At a United Synagogue Youth program many decades ago, I remember being asked the following question: “Are you an American Jew, or a Jewish American?”  Where, in other words, do your primary loyalties lie?

Then and now, American Jews have tried to dodge this question. There is no choice to be made, we insist; our Jewish values (including, for many, our emotional ties to Israel) and our American values are aligned.

But this year, for many Jews, there is a choice.

On the one hand, the United States as we know it is under unprecedented threat from a presidential administration that, aided by a politicized Supreme Court and a rubber-stamp Republican congress, has undermined its basic foundations. This is not a matter of political ideology; it’s not about tax cuts, restrictions on abortion, or environmental regulations, subjects about which reasonable people can disagree. It is about overt efforts to undermine the 2026 election, about blatantly authoritarian actions (ICE, DOGE, the ballroom, the Kennedy Center), and about a level of vulgarity, corruption, and venality never before seen in American history.

And on top of all of that, America’s standing in the world has precipitously declined; we have simply abdicated our role as leaders, and even members, of the international community. We are not only mocked around the world, but mistrusted; we have strengthened Russia and China. Trump’s deranged tariffs and pointless war have devastated the economy, causing millions to wonder how they will pay for fuel this winter.

Again, one may prefer Republican policies to Democratic ones, but all of this is beyond the realm of ideology. America faces an existential crisis.

On the other hand, there are “our” interests — chiefly the safety of American Jews and the security of Israel.

As I have written many times, I see the threats to each of these as primarily coming from the Right. Yes, there is anti-Zionism and antisemitism on the Left, but they pale in comparison to right-wing Christian Nationalism. Numerous Republican candidates have staffers who have knowingly promoted neo-Nazi propaganda. That same genre of propaganda (e.g. “Which way, American man?”) has been used in official statements of the Trump administration. Nothing on the Left compares to this level of institutionalization and power.

Nor do I see a blank check for Israel’s farthest-right extremists as beneficial to Israel’s security. When actions as modest as conditioning military aid or opposing settler violence in the West Bank are condemned as apostasy and antisemitism, Israel is not strengthened; it is weakened.

But, obviously, a large minority of American Jews see these matters differently. Domestically, they equate anti-Zionism and antisemitism, and feel themselves under personal threat from Muslim politicians like Zohran Mamdani or Abdul El-Sayed. They experience these threats differently from how I do — as worse than the threats from the Right. And they are dismayed by the support of the Palestinian cause among some progressive Democrats.

For these American Jews — again, a minority of the population, but probably a majority among Jewish institutional leaders and donors — there is indeed a choice. Which do we care about more: America’s survival, or Israel’s?  Democracy or Jewish safety?

As I have said, I disagree with the premises of this dichotomy. But it is unquestionably one faced by over two million American Jews, according to polls. And so I want to offer three responses.

The first is to remind my community of how fortunate we are to be Americans. I don’t think I’ve ever felt as patriotic as I have in the last two years; the more Trump and MAGA attack the American Dream, the more I find myself appreciating it. The America I believe in is one with its best days ahead, not behind; it is a vision of a pluralistic, multicultural democracy where everyone ought to have a fair shake, regardless of class, religion, race, sex, gender, or ethnicity. That vision has never been fully realized. But it is one worth fighting for, and working to bring into reality.

And it is one that enabled my family — and probably yours — to thrive here. Like many American Jews, my grandparents fled violence (and, in part of my family, poverty) in Eastern Europe to the goldene medineh, the golden country. Of course, they faced antisemitism and exclusion here too, but nothing like what they left behind. My parents went to great universities, enjoyed the post-war economic boom, and gave me opportunities that no one in my family had a century ago.

Do we not see how all this is worth fighting for?  And how endangered it currently is?  Do we really think that the MAGA nationalists even want us here?  Do we not see how attacks on immigrants and minorities are wrong, categorically, based on our own lived experience?

American Jews have prospered not by being an insular minority focused on our special interests, but by being engaged, patriotic Americans, fighting for the values in which we believe. That has been our ethical and political superpower. Yes, we take care of our own, but we are also part of the American experiment, motivated by Jewish values and the Jewish experience of marginalization. Let’s not abandon that now.

Second, I beg my fellow Jews to practice discernment rather than hysteria.

Ironically, I found an example of this where I did not expect to: in the “Non-Negotiable” campaign in Michigan, which sets out five non-negotiable positions for political leaders regarding Jewish safety and support for a Jewish state. Obviously, the subtext of the campaign is the senatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed, of whom I have written positively in these pages, and I do not agree with everything in its platform. That’s fine. The point is that by articulating positions, rather engaging in fear-mongering, hyperbole, and, let’s face it, Islamophobia, Nonnegotiable Michigan is doing something useful. They’re distinguishing between heated emotions and clear political positions.

And, by my reckoning, El-Sayed himself is on board with all five — actively supportive of three, and, he says, not opposed to two. (Many others on the Left are clearly not.)  But whether he is or isn’t, the platform offers light rather than heat, in contrast with a lot of what I see on Jewish social media channels these days, which often traffics in hysteria. I would only quibble with the name; we can disagree with our politicians on some issues while supporting them on others.

