Discussion Has Become Complicity.
Lori Lefkovitz • Age 68
Ruderman Chair of Jewish Studies and Professor of English at Northeastern University
Soon after October 7th, with the devastations of Gaza unfolding against a background of growing white supremacy and global antisemitism, I said in passing to a colleague, “it’s a hard minute to be Jewish.” I was met with … silence. If my colleague’s muteness was signaling that being Jewish is not as hard as being a mother in Gaza, how is that relevant?
Too often, recently, I doubt my interpretations of people’s responses, feeling (perhaps irrationally) negatively judged because my field is Jewish Studies and because I have a lifelong relationship with Israel. In this current climate of pervasive anxiety, I am also sensitive to expressing “the privilege of despair,” though I am grieving while awash in blessing.
For me, feminism often manifests in my life and work in the strength of community, feminist process, practices of self-location, compassion, morality, and being in conversation. I am at a loss as more and more people whom I admire insist that in the face of what they consider a genocide, discussion is complicity.
At the same time, because free expression is core to academic values, we academics have, ironically, also been demonized by segments of the Jewish community who characterize all challenges to Israel as antisemitic. I believe that it is dangerous to Jews when accusations of antisemitism are exaggerated or weaponized by forces on the political right who want to suppress protest. It is not lost on me that the college presidents who have been driven from their jobs this year are women. That said, antisemitism is visible among well-intentioned people who are understandably horrified by the war but have been persuaded by a range of antisemitic stereotypes and prejudices that they cannot disentangle from criticism of Israel’s policy choices. I feel frustrated as an educator that there are not sustained, strategic efforts to bring light to these various dark places.
What gives me hope? I am grateful for conversation partners, including smart feminist friends and other directors of Jewish Studies programs who represent diverse campus climates, puzzle out these intricacies together with caring for one another and a shared sense of purpose to protect students and maintain our loyalty to academic freedom. The Nexus Task Force, in which I participate, works to tease out the often-subtle difference between antisemitism and criticism of Israel, sharing readings and struggling to contribute fruitfully to a larger debate by advocating for nuance.
My joyful parents, survivors of the Holocaust, found two consolations for their immense losses: their children and the State of Israel, such that in the depths of my unconscious, I identify with Israel as a flawed site of redemption. What has devolved there breaks my heart, but I am heartened by the magnitude of protests in their streets.
