A Collapse of a Zionist Consensus Within US Jewish Community: What's Emerging Today.

Two years have passed since the mass murder of 7 October 2023, an event that deeply affected global Jewish populations like no other occurrence since the establishment of the state of Israel.

For Jews the event proved deeply traumatic. For Israel as a nation, it was a significant embarrassment. The whole Zionist project was founded on the assumption which held that Israel would prevent such atrocities repeating.

Some form of retaliation appeared unavoidable. But the response undertaken by Israel – the obliteration of the Gaza Strip, the casualties of numerous non-combatants – represented a decision. This particular approach complicated how many US Jewish community members grappled with the attack that precipitated the response, and it now complicates the community's observance of the day. How does one honor and reflect on a tragedy against your people during an atrocity being inflicted upon a different population attributed to their identity?

The Complexity of Remembrance

The difficulty surrounding remembrance exists because of the fact that there is no consensus regarding the implications of these developments. Indeed, for the American Jewish community, this two-year period have witnessed the breakdown of a fifty-year unity about the Zionist movement.

The origins of pro-Israel unity within US Jewish communities can be traced to an early twentieth-century publication written by a legal scholar subsequently appointed high court jurist Louis Brandeis titled “The Jewish Question; Finding Solutions”. But the consensus really takes hold after the six-day war that year. Earlier, US Jewish communities contained a vulnerable but enduring parallel existence across various segments which maintained different opinions concerning the requirement for Israel – Zionists, neutral parties and opponents.

Background Information

This parallel existence persisted throughout the mid-twentieth century, within remaining elements of Jewish socialism, through the non-aligned US Jewish group, within the critical Jewish organization and similar institutions. Regarding Chancellor Finkelstein, the chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary, pro-Israel ideology had greater religious significance instead of governmental, and he prohibited performance of Hatikvah, the national song, at JTS ordinations during that period. Nor were Zionism and pro-Israelism the central focus of Modern Orthodoxy prior to that war. Alternative Jewish perspectives remained present.

However following Israel defeated adjacent nations in that war in 1967, occupying territories including Palestinian territories, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, US Jewish perspective on the country changed dramatically. The military success, coupled with enduring anxieties regarding repeated persecution, led to a developing perspective regarding Israel's essential significance within Jewish identity, and generated admiration in its resilience. Discourse about the extraordinary aspect of the victory and the “liberation” of territory assigned Zionism a spiritual, even messianic, significance. In that triumphant era, much of the remaining ambivalence about Zionism disappeared. In that decade, Publication editor Norman Podhoretz famously proclaimed: “We are all Zionists now.”

The Agreement and Restrictions

The Zionist consensus did not include the ultra-Orthodox – who largely believed Israel should only emerge through traditional interpretation of the Messiah – however joined Reform Judaism, Conservative, Modern Orthodox and the majority of unaffiliated individuals. The common interpretation of this agreement, later termed left-leaning Zionism, was founded on a belief about the nation as a progressive and liberal – albeit ethnocentric – nation. Countless Jewish Americans saw the administration of Arab, Syrian and Egyptian lands post-1967 as provisional, believing that a resolution would soon emerge that would ensure Jewish population majority in Israel proper and neighbor recognition of the state.

Several cohorts of Jewish Americans were thus brought up with Zionism a core part of their religious identity. The state transformed into a central part within religious instruction. Israeli national day became a Jewish holiday. Blue and white banners decorated many temples. Youth programs became infused with Israeli songs and the study of the language, with Israelis visiting and teaching US young people Israeli culture. Visits to Israel grew and peaked with Birthright Israel in 1999, providing no-cost visits to the nation became available to US Jewish youth. Israel permeated nearly every aspect of the American Jewish experience.

Evolving Situation

Paradoxically, in these decades after 1967, American Jewry developed expertise at religious pluralism. Acceptance and discussion between Jewish denominations expanded.

However regarding the Israeli situation – that represented tolerance found its boundary. Individuals might align with a rightwing Zionist or a liberal advocate, yet backing Israel as a Jewish homeland remained unquestioned, and criticizing that narrative positioned you outside the consensus – outside the community, as Tablet magazine labeled it in writing in 2021.

However currently, during of the destruction within Gaza, food shortages, dead and orphaned children and frustration over the denial of many fellow Jews who avoid admitting their responsibility, that unity has collapsed. The liberal Zionist “center” {has lost|no longer