by Virginia Kruta

Cruz’s response got straight to the point: “If this is a student, she should be expelled. If this is a #Columbia professor, she should be fired. No university should allow one member of the community to advocate the murder of other members of the community.”

Cruz was not alone in his sentiments, as others flooded X with comments on the photo. AG added a second post, saying, “This image also made me think of a great line I saw from @neontaster the other day: The difference between a radical anti-Zionist and a moderate anti-Zionist is that a radical anti-Zionist wants to kill you, and a moderate anti-Zionist wants a radical anti-Zionist to kill you.”

“This was the least of it. At least one Jewish student was attacked at Yale. Several Jewish students were threatened at Columbia,” AG added in another post. “There are videos of the crowds threatening violence, telling Jews to go back to Europe, cheering terrorism, celebrating the American flag being taken down. This is all happening on 2 American campuses. It’s clear that these campuses are clearly not safe for Jewish students right now and not particularly productive for others as they have been taken over by antisemitic and pro-terrorist mobs. This is all coordinated and well-funded by some national activist groups, but the schools allowed for it to get to this place by allowing those involved to keep pushing the line/normalizing such behavior and they hired faculty/administrators who encourage it. Now it’s up to these schools to figure out how to address these mobs. It’s their problem because their reputations are on the line and their failures that led us here. If they refuse to address it, they should face civil rights investigations, lawsuits from students, and permanent reputations loss.”

If you support blatant antisemitism such as Molotov cocktails being thrown at a synagogue (IN BERLIN GERMANY, NOT ISRAEL) then you should get curb stomped. U people say “punch a Nazi” until it’s actually time to punch a Nazi and stand up for Jewish people. Some of you are not anti-Zionist you are 100% anti-Jew.

Goyim who reblog and internalize this message will get my eternal thank you!

Wanting to only give back the West Bank and Gaza to Palestinians while continuing to occupy the rest of historic Palestine and not allowing the Palestinian refugees who were ethnically-cleansed from there to return doesn't make a person any less of a Zionist from those who want to continue occupying all of Palestine from the river to the sea, no matter how much they swear they are not a Zionist.

“Hamas was hiding in those hospitals and schools” “Israel is only defending itself” “this issue is complicated” “Hamas started the conflict” “Israel still has a right to exist” “what about Jews and the Holocaust” “There are so many rumours going around” “Do you condemn Hamas”These are all arguments I have been given whenever I get upset over what is being done in Gaza, by my own family nonetheless. As a Jew, and especially from the perspective of a culture that has suffered this over and over, how fucking hard is it for you to understand that NONE OF THAT FUCKING MATTERS ANYMORE. NONE of these arguments matter because Israel refused to stop when it’s hostages were returned, it has used highly illegal weapons like white phosphorus bombs, it’s leaders have STATED how the Palestinians are “human animals” and how their aim is absolute destruction, the entire first world is funding this genocide, Palestine can’t even fight back, etc etc. even if any of their arguments were true, it just doesn’t matter in the face of this genocide. How can you debate the reasoning behind any of this when your response should be THEY HAVE KILLED OVER TEN THOUSAND MEN, WOMEN, AND CHILDREN, AND THE DESTRUCTION NEEDS TO STOP. None of these issues matter. THEY ARE DESTROYING EVERYTHING. As a Jew, it disgusts me how my own family can stand by and debate while watching another people go through what they went through. IT DOES NOT MATTER. STOP TALKING. START ACTING.

THE LATEST CASUALTY FIGURE IS 10,177. THE NUMBER IS GROWING AS WE SPEAK. THERE IS NO ROOM FOR DEBATE HERE.

feel free to reblog this with resources to help Palestinians and stop the bombings in Gaza.

if you can understand the difference between a communist and a tankie you can understand the difference between a socialist/cultural/reform Zionist and a revolutionary/radical Zionist

i’ve been trying to stay off social media in general but honestly nothing has radicalized me like this has. i think about it constantly. i’ve never been on the verge of tears almost constantly because of anything in the news before

being anti-zionist is NOT anti-semitic. however, believing israel is uniquely evil (compared to other countries who do equally horrible things), and/or controls the world, IS anti-semitic

