Hello, and welcome to On the Nose, the Jewish Currents podcast. Live for the first time.

We should say the Shehecheyanu.

Yeah, maybe it’s a bad idea to do this live. One thing that you guys are about to see is how good our editor, Jesse Brenneman, really, really is, but we'll try to keep it tight. I'm. For those that don't know me, I'm Arielle Angel. I'm the editor in chief of Jewish Currents and the host of On the Nose, and I have three guests today. Daniel May, publisher of Jewish Currents, Simone Zimmerman, advisory council member at JSM, and Peter Beinart, editor at large of Jewish Currents. Okay, so this is a mailbag episode. I think you all know this by now. We're just going to be answering your questions. Usually, these questions kind of run the gamut between really heavy ones and really light ones. And this time, it was all like: Can you solve the biggest problems in Judaism in five minutes or less? Whereas in the past, it was like: Do you guys like the show Girls? So, we're going to do our best here.

I'm going to start with a question from C: I'm a longtime listener and an anti-Zionist Jew for as long as I've known what Zionism is. I loved Arielle Angel's piece, “We need new Jewish Institutions”—thanks—but I also found it oddly lacking.

No, thanks.

Like it was afraid to look the beast in the face. I think we all know something needs to change. Some want political Zionism gone but the trappings of Jewish culture to stay the same. Some believe the Star of David and the usage of the word Israel in our sacred texts and prayers are forever corrupted. I've even met some people, Jewish and not, who suggest it is time for the next Abrahamic split. That even without Zionism, Judaism hinges on a form of ethnocentrism, communal closeness, and eternal victimhood that no longer works today. It may be a fringe belief, but it's becoming more common, and I don't think it's right to dismiss it as antisemitic or dumb. You guys are great at having difficult convos. Look this one in the face and have it now.

Okay. How much of Jewish culture is truly salvageable? Anyone? Okay, I'll start. I'll start. I think there's obviously been a lot of splits in Judaism at different moments. You have Karaites, and Samaritans, and Sabbateans, or whatever, but I don't think that any of them have been as successful as Judaism is when it is remade. Like Judaism itself, even as it transforms, is more durable than anything that kind of splits off. So just on that level, I think if we are trying to transform Judaism, splitting off seems to me to be something that makes that project smaller, as opposed to keeping it at the size we want it to be, to be transformative. That said, I really feel the agita of the question. I mean, I was sitting at Seder this year—and Simone knows this because we did Seder together this year—and just feeling like, I don't know if I can do this right now. Like, I don't know if I can do it anymore. That was the feeling that I had, and I think something that I'm feeling is that the amount of work that it will take to go deep into the tradition and come out with almost the same traditions and the same symbols and have the meaning of those symbols be transformed is the work. And it's really, really hard, and we actually have not done it yet. And so, we're in this like interim period where it's going to feel really shitty.

I guess I'm going to jump in because I also wanted to talk about our Seder. Another one of the members of our Seder was Eli Valley, the cartoonist and Jewish Currents contributor, and Eli, for those who don't know or haven't had the privilege of seeing his world-famous PowerPoint presentations, is a collector of old haggadot. And he brought a whole stack of them to the Seder, and one of them was written in the 1500s, and part of the thing he has discovered, flipping through these haggadot, is that in the section about the four children, for hundreds of years, haggadot depicted the wicked child as a soldier because militarism, and state power, and armies were considered anathema to Judaism. And it was actually after the founding of Israel that it flipped, and then, there were all these haggadot being printed where the wise child, all of a sudden, was an IDF soldier. And it's pretty devastating and, frankly, extremely illuminating. And for me, actually, that reminder of the hundreds and thousands of years of like deep tradition that we have that predates this moment that we're in gave me something very meaningful to hold onto as we're talking about this question, specifically of Jewish religion and what there is there for us.

I also think, just to build on the other part Arielle said, we had this Seder of a bunch of people, some of whom grew up with very rich Jewish upbringings, some of whom really didn't, and one of the things that we learned was that almost none of us knew the same melodies for most of the liturgy. And that's because we're just in a moment where even those of us who do have this are still coming into it from different places. Arielle and I have been talking about: What would be the work that we would have to do to have the Seder that we really want together? It would require both of us to do deeper study of this whole ritual technology. But again, it's like we have a haggadah. We have so much writing about these things that there is so much—it's there to build on if we choose to actually do the work of building it. But I think that so many of the answers to the most painful questions and existential questions that people are asking right now about Jewish ritual practice—the answer is: We are in a moment where you're not gonna be able to get it from institutions. And so, if you want it, you're gonna have to find your people, and you're gonna have to create it together. And that's the part that—I think a lot of the critiques of your piece, I think that a lot of what people are reacting to is their anger or frustration that it just doesn't exist already, and that it can't be

And that it can’t be given to you. It can't be handed to anyone.

