Divisions Over Politics and Religion Are Breaking Apart American Jews
Recently I had an upsetting e-mail exchange with an old friend. A prominent, politically active Jewish conservative, he told me that he had long ago given up trying to convince American Jews on the left to support Israel. “I don’t really see them as family anymore,” he wrote. “I’ve found a new family, the American Right.”
Heavy words — words that many Jews on the left can relate to, as well. Long sensitized to anything that smells of “neocons” and “Likud politics,” they, too, have cut themselves off from their conservative kinsmen, disavowing any sense of common destiny or “family” that once gave the word “Jewish” its most poignant, deepest valences.
But I just can’t swallow it. Maybe I’m naive, but I’ll never accept what looks a lot like the end of Jewish peoplehood.
I know, I’m oversimplifying. With so many Jewish “umbrella” groups, Jewish community centers, federations and so on, it’s easy to believe that, at least on the face of things, Jewish peoplehood in America is thriving. Yet, something does seem to be dying in the American Jewish fire. The infighting among Jewish groups, the polarization on Israel and the willingness to demonize whole communities of fellow Jews have become so extreme that one begins to wonder what, exactly, is left of the Jewish family. Read more >>
