We've been tracking how the elevation of Avigdor Lieberman could damage US-Israeli relations. But there are also questions about whether the rightward turn of the Israeli elections will further the alienation between American and Israeli Jews.
Friction has always existed between the American and Israeli Jewish communities. Although this tension is often hidden beneath general support for Israel, it does rear its head from time to time. Most recently in November American Jews descended on Israel for the annual general assembly of Jewish Federations and were roundly ignored, or insulted, by the Israeli press. But these differences involved such nuanced issues as defining the global Jewish community and building understanding between the communities, not on fundamental political questions. That might be changing.
Today in Ha'aretz Mike Prashker, the director of Merchavim: The Institute for the Advancement of Shared Citizenship in Israel, points out the irony that American Jews voted disproportionately for Barack Obama in the US elections, helping to challenge the legacy of racism in this country, while Israeli Jews supported politicians running on openly racist platforms in the Israeli elections. Prashker writes:
The fact is, however, that when it comes to core
democratic values, American and Israeli Jews are headed in
diametrically opposite directions. These elections have revealed
Israeli democracy as dangerously hollow – an easily manipulated
latticework of structures, mechanisms and procedures lacking the
normative and cultural foundations that are the bedrock of any
substantive and sustainable democracy.
He argues that Jews in the US need to help their Israeli brethren better understand democracy to create "a strong and sustainable national home for the Jewish people." He claims American Jews can influence Israeli democracy by sharing their "Jewish, Zionist and democratic values."
Prashker doesn't explain how to square the circle. Rather than just making a call for American Jews to share their democratic values, Prashker seems to be proposing a need to rethink Zionism. Let's open the question: can the goal of Zionism, a Jewish national home, be democratic? Israel very clearly seems to be saying the answer is "no." The recent Israeli election awarded politicians that ran on a platform of the need to "protect" the Jewish state from its own Palestinian citizens. How will American Jews respond to this?
There is a chance that Israel's illiberal reality will alienate American Jews who have benefited from an American society that has been very open to them. This may be the biggest story of all in the aftermath of the new Israeli government: whether American Jews will accept Israel's anti-democratic nature, choose to engage with Prashker's question, or begin to abandon Israel as antithetical to their values.