Right. And that if you are an anti-Zionist Jew and you want to be engaged in Jewish religious ritual; it's just not going to be handed to you. It's going to be something that you're going to have to be actively creating with other people.

I mean, I guess I can't possibly do—none of us can do justice to this question. But the challenge, it seems to me, of this moment is much more to the kind of Jewishness—fairly secular Jewishness—that has emerged in the United States (and obviously, in Israel) in the last 75 and 50 years than it is to Judaism itself. I mean, I think about when I think about the pillars of Judaism—the idea that the oral law was given at Sinai, kashrut, shabbat, monotheism, the belief that the Messiah will come—there may be all kinds of problems with all that stuff, but I don't necessarily think that the problems they have a lot to do with Israel's apartheid and genocide. Honestly, I study very, very badly. I study Talmud every day, and I come across all kinds of stuff that's hard to defend, but I don't really, really feel like it has a whole lot to do with what Israel is doing. And I think it's the Jews, frankly, who are most deeply immersed in this—in Borough Park or Bnei Brak or whatever—who I think are least threatened in terms of their identities by what Israel's doing. It's not to say that plenty of them haven't adopted the politics of this moment, but I think that that's pretty thin, in terms of what their basic Jewish identity is.

So, in a weird way, I feel like from a Jewish religious perspective, the move that the Reform movement made—to reject the authority of the oral law—was a much, much more profound challenge and break to Judaism than the political debates we're seeing now, from a Jewish religious perspective. So, I guess I think that there's oceans and oceans that one can swim in, in terms of engagement with Jewish religious texts and practice, and the more one swims, the more one actually can find that actually, there's all kinds of stuff that takes you far afield from this stuff, and it has roots and depth, which is much, much deeper than these kind of things, even if they are sometimes used. So, I guess that's my, on one foot, thought about it.

I was talking to a friend a few weeks ago, who said that we need to recognize that we were all raised in the Judaism that grew and was created and flourished between the genocides—after the Holocaust and to the genocide in Gaza. I think for many American Jews—certainly, this was the story for me—the central lesson of being a Jew after the first of those was having a particular commitment to the universal. A deep ethical universalism that was practiced through some ritual but also through a certain orientation toward liberal American politics and a story of, frankly, American exceptionalist progress and advancement. I think in some ways, the crisis of the moment for American Jews who were raised broadly in that milieu—in some ways, you could frame it around Zionism and what Zionism has done to Judaism, but I think the crisis is much more around liberal Judaism. Because for Zionists, the calamity of Gaza,—even for those who were opposed to it—it's a political problem, but it doesn't present a fundamental problem to identity. It's not like an existential question that shows up in a question like this—of how to be part of this tradition.

For those who are raised within the context of liberal American Judaism—wherein to be Jewish is to have this, again, particular commitment to ethical universalism, to human rights, to human dignity—the genocide in Gaza is existential because it seems to reflect a betrayal, and a hypocrisy, and a lie at the center of our tradition. If what it means to be Jewish is to have these kinds of commitments, and yet this is what Jews are doing in the world, then how can I be part of this? I think in some ways, that reflects some real problems in that story of American liberal Judaism—that, again, I was raised in, was hugely important to my own political formation—in which the central text is B'tselem Elohim: The core idea is all human beings are created equal. That's a pretty superficial understanding of Judaism. It lines up quite neatly with sentences in the Declaration of Independence, so it's very helpful for a story of American Judaism, but the center of Judaism is not B'tselem Elohim. The center of Judaism is a covenant.

What do you mean by covenant?

Well, what I mean by covenant in the theological sense is a covenant between God and a certain people.

Remember, the first covenant is with Noah before the foundation of the Jewish people.

Sure, of course. And that is a universal covenant, but that's not the covenant that gives rise to the idea of Judaism. The covenant that gives rise to the idea of Judaism is at Sinai. And it's a particular covenant where a law is given to a people, and there are certain obligations that adhere to that. Now, the revolution in rabbinic thinking and rabbinic practice, which is the birth of Judaism, is that the covenant, that idea of community, that idea of belonging, is not defined by geography. It's not defined by hierarchy. It's not defined by language. It's not defined by land. It is defined by shared practices—shared practices that extend wherever people are. I mean, this is, in some ways, what's so miraculous about the Seder. You have a book; anybody can do it anywhere. For those of us who are trying to think about what does politics mean in an era of rampant nationalism, and global capital, and the crisis that we just see all around us, the question of how to create political community that can transcend borders, that can create belonging and obligation without a monopoly on violence—there's a huge amount of power in that for those of us who are invested in left politics. I think that one of the ways to begin to think about what is the Judaism that is worth fighting for is a Judaism that begins from wrestling and engaging the central questions of the tradition. Now, again, we're gonna have different answers to that, but I think there's a lot of radical political possibilities, implications, resource within the tradition.

