Israel prevents its Jewish citizens from coming to terms with the country’s horrific treatment of Palestinians. Sadly, the Jewish community in the U.S. is no different.

When scholar Omer Bartov described the “brutal” expulsion of Palestinians during the Nakba, he was heckled and booed. Audience members at the Center for Jewish History shouted “Shame!” and one walked out.

A conversation between two leading U.S. rabbis show how strong the red lines still are in the organized Jewish community with regard to Israel.

Many in Israel approved of the settler “pogrom” against Huwwara because they regard Palestinians as “animals,” a leading Israeli reporter explained to American Jews last week.

Danny Ayalon, a vigorous advocate for Israel and former ambassador to the U.S., says he is worried about the growth of Jewish anti-Zionism in the United States.

At the organization’s annual national conference, J Street CEO Jeremy Ben-Ami announced a major pivot in the group’s advocacy: for restricting U.S. aid to Israel over its human rights abuses. “Maybe it’s time for some serious oversight and accountability for how our aid to Israel is actually being used,” Jeremy Ben-Ami said, likening Palestine to Ukraine under Russian invasion. Ben-Ami also warned that leading Jewish organizations that enforce loyalty to Israel are threatening the health of the Jewish community by undermining a traditional Jewish commitment to civil rights.

Israel’s assault on Gaza last May alienated many American Jews, and a lawsuit against a Westchester temple for firing 26-year-old Jessie Sander, an avowed anti-Zionist, for her blogpost condemning Israeli “genocide” and the pro-Israel “propaganda” of American Jewish institutions, highlights the fissures inside the Jewish community.

There is no middle ground; you’re either with Israel or against it these days, as J Street, the liberal Zionist group, found out yesterday. Jeremy Ben-Ami of J Street says it was shocking when the Jewish establishment allowed a speaker to call his group “anti-Semitic” at a UN summit against BDS. But the same event smeared Bassem Tamimi, the leader of nonviolent resistance in Nabi Saleh in occupied Palestine, without protest from J Street.

VP Mike Pence was introduced at AIPAC as an enemy of BDS and told the group that Trump is seriously considering moving embassy to Jerusalem. Meanwhile,, young Jewish protesters outside call the occupation a moral crisis in the Jewish community.

“Senator Hatfield said– and I will never forget these words as long as I live– ‘In this great distinguished institution of the United States Senate, when the Israel lobby says jump, 90 plus of my colleagues say how high. They never ask why.'” Khalil Jahshan at the annual Israel lobby conference in Washington, D.C.