Are six decades of solidarity giving way to generational strain?
For much of the last half-century, support for Israel was a defining pillar of American Jewish life. It shaped institutions, philanthropy, politics and identity. The consensus wasn’t always quiet — but it was broad.
Today, that consensus is under strain.
Younger American Jews — many raised in synagogues, camps and on birthright trips — are expressing a different relationship to Israel than their parents and grandparents. Some are building alternative communities. Some are challenging legacy organizations. Some are questioning whether Israel should remain the organizing center of American Jewish life at all.
Meanwhile, established institutions are responding with urgency — and anxiety — warning of rising antisemitism, political danger and fractures that could reshape the community for decades.
This tension didn’t begin on Oct. 7. But Oct. 7 — and the war that followed — has intensified it. Religion reporter Yonat Shimron joins us to trace the full arc: from postwar American Jewish flourishing, to decades of near-consensus, to the generational and institutional rupture unfolding now.
What changed? Who gets to define Jewish responsibility? And what happens next?
This transcript was generated using AI tools and may contain minor transcription errors.
Amanda Henderson
For much of the last half-century, support for Israel functioned as a kind of organizing principle in American Jewish life It shaped institutions, philanthropy, politics, even identity itself. The consensus was broad. But that consensus is now under visible strain.
Younger American Jews, many of them raised in synagogues, summer camps, and on birthright trips. are expressing a different relationship to Israel than their parents and grandparents. Some are building alternative communities Some are challenging legacy organizations. Some are questioning whether support for Israel should remain the central pillar of American Jewish life.
At the same time, established institutions are responding with urgency, warning of rising anti-Semitism, political threats, and what they see as dangerous fractures inside the community.
This tension didn’t begin on October 7th, but the war that followed intensified it. So what’s actually changed? Is this a generational shift, a political realignment, a theological reckoning, or something deeper about Jewish identity in the 21st century?
Today, religion reporter Yonat Shimron helps us trace the arc from post-war American Jewish flourishing to decades of near consensus to the moment we’re living in now. Yonat Shimran, welcome back to Complexified.
Yonat Shimron
Thank you for having me.
Amanda Henderson
Grateful you’re here. If we rewind to the mid-1960s, 20 years after the Holocaust, American Jews are thriving, suburbanizing, entering elite professions, dominating parts of entertainment and media. What did that moment feel like inside American Jewish life?
Yonat Shimron
Well, in nineteen sixty seven, during the Six Day War, Israel captured a lot of land, the Gaza Strip. the West Bank, parts of East Jerusalem. And there was this moment when American Jews just began to feel immense pride at what Israel had been able to accomplish. And if earlier in the decade, in the century, there was disagreement over Israel and over Zionism after nineteen sixty seven that all changed. And American Jews began to really see Israel as a part of as as as a core part of their identity. In some cases Israel even became a replacement for Judaism. It was it w it was everything for a lot of Jews it was much more important than going to synagogue or fulfilling the many mitzvot commandments of Judaism. Israel was kind of this It was it was kind of sexy. Hm. When Israel on trips, you know, they liked the bravado of the soldiers They loved, you know, Israeli food, the beach, the mountains, the ancient sites. It was just very, there was this kind of romantic sentiment about Israel
Henderson
So interesting. And what was the idea of Zionism during that time?
Shimron
Well, Zionism means many things, but one one thing it means is the idea of creating a a homeland for for Jews. Hmm.
Henderson
It’s kind of bound up in that that mythical connectedness to this land.
Shimron
to this land that Jews hadn’t occupied for so long and suddenly did again.
Henderson
Okay, so then we go to the nineteen seventies and nineteen eighties, nineties. Mainstream Jewish institutions increasingly organized around this pro-Israel advocacy. How did that political organizing around Israel become such a defining pillar of communal life.
Shimron
Yeah, I mean American Jews have donated vast sums of money to Israel through their organizations. Israel was also part and parcel of American foreign policy. It was an ally American government gave tons of money to Israel. There was a very close relationship between the two and that became began to break down a little bit as it’s became apparent that Israel wasn’t about to sign a peace deal or to give over the territories that it had conquered and there were, you know, increasing numbers of Palestinians living on that on those lands that were being oppressed there l ability to move around was limited, and they had no rights to vote, to arrange their affairs, to even buy land and organize their communities so it began to be a problem.
