You squirm, you wriggle, you deny, you denounce the methodology, but eventually there’s no escape: The data show quite decisively that here in America, Israel is considerably more popular among conservatives than among liberals.
The most recent confirmation of that comes from the highly regarded Global Attitudes Project of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press; their findings are based on a survey taken during the fighting in Gaza.
Overall, if you’re a fan of Israel, the news isn’t terrible. Forty-nine percent of Americans are more sympathetic to Israel than to the Palestinians; only 11% prefer the Palestinians. That’s more than a 4-to-1 advantage for Israel among those who have an opinion. (The results in Europe are wildly different.)
It’s when Pew breaks down the results that the pro-Israel leftward-leaning among us begin to cringe. Here in America, Israel has a 7-to-1 advantage among conservatives, a nearly 5-to-1 advantage among moderates — but only a 3-to-2 advantage among liberals. Among Republicans, Israel is preferred by 69%; among independents, by 47%; by Democrats, by 42%. By any measure, these are huge differences. Do they matter? And: How can they be explained?
There’s history, of course, beginning as early as 1967. The ’67 war was as much a morality play as a military confrontation, and in the weeks of run-up to the war, it was clear, worldwide, that Israel was Good and the Arabs were Evil. But once the war was over, Israel lost its status as the sympathetic underdog; it became the mighty Occupying Power. Over the years, it has confirmed that position many times, most recently in Gaza.
Israel plainly wants to be simultaneously Sparta and Athens; in some important ways it is. But that’s a frightfully difficult thing to pull off for decades on end. One day a carnivore, the next day a vegetarian? And many liberals, whatever their daily diets, are celebrants of vegetarianism.
A more precise history would take account of the internal politics of the New Left and the emergence in the ’60s and ’70s of the Black Power movement — and, years later, of neoconservatism, with its disproportionately Jewish intellectual elite.
For those of us with memories of earlier days, memories of the kibbutz and the Histadrut, memories of Israel before it became a client state of America, people who once, perhaps naively, imagined Israel as a Scandinavian-style nation in the Middle East if not an actual socialist utopia, there’s been biting disappointment. But it’s not the disappointment that underlies the Pew statistics, nor even the history. Most liberals, after all, still “prefer” Israel; many work actively on behalf of an Israel more in keeping with earlier hopes.
But more than a few reflect a persistent ideological problem that goes back to the early days of Zionism. Let’s call it a widespread case of Inflated Universalism.
Many Jews on the left (as also many others) have always felt queasy about nationalism, vastly preferring to imagine a post-nationalist world of universal brotherhood. Their brave new world, a world without boundaries, was rudely shaken and rendered not only absurd but also unseemly by the Holocaust. In the wake of the horror, denunciation of Jewish nationalism — Zionism — was virtually unthinkable. And even if Jews offended by nationalism could somehow still think the thought, they could hardly speak it out loud.
Over these last few decades, however, there’s been a reversion. Israel’s history can easily (if simplistically) be read as confirmation of the early anti-nationalist conviction. Is not the right in Israel on the rise, the often xenophobic right? Are not Israel’s principal defenders in the United States the Cheneys and the Hagees and the sulking neocons? Has the settlement project not been a disaster? Can a liberal American Jew easily accommodate the fact — so say the polls just now — of a Netanyahu government, or of an Avigdor Lieberman whose party may win as many as 18 seats, eclipsing Labor?
It is hard to persuade thoughtful people that this is merely a blip in an otherwise exemplary story of democratic development. We now know that the settlement project was not an instance of clever subterfuge, of nimble, ideology-driven settlers outsmarting an overly bureaucratic government. We know that the government itself — Labor and Likud alike — was an active sponsor of settlements that repeatedly and massively violated both Israeli law and international law.
