Hello i'm norton mezvinsky the president of the international council for middle east studies icmes this is the second webinar in the four-part icmes series that focuses upon anti-semitism and especially upon the definition of the international holocaust remembrance alliance ihra which alleges that anti-zionism And criticisms of certain policies of the state of israel are anti-semitic the ihra definition is as follows anti-semitism is a certain perception of jews which may be expressed as hatred towards jews rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-semitism are directed towards jewish or non-jewish individuals and or their property toward jewish community institutions and
religious facilities In this second webinar rabbi yaakov shapiro provides a critical assessment of the ihra's definition addresses the arguments given by its defenders and provides an alternative superior definition of anti-semitism rabbi yaakov shapiro was a pulpit rabbi for 30 years and is now emeritus he is host of the podcast committing high reason his 1380 page book the empty wagon zionism journey from identity crisis to identity theft is the most definitive scholarly presentation of the orthodox jewish antagonism to zionism rabbi shapiro has written extensively and lectured widely on judaism and zionism so rabbi shapiro let's get
straight into the issue the ihra definition of anti-semitism good or bad why good morning norton how are you The igra definition of anti-semitism is bad it's been widely criticized and there's very little to add to that criticism it's ambiguous it says it's a certain perception of jews doesn't tell you what the perception is and and so forth so really doesn't define what anti-semitism is either rightly or wrongly secondly worse yet are the examples the examples lead one to believe as jared kushner has as our state Department has that this definition means that anti-zionism is anti-semitism
that's how it's widely accepted anti-zionism is not anti-semitism that can be a pro-jews and anti-zionist you could be a jew a practicing jew and be an anti-zionist such as myself you can be a anti-semite and be pro-zionist richard spencer refers to himself as a white zionist because he believes that america should be for what he calls the Whites and jews should go to israel and one has nothing to do with the other not to mention the orthodox jews who because of their orthodox jews are anti-zionist for various reasons now if you're going to define anti-zionism
as anti-semitism what are you going to do with orthodox jews who for since the beginning of zionism were were Anti-zionist so you're going to have to come up with some absurd answers here's an example listen to this this is this is um deborah lipstadt she was asked on a podcast by peter beinert uh if anti-zionism is anti-semitism she said yes and then she brought up the question of orthodox jews listen to what she says now there's always the ringer which i'll Mention now because if i don't you will um some people like sapler that uh
you know who have amongst that new terry carter comes out of there though the cr and and within the jury carter there's the crazies who love to show up you know with palestinian demonstrations at holocaust denial um they attended a group of them attended the holocaust denial conferences in iran et cetera et cetera um are they anti-semites well i Think the jury is a little bit out on that um though if you say it to you know pizza it does complicate the matter but i think it's you know it's an exception which doesn't prove the
rule okay so whether orthodox jews such as hasidim it's not only sadness that are anti-zionist our anti-semites the jury is out on that it may be an exception but the jury is out on that let's face it any definition of Anti-semitism that results in declaring orthodox jews anti-semites because of their judaism has to be absurd okay then how should we define anti-semitism all right i i think that rather than just throwing out definitions of anti-semitism which many people have done there's a different way to approach that question When somebody just gives his idea of what
anti-semitism is it's difficult to know whether he's defining anti-semitism or redefining anti-semitism according to his own agenda instead i think we need to tackle this question from a different angle what we need to do is if we want to know what anti-semitism is for our purposes here we need to identify what it is about anti-semitism That makes it bad that makes anti-semitism hate and see if that characteristic of that element exists in anti-zionism and what i mean is this if i say i don't like jews that's cons that's hate that's anti-semitism if i say i
don't like blacks that's racism but if i say i don't like communists Nobody's going to accuse me of hate speech if i say i don't like capitalists socialists that's not considered hate speech so why is it that i could say i don't like certain people and other people to say i don't like them as a group is off limits obviously the difference is this a communist means somebody who chooses The ideology of communism a capitalist is somebody who chooses the ideology of capitalism ideologies are choices a person chooses his ideology and people are judgeable you
can judge people based on their choices and if i judge somebody to have made a bad choice an evil choice a unwise choice A detrimental choice um a dangerous choice that's my prerogative i could be right i could be wrong i could be really misguided i could be ignorant but it's not hate speech because i'm judging something that i'm entitled to judge i may be judging it wrongly but i'm entitled to joe but i'm entitled to judges as opposed to being black being jewish being a woman misogyny Those are things that are not even judgeable
judging somebody negatively obviously based on uh something that he never chose that's hate i'm not judging him based on his choice i'm removing his ability to choose freely like everybody else does based upon the way he would he or she was born now by the way in judaism uh this i believe would be considered literally Dehumanizing somebody and i mean this in the most literal sense judaism teaches that the difference between a human being and an animal is that a human being has the ability to choose so if i say that that human being has
