poll

Don’t dismiss findings

A survey of Jewish Canadians indicates that we are not a Zionist monolith. This will be news to no one who has enjoyed a family seder or logged onto social media in recent years. However, it is useful to have a fairly comprehensive public opinion survey on the range of issues that tend to most divide us.

For some, the organizations that co-sponsored the survey will lead to outright dismissal. Undertaken by the polling firm EKOS on behalf of Independent Jewish Voices Canada (IJV) and (UJPO), the goal of the exercise was no doubt to show considerable support for the positions espoused by these two groups that are routinely critical of Israeli policies.

By and large, though, the methodologies of the survey appear to have been relatively unbiased, and to ignore the findings is to bury our heads in sand.

Almost half (48%) of Jewish Canadians surveyed believe that “accusations of antisemitism are often used to silence legitimate criticism of Israeli government policies.” More than one-third (37%) have a negative opinion of the Israeli government. On the matter of the United States moving its embassy to Jerusalem, 45% oppose and 42% support the move. Nearly one-third (30%) think that a boycott of Israel is reasonable and 34% also oppose Parliament condemning those who endorse such a boycott. Almost one in three (31%) oppose the military blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The sponsors of the survey see the results as evidence that Jews whose positions are often dismissed as marginal actually represent a large swath of Canadian Jewish opinion.

We quibble with aspects. One question asks: “In 2004, the International Court of Justice ruled unanimously that the wall built by the Israeli government on Palestinian territory violates international law. In response, one year later, over 170 Palestinian citizens’ organizations called for a boycott to pressure Israel to abide by international law. Do you consider the Palestinians’ call for such a boycott to be reasonable?” It may be a bit much to ask someone answering a phone at dinnertime to disagree with something called the International Court of Justice and 170 Palestinian organizations. Overall, though, most of the questions were not misleading nor did they have preambles intended to lead the respondents, as did this one. The survey does, nonetheless, reflect a prevailing narrative that Israel has no legitimate security concerns and erects barriers along the West Bank and blockades Gaza just for fun. But that is the playing field we are on.

Whatever criticisms or doubts we might have about the survey should not distract us from the reality it means to deliver. There are serious divisions between Diaspora Jews and the approach of the government of Israel. Ignoring, papering over or stigmatizing these differences of opinion will harm both Jewish cohesion in the Diaspora and crucial support for Israel. As we have said in this space many times over the years, Israel’s leaders must make decisions based on its security needs, not on what makes it easier for Diaspora Jews to be proud Zionists. However, we do Israel and our own community a disservice by isolating and denouncing those who disagree with the positions of our main communal agencies.

An election is approaching in Israel and that could lead to more of the same or to a significant shift in policy – or to some sort of hybrid between the two. Things change quickly, particularly in that part of the world, and what is true in a survey today may not be true in a year or five.

Even if Israeli policies remain largely the same after April’s election, it is probably not a sustainable position for Canadian or other Diaspora Jewish communities to pretend that a (seemingly) growing chorus of dissent is nonexistent, insignificant, misguided or ill-willed. That is a recipe for irrelevance, particularly among younger Jews.

In fairness, the idea that the Jewish “establishment” is a monolith is an unjust characterization. A diversity of opinions exists in our communal organizations and, certainly, in the plethora of traditional media (like this one) and new media (blogs, online publications and social platforms), a million flowers bloom. So, we challenge the premise that our community enforces a strict ideological membership code. But, we definitely could be better at acknowledging the full range of diversity – even if that means arguing and contesting positions, or even shifting our communal narrative. Indeed, that is entirely in keeping with our community’s tradition.

The survey raises questions we rightfully should be addressing.

Poll exposes confusion

A poll undertaken by the Union of Jewish Students in France returned some bizarre and seemingly contradictory ideas among the French public about Zionism, Israel and Jews.

More than half of the 1,007 respondents to the poll – 53% – viewed Zionism as a Jewish conspiracy aimed at manipulating the world to benefit Jews. Likewise, half of respondents said Zionism is a racist ideology.

Thirty-eight percent said Israel’s existence “feeds antisemitism” and 26% said that boycotting Israel is justified. Asked if Israel was a “threat to regional stability,” 57% said yes. More than half – 51% – called Israel a “theocracy.”

These are disturbing findings. Some of these are not matters of opinion – Israel is not a theocracy, no matter how many French people say it is. Other responses are deeply distressing. The assertions that Israel is a threat to regional stability – rather than being seen as a stabilizing force in a region roiling with instability – or that Israel’s very existence makes people hate Jews indicate a pattern of opinion that is seriously disordered.

But here’s where it gets really weird: 46% of respondents acknowledged that Israel is a democracy and 48% see it as a “normal country like all others.” A remarkable 54% of respondents view anti-Zionism as a form of antisemitism and 59% correctly identify Zionism as a “movement of liberation and emancipation for the Jewish people.”

Together, these responses paint a picture of French confusion and contradiction – a picture that would probably be replicated to a degree in other European and North American polls, were we to undertake them. One might be tempted to critique the pollster and their methodology. After all, polling is suffering a crisis of credibility these days and this particular poll is so confounding in its contradictions that it simply can’t be right.