Henderson
Yeah. So it sounds like there’s these two things happening. One, there’s this kind of growth and flourishing of institutions. Jewish institutions. I think about the ADL and the different federations across the country. And it sounds like you’re saying that there was also some dissent in those decades that it wasn’t all consensus that there were these corners of kind of uneasiness about what was happening with the Palestinian people.
Shimron
Right, as you move into the 80s, the 90s, the failure of the Oslo Accords, the ongoing the first and second intifada Some Americans are beginning to question Israel’s behavior.
Henderson
Hmm. And what does that look like as Americans are questioning Israel’s behavior?
Shimron
Well, there are more and more groups that are cropping up. Yeah, Americans for Peace Now, J Street, all kinds of alternatives that try to encourage Israel to push towards some kind of a solution to the Palestinian problem and an end to the occupation which they view as corrosive certainly to society and to democracy and to all these good values.
Henderson
As time gets further and further away from the Holocaust and people who have experienced the Holocaust or have family members who have. Do you see generational differences develop in Jewish communities? relationship to Israel in the United States? Yes, absolutely.
Shimron
If initially your grandparents were completely on board with Israel you, you know, the children and grandchildren began to take a different approach to it. They began to s view Israel very critically. So there’s that generational divide definitely begins to take hold. There are groups that you know, like Birthright, you mentioned Birthright. There are Jews who are beginning to slide away, I guess, become assimilated. And Birthright tries to stem intermarriage by bringing young kids to Israel and hoping that they marry within the faith rather than outside of it. So yeah, there’s there’s more of that. There’s there’s less consensus certainly around Israel.
Henderson
Yonat, let’s move toward October 7th. This was this pivotal moment where we saw many different powerful responses among American Jews. There, of course, was this deep moral anguish and grief. There was also profound fear and solidarity What’s happening here in this moment of October 7th within the context of decades of developing and shifting Jewish identity?
Shimron
Yeah, October 7th was a big wound, obviously for Israelis, but also for American Jews. the Hamas attack was very, very painful for Israel. It was it was kind of embarrassing that this, you know, great power could be that Hamas could infiltrate Isra Israel so easily and so forth. But that pain turned into frustration very early on, at least in some parts of the American Jewish community. when Israel began a kind of very brutal assault on the Gaza Strip. It’s had gone on now for more than two years. There have been more than seventy five thousand Palestinians that have been killed by the IDF, all of them, you know, with American bombs and American artillery and American planes. You know, a lot of American Jews began to question whether the United States should be giving unconditional support to Israel and its army in the form of taxpaying dollar aid.
Henderson
To the tune of billions of dollars. And the people who are questioning that, how big is that questioning within the Jewish community? I mean, is the questioning fringe or is that mainstream questioning.
Shimron
That’s a good question, and it’s one that I think pollsters are really trying to get a handle on. A recent survey by the Jewish Federations of North America found that only a third of Americans now identify as Zionists. Wow. A big drop. Do you know what that was in the past? You know, I’m not sure, but I would venture to say that the majority of American Jews probably identified as Zionists in years past. There was another very devastating Washington Post poll last year that showed that Sixty-one percent of American Jews believe that Israel committed war crimes in Gaza and as many as 39% believe that it committed genocide. So a real drop in support for Israel as this war has progressed. It just seemed like it would never end.
Henderson
So of these folks within the Jewish community that are countering the ways of the State of Israel, are they Jewish folks who have been on the edges or are these people who are deeply within the Jewish community?
Shimron
Many of them are deeply within the Jewish community. There are people who have been to Israel, there are people who are educated in American Day schools. They are people who had, you know, went through the synagogue system, got a bar mitzvah, went to Jewish camp. Some of them are very highly educated in in about Jewish life.
Henderson
Yeah, and as more of these young Jewish people publicly criticize Israel policy, often in explicitly theological language. We’re seeing this strong, sometimes forceful response from established organizations. What explains the intensity of the reaction to that critique in this moment?
