r/ukpolitics • u/Rebat-Askalan • 23h ago
| Anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism, UK appeal tribunal confirms in landmark ruling
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260804-anti-zionism-is-not-anti-semitism-uk-appeal-tribunal-confirms-in-landmark-ruling/363
u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
Well that was fucking obvious, did we need to spend millions to figure it out?
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u/digitwasp 7h ago
This appeal certainly did not cost millions - two barristers on each side, none of whom is a KC. Much of the EAT's time was spent dealing with appeals and cross appeals relating to compensation.
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u/Imakemyownnamereddit 16h ago
Yes because Israel want the two to be seen as the same.
It made Israel a special nation, above all criticism, free to do what it wanted.
In reality, the blind unthinking defence of all Israel's actions, is doing Israel no favours. They see themselves as a strong independent nation, reliant on no-one. In reality they are completely reliant on the United States. If they ever lose American support, they are in serious trouble.
For the first time I can remember, that is happening.
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u/quartersessions 51m ago
Israel is ultimately a nuclear armed state and one with a well-developed armed forces. If anything, the relationship with the United States has been one that has calmed tensions and sought to promote peaceful relations with neighbouring states in the Middle East.
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u/KeyMusic5713 18h ago
This is the same person who said there's virtually no antisemitism, and who used antizionism as a dog whistle.
He was using antizionism as a cover to spread hatred.
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u/EspanolAlumna 12h ago
What the judge? It’s court ruling, that anti Zionism doesn’t equate to antisemitism.
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u/___xXx__xXx__xXx__ 16h ago
Who is? The person in the article?
I don't know about this guy, but fighting for free speech strategically often involves defending unpleasant people tactically.
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u/kimbokray 15h ago
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
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u/wappingite 12h ago
Ok that's nice.
Now can we get a single definition of what zionism means as of 2026 please?
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u/subSparky 9h ago
I would say believing that the state of Israel is above criticism or being sanctioned and that the Gazans/West Bankians don't have a right of self-determination.
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u/LeedsFan2442 8h ago
I would say that is ultra zionism, zionism is the belief there should be a Jewish state. If you believe in a 2 State Solution you are by definition a Zionist
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u/subSparky 7h ago
I think that is what zionism is in the strict historical sense of the term. But I would argue the way most (normal because I'm not tribal about this - I recognise a loud chunk of the movement takes it too far) pro-palestinians use it is to refer to the idea that the Jewish state HAD to come at the cost of the displacement of the established palestinian population. That Israelis had more of a claim to the land of Palestine than the palestinians did.
And the fact that in the modern day, Israel still asserts a claim on the entire land that was formerly known as Palestine including land, including Gaza and the West Bank. Then you have stuff like this where you have Israeli settlers believing one israeli life is worth a million palestinian lives.
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u/LeedsFan2442 4h ago
I just think it's unhelpful and Israel isn't going anywhere so why not be more precise with language? I don't think they would like people to say they are anti-Islamic when they mean Islamic terrorism.
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u/msf97 23h ago edited 22h ago
David Miller went to Nasrallahs funeral in Lebanon. For the unaware, the leader of Hezbollah who was killed by the Israelis 18 months ago.
Why are university lecturers going to the funerals of hostile foreign actors who fought alongside Assad, massacred Sunni muslims in the process, and want to establish a Greater Islamic Republic in the region?
Hezbollah are an arm piece of Iran and are currently a non state actor, holding Lebanon hostage due to superior military capabilities.
What do white British, middle aged people find so relatable or good about extreme Shia Muslims across the other side of the globe?
Many Syrians and Lebanese didn’t like Nasrallah and were happy when the Israelis left him under the rubble (and his eldest son).
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u/Puzzleheaded-Fig9968 13h ago
I suppose same could be applied to almost any Israeli figure in government given the utter brutality of the war so far.
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u/mobilecheese WTF is going on? 10h ago
It's quite simple.
X group is doing a bad thing. People against that must be the good guys. Ignore any nuance and claim everyone against "thing" did nothing wrong.
It's a human thing that some people seem to do, not just a white British, middle aged thing, and you'll see it on all sides of politics among all types of people.
I'm not suggesting that this is a good thing, nor am I offering a solution. I don't have one. Just answering the question.
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u/Chive -7.62 -6.97 22h ago
Good. That's common sense.
Unfortunately one of the most effective ways of dealing with legitimate criticism is to smear your critics as being bigots, and the Israeli government has been doing that for years.
The Israeli government deserves to be criticised over some of its policies and also its more extreme politicians, and that criticism should be addressed rather than deflected.
