“Af al pi chen v’lamrot ha-kol, im kol zeh…”
“Even so, in spite of all, nevertheless…”

How very much there is to celebrate on this sixtieth anniversary of the State of Israel. From the time that I made the first of many trips almost a half century ago, on each and every one I always saw Israel, in one way or the other, under the gun; sometimes visibly, as, in 1962, looking from the parapets of the Dormition Monastery toward East Jerusalem, or, from Y’min Mosheh, seeing the guns of Jordanian soldiers pointed at us. Still, over these years the young state with all of its flaws and imperfections has created a parliamentary democracy, and, in partnership with world Jewry, social, educational, cultural, scientific institutions, technological and research programs, commercial and industrial enterprises that stand comparison in excellence with some of the best in the world.

Yet at this sixtieth anniversary celebration I feel as did Ahad Ha’Am, founder of “Cultural Zionism.” After a significant Zionist congress at which the cultural, spiritual bases of Zionism were ignored, he said he felt like a lone mourner at a wedding feast. Ever since the occupation of the West Bank I have felt an increasing alienation from Israel’s policies and therefore from many of my friends in the American Jewish community. Yes, after the stunning victory in the 1967 war, I too, almost literally ran to the Wall soon after landing. I prayed there as if the Wall were a wireless through which I could communicate not only with the Eternal but also with my pious deceased father, who, while he made the trip to Israel soon after 1948, could not have imagined the realization of this particular age-old dream. Yes, I danced in the circle at Kabbalat Shabbat in the newly cleared plaza with my own four-year-old son as I had marched with my father in a celebratory parade after the declaration of the State sixty years ago.

But soon I felt uncomfortable with the sense of heedless triumphalism, the increasing military music on El Al, and the admiring description of Israel, by Time Magazine as (of all things!) “that tough Spartan state.” Also, increasingly, I felt foreboding that Ben-Gurion’s warning was unheeded. He said that Israel should focus on strong military enforcement of its borders and should withdraw from the conquered territories or else the Occupation would be worse for Israel than all the wars it had ever fought. His prophecy has, in so many ways, proven tragically true. And the worst of it is the wasting, the diminution and distortion of the Zionist ideal.

For me, Israel remains a home of memory and hope; above all, hope. It is the Zionist hope nurtured in my childhood, in the well-nigh all-consuming Zionist engagement of my Habonim Labor Zionist Youth; in the early days of the birth and struggles of the State sixty years ago; in the heroism of the Kibbutz movement, vanguard of Israel’s economic base, of its principles of social equity and of its early protective shield.

It is a Zionist ideal now dismissed as mere sentimentalism by a large number of those who consider themselves to be no-holds-barred defenders of Israel right or wrong. For a large number of my peers the old Zionist hope, the ideal, has been replaced by the stance and mechanisms of a hard-line, value-free real politique, according to which the only answer to continuous vicious attack is force majeure retaliation which over the years has yielded only increasing hate, violence and fuel for the ideologies of terror rather than lasting security for Israel’s people. The fulfillment of the Zionist ideals in which I had believed, and still do, is now considered by influential parties in Israel, and leading supporters of Israel in the North American Jewish establishment, as not only irrelevant but also dangerous to Israel’s interests in the battle against what they consider to be the inveterate and unassuageable hostility of the Palestinian cause, and even a betrayal of Israel itself.

What was that hope, that ideal expressed in the vision of ancient prophets, in our daily liturgy, and by the early Zionist thinkers of a return to Zion as a redemption of suffering Jewry from the historic forces of hate and pogrom and the Holocaust? “Give us a chance,” I heard rabbinic and communal orators say, “and we will create a society that is truly a light unto the nations.” From all of my early experience I formed an ideal of a state that is 1) Jewish in culture and language; its national celebrations those of Judaism; its street names, those of our heroes; its educational curricula featuring the great texts of our literature; while yet equitably open to all denominations; respectful and protective of all religions, 2) Democratic in line with the finest of classical liberal thought of the Enlightenment with its principles of liberty and equal rights and justice for all; and 3) Moral in accord with the noblest principles of social justice, equity and compassionate concern for the marginal and poor and weak of society as expressed by the sacred texts, the prophets and sages of our people.

This has been my definition of Zionism. The great Jewish thinkers I honor are those who in the past and still today maintain that remarkable genius of Judaism to combine particular concern for our people, our spiritual as well as material well-being, indissolubly with a universal concern for the needs, well-being and peace of all of humankind, the redemption of all who are oppressed.

With all the dangers that Israel will continue to face, the greatest danger to Israel is the loss of that Zionist hope, that ideal. Harsh demographic facts, and the lessons of postcolonial modern history show us that Israel cannot continue to exist as a state that is Jewish, democratic or morally true to Judaic teaching while continuing to maintain, by whatever means, control and authority over millions of Palestinians who seek their own autonomy and self-determination.

In Israel, the transition from socialist roots to a market economy has put increasing pressure on a wide range of unserved social needs. Beset with constant military security that the occupation entails, Israel cannot meet the civil needs, the growing gap between exceeding wealth and abysmal poverty, even, to our shame, of Holocaust survivors in Israel.

Partnerships between Israelis and Palestinians in economic and social endeavors of material benefit to both will prove a far greater security than military force. The Declaration of Independence of the State of Israel states the Zionist ideal, the Zionist hope:

“The State of Israel will be open for Jewish immigration, the in-gathering of the exiles. It will foster the development of the country and all of its inhabitants. It will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel. It will assure complete equality of social and political rights to all of its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex. It will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the holy place of all religions and it will be faithful to the principles of the charter of the United Nations….”

Contrary to the hawks and right wing fundamentalists of blood and soil, the ideal is, at the same time, in the long-run, the most practical.

After all, in spite of all, it yet can be.