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Leaders of the long-time standard-bearer for Israel’s liberal, Zionist left – Meretz – say their party is no longer Zionist. Is it time to retire the “Z Word”?
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This is a segment from The “Is it Time to Retire the ‘Z Word’?” Edition.
During the Standing Rock “water protector” movement one video that crossed my feed was of a handful of US veterans, not overtly Native American, appearing on knees before a Sioux chief at tribal forum, apologizing for what “we” did to NAs. I suspect the speaker for the knelled was sincere. But the scene would have very little traction in American politics or culture. The American [immigrant] westward push of Manifest Destiny will not be abjured. Our ancestors were not monsters; one of the reasons evolutionary biology is refused. One rather up front text of Trumpism is “no more apologizing.” If one assumes that the overt libertarian vote would overall feel similarly, it is quite possible that over half of the electorate would embrace that slogan, and I think you could add a fair number of Hilary voters as well.
The Israeli settler movement seems to have effectively framed settlements and their expansion as a continuation of the Zionism of Israel’s foundation–protective, essential, wholly defensive, and inherently righteous. Overall, humans want to be patriotic to something; once the Church or Lord or Crown or God standing alone, now the People as the Nation, so the State as Their Protector, a variant of the need for family. Post Zionism fails traction for failing this need. So long as there are barbarians at the gate, defense in the past will be lauded to organize the present. Consider the illegal immigrant question in the US; beneath the question of legal entry lies the view that such entry can never birth patriotism, only parasitism. Defense against outsiders defines insiders. And who does not need some measure of purity to survive self and community?
As far as I can tell, the national right has won Israel. If ever there was a Post Zionist stand in Israel it was Aharon Barak’s “judicial revolution,” mind you based on Knesset “Basic Law,” no matter how stealthily passed in minor majorities. Justices today either abjure that time or are afraid to defend it. With that demise, thought itself must be policed to prevent a future betrayal of Zionism and Nation. Free speech is not free when doors are closed thereby. And doors are closed in a fortress.
A Post Zionist Meretz is Meretz proudly walking dead.