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Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism, the international Jewish political movement that created a homeland for the Jewish People in Palestine (Hebrew: Eretz Yisra'el, “the Land of Israel”), and continues as support for the state of Israel. Opposition to Zionism has changed over time and has taken on a spectrum of religious, ethical, or political forms. Some include, opposition to the creation of a Jewish state prior to the appearance of the messiah, objection to the idea of a state based on maintenance of a Jewish majority, or rejection of Israel's right to exist in any form.

The relationship between Anti-Zionism and antisemitism is disputed. Some commentators argue that all or most contemporary anti-Zionism is inherently antisemitic. Others disagree with this interpretation.

Criticism of Israeli government policy is not the same as anti-Zionism, although it can stem from anti-Semitic or anti-Zionist opinions.

History and context of anti-Zionism

Political Zionism encountered both support and opposition since its small beginnings in the 19th century. The First Zionist Congress of 1897, which was originally intended to take place in Munich, had to be moved to Basel because of the hostile response from the Munich Jewish community. The Zionist movement only started to attract the attention of non-Jews as it grew larger. With the beginning of new Jewish settlements in Palestine, and as the settlements grew larger and more numerous, the first anti-Zionist demonstrations by Arabs occurred in March and April 1920, with the latter leading to the 1920 Palestine riots. Periods of violence increased in severity and consequence in the following years.

Contemporary discussions about anti-Zionism and antisemitism

In recent years, several commentators have argued that contemporary manifestations of anti-Zionism are often used as a cover for antisemitism, and that a "new antisemitism" rooted in anti-Zionism has emerged. Advocates of this concept argue that much of what purports to be criticism of Israel and Zionism is tantamount to demonization, and that together with an international resurgence of attacks on Jews and Jewish symbols and an increased acceptance of antisemitic beliefs in public discourse, this demonization represents an evolution in the appearance of antisemitic beliefs. Critics of the concept argue that the equation of anti-Zionism with antisemitism is often used to stifle legitimate criticisms of Israel, and trivializes the real meaning of antisemitism.

Dina Porat (head of the Institute for Study of Anti-semitism and Racism at Tel-Aviv University) suggests that anti-Zionism is anti-semitic because it is discriminatory:

...antisemitism is involved when the belief is articulated that of all the peoples on the globe (including the Palestinians), only the Jews should not have the right to self-determination in a land of their own. Or, to quote noted human rights lawyer David Matas: One form of antisemitism denies access of Jews to goods and services because they are Jewish. Another form of antisemitism denies the right of the Jewish people to exist as a people because they are Jewish. Antizionists distinguish between the two, claiming the first is antisemitism, but the second is not. To the antizionist, the Jew can exist as an individual as long as Jews do not exist as a people.

Professor Robert S. Wistrich (head of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism) at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem believes that Anti-Zionism is not inherently anti-Semitic and

that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are two distinct ideologies that over time (especially since 1948) have tended to converge, generally without undergoing a full merger.

He argues that much contemporary anti-Zionism, particularly forms that compare Zionism and Jews with Hitler and the Third Reich, has become a form of antisemitism:

Anti-Zionism has become the most dangerous and effective form of anti-Semitism in our time, through its systematic delegitimization, defamation, and demonization of Israel. Although not a priori anti-Semitic, the calls to dismantle the Jewish state, whether they come from Muslims, the Left, or the radical Right, increasingly rely on an anti-Semitic stereotypization of classic themes, such as the manipulative "Jewish lobby," the Jewish/Zionist "world conspiracy," and Jewish/Israeli "warmongers."

Brian Klug has argued that anti-Zionism and antisemitism are distinct concepts:

There is a long and ignoble history of "Zionist" being used as a code word for "Jew," as when Communist Poland carried out "anti-Zionist" purges in 1968, expelling thousands of Jews from the country, or when the extreme right today uses the acronym ZOG (Zionist Occupied Government) to refer to the US government. Moreover, the Zionist movement arose as a reaction to the persecution of Jews. Since anti-Zionism is the opposite of Zionism, and since Zionism is a form of opposition to anti-Semitism, it seems to follow that an anti-Zionist must be an anti-Semite.

Nonetheless, the inference is invalid. To argue that hostility to Israel and hostility to Jews are one and the same thing is to conflate the Jewish state with the Jewish people. In fact, Israel is one thing, Jewry another. Accordingly, anti-Zionism is one thing, anti-Semitism another. They are separate. To say they are separate is not to say that they are never connected. But they are independent variables that can be connected in different ways.

In 2005, the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) in its working definition of antisemitism, identified several ways in which antisemitism can manifest itself, such as using double standards against Israel or drawing analogies between its behavior and that of the Nazis. However, it also stated that “criticism of Israel, similar to that leveled against any other country, cannot be regarded as anti-Semitic.”

Jewish opposition to Zionism

Support for aliyah does not always translate into support of the modern Zionist movement; and as a result some religious Jews, and secular Jews, do not support Zionism. However, Zionism does have the support of the overwhelming majority of the Jewish religious community, with full support from Orthodax, Conservative, and Reform movements.

It should be noted that Jews who were (or are) not Zionists are not necessarily anti-Zionists; the term non-Zionist has been used traditionally in the United States.

