By Jason Charles on 3/27/2019 (5 years 270 days ago) Israel/Zionism
As you would imagine, most despotic states war against their own citizens when leveling criticism towards their own government, that is a given with oppressive, wicked regimes. But what kind of twilight-zone world do we live in when a government disallows criticism of a foreign government? Well just this week at the AIPAC summit in D.C., Secretary of State Mike Pompeo like many other world leaders have stated they will police their citizens for anti-Zionist sentiments, equating it to racism saying,
“US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo embraced Israel in a speech at the AIPAC policy conference in Washington on Monday.
“Israel should be admired, not attacked, embraced, not vilified," Pompeo stated at the annual gathering of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. "I’m proud to lead American diplomacy to support Israel’s right to defend itself, stand with the Jewish people, and champion the perennial cause of religious liberty."
…
Pompeo was one of the many elected officials from both Israel and America to speak at the event hosted by the pro-Israeli lobby. The State Department has historically been viewed by many pro-Israel activists as leaning toward pressuring Israel into compromise vis-a-vis the Palestinians. However the Trump Administration seems to have shifted the narrative, recognizing Israel's right to the Golan Heights on Monday. The strategic highlands was controlled by Syria from 1948 to 1967.
Last year, US President Donald Trump defended Israel's right to both eastern and western Jerusalem, moving the US embassy to the capital. "The rise of antisemitism and anti-Zionism strikes at the very foundation of freedom," Pompeo added. "The Trump Administration opposes it unequivocally and will fight it relentlessly, from the fever swamp of the UN Human Rights Council to the world’s number one proponent of antisemitism: Iran." (Jerusalem Post)
Why would any independent nation, of any stripe care to enforce anti-hate laws, or anti-free speech laws on behalf of another nation? Yet, this is exactly what has happened with Israel relative to the rest of the world. Nations all over the earth are prosecuting their own citizens based on nothing more than their criticism of Zionism and Israel, equating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism. How has Israel obtained this favored status when no other nation, including the Unites States has forced other nations to do so?
In February, U.S. President Donald Trump sent a delegation to Israel who equated criticism of the 100-year-old political movement called Zionism with anti-Semitism and racism. Elan Carr, head of the anti-Semitism envoy stated this,
“Elan Carr, the United States’ new envoy to combat anti-Semitism, told American Jewish leaders in Jerusalem that he will work to end the “attempted distinction” between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, while praising U.S. President Donald Trump’s efforts to combat the “scourge.”
“I will work to eradicate the attempted distinction between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. There is no distinction,” he told U.S. Jewish leaders gathered at Jerusalem’s Inbal Hotel as part of the annual Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations summit.
“There is a greater rise in new anti-Semitism that clothes itself as anti-Zionism. The anti-Semitism of the European street, of the college campus and of those that have embraced the notion that the Jewish people don’t have a right to their homeland,” said Carr.
“Zionism wasn’t born in 1948 or with [Theodor] Herzl or with the First Zionist Congress. Zionism started with Parshat Lech-Lecha, with Moses and on the banks of the river of Babylon,” he said. “Anyone who attempts to deny the Jewish religion its basic faith tenets, its rights to a homeland is wading into anti-Semitism. And I will fight it,” he declared.” (The Sun Sentinel)
These statements really are outrageous, equating Zionism with a religion is laughable considering Theodor Herzel, the father of the Zionist movement was an atheist as pointed out by famed Israeli talk show host and atheist, Yoram Sheftel just this month,
“In response to an open letter questioning how his atheism and Jewish identity mesh, Sheftel recently sat down with Arutz Sheva to shed some light on his unique worldview.
Sheftel began by pointing out that both Theodor Herzl and Zeev Jabotinsky – two of modern Zionism’s most important leaders – were complete atheists, yet were both motivated by an overriding love of the Jewish people.
Laying out the basis of his own Zionist beliefs, Sheftel said Jewish nationhood had the same basic features as other countries around the world, yet was also distinguished by the role of religion in creating ethnic identity.” (Israel National News)
Zionism was founded as a political movement well over 120 years ago, and consisted of irreligious atheists and orthodox Jews alike. Zionism has always been defined as a political movement, if there are any religious overtones it is only because it is useful as a tactic towards its political objectives, objectives that Google dictionary defines as such,
Defined (Source):
Zionism: A movement for (originally) the re-establishment and (now) the development and protection of a Jewish nation in what is now Israel. It was established as a political organization in 1897 under Theodor Herzl, and was later led by Chaim Weizmann.
Zionism is defined as a political movement which was originally created to establish a homeland for Jews, and now that they have their land, Zionism uses political means to protect itself.
Now without question, every nation has a right and duty to protect itself and its citizens, nobody would argue that point; but what happens when a political movement in the name of “protecting itself” shoots protestors, funds proxy armies, runs covert military operations in other sovereign territories, builds walled off zones of apartheid and genocidal oppression, lobbies foreign political allies willing to war on their behalf with surrounding nations, drone and bomb citizens of other nations continually, cut off water and utilities to surrounding neighbors, bulldoze homes that have been occupied by families for generations? What then? Do we just give such politics a pass? Of course we don’t we call it what it is, unwarranted aggression. When a political movement of any type conducts itself in such a way they will undoubtedly open themselves to criticism. Aggression is never okay whether a robber at gun point does it, a religion or class, or a political body and nation. History condemns such barbarity and rightfully so.
