#and the people saying this shit only cared about zionism and being anti zionist for the last 6 months

[jewishbarbies]

[a-very-tired-jew]

Absolutely wild to see a Jewish blog on here that has historically called out antisemitic rhetoric in media, such as Disney and AoT, fully embrace that same rhetoric when it comes to Israel and Hamas.

But I also understand.

I won't call anyone out, but if you can spot the similarities in AoT to Nazi rhetoric about Jews, then you can sure as shit spot them in the rhetoric of Hamas and their allies. Willfully ignoring it because "Western Civ is Bad" is an indicator that you have been radicalized by that exact same rhetoric, except this time it's coming from people you like or share interests with.

My Left leaning shalomies, you have got to be careful. You may identify as a Democratic Socialist, a Socialist, or even some form of Communist, but that "West Civ is Bad" rhetoric and talking points you're repeating that you heard from your more radical Comrade comes coupled with thinly disguised antisemitism. They're using your dissatisfaction with the state of things here in the USA and other Western countries to spread Holocaust Inversion/Denial, spread blood libel, ZOG, and other such antisemitic conspiracies.

How do I know?

I'm in my late 30s. In my 20s I was an avowed anti-Zionist. But as time went on more and more of the rhetoric I was being told by other anti-Zionists didn't make sense. It was a lot of Bundist talking points about how the diaspora was always safer while also denying the well documented pogroms that had happened against us.

While also denying what happened to the Bundists in the USSR.

What happened to people like Benjamin Zuskin.

And so many others who argued that we were "safe".

It was the Holocaust Universalization mixed with Denial and Inversion. It was so many things that when you looked at them in a bigger picture they ended up contradicting themselves.

It was the denial that Nazis allied with various regimes in the MENA to blatantly kill Jews for simply existing.

It was the denial that antisemitism was actually not a big problem nor as pervasive as it actually is.

Simply put, after enough time, life experience, reading, and thinking it became very clear to me that I had been fed a line of bologna. They had played on my dissatisfaction with the USA and its past actions.

I legit had the line "Israel only exists as a modern day concentration camp to keep all the Jews in one place and then exterminate them later. Jews need to be dispersed around the world to keep them safe" as justification to be anti-Zionist thrown at me when I was younger.

And it made sense at the time. You're fed so much pro-USA material growing up that eventually you find out the narrative that the USA lies, that the UK lies, that the West lies all the time. So you look for alternatives, but you end up embracing propaganda from even worse sources that are downright authoritarian and trying to deny their own atrocities and bigotry by pointing at others. You honestly swing so far the other way on the pendulum that you embrace and repeat rhetoric without fully understanding the nuance and complexity of it all.

When I hit my 30s I realized I had been taken for a ride. A veritable rube if you will.

And I see this same pattern in a lot of younger anti-Zionist Jews in that same age bracket. It's the same dissatisfaction that is being manipulated into antisemitism under the guise of anti-Zionism. It's the denial that what they're saying is antisemitic because surely they, as Jews, know what that actually is, and even if it is, they can't be antisemitic because they're Jewish. Right? Right???

So I beseech you. When the rest of us are saying "hey, this is actually antisemitic" and you go "Um, actually... As a Jew..." please stop for a moment. Think why some of us would be pointing that out. It's not for Zionism sake or any other political ideology. It's because that hate fueled rhetoric hurts all of us and some of us have been in your exact same shoes.

So if you can see the antisemitism in something like AoT and Disney, then you can surely see it in these slogans, rhetoric, and actions of anti-Zionist activists. And if you don't...well hopefully this will make you stop and think.

[feygaleh]

I'm a currently reconnecting reform Jew who was raised completely Secular and Acultural... I was anti-Zionist for a long time and I consider myself to still be but in my journey through reconnection I became more involved in Jumblr and it's hard to not fall prey to the Zionist rhetoric people keep spreading on here. I need to read the words of an actual Jew and not just another goy on why Israel is bad because otherwise I fear I will actually be gaslit. Do you have any recommendations on resources by Jewish people about the topic?? Or even some words you can provide yourself?? Thank you and I'm sorry for bothering you...

hey anon! thank you for being patient with my reply, i was pretty busy the other day and wanted to put real care into getting these resources for you

firstly, if you’re looking to find a better hub of anti zionist jews to unlearn any propaganda with, @stoptheantisemitism is a great place to start. from a former zionist israeli(iirc, correct me if not) jew who unlearned propaganda over time. they are a great inspo in the jewish community.

another great source is the documentary “defamation” by yaov shamir https://youtu.be/CTAjc1OSrmY?si=NsRJLOsxjlFPNSWC

ultimately discussing how zionism, israel, and the IDF preys on the “you’re unsafe anywhere but here. only in israel can you be safe to be freely and fully jewish” which is just textbook. textbook. brainwashing. i mean the amount of zionists in the jewblr tag alone treating any public hate moment as a “see! see! this is why we need israel!!” all of the attempts israel does to go above and beyond is not an actual act of care but an act of public manipulation.

not a source but when i went to gather this link for you i saw a comment that phrased it beautifully. they are so convinced that they are so deeply hated and can only be safe here and it is so strange not to mention, i hate to say this because i know its going to be misconstrued, very identical to cult indoctrination and brainwashing tactics

theodr herzl himself literally said antisemitism will be our greatest ally and he described israel as a colonial project. like the entire foundation of this place is so clearly propaganda

ie the recent “”””pogrom”””” in amsterdam began with zionist jews being publically and loudly racist to a group of people who eventually attacked back. they of course were being antisemitic in their words but the actions would not have happened if they weren’t provoked. but israel of course “comes to aid” these “poor victims” so NOW everyone’s like “see this is why we need israel!!! we aren’t safe anywhere not even europe” which is so exhaustingly ridiculous

it’s all curated. it’s all on purpose. israel wants the people who support them and get shit for it to hit the news. they want these attacks to happen so they can swoop on and “save” them and “prove we need them” but this was NOT a pogrom this was NOT provoked by antisemitism.

not to mention how conservative/orthodox they all are. many orthodox groups won’t even acknowledge us reform jews as jewish. they won’t recognize our interfaith relationships as decent, our kids as actually jewish, our identity as jewish, converts as jewish. etc. i’m not saying this from a place of bias. it is something my rabbi often openly discusses. the first thing he told me when i told him im a lesbian with a catholic girlfriend is “orthodoxy and the local chabad will never recognize your marriage as a jewish marriage. will never recognize your kids as jewish kids. same sex marriage is not legalized in any of the 15 marital courts in israel because of the way the country operates” so on so on. israel claims to be so pro lgbt but can’t even bend any of their rules to allow gay marriage? it’s just insane. this has nothing to do with israeli propaganda it is just a criticism i have on parts of judaism

several kinds of interfaith marriages aren’t recognized in israel.

never again. for anyone. the ISJN (international jewish antiozionist network) https://ijan.org as a very good program they run.

with multiple chapters in multiple countries they also provide a wordpress they compiled on the israeli attemp at worldwide repression

that INCLUDES testimonies against israel predating 2023. in their education programs they detail being anti-racist details the NEED to be anti-zionist

zionism and american politics are very intertwined so i dont understand why nonamerican zionists always attack nonzionist american jews. it’s very odd. much of our government lobbies for israel as often as they can. the veterans at my shul often argue in defense and against israel just depending on where their morals lay. it permiates american political cultures, especially jewish american political cultures. though most of the time im greeted with “bold words from someone who has never been in the middle east.” and that is so odd considering they know nothing about me. no i haven’t. i have absolutely no money to travel. israel offers birthright but why would i ever take them up on the opportunity for indoctrination? that’s what it’s for. the more people who come to israel and like it the more israeli citizens they have. the more citizens they have the more they can make my countries politicians lobby for “antizionism DOES equal antisemitism” which is so factually and morally untrue on so many levels.

israel is still actively killing everyone they need to under the guise of hamas. i implore you to go look at the ceasefire agreements hamas has tried to put out for the IDF by the way and see exactly what terms the IDF disagreed to bc it is VIOLENTLY and BRUTALLY inhumane. this is not in agreement with hamas but in disagreement with the IDF.

for further historical and political resources i encourage you check out this page https://ijan.org/resources-2/ i know im linking them a lot but its a great hub of everything i wouldnt linked you anyways

israel and the IDF are actively killing innocents for no good reason outside of colonization. outside of pure genocide. outside of ethnic cleansing. zionist jews’ recent tactics have been to call any mention of this blood libel which i find insane bc it is factually untrue to the definition of what blood libel is

for some odd reason my iphone won’t open this article anymore but go read on this from the new yorker!

if you ever see a bunch of white supremacists/nazis on tumblr being zionists or friends with zionists btw it’s bc the worlds largest zionist organization is made up of christian’s/catholics. just in case you want to know what side of history these people are on. fascists love being racist together <3

blog from more antizionist jewitches on christian zionism WITH sources cited

the difference between the three israels and why “am yisrael chai” is NOT synonymous to zionism or the existence of the state of israel

again with sources cited in the blog

finally i’d watch enduring roots https://vimeo.com/89376847

this is just the trailer as it is a donation based documentary but i did not pay much to watch this on my own. its a documentary put together by the international jewish antizionist fund about accounts from actual nakba survivors

how the fuck am i going to allow myself to believe a country that says it values the safety of my life. a jewish life. which by the way. in judaism we value all life. you can and should break any jewish law to save a life. so tell me then why are these people so comfortable carpet bombing children? murdering women? using HUMAN SHIELDS to get their way

anyways i will add more sources as i remember them but TLDR israels main line of propaganda and brainwashing IS “you belong here. we will keep you safe. we are the only place that can keep you safe” while actively causing so much harm and being founded on racist ideals while they allow tens of thousands of human souls to die when there are many places safe for us across the world

[rosebijoumme]

hi I’m this is your art big but I can’t be off anon rn bc of ppl harassing me on this account and I don’t want someone to user search me and find it.

