THE HOLOCAUST IS OVER WE MUST RISE FROM ITS ASHES

American Jews. Vulnerability can be felt in the most impressive community the Jewshave ever built, a Jewry more glorious than those of Babel and Spain, even more sothan German Jewry that existed between the time of Mendelssohn and of the Shoah.The potential is there for Jews to change the world for the better, if they only freethemselves from the Nazi shackles.Courageous Israel is a mini-America in the “Wild East.” It faithfully represents theAmerican spirit in a region that is very much in need of salvation. In Israel you findfrontiers and pioneers with vision just like the early American West. Israel plays thecowboy, and the Jews of America provide the strategic support that compels everyU.S. administration to support Israel. In turn, Israel supports the administration that issupported by the Jewish organizations that support Israel that supports them. What iswrong with mutual back-scratching?There is a major weakness in this triangle of strategic alliance. Jewish voters t raditionally cast t heir votes to t he Democrat ic Part y; Jewish Republicans are relativelyfew in number. Even in the heyday of Jewish support of Republican presidents—Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush—not more than one-third of Jews votedRepublican. The American Jewish voter is apparently more concerned with domesticissues than with what the Jewish wheeler-dealers claim is good for Israel, namely aRepublican president.“Good for Israel” means different things to the Jewish masses and to their leaders.It seems that instinctively, millions of Jews understand that a White House that isgood for Israel should not necessarily do everything that Israel requests, but rather dowhat Israel needs. Furthermore, an ordinary Jew, though he is affected by his family’smemories and suffering for their traumas, wants his children to grow in a healthysociety. He would rather integrate into a multicultural society and look forward to thefuture than linger, holding on to the past. He would want to preserve solidarity withthe government, reducing its involvement to a minimum.American Jews seek solutions both as members of the Jewish faith and as partnersin the building of the American nation. The one-issue strategy does not address thesegoals as it deals with Israel and nothing else. Yet every time a strategic reevaluationconcerning Israel is called for, the silencing voices are heard: Shoah, pogroms, selfhatingJews. Again antiSemitism, swastikas, and Hitler decide the debate on Jewishidentity and an opportunity for dialogue dies before it even begins.