less of ability to choose he has less free will than everybody else because he's born jewish so he must he doesn't have a ability to choose whether to be money hungry he's born with it this guy's Black so he doesn't have the ability to choose he's born with certain uh behaviors baked into him it's literally removing to whatever extent i'm judging them it's removing their free will which means literally i am making them less of a human being than everybody else in society now that would determine whether something is hate racist uh misogyny all of
the above type um Unacceptable ideas as opposed to not liking communists or communism i say i wish communism would disappear off the face of the earth that's not the same as me saying i wish blackness would disappear off the face of the earth i can judge communism as an illicit unacceptable ideology now let's see now that we have the criteria let's see whether zionism fits into category a or b the answer is clearly zionism is an ideology people choose to be zionists Zionism is like communism it's like socialism it's like capitalism zionism is an ideology
that people choose to adopt i have there should be no problem with me saying that i do not like zionism i wish zionism as an ideology would disappear off the face of the earth and even by the way religions religions are also in this category of ideologies There are plenty of religions that i don't like there are all sorts of satanic religions and various religions that i don't like and there are people who don't like my religion there are people who say i hear it all the time they don't like the way judaism uh regards
women they demand not equality but identicality Uh in religion uh they don't like animal sacrifices maybe maybe they don't like circumcision they think they're against these practices or these uh id these ideas you know what that they're not anti-semites if somebody or how about this atheists atheists do not like let's say they say all people who believe in god they're primitive we know somebody like that right norton everybody Educated person people who believe in god it's child they have a childish mind okay such a person is not an anti-semite i say they're they're totally misguided
untutored in regards to judaism at least but they're not that's not hate they have a right to say just i don't like animal sacrifices therefore i don't like judaism or i don't like i Demand i i i cannot see any god giving men and women different roles in this world they can say that it doesn't make them anti-semitic it makes them nonsensical and zionism if somebody says i don't like zionism because of its ideology there is nothing he if you want to say that he's wrong he's ignorant it's a dangerous uh Position to take we
could discuss that but to say that it's anti-semitic it's in the same category as saying i don't like a jew because he's a jew that's nonsense therefore norton the definition of anti-semitism will be and the our group in the icmes got together and decided on this the definition of anti-semitism will be hostility or discrimination against jews As jews hostility or discrimination against jews because they are jews the main part of that is because they are jews we decided that hostility and discrimination um would contain all negative attitudes or actions we also could have said negative
attitude or action towards jews as jews but the point is you're not judging the jew because of his particular behavior As an individual you're not judging the jew because of his particular ideas as an individual you're not judging the jew because of his particular choices as an individual you're judging him because he was born jewish the same broad brush that you necessarily would have to judge all jews because all jews are jews and If you're judging them as jews because they're jews what a person is essential characteristic a person's born with is beyond the domain
of what is legitimately able to be judged right or wrong right or wrong there's only people's choices and by the way before the ihra came out with this um everybody knew this if you wanna know anti-semitism is all you have to do is look in the dictionary and it's not Any dictionary you look at it's not gonna the definition is not gonna be much different than that which i just mentioned and even the zionists understood this i have in front of me something called the hasbara handbook i i'm not making this up that's really what
it's called it's called hasbro handbook promoting israel on campus published and produced by the world union of jewish students it's sponsored by the education department of the Jewish agency for israel and the joint distribution committee on page 13 there's a section called anti-semitism anti-zionism and israel here's what it says anti-semitism is an ideology of being opposed in certain ways to jewish people jews qua that's the key here cup jews not everybody who dislikes certain jews and anti-semites an anti-semite is Anybody who dis who dislikes jews simply because they are jews that's the point now israel
as a state is not the jews as jews if somebody says they don't like israel because of israel israel is a like a jewish individual or like a jewish institution if i say this jewish individual is behaving bad or has bad ideas this jew particular jewish institution is behaving bad or Has bad ideas this particular jew is money hungry not jews because they're jews that particular maybe bernie madoff okay bernie madoff is money hungry i could use all the money tropes anti-semitic money tropes against bernie madoff and nobody will accuse me of being anti-semitic because
i'm not judging him as a jew i'm judging him for his actions if israel is being judged if Somebody judges israel because of their actions because of their choices because of the ideology of zionism then that's not anti-semitic if somebody says well israel is bad because they're jews or of course it's a jewish state therefore what more can you expect of them then that's anti-semitic but even that is not anti-semitic criticism of israel it's the anti-semitic criticism of jews anti-zionism is never anti-semitism Anti-semitism is anti-semitism anti-zionism means criticizing zionism anti-semitism means criticizing or disliking a
negative feeling towards jews as jews if somebody says something about israel that indicates he doesn't like jews as jews then he's anti-semitic because of the latter the fact that he doesn't like jews as jews he's not anti-semitic first criticism of israel so again Asking asking at what point does criticism of israel cross the line into anti-semitism is the same as asking at what point does criticism of an individual jew whose behavior you don't like cross into anti-semitism the answer is it it never does criticism of an individual jew uh If it remains criticism of an