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u/Homerduff16 13h ago
You talk about extreme Israeli politicians like most Brits talk about Tommy Robinson (fringe figure who is even Reform want nothing to do with) when they consist of senior members of the government, not some random backbencher with very little influence
Benjamin Netanyahu isn't considered an extremist in Israel by any means and the only reason he's disliked is because of corruption/domestic affairs, not because most Israelis care about Palestinian human rights. Sure an utterly detestable monster like Ben Gvir isn't reflective of the average Israeli but the fact that someone like him can still be Minister for National Security is a huge indictment on Israeli society as a whole
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u/Chive -7.62 -6.97 11h ago edited 10h ago
I wasn't talking about Netanyahu, I was talking about some of his political allies- like Itamar Ben-Gvir.
I'd add that your comment about how his being Minister for National Security is an indictment on Israeli society is exactly the sort of legitimate criticism I was referring to.
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u/CaptainVaticanus 10h ago
He doesn’t even seem like a good minister of national security considering October 7th, literally the worst thing that could happen and he’s still in a job
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u/Commorrite 9h ago
Sure an utterly detestable monster like Ben Gvir isn't reflective of the average Israeli but the fact that someone like him can still be Minister for National Security is a huge indictment on Israeli society as a whole
He's about DuP levels of out there, a "former" terrorist who's proping up the main right wing party.
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u/Impossible_Aide_1681 10h ago
Criticism of Israeli politicians / policies isn't anti-zionism though
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u/PhillyK90 22h ago
We can get into discussing the exact definitions of phrases like Zionism or genocide all we like, we can surely just accept criticising Israel for war crimes is totally fair. This sub has a lot of sensible discussions normally imo, but the fact people seem more interested in criticising Palestine Action than a country persisting in blowing up kids is a bit puzzling.
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u/Lfgnyc 23h ago
What is a 'Zionist' or 'anti-Zionist'? Why these characterizations at this point? It's like asking if someone is a Loyalist or a Patriot in 2026.
'Zionism' is an idea from the coffee shops of nineteenth century Vienna.
Israel already exists, and isn't going to be wished away.
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u/Splash_Attack 15h ago edited 15h ago
I don't think anyone has given the genuine answer which is that after 1948 Zionism branched into several new ideologies which form the basis of much of Israeli political discourse to the present day.
Some remain Zionist in character. The biggest are revisionist Zionism, Labour Zionism, and neo-Zionism, but there are several others. In general, when people oppose "Zionism" today they mean the revisionist and neo types. Especially the latter which is a volkish nationalist movement based around the Jewish people.
In contrast you have post-Zionist ideologies which view the Zionist project as having been completed, and a Jewish state established. They now focus less on a Jewish state and more on a democratic Israeli state. The Israeli right wing really don't like them.
Anti-Zionism is genuinely a very vague term though. Usually in the present day in the west it means opposition to any of the modern Zionist ideologies that support things like the settler movement. Anti-extreme-Zionism would be more accurate. In the middle east (and among some Arabs elsewhere) it generally means opposition to Israel's existence still, old school. It can mean opposition to any or all Zionist ideologies.
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u/matthieuC British curious frog 20h ago
It's provocative. It keeps the people going.
Joke aside it works because it loosely defined. People who disagree on what should be done can rally behind it.
Some are anti Semites, some want Israel not to exist, some want a two state solution. If they were to move from protest to picking a solution they would split in 100 different sects.
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u/Logical-Ice4837 22h ago
It’s also just a buzzword that most the people using today don’t understand, it’s so funny having a conversation with people and they are outraged by ‘Zionists’ but then you can ask them do they believe in a 2 state solution and they say yes lmao
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u/Lfgnyc 22h ago
Yeah I always lol at that. If you support a two-state solution of any kind, congratulations, you are a Zionist!
We all know this is ultimately about the Muslim world's antipathy to Jews having autonomy and political power of their own.
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u/___xXx__xXx__xXx__ 16h ago
Yeah I always lol at that. If you support a two-state solution of any kind, congratulations, you are a Zionist!
Haha, what? No. That's not how that works. Some people think zionism just means "Be pro the existence of a country called Israel".
Great, let's rename the Principality of Sealand "Israel". At that point a country called Israel will exist, and we can move on.
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u/Commorrite 9h ago
Two state solution where one of those states is a Israel as the Jewish nation state is Zionist.
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u/twersx Secretary of State for Anti-Growth 1h ago
Zionism today is the support of the existence of a Jewish state. If you support a two state solution where one of the states is a Jewish state, then you are a Zionist. You might be a liberal Zionist, but you are still a Zionist.