But I was wondering how you avoid Zionist indoctrination while converting? Bc I decided to look into conversion last year (ultimately decided I do not theologically agree with Judaism as much as I thought) and after working in a Jewish community for a year, I found myself thinking more like a Zionist and agreeing with their beliefs. Until recently when I had to really get out of that and realize I was allowing myself to be told what to think. I think for me only hearing one side is what did it, and feeling like I have to be a Zionist if I want to be Jewish/reconnect w my Jewish ancestry. I feel bad bc I used to be pro Palestine or at least thought I was but my thinking started going down a pretty dangerous path and at two or three different points i had to pull myself out of it bc I felt like I was being radicalized.

whooooo boy.

The short answer is stick to your principles.

The longer answer is, you need to surround yourself with antizionist Jews and make a commitment to antizionism. I've actually had my conversion on hold for an unfortunate amount of time due to various life stuff causing me to leave my hometown, and have had trouble connecting with another Rabbi due to lack of community outreach for the region I live in, time, distance, etc. I've even reached out to rabbis and we started working on things until scheduling and other problems threw a wrench in the works. This is a sore spot for me so I don't talk about it much. But the thing is, a synagogue could be established in a 15 minute walk away from me tomorrow, and if it was predominantly run by zionists I would not go. This is because of my commitment. When I was 15-18, it was frustrating to see flags in the bimah, but I could ignore it- noting that I'm from the south and have had to learn how to cope with genocidal and regressive symbols like this (confed flags, dont tread on me, etc) being around me without any control over them basically my whole life, and that my hometown's temple largely didn't talk about Zionism. I'm sure thats different now and people there have likely gotten radicalized. I'm older now, and I can't, and frankly I dont think it was a good thing that I used to. I have no desire to participate in a temple that permits genocide.

You also need to critically think about... everything. Ask yourself "if someone said this shit about any other group, would I agree?" (For example, I would not agree that white Italians need their own state where being white Italians are central, and where keeping the white Italian birthrates high is necessary, and would recognize that as ethnonationialism- and people do say shit like that about Italy).

Additionally, you shouldn't. Ever. Lie to your rabbi/whatever other religious leader your branch of Judaism recognizes about something like this as a conversion student. It can turn on you very badly and very quickly.

Anti- or at minimum non-zionist rabbis and temples exist, though they aren't as common. I would prioritize finding antizionist Jews in your area and not only forming relationships with them, but asking their advice on who and where to go to. Sometimes there won't be resources that you can use as an antizionist. Sometimes you'll be stuck in a weird grey area for a long time. I'm not uncomfortable with this, honestly. The fact that I've stuck with it even through this only signifies my commitment. Abayudaya Jews created their community with few resources avaliable, and even through times of hostility. The commitment means I fully recognize them as Jews, even though plenty of them didn't convert the way rabbinic Judaism recognizes as sufficient. I care more about how other Jews who I have relationships with see me, knowing my struggle with community resources, than say, being recognized as a "proper Jew" by the Israeli state. This doesn't mean I think conversion isn't necessary (because people love to fearmonger about converts misbehaving); it just means that I don't feel personal spiritual unease with the way my path is going and the complications I've faced and still am dealing with. I keep to myself about these complications more because they're personal details and very stressful for me, so I don't care to share them in a public forum, especially because people treat converts very badly, and I'm also treated badly for not being white. And thats before considering that I'm not a zionist. People are going to do lashon hara enough about me without actually knowing private details like that.

Additionally, these in person relationships are necessary because a lot of rabbis won't loudly advertise that they aren't zionists as it can be dangerous for them, and whatever "advertisement" they do may be through orgs where there's a mix of "soft zionists" like If Not Now and JVP, and actually committed antizionists, and you won't know which is which because they don't do a lot of social media or etc.

[pwecie]

Hello everybody, before I start this, I need to preface everything that I’m about to say with some facts

My maternal grandfather is Palestinian, he has also lived in Israel.

My uncle fought in Afghanistan against terrorists.

Because of these, I feel like it’s important to clear up some misconceptions about the events going on.

Number 1: Israel’s primary target is Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist organization. Hamas has taken Israeli hostages who are just innocent citizens and have no connection to the fighting.

Number 2: It is very realistic that Israel is not all that innocent themselves, as my grandfather has told me stories of anti-Palestinian behavior within Israel that resulted in the death of a family member.

Number 3: Any organization that aids to help the people of Palestine is good, unless that funding or the actions of that organization aid Hamas as Hamas is a terrorist organization.

Number 4: The definition of Zionism is “the development and protection of a Jewish nation in what is now Israel.” The definition does not mention Palestine specifically or any hate to other nation as the term was coined in 1897, long before the formation of Israel.

Number 5: Zionism became popularized around the end of World War 2 in 1945, and the nation of Israel was founded 3 years later in 1948, probably because Jewish people wanted to feel safe and a sense of community after the mass genocide of Jews during the Holocaust.

Number 6: People are incorrectly using the term Zionism as the “dislike of or prejudice against people from other countries.” Which is actually the definition of Xenophobia.

If you really cared about the war in Gaza, then you wouldn’t be picking either Israel or Palestine specifically. You would be on the side of the people unrelated to this conflict that are suffering from the actions of corrupt Israeli soldiers and the terrorist organization Hamas. Do not support Hamas. do not support Xenophobia. Do not support Islamophobia. Do not support Antisemitism. Practice media literacy. Do your research on organizations that donate and make sure they don’t support terrorism or corruption. Posting an Israeli or Palestinian flag on your social media doesn’t do jack shit, especially when all the information you have on the situation comes from social media blogs that are tailored to give incomplete or false information to specific demographics. This situation is not black and white. We have a responsibility to protect innocent humans. Not nations, not ideals, innocent human beings.

I will be doing research and providing organizations that you can donate to that solely support affected people and not terrorism. I don’t care if you block me, but at last dig deeper and educate yourself, but if you attack me or send people to attack me, saying that I’m a zionist, terrorist, or anything under the sun without reading the entire post, then you are part of the problem.

Edit: I want to reiterate, while Israel has every right to want to fuck up Hamas six ways to Sunday, it is SO EXTREMELY and HIGHLY REALISTIC that war crimes have been committed by select individuals within the Israeli military. I cannot ignore these instances. While the war on terrorism is just, systematic Xenophobia does exist within Israel, which resulted in the death of my grandfather’s sister, or at the very least she received less priority with her medical care within an Israeli hospital. This whole post is neither a defense of Israel or Palestine and I cannot pick sides because of my family background being related to both a Palestinian AND a Nazi from WW2 (I didn’t include that in the beginning because I felt people would just read “Nazi” and shut my whole argument down on just that one factor). I have a moral obligation to make sure the genocide of Jewish people never happens again, but also to support my grandfather and his people overseas. My only purpose is to reiterate that this situation is not good-side bad-side, black or white. My goal here is to inform people of the history surrounding the situation and correct any misinformation. Which there is a lot of holy crap. My heart goes out to all the families within or related to those of the Gaza Strip, as well as Israeli families and individuals who have been affected by terrorism.

