Can Israel Defy History —
Again? L
effectively ended when it was split into
the two competing kingdoms of Judea
and Israel. The Hasmonean kingdom
ast week
marked Yom
began to fall apart due to infighting
Haatzmaut, our
beloved between the sons of Alexander and
Israel’s 75th birthday — the
Shlomtzion, the rulers of Judea in the first
day on the Hebrew calendar when
century BCE.

David Ben-Gurion proclaimed “the
Sovereign Jewish history tells us that
natural right of the Jewish people
at around the 75th year, experiments in
to be masters of their own fate” by
Jewish self-determination faced the most
establishing a Jewish state in the land
dangerous threat of all: self-destruction.

of Israel.

On its 75th birthday, Israel and its
Together with countless Jews
supporters face the internal tensions of
around the world, we express our
sovereignty: What does it mean for Israel
gratitude to be alive at this moment
A coin
minted during
the rule
of Mattathias
Antigonos (40-37
B.C.E.) toward
to be both a Jewish and democratic
in history when the Jewish people
the end of the last period of Jewish independence in the land of Israel
state and a home to all its citizens? How
have sovereignty and a nation to call
can Israel be both at home in the Middle
their own.

East while
modeled on Western democracies? How
to demand
passivity by
Jews as
they waited
for But on this anniversary, Yom Haatzmaut’s special
should its leaders balance majority Jewish culture
prayers and festive afternoon barbecues failed divine deliverance.

For two millennia, Jewish existence was one of with minority rights?
to capture the fraught feelings many of us are
The concerns of the old Zionism certainly still exist:
experiencing. Jews across the globe in all our vulnerability and victimhood — most often either
how to pursue peace even as Jewish vulnerability
hiding who
we are
or suffering
for it.

The Zionism
different peculiarities and particularities — from
all political orientations, religious and secular, of 1948 defied diasporic Jewish history by giving and safety continue to be threatened. But they take
progressive and conservative, for and against the Jews power, self-determination and sovereignty on a new character in this day and age, forcing us
judicial overhaul being proposed by the current to respond to external threats and establish a to ask how we can manage and embrace conflicting
visions of Jewishness and Israeliness while nurturing
Jewish state.

government — are reeling.

Understandably, most of the work of early Zionism social solidarity and cooperation across deep and
The past few months of terrible turmoil in Israel
surrounding the judicial overhaul proposal have was focused on mere survival — establishing a painful divides.

This Yom Haatzmaut came at a moment of
shown us how fragile our singular and precious state, providing safe refuge to the millions of Jews
rupture. But the current crisis in Israel represents
fleeing inhospitable
lands and
contending with
Jewish state is. While Israel’s history is replete
with instances when external forces threatened its enemy countries sworn to destroy the new nation. It an opportunity – a moment for our generation to
people, this moment is unique in revealing internal succeeded beyond any of the wildest imaginations ensure this rupture defies the pattern of sovereign
threats to its democracy and social cohesion. We of its founders. The first 75 years of Israel, in which Jewish history. The generations before us proved
have seen toxic hatred rising among Israeli Jews, it has become a powerful and thriving state, are that we can rewrite diasporic history, turning a tale of
a testament to the success of Zionism in defying vulnerability and weakness into one of strength and
with fears of a civil war at an all-time high.

power. Our generation and those that follow must
How, then, are we supposed to celebrate Israel on diasporic Jewish history.

But the next 75 years of Zionism present and likewise defy sovereign Jewish history and prove
its 75th birthday?
The answer to this question lies at the heart of impose on us a different task: To be Zionists today that we can protect our Jewish state from the internal
Jewish history and reveals that now is the moment means we must defy a different chapter of Jewish threats it faces. Our generation’s task is to overcome
for a new Zionist revolution led by both Israeli and history — one that might be called sovereign our divisions and not let fraternal hatred destroy our
shared home.

Jewish history.

Diaspora Jews.

On this 75th birthday, then, let us learn from our
Historians and educators have pointed out a
Zionism was never just about establishing a
Jewish state. It was about defying Jewish history. critically important pattern in the history of Jewish past and look forward toward a new future. Let us
In 1948, when Ben-Gurion and his fellow Zionist self-rule. There are two pre-modern eras in which continue to celebrate the incredible success by
leaders declared Israeli independence, it was nothing the Jewish nation enjoyed sovereignty in the land writing a new chapter in the magnificent story of
less than a radical assault on diasporic Jewish of Israel: at the end of the 11th century BCE with the Israel and Zionism. ■
history. It defied the thousands of years of Davidic Kingdom and the first Temple in Jerusalem,
Jews being a minority in other countries, subject and in 140 BCE when the Hasmonean dynasty Mijal Bitton is the rosh kehillah of the Downtown
to the whims and caprice of other rulers. It defied reestablished Jewish independence in Judea. But Minyan and a sociologist of American Jews. Masua
the image of the weak and defenseless Jew. as each approached its 75th year of existence, each Sagiv is the Koret visiting assistant professor of
It even defied Jewish tradition itself, which for started to disintegrate because of internal strife and Jewish law and Israel studies at UC Berkeley
centuries was understood by many of its adherents infighting. The Davidic reign over a united Israel School of Law.

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Mijal Bitton and Masua Sagiv