individual jew never becomes anti-semitism what becomes anti-semitism is if you criticize the individual jew and by doing so you're actually criticizing jews as jews and you're criticizing him as a jew if you're criticizing him as a jew which means you're criticizing jews as jews that's anti-semitism see even the question the way they put it at what points does criticizing israel cross Into anti-semitism what what that implies that question implies that israel is different than uh other jews israel is that there's something sacrosanct about israel there's like a certain space a certain area a certain line
beyond which you're not allowed to criticize it where is that line there is no line if you criticize an individual jew a jewish institution a Jewish state as jews because they're jews that's anti-semitism if not they're not it could be by the way that your criticism of an individual jew is hiding anti-semitism but that's not the question we're asking the question we're asking is is anti-zionism anti-semitism to illustrate the conflation between an immutable characteristic an identity that you're born with versus an ideology I'm going to quote something over here from kenneth stern's book it's called
the conflict over the conflict which is all about the controversy of the ihra definitions on page 168. he says the question of whether jewish identity today requires or perhaps is most informed by support for israel is a difficult question again the question of whether jewish Identity requires support for israel is a difficult question i would ask kenneth stern if jewish identity does require support for israel does it require support for israel only when israel is right or also when israel is wrong see if israel is right then why do you need jewish identity to support
it if israel is wrong why would jewish identity require you to support it What type of identity requires you to take a particular political position you see does being black require you to support any particular political position how does being born a certain way jewish identity how does that require you to support anything there are two types of identities and i'm using the word identity broadly there's an identity like being black or being male or female or or jewish things That you're born with that type of identity does not require you never requires you to
support anything then there's another type of identity we'll call it identity loosely that's really an ideology ideologies if i'm a communist it requires me to support communism but that's a that's redundant So what does he mean by jewish identity requires support for israel you see this doesn't make sense if jewish identity is requires a certain political position and support for israel is that then to that extent jewish identity becomes morally opposable because all it is is an ideology jewish identity If it's an essential immutable characteristic that a person is born with to say that it
requires you to support israel that's anti-semitic because i have free choice the fact that i'm born jewish or white or black or left-handed or black-haired and and brown eyes or or english-speaking from from parents from poland russia england that doesn't require me to do anything i Can think for myself so we're talking any identity that requires support for something is really an ideology and if you see what they want is the zionists want to have their cake and eat it too they want to say well being jewish requires this political position but but you're not
allowed to oppose that Political position because then you're opposing jewish identity well no you're using the phrase jewish identity in two completely different ways to the extent that jewish identity requires a political position you may oppose jewish identity to the extent that jewish identity is immutable and uh of opposing it would be considered hate that does not require you to support or Oppose any particular thing well what about the argument that's put this way that is perhaps the central argument uh for and in this ihra definition the argument has been made that zionism is part
of jewish identity and therefore being anti-zionism is akin to being anti-jew yeah that is the most important argument and it's it's nonsense and it really needs to be attacked um [Music] It's like it really needs to be attacked for its its dishonesty and it's uh it's dangerous number one it's not true and number two even if it was true it would not make a difference let's take the second part even if it's true it wouldn't make a difference if somebody chooses to be a zionist because nobody's born a zionist if somebody chooses to be a
zionist He's choosing an ideology and without going into the question of what's the definition of identity we don't have to go into that if somebody should choose to make zionism part of his identity whatever that means that still does not immunize zionism from being an ideology and therefore opposable if a communist says communism is part of my identity Or even somebody says judaism is part of my identity that doesn't make atheists anti-semitic any ideology this is the rule may be opposed an ideology is a choice and if you choose a certain ideology i can oppose
that ideology i don't even have to oppose you i could say freely i wish zionism would disappear off the face of the earth there are people who say i think religion should disappear off the face Of the earth because they think belief in god is a primitive thing or whatever reason they have they're not anti-semites they're ignorant but they're not anti-semites there's nothing hateful about opposing any ideology so even if you know if you make you can make a tree in my backyard your identity if that's how you want to identify but if it's in
my backyard i'm still allowed to cut it down And i'm not uh that's not a hate action against you i am allowed to disagree and oppose vehemently any ideology any choice that a person makes that i so choose what i cannot do is uh oppose a person or judge him based upon his essential characteristics just think of what our lives would be like if everybody can take any ideology they want and say well that's part of my identity and now guess what it's off Limits you're not allowed to criticize it you know what i'm an
