American Jews, Though Patronized, Won’t Desert Israel

The question concerns diplomats and Middle Eastern analysts the world over: Will America’s Jews now finally turn their backs on Israel, given the current strife in the occupied territories? Do the tensions mean that the longstanding American embrace of Israel, encouraged by its powerful Jewish community, is about to be withdrawn?

To stark questions like these, an unequivocal answer can be given: Not a chance.

The dream of the late President Anwar Sadat, to install Egypt as America’s Middle Eastern linchpin in place of Israel, was naive and unrealistic, given a long history of U.S. interests in Israel that go far beyond the moods of the Jewish community.

This much said, it is clear that the American Jewish community is undergoing an anguish, a frustration and a disenchantment with Israel beyond anything experienced in the last two decades. The deliberate policy of beating Palestinian demonstrators, to break their bones so that they can’t throw stones, triggered a revulsion and an outrage even among nonpolitical Jews that is turning, for many, into a sense of shame.

It is a visceral response, but it comes on a growing intellectual unease over trends in Israeli policy and society, exemplified in the statement last September of the venerable American Jewish Congress that warns of demographic and political dangers ahead if Israel continues along its present course.

The anguish of the last few weeks goes deeper than concern over current events, to basic strains of group psychology. Expressed in synagogues and community centers, by Jewish writers and intellectuals in their living-room study groups, it seems to spring from a sense of helplessness--the perception of American Jews that they have so little influence on the Jewsof Israel.

Lip service is always paid to the interdependence of the world’s two largest Jewish communities, of course, and respectful words are always uttered. The reassurances that American Jews so desperately seek are always provided, eventually, by attractive and persuasive Israeli dignitaries.

But, deep down, an American Jew is always fearful of the Israeli retort bound to greet his criticism: Why don’t you move to Israel to help us do better? It is easier for the American to muffle the criticism than to find a satisfactory answer.

If sophisticated American Jews understand that they will not get any sympathy from Israelis, their present anguish concerning the violence in the occupied territories turns to anger at Israeli leaders and spokesmen who patronize them.

“The question I must ask you is, what do you see as the alternative,” wrote Israeli President Chaim Herzog to Rabbi Alexander Schindler, the president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. “Not one of our critics so far has come forward with such an alternative.”

Such condescension provokes bitter derision from American Jews who have been warning for years, like many Israelis, of the dangers inherent in maintaining a long-term occupation over an alien, hostile population. As one Jewish writer remarked, “Herzog is asking sympathy as an orphan, after shooting his parents.”

Further discomfort among American Jewish leaders is caused by the habits of group cohesion, of not wanting to criticize Israel in public. The American Jewish community is not monolithic, and disputes within the group have long been endless and bitter. But a minority addressing the majority has reluctance in airing its own disagreements.

There is a more pressing reason: American Jews are acutely aware, and Israeli apologists will not hesitate to scold them if they should seem to forget, that any sign of dissent in their ranks will be pounced on by pro-Arab voices as a sign of Israel’s impending destruction.

Thus the so-called Jewish lobby in Washington is not about to go out of business, and its influence in Congress will remain strong. Economic aid to Israel may well be reduced slightly in the coming year, but not if there is any suggestion that it is being cut in punishment. Indeed, Israeli economic officials have already considered the possibility of a modest reduction in the amount of their annual aid request, to preempt any cutbacks initiated in an economy-minded Congress.

The danger for Israel in letting the discontent in this country go unheeded is that sophisticated and intellectual American Jews will lose interest in Israel at an ever faster pace, will turn their energies to other Jewish interests. Over time, a valuable source of energy--and charity--would diminish, and Israel would lose much of the appeal that it still retains among a curious younger generation of American Jews.

But this is far from the apocalypse that is sought by the Arabists and propagandists who are never reconciled to the legitimacy of the Jewish state. No matter how critical or disaffected they may become, American Jews will not turn against an Israel that has become deeply installed in their self-esteem. They may not like what they see, and increasingly they are saying so, but, like the audience applauding for Tinker Bell, they desperately want to believe.