This is something I’ve wanted to write about for about 2 years, but haven’t felt particularly comfortable doing so on a left-wing political site with a significant viewer base. With Bernie Sanders’ new appointment of a coordinator of Jewish outreach, and with a number of developments in the news concerning Israel and Jewish identity, now is a good time to post. I think it’ll get some support, and a lot of pushback.
So be it: here goes:
Bernie Sanders has a new director of Jewish outreach, Simone Zimmerman. Zimmerman is an outspoken activist against Israel’s right-wing policies, was a former member of J-street and has voiced support for anti-Zionist groups like Jewish Voice for Peace. I don’t think she supports BDS (the Boycott/Divestment/Sanctions movement)—she did not in the past—but she does advocate for mainstream Jewish groups like Hillel to permit them a voice as well (author’s note: I agree with her on this). She is head of an organization called IfNotNow, which seeks to end American support of the occupation. Good for her—so do I.
ifnot.net/...
The inspiring part of all this is that Zimmerman’s selection shows that Sanders isn’t afraid to go against our political orthodoxy in the U.S., which remains heavily skewed in favor of Israel in both political parties and treats Palestinians as somewhere between an annoyance, a non-entity, and a terrorist organization. This is wrong, and doesn’t bode well for peace at all—and while the democrats are a hell of a lot closer to even-handedness in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict than the republicans, we still don’t give the Palestinians anything near a fair shake in the negotiation process (a process from which Obama has been largely disengaged from the beginning).
In selecting someone like Zimmerman as the coordinator of Jewish outreach activities, Sanders is sending an important signal: that even allies should be subject to accountability, that lobbying groups like AIPAC cannot and should not be assumed to be the will of the Jewish community as a whole. We’re complex—as any group of 10 or 15 million people is, and as most of us lean to the left, it’s a fair assumption that most of us don’t approve—and often sharply condemn--much of what goes on within Israel’s political-military sphere, and are deeply distressed at the continuing occupation and mistreatment of Palestinians. Sanders’ decision to choose a young Jewish activist, out of U Berkeley, indicates that he has an ear to changing facets of social, cultural and political thought with respect to Jewishness, Israel and humanitarianism. It again signals that a Sanders administration would buck political orthodoxy, encourage us to think more deeply about what we expect and demand from our allies, and possibly suggest a shift from one-sidedness to more even-handedness in our dealings in the middle east.
These are all positives, and they are significant.
There are also causes for concern.
To address these concerns, I’m going to take a detour away from Simone Zimmerman’s appointment for a few paragraphs and discuss a bit about some of the disturbing trends I see in some of the social movements that deal with the I/P conflict. Some of what I see from the peace activist and social justice movements with respect to the Israel/Palestinian conflict is often not centered on actual peace or justice at all—which by nature should advocate for peace and justice for all parties in all conflicts. Rather, many of these movements and groups seek to fully isolate, delegitimize and in many cases eliminate Israel by going far past economic pressure to turning even Jewish cultural symbols and identities into visceral negative associations. Examples of this abound over the past few years: Demonization of Hillel, demonization of Jewish academics through proposed (and obscene) academic boycotts, re-introduction of the blood libel through virulently anti-Semitic hate merchants such as Joy Karega (now tenured!) at Oberlin and Jasbir Puar* at Vassar. At the student level, a new wave of campus anti-Semitism (regularly denied by its perpetrators) have now turned their attention to getting Jews silenced or thrown of panels as their shady Jewishness might somehow cloud their fairness or judgment—even speaking up for Jews, or suggesting that campus anti-Semitism might be a problem is enough to initiate motions against the offending students. Both in the U.S. and Europe, Instances of intimidation and violence are also on the increase—and while the horrific deaths of a number of Jews in Europe as a result of violent anti-Semitism are, thankfully, extraordinarily rare, hate instances like chair throwing and window bashing at King’s College in London certainly suggest to the targeted Jews that such sentiments are not as far from the norm as we had once thought, only a couple of years ago.
