...or carry the political water for any Israeli government without question?
Over the years, as a former (political) Zionist, having spent extended time in Israel and even considered living there, I've come to the conclusion that American Jews are the victims (perhaps half-willing victims) of a tremdous con job. By their unquestioning support of the actions of the government of the State of Israel they're in amy ways behaving similar to the victim of spousal abuse who refuses to press charges against the abusive spouse.
American Jews (and all Diaspora Jews), by living in America (or other diaspora country), have made a choice that is contrary to the ideology of Zionism, and, to some degree, an embarassment to the State of Israel. To understand why, you have to understand something about the ideology of political Zionism
Political Zionism is distinguished from cultural Zionism, or the idea that there might be some benefit to Jews lving in their historic homeland, developing a Hebrew culture, living in a community where they don't have the hassle of being a minority.
Political Zionism posits that there is no value for Jews living in Diaspora, no value, either to the Jews or to the "host" nations. It basically rejects the ideals of the Enlightenment that diverse peoples can live together, and feels that relations between Jews and Gentiles have become so poisoned that separation is the only way for both sides to respect each other.
Here we have Ted Herzl, the founder of political Zionism writing in his book The Jewish State (1896):
http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/6640/zion/judenstaadt.html
We have honestly endeavored everywhere to merge ourselves in the social life of surrounding communities and to preserve the faith of our fathers. We are not permitted to do so. In vain are we loyal patriots, our loyalty in some places running to extremes; in vain do we make the same sacrifices of life and property as our fellow-citizens; in vain do we strive to increase the fame of our native land in science and art, or her wealth by trade and commerce. In countries where we have lived for centuries we are still cried down as strangers. and often by those whose ancestors were not yet domiciled in the land where Jews had already had experience of suffering.
Anti-Semitism increases day by day and hour by hour among the nations; indeed, it is bound to increase, because the causes of its growth continue to exist and cannot be removed. Its remote cause is our loss of the power of assimilation during the Middle Ages; its immediate cause is our excessive production of mediocre intellects, who cannot find an outlet downwards or upwards -- that is to say, no wholesome outlet in either direction. When we sink, we become a revolutionary proletariat, the subordinate officers of all revolutionary parties; and at the same time, when we rise, there rises also our terrible power of the purse.
Remember that this was written in 1896.
Herzl was an assimilated Austrian Jewish journalist who got freaked out when the French mob started shouting Anti-semitic insults during the Dreyfus Affair, which he was covering. So he started thinking, and what he came up with was <The Jewish State.<>
Reading Herzl's book today can sometimes cause one to giggle at his poor powers of prediction. My favorite is:
We cannot converse with one another in Hebrew. Who amongst us has a sufficient acquaintance with Hebrew to ask for a railway ticket in that language! Such a thing cannot be done.
Having asked for railway tickets many times in Hebrew, I crack up whenever I read that one.
A more poingiant quote is:
But the Jews, once settled in their own State, would probably have no more enemies.
Herzl's book set off a spark that basically jump-started the Zionist movement as we know it today. But most of his support didn't come from his Austrian and German and French Jewish neighbors, it came from the great unwashed riff-raff of the Easter European Jewsh shedtl, who also happened to provide the ancestors for most of the Jews living in the US today (including yours truly.) These "ostjuden" were even more skeptical about the value of the Enlightenment than were the western Jews, but this was becuase they had never really had the opportunity to experience it, having the misfortune to be living in the Russian Empire.
The western Jews might have been a bunch of assimilated yuppies fearful of loosing whatever prvileged position they possesed, but at least they knew how democracy worked, and, indeed, particpated in it. The Ostjuden only knew about it on a theoretical basis. And these were the people who ended up being the founders of israeli democracy.
This lack of experience with democracy was no problem for the Ostjuden who decided to buy a steamship ticket to New York or Baltimore, or London, or whatever. The local political bosses taught us very well (to the point that one of my Ostjuden great uncles served as a state senator, and I'm currently represented in Congress by a descendent of the Ostjuden, and all sorts of descendants of Ostjuden inhabit Washington serving both political parties.) However, the ones who stayed back in the Old Country or became active in the Zionist movement retained some political views that are at odds with American and Democrativc values. Foremeost among these is the political seperation of ethnic groups within the territory of the state.
In other words, Israel is based partly on ethnic speratism, "separate but (un)equal," a political role for the clerics and other principles that America either never adopted or abandoned many years ago. I don't think that the Zionists intended for their state to end up the way it has, but that's what has happened. For an analysis, I reccommend the book The Tragedy of Zionism by Bernard Avishai. Avishai believes that what happened was that the Zionists (who were mostly Ostjuden) in the 30's and 40's developed a lot of improvised "solutions" to immediate problems they had that became absorbed into the fabric of Israeli society.
Avishai:
Most people bring tragedy on themselves not by doing the wrong thing but by doing the right thing too long. The challenge for Israeli democrats is to retire revolutionary Zionist distractions, not to call historic Zionist goals into question.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1111/is_1837_306/ai_103124272
Avisahi has a nice essay in this month's Harper's Magazione (whioch unfortunately isn't online) that explains this in more detail.
Where this is leading to is that I believe that the Israeli government has a political Zionist agenda that differs from the cultural Zionist agenda of most American Jews. American Jews want to support their fellow Jews living in the ancient homeland and want to have access to a Hebrew culture that will help them maintain their Jewish identity in a country where no one forces you to be Jewish. Political Zionists believe that Jews living outside the ghetto will inevitably disappear or be victims of anti-semitism, and see no value in an American Jewish community. At best, they use us to pressure our government to do the bidding of the faction rulling in Jerusalem.
They do this by preying on our fears over the safety of the Hebrew culture from which American Jews do benefit to some degree.As we have seen here in America since 9/11, preying on fear is the worst way to build political relationships and develop rational policies. What we American Jews need to realize is that Hebrew culture can exist safe and secure in the Land of Israel without West Bank settlements and without transfer and extrajudicial killings that result in unacepptable collateral casulties, and, indeed, without discrimination against non-Jewish Israelis in matters of land ownership and without a religious bureaucracy that enforces one sect of Judaism to the exclusion of the others.
In other words, American Jews need to realize that criticism of the State of Israel is not anti-semitism, and that the best thing they can do for the sake of Israel is to help end the dysfunctional lack of rational discussion over Israeli policies in our political institutions.