The purpose of this discussion is to explore one perspective on how Jewish identity fits within the framework of modern American liberation movements and identity politics, and to explore how the State of Israel fits within that same framework. Identity, Israel, and liberalism are topics that can sometimes lead to heated exchanges - that is not the purpose here. The purposes are as follows:
- To gain a new perspective on Jewishness and Israel
- To learn from others
- To share with others
- To think about positive ways we can "liberate" our Jewish identities
The purposes of this discussion are NOT:
- To convince others of your perspective
Some ground rules:
- Listen respectfully, without interrupting.
- Listen actively and with an ear to understanding others' views. (Don’t just think about what you are going to say while someone else is talking.)
- Respect others’ rights to hold opinions and beliefs that differ from your own.
- Commit to learning, not debating. Comment in order to share information, not to persuade.
- Avoid blame, speculation, and inflammatory language.
- Be aware of the space you're taking up within a conversation. Allow everyone the chance to speak.
- Avoid assumptions. We probably don't all agree on things you think are infallible.
This is not a trial of any group or movement or country. We're here to think and discuss, not judge and debate.
Thank you for your contribution.
PART 0: GROUNDING
Think about the following questions, on your own. Think about the answers to the questions, and about your reactions to the questions. If you'd like, share with the person or people around you.
- What are important aspects of your identity?
- How do the different aspects of your identity inform your opinions and decisions?
- Have you ever felt that a part of your identity was delegitimized?
- Have you ever felt that your Jewishness was delegitimized?
- Have you ever felt that your Jewishness was delegitimized by other Jews?
Some Definitions:
Anti-Semitism, hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious or racial group. The term anti-Semitism was coined in 1879 by the German agitator Wilhelm Marr to designate the anti-Jewish campaigns under way in central Europe at that time.
- Encyclopedia Britannica / Michael Berenbaum
Decolonization: the process of destroying colonial power structures and remaking oneself in a liberated image.
Identity politics: political positions based on the interests and perspectives of social groups with which people identify, groups include those based on age, religion, social class, culture, dialect, disability, education, ethnicity, language, nationality, gender identity, generation, occupation, race, political party, sexual orientation, etc. Identity politics are used by minority and civil rights organizations to form a coalition with members of the majority. (Wikipedia)
Intersectionality: an analytic framework which attempts to identify how interlocking systems of power impact those who are most marginalized in society. Intersectionality considers that the various forms of what it sees as social stratification, such as class, race, sexual orientation, age, disability and gender, do not exist separately from each other but are complexly interwoven. (Wikipedia)
Parvenu: a person who is a relative newcomer to a socioeconomic class. The word is borrowed from the French language; it is the past participle of the verb parvenir (to reach, to arrive, to manage to do something).
PART ONE: OUR INGRAINED MEMORY OF ANTISEMITISM
In both Exodus and Esther, we see a kingdom in which Jews were once welcomed turn against us.
- What are the similarities between the two texts above?
- What are the differences?
Feel free to bring in other parts of the stories, if you are familiar.
- Do you recognize any of the feelings expressed in these texts today? Where? Towards whom?
__________________________________________________________________________
The following sources are from:
From "Decolonizing Jewishness: On Jewish Liberation in the 21st Century" by Benjamin Steinhardt Case. Tikkun Magazine, April 18, 2018.
PART TWO: COMPLEXITIES OF ANTISEMITISM
The Complex Jewish Position
...from Fanon we learn that: (1) Jews are an oppressed people; (2) they are oppressed by the same colonial forces that dominate other oppressed peoples; (3) Jews as a group are in many ways closer to the colonizer than other oppressed peoples are; (4) that proximity is itself used by the oppressor to maintain the colonial situation... Ultimately, Fanon constructs a dichotomous world – colonizer and colonized – in which it is unclear where the complexities he discusses around the Jewish position fit in. If Jews are sometimes in one category and sometimes in the other, or if Jews simultaneously experience elements of both, then how can Jews pursue decolonization?
- Do any of Frantz Fanon's four characteristics of Jewish oppression speak to you?
- Do any make you uncomfortable?
- What would you add or remove?
Systemic Antisemitism
While most forms of racism place the target group at the bottom of the hierarchy, antisemitism locates its target in the middle... The middle position alienates Jews as a group from other groups above and below them in the social hierarchy. From above, they are viewed with suspicion, while from below they often appear as the most visible oppressor – for example as landlords, store owners, and bosses in low-income communities... As an identifiable group, Jews accrue limited but real privileges from above, resentment from below, and mistrust from both.
...
Brodkin (1998) articulated... that Jews had moved from an oppressed people to a white people... But the evident widespread resonance of violent antisemitic tropes in the Trump campaign along with attacks on Jewish sites and persons prompted the question: can Jews become nonwhite again? According to Brodkin (2016), this question itself was the answer – whiteness is by definition non-revocable. Part of its constructed social power is protection from such insecurity.