[gryficowa]

Do you know why I support Palestine? Because Israel's crimes are unforgivable, I don't care if I will be an anti-Semite for Zionists (which sounds absurd, because they themselves attack Jews for supporting Palestine), seeing Zionists happy that many people supporting Palestine have given up is disgusting, no, I will not give up, then, the fact that I don't take part in strikes because of ASD and social phobia doesn't mean that I'm not there as a supporter of Palestine, I do what I can, even if it's not standard (Sharing links to collections and publicizing them is crucial, and many people even use them I don't reblog which is sad)

And FYI, I will never be ashamed of it, you know why? BECAUSE RESPONSE TO FUCKING GENOCIDE IS NOT A FUCKING SHAME

Zionism is evil, no matter how Zionists defend themselves (By lying that Zionism cannot be separated from being Jewish, which is nonsense on many levels), and because the effects of Zionism have a physical fucking impact not only on Palestinians, but also on fucking on the Jews (Whom you say you protect), do you know why? Right-wing movements often take left-wing movements to spread hatred towards various groups, saying that every Jew is a Zionist, you are making a fucking threat to Jews and a physical one at that, what happened in Germany was a result of this and that's why we have to speak out about how Zionism increases anti-Semitism (Not pro-Palestine, just fucking Zionism)

What Israel does, its every crime affects Jews, the very fact that you defend Israel's crimes is fucking disgusting, but it also affects Jews in countries where they are minorities, because they fall victim to this shit and you feed on it (Because Zionism like Nazism, they feed on people in crisis because they are the easiest to manipulate, especially when they fear for their own lives)

The same cannot happen to the Jews as to the Germans, they cannot be attacked for the crimes of their ancestors, no more saying that every German is a Nazi, no more saying that every Jew is a Zionist, the sooner we separate it the fucking better

Right wing movements are already starting to use this to their advantage, just like years ago, think about the future generations, how the Jews will struggle with the shit that Israel has left them with, stop lying that you think about them when you do something that will benefit them a burden and will be persecuted for it, if you call me an anti-Semite, you are a hypocrite

[milevenfcb]

this was only supposed to be a few sentences but it turned into a really long rant so i apologize ahead of time, but i’m getting really sick of arguing with people about this. i really don’t care who reads through this or not, and feel free to disagree with me, but I’ll always believe anti-zionism is inherently antisemitism.

anti-zionism, going by the REAL definition and not the tiktok definition, is the jewish people’s right to self determination in their ancestral homeland (aka israel), and israel’s right to protect themselves (especially from their jew-hating neighbors hamas). zionism has nothing to do with the “genocide” or “apartheid”, even if you think it does.

going by the definition, being anti-zionist means you don’t believe israel should EXIST, not that you oppose palestinians dying. I also hate that innocent civilians in palestine are caught in this war, but that doesn’t make me an anti-zionist because i still believe israel should exist. and, news flash, if you believe in a two-state solution that makes you a zionist.

if you’re anti-zionist and believe israel shouldn’t exist, then what do you propose should happen to the nearly 10m jews, muslims, christians, and others currently living there? what’s your solution to the rapid rise of antisemitism in countries that jews making aliyah are trying to escape from? how does abolishing israel solve the war in any way?

i hate how the the word “zionist” has been turned into an insult because people can’t say “jew” since that would be obviously antisemitic. so instead they try to insult us by calling us “evil zionists” or whatever other shit to make us seem as immoral as possible.

also, reminder that “zio” on its own, which I’ve been called way too many times since 10/7, is a slur word created by david duke, a literal neo-nazi and former kkk leader, because he couldn’t outright use the word “jew”.

zionism isn’t bad. all it means is you believe jews have a right to self determination, any other definition is just political interpretation. and i think it’s very obvious that we need our own country + military, since somehow many “progressive” people STILL have an issue with jews even in 2024.

[edenfenixblogs]

This is inaccurate, disingenuous, and dangerous rhetoric. And nobody come at the OP, who is Jewish. I just happen to fundamentally disagree with almost every aspect of this post, and I believe that history, reputable sources, and data will back me up on this. This conflates several issues and doesn’t give any of them the nuanced discussion they deserve. I find this post purposefully offensive on many levels.

1. I have said before and will say again and again until the end of time: Zionism in the modern era has a deeply individual meaning to each Jewish person. It does not necessarily correspond to classical Zionism as envisioned by the founders of its ideology. And, in fact, grouping Jews together under the term Zionist as a way to demonize, other, or dismiss their concerns is a warning sign that your thinking is being influenced by antisemitic conspiracy theories. Yes. Even Jews can be influenced by this. This does not make Jews who feel this way enemies or worthy of violence or antisemitism.

Source: https://networkcontagion.us/wp-content/uploads/NCRI%E2%80%93AntisemiticDisinformation-FINAL.pdf

2. One of the distinctions/disagreements that many people who do call themselves Zionists have is that while some do believe that Jews can’t exist without Israel, many do not believe this. Many people simply believe that it means Jews are indigenous to the region and deserve safety and residence in their ancestral homeland. That does not mean it needs to be in the modern state of Israel. It simply means that there should be some way to return to the area and guarantee safety. This is just one of VERY MANY interpretations of modern Zionism.

3. I don’t believe that acknowledging a connection to Israel is the same as conflating the goals of the modern Israeli state, anti-Palestinian attitudes, and/or the goals of diaspora Jews. The fact is that many Jews of all colors and backgrounds have lived in the region for millenia. They do not deserve to be expelled from their homes. Many Israeli Jews living in Israel oppose the current government, and many diaspora Jews do as well. That said, 46% of all the Jews left in the world live in Israel. Not being antisemitic means that we must acknowledge this in our calculus of how to solve relations there. If you don’t want a modern state of Israel, fine. But we must be understanding of the fact that a) many Jews (including me!) have relatives that have lived in the area now termed Israel since even before wwii. And many people were forcibly relocated there after and b) it is always going to be distressing for diaspora Jews to see almost half of the people with whom they share a historically persecuted identity be dismissed or told their concerns are unimportant or that they all deserve to die. If South Korea were suddenly to start bombing the shit out of Japan, that would be horrible. But it wouldn’t justify attacks on Korean restaurants in Los Angeles just because there’s a strong connection between Korean Americans and Korea. Of course there’s a strong connection! There should be!!! It wouldn’t mean that Koreans Americans all support bombing Japan. The only reason Jews caring about Israel is more stigmatized is because of antisemitism.

4. It is not antisemitic to criticize Israel. It is not antisemitic to support Palestinian self determination. It is not antisemitic to want to overhaul the whole system. What IS antisemitic is not qualifying what “abolish Israel” or “free Palestine” means. It’s disingenuous at best to assume that all “reasonable” people will understand what you mean by those phrases. And it is irresponsible to use non-specific language when discussing this conflict. There are forces (including the oppressive Israeli administration and the Israeli military as well as the terrorist organization Hamas and a variety of outside interest groups supporting various positions) who are actively and purposefully obfuscating these terms. While I would hope “free Palestine” means “support Palestinian self determination, representation in a government that protects their interests, freedom from terrorist-run government, and full equal rights” that doesn’t change the fact that for MANY people it does in fact mean “free Palestine from the existence of Jews.” And that is a REAL PROBLEM. That is not Israeli propaganda. That is HAMAS propaganda. It doesn’t mean we stop supporting Palestine. It means we must be specific in our word choices. And if that’s too annoying or too much work for you then a) you’re not a good activist. That is literally the easiest thing you could do to preserve lives and safety of Jews in diaspora. B) i so not trust your intentions. YOUR WORDS MATTER. Antisemitism is on the rise and your words can actually get someone hurt or killed. If you use language that you know can be purposefully manipulated or used to bolster violence, that blood is on your hands.

5. This is not a one-sided issue. Statements from anyone calling themselves a pro-Israel activist saying any variation of “the bombings are unfortunate but we must wipe out Hamas” are ALSO being disingenuous. Hamas is underground. Hamas is not affected by the bombs. The bombings help Hamas. Anyone denying the atrocities is Palestine is disingenuous. Anyone who claims that the violence committed against Palestinians is in any way justified is wrong. No matter how scared they are for Jews in Israel or diaspora.

6. Jews can exist without the modern state of Israel. Jews CANNOT exist in a world that sees no problem disregarding the needs of Jews who live in Israel. There are 7 million Jews in Israel. 5 million of them are black and brown. Jews CANNOT exist in a world where the entire nation that many Jews call home must be abolished because half of them have shitty politics and a genocidal leader. Because, get this, HALF OF THEM DISAGREE WITH THIS AND ARE PUTTING THEIR LIVES ON THE LINE TO FIGHT THAT GENOCIDAL GOVERNMENT. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2016/03/08/key-findings-religion-politics-israel/#:~:text=About%20eight%2Din%2Dten%20(,%25)%20or%20Druze%20(2%25).

7. When Russia bombs the shit of Ukraine, you don’t call for anyone to abolish Russia. When North Korea massacres it’s own citizens, you don’t call to “abolish” North Korea. When Armenia massacres it’s own people, you don’t fucking call for an end to Armenia. YOU TRY TO HELP THE COUNTRY RID ITSELF OF THE DICTATORIAL VIOLENT RULE AND RESTORE PEACE. When ISIS and the Taliban swept through Iraq and Iran and Afghanistan and much of Northern Africa, the global focus wasn’t on abolishing the nations themselves just because the government wasn’t secular. It was about hoping to combat terrorism and extremism. Everyone who wasn’t Islamophobic understood that democratic and representative government was the solution to many problems and that it wasn’t our fucking business to tell these nations that the problem was that they were an Islamic state. Just that they were an EXTREMIST state. The difference here is Jews. You want to get rid of the state that has Jews. That has Judaism.

8. Jews disagree with each other. Famously. It’s one of the things we are best at. Fine. The OP can disagree with me. And I’m sure all my goy followers can find other Jews to disagree with me and find Jews to support their side. Because there will always be Jews to support whatever you already believe. We are a varied people with varied beliefs. But don’t pretend you actually care about Jews more than confirming your world view.

