Jewish institutions reject those questioning the role of Zionism in Jewish life, but the organization Judaism On Our Own Terms is creating a space where young Jews do not have to choose between their Judaism and their sense of justice.
Jews Against White Supremacy seeks to educate and radically transform Jewish communities around the world while challenging settler colonialism and fighting for a free Palestine.
Linda Dittmar witnessed abuses of Palestinians during the Nakba as a girl in Israel. Now in her 80s, living in America she seeks to retrace the ways that Israelis suppressed the Nakba and replaced Palestinian life with a Zionist narrative.
An Israeli Magistrate Court judge extended the detention of left-wing anti-Zionist activist Jonathan Pollak following his arrest at a protest in the Palestinian village of Beita.
The case could indicate a significant escalation in the Netanyahu government’s crackdown on those who resist Israeli colonization.
The Israeli slide to religious fundamentalism and ultranationalism has made more people realize that many Jews oppose Zionism not out of “self-hate,” but because we believe in the equality of all human beings.
Former Google employee Ariel Koren says the company has “sustained a culture of silencing anti-Zionist Jews and creating toxic and unjust conditions for Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim workers.”
The abuse of antisemitism is nothing new, but we tend to forget that the Israel lobby is only able to get away with its baseless smears because of a deep-seated anti-Palestinianism.
Younger American and Israeli Jews have starkly different attitudes from each other in a new survey by the American Jewish Committee– 45 percent of US Jews say that it’s appropriate for them to influence Israeli policy while 70 percent of Israeli Jews say, Stay out of our business. Nearly half of the Americans don’t feel very connected to Israel and 22.5 percent believe that there should be one “bi-national” state in Israel and Palestine.
The Jewish establishment is cracking. “Our institutions have to wrestle with the reality that increasing numbers of passionate Jews do not support the State of Israel,” even as the “donor bases” are shrinking, writes Rabbi Amy Bardack, a liberal Zionist leader associated with J Street. Bardack calls on Jewish organizations not to shun anti-Zionists. But there’s a reason anti-Zionists were shunned– because the principle of “equality” beats “Jewish nationalism” any day of the week.
Rabbi Wendi Geffen of a Reform congregation outside Chicago gave a sermon after the last Gaza conflict saying anti-Zionist Jews must not be allowed inside the Jewish “tent” because the “vast majority” of Jews support Israel. And she said the assertion by some Jews that Zionism contradicts progressive values is a threat to the Jewish people more dangerous than external threats. Her views are important because they reflect official Jewish statements that conflate Zionism and Judaism.