3 min read
American Jews are still digesting the news that Donald Trump is their next president.
Among the seven out of 10 who voted for Hillary Clinton there is, according to one New York rabbi, a "widespread and communal sense of loss, anxiety, fear and profound sadness" of the kind last felt on 9/11.
Immediately after the results, his congregants had gathered in random get-togethers, speaking in hushed tones almost as if they were at a shiva, he said.
Others tell of the divisive effects the elections are having on their communities. After one rabbi invited his congregants, mostly liberal Democrats, to gather to share their thoughts, he received an angry email from another member who accused him of being like Neville Chamberlain, and resigning his synagogue membership with immediate effect.
It was not entirely clear to the rabbi who was cast in the role of Hitler in this scenario but the anger and confusion triggered by the election results were unmistakable.
Jewish communal organisations, though, have already begun to get to grips with the new reality. According to one veteran communal leader, "no one from the Jewish community is willing to cut Trump any slack whatsoever.
"It's hard to quantify the anger that's out there. He is viewed as someone totally beyond the pale. There is no redemption for the things he has said and done."
Many issued statements congratulating Mr Trump on his victory but also voiced concerns about what may lie ahead. The American Jewish Committee said "a first priority should be to address the wounds of an extraordinarily divisive contest", noting the bigotry and exclusion that marred the election campaign and which threatens to corrode the "pluralistic fabric" of the United States.
Ameinu, the voice of progressive Zionist Jews in north America, was even more direct in its criticism of Mr Trump. According to Ken Bob, the organisation's president, "his misogynistic, anti-immigrant, insensitive campaigning cannot be wiped away with a few conciliatory phrases in a speech.
"This rhetoric encouraged a level of antisemitism that exceeds what we have seen in the US for some time.
"The appointment of Steve Bannon as chief strategist in the White House does not bode well in this regard. When a presidential candidate receives the endorsement of the Ku Klux Klan and David Duke, there is a reason."
Steve Bannon's appointment was also criticised by the Anti-Defamation League, which said: "It is a sad day when a man who presided over the premier website of the 'alt-right' - a loose-knit group of white nationalists and unabashed antisemites and racists - is slated to be a senior staff member in the 'people's house'."
David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, described Mr Bannon's appointment as a lightning rod for Jewish concerns about what the new administration will do.
He said: "I can't remember the last time a leading Jewish organisation came out so publicly against a president."
The Republican Party, which Mr Makovsky notes has tried hard to reach out to cultivate Jewish voters and be vocal on Israel, has remained largely silent on the matter.
A board member of the Republican Jewish Coalition, though, defended Mr Bannon, saying "the person that is being demonised in the media is not the person I know. What is being done to Steve Bannon is a shonda [scandal]."
Others are already looking beyond the immediate shock of the result.
The American Jewish Committee this week launched a new national group of leading Jewish and Muslim Americans, the Muslim-Jewish Advisory Council.
The AJC, one of the oldest and most influential communal organisations, has long advocated for strong inter-communal relations, and is signalling it will continue to do so in the face of Mr Trump's threats to bar, or at least impose "extreme vetting" or "ideological screening" on, Muslims who wish to enter the US. Mr Trump's policy towards Israel could also affect Jewish attitudes towards him.
According to Mr Makovsky, despite Mr Trump's lack of foreign policy experience, "one could easily imagine a honeymoon with Netanyahu, who has always wanted to work with a Republican president, and that they could bond over their shared animus to the Iran deal".
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal last weekend, Mr Trump suggested he would like to broker an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal. He will try to "turn the page after eight years, but we don't yet know how that will work out", warned Mr Makovsky.
There are more positive views on Mr Trump's election. According to Rabbi Abba Cohen of the strictly Orthodox Agudath Israel of America, the Orthodox community is adopting "a wait-and-see attitude and a willingness to let the new president follow through with his agenda and relationship with Congress. There is optimism, but it is a cautious one," he said.
Some go even further. "I and many of my friends felt bad after Obama was elected, given his relationship with Reverend Jeremiah Wright. The liberals in the Jewish community excused him for sitting in the church of an Israel-hater for 25 years," said one veteran leader of the New York community. "I survived eight years of Obama. Let's see what the next four look like."
Jonathan Cummings is a political consultant who has served on the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York
