#many sephardim are white

[earthytzipi]

as much as Zionism is a colonial project (though I tend to take the view as expressed in "Decolonizing Jewishness" re: Zionism as failed decolonization attempt) I think it's extremely reductive to claim that Ashkenormativity is to blame for the colonial nature of the Zionist reality. as more and more people from outside of Jewish spaces are introduced to the concept of Ashkenormativity, "Ashkenazi" is being used as a synonym for white and for colonizer.

this is not the whole picture. first and foremost, a large percentage of Ashkenazim are not white, though of course many of us are. conflating Ashkenazim with whiteness, both inside and outside of the Jewish community, contributes to the erasure of Jewish People of Color. additonally, the first Jews in the western hemisphere, arriving with conquistadors and colonizers, were, in fact, Sephardi. in the US, almost every Jewish person was Sephardi until the second half of the 19th century. Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews have also historically participated in and currently participate in Zionism, including in the settlements. furthermore, when we're talking about Israel's suppression of diasporic culture, a very real phenomenon, we need to discuss how many Ashkenazi cultural elements were also suppressed - including Yiddish and Ashkenazi Hebrew. in fact, Ashkenazim from Europe who wanted to hang onto their diasporic cultures were considered weak and effeminate. this reality should make sense to everyone who is aware of how Holocaust survivors are treated in Israel. in Israeli society, there is contempt for EVERY Jewish culture that is not Israeli, and of course that is compounded and exacerbated by racism for Mizrahi, Ethiopian, Indian, and other Jewish groups of color.

it's not the same dichotomy as the Black vs white dichotomy set up by US/UK/French/Spanish/etc colonization, and the term "Ashkenormativity" being taken out of Jewish contexts and applied to Zionism just makes Ashkenazim a convenient scapegoat for all the evils of Zionism. the main consequence I'm seeing is the idea that Ashkenazim are "fake European Jews" in contrast to the "real Middle Eastern Jews." this idea hurts us all. Jewish people are from every corner of the globe, and every Jewish person is a real Jewish person. I'm asking those of us who are pro-Palestine to tread very carefully when discussing this issue, and maybe retire the use of "Ashkenormativity" when it comes to discussing the racism of Zionism, which Jewish people from every diasporic background can and do participate in. Ashkenormativity refers to the centering of Ashkenazi history and customs when discussing Jewishness, and I'm really concerned that the way I'm seeing it used does not meet that definition and is not helpful (and maybe ends up centering Ashkenazi "evilness" or "Europeanness" while still not discussing Sephardi, Mizrahi, and other Jewish diasporic group's histories at all outside of their interactions with Ashkenazim in Israel). there's a lot of racism Jewish spaces, in Zionism, and in Israeli society, I just think we should call it racism and white supremacy.

[intern-seraph]

[goy voice] ashkenazim are all white europeans mizrahim are all arab and sephardim are all hispanic

[baroque-hashem]

@sephardigf put these tags on on a reblog of a post I reblogged, and it inspired me to make a post about this topic.

Goyim who assume that Jews are "white" and "oppressors" and have always lived the good life in America are truly laughable. Jews have never been treated as white. We were even victims of segregation. And if you notice all the new "No Zionists Allowed" signs on American businesses these days, we still are segregation's victims.

In the 1950s, the ADL looked into segregation of Jews by businesses in the US, and what they found was depressing to say the least. So many businesses, in all fifty states, had policies of discrimination and ostracization against Jews. Many places were designated "Gentiles Only". Jews started compiling travel guides to help each other know where was safe to visit. These guides later inspired African Americans to do the same. And Jews definitely saw ourselves in the struggles of African Americans for rights. Jews helped organize the NAACP and marched right alongside African Americans in their demonstrations demanding civil rights.

Don't you dare tell me Jews are "white" or "oppressors". We know all about oppression, from the perspective of the oppressed.

And this was the case no matter what kind of Jew you were. The goyim didn't distinguish between Ashkenazim or Sephardim. We were (and still are) just Jews to them. And we were "other".

Anyone who has the chutzpah to say that Jews are oppressors and "white colonizers" is a schmuck, no doubt about it.

You can ignore the realities of Jewish oppression all you want. But ignoring reality won't make it go away.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

[notaplaceofhonour]

I understand and agree with pointing out that the Holocaust didn’t just affect the Jews that lived in Europe, and shedding light on the stories of Jews in other territories under Axis control. Every life lost or uprooted in the Holocaust matters and deserves to be remembered, not just Ashkenazim.

However, I’ve been seeing a bit of an overcorrection to the point that this valid & important point get twisted by some into the idea that Ashkenazim weren’t actually all that affected by the Holocaust at all and may have actually been safer than other Jews due to being White/European*, and I wanted to walk through exactly why that is so far from the reality and gets into really dangerous Holocaust Distortion.

The fact is that the vast majority of Holocaust victims were Ashkenazim. How do we know this? Well, first and most obvious without even getting into the numbers: the Nazis were most active in Eastern Europe, where most Jews were overwhelmingly Ashkenazi. Germany had colonies elsewhere and the affect the Holocaust had on Jews living in Africa and Asia is not any less important (and the fact remains that their stories are a genuine gap in Holocaust education that needs to be filled), but this doesn’t change the fact that the center of Nazi activity was Europe, and thus that is where their impact on Jews was most intense. But it’s important to not just go off of what seems “obvious” because what’s obvious to any given person is subjective and subject to bias. So let’s look at the numbers:

Estimates prior to the Holocaust put Ashkenazim at 92% of the world’s Jewish population (or roughly 14 million of the 15.3 million total Jewish population), meaning that it would be physically impossible for less than 4.7 million (or 78%) of the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust to be Ashkenazim.

Even that number is only possible to reach by assuming that only Ashkenazism survived and literally every non-Ashkenazi Jew died in the Holocaust, which we categorically know is not the case due to the continued existence of Sephardim & Mizrahim, as well as other Jews. So the number has to be higher than 78%.

Additionally, the fact that the proportion of the world’s Jewish population that was Ashkenazi fell so drastically during to the Holocaust and still hasn’t recovered (from 92% in 1930, only recovering to close to 75% in the last couple decades) means that not only a higher overall number of deaths were Ashkenazim, but that a higher proportion of the total Ashkenazi population died than from other groups.

