Photo via MPP/Hamde Abu Rhama
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As Israel continues to perform its genocide of the Palestinian people, aided and abetted by the United States and the international community, it is important to understand that Zionism is a white supremacist ideology.
Zionism began as a political project from the mind of Theodor Herzl. It seeks to establish the “belief in the Jewish people’s right to self-determination in [their] ancestral homeland of Israel. [Zionism] affirms that Jews, like all peoples, have the right to live in safety, dignity, and sovereignty in a nation of their own,” according to the Jewish Center for Justice. It is based on the notion that Jewish people are a race, separate from whiteness, and deserving of their own nation to maintain their freedom. The use of race, in the case of Israel, may seem justified due to the oppression Jewish people have faced throughout time and space. The consequences of the Holocaust and other brutal campaigns of antisemitism have undoubtedly ravaged their sacred community. However, the extermination of a people is never reason to exterminate another people.
There are several fundamental flaws with the Zionist line of reasoning. First, race does not biologically exist, it is a social fabrication. Race was created by American and German pseudoscientists as a means of justifying the subjugation of non-white people. At the beginning of the 17th century, enslaved people could come from any ethnic background. Their slavery was mostly temporary and based on their failure to believe in the Christian God. Once enslaved Africans began converting to Christianity en masse, colonial occupiers had to find a new reason to keep Black people in chains. In a post-Enlightenment era, the only thing capable of trumping religion was science. A white supremacist, anti-scientific form of Anthropology was born. It systematically sought to justify the supremacy of the white race through perceived differences in African biology. Today we call this discredited practice of dividing humans into arbitrary racial groups Scientific Racism. Racialized slavery was introduced to Virginia in the 1640s and enshrined into law by the 1660s. Using Slave Codes to restrict the movement, gathering, and opportunities of enslaved Africans, colonial occupiers were able to set the groundwork for centuries of oppression. The hereditary enslavement of Africans in America was one of many terrifying byproducts in a tapestry of consequences of the invention of race.
Over time, all ethnic groupings were distorted to fit into rigid, nonsensical racial categories. Someone from Ireland used to be Irish, now they would be white. The same followed for Jewish people in America. Therefore, race (especially racial purity) cannot be used as a pretext for the creation of a state.
A country based on race is defined as an ethnostate because of the apartheid necessary to keep a certain race in power over all others. South Africa provides the most culturally accepted perspective on this issue. Before Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress liberated the African people of South Africa, they lived under the tyranny of a European minority. Black citizens could not vote or participate in South African politics; they could not travel freely, having to carry an internal passport when in urban areas; they were segregated into impoverished neighborhoods and given a lesser education. Their land was taken from them by the government and many Black people were forcibly worked without pay—slavery. All of this without even speaking of the non-state-sanctioned violence (oftentimes sexual abuse) they endured from entitled European occupiers.
Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian citizens of Israel are subjected to second-class citizenship of a similar degree to Black citizens in apartheid South Africa. They cannot travel freely throughout the state of Israel and face severe discrimination in housing, education, employment, medical care, and the law. Policies are influenced by strict interpretations of Jewish religious tradition that often leave Arabs without a chance for upward societal mobility. Arabs living in East Jerusalem are not even considered citizens. They have “permanent resident” status, meaning they are not afforded the false promise of equal rights and certainly cannot vote. According to the Law of Return (1950), all people with Jewish heritage have the right to immigrate to their ancestral homeland, the land that Israel occupies today, and be granted immediate citizenship. Non-Jews are not granted the right of return to that same land for which they also have a powerful ancestral claim—Palestine. This perpetuates a sustained power imbalance between the Jewish and Arab populations. Therefore, Israel is an ethnostate using discriminatory laws to ensure their Jewish majority.
Zionists will often claim it is antisemitic to be Anti-Zionist. But what if I am morally opposed to the existence of an apartheid state? Does this make me antisemitic? No, in fact, I believe suggesting that Zionism is inseparable from Judaism is antisemitic. Judaism is a beautiful religion that existed millenia before the state of Israel. Many Jewish people do not even consider themselves Zionists and some are actively fighting the genocide they see being conducted in their name. I can be opposed to the Chinese government’s genocide of Uyghur Muslims without being labeled “Anti-Chinese.” The same must apply for the Israeli government and its people.
Israel also employs biblical justifications for its state. They cite verses about God granting “land possession” of the space Israel occupies to Abraham, a Jewish man. Even the most orthodox Jews and Christians can understand that there are various interpretations of the bible, making it very difficult to take any of its stories as direct fact. Drawing on islamophobic ideas, proponents of Israel say that Palestinians would stone gay people if they could, then use this as ammunition to shame LGBTQ+ people out of solidarity with Palestinians. This tactic of misinformation is called Pinkwashing. It further exposes the Zionists’ apathy towards oppressed minority groups and a disregard for the bible as a tool of love.
According to international law, the practice of occupying territory outside the borders of your own country is illegal. It is also illegal for a government to send settlers into land beyond their borders to begin the process of colonizing another land. Israel has been doing both of these since at least 1967, after the Six Day War. In Gaza and the West Bank—the only territories still partially outside of Israeli control—Palestinians are regularly subjected to the illegal taking of their homes and lands. Israel is also currently occupying the Golan Heights in Syria and has plans to expand their borders into Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Lebanon. The United Nations Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Francesca Albanese, has declared that when it comes to Israel, “there is no such thing in international law like a right of a state to exist. Does Italy have a right to exist? Italy exists…What is enshrined into international law is the right of a people to exist.” No country expresses their “right to exist” in the way that Israel does. All countries exist because of their ability to defend their borders—which are always man-made.
This round of fighting began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas killed almost 2,000 Israeli civilians with airstrikes. Since then, Israel has bombed every university in Gaza. There are no functional hospitals left in the region. Between 60,000 and 100,000 people have been killed. Hundreds of humanitarian aid workers and journalists have been slaughtered while trying to provide food, hygiene products, and other essential services to the Palestinians of occupied Gaza. Palestinian women and girls face startling rates of sexual violence—the United Nations has provided evidence that what they experience rises to the war crimes of torture, willfull killing, and extermination. Israel has a genocidal regime, founded in white supremacy. Such an institution is indefensible and should not exist.
With all of this evidence mounting against Israel since its ill-conception, why does the United States still support them? Israel and its supporters spend hundreds of millions of dollars inside the United States through institutions like Project Esther, the Anti Defamation League (ADL), and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). These organizations do not have to register as agents of a foreign government yet use all of their money to influence American politicians and create propaganda for the state of Israel within the United States. This has led our government to waste $310,000,000,000 on Israel—enough money to end homelessness, fund Medicare, cut the crippling debt crisis, and more. But will we demand it? Several countries (UK, Canada, Mexico, etc.) have taken to officially recognizing the state of Palestine, but recognition does not end genocide. In fact, recognizing the state of Palestine may be the wrong move because the Palestinian people are still not in control of their territory. Whether it be one state with a proper democracy or two coexisting states, Palestinian self-determination must be the end goal. This includes all of the reparations necessary for a group that has undergone a genocide—healthcare, infrastructure investment, psychological support, and education among other stabilizing resources.
We cannot be satisfied until the bloodshed of innocent children has ceased. Almost half of the population of Gaza is under the age of 18. This is a people with infinite potential, if we find the courage to correct all the wrong that has been committed with unsettling malice and perpetuated by unfortunate ignorance. We must make Palestine free.
“The white man will try to satisfy us with symbolic victories rather than economic equity and real justice.” Malcolm X.
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This article was edited by Abigail D’Angelo
Anika Bobeck 
Serena Dash 
Fathema Siddiqua