Israel is “a failure,” the Zionist dream has curdled into Jewish selfishness, a major Jewish leader writes in an important article published yesterday. “After a life and career devoted to Jewish community and Israel, I conclude that in every important way Israel has failed to realize its promise for me,” David Gordis states.
Gordis is a former executive at the American Jewish Committee, a central organization of the Israel lobby, and former president of the Hebrew College and a former vice president of the Jewish Theological Seminary. He published his article yesterday at Tikkun under the title, “Major American Jewish Leader Changes His Mind About Israel.”
Gordis, who is in his late 70s (and the uncle of rightwing Zionist Daniel Gordis), writes that he completely believed in Israel when it was founded and through his adult life, but that the spiral of that society into occupation and Jewish particularism has caused him to change his mind. It’s a political, spiritual and religious failure: Israel is “distorted by a fanatic, obscurantist and fundamentalist religion which encourages the worst behaviors rather than the best.”
His indictment includes American Jews. “The establishment leadership in the American Jewish community is silent in the face of this dismal situation, and there are no recognizable trends that can move Israel out of this quagmire.” Peter Beinart said this about the establishment four years ago while Max Blumenthal laid out the problem in Israel’s political culture in comprehensive detail in Goliath three years ago and was promptly censored by every mainstream organ, from NPR to the New Yorker to the New York Times to the cables and public television– yes; “Frontline” features Dennis Ross and Ari Shavit as its spokespeople on Israel, to make the funders happy.
Read Gordis’s article in full. Here are some excerpts:
The Israel of today is very far from anything I dreamed of and worked for throughout my career….
Jews had returned to the stage of history after the devastation of the Holocaust. Israel was to be the great laboratory for the rebirth of an ancient tradition in a new land and in a country committed to being a model of democracy and freedom for the world.
What happened? We can debate the reasons but the bottom line for me is that it has gone terribly wrong. On the positive side, Israel’s accomplishments have been remarkable. Israel has created a thriving economy, and has been a refuge for hundreds of thousands of the displaced and the needy. Israel has generated a rich and diverse cultural life and its scientific and educational achievements have been exemplary. In spite of these achievements, however, Israel in my view has gone astray. And it in in the area for which Israel was created, as a Jewish state, embodying and enhancing Jewish values that I see this failure..
The political culture is rotten.
Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is nearing a half century in duration. Netanyahu’s “facts on the ground” steps to make a two-state solution impossible are bearing fruit, and there still appears to be no significant opposition to these policies in Israel itself. A number of smaller organizations supporting a two-state solution have emerged, notably J-Street and Americans for Peace Now, but recent steps by the Israeli government to delegitimize these groups are proceeding. The bottom line as I see it: The right has triumphed; the left has been defeated.
The spiritual culture is rotten. The Jewish experience balanced particularism and universalism traditionally. Not in Israel. The emphasis below is Gordis’s.
Present day Israel has discarded the rational, the universal and the visionary. These values have been subordinated to a cruel and oppressive occupation, an emphatic materialism, severe inequalities rivaling the worst in the western world and distorted by a fanatic, obscurantist and fundamentalist religion which encourages the worst behaviors rather than the best.
And most depressing of all for me, is that I see no way out, no way forward which will reverse the current reality. Right wing control in Israel is stronger and more entrenched than ever. The establishment leadership in the American Jewish community is silent in the face of this dismal situation, and there are no recognizable trends that can move Israel out of this quagmire. So, sadly, after a life and career devoted to Jewish community and Israel, I conclude that in every important way Israel has failed to realize its promise for me. A noble experiment, but a failure.
This article is a huge blow. Michael Walzer has had similar misgivings lately published in a book; but he has not stated the matter as emphatically as this. But I predict apres Gordis, the deluge.
Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun says that he published the article as submitted by Gordis, who is today a senior scholar at SUNY Albany:
We publish it with the same sadness that Gordis expresses at the end of this article, because many of us at Tikkun magazine shared the same hopes he expresses below for an Israel that would make Jews proud by becoming an embodiment of what is best in Jewish tradition, history, and ethics, rather than a manifestation of all the psychological and spiritual damage that has been done to our people, which now acts as an oppressor to the Palestinian people.
