Protest in Israel
As the tide of public opinion turns, Israel is in the midst of a reputational catastrophe. Day by day, the criticism grows, and the slippage is noticeable in every sphere. I expect to see it in the left-leaning press and what used to be called the Democratic Squad, but when Amy Klobuchar hints that the situation in Gaza is intolerable, we have crossed into a whole different universe of opinion. She has now allied herself with Bernie Sanders, arguing against the sale of offensive weapons to Israel. Senator Klobuchar is not some fire-breathing radical. She is the official Mom of the Democratic Party.
And things are about to get still more complicated. After a period of dithering and indecision, Europe will declare a Palestinian State this fall. That is arguably the right thing for the Palestinians, but it is also a marker of of Israel’s declining influence. It has held the line on this issue for decades, and the fact that France, Britain, and Germany (not to mention Canada) are about to say yes to Palestinian statehood is a sign that the age of deference is over.
That may also be true of American Jews. If you talk to an American Jew under 30, there is little support for the war in Gaza. The consensus is that Hamas has been defeated and what remains is the political calculation of Netanyahu. That has nothing to do with defeating an enemy and everything to do with forestalling investigations that would likely lead to the defeat of the Prime Minister.
And according to the New York Times this week, rabbis are emerging as primary actors. Not to put too fine a point on the matter, that also includes the so-called Modern Orthodox rabbinate, a phalanx of rabbis who are sensitive to politics and believe in the claims of morality and righteousness. They are not the core of American Orthodoxy, but an increasingly visible and influential cohort. The Times article quote Rabbi Yosef Blau, former head of Yeshiva University, who was pointedly critical of the Israeli government: “The responsibility and the lack of concern that Hamas has for the health and welfare of its own people does not free Israel from having responsibility for the destruction that it has caused.”
But I would caution all of us to be careful with our language. We are not really talking about Israel in these conversations, but the government of a state that is being badly led. On Saturday evening, August 23, half a million Israelis were in the center of Tel Aviv loudly protesting the behavior of their leaders. That’s the equivalent of seventeen million Americans at a single protest. A week before that, Israeli fighter pilots stood together to condemn the government and call on their military colleagues to change course in Gaza.
All of them demanded negotiations for the hostages and many of them were there to protest the war against civilians. Few of them believe in population transfer and none of them support settler violence against Palestinians. To say that Israel is engaged in a criminal enterprise ignores the fact that the nation is split, with committed protestors who detest this government and have sought to distance themselves from Netanyahu and his cronies. That is the sign of a healthy nation, not a corrupted populace beyond redemption. No, I will not support BDS and its demands to cancel Israel like some viral outbreak.
But I still believe that things are changing. Fewer Jews in America and elsewhere in the world will define themselves by their loyalty to the State of Israel. They will assert a new version of Jewish identity that is marked by a liberal commitment to social justice and the celebratory opportunities of Jewish tradition. Israel will no longer function as a proxy identity which offsets the self-perception of weakness with military strength. That was the default of Jewish life from 1948 forward. I don’t think that idea has the same meaning in our time.