We Need Action, Even if it Comes with Discomfort

But where these voices are not being heard, and not only ignored but actively repressed, is within the Netanyahu coalition.

To Netanyahu, as long as he can continue to play Trump for a fool, the protests have dulled into little more than a nuisance: white noise every Saturday night, something he can eventually tune out entirely.

This is distressing, to say the least. For Israelis who have been demonstrating since at least the beginning of the judicial overhaul nearly two years ago, to dismiss their efforts feels misplaced. Their stamina has far surpassed anything we’ve seen here in Canada.

But there must be a way for these voices to bring about real change.

In other contexts, a strong political opposition could take up this mantle. Yet in Israel today, aside from the Arab parties and at times The Democrats led by Yair Golan, there is little forceful or unified opposition capable of doing so.

Given that reality, the responsibility falls to the people, battered, traumatized, and exhausted as they are.

A recent poll from aChord, whose CEO Ron Gerlitz spoke at our conference this past spring, offered some hopeful signs. A vast majority of Israelis agreed on issues such as ending the war, prioritizing the release of hostages even over defeating Hamas, and the belief that Netanyahu must step down. But one troubling data point stood out: 62% of those surveyed said they believe there are no innocents in Gaza.

This is not an argument to dismiss an entire society, to label it “genocidal,” or to assume change cannot come from within. Similar polling of Palestinians shows troubling results as well, and we rightly reject the claim, so often made by the Israeli government, that all Palestinians support terror or that all Palestinians are Hamas.

What we see in both cases is the effect of a biased media landscape, the absence of leaders who can offer hopeful alternatives, and existing leaders who thrive by keeping their populations scared and divided.

The reason this matters in translating mass protest into meaningful change is that, without courageous leadership willing to make hard political decisions, the burden falls on ordinary people.

Peacebuilding and shared society work are important, but they aren't necessarily required for a diplomatic resolution to this conflict, especially when a two-state solution does not necessitate former enemies living in the same state. Still, in the absence of leaders working toward such a resolution from the top down, the only path forward is bottom up. A society tasked with leading to that resolution, in the absence of its leaders, that cannot confront the uncomfortable truths at its core cannot end this conflict, rebuild its democracy, or heal itself.

Without grappling with the occupation, the looming threat of annexation, mass starvation and famine in Gaza, and the humanitarian crises, in Gaza due to the war, and in the West Bank due to settler violence, the roots of the conflict will never be resolved.

There is a reason these issues are usually dealt with at a state level. Asking everyday citizens to put aside the issues most pressing to them - not only mundane everyday things like cost of living or access to public transit, but the very real stresses that we don't have to deal with here in Canada of hundreds of days in the reserves, the rise of PTSD among those soldiers, and of course, the ongoing saga of the hostages left languishing and abandoned in Hamas tunnels - is a tall order, and one that most societies would fail at.

But when the state refuses to act, the responsibility does, however unfairly, fall to the people.

Yesterday, activists from Standing Together spilled red paint at the residence of the IDF Chief of Staff. While hundreds of thousands march for an end to the war, it is smaller groups that escalate further, refusing draft orders or engaging in civil disobedience. These actions are often seen as extreme, even by fellow protestors, yet they reflect the desperate reality Israel now faces.

Change is born in discomfort. But discomfort also risks alienating would-be allies.

So how do we stand in true allyship with these Israelis? How do we support the dramatic action needed to end this war without it tearing us further apart?

First, by recognizing the humanity of all people, empathizing and striving to understand the mindset of others. Allyship must begin from our most human instincts and emotions.

Second, by making clear that every action we take is rooted in the desire to see an Israel that lives up to the ideals we know it can embody. We are not seeking Israel’s destruction. In truth, it is Netanyahu and his extremist partners who endanger Israel’s survival. We want to save Israel.

And third, by remembering that Israel is not just any state, and our relationship to it is not like that with any other foreign power. Israel is a Jewish state, and with statehood comes both privilege and responsibility. We must take that responsibility seriously, not only as a now-sovereign people, but as Jews.

So we must ask ourselves: What do our Jewish values compel us to do? What does our Judaism make of this moment? And when history records how we responded to this war, not as Canadians, not simply as allies of another nation, but as Jews in covenant with our siblings in Israel, will we be able to say we lived up to who we truly want to be?

Because history will ask. And our answer will define not only our relationship with Israel, but the meaning of our Judaism itself.