This we know from a still-classified report by reserve Brigadier General Baruch Spiegel, the most exhaustive and detailed report on the subject that has been done. The report, which was obtained by the Israeli daily Haaretz, shows, inter alia, that in about 75% of all the settlements, construction has been carried out without the appropriate permits or contrary to the permits that were issued. It also shows that in more than 30 settlements, extensive construction of buildings and infrastructure (roads, schools, synagogues, yeshivas and even police stations) has been carried out on private lands belonging to Palestinian West Bank residents. All this not merely with government acquiescence but with active government participation.
That does not mean the hyper-universalists were right all along. It does mean that Israel has played into their hands. It does make defending the core Zionist belief — call it “benign nationalism” — considerably more difficult.
The hyper-universalists will not go away, but more than higher approval ratings among liberals are here at stake. The foundational aspiration of the Zionist project is at stake.
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The liberals of today are like the liberals of Soviet times-believers in universal harmony, but only at the expense of the Jews. Jews played a major role in the Soviet Union, and no one would have expected Trotsky, Zinoviev of Kamenev to support a Jewish state. Stalin did away with them when they were no longer useful. Jews were communist leaders in Poland until Gomulka kicked them out. WE have never counted on the liberals because they believe in a false religion. Now the liberals shill for radical Islam. It was the liberal Jews of Egypt that were lost in the plague of darkness. History repeats itself
Bad news for David Nilsson-see below "But here - back at home, the rockets keep falling .Yesterday at Beer Sheba,Angela Izraelov, an O.R. nurse at the Soroka Hospital in town, was drivingher 7 year old son Orel, back from school.They heard the siren, she stoppedthe car, they both got out, and Angela laid on her son to cover him andprotect him. The Grad Missile fell very close to them. Angela was unscathed,yet little Orel was hit by shrapnel which entered his skull and lodgeditself in his brain. Angela's colleagues at the hospital have operated onhim , and he is now fighting for his life in the hospital." (by HananCaspi) This happened in the middle of January. We were all praying for Orel, theyoungest in the family, whose mother had undergone many treatments beforehaving him. I am overjoyed to say that today he was discharged from the hospital, and his chances for recovery are very good. God bless him and hisfamily!
I think the settlers should obey the law and respect the property rights of non-Jews. However, I don't believe they are the reason the left is drifting from Israel. Decades of focusing on internal devolopment have made Israel a thriving country. Her neighbors spent those decades on hate mongering and corruption, so they are still undeveloped. Liberals have a knee-jerk loyalty to whatever country is struggling, regardless of that country's merits.
I wont support Israel as long as it is a flawed country. San Francisco is my Jerusalem
As I get more upset about Israeli actions politics, I find myself feeling less and less connected not just to the Jewish community. (BTW, I went to Bais Yaakov, grew up in and maintain a kosher home, and teach Jewish adult ed classes.) I feel I have nothing in common with the people who post the right wing comments to this article, and I didn't even renew my in-print Forward subscription because I just don't relate to the points of view its journalists espouse, nor its readers (judging by the comments to articles like this one). (I just responded to an e-mail survey from Congressman Robert Wexler about the issues that were most important to me. Israel was not one of them.)
You can not deal with bad guy's that want to kill you no matter what. look back in history and it's the same old thing, just different people. I'm 81 & a combat Marine vet. ww2, and I can see things that younger people, don't see. People (and i use the word people) instead of devils. Have to be wiped off the planet earth. The trouble is all those "friends" so called, are afraid to side with the Jews. and keep crying over those poor palestinian people who never had a country of their own. We keep climbing the same hill but the same haters keep knocking us off, & we have to start all over again. But hey, it's only been a few thousand years, a drop in the bucket in the universal time zone But you can tell those people in Israel that they will never have "peace" (a word i've heard in The Bronx since I was 9) dealing with rocket launches. Semper Fi
Why? Because Liberals would rather die than hated. I'm sorry but I can't be more blunt than that. For years we've read column after column about 'post-modern' state, the EU-ification of Israel even if, especially if, it's at the expense of Jews and Judaism. If only Israel were in no way related to the Jews or Judaism and became a nondescrpt magical unicorn land in the mid east where post-Judaism people who once had Jewish ancestors worked shoulder to shoulder with the very same Hamas terrorists who want them all dead or gone, then liberals would fight tooth and nail for Israel, now a wholly owned subsidiary of Palestine.
