The greatest Jewish crisis: Growing estrangement from Israel

NEW YORK—The five young Jews who sat down in front of a group of Israeli journalists, educators and politicians (both secular and religious) at AIPAC’s impressive conference room last week came to the meeting armed and equipped with all the necessary punchlines for a first date. From the moment they entered the room, they kept smiling and speaking nicely, and there was no evidence of the crisis between Israel and American Jewry in their pleasant conduct.

“We are members of an organization called GatherDC, which was founded about a year ago. Our goal is to create networking opportunities between young Jews living and working in the American capital,” said one of the members of the group, which also included a young rabbi.

Considering the location of the meeting and the friendly message these young people arrived with, it seemed like a promising start. What could go wrong with Jews who just want to spend some quality time together? But several minutes later, the Israeli delegation members found out that the pleasant words were hiding a complex and alarming reality, which could be referred to as “Israel’s relations with the US Jewry in 2017.”

Pro-Israel rally in New York. A sight which should no longer be taken for granted (Photo: EPA)

  

“I joined because I saw on Facebook they had Happy Hour,” one of the young women said when asked why she had decided to join an organization that defines itself as Jewish but non-religious. “It’s an organization that aims to create friendships and connections between Jews. Being Jewish is much more than Israel; it’s family, roots, ties, community and nostalgia. It’s neither about Israel nor about religion.” And what about Israel, the Israelis in the room asked. Is it part of the organization’s narrative? “Israel is a difficult topic,” the group’s rabbi replied. “It’s hard to deal with Israel, so it’s not a topic with deal with. We are neutral in our content, and Israel is a topic that evokes disputes. We prefer not to deal with Israel.” And one of the young women added, “I don’t really understand what Israel has to do with my Jewish identity. I ignored Israel for years. It’s hard to come together on this topic today.” Some 6,000 young Jews are already coming together as part of the organization today, but not for Israel. They come together on everything, in fact, apart from Israel. In the Jewish American narrative, Israel no longer unites. In fact, it turns out, it actually divides.

This insight repeated itself quite a few times throughout the tour of the different Jewish communities in Washington and in New York. And as the hours and days went by, the extent of the rift became clearer: That majestic dream that was revived 70 years ago and turned into great pride it was once nice to be affiliated with, lost its glamour on the way and turned into an emotional, national, political and identical burden.

Young members of the GatherDC organization. ‘I don’t really understand what Israel has to do with my Jewish identity’ (Photo: Attila Somfalvi)

“Israel united the Jews in the past,” said a senior member of one of the major pro-Israel Jewish organizations in the United States, who requested to remain anonymous, “but it’s becoming increasingly difficult. Today, the discourse about Israel is divisive. The conversations about Israel get very heated. Even in the synagogues, rabbis are forced to stop discussions about Israel because they become very loud and focus on left-right division.” In AIPAC, which works to strengthen the relations between Israel and the US and exerts political pressure on Capitol Hill in favor of the Jewish state, officials try to convey a sense of optimism but admit there are difficulties. “The number of Jews involved in any type of activity is small,” a senior organization official noted. “We haven’t found sufficiently creative ways to make people come and be active. The Israelis should know that their decisions have consequences in the US Jewish community. In any event, we will keep working for Israel, but there are new challenges every day.”

The roots of American Jews’ slow disengagement from Israel branch out in many directions, and it’s hard to put a finger on the main reason for the serious crisis in the ties these days. It would be pretty superficial to blame Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or the stalemate in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. But Israel’s policy on the territories and the Palestinians, the decisions the government made on the Western Wall and conversion issues, as well as the ultra-Orthodox’s attitude towards Reform and Conservative Jews, who together make up the majority among some 7 million American Jews, all contribute to the expending rift between the two parts of the Jewish people—here and there.

Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove (center) in a debate with rabbis from the three streams. ‘Very concerned by the relations between the two communities’ (Photo: Attila Somfalvi)

An average young American has trouble accepting and coming to terms with what he sees in Israel today. He finds it even more difficult to live with the brutalization of the political and public discourse, which reminds him quite a bit of Donald Trump’s American political discourse. Considering the fact that most American Jews are secular (in Israeli terms) and liberal, and vote for the Democratic Party, it isn’t difficult to understand the inability to identify with the Israeli public discourse. And it doesn’t just have to do with the conflict between Netanyahu and former US President Barack Obama. The Jews, mainly the young ones who were not raised on the ethos of the Jewish state’s establishment, have trouble declaring themselves pro-Israel. Such a declaration carries a price, a heavy one. Quite a few young Jews prefer to disengage from Israel and from declared Zionism and clearly opt for the humanistic values they were educated and raised on. On campus, for example, they join human rights organizations that are willing to admit them as long as they don’t define themselves as Zionist. “Wanting to join a movement that supports black peoples’ rights on campus, and supporting Israel and the occupation of the territories in the same breath, don’t go together,” explained a senior official in one of the Jewish organizations. “Young Jews are forced to make a choice, and supporting Israel makes things difficult for them when dealing with questions of identity.” “I’m very concerned by the relations between the two communities,” admitted Conservative Rabbi Eliot Cosgrove of New York during a panel with two colleagues, and Orthodox rabbi and a Reform rabbi. “At the moment, there are two communities going in opposite directions. In Israel, positions and hearts are being hardened, and the Haredim are managing the discourse over our personal identity. The Western Wall is a symbol of the hardened soul of Israelis who aren’t trying to understand their brethren. “I don’t think the dispute is only about religion, however. I read that 65 percent of Israelis didn’t want Elor Azaria to go on trial. A liberal and democratic American who reads this sees a critical democratic value being jeopardized in Israel. It’s extremely troubling.” Guila Franklin Siegel, associate director of the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) of Greater Washington, described a situation in which—regardless of Israel—young Jews are fleeing the familiar community life in the US. “An average Jew will tell you today that he doesn’t have to belong to a congregation,” she said. “More and more young people are refusing to be part of synagogues. They come together around specific subjects. Most Jews who do connect with Judaism do it through the Reform and Conservative movements. People don’t want to pay so much money to the synagogues, so they organize groups and engage in other social activities. Being Jewish these days is expensive. Young people just won’t pay.”

Since arriving in New York, Israeli Consul-General Danny Dayan has been warning Prime Minister Netanyahu of the serious crisis faced by the Jewish people.

“We have to decide whether we are a state for Jews or a state for Israelis,” he says. “If we’re only a state for Israelis, fine, but it has consequences and carries a price. I believe we should be a state for Jews, but today we don’t pass the ‘Jewish state’ test. We stopped showing an interest in the US Jewry as soon as their donations became less important and as soon as we got a sympathetic administration in the White House. The Western Wall and the conversion issue are just symptoms resulting from our lack of interest in them.”

Eric Goldstein, CEO of the UJA-Federation of New York. ‘We had people who for years donated millions every year, and now they want to stop donating to Israel’ (Photo: Attila Somfalvi)

Dayan’s warnings, by the way, went unheeded. Netanyahu listened and nodded as usual, but nothing has changed so far. Gidi Grinstein, president of the Reut Institute and a social entrepreneur promoting “Tikkun Olam” (literally, “repairing the world”), has warned of the erosion of Israel’s status among US Jews and of the ramifications of this erosion. In a small forum led by senior members of New York’s Jewish community, Grinstein defined the situation as “a perfect storm” and the cancellation of the Western Wall plan as “a nuclear explosion.” “US Jews are a national asset, which reinforces Israel’s national security,” he explained. “But the situation is very serious and extremely dangerous, as more and more Jews are drifting away from Israel, donating less and being less connected. We must not give up, but the situation is very complex.”

The cancellation of the Western Wall egalitarian prayer area plan and the controversial conversion bill infuriated US Jews primarily because of the feeling of rejection from the State of Israel.

