I heard recently from a friend whose cousin is the director of a “Hillel” Jewish student-life program at a west-coast US university that she (the cousin) had been having a problem with the imposition from some outside funders that Hillel employees play an active role in supporting the racist/Zionist “Birthright” project that sends American Jewish students on an all-expenses-paid trip to Israel, supposedly with the aim of strengthening their connection with that country.
Now it seem my friend’s cousin is not the only Hillel employee having problems with the orders to run the Birthright (or, in Hebrew, “Taglit”) project. Read this intriguing blog-post from Chanel Dubovsky, an employee of the Hillel center at Columbia/Barnard in New York.
She writes,
- Part of the tightrope I walk in supporting my progressive students around Israel requires that I demonstrate my own lefty credentials: feminist activism, an organizing fellowship after college, years spent working on a campus where shoes are considered superfluous. I have to build trust, which is difficult when on the Left, Zionism, a movement I also align myself with, is most often seen as “racist, imperialist, insert incendiary political adjective here: ___________.”
So what am I doing behind this Birthright table, trying to rally Jews and only Jews to go to Israel with a program whose agenda is to make them rabid, unquestioning supporters of its actions? What am I supposed to say to my students who identify more with Palestinian solidarity than with a Jewish state?
… Campus activism around the war in Gaza (I refuse to use the term “anti-Israel,” or “pro-Palestinian,” unless presented with a specific situation) has resulted in a tense atmosphere at best. It’s difficult to recruit for a program that not only asks students to travel to a conflicted region at the center of controversy, but markets itself as a birthright to the people who are seem to many as holding all the power in the situation, the undeniable aggressors, the blood thirsty oppressors of a people they occupy for no good reason. As I write this, my own confusion seems overwhelming…
This is great news. It indicates that young, educated Jewish people in the US have become far more prepared than hitherto to buck the many “circle the wagons” and discourse-suppression pressures from within their own faith-group, to challenge the often nepotistically appointed leaders of the mainstream Jewish organizations, and do their own thinking from sound first principles about the rights and wrongs of the Israeli government’s actions…
And that these critically questioning students are able to have an increasing impact on those co-believers who like Chanel Dubovsky are a few (or maybe more than a few) years older than they.
The blogger you mention sounds like a moron, who does not know how to make the simplest of distinctions.
N. Friedman sounds like a moron who not only invents distinctions that don’t exist, but is unacquainted with the correct use of the comma.
Jerusalem & Babylon / Lieberman the Diaspora czar
(Anshel Pfeffer, Haaretz)
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1072494.html
“This is probably the worst possible time to oversee Israel’s relationship with Jews abroad. Youth identification with Israel is at an all-time low(…)
The new minister won’t be the government’s real Diaspora czar anyway. That will be the new foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman.
(…)
he doesn’t see Diaspora Jewry solely as a source of invitations to swanky events and campaign donations (though, if the interminable investigations into his business affairs are anything to go by, he is certainly aware of the financial benefits).
Yisrael Beiteinu was the only party that had a significant plan for Israel-Diaspora relations in its campaign platform. It called for “a dramatic change in the government’s attitude toward Diaspora Jewry. That means allocating resources and budgets on a much larger scale and reassessing Israel’s relationship with various immigration and absorption organizations, chief among them the Jewish Agency.”
The manifesto, which is basically a distillation of Lieberman’s personal beliefs and policies, raised the threat of assimilation and the “anti-Zionist elements overtaking Jewish organizations and institutes, especially the Jewish Agency and federations. The result is that instead of encouraging aliya, these elements are developing and perpetuating the existence of Jewish communities in exile.” (Interestingly, the manifesto uses the pejorative term golah – exile – rather than the more neutral tefutsot – diaspora.)
The party also dictates the balance between Israel and overseas Jewish communities – “Israel must restore its leadership and centrality in the lives of the Jewish communities around the world, become a consolidating factor and set the tone.” Organizations that encourage aliyah must receive priority and larger budgets. Furthermore, “Israel cannot leave work with Jewish communities to local organizations. It must be active itself, and all the rest should play only a supporting role.”
