I am not Jewish, but I am a Zionist. I believe that Israel has the right to exist and that a safe haven for Jews must exist to ensure the Jews’ survival. I believe that antisemitism is a plague and that the only solution to antisemitism is Zionism. I believe that Jews must be protected and that Israel, the Jewish state, must therefore be protected.

However, Zionism doesn’t seem to be too popular on Reddit, and I’ve had a few heated debates with self-proclaimed “anti-Zionists.” Stranger yet, a few of the aforementioned “anti-Zionists” are Jewish. The thing is, I don’t understand why some Jews oppose Zionism, as the purpose of Zionism is to protect Jews. Before I go any further, I’m going to define a few terms. You are free to disagree with my definitions.

Zionism: The belief that Jews deserve the right to self-determination in their ancestral homeland, the Land of Israel. It is inherently a secular political ideology as it seeks to create a nation-state for the Jewish people so that Jews can flee persecution in the diaspora. Thus, one could simply define Zionism as “Jewish nationalism.”

Anti-Zionism: Opposition to Zionism, the belief that Jews deserve the right to their own state in the Land of Israel. Anti-Zionists deny Jews the right to self-determination for many, often arbitrary, reasons. Anti-Zionists also frequently deny the Jews’ strong historical and cultural connection to their ancestral homeland and the city of Jerusalem. Anti-Zionists may also deny or downplay persecution of Jews in order to prove why Jews do not deserve a state. For these reasons, many Jewish organizations argue that anti-Zionism is antisemitic, mostly because anti-Zionists believe that other peoples deserve their own state.

Antisemitism: Hatred of or prejudice towards Jewish people. It is often considered the oldest form of hatred due to the Jews’ millennia-long history of persecution. It manifests itself in myriad forms and has led to countless expulsions, numerous pogroms, and, most infamously, the Holocaust.

Criticism of Israel: Criticism of Israeli politicians, the Israeli government, Israeli policies, etc. can all be considered criticism of Israel. Criticism of Israel is not inherently antisemitic, and many Jews in Israel are critical of their country.

Anti-Israelism: Opposition to Israel’s existence or Israel as a concept. Criticism of Israel becomes anti-Israelism when the critic unfairly holds Israel to a higher standard than other liberal Western democracies. Anti-Israelists may hold Israel to an impossible standard, arguing that Israel is bad because it is not perfect. Some anti-Israelists portray Israel as a uniquely evil state. Anti-Israelism is a form of anti-Zionism and is inherently antisemitic.

Now that I have defined my terms, it is time for me to present my argument:

I should begin by mentioning that anti-Zionist Jews are a token minority. 94 percent of Jews identify as Zionists, and 82 percent of American Jews consider Israel an “important” or “essential” part of their Jewish identity. In other words, the vast majority of Jews are Zionists. Despite - or, perhaps, because of - this, anti-Zionist Jews are usually very vocal about their belief that Zionism is a form of racist colonialism or oppression, even though Jews by definition cannot colonize their ancestral homeland. Anti-Zionist Jews seem hellbent on making it seem like anti-Zionism is a popular belief among Jews, even though polling suggests otherwise.

I have noticed that there are two different types of anti-Zionist Jews, and, other than their opposition to Zionism, their views could not be more different. On the one hand, some Orthodox Jews oppose Zionism for theological reasons, as they believe that Jews cannot reclaim Israel until the Mashiach (Messiah) arrives. However, they are a minority within a minority. The vast majority of anti-Zionist Jews are self-proclaimed “progressives” whose views often, ironically enough, align more closely with those of neo-Nazis and Islamists.

Jewish leftism is nothing new. For the most part, Jews have historically supported civil rights, and many Jews have been critical of capitalism. When it was founded, Israel was actually Soviet-aligned to an extent, though it eventually became a US ally. So, it seems only natural for Jews to support left-wing causes like anti-Zionism. The issue is, anti-Zionism is, if anything, regressive leftism, i.e. ostensibly left-wing ideas or policies that actually undo progress. The term “regressive leftism” has also been applied to some policies regarding race, with some critics arguing that things like “safe spaces” for certain races are just forms of racial segregation. As mentioned previously, the goal of Zionism is to solve antisemitism. After seeing the millennia of continued hatred of Jews, many Jews figured that the only solution was to create their own state, a safe haven for all the world’s Jewry. Opposition to Zionism, therefore, means maintaining the status quo, even if the status quo is antisemitism. Of course, now that Jews have a state, anti-Zionism now frequently includes calls to destroy Israel and her people by extension, i.e. a second Holocaust. In this way, anti-Zionism is regressive.

Now, why would any rational Jew support anti-Zionism? As mentioned, relatively few Jews do. However, for the Jews that do oppose Zionism, I believe that the main reason is privilege. Anti-Zionist Jews appear to overwhelmingly be American - which, considering the US has the largest Jewish population in the world, is not surprising, especially since >99 percent of Israeli Jews probably support Zionism. Unlike in other parts of the world, Jews have never really faced much legal discrimination in the US. Additionally, while most Jews who came to the US were impoverished, Jews today have the highest average wealth of any religious group in America. This is largely because Jews tend to be well-educated; Jews have the highest voter turnout of any religious group for the same reason. Most American Jews today have therefore lived alongside gentiles and thus probably don’t think that antisemitism is still that huge of an issue. This mindset, however, is wrong.

In recent years, the number of antisemitic hate incidents has steadily increased. Even before the Oct. 7 massacre, more than half of all religious-based hate crimes were against Jews. Following the Hamas attack on Israel, the number of antisemitic incidents skyrocketed, and antisemitism became more and more explicit. In October, you mostly had innocuous-looking calls to “Free Palestine.” In April, you had protesters harassing Jews and preventing them from attending class. Now, Jews are getting stabbed in the streets. With each passing day, the world becomes more hostile to Jews. And yet, anti-Zionist Jews either don’t seem to realize this or refuse to. Some outright say that the real antisemitism is assuming that all Jews support Israel (even though this is something that “anti-Zionists” frequently do). Some even say that Islamophobia is a greater issue or that the Palestinians are the real victims of antisemitism. Of course, both claims are ludicrous.

One thing I can say is that support for Zionism appears to be rising worldwide. As antisemitism becomes a fact of life once again in Europe, many Jews are packing their bags. Antisemitism has also become commonplace in South Africa, and most South African Jews have had enough. Israel has been anticipating a postwar wave of Jewish migration for months now, and it’s not hard to see why. As antisemitism becomes re-normalized, many Jews are realizing why Israel exists. Will the same happen to American Jews? Only time will tell.