Secular Jewish opposition

The Jewish community is not a single united group and responses vary both between and within Jewish groups. One of the principle divisions is that between secular Jews and religious Jews. The reasons for secular opposition to the Zionist movement (where it existed) were very different from those of religious Jews.

• Prior to WWII

Prior to the Second World War many Jews regarded Zionism as a fanciful and unrealistic movement. Many liberals during the European Enlightenment had argued that Jews should enjoy full equality only on the condition that they pledge their singular loyalty to their nation-state and entirely assimilate to the local national culture; they called for the "regeneration" of the Jewish people in exchange for rights. Those liberal Jews who accepted integration and/or assimilation principles saw Zionism as a threat to efforts to facilitate Jewish citizenship and equality within the European nation-state context.

• WWII and the creation of Israel

Attitudes changed during and following the war. In May, 1942, before the full revelation of the Holocaust, the Biltmore Program proclaimed a fundamental departure from traditional Zionist policy of a “homeland” with its demand "that Palestine be established as a Jewish Commonwealth." Opposition to official Zionism’s firm, unequivocal stand caused some prominent Zionists to establish their own party, Ichud (Unification), which advocated an Arab – Jewish Federation in Palestine. Opposition to the Biltmore Program also lead to the founding of the anti-Zionist American Council for Judaism

The full knowledge of the Holocaust altered the views of many who critiqued Zionism before 1948, including the British journalist Isaac Deutscher, a socialist and life-long atheist who nevertheless emphasised the importance of his Jewish heritage. Before World War II, Deutscher opposed Zionism as economically retrograde and harmful to the cause of international socialism, but in the aftermath of the Holocaust he regretted his pre-war views, arguing for Israel's establishment as a "historic necessity" to provide a refuge for the surviving Jews of Europe. In the 1960s Deutscher renewed his criticism of Zionism, scrutinizing Israel for its failure to recognise the dispossession of the Palestinians.

Contemporary Jewish American linguist, Noam Chomsky, reports a change in the boundaries of what are considered Zionist and anti-Zionist views. In 1947, in his youth, Chomsky's support for a socialist binational state, in conjunction with his opposition to any semblance of a theocratic system of governance in Israel, was at the time considered well within the mainstream of secular Zionism; today, it lands him solidly in the anti-Zionist camp.

On the other hand, Alvin H. Rosenfeld in his much discussed essay, Progressive Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism, , claims that a "number of Jews, through their speaking and writing, are feeding a rise in virulent antisemitism by questioning whether Israel should even exist." :Rosenfeld general claims are:

1. “At a time when the de-legitimization and, ultimately, the eradication of Israel is a goal being voiced with mounting fervor by the enemies of the Jewish state, it is more than disheartening to see Jews themselves adding to the vilification. That some do so in the name of Judaism itself makes the nature of their assault all the more grotesque.”
2. "Their contributions to what’s becoming normative discourse are toxic. They’re helping to make views about the Jewish state respectable - for example, that it’s a Nazi-like state, comparable to South African apartheid; that it engages in ethnic cleansing and genocide. These charges are not true and can have the effect of delegitimizing Israel."

Religious opposition

In the early history of Zionism many traditional religious Jews opposed ideas of nationalism (Jewish or otherwise) which they regarded as a secular ideology and because of an inherent suspicion of change. Key traditionalist opponents of Zionism included Isaac Breuer, Hillel Zeitlin, Aaron Shmuel Tamares, Hayyim, Elazar Shapiro (Muncatz), and Joel Teitelbaum, all waged ideological religious, as well as political, battles with Zionism each in their own way.

Many Hassidic Jews in particular opposed any attempt to create a secular Jewish state, and a few contemporary hassidic sects have remained steadfast in their anti-Zionism, notably the Satmar sect. The leader of the Satmar hasidic sect, Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum's book, VaYoel Moshe, published in 1958, expounds one Orthodox position on Zionism, based on a literal form of midrash (biblical interpretation). Citing to Tractate Kesubos 111a of the Talmud Teitelbaum states that God and the Jewish people exchanged three oaths at the time of the Jews' exile from ancient Israel.

The most prominent and largest Jewish religious group opposed to Zionism are the Satmar Hassidim, which numbers less than 130,000 adherents world wide. Even more strongly opposed to Zionism is the small Haredi Jewish organization known as Neturei Karta. , which has less than 5,000 members, almost all actually living in Israel. (According to The Guardian, "ven among Charedi, or ultra-Orthodox circles, the Neturei Karta are regarded as a wild fringe". )

Religious support of Zionism

• In the 1920s, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook articulated a fusion of Modern Orthodox Judaism and Zionism that came to be known as Religious Zionism. Over time extreme ultra-Orthodox opposition to Zionism has declined for a variety of reasons, including the need for Israeli government support and protection and popular support for Zionism among the laity.

• Before the Second World War, Agudat Israel, the political party of the strictly Orthodox, opposed Zionism. Today it is a primarily Israeli party and since the seventies it has participated in most of Israel's coalition governments. Agudat Israel still opposes nationalism, but has found ways of accommodating the Israeli state.

