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It has been the deadly assault of October 7, 2023, which profoundly impacted world Jewry more than any event since the founding of Israel as a nation.

For Jews the event proved profoundly disturbing. For Israel as a nation, it was a significant embarrassment. The entire Zionist endeavor rested on the presumption that the nation could stop similar tragedies occurring in the future.

A response was inevitable. But the response undertaken by Israel – the comprehensive devastation of the Gaza Strip, the casualties of numerous of civilians – was a choice. This selected path complicated how many US Jewish community members grappled with the attack that triggered it, and currently challenges their commemoration of that date. How does one honor and reflect on an atrocity against your people in the midst of devastation being inflicted upon another people in your name?

The Difficulty of Mourning

The challenge in grieving lies in the circumstance where little unity prevails as to what any of this means. Actually, for the American Jewish community, the last two years have experienced the collapse of a fifty-year agreement on Zionism itself.

The beginnings of a Zionist consensus among American Jewry dates back to an early twentieth-century publication authored by an attorney and then future high court jurist Louis D. Brandeis named “The Jewish Question; How to Solve it”. However, the agreement truly solidified after the 1967 conflict that year. Previously, American Jewry housed a vulnerable but enduring cohabitation between groups which maintained different opinions concerning the need for a Jewish nation – pro-Israel advocates, non-Zionists and opponents.

Historical Context

Such cohabitation persisted throughout the post-war decades, in remnants of leftist Jewish organizations, within the neutral US Jewish group, in the anti-Zionist religious group and comparable entities. In the view of Louis Finkelstein, the head of the theological institution, pro-Israel ideology was primarily theological than political, and he prohibited performance of the Israeli national anthem, the national song, during seminary ceremonies during that period. Nor were Zionist ideology the centerpiece of Modern Orthodoxy before the 1967 conflict. Alternative Jewish perspectives existed alongside.

But after Israel overcame adjacent nations during the 1967 conflict during that period, occupying territories including the West Bank, Gaza, Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, the American Jewish perspective on Israel evolved considerably. The triumphant outcome, along with enduring anxieties about another genocide, produced an increasing conviction about the nation's vital role within Jewish identity, and created pride in its resilience. Rhetoric about the remarkable nature of the outcome and the reclaiming of areas assigned the movement a theological, potentially salvific, importance. In that triumphant era, a significant portion of existing hesitation regarding Zionism dissipated. In that decade, Publication editor Norman Podhoretz stated: “We are all Zionists now.”

The Agreement and Restrictions

The pro-Israel agreement left out the ultra-Orthodox – who largely believed a nation should only be ushered in through traditional interpretation of the Messiah – yet included Reform Judaism, Conservative Judaism, contemporary Orthodox and nearly all secular Jews. The most popular form of this agreement, what became known as liberal Zionism, was based on a belief regarding Israel as a democratic and liberal – while majority-Jewish – nation. Numerous US Jews viewed the control of local, Syria's and Egypt's territories after 1967 as temporary, believing that an agreement was forthcoming that would guarantee a Jewish majority in Israel proper and Middle Eastern approval of the state.

Multiple generations of American Jews were raised with Zionism a core part of their religious identity. Israel became an important element within religious instruction. Yom Ha'atzmaut turned into a celebration. Israeli flags adorned most synagogues. Summer camps became infused with national melodies and education of modern Hebrew, with Israeli guests educating US young people national traditions. Trips to the nation increased and reached new heights via educational trips during that year, offering complimentary travel to the nation was offered to Jewish young adults. The nation influenced almost the entirety of Jewish American identity.

Shifting Landscape

Ironically, during this period following the war, US Jewish communities grew skilled in religious diversity. Tolerance and dialogue among different Jewish movements expanded.

However regarding the Israeli situation – that’s where diversity reached its limit. One could identify as a right-leaning advocate or a leftwing Zionist, however endorsement of the nation as a majority-Jewish country remained unquestioned, and challenging that perspective placed you outside the consensus – a non-conformist, as a Jewish periodical labeled it in an essay in 2021.

However currently, during of the ruin within Gaza, food shortages, dead and orphaned children and anger over the denial by numerous Jewish individuals who avoid admitting their involvement, that agreement has disintegrated. The moderate Zionist position {has lost|no longer