Zionism had as its founding precept at the end of the 19th century that the creation of a Jewish homeland was the best hope for the survival of Jews and Judaism. Without their own country, Jews would continue to suffer the crippling and lethal anti-Semitism they have endured as a tragic refrain throughout history. The Holocaust, if anything, seemed a searing confirmation of that logic. Since Israel declared its independence in 1948, it has continued to pursue as a core mission the rescue of persecuted Jews from around the globe to safety and freedom in the promised land. Now, almost 5 million Jews live in Israel, comprising about 40 percent of world Jewry.
Given the events of the last 17 months in the Middle East, however, it seems fair -- though hopefully premature -- to ask a chilling question: What if the Zionists were wrong?
Since the region's most recent convulsions started, over 1,300 people have been killed; more than 300 have been Jews. Former U.S. Middle Eastern peace negotiator Dennis Ross declared recently on the Charlie Rose Show that the situation has never been worse within the borders of Israel. Thomas Friedman, meanwhile, has wondered in The New York Times whether a terrorist will wipe "Israel off the map" with a nuclear suitcase. There is a real threat that if America makes good on its plans to oust Iraq's Saddam Hussein, he will go for broke and let loose on Israel a potentially catastrophic attack of nuclear or biological weapons. If disaster strikes, it is the Jews living in the diaspora outside of Israel who will remain.
There is an acute and tragic irony in this situation. Israel was supposed to make the world's Jews safer and freer. Theodore Herzl, the founder of modern Zionism, wrote in 1896 that, without a country of their own, "in vain are we loyal patriots." He continued: "In countries where we have lived for centuries we are still cried down as strangers." The solution that he famously advocated was the creation of a national homeland, in the land of Palestine, for an ingathering of Jews.
David Ben Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, addressed Herzl's vision in a speech to the Israeli Knesset in 1950, noting that there had been a Zionist debate "concerning the question: ingathering of exiles or ingathering of all the exiles?" Significantly, he made that comment in advocating what became Israel's "Law of Return," which states as its fundamental purpose that "every Jew has the right to immigrate to this country." It's a law, according to Ben Gurion, that "comprises the central mission of our state, namely, ingathering of exiles."
Of course, full ingathering never took place. This led to divergent views among Zionist thinkers about how Israel should relate to Jews in the Diaspora. Israeli philosopher Nathan Rotenstreich, for instance, wrote that life in Israel was superior for Jews and Judaism than life outside. But his solution was not to undermine that diaspora, but rather to speak of the "primacy of Israel" -- a phrase that, by designating a community that is first in status, firmly acknowledges the staying power of other communities.
A second solution is the continued yearning for a total ingathering. For instance, then-Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu commented as recently as 1998, "I don't expect massive immigration from the Western countries in the immediate future. But I believe that it will happen."
But if Zionists in Palestine have always hoped for a full ingathering, Jews in the diaspora have viewed things differently. Take, for example, Jewish philosopher Simon Rawidowicz -- who was born in Poland, took haven from World War II in England, and died in the United States. He spoke of an axis throughout history between communities represented by Babylon (the diaspora) and Jerusalem (the land of Israel). Maintenance of both is crucial. "The way of Jerusalem-and-Babylon is the way of Israel in its wholeness," he wrote.
That link is, if anything, especially true in the United States. Future Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who built up the rolls of American Zionists to then-unprecedented numbers and gave what had been a fringe movement the legitimacy of his reputation, epitomized this perspective. He said in 1915, "every American Jew who aids in advancing the Jewish settlement in Palestine, though he feels that neither he nor his descendents will ever live there, will likewise be a better man and a better American for doing so." Brandeis's comments meant not only that Zionists could be good Americans, but also that Americans could be good Zionists and Jews.
The debate of whether Jews should stay in exile continued after the creation of Israel. In 1950, Ben Gurion and Jacob Blaustein, then president of the American Jewish Committee, met in Israel to discuss how the diaspora and Israeli Jews would relate to one another. Blaustein stated his views bluntly. "The American Jewish community sees its fortunes tied to the fate of liberal democracy in the United States, sustained by its heritage, as Americans and as Jews," he said. Since 1948, American Jews have generally internalized the Brandeis and Blaustein view that they are still full-fledged Jews right here.
So, what if the American Jews got it right? What if life in dispersion is in fact the enduring fate and strength of Judaism? And, as the flip side of the same coin, what if Israel represents a vulnerability for Jews and Judaism?
The idea is not new. For instance, French-Jewish thinker Richard Marienstras pointed out in 1975 -- soon after Israel had won the Yom Kippur War in 1973 -- that "the concentration of an entire people in a contiguous territory makes it a hostage to fortune." This line of thinking has a compelling, if dire, logic to it. After all, in these post-September 11 times, New York financial behemoths have begun to set up crucial operations outside the city, in order to continue functioning if disaster strikes again.
None of this is to say that Israel, or the Jews there, face certain or imminent disaster. Far from it: The country has succeeded beyond all reasonable hope in its 50-plus years. But, as all Israeli leaders freely admit, Israel is still a tiny nation in a hostile region. The risks, if remote, are real.
So now, as the holiday of Passover approaches, Jews will end their seders with the traditional prayer, and the hope, that Jews will all be "next year in Jerusalem." Even if the tensions in the Middle East -- God willing -- do ease by then, it might also be appropriate to give a silent prayer of thanks that at least some Jews will be -- next year -- here.
