Jewish Voices
In the eyes of many leftists, ‘The Squad’, a group of 6 diverse Democratic members of the House of Representatives, has gained massive popularity over the last few years and has won the support of many left-leaning Americans. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Ayanna Pressley, the original four, have taken over the left and have been beacons of hope for multiple minority groups, but it always seems that one group is swept under the rug. This group being Jewish Americans.
It’s important to understand that criticizing Israel and its government is not the issue, rather it is the blatant antisemitism created by well-known politicians and their lack of support of Jewish issues. Whether it is through tweets, retweets, narrow viewpoints, or just plain ignorance, ‘The Squad’, along with many others, has been able to get away with this sort of behavior for quite some time. Despite the racism and hatred there is still hope left for the inclusion of Jewish voices in politics and change.
Though ‘The Squad’ and its members have been major catalysts for positive change in the American government and American society, their lack of support of Jewish Americans leaves Jewish people with no representation or support in America. AOC, specifically, has not outright said or done things unlike the other members of ‘The Squad’, her silence about antisemitism and the lack of Jewish representation speaks volumes. Although she has met with Jewish activism groups such as IfNotNow and Neturei Karta, she has made no comments on Zionism and the revitalized rampant antisemitism both in America and around the world.
The issue here is that Zionism is a nationalistic belief which is why there is never much representation for it from the left. There also has never been a Zionist nationalist leftist in politics, so there is not much information on how to handle these topics or what it would even look like.
Racial injustice is an issue that needs to be fought together, but many Jews don’t know where they stand in the Left’s point of view or beliefs. There is not enough representation because Jewish advocates usually don’t have the same platform or receive as much attention as other minority groups and there aren’t many non-Jewish people that take the reigns and make change possible.
Jewish voices are often suppressed and that has to be a change. They need representation as much as the next group, and that change starts here with this generation.
Sources:
- https://newvoices.org/2017/11/28/do-jewish-students-really-feel-left-out-of-the-left/
- https://rac.org/advocacy-activism-why-advocacy-central-reform-judaism
- http://evolve.reconstructingjudaism.org/reflectionsonjewishsocialjustice