The lessons of Zionism in 'BETRAYAL, The Failure of American Jewish Leadership'

Please note: The referenced book, compiled by Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser just came to print in June. It is a compilation of Jewish thinkers and academics whose credibility warrants thoughtful consideration. It is my hope that the result will stimulate every contemporary Jew to become a proactive contributor in protecting our Jewish future.

In the recent publication of “BETRAYAL, The Failure of American Jewish Leadership,” authors Charles Jacobs and Avi Goldwasser, assess the reasons for Jewish leadership’s ineffectiveness in combatting today’s antisemitism. Compiling 21 essays by leading Jewish thinkers and academics, “BETRAYAL” spotlights and documents the negative impact of ultra-progressive ideologies. Capitalizing on the fact that Jews historically tilt politically left, ultra-progressive ideologists have hijacked tikkun olam, redefining it from “healing/repairing the world,” interpreted as a state of G-d’s perfection, into “social justice,” with distortive political intentions. “White privilege” equates white to Jews and Zionists who suppress Muslim, Palestinian, and Black ethnicities; or embracing white nationalism to inspire Black nationalist provocations. “BETRAYAL” essays ask why Jewish leadership does not aggressively confront public groups or their leadership, like The Congressional Black Caucus, which affiliates with the likes of Al Sharpton and Louis Farrakhan. Or Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre when she attacks AIPAC affiliation as “contrary to Progressive ideals.” Leaders of the Women’s March embrace the likes of members Linda Sarsour and Tamika Mallory, both identified by their virulent antisemitic positions. Then, there’s Congress’ “Squad” and their individual members, notorious for antisemitic accusations and tropes, including sanitizing the Congressional resolution originally presented to condemn antisemitism.

“Betrayal” essayists condemn the failure of Jewish leadership to confront ultra-progressive education polices, including CRT programs currently active in Washington, D.C., California, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Maryland and Illinois. Countless colleges, universities, and their academics, most with Jewish-supported endowment funds, tolerate, endorse, even encourage BDS and anti-Israel accusations of apartheid, or institutional efforts to redirect the IHRA definition of Antisemitism. Organizations like J-Street, the Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow, and Students for Justice in Palestine, all emanated from Jewish day school graduates, steeped in Marxist-Progressives philosophy. Even the Jewish Council for Public Affairs actively promotes dissemination of progressive theology without consideration for related antisemitic consequences. And universally, the essayists condemn the ADL’s Johnathan Greenblatt. Since 2015, Greenblatt has turned the Anti-Defamation League into a highly partisan supporter of the contemporary progressive platform, accentuating the impact of racial distinction and white suppression. Most importantly, “BETRAYAL” highlights the failure of Jewish leadership in not aggressively counter-attacking the demented ideologies that champion overt antisemitic activity.

To understand “BETRAYAL”’s hypothesis, it’s useful to review the historical applications that enabled a successful outcome for the Zionist cause.

In the 1890s, Theodor Herzl, the father of modern Zionism, was assigned by his Viennese newspaper to report on the Dreyfus affair from Paris. Herzl was stunned to find the equivalent levels of French antisemitic violence as existed in his native Austria. This was the turning point at which Herzl acknowledged that antisemitism was more than a “social issue.” Jewish integration and assimilation into a secular society would not reverse the scourge. His conclusion: Jews required the security of a physical sanctuary from antisemitism thru the reestablishment of the historical Jewish homeland. Herzl’s commitment was formally inaugurated in 1897 with the first conference of the (World) Zionist Organization, held in Basel, Switzerland.

Ze’ev Jabotinsky, as an aggressive young Zionist, became the Russian delegate to the 1903 Sixth Zionist Congress. Jabotinsky vehemently believed that Jews needed to be physically self-protecting, both in Europe and ultimately in the Jewish homeland. At the age of 23, outreaching local Russian Jewish communities, he organized the Jewish Self-Defense Organization to protect Jews from local pogroms. To further validate Jewish martial, Jabotinsky convinced the British to inaugurate the first Jewish Legion within its WWI ranks.

In 1923, Jabotinsky organized the Alliance of Revisionists-Zionists. From Latvia, he founded Betar, a Jewish paramilitary youth movement, where members served two years with the Jewish Legion in Palestine. In 1931, Jabotinsky formed ETZEL, the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel. Following a 1935 split from the World Zionist Organization, Jabotinsky, established the New Zionist Organization, a more militarily aggressive organization that spawned the Irgun, for the facilitation of immigration and re-settlement of all of Palestine. Jabotinsky died in 1940 in upstate N.Y., while trying to effectuate a Jewish army to fight in WWII. His longtime collaborator and successor as leader of the New Zionist Organization of America, was one of the lesser-acknowledged Zionist activists, Benzion Netanyahu. (Yes, Bibi’s father)

In 1929, Jabotinsky constructed a “theory” for effectively honing pressure to exert influence on both public and diplomatic opinions, the goal being to influence a political directive. Jabotinsky published articles from London to pressure the British not to abandon the Balfour Declaration while Netanyahu did the same from Israel. But in 1939, Netanyahu convinced Jabotinsky to re-focus application of the “theory” to America. Netanyahu believed that the U.S., as the rising world power, could be convinced to adopt a pro-Zionist policy, whereupon the British would more readily follow.

Surprisingly, the American Jewish community, including Justice Louis Brandeis and Rabbi Stephen Wise, did not embrace the Zionist vision. Politically, FDR and the Democratic Party were in opposition to the creation of the Jewish Homeland in Palestine. Still, Netanyahu, thru a brilliant political move and with the help of Congresswoman Claire Boothe Luce, was introduced to Republican Senate Minority Leader Robert Taft. Netanyahu’s approach was to emphasize that the success of the Zionist vision would ultimately benefit the U.S. Results were realized with the 1944 Republican National Convention adopting a plank calling for “… unrestricted emigration…. with the full intent…. of the Balfour Declaration of 1917… and the Resolution of a Republican Congress in 1922, Palestine may be constituted as a fee and democratic Commonwealth.” The Republican adoption of this plank forced the Democrats to adopt a parallel resolution at its convention. The application of Jabotinsky’s “theory” laid the framework for the Truman administration’s endorsement of the creation of the State of Israel.

These three “fathers” of Zionism were motivated by one overriding assumption: The scourge of antisemitism can only be managed (not overcome) thru an aggressive application of Public Pressure, Political Aggressiveness, and Jewish National Identity. Fighting antisemitism as a “social issue” was naïve. The “fathers” understood that only thru proactive prioritization could attainment of the Zionist dream be realized.

The authors of “BETRAYAL, The Failure of American Jewish Leadership” have two primary goals. The first is to identify the causes of the failure of professional Jewish leadership for not aggressively confronting antisemitic activities. The second is to reverse this failure by implementation of proactive-prioritization: aggressive, “in-your-face” tactics, proven effective by Zionism’s founding fathers.

Jewish leadership needs to apply those lost tactics again today, to assure a Jewish future for tomorrow. It worked for the Jews in the past. It can certainly work again!