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Peter Beinart, Elliot Cosgrove and other Jewish leaders face off over the future of liberal Zionism
(JTA) — For decades, liberal Zionism served the American Jewish majority as the ideological bridge between democratic and Jewish values: Support for Israel was based in, and justified by, a commitment to Jewish self-determination anchored in democracy, and animated by the promise of peace with the Palestinians.
On Tuesday night in Manhattan, a group of prominent rabbis and Jewish thinkers gathered to ask whether that bridge is now collapsing.
The conversation, held at B’nai Jeshurun in the heart of the famously Jewish and historically liberal Upper West Side, centered on what panelists described as a profound crisis in liberal Zionism — accelerated by Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel and the devastating war in Gaza that followed, but rooted in decades of occupation, the rightward political drift in Israel and growing estrangement between American and Israeli Jews.
The panel brought together figures who have long wrestled publicly with Israel’s moral and political direction, albeit to different degrees: Rabbi Jill Jacobs, CEO of the rabbinic human rights organization T’ruah; Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of Manhattan’s Park Avenue Synagogue; Peter Beinart, the writer and editor who lately has soured on the idea of a Jewish state in favor of a single, binational state of Arabs and Jews; and Esther Sperber, an Israeli-American architect and Orthodox activist critical of Israel’s shift to the right.
Representatives of the Zionist right were not invited to sit on the panel, said moderator Rabbi Irwin Kula, because “that’s [not] where the crisis is.”
“We are living through the collapse of a paradigm,” said Kula, describing a polarized Jewish community shaken by grief, fear of antisemitism, and, especially for liberal Zionists, despair that their vision of two states for two people will ever come about. Kula, who championed pluralism as the president of the Jewish organization CLAL, said the question was no longer how big the Jewish tent should be, but whether it had already been “shredded.”
Throughout the evening, Kula resisted turning the discussion into a debate over one state versus two states or competing historical narratives. Instead, he pressed panelists to articulate the fears and “nightmares” driving their positions — a strategy meant to surface “vulnerability” rather than certainty. For the most part, the audience — 700 in the sanctuary, and another 1,000 online, according to the synagogue — held its applause and jeers, as Kula requested, lending the evening the hushed air of a memorial service.
Cosgrove, who recently referred to himself as a “liberal Zionist disillusioned by the Israeli government,” framed his fears around internal Jewish fracture. Drawing on biblical imagery, he warned that American Jews were increasingly turning one another into enemies, and said that the role of pulpit rabbis like him is to make room in their congregations for disagreement.
“My primary fear, and that is my primary role right now, is that in a moment of time when the Jewish people don’t lack for external enemies, we are making internal enemies,” he said. “And I believe that the role of rabbinic leadership and all of leadership right now must be that we restrain ourselves from this need to call the other a ‘self-hating Jew’ or ‘self-hating Zionist,’ or whatever label you want to put on one side, and a colonial oppressor on the other side.”
Jacobs, whose organization has been outspoken in condemning Israeli policies in Gaza and the West Bank, said liberal Zionism’s credibility has been undermined by institutions that claim its mantle while abandoning their Jewish values.
For years, she said, major Jewish “legacy” organizations instructed American Jews that supporting Israel meant defending its government, ignoring occupation and silencing Palestinian voices. As Israel has moved further away from liberal democracy, that model has alienated young Jews, whose distancing from Israel was front of mind for a panel whose youngest members are in their 50s.
“You have a young generation who’s never known Israel without Netanyahu in the helm, or almost never known the possibility of peace for both Israelis and Palestinians,” Jacobs said.
“Unsurprisingly,” she continued, that generation “looks around and says, ‘Well, if you’re telling me that Zionism means defending occupation and defending illiberal democracy, I want no part of that.’”
Jacobs suggested that most American Jews remain deeply connected to Israel while opposing its current government and supporting a two-state solution — a position she described as underrepresented in communal leadership.
In March, a Pew Research survey found that about 46% of Jewish Americans, or a plurality, said a two‑state solution is the best outcome. Polling by Pew and others also suggests that while a substantial share of young Jews still affirms the importance of Israel and the two‑state idea, they also tend to be less supportive of Israeli policy and more questioning of traditional Zionist approaches than older generations.
