The views and opinions expressed in this essay are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other entity or organization.
“Anti-Zionism is not Anti-Semitism.” If you don’t know much about Jews and Israel, that sounds like a harmless statement, right? Zionism is, like, “Israel-adjacent stuff,” right? So if you disagree with Israeli government policy, that’s anti-Zionist but not anti-semitic. What’s the big deal?
Zionism is the belief that the Jewish people, as a distinct ethnic group, deserve a state of their own—much like how Italians have Italy or the Japanese have Japan. Anti-Zionism is the belief that the Jewish ethnic group should not have a state. If you are anti-Zionist, then you believe that Jews should be condemned to living as a permanent minority in other nations.
I am going to save exploring what does and does not constitute anti-Zionism for the end of this essay. There are many obvious anti-Zionists out there, like Hamas and Iran, who outright state that Israel should be destroyed by force, but most anti-Zionism is not that blatant. Before we can have that nuanced conversation, we need to agree on a shared set of facts.
In this essay, I hope to establish four key points:
Especially if you live in the United States, you might have a friend who identifies as Jewish, but who is not religious. Much like the word “orange” can refer to a fruit or a color, the word “Jew” can refer to either of two things: a member of the Jewish ethnic group or a practitioner of Judaism. The second category is almost entirely a subset of the first, but not the other way around.
But wait! Why is Judaism an ethnoreligious group, but not the other Abrahamic religions like Christianity and Islam?
Historically, Judaism had a very high rate of intra-marriage and a very low rate of conversion. Proselytizing is not a major tenet of the Jewish religion. As such, most Jews in the world today are direct descendents of the Jews that lived in Judea and Samaria (modern-day Israel) over 2000 years ago.
In fact, early Judaism (the religion) was not really a religion as we understand it today, but more a set of laws and guiding principles that helped organize the lives of the residents of Judea. When Jews (the ethnic group) were kicked out of ancient Israel by the Babyloneans and then the Romans, Judaism (the religion) was what they packed into the suitcase to take their identity with them. At the end of every Passover Seder, Jews say “next year, in Jerusalem.” This is not a recent phenomenon, but a consistent part of Jewish tradition that continued for more than a millennium during the diaspora.
This understanding of Jews as an ethnic group is supported by genomics. There are certain genetic diseases with an unusually high incidence rate in Jews, such as Tay-Sachs Disease, because of the relatively low genetic diversity of the population. There are also common last names, like Cohen or Levy, which explicitly tie their bearers to roles or tribes of ancient Israel.
Within the Jewish ethnicity, there are subgroups. While most Jews on earth are descendents of the ancient Israelites, they did live in a diaspora for ~1500 years (more in the next section). During this time:
If you live in the United States, most Jews you know are probably Ashkenazi. In fact, 90% of Jews living in the United States are Ashkenazi. However, that is not the case in Israel. In Israel, only 30% of Jews are Ashkenazi. A majority of Israeli Jews (approximately 50%) are either Sephardic or Mizrahi, meaning they lived in the Middle East during the diaspora. The remaining 20% have mixed heritage due to recent intermarriages. To label Israeli Jews as “White Europeans” is to completely mis-understand fundamental demographic realities.
Jews ruled ancient Israel as a sovereign nation for at least 1000 years. After Jews were dispersed by the Romans in 135 CE, Judea and Samaria were primarily states within larger external entities, such as the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, and then the Ottoman Empire.
Living in a diaspora, the fate of Jews was often fraught. While Jews occasionally prospered as minorities in other countries, they were also subject to mass forced expulsions and murders.
It is a bit tricky to say exactly when the Jewish civilization in Ancient Israel started. By 850 BCE, it was firmly under Jewish control. However, these early Jews were likely a subset of the earlier Cannanites who had inhabited the land as early as 2000 BCE.
The modern Jewish diaspora arguably started in 135 CE when the Romans suppressed a Jewish uprising against their rule. As punishment for their uprising, Jews were forced to disperse throughout the Roman empire. As further punishment, Emperor Hadrian renamed the region to “Syria Palaestina” to erase Jewish ties to the land. The name is derived from the Philistines, an ancient enemy of the Israelites.