...
Meanwhile... in the times between periods of open anti-Jewish violence... the absence of the more visible type of brutality that is constantly visited upon other groups sows resentment between Jews and other oppressed peoples.
...
The unavoidable fact that some achieved elite status – most stereotypically the “House of Rothschild,” for example – has not only not shielded Jews from antisemitic violence, but the existence of such elite Jews is integral to the propagation of antisemitism.
- What is your reaction to the question: "are Jews white?"
- Do you feel that whiteness is a significant part of your identity?
- Steinhardt Case here talks about two different aspects of "systemic antisemitism" - the fact that Jews are placed in the middle of the social hierarchy, and the fact that open anti-Jewish violence tends to be episodic with long periods of calm in-between episodes. What do you think about this claim?
Jewishness in Identity Politics
In the identity politics framework, Jews are nowhere to be found on the racial spectrum. Jews as a group are not exactly white, but Jews as a group are also not acknowledged as POC. Jewish participants in Left-wing movements are assumed to identify as white unless they have another legitimate claim to POC status (i.e., Jews of color), and there is little room for affiliation in the struggle for liberation outside of POC status or allyship. Jews are thus disaffirmed as a legitimate people, which is to say as Jews, in terms of the oppressed as well as in terms of the oppressor.
- This is kind of a big thesis. Discuss.
PART THREE: HOW DOES ZIONISM FIT IN?
According to... Frantz Fanon, there are two main characters in the process of global imperialism: colonizer and colonized. Many... have drawn from his framework to pursue decolonization, or the process of destroying colonial power structures and remaking oneself in a liberated image. Considering the occupation as it stands, it is not difficult to view the current state of the region through an anti-colonial lens with Israeli Jews playing the part of the (settler) colonizers and Palestinians playing the part of the colonized (e.g., Pappé 2015, Said 1979).
...However, the Zionist project itself can also be understood as an attempt at Jewish decolonization.
- Ok. Take a breath, and take a moment here to really try and understand both perspectives. Don't worry, we won't hold you to any opinion you agree to understand. Can you understand why Israel might be seen as a colonial power? Can you understand why Zionism might be understood as an attempt at Jewish decolonization? It's pretty important to understand both perspectives here.
Zionism as (Failed) National Liberation
“The real anti-Semites… wanted to preserve the availability of the Jews as a scapegoat in case of domestic difficulties” (Arendt 1978:172)... Herzl’s Zionism led the Jewish people through a backdoor into the very same position they sought deliverance from, only on a global scale.
Though the Zionist movement’s goal was liberation from antisemitism, the identity of the Jewish people as scapegoats in service of rulers has survived the founding of the State of Israel unchecked. Worse still, the material advantages of colonial exploitation (Shafir 1989) combined with the parvenu impulse to “ape the gentiles” (Arendt 1978:68) resulted in the Israeli government molding itself in the image of the Western imperial power, including all of the barbarity that comes with it, and pitching Jews to the world as racially white. The founding of the State of Israel in this way – that is, in lock step with systemic antisemitism – perpetuated a paradox from which Jews as a people have yet been unable to escape. The State of Israel as it currently exists traps the Jewish people in liberation limbo, keeping it at odds with its neighbors and reliant upon ultimate salvation by neo-imperial powers.
Until today we have been unable to build a movement for Jewish liberation in solidarity with the liberation of all oppressed peoples, and all humanity. With the formal end of the exile in 1948, this is now the Jewish Question.
- Steinhardt Case describes Israel as taking on the Jewish role of "scapegoats in service of rulers" on a global scale. Whether or not you think he's right, why do you think he feels this way? Do you see examples?
PART FOUR: WHAT NOW?
Decolonizing Jewishness
The struggle for Jewish recognition cannot be won from within a parvenu mentality. So long as Jews as a people consent to the middle role in the service of the oppressor, we will be perpetual strangers... All of these problems have a simple and powerful, though admittedly painful, solution: the decisive step out of the colonial mindset is removing the white mask in all of its forms and confronting the colonizer within.
- What is Steinhardt Case suggesting we do to pursue Jewish Liberation?
- Do you agree with his assessment?
- What do you think we should do?
PART FIVE: CLOSING THOUGHTS
(ח) חֵ֤טְא חָֽטְאָה֙ יְר֣וּשָׁלִַ֔ם עַל־כֵּ֖ן לְנִידָ֣ה הָיָ֑תָה כָּֽל־מְכַבְּדֶ֤יהָ הִזִּיל֙וּהָ֙ כִּי־רָא֣וּ עֶרְוָתָ֔הּ גַּם־הִ֥יא נֶאֶנְחָ֖ה וַתָּ֥שָׁב אָחֽוֹר׃ (ס)