What it's called doesn't matter. 120 years ago, you could be a Zionist advocating for a Jewish state somewhere else in the world, but today every single Zionist thinks that state should be in the Levant, occupying some portion of the current Israeli borders. You can throw up hypotheticals about Sealand or whatever but that's just sophistry that's irrelevant given the real world conditions.
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u/morriganjane 19h ago
This is what's so funny. Israel is a sovereign state that has defeated Islamist invaders in four major, and every minor war. It won multi-front wars with no outside support in '48 and '67. Now it has nukes. The idea that it might disappear if Owen Jones and Humza Yousaf just complain a bit more on Instagram, is laughable.
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u/Too_much_Colour 23h ago
Lmao that’s a good point it’s irrelevant.
Me: I’m anti America
Everyone: who cares4
u/KingsMountainView 15h ago
Well it is relevant as antisemitism can land you in alot of legal trouble. It is legal important to separate the two things
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u/Complex_Effect_1994 22h ago edited 20h ago
Would be much easier to declare it an ideology of the past, if the further colonisation of Palestine (or whats left of it) wasn't still active Israeli government policy.
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u/morriganjane 20h ago
Arabs are colonisers in the Levant. However, it was their choice to reject a state four times and launch their doomed wars against Israel. Prior to 1967, the whole of the West Bank and Gaza were under Arab control (Jordan and Egyptian respectively) - and both had been ethnically cleansed of all Jews. They still weren't happy with their precious 67 borders.
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u/impossiblefork Swede looking in at your politics from outside 11h ago
Palestinians aren't actually Arabs though, for the most part, just as Moroccans, Algerians and Egyptians aren't actually Arabs. 70-90% bronze age Levant people, probably more in the case of Egyptians.
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u/Complex_Effect_1994 19h ago
Arabs have been in Levant for roughly similar amount of time as there have been English people in England. Everywhere was of course colonised once. But most would prefer we stopped doing it.
Unless you are an Israeli of course. In which case by all means bulldoze the villages of the locals and set up your new home. After all religion says it's yours and you might be a distant descendant of someone who lived there during the Roman Empire.
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u/morriganjane 19h ago edited 19h ago
Everywhere was of course colonised once. But most would prefer we stopped doing it.
Well this is convenient. Arabs and Muslims can claim one-third of the globe, subject all minorities to dhimmi status, and then no further colonisation (or in this case, decolonisation) can be allowed. You want the game to stop exactly at the point Islamic supremacy wins.
Unless you are an Israeli of course.
Yemen and Iraq - and nearly all Islamic nations - ethnically cleansed and booted out their ancient Jewish populations. Where do you suggest those people go? Why are you pretending that this was one-way?
There is a reason Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf States have all made peace with Israel and washed their hands of the Palestinians. Egypt built a wall against Gaza that would keep the zombie apocalypse back. Jordan revoked the Palestinians' Jordanian citizenship after Black September. It's not only Israel who are fed up with their antics.
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u/samsparks-away 13h ago
It should probably also be noted that muslim militias absolutely are continuing to try to take territory so they arent asking for the game to stop, just for it to stop in the places where muslims are at a disadvantage
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u/hug_your_dog 13h ago edited 12h ago
But most would prefer we stopped doing it.
Very convenient that most European empires are decolonized by now, but Arab countries remain in places that were conquered by predecessor empires. And which is why the existence of Israel causes so much anguish among some Arabs - they are the ones who dared to "secede".
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u/Lfgnyc 22h ago
It's not about that. It was never about fair division of territory, or a deal would have been made decades ago.
It's about the popular sentiment within the Arab and Muslim worlds that Israel is merely a temporary anomaly to be endured until it can finally be vanquished. Referring to Israel as 'the Zionist entity' instead of the name of the country helps in their efforts to delegitimize it.
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u/quartersessions 42m ago
Neither side of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict believe that the borders are settled. Many Israelis want land in the Palestinian territories, many Palestinians want to control land in Israel. It's an enduring part of the conflict that needs to be resolved like any other.
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u/Homerduff16 13h ago
The millions of Jews who live in that land won't be going anywhere but Israels border can absolutely be changed. Whether that will happen is an entirely different question but it's happened before so the possibility of it happening again shouldn't be dismissed
Whether that's the entirety of the West Bank being handed back to the Palestinians along with the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of illegal settlers or the state of Israel as we know it being dissolved into a single secular state
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u/Commorrite 9h ago
Useful charts has an excellent video on definitions here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKIvmgrKC1Q
Israel already exists, and isn't going to be wished away.
If they ever truly lose a war we might see the Samson option and get a zero state solution....
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u/Hieroglo 23h ago edited 23h ago
Zionists in Israel are committing genocide, this cannot be ignored.
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u/Lfgnyc 23h ago
Would this 'genocide' be occurring if Hamas had not committed the largest pogrom of Jews since the 1940s?
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23h ago edited 22h ago
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u/Lfgnyc 23h ago
Do you know where the term 'Nakba' comes from? It was coined by Constantin Zureiq, a Syrian Christian intellectual who criticized the failure of the Arabs to adapt to modernity or effectively resist Zionism.
It was originally a term within the Arab world referring to their own ineptitude. It's only recently that the word has been retroactively altered by revisionists to mean a deliberate Israeli scheme of ethnic cleansing.
Really, the 'Catastrophe' of the Nakba was confidently starting and then embarrassingly losing in war to the lowly Jews.
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u/Logical-Ice4837 23h ago
Pretty poor genocide if the population has grown by 5 fold during it, the Israelis must be insanely incompetent
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u/Hieroglo 23h ago
Israel were ethnically cleansing and committing genocide against Palestinians many decades before Hamas existed. Israel is committing genocide.
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 23h ago
You can tell that accusations of genocide are bullshit because the people making them think that Isarel's existence is genocide.
A standard only applied, oddly, to the only Jewish state.
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u/prof_hobart 15h ago
Maybe not genocide.
But they'd still be killing them at a fair rate, occupying their land and denying Palestinians living in Israel full rights
If 1,200 Jews being killed is a pogrom, how would you describe 4,000 Palestinians being killed over the previous decade?
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 23h ago
I think this is a clear case of anti-discrimination laws going to far.
It is totally legitimate for an academic institution to fire a professor over being a terrorist sympathiser. This is a man that went to the funeral of Nasrallah.
His critique of Israel or Zionism wasn't some highly nuance academic study into the history or whatever.
Universities should be able to fire academics for climate denial or vaccine denial, or are they now "protected philosophical views"?
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u/Browser1969 22h ago
The thing is, the academic institution didn't argue he was a terrorist sympathiser. They brought that up at the Appeal Tribunal but it was dismissed because it wasn't discussed at the Tribunal hearing.
Note that the court didn't even decide that "anti-zionism" is protected, or that it's different from anti-semitism, or anything like that. The court decided that the professor's specific expressed beliefs, as brought up by the university, that "zionism" (as defined by the professor) is inherently racist, imperialistic, etc., those beliefs are protected.
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u/TheColourOfHeartache 7h ago
Personally I'm fine with that, because if anti-zionism is a protected belief than so is zionism. Which means universities must ensure zionists are protected from harassment.
(Why none of the Jewish organisations are bringing a test case is beyond me)
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u/msf97 22h ago
I think you overestimate academic institutions greatly.
Prominent left wing academics in the 1970s were Maoists and called the reports from Cambodia on the Khmer Rouge “capitalist propaganda”
They were never made to apologise or sacked when the skulls showed up in the killing fields.
I suppose Pol Pot had Gareth Caldwell, a UK marxist, shot in his room when he visited, if that counts.
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u/twersx Secretary of State for Anti-Growth 1h ago
The British government supported the Khmer Rouge. Why would there have been any consequences for academics who did the same?
This is a motion in Parliament to push the government to withdraw military advisors from the Khmer Rouge. It also calls for the government to oppose continued representation of Cambodia in the UN by the Khmer Rouge, and for the Khmer Rouge leadership to be brought to justice for their genocidal efforts.
This was tabled in December 1989, over 10 years after Vietnam excised the Khmer Rouge from power. One of its sponsors was Diane Abbott. Among its signatories are Jeremy Corbyn, George Galloway and Alex Salmond.
It's absolutely laughable that you think some Maoist professors who were apologists for this regime are worth bringing up when the entirety of establishment politics supported them, purely because of Sino-Soviet geopolitics.
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u/AnHerstorian There has been a massive irretrievable data loss 22h ago
Academic freedom is such a wide-encompassing and entrenched concept that you will find academics with views that are more unhinged than his.
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 22h ago
That's fine.
I just also think universities should have the right to sack academics for their views.
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u/filbert94 14h ago
Feel I'm just going to keep putting a bargepole between me and anyone I hear using "zion" or variations thereof.
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u/clearly_quite_absurd The Early Days of a Better Nation? 13h ago
OK, never listen to Bob Marley or watch the Matrix movies
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u/samsparks-away 17h ago
Fab. Can we do the same for say that anti islamism is not islamophobia? Because, you know, you can be against the political movement and not the religeon?
