Monday, May 09, 2022
Elder of Ziyon
The article was not impressive. Its lies and arguments echoed thousands of similar articles written over the years by similarly uninformed Jews. Its logic was flawed, it can't get basic definitions correct, it twists and ignored history, just like articles I read every day in Arab media as well as in Western Leftist media.
Why did this bother me so much?
Upon reflection, I realized why I am disgusted by anti-Zionist Jews: They claim to be acting under rules of Jewish morality at the very same time they are ripping apart the actual rules of Jewish morality.
In this case, the author writes that, to her, being Jewish means "always speaking the truth and following my heart in the search for justice."
This is not at all true. Justice in Judaism is based entirely on facts and not at all on what is in ones' "heart." One's heart may be an excellent source of mercy and kindness, but it is an extremely poor arbiter of justice. Jewish law goes to great lengths to ensure that those brought before a judge are treated strictly according to the facts of the case, and the judge cannot favor one side for any external reason.
Invariably, the Jewish concepts that anti-Zionists rely on are not particularly Jewish at all. They are general social justice principles that have been repurposed as Jewish attributes, often giving them the Hebrew name "tikkun olam" that has nothing to do with what the term actually means.
These critics love the accident of birth that allows them to invoke their Jewishness. But while some of them may be Jewish in the legal or self-defining sense, they are missing the essence of what being a Jew means.
To be a Jew is to be a member of a tribe. It is to be part of a family. And anti-Zionists have cast themselves out of that role.
If you have a sibling or a child who is accused of a crime, what do you do? Do you automatically believe the charges, or do you ask them their side of the story? Do you believe the media reports or what the close relatives say? Do you go to the media yourself and condemn them, or do you support them - or at the very least suspend judgment until you can find out more?
Real families/tribes stick together and don't accept what outsiders say about them. They know how easily others can misunderstand their dynamics, their motives, their emotions, their mindset, and the larger context.
A real Jewish concept is to give the benefit of the doubt to your people, not to blindly accept what the New York Times is saying before listening to what your own family members say.
The writer of the article I mentioned creates a definition of Zionism that has no relationship to what the term actually means. She writes this with a confidence of the truly ignorant or the malice of the purposeful liar. What she emphatically doesn't do is find an actual Zionist or original Zionist writing that agrees with her lies. Her hateful narrative trumps the truth.
How many of Israel's Jewish accusers have ever read an IDF Military Advocate General report? Comparing the reports of an Amnesty, an HRW or the New York Times with a report by Israel's MAG on incidents where Israel is accused of war crimes is like comparing a high school paper on the Civil War with a thousand page book written by an expert on the era. The outsiders don't understand the details of what happened and take guesses that are invariably anti-Israel; the IDF knows the circumstances but has little incentive to reveal its intelligence sources. A member of the tribe would seek out Israel's side of the story and compare it, in detail, with the accusations and find that the accusers are nearly always wrong. The Jewish anti-Zionists want the MAG reports to be buried or dismissed without being read, because they are enemies of the truth.
How many of Israel's Jewish accusers have ever read an entire Israeli High Court ruling on a topic like Sheikh Jarrah or Masafer Yatta? They confidently claim that Israel is biased, without examining the actual legal reasonings of the court and seeing if the court made an error. Israel's High Court judges are experts and not easily refuted - which is why the anti-Zionists simply dismiss them. They couldn't win an actual argument.
A real member of a tribe would seek out the answers and find out that Israel is almost invariably right against its accusers. Pretenders who have no interest in being members of the tribe invoke their Jewishness to buttress their lazy and accusatory opinions - but their real interest in Judaism is as shallow as their anti-Israel arguments are.
The Wicked Son of the Passover Seder emotionally separates himself from his tribe - but he is still part of the family at the seder.
The Jewish anti-Zionists are far worse than the wicked son. They attack their own families and denounce them to the world. They are like the Jewish converts to Christianity who spread the blood libel. Both use their Jewishness to attack their tribe and to give themselves credibility with those who want to see the Jewish people destroyed. They lie to ingratiate themselves with the enemies of Israel, hoping that this will make them accepted as one of them. (It never works.)
That is why they are loathsome.
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