Nothing there about consultation or partnership.
This is probably the worst possible time to oversee Israel’s relationship with Jews abroad. Youth identification with Israel is at an all-time low, and anti-Semitism is rampant. Causes include Israel’s misdeeds in Gaza; the global recession and Bernard Madoff’s swindle, which ravaged the once proud network of Jewish mega-organizations. The main organ connecting Israel with the communities of the world, the Jewish Agency, is a shadow of its former self, searching for a new identity as its best employees desert in droves and lacking a serious candidate for the once-coveted position of chairman.
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There’s one more cloud lurking on the horizon: The new minister won’t be the government’s real Diaspora czar anyway. That will be the new foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman.
Lieberman is one of the few Israeli politicians who is at all aware that Jews exist outside the country’s borders. That is, he doesn’t see Diaspora Jewry solely as a source of invitations to swanky events and campaign donations (though, if the interminable investigations into his business affairs are anything to go by, he is certainly aware of the financial benefits).
Yisrael Beiteinu was the only party that had a significant plan for Israel-Diaspora relations in its campaign platform. It called for “a dramatic change in the government’s attitude toward Diaspora Jewry. That means allocating resources and budgets on a much larger scale and reassessing Israel’s relationship with various immigration and absorption organizations, chief among them the Jewish Agency.”
The manifesto, which is basically a distillation of Lieberman’s personal beliefs and policies, raised the threat of assimilation and the “anti-Zionist elements overtaking Jewish organizations and institutes, especially the Jewish Agency and federations. The result is that instead of encouraging aliya, these elements are developing and perpetuating the existence of Jewish communities in exile.” (Interestingly, the manifesto uses the pejorative term golah – exile – rather than the more neutral tefutsot – diaspora.)
The party also dictates the balance between Israel and overseas Jewish communities – “Israel must restore its leadership and centrality in the lives of the Jewish communities around the world, become a consolidating factor and set the tone.” Organizations that encourage aliyah must receive priority and larger budgets. Furthermore, “Israel cannot leave work with Jewish communities to local organizations. It must be active itself, and all the rest should play only a supporting role.”
Nothing there about consultation or partnership.
These aren’t mere election promises. Yisrael Beiteinu couldn’t have expected to receive even one more vote by committing the government to such a muscular set of policies regarding the Diaspora, certainly not by pledging more money to promote immigration during an economic slump.
A close confidante of Lieberman said this week that he certainly plans to harness Foreign Ministry resources to place Israel at the head of the Jewish world. One indication of how he intends to handle his new post is how, while strategic affairs minister, he insisted he have control of Nativ, the government agency that historically maintained Israel’s clandestine relationship with Soviet Jewry.
Under his aegis, the under-funded agency once slated for dismantlement saw its budget doubled, and Lieberman picked a dynamic new leader, Naomi Ben-Ami, to reenergize its activities throughout the former Soviet Union.
Lieberman also led Nativ to expand its activities to Russian-speaking Jewish communities in Germany, causing diplomatic tension with Berlin and an outcry by the local Jewish leadership, which was not consulted. A similar expansion into the United States and Canada was foiled by the powerful Jewish federations in North America.
Now with the entire foreign service at his disposal, Lieberman’s remit is worldwide. The manifesto makes clear that he has little use for the Jewish Agency and its tradition of partnership and compromise with the Diaspora. Tellingly, his deputy at the Foreign Ministry will be Yisrael Beiteinu MK and former Washington Ambassador Danny Ayalon. Until a few months ago, Ayalon was president of Nefesh B’Nefesh, the independent Aliyah organization that has all but usurped the Jewish Agency’s historical role of promoting North American immigration.
Jewish leaders who previously shunned Lieberman for his strident political views will now have to face him, not just as Israel’s premier representative to foreign governments, but also as the man who believes their duty is to Make Aliyah, Support Israel and Shut Up.”