• The Belzer, and Gerer Hasidim, among others, claim that involvement in Israeli politics is necessary in order to offer a religious viewpoint in the Israeli Knesset. Some Haredi figures have become Zionist in practice. Lubavitcher Rebbe has voiced vehement opposition to land concessions, based on the Code of Jewish Law. All Hasidic Jewish opponents to Zionism, including Rabbi Teitelbaum and Rabbi Shapira, do approve of Jews living in the Land of Israel. Their opposition is not to Jews living in the Land of Israel, but either to the ideology of Zionism or the secular nature if the Israeli government. Despite Munkacz, Satmar opposition to Zionism, there are many Hasidim living in Israel and yeshivos of both Munkacz, Satmar and, many other strongly anti-Zionist groups in Israel, particularly in Jerusalem.

Arab anti-Zionism

At the time when the Zionist settlement of Palestine began, most of the Arab world was under the control of either the Ottoman Empire or one of the European colonial powers.

Towards the beginning of Zionist settlement in Palestine in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, some Arabs were willing to consider alliance with the Zionist movement. For instance, Emir Faisal, the son of Sharif Hussein of Mecca, who helped lead the Arab nationalist revolt against the Ottomans, signed the following agreement with Chaim Weizmann at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference:

Mindful of the racial kinship and ancient bonds existing between the Arabs and the Jewish people, and realizing that the surest means of working out the consummation of their national aspirations through the closest possible collaboration in the development of the Arab states and Palestine.

This agreement also called for the fulfillment of the Balfour Declaration and supported all necessary measures:

to encourage and stimulate immigration of Jews into Palestine on a large scale, and as quickly as possible to settle Jewish immigrants upon the land through closer settlement and intensive cultivation of the soil.

For a number of reasons, the agreement was never realized. For one, Faisal had conditioned his acceptance of the Balfour Declaration on the fulfillment of British promises of independence to the Arab nations, which were not kept. Moreover, he had little local support for his position. Arab Palestinian leaders, among them the mayor of Jerusalem, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, rejected this agreement made in their name. The Arab inhabitants of Palestine also rejected any suggestion of Palestine being severed from the Arab-Islamic world. While a Jewish minority had lived in Palestine for centuries, the Arab Palestinians were strongly opposed to the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish immigrant state, and hence to any immigration that would threaten to change the majority status of the Arab population. Thus, while small-scale Jewish immigration (such as the First Aliyah of the 1880s) was accepted and often welcomed for economic reasons, larger influxes of Jews were resisted strenuously.

Once the Balfour Declaration made it clear that the British intended to establish a Jewish national home in Palestine, Arab opposition grew much firmer. Hostilities punctuated the 1920s (Jerusalem riots of April, 1920, 1929 Palestine riots (in Hebron, Jerusalem and Safed) and 1930s (activities of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam and the Black Hand group, 1936-1939 Great Uprising).

Anti-colonialist and anti-imperialist narratives—particularly popular in Arab countries with violent experiences of colonial rule—focus especially on parallels with cases such as Algeria or Rhodesia, seeing it in terms of a foreign power encouraging immigration into the country of a group which then sought to dominate the country. According to this view, the natural means of combating Zionism is considered to be Palestinian revolution, and the expulsion or weakening of the Zionist "occupiers". Among Palestinians, examples of notable individuals or political parties that emphasize anti-imperial and anti-colonial narratives in their opposition to Zionism include: Ghassan Kanafani, Edward Said, Leila Khaled, George Habash, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and The Palestinian Revolutionary Communist Party. Examples of Palestinian solidarity groups that root their activism against Zionism in anti-imperial and anti-colonial terms include: Students for Justice in Palestine, Al-Awda , and Sumoud . Critics of these movements argue that it is a red herring to compare Zionism to imperialism or colonialism, as Zionist ideology is focused on return to an ancestral homeland, rather than an attempt to exploit Arab Palestinians and that many Zionists are Arab Jews.

Pan-Arabist narratives—which enjoyed their heyday in the 1960s in the Nasser era, but have declined since—emphasize the idea of Palestine as a part of the Arab world taken by others (partly overlapping with the previous.) As such, Israel is seen as both a symbol of Arab weakness and—insofar as it geographically cuts the Arab world into two noncontiguous halves—an obstacle to any union of the Arab world. In this narrative, the natural means of combating Zionism is Arab nations uniting and attacking Israel militarily. Pan-Syrian narratives, promoted mainly by Syria, are essentially parallel.

In response to the Pan-Arabist narrative, Israeli historian Benny Morris commented:

Remember another thing: the Arab people gained a large slice of the planet. Not thanks to its skills or its great virtues, but because it conquered and murdered and forced those it conquered to convert during many generations. But in the end the Arabs have 22 states. The Jewish people did not have even one state. There was no reason in the world why it should not have one state. Therefore, from my point of view, the need to establish this state in this place overcame the injustice that was done to the Palestinians by uprooting them.

Local nationalist narratives of non-Palestinian Arabs emphasize the idea of Israel as a threat to the nation (commonly citing extremist Israeli individuals' dreams of a nation stretching "from the Nile to the Euphrates"). Among Palestinians, these emphasize other issues, such as the Palestinian refugee problem, and that in their view, over 90% of the pre-1948 British Mandate of Palestine is controlled by Israel.

Israel on the other hand claims that it controls only 23% of the original mandate, with the rest under the control of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, which already has a majority Palestinian Arab population.

