillel"---that is, the first Hillel to reject
the guidelines established by Hillel International concerning
discussions about Israel. These guidelines, students at Swarthmore
asserted in a resolution passed Dec. 8, 2013, present a "monolithic
face pertaining to Zionism" and "stifle healthy debate."
Burg Barred At Harvard
Even Israeli speakers who are critical of that government's policies
have been barred from Hillel. At Harvard, in November 2013, Avraham
Burg, former speaker of Israel's Knesset and now a sharp critic of its
occupation policies, spoke in an undergraduate dormitory after being
barred from speaking at Harvard Hillel. "It's such a shame that
Harvard Hillel would not allow an open discussion about Israel to take
place within its walls," said Sandra Korn, who helped organize the
talk. "Hillel should be a space for students to engage with Jewish
issues regardless of religious or political beliefs."
Jewish Community leaders at Wesleyan University issued a statement on
April 2, 2014 standing with the Open Hillel movement. Hillel's
policies of censoring dissenting views, they declared, "have resulted
in barring speakers from groups such as Breaking the Silence and the
Israeli Knesset from speaking at Hillels and has resulted in Jewish
Voice for Peace and other Jewish organizations not being welcome under
the Hillel umbrella...At Wesleyan, values of inclusion are central to
our identity both as Jews and as participants in the larger Wesleyan
community..In Hillel's guidelines, Jewish plurality gives way to
Zionist unanimity, and we are acutely aware that many individuals have
formed robust, meaningful Jewish identities that do not comport with
traditional Zionist ideas."
The students argue that efforts at censorship violate basic Jewish
values: "We believe that dialogue and critical engagement are central
Jewish values. Our community is founded on texts that are meant to be
interpreted, argued over, and debated endlessly... Hillel draws its
name from the great rabbinical sage who believed that all should be
able to learn, and that discourse should be free and unbound by
guidelines imposed from above...We believe Hillel International's
deviation from these principles alienates members of our community and
strays from Jewish tradition." Among those signing this statement were
former Wesleyan Jewish Renaissance Fellows Danny Blinderman, Becca
Caspar-Johnson, Sydney Lewis and Hannah Plum.
Resignation From Hillel
In Florida, in March, Rabbi Bruce Worshal, writing in the FLORIDA
SUN-SENTINEL/JEWISH JOURNAL, announced his resignation from an
honorary Hillel board to protest the bar on free speech. He declared:
"It is with a heavy heart that I write this column. I have long been a
supporter of the Hillel movement on college campuses...I also played a
significant role in obtaining funding for the Hillel building on the
Florida Atlantic University campus. I have served on the board of
directors of my local Hillel of Broward and Palm Beach...I am publicly
declaring that I am getting off the Hillel bandwagon."
Rabbi Worshal noted that, "Hillel is no longer the Hillel of yester
years. In 2010 the national Hillel issued guidelines as to what is
permissible dialogue at Hillel...This has essentially banned all
liberal Jews who love Israel but disagree with the current Netanyahu
government from Hillel involvement...I refuse to let my Zionism
dominate my Judaism. The love of Israel is only part of Judaism. The
Zionist movement is only 150 years old; Israel is only 65 years old.
Judaism has existed for thousands of years without both.
Unfortunately, for too many years, American Jewry has made Israel the
major part of its Judaism. It's a part, but not the major part."
Voices of dissent within the Jewish community are increasingly vocal.
In his book, "Breakthrough: Transforming Fear Into Compassion," a
former militant Zionist, Rich Forer, writes that, "Zionism, in its
current manifestation, is out of control....It is the ideological
force that enables the stealing of another people's land and enslaving
them in a virtual prison...Israel does not represent Judaism or
traditional Jewish values. Its Zionist foundation distorts the very
essence of Judaism...The dynamic of the victim mutating into the
victimizer has been a frequent feature of conflict throughout history.
After the trauma of their European experience, it is a tragic irony
that the Jewish people did not guard against this paradigm, that their
leaders would become committed to safeguarding their people's future
through a movement that required the subjugation of another people."
Reverence For Human Life
Forer expresses the hope that, "One day...Jews will realize that
Judaism's most sacred tenets extol reverence for human life more than
an emotional attachment to land, no matter how holy they believe that
land to be." He cites Rabbi Schlomo Yitchaki, better known by the
acronym Rashi, the most famous biblical commentator of the Middle
Ages, who taught: "Where the Torah tells about the creation of the
first human being...the earth from which Adam was formed was not taken
from one spot but from various parts of the globe. Thus, human dignity
does not depend on the place of one's birth nor is it limited to one
region."
