Last week, America’s Orthodox Union, meeting in Jerusalem, adopted a resolution supporting the right of their membership to oppose official Israeli positions on national security. The vote was significant but hardly surprising.

Having been frustrated organizationally and berated extensively by its rank and file for taking a back seat during Israel’s 2005 Gaza disengagement, the OU announced that it will no longer insist on a united front behind any and all decisions made by Israeli governments. While on social, religious, and domestic issues the OU has never hesitated to voice its opinion, it has always refrained from entering into a public confrontation with Israeli governments over foreign policy and national security issues. Now this will change.

The specific genesis of this move by the OU was twofold. First, the OU has felt dramatic pressure, beginning with the Oslo Accords, from many of its members and rabbis, who felt the organization should have been forthright in expressing its disagreements. Second, the OU saw that its Reform and Conservative counterparts, to say nothing of a range of advocacy groups — from Americans for Peace Now to the Zionist Organization of America — think nothing of dissenting publicly from security decisions.

From the perspective of the organized established Jewish community, this presents two major problems. It may make it even harder for the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations to adopt policies directly supportive of the Israeli government. The Presidents Conference was founded 50 years ago for the expressed purpose of providing one united, coherent, consensual Jewish voice with regard to America’s relationship with Israel. This action by the OU will only empower various constituent members to further assert their own independence, at the expense of having a unified Jewish voice.

Second, this position will intensify and make even more difficult the activities of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in its political dealings with Congress as well as the administration. When AIPAC develops positions supporting the policies of the Israeli government and lobbies Congress to back those policies, lawmakers can respond, as they often prefer, to one set of concerns aired by a unified set of constituents. True, Congress is already getting some mixed messages from groups like the ZOA and APN, but the OU’s vote could present Congress with a much more serious and complicated dilemma. Unlike the ZOA and APN, the OU represents a sizable voting population centered in a number of key states and cities. In addition, over the past 10 to 15 years, members of Congress recognize that the membership of the Modern Orthodox community has become far more active politically, especially in statewide and national elections. Political giving levels by those with some affiliation with the OU appear to be up dramatically. Internal evidence of this can best be seen at the heightened participation of the Orthodox community in AIPAC, in pro-Israel political action committees, and in political giving throughout the country.

By condoning public dissent, OU leaders are clearly suggesting that they are prepared to urge American political leaders to advance positions and policies counter to those adopted by an Israeli government. The OU decision also will have the clear effect of galvanizing the other denominational organizations to be far more out front and far less consensual in advocating for or against Israeli policy.

For Israel, the decision is a mixed challenge. On the one hand, it simplifies Israeli diplomacy. They no longer need to kowtow to myriad specific Jewish interests in the United States and can act like a mature country dealing directly and unambiguously with the world’s superpower. While sometimes complicating the situation of Israeli governments, this action may ultimately enable Israel and American Jews to develop a more honest, open, and respectful bond without perpetuating the sometimes patronizing and/or disingenuous affiliation that currently exists.

On the other hand, Israel will perhaps face a real decline in pro-Israel advocacy. It will also complicate its position in Washington since American political leaders in the administration and the Congress may from time to time get mixed messages — one from American Jewish constituents and one from an ally that is a sovereign state.

At times of existential crisis for Israel, American Jews will no doubt strive to speak in the same voice as the government of Israel. As a result of the OU decision, however, American Jews and Israel ought to prepare now for a new reality. On the road to peace or heightened confrontations, there are likely to be more and more debates and disagreements ahead both as to strategy as well as to tactics.