Mick Hartley

Olga Kirschbaum-Shirazki at Fathom:

The far-left and Islamist activists who are heading these sit ins, marches, and media platforms in non-Muslim countries in the name of global justice focus on Israel/Zionism as the source of global problems. The thesis is as follows: ‘Israel’, or ‘Global Zionism’, is at the centre of and exports every kind of injustice: racism, capitalism, colonialism, environmental destruction, war, and military and carceral technologies. This idea is expressed in local far-left media and parties, in the academy, as well as in Islamist media outlets in English like Al Jazeera, Islamic Republic News Agency, and Daily Sabah (Turkey). For millions of young people who want a better world, this discourse is galvanising. Faced with such urgent and overwhelming ‘challenges of the world’ and being offered a clear solution to those challenges – which in its crudest version says the Zionists, meaning the majority of Israel’s citizens, the majority of the global Jewish, community, and Israel’s supporters and allies around the world are malign and they control the world and that’s why it’s all going wrong – one can perhaps even understand why so many people are attracted, especially if they know little about the history of the Middle East and antisemitism.

Substitute "Jews" for "Zionism" – or "Global Jewry" for "Global Zionism" – and this all has a horribly familiar feel. And much of this is coming from supposed intellectuals and the universities. 

What many of us have observed since 7 October is that intellectuals, thought leaders, and artists are ushering people who admire them on other topics into the thesis of Zionism as a global evil. Many seem to think: if these figures are valiant environmentalists, inspiring psychiatrists, great poets, talented musicians, or dynamic actors and they think Zionism/Israel is the problem, then maybe it is….

As the Frankfurt School among other scholars have convincingly argued antisemitism is a projection. Far-left/Islamist anti-Zionism and far-right antisemitism share the same dynamic: they project what they think is evil onto ‘Global Zionism’ or ‘the Jews’ and claim therefore that the destruction of the Jews or the Zionist entity/Israel is a key measure for ‘redemption’ or ‘justice’. This is why their projections look different but function in the same way. In the 1930s the far right projected everything they detested onto the Jews as a race: cowardice, greed, pollution etc and sought to destroy Jewish men women and children across Europe as well as the Jewish community in Palestine (yes the Nazis were anti-Zionist too). Today the far-left projects everything they hate onto the Jewish state: colonialism, capitalist exploitation, incarceration etc., and call for the destruction of Israel. Islamist antisemitism is likewise a projection of what Islamists hate the most heresy, godlessness, etc. Their solution: the destruction of Israel and Judaism.

Her conclusion:

If one thinks in terms of conventional power and interests – amassing territory, wealth, defeating a military opponent – the destruction of two-thirds of European Jewry was a totally absurd endeavour for Nazi Germany. If, however, one sees the Holocaust as a projection of all evil onto the Jews, then it makes sense to those doing the projecting. Today, mutatis mutandis, this same narrative of redemptive anti-Zionism is being expressed across campuses and on far-left news outlets around the world, and is increasingly expanding in social democratic and liberal spaces. This is a clear deadly danger to Jews and must be stopped for this reason alone. However, the thesis that Zionism is a source of evil is also a deadly distraction for all people everywhere. We do not have time to lose with such a pointless projection that not only saps energy and time, but betrays our deepest humanity with its facile format. Our young people deserve a world where they can breathe, earn a living, and flourish, and more than that they deserve to learn that it can be built if we look at reality in the face, take responsibility, and work together with those who are open to doing so. We cannot get back the time and energy lost sitting on campus lawns, walking the streets, and scrolling on phones calling for the destruction of the only Jewish state. We need this time and energy for the real problems we face.