Much has been said about the withering of liberal Zionism, as the mainstream becomes ever more dominated by the military extremist and ultra-religious strains. Yossi Sarid says it poetically:
In the beginning, he was a gazelle whose neck the hunters were seeking. With time, he tried to become a seagull in the hope that if he was in the sky, they would not bring him down. He went to every corner of the land to build a nest for his rejected hopes, to find a refuge, until he finally found a place to rest his legs and soul − Nitzana. Late MK Arie “Lova” Eliav was the first traitor. But I did not speak out because I was not Lova.
Later on, they attacked the people of the kibbutzim for being hedonists, and the kibbutz for being a place where people sit on easy chairs and take a dip in the pool, where the grass is greener and the water is the brightest blue. So they imprisoned them within the security fence; they broke their spirits. The Zionists’ gem and pride turned into a wreck that would not be worth its weight in the settlements’ gold. But I did not speak out because I was not a kibbutznik.
It’s a beautiful read, check it out.
You know, it seems that what’s happening with Israel’s politics and definitions of Zionism is the inevitable outcome of the wheels set in motion in 1948. When you define your national identity through military power (in Israel, the common saying is "If force doesn’t work, try more force"), the space for anything else is bound to shrink.