If you’re an anti Zionist outside of Palestine, you should also be working to make your country safe for Jews so they don’t have a reason to move to israel. This includes being anti fascist, which includes working to deplatform fascists and their friends.

still thinking about how my hebrew is generally comprehensible, and I prefaced the word in english several times, i.e. "a common religious framework is that jews currently live in diaspora, in exile, in גלות, and pray for the end of galut through the ingathering of exiles to EY" but still got these israelim going "what is that word?" like girl,,, the goyim out here (with some non-zero orientalism) prioritize orthodox communities for being "authentic jews" and you don't know how to engage with the most basic religious zionist talking points. how are we going to convince nice goyische liberals that support for palestinian liberation is a moral imperative if we can't speak to that morality in both religious and social justice terms

honestly i think a HUGE part of the issue is that most of the left doesn't really understand antisemitism

after wwii it became wildly Unpopular to be blatantly antisemitic. obviously, it still happened. but the result of this is that instead of antisemitism being studied as a historical and pervasive form of oppression that has been around for thousands of years & has many many precedents BEFORE the holocaust.... it became:

something just simply Rude to say or do. if you're a polite liberal/conservative or a leftist, it's just something that is socially unacceptable. there is no real weight to this.

something when FIRMLY believed is ONLY held by people like nazis and white supremacists. who, as we know, are The Enemy and none of us can ever be like them at all ever by the virtue of... not being them. no need to watch your own behaviors, bc you are not a nazi! only nazis could ever be Actually antisemitic

something that erupted out of the ground in germany in the early 20th century, culminated with the holocaust, and ended after. antisemitism did not exist before that and it was solved after when the saving grace of the united states and england liberated the jews from the nazis out of the goodness of their hearts

however absolutely none of this is true. antisemitism stretches back thousands of years and it has not, for the most part, been only "fringe" conspiracy theorists and white supremacists who perpetuate it

antisemitism has been, by and large, presented as very logical. throughout, again, the thousands of years of history of antisemitism, very regular people have been antisemites. and most of them had reasons they felt were perfectly logical and understandable and most of all just. jews were trying to kill their children, of course they hated them! jews were purposefully trying to keep them poor, of course they hated them! jews believed Wrong Things and were morally and spiritually corrupt, of course there was something wrong with them. jews betrayed their country, lost them a war that ended with their husbands and brothers and sons dead, and now were living among them and taking advantage of social benefits out of the goodness of the hearts of the german people, of COURSE they hated them! and the nazis themselves were backed up by science at the time. scientific racism was THE science at the time. charles darwin was a scientific racist. it was all very logical.

and did jews actually do these things? no. but these people saw enough proof that aligned well enough with their morals and their beliefs and their fears & so to them it was completely logical and justified. it wasn't a fringe theory that only an insane person would believe in, or something impolite. it was true to them. to their morals, to their fears, to their core beliefs. it was true.

and so now we see a LOT. a lot of leftists being dragged ass first into antisemitism. because they don't even think they CAN be antisemitic. THEY aren't nazis and THEY aren't white supremacists, of COURSE they aren't antisemitic. but... well. the jews are doing things that go against their morals. they're doing things that validate their fears. the jews are violating things that go against their core beliefs! so of COURSE it is LOGICAL that they should hate them. of course, it is still rude to say "the jews are evil" so it gets replaced with "zionist". (and before you ask yes i am anti-zionism and do deeply believe what israel is doing is unjust and cruel) but even that is slipping.

it is getting all the more popular to go that one step further and instead of just making posts like "spam the hanukkah tag because the Zionists need to learn what their religion stands for" that are blatantly just replacing "jews" with "zionists", they are logically moving to being mask off. if zionism is wrong and half the world's remaining jewish population lives in israel, what about the rest? aren't they suspect? would they not ALL commit atrocities if given the chance? aren't they all racist for believing they're an ethnicity? aren't they all complicit? aren't they all threatening our deeply held leftist beliefs? it's a little weird and everyone has been too quiet for too long bc it's been rude to say but now you can get 300k notes for posting blood libel so why would you keep quiet anymore?

