The Wandering Who: A Study of Jewish Identity Politics (8 page)

Unconsciousness is the Discourse of the Goyim

Chapter 8

One Hundred Years of Jewish Solitude

Zionism is no longer a young movement. It is more than one hundred and ten years since the first Zionist Congress was held (1897) and more than ninety years have passed since the Balfour Declaration (1917) was issued, a promise given by the British Government to Zionist leaders to create a ‘national Jewish home’ in Palestine. It’s been over six decades since the formation of the Jewish State and the mass ethnic cleansing of the vast majority of the indigenous Palestinian population. Not only is Zionism no longer young, it is far from being a unified ideological movement. In fact, it is almost impossible to determine these very basic elements: what is Zionism aiming for, who is its leader? Is there a linear ideological continuum between the Israeli vision of Middle East interests and the architects behind the New American Century project? Is there a continuum between the crime carried out against the Palestinian people in Gaza in the name of the war on terror and the crime against the Iraqi people committed in the name of ‘democracy’? It is also difficult to find a demarcation line between Jewish ideology and Zionism. We are dealing here with largely overlapping identities.

Earlier on I suggested that it is possible to grasp the subject of Zionism in terms of an organismus in which each of its elements contributes towards the maintenance of the entire system. Within the Zionist network there is no need for a lucid system of hegemony. In such a network, each element is complying with its role. And indeed the success of Zionism is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Throughout the years, Zionism has become an efficient
system that serves what the Zionists define as primary Jewish interests. Within the Zionist framework, the Israelis colonise Palestine and the Jewish Diaspora is there to mobilise lobbies by recruiting international support. The Neocons transform the American army into an Israeli mission force. Anti-Zionists of Jewish descent (and this may even include proud self-haters such as myself) are there to portray an image of ideological plurality and ethical concern.

However, within such a network even the so-called ‘enemies of the Jewish people’ have a clear role. Ahmadinejad is the current ‘Hitler’ and the rest of the so-called ‘Islamofascists’ are there to finish the ‘Nazi Judeocide’. In other words, the Zionist vision is there to offer a conclusive and coherent insight into the issue of contemporary Jewish identity and Jewish affairs. Moreover, Zionism is there to offer a new ‘world order’, with the English-speaking empire as a world policing force and a defender of Jewish interests.

Though traditionally we tend to associate Zionism with a particular Jewish national aspiration, as well as a Jewish call for the return to Zion (Palestine), this is not necessarily the only viable historical or philosophical interpretation of the Zionist endeavour. I suggest that it makes far more sense to regard Zionism as a tribal Jewish preservation project. In other words, Zionism can be interpreted as a Jewish global movement that has as its aim the prevention of assimilation. It is there to stop the disappearance of world Jewry. Accordingly, Zionism should be seen as an amalgam of different philosophies specialising in different forms of tribal separatism, disengagement and segregation. It is there to infuse the third category identity with meaning.

Such an interpretation may throw some new light on the significant power of Global Zionism, the general support of world Jewry for the Israeli State. It may throw some light on the role of those sporadic, yet, extremely loud, Jewish voices which
happen to oppose Zionism. Such a terminological shift into the notion of Zionism will emphasise an ideological continuum between Herzl’s take on assimilation and the late Sharon’s ‘unilateral disengagement’, yet it will also expose a very embarrassing continuum between hard-core right-wing Zionism and the so-called Jewish left and Jewish anti-Zionism.

Leaving God Behind

Jews, like anyone else, are entitled to dump God, to leave their faith and to divorce from religion. Yet, dropping God is neither a philosophical argument nor a form of ethical reasoning. To abandon religion doesn’t necessarily mean becoming a humanist and secularization doesn’t imply universalism or any other ethical stand. Not only is dismissing the concept of God not a philosophy, it is not even an argument. It is mere practice. In fact, to replace God with an anthropocentric moral argument is what secularisation is all about.

Historically, it was Spinoza who launched the modernist attack on Judaic Biblical orthodoxy. Spinoza’s goal was to replace the God of Abraham with reason. While Pre-WW2 Jewish intellectuals, such as Franz Rosenzweig
⁴¹
, Herman Cohen
⁴²
, Gershom Scholem
⁴³
and others, were trying to engage Spinoza’s chasm by applying philosophical argument, post-WW2 Jewish philosophical confrontation with modernity has been replaced by a shallow form of Left identity politics and Zionist praxis.

