Earlier this year, my radar went up when I read Jo Ellen Green Kaiser's article "Charting Israel's Role in Progressive Jewish Identity" @ ZEEK: A Jewish Journal of Thought and Culture. An off-shoot of the socialist Forward, I knew to expect a left-wing bias going into the relatively new venture, something I have no problem with as long as it is stated outright. (Whereas delivering your own version of truth while claiming to be unbiased is, quite frankly, the bull of a media era gone by, IMHO.) What shocked me about this article was not the fact that it was written from a leftist standpoint, but what the author actually articulated to be, in their own words, the proper "progressive" point of view, namely that Israel had no place in a "Progressive Jewish Identity."
If anything should shake a Jew to the core, it is the idea that Israel has no place in their identity.
Argued strictly semantically, the term "Jew" comes from the Hebrew Yehudah, referencing one of the 12 sons of Israel and one of the 12 territories in the nation of Israel, later known as the southern kingdom after the Israel-Judah split. After Roman occupation, the territory became known as "Judea" and the inhabitants as "Jews". The term has since taken on a series of negative connotations to the point where some Jewish people do not like even being called "Jews", instead preferring the term "Jewish".
Bottom line: Israel is not only a family name, it is a national name, whereas "Jewish" and its associated term "Jew" are terms created out of division and diaspora. Before there were Jews, there were Israelis. You cannot be Jewish without having an ancestral tie to Israel. Moreover, to try and distance yourself from such an identity is equivalent to giving yourself an identity grounded in oppression.
Green Kaiser argued that choosing a Jewish versus an Israeli identity was a choice that "disowned the concept of diaspora." How? Very simply put, the author argues that because aliyah is a viable option, "diaspora" doesn't exist. Instead of living in exile, Jews choose not to move to Israel. It is an argument as equally semantic as the one I reasoned above. In the mind of the author, in order for the diaspora not to exist, Israel must exist. Progressive Jews, then, intentionally choose not to become a part of Israel, but still need it as a safety blanket in order to make free choices about where to live in the world.
Somehow, I can't help but read into this argument a metaphor of a teenager who complains endlessly about their parents before asking them for 20 bucks and a ride to the movies. Most parents blow off the heat they take from their kids because they remember what it was like to be a teenager and to live through that awkward period where you don't know who you are or where you belong in the world.
That is the identity crisis I see going on in the Left. It is an identity crisis echoed by the author in ZEEK who wrote,
"Jewish Voice for Peace got it right when they yelled, 'Not in My Name.' They understood on a visceral level that U.S. Jewry and the values and actions of the Jewish State cannot be separated. When Israel acts, it acts in the name of the Jewish homeland. How can one be Jewish and not be named in that way? Israel defines the space against which U.S. Jews construct their own identity."This argument illustrates the two primary problems with the Left's viewpoint. Firstly, it assumes that all American Jews identify themselves in contrast to Israel, that is to say if we take the author's viewpoint, against Israel. Secondly, and more importantly, the author assumes we must naturally be opposed to the entire government, and therefore the entire national identity, of Israel if we disagree with one or some of its actions.
Truth be told very few, even on the Left, are that radical as to take an "all or nothing" approach to Israeli politics. Politics is a game of bargaining; no one should know that better than the party of Ben Gurion, who had his own struggles with the "radical periphery" of his Labor Zionist party. Unfortunately for the Left, the radical voices have captured the attention of the politicians and the media, leaving Labor with an entire generation to re-shape if they even hope to maintain any Zionist identity into the future.
There are those on the Left who are waking up to the reality of their wing's identity crisis. Last week Forward's Senior Columnist J.J. Goldberg wrote about rehabilitating Israel's "lost love" for Labor, a move that would require the abandonment of the grossly ineffective party chair Ehud Barak in favor of the pro-education, pro-integration MK Avishay Braverman. It has been argued that this would be a move back to the roots of a Labor Zionism that managed to be proudly Zionistic while granting Arab Israelis equal rights as citizens of the Jewish state. Oddly enough, the move would also require reliquishing the West Bank in the name of strategic defense; it is easier to defend a border militarily than try to run a police state with 3 million people who want to kill you. Arguments, all of which, sound a lot more logical, reasoned, and centrist than the cries of "foul" coming from organizations like Jewish Voice for Peace, flotilla activists, and "progressive" Rabbis who are turning synagogues into nothing more than minyanim for social justice.
