by “There is no alliance more historic or more important than the alliance between African Americans and American Jews.”
That’s what Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League, said in 2020 during his organization’s joint Black Jewish Unity Week event with the American Jewish Committee.
But, Morial told me this week, that alliance is “being tested” by divergent views on the war between Israel and Hamas. And that divergence could influence how the two congressional districts (which traditionally support Democrats) approach this year’s elections.
The relationship between these two communities is longstanding and gained momentum during the civil rights movement. But it has not been without periods of friction.
Marc Dollinger, a professor of Jewish studies at San Francisco State University and author of “Black Power, Jewish Politics,” sees a strong parallel between now and the period around the 1967 Six-Day War, in which Israel took control of Gaza. Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem (as well as the Golan Heights and the Sinai Peninsula) and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were displaced.
The following year, just four months before the 1968 US election, a Times article The headline “Jews Concerned About Ties to Blacks” described a point of contention between the two communities as “Jewish resentment over the anti-Israel stance of black extremists who, in the parlance of the New Left, accuse the Jewish State of ‘ Zionist imperialism’ and ‘oppressions’ against the Arabs’.”
Dollinger describes any breakup that may be emerging now as “a kind of Chapter 2.”
Although American Jewish sentiments do not necessarily align with sentiments in Israel, the world’s only Jewish state, or with the policies of Israel’s government, there are parallels between the division perceived years ago and the division today: many black Americans , especially younger, more politically engaged black Americans oppose Israel’s conduct of the war in Gaza, with particular concern about the death toll among Palestinian civilians.
Many American Jews support Israel’s right to wage war to eliminate the threat posed by Hamas and support American support for Israel’s war effort, and some feel disappointed or even betrayed that many blacks appear more sympathetic to the perspective. Palestinian than from the Israeli Perspective.
The issues involved seem irreconcilable because many of those involved in the debate believe that their positions represent the moral authority. And nuanced opinions are sometimes characterized as weak. But there has to be room for nuances.
I believe that Hamas is a terrorist organization committed to the eradication of Israel, that its October 7 attack on Israel was horrific, and that all hostages taken in the attack should be returned.
At the same time, I believe that the slaughter in Gaza (thousands of civilian deaths, including thousands of children) is unjustified and unacceptable, even in war. Aid agencies continue to warn of a humanitarian crisis in Gaza and, as the International Court of Justice ruled last month, Israel must “take all measures within its power” to prevent violations of the International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Crime of Genocide. .
On these points, I adhere to a fundamental humanism. As Guardian columnist Naomi Klein says wrote In October, the progressive response to this war should be “rooted in values that are always on the side of the child against guns, no matter whose gun it is or whose child it is.”
It is the absence of these values that Ruth Messinger, former president of the American Jewish World Service, finds frustrating: the inability, she says, of people to “hold two contradictory ideas at the same time” when considering the war in Gaza. the insistence on an all-or-nothing approach to conflict on the part of both parties.
When we spoke, Messinger told me that within the Jewish community, when she says she is a strong defender of Israel’s right to exist and defend itself, but that the way it defends itself “means death for the people of Gaza and is” , therefore, “bad for the future of Israel and will contribute to the rise of anti-Semitism,” is often asked: “How can you say all those things that do not agree with each other?”
It’s because the conflict is complicated. And people who insist on putting it in simplistic terms do so to advance an argument rather than to promote understanding.
And in the end, this insistence on smoothing over the complexities of the issue could have a devastating effect on politics here. President Biden’s support for Israel in this war has alienated some Black voters. Withdrawing some of that support could alienate some Jewish voters. However, he needs the strong commitment and support of both groups to win re-election.
But Cliff Albright, co-founder of the Black Voters Matter Fund, lamented that the current tension between these two constituencies over this issue “definitely threatens our ability to work together in terms of electoral organizing.” And he believes this tension is exacerbated by the rising death toll in Gaza and by the targeting of black leaders for their positions on the war, such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. endorsement of campaign opponents to members of the so-called Squad, a small contingent of progressive members of Congress, all of them black and several of them black.
When I contacted AIPAC to ask if the organization was concerned that attacking the Squad could cause political friction between the black and Jewish communities, a spokesperson for the group responded by email, not directly answering my question, but writing: “We believe that It is entirely consistent with progressive values to support the Jewish State” and “Our political action committee supports nearly half of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the Black Caucus, and the Hispanic Caucus.”
One concern for Democrats is that young progressives who oppose Biden’s position on the war, including many young black people, will refuse to vote for him on principle.
But Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, a former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee who co-founded the bipartisan Congressional Caucus on Black-Jewish Relations and helped reboot it last year, made a point I’ve thought about quite a bit recently: “A protest vote here or lack of protest voting will result in a more toxic and more painful situation” than the one that already exists for the Palestinians if it means re-electing Donald Trump.
Even if some voters find that Biden has not responded sufficiently to Israel’s right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his continuation of the war, they should consider that such a pushback would likely be nonexistent under Trump. In that way, refusing to vote for Biden as a way to express support for the Palestinians (or at least hope for a ceasefire) could end up further damaging the Palestinian cause. The moral position, abstention, could actually become an immoral act, opening the door and allowing even more danger to enter.
It may be difficult to understand, but the prospects for the Palestinian people could worsen.