We also know that 85% of Jews killed in the Holocaust were Yiddish-speakers. The fact that Yiddish is endemic to Ashkenazi culture (and not all Ashkenazim would have even been Yiddish-speakers) due to assimilation means that at least—and most likely more than—85% of Jews killed in the Holocaust were Ashkenazi.

So, no, Ashkenazim were not some privileged subcategory of Jews who avoided the worst of the Holocaust. They were the group most directly devastated by it.

That doesn’t change the fact that the devastation the Nazis and their allies wreaked on other Jews is every bit as important to acknowledge and discuss, and must not fall by the wayside. The stories and experiences of all victims & survivors deserve to be heard, remembered, and honored, not just the most common or most statistically representative of the majority of victims. However, we can (and must) do that without allowing the facts of the Holocaust to be distorted or suggesting Ashkenazim were somehow less affected by the Holocaust or more privileged under the Nazis. The Nazis hated all Jews. Antisemitism affects all Jews. Period.

*without getting too deep into how categories like Ashkanzi/Sephardi/etc. don’t map neatly onto race like so many people seem to want them to. that’s a different post, but just pointing that out

[magnetothemagnificent]

Is it true that is used to be forbidden for sephardi to marry ashkenazi? Or like, any group to marry into a different subsection? I mean from both sides not one being biggoted against the other.

It was never forbidden halakhically, but there was (and in some places still is) taboo and intense social wariness against such marriages.

Ashkenazi and Sephardi marriages have been happening ever since there became a split dividing diaspora Jews into "Ashkenazi" and "Sephardi". Historically, the families of important Rabbis and community leaders especially would often marry into each other, regardless of whether one was Ashkenazi or Sephardi. Rabbi Yitzchak Luria (the ARIZaL), a famed medieval Kabbalist, for example, was the child of an Ashkenazi father and Sephardi mother.

It is unfortunate that there was and still is a taboo- there's a huge issue of racialized white Ashkenazi Jews having colorist and racist attitudes towards Sephardi, Mizrachi, Ethiopian, and other non-Ashkenazi Jewish populations (not all Ashkenazim are racialized as white, though, and not all Sephardim are racialized as non-white). Some Jewish communities, regardless of whether they're Ashkenazi, Sephardi, etc, are more insular and frown upon marriage with any Jew outside of their group, for example; some Chassidic sects might socially forbid marriage with someone from another Chassidic sect.

Intermarriage between Sephardim and Ashkenazim has become more common and accepted, and sometimes even encouraged- I remember vividly sitting in Jewish health class in high school (presentation about genetic diseases and screening many Jewish high schools and seminaries give) and the person presenting all the information to us told us that Ashkenazi-Sephardi marriage is good because it diversifies the gene pool.

TLDR: No it was never forbidden according to Jewish law for Ashkenazim and Sephardim to marry each other, but there was and still is taboo regarding it.

[frithwontdie]

Are Ashkenazi Jews white? Short answer, No!

Ashkenazi Jews may appear white, but are not. Some identify as white and some don't. Even many jewish news articles claim their not white.

But what do the facts say?

Ashkenazi Jews are a genetically and culturally Middle Eastern people, who only began to “integrate” into European society after the rise of Liberalism in the 17th or 18th Century. Their history in Europe has been full of conflict. Being continually massacred, and expelled from every single European country that they have ever inhabited. It was clear that white Europeans considered jews to be categorically separate race from them. (plus the Jews also considered themselves separate from white Europeans as well). Plus the overwhelming majority have distinctly non-European phenotypes that are obviously Middle Eastern in origin.

Plus, the claim that they're white, is not supported by scientific, genetic evidence.

Despite their long-term residence in different countries and isolation from one another, most Jewish populations were not significantly different from one another at the genetic level.

Admixture estimates suggested low levels of European Y-chromosome gene flow into Ashkenazi and Roman Jewish communities.  Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations were not statistically different. The results support the hypothesis that the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population, and suggest that most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora.”

The m values based on haplotypes Med and 1L were ~13% ± 10%, suggesting a rather small European contribution to the Ashkenazi paternal gene pool. When all haplotypes were included in the analysis, m increased to 23% ± 7%. This value was similar to the estimated Italian contribution to the Roman Jewish paternal gene pool.

About 80 Sephardim, 80 Ashkenazim and 100 Czechoslovaks were examined for the Yspecific RFLPs revealed by the probes p12f2 and p40a,f on TaqI DNA digests. The aim of the study was to investigate the origin of the Ashkenazi gene pool through the analysis of markers which, having an exclusively holoandric transmission, are useful to estimate paternal gene flow. The comparison of the two groups of Jews with each other and with Czechoslovaks (which have been taken as a representative source of foreign Y-chromosomes for Ashkenazim) shows a great similarity between Sephardim and Ashkenazim who are very different from Czechoslovaks. On the other hand both groups of Jews appear to be closely related to Lebanese. A preliminary evaluation suggests that the contribution of foreign males to the Ashkenazi gene pool has been very low (1 % or less per generation).

Jewish populations show a high level of genetic similarity to each other, clustering together in several types of analysis of population structure. These results support the view that the Jewish populations largely share a common Middle Eastern ancestry and that over their history they have undergone varying degrees of admixture with non-Jewish populations of European descent. We find that the Jewish populations show a high level of genetic similarity to each other, clustering together in several types of analysis of population structure. Further, Bayesian clustering, neighbor-joining trees, and multidimensional scaling place the Jewish populations as intermediate between the non-Jewish Middle Eastern and European populations. These results support the view that the Jewish populations largely share a common Middle Eastern ancestry and that over their history they have undergone varying degrees of admixture with non-Jewish populations of European descent.

A sample of 526 Y chromosomes representing six Middle Eastern populations (Ashkenazi, Sephardic, and Kurdish Jews from Israel; Muslim Kurds; Muslim Arabs from Israel and the Palestinian Authority Area; and Bedouin from the Negev) was analyzed for 13 binary polymorphisms and six microsatellite loci. The investigation of the genetic relationship among three Jewish communities revealed that Kurdish and Sephardic Jews were indistinguishable from one another, whereas both differed slightly, yet significantly, from Ashkenazi Jews. The differences among Ashkenazim may be a result of low-level gene flow from European populations and/or genetic drift during isolation.