9. Ok. Fine. Let’s say I accept OP’s statement at face value. I’m Jewish. I do not support abolishing Israel as a state, especially without a proposed plan for how to accommodate the Jews and Palestinians already living there and how to create protections for both groups. What is the correct way to be upset if someone attacks my home? What about my synagogue? What about my favorite Israeli restaurant run by immigrants from Israel? What exactly do I need to do in order to not be blamed for any of this? Or am I to blame? I have already sinned, so whatever befalls me is just deserved, right? It’s “unfortunate and distressing” but I’ve made the mistake of caring about Israelis so I guess it’s fine.

Ignoring or minimizing or flat-out invalidating Jewish pain does nothing to help Palestine.

And I shouldn’t have to frame my pain and fear in a way that condemns Israel or helps Palestine in order to be considered valid and human.

And I can think that and still support a free and liberated Palestine.

every time zionists post something about like instances of jewish restaurants getting defaced with stuff about israel and mention that they have nothing to do with israel/are older than israel i want to scream because yes its antisemitism its unfortunate to see its distressing and its YOU WHO CONFLATES JEWS AND ISRAEL OVER AND OVER AGAIN AND CALL CRITICISM OF ISRAEL ANTISEMITIC. PRO ISRAEL ORGANIZATIONS AND ZIONISTS ENTIRE STRATEGY FOR YEARS IS TO DO THIS and now you all want to draw a distinction between jews and zionists but only ONLY then! otherwise they falsely claim that 90% or more of jews are zionists and that we cant exist without israel and then wonder why people are conflating jews and zionists

[momowho34]

Here are some jewish myths you might still believe!!!!

(Pls read and reblog I’m tired of people echoing shit like this)

Jesus was not a rabbi. He lived a hundred years before rabbinic judaism even started to develop. Please stop saying this as if it lends him credence in our religion, because no. It doesn’t.

Yeah, Jesus was jewish, but he also rejected mainstream Judaism and hated it. Stop pretending he means anything to us. Idk if you guys have even read your own books, Matthew is like 60% about how the Pharisees are bad and wrong and evil for sticking to the traditions that have kept them alive for 100s of years. It’s also, y’know, historically inaccurate to the actual behavior of the Pharisees in that time period. Seriously man he is not ours and means nothing to us, keep your Jesus and stop trying to shoehorn him into judaism.

Our god is not yours “minus the Jesus.” In trinity terms; divide the Holy Spirit by the Father and then subtract the Son and that is a bare bones grasp of what god appears as for Jews.

Jews are not white as a whole. Are there white Jews? Yes. Are there jews who are literally every other skin tone? Also yes!! We are all over the place. India, numerous Middle Eastern countries, Morocco, Spain, and a lot more I can’t be bothered to list. You are actively hurting poc jews by pretending that all jews are European, holy shit stop doing that please!!! Most white jewish people are Ashkenazi, which is just one type of judaism.

Actually, the historical relationship between Jews and Muslims is a lot more complicated then you think it is. Sometimes we got along, sometimes we didn’t. Some would argue that Jews were treated better by Islamic caliphates in the Middle Ages then they were by Christian kingdoms. Stop trying to pretend we are and have always been “arch nemeses” or some fucking bullshit (that would be the Amalekites for us, actually, and not the Muslims) Also we’re honestly more similar to them when it comes to traditions then christians so like take that into account thanks

Hey guys listen to Romani when they talk about the Holocaust too!!!!! Please, they have a different experience/perspective and deserve to have their voices heard. Don’t pretend they don’t exist and that it didn’t effect them because uh.... it did. To a degree that I don’t think I can properly explain. Do not overlook them and then pretend it’s just because ur a “jewish ally” or whatever the fuck.

Stop pretending that we’re the same as Christianity. We aren’t. Stop stop stop holy shit stop. That’s not how any of this works at all. Christianity is so so so different, it takes like a handful of jewish beliefs and runs with them. Christianity is its own thing and so is Judaism, stoppp.

Not all Jews are zionists. some are explicitly anti-zionists. Not all zionists are anti-Semitic, but some of them are. Basically, jews aren’t inherently zionists and anti-Zionism isn’t inherently antisemitic. That being said, some people do use anti-Zionism as a cover for their anti-semitism. Watch out for those people, they’re not that hard to spot. That’s all I’m going to say about that, don’t want to start on this issue because it isn’t what this list is about.

Jews never actually lived by the literal laws of the Torah. We did not stone people. There is no archeological evidence of that and actually more evidence pointing to the opposite. jewish communities actually held capital punishment as being inherently immoral and was very very very rarely used in some communities. Understand that. Don’t ever say shit like “but the Jews used to live by the Bible too, and they stoned gay people!!!” No. No we didn’t. Ever. Nobody did that in ancient times.

Guess what, jews are not rich or greedy! what the fuck are you talking about??? Quit it please. This stereotype has literally been used since the Middle Ages to alienate Jews as a more privileged “other” that deserve their prosecution. Stop stop please stop, please!!!!! People actually believe this shit and commit hate crimes, stop, even as a sarcastic joke.

The Old Testament is not the same as the Torah/Tanakh. It’s just not? For one thing, the Old Testament is a translation of a cut down version of a translation of a different modified version, so no. Not the same. Also the books are ordered differently and the sections are mixed up.

God does not abandon the Jews in the Tanakh or the Old Testament for that matter. It’s like... sort of implicated to happen between the two testaments in Christianity. The Old Testament basically structured the books non-chronologically so that the last one would be Malachi because his prophecies are supposed to echo Jesus. We end the Tanakh on Nehemiah, and there is no “New Testament” for us because there’s only one and it ends at the end of the story.

Antisemitism is definitely still a thing. I don’t know who the fuck told you about this one? The Jews got treated like shit after the holocaust, and some of the few survivors 70 years later got reparations so now everybody’s acting like antisemitism doesn’t exist. It does. It really, really fucking does. Please listen to us.

Holocaust denial isn’t “a fringe conspiracy theory,” it’s genuinely awful and dangerous and hurts real people. I’m serious about this one, holocaust denial (and any genocide denial for that matter, whether it’s talking about the Armenian genocide or Holdomer or any others) is legit dangerous. Pay attention to it and have 0% tolerance for that shit

You are allowed to be invited to a jewish event if you’re not jewish! We literally do not care. Respectfully participating in traditions if you’re invited to is fine! The issue is when people take a jewish tradition and twist it into something for them. That’s a no-no, but getting invited to a seder/bar mitzvah/bris is fine. just show respect to traditions you see, even if you don’t entirely understand them. Do that and you’ll be fine.

Jews are a ridiculously diverse group of people with a lot of different beliefs! We all have vastly different ideas of fucking everything from god to the purpose of pomegranates (not a joke). Accept that we think differently form eachother and aren’t a monolith please

These are all the ones I could think of lol, jewish friends add more if you can think of some. Ok and encouraged to reblog for everyone.

[hero-israel]

What do you think of non-Palestinian anti Zionism? Palestinians are anti Zionist for obvious reasons but i believe that most people who are not even Arab only care because they believe it’s a Muslim issue however Palestinians/Levantine people are more secular than other Arabs so it doesn’t really make sense as to why they would see it as a religious issues. We saw when it came to the journalist, a lot of religious fanatics opposed praying for her as she was Christian so it really confuses me about what the majority actually want from Palestine or do different groups have different interests and just Palestinian cause to reach it?

In real-world politics(*), antizionism is antisemitism. The only people who can be antizionist without it being a massive red flag are Palestinians themselves, and ultra-Orthodox Jews who are religiously opposed to the creation of a state of Israel by mortal men instead of by Moshiach. All other groups can find another topic in the infinite universe to "just criticize."

And among those other groups, vanishingly few actually give a shit about Palestine or Palestinians, who are mere instruments for the real joy of hating and condemning and politically / physically expelling Jews. It is not at all unlike how "pro-lifers" seem to care far less about about protecting babies (food, healthcare, schools, gun control, etc.) than they do about controlling and punishing women.

(* = there are high-minded hypotheticals that people could put together about antizionism but they have no political relevance at all and can in fairness be ignored. You could right now surely imagine someone putting together a case why black people shouldn't vote, in a way that wouldn't necessarily be racist - "both parties are the same, nothing ever changes, it's just manufactured consent, take down the core assumptions of the system without supporting it, blah blah," one can string words together in any order - but that set of politics does not exist in the real world, where saying black people shouldn't vote is racist and, given the stakes involved, can be fairly met as racism 100% of the time.)

[stephenjaymorrisblog]

From The Warsaw Ghetto- To The Gaza Strip

(Palestinians versus Israel)

By Stephen Jay Morris

May 14, 2021

©Scientific Morality

The bifurcation of metaphysical morality boils down to good and evil.  This is intended for the simple minded who can’t comprehend the complexities of political science.  In the Old Testament, King Solomon is a hero. Two women come to him, each claiming a newborn baby is theirs. King Solomon took a sword and threatened to split the baby in two so as to equally award half of the child to each alleged mother. One of the women, intent on saving her child’s life, surrendered the baby to the other.  Thus, the real mother was revealed and King Solomon awarded the child to her.

