I often get the impression that most people discussing the Israel-Palestine issue have done very little research into the history of Zionism, the history of Palestine, the history of the Jewish Diaspora, or the history of the State called Israel (henceforth called Medinat Israel). It can lead to very frustrating discussions where nobody seems to understand why the other side won't agree with them or change their mind or even empathize with the other position in the slightest.
You often encounter liberal American Jews who say things like "I am a Zionist, but I oppose the occupation, and the Likud government, and believe in separation of religion and State, and support equal rights for Palestinians, and even right of return of Palestinians... but I'm a strong Zionist like I really believe in Zionism" and it begs the question "what do you think Zionism means then?" Likewise, you sometimes encounter anti-zionists, like myself, who seem to have no idea why so many Jewish people moved to Palestine, or why these holocaust survivors keep electing fascists, and then we'll say ignorant things like "they should all move back to Europe" which basically immediately tells whoever is listening that you have no idea what you're talking about.
For a full-disclosure, I'm an anti-zionist, I do not believe in Zionism. I think Zionism is the golden calf of our day and has turned many Jews away from Judaism and towards a fascist nationalist worship of the State. I think Medinat Israel is an awful racist apartheid state and needs to be abolished and replaced with a secular bi-national state with equal rights for all and a right of return for Palestinians in diaspora, and that the funds used for Aaliyah programs should be diverted to helping any Palestinians who return to re-settle in the new state, ideally on their original lands which had been taken from them only a generation or two ago. I also believe in freedom of movement, that is unethical to displace someone from the place where they were born, and that there should be no enforced demographic proportions or attempts to affect who has the majority at any give time. I even think it's maybe possible for a one-state solution to still provide a safe refuge for Jews fleeing persecution in very hostile countries without privileging Jews over Palestinians; though right now I think it honestly makes more sense for us to encourage them to settle in like, New Jersey, which is honestly objectively safer for Jewish refugees than an active war zone like Palestine.
And that last part might confuse some people. How can you be an anti-zionist and also believe that Palestine can be a safe refuge for Jewish refugees? and that would be because most people don't understand what Zionism means.
Terminology
Here's some terminology:
B'nei/Beney Yisrael: This means "The Sons of Israel" and has referred to the Jewish people for thousands of years. In many languages, this is just what you call Jews. Yisrael/Israel, on its own, for thousands of years, just meant "All the Jewish People." In Jewish liturgy, any time "Yisrael" shows up it's not referring to the Land of Israel and certainly not the State of Israel, it just means "The People called Yisrael."
Bene Yisrael: This refers specifically to the Jewish diaspora in India and Pakistan, the many Jews who, upon being expelled from Judea by the Romans, headed east and settled in the Indian subcontinent. After the partition of India and the movement of Pakistan and India towards being states defined by being Muslim or Hindu, most Bene Yisraeli Jews feared persecution and moved to Medinat Israel, the US, or other British Commonwealth countries.
Benai Yisrael: This spelling generally refers to Samaritans, who are a different ethnoreligious group in the Levant region, mostly Ha'aretz Yisrael, who were never expelled and do not consider themselves Jewish though they do claim to also be descendants of the ancient Israelites, just a different tribe than the ones who became the Jews.
Bnei Isro'il: This refers specifically to the Jewish diaspora in a part Central Asia that is now within Uzbekistan, they are a subset of Mizrahi Jews called the Bukharan Jews. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union shit got really difficult for them and most of them moved to Medinat Israel or to the United States.
Beta Israel: This refers specifically to the Jewish diaspora in Ethiopia, who have always faced a lot of racism from other Jews and were more separate from the other diaspora groups because of it, thus their version of Judaism is more different than Ashkenazi or Sephardic Judaism (though it's still very much valid Judaism!!). This racism is, of course, because Beta Israeli Jews are Black. Ethiopia was kind of a rough place to live what with WWII and the famine and the wars, so Beta Israel actually was really interested in leaving Ethiopia more-so than most other diaspora groups. The Ethiopian government, however, for a long time, prohibited Jews from emigrating from Ethiopia. During the Ethiopian Civil War in the late 20th century, things got worse, with the Ethiopian government becoming increasingly hostile to the Jewish population in retaliation for horrible human rights abuses enacted by Medinat Israel, even though the Jews in Ethiopia had nothing to do with it what since they were living in Ethiopia and not allowed to leave the country by the same government attacking them. In response, Medinat Israel evacuated nearly the entire Beta Israel community to Palestine through an elaborate MOSSAD operation; and since then, some have moved to the United States. Once in Medinat Israel, they have faced lots of racism including coerced sterilization by the government; with many Beta Israeli women saying that they were told by immigration officials they would not be allowed to immigrate unless they agreed to being injected with a long-term contraceptive drug.