A poll of Arab-Israelis conducted by the Israeli Democracy Institute in 2007 found that 75% of Arab-Israelis support the existence of a Jewish state:

A vast majority of Israeli Arabs would support a constitution that maintained Israel's status as a Jewish and democratic state while guaranteeing equal rights for minorities. Among the 507 people who participated in the poll, some 75 percent said they would agree with such a definition while 23 percent said they would oppose it.

Muslim anti-Zionism

Muslim anti-Zionism generally opposes the state of Israel as an intrusion into what many Muslims consider to be Dar al-Islam, a domain rightfully, and permanently, ruled only by Muslims. Once Islamic rule is established in a country, non-Muslims are given dhimmi status as protected from violence. Thus any sovereign, non-Muslim government in what is now Israel would be anathema.

Palestinian and other Muslim groups, as well as the government of Iran (since 1979 Islamic Revolution), insist that the State of Israel is illegitimate and refuse to refer to it as "Israel", instead using the locution "the Zionist entity" (see Iran-Israel relations). In an interview with Time Magazine in December 2006, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said "Everyone knows that the Zionist regime is a tool in the hands of the United States and British governments" .

An example of this view is the work of Ismail al-Faruqi (1926-1986). In Islam and the Problem of Israel (1980), he argued that Zionism was a "disease" largely influenced by European romanticism far removed from Judaism. He opposed the Zionist occupation of Palestine and called for the dismantling of Israel and the launch of a jihad. He said that the injustice caused by Zionism is such as to necessitate war. From the standpoint of Islam, Faruqi wrote, Zionism represents apostasy against Judaism.

Western anti-Zionism

Matthias Küntzel wrote concerning contemporary European antisemitism that

It is a historical fact that since the year 1921 there has been an antisemitic anti-Zionism in existence. Alfred Rosenberg wrote his first book against Zionism in that year, and it is completely antisemitic. Second, antisemitism has been a part of Europe for two millennia. And antisemitism is like a chameleon that changes its complexion over time as its environment changes. In such a deeply antisemitic world as Europe, it’s just common sense to look for the ways in which the establishment of a Jewish state would reshape antisemitic thinking.

In the liberal Western world, opposition to Zionism has often focused on the United Kingdom since it was the UK's decision to create a Jewish homeland in Palestine. The decision was controversial from the start as some British people believed the Balfour declaration undermined Britain's relationship with Muslims in the Middle East and India. Between 1919 and 1939 the British government steadily reduced its support for Zionism. In 1939 Britain formally announced its intention to create an Arab state in the whole of Palestine, ending its support for the Balfour declaration.

There was little opposition to Zionism in other countries but as Arab states became independent the desire to maintain positive relations with Arab states has often affected attitudes to Zionism.

Although supporting the creation of Israel, from 1949 onwards Communist countries adopted increasingly anti-Zionist and antisemitic positions and this affected attitudes of Communists in the West. The increasing popularity of a world-view emphasizing a global class struggle in which the Third World proletariat fought western exploiters placed the Palestinians as a focal point in global relations. In this "Third Worldist" worldview, Israel was generally described as a tool of western imperialism and a colonial settler state.

The growing conflict between Palestinians and Israeli settlers and between Palestinian liberation movements and the state of Israel has also generated an increase in anti-Zionism in the West.

Soviet anti-Zionism

Zionism was viewed in the Soviet Union as a form of bourgeois nationalism, and its active promotion among Jews was discouraged and eventually banned. From 1919 through most of Joseph Stalin's rule, the Tsarist government's anti-Jewish policies of the previous century were reverted and actively denounced. The rise of various forms of Jewish nationalism prompted the government in 1928 to establish and promote a "Soviet Zion" in Birobidzhan, a project that failed to meet population goals and was soon abandoned.

Throughout this, the official position of the Soviet Union and of its satellite states and agencies was that Zionism was a tool used by the Jews and Americans for "racist imperialism." The meaning of the term Zionism was misrepresented to conform to a policy of the ruling Communist Party of the Soviet Union: "the main posits of modern Zionism are militant chauvinism, racism, anti-Communism and anti-Sovietism,... overt and covert fight against freedom movements and the USSR."

During the years of Joseph Stalin's rule Soviet Jews were frequently attacked as "Zionists," although the majority of Soviet Jews at that time did not hold strong Zionist convictions. After the creation of Israel, however, many Soviet Jews began to sympathise with the Jewish state, thus arousing further antagonism from the Soviet government, which saw Zionism as a potential source of disloyalty.

However, from late 1944 through 1948, the Soviet Union's stance toward Zionism was strongly influenced by geopolitical concerns, and the government officially supported the foundation of Israel , although this was hidden from the Soviet media. From the end of 1948, the Soviet Union changed positions to support Arab concerns against Israeli interests through the end of the Cold War, and Israel began to emerge as a close Western ally.

During the last years of Stalin's rule, roughly 1948-1953, official Soviet anti-Zionism was intensified. While Stalin's campaigns were officially carried out under the banner of anti-Zionism, critics argue that they had a strong antisemitic content, often borrowed directly from traditional Russian antisemitism. This included a campaign against so-called "rootless cosmopolitans" and the fabrication of the Doctors' plot. After Stalin's death, anti-Zionism continued through the rise of "Zionology" in the 1960s and subsequent activities of official organizations such as the Anti-Zionist committee of the Soviet public.