“Most US Jews don’t want and don’t need help from Israel,” Guila Franklin Siegel explained in a meeting with the Israeli delegation in Washington. “They simply want to be accepted. It’s called acceptance. It was a very bad year because of the Rabbinate and the Western Wall plan. How can a Jewish student be taught to love Israel, when Israel informs him he isn’t Jewish? We were hit in the head this year, and it will take time to fix what happened.” And if we’re back in Washington, life isn’t as simple as it used to be on Capitol Hill either. While it’s still easy to pass decisions and laws in favor of Israel with a vast majority in Congress, the changes in the American left present new challenges for Israel’s supporters. In a meeting with a senior Democratic Congress member and with two political advisors from both sides of the aisle, the three warned of the consequences of Prime Minister Netanyahu's past and present actions in the American political arena, when he decided to address the two Houses of Congress in defiance of President Obama. While they define the speech as “excellent,” they believe its negative implications are still felt to this very day.

AIPAC officials have also been warning of the changes taking place both below and above the surface. “The easiest thing today is to pass a decision for Israel,” said a senior AIPAC official, “but it won’t last if we’re not active. More and more Democrats are changing their thinking, and we are concerned by the future generation of politicians. In the Right, there is a rise in anti-Semitism, while in the Left there is a rise in anti-Israel sentiments.”

“Two things concern me, the Iranian threat and the question of whether support for Israel will become a one-party thing,” said the Democratic Congress member who asked to speak off-the-record. “At the moment, most Congress members are in favor of legislation for Israel. But if this becomes a one-party thing, it would dramatically harm Israel. Netanyahu's Congress speech was prepared inappropriately, and it created real tensions among the Democrats. “Ten years ago, people in the Democratic Party would vote according to AIPAC’s request. Today, that’s no longer the case. The liberals in this party are much tougher and more influential, and it’s harder to get them to sign in favor of Israel. there’s no doubt that the tensions between Obama and Netanyahu created political damage and a certain rift in Congress. That’s why it’s so important to preserve the bridge between Israel and the US Jewry. But the Israelis don’t understand what’s important to us.”

Eric Goldstein, CEO of the UJA-Federation of New York, had even harsher criticism to dole out. “In the past, we would unite around Israel,” he said. “Today, Israel is much more complex for the Jews of New York. Israel is becoming more right-wing, and that clashes with the opinions of these people, the vast majority of whom voted for Hillary Clinton. In the past five years, there has been a real retreat in the Jews’ support for Israel. We had people who for years used to donate millions annually, and now they want to stop donating to Israel. We are fighting it, but it’s reality.

“I totally understand the pain of people who are told in Israel that they’re not Jewish enough,” he explains. “We’re in a situation in which we have started to lose focus of Israel’s importance to the Jews in America, and that’s very, very troubling.”

The writer was a member of a Gesher and Diaspora Affairs Ministry delegation meeting with US Jews.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

The greatest Jewish crisis: Growing estrangement from Israel : http://ift.tt/2BrxGxD

German court rules 'bookkeeper of Auschwitz' fit to go to jail

A German court ruled on Wednesday that a 96-year-old German known as the "bookkeeper of Auschwitz" was fit to go to prison, rejecting his plea for the sentence to be suspended.

 

Oskar Groening, who is physically frail, was sentenced to four years in prison in 2015 for his role in the murder of 300,000 people at the Nazi death camp Auschwitz. However, he had not started serving his sentence due to a legal argument about his health.

Former Nazi SS guard Oskar Groening, at court (Photo: AFP)

Prosecutors said in August that a medical examination showed Groening was fit to start serving his prison sentence, though Groening's lawyer disputed that. On Wednesday a court in the northern German town of Celle said: "The higher regional court thinks, based on expert opinion, that the convicted man is able to serve his term despite his advanced age." It said enforcing Groening's sentence would not breach his fundamental rights and added that special needs related to his age could be catered for in prison. In a 2015 court battle seen as one of the last major Holocaust trials, prosecutors said although Groening did not kill anyone himself while working at Auschwitz, in Nazi-occupied Poland, he helped support the regime responsible for mass murder by sorting bank notes seized from trainloads of arriving Jews.

(Photo: AP)

Groening, who admitted he was morally guilty, said he was an enthusiastic Nazi when he was sent to work at Auschwitz in 1942, at the age of 21. Some 6 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust carried out under Adolf Hitler.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

German court rules 'bookkeeper of Auschwitz' fit to go to jail : http://ift.tt/2iir6Wl

Russian probe asks if czar's murder part of ritual carried out by Jews

The head of a Russian Orthodox Church panel looking into the 1918 killing of Russia's last czar and his family said in a statement that angered many angered Jewish groups the panel was investigating whether it was a ritual murder.