One last point. From his American Jewish Committee days, Gordis reflects that that Israel lobbying organization had political tensions built in.
its lay leadership tending center-right and its professional staff clearly center left.
This is always the tension in these organizations. Right now I bet J Street staff is composed of people who understand the failure of Israel, while the leadership clings to HaTikvah Zionism so as to influence the Democratic Party an iota. Americans for Peace Now surely has young staff who believe in one state.
I swear, I’m sounding like hophmi now, but Phil you’re bringing this on yourself.
No, it’s not. It’s an old geezer who is just one single old geezer. I know you desperately want to see a ‘huge shift’. Just like you told us that I/P would be a huge issue in the democratic primaries. What happened? Nothing. Even the so-called radical Bernie Sanders refuses to utter the word Israel together with the name Sheldon Adelson.
We have these existential outbursts from time to time, what should we make of them? It is merely an emotional valve for people who are trying to reconcile their supposed liberalism with staunch support of racial Apartheid.
As I say: whenever there is a lull in the conflict(like now) or where there is a totally 100% Jewish space(like Tikkun), these “liberal” Zionists come out and start their bleating.
But by the time their help is needed with BDS, when Israel is butchering children is Gaza, where are all these enlightened liberals? Siding with the Jewish Apartheid militant state.
It’s been said before and it must be said again: it’s no longer possible to wait for a Jewish awakening. The young Jews will get there, but we don’t have time to wait 30-40 years before they become the masters of their communal establishment. We have to draw the conclusion that the vast majority of older Jews(50+) are either indifferent or will go down with the ship of Jewish apartheid. The writing’s all over the wall.
If you’re 50 today, you still have a decent 25 years in the establishment. Just look at Madeleine Albright or the Koch Brothers or for that matter someone like Hillary Clinton. Our elites are getting older. We don’t have time to wait for the young, we have to organize within the communities that are receptive to change and as much as it pains you, the Jewish community over the age of 50 isn’t one of them.
Mr. Gordis seems upset that Zio-supremacism and the “Jewish State” project have gone too far and that Israel isn’t the “kinder, gentler” religion-supremacist state of his dreams.
But he doesn’t seem to be bothered by the fundamental injustices and immorality behind the ideology and the project. The impression I get is that if Israel were to clean up its act, he wouldn’t hesitate to renew his Zio-supremacist membership.
I’d put this one on par with Trump’s promise of “neutrality” on the I-P issue: Sounds great, means little.
@Krauss
Whilst like you I would not categorise this as a “huge blow” it has to be seen as a realistic and positive statement of the facts by someone who appears to have been a reasonably high profile and presumably unquestioning American Zionist in the past . I particularly noted his use of the words “laboratory” and “experiment” when describing Israel. I expect the rabid Zionists in Israel and the US will really be pissed of at the use of these nouns to describe their beloved Land of Creation.
As for Rabbi Gordis I think you have to acknowledge his courage in coming out particularly given his age. He could simply have stayed silent and remained a self loving older generation Jew but now faces the usual “self loathing ” slanders.
Younger American Jews who are alive to the reality of Israel and Zionism IMHO also do need older “role models” like Rabbi Gordis to encourage them to go forward and at least attempt to sever the US-Israel umbilical Zionist cord.
Gordis: “and most depressing of all for me, is that I see no way out, no way forward which will reverse the current reality. Right wing control in Israel is stronger and more entrenched than ever. ”
To me this means that until recently Gordis [1] saw the bitter truth (probably for a very long time, he is not blind), but [2] for that very long time clung to a hope that things might get better.
I think he wants a better world, not just a jack-booted Disneyland for Jews. I am with him, even though I never entertained his former dreams.
Every article like this comes w the obligatory nonsense.
Gordis: A noble experiment, but a failure.
It was never a noble experiment, it is — to paraphrase Wilford Brimley — what it was always meant to be.
Weiss: This article is a huge blow.
Here we go again….