The view of the American political scene from Israel is looking increasingly surreal. We are seeing the normalization of the most radical Presidential candidate since Henry Wallace. Kamala Harris’s voting record and pronouncements should be causing jaw dropping reappraisals by all Americans who cherish the exceptionalism of America and its values.
Most painfully, it appears that the majority of American Jews have decided – against all evidence – that Kamala Harris would be an appropriate choice, and even, astoundingly, good for the Jews.
How they reached this conclusion is a great mystery. Is it because her stepdaughters refer to her as “Mamala”?
Or is it because they have an anachronistic notion of the Democratic Party, of what it stands for and represents. Conversely, do they have a correspondingly anachronistic perception of the Republican Party?
In that regard, Jews find validation for their perspective in the person of Donald Trump. He is crude, crass and supremely narcissistic. And somehow, they have concluded from those personality traits that he is a threat to democracy itself.
Let’s stipulate that Trump is indeed narcissistic. But let’s also ask how that narcissism had any effect on his making America energy independent, with a secure Southern border, and presiding over record low Latino and Black unemployment, as well as a Middle East that was not at war.
And of course, from the Jewish perspective, Trump was heroic: recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, moving the US Embassy there from Tel Aviv, recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan, and stating that the Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria were not at all illegal.
Oh, and in case we forget, there were the Abraham Accords, which have the potential of re-aligning the region into a more stable and peaceful place based on mutual fear of Iran and broad based economic development.
In other words, Trump’s faults, flaws, his sins as it were, are aesthetic. They did not prevent him from acting responsibly and supportively towards Israel, and they were not an impediment to enacting highly beneficial and needed policies for America and the American People.
Kamala Harris has a long track record of supporting woke causes and ideas. She was totally ineffective in securing the Southern border and from an Israeli perspective she is at best a no show.
The best she can summon is a recognition that Israel has a right to defend itself. What nation on earth does not have the right, indeed the obligation, to defend itself?
But to win, to prevail, to defeat its sworn enemies? Nothing. Worse than nothing, there is the proud support for not supplying bunker buster bombs and the willingness to consider an arms embargo.
There is empathy and understanding for the pro-Palestinian protesters, complete moral equivalence as to the situation in Gaza, and a knee jerk demand for a two state solution.
In other words, the faults, flaws and sins, as it were, of Kamala Harris, especially from a Jewish perspective, are existential. A Harris presidency would likely put more conditions, distance and, ultimately, hostility between the US and Israel.
Trump might be typically histrionic in asserting that Israel would be doomed were Harris to be elected, but he is certainly on to something.
Trump has expressed his appropriate disbelief that the American Jewish community would still turn out to support Harris. He has the clarity of the boy who recognized that the Emperor had no clothes.
How could Jews turn their back on the man who did so much for Israel? How could they ignore the lack of unambivalent support that Harris represents?
Again, appropriately, but not realistically, Trump assumes that American Jews have the welfare of Israel as a primary priority for themselves. Given that priority, how could they not want to bring back to office someone who was so supportive towards what should be a major concern for American Jewish voters?
What Trump fails to understand is that American Jewish voters no longer prioritize Israel in their voting choices. They are more concerned with issues such as abortion, equity and fuzzy notions of justice.
They feel the pain of the world, but not of their own. They are increasingly critical of Israel and understanding, if not downright sympathetic, to the plight of Israel’s adversaries.
Even if they are not actively opposing Israel, like the Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now organizations do, many no longer feel the bond, the connection, the inter-relationship with Israel that defined the American Jewish community not so long ago.
Trump, to his credit, does not understand this, nor should he. What he is missing is an awareness of the breathtaking disintegration of much of the American Jewish community from a People-centric to an identity-centric relationship to their Jewishness.
Identity-centric Jews feel embarrassment for being white and privileged. They are proud to be judgmental of Israel, as it somehow proves their moral bona fides, and of course, their eligibility to be part of the Progressive worldview of intersectionality, wokeness, and of course victimization.
Israel, outnumbered almost 50 times in the Arab world, is somehow a victimizer, and of course, or because, it is not a victim.
And of course, to them, a major knock against Israel is that someone like Trump would be a supporter of it. That in and of itself is proof positive of the lack of its worthiness.
Perhaps it is not too late for thoughtful American Jews to honestly face the question of who would be better for American Jewry itself. Does a Harris presidency, wrapped in the trappings of DEI and wokeness, bode well for Jews?
Will the shrinking numbers of Jews at top schools, and in culture and media be arrested by a Harris presidency? Or will there be a tailwind for the continued marginalization of the Jewish community in America?
Trump is overstating his case when he speaks of the demise of Israel if he is not elected, but he recognizes correctly that Israel will be far worse off under Harris. What he does not address, but which seems to go hand in hand with his concern, is that American Jewry itself will suffer badly under Harris.
For all his drawbacks and shortcomings, Trump deserves American Jewish support. My brethren, hold your noses if you must and do the right thing.
Douglas Altabef is the Chairman of the Board of Im Tirtzu and a Director of the Israel Independence Fund. His views are his own.