Sperber brought the crisis into the realm of family and faith. Speaking as an Israeli with relatives across the political spectrum, she described conversations that have become nearly impossible, even among her siblings in Israel who share religious language and deep attachment to the land.
She said her own activism as a founder of Smol Emuni, or the “faithful left,” grew out of alarm at what she called the celebration of power, vengeance and dehumanization in Israel discourse in her community of Orthodox and otherwise observant Jews. Their uncritical support of the current Israeli government and its hawkish policies is often justified, she said, through distorted readings of Jewish tradition.
“We hear a kind of admiration of power and vengeance and brutality that is using our Jewish tradition as its justification,” said Sperber. “People talking about the Palestinians as Amalek, a kind of mythical nation that is supposed to be destroyed.
“Our Judaism has been leached away from us, and we need to find a way to bring it back into a place that’s morally grounded in our Torah and in our kind of democratic and liberal” values, she continued.
What is needed, she argued, is not only broader inclusion but teshuvah — moral self-examination and repentance — a core Jewish response to catastrophe.
Beinart, a prominent journalist whose call for one state has placed him outside the liberal Zionist camp, described his own position as emerging from years of listening to Palestinians, including people in Gaza. He spoke of specific conversations that left him haunted by the scale of civilian suffering and fearful of being judged by future generations for silence or complicity.
“The most constructive role I could play is to nudge people a little bit to listen to Palestinians,” he said. Such conversations undermine assumptions about Palestinian intentions and force Jews to confront how “ethnonationalism in Israel-Palestine” contradicts their own ideals as Americans. The liberal Zionist promise — that one could affirm Jewish safety, democracy and equality simultaneously — has failed under the weight of reality, he suggested.
At the same time, Beinart — recently criticized by Zionists and supporters of the Israel boycott after his appearance at Tel Aviv University — acknowledged the cost of rejecting the Zionist idea of exclusive Jewish sovereignty: estrangement from the observant Jewish communities he once felt at home in, and anxiety about what that alienation means for his children.
“My nightmare is that I will continue to lose those relationships because I can’t find a way to communicate effectively with people who profoundly disagree with the positions that I’ve taken that I do it out of love for our people and then other people,” said Beinart.
Indeed, Cosgrove suggested that Beinart’s views have become so toxic in many parts of the Jewish community that it was a risk for a prominent pulpit rabbi like him to share the stage. “I’m concerned, because this is a public forum, that me sitting here quietly would signal my assent with anything that’s being said here,” Cosgrove said at one point, earning scattered applause.
Cosgrove agreed with the notion that American Jews could learn from Palestinian voices, but also said that critics of Israel should speak with Israeli soldiers and others “risking life and limb to make sure the atrocities of Oct. 7 never happen again.”
Repeatedly, the conversation returned to American Jews’ relationship with Israeli Jews — and to the question of responsibility across distance and disagreement. Even panelists sharply critical of Israeli policy rejected the idea of disengagement.
“We can’t try to create a Jewish community that has nothing to do with half of the [world’s] Jews,” Jacobs said, referring to the young anti-Zionist Jews who are severing their relationship with Israel, home to more than 7 million Jews. At the same time, she urged American Jews to stop using Israel as a proxy for Jewish identity and invest more deeply in Jewish life at home.
By the evening’s end, no roadmap had emerged for saving liberal Zionism — or replacing it. Sperber suggested Jews like her have a responsibility to continue to bring their “moral convictions to your Jewish community and the very broken country that we live in,” even in the absence of political solutions.
“The challenge is on us, those who still believe that Israel is a vital and important place that we care [about] and love,” she said.
The post Peter Beinart, Elliot Cosgrove and other Jewish leaders face off over the future of liberal Zionism appeared first on The Forward.
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Hormuz Standoff Continues as US-Iran Ceasefire Teeters
People walk past a mural depicting the late leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and the late Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in Tehran, Iran. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Prospects of a peace deal with Iran dwindled on Tuesday after Donald Trump said a ceasefire was “on life support” as Tehran rejected a US proposal to end the conflict and stuck to a list of demands the US president described as “garbage.”
