Yesterday I appeared on a panel at J Street, where I debated Matthew Yglesias on what it means to be pro-Israel, as well as J Street's role in this debate. My main argument was that the Jewish community needs a group like J Street to keep the most extreme elements from defining "pro-Israel" too restrictively, to provide a counterweight against the natural inclination of any ethnic community toward tribalism, and to provide political space for the territorial compromises needed to create a two-state solution.
The problem, though, was that J Street had loosened the definition of "pro-Israel" to the point where it had virtually no meaning. As a result, the group has attracted the support of a lot of people who do not think of themselves as pro-Israel at all, some of whom oppose Israel's continued existence as a Jewish state. My bottom line was that J Street could be a group that represents a significant chunk of the American Jewish population, or it could be a group that represented people with Walt/Mearhseimer-esque views on Israel, but it couldn't be both and would have to choose.
What's interesting to me is that this tension has been apparent to numerous observers of the conference, including people who approach the problem from the opposite ideological side. Left-wing anti-Zionist Phillip Weiss noted that the J Street crowd was much more left-wing than the group's leadership. Max Blumenthal protested J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami's moderate interview with Jeffrey Goldberg. And Yglesias, who began the panel by disputing my thesis, wound up changing his mind and agreeing with it.
My main thought coming out of the J Street conference is that J Street has a huge problem on its hands. It's trying to win political influence and compete with AIPAC to speak for the center of American Jewry on the Middle East. Meanwhile, its most enthusiastic supporters have beliefs that are totally incompatible with this goal. J Street has played a delicate political game, sending different messages to different constituencies, but something is going to have to give.
The video of my debate is here:
Debate: Jon Chait & Matt Yglesias square off on what it means to be pro-Israel from Isaac Luria on Vimeo.
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COMMENTS (3)
"My main thought coming out of the J Street conference is that J Street has a huge problem on its hands. It's trying to win political influence and compete with AIPAC to speak for the center of American Jewry on the Midle East. Meanwhile, its most enthusiastic supporters have beliefs that are totally incompatible with this goal. J Street has played a delicate political game, sending different messages to different constituencies, but something is going to have to give."
Excellent analysis, Jon:
This group reminds me of the way left wing Jews jumped in to take over the Yiddish Bund ( a Jewish labor group that worked to preserve Jewish culture in Czarist Russia) under orders from Lenin. These f ... view full comment
"My main thought coming out of the J Street conference is that J Street has a huge problem on its hands. It's trying to win political influence and compete with AIPAC to speak for the center of American Jewry on the Midle East. Meanwhile, its most enthusiastic supporters have beliefs that are totally incompatible with this goal. J Street has played a delicate political game, sending different messages to different constituencies, but something is going to have to give."
Excellent analysis, Jon:
This group reminds me of the way left wing Jews jumped in to take over the Yiddish Bund ( a Jewish labor group that worked to preserve Jewish culture in Czarist Russia) under orders from Lenin. These folk posed as “Jewish” leftists wanting to preserve Yiddishkeit, but they were nothing of the kind. They were just leftists who wanted to subvert the organization.
During the Stalin era the Bund, as is well known was, by turns suppressed then used by Stalin during WW2 for propaganda purposes and finally many of their leaders were shot or sent to Siberia.
There is also a comparison to be made to the way Communists in the US wanted to take over and subvert the Union movement. (Lenin never believed in workers union that tried to bargain for better work conditions and pay---he believed in Union that would work towards his own revolutionary goals).
If J Street is to succeed they will have to challenge the anti-Israel uber leftists within it they way the Unions in the US after WW2 challenged and threw out the Stalinists in their midst.
Jon,
I agree with jackson and you: J Street does have to figure out what they're really all about and if they're serious about carving out another perspective pace AIPAC that does not include reflexive anti-Israel critics (some would call them haters I suppose).
This is the kind of perspective that I expect from tnr and I have come to expect from you: Serious. critical, and reflective. Quite different a bit down a few blogs down from the Plank though.
Jon,
I agree with jackson and you: J Street does have to figure out what they're really all about and if they're serious about carving out another perspective pace AIPAC that does not include reflexive anti-Israel critics (some would call them haters I suppose).
This is the kind of perspective that I expect from tnr and I have come to expect from you: Serious. critical, and reflective. Quite different a bit down a few blogs down from the Plank though.
Aren't you just more concerned about anti-Zionist support of J-Street than anything specific J-Street has done? How exactly has "J-Street has played a delicate political game, sending different messages to different constituencies"? Where do you see *their anti-Zionist message?
In a way, this seems like the health care debate. Republicans objections to the public option are not rooted in the public option per se, but rather in the idea that some of the people who support the public option also support fully nationalized health care. Thus, they argue, the public option is ultimately a gateway to something else - and we know this because some of the people who support it support other thing ... view full comment
Aren't you just more concerned about anti-Zionist support of J-Street than anything specific J-Street has done? How exactly has "J-Street has played a delicate political game, sending different messages to different constituencies"? Where do you see *their anti-Zionist message?
In a way, this seems like the health care debate. Republicans objections to the public option are not rooted in the public option per se, but rather in the idea that some of the people who support the public option also support fully nationalized health care. Thus, they argue, the public option is ultimately a gateway to something else - and we know this because some of the people who support it support other things!
To characterize this point of view as a "slippery slope argument" is to do a great disservice to "slippery slope arguments" everywhere, because it is admittedly not even concerned with the policy in question and what *it leads to - it's only concerned with some of those who support the policy and what they would ideally want.