Anna Baltzer, author of "Witness in Palestine: A Jewish American Woman
In The Occupation," grew up in a secular, unaffiliated Jewish
household. She recalls that, "I knew where my allegiance lay. I saw
Israel as a victimized country that simply wanted to live in peace but
couldn't because of its aggressive, Jew-hating Arab neighbors...I
first confronted an alternative narrative while traveling through the
Middle East. I was taken in by families of Palestinian refugees, who
told me their stories, They recounted tales of displacement, destroyed
villages, land confiscation, imprisonment without trial and torture.
When I first heard these accusations, I didn't want to believe them.
In fact, at first I didn't...I set out to do some research to prove
them wrong and quickly realized how little I actually knew about the
situation."
What she discovered, notes Baltzer, "shocked me beyond anything I had
read or heard. I witnessed a system of complete segregation. There was
one kind of road for Jews living in the West Bank and another for
Palestinians. I saw Jewish Israelis paid to leave Israel and move to
the West Bank, pushing off my Muslim and Christian neighbors simply
because of their ethnicity and religion. I visited a Palestinian
village that had been intentionally covered in raw sewage, forcing
inhabitants to leave and clearing the surrounding area for subsequent
Jewish-only settlement...The human rights violations I witnessed in
Israel/Palestine are profoundly contrary to the basic tenets of
Judaism. There is nothing Jewish about occupation and discrimination,
and there's nothing anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic about recognizing and
examining these practices; in fact, it's in line with a Jewish
tradition of social justice."
Passivity and Indifference
Poet and essayist Irina Klepfisz was one of the organizers of the
Jewish Women's Committee to End the Occupation of the West Bank and
Gaza. Her father, Michal Klepfisz, belonged to the Jewish Fighters
Organization in the Warsaw Ghetto. He was killed in 1943 while
protecting other Jewish fighters who were trying to escape during an
uprising against the Nazis. Explaining why she was driven to seek
justice for the Palestinians, Klepfisz said: "Knowing that the world
was passive and indifferent while six million Jews died, I have always
considered passivity and indifference the worst of evils. Those who do
nothing, I believe, are good German collaborators. I do not want to be
a collaborator."
In April, THE FORWARD asked its readers if the spending priorities of
American Jewish charities match those of American Jews. The paper
reported (April 18, 2014): "Judging by an informal but highly
revealing poll of Forward readers, the answer is no. As in NO. As in:
spend more money on education, culture and community, about the same
on general advocacy and much less on Israel. The Forward's poll grew
out of our groundbreaking series on the Jewish charitable network, in
which we analyzed newly released tax documents filed by 3,600
not-for-profit organizations to better understand an ecosystem with
assets of roughly $26 billion. The largest share of donor money
outside the federation system goes to organizations that focus on
Israel, with health care and social services second and education
third. But when we asked readers to register their choices...(they)
responded with a dramatically different list of priorities. Education
leaped to the top, while Israel dropped to fourth place."
A long time donor to Jewish causes who has chaired federation and
Israel Bond campaigns expresses concern about efforts to silence
critics of Israel within the Jewish community. Larry Gellman, in an
article headlined "A Donor Laments the Dwindling Size of the Tent"
(Forward, April 11, 2014) writes: "I am saddened and frustrated by the
recent decision of Federation and Hillel of Greater Philadelphia to
co-sponsor a divisive film screening that demonizes a fellow Jewish
group---in this case, J Street...The film 'The J Street Challenge,' is
nothing more than a lengthy political advertisement, featuring
testimony from like-minded right-wing pundits, and funded by
well-known J Street detractors who are trying to move from the fringe,
to defining the parameters of what can be discussed in our community."
Gellman points to the fact that, "Our community has a vibrant
diversity of opinion, and we should embrace that...If we disagree
about the proper course for Israel to take, we should debate those
differences openly instead of slinging mud...As a person who has
worked so hard and invested so much in building our Jewish
communities, it saddens me profoundly to see so many of the very
organizations and people whom I believed shared common Jewish values
and a commitment to open respectful conversation suddenly behaving in
such destructive ways."
