#zionism does not protect jews

[reggiespoon]

Anti-Antisemitism so advanced it's become regular Antisemitism again

Physically assaulting and arresting the 65-year-old Jewish HEAD of Jewish STUDIES at Dartmouth to fight the so-called antisemitism at these encampments is truly something you can’t even write.

X: RossWMUR

[necronomeconomicism]

Ok gotta talk about it.

As a Jewish historian, I fucking hate Israel in ways most probably will never be able to comprehend. I'm going to try and explain it anyways. The central creation myth of Israel is that it is Jewish, and then consequently, that Israel is a part of Jewishness. Its easy to simply state this is false, but fully comprehending this and putting it into practice in thought and deed seems rare to me.

The evil at the heart of this violence predates the recent acceleration of genocide. Israel is a colony, and more than that, an antisemitic fraud itself. After WW2, when Israel was being founded, the Jews of Europe generally did not wave goodbye to their neighbors and head to the promised land. Many were expelled from their homes. Zionism itself, as an action, was a false choice at the time. A mere excuse to place an ally in the middle east, and an excuse to complete the expulsion and destruction of the European Jew. The Zionist Jew is more than complicit in this, they actively seek the destruction and assimilation of all other Jews.

Many fail to realize, and largely because of Israel, that Jews are not inherently white, Ashkenazi, European-descended people. Our faith and culture has an immense variety that is spread all across the globe. Jewishness, in population and volume of culture, exists more so outside of Israel than within it. Israel is for a very specific kind of Jew. The kind that lets Yiddish die, that attaches themselves to European things, that makes themselves and their practices as white as possible.

And they have the nerve, the fucking belligerent GALL, to frame themselves as the necessary saviors of our people. To the Zionist, questioning Israel is to question Jewishness itself. They bake adoration for the colonial machine into their very prayers, and push them on us even as children. To *not* oppress, to *not* kill, to *not* genocide, is to invite death. This is the core of fascistic thought, of course. "Kill them before they kill us." And they KNOW this too, they really do. The truth of that irony does not matter, because as is true for all fascists, the truth itself does not matter to them. They wanted this, they wanted this even before the British saw it in their best interest to give them the land. Any excuse to RETVRN, as the neo-nazis say of Rome, or the German Empire, or whatever the fuck stupid country they want to poorly animate the corpse of. Some select Zionists even *sided with the fucking Nazis* in agreement they should abandon Europe to colonize Palestine. (Haavara Agreement)

My people have proved time and time and time again you don't need a nation state to have an enduring culture. We have protected ourselves for thousands of years without the help of these spiteful, doom-saying maniacs. I was going to post something like this on Passover, but that would be hypocritical. The state of Israel doesn't actually have shit to do with Jewishness. Hear Israel (the state and supporters, Israel the icon) I should outlive it long enough to bury it. (old yiddish curse)

Free Palestine. Donate what you can, they need it right now.

[zvaigzdelasas]

New York University led by troubling example when the school shared an updated code of student conduct last week. Ostensibly aimed at curtailing bigotry, the new language instead shuts down dissent by threatening to silence criticism of Zionism on campus. Students who speak out against Zionism — an ethno-nationalist political ideology founded in the late 19th century — will now risk violating the school’s nondiscrimination policies.[...]

Tucked into a document purportedly offering clarification on school policy, the new NYU guidelines introduce an unprecedented expansion of protected classes to include “Zionists” and “Zionism.” Referring to the university’s nondiscrimination and anti-harassment policy, known as NDAH, the updated conduct guide says, “Speech and conduct that would violate the NDAH if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the NDAH if directed toward Zionists.”[...]

“Using code words, like ‘Zionist,’” the guide says, “does not eliminate the possibility that your speech violates the NDAH policy.”[...]

The entire premise of the guidance — that “Zionist” must be functioning as a “code word — is a flaw egregious enough to reject the entire document outright.

The language here is of utmost importance. The text does not say that “Zionist” can and has been used by antisemites as a code word, which is no doubt true. Instead, it takes it as a given that, when used critically, “Zionist” simply is a code word.[...]

According to NYU’s guidance, then, Zionist and Zionism are either antisemitic dog whistles when invoked critically or a protected category akin to a race, ethnicity, or religious identity. Ethically committed and politically informed anti-Zionism — including the beliefs of many anti-Zionist Jews like myself who reject the conflation of our identity and heritage with an ethnostate project — is foreclosed, and the long history of Jewish anti-Zionism, which has existed as long as Zionism itself, is all but erased.[...]