Iran has called for an end to the war on all fronts, including Lebanon, where US ally Israel is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah terrorists. Tehran also emphasized its sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz, demanded compensation for war damage, and an end to the US naval blockade, among other conditions.
Trump, who will discuss the war with Chinese President Xi Jinping during his trip to Beijing this week, said Iran‘s response threatened the status of a ceasefire announced on April 7.
“I would call it the weakest right now, after reading that piece of garbage they sent us. I didn’t even finish reading it,” Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to end the ceasefire, told reporters on Monday. “It’s on life support.”
OIL EXTENDS GAINS
The US had proposed an end to fighting before starting talks on more contentious issues, including Iran‘s nuclear program.
Brent crude oil futures extended gains, climbing to around $108 a barrel, as the deadlock left the Strait of Hormuz largely closed. Before the war began on Feb. 28, the narrow waterway carried a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas shipments, and has since become a central pressure point in the conflict.
US Central Command said the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln was in the Arabian Sea continuing to enforce the US blockade against Iran, having redirected 65 commercial vessels and disabled four.
The Pentagon put the cost of the war at $29 billion so far, an increase of $4 billion from an estimate provided late last month. An official told lawmakers the new cost included updated repair and replacement of equipment and operational costs.
The war also has driven a roughly 50% increase in gasoline prices across the US, where consumer prices rose at a brisk clip for a second straight month in April, resulting in the largest annual increase in inflation in nearly three years.
TRUMP’S TRIP TO CHINA
Surveys show the war is unpopular with US voters less than six months before nationwide elections that will determine whether Trump’s Republican Party retains control of Congress.
Two out of three Americans, including one in three Republicans and almost all Democrats, think Trump has not clearly explained why the country has gone to war, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Monday.
Trump is expected to arrive in Beijing on Wednesday.
Trump wants China to convince Tehran to make a deal with Washington to end the conflict. China maintains ties with Iran and remains a major consumer of its oil exports. China’s foreign ministry has said the US blockade of the strait does not serve the common interest of the international community.
The US on Monday imposed new sanctions on individuals and companies it said were helping Iran ship oil to China, part of efforts to cut off funding for Tehran’s military and nuclear programs, while also warning banks about attempts to evade existing curbs.
IRANIAN OFFICIALS USE TOUGH RHETORIC
Iranian officials, meanwhile, issued statements attempting to show continued resolve in the face of US pressure.
A Fars news agency report cited Mohammad Akbarzadeh, deputy political director of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy, as saying Iran had expanded its definition of the Strait of Hormuz into a “vast operational area” under a new plan.
There was no immediate reply from Iranian authorities to a request for comment on Akbarzadeh’s remarks, which defined the waterway as a zone stretching from the coast of the city of Jask in the east to Siri Island in the west.
In a post on X, parliamentary national security and foreign policy commission spokesperson Ebrahim Rezaei said Iran could enrich uranium up to 90% purity, a level considered weapons-grade, if the country is attacked once more.
Iran’s defense ministry spokesperson said any new attack by an enemy would be met with an immediate response, according to state media. In Tehran, the Guards held drills “centered on preparation to confront the enemy,” state TV reported.
TRICKLE OF SHIPPING THROUGH HORMUZ
Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains at a trickle. Shipping data on Kpler and LSEG showed that three tankers laden with crude exited the waterway last week, with trackers switched off to avoid any Iranian attack.
In the Qatari capital Doha, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said the strait should not be used as a “weapon.”
Lithuania said it could contribute minesweeping capabilities and resources for a potential mission to protect shipping in the strait. Britain said on Saturday it was deploying a warship to the Middle East in preparation for a potential multinational effort in the strait once conditions allow.
Kuwait summoned Iran’s ambassador and handed him a protest note over what it said was the infiltration of Bubiyan Island by armed members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and clashes with Kuwaiti armed forces, the foreign ministry said. There was no immediate reaction from Iran.
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New Israeli Law Sets Military Tribunal for Hamas Oct. 7 Terrorists
Hand prints and other markings made in the soot on a wall are seen, nearly a year since the deadly Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, in Kibbutz Beeri, southern Israel, Sept. 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israel’s parliament passed a law late on Monday establishing a military tribunal to try hundreds of Palestinian terrorists who took part in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, a step lawmakers said would help heal national trauma.