"Israel Right Or Wrong"
Those who have sought to enforce a code of "Israel, right or wrong"
within the American Jewish community appear to be in retreat, which
may be the cause of their increasingly desperate attempts to enforce a
standard of orthodoxy upon all discourse regarding Israel. They are
being challenged by those who believe that free speech and open
discussion is an important Jewish value. Many of those engaged in that
challenge may not be aware that Zionism---and the notion that Israel
is, somehow "central" to Judaism---is a somewhat recent phenomenon.
Historically, Zionism has been a minority view within Judaism, and is
likely to become a minority view in the future.
In 1841, at the dedication ceremony of Temple Beth Elohim in
Charleston, South Carolina, Rabbi Gustav Poznanski declared: "This
country is our Palestine, this city our Jerusalem, this house of God
our temple."
In 1885, under the leadership Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, the Union of
American Hebrew Congregations, meeting in Pittsburgh, issued a
statement of principles which declared: "We consider ourselves no
longer a nation, but a religious community, and therefore expect
neither a return to Palestine, nor a sacrificial worship under the
sons of Aaron, nor the restoration of any laws concerning the Jewish
state."
As one of the leading Jewish theologians and philosophers of the 20th
century, Abraham Joshua Heschel, said: "Judaism is not a religion of
space and does not worship the soil. So, too, the State of Israel is
not the climax of Jewish history, but a test of the integrity of the
Jewish people and the competence of Judaism"
American Council for Judaism
Since 1942, the American Council for Judaism has advanced the
philosophy that Judaism is a religion of universal values, not a
nationality, and has maintained that Americans of Jewish faith are
Americans by nationality and Jews by religion, just as other Americans
are Protestants, Catholics or Muslims. Current developments and trends
show us the prophetic vision of its founders.
Among the Council's founders was Rabbi Morris Lazaron of Baltimore. He
had been an early Zionist, captured by the romantic vision of the
movement. After visiting Nazi Germany and seeing the effects of its
nationalism, Lazaron became convinced that nationalism, a force
leading the world to destruction, could not serve as an instrument for
Jewish salvation. For Lazaron, the mixture of religion and state
spelled disaster.
Judah Magnes, chancellor of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, wrote
a letter endorsing the Council's statement of principles: "It is true
that Jewish nationalism tends to confuse people not because it is
secular and not religious, but because this nationalism is unhappily
chauvinistic and narrow and terroristic in the best style of Eastern
European nationalism."
Challenging The Zionist Consensus
The intolerance of the organized Jewish community was reaffirmed in
April when the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish
Organizations voted to deny membership to J Street, the dovish
lobbying group which has been critical of some Israeli policies. THE
NEW YORK TIMES (May 1, 2014) noted that, "A poll conducted last year
by the Pew Research Center found that a plurality of American Jews did
not believe the Israeli government was making a sincere effort to
reach a peace settlement....The president of J Street, Jeremy Ben-Ami,
said the vote sent a 'terrible message' to those who have concerns
about aspects of Israeli policy...'It sends the worst possible signal
to young Jews who want to be connected to the Jewish community, but
also want to have freedom of thought and expression.'"
Recently, the number of Jewish voices challenging the Zionist
consensus which has emerged in organized American Jewish life is
growing. There is a new understanding that the idolatry of the state
of Israel has led to the distortion of a rich religious heritage. The
founders of Reform Judaism, in particular, rejected the notion of a
God confined to a particular "holy" land, embracing instead a
universal God, the Father of all men, and a religion of universal
values as relevant in New York, London or Paris as in Jerusalem.
Universal Faith
The Prophets preached a universal faith of ethical values for men and
women of every race and nation. Narrow nationalism, in recent years,
has corrupted this humane Jewish tradition. Today, more and more
American Jews are seeking to return to that tradition, a vindication
of the vision of those who have worked so hard to keep that philosophy
alive. The Zionist moment in American Jewish life seems to have
passed, although its retreat will be divisive and its assault upon
those who challenge its premises will be harsh. That, after all, is
how movements in retreat traditionally conduct themselves.
-------------------------
Allan C. Brownfeld is a nationally syndicated columnist and serves as
Associate Editor of The Lincoln Review and Editor of Issues. The
author of five books, he has served on the staff of the U.S. Senate,
House of Representatives and the Office of the Vice President.
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