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The Diaspora exchange, part 2: ‘The best path for Israel is to improve Zionism, not to abandon it’

[additional-authors]
December 24, 2014

Alan Wolfe is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College. He is the author and editor of more than 20 books. Professor Wolfe attended Temple University as an undergraduate and received his doctorate in political science from the University of Pennsylvania in 1967. He has honorary degrees from Loyola College in Maryland and St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. Professor Wolfe writes often for different publications including The New York Times, Harper's, The Atlantic Monthly, and The Washington Post. He served as an advisor to President Clinton in preparation for his 1995 State of the Union address and has lectured widely at American and European universities. He has twice conducted programs under the auspices of the U.S. State Department that bring Muslim scholars to the United States to learn about separation of church and state.

This exchange is dedicated to Professor Wolfe's new book, At Home in Exile: Why Diaspora Is Good for the Jews (Beacon Press, 2014).

(Part 1 can be found right here.)

***

Dear Professor Wolfe,

In the first round we discussed your criticism of early mainstream Zionism’s dismissive and even disparaging attitude toward the diaspora. In response to my question, you stated that rather than an attack on the basic tenets of Zionism, your book tries to help “reclaim the universalistic spirit that moved some, but not all, early Zionists”. The representatives of this type of thinking which you favourably cite are Ahad Ha’am, Dubnov, and Rawidowicz.

The narrative you present is one which contrasts humanist-minded Jewish universalism with nationalist-minded Jewish particularism. Curiously, though, most of what Israelis know as Zionism seems to fall into the second category. As an illustration of this we can point out that in Israel (including among members of the Israeli left) David Ben-Gurion is usually cited as an emblem of Jewish humanism; in your book he comes across as a rather stern particularist.

While your approach is not against Zionism itself, it does seem to be deeply critical of the type of Zionism that ‘has won’ in Israel and which most Israelis were raised on (a Zionism that stresses Jewish srength, independence, and pride). I have two questions:

1) Is it realistic to expect mainstream Israeli Zionists to take a turn toward the type of Jewish universalism you wish to promote?

2) If it isn't, do you believe that life in the diaspora has more appeal as far as ardent believers in Jewish Universalism are concerned?

Yours,

Shmuel.

***

Dear Shmuel,

You have correctly described the intent of my book. It is to remind readers that Zionism has existed in many forms, implying that the current version, under which so many Israelis were indeed raised, is not the only one.

My first comment is to point out something on which we agree: the term “Zionism” still contains valuable meaning.  Not everyone is convinced of this. So called “post-Zionists,” mostly on the left, believe that the term is no longer useful: Zionism, in their view, was a rationale for creating a Jewish state in a region in which it did not really belong. Now that military force more than any abiding idea is the dominant feature of Jewish statehood, it follows, the term should be retired. That, I wish to insist, is not my view. I think that the best path for Israel is to improve Zionism, not to abandon it.

But is this, you ask, realistic? It is certainly a fair question; although I would not never claim expertise with respect to Israel, there can be no diaspora without a conception of a homeland, and for that reason, I cannot “cop out” from the question you ask by claiming that what happens in Israel is beyond my purview. Certainly the prospects for a return to the more humanistic tradition in Zionism could not look more bleak at this moment: a country so often at war, and so threatened by terror, cannot be asked to embrace full-scale universalism. I nonetheless believe that at some point, Israel will have to address the question, not of security, but of security for what? All states ultimately survive for a reason, no matter how much its everyday actions may violate that sense of purpose: a conception of furthering democracy still dominates American public policy, for example, even as aspects of its policies run counter to democratic aspirations. It is for this reason that Netanyahu will be judged a failure by those who come after us. He is great at forming coalitions, but pitiful at getting them to take positive steps that will leave Israel at peace with its neighbors. (By the way, Bibi was in many ways formed by the diaspora; he want to high school less than a mile from where I grew up.)

You are correct that I have some unfavorable things to say about Ben Gurion. Still, Ben Gurion was prime minister at a time when Zionism continued to possess humanistic ideals. That is why he felt the need to exchange letters with Rawidowicz: what current political leader in Israel would consider it important to enter into discussion with a prophetic idealist? Another great Jewish thinker, the Israeli prophet Yeshayahu Liebowitz, also did his best to persuade Ben Gurion of the importance of separating religion and politics; had his advice been followed, Israel today would likely be a very different country. Can there be another Rawidowicz or Liebowitz? Maybe not. But their lives remind us of the importance of voices that can look beyond the needs of the day and in so doing ask a country to live up to its ideas. Their day will come when Israel becomes secure enough to consider more than it has its place in the world.

Your second question asks whether universalism is more likely to thrive in the diaspora than in Israel. The answer is yes. In both Europe and the United States, younger Jews, while more likely to intermarry, are also more likely to want to see their liberal values reflected in Israeli domestic and foreign policy. There are those who regret such a transformation: Jews, wherever they live, should never forget the Holocaust, they argue, and should always appreciate Israel as a place that will welcome them no matter how much others may hate them. But generations change; that, in many ways, is what they are for. Living in the past, and the most hostile past ever to confront the Jews, is an odd way to face the future. In the early years of Israel’s existence, diaspora Jews supplied money. The best contribution they can make today is to offer Israel the universalism it does not possess in sufficient measure.

If the diaspora fails in this task, I believe that its political right, like its extreme left, will fall victim to its own version of post-Zionism. Instead of the turbulent debates and romantic passions of the early Zionists, Israel will come to embody the same kind of insipid, and dangerous, nationalism characteristic of so many other countries, lacking in vision, closed to debate, and a constant source of danger to its region.

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