We could use that ancient Solomonic wisdom in the Mideast right now!   The only people who give a damn about the plight of the Palestinian people are the international Left, while the supporters of Israel are American Imperialists, “End of Days” Evangelical Christians, and a handful of Conservative American Jews and Orthodox Jews.  Most Jews in the USA are Reformed Jews and Secular Jews.  American Jews consider themselves, simply, American and many marry outside of their religion.  American Secular Jews have no Jewish identity, which satisfies a lot politically conservative Jews.  This is a curious contradiction.

I always thought that Judeo morality was absolute.  How can you have one foot in Israel and another in America?  Is America the greatest country in the world, or is Israel?  Religious dogma dictates that you cannot serve two masters.  Can the Rabbis in a Yeshiva solve this dilemma?  Rabbis arguing about text in the Torah is how Polemics got started.

There is this notion that Jews are all monolithic and all the same.  The revisionist Zionists infer that they speak for the Jewish people.  They don’t!  They tell non-Jewish Right wingers that Anti-Zionism is the same as Anti-Antisemitism.  WRONG!!!!!  Take the case of the ultra Orthodox Jewish sect, Neturei - Karta.  They believe that the Jewish nation of Israel violates Jewish Law and Prophecy.  This sect is against Israel.  What do the rest of the Zionists think of this sect?  They don’t.  They simply ignore it. Are these Jews are self-hating?  Are they Uncle Jake's?  What is an Uncle Jake?  A Jewish version of an Uncle Tom.

Then there is the Jewish Left, and the secular Jewish Left. These secular Jews would never disclose that they are Jewish.  I knew a guy for years who never told me he was Jewish.  Then there are the Jewish Left groups like Hashomer Hatzair, or even the former political party in Israel, the Labor Party.  The Jewish Left in Israel has been suppressed.  They have been taken over by the Likud Party and a coalition of Jewish religious Right groups.  They are financed by Right wing Christians in the USA.  If you’d like to learn about the history of the Jewish Left, click here: The first Zionists were socialists > Sapardanis Kostas

The same problem exists with the Palestinians.  The first group that represented them was the The PLO – Palestinian Liberation Organization, who were Marxist revolutionaries.  Following them, the Islamic religious Right took over.  That was Hamas.  What kills me about Right wing propaganda is how they like to mislabel their enemies; ie: “Islamic Fascists are Leftists.” Holy shit turds!  Leftists? They are absolutely not!

So, what would be a Solomonic solution be to all this? The Palestinians should kick Hamas out and create a secular Leftist revolutionary group.  The Left wing Israelis should destroy the Jewish Right and have a peace treaty and planning conference with Palestinians.  Other then this, I agree with my Anarchist comrades: Have a “No State Solution.”  Fuck it, man!  As a Jew, I can say this shit.

Addendum: Today is May 17, 2021. Israel is bombing the Gaza Strip. It is said that the first casualty of war is the truth. I say the first fatalities of war are women and children.  What is happening in Israel now reminds me of the Vietnam War during the late 60’s and early 70’s.   Innocent women and children, along with elderly Vietnamese, were bombed by the American Air Force, while U.S. ground troops burned down their straw huts.  The women and children were always accused of being in cahoots with the Vietcong, the communist guerrillas of the jungle.

The same lie that I heard back then is now coming from the Right wing government of Israel.  They say that the Islamic guerrilla group, Hamas, is using innocent civilians for human shields.  So the Palestinian women and children have to be sacrificed in order to protect Israel? Excuse me?  Protect? What’s the matter—are Israel’s nuclear bombs at the bomb clinic undergoing repairs?  Maybe the Iron Dome is out of order?  Hamas versus nuclear Israel is, by no measure, a fair match.  When the Polish Jews rose up in World War II, they were in the same position, fighting the invading Nazi army in the Warsaw Ghetto.  Just like the Gaza Strip, no one could leave or enter the occupied city.  Of course, the Nazis called the Jewish resistance, “Terrorists.”

I think Benjamin Netanyahu should be charged with war crimes.  I also think that the Likud Party should be outlawed.  I don’t care if 71% of the Israeli voting population supports Donald Trump.  Shame on all you people! I realize that the Israeli Left is outnumbered, however, if you were true to your convictions, you would protest your government.  The mainstream media will not cover your protest, but social media will.  

All my life, the subject of Israel would come and go. I remember the Six Day War in Israel, back in 1967.  At my junior high school, I saw a Jewish and a Black student debating. The Black Civil Rights movement was supporting the Palestinians at the time.  The Jewish kid wore a Yarmulke, so he was a target of hostilities towards Israel.

When I was 13 years old, I didn’t know better and I supported Israel.   I am older now, so—no dice!  Just because I am Jewish, it doesn’t mean that I am obligated to be a supporter, especially when the Israeli government is corrupt.  This war is morally wrong and should be stopped!

[poledancingghostson]

Do you know why people are saying being a Zionist is bad?? Like I’m not confirming or denying that it’s true but I just???dont know??? If you don’t know I’m hoping one of ur followers do dndkndj I’m just very confused and unsure of who to ask

It’s complicated. Basically, a lot of land that is currently Israel belonged to Palestine before Israel was created, and so they’ve been at war for a long time, fighting over that land (especially Jerusalem and Gaza). Israel, because it has gotten so much help from the US, is pretty powerful, and has abused the hell out of that power and committed a shit ton of human rights violations against the Palestinians, most recently killing 50+ peaceful protesters in Gaza. So, you know, not great. Neither of them seem to care about diplomacy or compromises. And, honestly? Neither do their hardcore supporters. The loudest voices tend to either be: “Israel has done no wrong and deserves any land they want”, or “Israel is the worst country ever and shouldn’t exist”. In our current popular definitions, that’s zionism vs anti-Zionism.

Personally, I think that both of those statements are bullshit. I think that compromises can be made that make both countries reasonably happy if they only tried. I also would like to add, because I’ve been shit talking Israel a lot so far, that framing the Palestinians as completely innocent here isn’t correct either, as both countries have been killing each other for a while (missile strikes are a thing from both), but Palestine has fallen victim to a lot of the serious human rights dilemmas. The thing, though, that anti-Zionist goyim don’t understand, seems to be the history of why Israel was created. It’s not just religious reasons. Yeah, that area was chosen because supposedly it’s our promised land, but Israel was created as a refuge. It was founded in 1948. Right after World War 2. Throughout our history, Jews have been killed, persecuted and kicked out of our homes more times that I can count. Israel exists as a place to go when that happens. Any Jewish person facing oppression can go there and be accepted. That provides a lot of comfort to Jews all around the world, especially in times like these, where Neo-Nazis are on the rise. So, yeah, its existence isn’t necessarily the problem.

But the truth is, the Israeli government is shit and has treated the Palestinians terribly. And, though we were there first thousands of years ago, we left, and other people moved in, so it exists on stolen land. I get uncomfortable when people Goyim say that all Zionism is bad, because at its core, it was just the belief that the Jewish state should exist at all, but the problem is that it has since grown into something that means that Israel can do no wrong, and that Palestine shouldn’t get anything, and that’s just not okay.

So, yeah, I’m honestly no expert, but this is my understanding of all of it. Again, it’s all pretty complicated.

[binickandros]

Yes You are antisemitic in that you only defend Jewish people who pass a test on Israel. It was a LGBTQ march. Jews were approached for being visibly Jewish and you're defending that. It doesn't matter what their political views were. They were subject to harassment just because they were Jewish (2 hours of questioning of their political views, come on). Antisemitism in the left exists and this was an example of it. Your defense of the act shows that you're no ally to Jewish people as a whole

Sigh. Okay, first of all, did you read the statement released by CDM? 

(readmore time bc it gonna get long)

They were not approached for “being visibly Jewish.” There were quite a few (visibly) Jewish groups marching that day. This group was approached because they were in a very specific pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist space and they were chanting anti-Palestinian...I don’t know if “slurs” is the right word, but, at the risk of being redundant, chants.

They were from a known anti-Palestinian, Zionist group called A Wider Bridge. They knew ahead of time that the march was pro-Palestinian. When one of the directors of AWB approached CDM ahead of time and asked if they could attend, they were told they were welcome as long as they left their anti-Palestinian nonsense at home. That doesn’t mean leave their JEWISHness at home. It doesn’t even mean leave their feelings about Zionism at home! Just keep the latter quiet out of respect for the mission statement of the march, and the other attendees!

This group chose, instead, to be vocally anti-Palestinian, and tried to encourage others to do the same. Out of the however many thousands of ppl there, including (visibly) Jewish marchers, these THREE (3) women were the ONLY ONES asked to leave.

Just them. That’s it. These three (again, 3) people. Do you honestly think they were the only visibly Jewish dykes at the dyke march?? Really?? Come on, man. Lemme sell you a fuckin bridge.