why WOULDN'T you just say "thank god someone finally said it i was worried about stepping on toes" when someone makes a post full of antisemitic conspiracy theory. why WOULDN'T you say "i don't care if all of israel gets bombed and every single person dies after this lmfao they deserve it"? (which would wipe out, again, half the world's population of jews- many of whom living there are anti-zionist and actively protesting their government. or. you know. children.) why WOULDN'T you make posts about how jewish identity is just nazi aryanism? why wouldn't you make posts about how the jews are privileged in america bc they run hollywood and the economy? why WOULDN'T you say the star of david is a hate symbol to you now and that you mistrust anyone using it? or that you find anyone speaking hebrew suspect?

these are all perfectly logical. to you. and YOU are not a nazi or a white supremacist. so it can't be antisemitic.

Clearly, y'all don't care about Jews, and the fact that Hamas is violently antisemitic doesn't seem matter to any of you. So let me go with a new approach, of equal truth and value. Hamas is violently anti-Palestinian.

This past week, Hamas attacked evacuation routes and prevented Gazan citizens from fleeing an active warzone. [1]

They did that because they routinely use Gazan civilians as human shields. Hamas intentionally builds military targets close to schools, hospitals, and mosques, putting soft targets in the way of both incoming and outgoing fire. Hamas encourages Gazan civilians and children to stand on the roofs of buildings they know the IDF is targeting. [2]

Hamas has refused to allow elections in Gaza since 2006. Not just Palestinian National Authority elections, mind you. No open elections for any office have been held in seventeen years. Palestinian rights to free elections and self-determination have been denied by Hamas. [3] (And good luck to anyone who tries to blame that on Israel, because elections were held by the PNA in the West Bank in 2012, 2017, 2021 and 2022. It's Hamas's intention alone to purge democracy.)

Hamas's track record on human rights is appalling. Palestinian prisoners in Gaza face unfair trials and death sentences after being tortured by police. Palestinian women are prevented from accessing the legal systems to escape domestic abuse situations. Political dissidents in Hamas, even ones who merely support the other half of the Palestinian government, have been summarily executed. [4] [5]

Peaceful organizers in Palestine protested Hamas's massive tax hikes in 2019. Hamas security forces responded by assaulting demonstrators, tracking them down, raiding their homes, and detaining them. And, as previously mentioned, prisoners in Gaza are not treated well by Hamas. [6]

Edit Nov.5, 10:30 PM: I forgot to add arguably the most important thing-- Hamas manipulates the humanitarian aid they receive away from helping Gazans and toward killing Jews. 5% of Hamas's budget actually gets used for humanitarian aid, while 55% goes to military use. Construction equipment intended to rebuild Gaza's crumbling infrastructure is used to build a complex series of underground tunnels. Those tunnels in turn are used to smuggle Iranian military equipment into the country. They were also used for human trafficking in the October 7th attacks. [7]

If you actually want Palestinians to be free, you can't just replace Israel with Hamas. But it's not like they're the only option for supporting Palestinian liberation. While Fatah doesn't have an immaculate historical track record, it now operates as a leftist, democratic socialist, secular Palestinian government that fights for a two-state solution. Similarly, Arab-Israeli political parties like the Hadash-Ta'al coalition support leftist, anti-Zionist, and two-state solutions from within the Israeli parliament.

You can and should support Palestinian liberation movements that abuse neither Jewish nor Arab human rights and dignities. Plenty of them exist out there. But if y'all continue to throw your weight behind an antisemitic and anti-democratic terrorist regime, Palestinians and Jews will both take note of exactly where you stand.

to be clear: what is your stance on i/p conflict

my stance is this:

Both ethnic palestinians and jews have the right to live in the land of Israel as its native people. Jews have lived in Israel for over 3,000 years, and Palestinians have roughly 1,000 years of history there as well.

Hamas' war is a holy war, and their "win" would be the eradication of Jews from our holy land

Israel is not being careful enough in their assault of Hamas: yes, Hamas launches missiles from refugee camps and hospitals and schools, and yes, even by Hamas' numbers Israel only kills 0.8 people per missile, but there is wayyyyyy to much collateral damage.