orthodox jew being an anti-zionist is part of my identity so guess what they're not allowed to they're not allowed to disagree with anti-zionist see how it works it's very simple so even if you want it to be part of your identity that's fine but you need to accept if you Adopt zionism or any other ideology maybe communism or whatever it is as your ideology i'm sorry if you adopt any ideology zionism communism or anything as your identity go right ahead but you need to accept you are assuming the risk that other people are allowed to
oppose that ideology even if you consider Opposition to that ideology erasure of your identity that's your prerogative but it's somebody else's prerogative still to criticize any ideology that he wants you can't police and control people's thoughts by declaring some ideology to be identity secondly it's absolutely not true that um being a zionist is part of the identity of a jew I mean again there are plenty of jews who are not zionists there are plenty of jews who are anti-zionists that doesn't make them less of a jew all right now there's another argument that you've heard
we've all heard often and this argument is that without israel there will be another holocaust or that if there is another holocaust jews will need israel as a place of refuge therefore If someone is against israel he or she is against the only safety net that jews have against genocide that's another argument so this argument is wrong because that's a political opinion there are people who thought jews who thought that or communism once upon a time they thought is going to save the jews from anti-semitism communism is going to Treat everybody equally and there won't
be any anti-semitism anymore different people have different ideas of uh what's better or worse or safer not safe we see it all the time political parties argue about this all the time going to war not going to war if we do this this is the only people have ideas about science too there's uh global warming there's the uh environmentalists different people have Different opinions about what's going to save the world what's dangerous for jews they say the zionists say history prove this that's an opinion and a political opinion may be opposed so if somebody says
you know what i want zionism to disappear because i agree with that and i want all the jews to be killed of course he's an anti-semite but if somebody says i such as myself And such as many others i disagree with that israel is far from the only salvation for the jews the only safety net for the jews on the contrary zionism is a liability for the jews it's not worth the deaths in wars and terrorism and anti-semitism that is generated all over the world that's increased because of israel i don't see it and by
the way this is not This is not merely an anti-zionist opinion there are plenty of zionists that believe this as well like i have in front of me a book of lectures and conversations of rabbi dr joseph b sullivachik arguably the most prominent uh religious orthodox zionist authority of his time and perhaps of any time depends who you ask in this book somebody asked him if he believes now again this is the Certainly the greatest religious zionist orthodox authority of his time somebody asked him um does he think that israel could be a future of
judaism if america like we see germany and spain were destroyed that was the question so he says you mean physically destroyed do you want me to talk turkey or do you want me to be nice so the student says the truth here was his answer Imagine go america goes anti-semitic god forbid like germany in 1932. imagine america discontinues its aid to israel and supplies the arabs with all sophisticated weapons imagine that in addition to america it doesn't matter anyway that france and england go anti-semitic now you have to take into consideration the 100 million arabs
and arab-friendly russia how secure do you think israel will be so he didn't believe that israel is a Safe haven for jews it had you could be a zionist and not believe this political opinion you could be an anti-zionist uh be uh vehemently opposed to the ideology of zionism and all it stands for and believe this a particular opinion one it has nothing to do with the other but certainly it's only a political opinion and one may disagree with it without being accused of being anti-semitic see the problem is that zionists have from their youth
been Taught these things not as okay this is our opinion or this is even our religion knowing full well that there are others who have other religions you know i was brought up uh orthodox jew but i know that there are other religions out there that don't believe in orthodox judaism zionists are taught the zionist narrative and that things like history proved it this is it's axiomatic these are postulates and only anti-semites Don't believe this but they need to get out of that mindset they need to get used to the fact that zionism is just
a an ideology it's a set of opinions it's a set of ideas and others could oppose it that doesn't make them anti-semites all right uh there is another argument that we've heard that when people criticize Certain policies of many other states they are not criticizing the right of those states to exist but the argument is that when many anti-zionists criticize israeli policies they are criticizing the state of israel's right to exist and that is anti-semitic you're saying there's a double standard that if you cross okay That's a mistake um no problem uh let's not criticize
israel's right to exist nobody should do that criticize the policy here's the policy that israel is the state of the jews get rid of that policy that's all now the problem is that zionists will tell you that well if israel's not the state of the jews israel doesn't exist you see the difference between israel the criticism against Israel versus the criticism against other countries is this there are certainly countries that do worse than israel let's say north korea right north korea is worse than israel but north korea could solve its problem let's not focus on
how bad the problem is let's focus on what the solution needs to be if north korea wants to change its ways repent so the leader of north korea could one day say you know what I'm changing my mind i would like to change my policies so that'll be great or you get a new leader if you don't like him um in a democratic country you could de-elect somebody if you don't like one president you elect another in a non-democratic party there are other ways to get rid of the leader or the leader can change his
