Antisemitism Is Not Anti-Zionism

Understanding Judaism, Jewish identity, and Zionism—why they are not the same, and how antisemitism is being weaponized to erase the difference.

Jun 20, 2025

What Is Judaism?

Judaism is not a state. It is not an army. It is not a nation defined by borders.

Judaism is an ancient monotheistic religion rooted in ethics, memory, and the pursuit of justice. Over centuries, it also developed into a broader diasporic civilization—preserving not only religious practices, but a deep reservoir of legal, philosophical, artistic, and communal life. It has expressed itself across centuries and continents—from ancient Hebrew to the rich spiritual, legal, and poetic traditions that flourished in many lands.

Judaism survived not by conquest, but by continuity—through books, not borders; through questions, not kings. The Talmud teaches: “Whoever saves one life, it is as if they have saved the entire world.” (Sanhedrin 37a)

The Torah commands: “Justice, justice shall you pursue” (Deuteronomy 16:20). Not conquest. Not silence. Justice.

Jewish thought across centuries affirms life, ethical conduct, and the responsibility to heal the world—Tikkun Olam.

Judaism has always contained contradictions and diversity. Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Sephardi, Ethiopian. Reform, Orthodox, secular, feminist, queer. Judaism flourishes not by forcing one view, but by arguing across a thousand.

And through it all, it has never required a state.

What Does It Mean To Be Jewish?

Being Jewish means belonging to a people whose identity has been shaped across centuries, not by kings or armies, but by memory, meaning, and resilience.

It means lighting Shabbat candles in exile. Whispering prayers passed down through persecution. Singing songs in Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. Holding memory and imagination together.

It means surviving pogroms, exile, and genocide—and still dancing at weddings where grandparents once fled. It means wrestling with God, and still returning to prayer. It means mourning the past while dreaming of a world healed by justice.

Being Jewish is layered. It’s religious and secular, mystical and rational, old and ever-renewing. It lives in kitchens and libraries, in poetry and protest. It speaks in the voices of Spinoza and Emma Lazarus, of Abraham Joshua Heschel and Judith Butler.

Emma Lazarus, whose words are inscribed on the Statue of Liberty, was a Jewish poet who wrote:

“Until we are all free, we are none of us free.”

Abraham Joshua Heschel, marching beside Dr. King at Selma, said:

"When I marched in Selma, my feet were praying."

To be Jewish is to carry the stories of ancestors who refused to give up their songs, even in exile. It’s to ask questions that outlive empires. To be both rooted and wandering. To plant trees where trees were once torn down.

It’s to honor the dead by refusing to abandon the living.

Jewishness is not nationalism. It is not—and has never been—defined by Zionism.

What Is Zionism?

Zionism is a modern political ideology born in 19th-century Europe. It was a response to European antisemitism, and its core belief was this: Jews can only be safe if they have a state of their own.

That state was created in 1948. It provided refuge for many Jews, but it came at a catastrophic cost: over 700,000 Palestinians were displaced, their villages destroyed, and their homes were emptied.

Zionism is not Judaism. Judaism is ancient, diverse, and moral.

Zionism is a nationalist project built on territory and military power.

Not all Jews are Zionists. Many never were. Many never will be.

What Is Antisemitism?

Antisemitism is the hatred or targeting of Jewish people because they are Jewish. It includes:

Attacks on synagogues
Desecration of graves
Stereotypes about Jewish power or wealth
Conspiracies blaming Jews for world events
Violence or threats toward Jews as a group

That’s antisemitism.

Criticizing Israel? That’s not antisemitism. Condemning apartheid? Not antisemitism. Supporting Palestinian freedom? Not antisemitism. Saying Zionism is not Judaism? Also, not antisemitism.

More than 200 scholars said so in the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism:

“Criticism of Israel as a state, or Zionism as a political ideology, is not in and of itself antisemitic.”