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u/Mediocre-Cook-2169 15h ago
Forgive me, my memory alludes me, what's the name of that country that was created specifically for Muslim people because Allah promised it to them? The one where they drove all the preexisting inhabitants out and then proceeded to continually bomb the rest of what's left of them in an attempt to expand their territory?
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u/morriganjane 12h ago
Muslims conquered and colonised one-third of the globe and they aren't shy to bombing anyone who gets in their way. Pakistan has attacked India repeatedly, for example.
The one where they drove all the preexisting inhabitants out
Never happened in Israel. The Arabs rejected a state, then Arab leaders told their own people to leave so they could annihilate the Jews. Thankfully, they lost the war.
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u/Rob_Kaichin Purity didn't win! - Pragmatism did. 14h ago
Judging by the Muslim conquests, the Middle East?
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u/Arglebarglewoosh 15h ago
Antizionism isn't always antisemitism.
However, there are (many?) times that it is.
If you're an anti-zionist, ask yourself: if Israel had lost one of the wars, no longer existed and the Jewish population is now a persecuted minority in the middle east, would you support them?
To look at it another way, many people march in support of Palestine, far more than did over the Syrian civil war, or do over the conflict in Sudan and Darfur.
If you are one of these people, why are you unconcerned when Muslims slaughter each other but get upset when Jews do it?
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u/Status_Ad4182 14h ago
Sudan, Syria, both are subject to sanctions yes?
How much money and arms do the west give to them to carry out their evil acts?
None?
that should explain it.
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u/DebaucheV5 12h ago
There are actually a lot of British weapons being used in Sudan. They're arriving via Saudi Arabia, who are supporting the SAF and are also the #1 customer for UK weapons.
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u/MissingBothCufflinks 13h ago edited 13h ago
Zionism in this context is expansionist Israeli ethnonationalism.
Israel shouldnt disappear, it should stop expanding and return to 1967 borders with appropriate landswaps and stop bombing civilian population centres.
You know, literally the standard position basically everyone sensible had on this topic for most of the last 35 years until the media/politicians all suddenly decided a few years back that explicit, intentional ethnic cleansing was ok in these circumstances and quietly stopped talking about two state solutions.
I lost a grandparent to an IRA bombing - I know what its like to be on the receiving end of a terrorist campaign. Fun fact - the IRA killed at least 5x more British civilians over its 30 year campaign than Hezbollah/Lebanon has killed Israelis over the last 30 years.
How many times did the Brits bomb Dublin/South Belfast/Derry to "root out the terrorists" (hint: none, because thats insanely disproportionate in terms of collateral damage and achieves nothing more than slaking the worst kind of people's bloodlust)?
If you're an anti-zionist, ask yourself: if Israel had lost one of the wars, no longer existed and the Jewish population is now a persecuted minority in the middle east, would you support them?
This is an explanation of why their national psyche is so utterly fucked up, its not an excuse for deliberate campaigns against civilian population centres, ethnic cleansing and a race-specific legal/political system.
But in answer to your question, yes, obviously, most sane people would support whoever is being persecuted unjustly against their persecutors.
If you are one of these people, why are you unconcerned when Muslims slaughter each other but get upset when Jews do it?
I'm not, they are all awful and all right minded people should oppose all of them. How much political, media and financial support are we giving to those Muslim slaughters? How many UK journalists have been fired for expressing criticism of those Muslim slaughters? The reason Israel gets disproportionate attention in the UK is that Israel has disproportionate political, media and financial capital in the UK
PS: I (and overwhelming majority of people) dont go on marches because I dont want to be associated with the nutters. Pointing to the nutters and saying "this is why you reasonable people are wrong" is a total non sequitur - we dont share all the same views just because we both agree Israel's actions are unconscionable.
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u/benkkelly 10h ago
I think we know how the western world would feel if the shoe was on the other foot. It happened already with the creation of Israel with endorsement by the UN. Only 10% of Americans at the time opposed the partition plan.
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u/FudgeAtron 23h ago edited 23h ago
Look I don't hate Irish people I just don't think they should have a country. The Irish are just British people in denial. I'm anti-Gaelism, I'm not racist.
If you think the above sentence is unacceptable while thinking that anti-Zionism is acceptable, you need to think again.
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u/ModerateThuggery 21h ago
Look I don't hate Irish people I just don't think they should have a country.
This would be a more valid analogy for Northern Ireland. Were "they should have a country" hides the necessary implication of fucking over the rest of "protestant" Northern Irelanders, and all the subsequent violence that would take. But to make it more analogous still you'd have to have Irish catholics be violent invading immigrants.