Ha'aretz Yisrael: This refers specifically to The Land of Israel, regardless of who is living there now or what the current government is. It's where the Kingdom of Israel from the TaNaKh supposedly was though the exact borders are under dispute. It's also where we all originated, albeit over 1800 years ago (and you can tell by looking at us that all of us are of mixed heritage now, no matter what anyone claims). This land traded hands between various empires constantly who all liked to change the name, so Jews just refer to it as Ha'aretz Yisrael rather than trying to keep up with what we're calling it these days according to whoever most recently conquered it. Traditionally, there is a prophecy that someday in the distant future, when there is no more war or hunger, a messiah will come who will lead all the Jews in diaspora back to Ha'aretz Yisrael and then all the dead will come back to life and everyone will be immortal and it's basically the closest thing Judaism has to an afterlife; and most Jews don't even believe this anymore. Some Jews believe that we explicitly should not preempt this and should avoid living in Ha'aretz Yisrael before the messiah comes.
Medinat Yisrael: This means "The State of Israel" and refers specifically to the government, the State, that has been established in Palestine, which named itself "Israel." It didn't ask us all if we wanted them to use the name that traditionally referred to the entire ethnic group as the name of their government but that's what they decided to do and now we're stuck with it. More abstractly, it can refer to the idea of "A Jewish State" of a non-specific location, it just so happens that the one that exists is also in Palestine.
Israelis: People who have been born in Medinat Israel, or have become Israeli Citizens through immigration, regardless of if they are Jewish or not. This includes Israeli Arabs and Israeli Palestinians.
Israelites: The ancient people of the Kingdom of Israel as featured in the TaNaKh who Jews, Samaritans, the Banu Israil Muslim community in Uttar Pradesh, the Knanaya Christians in Kerala, the Lemba people in Zimbabwe and South Africa, some Pashtuns, some British Nationalists, some French Nationalists, some Scandinavian Nationalists, some Kurds, some Japanese Nationalists, the Black Hebrew Israelites in the United States, and the Mormons in the United States all claim ancestry from. Genetic testing has shown evidence that Jews and Samaritans (discounting recent converts) probably do actually share a common ancestor that lived where the Kingdom of Israel was around that time but like, that's so long ago we really can't say anything for certain.
Sabra (pl. Sabrim): Jewish people who have been born in Medinat Israel; which is what a lot of people mean to refer to when they say Israeli.
Aliyah: When a Jewish person immigrates to Medinat Israel, they call it "making aliyah." Someone who has made aliyah becomes an Israeli but not a Sabra.
Anyway, that's all super easy to remember right? So here's the misconception: Many people believe that Zionism is the belief that B'nei Yisrael should live in Ha'aretz Yisrael but actually Zionism is the belief that B'nei Yisrael should live in Medinat Yisrael, which happens to be located in Ha'artez Yisrael but it didn't necessarily have to be. Zionists, in turn, have helped Bene Israel, Bnei Is'roil, and Beta Israel emigrate to Medinat Yisrael (among others in B'nei Yisrael). Benai Yisrael was already in Ha'aretz Yisrael before the Zionists established Medinat Yisrael in Ha'aretz Yisrael. Simple, easy to remember.
Could You Please Say That Again in English
There is a misconception that Zionism is the belief that Jews from across the diaspora should all live together in the Land of Israel, AKA where Palestine is now. They might even think it's just the belief that the country called Israel should be allowed to exist at all, and that the Jews who live there should be allowed to continue living there. But that is not what Zionism is.
Zionism is the belief that Jews should live in a Jewish State, which is to say, a nation-state that is majority Jewish and controlled by Jews and only or primarily Jews1. It is explicitly and openly a colonialist venture. The Zionist movement originally didn't even care if the proposed Jewish State was in Palestine, although it was definitely always their top choice.
Theodor Herzl was the father of modern Zionism as we know it. In his manifesto, Der Judenstaat, Herzl talks about how establishing a Jewish state would be this magnificent replication of European colonialism and would elevate the Jewish people to the level of the Western Civilizations. He proposed that the Jewish state be established in.... Argentina! Well, he also proposed Palestine, but he thought Argentina might be more practical.