There is nothing wrong with losing the support of delusional fools. And if by Liberal, you mean somebody who believes there is no problem that cannot be solved by good will, earnest discussion and/or 'Liberal' amounts of remuneration, then we are basically speaking of people who are suffering from incomplete understanding and an inability to absorb any Reality that threatens their immature construct of the Human Condition.
Fein forgets to mention the rise of right-wing evangelical Christians, who have certainly swelled the ranks of Conservatives. They will support Israel down to the last Jew, and in fact welcome it, as this all signals the "end times" and the return of Christ. But Israel is losing Liberals because ultimately you can't square a circle. Israel does not stand for liberal humanistic values, it stands for ethnic nationalism and all that that entails. There is only so much gilt you can throw on a road apple. The much quoted percent of Americans more sympathetic to Israel than Palestinians is not a very enlightening statistic. "More sympathetic" is a very vague term, and the numbers most likely only reflect what most Americans receive from their media. Once the questions become more specific support for Israel peels away. The fact that it is only 49% may point back to the gilded road apple; even with American media continually tossing their pom-poms for Israel, most Americans are either for Palestine, neither, or have no opinion. A few stats are significant: Democrats by a 24% majority opposed Israel's latest attack on Gaza. An overwhelming majority of Americans want US policy to be entirely even-handed, to take neither side. This has been so for many years.
Mr Grif, you are entitled to your opinion on the Israeli-arab conflict but you are not entitled to speak for the majority of Americans. Two new polls show that Americans strongly back Israel over Hamas in the ongoing conflict in Gaza. A McClatchy/Ipsos poll found that 44 percent of Americans support Israel's use of force, in comparison to 18% who think Hamas's use of force is appropriate. And 57% think the latter is using excessive force - something only 36% believe Israel to be doing. The poll also found that more Americans now oppose rather than support creating a Palestinian state, with 45% saying the US shouldn't favor one, versus 31% who said it should and 24% who didn't know. In addition, the majority of Americans (51%) are not confident that President-elect Barack Obama will be able to forge a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians once he takes office: 32% said they were somewhat confident, and only 10% said they were very confident. A large plurality, 49%, put the blame for the current conflict squarely on Hamas, with only 14% blaming Israel and 29% undecided. Nine percent said both, and 4% said neither.
"WASHINGTON (CNN) — A new national poll suggests that six in ten Americans sympathize more with the Israelis than the Palestinians in the recent fighting in Gaza, and most believe that Israel's initial decision to take military action against Hamas was justified. Sixty percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Saturday say they sympathize with Israelis, with 17 percent backing the Palestinians. The poll was conducted while Israel was still taking military action in Gaza, so it does not reflect how Americans feel about the recent cease-fire in Gaza. But 63 percent of those questioned do think that Israel's initial military action was justified, with three in ten saying it was not justified.
1. Fein fails to distinguish between liberals and the illiberal Left. Genuine liberals still love and defend Israel against its enemies, the most illiberal countries and forces in the world today. See Alan Dershowitz's piece in the January 30 Los Angeles Jewish Journal, http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/my_answer_to_prager_why_i_refuse_to_join_20090128/. An important task for liberals is to disassociate themselves from and denounce the illiberal Left. 2. A related task is for liberals to confidently reaffirm the right of a people, such as the Jewish people, to have a nation-state within which to chart its own destiny.
but it's so simple, it's the ignorance compounded either with stupidity or lack of curiosity about what's what.