“For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity,” the NYU guidance says. And this is of course true. That does not, however, make Zionism an essential part of Jewish identity.

There are conservative Christians for whom the damnation of homosexuality is a key part of their Christian faith too, but Republican lawfare to see homophobic positions enshrined as protected religious expression have been rightly and consistently condemned by the liberal mainstream.

“The new guidance sets a dangerous precedent by extending Title VI protections to anyone who adheres to Zionism, a nationalist political ideology, and troublingly equates criticism of Zionism with discrimination against Jewish people,” NYU’s Faculty for Justice in Palestine said in a statement in response to the updated conduct guide.[...]

“Furthermore, the new guidance implies that any nationalist political ideology (Hindu nationalism, Christian nationalism, etc.) that is integrated into some members of that group’s understanding of their own racial or ethnic identity should be entitled to civil rights protections.”

27 Aug 24

[sscarletvenus]

please stop scrolling for a moment and read.

this happened on wednesday in occupied jerusalem, supposedly the "only democracy in middle east."

israeli police raided the anti-zionist jewish neighborhood, to attack any symbol of jewish solidarity with Palestine, took down the Palestinian flag, brutally assaulted anti-zionist jews by knocking them down on the road, hitting them, and punching them in the face.

zionism is a violent and fascist ideology that doesn't even spare the very people it is supposed to protect. anyone who disagrees with its racist mandate, even jews, are targeted by the entity that falsely claims to represent jewish people.

if they can do this to their own, can you even bear to imagine how they have treated, and continue to treat, Palestinians? except you don't really have to - idf soldiers have, on multiple occasions, documented their own war crimes and violations of the very nature of being human. they have gloated over their own capacity to commit undeniable evil too many times on camera.

does amy schumer care about these people standing up against genocide and getting persecuted for doing so? what does noah schnapp have to say?

what do well-off white jews in the west who record tiktoks with a face full of makeup, impeccably manicured nails, curated fits and ring lights, who have monopolized claims to antisemitism and grief and victimhood while black and other non-white jewish people have been rendered almost entirely invisible from public memory, have to say about this?

israel was never about judaism.

[iswearbyalltheflowers]

This is a good example of how a non-antisemitic anti-zionist movement would almost be a contradiction in terms, because non-jewish political anti-zionism starts from the premise that yes jews ARE invaders and parasites and unwanted guests living on the sufferance of christians and muslims who have a natural right to expel us and that zionism is a violation of this right that must be redressed.

This post would like to have it both ways and assert that jews fully belong where we live AND grant that anti-zionism seeks "decolonization." But to say that it constitutes "colonization" for the jews in Israel to have sought self determination for themselves, is to admit that jews do NOT in fact fully belong. As it turns out, jews' belonging someplace is actually contingent on not asserting ourselves politically, on our subjugation or assimilation. Everywhere jews have been the outgroup for as long as we have lived we can at a moment's convenience be deemed actually "colonizers" and asked (forced) to leave. Which is why every anti-zionist regime has indeed done so.

(x)

if you are anti-zionist the most effective work you can do is to ensure your community--politically and geographically-- is safe for jews to exist in. im serious. is your community safe for jews to be in? do you know any jews? if you do, are they scared of you? if you don't, if they are, why?

zionism is the premise that jews need to take exclusive control of our own homeland by force because there is nowhere else in the world for us to belong. that's it, that's the heart of it. if you disagree with the premise, you need to be part of the counter argument: that the jews of the diaspora are valued by their fellow citizens in countries around the world. that the jews of europe and asia and africa and the americas belong where they were born, that the jewish people deserve to belong wherever we live, that we are not invaders or parasites or unwanted guests living on the sufferance of christians and muslims who have a natural right to expell us when we've outstayed our welcome.

i'm not israeli. that land is the home of those who were born there, and i was born in california. i know a lot of my fellow americans right now that say they're anti-zionist but what they mean is they want israel gone and me along with it. and that is, ironically, why there's zionism in the first place.

are you anti-zionist or anti-jew? are we your neighbors or not? if you really want decolonization, get your own community in order. if you want all the jews to just fucking shut up already, you can join a six thousand year tradition of not actually ever managing that no matter how many genocides get done.

[anexperimentallife]

The Gaza genocide is going exactly according to the US Evangelical Fundamentalist Christian agenda, with which they hope to wipe out all Jews and Muslims

To anyone raised in the US Evangelical Fundamentalist Christian Dominionist movement in the US, the horror and inhumanity, the genocide Israel is engaged in against Palestinians right now is not a surprise. We all KNEW this was coming, and those of us who got out of the movement we were raised in have been trying to raise the alarm for decades, mostly to either deaf ears, or accusation of antisemitism.