A week later, the Forward published an article written by Ameinu President Kenneth Bob, in which he draws a line in the sand between his self-defined progressive organization and Jewish Voice for Peace's "agnostic" approach to the sovereign Jewish identity of Israel. Bob writes,
"That is what separates progressive Zionists from JVP. We cannot be “agnostic” about the most central issue in the conflict, the importance of a solution that includes two states for two peoples, Israel and Palestine. It is ludicrous to suggest that one can be involved in the Jewish communal discourse about the future of the Middle East without having an opinion on whether Israel should exist. In addition, JVP’s stated support for a complete suspension of American military aid to Israel just emphasizes the organization’s cavalier attitude toward Israel’s survival."Bob stands firm on his organization's two-state solution platform, encouraging the Jewish community to support "open and frank discussions around controversial issues related to Israel" but admits that, "unfortunately, our communal track record has not always been good in this regard." Bob's admonishment to progressive Zionists to distance themselves from anti-Zionists like JVP is a positive one that is long overdue and will, no doubt, receive its fair amount of criticism from those who think his organization's stance isn't Left enough. But it is an argument that needs to be made if Labor Zionism is going to survive on either side of the world.
Perhaps this long-overdue self-examination has been inspired by Peter Beinart who finally put voice to the Left's identity crisis when he published his "groundbreaking" essay "The Failure of the American Jewish Establishment" last May. My thoughts then are the same now: "What we need, on the whole, is a sense of communal self-actualization. ...[Jewish Americans] need to take purpose and meaning in their Jewishness as individuals by engaging with the community instead of running away from it."
Call them "progressive" or tag them by organizational names, there is a real segment of the Left wing that is running, fast and furious, from Israel. And, whether the Left likes it or not, many young Jews in Israel and abroad are following suit. If the Left wing cannot combat the dissention in their own ranks in this generation the next may know a Labor, but no Zionism will be attached.
In his well-written extensive critique titled "The Decline and Fall of Labor Zionism," former WJC leader Isi Leibler writes:
"The challenge for democratic socialists in Israel is to resurrect a party which has become a haven for defeatists, post-Zionists, former Marxists and other lost souls. ...There are strong grounds to believe that the majority of Labor supporters remain committed Zionists. Most would also probably agree that despite the noble intentions of the architects, the Oslo Accords were flawed because our designated peace partner, Arafat, sought our destruction rather than seeking a peace settlement. For this as well as other reasons, there are grounds for hope that in the wake of a massive electoral defeat the silent majority of Israeli social democrats will rally and try to revitalize Labor Zionism from within.My husband is a third generation alum of the Labor Zionist camp movement Habonim Dror. It is a movement his grandfather and great-grandfather helped to establish in America in the 1930's. In the book Arise and Build: The Story of American Habonim, the introduction to the movement magazine Haboneh is quoted:
If not, a new Labor Zionist party must be created to cater for those on the Left who recognize the need to renew the Labor Zionist tradition which played such a noble role in nation building and leading the Jewish state during its formative years."
"We as Habonim are part and parcel of the great Socialist Zionist movement which has borne the brunt of the burden for laying the foundation of a revived homeland. We, the Habonim, believe unshakingly that the homeland must be built, and we must build it. We do our share while yet in America, materially and spiritually; and soon many of us will be personally transplanted to Eretz Israel to be part of the new Jewish society."
One of my husband's favorite things to do around the campfire with his fellow campers was call out various camp chants and slogans as the conversation deems appropriate. One of the more popular ones is, "Hypocritical! Hypocritical! Two-face! Two-face!"
The alarm has sounded for the Left. Now it is their turn to look themselves in the face, lest the movement that once labored for Zion is only remembered for laboring against her.
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