You’re right, the ‘tolerant liberal middle ground’ is where we do best. That was the ‘golden age’ of roughly 1945 to 2001.
That’s gone forever for a host of reasons, foremost among them (ahem) demographics, and restoration to such an age is now impossible. So the only question left is can further erosion of whatever shred of ‘middle ground’ is left be halted. The only hope for that would be the sidelining of most of the people and strategies you cited above and a hard switch to a much more innovative, street-level, and aggressive fight for Jewish civil rights in the face of the raging and massive ‘Hound-o-caust’ being waged against us across the West.
No matter what the old establishment dogs achieved for our community in the past, and it was considerable in many cases and to be lauded, they are totally ill suited to todays threat environment and need to be retired to make way for new and muscular bunch of clear eyed realist Jewish shit-disturbers with Leviathan chutzpah. We need new dogs and new tricks.
To allow them to rise and take them helm, we must end our crippling self-editing and internal policing by our self-appointed elites. We have to stop libelling non-establishment right-leaning voices as ‘extremists’. Our very lives in the diaspora depend on it.
This is an interesting article that partially recounts interviews with many local Toronto advocates. Some do more than others; some are more effective than others. None of those interviewed believe themselves to be on the extremes of any political movement. Yet the conclusory comment refers to those on the political extreme left or right "(Bari). Weiss recognizes that Jews never do well in times of extremism. They need a tolerant liberal middle ground...I agree with Weiss that the threat to Jews has always come from the extremes".
Aside from the minor issue of what in the article leads to that conclusion, other than the Weiss quote, the conclusion seems to negate anti-Zionism or anti-Israelism as antisemitism, a new anti-semitism. Inconvenient as it might be, the BDS movement is fully supported by many "tolerant" liberals.
You need only look to the highly embarrassing Ivory Tower "tolerant liberal" schools of higher learning. Historically involved Jews and Jewish organizations supported all of those institutions to a greater or lesser extent. They came to a harsh and belated realization well after Oct 7. Most started clearing their throats only after a nonJew, Congresswoman Elise Stefanik, exposed the creepy views of the most elite University Presidents.
One may now be convinced that Ivy League schools are extremists on the left or right of the political scales. That might not be easy to argue.
I'm afraid the "tolerant" liberal middle ground is not so tolerant to, nor a friend to, any anti-anti-semites.
Thank you for this post, it gives some hope.
Thanks for this survey. My Substack, Canadian Zionist Forum, with 950 subscribers after 19 months is also dedicated to addressing these issues.
You’re right, the ‘tolerant liberal middle ground’ is where we do best. That was the ‘golden age’ of roughly 1945 to 2001.
That’s gone forever for a host of reasons, foremost among them (ahem) demographics, and restoration to such an age is now impossible. So the only question left is can further erosion of whatever shred of ‘middle ground’ is left be halted. The only hope for that would be the sidelining of most of the people and strategies you cited above and a hard switch to a much more innovative, street-level, and aggressive fight for Jewish civil rights in the face of the raging and massive ‘Hound-o-caust’ being waged against us across the West.
No matter what the old establishment dogs achieved for our community in the past, and it was considerable in many cases and to be lauded, they are totally ill suited to todays threat environment and need to be retired to make way for new and muscular bunch of clear eyed realist Jewish shit-disturbers with Leviathan chutzpah. We need new dogs and new tricks.
To allow them to rise and take them helm, we must end our crippling self-editing and internal policing by our self-appointed elites. We have to stop libelling non-establishment right-leaning voices as ‘extremists’. Our very lives in the diaspora depend on it.
This is an interesting article that partially recounts interviews with many local Toronto advocates. Some do more than others; some are more effective than others. None of those interviewed believe themselves to be on the extremes of any political movement. Yet the conclusory comment refers to those on the political extreme left or right "(Bari). Weiss recognizes that Jews never do well in times of extremism. They need a tolerant liberal middle ground...I agree with Weiss that the threat to Jews has always come from the extremes".
Aside from the minor issue of what in the article leads to that conclusion, other than the Weiss quote, the conclusion seems to negate anti-Zionism or anti-Israelism as antisemitism, a new anti-semitism. Inconvenient as it might be, the BDS movement is fully supported by many "tolerant" liberals.
You need only look to the highly embarrassing Ivory Tower "tolerant liberal" schools of higher learning. Historically involved Jews and Jewish organizations supported all of those institutions to a greater or lesser extent. They came to a harsh and belated realization well after Oct 7. Most started clearing their throats only after a nonJew, Congresswoman Elise Stefanik, exposed the creepy views of the most elite University Presidents.
One may now be convinced that Ivy League schools are extremists on the left or right of the political scales. That might not be easy to argue.
I'm afraid the "tolerant" liberal middle ground is not so tolerant to, nor a friend to, any anti-anti-semites.