“Anybody who is contributing to the Israeli economy should stop. Stop that contribution until the wind changes.” Noa Sattath, an Israeli rabbi and civil rights activist often promoted by the liberal Zionist group J Street, called for crushing economic pressure on the fascistic new Israeli government during a webinar with Americans for Peace Now last week.
The new Israeli government shows that Zionism is finally a nightmare for Jews. Israeli leftwingers report that they are “under attack,” “afraid,” and blacklisted, and that anti-occupation activists will be subject to violence of the sort Palestinians have always faced. And the “Reform movement is enemy number one” for the new government.
Israel’s boosters across the political spectrum are panicking over the far-right’s victory in Israel’s election, and the reactions are telling. “We cannot remain silent knowing the enormous impact that the words and actions of Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich as senior ministers would have on the US-Israeli relationship,” writes Israel lobby stalwarts Dennis Ross and David Makovsky.
“Even Israeli kibbutzes these days is hosting Itamar Ben Gvir. He is invited to speak at the kibbutzim. Unbelievable,” says Tal Schneider of the Times of Israel. And Netanyahu’s possible return to prime minister in Israel is helped by the rise of Ben Gvir’s racist party, once banned in the Knesset.
Two Israeli writers explain the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh as the price of Israel’s clamping down on terrorism originating in the West Bank, with no consideration of the Palestinian experience under an apartheid army. Yet these talking points are echoed by Biden administration officials. Even as the Lapid government moves forward on more Jewish settlements on Palestinian lands, colonies that the Netanyahu government didn’t approve.
The liberal Zionist organization J Street is adamantly opposed to BDS, the nonviolent boycott campaign targeting Israel, and proudly declares that it is “Pro-Israel.” But one of its student leaders evidently disagrees with the organization. Eliana Blumberg supports BDS and says that the effort to say that being “pro-Israel means being pro-democracy, not pro-apartheid” is “futile.”
Civic leader Ruth Messinger says that the large sums of “secret” money being spent by AIPAC-aligned superpacs on congressional races to defeat progressives who are critical of Israel such as Donna Edwards and Yuh-Line Niou makes Americans think “less well of Jews.” While digital media expert Mik Moore says the money has “perverted” the political process and punished the “boldest” progressives.
U.S. Liberal Zionists have now upped the pressure on the Biden administration to condemn Israel’s “persecution” of Palestinian human rights group, by issuing statements that Israel’s declaration of the groups as terrorist is “baseless.” Let’s hope J Street victorious NY endorsees Jerry Nadler and Jamaal Bowman now join other Congresspeople in condemning the action.
Israel’s openly-fascistic move of shutting down seven Palestinian human rights groups in occupied territory was widely condemned by American progressives who demanded that the Biden administration take action against Israel. But rightwing Israel lobby groups were silent on the crackdown, J Street expressed “deep concern,” not condemnation. Though Americans for Peace now denounced the “persecution” of the Palestinian groups.
The Gaza attack has heightened Israel’s rightwing political tilt as it approaches its next election. “The only place where you can see real energy is on the far right among young people,” Chemi Shalev says of the surprising support among the young for the fascistic racist Religious Zionism party.