During the Cold War, the spectre of Zionism raised fears of internal dissent and opposition. The Soviet government liquidated almost all remaining Jewish organizations, and placed synagogues under police surveillance, both openly and through the use of informers. At the same time, the persecution of Soviet Jews emerged as a major human rights issue in the West. See Jackson-Vanik amendment.

In 1975, the Soviet Union sponsored the UN General Assembly Resolution 3379, discussed below.

International anti-Zionism

Many of the most important authorities on ethics in the 20th century have contributed to the debate on Zionism, with some, such as Mahatma Gandhi in the 1930s and '40s, expressing opposition to the Zionist movement. U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall strongly opposed the creation of the Jewish state in 1948 but lost the internal debate in the White House over formal U.S. support of Zionism.

In contrast Martin Luther King is said to have replied to a black student who criticized "Zionists" at a 1968 dinner, "Don't talk like that! When people criticize Zionists they mean Jews. You are talking anti-Semitism." (The accuracy of this quotation is debated, and it became the source of a serious hoax.)

Paralleling the rise of anti-Zionist sentiment in the west was increased hostility towards Israel at the international level. During the 1950s and 1960s Israel made great efforts to cultivate good relations with the newly independent states of Africa and Asia, and hostility to Israel was confined to the states of the Arab-Muslim world and the Communist bloc. A combination of inter-related circumstances in the 1970s radically changed this situation.

The first was the increased hostility to Israel following the onset of the Israel-Palestinian conflict in the late 1960s. The second was the decline in the prestige of the United States following the end of the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal. The third was increased economic power of the Arab oil-producing states in the aftermath of the 1973 Arab-Israeli War and the resulting energy crisis. The fourth was the rise of radical anti-western regimes in a series of African countries. The fifth was the increased diplomatic and economic presence of the Soviet Union, China and Cuba in Africa.

This anti-Zionist trend was manifested in organisations such as the Organization for African Unity and the Non-Aligned Movement, which passed resolutions condemning Zionism and equating it with racism and apartheid during the early 1970s. It culminated in the passing by the United Nations General Assembly of Resolution 3379 in November 1975, declaring that "Zionism is a form of racism." This resolution was passed by 72 votes to 35, with 32 abstentions.

The 72 votes in favour consisted of 12 Communist countries (including East-Germany, Poland, Hungary, Byelorussia and the Ukraine), all 20 Arab states, another 12 Muslim-majority states (including Turkey), 14 non-Muslim African states, and 14 other states (including Brazil, India, Mexico and Portugal).

Those opposing included 5 African states (one of them Moslem), most of Latin-America and practically the entire English speaking world.

By 1991 this international situation had been reversed following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the American-led victory over Iraq in the Gulf War and the return of the United States to global political and economic dominance.

On December 16, 1991, the General Assembly passed Resolution 4686, repealing resolution 3379, by a vote of 111 to 25, with 13 abstentions and 17 delegations absent. Thirteen out of the 19 Arab countries, including those engaged in negotiations with Israel, voted against the repeal, another six were absent. No Arab country voted for repeal. The PLO denounced the vote. All the ex-Communist countries and most of the African countries who had supported Resolution 3379 voted to repeal it. Only three non-Muslim countries voted against the resolution: Cuba, North Korea and Vietnam. The rest abstained (including Turkey) or absented themselves.

International anti-Zionism, like domestic anti-Zionism in many countries, rises and falls in parallel with events in the Middle East, and the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 saw some revival of anti-Zionism in some countries; however, it is also possible that it was not until this time that media attention focused on the phenomenon.

See also

Works related to Zionism at Wikisource

• Post-Zionism - Neo-Zionism
• Anti-globalization and antisemitism
• Israel and the apartheid analogy
• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Israel