(Because, they would say, "if you don't support Zionism, and stand behind everything Israel does, you must hate all Jews!" Ignoring that many Jews all over the world--yes, including many Israeli Jews--do not support Israel's foreign policy.)

Because everything in the orbit of Israel is going exactly to the Evangelical Fundamentalist Christian Doomsday plan--a plan that has been OPENLY talked about in Fundie circles since I was a little kid being indoctrinated into it.

In case you're not familiar, let me break down the Fundie thinking here:

Their support of Israel and embrace of Zionism is based around their beliefs that:

a) the return of Jews to Israel, and then Israel/all "unconverted" Jews being completely wiped out in an apocalyptic war, is essential to Jesus' return.

b) but that any nation that DIRECTLY opposes Israel will fall even if they defeat Israel. So that in order to fulfill prophecy, they must

c) set someone ELSE up to wipe out Israel/the Jews.

(To go into more detail: They believe that "the Jews were God's original chosen people until Christians took their place in God's favor when the Jews denied Jesus." But that God is still attached to his former faves and will punish anyone who wipes them out--thus the entire fundie idea is to get someone ELSE to do it, then serve as "the instrument of God's vengeance" by genociding the genociders.)

So they support Israel's increasing violence intentionally to create greater and greater conflict and turn more of Israel's neighbor states against them, meanwhile fostering the idea that with the power of the US backing them, they cannot fail.

And here's their next planned phase--maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but eventually

Once things reach a tipping point, the Fundies (currently the single most powerful force in US politics, thanks to ANOTHER multi-generational plan openly talked about in Fundie circles, which was specifically designed to put Fundies amd their allies in powerful positions) will force the US to pull support from Israel so that its neighbors can destroy it, then use that destruction as a pretext for their own genocide against remaining Muslim/Arab (there is little distinction between the two in their minds) peoples.

Christian Fundamentalist support of Zionism has always been about the elimination of both Jews and Muslims, and bringing about a Christian/Capitalist (aka fascist) world.

They emphasize that they LOVE Jews, and maybe don't even entirely HATE the "evil Muslims," but that this is "God's will," and that they have no choice but to obey. They'll even shed crocodile tears about how sad all this is, but believe me--they are CELEBRATING inside. They are OVERJOYED, because they think this will bring about the Rapture, the end of the world, the Thousand Year Reign, and all the other crap in their shitty Doomsday prophecy.

(This is also their excuse for every other group they are trying to destroy. "Oh, I personally have nothing against the gays, but I have to follow God's will. Plus our children need to be protected from their recruitment efforts." During slavery, then segregation, Black folks were often said to have "the mark of Ham, meaning God said they were DESTINED to be slaves because of Ham's sin. Oh, WE'RE not saying it; GOD is!" See also: child marriage, and lots of other talking points.)

Don't believe me? Ask around on the EXvangelical tags. Listen in at some of the more conservative churches in your area. There are a lot of us who were raised being brainwashed with these ideas and had to deprogram ourselves.

[nerd-at-sea5]

are u pro palestine... we have the same interests but i dnt want to follow u if ur weird

honestly this blog is for silly little thoughts about lesbians and such and the occasional personal story or opinion but it’s about time i got one of these. so buckle up long post ahead and it’s not gonna be a cut and paste yes/no answer bc yeah. just read the thing

first of all: im jewish. raised jewish and will forever be jewish. i'm proud of it. i'm not super religious and don't really believe in god but that doesn't mean i'm any less jewish.

second: i believe in a 2 state solution. i don't like terrorists. i think hamas needs to be held accountable for the murders and horrors they've committed, because frankly i think they're a bunch of monsters and terrible people. i don't agree with a lot of the stuff that netanyahu does either because that stuff is also not ok. but overall: fuck hamas.

that being said, i believe that israel has the right to exist. i believe that the jews deserve a homeland where we can be safe. i believe that a 2 state solution is the safest and smartest option. but i will also say that as the correct and historically accurate definition of zionism is to believe in the movement and protection of the jewish state - i am a zionist and i am not going to shy away from what i believe in.

i am aware that people will not like this about me, and i am aware they will try to tell me things about myself that are not true. so i am going to set the record straight and go back to posting about my silly little tv shows.

israel has a right to exist and to defend itsself

hamas are terrorists and should not be in power

i am in favor of a 2 state solution

the people of gaza don't deserve to live in horrible conditions because of the terrorists in power

jews and israeli's don't deserve the hate and abuse that they're experiencing because of people who don't know how to fact check

the hostages should be home. this is non-negotiable, they should be home.

and again - im aware that this isn't the yes/no answer you want, but i can't give that to you because its much more complicated than that.

lastly, if you want to unfollow me for any of these things please go ahead, i don't care. i implore you to fact check yourself before sending hate and threats to people online or in real life (or assaulting/hurting people, seriously just don’t do that.)

if you pick and choose who to engage with online due to political opinions that's up to you, but a difference in opinions isnt 'weird' its just human.

