The September issue of Commentary Magazine (not yet online) includes a response by William Kristol to Norman Podhoretz’s complaint that Jews are liberals (in Podhoretz’s forthcoming book, Why Are Jews Liberals? Commentary’s editor, John Podhoretz, is giving his father’s book a nepotistic shove). Kristol’s response is far more forthcoming about religion than he usually is, for instance when he was a columnist for the New York Times. He believes, as I have reported before, that Jews should stop worrying about maintaining American Jewish support for Israel, and seek support for Israel in other American places. He says that Jews should revive Jewish religious observance among those Jews who care about Judaism. I.e., give up on the unaffiliated, and the assimilationists.
Kristol suggests in this piece that Israel is the heart and soul of Jewish life. "Instead of focusing on the attitude of American Jews toward Israel, why not focus on the attitude of all Americans toward Israel? The important things are for the practice and study of Judaism to become more vital, in America and elsewhere, and for the state of Israel to remain strong and secure."
I.e., more Jewish day schools. Not a word about apartheid or the destruction of idealism in Israel. No, Kristol is a conservative, in the blindered, parochial mode.
I’m burying the lead. In talking about the 2008 election, Kristol says that 80 percent of Jews shrugged off "all the information about Obama’s coolness toward Israel and McCain’s strong support for the Jewish state, and voted for Obama."
This is Kristol’s only consideration of the election, really. And it reminds us, that for Kristol and for so many other neocons, all that matters in a presidential candidate is his/her stance on Israel. (Yes, and why did the neocons push the Iraq war?) This is the essence of dual loyalty, a belief that Israel’s interests are identical with the U.S.’s, or should continue to be regarded as such by the powers that be. Kristol was a Times columnist all last year. He was never so frank then about what really matters. That’s another big problem with the Israel-firsters, subterfuge. The mainstream press can be blamed for failing to report on what was the hidden tension in last year’s presidential race, and one that continues to put great pressure on Obama.
