Passover thoughts on Zionism and Israel’s siege mentality, and a bit of hope in the form of the local ‘occupy’ movement.

Normally I would not pay much attention to anything signed by “Latma” – a Hebrew right-wing media watchdog and satire site. This time, however, I think they’re on to something. The clip they released for the coming holiday – “Happy Passover Bro!” – is catchy, easy going, and most importantly I think it is something that most Jewish Israelis can relate to. And this, to me, is quite sad.

Latma use one of the oldest tricks in the Israeli right-winger book: take a Jewish or a Zionist holiday, wrap it up with a smile and slogans of unity and brotherly love, and what do you get? A condensed capsule of siege mentality of a united and caring “us” vs. an alien and eternally threatening “them.”

“Settler, leftist, or angry screamer – doesn’t matter, you’re my bro!” goes the song, to the tune of Aretha Franklin’s “Think,” linking us directly to the holiday spirit with repeated chants of “freedom.” The song goes on about the differences between left and right, or opposing football clubs, but all these, say the good people at Latma, are nothing in the face of our decades-long tradition of vouching for one another.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UDFqpSRs7o[/youtube]

This nationalistic ethos of Jews looking out for one another as a group no matter what is at the core of most political thought and practice in Zionist Israel. You see it in the media and in politicians’ rhetoric, and just recently we saw it in the High Court’s ruling on the mass pardon granted to right wingers arrested while protesting against the disengagement, when justices called the dismantling of illegal settlements a “national trauma.”

And so Latma releases this video clip, which so many Israelis can relate to, and once again Jews in Israel will celebrate the holiday of freedom while a general blockade is imposed on the West Bank (as is the procedure for any Israeli holiday), and soon we’ll be celebrating Memorial Day while forgetting all those killed by our army, and then Independence Day, neglecting those who still live under our boot of occupation. The holidays will be celebrated, and a feeling of joyful unity will be in the air, but it will once again be Jewish unity – exclusive and alienating to everyone else.

Yet there is hope

Perhaps for the first time in Israeli history, there is now a second, competing ethos, which could challenge the dominant Zionist one. In the past two weeks, there has been talk of a revival of last summer’s J14 movement for social justice, and small demonstrations and minor “occupation” events are starting to sprout up. As I wrote after one of the bigger demonstrations last year, I believe J14 has the potential to replace the right wing, chauvinistic and siege-mentality elements of Zionist discourse with one that favors cross-national solidarity based on class lines. The slogans and the spirit of the movement seem to be drifting towards defining “us” as the middle, working and poorer classes, as opposed to the capitalist “them.”

Of course this is not something that changes in a day. Most Jews who participated in demonstrations last year surely define themselves as Zionists, and most would probably find themselves agreeing with and enjoying the Latma song. This to me represents the split at the heart of the struggle: on the one hand, there is an internationalist leftist ethos based on equality for all, and on the other is the Zionist background of the activists themselves. While some anti-occupation activists consider this to be a reason to abandon J14, and thus dub it a “struggle to preserve Jewish privilege,” I find hope in the fact that for the fist time there is actually a relevant movement in mainstream Israeli politics that has a fighting chance against nationalism. And it’s our job to be part of the struggle to take it in the right direction.