Archaeologic and genetic data support that both Jews and Palestinians came from the ancient Canaanites, who extensively mixed with Egyptians, Mesopotamian and Anatolian peoples in ancient times. Thus, Palestinian-Jewish rivalry is based in cultural and religious, but not in genetic, differences.

One study 2010 study stated that Both Ashkenazi Jews and Sephardic jews share only 30% European DNA with the rest being of middle east decent. And by a recent 2020 study on remains from Bronze Age (over 3000 years ago) southern Levantine (Canaanite) populations suggests Ashkenazi Jews derive more than half of their ancestry from Bronze Age Levantine populations with the remaining 41% of their ancestry being European and 50% being Middle Eastern.

[stealth-liberal]

While Jumbler on this site focuses massively on left wing issues and left wing sins (of which Jew Hatred is paramount) I live in a red area, so my life and the lives many other Jews just like me are different.

Jews like us have MAGA nutbags come up to us, apropos of NOTHING, and try to get us to agree with them about the CRAZIEST islamphobic bullshit you've ever heard in your life. For Jews like us, this is the only time right wing antisemites try to do anything other than terrify us or try to bully us out of our homes and neighborhoods, or to bully our children out of the schools. And it's so clearly a trap that they actually think we're stupid enough to fall for, that we might actually play respectability politics for them. That we'll be the "good Jew" that they can point to that they know, so as to defend themselves from accusations of antisemitism or straight being a neo-nazi.

I haven't met a Jew yet who plays along. For Sephardim, MENA, Mizrahi, and Beta Israel Jews... it's so very clear they want them to play "the good darkie" and for many Ashkenazi Jews, it's so clear they want them to twist themselves into knots to prove that they're "white like you". It's a losing game. No Jew can be "the good darkie" enough for them. No Jew can be white enough for them. They will ALWAYS toss us into the fire.

In my city, we have Jews and Muslims, and we don't have the option to tear each other apart. There is an embedded hate element here, and for the most part, we watch each other's backs. It isn't always perfect, but I don't mind watching my Muslim neighbors back, and they don't mind watching mine, and so on and so forth.

Why am I writing about this? Because since the war in Israel began, I have had some stomach churning experiences in my town. Many of them some right wing fuck nugget trying to get me to agree that we should do some sort of violent act towards Muslims in this country because... blah, blah, blah. And when I back away and vehemently don't agree, they practically turn purple with rage and yell at me. I live in a city that Marjorie Taylor Greene visited on her Jewish Space Laser tour. So it's just a day ending in Y for me. It's clear they want to scare me, but I used to be a Marine, don't let the makeup fool you, I can take care of myself easily. That kind of thing doesn't scare me.

But I want to be clear. I hate Hamas with every fiber in my body. I support Israel's right to exist and to defend itself. I do not, nor have I ever hated Palestinians. They're just people, individuals. I do not, nor have I ever hated Muslims. They're just people, individuals. No Muslim that I've ever known has made me feel unsafe, hated, or in any way fearful. I've spent too much of my adult life in areas with small or even tiny Jewish populations to turn away someone who's willing to reach out and watch my back. I think most of the Muslims I know have had the same situations.

So if one more fucking right-wing antisemite/islamaphobe comes up to me and tries to get me to agree to some Muslim hatred nonsense... I swear to G-d, they're getting my hands in their teeth. Same goes for online encounters. Though instead of hands, you'll get blocked and reported.

I have been dealing with intense antisemitism both in my real life town and online. I refuse to add islamaphobia to that shitty cocktail. Go find some other putz, I'm not the one. I'm heartbroken and enraged right now. Don't try me. I'm not your fucking pawn. Jews are not your scape goats nor your pawns.

[mariacallous]

For many of us, breaking the Yom Kippur fast is an Ashkenazic feast of bagels and lox, blintzes, noodle kugel and perhaps some sweet rugelach, babka or kuchen (coffee cake). For Sephardim around the world, break fast looks and tastes very different while still meeting the need to be tasty when prepared ahead, quick to assemble at the last minute, easy to digest and, above all, restorative.

For Jews of Morocco, a flavorful stew of chicken with preserved lemon and olives is often served for Yom Kippur break fast, providing comfort and nutrition similar to chicken soup. I’m tempted to re-name this dish “White House Chicken” because I was honored to prepare it as the guest chef for three Passover Seders hosted by President and Mrs. Obama. Even dearer to my heart, it’s the one dish my son said he absolutely wants me to make for the Shabbat dinner prior to his upcoming wedding. Fifty people? No problem. This is a perfect dish for large gatherings and holidays as it’s easily multiplied for a crowd, tastes even better if made a day or two ahead and freezes well. Let’s also appreciate that it’s made and re-heated on the stove top when so many other dishes vie for space in the oven.

Traditionally, this dish is made with bone-in and skin-on thighs or a whole cut-up chicken. Using boneless, skinless thighs and breasts was the preference at the White House and the way I prepare the dish at home so my guests don’t have to deal with bones. I also find the dish doesn’t need the extra fat from the skin. Use whatever is your preference, although if you do use bone in, you might need to add a little extra broth to cover the chicken pieces. Serve the chicken with lots of the sauce on a big rimmed platter on its own or surrounding a mound of rice or couscous in the middle. 

[hadarmarkin]

Beyond Latkes: Sephardic Hanukkah Recipes and Traditions 🕎

Hanukkah is here and if you are already tired from Latkes dipped in sour cream, here are  some traditional alternatives from the Sephardic kitchen. 

For a healthier version of Latkes, try Keftes de Prasa- leek patties-  popular among Sephardim in the Balkan communities, such as  Bulgaria and Turkey. Here the dominant flavor is leek, which is paired with herbs and sometime feta cheese. The use of leek is ubiquitous in the Sephardic repertoire from ancient times. In fact, according to Jewish folklore, being caught cooking leek or smelling of it during the Spanish Inquisition, immediately revealed one’s Jewish identity and led to a sentence of death by torture. Despite this dark chapter, Sephardim remained loyal to their favorite allium for its tender flavor, abundance and low cost. Leeks are the main ingredient in many Sephardic holiday dishes, and here is the Hanukkah one. 