References

1. Webster's 11th Collegiate Dictionary, ("Zionism,"), "An international movement originally for the establishment of a Jewish national or religious community in Palestine and later for the support of modern Israel."
2. ^ Bauer, Yehuda (January 11, 2005). "Yehuda Bauer: Anti-Semitism" (RealMedia) (Interview). Interviewed by Michael Krasny. Retrieved 2007-05-30. {{cite interview}}: Unknown parameter |callsign= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |city= ignored (|location= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |program= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |subjectlink= ignored (|subject-link= suggested) (help)
3. ^ Laqueur, Walter (2006). "Golda Meir and the Post-Zionists". Dying for Jerusalem: the past, present and future of the holiest city. Naperville, Illinois: Sourcebooks, Inc. pp. pg. 55. ISBN 9781402206320. OCLC 61704687. LCCN 20-5 – 0. ...behind the cover of "anti-Zionism" lurks a variety of motives that ought to be called by their true name. When, in the 1950s under Stalin, the Jews of the Soviet Union came under severe attack and scores were executed, it was under the banner of anti-Zionism rather than anti-Semitism, which had been given a bad name by Adolf Hitler. When in later years the policy of Israeli governments was attacked as racist or colonialist in various parts of the world, the basis of the criticism was quite often the belief that Israel had no right to exist in the first place, not opposition to specific policies of the Israeli government. Traditional anti-Semitism has gone out of fashion in the West except on the extreme right. But something we might call post-anti-Semitism has taken its place. It is less violent in its aims, but still very real. By and large it has not been too difficult to differentiate between genuine and bogus anti-Zionism. The test is twofold. It is almost always clear whether the attacks are directed against a specific policy carried out by an Israeli government (for instance, as an occupying power) or against the existence of Israel. Secondly, there is the test of selectivity. If from all the evils besetting the world, the misdeeds, real or imaginary, of Zionism are singled out and given constant and relentless publicity, it can be taken for granted that the true motive is not anti-Zionism but something different and more sweeping. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
4. ^ Wistrich, Robert S. (2004). "Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism". Jewish Political Studies Review. 16 (3–4). Retrieved 2007-02-26. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
   Nevertheless, I believe that the more radical forms of anti-Zionism that have emerged with renewed force in recent years do display unmistakable analogies to European anti-Semitism immediately preceding the Holocaust....For example, "anti-Zionists" who insist on comparing Zionism and the Jews with Hitler and the Third Reich appear unmistakably to be de facto anti-Semites, even if they vehemently deny the fact! This is largely because they knowingly exploit the reality that Nazism in the postwar world has become the defining metaphor of absolute evil. For if Zionists are "Nazis" and if Sharon really is Hitler, then it becomes a moral obligation to wage war against Israel. That is the bottom line of much contemporary anti-Zionism. In practice, this has become the most potent form of contemporary anti-Semitism....Anti-Zionism is not only the historic heir of earlier forms of anti-Semitism. Today, it is also the lowest common denominator and the bridge between the Left, the Right, and the militant Muslims; between the elites (including the media) and the masses; between the churches and the mosques; between an increasingly anti-American Europe and an endemically anti-Western Arab-Muslim Middle East; a point of convergence between conservatives and radicals and a connecting link between fathers and sons.
5. ^ "Working Definition of Antisemitism" (PDF). EUMC. 2005. Retrieved 2007-02-26. Examples of the ways in which anti-Semitism manifests itself with regard to the State of Israel taking into account the overall context could include:
   • Denying the Jewish people right to self-determination, e.g. by claiming that the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavor.
   • Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.
   • Using the symbols and images associated with classic anti-Semitism (e.g. claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.
   • Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.
   • Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the State of Israel.
   However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as anti-Semitic. {{cite web}}: line feed character in |quote= at position 151 (help)
6. ^ Said, Edward (2000). "America's Last Taboo". New Left Review. 6: 45–53. Retrieved 2007-02-26. {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |quotes= (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help) “For a totalitarian Zionism, any criticism of Israel is proof of the rankest anti-semitism. If you do not refrain, you will be hounded as an anti-semite requiring the severest opprobrium. In the Orwellian logic of American Zionism, it is impermissible to speak of Jewish violence or Jewish terror when it comes to Israel, even though everything done by Israel is done in the name of the Jewish people, by and for a Jewish state.”
7. ^ Zipperstein, Steven J. (2005). "Historical Reflections on Contemporary Antisemitism". In Derek J. Penslar, Michael R. Marrus, and Janice Gross Stein, eds. (ed.). Contemporary antisemitism: Canada and the world. Toronto, Ontario: University of Toronto Press. pp. 60–61. ISBN 978-0802039316. OCLC 56531591. LCCN 20-5. Speaking, however, in terms of the preoccupations of intellectuals in the West, it seems that responses to Jews and the Jewish state are not fundamentally the byproduct of antisemitism. They are, above all, a by-product of the wildly disproportionate responses that mark the post-September 11 world. Disproportionate reaction seems increasingly the norm, especially in regards to antipathy for the United States, antipathy that has meshed, it seems to me, with an outsized antagonism for its smallest but singularly visible Middle East ally, Israel. Distinguishing such reaction from antisemitism without denying that the two coincide is not meant to dismiss the significance of such attitudes, which remain troubling, but in ways different from how they have been widely understood....What Raab means by anti-Israelism is the increasing role that a concerted, vigorous, prejudice against Israel — and he does see such sentiments as born of prejudice — has played in much of the political left, visibly in the antiglobalist campaign, but where there is no discernible hatred of Jews. Often, in this context, belief in Israel's mendacity is shaped, above all, by simple, crude, linear notions of the causal relationship between politics, oppression, and liberation, by transparent beliefs in a world with clear-cut oppressors and oppressed — in other words, by a much distorted, simplistic, but this-worldly political analysis devoid of anti-Jewish bias. Such prejudice against Israel is not antisemitism, although undoubtedly the two can and at times do coexist. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); |editor= has generic name (help); |format= requires |url= (help); External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)
8. ^ Feiler, Dror (October 13, 2005). "Letter sent to the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia concerning the Working Definition of Antisemitism". European Jews for a Just Peace. Retrieved 2007-02-26.
   