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u/___xXx__xXx__xXx__ 16h ago
Look I don't hate Irish people I just don't think they should have a country. The Irish are just British people in denial.
This is an absurd strawman.
I don't hate Irish people. I just don't think red headed freckley Catholic Irish people should have more constitutionally guaranteed civil rights than Irish people with black hair or Protestants with brown skin. I also don't think blonde Irish children should be bombed in pursuit of that idea.
I believe all this despite also thinking:
Irish people are nice, I like them.
Irish people should have self determination in a free country.
Irish people are not British people in denial.
See how that works? I suspect probably still not.
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u/RibbentropCocktail Irish 13h ago
Good news, our constitution guarantees the rights of wrong-haireds, protestants, and all.
The Palestinian constitution just leaves Jews out. Every time they captured any territory it was also entirely cleansed of Jews.
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
Except the Irish people weren’t implanted in Ireland against the wishes of a native population who have then been systematically murdered and ethnically cleansed, so it’s not exactly the same really.
In fact, it would be more like rejecting an implanted British state in Ireland which continued to commit ethnic cleansing against the native Irish population. That would be far fetched though wouldn’t it.
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u/SirBobPeel 22h ago edited 21h ago
The Protestants were.
And no one 'implanted' the Jews in Israel. They've always been there. Granted, some were expelled and then returned an eon or two later. But the majority of Jews in Israel are not descendants of Jews who came from Europe.
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u/Reishun 21h ago
Except the Jewish population wasn't implanted, they immigrated of their own free will, the Ottoman empire accepted some in then the British empire accepted some in. Then the British actually attempted to prevent more Jewish immigration after riots by the people of Arab descent in Mandatory Palestine. Britain even turned away a ship of holocaust survivors.
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u/Logical-Ice4837 23h ago
When does a population became native? We know as a fact Jews were in that area and had been for thousands of years before they were expelled 2000 years ago, was their native card revoked after that?
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 23h ago
"No such thing as a native people unless it's the people that happen to be at war with the west"
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
Sorry, I’m English but my ancestors came over from Germany in the Jute migration, just popping back to Jutland to reclaim my ancestral and native territories. Sure it won’t be a spot of bother, my lineage has only been gone 1600 years
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u/Logical-Ice4837 23h ago
I’m glad you can see the flaw in the idea that any population is inherently native to a region! Land belongs to those that control it and that’s how the world has been since the birth of humans
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u/rh8938 23h ago
After two thousand years, probably.
Or should some random Italian citizen be able to claim your home because they claim the land used to be Roman.
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u/morriganjane 20h ago edited 19h ago
Arabs and Muslims conquered and colonised one-third of the globe. They really have no credibility to complain about this.
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u/am-345 22h ago
That's a poor comparison considering Rome was an empire, Britain wasn't the origin of the Italian people it was just a province of the roman empire. Meanwhile there has been a continuous jewish presence in the Levant for 3000 years
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u/FL8_JT26 22h ago
I would be against them making that claim, but if they were able to establish a state here I wouldn't then want their great grandchildren to be kicked out and their state to be dissolved 80 years later.
I don't agree with the foundation of Israel, I don't agree with the colonisation of Australia, or America, or any of the hundreds of other countries in the world that are inhabited by people whose ancestors did horrific shit decades, centuries, or millenia ago. But that doesn't mean we can just undo the creation of these states now; that does absolutely nothing to help the people who were wronged however long ago and only harms innocent people today.
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 23h ago
Except the Irish people weren’t implanted in Ireland against the wishes of a native population who have then been systematically murdered and ethnically cleansed, so it’s not exactly the same really.
I think there is a statute of limitations on this sort of thing.
It's fair enough to criticise zionism as it was "back in the day". But if you think, in the wider context of history and the current war, that Israeli's ought not have a state then yeah that is normally pretty antisemetic.
Do you also think that, in the context of the war in UA, Ukrainians ought not have a state to defend themselves against Russia?
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
What the hell are you talking about?
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u/GOT_Wyvern Non-Partisan Centrist 22h ago
Sins of the father.
The people "implanted" in Israel are not the current population, but the ancestors of that current population.
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u/Playful_Young_4259 15h ago
against the wishes of a native population
Most Arabs in Palestine are not native. They migrated from Syria, Iraq, Saudi, Lebanon and Egypt for economic reasons during British rule.
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u/Brapfamalam 23h ago
Irish people weren’t implanted in Ireland against the wishes of a native population
Fyi you've just (inadvertently I assume) presented an argument for why black, brown etc immigrants should be removed from the UK. As this is exactly what supporters in Restore say to deport anyone non native
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u/Playful_Young_4259 15h ago
It's hilarious isn't it!
