Progressive Jews and Israel

“Progressive Jews”, that’s what they call themselves. They assert their Jewishness is toward a universal brotherhood of man: kindness, empathy, generosity of spirit. They donate money and time to a cause they perceive as furthering that belief. These causes include opposition to climate change, outreach to brown and black peoples, one world with open borders, people of irregular sexual identification. Some say they are religious, but by religion they do not mean a belief in a living God, but rather a belief in the grandeur of the universe and in the perfectibility of man. As Jews, they believe and support Tikkun Olam as they define the phrase. If they belong to a Jewish Congregation it will be one where the rabbi, often a woman, and the other congregants share their views. Many use a modern Haggadah that emphasizes a general human hope for freedom and cites this freedom being denied to Palestinians. The Holocaust rather than Israel is often the central focus of their Jewishness; many actively oppose Israel. Many would support Israel if it would change to a non-Jewish focus and merge with the Palestinian Authority. “Jews survived for 2000 years without Israel” say those who still claim an attachment to Jewishness.

These Jews cover a wide spectrum. They include upper income, college-educated and well-read along with pensioners of the Workmen’s Circle of many years ago. Some are still in high school or college. Many have Jewish summer camp experience, some had a Bar Mitzvah, some are fluent in Yiddish or in Hebrew, some were born in Israel. However, in a serious conversation it is evident that none that I know have a deep knowledge of the history of the Jews. They lack understanding of the Jewish experience in Ottoman Southern Syria or of the immigration there beginning in the 1880’s. They don’t know the demographic changes that followed They often have no knowledge of the atrocities of post-World War I, have never heard of the Peel Commission, don’t know the details of the 1947 UN resolution 181, don’t know the origins of the 1948 War. They ignore the 800 thousand displaced Jews from Arab countries in 1948-50, etc. Some have forgotten the headlines of 1967 and blame Israel for a preemptive attack. They do not know that the Palestinians have never submitted a written peace proposal. The Israeli Jews among these are often from a Communist family that expected Israel would join the Soviet bloc after 1947. In the United States many of these progressives turned against Israel in 1967 in concert with the Soviets (see I.F. Stone, etc).

Of most importance there is another and more telling commonality; they or their children will be the last of the Jewish line in their families. That is, either they themselves are in process of leaving Judaism or their children will. Bernie Sanders and the founding Jews of the New York Times are prominent public examples of this self-removal. I have many among my acquaintances.