   • "Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination" assumes that all Jews equate self determination with Zionism. Not only is this not true today, it has never been true. There is a long and respected tradition in Jewish history and culture among all those who have wished or wish today for cultural, religious or other forms of autonomy falling short of a Jewish state; for a binational state in Palestine as did Martin Buber and others; or for a one-state solution today, whatever form it might take – a minority view in Israel today to be sure, but held by numbers of respected Jews. To make the assumption that all Jews hold the same views is in itself a form of antisemitism.
   • "Applying double standards by requiring of it a behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation." This is a formulation that allows any criticism of Israel to be dismissed on the grounds that it is not simultaneously applied to every other defaulting state at the same time. As campaigners for a just peace in the Middle East we can affirm that it is thrown willy-nilly to stifle any and all but the narrowest criticism of acts of the Israeli government that are in prima facie breach of clause after clause of the 4th Geneva Convention. Or again, the democratic norm that all citizens in a state should be treated equally sometimes sits uneasily with some notions of Israel as a 'Jewish state' and it is not antisemitic to point this out or to suggest that Israel should, indeed, be a 'state of all its citizens'.
   • "Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel." This is the flipside of a position, frequently expressed by Prime Minister Sharon and many Zionists, that refuses to make any distinction between the interests of Israel and those of Jews worldwide. Why it is permissible for them to make this elision but evidence of antisemitism when others do so is not clear. It might even be taken as evidence of double standards... In reality it is all too often Zionist rhetoric which fuses the notion of Israel's interests with those of Jews worldwide and thus fuels what the EUMC identifies (other things being equal) as a potential indicator of antisemitism.
   This is not to deny that there are circumstances in which criticisms of the state of Israel might indeed be antisemitic. But the presumption should not be that they are. This requires demonstration on a case by case basis. {{cite web}}: line feed character in |quote= at position 7 (help)
9. For a discussion of this see Friedman in http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9406EFDE163DF935A25753C1A9649C8B63
10. For early examples of anti-Zionist writings see Avraham Baruch Steinberg, Sefer Da'at ha-Rabbanim (Warsaw, 1902) and Shlomo Zalman Landau and Yosef Rabinowitz, Sefer Or LiYesharim (Warsaw, 1900), cited in Gurock, Jeffrey S. (1996). American Jewish Orthodoxy in Historical Perspective. KTAV Publishing House, Inc. ISBN 0-88125-567-X, p. 404.
11. {cite book | last =Vital | first =David | title =The Origins of Zionism | publisher =Oxford University Press | date =1975 | location =Oxford | pages =335-6 | isbn =0-19-827439-4})
12. The Times, Saturday, May 14, 1921, p. 6; Issue 42720, col C; 'In Palestine To-Day. IV-Water-Power From Jordan, Employment For All', The Times, Wednesday, May 18, 1921, p. 7, Issue 42723, col A; 'Psychology Of Zionism. Dr. Myers On Religion And Nationality', The Times, Tuesday, April 25, 1922, p. 11, Issue 43014, col D; 'Readjustment In Palestine. A New Outlook., Fruits Of The Arab Agitation', The Times, Monday, December 24, 1923, p. 9; Issue 43532, col A.
13. The Washington Post, September 4, 2007, Denis MacShane, The New Anti-Semitism
14. Taguieff, Pierre-André. Rising From the Muck: The New Anti-Semitism in Europe. Ivan R. Dee, 2004.
15. Klug, Brian. The Myth of the New Anti-Semitism. The Nation, posted January 15, 2004 (February 2, 2004 issue), accessed January 9, 2006; and Lerner, Michael. There Is No New Anti-Semitism, posted February 5, 2007, accessed February 6, 2007.
16. Dina Porat, Defining Anti-Semitism, http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2003-4/porat.htm#_edn23 accessed 15/11/2008 See also Emanuele Ottolenghi http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/nov/29/comment
17. Wistrich, Robert S. (2004). "Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism". Jewish Political Studies Review. 16 (3–4). Retrieved 2007-02-26. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
    
18. Klug, Brian. The Myth of the New Anti-Semitism. The Nation, posted January 15, 2004 (February 2, 2004 issue), accessed January 9, 2006; and Lerner, Michael. There Is No New Anti-Semitism, posted February 5, 2007, accessed February 6, 2007.
19. ] Rachael Gelfman, Religious Zionists believe that the Jewish return to Israel hastens the Messiah
20. ] Ehud Bandel - President, the Masorti Movement, Zionism
21. http://ccarnet.org/Articles/index.cfm?id=42&pge_prg_id=4687&pge_id=1656
22. Walter Laqueur, A History of Zionism (Schocken Books, New York 1978, ISBN 0805205230), pp385-6.
23. Walter Laqueur, A History of Zionism (Schocken Books, New York 1978, ISBN 0805205230), p399.
24. American Jewish Year Book Vol. 45 (1943-1944) Pro-Palestine and Zionist Activities, pp 206-214
25. American Jewish Year Book Vol. 45 (1943-1944), Pro-Palestine and Zionist Activities, pp 206-214
26. Peck, James (ed.) (1987). Chomsky Reader. ISBN 0-394-75173-6. p.7

    "what was then called 'Zionist'....are now called 'anti-Zionist' (concerns and views)."

27. Peck, James (ed.) (1987). Chomsky Reader. ISBN 0-394-75173-6. p.7

    "I was interested in socialist, binationalist options for Palestine, and in the kibbutzim and the whole cooperative labor system that had developed in the Jewish settlement there (the Yishuv)...The vague ideas I had at the time were to go to Palestine, perhaps to a kibbutz, to try to become involved in efforts at Arab-Jewish cooperation within a socialist framework, opposed to the deeply antidemocratic concept of a Jewish state."

