I think it’s a mistake to assume there is a single reason and that all Jews consider that to be the primary reason.

1. The State of Israel exists. This is a fact that cannot be changed, nor does Israel’s national existence need any justification at this point other than the fact that it is a fact. This is true not because of anything having to do with Jewish anything, but because there are now at least two generations of people living within the borders of that nation who were born there after 1948, for whom Israel is there national home, whether they are Jewish or not. (I don’t mean to imply that “two generations” is some sort of magical number; I just mean to state the obvious that the independent state of Israel–as opposed to the land where that state exists–now has a significant native population.)

To suggest that Israel, because of its policies, or because of its origins, should somehow cease to exist as an independent state is therefore not only impractical and unjust; it is also almost certainly anti-Semitic, unless one is also calling for a similar dissolution of, say, the United States, which is also a country built on colonial roots and the disenfranchisement of the native population. (I am not interested in arguing whether the Israeli occupation is justified or not; nor am I suggesting that the Israelis want to wipe out the Palestinians as the US government seemed at one time to want to do to the Native American population, but there are parallels between the formation of the US and the formation of Israel, and if you are going to call for the dissolution of Israel on those grounds, then you really should be calling for the dissolution of the US as well.)

2. Because Israel exists as an indpendent state, it has the right to defend itself, especially now that Hamas, a group that is sworn to eliminate Israel has made such a strong showing in the Palestinian elections. Expecting Israel to do anything right now that would make itself vulnerable to this goal that members of Hamas in the Palestinian government have insisted remains in force is both naive and stupid.

3. The State of Israel exists as a Jewish state, both in terms of its majority population and certain aspects of its government. More to the point, for Israelis, Jewish and not, this is as much a part of Israel’s culture as, say, the separation of church and state is here in the US. Whether or not Israel should continue to be a Jewish state in this way, however, and/or what precisely it means for Israel to be a Jewish state, is also a legitimate issue for debate for two reasons:

a. It places non-Jewish Israelis in a permanently less privileged position in their country of citizenship. This would be true even if there is no difference now between how Jewish and non-Jewish Israeli citizens are treated under the law, which, as I understand it, is not the case: those laws can change and to the degree that Israel is a Jewish state, non-Jewish Israelis are vulnerable to some future government that might deem it necessary to institute forms of discrimination against them because they are not Jewish. And, I would add, the fact that we, and by “we” here I mean Jews, might consider this extremely unlikely and therefore not a high priority issue is indicative of precisely the kind of privilege I am talking about. This is a debate that should take place, it seems to me, in Israel, between and among Israelis.

b. If the existence of Israel as a Jewish state means that it is also, or that I should see it as, “my” state, either because Israel claims me as among its own–as Ariel Sharon did and other Israelis have done explicitly–or because the Jewish community insists that laying claim to Israel as my homeland (or any of the variations on that theme one can imagine) is foundational to a valid Jewish identity, then the question of precisely what it means for Israel to be a Jewish state has, to the degree that I identify myself as a Jew, been made central to who I am. If I choose not to lay claim to Israel as my homeland, or if I do not see Israel’s existence as the fulfillment of my personal version, because I do not have one, of what others portray as the universal or near-universal aspiration of the Jewish nation for a state, have I denied some essential Jewishness that I was born with? Have I betrayed my people? Anyone here who is Jewish and has been through any sort of Jewish education, formal or informal, knows both the questions and the standard answers. (Interestingly, they are similar to the questions that are asked of, or the charges made against, those who intermarry, and as a Jew married to a Muslim raising a son without any religious affiliation, these are questions I have been confronted with quite often.)

It is obvious, I suppose, but nonetheless important to stress that this second area of debate encompasses a much larger population than the first one I defined. Indeed, I find myself having very different conversations with Israeli Jews about the situation of Israel and the Palestinians, and about the nature of Israel and as Jewish state than I do with Jews who live elsewhere in the world. For Israeli Jews, Israel is their home, not in some metaphorical sense of that word, not as a bottom-line place of refuge or safety in an anti-Semitic world, not as some place where, thank god!, Jews and not goyim are in charge, but their home, the place where they were born and raised, or the place they chosen to claim as if they had been born and raised there, and because it is their home, because it is the place where they live and work, have children and so on, the issues that arise there are ultimately their’s to work out on their own terms. I, of course, have my opinions, and I share them, but I would never presume that their interest as Jews in what happens in and to Israel coincide with mine as a Jew because Israel is not my home, nor do I have any plan to make it my home.

On the other hand, when I talk to Jews who live outside of Israel, for whom Israel is not home and who seem to have no plans to make Israel their home, but who define their interests in Israel as if it were their home, I don’t feel the same constraints. To these Jews, I am very willing to say, for example, that I don’t think Israel should be a Jewish state, if by Jewish state we mean a state that claims me or that I am supposed to claim as part of some essential Jewishness that exists within me. And with these Jews I am willing to debate the issues at stake in the history of Zionism or of Israel’s formation or whatever because, with these Jews, it always seems that the stakes come down not to home, but to identity.

There is a lot more to say, I suppose, but I guess I will stop there.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the purges of the late 30’s took their toll on leadership, and the whole thing never really took off. I, for one, don’t particularly blame the Zionists for not a) trusting Stalin unconditionally, and b) enthusiastically moving to Siberia. The 2002 census in Russia showed over 2000 Jews (just over 1% of the population) living in the region.

There was a documentary about it a few years ago, but I’m told it wasn’t very good.

Also, I completely fail to see why the lack of Jewish efforts to secure a homeland/state in Israel before the 19th century is an argument *against* a Jewish state. All that’s really saying is that if you successfully oppress people long enough and hard enough so that they stop fighting for their state back and hopefully even forget they had one in the first place, then you don’t have to feel guilty about undermining their successful efforts when they finally can make them.