Leek Fritters (adapted from Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty)

For the sauce (optional but recommended)

-½ cup greek yogurt (I increased to almost 1 cup)

-½ cup sour cream (I reduced to 2 tbsp)

-2 garlic cloves

-2 tbsp lemon  (I used 3 tbsp)

-3 tbsp olive oil

-½ cup parsley leaves

-2 cups cilantro leaves 

-Blend all the ingredients together in the food processor until they turn green.

For the fritters

-3 leeks cleaned; white and light green parts sliced into 1 inch slices

-5 shallots finely chopped

-⅔ cup olive oil (you may use less depending on need)

-1 fresh red chili pepper, seeded and finely chopped

-½ cup parsley - leaves and thin stalks finely chopped

-¾ tsp ground coriander

-1 tsp ground cumin

-¼ tsp ground turmeric

-¼ tsp ground cinnamon

-1 tsp sugar

-½ tsp salt

-1 egg white

-¾ cup +1 tbsp self-rising flour

- 1 tbsp baking powder

-1 egg

-⅔ cup milk

-4 tbsp melted butter

-Sauté the leeks and the shallots for 15 minutes or until soft on medium heat.

-Transfer into a large bowl and add the pepper, all the spices, sugar and salt. Mix well and allow to cool.

-Whisk the egg white until foamy and add into the veggie mixture. 

-In another bowl mix together the flour, baking powder (I recommend sifting dry ingredients to avoid bulks), whole egg, milk and butter to form a batter. Gently pour the batter into the veggie - egg white mixture. 

-Put 2 tbsp of oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Spoon half of the mixture into the pan and form 4 large patties. Fry each side for 2-3 minutes or until golden and crisp. Transfer to a platter with paper towels to absorb the oil. Repeat the process to create 8 patties total. 

-Serve warm with a spoonful of the green yogurt sauce on top.

On the sweeter side of things, the Israeli national obsession with Sufganiyot (traditionally jelly and nowadays extremely sinful) is definitely rooted in the diaspora. Almost each Sephardic and Mizrachi community makes its own variation of a sugary fritter using the spices common in their country of origin. In India, for example, Jews celebrate Hanukkah with Gulab Jamun- also a popular street food- that is yogurt based and often flavored with cardamom and rose water.

In Greece, Turkey and the Balkans, Jews made Bimuelos often scented with orange blossom, dipped in honey syrup and fried in olive oil. The Iraqi-Syrian’s Zengoula is closer in texture and shape to an American funnel cake.

Last but certainly not least- is the Sfenj- the ultimate North African competitor to the Ashkenazi Sufganiyot. Similar to its French cousin the beignet, Sfenj is simply pastry dough randomly shaped and coated with powdered sugar. It’s extra delicious when eaten fresh off the frying pan.

Ditch the Deep Fryer for Ricotta Pancakes

If frying is not your thing, rest assured that Hanukkah is also celebrated with dairy. Apparently, the miracle of the everlasting oil in the temple and the bravery of the Maccabees is not the only Hanukkah story. In fact, many Sephardic communities honor the heroic act of Judith - Yehudit. According to the Book of Yehudit and Talmudic tales, Judith lured into her home the Syrian Greek General Holofernes, who was attempting to besiege the city of Bethulia. She offered him salty cheese and wine. Once sedated, she killed him and displayed his corpse at the city gates. Seeing what had been done to their commander- terrified the soldiers, and they fled immediately. The liberation of Bethulia raised morale among the tired Maccabee fighters, and helped bring victory one step closer. 

'Judith and Holofernes,' 1605, by Jan de Bray.

The crucial role of cheese in the story of Judith gave reason for certain cultures to celebrate Hanukkah with a variety of dairy dishes.  A particularly decadent one is the Ataiyef-  the Syrian answer to mundane breakfast pancakes. These are stuffed with ricotta cheese, dipped in rose water syrup, sprinkled with pistachio pieces and deep fried, in honor of Hanukkah of course. 

A similar and more attainable recipe is the Roman-Jewish Cassola. This simple gluten-free sweet ricotta pancake is perfect for a weekend breakfast on Hanukkah and throughout the year.  

Cassola (adapted from Claudia’s Roden Book of Jewish Food)

-1 lb (500 g) ricotta

-1 cup sugar (recipe calls for 200 gram I reduced to 170, and it was still a little too sweet)

-5 eggs

-2 tbsp oil (I subbed for 1 tbsp butter)

-Grated rind of 1 lemon (optional but adds significantly)

-Blend the ricotta and sugar with the eggs in a food processor. 

-Heat oil/ butter in a large ovenproof pan.

-Pour mixture into the pan and cook on medium-low flame until the bottom has set firmly. 

-Put under the broiler and let it brown for a couple of minutes. 

I served it with cherries and berries and a spoonful of homemade granola. No syrup needed!

A Women’s Fest

The story of Judith inspired several Jewish communities to add other customs in addition to the dairy feast. In North Africa, the sixth (and sometimes seventh) night of Hanukkah was known as Chag Ha’Banot - (Eid Al Bana', in Judeo-Arabic), or The Festival of Daughters.  During this night, women went to synagogue to pray for the health of elderly women in their community, and to ask for a good match for their single daughters.  They lit the Menorah recalling remarkable Jewish heroines, such as Judith and many others. The praying sometimes turned into a lively party featuring singing, dancing and drinking wine.

The feast usually included dairy foods, followed by several desserts, such as sweet couscous with chopped nuts and dried fruit.  

This ritual is representative of the endless number of mini traditions existing in the Sephardic-Mizrachi world around Hanukkah. To that point, I am sharing one last non-food tradition- the extra candle.  Ladino speaking communities and in Aleppo, Syria, had the custom to light an extra candle each night of the holiday in honor of their ancestors, who were exiled during the Spanish expulsion of 1492. A popular song that accompanied the candle lighting was Ocho Kandelikas (8 little lights in Ladino). Enjoy listening!