Fein forgot to mention the discomfort liberals feel about the role religion plays within Israel's politics. Given Israel's identity as the Jewish state, there will always be a natural tension in this regard, especially compared to the church-state (or shul-state, if you wish) divide in the U.S. Liberal Americans, especially, I think, liberal Jewish-Americans, get nervous when we hear Israeli rabbis deliver opinions with the force of law as to who is and who isn't a Jew. Reminds me too much of the Nuremburg laws. And speaking of that era, when I read Hesh's comment about "Have to be wiped off the planet earth," am I the only one who understood him to be proposing a Final Solution for Palestinians? I am struggling to comply with the Forward's directive to be civil and refrain from personal invective, but Hesh's comment is the beginning of a process that ends in Jews building Dachaus. And, sorry, as a proud liberal Jew, I have a problem with that.
That conservatives are much more likely than liberals to support Israel over terrorists is hardly surprising. Conservatives generally have fixed moral views, often established by religious tradition. Liberals (of the hard left kind, in particular) are far more likely to be moral relativists, which makes them susceptible to buying into propaganda that paints the immoral as moral. This is nothing new. Many liberals were also sympathetic toward the Soviet Union, which conservatives rightly saw as an "evil empire".
The liberal lives with the leftist and is influenced by him. The Jewish liberal has been influenced by the by the Emma Goldmans and Leon Trotskys of the world and so it's only logical that he would choose to walk away from is heritage and adopt the value system of a people who helped usher in gulags and totalitarianism. If you ask anyone in the USA what we would do if Miami is hit by missles from Cuba, they would tell you we would be in there in a minute and force a change in regime and we would not stop the attack until the missles stop - period. But Israel is different. Why? The anti-semites of the world are consistent and logical. But what's the Jewish liberal's problem? Does he feel so connected with the left that he hates his own people so much?
Thank you once again Mr. Fein for expressing the silent sadness of many American Jews. This liberal American Jew, painfully, no longer considers Israel as ‘the Jewish State.’ Yes, a state for Jews but not a state that expresses the values of my Judaism. Yes, a state for Jews and others within the pre-1967 boundaries. No, not “The Jewish State” because that state makes a mockery of my Judaism by corrupting the concept of “Btzelem Elohim”; the precept that every person is created in God’s image and therefore every person is equal in the eyes of god. There’s no place in my Judaism for a state that has for 60 years discriminated against its own Arab citizens and for 40 years oppressed and slowly destroyed the spirit of the Palestinian people. My Judaism is a Judaism that confronts injustice and speaks truth to power. I suspect that many liberal Jews feel some of these same feelings but are not yet able to say not my ‘Jewish State’
The problem with this analysis is that it plays into the idea that because there are disagreeable people in a country who have done wrong things (or even agreeable people who have made mistakes), that this country (Israel) should be merged with another("Palestine") to make one nation state. Wouldn't that be dandy? So, while we liberals (and I am one) suffered through Nixon, Reagan, and Bush, why not think of combining the U.S. A. with Canada - those lovely (and universal health care loving) neighbors to our north. Because Americans were stupid enough to elect leaders on the Right, perhaps they, too, have given up their right to their own nation state? It is not criticism of Israel from the Left which is the problem, it is the unfortunate tendency to apply standards and draw conclusions from those standards -to Israel -but to no other nation state. It gives another meaning to that popular term, "disproportionate".
Israel isn't "losing" the "liberals". The "progressive" liberals abandoned Israel and the Jewish people. Whether that is the result of poor upbringing, faulty education, failure of character, damaging influence of faux-Jewish rabbis and liberal congregations, or deep-seated self-loathing, they do not deserve to be considered "Jews" at all. But the most corrosive damage to the public's support of Israel is from the anti-Israel leftist propaganda by the likes of Ha'aretz, and pretty much the entirety of the Western "media"; the "liberal" media is populated by antisemitic "reporters", editors, and media owners.
