The Paradox of Zionism: How can one be pro-Jewish state and anti-Jews at the exact same time?

Imagine a country that is Christian, its flag proudly using the symbol of the cross. This country declares itself to be the country of all Christians, an independent Christian state. But then, this country commits genocide. Does this not inevitably mean that genocide is a representation of
Christianity? What does this say about the Christian religion?
Now, let’s take a look at Israel, as I see it.
More than a decade ago, when I became an activist, I realized the beneficial advantages of teaching myself the history and politics of Israel/Palestine. Growing up in a French, Christian household in Israel, I left the Israeli school system to begin attending the American International School from the fourth grade, until I graduated from high school. Looking back, I was lucky enough that this was how my life had shifted, because I wasn’t brainwashed or indoctrinated by the Israeli system, which is shaped by the putative Zionist agenda.

I began my political activism volunteering with refugees. I used to visit the Holot concentration camp every Saturday, and befriended the refugees there. Doing this for almost two years, I was driven to read and educate myself on the politics of the State of Israel, trying to grasp how it came to be that refugees are held under such conditions. And this, of course, led me to better
understand Zionism, its history, mechanisms, goals, and ambitions.
In Israeli schools, no one really teaches the broader aspects of Zionism or its implications, not in the way that I had exposed myself through my self-taught research. For kids growing up in Israel, Zionism is implanted in their minds, no questions asked, starting from the young age of kindergarten, with children attending memorial days throughout the year, to the army prep
activities that overtake their life as teens, and then only further exacerbated in adulthood by the biased media that is so aligned with the Zionist-led Israeli regime. Zionism is a “given” to most Israelis. It is not something they question, or wonder about. It is rare to find a group of vehemently recalcitrant Israelis.

Being the person that I am, it’s impossible for me to just accept what I’m told without delving deeper into things, or checking the facts for myself. So, I continued educating myself on Israel, its history, the concept of a Jewish State, and the Palestinian Nakba. I remember sitting one day at home, reading about Zionism. I realized that the majority of Jewish Israelis hold the notion that they deserve a state, because of what had happened in the
Holocaust. But, as I had learned, Zionism started long before the Holocaust. It began at the end of the 19th century, and rose to power with all the other colonial movements of that time. In fact, Zionism is a typical colonial movement. When Herzl (the founder of Zionism) met Cecil Rhodes
in 1902, he wrote a letter to him, asking that Cecil teach him how to colonize a land:

“You are being invited to help make history,” Herzl wrote him. “[I]t doesn’t involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor; not Englishmen but Jews… How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial… [Y]ou, Mr. Rhodes, are a visionary politician or a practical visionary… I want you to… put the stamp of your authority on the Zionist plan and to make the following declaration to a few people who swear by you: I, Rhodes have examined this plan and found it correct and practicable.”

This indicates that from the very beginning, Herzl was not only creating a racist, anti-Semitic movement called Zionism, he was also making sure that this movement would be colonial to the core. The Jews who came to Palestine in 1881, were mostly driven by the colonialist aspect of Zionism, and left their homes in Europe with one clear aim — to Judaize Palestine. This is one of
the reasons why it is false to relate the existence of the State of Israel only with the Holocaust. Hence, justifying the existence of Israel, an anti-Semitic state, as the answer to the Holocaust, which was an anti-Semitic event of catastrophic proportions, is absurd and dangerous. Here’s why Israel is in fact anti- Semitic:

Zionism is anti-Semitic. And because Israel is built on the foundation of Zionism, Israel is in fact anti-Semitic too. There is no way around it.
Israel defines itself vis-à-vis Zionism as “the land of the Jewish people,” yet Judaism is only a religion, not a national identity or a racial one. This means that Jews cannot be a nation. Zionism has transformed Judaism from a religion into a nationalist movement, and the Jews into a nation, a race. From this perspective, Zionism becomes shockingly aligned with Hitler’s views, who persecuted Jews not for their faith or religion (since most Nazis were atheists) but for them being a race, the Jewish race, with specific traits that come with it, both mental and physical, as is evident in the infamous long-nosed Jew, for example.

Zionism forces all Jews anywhere in the world to be connected with Israel — if you are a Jew, you must inevitably be a Zionist too, and by extension also pro-Israeli. But Judaism is only a religion. And here lies another inevitable point — Israel, as a Jewish state, cannot be democratic, because it is a religious state. And I oppose a Jewish state, just as I oppose Saudi Arabia — a
Muslim state. I would also oppose a Christian state if there were one (the Vatican doesn’t count in this respect). Zionist educational movements, such as Birthright, strengthen the state’s Jewish identity, enforcing the connection of Jews across the globe (mostly from America) to Israel from a young age.