#sephardic

#Hanukkah

[osmanthusoolong]

I appreciate what the post about ashkenazi supremacy within Israeli is trying to do but I would like to add that the majority of Likud voters are sephardic. I am not trying to deny the racism or anti-blackness of Israel at all but I think it does dissemble a little bit about the current state of Israeli politics. Definitely I think Ashekenazi jews do see themselves as superior within israeli politics but from a left/liberal stance -- many of them came from Soviet politics and have a chauvinist posture and racist beliefs. I would also say Israeli Sephardic identity has been captured by Zionism. The Shas party -- the Haredi Sephardic party that is the fourth biggest party in Israel -- is pro-settler pro-genocide. The chief Sephardic rabbi has called many times for genocide and so did his father (who, might I add, was born in Baghdad.) These people hold tremendous political sway and I think it's important to talk about white supremacy when it comes to israel but my stomach kind of turns when painting non-ashkenazi jews as not being beneficiaries of the genocidal state of Israel and who actively want to eliminate the Palestinians from the face of the earth because they do have something to be gained from a state of jewish supremacy. And I do think it's true that ethnic lines blur too. There are arab sephardim and european sephardim. It's really unfortunate but it's the reality at this current moment. Sorry if this is a lot I hope you have a good day.

Absolutely no need for sorries, I really appreciate this addition, thank you. I hope you have a good day/evening/tomorrow as well 💜

[owl-liberation-now]

While a reasonable introduction, by omission this video makes it sound like the Nakbha was less violent than it was. It wasn't simply millions of citizens displaced; displacement in this case means a bunch of soldiers coming into villages with guns and shooting at everyone until they were all dead or had managed to run away (Leila is a great movie about this on Netflix). At least 15,000 Palestinians were murdered by the occupying Zionist movement from 1947-1949 (source: Time magazine). This figure is likely lower as information on the Tantura massacre and other similar sites was obfuscated for decades and continues to be denied by the Israeli administration.

Also, incredibly important to point out, Israel's institutional racism doesn't stop at islamophobia. while underrepresented and invisiblised, there are many non-white Jewish identities each with their own histories dating back centuries (((and Israel is racist towards them)))

Despite continuing to vote far right, Mizrahi jews face discrimination in all aspects of Israeli society:

"Examination of the social structure in Israel shows that for economic and other reasons, members of the Mizrahi communities are underprivileged. This applies to ‘old inhabitants’ as well as new immigrants" - Haaretz

"The ethnic division between Israeli Jews, especially between the European Ashkenazi Jews and the Asian and African Jews, most of whom hail from the Arab world, is as old as the Zionist project, although it did not become explosive until after the Jewish settler colony was founded in 1948. Israeli officials would especially denigrate Moroccan Jews, the poorest of what Israel called the "Oriental communities", who later became known as the "Mizrahim". Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, had the following to say: "Those [Jews] from Morocco had no education. Their customs are those of Arabs." He asserted that "The Moroccan Jew took a lot from the Moroccan Arabs. The culture of Morocco I would not like to have here (...) We do not want Israelis to become Arabs. We are in duty bound to fight against the spirit of the Levant, which corrupts individuals and societies, and preserve the authentic Jewish values as they crystallised in the [European] Diaspora." - Middle-East Eye

Anti-Yemini racism (Stealing kids of Jewish-Yemini parents and giving them to Ashkenazi Jews):

One of the crueller chapters of this period involved the kidnapping of hundreds of children of Yemeni Jews from the transit camps in Israel. Some of the children were given to childless Ashkenazi couples for adoption in and outside of Israel. Yemeni parents whose children were sick were taken from them to hospitals where the parents were prevented from going. The parents were later told that their children had died. Twenty years later, in 1968, the Ministry of Defence sent military draft notices to the addresses of the parents of these children. (...) the affair was sophisticated enough to produce death certificates for some of the kidnapped children and to obstruct for decades all attempts by their parents to investigate the crime." - ibid.

Racism against Sephardi Jews (Ashkenazi Jewish parents refusing a court order to make their school racially integrated):

"With the resistance of the Immanuel parents to the court-ordered integration, the Ultra-Orthodox Sephardim have been forced to wake up from their complacency and see Ashkenazi racism anew. Feeling that they have properly assimilated into the Ashkenazi Haredi world, these Sephardim have been unpleasantly surprised to find that they are not welcome as equals in that world." - Huffington Post

Sephardi Jewish Erasure by Cultural Ashkenormativity:

"Middle Eastern Jews have for many decades lived as stigmatized citizens of Israel; their traditional Arabic culture and form of Jewish religiosity frequently objects of scorn and prejudice. Less obvious than the second-class status of Sephardim in Israel has been the gradual assimilation of Sephardic Jews into the dominant Ashkenazi collective. In spite of the fact that Sephardim comprise a substantial percentage of the Israeli Jewish population, in socio-cultural terms they find themselves in a subservient position vis-à-vis the Ashkenazim." - ibid.

Falash Mura Jews were denied the right to return until 2020, and even then they only allowed 2000 citizens in:

The Falash Mura community descends from members of the Beta Israel who were converted to Christianity by European missionaries in the late 1800s. They have since returned to practising Judaism but are not officially recognised by Israel's interior ministry as fully Jewish. The issue of whether they should be allowed to come to Israel at all is a divisive one, even among Ethiopian Jews in Israel (...) Ethiopian Jews' integration in Israel has been challenging, with the community suffering disproportionately high levels of unemployment and poverty as well as discrimination, although their situation has shown signs of improvement in recent years." - BBC News

And if you think that's bad, imagine how it is for gentile racial minorities. (it's bad; it's not good). Ethiopean refugees face extreme stigma and the same anti-migrant rhetoric seen in Europe.

