"You Are Anti-Israel!"

The American/Israeli Bibi Divide

The other day I received an unusually bizarre insult. I wrote a post on Facebook that was critical of Israel’s government ministers, and someone told me that I should join “the Anti-Israel protests by the Palestinians in the US.” Now, considering that I live in Israel, send my kids to the IDF, and just published a book specifically countering anti-Israel propaganda, why on earth would someone say such a strange thing to me?

I would like to judge them favorably. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the person who wrote this ridiculous insult lives in Teaneck. Don’t get me wrong; some of my best friends live in Teaneck! It’s one of my favorite communities outside of Israel. But anyone living in the US (or elsewhere outside of Israel) is living in a fundamentally different context than those of us who live in Israel, which can affect how they see things.

Jews outside Israel are surrounded by voices saying that Israel is the bad guy in the larger Israel-Palestinian/Arab conflict, and they play an important role in defending Israel against these voices. Some of these voices are in positions of political power; others are mainstream media outlets. The issues being debated are about the fundamental legitimacy of Israel and its conflict with the Palestinians. And outside of Israel, Israel is generally represented by the government of Israel. So naturally, there is a tendency to conflate supporting Israel with supporting the government of Israel - and to conflate criticism of the government of Israel with criticism of Israel.

Jews inside Israel, on the other hand, are surrounded by people who support Israel’s general legitimacy in its conflict with the Palestinians and other Arabs. The government is just one particular player within that context. And since the current government has made some very lethal mistakes in that area and refused to take responsibility, has a rather strong record for extreme corruption even by political standards, along with kowtowing to anti-Zionists in order to maintain itself in power, and trying to remove any limitations on its power, many people are very strongly opposed to it. This is even as these people simultaneously obviously very much support Israel (and make tremendous sacrifices for it) in the general picture - in fact, their opposition to the current government is precisely because they very much support Israel and make tremendous sacrifices for it!

(Incidentally, just in the last week or so in Israel, we had the following:

• The revelation that the war-torn town of Kiryat Shemona has been ostracized from receiving government support to help rebuild from the damage it suffered, in retaliation for it having elected the non-Likud candidate as mayor;

• The Likud admitting that one billion shekels were illegally transferred (=stolen) from public funds and given to anti-Zionist schools that raise children to become an even greater drain on the economy;

• Not a single arrest from a huge crowd of anti-Zionists who set fires in the street, damaged property, and threw rocks at people, with the police failing to respond to a bus driver who called them in a panic that he was about to be lynched, yet a handful of protestors outside a Likud MK’s office were arrested;

• The government determinedly advancing a Draft Exemption Law that would formalize an exemption for a community of over a million people and entitle them to receive billions to fund their deliberate economy-draining lifestyle, while millions of others continue to suffer as a result of the endless call-ups of reservists due to the IDF manpower shortage;

• The government seeking to lower the voting age, so that they can get much-needed support from a larger number of anti-Zionist charedim in the coming election.)

The full statement of the Teaneck slanderer was as follows: “You hate Bibi and the Israeli government. You hate your fellow Jews. You would do well here in the US with the Anti-Israel protests by the Palestinians. You both stand for the same points.” In his mind, the fact that I despise the way that Bibi and his government acts means that I am anti-Israel! It’s utterly absurd, but at least I can understand where this ridiculous perception comes from.

The Teaneck person subsequently declared that he respects all Prime Ministers of Israel. That’s very nice for him. It might even be appropriate for him to say that. But here in Israel not a single person from any political persuasion would say that. You’re not going to find any supporter of Bibi saying that they respected Shimon Peres or Ehud Barak as prime minister!

Following backlash from others who harshly criticized the Teaneck person for his comments, he claimed that my comments about the Israel government “could be used by Jew-haters.” I suppose that statements calling out corrupt politicians could indeed be used by Jew-haters who would claim that it is indicative of Jews as a whole. So could exposing child-molestors in the Jewish community. Does that mean that we shouldn’t do it? Should people living in Israel who are opposed to the government’s policies, or who are even suffering as a result of them, not say anything because of how haters of Israel might use their words in a distorted way to delegitimize Israel?!

(Note: This is very different from charedi leaders who actively sought out the US administration to tell them a bunch of lies about how Israel is harming charedi Jews and to try to weaken the IDF and the economy.)

As the people who actually live with the consequences of both government actions and foreign antagonism to Israel, we’ll make our own decisions about whether to publicly complain about things that our government does, thank you very much. We are extremely grateful for the support of those who do not live here, but please don’t tell us not to call out and fix the problems in our country. And you most certainly don’t have a right to claim that we “hate Jews” and are “anti-Israel” if we do so.