A ceasefire only means Israel stops defending itself in any capacity, and Hamas continues attacking Israel. It's happened almost 20 times this decade. Hamas doesn't want a ceasefire, they want a concession and then a genocide.

Benjamin Netanyahu should be removed from office, as most of Israel has been asking him to do since summer and earlier.

These are all facts that have been well documented over the past few months and the past few decades.

And that's my "stance"

An end to the conflict needs to happen, but it needs to include the dissolution of Hamas.

sorry for the word salad, but too many Jews are being deemed "zionists" (that word has been distorted on social media these past few months too) simply being anti-hamas.

In the broader world, you see organizations like BDS which maps Jewish communities which has led to schools and temples receiving bomb threats, JVP which has condoned calls for genocide against Jews, and University of Toronto which banned kosher foods. And this is widely accepted, and opponents of these are also called "zionists."

I know that's a lot, but I've been following the I/P conflict and antisemitism for a long time now, and that's the Jewish experience.

Let's talk about Israeli cuisine.

Unfortunately, I have less experience with it than I should, as it looks absolutely delicious, but I've never had any. Diaspora Jew in a place with few Jews or Israelis moment :(. And I'm talking less about Israeli cuisine and more about how it's perceived--namely how it's taken from Israelis, denigrated as 'not Israeli', as having been 'stolen' from Arab cuisine as a part of a broader project of 'cultural conquest'. Looking at you, Joseph Massad.

This assertion is not only a bald-faced lie, it is also deeply antisemitic. People have the right to make food. Nobody's going to call a non Italian racist for making or eating Italian food. Nor would an Italian be culturally appropriating if they eat sushi. Yet Jews and Israelis are stealing if they make Middle Eastern food?

More than that, though, it ignores Jewish history. Jews have lived in the Middle East for... as long as homo sapiens have lived in the Middle East? Mizrahim, who make up most of Israel's population, did not grow out of the ground in Israel from 1948-1979. They were expelled, violently chased out of the Muslim-majority countries they had lived for millennia. Before then, they sustained themselves on falafel, couscous, hummus, tahini, halva, shawarma, and every Middle Eastern food under the sun. If there were such a thing as the 'right' to make food, they'd absolutely have it.

But it's instead 'colonization', 'cultural appropriation', and 'cultural conquest'? To bring the culinary practices they and their ancestors had been practicing since Judaism began to the only country that had thrown open their doors to them? After experiencing pogroms, riots, anti-Jewish legislation, the world once sat by and did nothing to stop it. Again. And then members of these countries have the gall--the audacity and sheer disrespect--to accuse them of pilfering their own fucking culture?? After violently kicking them out???

Like, it blows my mind how many injustices Israelis are subjected to by moronic protestors who think 'Zionism is racism' or whatever. Every time someone posts about Zionist colonization of Palestinian food and culture, they're ironically themselves indulging in cultural erasure. The fact that Palestinians often make the same foods isn't indicative of a supposed Zionist plot to exterminate Palestinians and steal their culinary practices, but rather reflective of their shared origins as being Middle Eastern. But these online 'activists' don't care--nor do they care that the implied 'Zionist plot' that runs through their claims is textbook antisemitism.

Middle Eastern food is widespread in Middle Eastern countries. When Middle Eastern people get kicked out of Middle Eastern countries and go to another Middle Eastern country, they make... Middle Eastern food. Shocking, I know.

It isn't stealing. It isn't cultural appropriation.

Now, gut shabbos everyone.

academia is often used as the forefront of much of the violence inflicted on palestinians — for example in the library of congress, there is a collection called "the american colony of jerusalem" with racist photography and items that help visually perpetuate the "people without a land, land without a people" part of herzel's ideology, which itself is the forefront of much of zionist ideology. pointing out the systematic harm in academia is often considered "irrelevant" by zionists.... denies the origins of zionism as a political and academic ideology with physical consequences.

much of palestinian history throughout the last century has to do with erasure and silencing — that is how we got to this point. when i say no one listened to palestinians i mean NO ONE listened. they were ignored. all their demands were unreasonable. instead they get blamed for much of the world's unwillingness to listen. even my family members — i have stories of their work in academic resistance since '48. and some of them are well known contributions throughout euro-american and swana society. yet they're still ignored because of their palestinian origin.