The surprise attack, led by elite “Nukhba” force fighters from the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, was Israel’s deadliest single day and the worst attack on Jews since the Holocaust. At least 1,200 people were killed, most of them civilians.
Israel responded with a military campaign aimed at dismantling Hamas’s military capabilities and political rule in neighboring Gaza.
Israel has been holding an estimated 200-300 fighters – the precise number is classified – captured in Israel during the attack, who have not yet been charged.
The special military court established by the law, to be presided over by a three-judge panel in Jerusalem, could also try others captured later in Gaza and suspected of participating in the attack, or of having held or abused Israeli hostages.
The new law was backed by a wide majority 93 of the Knesset’s 120 lawmakers, in a rare show of Israeli political unity.
The terrorists burst through the Gaza border and rampaged through southern Israeli villages, army bases, roads, and a music festival. Besides the killings, the fighters also took 251 hostages back to Gaza.
NO TRIAL DATE
Lawmakers from both the governing coalition and the opposition authored the bill, meant to ensure all assailants are brought to justice under existing Israeli criminal statutes for what it describes as crimes against the Jewish people, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
Proceedings will be public, with major hearings broadcast live. While defendants will attend only key hearings in person and all others by video, surviving victims will be allowed in-person access, according to the new law.
Ya’ara Mordecai, an international law expert at Yale Law School, said the new law raised some concerns about due process, given the military court setting, as well as a risk of atrocity proceedings turning into politicized or symbolic “show trials.”
Knesset member Yulia Malinovsky, one of the bill’s authors, said that the legislation ensures a fair and lawful trial.
“They will be sentenced by Israel’s judges, not by the street or by what we all feel,” Malinovsky said before the vote. “At the end of the day, what makes us great is our spirit, our resilience, ability to cope and withstand this immense pain.”
OPTION OF CAPITAL PUNISHMENT
Israel’s penal code includes capital punishment for some of the charges which the terrorists are likely to face. If handed down, a death sentence would trigger an automatic appeal on behalf of the defendant, according to the new law.
The last person executed in Israel was Adolf Eichmann, an architect of the Nazi Holocaust, hanged in 1962 after being captured in Argentina by Israeli agents. Military courts in the West Bank can sentence Palestinian convicts to death but have never done so.
A separate law passed by Israel in March making death by hanging a default sentence for Palestinians convicted in military courts of deadly attacks drew criticism at home and abroad and is expected to be struck down by the Supreme Court.
HAMAS CONDEMNS NEW LAW
Hamas Gaza spokesperson Hazem Qassem said the new law “serves as a cover for the war crimes committed by Israel in Gaza.”
The International Criminal Court is probing Israel’s conduct of the Gaza war and has issued arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as three Hamas leaders who have all since been killed by Israel.
Israel is also fighting a genocide case at the International Court of Justice. It rejects the allegations as politically motivated and has argued that its war is against Hamas, not the Palestinian people.
Israeli officials say the military has gone to unprecedented lengths to try and avoid civilian casualties, noting its efforts to evacuate areas before it targets them and to warn residents of impending military operations with leaflets, text messages, and other forms of communication.
Another challenge for Israel has been Hamas’s widely recognized military strategy of embedding its terrorists within Gaza’s civilian population and commandeering civilian facilities like hospitals, schools, and mosques to run operations and direct attacks.
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Man Suspected of Plotting Violent Attack Had Sought to Target Louvre, Jewish Community, Officials Say
A man talks on the phone at the renovated Gallery of Five Continents (Galerie des Cinq Continents) in the Denon wing (Aile Denon) during a press preview at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, Dec. 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes
A 27-year-old man suspected of plotting a violent attack and of planning to join Islamic State in Syria or Mozambique had sought to target a Parisian museum and the Jewish community, though no specific target was identified, a source close to the investigation said on Monday.
French newspaper Le Monde reported that the man, who was arrested on Thursday, had attempted to target the Louvre and the Jewish community in Paris’ 16th arrondissement.
Security gaps at the Louvre, the world’s most-visited museum, were spotlighted last October, when burglars made off with $102 million worth of jewels.
In France, as throughout Europe, antisemitic acts surged to record highs after the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza.