Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Zionism: Lets Get Back To Basics

Zionism is not dead nor is it 'post', nor has it failed, far far from it! Lets get back to basics: Zionism is the Judao-Political belief in the in gathering of the Jewish people our homeland, Israel. It is the idea that led to and still builds the State of Israel. It cannot be dead or 'post' anything because Zionism has not yet fulfilled its core mission while 40% of the Jews of the world live outside Israel. Yes, its that simple! The post-zionist era will commence only when the last Jew makes aliyah (emigrates to Israel)!

Having said that, Zionism is an incredible success, unlike any political or nationalist movement in history. in just over 110 years it has brought the wandering Jew home. They left behind generations of pogroms and ghettos; African famine and Arab racism and of course The Holocaust, and they built a country out of swamp, desert and scrub. And not just any country, but one that stands as a beacon of what can be achieved even in the most difficult parts of the globe, such as the Middle East where it sits and where despots ruled and still rule and peoples rights, quality of life and futures are crushed by the cold Islamic clerics, and the secular corrupt Arab dictators. In a tiny corner of this downtrodden area, zionism built a country that is an economic miracle; a military rock, and spiritual center. A country where freedoms are the norm from regular open elections to free liberal press; freedom of speech to an active judiciary. Israel leads the world in technology, in health advances, in literacy, in university graduation, economically, in the numbers of books published and so many other ways. The Jewish world through the mechanisms that Zionism established such as The Jewish Agency For Israel (where I work) built cities on sand dunes and farmland on malaria swamps. The world turns to us for green technology, water reclamation and disaster relief. Zionism did all that. Zionsim was never about Palestinians,arabs or anone else. It wasn't about wars, negotiations, hate or even love. Zionism was a force to build a state where finally the Jews could have a home and from where they could be free to be Jews and as it turns out, change the world!

Our enemies love to redefine Zionism, applying many derogatory meanings to it, many of them simply using the term as a politically correct alternative to saying 'Jew' so as not to be seen as antisemitic (Gd forbid!), so we read that 'Zionists' run the media; Zionists rule america; Zionists run the world economy and so on. Old antisemitic attacks, with a new word for Jew (oh, but they don't mean Jews, because some orthodox Jews aren't zionist at all!??!)

None of the labels & redefinitions of Zionism stand up to even cursory examination:
Zionism is racism? Really? The facts make that claim laughable: Israel is the only country in the Middle East that has accepted Sudanese muslim refugees. Their Muslim brethren shoot them in Egypt & other states ! We absorbed, even encouraged, into our tiny population over 80,000 Ethiopians in the 80s and 90s; we're the first on hand in Haiti, Thailand, Japan and anywhere else disaster strikes. A Jewish state? Sure, but that isn't racist (unless you hold the view that any form of nationalism is racist!). In 1949 when most of the Arabs of this land were encouraged by their leaders to flee while the Arab states crushed tiny new Israel, Zionist leaders made sure that those that stayed became citizens with full rights as Israelis, even making Arabic one of the two official languages of The 'Jewish' State of Israel! Israel understood the dual loyalty of Arab Israelis, and exempted them from army service. Nevertheless Druze and Bedhuin arabs volunteer en mass to serve. So not racist at all!

Many on social media and indeed enemies of Israel in the press, and parliaments of the west, say that Israel is a terror state. Really? Are airport scanners looking for Zionists? How many terror attacks in London, Spain, US etc were caused by Zionists? In fact falsely accusing Zionism of doing what Islamists do daily seems to be the norm: Israel is regularly accused of massacre, genocide & ethnic cleansing, with little or no evidence, whilst we actually see these happen in Syria at the moment. If these claims were true, why are the Palestinian Arabs of the 'West Bank' still in there homes in Jenin, Ramallah, Hebron & even Gaza. Surely since 1967 they'd be dead or exiled. It seems that Zionism is very poor at ethnic cleansing indeed, because their numbers are growing! Muslims pray daily at their 3rd holiest site, the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, but that happens to be Judaism's holiest site, the site of Solomon's Temple, and yet they were allowed to continue to be free to pray since 1967 when it came into israeli hands. The same could not be said for the Jewish 'Western or Wailing Wall' below, which when in Arab hands from'48-'67 was forbidden to Jews. It can't be said for Josephs tomb or the cave of the Patrarchs which Palestinians are allowed to limit Jewish access to. In fact, if a Jew goes to the Temple Mt aka AlAqsa and looks like he is praying, he will (and many times this happens) be attacked. Recently some Christian tourists were mistaken for Jews and were attacked there! Thats real racism!

In fact the racism and ethnic cleansing is built into the Palestinian dream - they openly want every last Jew out of a future Palestine! Their leaders call for genocide on a daily basis, comparing Jews with monkeys or worse with Nazis, perhaps the most despicable of all the lies aimed at Zionism. The first law enacted by the Palestinian Authority was one to outlaw selling land to Jews on PAIN OF DEATH!

Zionism is Fascist? When the Israeli's build death camps, forcing men women and children in to gas chambers then perhaps the label could be applied; if the Zionist forces round up kids, dig trenches, shoot them, cover them with soil and do it again, then perhaps Nazi or Fascist would fit Zionism. To use that label so falsely cheapens the memory of what The real Nazi's did to The Jews, Gays, Gypsy's and others. Israel is a liberal minority with equality for sexes, gays and minorities. It is the antithesis of Fascism.

I actually understand the anger of the Muslim world because Zionism, which despite their claims that its about doing evil to them and the world, is actually about building a state and improving the world, zionism exposes the Islamic world for the abject failure that it has sadly become. Not one Islamic country, certainly not an Arab one, has gender equality, freedoms, rights of citizens, or indeed living standards for ordinary people like Israel. Israel sits in their midst, a beacon of light exposing the darkness of Islamic / Arab failure!

They have massed their armies on this tiny state more than once, the first time when it had almost no weapons, and they have not just been beaten every time, but humiliated by the scale of that defeat. The protesters in Tahrir square must have known that everything they wanted, every Israeli (including the Arab citizens) already had for 65 years.

If Zionism makes Islam look bad, there can be only two options: improve the Islamic world, or get rid of Zionism. If the Islamic world were capable of choosing the first option, it wouldn't be in the mess it is in the first place. so they seethe with hatred for Zionism.

Lets get back to basics: The goal of Zionism is to bring the Jewish people here. If 60% of the Jews of the world in Israel can achieve all this, what can 100% of us do? SO Zionism will continue to build, educate, support, empower and engage Jews worldwide. Planes of Jews from the 4 corners will continue to land at Ben Gurion airport every day, packed with brand new 'Israeli's by choice' and the hate of our enemies in the Arab & Muslim world will grow, as Zionism succeeds to build a country from hope, while Islamism continues to sow fear and destruction. Zionism is a success...pass it on!!

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