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Deeper Than We Know
- Editorial
- As the Jewish state prepares to celebrate the 58th anniversary of its independence next Wednesday, May 3, America and Israel are home to the two largest Jewish communities in the world - arguably the most vibrant and powerful Jewish communities the world has ever known. They are different beings, these two communities. One is a sovereign state of enormous vitality and strength. The other is a confident, influential minority within the world's greatest superpower.
- For all that, the partnership between them is almost limitless in its potential. Never have cross-border understanding and cultural exchange been easier than in this age of instant communications.
- In truth, we do not communicate much. Sometimes we talk, mostly past one another. Sometimes we use each other - American Jews as Israel's best ally, Israel as American Jewry's emotional symbol.
- The underlying ties are stronger and more enduring than the surface would suggest. If few American Jews consider Israel central to their Jewish identities, the vast majority feel a kinship.
- As we've learned from the experience of Birthright Israel, it doesn't take much a quick, 10-day tour of the Holy Land will do, it seems to awaken something unexpectedly powerful inside most Jews.
- Our bonds run deeper than we know. The challenge for the next six decades is to nourish them, and let them nourish us. (Forward)
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A New Dialogue with the Diaspora
by Avi Beker
- The political changes to the Israeli party map created an enormous gap between the positions of a small group of activists in the Jewish community and the vast majority of the community, and it will take time until the change is fully comprehended there.
- Sociologists claimed that Israel had become a kind of "civil religion" for Diaspora Jewry, especially in the U.S. where the activities on behalf of Israel were institutionalized in fund-raising and political lobbying.
- Like in Israel, the 1990s were a period of adaptation and uncertainty for the Jews of the Diaspora. The Oslo accords created tension between the leaders of those organizations and the leadership in Israel that was trying to foment political change among American Jews.
- The next government will have to prepare the groundwork with elements of the Jewish lobby. On more than one occasion, Israel's friends in Congress have complained that they find it difficult to spot a common denominator in the cacophony of messages they receive from Jewish organizations.
- It is vitally important that the dialogue with world Jewry not focus on the "big bangs" of Israeli politics, but rather on the deeper content of contemporary Jewish identity. (Ha'aretz)
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