mind now north korea still remains north korea and it changed its policies i mean adolf hitler Was the biggest monster in the world right uh if adolf hitler would one day say you know what i changed my mind um i'm not going to kill jews anymore i'm not kill any i'm not going to kill anybody anymore i saw the error of my ways uh i'm repenting or hitler gets killed and some new leader takes his place which is which is what happened um germany is still germany it still exists and you solve the Problem all
when you criticize a country's policy what you mean is change the policy change the leader let the leader change his mind change the policy in israel's case the bad policy is that israel is a the state of the jews not the state of its citizens let me explain this when mayor kahana and john kerry and others have said You cannot have a jewish and democratic state what that means is that israel defines itself as the jewish state meaning the nation state of all the jews it defines itself not as the it's the only country in
the world that does this by the way every country in the world defines itself as the country of its citizens italy is the country that represents the italian citizens Uh france the french citizens america the american citizens israel is the only country in the world that says that israel is not the country of the israelis israel is the country of the jews okay meaning two things thing number one people who are not jews who are in israel by the israeli nation state law do not have Uh self-national self-determination rights um they have civil rights but
not national self-determination rights meaning it's not their country thing number two me i'm a jew i don't live in israel don't plan on living on israel in israel i'm not a citizen but it is my state naftali bennett said that the prime minister of israel's job is to be the leader of all world jewry he once said About netanyahu that uh excuse me was isaac herzog that referred to netanyahu who was the prime minister of all the jews netanyahu referred himself as a leader of all the jews when he came to congress he said he
had to to oppose um barack obama's uh iran deal he said he's here representing not only israel but all the jews there is no country in the world that claims to be anything other than the country of its citizens even an Italian american that once lived in italy italy doesn't claim to politically represent it any represent the italian americans anymore it doesn't demand loyalty it doesn't refer to it doesn't claim it represents them countries represent their citizens israel when israel declared itself in its declaration of independence a jewish state that's what it meant now it's
important to know that israel is the only country in the World like this this is this is what zionism is and really this is the reason why the head zionists and i'll give you a list in a moment claim anti-zionism is anti-semitism here netanyahu netanyahu wrote in his book a place among the nations that the reason anti-zionism is anti-semitism is because saying that i don't like israel i saying that i'm Against zionism but i'm for the jewish people is the same as saying i'm in favor of the american people i just wish america would not
exist in other words america is to the americans what israel is not to the israelis what israel is to the jews without zionism america's to the americans what israel is to the israelis zionism is an ideology that changes that Americas to the americans what zionism is to the jews i have infants not only netanyahu that said this on israel's own website mfa ministry of foreign affairs dot gov il there's an article from avigdor lieberman who's to netanyahu's right it's called the meaning of israel as the state of the jewish people he says quote the term
jewish state refers primarily to nationality Israel is to the jewish people what francis to the french people ireland is to the irish and japan is to the japanese danny i alone wrote an article called identifying with israel's national character he says that he explains to dignitaries quote i frequently tell visiting dignitaries who are similarly uncertain uncertain as to what jewish identity is That jews are to israel as chinese are to china and france is to the french now consider he's not saying that israel is to the jews in israel what francis to the french he's
saying that israel is to the jews in france what france is to the non-jews in france so france is comprised of jews and non-jews What francis to the non-jewish population and citizenry of france israel is to the jewish citizenry of france do we understand how insidious this is this is zionism by the way it's not only the right yara lapid had an interview in the huffington post he was asked whether it's possible to be anti-zionist but not anti-semitic his answer quote i think not i think it's camouflage israel is the Embodiment of the jewish spirit
that is zionism zionism claims that israel that japan is to the japanese what israel is to the jews a normal country without zionism would be the formula would be japan is to the japanese what israel is to the israelis now it's very simple israel's policy don't criticize its right to exist the policy that you want to criticize is That israel is the state of the jews not the state of the israelis simple guess what because zionism says that that is israel's identity and without that ideology israel doesn't exist they just like they claim that zionism
is part of jewish identity and without zionism the jew doesn't exist they claim without this policy israel would not exist fine if that's how You're going to look at it no problem but the the short answer to your question then is the difference between israel and all the other countries is all the other countries you could solve the problem with a policy change and the country will still remain the country if you change israel's problematic policy then israel as defined by the zionists no longer exists find me a way to change that policy the One