[rabbitrah]

One of the frustrating things about many political leaders and Jewish organizations pushing this line of thinking that "anti-Zionism = antisemitism," is that many people will believe "Zionism=Judaism" and then make the leap that "more religious = more Zionist." I hadn't realized the extent of this until a family member, who is anti-zionist, said something that made it clear that he thinks that religious fervor/devotion/orthodoxy is the cause of Zionism and the genocide of the Palestinian people. THIS IS DANGEROUS FOR MANY REASONS.

First of all, it's incorrect. Haredim, or strictly orthodox Jews are MUCH LESS LIKELY to be Zionists. No group is a monolith and there are different groups with different stances, but the most outwardly devout religious communities in Israel are not Zionist, and instead are mostly non-Zionists (neutral, pragmatic), with a smaller minority being anti-Zionist (believe that the state of Israel should not exist).

With few exceptions, HAREDI MEN IN ISRAEL DO NOT SERVE IN THE MILITARY. The majority of them never serve in the IDF and unlike other young people in Israel, their right as conscientious objectors is actually protected by law.

I know this is a very small and complicated part of a very large and complicated issue, but this is a clear example of how Judaism does not equal Zionism, especially at the more orthodox end of the spectrum.

We're stuck in this quagmire where

Jewish Zionists suggest that Judaism and Zionism are the same.

Non-jews who are also Zionists believe it

Non-jews who are anti-Zionists believe it

The desired result by Zionists is that anti-Zionism will be considered hate-speech and written into law.

The unintended result is an increase in legitimate antisemitism. Add to this the fact that Orthodox Jews who live outside Israel are more likely to be targets of antisemitism because they are more visibly Jewish, and I want to cry out to God at the unfairness of it all.

I probably didn't do this topic justice and I know there are many people who could say it better than me, but I haven't seen it said at all. I see people saying "anti-Zionism isn't antisemitism" but I didn't see the added explanation that orthodoxy is inversely correlated with Zionism, which I think is really important point.

[unbidden-yidden-deactivated20240]

Honestly watching western goyische leftists veer sharply into blatant, violent antisemitism ostensibly due to Palestine inspires a very specific type of rage in me that can only be triggered by ideologically-driven hypocrisy.

It's like watching the anti-abortion people also oppose comprehensive sex education and birth control while lamenting at how many abortions are currently happening. Every single person with more than one functioning brain cell knows that the only way to reduce abortions (not stop them, because that's literally impossible) is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies - something for which there are mountains of evidence demonstrating that comprehensive sex education and birth control can accomplish. But they don't want those things, because they allow childbearing capable people reproductive autonomy and freedom. So they DARVO and move goalposts and in general try to pretend it's about protecting babies when it's literally just about controlling women, girls, and people they're misgendering as such. Because if they truly cared, if they were genuine in their beliefs, they would support whatever method was most effective at reducing unwanted pregnancies and therefore abortions.

The antisemitic "pro-Palestine" leftists do the exact same thing by ramping up antisemitism in the diaspora, despite the fact that the main driving force behind Zionism is a desire for Jewish safety. If you make the entire world unsafe for Jews except Israel, and you also want to dissolve Israel, where does that leave Jews? And I get that a lot of people just straight up do not care, genuinely want us dead, but here's the thing: people who are backed into a corner are going to fight for their lives. That is what Israel has done for the last 75 years. They have nowhere else to go, and the more antisemitic you make the diaspora, the more Jews will congregate there out of necessity.

If you don't address the root cause in a humane way, you are never going to make headway and you're literally just spraying water on a grease fire.

[determinate-negation]

I see your answer, and it frankly infuriates me, your denial of documented hateful comments on campus and ACTUAL Jewish people saying they feel threatened. The refusal to acknowledge even the slightest defect in your "side" leads me to the conclusion that you yourself are not immune to propaganda and you certainly do not value jewish voices (unless, of course they agree with you). You are more than welcome to check the jewhatedb to have a taste of the spirits in some campuses.

As for this: "more cops on campus and administrations destroying academic freedom cynically framed as “preventing antisemitism” is actually a bigger threat for us in the long run" oh how nice of you to ignore those pesky jews in name of the greater cause of academic freedom, consider this, a space that ignores Jewish voices and excuses antisemitism wasn't free to begin with. You are willing to accept their absence for some sort of "long run" greater cause and that's, for the lack of better words, fucked up.

i didnt deny shit, i stated multiple times that antisemitism exists on college campuses, but i did point out that your examples are not coming from pro palestine students. theyre coming from people who are trying to vilify pro palestine students. why doesnt it infuriate you that people are threatening to murder jews just to make muslim students look bad? why is it not infuriating to you that bad media coverage on this makes jewish students unneccesarily scared when the threats are coming from our zionist so called allies? when did jews start cheering for police repression? do you think that attacks on left wing political organizing on college campuses are actually good for jews in the long run? i see someone didnt do their nazi history homework.

also im a marxist not a liberal that subscribes to bankrupt identity politics so the identity of voices is less relevant to me than the content of what theyre saying, but if you want to go on that path why the fuck are you ignoring my jewish voice and the voices of other anti zionist jews who agree with me?

as ive said many times before, there is a difference between feeling threatened and being threatened and jewish students feeling threatened by the existence of pro palestine organizations that are generally progressive and full of jews is in my mind separate from being threatened by real antisemitic incidents. which should be taken seriously but arent coming from pro palestine students as much as they are from reactionaries and opportunists.

besides the fact that “jewish voices” are not a monolith, academia does not ~ignore jewish voices~ except for anti zionist ones. anti zionist jews get doxxed by organizations like canary mission, get kicked out of jewish centers, get slandered by college admins and pro zionist organizations. college administrations bend over backwards to support israel and denigrate sjp and jvp on their campuses. as for academic freedom, its historically never been free for critics of israel, not zionists. jewish professors have been blacklisted from academia for criticizing israel in fact. you said youre glad youre not in american academia and its very obvious you understand nothing of american academia

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/the-blacklist-in-the-coal-mine-canary-missions-fear-mongering-agenda-college-campuses

[edenfenixblogs]

I think that I’ve realized one of the big reasons that antisemites are so anti-Israel—I mean, aside from it being a state where a lot of Jews are.

Israel is a state that protects Jews. It also does a lot of bad things under the Likud government. And it also harms Jews that get in the way of the Likud government. But none of that matters to antisemites.

Because a state is an institution. And the left has been very clear that it’s all about criticizing institutions.

And in the absence of a governing religious body to criticize, the Israeli state is all the leftist antisemites have to criticize.

They can’t seem to fathom that the leadership of Israel is not in anyway synonymous with a religious institution. They cannot seem to fathom that the Likud government isn’t in any way representative of Jewish people as a whole—and not even of Israelis as a whole! (Once again, Israel is a parliamentary system. It’s about who has the largest proportion of votes, not a majority) and that Jews in Israel as well as non-Jews in Israel have a say in who to vote for and often strongly oppose Likud and Netanyahu.

It’s like a whole chunk of otherwise progressive people have been waiting for a way to criticize all Jews by attacking some institution they think speaks for us.

They cannot fathom that we are literally just a small ethnic group with half of our number in one location and would very much like for us and for them to not be victims of violence. That’s the uniting principle.

They’ve continually demonstrated how little they know and understand about Judaism, Jewish culture, and Jewish history.

I genuinely do not know if they’re aware that there’s no supreme Jewish council or whatever. There’s no Jewish version of the Grand Imam, Grand Ayatollah, Dalai Lama, Celestial Master, or Head/President of the Church.

We don’t even have a main synagogue from which edicts or traditions flow. We did have one. The Wall in Israel was our main institution. But colonizers and invaders destroyed it. And other religions built their institutions on top of it. And the religious governing body of Jews fell apart thousands of years ago.

…so the only thing that holds us together is each other. Rabbis don’t answer to some central authority. We hold traditions together through culture and traditions and connection to our land of origin, like many our even most other indigenous cultures.

But, because there is one (1) place on the entire planet where Jews are a majority of the population and not a minority, suddenly vicious attacks on the character of Jews everywhere are fair game as long as antisemites pretend they are talking about “Israel.” But they aren’t talking about the State of Israel. Because they get mad whenever we tell them to please specify the current government and the Likud party, because they are the ones responsible for carrying out the needless violence.

