Sarah Hurwitz and liberal Zionism’s hail mary

Sarah Hurwitz’s now-viral appearance at the Jewish Federations of North America General Assembly last week is a gift to anti-Zionist and Palestine solidarity activists. The former speechwriter for Barack and Michelle Obama unwittingly does more in ten minutes to demonstrate the desperation and moral depravity of those who have spent the last two years attempting to stifle pro-Palestine sentiment and justify genocide than many have done in hours of speechifying. 

Thanks to the social media bogeyman she identifies early in her comments, millions have listened, aghast, as she bemoans TikTok “smashing our young people’s brains all day long with video of carnage in Gaza. And this is why many of us can’t have a sane conversation with younger Jews, because anything we try to say to them they’re hearing through this wall of carnage.” 

The “it’s TikTok’s fault” complaint is nothing new, of course. But her pivot to blaming Holocaust education for young Jews empathizing with Palestinians and increasingly abandoning support for Israel was an unexpected twist. Yes, you read that right. Holocaust education did us wrong. Granted, there is much to criticize about how mainstream Holocaust instruction is conducted. But Hurwitz is not joining those prominent Holocaust scholars who critique the kind of “postmemory” Holocaust education that insists on Jewish victimhood in perpetuity and weaponizes it to wage war on Palestinians and others. In Sarah’s view:

And you know I think unfortunately, the very smart bet that we made on Holocaust education to serve as antisemitism education in this new media environment, I think that is beginning to break down a little bit because, you know, Holocaust education is absolutely essential, but I think it may be confusing some of our young people about antisemitism. Because they learn about big, strong Nazis hurting weak, emaciated Jews, and they think oh, antisemitism is like anti-black racism, right? Powerful white people against powerless black people. So, when on TikTok all day long, they see powerful Israelis hurting weak, skinny Palestinians, it’s not surprising that they think, Oh, I know the lesson of the Holocaust is you fight Israel. You fight the big powerful people hurting the weak people.

So, the lesson of the Holocaust we’re supposed to learn is: Never again for us, but for Palestinians, never say never. And never be confused into empathizing with them, regardless of what you see on social media.

The memes and analyses of these comments are plentiful, and I recommend dipping into a few to understand the common themes.

But wait, there’s more.

Hurwitz’s condescending remarks about young Jews and jaw-dropping statements about the Holocaust deserve the scorn that has been heaped upon them. Yet flying below the analytical radar are other comments she makes later in her talk, which reveal the crisis of Zionism in the U.S. and how utterly desperate “leaders” like Hurwitz are in facing it.

In the last two minutes of the panel, Hurwitz mentions a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allowed a public high school football coach to continue conducting post-game Christian prayers on the 50-yard line. In explaining her reaction to the ruling to the JNF audience, the Harvard law grad waffled over if it was good or bad, until she realized the true import of the decision — it would help ensure young Jews feel okay about being alone. Of course, she doesn’t want a Jewish football player to feel bad (or a Muslim, Hindu or atheist. After all, she is a good liberal). But young Jews just need to get used to the idea of being uncomfortable outsiders, and we need to stop coddling them because we Jews have a higher purpose to serve: 

I don’t think feeling uncomfortable at the 50-yard line is the worst thing because to be a Jew is to be different. And I think leaning into our difference, embracing our difference, our values, our wisdom. I think if that makes us a little bit uncomfortable, that’s not really the worst thing in the world.

Why, after careening in her remarks from “brain-smashing TikTok,” to insisting upon viewing the seven million Jews in Israel as not just co-religionists but “my siblings,” to emphasizing the primacy of 2500 year old Jewish texts as the ultimate guard against anti-Zionism, does Hurwitz end with a three-year-old Supreme Court decision about a praying Christian football coach?  

Let’s call it Hurwitz’s Hail Mary pass.

She knows the jig is up. She knows that’s so when she admits that “I sound obscene” while trying to convince young Jews not to believe what their lyin’ eyes see happening in Gaza. She knows that’s so when she faults Holocaust education for somehow evincing a power analysis that, in her world, wrongly posits Israel as capable of oppression. She knows that’s so when she advocates absurdly for banning all Jewish day school students from having a smartphone until their senior year, because arguments for Israel can’t be heard through the “wall of dead children” in Gaza they would otherwise see. And if the jig is up but you need young people to join you in doubling down on Zionism, then the only thing left is to convince them that being Jewish means embracing the noble sacrifice of being different and virtually alone in supporting an ethno-nationalist state that is committing a genocide most people oppose. After all, there are worse things in the world. Just don’t look for them on TikTok.