Read the Torah. A mixture of bloodcurdling exaltation in conquest and the crushing of enemies, pious exhortations and self-congratulation about how special the Jews are, and weird catalogues of ritual observances. The Talmud is worse-- 18-rated stuff, which many Jews prefer not to dip into. That's how Israel is turning out: seems the scriptures were blueprints. Herzl said their own state would permit the Jews to live normally there, and despite the atheism and agnosticism of most Israelis, they are doing so: reverting to Toraic type. We see the permanent privileging of religious extremists and their rabbis, the glorification of combat and the continual transformation of generals as warlords of the state, the "hurts me more than it hurts you" kvetching about the cruel necessity of putting down enemies that supposedly lurk all around waiting to destroy the poor innocent pacific Jews (Ahmadinejad as the neww Pharoah), the delight in piling up treasure on earth in a modern cult of Moloch, the vainglorious trumpeting about how much more civilised israel is and how uniquely "tragic" is its history, with never a whiff of self-accusation because that would be "self-hating" and "not good for the Jews". Face it, the whole schmear of the 1948 Show is just a secularised modern update of the Mosaic myth by political Zionists. But from time to time even the carefully filtered US media give Americans, including Jews, a glimpse of how the hypocrisy-on-stilts of lawbreaking, persecuting, land-annexing Israel is viewed by most of the planet's people. And Gaza has done a hell of a job in opening eyes.
A very balanced article indeed.
Well and good that the "foundational aspiration of the Zionist project is at stake." How many American Jews have the vaguest notion that Zionists whose names hover over streets in Israel deliberately chose land over lives of Jews in Europe during the Holocaust? Only a handful, I suggest. Else, they would be the first to condemn Israel's Machiavellian policies today. Much as they would be the last to condemn nationalism elsewhere. Wat's wrong with us? What’s wrong with the views of American Jews Who, time and time again, Will turn our heads and hearts from God And choose to worship men? Averting our eyes from traditional ties We lust after every every perversion. Quick to rejoice in freedom of choice Forgetting the threat of dispersion. We’ll do as we may, we’re free, so we say The American way we adore Our future we cast, not laws of the past, Forgetting what happened before. The Jews of Berlin Were practiced in sin A cult of high culture they led They worshipped the stranger Dismissing the danger And now we remember our dead. Why can’t we admit That the world where we sit Wasn’t created by men With weapons fulfilling And arrogance chilling We’re sure to be crying again
Thank G_d for Leonard Fein!
I think part of the difference here is a difference of world view. Generally speaking, Conservatives see the world as a series challenges improvable, but not perfectable. Conservatives tend to recognize that there will always be some problem or another to fix. Liberalism views the world as perfectable and have some difficulty with the idea that things do not meet their ideal. Israel is just an example of this divide. This may be an oversimiplication of the problem, but it illustrates the point.
Fein pulled the old switcheroo with this essay. He starts out acknoweldging the "universalist" dream those of us who regard ourselves as liberals believe in, even though it is an unrealistic actuality. Then he dregs up the settlements as a core reason "they" hate Israel. Somehow he worked in the notion that Israel has to take responsibility for the loss of liberal support because of its settlements. While I believe the settlements exarcerbate the predicament, Western (primarily European but increasingly American) attitudes to Israel are condemnatory simply because Saudi-financed pro-Palestinian sympathy has been aimed at positioning the Palestinians as the David of the Goliath-David dualism. The liberal community, committed to universal ideals ("all men are brothers" or more currently, "all people are brothers and sisters") has forgotten or ignored the truth: that Israel is surrounded by a hostile and fundamentalist band of countries who deny universalism and have openly expressed its pledge to spread Islamism around the world. We should be explaining that Israel is the canary in the coalmine - let Israel be vanquished and you'll see sharia law in your town. Israel may convince those already committed to Israel. They cannot convince those committed to the Palestinian narrative. The pictures and statistics make it difficult to reach people in the middle, including those who seldom pay attention to Israel, but who were revolted by 'disproportionate' death and destruction.
Liberals have a knee-jerk reaction to take sides against: 1) the more powerful side in any dispute; and 2) the side representing Western Civilization. Israel has the misfortune to be both Western and powerful, so, for most of the idiot left (but I repeat myself) the inquiry ends there.
