One Year Later Part I: Israel and Zionism

September 20, 2024 – י״ז אֱלוּל תשפ”ד

Many of us will always remember where we were on October 7th. Previously, I had  three specific dates that I will always remember:

  • The famous handshake on the White House Lawn between Yitzhak Rabin, Yasser Arafat, and Bill Clinton to formalize the Oslo Peace Process on September 13, 1993;
  • The assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin on November 4, 1995;
  • The attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001.

These dates are moments frozen in time. Now, October 7, 2023 will live in infamy as the 4th to be added to the list in my lifetime. It is not cliché to claim that the massacre on October 7, 2023 – כ״ב תִּשְׁרֵי תשפ”ד, the Shabbat of Shemini Atzeret/Simchat Torah – changed the world so considerably that we now view life in a binary time frame of pre- and post- October 7. The brutality and magnitude of the carnage and destruction proved to be unlike anything we had seen in the past and hopefully like nothing we will ever see again. As we approach the first anniversary of this dreadful day that has been seared into our memory as a people like a hot iron, we find ourselves finishing one part of mourning and transitioning into the next phase. In this next phase, we will be looking to learn, reflect, analyze, and digest the lessons that we take from such a monumental event.

I will use these columns to offer a three-part reflection on “Where We Were One Year Later” and will address the following topics:

  1. What are the implications of October 7 for Israel and Zionism?
  2. What does October 7 mean for Diaspora communities and how we have changed?
  3. How has October 7, 2023, impacted Jewish life going forward, and what could/should the future of Jewish life look like for us as a people?

Thank you, as always, to my faithful and critical readers for embarking on this journey together.

Israel and Zionism – Part I

One year later, we are only at the beginning of understanding and internalizing the implications of the magnitude of the attack, the colossal failure of the military, the total malfunction of the intelligence apparatus, and the sitting government’s inability to deter, prevent, and react immediately and fully to the attack. Books will be written, case studies applied, and investigations will reveal how this could have happened and might have been prevented. In retrospect, one thing is already clear – the overwhelming national feeling of vulnerability.

In one fell swoop, Israelis were brought back to that sense of vulnerability that many had filed away in our collective memory from over a century ago when we lived under the rule of the Czar and were the perpetual victims of anti-Jewish persecution and torment. October 7 took us back to an era when men cowered behind walls and hid in cellars while women were raped and mutilated – straight out of Chaim Nachman Bialik’s epic poem “In the City of Slaughter” written in the wake of the 1903 Kishinev pogrom, a horrendous event in its era but nothing as terrible as October 7 in ours.

Bialik’s poem was, in many ways, a clarion call for the need for Zionism, meaning that we as a people must be responsible for our own fate and that we must be able to defend ourselves and repel our enemies. For the first 75 years of Israel’s existence Israelis, by and large, maintained the mythos of strength and what we refer to as QME (qualitative military edge). And then came October 7th and the ensuing war.

One year later, Israel and the Jewish world are confronting a reality in which Israel faces a multi-front war backed by an Iranian war machine. Its proxies have been successful in effectively pushing Israel’s northern border well into Israeli territory. Many Israelis are left questioning whether a “total victory” (as PM Netanyahu touts), including a complete eradication of Hamas, continues without any end in sight as tens of thousands of Israelis and hundreds of thousands of Gazans are displaced from their homes and communities.

The Social Fabric

One year later, Israeli society has proven its resilience. In the absence of effective governmental leadership, civil society, and ordinary citizens stepped up to organize, mobilize, and provide for all needs – from military to medical to social to anything and everything one can imagine. Watching and participating in these gargantuan efforts has been nothing short of inspiring. It remains a clear and present reminder of the self-sacrificing spirit that is at the foundation of the Zionist ethos. Sadly, it took a crisis of this magnitude to bring out that spirit, a positive attitude that was also present in the pre-October 7th efforts to preserve Israeli democracy.

Now, one year later, we are again witnessing deep divisions in Israeli society. We are also seeing very different understandings of Zionism. On the one hand, there are those who regard themselves as modern-day pioneers working to rebuild their destroyed communities. On the other hand, there are those who consider this to be an apocalyptic/messianic moment – not unlike the Six-Day War – and a harbinger for the resettlement of Gaza by Jewish settlers and the de jure annexation of all of the West Bank into Israel, regardless of international law and norms.

Israeli culture has been overflowing with art, song, and poetry, and Jews around the world are striving to comprehend the trauma in which we find ourselves in this new era of Jewish history. Only when the war is over can we truly begin the healing process. In this past year, there has been a powerful display of Israeli Judaism, using our ancient wisdom to express through music and poetry all the emotions since October 7 and during this war. Likewise, serious Jewish legal discussions have arisen over the importance of two of Judaism’s most important mitzvot, saving a life and the obligation to redeem captives.

As we approach the one-year mark, Israeli society faces deep social, cultural, religious, and political divisions. One may still feel the motivations of volunteers to selflessly support displaced families, to support soldiers who have spent months in reserve duty while separated from their families and businesses. All of that while doing everything possible to bring home the remaining hostages who very few people fathomed would still be in captivity one year later.

It now seems clear that prioritizing the hostages is the largest dividing line in Israeli society. Those who do prioritize the hostages are accused of being traitors and worse. One former hostage, released in the November hostage deal, detailed on one of Israel’s main news programs the abuse she received from other Israelis during public demonstrations, at bus stations, and on social media. There continues to be great skepticism, anger, and a deep sense of distrust toward the government regarding the motives of various coalition members, chiefly the Prime Minister, in not moving as soon as possible to get the hostages home as a top priority.

Some in the Israeli public see short-term James Bond-esque maneuvers like the assassinations of Fuad Shukr and Ismail Haniyeh earlier this summer to this week’s (couldn’t-have-been-written-better-by-Fauda) booby-trapped beepers and radios in Lebanon as signs of strength and as a reversal of Israel’s initial intelligence failure. However, others may see this attack on Hezbollah in Lebanon as a distraction. While the Mossad (if it is in fact responsible for this week’s events), is busy with such missions that have the value of being technologically and operationally impressive – along with the legitimate need to retaliate against Hezbollah after nearly a year of constant rocket fire and bombardment displacing tens of thousands and essentially waging war on Israel’s Northern front. The fact remains, however, that we have not moved one inch on the hostage issue. What’s more, Yehiya Sinwar, now the top leader of Hamas, is understood to be alive and still calling the shots from Gaza.

One year later – reality and hope:

One Year later, Israel still faces dangerous threats from Hamas (even though it has been demonstrably weakened) from Hezbollah, and from Iran.

One year later, Israelis are still feeling traumatized.

One year later, many more are becoming aware of the enormous damage in Gaza, the high toll of Palestinian civilian deaths, and the dire humanitarian crisis there.

One year later, Netanyahu’s coalition is still in power with few signs of collapse and new elections.

One year later, the hostages are still in captivity, and time is running out before they all die.

One year later, Israel is not the same country as it was before.

I find hope in those who have put their country and their society above themselves. I find hope in those who continue to protest and rally to bring their loved ones home. And I find hope in those who understand that two peoples exist between the River and the Sea and that no peace will come until that truth is universally recognized and accepted.

One year later, I find hope in our continued perseverance as a people and in our commitment as a Jewish people to take care of one another.

Stay tuned next week for how I believe the world has changed on this side of the Ocean.

Shabbat Shalom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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