Rabbi Shaul Magid on Israel’s descent into genocidal fanaticism
Liberal Zionism, the notion that Israel’s existence can be compatible with liberal values, has run its course. As Israel’s genocide in Gaza continues despite the outcry of the world and the International Court of Justice, it is clear that any hopes of earlier generations to build a humanistic society in Israel have failed.
Israel has long legitimized itself by purporting to be necessary for the protection of Jewish people from antisemitism. But Judaism and Jewish identity are far older than Zionism, and far more diverse than Zionism’s narrow claims to monopolize the meaning of faith and ancestry. Rabbi Shaul Magid joins The Chris Hedges Report for a discussion on how religious fanaticism has come to dominate Israeli politics, and how a Jewish identity that rejects Zionism can be constructed from the rich and profound history of the Jewish faith and people.
TRANSCRIPT
Chris Hedges: Has Zionism, especially liberal Zionism, exhausted itself? The humanistic constructs of liberal Zionism are always in conflict with itself because of its refusal to grant Palestinians equal civil and political rights and has led many Israelis to embrace a far more chauvinistic and fanatic religious Zionism. What does this mean for Israel? And as important, what does this mean for Judaism? The Zionist movement which became a dominating force with the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948, has sought to shut out Jewish critics of Zionism. It not only maligned Jews who did not embrace Zionism but labels them “anti-Jews,” “self-hating Jews,” or “counter-Jews.” This war within Judaism, between those who put Israel at the center of Jewish identity and those who do not, has ripped apart the Jewish collective. As Rabbi Shaul Magid writes, “The Talmudic sages teach that the heretic is actually worse than the idolater. In their estimation, unlike the idolater, the heretic subverts Judaism from the inside.”
Rabbi Magid goes on to argue that the demand for the full Zionization of American Jewry is an attempt to brand all who do not give their primary loyalty to the state of Israel as heretics or apostates. This battle within Zionism raises crucial questions: What role does exile play in Jewish belief? What role does the state of Israel play in Jewish belief? Is Zionism the only true refuge for Jews? Are Jews who reject Zionism and Israel’s occupation of the Palestinians, who embrace lives outside of Israel, upholding or defying Jewish tradition? Is the nation’s state the best or the healthiest collective structure for Jews? Is a Jewish homeland, known by Jews as the land of Israel, connected to sovereignty?
Judaism existed long before the concept of sovereignty and the land of Israel has been the homeland of the Jews for millennia without sovereignty. Is the concept of homeland dependent on statehood or even residents in Israel? Or is this concept, in its origins, a theological concept? Joining me to discuss Zionism and its relationship to Jewish belief is Rabbi Shaul Magid, professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College and senior fellow at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard University, as well as the author of The Necessity of Exile: Essays from a Distance….
https://scheerpost.com/2024/02/24/chris-hedges-the-death-of-liberal-zionism
***************************************************
We’re anti-Zionist Jews and we see genocide unfolding in Gaza
Standing up for Palestine is also standing up to save the west from the worst of itself
Seth Anziska on Dominant Orthodoxies
Gaza and the End of Western Fantasy
The World Must Force Peace on Israel
Netanyahu’s deliberate extremism has failed
Haaretz Editorial: Netanyahu Bears Responsibility for This Israel-Gaza War
After the truth-shower 