This issue needs to be put into perspective. I'll use California as an example, because that's where I am. Adapt this perspective to your own area. What if Britain had agreed to give half of California to the Zionists for them to establish a "Jewish State"? Take note that prior to UN involvement the Zionist's stated goal included all of California plus Nevada. Would Californians have agreed to the UN partitioning their land even if Nevada got to keep theirs? What if we didn't and the Zionists took it by force anyway? What if when we resisted we were bombed by an advanced military, and then labeled as "terrorists" for fighting back? What if the world sat back and just let it happen? The high mountain desert where I am would be our occupied West Bank, and LA our war torn Gaza strip. How would you explain sanctions and occupation to your kids? What if a nation like America funded and supported it? How do you explain that? What about the displaced people from San Fransisco, Sacramento, etc, do they ever get to go home? Who would your kids blame for all of the undue hardships in their lives? I wish for the best for all the Jewish people, but not at someone else's expense. Israel's identity as a "Jewish State" can not take priority over justice. It's time for the world to stand up for Palestine, for justice, and the 'Right of Return'. Peace comes first, it is the only possible path, the rhetoric has to end and the correct conditions created. To move forward, peace and security for all the people is the only correct answer. It's time to set things straight, and make sure the whole situation is finally put into perspective. It's time for peace, and we're not backing down.
After reading James Hovland's comment, I find myself totally baffled by the logic of an anti-Israel American. Is he not aware of the widely known fact that the entire North American continent was taken over by European settlers "at someone else's expense"? Apparently not, because in order to put things "in perspective", he compares the theoretical possibility of "Zionists" establishing their state in his California to the founding of Israel. Well, if I were an American, I would be a bit ashamed to preach to others. In any case, despite Mr Hovland's strange perceptions of justice, it should be stated that the Jews are one of the native populations of the Middle East, not foreigners. Our state is an expression of the universal right of self-determination of all peoples. If he truly wishes to "stand up for Palestine", it would be indeed an act of friendship to help them seek realistic and moderate aims in which both national communities achieve sovereignty.
I simply do not agree with Mr Fein that "many Jews on the left have always felt queasy about nationalism". American Jews have very strong feelings of belonging to the American experience. They may claim to be "universal", but their obvious culture is particularistic - it's American. It's the language they speak, the culture they understand and the sense of "being at home" in the American world. Some may feel "queasy" about Jewish nationalism. Indeed, the early opposition of some American Jews to Zionism was essentially that Jews belong to the national groups in which they live; i.e. an American Jew belongs to the American national group. That's an expression of nationalism, obviously - American nationalism.
Perhaps Israel today is losing the sympathy of some liberal Jews in America. I don't think that the reason is so simplistic as Mr Fein would have us believe ("the occupying power"). Liberal American Jews can be at odds over American politics, protesting the war in Vietnam or issues of civil rights, etc - yet, their basic love for America remains strong. However, disagreement with Israel could mean that a liberal Jew will turn his back on Israel. Why is it possible to love an imperfect America, but it's impossible to stand with an imperfect Israel? The answer is one of identity. The Jewish identity of the American Jew is weakening with each generation. Yiddish language has been abandoned, Jewish education is so meagre and much more. The relation of American Jewry with Israel is a two-way street. There is something happening also in America - not only in Israel.
