We conducted two sessions outside North America in midsize Jewish communities in Germany and South Africa. Germany has a Jewish population of about 100,000; 60,000 Jews remain in South Africa. Dialogue sessions in both cases consisted of the Jewish leadership. Interestingly, neither community reported polarization to the same extent as the North American communities. In place of that they experience: 1) friction and even conflict with the non-Jewish environment; and 2) and a sense of remoteness from, and apathy toward, ideological and political controversies that engulf the larger communities in Israel and North America.
The problem of conflict with the non-Jewish environment was very much present in the discussion with the South African community. The South African government, headed by the ANC, is unabashedly pro-Palestinian and very critical of Israel. It has reduced diplomatic relations with Israel and has downgraded its embassy in Israel to liaison office. Although South African Jews took an active role in the anti-apartheid struggle, this hostility and other economic and political problems besetting South Africa, have turned the community somewhat inward and increasingly Orthodox. In this context, internal conflict has been minimized and intra-community solidarity has increased in the face of external threats. At the same time, the South African Jewish community tends to feel at some remove from the controversies and the struggles in Israel and the North American community. They would like to be part of world Jewry, but its agenda is not entirely relevant for them.
The German leaders expressed similar feelings. One participant said that, unlike the North American community, they don’t have debates or arguments over Israeli government policies within their communal structures. They did, however, report that they are affected by what Israel does, because their non-Jewish environment views them as “representatives” of Israel and holds them “responsible” for what Israel does or does not do. From this point of view, it would be useful if the Israeli government could implement a mechanism to estimate and report to Israeli decision makers the impact Israeli actions have, or would likely have, on Diaspora Jews. Despite this, because of their remoteness, the German leaders said that there is a certain degree of apathy toward recent internal Israeli controversies. Some suggested that it would be useful if they were given the intellectual resources – by the Israeli government, the Jewish Agency or other major Jewish organization – to hold an evening seminar in which Israel’s judicial reform controversy could be explained. They would like to have both sides of the controversy explained together with the advantages and drawbacks of each position.
Despite the differences in situations, the survey answers of the non-American participants were quite similar to those in Dialogue discussions convened by American federations. This was somewhat surprising in light of their indication that the controversies preoccupying the North American communities and Israel were less relevant for their communities. We suggest two approaches to reconciling the data that could dovetail and reinforce each other. The first is that the participants were communal leaders and hence more aware of, and involved with, trends and developments in North America and Israel. Second, because of the friction and conflict with the non-Jewish environment consensus and harmony are norms of communal life there. As one German participant explained, exposing disagreement and controversy in the public communal space is simply “not done.” However, when they privately and anonymously completed the survey, they allowed themselves to indicate an awareness of, and concern about, polarization.