In fact, here's all the locations that Zionists proposed might be good places for The Jewish State to be established:
- Grand Island, Erie county, New York
- Uganda
- Palestine
- Argentina
- Siberia
- Crimea
- Cyprus
- Kenya
- Manchuria
- Madagascar
- British Guiana
- Ohio
- Ethiopia
- Tasmania
- The Polish provinces that had previously been annexed by Russia
- Jordan ("Eh, close enough to Palestine?")
- Saudi Arabia
- The Dominican Republic
- Greece
- Albania
- Australia
- Eastern Prussia/AKA what is now that weird exclave of Russia.
- Kiryas Joel, New York
- Quebec
- Alaska
- Vietnam, which was actually offered to David Ben-Gurion by Ho Chi Minh himself, which supposedly David Ben-Gurion dismissed by just saying "for obvious reasons, this was unacceptable."
- G... Germany... Just... right in Germany... which I'm sure all the Jews would feel very safe doing.
There are many flavors of Zionism, certainly. Liberal Zionists believe in having a liberal democratic capitalism state. Religious Zionists who basically believe David Ben-Gurion was the aforementioned messiah. Labor Zionists who believe that the Judenstaadt should have socialist collective farming or something. The current flavor of Zionism that dominates Israeli politics and is the ideology of the ruling Likud party is Revisionist Zionism which believes first and foremost in having a strong military to defend the Jewish State, that "the ability to shoot" is the most important thing, and that the Jewish majority in the Jewish state must be maintained through violence in order to keep Jews safe. They are also territorial expansionists and believe that Medinat Israel and Ha'Aretz Yisrael should map 1:1 to the fullest extent, which is to say, they believe in annexing Palestine, and chunks of other neighboring countries as well. Likud also came into power by assassinating a sitting prime minister, which is cool. They'll claim that they're not responsible but the assassin was a member of the Likud party, so, like, take that as you will.
Let me be clear, all flavors of Zionism are colonialist ideologies, but the Revisionist Zionists are downright fascists. The Irgun, the armed militia that the Likud party grew out of, openly praised Adolf Hitler and said that they would only fight the Nazis because they are antisemitic and a threat to Jewish people, not because they disagreed with anything else that the Nazis were doing. They said that the anti-semitism of Nazism was the "shell" that they would discard, but they would keep the "Anti-Marxist Kernel" which they admired in Nazism. Here is a citation for this because I know many people might struggle to believe this, but it's in like the first thirty pages of this book.
I do not believe that all the Jews currently living in Medinat Israel should be deported, especially not the sabrim or the refugees whose entire communities moved there looking for a place where they wouldn't be persecuted. I think it's always wrong to displace people from where they were born, whether they be Jewish or Palestinian, and that it's important for people to accept refugees and immigrants. But I don't believe in Zionism, because I do not believe in a Jewish State. I do not believe in maintaining a Jewish majority. I do not believe in ethno-states or theocracy or ethnotheocracy. I do not believe Jews are entitled to owning all or any of Ha'aretz Yisrael and I do not believe Jews should be aspiring to replicate Western Colonialism. In fact, I believe that colonizing and displacing the Palestinian people from their land is morally wrong and contrary to the ethics of Judaism. Thus, I am anti-zionist.
Zionism is not believing it's OK for Jews to live in the State of Israel; or that it would be cool for Jews to live together in our ancestral homeland; it's believing that Jews should control a State of Israel as a privileged class with a unnaturally maintained majority. Zionists believe Jews will never be safe unless we control the government to exclusions of everyone else. I disagree. I think diversity is good and it's possible to live in harmony with other peoples. The Zionists disagree with me. I think they're racists and, these days? mostly fascists.
OK so, wait, how the hell do so many Jews believe in Zionism then? Most Jews are pretty anti-fascist given the whole holocaust thing, right?
Here's the thing that I think a lot of people miss. Most Jews living in Medinat Israel didn't really have a choice, and they have nowhere to go back to either. Before WWII, Zionism was not very popular. You can find so many historical documents of Jews making fun of Zionists as "wanting us to waste a lot of money and go die in the desert." Jews across the diaspora weren't exactly doing stellar but for most of them, they were living in society and the way the Zionist framed things (whether or not it was true) was that settling Ha'Aretz Yisrael was gonna be this whole colonial venture of building up new cities from scratch and working the land and farming and being survivalists and shit. When everything is already so precarious, why risk what you do have for a hypothetical thing that sounds exhausting and risky?
