Dear King David Schools,
I have mainly good memories of my time at King David Victory Park, one of six Jewish day schools under the King David banner in Johannesburg. But it has also become increasingly clear to me, as I grow older, that King David’s brand of education has actively contributed to the mess Jews now find themselves in globally.
Even in the midst of Israel losing control in every conceivable way, committing progressively immoral acts each day, including forced starvation, the shooting of innocent people queuing for food, the torture of prisoners, the targeting of aid workers and journalists, the destruction of Gaza’s entire medical system, the carpet bombing of civilian areas, and so on, we as Jews, according to the Zionist education I received at school, are meant to continue to support Israel, right or wrong, without question.
King David is not just a Jewish school, but an overtly Zionist one. As a pupil of this school in the 90s, I was taught Zionist history, including deliberate distortions of the truth such as the idea that the State of Israel was ‘a land without people for a people without land’, and that Israel boasted the world’s ‘most moral army’, a claim that has since been proven so completely out of touch with reality that it has seemingly been abandoned as a hasbara talking point. Our sports houses carried the names of Zionist heroes – Herzl, Ben Gurion, Weizmann and Bialik, men who I came to realise in time played a role, whether physically or ideologically, in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
At the age of fifteen, I was sent on a tour of Israel alongside about half of the people in my standard. This tour, Ulpan, served its purpose for my educators at the time, I left a committed Zionist who very much believed in the importance of Israel in keeping Jews safe. But on the tour, the issue of the Palestinian people was rendered invisible. We did not meet any Palestinians or visit the parts of Israel where they are – at least for now – still allowed to exist. It was as if us becoming committed Zionists would only be possible if the very existence of the Palestinian people was erased from our collective memory.
Other memories from school highlight the dangers that the conflation of a religion with a political identity has resulted in. One rabbi would lead his classes in the singing of parody songs based on famous hits. One of these songs, based on U2’s With or Without You, contained the refrain ‘we won’t give this land away’. The same rabbi, in a speech in front of the entire school at assembly, joked about throwing stones at his Arab neighbours as a child. It was in this way and others that the idea of Judaism as a militaristic religion that dominates through sheer might was reinforced.
The results of this education were evident when I first began to question what Israel has done and continues to do with ever increasing fervour in all our name.
Back then, I did not yet see myself as an Anti-Zionist, and wrote a Facebook post reacting to news that Israel, during one of its regular attacks on Gaza, had bombed schools. I stated that this is unacceptable and called for a two state solution. The post was mild – of course both Judaism and Zionism should not allow or accept war crimes such as the bombing of schools, and the two state solution back then was – at least officially – endorsed by many Zionists (and since rejected by many Anti-Zionists such as myself in favour of a single, democratic state). But from the reaction to my post, you would think that I called for all Israelis to be expelled immediately.
One former school mate accused me of being an existential threat to my own people. Another expressed the bizarre but very common view that Palestinians don’t exist, as if the schools being bombed were a figment of my imagination. Others, in other regards seemingly normal compassionate people, expressed the view that bombing schools was not only morally acceptable but the right thing to do. The ‘nicest’ former King Davidians responding said the only reason they could think of for one of their former pupils speaking out against the bombing of a school was that I was seeking attention. If the role of a school is to impart basic moral values in its pupils, then the reaction to my post shows that King David has failed in this regard.
The result of the vitriol I received in response to expressing a view that should hardly be controversial, for me, was the beginning of the journey that allowed me to reject Zionism fully. If Zionism created people that had no problem with schools full of innocent children being bombed, even arguing forcefully that bombing such schools is the right thing to do, then I wanted no part in it.
I write this letter because I feel it is time for King David, as a learning institution, to take responsibility for not only allowing but in many ways encouraging its students to grow up holding such violent beliefs. These beliefs are a perversion of Judaism’s true values, which include Tikkun Olam – the concept of repairing the world – Tzedakah – the concept of charity and justice, and Chesed – the concept of loving kindness.
In other ways, King David was a school that taught critical thinking, a central part of Judaism. When I was there it was possible to debate almost any idea. But when it came to Israel, this veneer of critical thinking fell away completely. It was simply accepted when I was at school that Judaism was Zionism and that any questioning of this made one a traitor. As a learning institution, you need not only to take responsibility for this lapse in the ability of your former pupils to think critically, but to do better than this in future.
There is a lot King David can do to start the painful process of returning to Judaism’s true values. I acknowledge that given the school’s history, asking for you to retreat entirely from Zionism would be too much, as much as I believe this would be the best course of action. Rather, I would ask for you to acknowledge the existence of non-zionist and Anti-Zionist Jews within your community, and to actively protect our right to free speech. Teach your children not only that we exist, but why we exist: because Zionism is a political ideology and that not all Jews accept it. Teach them about organisations such as South African Jews for a Free Palestine, of which I am a member. Show them that it is possible to reject Zionism or to at very least reject our current reality, a never-ending cycle of death and destruction. And more importantly, teach a version of history that includes the Palestinian perspective and that does not rely solely on propaganda. Teach your children that Palestinians are normal human beings like you and me, not an amorphous mass of bloodthirsty terrorists. Teach them this because it is the truth.
