Jewish Religious Groups Are Urged To Remove Critics Of Zionism

There is a growing effort to stifle free speech within the American Jewish community. Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) calls for a battle inside Jewish religious denominations against Jews who oppose Zionism, a group which is growing dramatically in number. He spoke to the World Zionist Congress in August in Basel, Switzerland and declared that “anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism.”

He lamented that “even some Jews traffic in it” and that this “threat” must be confronted. He declared: “In the political context today there is no doubt that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. And we must reckon with the fact that there are anti-Zionists within the Jewish community. We must be honest and acknowledge that reality. But the reality is just because you are Jewish doesn’t exempt you from trafficking in anti-Zionism…We have got to deal with this openly…This will be a fight.”

David Wolfe, a Conservative rabbi in Los Angeles endorsed the idea of a battle against anti-Zionists in religious orders at the same August conference. He said that, “Sinai Temple takes the largest delegation to the AIPAC conference every year of any synagogue in the country We have an absolutely unapologetic Zionist commitment…It’s true in America, as you know, Zionism is a word that often draws tremendous ire, but it’s a battle that is important for Jews to fight.”

After author Gil Troy, a columnist for the Jerusalem Post, decried the fact that Conservative rabbinical students can get a degree at the Jewish Theological Seminary and not commit to Zionism, Rabbi Wolpe endorsed the battle inside the Conservative movement: “Of course, you fight the battle in your own house.”

Mondoweiss (Oct. 12, 2022) notes that, “Wolpe and Greenblatt are trying to stop the tide: young Jews who are giving up on Zionism, with sizable numbers saying they believe Israel is an apartheid state.”

Zachary Lockman, professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and History at New York University, in an interview with MERIP, the Middle East Research and Information Project, provided this assessment: “The Jewish community—-the organized, very Israeli-connected Zionist mainstream organizations—-think they don’t have as much power as they did because the community has changed. Younger American Jews don’t care about those big organizations. They may or may not belong to a local synagogue, but the synagogues themselves have changed.”

In Lockman’s view, “Younger American Jews are shifting. I think there’s been a sea change. Segments of the American Jewish community were actively hostile to Zionism. Into the 1930s and 1940s, Reform Judaism was formally opposed to Zionism. Polls show that a good chunk of the younger generation don’t feel much connection to Israel, or are critical of it, have no great desire to visit. The assaults on Gaza horrify a lot of people. The asymmetry of power and violence and death is hard to miss.” **