Finally, and relatedly, I want to remind us all of some core political truths. Purity tests are political suicide; the perfect is the enemy of the good. The matzav (“Situation”) regarding Israelis and Palestinians is complicated; even if you think one side has acted worse than the other, both sides have done very bad things. (That is true if you’re on the Left or the Right.)  Statements can feel hurtful without actually being hurtful; they may just be attacking something we care about.And when it comes to politics, emotional reactions often lead to bad results; it is far wiser to evaluate, consider, critique and reflect.

All of these facts point to the same conclusion: that oversimplifications and emotional reactivity are not our best allies when it comes to making political decisions. The Jewish tradition has bequeathed us two thousand years of legalistic parsing and multiple perspectives on even the most mundane of issues (I once spent three months learning about what makes an etrog permissible for use on Sukkot.). Let’s put those skills to use on something non-mundane: the survival of our country and our people. Consider all of what is at stake this year, yes, for our community, but also for the vibrant, flawed, but unprecedented nation that has allowed us to prosper. Both deserve better than this.

 

The post This time, some American Jews really do face a choice between ‘American’ and ‘Jewish’ appeared first on The Forward.

(JTA) — JERUSALEM – As election results from Israel’s parliamentary vote on Tuesday continue to trickle in, what seems clearest is that no side in this political race will have enough votes to form a majority government, meaning the question of who Israel’s next prime minister will be remains uncertain.

According to the vote count so far, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party could have as many as 28 seats, yet his bloc of right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties will fall short of the 61 seats needed to form a majority government.

Yashar, the party led by Netanyahu’s main rival, former Israeli army chief Gadi Eisenkot, looks set to be the second-largest party, with around 22 seats. The so-called “change” bloc that Eisenkot leads will likely have around 47 seats, also far short of what is needed to form a government on its own.

Meanwhile, Israel’s Arab parties, which both blocs have said they wouldn’t include in a coalition, are on pace to get at least 17 seats collectively and could become key to helping the opposition oust Netanyahu.

The formal process whereby each party holds consultations with Israel’s President Isaac Herzog to recommend a candidate for prime minister will likely begin next week. Political analysts are already speculating on possible scenarios.

Their tentative takeaway: Reality may force political leaders to break their solemn promises to not work with certain other parties.

So what are the possible scenarios if the final results leave the political arena so starkly divided? Here are the three most likely outcomes.

1. The “change” bloc plus the Arab parties

All the parties in the change bloc bar the Democrats, led by Yair Golan, stated throughout their campaigns that they would not form a government with either of the Arab parties, even though Mansour Abbas, the leader of Ra’am, an Islamist faction, joined a centrist coalition from 2021-2022, breaking what had once been a taboo. Abbas is again offering to join forces with the change bloc.

“Clearly this is emerging as an option mathematically and politically,” Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Wednesday. But he added, “It’s obviously not only a violation of campaign promises, but I think the Israeli public opinion is deeply unprepared for such an option.” Tolerance for working with an Islamist party has diminished since the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led raids.

Another variation on this option is for the change bloc — Eisenkot’s Yashar party, B’Yachad, led by former prime ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid, and Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party, as well as the Democrats — to form a minority government.

While 61 seats are needed to form a majority government, there is nothing to prevent a government with fewer than 61 seats from being formed if it can gain support on key legislative decisions.

This could happen if Arab factions support the change bloc on key votes but otherwise don’t play a role in the government. This would give the change bloc up to 65 seats when Arab parties’ support from the sidelines is added in.

Even this step has been rejected by Lieberman, yet Professor Jonathan Rynhold, of the Department of Political Studies at Bar-Ilan University, said it was possible that Eisenkot could put pressure on him to accept.

“Even though Lieberman has said no to such an option, he might say yes if he’s the prime minister,” Rynhold said.

On the other hand, the Arab parties, especially the Joint List, might demand concessions for such an agreement that Eisenkot himself finds hard to stomach.

2. Formation of a unity government

A quick look at the political map following Tuesday’s vote shows that center-right parties ranging from Eisenkot’s Yashar party to Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu, with Likud and B’Yachad in between, gained a substantial share of the seats. One possible scenario is that some of these parties, even though they are avowed political foes, could join forces.

“I think it is perhaps more likely that there will be serious negotiations around a unity government,” Plesner said. “I would imagine that Netanyahu would prefer unity based on him forming a coalition with all of his bloc members, and then luring one of the ‘change bloc’ parties to his government.” That would mean including ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism and far-right parties led by Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.

However, Plesner said the change bloc parties would most likely push for a “real unity government,” whereby Netanyahu “gives up on one of the far-right parties that has caused a lot of challenges for Israel’s international image, or perhaps an ultra-Orthodox party that has refused to pass a military draft bill.” He was referring to a law that would force more haredi men to serve in the military, from which they’ve traditionally been exempted. This, he said, would create a “Zionist, more centrist-leaning option.”

“I think this is something that Israeli public opinion would be able to live with and perhaps even prefer, but I can’t say anything about the political viability of it,” Plesner said.