Finally, in 2013, 35 Jewish-Ethiopean women claimed they were coerced into taking long acting contraceptive injections in order to be let into the country:

Figures show that 57 per cent of Depo Provera users in Israel are Ethiopian, even though the community accounts for less than two per cent of the total population. About 90,000 Ethiopians have been brought to Israel under the Law of Return since the 1980s, but their Jewishness has subsequently been questioned by some rabbis and is doubted by many ordinary Israelis. Ethiopians are reported to face widespread discrimination in jobs, housing and education and it recently emerged that their blood donations were routinely discarded. "This is about reducing the number of births in a community that is black and mostly poor," said Hedva Eyal, the author of the report by Woman to Woman, a feminist organisation based in Haifa, in northern Israel. - The National

This one is potentially spurious as direct evidence was never found (so it's often dismissed as anti-zionist propaganda, this one is from IsreallyCool which is admittedly a great pun). However we do know from an investigation in 2012 that the birthrate for Jewish Ethiopeans halved in ten years, and we also have a verbal confirmation of the Depo-Provera affair by the Deputy Health minister at the time:

"In 2013, (...) Yaakov Litzman admitted that they had administered Depo-Provera to Ethiopian immigrant women without their consent, after reproductive and civil rights activists in Israel called for an investigation after a drop in the birthrate among Ethiopian women: close to 50 per cent within the previous decade." - Sage Journals

I bring this up not just for transparency (or because I accidentally spent 2 hours researching this) but because I think it's a great example of how oppressive regimes are able to obfuscate the extent of the harm they commit, or otherwise position themselves as not responsible. It's the same thing as Brianna Ghey's murder not being tried as a hate crime (despite texts clearly showing it was motivated by transphobia), or the acquittals in the Rodney King verdict (despite video evidence of their involvement), or the UKs continual denial of its participation in the 1953 coup against Mosaddegh (despite explicit testimony from one of the MI5 agents, or the goddamn Cass report. Systems of power conspire to evade culpability, and as a result some of the worst events in history disappear without a trace (like the massacre at Tantura almost did). This is why it's so important to do your research and stay informed!!

I hope this helps with that.

Israel is one of the most racist countries in the world.

[lgbtunis-moved]

honestly I think a lot of activists are baffled and confused by a lot of Jewish ethnic identities and experiences because they try to fit them into specific racial categories that they’re familiar with and there’s a reason it doesn’t work. this isn’t exclusive to gentiles, btw, I’ve seen this done by (white American) jews as well.

while ‘ashkenazi’ means “community originated around Germany” and ‘Sephardi’ means “community expelled from Iberia” (mizrahi” includes Persian jews, Bukharan jews, various Sephardic jews...), Jewish communities were shaped by immigration (fleeting persecution) and the existence of “European” jewish communities outside of Europe seems to confuse many. are Moroccan Sephardim white because they “originated” in Spain? are Armenian ashkenazim white?

let me put it like this. racists don’t care. how are Sephardic Tunisians are treated in France you ask? as Tunisian jews. a large amount of antisemitic hate crimes in France is against Sephardic maghrebis, because they don’t CARE. you won’t see someone stopping before a hate crime asking a Moroccan Jew for their family tree, going 500 years back and saying ‘oh shit my bad you’re actually from Europe I’ve decided to not beat you up my white brother’ like. (not to mention the assimilation of sephardim and connections with older communities)

the existence of west asian ashkenazim (like Turkmenistani, Uzbek, Armenian and Georgian ashkenazim) confuses you? the whiteness/lackthereof of asian and north african sephardim confuses you? Latino Sephardim? African-American ashkenazim? southwest asian jews that identify as arab? southwest asian jews that don’t? good. learn more about jewish history. educate yourself. and leave our identities to us.

(gentiles are encouraged to reblog, don’t clown tho)

[dikleyt]

There’s a weird false narrative going around where it’s “Nazi race science” to talk about Jewish genetics and how they demonstrate that almost every Jew is related. And how, for example, Polish Jews are more related to Iraqi Jews than to non-Jewish Poles, and vice versa.

Nazi race science involves using physical traits to determine a person’s ancestry. For example, saying that someone with a big nose and dark hair and brown eyes must be a Jew. Or that everyone with white skin who isn’t a Jew comes from the same place. Or that the skull shape of a person determines whether they are “pure Aryans.” The heirs of Nazi race science today are the people who say that Ashkenazim must have originated in Europe because many of us have light skin (although, inconveniently for these people, so do many Sephardim and Mizrahim, and so do many Palestinians).

Genetics are a legitimate science that helped to disprove race science by showing that, for example, there are groups of white people who are more related to groups of Black people than to other white people, and vice versa. People who insist that Ashkenazim must be from Europe because of certain physical traits are defending race science against legitimate genetics.

Not only that, but genetics actually help the Palestinian argument that they are descended from the Canaanites (including Jews) who lived in the land in ancient times, and many pro-Palestinian activists have already started using this to their advantage. It just also helps the Jewish argument of being the descendants of the ancient Jews, which complicates the whole “white European settler colonialism” narrative that people are still trying to push.

[weemietime]

The fact that a large majority of these people actively support Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis (two organizations so vile that even Arabs who otherwise support Hamas hate them [I mention Arabs because Yemenis and Syrians were fucking brutalized by these people, and many Arabs spoke out about this.])

If u think they're ur UWU fun time group who only hate evil white Zio dogs, hate to tell ya - and mourn these pig fuckers deaths simply because they attack Jews.... Like, they are the sieg heiling Nazi, lmao

Actually I don't hate to tell ya, I truly wish white antisemites would shut the fuck up about this gd conflict. Reminded of that post that was so fucking casually like ArE tHe BrOwN iSRraHellIs In tHe RoOm WiTH uSssss???!!!

Like yeah bitch do you mean 70% of fucking Israel you stupid motherfucker? I will pay $8000 per person if white antisemites shut the fuck up about Israel and Palestine. Stop speaking over Syrians and Lebanese and Iranians and pashtun and kurds and Iraqis and and sephardim and Mizrahim. Shut up!

You don't get to have an opinion just because David duke confused Ashkenazi Jews with his own ancestors lmao and sound like the most racist fucking idiot possible genuinely saying dumb ass bullshit

and this is something that someone genuinely said to me, "how would Palestinians know to stop killing Israelis since Israelis kill them?" just in case u think I made this up since I am an evil lying Jew, I tagged this person's post. #youbetispokane (same moron who thought one sentence qualified as fanfiction)

I dunno boss I'm pretty sure Palestinians can figure out that murder is wrong because they're not four fucking years old. Stop talking.

I’m ngl most of you are really antisemitic and you don’t realize it because you don’t know anything about Jews and the history of antisemitism. It’s so easy to say ha, that’s not me, when shit is so incredibly ingrained that you wouldn’t even notice if anything less than a sieg heiling-nazi hit you over the head.