We're going to have to move on from this question, but the one thing that occurs to me as you guys are talking is that one of the main things that we will have to do with this question is just de-exceptionalize the Jewish piece of it. We're not the first group of people to do bad things. Christianity colonized the entire world, and nobody's saying like: Should we just get rid of it? I mean, maybe some people are actually saying: Should we just get rid of that? But it persists, you know. Okay, I'm going to move to the next question. Another really light question:

I'm interested to hear your opinions on how American Jews (and separately, their institutions) will react to the belated realization that the turn of the American public and, eventually, its government against Israel is permanent and strong. My read of the last three years is that there's a recognition that Israel has become deeply unpopular, but the institutions, at least—and not a small number of rank-and-file American Jews—still cling to decades-old methods of cajoling and shaming and assume that it'll eventually snap enough people back in line. But what will be the impact when disgust for Israel is a permanent feature in the US? Do you anticipate different responses from the rank and file and from the institutions? Can the synagogues in particular continue to exist if their membership drops out, if for no other reason than embarrassment and being associated with such a widely reviled project?

Well, my first thought is not to underestimate the power of grievance. I mean, I'm not sure that I buy the fundamental premise that the shift that we've experienced is permanent and long-lasting.

Can we just actually set the stage? I mean, J Street said that they no longer support paying for Iron Dome. That's kind of a big deal. J Street is a liberal Zionist organization, super committed to peoplehood and the people of Israel. And so, the idea that they're now saying: We're not going to pay for defensive, quote, unquote, “defensive weapons”—for J Street is a big deal. And now, the fight among liberals is whether you think that we should be not selling any weapons, defensive or offensive, or whether you think we can sell them if they're paying for it, but not. And that's a way different place than we've been in at any other point. And we suddenly have progressive potential presidential candidates, who say it's a genocide, who don't favor any money to Israel, any money for weapons, like Ro Khanna, like AOC.

Ro Khanna said that they can buy them.

Yeah. That they can buy them, but he doesn’t—.

Or Iron Dome. He said they can buy Iron Dome.

Right. And on the right, you have a whole new flank of kind of anti-interventionist candidates. I mean, you have James Fishback coming up, who's enormously popular in Florida, and JD Vance when he's not the vice president. So, I don't know. I mean, it's enough to just say there is a turn, and there certainly is a turn among the electorate. We know that.

Well, I'm curious if you guys have an analysis of: Why now for J Street? Because I do think that's part of answering the question.

I mean, last poll I saw, 75% of registered Democrats support ending all aid to Israel. So, if you want to be the organization that is claiming to represent the Democratic Party vis-à-vis Israel, then that's the policy that you have to embrace to just follow where folks are at. Simone and I were both very involved in J Street. Given what we know of J Street over the last 15 years, it's surprising, but I think given what we know about the current political moment, it's not very surprising.

Okay, so then I think that this guy's premise stands.

Well, certainly he's describing a particular moment. I do think that there is a massive shift happening that changes the terrain for American Jewish institutions. I also think there's a lot of mileage to be had—as I said, don't underestimate the power of grievance. Being in the position of being the aggrieved that is still holding a position that is one that is under attack for all kinds of quote “unjust” or “unreasonable” reasons. I think a lot of institutions—I mean, you can see in the same period that we're talking about over the last two years. The amount that federations have raised, the amount that the ADL has raised—all these institutions have raised enormous sums in the context of this shift. Well, that's not terribly surprising because being in that defensive posture is one that does mobilize a fair amount of support.

But it also might just be saying something about the people who are the most aggrieved are also the people with the most resources. Like, it's just saying something about the class position of the people who are holding onto that situation. Simone, you wanted to jump in?

Yeah. It seems to me that part of this split that we're talking about is that part of the American Jewish community is going to cleave even more strongly to a Zionist politics. We already see this; this already is what the politics of New York City are, for example. Zionist politics in New York is deeply in bed with Wall Street, and cops, and real estate, and those interests mix very easily with each other. And so, it's just all the worst people invested in a certain vision of the city are working together, and I do think that the pro-Israel politics are a very important part of that. It seems pretty likely that we'll see a part of the community cleaving much more deeply into a grievance politics that is probably like a white grievance politics, that is going to use all of the capital that they have at their disposal to stay invested in the project of US imperialism and wall off their communities and all that.

