Пересказ: Towards a New Zionism

Towards a New 'Zionism'

Источник: https://drlou.substack.com/p/towards-a-new-zionism

The truth about Zionism

“Zionism is nothing more – and nothing less – than the Jewish people’s sense of origin and destination in the land linked eternally with its name”

This was a powerful and positive representation beautifully articulated by Chaim Herzog fifty years ago when, as Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, he confronted a UN resolution which identified that “Zionism is a form of racism.” Though the resolution was later revoked due to Herzog’s words, it’s premise and pretext continues to resonate

As a Jew who has lived and worked in Israel and remains a strong supporter of the Jewish State of Israel (if not the current government coalition), I would argue that ‘Zionism’ is now more an ahistorical term and artifact in need of significant revision and reconfiguration. We have returned to the place of our origin. We are home but, at the same time, haven’t yet quite evolved into this new reality

Modern ‘Zionism’ has since been deeply co-opted particularly by long standing Jewish Supremacists and extremists - both in and out of Israel’s current government - to justify militarized and malignant assaults on those living on land they believe theirs by the bible. But the Old Testament is not a demographic, cartographic or geographic text

Instead, it is a mix of fact, fable, and early faith; ancient history and myth rather than a literal guide somehow able to justify the extreme brutality and terror we have seen in Gaza and by unrestrained, illegal settler collectives in the West Bank who continue to ratchet up their violence to and destruction of long standing Palestinian villages and farmers. These same settlers also have no problem attacking the IDF even when the IDF does attempt to stop or, at least, restrain their attacks

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The unprovoked settler attacks on West Bank Palestinian villages and farmers must unconditionally stop, unlawful settlements removed, settler terrorism ended and the Jewish perpetrators arrested and held as would any other terrorist committing these crimes. And senior government officials who, at the least, turn a blind eye to settler atrocities and, at the most, support and encourage them must be directly called out and challenged

The start of the war on Hamas in Gaza two plus years ago was clearly justified. But as led by Netanyahu, and reflecting his desperation to pander to his extremist government coalition, it was turned into excessive and unjustified ‘over the top’ brutality and utter destruction. I still would not call Netanyahu’s actions ‘genocide’ but also believe that the line for alleged war crimes has been crossed.

Instead of replicating the strategic brilliance of Israel’s dismantling and degrading of Hezbollah in Lebanon, the war on Hamas became a war on Gazan citizens as Netanyahu fell directly into the trap set for Israel by Hamas as part of its deeply genocidal assault on Israel on 7 October 2023. Only Netanyahu and his coalition allies could have lost the global empathy and support received after 7 October so quickly.

The extremes of violence and destruction in Gaza combined with settler terrorism in the West Bank is the dark, abused and revisionist side of Zionism now seen and (mis)understood by the world. I’d argue that while the philosophy of Zionism reflects our millenia long drive to return to the land to which we are ‘eternally linked;’ we’re now here. And rather than being ‘colonists,’ Jews are among the true and original anti-colonists

We now desperately need to reconstruct and reframe a new ‘Zionism’ that acknowledges and more accurately represents our current reality and place on the Timeline of History which took a significant revision in 1948. Israel, unfortunately, seems to remain locked at this earlier stage in its modern History. The current manifestation of a biblically framed ‘Zionism’ makes Israel far less, rather than more, secure while driving incredible violence

It is time to look forward rather than backwards

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