Zionism whether spiritual, secular, political or otherwise would be beyond reproach if it was peace loving and amiable towards its neighbors and the world, but Israel and the Zionist political movement is anything but peaceful.
We have to realize that everything Israel does becomes a political tactic towards self preservation, including the effort to recruit foreign nations to police their citizens for speech. Connecting anti-Zionism which is purely political criticism with something as loathsome as racism and anti-Semitism the world over is nothing more than a political tactic that looks to deflect criticism of political policies that are extremely heavy handed and oppressive in the region.
The foreign policy website Mondweiss, writing last month on French President Emmanuel Macron’s speech, where he, like Pompeo and Trump, also equated anti-Semitism with anti-Zionism said this on the subject,
“US and European elites have moved on from their once-defensive posture that Zionism is not racism. Now, they are on the attack. Their presumption is that anti-Zionism – the position of much the international community 44 years ago – is synonymous with racism.
Or more specifically, it is increasingly being accepted that anti-Zionism and antisemitism are two sides of the same coin.
That trend was consolidated last week when Emmanuel Macron, the centrist French president, went further than simply reiterating his repeated conflation of anti-Zionism and antisemitism. This time he threatened to outlaw anti-Zionism.
Macron’s confusion of anti-Zionism with antisemitism is patently nonsensical.
Antisemitism refers to the hatred of Jews. It is bigotry, plain and simple.
Anti-Zionism, on the other hand, is opposition to the political ideology of Zionism, a movement that has insisted in all its political guises on prioritising the rights of Jews to a homeland over those, the Palestinians, who were already living there.
Anti-Zionism is not racism against Jews; it is opposition to racism by Zionist Jews.
Of course, an anti-Zionist may also be antisemitic, but it is more likely that an anti-Zionist holds his or her position for entirely rational and ethical reasons.” (Mondoweiss)
They are exactly right, people who criticize Israel do so on the basis of what they see as being high crimes against humanity. Most are coming from a place of principle, completely blind to the issue of race. In fact most people who denounce Zionist Israel also criticize America and Saudi Arabia seeing them as being complicit, and equally as murderous toward Muslim countries in the Mid-East.
Even the U.N., who has always given Israel a pass over the decades, had to respond to the disgusting way Israel dealt with unarmed protesters in Gaza last year by issuing a report that shows Israel as being guilty of war crimes by targeting journalists, children and even the disabled.
“A United Nations inquiry has found Israeli forces may have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity by targeting unarmed children, journalists and the disabled in Gaza. The report, released by the U.N. Human Rights Council on Thursday, looked at Israel’s bloody response to weekly Great March of Return demonstrations, launched by Palestinians in Gaza nearly a year ago, targeting Israel’s heavily militarized separation barrier. The report found Israeli forces have killed 183 Palestinians—almost all of them with live ammunition. The dead included 35 children. Twenty-three thousand people were injured, including over 6,000 shot by live ammunition. We speak with Sara Hossain, a member of the U.N. independent commission that led the Gaza investigation.” (Democracy Now)
This isn’t a race issue, as the charge of antisemitism implies, no, this is about what is right and what is wrong. Unilateral, unmerited aggression by partner nations as means to dominate and centralize power is without question evil, and we must maintain the right to criticize such evil.
Conclusion
The ability to speak without fear on any topic is a metric of freedom in a society. Nothing in a free country is off limits, for good or bad. I should be able to criticize my own government as well as a foreign government without fear of repercussions in a free country. But guess what, in the United States of America like in Europe, our leaders are looking to persecute and penalize people based on their criticism of Israeli policies. Nobody cares about the race issue, people care about the humanitarian issues that these endless wars have brought the region. To link these subjects together is disengious to say the least.
The fact that world leaders are banning together and policing their citizens on their speech relative to a foreign nation should be looked at with the utmost suspicion. It speaks to the larger issue of who really rules the world, who truly is the world’s super-power, the U.S. or Israel?
It seems every world leader is simultaneously speaking out on behalf of Israel, rolling out the same talking points on anti-Zionism being equivalent to anti-Semitism; all of which provides cover for the political ambitions of Israel in the region. This goes beyond the simple support of a partner ally, and lends itself towards a master-servant relationship. Countries like the U.S., France, Germany, the U.K who prosecute citizens are seen as being subservient to Israel’s demands.
Now this is nothing more than pure speculation and analogy on my part so spare me the emails, but I liken it to the passage in Revelation that speaks to the 10 kings that give their power to the beast.
It seems every leader in the world is on this bandwagon right now, Donald Trump, Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron, Jeremy Corbyn, Theresa May and more have all made it their business to fight anti-Semitism as policy in their respective countries. It truly feels like the kings of the world are giving their power over to the Beast. Whether true or not, the analogy holds considering this is exactly what world leaders are doing, the anti-Semitism debate is giving Zionist Israel unmerited favor and power. To which I will critize whether labeled an antisemite or not.
These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast. Revelation 17: 13
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