The change bloc ran on replacing Netanyahu, and no doubt many of its voters would feel betrayed by such an outcome.

3. Another round of elections

In his election night speech, Eisenkot declared that “after an election with such high voter turnout, it would be a mistake to hold another election.” Some 77.7% of voters cast ballots, the highest since 1999, according to election officials.

However, with no bloc reaching a majority and serious ideological disagreements among the parties, another round of elections might be the most likely possibility. For Netanyahu in particular, allowing the process to play out while he retains his position as interim prime minister until another election is held could well be the most favorable outcome for the long-serving leader, according to Plesner.

A similar scenario played out beginning in 2019, when Netanyahu’s bloc of supporters failed to achieve a majority. Israel then held a series of elections, culminating in the March 2021 vote, when Netanyahu’s bloc was ousted by a center-left alliance led by Bennett and Lapid. The November 2022 election returned Netanyahu to power.

“I don’t really know what the path forward is now,” said Gideon Rahat, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

“If we were talking 10 years ago, I would say that something else might happen – a unity government or a different solution perhaps,” he said. But given the entrenched political camps at this point, another round of elections might be where the country is headed.

On the other hand, given the unpredictable nature of Israel’s political scene, Plesner noted that it could be a “time for politicians to get creative.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if all sorts of ideas that we haven’t thought of before come up in the upcoming few weeks,” he said, adding that he believed that, with so much uncertainty, it could “take weeks and perhaps months” before the next prime minister is determined.

This article originally appeared on JTA.org.

The post Israel’s election deadlock: 3 scenarios for what comes next appeared first on The Forward.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may have just won over Israelis. Now comes something harder: winning Americans.

Israel’s election results aren’t final, and there is still a long way to go before a government is formed, but Netanyahu outperformed the expectations of almost all the polls and pundits.

I get why. Security is Israelis’ primary concern, and under Netanyahu, the IDF has set back Iran’s nuclear program, quieted rockets from Hezbollah in the north and devastated, if not fully defeated, Hamas in the south.

Israeli voters overlooked or dismissed Netanyahu’s accountability for Oct. 7, focusing instead on the country’s strong economy, the Abraham Accords, or his willingness to accommodate the demands of the religious parties.

But what is working at home for Netanyahu is not working abroad. Specifically, in America, support for Israel under Netanyahu has cratered, and yesterday’s election is unlikely to boost it back up.

The percentage of Americans holding an unfavorable view of Israel has gone from 42% in 2022 to 60% in 2026, according to Pew research.

For the first time since 2001, according to Gallup, more Americans sympathize with Palestinians (41%) than Israelis (36%).

Among Democrats, 8 in 10 have an unfavorable view of Israel — up from 69% last year. Among Republicans, the future looks the same: 57% of Republicans 18 to 49 now have an unfavorable opinion of Israel, up from 50% last year.

Tucker Carlson and Vice President JD Vance, both of whom have accused Israel of dragging America into war with Iran, are more likely the party’s future than its past.

American Jews used to boast of a bipartisan consensus in favor of Israel. They worked for decades to help forge it. Now that bipartisan consensus is moving in the opposite direction.

Under these circumstances, any new Israeli prime minister would be facing the world’s shortest honeymoon with Israel’s strongest partner.

Netanyahu’s will be even shorter if he prevails. Israelis may not be tired of Netanyahu, but Americans are. A Pew survey this year found 59% of Americans had little or no confidence in him. Among American Jews it was 56%.

Those numbers should frighten anyone who cares about Israel. The American-Israel relationship is not about popularity. It’s about survival.

No matter who was elected, America’s foreign aid allocation to Israel, a political liability, should phase out, something Netanyahu himself proposed when the current aid bill expires in 2028.

But Israel will still need to buy weapons from somewhere when its stockpiles run low during a war. It will need to share and coordinate intelligence, or join forces to eliminate nuclear or other common threats. America is still the best address for that.

A strong bilateral relationship — “even close to the strength that we’ve known it for the past couple of decades” — will depend on a new government’s behavior, Rachel Brandenburg, a senior policy analyst at the Israel Policy Forum, said in a call with journalists before the election.

‘Repairing a relationship’

That begs the question: Can Netanyahu change?

After almost two decades in power, is it at all possible that he will recognize the cost to Israel’s standing in America if he continues down the same path his current government has followed?

If he wants a reset with Democrats and Republicans, will he actually reach out to Democrats? Will he rein in the Jewish terrorists on the West Bank who have wreaked havoc on Palestinians, including American citizens? Will he exclude these terrorists’ supporters from his cabinet? Will he include Arab parliamentarians in his government, and address Arab concerns, after their historic showing in this election?

Finally, will he open up a diplomatic horizon with the Palestinians that will, in the end, be the only way to consolidate the military and diplomatic gains he has made?

These steps would go a long way to repairing a relationship whose rupture would be devastating, but not symmetrical.

“Israel will not be alone unless it decides to go alone,” President Lyndon Johnson warned the Israeli prime minister on the eve of the 1967 Six-Day War.

It’s a warning I pray the next Israeli prime minister abides.

The post Netanyahu may have won Israel. He’s losing America. appeared first on The Forward.