Jews in Europe dealt with several major massacres and exiles:
Obviously, there was also the Holocaust in the 1940s. It was not an isolated incident, but the culmination of centuries of persecution. Many German Jews thought that they had thoroughly assimilated into German society and would be viewed as Germans first and Jews second. That did not matter: anyone with Jewish ancestry was treated as Jewish, regardless of their German heritage. That pattern would repeat itself elsewhere: even Soviet Jews who were completely secular or who considered their Soviet identity to supersede their Jewish identity were heavily discriminated against.
Until the late 1800s, Jews in Arab countries were treated relatively better than Jews in Europe. Still, they were not equals.
Jews in Arab Countries were granted protected status (dhimmi) in exchange for accepting a lower class of citizenship, with social and legal restrictions. These restrictions included:
A Muslim man could choose to marry a Jewish woman, but a Jewish man could not marry a Muslim woman. This was rooted in the belief that men were the head of household, so a Muslim man could ensure that the children were raised Muslim.
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, ethnic tensions grew and Jews were forced out of Muslim countries. This was particularly complicated by the collapse of the Ottoman Empire following World War I. The power vacuum gave rise to several nationalist movements, including Zionism and Arab nationalism. More on that in the next section!
By the mid-1900s, almost all Jews living in Arab countries were forced from their homes. At their peak, there were 100,000 Jews in Iran, 150,000 in Iraq, 80,000 in Egypt, 30,000 in Syria, 20,000 in Lebanon, 80,000 in Turkey, 55,000 in Yemen, and 250,000 in Morocco. Almost all of these populations have disappeared today.
Especially if you live in the United States, it can be easy to forget that Jews make up only 0.2% of the world’s population. In fact, almost all Jews in the world live in one of two countries: Israel or the United States. In every other country in the world, Jews comprise less than 1% of the population. That makes Jews one of the world’s smallest minorities. Most people in the world have never met a Jew.
After the first world war, a view emerged that if ethnic minorities had their own homelands, it would ease tensions and reduce the likelihood of yet another all-out global conflict. After the second world war, this effort gained steam. This was achieved through a combination of creating new countries, subdividing existing countries, adjusting borders, and occasionally encouraging population exchanges.
At the end of the second world war, there were approximately 100 countries in the world. In just the past 80 years, that count has doubled to approximately 200.
Zionism was just one of many nationalist movements. Around the same time that Israel was being founded (1948), Arab nationalism was also taking root, leading to the formation and independence of Saudi Arabia (1932), Iraq (1932), Lebanon (1943), Jordan (1946), and Syria (1946). Prior to 1922, most of these countries were part of the Ottoman Empire.
In some cases, borders were redrawn and populations relocated. These “population transfers” were awful for those involved, but were believed to be a sacrifice for the greater good of society. Ideally, minority populations that migrated would be absorbed into their new homeland and live a more prosperous life. Examples of these exchanges include:
Seen through this lens, the 1948 proposal to split Israel into a Jewish state and an Arab state was not unusual. At the same time that 750,000 Arabs were displaced in 1948 (some voluntarily and some forcefully), 850,000 Jews were displaced from Arab states (most forcefully). The only difference is that the fledgling Jewish state effectively formed a government and absorbed the refugees, while the Arab states did not.
The phrase “Anti-Zionism is not Anti-Semitism” has its roots in Cold War-era Soviet propaganda. After World War II, the Soviet Union initially supported the establishment of Israel in 1948, viewing it as a potential socialist ally in the Middle East. However, this stance shifted when Israel aligned more closely with Western powers.
The Soviet Union increasingly began to portray Zionism as a form of bourgeois nationalism contrary to communist ideology. This shift was compounded by the broader geopolitical rivalry of the Cold War and the USSR’s desire to support Arab nations against Israel. Soviet propaganda depicted Zionism as an extension of Western imperialism, accusing Israel of being a tool of Western hegemony in the Middle East.
By the late 1960s and 1970s, following Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War (1967), the Soviet Union intensified its anti-Zionist campaign. In 1975, they advanced UN General Assembly Resolution 3379, which declared that “Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination.” Soviet-allied countries voted for the resolution and Western countries voted against it.
The Soviet Union distributed anti-Zionist literature worldwide, often blending traditional anti-semitic tropes with anti-Israel rhetoric. They portrayed Jews as greedy capitalists intent on world domination, a trope that has followed the Jews for hundreds of years. Within the Soviet Union, labeling Jews as “Zionists” implied they were loyal to a foreign power and served as a pretext for repression.
