A few weeks back, Dana Goldstein of The American Prospect overcame her reserve about writing about Israel/Palestine because Gaza was so appalling to her; and she called on Jews to raise their voices. Now she's back. Today in The American Prospect she has a clear and powerful Passover-inspired piece about her Jewish education and the contradictions of Jewish identity, in which she describes the Diaspora as the central element of Jewish history:
Pair this narrative — the most central to the Jewish faith — with lesson upon lesson about the Holocaust, and you can begin to understand the oppression ideology with which American Jewish children are raised. Now look at the lives of many of these children — cosseted, suburban, affluent — and you can begin to understand the bipolar nature of Jewishness in America.
The Jewish people have a 3,000-year history of exile. The
intellectual vigor of our people was fostered not only by our devotion
to the Torah — "the book" — but also experientially, by generation
upon generation forced to make sense of societies that were alien to
us, and often cruel and hostile. In Israel today, that dynamic is
reversed. It is Jews who have the power, as conservatives like Avigdor
Lieberman know well. It is a power whose exploitation they relish.
Things I like about this piece:
–The authority of a young writer. Goldstein's voice is clear and forceful. The piece is called the "Questioning Spirit," invoking the child questioners of the Passover seder. Make no mistake, she is taking on her elders on essential issues;
–Its non-Zionism. Moving to Israel is called making "aliyah," or going up, and most Jews have a feeling that Israelis are superior for having moved there. Goldstein is rethinking this idea openly;
–the word experiential. I would add that, as Goldstein hints, that Jewish experience includes assimilation and power.
(Thanks to Serge Duss for tip)