Jew-hating troll Israel-basher!

Just kidding. You haven’t said anything I would raise an eyebrow at, even if I would disagree, and I’m pretty touchy about Israel.

To argue that state’s policies need serious overhaul is one thing; to argue that state should dissolve and either move somewhere else far away, or cease to exist, is far from merely being a “critic of Israel”.

I know I said I’d stay out of it, but I just wanted to clarify. I hope you don’t think that’s what I said. I (thought I) made it pretty clear I was reacting to the idea that native lands should be retuned to ‘First Peoples’ since it seems to disregard what happens to the ’second’ or ‘third’ peoples.

It’s just very weird to talk about a ‘contested’ and ‘religious’ history as a bad reason for Jews to live there, completely avoiding the fact that the secular and religious history in that region is heavily related to Judaism.

I think you’ve assumed I was saying it was a ‘bad reason’. I never said this was a reason Jews shouldn’t have picked Israel. What I was trying to say was this *was* the reason Jews picked Israel. If they were *only* seeking a safe haven from opression, then, as Robert notes here:

As an historical aside, it should be noted that there was some feeling in the early days of the Zionist movement(s) that someplace isolated and unvalued by strong polities would make a good Jewish state. (Madagascar was floated as a possible site, as I recall, because none of the real powers cared about it.)

…a choice like that would have been made.

Jeeze. I never thought I’d feel like a troll on a blog I read so often.

Nobody suggested otherwise. It’s just very weird to talk about a ‘contested’ and ‘religious’ history as a bad reason for Jews to live there, completely avoiding the fact that the secular and religious history in that region is heavily related to Judaism.

All I meant was that the “all we want is a place to escape the capriciousness of the goyim who hate us” argument for the necessity of Israel’s existence as a Jewish state, while entirely reasonable from an emotional point of view, does not justify the displacement of another people in order to create that state.

I didn’t intend to present that sentiment as a final argument–we need safety, get out of our way, resident Arabs!–but as an explanation for why Jews feel the need for a Jewish state, period, and in response to the idea that anti-Semitism in America is dead so why can’t Jews just be happy here? (I also don’t think your paraphrasing is quite accurate. It’s not ‘escaping the goyim’ , it’s ‘living in a nation where we, not the goyim, are in charge.)

Whether or not there should have been a Jewish state in Canaan and who did what to whom, there is a Jewish state there now. To argue that state’s policies need serious overhaul is one thing; to argue that state should dissolve and either move somewhere else far away, or cease to exist, is far from merely being a “critic of Israel”.

Perhaps my use of the term “right” was imprecise, though I have heard plenty of Jews argue that we have the right to a state because we have, in one way or another, been oppressed in every country we have lived in, and since no one else seems to want us or to be able to live with us.

All I meant was that the “all we want is a place to escape the capriciousness of the goyim who hate us” argument for the necessity of Israel’s existence as a Jewish state, while entirely reasonable from an emotional point of view, does not justify the displacement of another people in order to create that state. And I do not want to get into a historical argument here about whether the Jews did or did not behave ethically when they began to settle Palestine, or whether the Arabs welcomed them or not, or tried to sabotage the settlements from the very beginning or not. The fact is that the Jewish settlement of Palestine, with the intent of establishing a Jewish homeland, could not help but result in a radical change in the relationship not only between the Jews and the Arabs, but also between the Arabs and the land.

It is true that there has been a continuous Jewish presence in that part of the world for thousands of years; that Jewish presence, however, did not constitute a Jewish state; and I am not aware that the Jews who lived there were agitating for the formation of such a state. There may have been such agitation, and if so I will have to rethink this position; I just don’t know about it. At least some Zionists recognized early on that the establishment of the Jewish homeland would necessitate taking land away from the Arabs who lived there, and they did, as Robert put it have the “desire, will and strength.” The fact that they had these things, however, did not mean they were right in doing what they did.

It’s worth reading, in this regard, Vladimir Jabotinsky’s The Iron Wall, which is remarkably prescient, given the wall that is now being built in Israel.

Too late!

Perhaps you’ve forgotten that the religious history of that land is Jewish religious history?

The problem is, it’s not solely and exclusively Jewish history.

I’m referring to the need to belong to an entity larger than oneself, in the broad sense, both for protection (”my gang will take care of me”) and for bonding. It requires a distinction between in and out groups.

It’s certainly the case that you can have multiple roles that fill the need - but if you are already getting as much as you can get out of (say) your family, then the disappearance of nationalism is going to leave you with something unfulfilled.

liberal, Christian Britons

Hm. I wonder if the British Israelites got involved in this?

NOT going to mention the Templars. Nope. Not.

You can fill that space with family/clan identity. You can fill it with tribalism. You can fill it with nationalism. You can fill it with ideological groupings (communism/nazism/etc.)

What do you recommend we fill that space with, that’s less dangerous than nationalism? Nationalism seems to me like the best choice from a bad list.

What safer alternative do you propose? That emotional space in people has to be filled with something.

It probably doesn’t matter for me, because I think nationalism is incredibly dangerous, and I’m generally anti-states.

You have to understand that for most Jews, it’s not so much about God Gave Us This Land is that we want one freakin’ safe space where we aren’t depending on the temporary and capricious goodwill of the non-Jewish ruler.

Mythago I think what you’re saying is really important - and that was one of the things I liked best about Naomi Klein’s article, is that she explored the implications of this. Unfortunately, looking from a purely practical point of view, Israel isn’t currently that safe-space (particularly not with its dependance on US aid), and no amount of bombs or walls will make it so.

Then why choose such a hotly contended piece of land rich with religious history?

Perhaps you’ve forgotten that the religious history of that land is Jewish religious history?