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Anti-Zionism is Anti-Semitism

(Guardian-UK) Emanuele Ottolenghi - Israel deserves to be judged by the same standards adopted for others, not by the standards of utopia. Singling out Israel for an impossibly high standard not applied to any other country begs the question: why such different treatment? Zionism comprises a belief that Jews are a nation, and as such are entitled to self-determination as all other nations are. To oppose Zionism in its essence and to refuse to accept its political offspring, Israel, as a legitimate entity, entails more. If nationalism is a pernicious force, then one should oppose Palestinian nationalism as well. Negating Zionism, by claiming that Zionism equals racism, denies the Jews the right to identify, understand, and imagine themselves as a nation. Anti-Zionists deny Jews a right that they all too readily bestow on others, first of all Palestinians. Zionism reversed Jewish historical passivity to persecution and asserted the Jewish right to self-determination and independent survival. By negating Zionism, the anti-Semite is arguing that the Jew must always be the victim. What anti-Zionists find so obscene is that Israel is neither martyr nor saint. Their outrage refuses legitimacy to a people's national liberation movement. Israel's stubborn refusal to comply with the invitation to commit national suicide and thereby regain a supposedly lost moral ground draws condemnation. Jews now have the right to self-determination, and that is what the anti-Semite dislikes so much.
2003-12-02 00:00:00
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