Although Resolution 3379 was formally revoked in 1991 (with all of Israel’s Arab neighbors voting against the revocation), the damage was done. Soviet propaganda succeeded in sparking a strategy that persists to this day, equating Zionism with evil in pithy one-line statements: “Zionism is racism/apartheid/colonialism.” To learn more about how this strategy has evolved, I recommend looking up “The Placard Strategy,” a term coined by Einat Wilf.
In this Soviet-created reality, the phrase “Anti-Zionism is not anti-semitism” was a thin veil of plausible deniability to cover obviously anti-semitic actions. This carefully constructed rhetoric enabled them to persecute Jewish people and promote anti-Jewish sentiment under the guise of political opposition to Zionism. Ultimately, it is a cynical manipulation of language and ideology.
Obviously, not every statement can be neatly classified as Zionist or anti-Zionist. To some extent, it is a matter of intent. Let’s explore this in two examples.
Criticism of the Israeli Government
Criticism of the Israeli government can be made in good faith, even vehemently, without being anti-Zionist or anti-semitic. A well-meaning person can strongly oppose specific Israeli government actions while still deeply caring about the survival and safety of the Jewish state. They do not question Israel’s right to exist, no matter how harsh their criticism.
In contrast, some critics of Israel weaponize anti-Semitic tropes to bolster false claims. Two examples of this are:
Those who intentionally use these tropes are obviously anti-Zionist and anti-semitic. Of course, many critics of Israel are not ill-willed, but simply uninformed. I hope that readers of this essay will recognize if they fall into that category and will be aware of these tropes and careful not to share false information.
Advocacy for a Two-State Solution
A genuine advocate of a two-state solution envisions two sovereign states coexisting peacefully, one of which has a Jewish majority. For such advocates, a two-state solution represents a permanent resolution, with mutual acceptance and no further demands.
In contrast, the Palestine Liberation Organization’s (PLO) “Ten Point Program” outlines a fundamentally different vision. Their version of a two-state solution involves using the non-Jewish state as a base for continued hostility, aiming to erode and ultimately dismantle the Jewish state. Central to this strategy is the PLO’s advocacy for a “right of return,” which demands that millions of descendants of Arabs who left Israel in 1948 (after the Arabs refused the partition plan and five Arab armies attacked the fledgling Jewish state) be granted citizenship in the Jewish state. Unlike any other conflict in the world, the PLO considers refugee status to be inherited, so the “right of return” would apply to families who have long since resettled in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and beyond. Such an influx would demographically overwhelm the Jewish majority, effectively ending Israel’s status as a Jewish state—a goal the PLO has made explicit. This approach reveals intentions that are both anti-Zionist and anti-semitic.
This is another example where the uninformed might unintentionally echo anti-semitic tropes. Positions such as the “right of return” or certain versions of a one-state solution aim to undermine and ultimately erase the Jewish character of the Jewish state. These positions are, by their very nature, inherently anti-Zionist and anti-semitic.
The Intersection of Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism
The overlap between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism becomes apparent in how anti-Zionists conflate Jewish identity with opposition to Israel. Examples of this behavior abound on social media. For instance, Jewish events like Chanukah celebrations in Germany often face protests rooted in anti-Israel sentiment. Such actions reveal an underlying bias not only against Israel but also against Jewish self-determination.
Is it ultimately possible to be anti-Zionist but not anti-semitic? Is it possible to oppose gay marriage without being homophobic? Is it possible to oppose integrated schools without being racist? Is it possible to oppose women’s suffrage without being sexist? Maybe. But probably not. Denying a group the same rights as other equivalent groups is often a sign of prejudice against that group. Throughout history, ethnic groups have attained self-determination through nationalist movements. Zionism is the Jewish version.
I hope this essay provided a better understanding of the historical context of Jewish persecution and the unique vulnerabilities faced by the Jewish people throughout history.
Zionism emerged as a response to centuries of discrimination, displacement, and violence, culminating in the horrors of the Holocaust. For many Jews, the establishment of a Jewish state in their ancestral homeland represents a vital safeguard against future persecution and a guarantee of their collective survival.
Opposing Zionism, therefore, undermines this fundamental security and jeopardizes the well-being of the Jewish people. At its core, anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism.