American Jews & the state of Israel

Interesting commentary with lots of poll data about why American Jews instinctively vote with the Left, despite the seemingly obvious danger in which that places the state of Israel. The key paragraph:

To the question, ‘Would you support or oppose the United States taking military action against Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons,’ 47% of Jews said they’d oppose America moving to save Israel from nuclear annihilation, 42% would support it, and 11% were unsure.

This is perhaps the clearest indication that a significant segment of the Jewish community either doesn’t give a damn about Israel or is delusional.

A few personal anecdotes (for whatever they’re worth):

I went to high school with many ethnic Jews (about 22% of my school in fact) and while many brought unleavened bread to lunch during passover week, most could not tell me what passover was all about. They knew the ethnic side of the story, at least the food part of the deal, as many, understandably, complained the entire week - but the ones I spoke to did not know its history. Being an evangelical Christian, I knew all about the lamb’s blood on the door post and the angel of death “passing over” these homes on the eve of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, but most thought I was crazy and just looked at me with blank stares as if to say: “Lamb’s blood? Whatever man, I just know I have to eat bad food during this week.” Some even commented that I was dead wrong. “Passover had nothing to do with that,” they said.

In graduate school I encountered a woman of Jewish heritage who told me that the only reason the United States protects the state of Israel is because the Christian fundamentalists in this country believe that Jesus Christ will return to the temple mount to usher in the end times (as if somehow Christ couldn’t descend from heaven, return to Israel, rebuild the temple, and establish his kingdom on earth without it being in the hands of the Jews or without the United States’ support). She seemed to believe that supporting the state of Israel equated to ushering in a Christ-centered end times, rather than simply supporting the Jewish state’s right to exist. As she didn’t believe in Christ, then she couldn’t support Israel. I found her reasoning rather puzzling. While she can certainly believe whatever she wants about the end times and Jesus Christ, she seemed to believe that the state of Israel was a Christian thing and should not be of Jewish concern.

I think most American Jews share this sentiment. They are ethnic Jews only. They eat unleavened bread, they don’t eat pork, they send their children to Hebrew school to learn the language, they throw bar/bat mitzvahs for their 13 year-olds, but they generally aren’t religious Jews and they largely, surprisingly, do not seem to care about the state of Israel. Or as the article stated, maybe they do care and it’s just not their top priority or they’re delusional.