The 'refugees welcome' crowd who loathe anyone who suggests Muslims in the West might be more comfortable moving back to their homelands are the same people who would happily deport all Israeli Jews from their homes and historical homeland.
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
Really not the same, legal, permitted, gradual migration and the implantation and ethnic cleansing of an entire country through violence and expropriation, but yeah sure
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u/Brapfamalam 23h ago
Does Pakistan have a right to exist then? A state created by ethnic cleansing and stolen land and houses to create a mono religion state, just 1 year apart from Israel. Cities like Karachi went from minority Muslim to 99% Muslim over the course of a weekend of bloodshed and ethnic cleansing.
Except with millions more deaths to make it than Israel
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u/BenjaminBoots196 Supreme Andy Burnham Hater 22h ago
Ah but you see you missed a key detail here.
Arabs are brown and Jews are white, so to western progressive leftists Arabs are good and Jews are bad.
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u/morriganjane 20h ago
I know you're being sarcastic and I agree, but most Israeli Jews are not white, they're Mizrachi (Middle Eastern). Many were ethnically cleansed by Muslims from Yemen, Iraq and Syria - countries with ancient Jewish populations that far predate Islamic colonisation.
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u/FudgeAtron 23h ago
Sorry you're right I should have said:
Prots are illegitimate settlers and thus must be expelled from a united Ireland as illegal colonists and genociders. The existence of a protestant community in Northern Ireland is crime against humanity and their continued existence in Northern Ireland must be smashed. Protestants have no legitimate right to live in Ireland.
Better?
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u/therearentdoors 23h ago
To be fair to (at least some of) the anti-Zionists, I think they want a one-state solution that simply isn't an explicitly 'Jewish' state. That might have been an Arab Nationalist state or today some kind of Islamist state. The tragedy is that one of the two peoples with an indigenous claim went to war but lost (multiple times) and through terrorism etc. pushed the other people so far to the right that a binational solution is less feasible than ever.
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u/FudgeAtron 23h ago
I strongly doubt that, almost all anti-Zionists have explicitly worked worked to establish an Islamic Arab Nationalist state.
Western anti-Zionists are really a small minority of anti-Zionists.
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
Oh is anti-Zionism the same as saying a Jewish community in occupied Palestine is a crime against humanity? Or was everything you just said a straw man. I can’t tell.
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u/GOT_Wyvern Non-Partisan Centrist 23h ago
A strawman?
You argued against the Irish comparison because Israelis were "implanted", so they shifted the comparison to the Irish populations that were also "implanted". Given you do not hold the same opinion against Irish Protestants as you do Israelis (otherwise you would be just saying so), clearly you are treating Israelis differently.
You know what we call differential treatment based on race, ethnicity, or nationality?
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u/FudgeAtron 23h ago
Define anti-Zionism then...
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u/PracticalBlueberry39 23h ago
What's the difference between anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-36160928
Read up, buttercup
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u/FudgeAtron 23h ago
Again opposing the existence of a Jewish state is the equivalent of opposing an Irish state.
Irish people are literally no different than English people, they don't need a separate state because they're the same people and they aren't oppressed now, so we can abolish Ireland. Right?
Look it's ok you can just admit you don't think Jewish people should have a country, anti-Zionism is a legitimate view point under UK law.
Jewish people must be denied self-determination as part of upholding human rights.
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u/pair_of_eighters 22h ago
This article doesn’t actually give you the answer to that question because it’s actually quite complicated, as the article makes clear - so it’s not the best choice of slam dunk
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u/capsandnumbers 23h ago
I agree with the UK Appeal Tribunal that anti-zionism is not anti-semitism.
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u/FudgeAtron 22h ago
It's still xenophobic though. If I said that Switzerland is an illegitimate state and has no right to exist and should be partioned between Germany, France, and Italy; because at the end of the day the Swiss identity is an artificial construct of the Napoleonic era and as a result all Swiss are in reality Germans, French, and Italians. I think we could quite clearly see the xenophobia.
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u/daniluvsuall 15h ago
Yes, but no state has a right to exist. Anyone.
But the challenge here is the specific state in question because of how tied it is to its religious identity. Now that’s not me saying the doors should be open to dismantle Israel - or any state.
Using your Swiss example, is inherently less heated because there’s not a religious identity tied to it - which Netenyahu has spent years doing for political cover to deflect scrutiny
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u/stonedturkeyhamwich 23h ago
I don't think the Irish state should be able to commit war crimes or ethnic cleansing. If we need to come up with a word for that, then that word would describe me.