Also, your framing of a 2-hour long conversation as an interrogation (not your exact word, but certainly your sentiment) is inflammatory. It’s not like the organizers of the march are cops or some shit; if the women felt threatened or uncomfortable during the conversation, they could’ve turned around and left. They stayed to talk for that time, so obviously they felt there was some value in the conversation.

Look. I don’t care about Zionism. Okay? I mean, that’s probably not a cool thing to say, but I seriously don’t. I don’t care if you’re a Zionist Jew or not. It doesn’t lessen or increase your Jewishness or your worth as a human being in my eyes in any way. This is not a hill upon which I choose to die.

I care about people coming into what is supposed to be a safe space, knowing the rules of said space beforehand, and PURPOSEFULLY working to undermine the spirit of it. I care about people being made to feel unsafe. That’s what these women were doing, and that’s why they were asked to leave...after being given two hours’ worth of chances to act within the spirit of the march.

Now AWB is using its considerable resources and reach to smear an amazing group of women who organized a wonderful event, and fuck if it ain’t working. As of course they planned all along. That bothers me more than anything. They created this narrative. They manipulated it. And now they’re exploiting the motherfuckin HELL out of it, all for their own ends. They don’t give a fuck about supporting LGBT causes; they care about supporting THEIR cause, and fuck anyone who doesn’t agree with them. Oh wait...isn’t that the definition of pinkwashing???????

Also. This is the last ask I’ll publicly address about this issue. Anon is going off, so if anyone wants to talk about this further, you can send an ask off anon and we can speak privately. I’ve made my position clear.

[gryficowa]

Time for a controversial post:

Israel is the colonizer and Zionism is the Nazis of today

Pinkwashing/queerbaiting/homonationalism is queerphobic, not pro-queer

Trans women are women and trans men are men

Gender-segregated professions should cease to exist because they consider gender to be binary and that's what they were created for, because fragile masculinity was afraid that a woman would beat them

Radical feminists are not feminists, but misogynistic people pretending to be feminism

Harry Potter is a boring series and Rowling is a piece of shit

Harris is a Zionist and the Vote Blue people are Islamophobic and ableist

Disney and Pixar movies aren't as great as cartoons like "Gravity Falls" and "The Owl House" (Fuck Disney)

Hitler was a right-winger, and fascism is an extreme right-wing (Stalin, by the way, was not a leftist)

People who say "Political Correctness" and "Woke" are not very intelligent people

Bumblebees are the most underestimated pollinators of flowers

Radical feminists don't care about non-white women from Palestine, Sudan and the Congo

Gender is a spectrum

Hate men is not true feminism

Choosing the lesser evil doesn't work

Capitalism is a piece of shit

Trans women's rights are cis women's rights

The right to abortion should be legal

Fuck the USA because it has paid medical services and ambulances

If you are LGBT+ but you hate trans people or Muslims (Or use autism as an insult) then you are a hypocrite who doesn't know the history of LGBT+ people

Asexuality and aromaticity are part of LGBT+

Shipping a canon aroace character with another character is sus

Media representation of autism, muslims and aroace is a problem

"From the River to the Sea" does not mean the extermination of all Jews, it is Israeli propaganda

Animals like pigs, horses and spiders are greatly underrated in mainstream media

Enderman is the cutest mob, it looks a bit like a bumblebee, meaning it's big and loud

Manji is not a Nazi swastika

Being queerphobic is being a Nazi, because Nazis targeted gays and trans people

Being anti-Zionist is not anti-Semitic

Fuck corporations, many of them support Israel

Dividing people into races is fucked up and involves dehumanizing those who are considered an "inferior race", and the fact that new races are still being created is sick

Animations are not a medium only for children

I don't know what else to add

[brick-van-dyke]

The WJC is very anti orthodox, like the Jews I know have said they don't feel represented and have been underrepresented. Also, again, Zionists aren't = to Jews. A lot of what's being stated in those "stats" is probably true. Like physically, you can talk to any historical/ archeologist in most countries and they'd be so confused by this??

What even IS an abuse tactic, disagreeing??? Like you've been out here playing the victim and guilt tripping as if you're my mother, goddamn.

The reason I refer to TERFs is because I am transgender and have been harassed in the same way by TERFs. Like this is what they use to claim trans people are threats to women. Also, it's been like, what? 10 minutes per reply as we try that's like an essay each (not a bad thing, like good actually, but I'm saying that takes time) and you think I've already read through them all in such a short amount of time? Like I haven't even gotten to that yet because of all the other accompanying stuff you're saying like "um you said This about Jews" and it's a thing I literally didn't say so I have to go through point by point first to address that before I can even talk about sources.

Again, Zionism isn't Judaism or being a Jew. There are Christian Zionists, atheist Zionists. Unless you think me hating them is antisemetic, as hating non Jews, then no I'm not fucking referring to Jews. Israel is a man made political entity and is subject to the same things as Australia or the US. Does criticising Australia mean I hate the Yorta Yorta, my own damn people? No. It means the politics are shit and I'm allowed to say "well right wing parties suck" because they do, and believe it or not, regardless of the ethnicity of the person, the primary party in Israel is a nationalist right wing party.

Literally, my entire point in the first post was "well I see Zionists as kind of the reason for the antisemetic sentiment since they equate Jewishness to Zionism" which, again, is a political ideology. But you can't decide on a damn struggle and say "well so you mean Jews" then turn back to "but Judaism and Zionism are different" like. Which is it. Decide where you sit please.

And yeah, now try not using an archive of stuff. Like I didn't even do that when I was on twitter being told to off myself for being a "Tranny Groomer". Because when people present bad faith arguments they're not worth talking to. Legit, the only reason I'm bothering now is to address it for others who may come across it because I don't think you're being honest. I'll get to the sources themselves now, but the constant "um so you want to murder all Jews?" Is totally something you're getting out of your arse to justify your weird "well, when you say Zionist you mean Jews, but Judaism is different to Zionism". like. Pick one.

I don't even get this tactic honestly, since it's very obvious for people reading it. Is it like...to gaslight until I think I AM saying something I never did? Is it to confused me? I don't get it. And why I say TERFs specifically is because this is EXACTLY what they did to me on twitter. Like this specifically, what you're doing, is how they interacted with me to the point it's actually so creepy. It's the same exact tactic of "well if I repeat it enough times maybe they'll believe they said it" and it's so weird. Every right winger I've ever interacted with has done this exact thing and I don't get why??

Anyway, yeah. I think that addresses some of the things but who cares at this point I think others viewing this can see the obvious.

dear jumblr: STOP LOOKING DOWN ON AND CONDESCENDING TO CONVERTS.

this includes saying “ofc converts don’t notice antisemitism.” or “they’re a convert, they don’t know any better.”

i really don’t think a lot of you realize how many converts don’t reveal they are converts because of this kind of behavior. my own patrilineal convert parent refuses to publicly, not because they are excluded, but because of the condescension. the way converts are basically patted on the head even if they have ancestry, are patrilineal, were raised in a jewish environment, etc. or have none of these at all.

if converts are equals to you, treat them that way. most gerim learned more during their process than many of us learn in hebrew school, let alone what most secular “born” jews learn throughout their lives. so yes, converts DO spot antisemitism. they DO know things. and there isn’t an excuse for them to be bigoted, to spread lies about our people, or to side with our enemies or to otherwise harm their community. just like there isn’t an excuse for any other jew to do so.

you are not being open minded or accepting thinking and talking this way. you are actually engaging in exclusion and separation. you’re looking down on converts instead of treating them like they have equal standing.

if a convert doesnt know something or does display bad behavior? call them in instead of making excuses for them. treat them like equals, because that is what they are.

[bloggerblagger]

86) Jeremy Corbyn would make a fine prime minister.                                                 (Irony: a type of usually humorous expression in which you say the opposite of what you intend.)

If it doesn't look like a duck - not remotely - but  it quacks like a duck and it acts like a duck, is it a duck?

Let’s face it. If it didn’t come with the traditional webbed feet and beak, you’d have serious  difficulty in accepting it was a duck even if laid perfect duck eggs and towed a line of  pretty little ducklings along behind it. And that, I believe, is one of the principal reasons why, despite the well founded charges of anti-Semitism made against Jeremy Corbyn, and all the attention they have received, he still seems to sail serenely on.

What makes it so hard for so many  to  believe that Corbyn is an anti-Semite is that it seems counter-intuitive. One may think he is completely misguided but his quiet reasonableness and ‘beard and sandals’ appearance and his do-gooder earnestness and his bloody allotment always make him seem so well intentioned. How could such a man be an anti-Semite? Has he not been fighting racism and equality all his life?

Tough to see beyond that. And yet, if you were a foreign power - the Islamic Republic of  Iran for instance - who thought it would be useful to get a virulent anti-Israeli  and anti-Semite into office here, rather than put him in a brown shirt and jackboots, would you not  produce someone just like Jezza? What better disguise would there be?

I am not actually suggesting he is an Iranian agent - although he’d been doing a damn good job if he were -  but I am saying, just to thoroughly mix my animal metaphors,  that it is very possible to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing if the disguise is good enough.

Labour, the party that cares, doesn’t.

As I say, that’s one of the reasons that the sainted Jezza has got clean away with such outrageous, blatantly anti-Semitic behaviour.

Oh - you don’t think it’s  really been all that bad? You don’t? 

That’s another reason.

And the rest of the current Labour leadership seems to agree.

I, and most other Jews too, I believe, have reached the depressing conclusion, that, frankly, they don't give a shit about anti-Semitism. (I am sure  it is has not escaped Seumas Milne, Labour’s Director of Strategy,  that with only 300,000 Jews in the country and, at a guess, a quarter of those children, we really don’t count electorally.) 

That would certainly explain the official Labour  response to any of these charges, which has been to lock His Corbyness away in a closet and  to send out attack dogs like Chris Williamson MP  and Owen Jones to rubbish the people speaking out, to flatly avoid answering any direct questions, and to repeat the mantra that Corbyn has always been a man of peace, and couldn't possibly be anti-Semitic.

L: Our Dear leader, man of peace.              R:ChrisWilliamson MP, piece of work.                                  

Probably futile but...

It has reached the point where one feels it almost pointless to try to explain why, amongst Jews, there is such profound distrust of Corbyn and why they simply do not accept his blandishments. But I will try one more time by dealing with the most grievous example of the profound offence he has given.

He has been caught on film saying that the Zionists in the room, despite perhaps having lived in Britain all their lives, did not understand English irony and needed a history lesson. 

As he will perfectly well have known, Zionists are overwhelmingly Jews. To argue, as he has, that he didn't know they were Jews or that he was using the term in the political sense  - whatever the hell that means -  may be enough for Ken  and Seumus  but it won't wash with me or 99% of British Jews.

To say that we don’t understand something ‘English’ clearly implies that we Jews, no matter how deep are roots here, are not fully English - that we don't quite get what it is to be English. It is one of the oldest tropes about Jews and it is was unambiguous anti-Semitism.

And let’s not pretend, as Shami Chakrarbarti did the other day on Radio 4, that these remarks were taken out of context. Utter bollocks. The Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition said exactly what he was reported to have said. And he clearly meant to say it. There was nothing in the ‘context’ that made the slightest difference to the meaning. Here is the film of his entire speech.  Judge for yourself. 

(Click on the link below but since the sound quality is poor, click also on the subtitle symbol. That’s the litte square with ‘cc’ on it, on the bottom right.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xf1hwfo2W0

This time it’s personal

I feel I cannot adequately convey just how angry I am about this. 

It wouldn’t make a jot of difference if my parents had been recent immigrants but, as it happens, I have ancestors who were in this country ten generations back. 

While Jeremy’s father was not in the Army, Navy or RAF in the second world war - but doing a Pike in the Home Guard - my father (older than his) spent six years as a private in the Eighth Army in Egypt, Italy and Greece. And he felt obliged to change his name. Jerome Abraham Phillips had to become Jerome Arthur Phillips because of the fear of anti-Semitism. (Anti-Semitism in the British Army that is.)

How fucking dare Jeremy Corby accuse me - because he was, by association, accusing me - of not being fully English.

Jeremy Corbyn’s father served in Dad’s Army at the age of 24

Despite a lack of irony my father was allowed to serve in the Eighth Army.

Enter an establishment Jew

For the ex-chief rabbi, Lord Sacks   to have intervened when this video came to light and charge Corbyn with being an anti-Semite  was a very, very big deal. It was unprecedented.  Rightly or wrongly, Sacks is the  Jew most venerated by the British media and the establishment.  ( As if to prove the point  he is currently hosting a Radio 4 series on Morality.) Yet his words have been dismissed by the Labour leadership out of hand. The fact that he unwisely  mentioned Enoch Powell in the same breath gave them an excuse to blithely shrug off the substance of his complaint.

But let's, for a moment, take Corbyn at his word, and assume he is so insensitive he didn't realise what the effect his words would have. What has his  response been? To apologise? To meet with Lord Sacks? Or to make up completely unbelievable explanations and then avoid the press and cameras himself and send out his emissaries with their pugnacious, unyielding messages of denial. 

What if it hadn’t been about Jews?

If he had made similar remarks about any other minority  group he would have been forced to resign immediately. Imagine if he said that those who advocate  the wearing of a burka  might have been born in this country, but didn’t understand English irony or know English history. 

Those who advocate wearing a burka may not  necessarily be  Muslims, but almost certainly are, in the way that Zionists are almost certainly Jews. It would certainly be something you might  expect  the leader of the English Defence League to say, but the leader of the Labour Party?  Do you honestly think Corbyn would still be in a job if he’d said something so Islamaphobic?  

But Jews don't matter to Labour. That is the message that Corbyn and his supporters have sent us.

Don’t just blame poor Jeremy

Jezza  and his acolytes are not alone amongst public figures on the Left in their supposedly unwitting ant-Semitism. Steve Bell, the cartoonist in the Guardian is another culprit. In two recent cartoons he has been profoundly offensive. He has been accused of anti-Semitism before so he can’t make the excuse that he couldn’t have known the risk he was running. Here’s the first.

What can this mean but that the people caricatured are not sincere in their complaints about Labour anti-Semitism?  One of those ‘sanctimonious humbugs’ (front row L) is clearly Lord Sacks and another, also in the front row, is Margaret Hodge, the MP and Jewess (to use a nice, old fashioned term) who called Corby an anti-Semite to his face. 

And here’s his other recent intended witticism on the subject. 

What can this mean but that these Labour grandees led by Margaret Hodge, who,  since she is holding the weapon is implicitly the executioner in chief, are being wholly unreasonable in asking Corbyn to apologise and recant? 

I was frankly shocked when I saw these cartoons, and probably should have complained but I didn’t. Shocked perhaps but not all that surprised. Katherine Viner, the editor, is the co-author of the 2009 play, ‘My Name is Rachel Corrie’, which a writer in The Spectator called  an ‘unapologetically pro-Palestinian drama’.

I wouldn’t accuse her of being anti-Semitic but neither can we expect the Guardian under her stewardship to be entirely even handed on the subject of the Israeli/Palestinian situation. 

Which brings me on to the subject of anti-Zionism. And anti-Semitism. And why the two so closely intertwined as to be effectively indistinguishable.

Zionists v Anti-Zionists

To  be a Zionist is to believe that Israel should be a homeland for Jews.  And that is all it means. It does not mean you  support  the policies of Netanyahu and his government. Not the annexation of East Jerusalem. Not the building of settlements on the West Bank. Not the ridiculously provocative, recently passed, ‘nation state’ law. I, and almost all the Jews I speak to, are vehemently  opposed to all of these things, 

But I, like most Jews, am a Zionist. (Some, a very few, aren’t, but then again, too few to mention.)

So what is an anti-Zionist?  Clearly someone who takes the opposite view; who does not believe that Israel should be a homeland for Jews. That the Israeli state should cease to exist. An anti-Zionist hopes that that one day, we would wake up and find Israel was no longer there. 

In such an eventuality, if you weren’t a Jew you might be a bit concerned, even alarmed,  but you’d get over it.

For me, it is a simply terrifying prospect. Quite literally, an existential threat to my own life  and that of my daughter. I don’t want to rehearse all the arguments why that is the case here, because I’ve been through them all in a previous post. https://bloggerblagger.tumblr.com/post/143854734827/62-anti-zionism-anti-semitism-an-expert-explains (If you have the stamina click on the link and go back and read it.)

But the bottom line is this: anti-Zionism is  plainly inimical to the interests of Jews, as hostile as crude old fashioned ‘you’re not really English’ anti-Semitism. 

A history lesson for Jeremy.

There are always different versions of history.

It is said that the winners write the history and while I can’t help but admire Hamas’, Hizbollah’s and Al Fatah’s pretty successful attempts to buck the trend, I do feel the need to point out a few things in Corbyn Minor’s textbook that are factually incorrect.

1) Israel is not, as  anti-Zionists insist on calling it, an ‘apartheid state’. I lived in  South Africa at the height of apartheid so I  have the advantage of some direct experience. The 21% of Israeli citizens - those living in Israel proper - who are Israeli Arabs or Israeli Palestinians or just plain Palestinians (however they prefer to self identify) have the full rights of citizenship. They can vote, stand for parliament (the Knesset) own property, demonstrate against the government. None of these rights were available to non-whites (as they were officially called in South Africa) under apartheid - which was the doctrine of separate development. 

That is not to say that there is no racism amongst Israelis and Jews generally. Sickening bigotry can be found  in every country, amongst every ethnic group. Jews have no claim to be any better. Why should they be expected to be?

Today I heard an astonishing story which both proves that there is sometimes, official racism in Israel and, simultaneously and seemingly impossibly, that there  isn’t.

