NYC voters elected a BDS mayor. Voters in my city went much farther.

Ifirst declared myself a Zionist when I was 10 years old in 1981, singing the song of Camp Young Judaea Sprout Lake, which went like this: “We are Young Judaeans, we have a story to tell. Too young for Tel Yehudah, but Zionists just as well.” Tel Yehudah was the high school age camp of Young Judaea, the year-round, non-denominational Zionist “movement” founded in 1909.

I was deeply involved in Young Judaea through my high school graduation in 1988. At the time, 40 years after the creation of the state of Israel, being a Zionist was not controversial. But Zionism as a “‘movement” felt fossilized. Its main goal had been achieved generations earlier, but we were still learning about the pre-state ‘Zionist thinkers.” The question of Jewish political autonomy in our ancient homeland had long s