Are US Jewish groups ashamed to support Israel?
Let’s finally organize a Jewish march on DC for Israel. Let’s do it, God willing, in the next two weeks. Let’s stop with the excuses.
While American Jews were being beaten on the streets of New York and the State of Israel’s good name was being shredded all across American mainstream and social media, the Jewish Federation of New York, America’s largest private charity, decided to take action. It sent a group of rabbis to Israel as the rockets fell on Tel Aviv and Sderot.
That seems pretty courageous, no? What better statement of solidarity with Israel than to send rabbis to Israel during a war, at personal risk, to show that American Jewish religious leaders care. Except that their communities were in the US, their congregants were cowering in fear over even wearing yarmulkes and Magen Davids in Times Square, and we needed them to inspire their communities to stand up for Israel while it was being vilified by antisemitic politicians like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib and celebrities like Bella and Gigi Hadid and Dua Lipa.
Plus, there was the arguably more important fact that many activists were begging the federation to get involved and cosponsor – or at least participate in, and promote – a rally for Israel that was being organized in Times Square by the Israel-America Council, me and our own World Values Network.
The mainstream Jewish organizations were of two minds about joining the rally. Sure, they saw its importance. But they complained it wouldn’t get enough people and we’d be worse off with a small crowd.
In addition, unmentioned, was the fact that Israel had become more toxic than ever in a media landscape where it had few, if any, defenders. Why sully the organizations’ names at the height of Israel’s Gaza operation if things could be done more quietly with less of a reputational price to be paid? This is especially true since the rally at Ground Zero focused purely on support for Israel, while the mainstream organizations wanted it to focus equally on the rise of antisemitism and the quest for peace in the Middle East.
But we who were organizing the rally at Ground Zero insisted that its focus had to be Israel and unadulterated support for the Jewish state. It was Israel that had thousands of murderous rockets falling on its cities and citizens daily. It was the Jewish state that was locked in a battle with genocidal death cult Hamas. And it was the Jewish state that was fighting its cause all alone, abandoned by the world, while the less controversial issue of fighting antisemitism had more natural allies.
So, federation and mainstream Jewish organizations like ADL did not participate in the rally but sent the rabbis to Israel instead.
Plus, there was the arguably more important fact that many activists were begging the federation to get involved and cosponsor – or at least participate in, and promote – a rally for Israel that was being organized in Times Square by the Israel-America Council, me and our own World Values Network.
The mainstream Jewish organizations were of two minds about joining the rally. Sure, they saw its importance. But they complained it wouldn’t get enough people and we’d be worse off with a small crowd.
In addition, unmentioned, was the fact that Israel had become more toxic than ever in a media landscape where it had few, if any, defenders. Why sully the organizations’ names at the height of Israel’s Gaza operation if things could be done more quietly with less of a reputational price to be paid? This is especially true since the rally at Ground Zero focused purely on support for Israel, while the mainstream organizations wanted it to focus equally on the rise of antisemitism and the quest for peace in the Middle East.
But we who were organizing the rally at Ground Zero insisted that its focus had to be Israel and unadulterated support for the Jewish state. It was Israel that had thousands of murderous rockets falling on its cities and citizens daily. It was the Jewish state that was locked in a battle with genocidal death cult Hamas. And it was the Jewish state that was fighting its cause all alone, abandoned by the world, while the less controversial issue of fighting antisemitism had more natural allies.
So, federation and mainstream Jewish organizations like ADL did not participate in the rally but sent the rabbis to Israel instead.