A friend of mine working in London, a Muslim with a family home in Nazareth,  who self identifies as an Israeli Arab, travels frequently between London and Tel Aviv. Whenever he goes through Tel Aviv airport, despite having been through all the security checks that every  passenger does, he  is asked to do more.  As soon as he hands in his passport, it flags that he is an Arab and he has to go off to have all the contents of his luggage checked piece by piece. What is that but racial profiling and what is racial profiling but racism?

But here’s the twist. In order to satisfy Israeli legal requirements that this is not racial profiling, whoever is unfortunate enough to be standing next to him in the queue is dragged off to suffer exactly the same irritating bullshit. The last time it happened it was a black hatted, ultra orthodox Hassidic Jew. 

Apartheid? Not exactly.

2) Is it often said that Israel flouts UN resolutions, most notably ‘242′, passed half a century  ago, which calls on Israel to withdraw behind the 1967 borders. But there’s another part to that resolution which its critics conveniently ignore. Namely, that in return, all parties should recognise the right of every country in the region - including Israel - to exist in peace and security. So far, after 50 years, only four out of twenty two Arab countries have done so.

As for the other 64 UN resolutions, do you think it is possible that at least some of them have been passed because there are 50 Muslim majority countries and most, if not all, routinely vote against Israel on any and every issue?

3) Which brings me to Gaza. We constantly hear of the Israeli blockade. But it isn’t just an Israeli blockade. It is, at the western end,  also an Egyptian blockade. Have you ever heard Corbyn Minor mention that? Perhaps he was sleeping through that part of the lesson, 

Gaza was territory taken in 1967 in the Six Day War by Israel and voluntarily given up to Palestinian sovereignty - as Sinai was earlier given back to Egypt - and that involved the forcible removal of thousands of Israelis who, wisely or not, had made their homes there. 

Within months the people of Gaza had rewarded Israel for this act of peace by electing an Hamas government which was, and still is, sworn to the elimination of Israel. If they were to recognise Israel’s right to exist, then Netanyahu would have lost his best excuse for maintaining the blockade and not actively pursuing peace. They could shoot his fox tomorrow but they prefer to fire rockets. 

It’s true that they wouldn’t get everything they want in a negotiated peace settlement but nobody ever does. It takes two to make peace on earth Jeremy, and they have to want it more than eternity in  paradise. 

Exactly who are the real racists here?

Then we have the charge that the very concept of Israel as a Jewish homeland is  inherently racist; that it was when it was created in 1948, and that it still is. 

It’s a point. As least, it is in the precisely the same way that Pakistan was always inherently racist and still is. Pakistan, created just a year earlier than Israel, came into being  for the specific reason of being a nation for Muslims and is still the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. 

There are differences of course. In Israel all religions are free to practise exactly as they wish, people are not murdered for blasphemy, and LGBTQI (and whatever else)  rights are fully respected.

it is different too from the Islamic Republic of Iran where the religious minority, the Baha’ai are not permitted to  go to university and where gays are hung from cranes.

In fact, Islam is the official state religion in many countries, of which more than a few discriminate against other religions and where anything but heterosexual sex is illegal. 

In Egypt a bill was recently introduced to outlaw atheism. That would put it in line with the thirteen countries where atheism is punishable by death: Afghanistan, Iran, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritania, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

Why is it that Corbyn and his gang are so obsessed with Israel and never seem to notice the racism of others? Isn’t the act of charging one nation with racism while ignoring all the others, racism in itself?

We, in the United Kingdom, shouldn’t feel too superior by the way. We have a state religion and all others are discriminated against. The Church of England is the Established Church and followers of any other religion, even other Christians,  are proscribed by law from landing the top job in the country. No Muslim, no Jew, no Hindu, no Roman Catholic, and I believe, not even a Presbyterian  can be our Head of State.

Even post apartheid South Africa is racist. It was openly discussed in the South African press that  the mixed race  Trevor Manuel, the much praised Minister of Finance in the noughties could never be President because he wasn’t black enough.

Trevor Manuel. Not black enough to be South African President

It would, of course, be marvellous if group identity - tribalism if you will - was outmoded and eliminated and  ‘content of character’ was the only thing that mattered. But the truth is that almost every country in the world is dominated by one ethno-religious group or another. And it doesn’t seem remotely likely that any of them would tolerate the  possibility of  their ongoing majority  being challenged.

About 5-10% of the UK’s electorate are Muslims. Can you imagine the reaction if they became 25%, never mind a majority? And would it not be the same in France, Germany, Sweden, Russia, the US and in most of the countries in the non-Muslim world. 

And Jeremy, ask your Mexican wife what she thinks the reaction in Mexico would be if the hegemony of Roman Catholics was ever under threat.

Calling a Jew a Jew

No Jew would ever argue that there isn’t anti-Semitism on  the political right. Or indeed anywhere in British society. There is always a low level buzz, probably not picked up by by the antennae of non-Jews, but  Nazi death camps, Russian pogroms, Spanish inquisitions  and yes, English expulsions (oddly enough, Corby, we really do know our history) have left   Jews super attuned to anti-Semitism  and it is always there in the background for us.

I will give you one simple example of endemic anti-Semitism  that flies so low below most people’s radar that even Jews unwittingly accept it. It is the use of the word ‘Jew’.  

How often do you hear even the most ardent supporter of Jews refer to us by the actual word? Christians can be referred to as Christians and Muslims as Muslims, Hindus as Hindus, Janes as Janes, but Jews are never called Jews. They must be referred to as ’Jewish people’. Why? To soften the effect. Because the word Jew is still, after all these years, somehow, unconsciously perhaps, regarded as pejorative.

To be a Christian is to be kind, to be generous, to be virtuous. To be a Jew is to be tight, to be clever - too clever by half - to be cunning, to be manipulative, sneaky. So even our friends and usually, even  we ourselves- would rather say we are Jewish.

To call us Jews is deemed to be too strong, too brutal,  too, too, too… well, Jewish.

Outing myself

Another example: whenever I meet new people who are not Jewish, I let them know almost immediately that I am, and I know that I am not alone in doing this. The purpose is to try to ensure that no careless remark - no Jewish joke about money, no casual mention of ‘front wheelers’ - is going to be made in my presence. Because I don’t want to be put in the position of either cravenly saying nothing, or calling them out and then feeling I’m responsible for  the embarrassment, the awkward silence that would follow. 

And yet it still happens, and shamefully, more often than not, I follow the example of another well known Jew, and turn the other cheek.

I know that these remarks are not made out of any deliberate attempt to give offence, but the moment you draw attention to someone’s otherness you take the risk that you will. So I try to draw any potential sting by identifying  my otherness before you can. 

Who could possibly have been the inspiration for these posters?

On Wednesday September 5th 2018  these posters were flyposted over other advertisements at several different locations across London. Less than 24 hours after the infamous meeting of the Labour Party National Executive meeting at which, late in the afternoon, it was finally agreed to adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism in full, along with the caveat that ‘it will not in any way undermine freedom of expression on Israel or the rights of the Palestinians.’ (Quite why they did this is a mystery to me as there is nothing in the IHRA definition to prevent either.) 

That wasn’t enough for JC though. He wanted to include a clause that said, “it should not be considered antisemitic to describe, Israel, its policies or the circumstances around its foundation as racist because of their discriminatory impact, or to support another settlement of the Israel-Palestine conflict”

This suggestion was apparently defeated, but why exactly was Corbyn pressing a case for this, when he knew that, had it been adopted,  it was bound to pour a tanker of oil on the flames of the dispute between the Labour Party and the Jewish community? 

Why should he want to appear the most antagonistic and unyielding member  of this now very left wing, Momentum-heavy body? 

How and why  was the news of this leaked when all the phones were supposedly taken off all the participants on the way in? 

And how was it that these posters could suddenly have appeared, pushing the very same specious bollocks that Corbyn has been trying to get adopted the evening before?

They were obviously  professionally designed, printed and posted in what must have been a highly coordinated operation  involving a number of people with different skill sets. And all in less than 24 hours. Really?

Here’s a conspiracy theory for you:  the people who did the poster - the London Palestine Action group apparently - had advance warning of what their guru was going to say and had the posters ready to go. It  was Jeremy himself or one of his acolytes who sprung the leak. And it was all part of the same orchestrated publicity campaign.

Yes, I grant you, it seems pretty fanciful. Why would the Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition risk getting involved in such a crazy scheme? if it were exposed wouldn’t even he be seriously, even fatally, damaged politically?

Crazy perhaps, but  I have a very nearly  plausible answer: Corbyn is a  lifelong idealogical purist.  A ceaseless campaigner for anti-establishment causes. A zealot. A rebel to the marrow of his bones. Would he really mind if he crashed and burned and became a hero and a martyr? Wouldn’t that be more attractive to a chap like him than having to deal with the quotidian mundanity of having to  read the boring contents of dispatch boxes  and deal with Sir Humphrey? 

Even if he didn’t have anything directly to with those posters, the timing tells you he was, at the very least,  the inspiration. 

And for all the reasons I have outlined here, those posters were unarguably anti-Semitic.

And Jeremy Corbyn is a duck.