And then, there's the other half of us. And this might be a little bit of a digression, but Molly Crabapple, who many of you know, has an amazing book that just came out about the Bund. A very funny conversation that she and I have once a week is, she'll reach out to me to be like: This Zionist said this crazy thing to me. Can you explain this? And the recent one that she sent to me was somebody accusing her of wanting to be liked by the goyim. And she was like: I don't really understand. What is this idea, that it would be an insult for non-Jews to like you, to want to read your book, to care about your culture, to want to be in political struggle with you? I don't get it. And to me, that goes back to the J Street answer, that it makes sense to me that part of the shift would be catalyzed by being like: We're seeing the horrors. But I actually think we can be honest that they're probably not motivated, first and foremost, by the horrors themselves because they've been going on for too long for that to be the reason. But I think they see the way that the Israel politics are threatening to tank the Democratic Party and the entire political project that they care about in this country, and they realize there are other things that they care about more than defending this emotional attachment to this country overseas.

Yeah. I mean, I think that I agree with Daniel about the kind of dynamic in which, if your view is that it's always kind of 1938, and you define anti-Zionism, antisemitism, and anti-Zionism is really rising, then it does feed into your view of the world, and I think there will be these Jewish institutions that see themselves as the institutions that are giving people protection from this increasingly powerful siege. I think some Jewish institutions are better situated to be those kinds of institutions than others. So, I think that the institutions that will remain stronger will be the ones that are organized well enough, I think, to function as places where you can really build a high wall. So, I've always thought that people who remained very, very strongly pro-Israel—if they don't actually go to Israel—might gravitate into the Orthodox community, because I think the Orthodox community offers you a set of institutions in a world where you really have a much stronger buffer against that kind of thing. I mean, you can see it in all kinds of ways. You can see it in the way universities in the South are defining themselves as places where, basically: We won't have any woke pro-Palestinian stuff there. And the way in which you see more of a certain kind of Jewish students going to those universities, because the Ivy League schools—or northeastern schools in general, or California schools—can't really provide the kind of protection that some of the other schools can. So, I think those would be the institutions that remain stronger. But I think you could argue they've become more ghettoized and less relevant to the larger public.

Look, I actually think that we are close to—not the institutions, the support for Zionism collapsing within institutions—but among people. I know it may not feel that way with your parents right now, but I don't think they've been pushed hard enough. And I think that when they start to feel uncomfortable, and they have to make a choice in their day-to-day, a lot more people are going to move. Because American Jews love to be Americans, and they like to be Americans par excellence. And when the American system turns against this idea, it will be a lot harder for them. I don't think that the Zionism—I think it's very deep-seated, and I actually have a belief that the Americanness is deeper. But we do see this collapse of identification with Zionism. Like, the polling itself supports that people are more ambivalent about the word Zionist than they were before. Only 37% identify as Zionist, according to the last Jewish Federation poll, and a lot more people, like 88%, are saying, “We believe in Israel as a Jewish and democratic state,” which literally could mean anything, considering it cannot be both of those things at the same time. So, you can't know what they mean when they answer that.

And also, the Federations had to go out of their way to write all these extra explainers to be like: No, no, no, actually. Even though only 31% of our survey respondents said they were Zionists, here's all these other numbers. They're trying so hard to cook the numbers, and they can't do it.

One of the points that our old colleague Josh Leifer often would make—that I've heard him make several times—is that ordinary American Jews are less clued in to American Jewish institutional discourse, and what are the supposed lines, and oftentimes, people like us are following these institutions for a living. I told you the story, I think—Arielle, just to go to your point about how deeply impacted people are by the currents of Americanism, even if they happen to be Jewish—I was invited to speak at this university, and they put me on a panel with two students. They were both really interesting students. One was involved in the pro-Palestine solidarity movement. The other was the head of the Young Republicans group. And the head of the Young Republicans club was a Jewish kid. And so, I figured that I would get very, very different questions. No. The Jewish, Trumpy head of the Young Republicans club is anti-Israel because he listens to Tucker Carlson. And he said: Yeah, I used to listen to Ben Shapiro; kind of gotten more into Tucker Carlson. I was like: Yeah, that's what most young Trumpy people are doing. And he was saying: Why are we giving all this money to a foreign country? It was just a very American discourse, and the fact that he was Jewish wasn't that big a part of it. And I think that's kind of what you're getting at.