"if you were just more reasonable" or "if you took the time to listen with compassion" or "you have to appeal to people's sense of reason" ignores the fact of the matter — this ideology's founding principals were built on "a people without a land for a land without a people." you cannot and should not ignore that. in order to complete the zionist ideology, you must remove the native population. therefore any subscribers to the idea of zionism are violent, whether they intend it or not.

and if it were true, that academia were irrelevant.... then that doesn't explain the systematic torture and imprisonment of writers and scholars, the exile of my family members who were journalists and activists, the captivity of friends for no other reason than they were deemed a threat by some list or the other.

oftentimes zionists, or zionist sympathizers, ignore our (diaspora's) material ties to the occupation and dismiss us as being "disconnected" from the "situation" in Palestine and "misunderstanding" or "misconstruing" israeli society. what am i misunderstanding exactly? that the origins of this "country" relies on violent displacement and exile? that for the past 75 years, that violence has not stopped once? that no matter what we say about the violence of zionism as an intrinsic aspect, it takes a secondary seat to the imagined realities of zionism?

therefore, anti-zionism is the logical conclusion for valuing palestinian lives. but what are the arguments against anti-zionism? that arab governments expelled jews from SWANA? do you think that's a result of anti-zionism? then you must not understand that palestinians are often treated poorly by the same governments that claim to have done this in the name of "anti-zionism," living in poverty in refugee camps, tortured and arrested, even in some cases exiled by governments. this also neglects to mention zionist collaboration with said governments to exile the jews of their lands.

so then, what?

if anti-zionism is the rejection of the settler colonial state of israel, which you must admit to be truly anti-zionist, then it is an exclamation of palestinian sovereignty and identity. so when you say anti-zionism and antisemitism are linked.... do you realize what you are implying? do you realize that zionism, the root cause of palestinian suffering, is the reason for our expulsion and displacement? so then when you write academic thinkpieces about the "complexity" of zionism, do you realize the harm you're doing? do you realize that this, in fact, is not a new or useful argument? that i've seen iterations of it for years and years? that at the core, the zionist ideology relies on this muddying of the waters for you to not do anything?

to be frank, your constant reminding of the complexity of zionism when people in palestine are suffering from the material effects of it only scream, to me, utter contempt and selfishness. zionism is violence, to me and my family. it is violence for every palestinian in this world. you must admit that to be a sincere advocate for palestinians, otherwise your words ring hollow. the present reality outweighs any possibilities.

since zionists want to act obtuse about why we're criticizing a superbowl ad, here's an explanation from before the ad even aired. it was openly designed to act as pro-genocide propaganda. fighting antisemitism is a worthy goal but that's not what's happening here:

"The New England Patriots’ 81-year-old owner, Robert Kraft, writes seven-digit checks to the right-wing Israeli lobbying machine AIPAC, but his personal, political, and financial ties to Israel run deeper than the occasional donation. The multibillionaire married his late wife, Myra, in Israel in 1963 when Kraft, then 22, was older than the nation itself. Together they set up numerous business, athletic, and charitable ties to Israel, a record of which is proudly proclaimed on the Kraft company website. In particular, the Kraft Group boasts of its 'Touchdown in Israel' program, where NFL players are given free, highly organized vacations to see 'the holy land' and come back to spread the word about 'the only democracy in the Middle East.' (Not every NFL player has chosen to take part.) Kraft also attends fundraisers for the Israel Defense Forces, currently—and in open view of the world—committing war crimes in Gaza."

Now, as Israel wages war against the civilians of Gaza—more than 25,000 Palestinian have been killed with at least 10,000 of them children—Kraft is again flexing his financial and political muscles in order to defend the indefensible. His Foundation to Combat Antisemitism (FCAS) will be spending an estimated $7 million to buy a Super Bowl ad titled 'Stop Jewish Hate' that will be seen by well over 100 million people. Under Kraft’s direction, the ad’s goal is to create a propaganda campaign to counter the reports and images from Gaza that young people are consuming on social media. 