A truly interesting text was published a few years ago by the London Jewish Chronicle (JC). It is a glimpse into the political and philosophical mantra of a Jewish, socialist as well as anti-Zionist couple who have rejected the God of Abraham. In spite of the fact that they are proud they have dumped God, they still hold a Seder (Passover dinner) and they circumcised their twin sons. They also gave them a ‘faith-free’ Bar Mitzvah. To a certain extent, the JC article is a dialogue between the voice of the mainstream ‘Jewish community’ and the so-called ‘Jewish
dissident voice’. This is the story of journalist Julia Bard (56) and teacher David Rosenberg (48), both founding members of the British Jewish Socialists. It is a peep into the strange and inconsistent world of the Jewish tribal left. I admit that it was Bard who opened my eyes and led me to a terminological shift that presents Zionism in a new light.

According to the JC: ‘Julia Bard and David Rosenberg are committed Jews. They feel passionately about Jewish history, they have a strong Jewish element to their social lives and their children have inherited a love of Hebrew and Yiddish culture… David and Julia do not belong to a synagogue, do not believe in God and are antagonistic towards Zionism. They feel strongly that these factors should not exclude them from full acceptance as part of the mainstream Jewish community.’

Like many modern assimilated Jews, David and Julia insist on reducing Jewish-ness to a form of tribal orientation spiced up with some cultural aspects. They love Yiddish and they love ‘Jewish History’. Very much like modern assimilated Jews and Israelis they probably regard the Bible as an exoteric historical text rather than an esoteric spiritual guideline. This isn’t a crime.

Although David and Julia do not like God that much and in spite of the fact that they are not that impressed with Judaism, they still followed the Judaic blood ritual and had their children’s foreskins removed. In spite of Julia and David’s dismissal of the Jewish faith, they still very much want to be part of the Jewish community. I wonder why? What is it that they need from the Jewish community? Why don’t they just ‘get on’ with their ‘socialist agenda’ and join the human family as ordinary people? Many people around the world do not believe in God, many millions of Westerners left their faith, yet, they do not insist on calling themselves Catholics, Hindus, Protestants or Muslims. They just go forth into new life in a multi-cultural, multi-faith society.

Julia believes in multi-culturalism, hence she answers: ‘I
wanted to remain Jewish…. I want to prove that there is a way of being Jewish that doesn’t involve saying prayers to a God you don’t believe in.’

Apparently Julia, like many other emancipated Jews, is craving an authentic identity. She is looking for her individual secular voice while maintaining her ties with her Jewish heritage. Again this is not a crime, however, I wonder why she can’t just regard herself as a Jew or even a secular Jew without appealing for ‘acceptance’ by the ‘Jewish community’? For instance, I regard myself a ‘Hebrew-speaking Palestinian’, I do not seek anyone’s approval to do so. I also regard myself as a ‘proud, self-hating Jew’ and again, I do not need anyone’s approval. Julia, on the other hand, needs approval. Julia expects the Jewish community to accept her in spite of the fact that she rejects God and the faith of Judaism.

Julia suggests an answer, she says: ‘I understand my Jewish identity as an ethnic identity…’

Perhaps we are getting somewhere. The magic words ‘ethnicity’ and ‘identity’, have been introduced into the discourse. What does Julia mean when she refers to ‘ethnic identity’? Is it the famous old chicken soup or is it
Gefilte Fish
⁴⁴
this time? Is ‘Jewish ethnic identity’ a form of belonging to Jewish history and heritage? Again, I am pretty sure that no one is going to stop Julia and David from cheering themselves up by reading chapters of Jewish history, an endless chain of catastrophes. In fact no one is going to stop Julia and David from celebrating any of their cultural symptoms. Nevertheless, Julia and David want a bit more than mere celebration, they clearly want recognition.

Again I find myself slightly bewildered. Recognition is something you may aim to achieve, nevertheless, it isn’t something you can ever demand. Among my sins I play jazz. I indeed want to be widely recognized as a leading saxophonist and an original voice, yet I would never consider insisting in a jazz magazine that the jazz community should accept me or
acknowledge my contribution regardless of my merits. My ‘acceptance’ as an artist is obviously subject to my achievement and contribution to the art form. Julia insists upon being recognised as a Jew, without suggesting or specifying what her exact contribution to the Jewish discourse and experience is.

