For the kids, Purim is about dressing up and playing. For the adults, it is about booze.
Once again, Jews around the world woke to find that Israel has confirmed that every aspect of Jewish life, no matter how apolitical or peaceful, must be co-opted for Benjamin Netanyahu’s thousand-front war against the rest of humanity.
“Twenty-five hundred years ago, in ancient Persia, a tyrant rose against us with the very same goal, to utterly destroy our people,” the Israeli prime minister reportedly said, referring to the joint strikes with the United States on Iran that took out its top leadership and killed hundreds of civilians.
“Today as well, on Purim, the lot has fallen, and in the end this evil regime will fall too.”
Netanyahu’s three-decade grip on Israeli politics has been defined not only by the destruction of the so-called peace process and the secular left but also by a crusade to ensure that Diaspora Jews, those pesky outsiders still addicted to woke liberalism, can no longer have nice things.
We can’t even eat a few Hamantaschens outside the context of World War III.
Worse, the confederation of monied and influential Jewish-American establishment groups that have decided they speak for all Jews rushed to shower praise on the Trump-Netanyahu Iran war.
The American Jewish Committee (AJC), the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and the Jewish Federations of North America all threw their weight behind the operation, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported, as did the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations.
Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, who might be expected to counter the Trump movement’s public philosemitism, took issue not with the strikes themselves but with procedure.
“Iran is the largest global state sponsor of terror, and it must never have the ability to acquire a nuclear weapon. We strongly support the U.S.-Israel security relationship, and stand with American troops and Americans in the region, the Israeli people and military, and our Gulf partners as they defend against an onslaught of ongoing Iranian ballistic missile attacks,” Soifer said, adding later that “hope for a democratic future in Iran and security in the region does not eliminate the need for President Trump to seek and receive the authorization of Congress prior to attacking Iran.”
The American Jewish Committee (AJC) perhaps offered the stupidest response of the group when it wrote on Facebook that “Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE were all attacked by the Iranian regime,” all of whom “uniformly condemned the attacks as a flagrant violation of their national sovereignty and an unacceptable escalation that threatens the security and stability of the region.”
The AJC added, “This aggression is also a stark reminder of the shared threats facing both Israel and the Arab world, and of the need for deeper regional cooperation.”
Maybe the social media crew over there thought enough observant Jews hadn’t been online for Shabbos reasons and thus didn’t see that this “aggression” was a defensive reaction against US and Israeli forces that had fired first.
For decades, Israel advocates have justified Israeli militarism with the phrase “Israel has the right to defend itself,” but now, in beautiful simplicity, the AJC offered the other part of that conceit: No one, and we mean no one, has the right to defend themselves from Israel.
Such posturing isn’t winning a popularity contest. Only a fifth of Americans back an invasion of Iran, according to one poll, with another more generously reporting one in four Americans supporting the attack.
Israel is polling poorly. “Forty-one percent of Americans now say they sympathise more with the Palestinians in the Middle East situation, while 36% sympathize more with the Israelis,” reported polling group Gallup, noting that this “contrasts with a clear lead for the Israelis only a year ago (46% vs. 33%) and larger leads over the prior 24 years.”
Fewer American Jews identify as Zionists anymore. Americans are turning against US support for Israel, and that includes Jewish Americans.
The Iranian regime appears to be a bigger theme for these groups than the fact that Jews in America are living under a regime of intensified fascism.
Sure, the concentration camps being created and the martial round-ups of undesirables aren’t targeted against them, yet.
However, the debate between right-wing journalist Tucker Carlson and Mike Huckabee, the fanatical Christian US ambassador to Israel, should have been a clarifying moment for Jewish Americans regarding their fate under the current ruling ideology.
Carlson, who has been accused of advancing white nationalism and other forms of extremism, in this dichotomy loosely represents the point of view that can often be heard expressed by people like Nick Fuentes.
One theory holds that Israel’s aggression and policies are bad not out of any real solidarity with Palestinians but because support for a foreign Jewish power diverts from a white Christian nationalist project.
Huckabee seemingly loves the Jews, but the deeper meaning behind his stance is more sinister. In his worldview, the Christian crusade for Jerusalem needs the Jews to sacrifice themselves in this coming war with the savage east.
With Trumpism dominating the conservative movement, Republicans’ full control of the federal government and no real sign of Democratic opposition, for Jewish Americans, these worldviews are the two parties in the United States.
The Jewish establishment’s rush to defend the attack on Iran isn’t just pro-Israel. It’s an endorsement of the Christian Zionist belief that Jews are a junior agency in the Evangelical imperial project.
We may be doomed to extinction. But at least we got a senior role in the endeavour.
Photograph courtesy of Joel Schalit. All rights reserved.