Or can it? Is it possible that the French (and others) are so baffled by the truths and fictions floating around that they could, as a community or as individuals, hold such cognitively dissonant ideas such as the acceptance that Zionism is a movement for the liberation and emancipation of the Jewish people and that it is a Jewish conspiracy to manipulate the world and that its fulfilment creates antisemitism? Could people believe both that Israel is a democracy and Israel is a theocracy? One could argue that different individuals responded differently to the questions, but with affirmative responses to all these questions ranging near or above majority levels, it is almost certain that some people responded affirmatively to contradictory positions.

In fact, this makes as much sense as any other explanation. The poll seems to suggest that the French (and we would extrapolate to most Western countries) hold very confused, bizarre and inconsistent views about Jews and Israel.

For all the work Zionists have done explaining ourselves for the past seven decades, we seem to have a long way to go.

Dire new poll results?

A new report suggests potentially alarming trends in support for Israel among Americans.

Frank Luntz, a Republican consultant produced a poll, sponsored by the Jewish National Fund, of the country’s “opinion elites” – highly educated, very active political operatives – and found sharply divergent views between advocates for each party.

“Israel can no longer claim to have bipartisan support of America,” Luntz asserted.

Among the Democrats Luntz polled, 76% of those responding said that Israel has “too much influence” on U.S. foreign policy. Among Republicans, the number who affirmed that position was 20%.

Asked if Israel is a racist country, 40% of Democrats said it is, while 13% of Republicans agreed.

As to whether Israel wants peace with its neighbors, 88% of Republicans contended that it does, while just 48% of Democrats said so.

Questioned whether they would be more likely to vote for a politician who supports Israel and its right to defend itself, 76% of Republicans said yes, but only 18% of Democrats concurred. Seven percent of Republicans said this would make them less likely to support the candidate, while 32% of Democrats said so.

Asked whether a politician who criticizes Israeli occupation and “mistreatment of Palestinians” would get their vote, 45% of Democrats said yes, while six percent of Republicans agreed.

One-third of Democrats and 22% of Republicans said that they were upset that “Israel gets billions and billions of dollars in funding from the U.S. government that should be going to the American people”

On the choice of whether the United States should support Israel or the Palestinians, 90% of Republicans said Israel and two percent said Palestinians. Among Democrats, 51% said Israel and 18% said Palestinians. Asked to self-identify, 88% of Republicans and 46% of Democrats called themselves “pro-Israeli,” while 27% of Democrats and four percent of Republicans said they were “pro-Palestinian.”

Half of Democrats and 18% of Republicans said that “Jewish people are too hypersensitive and too often labeled legitimate criticisms of Israel as an antisemitic attack.”

The numbers look bad at first glance. But first glance is about all Luntz has given us. As other commentators have noted, the entirety of the poll’s methodology and results have not been made public, and the term “elites” suggests the interviewees may have been more “activist” than the average voters – read: “more liberal” in the case of Dems and “more conservative” in the case of Republicans.

As well, we would like to point out that asking someone if they support Palestinians or Israelis is a “false choice,” almost akin to asking which of their children they support. Such simplistic dichotomies are yet another example of the weakness of polling.

However, regardless of the specifics of the poll and its merits, Luntz had some common sense suggestions about pro-Israel messaging to which Americans, especially Democrats, respond well: messages of encouraging more communication and cooperation, and more diplomacy and discussion, not less, for example. The boycott, divestment and sanction movement, for instance, is opposed to these things and that is an Achilles’ heel for them.

Emphasizing the equality of women and freedom of religion, he found, were effective at increasing sympathy for Israel, while less successful were messages emphasizing the need for Jewish sovereignty after the Holocaust, claims to the Holy Land and depicting Israel as a “startup nation,” said Luntz.

Though the extent of the “crisis” may not be as severe as Luntz implies – Democratic nominee-apparent Hillary Clinton is striking an unambiguously pro-Israel tone in her campaign, for example – no one doubts that there are frictions in the Israel-U.S. relationship that are stronger on the Democratic side.

Certainly the petulant relationship between U.S. President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has not made things better.

There is also the fact of 15 years and counting of concerted anti-Israel mobilization on the left, especially on American university campuses, and in the burgeoning online media world.

Some of the unfriendliness may reflect simple political differences between a Democratic administration in the United States and a Likud government in Israel.

Despite the right-wing government in Israel, though, it remains ideologically consistent for people on the left and centre-left to remain committed to Israel because of its inherent liberal values. That is a message that needs to be more emphatically expressed by Israel activists on this side of the ocean. It won’t solve every problem, but it will be a start.

Canada, in this as in other things, differs. In Canada, the trajectory may well be the opposite, with the federal government’s pro-Israel position dragging the opposition parties and some of the public closer to Israel.

In both Canada and the United States, pro-Israel activists should be careful to tend all sides of our gardens. We need to ensure that people of all political persuasions understand that the existence, security and thriving of Israel is not a partisan matter, but one that, in addition to all the other reasons, makes the world a better place.