policy that's all i'm criticizing israel is a state of the jews it's not it's not my state israel is not the state of the jews now to give you an exam now that's really what zionism says now they try to hide this by the way even though it's on their websites and on their articles but when they bring that when they when they bring that accusation of anti-semitism that you Just mentioned they kind of define jewish state differently then it's really defined here's an example i'm going to share my screen hey this is avi meyer
we all know who he is on twitter to say that only a jewish nation state can't be a democracy while saying nothing of the sort regarding any of the dozens of other nation states with Distinct ethnic religious majorities is plainly anti-semitic well that's true except that that's not what a jewish state means a jewish state doesn't mean a state with a jewish majority a jewish state means a state that must act to maintain its jewish majority means that it claims that it is the state of all jews all over the world there is there are
many muslim states you know israel claims they have so many muslim states And only one jewish state but there is not a single muslim state that's a muslim state in the sense that israel claims to be the jewish one there is no muslim state that claims to represent all muslims to be the nation state of all muslims all over the world the definition of israel as the jewish state as stated by israel's own ministers and ambassadors is that israel is to the jews not to the israeli citizens israel is to the jews Outside of israel
and israel is to only the jews inside of israel which japan is to the japanese and italy is to the italians if you move to israel if you move to italy you have become a citizen you have children there they have grandchildren they have great grandchildren you can become an italian and you're an italian like anybody else we're all americans and some time ago Our ancestors moved here right and you could become an italian national an american national a french national but you can go to israel become a citizen live there 20 generations all have
everybody serving the army be the most loyal israeli citizen but guess what you're still not a jew the italian becomes an italian because of italy the french become american becomes an american because of america but Israel will deny the national status to somebody unless he is jewish according to whatever definition israel has that's the problem change that policy but guess what once you change that policy you've changed israel's identity rabbi shapiro there's another way it seems to me that zionists have tried to put their argument about anti-s about anti-semitism about anti-zionism being anti-semitism And this
similar argument is that anti-zionism denies the peoplehood of the jewish nation as david hirsch has put it and to be fair he says of course it depends upon the context but the claim here is that any possible state of israel would necessarily be a racist endeavor he says that's the anti-zionist approach that would be an extraordinary claim to make it would be criticism not of israeli policy but of jewish peoplehood per se Quite unlike that levied against any other people and it could for sure in certain contexts be anti-semitic well you know yeah i saw
that that that's in that fathom journal that many of the other defenders of the ihra definition wrote in and when i saw it i actually chuckled the idea that denying a jewish peoplehood meaning the Political peoplehood of the jewish people not just merely being a religion that's what he means the national peoplehood of the jewish people is anti-semitic i i smiled when i saw that because at the beginning of that publication they have a whole bunch of these blurbs praising the fathom organization um and the first of the blurbs is by vinery okay Uh soma
vinery one of the top political scientists um in israel now wrote a book which i have on my lap now called the making of modern zionism and in it he explains the following zionism was the most fundamental revolution in jewish life it substituted a secular self-identity of the jews as a nation for the traditional and Orthodox self-identity in religious terms later he says in the chapter about uh gretz gretz's position is enormous and revolutionary the jews are a people a nation not just a community of faith they have a history and a jewish national history
has a meaning within the structure of world history judaism moreover has a political content as well As its religious belief system and the messianic dimension of judaism has clear political connotations inextricably connected with palestine a little later on on the page he says quote perhaps more than any other person gretz contributed to the view of the jews as a nation today his historical method can rightly be criticized as inadequate and highly slanted yet it educated a whole class of modern secularized jews to view their Own history in terms relevance to a modern secular and highly
politicized world the idea that the jews are a political people that the jews are in nationality is a modern construct it was an innovation of zionism now gretz wasn't a typical zionist but the reason why avineri put him in that book was because he like he said was the one more than anything anybody else that contributed To this zionist idea of the jews as a nation zionism at its core makes two claims claim number one the jews are nationality claim number two israel is the nation-state of that nationality so first denying the jewish nationhood denying
the national peoplehood of the jewish people is not anti-semitic in fact it's what people believed before zionism now This by the way is the biggest orthodox jewish opposition to zionism yeah i want to play you a clip now of uh a mullaine phillips who was involved in a debate in england as to whether anti-zionism is anti-semitism and she also as deborah lipstadt did previously addresses the problem that zionists have that they are orthodox jewish anti-zionists listen now people say anti-zionism can't be Anti-semitism because some jews are anti-zionist very true but in fact they have always
been jewish anti-semites karl marx to name but one who wrote quote the emancipation of the jews is the emancipation of mankind from judaism yes a small fringe of ultra-orthodox jews campaigned against the state of israel but they nevertheless pray every day that the jews should return to live in zion free of foreign rule their beef is they think the return in Israel is premature and should happen under different conditions so their problem is a matter of timing let me assure you that is absolutely untrue as a proud member of this alleged fringe group of orthodox