It’s difficult to recruit for… the people who are seen by many as holding all the power in the situation, the undeniable aggressors, the blood thirsty oppressors of a people they occupy for no good reason.
This sort of clarity is becoming more and more prevalent. The Israelis’ actions in this last great pogrom in Gaza have broken the dirty panes from the windows of many peoples’ homes and now all see the world without glass or any other media intervening and what they see is undeniable.
To continue in uncritical support of Israel at this point in time is for one of conscience an impossible thing to do.
John,
You write: “To continue in uncritical support of Israel at this point in time is for one of conscience an impossible thing to do.”
Yet, you give your uncritical support to Palestinian Arabs, a group which uses the massacre as a military tactic of choice, which shoots rockets indiscriminately into civilian neighborhoods and a group now led by Hamas, which advocates genocide in its founding covenant.
Is that what conscience is all about? You must be joking.
If you are Jewish, but ashamed by the actual aggressive politic of Israel against the Palestinians, you may sign this Jewish (internet) call to the new Israelian government. The appeal was issued mainly by academicians teachers and researchers living in Israel, Switzerland, Austria and Germany.
Then you can forward this call to other Jews you may know :
Dear xxx
I invite you to join the following appeal to the Israeli government:
Out of a sense of shared responsibility and in the spirit of Jewish tradition – because the Occupation is destroying the lives of the occupied and the souls of the occupiers we make this appeal to the Israeli government:
We the undersigned Jews want the Israeli occupation, settlements and blockade of Palestinian territories to come to an end. We call for humane living conditions and security for all the people in Israel and Palestine.
YYYYYY
This e-mail received today from Mike Odatella is very relevant to this topic as well as the topic just above it. I post it here with permission from Mike.
A few of years back, while waiting for a relative to arrive at Ben Gurion Airport, I sat there for 6 LONG hours and while I waited, I got a chance to see more than 300 young Jews from around the globe arrive as part of “The Israeli Experience” program whereby they bring high school ages youngsters from around the globe and let them “experience” Israel…In the airports arrival promenade, huge concrete columns that support the reception area were decorated with balloons, confetti, and each one had a number on it.
Before these teenagers came threw the doors they were assigned group numbers and they went to their designated areas whereby each and every one of them were greeted by young, good-looking Israeli soldiers in uniform (no guns). The females were greeted by a male soldier, and the males by a perky female soldier. One by one the soldier/greeters hugged these gangly teenagers (it looked very awkward and some seemed to be not so “comfortable” by this public show, BUT after the hugs the female soldier would lock arms with a male “guest” and do a little dance (the same for the male soldier and female guest) reminiscent of an old fashioned “country style hoe-down” dancing as the others clapped and singing in English “This is how we party! This is how we party! Israel loves to party!” They did this for each and every one of their young “guests”…
Israelis soldiers (only the “good looking ones”) serve as camp “counselors”/greeters and chaperones for these young Jews and they “experience Israel” in constant company of these IDF ambassadors. The picture of what the Zionist government is trying to accomplish is crystal clear. They want to plant the “seeds” for future IDF service in the fertile/confused minds of these teen-agers and they do so by making it seem “fun”…
In the Zionist State, there exists a widespread culture of hate and racism and the actions of the IDF in Gaza and elsewhere are NOT “isolated” cases as they would have the world believe, BUT a prevalent and systematic approach to the Palestinian Arabs, their lives, rights, and property…
One time, while waiting at the “Hizma” checkpoint, I noticed a young Israeli soldier putting Palestinian men, women, and children in the crosshairs of his gun and pretended to “shoot” them one by one (he was providing the soundtrack as he pretended to pull the trigger) and his buddies were laughing…He was an American serving his summer in the service of the IDF and was “itching” for some action as his buddies explained to me that he was also “bored” with his duty at the checkpoint and longed for “action”…Truly a disturbing sight, but made all that much more bizarre was the fact that he sang Britney Spears song “Crazy” as he was pretending to blow off the heads of Palestinians as they waited in long lines to cross the checkpoint…
Actually, someone I know well who went on one of these Birthright trips said the way the whole thing was programed seemed to be designed to encourage a spirit of drunken revelry and subsequent intimate relations among the participants, or between them and their guides, with the consequence the young women among them would get pregnant and have to marry the assuredly Jewish fathers… and might well want to stay in the place where they’d engaged in this youthful “revelry” (aka strongly encouraged date rape?)…
A way to help prevent the out-marriage of young US Jews which is one of the big “fears” of Elliott Abrams and similarly intense tribalists, while also fostering stronger ties with Israel.