Okay, thank you guys for giving us a little lighter questions in the box. So I'm going to go to one of those just for fun. This one is actually just for me. I'll take this as a little interlude because you guys haven't watched The Pitt: Which character on The Pitt is definitively a JC subscriber? You guys haven't watched it. I'll tell you guys. Not Dr. Robby; he's definitely a Zionist. He's like a liberal Zionist. He has pretty mavericky, kind of realist views sometimes, so you think you can get through to him. But no, he is a Soviet Jew, after all, of a certain age. My guess is Javadi because she's an overachiever, and she's like a Gen Z political influencer. I just feel like she normally wouldn't subscribe to Jewish Currents, but because she's like trying to do everything like right and wants to be in, I think it would be Javadi. And I think al-Hashimi reads Jewish Currents—and I know that the real al-Hashimi reads Jewish Currents.

Okay, back to the sad questions. You guys thought you were coming out for a fun night, but we're talking about Jewish stuff: After the government of Israel falls and Jewish supremacy no longer reigns—strong start—Palestinians will establish an accountability process. Here in the US, there are multiple generations of rabbinic leadership, heads of Jewish community organizations, and lay schnooks who must be held to account. They have extended the duration and severity of the genocide of the past 26 months and previous 80 plus years, leading to the killing and disabling of hundreds of thousands more Palestinians, Lebanese, and Iranians. They have impacted US elections, contributed to the climate of oppression on campus and in our cities, indoctrinated children, etc. When Israeli Jewish supremacy collapses, what consequences do you imagine will be appropriate and sufficient for US rabbis, leaders of Jewish community organizations, and lay accomplices? What might transformative justice and repair look like for these different groups?

So, just to say, this question starts with the recognition that Palestinians will establish an accountability process. So obviously, we are not Palestinians, but as a hypothetical here—and I think this question is really asking about the American Jewish community, not the people making the IDF plans, but the people supporting it, the people sending money, going on missions, doing the sermons. What happens to Ammiel Hirsch on the next day?

If I try to think of other examples in American history, where you have political forces that were aligned with something that became clearly seen as morally abhorrent, I don't really see much precedent for those people being held to account in some meaningful way. They evolved politically to some degree. People who supported segregation in the South—I mean, maybe they said we don't support segregation anymore, but a lot of them still supported something that wasn't too far away from that. So, I guess that's my pessimistic kind of thinking. I can't really think of a lot of examples of what this person was talking about in the United States. I mean, how often is it in American media that people who supported disastrous policies in the past even get asked hard questions about it when they propose their new disaster policies?

Well, I mean, the Iraq War.

Yeah, exactly.

All of the infrastructure is still in place. All the same people are commenting on it.

Absolutely. Right. So, I think that what we have now is that people exist in communities, in bubbles, where they never have to answer hard questions. I would want people to actually have to answer those hard questions. That in itself would be—if we even get that, where people are actually forced to answer hard questions and be in conversation with people who ask them the hard questions—that itself would be light years ahead of where we are now.

Look, this is what we want to happen, so I'm just gonna say what I want to happen, which is I don't think any of those people should be in leadership anymore. There was this article in the New Yorker about this fight that is happening mostly inside a synagogue in Montclair, where the synagogue has a “We Stand with Israel” sign outside, and a couple of the congregants went outside to protest it, and they now have a WhatsApp group for the congregants for Palestine or whatever. Reading that article made me so insanely depressed because it's basically a story about a group of people trying to wage a campaign inside of an institution, and basically, the best thing they get at the end is that the synagogue takes down this “We Stand with Israel” sign, replaces it with an Israeli flag, and reads a prayer for peace, written by Israeli and Palestinian bereaved mothers together, outside of the synagogue. And the other thing is, they got one of their rabbis to remove themselves from the national anti-Mamdani letter.

The other rabbis signed it.

Right. While the head rabbi was still on the letter. And then that also talked about this event that you did, Peter, at B'nai Jeshurun, where you're on stage with Rabbi Cosgrove, and you guys are asked to talk about your nightmare scenarios for the Jewish community, and Rabbi Cosgrove has the just astounding chutzpah, months after he initiated a national smear campaign against our now mayor, to sit on the stage and talk about how he's up late at night because Jews can't talk to each other. I mean, I was sitting there in the audience listening to this man, and I was like: If anyone had asked me, this person does not deserve a position of leadership anymore. This person should not be on a stage. And I think that what the genocide (and what has happened inside communal institutions) the last two years has revealed is that a lot of the people who are currently in leadership at these institutions—by our definition, these people are not fit for leadership. They have showed themselves to have bad judgment, absolute cowardice, among many other things.