But in the mid-20th century, well, their hands were forced. The holocaust happened, and entire communities were wiped out. The Lithuanian village my great grandmother's family was from? After they left, the holocaust killed 100% of the Jews living there, and then the Soviet Union displaced all the Lithuanians, demolished all of the buildings, and just built an entirely new settlement with new people living there. In fact, they did this to the entire Marijampole metropolitan region. The Marijampole region as my great grandparents knew it is just gone. Lithuania once had some of the most Jews in the entire world, with some parts like Majiampole being super-majority Jewish. Of course the Jews in Marijampole didn't find Zionism particularly appealing, they already had their majority Jewish city, why build another one? In the year 2000, there were only 3600 Jews left in all of Lithuania. The city of Minsk in Belarus? It was once 55% Jewish, and no, Zionism wasn't very popular. The Nazis killed 90% of the Jews living in Minsk. The rest of the Jews all emigrated to Medinat Israel or the United States. Minsk is now less than 1% Jewish. Minsk is where my grandmother's parents had been born, but the Minsk they knew is gone entirely. After the Nazis killed all the Jews, and WWII destroyed most of the city, the Soviet Union basically just built an entirely new city and settled new people there who weren't Jewish.
And what were the Zionists doing at this time? They were evacuating refugees. When the Nazis are on your trail, you don't really ask where you're going. The Zionists said "Hey, looks like living in Europe isn't going so well for you, wanna come settle Palestine with us?" and the Jews of Europe said "SURE, FINE, GET ME THE FUCK OUT OF HERE, ASAP." Remember, the argument of the Zionists was "Jews will never be safe if they don't control the State" and now were extending their hand presenting themselves as the only way to escape the holocaust. Remember, also, that a lot of countries were refusing to take holocaust refugees, or setting very limited caps on how many they would take. The Zionists said "come here, all of you, no matter what."
A lot of the state-building the Zionists were doing was before the holocaust, and they were certainly building popularity the further they got along, but the holocaust was when their huge population boom happened, it was when they hit critical mass, it was when the majority of Jews came to sympathize with the Zionist project. The holocaust became the perfect example for the Zionists to use to argue that the Judenstaadt is necessary. This was a rhetorical trick. If you read Der Judenstaadt this was never the original concern of Herzl. Herzl believed that the Jewish State should be a technocracy run by corporations using Jewish immigrants as cheap loyal workers to turn a profit. But, hey, Herzl didn't foresee WWII.
Now, all that? That's just the Ashkenazi Jews and some Sephardic Jews. But let's talk about the Mizrahi Jews. The Mizrahim are the Jews who didn't travel too far from Jerusalem after the Romans expelled us. They lived in the Middle East, Central Asia, the Arabian Peninsula, Iran, Egypt, even Palestine (it's not like the Romans were still keeping us out forever.) Under most Muslim governments, Mizrahim were given the status "people of the book" and considered a sort of protected second-class citizen. While not as privileged as Muslim citizens, they were still able to attain a pretty comfortable and stable middle-class life. Again, why would Zionism appeal to you? Sure, you weren't top of the food chain, but life was fine enough.
But when Medinat Israel declared independence and started pushing out all the Palestinians, all the neighboring Muslim nations were outraged (and rightfully so!) Unfortunately, they retaliated against the Mizrahim who lived within their borders, who had nothing to do with Medinat Israel but were blamed for it anyway. Many Jews were downright expelled from these countries, or were forced to move to Medinat Israel through negotiated "population exchanges" where Medinat Israel deported thousands of Palestinians to neighboring countries who in turn deported an equal number of Jews to Medinat Israel. This is a violation of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights.
This same story is repeated throughout the world. Once the State of Israel was established, people could finally tell the Jews to "go back where you came from." Entire communities emigrated, whether to flee existing persecution, new persecution that is arguably the fault of the Zionists, or were just absolutely terrified of being next, after seeing what was happening in the rest of the world.
If you tell most Israeli Jews to "go back where they came from" the question they'll ask back is "and where exactly is that? Is that not here? Because those other people told me to go back where I came from and sent me here." They'll say "you're insane, why would I do that, did you see what happened to us there?" They'll say "The place I'm from doesn't exist anymore. It was destroyed. Everybody left. It's gone." They'll maybe even say "I'd love to, but I'm not allowed to."