Thank G-d for the great young anti-racist activists of “Birthright Unplugged”, eh?
Actually, someone I know well who went on one of these Birthright trips said the way the whole thing was programed seemed to be designed to encourage a spirit of drunken revelry and subsequent intimate relations among the participants, or between them and their guides, with the consequence the young women among them would get pregnant and have to marry the assuredly Jewish fathers… and might well want to stay in the place where they’d engaged in this youthful “revelry” (aka strongly encouraged date rape?)…
That’s a joke, right Helena? I think that you should stick to your day job and give up comedy!
JES,
You should read the comments section more attentively. What you stigmatise are not Helena’s words, she has just quoted them. Shirin reported about this experience of a friend who allowed her to quote his words.
We all know that you never miss an occasion to jump on the back of Helena.. but at least don’t attribute her words which are not hers.
Why isn’t JES so funny anymore is it all the innocent blood he and his fellow travelers are soaked in?
JES I surely hope the “J” in the nickname you chose for yourself is NOT in any way meant to stand for “Jewish” I’m sure any number of moral and decent Jews around the world share this view! So I am obliged to presume then that this is just some random or insignificant set of initials you have chosen that happens to start with “J”. If not, shame on you, JES!
I mean lets be clear, that if we are to believe the UN reports (and if they aren’t part of your gang of thugs assumed enemy why did the IDF bomb them yet again?)is that the blood of men, women and children is equally good to your “side” JES. Applause then to the IDF for being an equal opportunity murderer! How wonderful that you can butcher people with or without scarfs, in the hope of killing a few possible terrorists!
Yes Christiane, I did understand that Helena was quoting a friend. I just think that it’s pretty odd that she would even think of giving the report credibility. BTW, having seen those “Birthright” groups arriving, I would say that Mike Odatella’s description and analysis is just… well… a tad embellished and possibly a bit hyperbolic.
All in all, I’d say the overall quality of the discussion on this blog has deteriorated, and I suspect that it’s because of the wingnuts, such as Roland, who have been attracted to it.
The Birthright participant whose report I recounted above was someone whose word I trust a lot, otherwise I would not have recounted it.
And no, being a feminist, she didn’t think the ambience she found there was ‘a joke.’
Also, what Mike D. had written about was not a Birthright tour, it seems, but one for slightly younger participants.
Finally, Roland, I do think some of your comments are unnecessarily inflammatory and ad-hominem. Let JES use whatever on-line handle he wants.
I well understand that a lot of people’s emotions are pretty raw because of the recent and ongoing violence, suffering, and oppression. All the more reason to keep the discourse civil. That’s the only way we can increase the general understanding of the issues involved. Ommm.
“drunken revelry and intimate relations”?
“the young women among them would get pregnant and have to marry the assuredly Jewish fathers…”?
“strongly encouraged date rape”????!!!
Give me a break!! Your “source” seems to assume a lot about the purpose of these trips – apparently it’s to populate occupied Palestine! Just for the record, Jewish women tend to be smart enough to use birth control and it is irrelevant who the father is, as it’s enough that the mother of the offspring is Jewish. Further, in the vast majority of the cases that I am familiar with of an American Jewish woman marrying an Israeli father, they eventually wind up returning to the US so the husband can get a job in “Daddy’s business”.