If you do insist, as I’m sure you will, that Zionist values are an important part of a Jewish education, then at least teach your children that peace is possible, and that Zionism’s current form of right wing fascism must be opposed. If it is possible to teach a form of Zionism that does not result in a community that finds the bombing and starving of innocents acceptable – and I’m convinced it isn’t – I would call on you to at very least prove this by example. Failure to do so will only prove the point that Zionism is not compatible with the basic morals espoused by our religion.
As I’m sure you are aware, antisemitism is on the rise globally. I’m sure we are in agreement that this is dangerous, but we disagree on why this is happening. At school I was taught that Judaism – a religion that has existed for thousands of years and Zionism – a nationalist political ideology only a couple of hundreds of years old and that began as a fringe movement widely treated with suspicion by Jews – were indivisible. At King David, the idea that you could be Jewish while rejecting this ideology was treated with derision, those suggesting it silenced and marginalised.
But to me and many others, it is very clearly this idea that is fuelling antisemitism globally. People have seen that Israel is committing morally and legally unacceptable acts daily. If they are to believe, as you appear to, that these acts are being perpetrated not only on behalf of a state but in the interests of all Jewish people, obviously they are going to form negative views regarding the religion as a whole.
Likewise, the idea that Israel exists to keep Jews safe is, at this point, absurd. Israel’s actions are very clearly putting Jews around the world in great danger, as the rise in antisemitism as a result of Israel’s actions shows.
I could scarcely think of a less safe place to be than Israel right now. The recent decision of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies to ‘repatriate’ (their words, not mine) 200 South African citizens visiting Israel during Iran’s response to the war Israel provoked it into, appears to indicate that they agree with me on this. If they don’t, I would love them to explain how a country that is committing a genocide while also attempting to coax Iran into a war that could affect the entire world is keeping anyone, even its own people, safe.
If you insist on maintaining that Judaism and Zionism are one and the same, then you must in turn take responsibility for the current rise of antisemitism globally. If the IDF represents Judaism, then Judaism must, by extension, be a religion that supports genocide, torture, forced starvation, and the murder of innocent children. I strongly reject this idea, and it is time for all Zionists to reckon with an obvious truth – by standing against violence, Anti-Zionist Jews are the only Jews currently doing what they can to lessen antisemitism, by demonstrating that authentic Judaism is in fact a religion of peace.
Rather than acknowledging this, Zionist Jews attack their Anti-Zionist counterparts relentlessly, without any repercussions, and call us ‘kapo’, which refers to Jews who collaborated with Nazis during the Holocaust. This is ironic, since if you have to compare current events to this immense tragedy, it is in fact Zionists, who appear to support genocide, starvation, the shooting of innocent people queuing for food, and now the proposed creation of a concentration camp to house the remaining Gazans, who are behaving in a similar way to those who once sought to exterminate all Jews.
I write this because the status of Zionism as a failed, dying project at this point is very clear to anyone able to see beyond the indoctrination that forms part of a formal Jewish education in South Africa and other places globally. Part of the reason for this is that liberal Zionists, rather than applying their liberal values to Israel, have always instead made an exception for it, reinforcing the idea that this state does not have an obligation to function under the same laws as any other.
As most Zionists have regressed into a state of undisguised and blind bloodlust, it seems it has been left up to supposedly liberal Zionists to try and spin the actions of their more violent – albeit honest – allies. But these liberal Zionists are unable to advance coherent arguments for the very simple reason that none of their liberal values – such as equality for all and equal rights – exist in Israel. Their existence is therefore a paradox, and they tie themselves up into all sorts of logical knots trying to deny this.
Zionism’s supporters at this point seem to have entirely rejected facts in favour of a few basic and easily debunkable hasbara talking points. Hamas, human shields, tunnels underground, etc. It’s not good enough and normal people around the world are now able to see through it immediately. The atrocities we have all had livestreamed on our devices for nearly two years cannot simply be explained away, not even with more complex propaganda than that with which Israel’s defenders automatically fall back on when confronted with the state’s many unacceptable crimes against humanity.
While hard-line Zionists have run amuck with total impunity, so-called liberal Zionists have failed to hold the state they support accountable in any way. By not resisting Israel’s decades-long descent into right wing fascism, they have signalled over and over again that they are ok with this development. For this reason, any distinction between Zionists who state their intentions clearly and those that hide behind delusions of liberalism is irrelevant.
I am sure that the reaction to this letter will be predictable. Zionists will respond to my central point, that the Zionist worldview rejects moral and critical thinking, in a way that simply reinforces it, utterly unaware of the irony of them doing so.
I am under no delusion that this letter will magically break the spell Zionism has placed you under. But as one of a growing number of anti-Zionist jews, we have no other moral choice but to try to break this spell. Whether that is possible, at this stage, is unclear, but still, we must try. The question is, what will it take for King David to stop actively promoting ideas that make the world less safe for Jews, Palestinians, and indeed all human beings? I think not only those within your community who dare to stand up against what has been done, but all people invested in a better world, deserve an answer to this question.
Since I have outlined the ways in which you, as educators, have played a role in getting us into this mess, I hope you will do the self-reflection required to help get us out of it.
I live in hope, because like all other people who are unable to accept neverending violence as the only possible reality on this planet, hope is all we have.
Sincerely,
Daniel Friedman, an ex-pupil