 

Father Tikhon Shevkunov, the Orthodox bishop heading the panel, said after Monday's session that "a large share of the church commission members have no doubts that the murder was ritual."

A representative of the Investigative Committee, Russia's top state investigative agency, also said that it will conduct its own probe into the theory, which further inflamed tensions among Russia's Jews.

Father Tikhon, heading the commission, spoke about the czar's execution having ritual characteristics (Photo: AP)

 

Boruch Gorin, a spokesman for the Federation of Jewish Communities, Russia's largest Jewish group, expressed a strong concern Tuesday about the claims that he described as a "throwback to the darkest ages."

Some Christians in medieval Europe believed that Jews murdered Christians to use their blood for ritual purposes, something which historians say has no basis in Jewish religious law or historical fact and instead reflected anti-Jewish hostility in Christian Europe.

Nicholas II, his wife and their five children were executed by a Bolshevik firing squad on July 17, 1918, in a basement room of a merchant's house where they were held in the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg. The Russian Orthodox Church made them saints in 2000.

(Photo: AP)

The speculation that the czar and his family were killed by the Jews for ritual purposes has long been promoted by fringe anti-Semitic groups.

Gorin said his group was shocked and angered by the statements from both the bishop and the Investigative Committee, which he said sounded like a revival of the century-old "anti-Semitic myth" about the killing of the imperial family.

Nicholas II and his family were executed at the outset of the Bolshevik Revolution (Photo: AP)

Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill attended Monday's meeting of the church panel investigating the killing of the czar and his family. He didn't address the issue of whether the killing was ritual, but emphasized that the church needs to find answers to all outstanding questions and "doesn't have the right for mistakes."

Bishop Tikhon's words carried particular weight given his reported close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and influence within the church.

The bishop elaborated on his statement Tuesday, telling the state RIA Novosti news agency that the "Bolsheviks and their allies engaged in the most unexpected and diverse ritual symbolism." He claimed that "quite a few people involved in the execution—in Moscow or Yekaterinburg—saw the killing of the deposed Russian emperor as a special ritual of revenge" and added that Yakov Yurovsky, the organizer of the execution who was Jewish, later boasted about his "sacral historic mission."

Father Tikhon (L) is considered close to Russian president Putin (center) (Photo: AP)

While Tikhon steered clear of singling out Jews as those responsible for the killing, Gorin said that the use of the term coined by anti-Semites of all stripes was "extremely alarming."

"Bishop Tikhon's invectives undoubtedly cast a shadow over the Russian Orthodox Church," he said. "And a representative of the Investigative Committee talking about the same theory yesterday casts a shadow on the government as a whole."

Gorin said he expects both the church leadership and Russian government officials to provide explanation.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Russian probe asks if czar's murder part of ritual carried out by Jews : http://ift.tt/2zAyhN0

Man planning to bomb Jewish center sentenced to 25 years in prison

A Florida man will be hospitalized for psychiatric treatment and likely serve 25 years in prison for plotting to bomb a synagogue and Jewish school center during Passover last year.

A Miami federal judge ordered that sentence Tuesday on 41-year-old James Medina, who pleaded guilty to a religious hate crime and attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction. The maximum sentence is life in prison. Authorities said Medina planned to attack the Aventura Turnberry Jewish Center. Medina was arrested in April 2016 after approaching the center with a fake bomb provided by an undercover FBI informant.

Illustration (Photo: AP)

FBI recordings showed Medina supported the Islamic State extremist group and claimed an obligation to attack Jews in the US. His lawyers say Medina suffers from significant mental health problems.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Man planning to bomb Jewish center sentenced to 25 years in prison : http://ift.tt/2naW0BB

Simon Wiesenthal Center seeks witnesses to Babi Yar massacre

The Simon Wiesenthal Center for preserving the memory of the Holocaust announced it is seeking out Holocaust survivors who survived the Babi Yar killing fields in the Ukraine during World War II and who would be willing to testify in the trial of some of the perpetrators, who were only recently located. The center, named after the storied Nazi hunter, located the names of 80 people who participated in the Babi Yar massacre, while two of those involved were located alive and well by the German two months ago.

