Amanda: to understand our present predicament, the difference between antisemitism and anti-Zionism is essential. Both are later forms of (eternal?) hatred for Jews, following the first, religious anti-Judaism . As Adam Louis-Klein has pointed out, the medieval Jew could escape condemnation by converting to Christianity; the Jew as defined by racial antisemitism cannot escape condemnation because he can’t change his “race”; but like the medieval Jew, the modern Jew can escape anti-Zionist condemnation by abjuring Zionism. Another distinction is needed: it is between the radical Islamist eliminationist anti-Zionist, like the killers in Australia, for whom all Jews who have not converted to Islam are to be eliminated; and the Western intellectual anti-Zionist, who embraces Jews who have abjured Zionism. Mamdani is the perfect example; he has appointed in his administration Jews who belong to the anti-Zionist organization Jewish Voice for Peace. Western anti-Zionism seeks to break the bond between Israel and Diaspora Jews (particularly, American Jews) in order to weaken the Jewish State. And they are succeeding, given the fact that Mamdani’s declared anti-Zionism did not prevent 30% of New York Jews from voting for him. Certainly, they weren’t all anti-Zionists, but they felt distant enough from Israel to feel that his anti-Israel activist stance was not an obstacle to supporting him. For the anti-Zionist, Zionism is racism. Antisemitism is racist; anti-Zionism claims to be antiracist, and that is the paradox in which anti-Zionism wishes to imprison Jews.