Why This Distinction Matters

When we conflate Zionism with Judaism, we:

Erase the Jews who oppose Zionism
Protect state violence from criticism
Make it harder to fight actual antisemitism
Weaponize identity to silence dissent

There have always been Jewish voices against Zionism:

Orthodox groups like Neturei Karta, who believe Jews are not meant to have a state until the messiah comes
Reform rabbis who declared in 1885 that Jews are a religious community, not a nation
Holocaust survivors who say: “Never again for anyone”
Jewish anti-Zionist movements across generations, continents, and traditions

Judaism builds memory. Zionism builds walls around borders, around memory, around dissent.

The Prime Minister’s Inheritance

To understand how Zionism became what it is today, look at the lineage of Israel's most powerful family.

Nathan Mileikowsky, Benjamin Netanyahu's grandfather, was an early Zionist rabbi and writer. He preached a hardline vision of Jewish nationalism that saw Palestine not as a place to share, but to conquer, based on biblical entitlement.

His son, Benzion Netanyahu, was secretary to Ze’ev Jabotinsky, the founder of Revisionist Zionism—a militant strain that rejected coexistence and demanded Jewish supremacy in Palestine. That movement rejected compromise and called for Jewish power through force. In 1923, Jabotinsky wrote " The Iron Wall" calling on Jews to build military dominance so strong it would break Arab resistance:

“Zionist colonization must either stop, or else proceed regardless of the native population… behind an iron wall which the native population cannot breach.”

Benzion believed Arabs were inherently hostile and could never be partners in peace. In a 2009 interview, he said:

“The tendency to conflict is in the essence of the Arab. He is not able to compromise, he is not able to reach an agreement. It is not a question of psychology. It is rooted in the very depth of his personality.”

And even more disturbing:

“Compromise is not realistic. It weakens our positions and brings us to a state of limpness, of false beliefs, of illusions. Every illusion is weakening.”
“That they won’t be able to face [anymore] war with us, which will include withholding food from Arab cities, preventing education, terminating electrical power and more. They won’t be able to exist, and they will run away from here.”

This wasn’t just ideology. It was policy.

Benjamin Netanyahu, Benzion’s son, took that legacy and turned it into a strategy:

Expansion of illegal settlements
The Nation-State Law defines Israel as a Jewish-only state
Decades of opposition to Palestinian sovereignty
Alignment with ultra-nationalist and far-right factions
Labeling Jewish critics as traitors or “self-hating Jews”

This is not Judaism. This is not what being Jewish means. This is Zionism—as power, as dominance, as violence.

When Antisemitism Is Weaponized to Suppress Justice

Antisemitism is real. It’s dangerous. And it must be fought.

But what happens when it’s manipulated to serve political power?

In recent years, we’ve seen a dangerous trend: the deliberate misuse of antisemitism to shut down protest, silence dissent, and criminalize solidarity.

On university campuses, students demanding Palestinian human rights are smeared as antisemites, their organizations defunded, their speech monitored.
In Congress, lawmakers who criticize Israeli policies are accused of hating Jews—even when they speak in defense of human rights.
At the international level, movements like BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) are labeled antisemitic simply for using nonviolent pressure against a state.

This isn’t about protecting Jewish people. It’s about protecting political power.

As Peter Beinart writes:

“If we say that opposing Jewish ethno-nationalism is antisemitic, then we turn Judaism into a shield for domination.”

Judith Butler reminds us:

“Antisemitism must be named and opposed. But we lose our way when we use it to suppress criticism of injustice.”

Butler, like many Jewish thinkers, makes clear: confronting antisemitism and confronting injustice are not opposites—they are intertwined.

Even Hannah Arendt—writing after surviving the Holocaust—warned of Zionism's transformation into an ideology of separation and domination, rather than coexistence and justice.

Antisemitism is real. It is dangerous. And it deserves to be fought.

But fighting antisemitism does not mean defending occupation. It does not mean silencing the oppressed. And it definitely does not mean criminalizing solidarity.

One More Time, For the People in the Back

Judaism is not a military project. Judaism is not a nation-state. Judaism is not Zionism.

Being Jewish does not mean defending a government. Fighting for Palestinian rights is not antisemitic. Real safety means justice for everyone.

To stand with Jewish values is to stand against injustice. To remember Jewish history is to refuse to repeat it, against anyone.

Zionism builds a wall. Judaism builds a world.

Not Saints Not Saviors

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