The two perpetrators, whose identities were made public, were located by Germany thanks to information received from the Simon Wiesenthal Center. None of the people who carried out the massacre—which involved the murder of some 50,000 Jews starting September 1941—has been indicted thus far.

Memorial at the Stutthof concentration camp (Photo: Ezra Wolfinger/NOVA)

The center is also continuing to seek out people who survived Poland's Stutthof concentration camp. Two of the soldiers who served in Stutthof near the end of 1943, when gas chambers were active in the camp, were indicted for their part only two weeks ago. The center is attempting to find witnesses to testify in the trials, and has located some 20 people who were interned there during the aforementioned period. Survivors from the Zhytomyr and Kamianets-Podilskyi camps in the Ukraine are also being sought by the center. Hungarian Jews who were not citizens were deported to the two camps in the summer of 1941, and were murdered there by Ukrainians, Hungarians and Germans. Locating survivors from the camps is considered to be a last ditch effort to try the Nazi criminals. Germany's policy on indicting Nazi war criminals underwent a change ten years ago. In the past, to indict a Nazi criminal the prosecution would have had to prove he had committed a specific crime against a specific victim with the motive being racist hatred, conditions which are nigh impossible to prove today, with so few witnesses left and the difficulty in singling out the criminals who participated in the extermination—as most Jews had no idea who their assailants were.

The policy shift was made possible thanks to a decision that stipulated the entire existence of death camps was predicated on murdering innocent people, and that therefore anyone stationed there may be indicted for being an accessory to murder based on their service alone. The attendant punishment for said offense in Germany was five to ten years.

The trial of John Demjanjuk served as precedent to try others based merely on their service in death camps (Photo: AP)

The change made is much easier for the prosecution, which no longer needed a witness to finger the defendant, which itself paved the way for the prosecution of many criminals who could not have been indicted otherwise. The conviction of John Demjanjuk, purported to be a Treblinka guard dubbed by prisoners "Ivan the Terrible," based on the policy shift was a precedent. After his trial, widespread searches were underway in an attempt to locate anyone who served in the death camps or murder squads, and two other criminals who served in Auschwitz were also convicted.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Simon Wiesenthal Center seeks witnesses to Babi Yar massacre : http://ift.tt/2AEUpdi

'Entry forbidden to Jews' at Polish hotel

A photo of an anti-Semitic sign hanging outside of a hotel in the town of Cesarzowice "Entry forbidden to Jews, Commies, and all thieves and traitors of Poland", said the sign.

 

In nearby Wrocław, one of the largest cities in Poland, there was an anti-Semitic incident in November, 2015. Piotr Rybak, leader of the extremist "National Radical Camp", burnt an effigy in the figure of a religious Jew at an anti immigrant rally in a city square. According to one of the reports out of Poland, Rybak is the owner of the "The Polish House", the hotel, with the sign.

The sign

The website of the Anti Defamation League (ADL) stated that Rybak is in custody after anti-Semitic calls at a rally in Wrocław during an Independence Day celebration this month. Rybak was arrested after he violated his parole agreement after a two year trial for the events at the November, 2015, rally.

Last month, Rybak, who was indicted for incitement against Jews, managed to avoid a prison sentence of ten months. He was sentenced to three months of partial house arrest.

In light of the anti-Semitic sign, the ADL called on the Polish authorities to investigate the incident and take the necessary steps against the perpetrators.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

'Entry forbidden to Jews' at Polish hotel : http://ift.tt/2AsgYBL

German artists build Holocaust memorial near far-right leader's home

[unable to retrieve full-text content]

German political art group builds Holocaust memorial near the home of a far-right politician who said history should focus more on German WWII victims; the art collective said it would remove memorial if politician would kneel in front of it and ask sincerely for forgiveness; politician denies he criticised memorial, adding that he had said the Holocaust was a disgrace. German artists build Holocaust memorial near far-right leader's home : http://ift.tt/2jeCMpC