The Specter of Zionism

It haunts the Left

Most Jews are not Zionists in any meaningful sense. The Left is confused about this. Rooting for whatever Israel does, while deplorable, is not an incisive definition of Zionism.

Jewish life outside of Israel is known as the diaspora. The core principle of Zionism is that Jews should settle in Israel. Those who have not gone identify with Israel in any number of ways, but I would assert they are not Zionists. This encompasses Jews in Europe and the Americas who have the option of emigrating but decline to do so. Indeed, until World War II was over, the overwhelming majority of Jews in the world failed to emigrate. As late as 1915, Israel had fewer than 40,000 Jews. This speaks to the fraudulence of the premise that Zionism represents the age-old aspirations of the Jewish people.

Without doubt, Jews in the diaspora take pride in the establishment and growth of the state of Israel, including its military victories. They look past its moral turpitude. They support pro-Israeli policies with their voices, votes, and money. So, incidentally, do the so-called Christian Zionists and assorted reactionaries.

I would argue that “Christian Zionist” is an oxymoron. The underlying religious view foresees an end to Jewry altogether. That hardly equates to the Jewish view of an eternal safe haven in Palestine, granted by God no less. A more apt synonym for Christian Zionist, from a Jewish standpoint, is “sucker.” The Christian Zionists afford pro-Israeli forces more leverage on U.S. politics. In return they get nothing. Meanwhile the Israeli state oppresses Christians inside Israel and bombs Christian churches in Gaza.

It’s been said that philo-semites are antisemites who like Jews. It is interesting to note that Google’s AI flatly asserts that is incorrect. Stupid-ass Google! Corrupt Google, in bed with the oil industry. The American Jewish Committee is a little more nuanced. I used to listen on the radio to G. Gordon Liddy while driving to work. (Laura Ingraham too. My hatred ripens like a fine wine.) Liddy, who did a great turn in Miami Vice, once praised Israel for doing the “dirty work” of the U.S. Government. Racists were capable of celebrating the athletic feats of a Michael Jordan, sometimes ascribing his abilities to his race. That’s Christian Zionism.

Then there are the Jews of Israel. Many of them are patriotic, loyal to the State, and by what I’ve read, most are none too sympathetic with Palestinians. I would not conflate Israeli patriotism with Zionism. It’s simplistic. The latter has a diverse history. The deeds of the Israeli government have been justified by a particularly horrific, extreme expression of Zionism, so it has become difficult to distinguish the history from the present.

State policies to which Israeli Jews acquiesce certainly invite more immigrants, not to mention dispossession of the indigenous Arab inhabitants. It is reasonable to assert that this is what Zionism has become, but it is a distance from its pluralistic past, as are current Israeli policies. So equating Zionism with the liquidation of Gaza is at least a little complicated.

Israeli-Jewish support for ethnic cleansing has little to do with ideology and mostly to do with a thirst for revenge and extremist ideas about national security. The latter lacks the religious or cultural content of Zionism per se.

A political problem that follows is a politics that automatically stigmatizes any type of Zionist as complicit with the onslaught on Gaza, along with multiple atrocities in the occupied territories. A friend calls this “anti-Zionistism.” It’s only a stone’s throw from antisemitism. A good example was the scandalous protest at a Jewish law professor’s house in San Francisco.

Jews, for all the contradictions and uncertainties in their views, still punch above their weight in U.S. politics. Some finesse is called for. Senator Bernie Sanders and Zohran Mamdani show how to do it. I wish more of their enthusiastic supporters would pay closer attention.

No small amount of Lefty rhetoric leans on charges of genocide. I have no problem with the terminology. “Apartheid” is a little more problematic. It tends to fail to distinguish between denials of civil rights for Arabs in Israel proper, on the one hand, the ethnic cleansing practiced in the territories by fascist settlers, and the Gaza carnage. Yes it’s all connected, but it’s not all the same.

One important difference is that Israeli policies in Gaza and the West Bank violate international law, not a trivial matter. Oppression of Arabs who are legitimate citizens of Israel is more of a can of worms. Of course, the U.S. itself is not innocent of such offenses.

What the charges of genocide and apartheid have in common is moral absolutism. To more than a few comrades, moral condemnation is the mother’s milk of politics. It certainly is not without effect. But here we are in the wake of Gaza’s destruction, which is ongoing, so it is always time in a crisis to assess whether progress is being made as rapidly as possible, if at all. I still see no restraints on Israeli policy, though a Mayor Zohran could have an impact.