Shimron
You know, I think they’re unprepared for it and, you know, in the past many Jews just kind of disaffiliated and, you know, they assimilated into secular culture. This group of Jews is not disaffiliating, it’s not cutting its ties, it insists on creating new institutions, not criticizing often very sharply the Jewish institutions that have that have shown absolute fealty to Israel and an inability to stop and consider the fate of Palestinians and this the intense suffering that Israel has inflicted on Palestinians. So it’s a little bit different.
Henderson
I always think about the the multiple ways to address change. You know, you can work for change from within institutions or you can leave the institution and start your own community. are there pieces within the Jewish community where each of those things are happening, where people are trying to reform institutions or are people Leaving.
Shimron
I just returned from Boston where I reported on the conference of the on the Jewish Left that was sponsored by Boston University. And there I found both. So there are lots of new congregations being established. Many of them are not quite yet completely established. They’re more like home prayer groups. Some are far more far farther along, but there’s also plans for a new anti-Zionist Day School that’s being developed in Boston. And there’s a lot of ferment. There’s a lot of new organizations that are being birthed. that are tha that have a different relationship with Israel. They they they want to distance themselves from Israel or completely disavow it. The various reactions. But there are also, I did find one group that is trying to help people who have different views about Israel trying to help them create respectful dialogue within their existing congregations. There’s this new group called Massachusetts Synagogue Network on Israel-Palestine And it’s trying to work with people instead of having them leave synagogues because of their criticism of Israel. It’s trying to see if they can provide space for people with different opinions within those congregations. But ultimately I think Many younger people don’t want to be in these older established synagogue places. They want to create their own kind of Judaism.
Henderson
And what kind of values are they calling upon and how do they draw upon the history of the people of Israel and of it within their Jewish tradition as they’re establishing those new communities.
Shimron
Yes, so many of these new communities, they they talk about creating a liberatory Judaism, one that honors the sacredness of all life, not just Jewish life. And it’s rooted in core values of of justice and equity and solidarity, certainly with the poor and the the stranger. So yeah, so that’s that’s kind of the the ethos of many of these new congregations.
Henderson
So Judaism has always been tied up in politics. Yes. And I wonder as these movements are shifting and changing and there’s less of a assumed consensus on American Jewish support for Israel as a country. How is that playing out politically in the United States
Shimron
American Jews have for the most part been pretty liberal as a whole, maybe changing a little bit now, but about 75% of Jews typically vote for the Democratic Party. And and that hasn’t really changed much over the past few decades, certainly. There is a growing number of Jews who as a response to Gaza have be begun leaning to the right, but it’s not clear yet that they’re that they will ever be a majority any time soon. So There are increasingly calls among Jews themselves to condition aid to Israel. We see this on a national level. we see you know even some Jewish candidates for office who are calling for conditioning military aid to Israel, most notably in the person of Bernie Sanders. But there are growing numbers of candidates that are willing to challenge this, some of them Jews as well, and the success of Zohran Mamdani in the New York Mayoral race is a big indication that the consensus has frayed. He was helped to victory by a vast grassroots effort on the part of younger Jews. Not all Jews, of course, voted for Mamdani, but younger Jews did in great in in great numbers.
Henderson
Mm-hmm. Which has been contentious, it sounds like, among Jewish communities.
Shimron
Yes. The Anti Defamation League believes that he is anti-Semitic because he does not he is not a Zionist and calls what Israel did in Gaza a genocide and it has started this Mamdani Monitor to watch his every move and prominent rabbis have also spoken out against him, saying they believe that he’s a danger to the Jewish community in New York. Rabbis like Elliot Cosgrove and Andrea Buchtal have urged their flock not to vote for him. It’s it’s caused a lot of division
Henderson
Yeah, while simultaneously the younger generation is supporting him. Yes, that’s right.
Well, this has been fascinating, so interesting, and I am grateful for you taking the time to help bring us into the fullness of this story of the shifts in Jewish identity really over the past 50 years and this real pivotal moment that we are in today.
Shimron
It’s a pleasure
Henderson
Complexified comes to you from the Institute for Religion, Politics and Culture at the Isle of School of Theology, in partnership with Religion News Service. Senior producer is Jonathan Woodward. We are edited by Stefanie De Leon Tzic. Associate Producer is Josh Perez. Consulting producer is Paul O’Donnell. I’m Amanda Henderson. The world needs us now. More thinking, more questions, more curiosity, more complexified.
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