uh anti-zionists i can tell you that she's completely misrepresenting our position while it is true that it is prohibited by a law by jewish law to create a state run state governed by jews um nowadays that is not The main objection of orthodox jews to zionism that's a objection to creating a state of israel but first of all the what we pray for what emily phillips is it claims that we're looking for a state of israel just at a different time is absolutely false what israel is Doesn't resemble in the slightest what we pray for
we're not we are not praying for self-determination political independence not at all we are praying for a messianic renewal of the world where the wolf will lay down with the lamb and the entire world will see the glory of god god himself will be running the world he will be the ruler of the world and on the throne will be a resurrected from the dead king david That's precisely what we pray for that's the words of the prayers god should establish the kingdom of david meaning a resurrected king david and our religious law and theological
authorities tell us that what this means is that absent any of those requirements absent uh resurrected king david on the throne absent god's uh rev the revelation of god's glory to everybody in the world we Are not asking for anything less we are not asking for it we are not asking for political self-determination by the way when she talks about foreign rule zionist rule would also be considered foreign rule we are talking about a a complete religious messianic experience not a question of timing what we are praying for bears no resemblance no resemblance at all
to what israel is and it has nothing to Do with political self-determination in the sense that she means not at all now but the me that wasn't even the main objection of orthodox juice to zionism the main objection was and there's nothing with satmar although the samurai does state this but it's not only him in the knesset ichamaya levine the mk of the agoda one of the uh orthodox parties that's in the Government mentioned it as well and it was it was mentioned from the beginning of zionism the main objection to zionism even if there
wasn't a state even before they created a state of israel is that zionism redefines jewish identity as national jewish identity according to orthodox judaism is created by the religion god Gave the jews the torah at mount sinai very that's our story god gave the jews the torah if you change the conception of god the pagan idol worshipers you obviously created another religion if you change our conception of the law you make a new testament that's another religion and if you can change our conception of the jewish people from somebody and a society a people that
was created at Mount sinai today you have become a people the bible says and our talmud explains that means at the giving of the torah because of being a jew is a job description that it's the responsibility somebody who carries the responsibilities of fulfilling the mitzvos of the commandments of god he's a jew the idea that the jews are a political nationality such as the french or the japanese Is considered idol worship it's a form of idol worship and a different religion according to judaism and that means that zionism even before they created a state
even if there wouldn't be a state of israel the idea that the jews or nationality is opposed by the orthodox jews so so first of all and by other other jews as well by the way not only the orthodox so first of all um Jewish peoplehood is manifest in ways other than politics and nationality and to deny it is not only not anti-semitic it's actually judaism she compared uh orthodox she compared jewish anti-semites to karl marx the difference is that karl marx was declared an anti-semite because he opposed judaism we are being declared anti-semites or
maybe the jury's out on that Because we practice and believe in judaism that's the big difference and no it is not axiomatic it is not true that if somebody opposes the jewish peoplehood he's an anti-semite and and in fact the idea of jewish peoplehood was invented by gretz and the zionists i recently in the jerusalem post the historian gil troy um was very blunt in making this statement that i'm going to read and uh then i'd like you to Comment the brutal lashing out of jews because of the actions of the jewish state shows there
is an overlap between anti-zionism and anti-semitism end quote um yeah it shows there's an overlap but that doesn't mean that anti-zionism is anti-semitism the reason why people lashed out at jews because of what happened in gaza was Because people wrongly believe that well what netanyahu said what i think the lieberman said um what danny i alone said israel is to the jews what japan is to the japanese so here's how this works if somebody if america bombs afghanistan the afghanis are going to be angry at the americans if japan bombs the united states the americans
are going to be angry at the japanese Now it's criminal to attack a non-combatant uh japanese because of what the government his government did and it's criminal to attack an american if you're in afghani because of what the american government did attacking and violence against non-combatants is always criminal however there are criminals out there and there Are bad actors out there and there will be people that will beat up chinese people because of a virus that came from china that's criminal and there are criminals that will do that but it's insane and absurd to beat
up irish people because of a virus that came from china nobody would do that because what do the irish have to do With the chinese virus again it's criminal to beat up a chinese person because of the virus it's disgusting criminal and despicable but nobody it's insane to beat up an irish person because of that and therefore if somebody when when israel is at war with gaza and people support gaza normally if not for zionism people would be angry at israel and israelis and Again it will be criminal to attack an incompetent israeli because of
what israel did but it will be insane to attack american or european jews because of what israel did i am not israeli and i am not palestinian i am as much connected with the war between israel and gaza as i am as an irish person is it save for the fact that israel conflates consistently conflates the Jews with with zionism and the jews with israel so what what do you expect the bad actors to do when they are jews that uh at antis anti-anti-semitism rallies in the streets in america waving israeli flags what do you