... The content of the Super Bowl ad is not yet known, but FCAS has afforded Kraft the opportunity to make the rounds on cable news saying things like, 'It’s horrible to me that a group like Hamas can be respected and people in the United States of America can be carrying flags or supporting them.'

This is Kraft enacting the mission of FCAS: fostering disinformation. He is far from subtle: A Palestinian flag becomes a 'Hamas flag,' and people like the hundreds of thousands who took to the streets of Washington, D.C., last month to call for a cease-fire and end the violence are expressions of the 'rise in antisemitism.' Without a sense of irony or the horrors happening on the ground in Gaza, Kraft says he is giving $100 million of his own money to FCAS, because 'hate leads to violence.'

Let’s be clear: What Kraft is doing politically and what he will be using the Super Bowl as a platform to do is dangerous. He appears to think any criticism of Israel is inherently antisemitic. For Kraft, it is Jews like myself, rabbis, and Holocaust survivors calling for a cease-fire and a Free Palestine that are part of the problem. Kraft seems to think that opposition to Israel, the IDF, and the AIPAC agenda is antisemitism.

... Right-wing Christian nationalists, with their belief in a Jewish state existing alongside their conviction that Jews are going to Hell, are welcome in Netanyahu’s Israel and Kraft’s coalition. Left-wing anti-Zionist Jews are not. The greatest foghorn of this evangelical right-wing 'love Israel, hate Jews' perspective is, of course, Donald Trump. Kraft, while speaking of being troubled by events like the Charlottesville Nazi march and the right-wing massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue, counts Donald Trump as a close friend and even donated $1 million to his presidential inauguration.

No one who provides cover for the most powerful, public antisemite in the history of US politics should ever be taken seriously on how to best fight antisemitism. No one who funds AIPAC and the IDF and opposes a cease-fire amid the carnage should be allowed a commercial platform at the Super Bowl. But given that the big game is always an orgy of militarism, blind patriotism, and big budget commercials that lie through their teeth, perhaps that ad could not be more appropriate. We can do better than Kraft’s perspective on how to fight antisemitism. Morally, we don’t have a choice."

One of the frustrating things about many political leaders and Jewish organizations pushing this line of thinking that "anti-Zionism = antisemitism," is that many people will believe "Zionism=Judaism" and then make the leap that "more religious = more Zionist." I hadn't realized the extent of this until a family member, who is anti-zionist, said something that made it clear that he thinks that religious fervor/devotion/orthodoxy is the cause of Zionism and the genocide of the Palestinian people. THIS IS DANGEROUS FOR MANY REASONS.

First of all, it's incorrect. Haredim, or strictly orthodox Jews are MUCH LESS LIKELY to be Zionists. No group is a monolith and there are different groups with different stances, but the most outwardly devout religious communities in Israel are not Zionist, and instead are mostly non-Zionists (neutral, pragmatic), with a smaller minority being anti-Zionist (believe that the state of Israel should not exist).

With few exceptions, HAREDI MEN IN ISRAEL DO NOT SERVE IN THE MILITARY. The majority of them never serve in the IDF and unlike other young people in Israel, their right as conscientious objectors is actually protected by law.

I know this is a very small and complicated part of a very large and complicated issue, but this is a clear example of how Judaism does not equal Zionism, especially at the more orthodox end of the spectrum.

We're stuck in this quagmire where

Jewish Zionists suggest that Judaism and Zionism are the same.

Non-jews who are also Zionists believe it

Non-jews who are anti-Zionists believe it

The desired result by Zionists is that anti-Zionism will be considered hate-speech and written into law.

The unintended result is an increase in legitimate antisemitism. Add to this the fact that Orthodox Jews who live outside Israel are more likely to be targets of antisemitism because they are more visibly Jewish, and I want to cry out to God at the unfairness of it all.

I probably didn't do this topic justice and I know there are many people who could say it better than me, but I haven't seen it said at all. I see people saying "anti-Zionism isn't antisemitism" but I didn't see the added explanation that orthodoxy is inversely correlated with Zionism, which I think is really important point.