Support for the state of Israel is in decline among American Jews. Let there be no confusion: Israel still commands strong support among most American Jews; especially older Jews and Orthodox Jews. But that is the issue. Israel is losing support among the rising generation of American Jews whom are overwhelmingly liberal and committed to universal values.

Older Jews are more committed to Israel for Israel was born in their time as a fledgling state risen from the ashes of the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a stronger focus on the imagination of Jews of that generation and the suffering of so many Jews created a passionate need to defend a Jewish state that would provide self-defense for the community. Israel and Zionism become a part of the Jewish identity. Further, older Jews were raised on the image of Israel presented in the Hollywood film Exodus which presented a benign state of optimistic settlers while portraying in unabashed racism Palestinians as savages with no tangible connection to the land of Palestine.

Religious Jews support Israel out of tribal loyalty and biblical devotion. There support is more blind-minded. There are also, of course, secular Jews who are support Israel out of tribal solidarity.

But both these groups are a minority within the Jewish community. Younger Jews are liberal and have been raised in an era when Israel is not a new state founded ostensible on Western values, but an occupying power that routinely abuses and kills a people which it denies any rights to.

This is the point a Washington Post op-ed makes today:

...for the past 42 of its 61 years, Israel has ruled over Palestinians who are citizens neither of Israel nor of a Palestinian state. They are — a condition that should be familiar to Jews — stateless. The blame for their statelessness is surely their own as well as the Israelis’, but in time, the Israeli role in the Palestinian disaster has eroded American Jewish identification with Israel.

Israel’s is losing its American foot-soldiers meant to defend the nation. Instead of being a cause that once inspired Jews, for many young, liberal American Jews Israel now appears to be more a right-wing and, less appealing, a right-wing Evangelical Christian cause.

Expert pollster Frank Luntz, polled 800 American Jews and found support down among the youth.

Of the 800 American Jews Mr. Luntz questioned, 67% of those age 65 or older said they were strong supporters of Israel, compared to 53% of those between the ages of 18 and 29.That number has dwindled in the last 20 years.

Supports of Israel see such a reality and instead of blaming Israel’s destructive policies, they blame the media or lack of an effective propaganda campaign. But those talking points have grown tired.