Rabbi Tony Jutner won't support a flawed Israel. I wonder if that is true also about other aspects of his life. Does he stand behind a flawed wife? And what about a flawed city hall in San Francisco? Will he then find a new city to be his next "Jerusalem"? Let's face the truth, Rabbi Jutner. First of all, you are anti-Israel for whatever ideological reason it might be. I would imagine it is the "Classic Reform" that is uncomfortable with Jewish particularism (but not uncomfortable with American particularism). After being anti-Israel, only then do you find the justification - "it's a flawed country". Once upon a time, walking through the forest, I saw a target painted on the tree and an arrow exactly in the bull's eye. Then I noticed again yet another painted target with an arrow in its bull's eye - and then another one. Finally, I ran into a young boy with a can of paint in one hand and a bow and arrow in the other. "Hey, kid, you're a great shot", I said. "Oh, it's nothing", he answered so humbly, "I first shoot the arrow and then I paint the target!" There's no unflawed country, and you know it. You're just painting a target around an arrow. Moreover, writing off half the Jewish population of the world as not worthy of your support means that you didn't learn in rabbinic school "kol yisrael arevin zeh la-zeh" - all Jews are responsible for each other.
I have always considered myself a "progressive", or a "liberal" (although I have picked up the habit of registering Republican to oppose the far right in the primaries). I have also always supported Israel as a Jewish country. The problem is that "Eretz Yisrael", or "Palestine" as the Muslims insist on calling it, is the revered home of more than one people, leading to a zero-sum territorial fight that shows no sign of letting up. I think a two-state solution is probably the best way of handling it, but only if the two states try to be allies and to work with one another instead of blowing each other up. I want Israel to be a light unto the Mideast and its part of the world, not a target by its part of the world. If this means risking antisemitic claims of "trying to control the world", so be it - but we need to state clearly what WE want, how the MUSLIMS and CHRISTIANS will benefit from what we want, and how Israel can enlighten the Mideast.
Yehuda, "Why Israel Is Losing the Liberals"
My comment was an informative response to that. To understand "why", you have to "put it into perspective". Not your perspective, but that of the Liberals, Palestinians, etc. Empathy is more about intelligence than compassion.
Are you interested in understanding the situation? Or just defending it?
I assume you're a nationalist, I'm not. I assume that because in the framework of your mind, I approve of everything my country has done, I don't. However, I happen to live along side some original Americans, there are no separation walls, no check points, no occupation, nothing like that. In fact rather than being second class citizens, they have all the right I do, plus additional ones, entitlements and more.
You claim that the Jewish people(
It was interesting to read James Hovland's earlier post, because it so well illustrates the mindset of so many anti-Zionists. For these folks, Israel is illegitimate precisely because Jews simply do not exist as a people. There is no Jewish people, it has no Jewish history, and it certainly does not involve any historic relationship with the land of Israel! If Jews pray facing Jerusalem (a city one of whose other names is Zion), it is a fanciful religious affectation; if their annual cycle of festivals closely tracks the Middle Eastern harvest cycle, it is mere happenstance or something to be ignored; if they talk of a diaspora, it is a loosely-connected set of links between non-minority persons, each in an ethnically homogeneous country, who happen to share some religious values -- "fellow citizens of the Mosaic persuasion". For them, it is important to believe that Israel, California, Uganda, it's all the same to the Jews.
So let's be clear on something. Under basic international law, the Jews constitute a "people", and exercise the same collective rights as any other people (the singular noun, which is refers to a subject of international law; not the plural of "persons"). A basic cornerstone of international law is the right of peoples to self-determination. Where such peoples are demonstrably able to exercise such self-determination (cultural and otherwise) in the context of an already-existing state, there is an argument by which self-determination need not, under the rules of international law, take the form of an independent state. That argument is certainly not available in the context of the Ottoman or British Empires in the Middle East, which were each breaking apart.
Jews, in other words, have the right to self-determination in our historic homeland, Israel, as a matter of international law. That has absolutely nothing to do with religion (although some wish to imbue it with religious content, which is their right), and absolutely nothing to do with the Holocaust (although some wish to draw a link between sympathy for dead Jews and the political recognition of the Jewish people's legal rights, and that is their right, too). You may disagree with many things -- with the borders of said state and that of the Palestinian state which, one would think, will happen sooner or later, despite the apparent best efforts of Palestinian politicians to resist it; or with Israeli defence policy, which you might think should involve talking nice and not building settlements in strategic locations and just trusting that those immediately adjacent to you with the incentive and opportunity to kill you won't do so; and so on. And I might disagree with those very same things, and agree with you on many matters of policy.