But they won’t do that. They seem to believe that there is some uniting religious force that exists in the Israeli government. And they seem to think that we are all united by this religious directive of “Zionism.”

That’s the only way any of their criticisms make sense logically. They don’t see themselves as attacking actual humans. They see themselves as attacking institutions. And any Jew who disagrees with them? Well they are just bastards supporting the institution.

But…there is no supreme Jewish institution. It doesn’t exist. It doesn’t exist because they destroyed those institutions.

They’re making themselves feel good by thinking attacking Jews is somehow helping free Palestine. But it’s just attacking Jews.

It’s like a weird continuation of supercessionism. They’re projecting their religious structure onto a religion that is fundamentally incompatible with that structure.

[chelledoggo]

friendly reminders/spicy hot takes:

you can (and should) support Palestine and oppose Zionism WITHOUT being anti-Semitic. practicing Jews exist in Palestine, even if they are a minority there.

to Christians supporting Israel because they "support their fellow Christians": Christians exist in Palestine, too.

also to Christians: Revelations was never meant to be a literal prophecy of the future. we don't need to "protect Israel" so "Jesus can come back." (i know. this is a lot to take in. i was surprised when i first learned this, too. feel free to sit down and process this.)

one more to Christians: if you "support Israel" but hate Jews, stop and take a look at yourself in the mirror because what the fuck is wrong with you?

don't boycott your local Jewish-owned small businesses if you don't know for certain whether they support Israel, you weirdos.

if you support Israel just because they're "LGBTQ+ friendly," you have your priorities messed up. (and i'm saying this as a queer person myself. government pinkwashing does not excuse war crimes.)

war is hell and by no means should we be okay with violence or death of civilians. we want peace and freedom for Palestine, not more death.

literally anyone can drop into your DMs and claim to be a Palestinian in need of financial support. make sure to thoroughly verify their genuineness before considering donating. (the person in the DMs claiming they're verified by 90Ghost is NOT sufficient proof.)

beware of AI "photos" and videos. (i can't believe i need to say this we live in the worst timeline i s2g)

Israel's government is the enemy. innocent civilians of Israel are not. (unless they support the war, but in that case they are likely brainwashed by their government. no one is immune to propaganda.)

people can care about other current issues while also caring about Palestine. don't freak out because someone is talking about the hurricane or election season "instead of" talking about Palestine.

for the love of GOD don't shame people for taking a mental health break from the news.

k bye

[matan4il]

To the lovely American Nonnie, who told me that all antisemitism is bad, but leftist antisemitism is the worst because "they are being protected and celebrated. By media, pop culture, and academia. With no middle ground," I agree. The anti-Israel type of antisemitism is, without a doubt, the most socially accepted kind. It's the only kind that someone can spew, and get publicly applauded. The only kind where someone can celebrate the massacre of Jews, and either there are no consequences to that, or there finally are, and then that person and their supporters can pretend they're a martyr, being "persecuted" for being "critical of Israel," when in reality legit criticism of Israel is a very different thing to bias against the only Jewish state, and that person is just another Jew hater.

But I don't think it's just that.

I think it's also the fact that most antisemites are at least honest about hating Jews. The anti-Israel type of antisemitism tries to pretend it's not Jew hatred. So you'll get the hypocrisy of wishing Jews a Happy Hanukkah, a Zionist holiday, while attacking Zionism, and claiming it's incompatible with Judaism. Or you'll have people telling you how important it is to them to combat antisemitism, then they'll turn around and spit out leftist antisemitic conspiracy theories, that instead of saying Jews use the blood of non-Jewish kids to bake matzos, claim the Jewish state only sent a field hospital to Haiti after the earthquake, to harvest human organs. Or they'll proudly announce they're not antisemitic, and to "prove" it, they'll tokenize Jews, which is an antisemitic act in itself. And the worst is when they won't even listen to Jews who tell them that they're being antisemitic, or worse, they'll claim Zionism is antisemitic, which would make 90% of Jews, as well as the Bible itself, antisemitic. It's gaslighting Jews and non-Jews on what is Judaism and what is antisemitic. Other types of antisemites don't do that.

I also think this kind of antisemitism is particularly infuriating, because of the deep discrepancy between the values the left is supposed to stand for, and how they abandon those values when it comes to Jews. "Believe all women!" suddenly isn't applied when Israeli Jewish women are mass raped. "Violence is never the answer! Taking a human life is always wrong!" Then suddenly when Israeli Jews are massacred, and we get explanations on why violence is legit if people are occupied, even when it's translated into mass murder.

