J Street is the last dying gasp of liberal Zionism

By Ted Belman

Spengler is on a roll. His recent article Beinart’s Eulogy for Liberal Judaism starts with

    Peter Beinart, the former editor of The New Republiclaments the failure of the American Jewish establishment to present the universalizing, leftist, secular side of Israel to young Americans whose interest in Israel is small compared to that of their elders. His New York Review of Books essay contains no new information. He bases his view on Frank Luntz’ 2003 polling data of Jewish college students, which I had discussed a year ago in a First Things essay entitled ”Jewish Survival in a Gentile World.” Young, secular Jews (as well as young Reform Jews, if you can find any) don’t care about Israel. They lack the impulses of their secular parents, who came from a religious world and still maintain Jewish loyalties.


He goes on to argue that secular zionism is all but dead and that includes any attachment to Israel among leberal Jews.

    Nonetheless Israel’s position is stronger than ever in the hearts of Americans. The Orthodox may be fewer in number, but more young Americans are spending time in Israel, studying in Israel, and moving to Israel than ever before. The rapid growth of the young Orthodox Jewish population is making an impact on Israeli demographics (which are in excellent condition due to a fertility rate of nearly 3), and will make an increasing impact over time. Skullcaps are multiplying on American college campuses, and many of them sit on heads that spent a year before college at an Israeli yeshiva.

    In absolute numbers, the support of young American Jews for Israel is stronger than it ever has been. Zionism is in no danger. The entity that is in trouble is Jewish liberalism.

In fact, he suggests that J-Street represents the last dying gasp of secular Jews.

    In fact, the left wing of Zionism just had its moment in American history. If you blinked, you missed it. J Street, the leftist “pro-Israel” alternative to the mainstream American Jewish organizations, persuaded President Obama–or so one hears from the Israeli government–that if it put pressure on Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, it could force him out and bring in a more amenable government. This effort failed miserably; Obama has ensured that Netanyahu will be prime minister for a very long time, and only served to make J Street’s friends in Israel look like rag dolls.

    Beinart’s view prevailed at the White House, and resulted in a humiliation for the President, a humiliation so profound that Rahm Emanuel was hauled out to convene a group of rabbis and acknowledge that his boss had “screwed up the message” in dealing with Israel. After the fact, his lament reads less like a program than a eulogy for the liberal Zionism of the past.

Do read Spengler’s article in full and also the comments which follow.

May 18, 2010 | 15 Comments »

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15 Comments / 15 Comments

  1. The Region: Russian traps – and moves

    I mostly agree with this assessment by Rubin, however, he is not fully grasping Obama’s radicalism when he writes:

    The Obama administration should act quickly to reject this doctrine. This is a trap that the administration’s own policy has helped to lay by saying it doesn’t believe in strong US leadership. The proposed precedent would institutionalize that limitation in a way that is going to be very harmful in the future.

    Obama is not being deceived by a trap he unwittingly helped set; this is the way he wants it. He intentionally helped set the trap because it is not for him; it is for America. Imagining that Obama would ever have an epiphany and reject this doctrine is naive. It is by design. He knows exactly what he is doing in terms of bringing about what he wants for America and the world.

  2. no matter what I have written here, ayn reagan and yamit refuse to believe me.

    I do not know any American Jews who voted for Obama.

    YOU represent 100% of Israelis.

  3. My primary grievance against J Street and the liberals who support it is not that they hate Jews.

    They are hardly marching alone in that parade.

    The problem is that J Streeters hate Jews more than they love America.

    They support Palestinians who have repeatedly murdered Americans, and who joyously danced on the rooftops following 9/11.

    Yet liberals subordinate American national security to the higher purpose of murdering Jews.

    Anti-Semitism and treason is a most aesthetically unpleasing combination.

    If J Street could somehow find a way to hate Jews while simultaneously loving America, that would represent a marked improvement.

    But as with their philosophical brethren on the Right like Patrick Buchanan, liberals have never been able to find a way to hate Jews and love the United States.

    It seems that being anti-Semitic and being anti-American are mutually inclusive.

  4. It is really unpleasant to find such sweeping generalizations about American Jews at Israpundit

    So debunk them.

    Here’s a push start:

    American Jews did nothing to help European Jewry escape the Holocaust.

    American Jews routinely vote for anti-Semites.

    Disprove those two claims and you will have gone a long way towards instilling a higher plateau of tolerance on Israpundit.

    The American Jewish community still supports Barack “My Spiritual Adviser Is Best Buds With Farrakahn” Obama.

    That self-indictment is far more condemnatory than anything mly or I have written.