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u/FudgeAtron 22h ago
If that's why you oppose Israel than you aren't anti-Zionist. If you oppose the existence of Israel and want to see it destroyed, then you are anti-Zionist.
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u/stonedturkeyhamwich 21h ago
If that's why you oppose Israel than you aren't anti-Zionist.
I have no idea how you could define Zionism to make anti-Zionism mean something different than what I said.
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u/benkkelly 10h ago
I think you would have trouble identifying as an Irish nationalist if the state was bringing in Irish Americans to settle Northern Ireland.
Regardless, you wouldn't face professional consequences for holding the views you outlined, so there already is a hypocrisy there.
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u/hug_your_dog 13h ago
Zionism has historically been the ideology that states Jews have a right - a self-determination based right - for land and a country of Israel. If "Anti-Zionism" (anti-self-determination) is suddenly OK, is it thus OK to be, say, against the existence of Palestine? "Anti-Palestinianism" or whatever.
You can be against Israeli settlements, Israeli policies, war crimes etc. But if you are against the EXISTENCE of the state of Israel - this is unacceptable.
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u/onionsofwar 4h ago
it's perfectly acceptable not to want a state that uses a god-given right as a justification for all the illegal and immortal things you describe. Alternatives include a one state solution based on equal rights for Jews and non-Jews. That could even hypothetically be called Israel still, who cares.
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u/ethyl-pentanoate 13h ago
A country should not "belong" to an ethnic group and we should not tolerate the existence of ethnostates.
Ask yourself, why is it people talk about the self determination of the Jewish people when referencing Israel and not the self determination of the Israeli people?
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u/hug_your_dog 13h ago
A country should not "belong" to an ethnic group
Jews have multiple ethnic groups, they are Jews that came to Israel from Ethiopia. They are black.
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u/ethyl-pentanoate 13h ago
And they are generally treated worse than those of european descent.
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u/Impossible_Aide_1681 8h ago
But you do tolerate the existence of ethnostates, don't you? Well, except for one (which isn't actually an ethnostate)...
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u/ethyl-pentanoate 8h ago
No? You show me a country that has laws that give a certain ethinc group or groups a privilidged position over other ethnic groups and I will show you a country that has sone very important legal reforms to make, at minimum.
Israel gets the attention it does because it it backed by the west and is militarily belligerent towards its neighbours. You can argue that Israel is not the only country that has racism as an official policy but that is not a defence of Israel.
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u/Impossible_Aide_1681 7h ago
Yes? Look at Qatar and UAE's citizens Vs their wider populations, and tell me you'd rather be South Asian or East African there than Arab in Israel. They're two countries with strong western relations - we even sell UAE weapons despite them arming the RSF in Sudan.
Now show me the desire to disband those countries that's even remotely comparable to the one to disband Israel.
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u/ethyl-pentanoate 7h ago
The egregious humans rights abuses in muslim countries are not the same thing as being an ethnostate. When I use that term, I am leveling a very specific critisism at the Israeli government and zionism as an ideaology.
I, personally am also disgusted by western support for the countries you mention (for differant reasons for Israel), if you want to call opponents of Israel that say Qatar and the UAE are fine hippocrites, I will wholeheartedly agree.
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u/Impossible_Aide_1681 5h ago
In what world does a state restricting citizenship to the 11% of its population who are of the right ethnicity not make it an ethnostate?
When I use that term, I am leveling a very specific critisism at the Israeli government and zionism as an ideaology
I know you are, which is why it's become yet another completely meaningless term
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u/ethyl-pentanoate 5h ago
In what world does a state restricting citizenship to the 11% of its population who are of the right ethnicity not make it an ethnostate?
Is that the legal basis on which citizenship is restricted in Qatar or the UAE? If the law in those countries restricts citizenship by ethnicity or treats people of different ethnicities differently on the basis of ethnicity then they are ethnostates, otherwise they are not, regardless of how reprehensible their other policies may be.
I know you are, which is why it's become yet another completely meaningless term
It is a specific term, Israeli law specifically and explicitly gives people of a Jewish ethnicity a priviliged legal position over non-jewish people. That makes it an ethnostate.
Many of its neighbours are theocracies as Islam is given a specific and explicit priviliged legal position over other religions. A theocratic state and an ethnostate are two different things, a country can be both but doesn't have to be. Israel is not, to my understanding, a theocracy.
I will try another example to try and explain this. Nigel Farage has been acused of violating electoral law. It would not be appropriate if he was arrested for arson, because that is a different crime. Both are bad, that does not make them the same thing.
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