Still rearranging the deckchairs?

GEOFF SIFRIN

Who is to blame for the heartbreaking decline in the numbers of South African Jewry, from 120 000 in 1970 to 50 000 today? Those who say this is not tragic are putting on a brave front or fooling themselves.

Part of the explanation is that Jews are leaving the country as part of the broad trend of white people leaving. Between 2013 and 2018, the white population dropped by 2% to 4.5 million, out of a total population of 57 million.

Where is the Jewish religious leadership? Religious leaders are a major influence in how Jews see themselves. It would be good if those leaders of whatever rank would do what they could to build bridges and bolster morale, not divide.

The iconic Titanic has been a cipher for many metaphors of collapse. South African Jewry fits here. Some may say that the community can be small, but still vibrant, with active Jewish schools and so on. That might be true for now, but the numbers tell their story.

In ten years’ time, there won’t be 50 000 Jews, but maybe 10 000. Afterwards, as more old people die and younger ones leave, who knows?

Within a few years, there will probably be no African country with a sizeable Jewish community. Most Africans will never meet a Jew in their life, and will be left only with stereotypes from books.

Many believe the orthodox component of this community – the largest – has failed to show necessary leadership.

To an observer, obsessive attention to whether the international Jewish learning programme – Limmud – is kosher enough, or who can sing at the cemetery, is bizarre.

And, some people object to the orthodox leaders’ use of European holocaust rhetoric to bolster arguments against Israel’s critics rather than exploring whether this dying community can be rescued by gathering together its remaining resources.

Examples of this trend were published in Haaretz in an article about South African Jewry on 16 June, in which the South African chief rabbi is quoted as saying that the apartheid accusation against Israel is “on the level of blood libels in Europe”.

And, the national chairman of the South African Zionist Federation is quoted as saying that BDS (the Boycott Divestment Sanctions movement’s) tactics, which have included storming events with Israeli guests and boycotting stores that carry Israeli products, are a “Kristallnacht”.

Historians and pro-Israel quarters find this trivialisation of the blood libel an insult to Jews who were persecuted in its name over centuries. Similarly, the use of the word “Kristallnacht” in this way, is an insult to Jews who were destroyed by it.

Leaders use these analogies irresponsibly, while the Titanic that was once South African Jewry quietly begins to list. Rationally analysing the facts and listening to critical voices would be better than demeaning critics.

Jewish leaders are constrained by their positions from expressing personal views openly. They have to stick to the standard line: that the community will survive; Jews are loyal South Africans.

Alarm bells are ringing; this Titanic is sinking. In years to come, there may be a reckoning about who tried to man the lifeboats and save something, and who let everyone go down as the band played on because they wouldn’t sit at the same tables as other Jews.