Many defenders of Israel’s barbaric behaviour accuse those who criticize Israel of being antisemitic. Rarely is this fair or accurate. Most who criticize and sometimes even condemn Israel, myself included, are not antisemitic in any way, shape, or form.
I recently became aware of a school of thought, put forward by some Jews who are critical of Israel, that Zionism itself is antisemitic.
On the face of it, the idea seems preposterous. Zionism after all is based on the belief that the Jewish people should have their own state in their historical homeland of Palestine. The establishment of Israel in 1948 was the fulfillment of that ambition.
Antisemitism is defined by Britannica as, “hostility towards or discrimination against Jews.”
It’s hard to see how anyone could be both at the same time.
However deeper research into history and current politics gives credence to the assertion that there is a significant overlap between the interests of Zionists and those of antisemites.
Although the term antisemitism was not used until the late eighteenth century, hatred and persecution of Jewish people goes back thousands of years, sometimes for religious reasons, sometimes due to geopolitical factors.
It is a fascinating and unsettling history, which reflects in no small part the various religious wars and wars of conquest that have taken place throughout so much of human history.
By the 1800s, antisemitism had become ingrained in numerous countries and governments, particularly throughout Europe and Russia. Around this time, the term itself began to be more commonly used to refer to anti-Jewish views.
Open discrimination was becoming the norm by the late nineteenth century, with various antisemitic conspiracy theories taking hold in popular thought, while pogroms and other targeted, violent incidents in certain areas were forcing Jews to flee as refugees to more welcoming countries.
At the same time, ethnic nationalism was on the rise in Europe, with countries setting geographical boundaries based on ethic alignments. This movement proved an inspiration for certain Jewish factions which reacted to the period’s spreading violence and discrimination by determining to establish in their own nation state. This movement became known as Zionism.
So, antisemites wanted the Jews to leave, and the Zionists wanted Jews to emigrate and set up their own state in Palestine. It wasn’t long before the two sides realized they had a common cause. As Theodor Herzel, Zionism’s founder, wrote in mid-1895, “anti-Semites will become our most dependable friends, the anti-Semitic countries our allies“.
In response, a strong anti-Zionist movement also arose, with many Jewish communities seeing their Jewishness as a matter of religion and tradition, while identifying nationally with their current home countries.
The separation between pro-Zionist and anti-Zionist factions continued to grow as the Zionist drive to establish an ethic homeland for all Jews gained adherents. Zionists roundly condemned the Jews who opposed their vision, often publicly supporting the views and actions of antisemites on the grounds of motivating Jews to emigrate to Palestine.
Over time, Zionists were very successful in recruiting support from antisemites, complicit governments, and more recently, evangelical Christians. For example:
- In 1917, the British government issued a public statement — known as the Balfour Declaration — supporting the establishment of “a national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine. This venture was coordinated by the government in collaboration with the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. Key factors in framing the discussion were political considerations related to the ongoing First World War, the continued colonial aspirations and considerations of various European countries, and the prevalence of antisemitism during that period.
- There was collaboration between the German Nazi government and German Zionist organizations, exemplified by their 1933 signing of the Haavara Agreement, which enabled some assets of German Jews to be transferred to the British Mandate in Palestine which those Jews could access when they immigrated, while the Nazi state kept the rest. This bargain ultimately facilitated the migration of about 60,000 Jews to Palestine between 1933 and 1939.
There is ongoing debate about the true level of cooperation between Zionists and German Nazis during that period, although it’s clear there was at minimum significant contact.
- Christian Zionism is a theological and political Christian movement that, based on biblical texts, supports the return of the Jewish Diaspora to their homeland in Palestine. A major impetus behind the movement is the evangelical belief that the Jews’ return to Palestine will lead to the Second Coming of Jesus.
The Christian Zionist movement has become very influential in the U.S. government and is almost certainly guiding U.S. policies in the Middle East in collaboration with Israel. U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, recently suggested in an interview that Israel has a God-given right to much of the Middle East land. This belief also underscores the strong political and financial ties that have developed between U.S. Christian Zionists and Israel’s Zionist right-wing government.
Zionists finally achieved their goal of establishing the Jewish state of Israel in 1948, due in large part to the public horror at the atrocities of the Holocaust. In the years since, the ethno-nationalist focus and geographical aspirations of successive Israeli governments have once again made it clear that Zionism and traditional Jewish culture are very different things. Opposition to the actions of the Israeli state are not the same thing as discrimination against Jewish people in general.
But is Zionism antisemitic? I think not entirely. However, it’s impossible to ignore their significant historical collaboration, even codependency.
The controversy has been well documented by scholars such as Yakov Rabkin, in numerous books such as A Threat from Within: A Century of Jewish Opposition to Zionism, and his more recent publication, Zionism Decoded in 101 Quotes. You can listen to Professor Rabkin in conversation with Jeffrey Sachs on YouTube in postings such as The End of Zionism. It is well worth understanding more about this complicated history.
Daily atmospheric CO2 [Courtesy of CO2.Earth]
Latest daily total (March 25, 2026): 431.50ppm
One year ago (March 26, 2025): 428.37ppm
Subscribe to Tim Louis
Keep up to date Tim's latest posts.