[grecoromanyaoi]

im gonna b honest. the um, white jewish communities’ (as in those that are detached from joc communities so like. mostly americans.) approach towards mizrahi traditions that are not as common among yt jews (specifically hamsas and the ayin) is so weird. like, youre claiming them as “pan-jewish” but we both know your grandaddies called mizrahim superstitious and ~pagan~ for those exact practices.... also treating mizrahi/sephardic as two completely separate identities like black/white is so so ignorant like. for so many communities mizrahi/sephardic is a joint identity (mizrahi sephardim have way more in common w other mizrahim then with white sephardim). anyways. yall tire me.

[nevermindirah]

Non-Jewish friends, y’all might be wondering right now: Israel is doing clearly unacceptable shit to Palestinians. So, why are some Jews ardent Zionists, and why do some Jews seem to feel personally attacked by criticism of Israel?

A lot of (non-Palestinian) non-Jews have asked me where I stand on Israel/Palestine over the years, apropos of nothing, just because I’m Jewish. For the longest time I felt so stuck because I just didn’t know much about Israel/Palestine and what little I did know turned out to be largely misinformation and I felt so much pressure to say The Correct Thing That All Jews Should Say About This Issue. Obviously the violence Israel is committing against Palestinians is horrific and the interpersonal weirdness individual Jews might experience as people discuss Israel’s horrific violence doesn’t compare. I’m making this post as a small supplement to the important conversations going on about what Israel is doing to Palestinians in East Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank, as well as Palestinian citizens of Israel and Palestinian refugees and their descendants living outside land Israel controls. I’m making this post because non-Jews might be feeling confused by conflicting messages about Zionism as either settler colonialism or Jewish self-determination. It sucks feeling like you have to choose only one oppressed group or another. It’s possible to support Palestinian liberation and Jewish liberation at the same time! Here’s some context that might help.

Palestinian friends will probably want to ignore this post, y’all shouldn’t have to deal with your oppressors’ feelings, and especially not right now.

Zionism is the ideology behind the devastating violence Israel is committing against Palestinians right now and has been committing against Palestinians since 1947-48. It’s heartbreaking and messy to talk about this reality, because Zionism originated as a strategy to protect Jews from antisemitism.

Any oppressed group can turn into oppressors under enough pressure, because humans are flawed. Jews fleeing antisemitism turning into Israelis ethnically cleansing Palestinians happened because Zionism is profoundly influenced by its time and place of origin: 19th century Europe.

Europe invented antisemitism, and basically every European country has done at least one very very bad structural antisemitism, like expelling all the country's Jews (the monarch and/or the church then stole all the wealth the expelled people had to leave behind), looking the other way when peasants murdered a bunch of Jews as an outlet for their frustration with the actual (non-Jewish) ruling class, banning Jews from owning property or holding certain jobs or being members of guilds etc, and of course the big horrific state-sponsored mass-murder operations the Inquisition and the Holocaust. From the 1790s through the 19th century different European governments emancipated their Jews, ie removed legal barriers to full citizenship and economic participation. But this didn't end antisemitism. Just like the legal improvements of the 19th and 20th centuries didn't end antiblackness in the United States.

Also happening in this time: nationalism swept Europe. From the French Revolution through the end of World War I, Europe’s predominant form of government transformed from multiethnic empires to nation-states, countries led by and for a particular ethnic group.

So this Austro-Hungarian dude Theodor Herzl came up with this idea for Jewish nationalism. Every other European ethnic group is getting their own country, so why not Jews? Maybe this is the solution to antisemitism! Maybe we’ll finally be safe if we just all move en masse out of Europe to a place that will take all of us and never expel us!

But also also happening in Europe and around the world in this time: European imperialism and white supremacist settler colonialism. Chattel slavery saw its height and then its end (legally, at least) during this era, but white supremacy entrenched itself across the planet in post-slavery economic practices and cultural imperialism as well as national and international laws.

I believe countries have a moral obligation to take in as many refugees as they can squeeze in. International law protecting refugees has evolved a lot over the past century, but we’re still devastatingly far from every refugee getting a safe place to call home, and the main reason for that is white supremacy. The Biden administration didn’t undo the Trump administration’s horrifically low cap on refugees until like last week and it’s because Democratic party leaders treat centrist white people as more valuable voters than the huge and growing numbers of people of color, immigrants, LGBT people, unmarried women, and working class people who want to vote for elected leaders who get that nobody’s free until we’re all free. Ahem. Back to the topic at hand, the US and many other countries turned away untold numbers of refugees fleeing the fucking Holocaust, so odds are slim they’d be more welcoming in less desperate times. Moving from places where Jews are an unwanted minority to places where Jews are still a minority and either still unwanted or little understood and unlikely to win revolutionary levels of support from a largely non-Jewish public seems like a bad plan.

In the mid to late 19th century, lots of Jews took the kernel of Zionism and ran with it in different directions. Maybe this ideology could mean Jewish cultural flourishing alongside stronger political/economic integration into the societies where we’re already living! Maybe it could mean a particular kind of socialism that advocates for the liberation of Jews both as Jews and as workers! Maybe it could mean a revitalization of Jewish religious practice both in Jerusalem where we have important heritage sites and everywhere we live across the world!

Eventually Herzl’s vision of Zionism won out over the others: Jewish nationalism in the sense of a Jewish nation-state, a country that has a Jewish demographic majority and/or that legally privileges Jews over non-Jews.

Problem is, if you want to do that, you have to find a piece of land on which to do it, and Earth was already a pretty crowded place a hundred years ago. Many locations were considered, and the one that ended up winning that debate was Palestine. Where a shit ton of people, mostly non-Jews, were already living. They were forming their own nationalist movement at the time: in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire they began to organize for local self-determination in Palestine.

The Herzl types who developed Zionism as an ideology and built institutions to advocate for and create a Jewish ethnostate in Palestine were a small subset of European Jews, mostly men, mostly with significant economic privilege within what Jews were able to achieve in their particular societies at the time. They were just as Orientalist as the non-Jews around them, just as antiblack, just as racist generally for all that Jews were (and sometimes still are) considered non-white in much of Europe. They had a cool idea (put a lot of effort into something that could protect Jews from antisemitism) floating in a bathtub full of shit, and they did practically nothing to protect the cool idea from absorbing that shit. Results of this include thinking about the millions of people already living in Palestine as if they were either like the rocks and the trees that will go with the flow and accept a new ruling class, or indistinct Arabs who would just leave for other Arab countries because what could be the difference — in the staggeringly small amount of time they considered the existing residents of Palestine at all.