As a colonialist entity that draws its power from the Jewish faith, Zionist Israel has adopted purely religious Jewish symbolism to construct its own identity — its flag use the Star of David (a symbol adopted by Jews in late medieval times), the ancient Hebrew of the Bible has been revived as Israel’s official language (the only place in the world that speaks it), the Menorah
symbol of divine light spreading across the world (as it had once stood in the Holy Temple of Jerusalem) now serves as a powerful Israeli national symbol. This creates an atmosphere where no Jew anywhere in the world can remain impervious to the State of Israel, forcing one to acknowledge their own “foreignness” to the Israeli national identity, should they protest the
colonial Zionist acts, even if they are wholehearted believers in Judaism itself.

This then is the crux of Zionism being anti-Semitic, because it has taken Judaism and applied its religious creed to create an explicit divide within the Jewish people. Zionism determines that there are good Jews — those who accept Israel as an apartheid state, and led by white (Ashkenazi) Jewish supremacy; or bad Jews, also referred to by Zionists as “self hating Jews”,
who abide by human rights and oppose the heinous human rights violations, occupation, and apartheid that are committed by Israel towards the indigenous Palestinian people. In other words, Zionism is anti-Semitic because Jews who do not take upon themselves the definitions of Zionism are outcasts, ostracized not only from the Zionist/Israeli identity,
but also from the Jewish one. This is a purely anti-Semitic approach, a hatred of those who do not conform to the norm set by Zionist ideology. As I have said, in the Zionist eye a good Jew supports apartheid and genocide, a bad Jew supports human rights. By creating this division, and declaring Israel as the emblem of Judaism, a state that represents all Jews, Zionism
creates the precarious notion that genocide and apartheid are an inherent part of the Jewish religion.

And, behold, Israel has in fact already exposed its downright fascist policies, and even exhibits some Nazi characteristics — Holot is one example, since it was not only a detention camp for refugees held under lugubrious conditions, but also a concentration camp into which the refugees were placed to keep them away from and outside of Israeli society. Some of these refugees were forced by the Israeli government to return to their genocidal homelands, which meant that they would be sentenced to their death. And Gaza is a Ghetto besieged by the militant, Zionist IDF, all in the name of Judaism, cynically used to gain power and justification, transforming this ancient religion into a nationalist, racist movement in the hands of Zionism.

Zionism obfuscates and whitewashes human rights violations, committed against anyone who opposes its racist power, from refugees and asylum seekers, to the indigenous Palestinians who are brutally silenced. The BDS, a Palestinian civil society movement, has tried to fight Zionism non-violently by calling for a boycott from outside, realizing the scope of blinding indoctrination that has swept across all Israelis. Zionism is so ubiquitous in Israeli society, for most Israelis it is a given, a basic fact of their life and being, which they don’t question or even consider if its actions are at all justifiable.
But it does not stop there, Zionism also uses culture for its cause, painting an image that insinuates an ostensibly forward-thinking Israeli society, open to all, multicultural, promoting intellectualism through theater, art, etc. But in reality, Israel is quite the opposite. It explicitly uses art and culture to whitewash its human rights violations, and the regime oppresses
Palestinian artists, as in the case of Dareen Tatour who was incarcerated for a poem she wrote, and Tamer Nafar, whose concerts were banned by Culture Minister Miri Regev, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. As for embracing diversity, the country forbids gay marriage (the whitewashing of the LGBTQ community is called “pinkwashing”) and oppresses Palestinians
LGBTQs. Israel threatens Palestinian queers to be outed if they do not cooperate with the regime, and Israel violently uses art to whitewash the occupation, genocide, and apartheid regime.

All this has created an atmosphere where it is possible for people to love Israel, which is the Jewish state, but at the same time — hate Jews. It’s a strange situation, where people can be both “pro-Jewish state” and “anti-Jews” at once. Both anti-Semites and the state of Israel are united in their hatred of Arabs and Muslims. They believe that Israel is fighting Islam, hence
they are joining them in this militant effort targeting Islam, which they so whole heartedly fear and hate.

The Zionist rhetoric has changed the definition of anti-Semitism, from discriminating against Jews, as it had done for ages, to bashing Israel. It’s the new anti-Semitism, which means anti-Israel. Zionism has equated support for Israel with support for Jews, and opposition to Israel with opposition to Jews. The world today is conflating Jews and Israel, as if they are
interchangeable. This in itself is anti-Semitic to the core, since it actually stems from the belief that all Jews are and should be inherently loyal to Israel. This is Zionism at work for decades, reaping its effort to justify colonialism by tying its cause to Judaism and Israel, now further
perpetrated by Israeli politicians. There is real danger in this redefinition of anti-Semitism, because it brands boycotters as anti-Semitic, instead of the new wave of fascist extremists currently gaining momentum.

Zionism has made the ancient Jewish faith system synonymous
with nationalist Israel, the Jewish State, with its Star-of-David flag that legitimizes the atrocities it is committing against the indigenous people of the land, the Palestinians.

The only way for the Jews to separate themselves from the anti-Semitic Zionism, i.e. Israel, and to end the oppression of Palestinians, is to demolish Zionism by creating one democratic state for all the people of the land.