As the Israeli government reflects its growing ultra-Orthodox population, older, liberal American Jews find themselves uncomfortably supporting an illiberal cause, while their children aren’t tempted to support the cause at all.
Peter Beinart identifies this schism in Jewish America. "For several decades," he says, "the Jewish establishment has asked American Jews to check their liberalism at Zionism's door and now, to their horror, they are finding that many young Jews have checked their Zionism instead."
The event was part of the 2010 Melbourne Writers Festival.
Bio
Peter Beinart
Peter Beinart is an American journalist and Associate Professor of Journalism and Political Science at the City University of New York. He is a Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation and Senior Political Writer for The Daily Beast website. Beinart worked at The New Republic until 2006, for much of the time writing The New Republic's signature "TRB" column, which was reprinted in the New York Post and other major American newspapers.
From 2007 to 2009, Beinart was a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Beinart is the author of The Good Fight: Why Liberals, and Only Liberals, Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again, and The Icarus Syndrome: A History of American Hubris.
Kerry O'Brien
Kerry O'Brien is one of the most prominent and respected names in Australian journalism. He has won many accolades, including the top award in journalism, the Gold Walkley.
Born in Queensland, O'Brien started as a news cadet in 1966. He has worked in newspapers, wire service and television news and current affairs, as a general reporter, feature writer, political and foreign correspondent, interviewer and compere. O'Brien came to The 7.30 Report, after six years as compere/interviewer of the ABC's highly respected Lateline program. Since December 1995, O'Brien has been editor and compere of the national 7.30 Report. He also anchors and moderates the ABC's election telecasts.
Country, Middle East, at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. Area: 8,357 sq mi (21,643 sq km). Population (2009 est.): 7,128,000 (includes population of Golan Heights and east Jerusalem; excludes population of the West Bank). Capital (proclaimed): Jerusalem (the city's status as capital has not received wide international recognition). Jews constitute some four-fifths of the population and Arabs about one-fifth. Languages: Hebrew, Arabic (both official). Religions: Judaism; also Islam, Christianity. Currency: new Israeli sheqel (NIS). Israel can be divided into four major regions: the Mediterranean coastal plain in the west; a hill region extending from the northern border into central Israel; the Great Rift Valley, containing the Jordan River, in the east; and the arid Negev, occupying nearly the entire southern half of the country. Its major drainage system is the interior basin formed by the Jordan River; Lake Tiberias (Sea of Galilee) provides water to much of the country's agricultural land. Israel has a mixed economy based largely on services and manufacturing; exports include machinery and electronics, diamonds, chemicals, citrus fruits, vegetables, and textiles. Its population is nine-tenths urban and is concentrated largely in the Mediterranean coastal plain and around Jerusalem. It is a multiparty republic with one legislative house, the Knesset; its head of state is the president, and the head of government is the prime minister. The record of human habitation in Israel (seePalestine) dates to the Paleolithic Period. Efforts by Jews to establish a national state there began in the late 19th century. Britain supported Zionism and in 1923 assumed political responsibility for what was then called Palestine. Migration of Jews to Palestine, which increased during the period of Nazi persecution, led to deteriorating relations with Arabs. In 1947 the UN voted to partition the region into separate Jewish and Arab states. The State of Israel was proclaimed in 1948, and Egypt, Transjordan (later Jordan), Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq immediately declared war on it. Israel won that war (seeArab-Israeli wars) as well as the 1967 Six-Day War, in which it occupied the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights, and east Jerusalem. Another war with its Arab neighbours followed in 1973, but the Camp David Accords led to a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt in 1979. Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 to expel the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from that country, and in late 1987 an uprising broke out among Palestinians of the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip (seeintifadah). Peace negotiations between Israel and the Arab states and Palestinians began in 1991. Israel and the PLO agreed in 1993 to a five-year plan to extend self-government to the Palestinians of the occupied territories. Israel signed a peace treaty with Jordan in 1994. Israeli soldiers and a Lebanese militia, Hezbollah, clashed throughout the 1990s. Israeli troops withdrew from Lebanon in 2000, and negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians broke down amid violence that claimed hundreds of lives. In an effort to stem the fighting, Israel in 2005 withdrew its soldiers and settlers from parts of the West Bank and from all of the Gaza Strip, which came under Palestinian control.
Religion of Jews who adhere strictly to traditional beliefs and practices; the official form of Judaism in Israel. Orthodox Jews hold that both the written law (Torah) and the oral law (codified in the Mishna and interpreted in the Talmud) are immutably fixed and remain the sole norm of religious observance. Orthodox Judaism has held fast to such practices as daily worship, dietary laws, intensive study of the Torah, and separation of men and women in the synagogue. It also enjoins strict observance of the Sabbath and does not permit instrumental music during communal services. A leading center of Orthodoxy in the U.S. is New York's Yeshiva Univ.
Jewish nationalism movement with the goal of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine. In the 16th–17th century, a number of “messiahs” tried to persuade the Jews to return to Palestine, but by the late 18th century interest had largely faded. Pogroms in Eastern Europe led to formation of the “Lovers of Zion,” which promoted the settlement of Jewish farmers and artisans in Palestine. In the face of persistent anti-Semitism, Theodor Herzl advocated a Jewish state in Palestine. He held the first Zionist Congress in Basel in 1897. After World War I the movement picked up momentum with the issuing of the Balfour Declaration. The Jewish population in Palestine increased from 90,000 in 1914 to 238,000 in 1933. The Arab population resisted Zionism, and the British tried unsuccessfully to reconcile Jewish and Arab demands. Zionism achieved its goal with the creation of Israel in 1948. See alsoAlliance Israélite Universelle, David Ben-Gurion, Hagana, Vladimir Jabotinsky, Irgun Zvai Leumi.
Very stuck on stupid this fellow needs history lessons. I am a jew well over sixty and i know of the camps parents barely survived there was never ever a palestine nation the turks pushed arabs into jewish palestine years before ww1. No such thing as palestine or palestine people. To support hamas you support distorted history out right lies:
Knowing the historical details makes this entire lecture stuck on stupid, useless and promoting false history.
The expulsion was arabs telling arabs to leave and come back after the arabs slaughter the jews:
Mufti jerusalem deal he made with hitler will always be remembered by jews.
Peter is historical moron very stupid
member. 
