A Dissolution of a Zionist Agreement Among US Jews: What's Emerging Now.

It has been the deadly assault of 7 October 2023, an event that shook global Jewish populations like no other occurrence since the founding of the state of Israel.

Within Jewish communities the event proved profoundly disturbing. For the Israeli government, the situation represented a significant embarrassment. The whole Zionist movement had been established on the belief that the nation would ensure against things like this repeating.

Military action seemed necessary. But the response that Israel implemented – the comprehensive devastation of the Gaza Strip, the casualties of tens of thousands of civilians – was a choice. This particular approach created complexity in how many US Jewish community members understood the initial assault that precipitated the response, and it now complicates their remembrance of that date. In what way can people mourn and commemorate a tragedy against your people while simultaneously devastation being inflicted upon a different population in your name?

The Challenge of Grieving

The complexity in grieving lies in the circumstance where there is no consensus about the significance of these events. Indeed, within US Jewish circles, the recent twenty-four months have seen the collapse of a decades-long agreement on Zionism itself.

The beginnings of pro-Israel unity across American Jewish populations dates back to writings from 1915 written by a legal scholar and then future high court jurist Louis D. Brandeis named “The Jewish Question; Finding Solutions”. Yet the unity really takes hold after the Six-Day War in 1967. Previously, US Jewish communities contained a vulnerable but enduring parallel existence across various segments that had diverse perspectives about the requirement of a Jewish state – pro-Israel advocates, non-Zionists and anti-Zionists.

Previous Developments

This parallel existence persisted during the 1950s and 60s, within remaining elements of Jewish socialism, within the neutral US Jewish group, within the critical American Council for Judaism and comparable entities. Regarding Chancellor Finkelstein, the head of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Zionism was more spiritual rather than political, and he did not permit the singing of Hatikvah, the national song, at religious school events in the early 1960s. Additionally, support for Israel the main element of Modern Orthodoxy until after that war. Different Jewish identity models coexisted.

Yet after Israel defeated neighboring countries in that war in 1967, taking control of areas such as Palestinian territories, Gaza, Golan Heights and Jerusalem's eastern sector, the American Jewish relationship to Israel evolved considerably. The military success, combined with longstanding fears regarding repeated persecution, resulted in a developing perspective about the nation's critical importance for Jewish communities, and generated admiration regarding its endurance. Rhetoric regarding the “miraculous” quality of the success and the freeing of land assigned the Zionist project a religious, potentially salvific, importance. During that enthusiastic period, a significant portion of previous uncertainty about Zionism vanished. In the early 1970s, Commentary magazine editor Norman Podhoretz famously proclaimed: “Everyone supports Zionism today.”

The Consensus and Its Boundaries

The unified position excluded the ultra-Orthodox – who generally maintained a nation should only emerge by a traditional rendering of redemption – yet included Reform, Conservative, contemporary Orthodox and the majority of unaffiliated individuals. The predominant version of the unified position, identified as left-leaning Zionism, was founded on the idea regarding Israel as a liberal and democratic – though Jewish-centered – state. Many American Jews considered the occupation of Arab, Syrian and Egypt's territories following the war as temporary, believing that a resolution was forthcoming that would maintain Jewish demographic dominance in pre-1967 Israel and Middle Eastern approval of the state.

Several cohorts of US Jews were thus brought up with pro-Israel ideology an essential component of their Jewish identity. Israel became a central part within religious instruction. Yom Ha'atzmaut became a Jewish holiday. National symbols adorned many temples. Summer camps were permeated with Hebrew music and education of modern Hebrew, with visitors from Israel educating American teenagers national traditions. Visits to Israel grew and reached new heights through Birthright programs by 1999, when a free trip to Israel became available to US Jewish youth. Israel permeated almost the entirety of the American Jewish experience.

Shifting Landscape

Paradoxically, during this period after 1967, American Jewry developed expertise regarding denominational coexistence. Acceptance and dialogue across various Jewish groups expanded.

Yet concerning Zionism and Israel – that represented tolerance ended. One could identify as a rightwing Zionist or a liberal advocate, yet backing Israel as a Jewish state was a given, and questioning that perspective placed you beyond accepted boundaries – outside the community, as a Jewish periodical described it in writing in 2021.

However currently, amid of the destruction in Gaza, food shortages, dead and orphaned children and outrage over the denial within Jewish communities who decline to acknowledge their responsibility, that consensus has disintegrated. The centrist pro-Israel view {has lost|no longer