I think that people who are asking themselves questions about what accountability or what a future inside an institution looks like—I would want to send anybody thinking about how to organize their synagogue that New Yorker article, to say: If this is the best you can do, you need to leave this institution immediately, because that is not a win. And again, this goes back to the question that we started with, which is like: If you want to be part of an institution that actually reflects your values, you either need to be willing to organize so hard, and be so disruptive and annoying, and get enough people in the institution willing to actually exact cost on the institution that they would do something meaningfully different. There are things you could do. Synagogues could be organizing reparations for Palestinian communities. Synagogues could be actively organizing lobby delegations to Washington. They could be promising to back candidates, at every single level of office, that support Palestinian liberation. They could be doing public apologies. They could be doing education inside their communities. There is so much that could be done. If the best you can do is the prayer for peace, you should leave, and you should build an institution elsewhere. Because I was just so depressed reading that that was what they could get.

I mean, the premise of the question is that Zionism has ended as we know it, and we're in a different reality. In some ways, I want to try to answer the question, but I think that I resist the premise, in the same way that I resist a little bit of the premise of the first question, in the sense that I think that we're in a fight over this future, and we need to understand this fight. I do not think that the change in American politics is necessarily or inevitably permanent. I think it needs to be won, and I certainly think that in some ways, whether it's more likely or not, my nightmare scenario of what accountability looks like is Elliot Cosgrove's grandson, from the bema of the synagogue that he's now a rabbi at, giving land acknowledgments for the Palestinian villages that have been destroyed. Because accountability is easy and cheap when it's over, when that civilization has been destroyed. Now, what I think accountability could potentially look like, in the scenario in which apartheid has ended and Zionism, as we know it, is over—I think I agree with Peter. There's certainly no precedent in American politics. We take the folks who led the revolt against this country to protect chattel slavery and give them statues, and then 150 years later, consider it a victory for justice when we take those statues down.

And then, they get put back up.

The one example that comes to mind, and it also has huge limitations, but it is the example of the Catholic Church after the Holocaust, when the church went through a not insignificant process of taking account for its responsibility and contributions to anti-Judaism and antisemitism for centuries in Europe, and its tacit support—certainly not opposition—to Hitler, and interrogated the way in which the consequence of deep theological commitments around Christian supersessionism and the relationship of Christianity to Jews over millennia. Now, again, various kinds of limitations, but I think that it's something on the order of that kind of magnitude, in the sense of interrogation of deep assumptions about what we take to be the tradition that we have participated in that has allowed this, and unraveling that, taking account for it, presenting a future that would address it. I think that's the only example that comes to mind that would at least give a sense of possible containers for the kind of process that is hopefully pointed to in the question.

Okay, I have another question from someone in this room: I was born in Israel and grew up loving it culturally. As a current anti-Zionist, I still feel very connected to my roots as a kibbutznik and wish I could take my fiancé to see where I grew up. Is there room for this in the anti-Zionist and Palestinian liberation movement? Does the timing of a visit matter?

That's a very difficult question. I will also just say or acknowledge that what I consider to be one of the most difficult questions to have on the anti-Zionist left in general is the question of just what to do with Israelis, in a very broad sense. They're there; they exist. We have to find some way of figuring out how to talk about them and what the reality of that is, because I think sometimes, it's almost easier not to talk about it because the messiness of dealing with real people in their lives gets in the way of the purity and the militancy. So I really appreciate the question and the opportunity to do that.

Yeah, I mean, you can travel to Palestine/Israel. The BDS movement doesn't say, like: Don't go there, period. There's guidelines for how to do so ethically. I'll quote my friend Emily Dische-Becker, who always says: We don't believe in the sin of birth. For me, that feels like very much a true thing of what my politics are and the politics of this project are. I do think it is important—I would not go to visit there right now without some real serious considerations of having a not just political agenda while being there, but really thinking very consciously about how to move through that space as a person who is in solidarity with the Palestinian freedom movement, and not just going there to be a tourist and to have a vacation. But I don't think not going to see your family—I don't think that's actually a political imperative that really helps anybody.

Yeah, I mean, I have made a decision that I'm not traveling to Israel anymore, and I do have family there and friends. I think part of what I am saying, also, is that that's easy for me to do. It doesn't require that much of me to make that decision, and it feels really simple. I do think that it's important for people for whom it is easy to make that decision to make it. That said, I feel like there are some good examples of what it means to actually reckon with the cultural legacy and also the cultural appropriation, even of the kibbutzim. We know that kibbutzim were built as outposts, that they were structurally there for a reason, to act as buffers. They were part and parcel of the entire settlement, and their structural socialism undermined labor that included Palestinians. So, we have these histories. We can't keep them out of frame. I feel like Hadar Ahuvia is someone whom I look to, as someone who does really, really important work. She grew up with Israeli folk dance, and she really talks about how that's her cultural lineage, that's her dance lineage as an artist, but she is able to dig into that, to make work that actually keeps in the frame the appropriation, the violence of that appropriation, and the violence of the founding of the state and the culture. I think that's the only way to do this, is to keep that always in frame and to constantly be interrogating it. I don't think that we can have an unambivalent relationship to that at this point.