Here's another way to think of it: The Israeli Jews are like a child who was beaten growing up and grows up to be violent and angry and to believe that being strong and intimidating is the only way to protect themselves. They are fiercely loyal to Medinat Israel because it took them in when they lost everything. They believe the fascist Likud narrative because to many of them, it is their own lived experience. They thought they would be safe, then they faced violence, and then they were forced to flee. Medinat Israel was the only guaranteed safe place to go. Perhaps you could try to emigrate to Canada or the United States but passage wasn't guaranteed and that would still be colonizing someone else's land. Medinat Israel guaranteed they would be brought in and even given help to settle. It was a deal they couldn't refuse. And besides, haven't the Jews always lived on someone else's land? Weren't they always unwanted wherever we went? What was different this time in that sense? How were Palestinians different from Germans or Ethiopians or Moroccans? The Zionists would say: "The difference is this time we are stronger than they are. This time we will be in charge."
And it is sad. It is horrible. It is tragic. It is miserable that so many people who have been the persecuted minority themselves would turn to becoming the oppressor. That victims of genocide and displacement would turn to genocide and displacement as what they believe is the way to protect themselves. And they are wrong, too. This is not necessary. The violence is not necessary and is evil. Palestinians and Jews have so much in common culturally, spiritually, even genetically. We could have lived together in peace and become the best of friends. If only the Zionists had been willing to live together in peace. But peace is not possible within their ideology. The Zionist ideology is inherently one of state violence. There is no way for one ethnic or religious group to control a state without persecuting a minority, and forcing them to remain a minority through violence. Zionism is the belief that Jews cannot be safe unless Jews have a monopoly on violence within a given region.
And what of the Jews in diaspora who support Zionism? The Americans and Canadians and Argentinians and Brits who do not wish to move to Medinat Israel but support it in everything it does uncritically? The younger Jews, the fourth or fifth generation immigrants, we don't have much attachment to whatever shtetl or city our families came from, it's easier for us to see the horrors and evils of Zionism for what it is. But for our grandparents and great grandparents, they remembered those shtetls and cities, they had family and relatives there, and they listened on the radio as all of those people died, as their old world was destroyed completely. Nobody wanted to talk about Marijampole or Minsk to me. They are gone. It's best not to ruminate on them. Jews have been displaced every generation with no attachment to where we were, I was told, so why does it matter.
To these Jews, Medinat Israel represents having one place in the entire world where the Jews are safe. One place that will always accept them as refugees if America or Canada or Argentina doesn't work out.
It is an unfortunate and tragic reality that most people will put their own safety and needs over the safety and needs of others when they feel that they are under threat. The place of empathetic breakdown is that at some point you say to the true Zionist "Don't you see that what you're doing to the Palestinians is wrong?" and the true Zionist says "Yes, it is wrong, and it is also necessary for us to survive and that is more important."
And they are wrong. Had the Jews fleeing to Palestine just treated the Palestinians with respect and dignity, as equals who deserved this land, as the owners of this land who had a right to it, then Jews would actually have been safer. Solidarity is safer than animosity. Palestine was a former British colony achieving independence for the first time in centuries. The Jews and Palestinians could have worked together to rebuild a new country based on mutual respect and dignity and solidarity.
But, alas, that is not their mentality. Their mentality is one of a beaten child. And so seventy years pass and you ask the American Jew living in the suburbs of New York "do you support the State of Israel? Are you a Zionist?" and they say "Uhh... I guess I'm a Zionist. I don't really know the history. But I want the Jews there to be safe, that's important to me. They shouldn't have to leave."
Zionism isn't just colonialism, it's worse, it's millions of historically persecuted people turning to fascism because of generational trauma. It demonstrates that just because someone is from persecuted minority, doesn't meant that violence and power can't corrupt them just the same.
Because the Zionists have convinced us that those are the only options, that co-existing is impossible, that friendship and solidarity across differences is impossible. Zionists created a narrative that if the Jews do not hold absolute power, then they'll have to leave. But it's not true. They are wrong. Peace is possible, if we can just believe in it, if we can loosen our grip on power, if we can be willing to pay reparations. I truly believe that that is possible.
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In-turn, anti-zionism is not the belief that Jews shouldn't live in the Land of Israel. It's the belief that Jewish people shouldn't be trying to establish an ethno-state or replicate colonialism.
