The Undoing: America’s Jews in Search of their Identity & Community

Jews in America are experiencing a crisis of political and communal anomie, as they struggle to find their place. Jews are facing political uncertainties and social disruptions in connection with the Second Trump Presidency, just as they are confronting with mixed emotions Israel’s conduct in Gaza.

Their liberal Jewish inclinations are all but discounted and rejected in this current scenario as this nation’s Jews explore their future political destiny as part of their American identity. Many are caught up in ongoing debates over the state of Zionism, involving their current complicated and disjointed association with Israeli nationalism as framed by the current government. All this angst involves not only their political relationships but also their emotional connections with both America and Israel.

These conflicts are personal as they are communal, as Jews are encountering the anger and disconnect of their children and grandchildren around Israel’s actions, while others face a quieter but equally as challenging case of resignation and despondency, as friends and family express their frustration and disagreements over the state of American politics. In a recently released Jewish Voters Resource Center, 74% of America’s Jews disapprove of President Trump’s job performance, and some 61% expressed similar concerns regarding Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s managing of the Gaza Conflict.

Eric Altman’s New Republic article frames the battle lines that are now forming within the Jewish world:

The net result is that we are in the early stages of a Jewish civil war unmatched since the early battles over Zionism of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. …A conflict like no other in contemporary Jewish affairs is beginning to build. Increasingly, audiences across the country are raising difficult but real concerns over the increasing divisions that pit both the Trump campus agenda and the Netanyahu Gaza military campaign as challenging Jewish liberal sensibilities concerning the welfare of Jews here in America but also across the Diaspora.

This is a moment in time for rebuilding dialogue in the face of what some are describing a political futility. It is such settings that we return to community-based organizing, to rebuild and replenish this democracy. Realizing that “all politics is local” allows us to employ this time as an opportunity to reconstruct bottom-up political engagement and activism.

As Altman notes:

 A new uneasiness has emerged within Jewish circles over the policy choices involving whether Donald Trump’s war on America’s liberal educational institutions or the right-wing government of Israel’s war on Palestinians. Will such decisions produce profoundly negative and dangerous consequences for America’s Jews and in turn, for the global Jewish scene?

In this transformative moment, Jews are in search of a new political platform at home and a new brand of Zionism abroad.

In this renewal process, both old political ideas and new social principles are being introduced. As this search process unfolds, we are likely to see a broad and vigorous discussion, introducing multiple political models designed to challenge and replace the existing order. The debate ahead over the state of American democracy and how best to reframe its character and content will be aligned with a discussion on how and where Jews will fit into this new constellation.

The New and Growing Critique of American Jewish Leaders:

Correspondingly, the Jewish community is experiencing a new operational reality. American Jewry is critiquing and questioning the leadership and decision making of our communal and religious institutions in the aftermath of both October 7^th and the 2024 election of Donald Trump. This moment marks one of the first occasions where American Jews are expressing a form of public non-confidence in the performance of the Jewish communal system. This political rejectionism is present on two fronts including the American Jewish organizational response to the conduct of the war in Gaza by the Israeli government and by the failure of our communal order to more effectively and successfully handle the onslaught of anti-Israelism and antisemitism in this country.

For the first time in my years of communal and academic engagement, I am being confronted by mainstream Jewish audiences who have asking why were we not better prepared to deal with the post-October 7^th phenomenon and the corresponding acceleration of antisemitism? More directly, Jewish audiences are asking why communal institutions have become so siloed, leaving our community without a masterplan for orchestrating not only the battle against antisemitism but also in waging a more effective public relations campaign in the aftermath of the Hamas attacks in defense of Israel?

Many Jews are wondering if Jewish organizations and synagogues are fully appreciating the impact and meaning of the “Awakening” as hundreds of thousands of Jews return to the Jewish community, its schools, camps, charities and congregations? Yet, many from within our community not only question whether our institutions fully understand and appreciate this phenomenon but also are expressing concerns over how well they are prepared to serve, engage and sustain this momentum.

Finally, quietly but clearly, there are many within our ranks who have begun to raise concerns regarding the state of our Jewish legacy institutions. Some of these prominent anchors of American Jewish life, including key national membership organizations, denominational structures, and communal service institutions, are dying or have been significantly weakened as we undergo a major generational shift and as the Baby Boomers and Matures leave the Jewish scene. Are we, as a community, in a position to bring along a new cadre of leaders and donors in order to replace them; and who will be the future members and participants to support these traditional mainstream organizations? Or will they ultimately disappear?

End Note:

On each level the glue that bound Jews to one another, to their political beliefs, and to their shared communal culture has come undone, creating a fundamental transition in our understanding of the Jewish future. The unraveling of the American Jewish connection with Israel and Zionism is likewise altering this historic and critical relationship. In so many ways, this new political and structural reality will be reshaping the American Jewish experience.