28. Alvin H. Rosenfeld. 'Progressive' Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism. American Jewish Committee. 2006.
29. Patricia Cohen. Essay Linking Liberal Jews and Anti-Semitism Sparks a Furor. New York Times. January 31, 2007. Accessed March 19 2007.
30. Shaul Magid, “In Search of a Critical Voice in the Jewish Diaspora: Homelessness and Home in Edward Said and Shalom Noah Barzofsky’s Netivot Shalom,” Jewish Social Studies: History, Culture, Society n.s. 12, no. 3 (Spring/Summer 2006), p.196
31. Jews Against Zionism website Retrieved on 2008-06-04.
32. Neturei Karta International, Jews United Against Zionism website Retrieved on 2008-06-04.
33. In a state over Israel by Simon Rocker (The Guardian) November 25, 2002
34. An Analysis of the Camp David Peace Process
35. Benny Morris Interview in Ha'aretz (Part 2)
36. Poll of Arab-Israelis
37. Neusner, Jacob (1999). Comparing Religions Through Law: Judaism and Islam. Routledge. ISBN 0415194873. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help) p. 201
38. Merkley, Paul Charles (2001). Christian Attitudes Towards the State of Israel. McGill-Queen's Press. ISBN 0773521887. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help) p.122
39. Akbarzadeh, Shahram (2005). Islam And the West: Reflections from Australia. UNSW Press. ISBN 0868406791. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help) p. 4
40. Lewis, Bernard (1984). The Jews of Islam. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-00807-8 pp.10,20
41. Matthias Küntzel, Islamism, Antisemitism, and the political left
42. Antisemitism in Post World War II Hungary - violence, riots; Communist Party policy | Judaism | Find Articles at BNET.com
43. OZET lottery posters and tickets featured in Swarthmore College's online exhibition "Stalin's Forgotten Zion: Birobidzhan and the Making of a Soviet Jewish Homeland."
44. Template:Ru icon Сионизм, Большая советская энциклопедия (Zionism. Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition. 1969-1978)
45. A History of the Jews by Paul Johnson, London, 1987, p.527
46. UN Debate Regarding the Special Committee on Palestine: Gromyko Statement. 14 May 1947 77th Plenary Meeting Document A/2/PV.77
47. Gandhi, The Jews And Palestine Compiled by E. S. Reddy. A Collection of Articles, Speeches, Letters and Interviews explaining Gandhi's opposition to Zionism.
48. McCullough, Truman,
49. "The Socialism of Fools: The Left, the Jews and Israel" by Seymour Martin Lipset; in Encounter magazine, December 1969
50. Eric J. Sundland, Strangers in the Land: Blacks, Jews, Post-Holocaust America, Harvard University Press, 2005; p. 109
51. CAMERA: CAMERA ALERT: Letter by Martin Luther King a Hoax

v t e Zionism
Concepts	Zion Land of Israel Aliyah Yerida Homeland (proposals) Jewish state Law of Return Yishuv Territorialism Promised Land Gathering of Israel Settlement Negation of the Diaspora Revival of the Hebrew language Hebraization of surnames Judaization Zionism, race and genetics
Ideologies	General Labor Revisionist Reform Religious Cultural Federal Post-Zionism Proto-Zionism Neo-Zionism Non-Zionism Green Christian Canaanism Yiddishist Golus
Organizations	Histadrut Hovevei Zion Bilu World Zionist Organization Zionist General Council Zionist Federation of Germany Zionist Organization of America Zionist Organization of Canada Religious Zionists of America Jewish National Fund Poale Zion Jewish Agency for Israel Jewish National Council Mizrachi Bnei Akiva Habonim Dror Hashomer Hatzair Haganah HaNoar HaTzioni World Agudath Israel Irgun Betar Lehi Jewish Party (Czechoslovakia) Jewish Party (Romania) Jewish Resistance Movement Palmach Women's International Zionist Organization Hadassah Women's Zionist Organization of America Aytzim American Zionist Movement Am Yisrael Foundation Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland Institute for Zionist Strategies International Fellowship of Christians and Jews Nefesh B'Nefesh Birthright Israel
History and timelines	History of Israel Chronology of Aliyah History of Zionism Balfour Declaration UN General Assembly Resolution 3379 UN General Assembly Resolution 46/86 Timeline of Zionism Israeli–Palestinian peace process Timeline of the Arab–Israeli conflict
Holidays	Yom HaZikaron Independence Day Jerusalem Day Yom HaAliyah Herzl Day Jabotinsky Day Ben-Gurion Day Rabin Day
Related topics	List of Zionists Anti-Zionism The Holocaust Antisemitism New antisemitism Not one inch Jewish Autonomism Jewish emancipation Jewish political movements Greater Israel Muscular Judaism Muslim supporters of Israel Progressive except Palestine Zionism as settler colonialism Zionist antisemitism Zionist political violence Zio (pejorative) Ulpan Conservatism in Israel Liberalism in Israel

• Misplaced Pages neutral point of view disputes from December 2007
• Anti-Zionism
• Arab-Israeli conflict
• Zionism
• Israeli-Palestinian conflict
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