And also, just to say that she made a movie about it.

Oh, yeah. Everything You Have is Yours.

Why do you say that you think it's important for people for whom the choice is easy to not go?

Because I think refusal is one of the few things that we have. I do think that there's a real power to diaspora Jews at this point, basically saying: We’re not doing business as usual. For me, that's part of that.

I just think from my own experience, I would not be on this stage in this conversation were it not for having lived in Jerusalem for a summer in 2009. That experience was so formative in terms of my own politicization, and I guess I do feel like there is a tremendous amount of political learning to be had from experiencing the reality of military rule.

I just disagree so completely with that. I feel like when the media ecosystem was such that you literally could not see what was going on without being there, that was one thing. But I think younger people just don't need that. Plus, I'll just say, Encounter and all of those programs to take people there—you have all of these rabbis traveling, going to Area C, going to Susiya, seeing all the horrors, and coming back and doing jack shit.

Sure. But the problem is that they go back to the communities that they're part of, that have all sorts of incentives, culture, context, that is unchanged. I guess I think there is a big difference, experientially, between seeing something on television or on social media and experiencing it in your body. And I think that it matters politically.

Okay, but so also, go to Palestine.

Well, sure, that's what I’m saying.

That’s part of what Simone is saying, right, is that there are ways of doing exactly that, of having the kinds of experiences Daniel's talking about having, which I think can be really impactful. And even some of those rabbis, I would say the story is not done yet. I mean, in a sense that part of what we were talking about earlier is, as the political power shifts change, it may be that there are things that people were too afraid to do—and shouldn't have been too afraid to do, but were—that come to the fore because they do have that experience. Even though it's too late, it's better late than never. I mean, obviously, someone has the right to go or not go wherever they want, but it seems to me if someone is doing it—in a way that is genuinely listening to Palestinians first—I think that there's a potential to come back in a much richer sense of connection and appreciation for how much this question matters to you, and in a way that I think can make one have a deeper understanding, a more sophisticated understanding, and a greater commitment.

I sometimes wonder, Arielle, if you underestimate the power of your own Zionist upbringing, or you universalize it.

What do you mean?

I just think for you, it's so obvious: Why would you need to go? Isn't it clear? The existential, monumental injustice. And I think, obviously, I agree with you, but I think that there is a way that we grew up very differently. I wasn't raised in a particular Zionist household. It wasn't very central to me, and it certainly would not have become central to me without those experiences, where I just think for you it was so, so central from the start, that those experiences are sort of extracurricular.

I mean, I was radicalized here, and I think that if we can't radicalize people here, if we think that people have to go there, then our organizing model is flawed because that's expensive. That's Birthright.

Sure. I'm not saying that they have to go there. The question was whether they should not, and I think that's the thing that I disagree with you on.

And some people go there and do good things. They go, and they spend time, a lot of time, in the West Bank, doing work that is actually valuable.

I mean, look, I have questions about what it means to bring a lot of Americans to do protective presence in the West Bank.

I don't think there's anything wrong with asking the questions. My concern would be you answering the question.

Yeah, you should. I'm not answering for anyone else.

And have the conversation with the people, in particular, who are in the West Bank.

Of course. I'm not saying we shouldn't have the conversation, but I am going to give my opinion on it.

No, no. Sure.

I'm kind of on Arielle's team about this.

I mean, it doesn't surprise me, given for similar reasons. You were also raised in this extremely hyper-Zionist context.

Well, and because of that context that I come from, I still see a way that a kind default going to visit Israel is just part of the thing that a lot of people think is okay to do right now. And then, they're like: Oh, and by the way, we spent one day visiting a Palestinian village in the West Bank. And I'm like: That was to make you feel good about yourself for the rest of the time that you spent in this place. That's not actually about a real commitment to solidarity. I think I disagree with you, Arielle—that I am in favor of people continuing to go do protective presence. I would love to see synagogues doing not a day—delegations to actually do extended protective presence on the ground. That's a great way to use your privilege and your access.

No, just to be clear, I'm not against it. It's just that there is something about the fact that we're bringing in Americans to do that work.

There are a few Israelis here and there.

