The Death of Liberal Zionism in America?
Well, perhaps not. But you gotta wonder when the only panel of "intellectuals" speaking about Israel at the AIPAC convention consists of…three neocons and a liberal hawk!
Yes, that's right. A plenary session panel composed of Natan Sharansky (russian ethnonationalist and Shalem center neocon), Michael Oren (historian and Shalem center neocon), Ruth Gavison (law professor and Israeli neocon), and Leon Wieseltier (liberal hawk literary editor of the New Republic) was held at the AIPAC convention Monday night to discuss Israel at 60. Now I know Leon. Any panel in which he is the leftwinger has got to raise some eyebrows. What does this say about the place of liberal Zionism at AIPAC? Is Michael Walzer in cherem?
The old fashioned Abba-Eban-Peace-Now-Amos-Oz liberal/socialist Zionism is no longer suitable for the AIPAC crowd. AIPAC has been hijacked by the liberal hawk/neocons. I don't even to expect to find many liberal hawks there. It's a neocon show.
As such, it is SOOOO unrepresentative of American Judaism. I can't say it better than Richard Silverstein, who writes
AIPAC is like a fun house mirror. You stand in front of it and watch as your entire body is distorted out of all proportion. That's the relation of AIPAC to the real American Jewish body politic. If AIPAC is a fun house mirror that would make its annual convention a carnival sideshow.
Sure, it hurts a bit to see goyim who should know better kowtowing to the loonies of the right. But it feels good when only rightwing intellectual ideologues frequent the place.