expect these criminals to do when netanyahu when uh naftali bennett when avigdor lieberman when yaya lapid says that israel is the country of the jews what do you expect criminals to do bad actors to do When israel and the zionists say that japan is to the japanese what israel is to the jews and of course statistics show you could look it up in the cancer centers they can't it's television university's cancer center uh for anti-semitism they put out reports every year i didn't see this year's report yet but it's pretty obvious that uh whenever israel
we saw this by the gaza war this time and i Remember by the last gaza war they said that whenever israel does something controversial anti-semitic attacks go up and the reason they mention the reason because people conflate jews with israel but how why would they not conflate jews with israel seeing that israel and zionists are constantly insisting that people do so so yes it shows that there's an overlap of course there's an overlap All right let me give you let let me present one more um uh kind of argument that is made it's a little
bit different this one is an argument that was made by ron dermer who was the israeli ambassador to the united states and i'm cody if a couple has a conversation about whether or not they should have children whether they can afford children whether They have the disposition to be good parents that conversation is legitimate before the couple has any kids after the children are born that discussion becomes immoral similarly 75 years ago before the modern state of israel was born it was legitimate to have conversations as many did about whether or not a jewish state
should be established particularly if that state would have to quote Live by the sword end quote and engage in the quote dirty business end quote of statehood today however to suggest that the jewish state of israel has no right to exist is immoral and anti-semitic end quote um no that doesn't that doesn't make any sense um the reason why it's immoral to kill a baby is because a baby is a human being And human beings have rights countries are political constructs and countries don't have rights the soviet union didn't have rights when people said it
should be dismantled i remember i used to say the soviet union should be dismantled and by the way that didn't mean that i had anything personal against any of the citizens of the soviet union i just thought it would be better for them and for the world if the soviet union would change the regime and Become a different country czechoslovakia east and west germany do these countries have rights countries don't have rights people do so for example let's use his his analogy of a parents uh deciding whether they should have a kid if the parents
themselves decide that they don't want a kid they change their minds obviously they can't murder the kid either right that's the same as anybody else murdering the kid in fact It would be considered uh a more heinous crime let's say on the other hand all the citizens of israel and referendum unanimously and not only israel all over the world jews non-jews the entire world would decide you know what let's peacefully dismantle israel would you say that with ron dermer say that no israel has a right to exist the way babies have rights to live and
Therefore it would be immoral for the world who wants israel dismantled to dismantle that's insane you know countries don't have rights people's people have rights if somebody says that israel israeli citizens have the right to live in peace 100 percent uh but that a country should be compared to a human being that's very strange All right one last consideration based on your knowledge of the dynamics between zionism and anti-semitism do you have any suggestions regarding how to a reduce anti-jewish attacks that are perpetrated by enemies of israel and b how to protect zionist students from
anti-israel harassment on campus which is a charge that zionists make repeatedly Okay well how to prevent israel's enemies from attacking jews so again i i want to say that obviously uh even if they attack israelis you can't attack non-combatants that's vile that's a crime but again nobody would attack irish people israel's enemies would not attack irish people and what we need to do therefore is to break that formula that crooked Formula that false formula that japan is to the japanese what israel is to the jews and replace it with the truth japan is to the
japanese what israel is to the israelis if there is a zionist that chooses to adopt zionism and claim that israel is his country then that's his choice but jews as jews need to declare to the entire world that Israel doesn't represent the jews israel is israel and jews are jews look there are many jews who on one way or another in one way or another are zionists although uh anecdotally when people tell me they're zionists i ask them do you agree with the statement that japan is to the japanese what israel is to the jews
and many of them say no no no i wouldn't agree with that so the definition of zionist is like it's they're all over The map but what we need to do we need to explain to the world that israel does not represent the jews zionism is not judaism and therefore anti-zionism is not anti-semitism so if somebody's angry at israel again it's criminal to attack non-combatants but it would be insane to attack jews because they're Jews because somebody's angry at israel that's the first step to explain to the world that israel doesn't represent the jews second
question you asked there are zionist students who are being attacked for being zionists not for being jews that's the second half of this equation and that's criminal and they need to be protected i'm not and i i'm not an expert i must admit in campus security so i'm unable To give you advice in that area but i will tell you this a great rabbi once said that it's better to have a good question than a bad answer and how to protect those students is a good question there are many things that could probably be done
but one thing that absolutely should not be done is to make anti-zionism into anti-semitism because that is a very bad answer Thank you you