  5. It is really unpleasant to find such sweeping generalizations about American Jews at Israpundit. the other face of close-minded intolerance!

    What is so wonderful about tolerance?

    There is truth there is untruth. There is right and there is wrong. Jews who support my enemies are my enemies. I have no tolerance for

    enemies Jew or non Jew. Why should I/we?

    Judaism’s Golden Rule: “Inequality dictates intolerance to those who demand equality – gays, Arabs, and leftists. Intolerance guards our cherished values”.

    If, indeed, any values exist.

  6. It is really unpleasant to find such sweeping generalizations about American Jews at Israpundit. the other face of close-minded intolerance!

    It may be unpleasant but is it a false generalization? Can you refute many of our negative opinions and assumptions Bird?

    Fewer than 10% of American Jewry have ever been to Israel and less than ten % of all funds donated by Jews are given to Jewish institutions and charities as well as Israel. It is also estimated that roughly 40% of all American billionaires are of Jewish decent, but most are totally assimilated JINO’s. I won’t quote intermarriage rates or Jews converting to other faiths and oriental creeds. or the leaders of and those in the vanguard of anti Israel movements. Those who support our enemies and condemn us. Even Jews who are emotionally still connected to Israel supported the suicidal peace process Oslo and supported Clinton and now Hussein, You cannot be supporter of our engines of destruction and still claim innocence of complicity! These are the generalization and yes, we still I am sure have a hard core of Jewish support but they are muted and ineffective. Of all the Mainstream Jewish organizations only the ZOA has been vocal and consistent.

  7. yeah, reading Spengler on Beinart is far preferable to following it by reading Beinart at the NYRB. I still have a headache from THAT! Beinart’s revulsion for the ultra-orthodox and Russians of Israel is comparable to Mearsheimer’s recent propaganda rant. it would seem that liberalism no longer means open-minded tolerance, but rather a fantasy of an Israel (and the U.S.) that never existed.

    It is really unpleasant to find such sweeping generalizations about American Jews at Israpundit. the other face of close-minded intolerance!

  8. The origin of Jewish liberalism:

    When the industrial revolution, coupled with the new foodstuffs from the Americas (particularly the potato), reached eastern Europe, the Jewish population there boomed.

    Before that time, infant mortality was high, and the population was small and in equilibrium. The rulers of the Jewish communities were the rabbis in partnership with the few rich Jews.

    When the Jewish population suddenly boomed, a large group of young, smart, ambitious Jews emerged who could not find jobs in the small Jewish ghettos. They begged the ultra-conservative rabbis: Please cut us a little slack so we can find jobs with the goyim. The rabbis felt that their absolute authority was threatened, and they refused.

    So the young, smart, ambitious Jews left the ghettos with its rigid forms of Judaism to form new communities in the goyish towns and cities. And we got conservative, reform, socialist, liberal, and communist Jewish movements, with a few crazies going to Israel.

    The rigid, uncompromsing rabbis in europe were killed by the german christian nazis. In America and Israel, rabbis could no longer control their congregations by force, and had to win them over by choice.

    This led to the current group of rabbis, whom you now choose to follow without any compulsion, and leave if you are unhappy with them. But the cost of this is that all the Jews who left Torah-true Judaism have continued down the path of assimilation and will soon be lost for good.

  9. For most American Jews, Liberalism is the antithesis of Judaism. Liberalism is the neo paganist religion of choice by most American Jews. Shortly they will cease to exist as an identifiable Jewish communal entity.

    Their choice and good riddance. With 40-50 million Christians replacing them who cares if they disappear?

  10. It is a truly beautiful thought, evoking compelling memories of gorgeous sunsets and multiple orgasms.

    The most memorable sunsets were those shared with they who purred like a kitten after multiple orgasms. I was always jealous of that unique female ability. I usually had to wait 15-20 min. between mine, but that did allow for hours and hours of intense sexual activity. Then I had no energy to purr just relapse into sweet and restful and contented sleep.

    Yet when this benighted Earth ultimately spins off its axis and helplessly careens into oblivion, the final two inhabitants of the dying blue orb will be the indestructible cockroach and the Jew who votes for anti-Semites.

    “the final two inhabitants of the dying blue orb will be the indestructible cockroach and the Jew who voted for anti-Semites”, or would still have voted for anti-semites.

  11. In fact, he suggests that J-Street represents the last dying gasp of secular Jews.

    It is a truly beautiful thought, evoking compelling memories of gorgeous sunsets and multiple orgasms.

    Yet when this benighted Earth ultimately spins off its axis and helplessly careens into oblivion, the final two inhabitants of the dying blue orb will be the indestructible cockroach and the Jew who votes for anti-Semites.