Seemingly, it is
identity
rather than reason that the JC and Bard are concerned with. Yet, it is clear that Bard believes that one’s identity reflects upon one’s authenticity. Bard, like many others, is obviously wrong. As explained earlier on, it is actually the other way around. Identity and identity-politics alienate one from any notion of authenticity. Identity politics aims at setting measures of identification, categories of belonging, it demands recognition. It prefers gathering and grouping rather than meditation on the self or any form of true reflection. In fact, people who possess a genuine notion of a self do not crave the acceptance of any community, whether Jewish or other. They are recognised for ‘who they are’ rather than accepted for what they claim to be.

Regarding herself as a ‘progressive’ Jew, Bard believes that ‘Jewish future rests on the community being inclusive rather than exclusive.’
⁴⁵
Being part of an ethnic collective, Julia is truly concerned with issues having to do with assimilation and preservation of the Jewish people. Yet, unlike the rabbinical institutes, she welcomes a hybridisation of a Jewish collective rather than a rigid uniformity. ‘Those people who are bleating on about the Jewish community shrinking base it on a false assumption
–
that Judaism remains unchanging and that you can’t be Jewish without being religious.’
⁴⁶

But there is a far greater concern raised by Bard. Seemingly, a ‘liberated’ Jew is disturbed by the fact that the Jewish community is ‘shrinking’. One may wonder why a liberated being, a ‘progressive’ Jew and a ‘socialist’, is concerned with issues to do with assimilation and the disintegration of a ‘reactionary’ tribal and racially-oriented community.

The notion of Jewish Socialism may provide the answer. Jewish Socialism, like Judaism, is a unique, esoteric ideology that is primarily concerned with Jewish interests and Jewish-ness in general. This is what I found on the ‘Who We Are’ web page that the Jewish Socialist couple are associated with: ‘We (Jewish Socialists’ Groups) unite on issues we recognise as crucial for the future of the Jewish community.’ Seemingly, Julia Bard and her Jewish
comrades
are part of the Jewish community, and the subjects they are concerned with are issues to do with the future of the Jewish tribe. Reading these lines rings a bell. It was actually my grandfather, the right-wing, racist
Irgun
commander terrorist, who insisted that ‘Jewish Socialism’ is not only inconsistent, it is deceitful to the bone.

The ordinary Marxist may wonder why Julia Bard, David Rosenberg and their comrades echo the words uttered by ultra-Zionist Israeli PM Golda Meir in the 1970s. ‘To me,’ says Meir, ‘being Jewish means and has always meant being proud to be part of a people that has maintained its distinct identity for more than 2,000 years, with all the pain and torment that has been inflicted upon it.’ (Golda Meir, My Life). Meir was also known for suggesting that mixed marriages were the biggest threat to the Jewish people. Like Bard, Meir was concerned with identity politics. Like Bard, Meir was a club member. Like Bard, Meir was worried about assimilation which she regarded as the ‘greatest threat to the Jewish future’.

Could it be that Julia Bard and Golda Meir are two sides of the Zionist coin? Surely there is one clear difference? While Meir was an authentic hawk, she spoke tribal and thought tribal, Bard and friends speak ‘universal’ but it seems to me that they think tribal.

Zionism Revisited

Bard, Rosenberg and Meir are not being particularly innovative here, each demonstrating Zionism’s original basic intent: to confront assimilation and the disintegration of Jewish identity.
Already in 1897, Herzl and Nordau had raised very similar concerns to those expressed by Meir and Bard.

If we redefine Zionism as a modern form of Jewish activism that aims to halt assimilation, we can then reassess all Jewish tribal activity as an internal debate within a diverse Zionist political movement
–
the colonising of Palestine can then be considered as just another one of the faces of Zionism. Jewish socialism and Jewish progressive activism fit very nicely into the Zionist project. As integral parts of the Zionist network, they are concerned with the future of the Jewish secular tribe
–
they are there to collect the lost souls amongst the humanist Jews, to bring them home for Hanukkah. The Israel lobby and the Alan Dershowitzes
⁴⁷
of the world are the voices of Zionism; the third-category socialists are there to stop proud, self-hating Jews from blowing the whistle.