And lastly, there's the discrimination, because the left would never treat any other marginalized group the way it does Jews. "Don't speak over a minority group! Listen to their lived experiences!" Then a Jew tries to explain why anti-Zionism is antisemitic, and suddenly all the non-Jew leftists are bigger experts than us on Jewish history and and hatred of Jews, and we're not listened to when we talk about our persecution in the Middle East pre-modern Zionism (meaning the persecution and repeated massacres of Jews in the Middle East is being denied, in a way no one on the left would dare deny, for example, that the transatlantic slave trade happened), or how much anti-Zionism threatens non-Israeli Jews. "Educate yourself" is a common call, but no one feels the need to properly educate themselves on Jewish history, identity and native rights, or worse, they read propaganda from anti-Israel sources only, and think that's the same as educating themselves, as if when they're about to write about any other marginalized group, they would only take in the "education" of those that the group says hate it. "Ethnic cleansing is the worst!" the left says, while chanting slogans that, at the very least, call for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Jewish ancestral homeland, and no one gives a damn about us when we point this out. "None of us is free until all of us are free!" goes the intersectionalist call of the left, but Jews are excluded from that. No one cares about modern Zionism being our liberation movement, and we are sometimes physically removed from spaces that are supposed to be dedicated to marginalized groups, as was done to my friend at the Chicago Dyke March, when she wanted to hold a Jewish pride flag, under the claim that the Jewish pride flag makes Palestinians at the march feel unsafe... How safe did queer Jews feel in that moment, or when learning about that incident? But no one cares.

Sending lots of hugs from Jerusalem to you, in the US! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[ransomnote]

i want to highlight this because i've seen a lot of queer people my age fall for zionism because of them dangling the (very shaky) protections for queer people in israel like some kind of gotcha card against calls to free palestine. so, if you're queer, i'm posting this video to show what zionists think of you.

this isn't a prageru video. it was posted by noa tishby. in the caption she claims that this is jewish humor, and that this is how jewish people cope with trauma, and i'm here to tell you it's not. jewish humor isn't homophobic. it's not racist. it doesn't play off the suffering of others. jewish humor is something deeply important to me, that builds community, that brings people closer together, that is used to soothe and heal. to see it bastardized like this and used to excuse this disgusting video that does nothing but cause pain is sickening.

if you're queer, zionists don't care about you. as a queer jew, i refuse to let governments speak over people, just like how i refuse to let the israeli government speak for israeli citizens and diaspora jews like me. there are queer palestinians. there are queer people in gaza, currently being systematically wiped off the face of the earth with every other person in gaza. i refuse to abandon them on the basis that they were already being persecuted for reasons other than being palestinian. do not let your identity be weaponized to scare you away from doing something to stop a genocide.

[notaplaceofhonour]

The Ethnostate Canard

This is a reminder that the framing of Israel as a Jewish “ethnostate” equivalent to what Nazis want a White Ethnostate to be and the claimed moral equivalence of Zionism to White Nationalism came from Neo-Nazis. It is a Neo-Nazi talking point.

Actual ethnostates are defined by restricting citizenship to members of a specific race or ethnicity, and factually, Israel just does not do that; 73.5% of Israelis are Jewish, 21% are Arab (not counting Arabs in Gaza & the West Bank), and an additional 5.5% are other ethnicities. While Israel does define itself as a Jewish nation-state and does extend a special right of return that guarantees Israel will facilitate the immigration of Jews in diaspora, neither of these things are particularly exceptional—most SWANA countries are explicitly Arab nation-states, and many countries, from Ghana to Ireland to Spain to Armenia, have a right of return for members of specific historically displaced ethnic groups, of which Jews are one.

There are absolutely valid criticisms to be made of the Zionist movement (in theory and in practice), the nation-state model in general, and the fact that specifically Israel’s right of return does not cover the primary ethnic group Israel itself displaced: Palestinians. The latter especially is a common criticism of Israel, and it’s one I am extremely sympathetic to—like, maybe I’m off base here, but I feel like the bare minimum Israel can do for the Palestinians they displaced in the Nakbah and Naksa is to guarantee

full citizenship

return of stolen property if possible

reparations, including an allotment of land

fully facilitated immigration to Israel comparable to what is done for Aliyah

and most urgently a ceasefire and a commitment to never bomb a single inch of Palestinian land or kill a single Palestinian noncombatant again

And I don’t think criticism of Israel & advocacy for the Palestinians is at odds with this: Israel’s oppression & myriad injustices against Palestinians just does not a White Ethnostate™️ make, and we need to be able to recognize the facts of Israel’s injustices while being critical of the narratives we slot them into. Specifically in this case, we need to remember as anti-racists & people who care about equity that a common tactic Nazis, racists, and other bigots like to use is to point to things like affirmative action, Historically Black Colleges, Black churches, Pride parades, “safe spaces”, and such that exist to provide special protections for marginalized & oppressed people, and then say “Well, why don’t we get that too? I (a member of the privileged majority) just want what the minorities have!”

