Other Jewish voices
“When unqualified support for Israel is categorized as Jewish,” says historian Marjorie Feld, “it erases dissent and flattens Jewish life.”
The Threshold of Dissent and author Marjorie N. Feld. (Courtesy images)
Mainstream American Jewish institutions have vociferously condemned the pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled student campuses this spring, throwing their support behind Israel and labeling critics, even Jewish ones, as antisemitic. In an April 25 MSNBC appearance, Anti-Defamation League head Jonathan Greenblatt went so far as to suggest that some campus activist groups—including Jewish Voice for Peace—are Iranian proxies.
But unconditional support for Israel and for Zionism has not always been a given. From the origins of organized Zionism in the late 19th century until after the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, American Jewish leaders were ambivalent about the idea of a Jewish nationalism. It wasn’t until the 1967 Arab-Israeli War that they began to coalesce behind allegiance to Israel.
Marjorie N. Feld’s new book, The Threshold of Dissent, looks at the long history of American Jewish dissent on Israel, which, the historian argues, has increasingly been silenced by the mainstream US Jewish establishment. Feld teaches at Babson College, has served on the Jewish Voice for Peace Academic Advisory Council, and is active in her Boston-area synagogue.