But I certainly do not agree with the negation of the Jewish people.
To the above I should add that anti-Zionists like Mr. Hovland, who always seem anxious to forbid any criticism of Israel unless that criticism is couched in a wholesale rejection of the existence of the Israeli state and of the existence of a Jewish people, have a lot to do with why, if Israel is apparently losing the liberals, the liberals are -- more to the point, I think -- losing Israel, and many Jews along with it.
There seems an insistence that all criticism of Israel be couched in hysterical and violent terms. It's not enough to say you think maybe Mr. Lieberman shouldn't be included in a coalition, you must do so as part of a statement that Israel is an evil apartheid state whose citizens are not really human beings. It's not enough to say you disagree with parts of or, for that matter, all of the Gaza offensive, you must point to as proof of a bloodthirsty illegitimate carnivorous baby-eating Israel which must surely be ejected from Christendom -- sorry, I mean, from the international community.
Well, those who take rhetoric in that direction reap what they sow. There was a time I was much more critical of Israel in the public place. I simply will no longer do it, because I will not ally myself with the racist ravings of those folks who dominate anti-Zionist discourse. Sure, I'm open to imagining a post-national world in which Turkey and Greece have rubbed out their border, the UK and France are one country, and Japan and South Korea live together as a happy single state at long last. But most anti-Zionism is not about that. It's about demonizing Israel and negating the existence of the Jewish people. No, thanks.
A number of points. 1) Mr. Fein plays it light. The left- wing opposition to Israel has now moved into hypocritical self- righteous demonization. They align with the neo- Nazi Right in Europe. They support the most anti- feminist, most immoral and inhumane murderers whose whole story involves trying to kill as many civilians as possible. 2) Mr. Fein tends to neglect to mention that the 'settlements' are in that disputed territory which is the heart of historical Eretz Yisrael. And the settlement project whether one likes it or not, is the work of religious idealists. The great share of settlements are on state- land. I would also point out that however 'disputed' these territories are they were never under Palestinian Arab sovereignty. 3) It would take a lot of courage on the part of the people of the left to stand up to those of the left who have decided that the suicide- bombers, and the genocide and staticide seekers are morally evil. Dershowitz who is a liberal and supports the two- state solution is such a courageous person. I wish there were more of them. 4) The so- called Rabbi who posted here his total contempt for the land of Israel cannot be in traditional terms considered a Rabbi at all. The connection of the people of Israel with the land of Israel is at the heart of the Jewish tradition.
First, I agree entirely with Hesh. I too am a Veteran of WW11 though a bit older the Hesh.
Having said that, I can't conceive of the so called Liberal Left abandoning Israel, the escpe hatch for all of the worlds Jews, in case another Holacaust befalls the Jewish people. Having grown up durring the depression and being well aware of the Overt Ant-semitism that prevailed in the America of the thirties, I realized coming back from three years overseas, that at last Jews,loyal Americans, were no longer second class citizens in the land of the free etc. I could hold my head up proudly and proclaim my self an American Jew. Though it was some two years later , 1948 to be exact, that Israel became a dream come true. Now I pose a question to the so called "liberal left, and I hate calling them Jews,of the 60's and seventies who became affluent through the efforts and blood of others, having contributed nothing to their country except through top grade education and the ability to become affluent and then flaunt their heritage becoming "Universatist" a term I learned from the far Left "Forvitz" which my father read religiously in Yiddish. The Point is Jews better support Israel through all difficulties because if they think as The German Jews did that they were an integrated part of German Cultural, which the ovens proved them wrong, that it couldn't happen hear, God Forbid.
In conclusion I doubt that "Tony" Jutner is a Rabbi, and that he is even a Jew.
i know Rabbi Tony Jutner and he trained me for my bar mitzvah. i have to laugh when you say you doubt he is a jew.