They are coming back.
In American and European academic (and other) environments, central Jewish symbols of identity—whether Israel, Zionism/liberal Zionism, Hillel, even circumcision—find themselves under attack, and often such attacks are underpinned with classic hate imagery—sometimes drawn directly from Nazi Germany. Even the extraordinarily strong Jewish educational ethic is targeted at its core by moves towards academic boycotts (as with the American Anthropological Association who, I believe, votes on April 15**). Such moves obviously do nothing to help Palestinians—but they serve as a step forward in the destruction of Jewishness—the “wrong kind of Jewishness™”. At Oberlin and Vassar, students admit to being afraid to voice their own feelings about their own identity—a fear that extends to faculty as well, with some having expressed fears about actually losing jobs—or not being able to get jobs—in certain departments or environments.
Jews afraid to be Jewish, or feel the need to hide aspects of their identity. There’s a term for that: crypto-Jews—and that hearkens back to black places in world history. Yet here they are...at Oberlin and Vassar.
Yet on these matters there is absolute, and extraordinarily loud, silence from the academic schools of critical social theory, intersectionality, and related social justice advocacy that have spawned today’s purported social justice movements in which many activists have chosen to situate themselves—this is a large issue that is being increasingly recognized with growing alarm on the left (the right has, unfortunately, managed to cynically co-opt the issue first, much to my consternation). But the promotion to tenure track of the likes of Joy Karega, while other faculty face intimidation for speaking out, shows a sinister double-standard when it comes to safety and security for Jews. Even in circles that are central to causes on the left, such as LGBT issues, the whiff of association with “the wrong kind of Jew™ ” can cause problems. In a recent instance in Chicago, an event sponsored by the group “A Wider Bridge”, a group that seeks to bring LGBT people in the U.S. and Israel together, was “de-platformed” (to use the hip new term) by groups including the Muslim Alliance for Gender and Sexual Diversity and the Gay Liberation Network on charges of what they call Pinkwashing (Pinkwashing is the slur that Israel and Jewish organizations “play up” gay rights in Israel to cover for political-military injustices). Clearly, those who are punished are gay and transgender people in Israel. When Slate tells you you have an anti-Semitism problem, perhaps you have an anti-Semitism problem.
It is within this fraught and unsettling environment that Simone Zimmerman finds herself. Zimmerman, from everything I’ve read about her, is a good, sincere, passionate person. She is an activist, she’s cause-oriented, and her experiences at Berkeley opened her eyes to Israeli injustices that, she didn’t learn enough about in her own upbringing. I applaud Zimmerman for learning about realities on the ground, and for taking it upon herself to try to do something about it. I can relate—I lived in Israel during a study abroad semester back in ‘95 (just before Rabin’s assassination). When I went over there, I was pretty staunchly pro-Israel—when I left, I had shifted from Zionist to liberal ZIonist: I believed in the state of Israel as a homeland for Jewish people and a place of refuge—but I wanted peace, equality, and “refuge” to be available for all. But Zimmerman seems to have swung much further to the other side of the pendulum than I did—she has voiced support for Jewish Voice for Peace, a group that, while purporting to advocate for Palestinian justice, regularly sweeps true and often extreme anti-Semitism under the rug (they have, example, bent over backwards to excuse several of the instances I’ve cited above). The group regularly invokes the “Anti-Zionism <> Anti-Semitism” line, which has become extremely popular of late. People who invoke the mantra usually say they are doing so to ward off people who refuse to permit any criticism of Israel. They’re right—this does happen too often. But what ALSO happens all the time is that the anti-Zionism line is used to hide anti-Semitism, or to pretend it doesn’t exist. There are a number of people on the left who claim that Anti-Semitism ended when the war did and that all is fair game now with the anti-Zionist label. Including Nazi imagery (sorry for linking to a zombie account—I had lost my password at that time ;) — ed. )
On anti-Zionism, a topic on which I solicited community opinion a little while ago, Zimmerman has this to say:
From an academic perspective, I can agree to an extent: if you don’t believe in the concept of ethno-nationalist, or ethno-religio-nationalist states, that’s your perspective, and I don’t fault you for it. However if you are for the erasure of the Jews’ place of refuge, and ESPECIALLY if you are for the erasure of that refuge and no others, then you might have a problem. Simone Zimmerman is in no way anti-Semitic—she strikes me as very un-antisemitic--but she does seem to have bought too easily into the line that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are inherently separate and distinct—when the truth is that crossover into targeted ethnic hatred is rampant. Her support for Jewish Voice for Peace bothers me as well—as with groups like Students for Justice in Palestine, although there are some in both movements who truly wish for peace and justice, the goal of each of these organizations is to isolate Israel in an absolute sense. In the case of Jewish Voice for Peace, they can say “Look—there are Jews here so it’s fine!!” but it isn’t. Hurting Jews to help Palestinians is the wrong answer—and while I”m sure a lot of people in these groups mean well (other don’t)—that’s what they’re doing.There are other, truly peace oriented organizations, that do not use these approaches, and advocate community, goodwill, cultural exchange: J-Street (of which Zimmerman is very familiar), Third Narrative, Seeds of Peace (thanks for the h/t, RedDan!) I would like to see Simone ZImmerman, in her well-intentioned activism, hold up a few more mirrors to the movements in which she is a part.
As for Bernie’s choice in Simone Zimmerman, it’s a fascinating one, given the upcoming primary in New York. FiveThirtyEight forecaster Harry Enten has this to say, a bit sarcastically:
Bernie is doing some wild things in the run-up to the NY primary, given the Vatican situation (however that plays out) and this particular selection. This will cause a lot of consternation in many Jewish circles, and will be heralded among a number of younger Jews on the left. The concept of, and association with, Israel is quite different among the generations (see the Peter Beinart article in ZImmerman’s tweet above). I have no idea where this is going to end up, to be honest.
Ultimately, my own take on this is mixed. I’m a Clinton supporter, but I’ve always liked Bernie, and as a liberal Israel supporter i’ve been regularly appalled at the direction that the Likud government has taken. There are of course those who say that Israel has always been like this, that this is nothing new, that Israel has always been a settler colonialist state and is itself an original sin — those who ever read what I write know that I acknowledge the severe problems, but that I will never accept the original sin framing because it is at once hateful, unfair and unhelpful. However much needs to change. Bernie’s choice of Zimmerman suggests that he realizes and encourages this change—and that is, in the parlance of CNN, A Good Thing. At the same time, ZImmerman’s commitment to groups and activities that regularly try to isolate and demonize Israel and contribute to a disturbing environment for wrong-thinking Jews is a problem—and ZImmerman does need to do more to hold up a mirror to the anti-Semitism that exists within the social justice movments of which she is a part.
In closing, given increasing pressure on the Jewish community in the U.S. and Europe, particularly in left-leaning/academic environments, I’m not comfortable with many of Zimmerman’s views and approaches. I am, however, willing to give her a chance to help change the narrative, to help bring about more equity to the debate, and to help give some perspective on Bernie’s views. I also encourage her to look more closely at systemic problems within her own sphere of activism, and to use that knowledge to work with Bernie Sanders to provide the best, most effective, and positive outreach for Jewish, Muslim, Palestinian and Israeli communities in the U.S. and around the globe.
I wish her the best of luck.
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*I’ve decided to link to an article for Jasbir Puar that basically says that intimating the blood libel isn’t anti-Semitic. Note to author: yes it is—and it’s contortions like this that explain why we don’t trust you when you say your movement is about peace and justice, rather than demonization and hate.
**—and if the AAA were to vote to support an academic boycott on Israeli institutions I will consider it a wholesale assault on my own identity and that of my community. Possibly to the level of changing careers.