On what moral grounds do these residents of the safe havens of Newton or Boca Raton have the chutzpah to tell Israelis what risks they should take for “peace”?
On the day that Benjamin Netanyahu was supposed to speak at AIPAC, some 300 self-identified ‘concerned millennial Jewish Zionists’ sent him a letter stating their concerns about Bibi’s refusing to distance himself from the Jewish Power Party, allowing the Orthodox community too much influence in forming state policy and refusing to take concrete steps towards a two-state solution.
In effect, they threatened to stop advocating on behalf of Israel unless the government takes steps to hew to their vision of how the Jewish state should conduct itself.
It seems that many of these signatories “already occupy positions of influence in the North American Jewish community, in political activism and in the policy-making world,” so Bibi is on notice that if he wants these monumentally important members of our community to support the Jewish state, he had better adopt their progressive point of view.
Limited Understanding of Reality
Never mind that these American Jews have only a very limited and very left-leaning understanding of the realities of Israeli life and politics; never mind that there is no Palestinian leadership with whom a two-state solution could be negotiated; forget the fact that Israel is the world’s only Jewish state and that protecting and valuing our Orthodox brothers and sisters is critical to the continuation of that Jewish identity.
The first question that needs to be asked here is: What on earth is wrong with American Jews that that these self-absorbed ‘leaders’ think it’s perfectly acceptable to essentially blackmail Israeli politicians (it’s our way or the highway, chaver)?
How is it that under the leadership of these esteemed 300 influencers, almost three-quarters of American Jews support the Democratic Party despite the growing anti-Semitism in the party’s ranks and the fact that more than two-thirds of Democrats feel more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause than to Israel? Did any of these 300 self-labelled leaders express any strong criticism of Ilan Omar’s despicable anti-Semitic screeds or decry the Democratic Party’s ever-accelerating descent into the American version of the U.K.’s Labour Party? I have my doubts.
And on what moral grounds do these residents of the safe havens of Newton or Boca Raton have the chutzpah to be lecturing Israelis on how they should behave and what risks they should be prepared to accept in exchange for ‘peace’? When the rockets are falling on their Massachusetts and Florida suburbs, perhaps they would then be in a better position to lecture Israelis on how they should just suck it up.
Here’s my advice to these 300 millennials: In a world that is increasingly more hostile towards Jews, Israel is the bulwark that is vital to our long-term survival, so why don’t you stand alongside Israelis and support their decisions on how best to secure their – and our – future? Instead of continuously nitpicking and sniping and grousing, why not acknowledge and respect Israel for having to make some very difficult decisions in the face of myriad existential threats?
Blaming the Victim
I understand why Israel’s enemies continually misrepresent and demonize Israel’s actions, but do you have to be their willing accomplices by parroting the same falsehoods?
There are so many threats to Jews around the world, but Israel’s policies are not the problem. These 300 so-called leaders are unwilling to face the real threat to Israel and Jews worldwide, namely, rampant and mutating anti-Semitism in the US and Europe. Instead, they choose to blame the victim.
They should be ashamed.
