The vast majority of Israelis polled in a recent study think Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has the best understanding of the complexities of the US-Israel relationship, according to a poll released by the Ruderman Family Foundation. The poll focused on the relationship between Israel and the US, and was released ahead of the third Ruderman Fellows Knesset Mission trip to New York and Boston, sponsored by the Ruderman Family Foundation and aimed at better educating MKs about the American Jewish community.
“The American Jewish community plays one of the most important roles in securing Israel's future, yet this vital Diaspora community is often not well understood by Israelis and their leaders,” said Jay Ruderman, president of the Ruderman Family Foundation. “The Ruderman Fellows Knesset Mission seeks to educate Israel's leaders to the diversity, pluralism and changing connection of American Jews to Israel. We believe that this one of a kind program will lead to a more nuanced relationship between Israel and American Jews.”
Of the politicians listed by the poll — Netanyahu, Finance Minister Yair Lapid, Disapora Affairs Minister Naftali Bennett, Opposition Leader Isaac Herzog, and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman — around 44 percent felt Netanyahu had the best handle on the US-Israel relationship. Twenty-three percent of respondents said they did not know which politicians had the best understanding. Bennett and Lapid received 7.3 and 4.2 percent of respondents’ votes, respectively.
Ruderman told the Post that the main focus of the upcoming trip for MKs is to help mitigate this apparent gap in knowledge that he said many Israeli politicians display. In his long history of interacting with Israeli political figures, Ruderman said, he realized that they “didn’t understand the American Jewish community, and didn’t care.”
“I believe the role of the American Jewish community is a strategic importance to Israel, and yet when I met political figures, they didn’t care and they didn’t know much about American Jews,” he said.
After all, most Israelis’ interactions with American Jews were in the context of discussing Israel: “Americans would come and talk about the threats facing Israel in Israel, and then Israeli politicians would come to the US and it would be the same conversation,” Ruderman said. “No one was talking about what the American community looks like, how it’s different than in Israel, how it operates, its connection to Israel and how that might be changing.”
Jewish life in America is very different, and just as vibrant, as in Israel, Ruderman said. This trip is an attempt to teach the six MKs from Meretz, Labor, Yesh Atid, Bayit Yehudi, and Likud Beytenu attending to not be so inwardly focused. “A lot of statements made in Israel are intended for internal consumption, but make Jews in the Diaspora upset,” Ruderman said. “There is a need to be more sophisticated and nuanced for the Diaspora community, because they’re paying attention. And as an elected official for the only Jewish state in world, they should be aware of largest Jewish community outside of Israel.” After all, Ruderman warned, that outside community helps ensure Israel’s security, and that doesn’t happen by accident. “Dynamics in the American community are not static,” he said.
The Ruderman poll also revealed that most Israelis recognize the need to engage with and be better connected to the American Jewish community, and were concerned about the trend in the younger generation of American Jews of disengaging with Israel. Around 62 percent of respondents strongly felt that the Israeli government should be spending money on trying to reverse this trend.
The two previous years of the trip, 2011 and 2012, Ruderman said many MKs, both who have visited the US hundreds of times and who have never been before, found their attitudes changed. Former head of Shin Bet Avi Dichter, one of the fellows on the first 2011 trip, reportedly told Ruderman that even though he had been to the US many times, it was the first time he had actually learned about the American Jewish Community.
“I think they’re extremely surprised at how the community works together,” Ruderman said of how the MKs have reacted in the past. “They’re shocked at pluralism here between the Reform, Conservative and Orthodox elements. Also, I believe they come to America thinking that all Jews have a connection to Israel, and that they should be making aliya, and if they’re not it’s for material reasons. And then they come and they realize there’s a vibrant Jewish community here, and they don’t know anything about it.”
One very interesting response was to a question about the Israeli Chief Rabbinate: most Israelis — around 49 percent — strongly felt that the Israeli rabbinate should officially recognize the Reform and Conservative streams of Judaism, sects to which the majority of American Jews belong, “and that this will in turn strengthen the connection with American Jews,” the poll said; only 10 percent of American Jews identify as Orthodox, the only brand of Judaism currently recognized in Israel. About 19 percent of respondents said Reform and Conservative Jews should not be recognized.
However most respondents (31.4 percent) felt that Diaspora Jews should not be represented in the Knesset; 29.7 percent said they felt Diaspora Jews should be represented “to some extent.” 37.2 percent were ambivalent about the idea of immigrants heading key ministries and Knesset committees who work in Diaspora relations.
About 30 percent of those polled felt the views of American Jews in the peace process should be taken into account “to some extent.” 22 percent thought American concerns should be taken into account “to a great extent,” and 18 percent said “not at all.”
The poll was run by Telesker and conducted by telephone with 500 Hebrew-speaking men and women over the age of 18. Participants were asked six questions about the US-Israel relationship, and were scaled in five categories: “to a very great extent,” “to a great extent,” “to some extent,” “to a small extent,” and “not at all.” Results were broken down by gender, age, religiosity, level of income and level of education.