It is important in any of these cases to recognize Nazis are doing this in bad faith, and whatever good-faith criticisms a progressive person can have of affirmative action or safe spaces or how they can be abused, not to adopt the Nazi’s framing of these special protections, lest we label affirmative action “Black Supremacy” and queer safe spaces “Gay Supremacy” or such nonsense. Unfortunately, the left dropped the ball with the “Israel is a Jewish Ethnostate” line.

The word “Ethnostate” really didn’t appear outside its strictly literal definition in academic writing before around 2013-2014, when White Nationalists began to use the previously-mentioned tactic, and incorporated it into their propaganda—they even reprinted Herzl’s “The Jewish State” with a foreword about how to co-opt it—where they started to call the Jewish nation-state of Israel an “Ethnostate” & claim they just wanted what the Jews had, for White people. The two main problems with that is that a) a globally oppressed minority (Jews) getting special protections is not the same as a globally dominant one (White People™️) getting further protections, and b) they didn’t want a White equivalent to Israel (they didn’t want a nation-state); they wanted an ethnostate and they projected that onto Israel.

And this is where the left failed Jews. Because the left only started to use the word “ethnostate” after Richard Spencer called Israel one at a Neo-Nazi rally in Florida—at the same time he said he wanted a “safe space” for White people like minorities had. And the left, rather than looking at the man who makes no bones about hating Jews, and asking themselves, “should I maybe be more critical about accepting how the man who loves Hitler and wants to genocide Jews and gay people frames what safe spaces and the Jewish state are?”, turned around and said, “Nah, he’s right. Jews are like Nazis.”

[anti-zionist-jew]

I had to start a new blog, so I figured I would reintroduce myself.

My name is Zara. I’m a Black Ashkenazi Jewish woman, 36 years of age, who grew up in one of the oldest majority Black synagogues in occupied Turtle Island (USA). Being a Black woman, and a Jewish woman, have shaped my entire identity and walk through life. I am proudly Black and Jewish. I have been on the “birthright” trip, and can attest first hand how that is two weeks of pure Zionist propaganda, and how none of this is about Judaism.

We do not need a country to all be shuffled into in order to be safe. Israel does not protect Jewish people, and it never has. Palestinian sovereignty is not and never will be antisemitic, and From the River to the Sea is not a call for genocide against the Jews. It is a call for liberation, a declaration of decolonization. Is “from sea to shining sea” a call for genocide? Or is it a declaration that the land from the Pacific to the Atlantic is the USA?

White westerners get to hide their antisemitism by “supporting Israel” and thus supporting the idea of shuffling Jews to the Middle East. They get to claim they are protecting a historically marginalized people, while sticking us on the other side of the world, where they can “be over there, and they can fight amongst themselves far away from us”

Israel is a settler state. They came in and murdered people to steal their homes. Occupied the land. Began controlling all access to resources. And then started committing genocide when Hamas retaliated. What Hamas did is not just unsurprising, it was inevitable. Tell me that you, in Podunk USA would let people come steal your house. Tell me you wouldn’t use the “stand your ground” or “castle doctrine” to shoot the thieves coming to rob you. Tell me you’ll voluntarily give your home to an indigenous American. You simply cannot. Explain to me how Jews living in Israel who stand against genocide are being arrested, beaten, exiled from their communities. Explain to me how they’re not an ethno state when they do not legally recognize interfaith marriage.

Israel is an apartheid state, Israel has its hands in the worst atrocities the world over. Yes, white Jew reading this in Brooklyn, what is happening to Palestinians will always be far worse than the pro Palestine protestor calling you a colonizer when you inserted yourself against their cause, and then wanted to pretend you were attacked for being Jewish. Zionism ≠ Judaism, and the world knows that now.

Even in the context of those arguments to indigenous to the land, please read a single book or paper published by an indigenous scholar. Multiple people can and are indigenous to the same regions.

Anyway, it’s Free Palestine. Free Congo. Free the Sudan. Release the chains from all oppressed and colonized people. Agitate, educate, organize. And long live the intifada