No, there are. There are. There are. I'm not saying that there aren't, but there are also a lot of Americans who live in Israel who are doing that work too. I just feel like there is something wrong when the balance of that is off, you know?

Yeah, but I think there's two separate things we're talking about here. One is the mission to Israel/Palestine as a political tool, and I agree with you, Arielle, that I think that we're in a totally different political moment, where people are so radicalized against Israel that you really just don't actually need to go on that trip. Not to say that it wouldn't be transformative, but sure, go on a Palestinian-led delegation. I'm in support of people doing that. I think then there's the separate question about maintaining a relationship if you have family and community there. I’m, I think, against telling people to cut off the relationships that they have, and I don't think it actually benefits movement work to say the place that you grew up in, and where you could go and do deep learning and reflecting and whatever, and think about it in an ethical way, that you shouldn't feel able to go there. I also just don't really think we can prescribe that for people. I do think that's a very personal, very individual question that you have to consider that I think is worth considering. But I do think that people who don't have a reason to go there right now shouldn't.

Okay, we have, I think, time for one more question. So, I'm gonna take a fun question. Best Jewish food in New York City. Oh, totally. B&H Dairy Kosher is the right answer. The full correct answer. 100%.

I'm a lox girl.

You cannot say that was the right answer.

No, I know. Okay. So, I actually think that the actual right answer is Russ and Daughters. The counter, not the restaurant. Never go to the restaurant. Only the counter. But B&H—well, the thing is that B&H is not the best in terms of the food, but it is the best in terms of how you feel inside when you're there, and I think that counts for a lot. And also, the cabbage soup is actually amazing, and so are the latkes. But everything else is kind of not the best. But it is the best place.

I lived in LA for a bunch of years, and a friend once mentioned to me: In LA, you don't belong to synagogues, but you belong to delis. Like that's how LA Jewish community is organized. And I definitely belong to the deli of Canter’s in Los Angeles.

Oh my God, it's the best.

It's the best. And I do not have a relationship with any New York food establishment like my relationship with Canter's, which is, I think, the greatest Jewish restaurant in America. Open 24 hours, crazy lighting, weird people at all hours. That's my non-answer.

Wait, what is Jewish food anymore?

Well, when I think back to when I was a kid, when I was younger, there were a lot of places in New York that I would have thought about as Jewish food places, and a lot of them aren't really around anymore. You know, like the Carnegie Deli, Pastrami King. I don't know if Pastrami King is still around, but a lot of them were not kosher, but they had kind of old-style, Eastern European food. It seems to me, I mean, what's happened over the course of my life is that there's less and less in that, but much more kosher food. So, the question one has to answer is like: Is that Jewish food? According to this definition. Because some of it serves kind of some of that stuff, but a lot of it doesn't. I went to a kosher place with my kids the other day, which was Mexican, that I thought was really, really good.

You know, the tradition is evolving.

Yeah. But I don't know, was it a Jewish experience? Was it Jewish food? I don't really know.

I now have a sad answer to this happy question.

Oh no.

The last time I went to Second Avenue Deli to get some very Jewish food for my mom, the amount of “We Stand with Israel” signs of different shapes that were plastered around there was pretty devastating. So, I do not recommend anybody go there.

Also. It's gross.

I'm scared to ask. I haven't been to Barney Greengrass in the last two years. But for me, that would be the spot.

Still good. Yeah. Barney Greengrass is good, it's just overpriced. Can we agree that Barney Greengrass is overpriced?

Yeah. I mean, Yonah Schimmel's—is Yonah Schimmel's still there?

He's got the biggest.

Wow. All right, well, interesting crowd.

And Kossar's. And Kossar’s. I mean, the bialys.

Oh, yeah, they're dry as dust.

Do you guys remember when Kossar’s was ugly inside, and you could only buy the bialys, and then you would have to go to the fridge and get the little cream cheese things, and you would have to dip it in? And they didn't toast, and they didn't do anything? And that was Kossar’s. And now it has subway tile, and they do everything for you.

Did anyone here ever go to Sammy's Famous Roumanian?

I was about to say. RIP Sammy’s.

But only to get wasted, not to eat.

Yeah, we also ate it.

It was a special experience.

Yeah. RIP Sammy’s.

Okay, I think we've done it.

Woo.

This has been another episode of On the Nose, live. Thank you guys for sticking with us. I don't know how this went, so you'll have to tell us.

However it went, Jesse will turn it into something.

Yeah, it'll be better edited. Sorry for you guys who had to sit through the whole thing. If you like this episode, share it, rate it, and subscribe to Jewish Currents, JewishCurrents.org. Thank you to our editor, Jesse Brenneman. Thank you to my guests, and see you next.