From Grief to Actifest Hope: The Israeli Pro-Democracy Movement
By Cherie Brown
Cherie Brown is President of the Board of The Shalom Center, and is the founder and executive director of the National Coalition Building Institute. For over 50 years, she has led hundreds of workshops all over the world on Jewish Liberation, antisemitism, internalized antisemitism and the intersection of antisemitism and racism.
There is an ancient rabbinic tradition that Mashiach — Messiah — was born on the afternoon of Tisha B’Av, but hidden away till the world was ready for their guidance to create peace and justice everywhere. In other words, out of the worst disaster could come the greatest transformation.
Perhaps the rabbis saw themselves as “Messiah” and the creation of a new version of Judaism — rabbinic Judaism — as both possible and necessary with the destruction of the Temple. By analogy today, we might see the disruption of democracy by the present government of Israel, the worsening of settler pogroms against the Palestinian people, along with devastation of Temple Earth by Carbon Corporations, as the harbinger of a new Prophetic Judaism to help make real a world of love and justice.
To reaffirm the tradition that transformation may begin as Tisha B’Av dwindles, we are sending you Cherie Brown’s essay on the afternoon of the day of Grief. We view her essay as a vital contribution to a growing chorus of deep critiques of the anti-democratic policies of the present government of Israel, and strong support for the pro-democracy movement in Israel. We believe her emphasis on the possible shared pro-democracy activism of Jews in Israel and in the Diaspora is especially important. We are proud to include it in our Prophetic Voices as we prepare to leave Tisha B’Av and enter the Seven Shabbats of Consolation capped by Rosh Hashanah.
— AW, editor
Cherie Brown writes:
The piece below was written last week, days before the vote in the Israeli knesset to totally weaken the Israeli Supreme Court. The staff of the Shalom Center and I believe these words are more important now than ever. The pro-democracy demonstrations are continuing in both Israel and the Diaspora and with even more determination to win the battle for the soul of Israel.
Demonstrators march from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem to protest the Israeli government’s judicial overhaul. Photo: Flickr user Mussi Katz.
I just listened to a very powerful Webinar, sponsored by J Street with a speaker from Unxeptable — a new U. S. organization of Israeli Expats demonstrating in support of the Israeli pro-democracy movement — and a speaker from Israel, Mika Almog, an Israeli journalist and major leader in the growing Israeli pro-democracy movement. Their presentations moved me deeply and inspired me to want to write a few key things about this moment.
1) The current Israeli pro-democracy movement throws on its head several of the old stale debates concerning Israel:
a) Debate 1: Diaspora Jews should shut up and listen to Israelis — you don’t live in Israel, pay taxes, fight in the army. You have no right to speak about what Israelis should or shouldn’t do. We Israelis are tired of hearing Diaspora Jews always sounding like they know better than we do what’s best for Israel.
b) Debate 2: A call to end the occupation needs to be the primary focus for all organizing that has anything to do with Israel. Any efforts that focus on Israeli society, including the call to cease the Judicial coup, must keep the issue of the occupation at the center or they are wrong, immoral, and doomed to fail.
2) In listening to Mika, I came to a whole new understanding of the power of this pro-democracy movement for ALL of world Jewry. Both the pro-democracy movement in Israel and Unxeptable are calling this movement an International movement for ALL of World Jewry. This has the potential of breaking down all the historic divides between Israeli Jews and Diaspora Jews and between leftist Jews and more liberal democratic Jews.
The brilliance of the pro-democracy movement, as it has currently been organized, is that it touches so many Israeli Jews and so many Jews worldwide. Fighting fascism, authoritarianism, and the take over of democratic checks and balances is something many, many Jews can connect to. You can be far to the left; you can be more of a centrist. The call to fight the authoritative take over by the right wing Netanyahu coalition speaks to the hearts of so many Jews. This is HUGE.
The Israelis leading this movement both in Israel and in the Diaspora fully see this as a movement for world Jewry and for the heart and soul of all of the Jewish people. This is central to what is happening now.
3) We have not had this kind of opportunity for Jewish unity that I can remember in my lifetime. There is important work happening in the movement to create a big enough tent so the anti occupation folks can demonstrate side by side with the anti Supreme Court Coup activists. In the early weeks of the movement, anti occupation, pro Palestinian flags were banned from some demonstrations out of a fear that these symbols could divide the movement. But with more and more confidence in the growing strength of the movement — that is changing. There is a growing space for anti-occupation signs side by side with pro-democracy signs.
4) With the current success of the pro-democracy movement to organize so many Israeli Jews and Diaspora Jews to take to the streets, one of course has to ask the question — why has this not happened sooner? And more importantly — why couldn’t we do this about the occupation, or the increased violence of the settler movement, or the non stop wars and going to the brink almost wars?
5) On the one hand, it’s ok to let our hearts break that the occupation, the violence done to the Palestinian people daily, has never yet been enough to bring these numbers of Jews to the streets.
6) But I think we have the opportunity in this new moment to rise up and see things in a fresh and hopeful way. I believe deeply in Hillel’s call to Jews — If I’m not for myself who will be for me AND that it comes before If I’m only for myself what am I. We can’t build a powerful successful movement of Jews worldwide on behalf of Palestinian Liberation (which we do need to do) if we haven’t first built a powerful and unified movement of Jews. I believe this is one of the strongest lessons of this moment.
7) Two things Mika said particularly struck me:
a) In most of the existence of Israel, to support Israel meant supporting the Israeli government. The current pro-democracy movement in Israel is making it possible to make a huge break and separate out supporting the Israel people vs supporting the government. This too is significant. There have always been some Jews calling for the world to separate the Israeli people from the policies of the Israeli government. But never before with this force and in these numbers.
b) And the other thing Mika said which I loved is that Israelis are not polite. They are not afraid to go into the streets; to do mass civil disobedience. She said the type of in-the-streets organizing required now to topple the judicial coup matches well with what she sees as the Israeli personality.
And because Israel is such a small country, hundreds of thousands in the streets, refusing to show up for military duty, shutting down malls and universities — I heard this morning that doctors are now hoping to call for a strike this week of all non-emergency workers — all of this could make a big difference because of the size of Israel.
8) I love thinking that instead of Israel being the visible, out-front, world symbol of oppressor behaviors (and then attacked, blamed, vilified, and isolated from the rest of the world) the Israeli people are being looked to now as a model for the world of what a determined pro-liberation people can build when they set their minds and hearts to it.
There is a long road ahead. The Supreme Court Coup may very well continue to happen. There will be many attempts to split apart the unity being built. But the gains being made, the relationships forged, the glimpse of a strong grass roots people movement will be in our consciousness forever and propel us forward..
This is a powerful new moment for Jews everywhere. Let’s find each other and put all we have both individually and collectively behind Jews all over the world as we support the growing pro-democracy movement.
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