This racist hand-waving extended to Zionist leaders’ attitudes about Jews outside Europe as well. White Jews in settler colonies like the US were largely anti-Zionist at the time (not wanting their own countries to accuse them of dual loyalty was a common reason) but European Zionist leaders took what help they could get from Jews in the US, South Africa, Australia, etc. Jews across the Middle East and North Africa, however, barely heard from Zionist leaders about any of this until Zionist militias had removed enough Palestinians from the land and it was time to repopulate it with whichever Jewish bodies were convenient. You might have heard "all the Arab countries expelled their Jews in 1948" but lots of first-person accounts tell a different story of Israel coercing Jews who’d lived securely for a long time in places like Morocco to immigrate to Israel and then confiscating their passports and forcing them to live on less-fertile land with fewer resources while serving as a buffer between Palestinians and European Jewish immigrants. Ella Shohat is the best-known writer on Israeli racism against non-European Jews and I strongly recommend Sephardim in Israel: Zionism from the Perspective of Its Jewish Victims as a starting point to learn more about this.

Which brings us to today. We still haven’t eradicated antisemitism, several European governments that did a lot of structural antisemitism they still haven’t made meaningful reparations for get to feel good about themselves for “giving the Jews a state” as if carving up the former Ottoman Empire was up to them and not the people who lived there, and millions of people across the world who previously either lived peacefully enough alongside Jews or hadn’t really thought about us much at all now have very valid reasons to be pissed at this country that claims it represents all of us.

Zionism was supposed to protect Jews from antisemitism. And Israel has saved Jewish lives! But if we hadn’t sunk the past 70+ years into an ethnostate we could’ve been putting that energy into other political and economic activity to create adequate international support for refugees while we work on ending root causes of refugee crises, like antisemitism, racism, climate change, and capitalism. Meanwhile Zionism has killed, maimed, incarcerated, stolen from, traumatized, and erased the history of millions of Palestinians just because they happened to be living on land that some dudes who had a lot more in common with Thomas Jefferson and Donald Trump than with you or me decided needed to be cleansed for a Jewish ethnostate.

White nationalists in the US love Israel because they want American Jews to go away. Fascist leaders across Europe love Israel for the same reason, so much so that Israel’s prime minister is buddy-buddy with Trump and the equivalent shitstains of several European far-right parties. And I don’t know what it’s like in other white supremacist countries that are close allies of Israel, but the overwhelming majority of Zionist lobbying that pushes the US to give so much aid to Israel comes from Evangelical Christians, because they believe all the Jews have to be in the Holy Land for Jesus to come back. No thanks.

This whole thing fucking sucks. Jews and Palestinians, like all human beings, deserve to be free. Many Jews are understandably afraid of what might happen next if Israel decided to give up on ethnonationalism, allow Palestinian refugees to return, make reparations, and establish a pluralistic democracy that represents and protects all its residents — will some Palestinians murder Jews in revenge? That’s genuinely fucking scary. And it’s genuinely fucking scary to be a Palestinian in Israel/Palestine, and has been for over 70 years. We’ve gotta do something different. I say that as a white person sitting on land stolen from Piscataway people who has thought in detail about what portion of my income would be reasonable for my government to tax in order to fund reparations for the descendants of enslaved people.

Ok. One final piece of context before I wrap this up.

Most Jewish institutions in the US are explicitly Zionist, teach children that Zionism is THE way to ensure Jewish safety, and increasingly tell non-Zionist Jews that we're unwelcome or even that we’re not “real” Jews. This comes in a context where it’s only been 76 years since the latest and most gruesome of several attempts to wipe our entire people off the face of the planet. If you grew up in that environment, you, too, might be jumpy about even hearing the words Zionism or Israel, let alone considering the devastation this ideology and country have caused Palestinians.

Jews have a right to exist. Jews have a millennia-old connection to this scrap of land in the Levant, and we have a right to access religiously and culturally important geographic landmarks. What we don't have a right to is murdering or expelling other people in order to make an ethnostate, on that land or any other. Zionism is settler colonialism, but it’s settler colonialism by and for people who have a valid need for protection from structural antisemitism, which means that it’s going to take a lot of messy empathy to undo. The members of my extended family who voted for Trump (non-Jews in my case, though Jared Kushner isn’t the only Jewish Trumpite) are afraid that ending white supremacy will demote them from a privileged class to equal footing with everyone else — that’s the kind of fear individuals work on in therapy, not the kind that’s reasonable for a whole society to prevent from happening. I and millions of Jews do deserve for whole societies to work hard to end antisemitism.

I would never and will never ask a Palestinian to gently request their liberation. But if you’re not Palestinian, and you’ve got a little extra empathy to spare this week, I ask you to remember what I’ve shared here when interacting with Jews about Israel/Palestine.

If you’re a fellow Jew reading this and you feel like Israel is the only way to guarantee our safety, all I ask of you is to sit with the idea that what Israel is doing to Palestinians is too high a cost for safety that’s still not guaranteed, and start to imagine real-world ways we can protect our people from antisemitism without an ethnostate.

I made this post for people who know me (or know of me I guess?) in Old Guard and Cap fandom, despite my better judgment, because talking about Jewish Booker and Jewish Bucky and Jewish Natasha makes me so happy and I think some of the people I love on these characters with might appreciate this perspective. I didn’t provide any links in this post on purpose (to decrease its usefulness, so fewer people will reblog it) because the risk of anon hate when talking about Zionism outside my immediate fandom circles is so high. You’re welcome to reblog this post if you find it helpful! Unless you’re not within a few concentric circles of me, in which case, maybe don’t? If seeing this post makes you want to send me anon hate, no need: many people who share your perspective have already done so on Twitter.

Reliable sources on all this info are a few googles away, and I apologize for the things I know I oversimplified as well as any things I might have misremembered. I’m an American who’s never lived in Israel/Palestine who is posting this on my fandom blog.

TL;DR: This is a short ‘n pithy post about the same idea.

TL;DR, fandom edition: The shortest distillation of this anti-Zionist Jew’s feelings on the matter can be found in segment 4 of Five Times Booker Got Wasted on Purim and One Time He Didn’t.