"Rachel" and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival

One of Dane's friends, Davey, recently wrote a terrific post about Jewish San Franciscans who pressured SFJFF not to screen Rachel, a documentary about the late activist Rachel Corrie, about whom I've also written. (It ended up being screened, as JTA reported today.) When Davey refers to

a small but wealthy segment of the Jewish community that is so Zionist that it considers it inappropriate for a Jewish film festival to screen any film that is not explicitly and completely pro-Israeli-government

the word "groupthink" comes to mind, and I feel grateful that I was raised with healthy skepticism in relation to Israel.

When I was growing up, if someone around our family's Passover table said "Next year in Jerusalem," as is customary, my father would express ambivalence about that supposedly universal Jewish yearning. I think a source of my own ambivalence with regard to Jewish identity is related to the notion that because I'm Jewish I should believe X, Y, or Z, or should support Israel in this or that particular way. I'm an individual, I have my own mind, and the Israeli government is a government, not something God created, not the 11th commandment. It's flawed, and when it's acting as an oppressor, it needs to be called out, especially by Jews.

Some aspects of my skepticism towards Judaism and certain things Jewish may reflect deep-seated ethnic self-loathing, but when it comes to questioning Israel's actions (and its incredibly suspect "internal investigations" of such incidents as Corrie's death), skepticism equals common sense.