Wendy Kalman
There are many ways to see and understand

Between a rock and a hard place

If you are like me, an American Jew who believes people should be able to live life free of bias and that every person is truly entitled to the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness and you support Israel, you are beginning to feel screwed by our two parties.

I see Republican policies as being indifferent, even harmful, to the actual welfare of citizens and country alike. And the president, though not a member of the party, leads with inflammatory statements. The relationship between the two doesn’t help. Republicans in Congress don’t distance themselves from him as long as they are able to advance whatever they want to push forward. Meanwhile, the alt-right movement and hateful citizens alike feel emboldened to express racist, anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, misogynist sentiments. As a Jew, I find the increasing intolerance scary.

Anti-Semitism from the right is real.

The Democratic party is also problematic for me. While it changed its platform in 2016 to reject BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions), I don’t see it being very vocal about it. In fact, while Congress is in the process of trying to criminalize it, prominent Democrats are denouncing those efforts. How can they both support their party platform and yet come out against supporting parts of it? Further, more and more, I’m seeing this boycott against Israel being extended to include acts against all Jews, even those who aren’t Israelis, like when Matisyahu was rejected from a Spanish festival; this is not “just” anti-Zionism..

Anti-Semitism from the left is real.

Then you have those who are associated with the left – like Democratic Socialists of America who are incorporating BDS into their platform – and Students for Justice for Palestinians, which focuses on hate instead of on what Palestinians need for Justice (ummm, like finding and electing Palestinian leaders. for instance, who actually want to achieve a state and understand that advocating and demonstrating for peaceful coexistence is the way).

The topping on the cake for me, was this week — when Bernie Sanders came out calling for a rethink on Israel.

Look, both parties have a spectrum of center-to-far elements within them, and both parties are led by people who are not members. IT’s an issue. It means that party members may not back everything their leaders or their fringes say, but without a loud enough party disavowal, the end result is the same — Jews who support bias-free socially aware positions and support Israel are caught between a rock and a hard place. We can’t find a comfortable home in either party.

So where do we go from here?

Lobbying? Educating? Pursuing other parties? Withdrawing from political life? Getting more active within parties to affect change? I don’t know. Honestly. But what I do know, is that I am finding the political atmosphere less and less welcoming. And it hurts.

About the Author
Wendy Kalman, MPA, MA, serves as Director of Education and Advocacy Resources for Hadassah The Women's Zionist Organization of America, Inc. Previous roles include senior academic researcher for an Israel education nonprofit, knowledge manager at a large multinational as well as roles in marketing and publishing in the US and in Israel. She has presented papers at political science and communications conferences and has participated as a scholar-in-residence at an academic workshop on antisemitism. Wendy lived in Israel for over a decade and is a dual citizen, fluent in Hebrew.
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