You need not be Jewish to be a Zionist

I am a Zionist, which means that I support Israel as the independent, ancestral, legally-recognized home of the Jewish people.

This is no more remarkable than me supporting France as the home for the French people, and Botswana as the home for the Botswana people. Jews are Israel’s indigenous people. This was recognized by both the League of Nations and the United Nations.

“Zionism” means supporting a national homeland for the Jewish people. Period. That’s all it means, and anyone who tells you differently is lying to you for their own purposes, which are probably anti-Jewish. 

Not all Jews are Zionists, and not all Zionists are Jews.  Some few Jews are not Zionists, while millions of Christians are Zionists, at least in part because the Bible affirms Israel’s existence. Many Christians know Israel is the only Mideast nation where Christians are completely safe.

In recent weeks, Jewish houses of worship are not safe. The attack on the large Michigan congregation on Thursday was the fourth in the last two weeks in the U.S. and Canada. It is likely the attacks are connected to the U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran. Jews and Israel are blamed by some for the war on Iran.

On the internet are stark accusations that the war was actually ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, as if President Donald J. Trump would take orders from anyone else. Before Israel allows its military to do something big, it gets a green light from the U.S. It won’t run a red light flashed by its most important ally and friend.

Sometimes tangled in the attacks on Israel are questions of its legitimacy, for its right to exist where it is.

History affirms there was an independent Jewish state in the Mideast 1,000 years before Christianity. 

I acknowledge Israel as a “Jewish state,” in the same way I acknowledge Vatican City as a “Catholic state,” and Iran as an “Islamic republic.” 

Those choices generally reflect the will of the governed, although the only true democracy of the three is Israel, which accepts people of all religions as citizens, and also extends equal treatment to women and gays, something not true of the other two.

There are 120 Christian-majority countries; 53 Muslim-majority countries; seven Buddhist-majority countries; India and Nepal are Hindu majority. 

The word “Zionism” gets bandied around a lot, especially by those either ignorant of its meaning, or who are hostile to Jews and Israel. 

Zionism does not mean white supremacy, nor does it mean nonJews are excluded. One-fifth of Israeli citizens are Arab Muslims, most of whom have lived there for generations.

Throughout Israel, mosques and churches coexist next to synagogues. The headquarters of the Baha’i faith, which developed in Iran, settled in Israel for its safety. Nor is Israel an outpost of white colonialism, as ill-informed critics say.

Twice in recent history Israel has rescued black Jews from Ethiopia and brought them to Israel. No white supremacy country would do that.

The airlifts were said to be the first time in history that Africans were taken from the continent and delivered to freedom: Operation Moses in 1984 and Operation Solomon in 1991 brought more than 20,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel, which is the only Mideast nation in which numbers of Christians are increasing, even if at a lower rate than Jews and Muslims, which enjoy a higher birth rate.

While people are entitled to oppose the policies of Israel‘s government (as many Israelis do) without automatically being anti-Semitic, people who oppose the principle of a Jewish state are, without question, anti-Jewish, applying a standard to Israel they apply to no one else.

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We are living through a rising tide of anti-Semitism, probably the worst since World War II. 

Although Jews are 2.4% of the U.S. population, according to the FBI they are victims of almost 70% of religious-based hate crimes. 

That is quite astonishing.

On the putrid fringes of the Far Right, you have khaki-clad wannabe storm troopers marching to the tune of the replacement theory conspiracy, which started in Europe. It  holds that white people are purposely being replaced by nonwhite people. 

In some snake-filled swamps of the Internet, despite their tiny numbers, Jews are singled out as prime promoters of the policy.

Anti-Semites manage to believe in contradictory myths — that Jews are the energy spreading world communism, while at the same time controlling Wall Street, the fountainhead of capitalism.

As prostitution is called the world’s oldest profession, anti-Semitism is called the world’s most enduring hate.

Where does it come feom?

More than one cause, but sitting on center stage is the church.

For almost 2,000 years, the Catholic Church held Jews guilty of deicide — killing God in the form of Jesus Christ. That lasted until the ‘60s, and Pope Paul VI. 

From Wikipedia: “In the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), the Catholic Church under Pope Paul VI issued the declaration Nostra aetate that repudiated the idea of a collective, multigenerational Jewish guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus. It declared that the accusation could not be made ‘against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today.’”

But centuries of harm had already been done.

Some religious leaders had engaged in “teaching contempt” for centuries. Others did worse.

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Often seen as alien “outsiders,” Jews were easy to scapegoat, and were barred from many professions, or owning land. They were often pushed into the role of money lenders — crucial, yet despised.

Being forced into finance and trade led to persistent false stereotypes that Jews were wealthy, greedy, with undue control of the economy. 

The scapegoating took the form of being blamed for the black plague, poisoning wells, even sacrificing Christian children. 

Other elaborate conspiracy theories arose, accusing Jews of manipulating world events, governments and institutions. The Nazis mastered this. 

In the 19th and 20th centuries, anti-Semitism morphed from being primarily religious to racial. Claims were made that Jews were a distinct, and inferior, biological race with inherited dangerous characteristics.

In the later 20th century, there was a further evolution, with the reemergence of Israel, as a Jewish state.

This bigotry usually manifests itself as hostility to the Jewish state, and holding all Jews responsible for the actions of the Israeli government. 

There is a wide-spread belief that Jews cheat, or use an invisible network to forward their own cause.

If they did not cheat, how else to explain how an infinitesimal minority could have produced so much science, literature, medicine, and philosophy, not to mention comedians, playwrights, actors, directors, journalists, and entertainers ranging from Al Jolson to Barbra Streisand to Barry Manilow to Hedy Lemarr to  Zac Efron to Scarlett Johansson?

You like that polio has been vanquished? Thank a Jew, Jonas Salk.

You like “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas”? Thank a Jew, Irving Berlin.

You like the Theory of Relativity? Thank a Jew, Albert Einstein.

You like the ball point pen? Thank a Jew, Caszlo Biro.

You like American freedom? Thank a Jew, Haym Salomon, for helping finance the revolution and bankrupting himself in the process.

You like modern genetic engineering? Thank a Jew, Paul Berg.

You like life-protecting Kevlar? Thank a Jew, Stephanie Kwolek. 

You like Google? Thank two Jews, Larry Page and Sergey Bein. 

Baskin-Robbins, Waze, Dunkin’ Donuts, H&R Block, Snapple, MGM —all founded by Jews. 

Early work on the cell phone was done by Motorola — in Israel.

To return to the beginning, Israel is a product of Zionism.

That is why I am a Zionist. Because the Jewish people deserve a homeland.