There’s nothing new about Jewish disunity, which makes our story even more miraculous.
Ruthie Blum, a former adviser at the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is an award-winning columnist and a senior contributing editor at JNS. Co-host with Ambassador Mark Regev of the JNS-TV podcast “Israel Undiplomatic,” she writes on Israeli politics and U.S.-Israel relations. Originally from New York, she moved to Israel in 1977. She is a regular guest on national and international media outlets, including Fox, Sky News, i24News, Scripps, ILTV, WION and Newsmax.
(JNS) It’s become fashionable—almost ritualistic—to lament the “unprecedented” disunity among Israelis today. Members of the public wring their hands over the loss of social cohesion that they insist used to characterize the country.
But let’s face it: Such nostalgia borders on amnesia. Indeed, anyone reviewing both past and recent history has to admit that there’s nothing new about Jewish polarization.
On the contrary, a lack of consensus is one of our oldest traditions. So, maybe it’s time that we replace whining with acceptance and embrace discord as an integral part of our heritage—a God-given challenge we are compelled to meet, like it or not.
Passover provides the perfect opportunity to examine this paradox of a seemingly disparate people bound together, in spite of ourselves, by a life force beyond our control. As Jews around the world gather this weekend around Seder tables to celebrate our freedom from bondage in Egypt, we would do well to draw parallels between then and now.
The Haggadah recounts the miracles of the Exodus—the Ten Plagues, the splitting of the Red Sea, the defeat of Pharaoh’s tyranny. But it also tells a tale of doubt, ingratitude and strife among the Israelites.
In Exodus 6:9, for example, Moses delivers God’s promise of redemption to the Israelites, but they “did not listen to him because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery.”
Who could blame them?
They were beaten down, exhausted and skeptical, much like many Israelis are at the moment, after 18 months of an ongoing, multi-front war whose conclusion often feels elusive.The understandable mood made it hard for the Israelites to envision a future of salvation.
Ditto for those who currently mistrust Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies and motives.
These are people whose visceral hatred for him is so strong that it blinds them to the possibility that he might be leading the country toward the security it requires and reasserting the sovereignty under question by ill-wishers. They are the ones who encourage and amplify national despair through a hostile media echo chamber.
Then there’s the episode in Exodus 5:20-21, when the Israelite taskmasters, after Pharaoh increases their labor, confront Moses and Aaron: “You have made us abhorrent in Pharaoh’s eyes … you have put a sword in their hand to kill us!”
This is the ancient version of refrains we hear ad nauseam from the Israeli opposition. Whatever Netanyahu’s stand on Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iran—or, domestically, on judicial activism—his detractors accuse him of endangering Israel, rather than safeguarding its survival and democracy. Ironically, they even invoke the Exodus to compare him to Pharaoh.
The most dramatic instance of disaffection in the Exodus story occurs at the edge of the Red Sea, in passage 14:11-12.
With Pharaoh’s army bearing down, the panicked Israelites hurl at Moses,“Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to die in the wilderness?”
Stunningly, they went so far as to suggest that slavery under Pharaoh was preferable to trusting Moses. It’s a “cut off your nose to spite your face” attitude that Israel’s elites have been promoting with a vengeance.
In the immediate aftermath of the Exodus, the Israelites grumbled about food and longed for the “fleshpots of Egypt,” blaming Moses for their plight.
The Israeli left sees the past through similarly rose-tinted glasses.
Not only does it fault Netanyahu for “destroying” a “healthy” system of governance; it has stooped to asserting that he is prolonging the war for personal gain and is indifferent to the fate of the hostages. It’s a blood libel in protesters’ clothing.
Moses had to deal with this kind of rebellion. And though Netanyahu’s no prophet, he has borne the brunt of internal schisms more than any contemporary leader, with supporters treating him as a savior and rivals as a dictator.
The Israelites who left Egypt weren’t immediately ready to become a nation. It took decades of wandering in the literal and figurative desert.
This is worth keeping in mind with regard to the modern State of Israel. While a thriving symbol of technological innovation, military might and societal resilience, it’s the homeland of the Jews.
In other words, the very DNA responsible for the country’s miracles is what prevents it from escaping the burdensome rifts that have characterized our people from time immemorial. We can opt to see this as good news or bad. This year at the Seder, let’s aim for the former.
