[see Edward Said original post,Crisis for American Jews which was originally published in Al-Ahram Weekly Online May 16-22, 2002 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/portside/message/2490 and Mort Frank rejoinder: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/portside/message/2518 ]
1. Joe Dimow 2. Rob Prince
============================ Joe Dimow writes:
Zionism in the American Jewish community is a somewhat different movement than that described by Edward Said and Morton Frank. In the last elections for delegates to the World Zionist Congress, in Feb. less than 90,000 people bothered to vote out of about 6 million Jews. The largest vote went to the Reform religious movement with 37, 492 votes. Next was the Conservative religious organization with 19,787 votes. Both of these favor a negotiated peace in the Israeli- Palestinian conflict and establishment of a Palestinian state.
Third was the Orthodox group with 17, 952 votes. Fourth was the Meretz slate with 3,517 votes from this affiliate of Israel's leftist and Zionist party. The Zionist Organization of America, the hard line right wing group opposed to a Palestinian state, got 2,720 votes.
The lesson here is that the vast majority of American Jews, while saying they support Zionism, don't even know its principles and simply mean that they think a Jewish state has a right and a need to provide a national home for those Jews who want it. Aside from a small handful of religious fanatics who cause a great deal of trouble in Israel, most American Jews have no expectations of moving to Israel.
We live in a Post-Zionist world and Said would do better to apply his great talent to helping build movements for compromise and negotiations instead of speculating about what is wrong with the Jews. The Jews do enough worrying about that on their own.
See my column in Jewish Currents for more info on what is going on in the Jewish community.
Joe Dimow
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Rob Prince responds:
For starters I make certain assumptions about Frank's position:
1. He supports an Israeli withdrawal to its 1967 borders and a dismantlement of the settlements
2. He supports a two state solution, Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza and Israel's right to exist within its pre-1967 borders in peace and security. Assuming this is correct I would add the following:
a. While Edward Said is not above criticism, his analysis of the American Jewish Community is pretty much on target, certainly better than anything I've seen so far coming from the Jewish Community itself. If such an analysis exists, I'd like to see it. One has to be miopic not to see the outpouring of a particularly virulent and ugly manifestation of narrow nationalism on the part of significant segments of the American Jewish Community today in blind support of Israel, targeting all whom criticize Israel and the occupation regardless of how soft or hard the criticism. It has all of the characteristics and emotional political bigotry of the McCarthyite Period. Even zionist commentators are now referring to it as a kind of `ethnic panic'. It suggests a kind of deep identity crisis for zionism that has been provoked by the events of the past two years - but which has its roots in the entire Zionist experience. What stands out in my mind is the persistent pervasive level of denial - denial of the plight of the Palestinians which has reached unparalleled proportions, and evident most recently in which major Jewish publications in this country have covered up and excused the carnage in Jenin (whatever its extent). Said has his finger on the pulse about all this and is far closer to reality it seems to me, than Frank is in his criticism.
At this moment of crisis, as is manifested daily, the diverse segments of the Jewish Community in this country have essentially rallied behind Sharon and have defended his actions. Those few wonderful voices within American Jewry that challenge this position, Michael Lerner, this and that committee of progressive Jews (including one here in Colorado - Colorado Jews for a Just Peace), are exceptional and at least at present, narrowly based. In those complex interactions between `ethnicity' and `class' that mark all ethnic communities, the class dimensions of American Judaism have been temporarily downplayed as a narrow display of ethnic nationalism, very similar to how the Serbs related to the Albanians in Kosovo, manifests itself.
b. Franks' class analysis of the Jewish Community in the United States is outdated. The community itself has evolved, how much so remains to be seen. What would be very useful at this critical juncture is a thorough class analysis of American Jewry that would compare its present situation with that of the 1920s or 1930s (ie. the community after 1924 when immigration from Europe was pretty much shut off). What is left of the working class, radical heritage of American Jewry? What is the significance of figures from Henry Kissinger to Paul Wolfovitz within the US ruling class suggesting more influence at the top than in the past? What is the extent and the limits of pressure organizations like AIPAC, whose influence seems to have grown, if anything, recent decades? Have read two excellent articles on AIPAC of late - `The Israel Lobby' by Michael Lind in Prospect Magazine (www.prospect-magazine.co.uk) in its April issue and Michael Massings `Deal Breakers' in American Prospect of March 11, 2002 (don't have the website) that provide a decent and objective starting point for such a discussion, although the class analysis of American Judaism in both is muted.
I'm not a member of the Committees, have no intention of joining either. Not even sure how it is that I began to receive the postings from Portside. That said, many old friends are there and the statements on the Middle East that have come my way seem well thought out, reasonable and a basis for doing important peace work on Middle East issues.
Rob Prince/Denver