So people often wonder why there isn't an explicitly Anti-Zionist Jewish instance. This is often said by people who hate Babka but wish there was an alternative. Let's explore the challenges of such an instance.
Firstly, there have been Anti-Zionist Jewish instances. There was masto.jews.international, kibitz.cloud, and even simcha.lgbt originally were all explicitly Anti-Zionist instances. So you can make one but what problems happen?
Well, it turns out people who hate Jews don't care if you are Anti-Zionist. They will accuse you of being one despite all evidence to the contrary. Not everyone will believe the bigots, but enough will that you will deal with regular harassment if you have any visibility.
Any visibility here meaning gentiles are broadly aware of your instance's existence, and you push back in any way on antisemitism from gentiles on the network.
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You will get harassed by Zionists that call you fake jews, tokens, and antisemites. This will include both Jewish people and non-Jewish people.
You will also face severe pressure to not associate with Zionist Jews at all. If you do, you will be accused of being a Zionist and then harassed again.
Assuming you manage all that. It's going to be a small instance. There aren't that many Jews on Fedi, and there are fewer Anti-Zionist ones plus allies. At which point for things to be interesting you'll want to connect to other instances with compatible politics. You will face lots of pressure to look the other way on antisemitism or be defedded. And remember this would be a small instance so it's easy to defed.
At which point, many of your members are likely not using the instance as their main and get better safety guarantees just being on a larger instance.
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Even if you manage all that. It soon becomes clear there aren't many people. The server costs are still there, and it becomes boring. Congrats no one has time or motivation to maintain your instance. You close up shop and recommend people just use their main accounts elsewhere.
I'd really love to see an Anti-Zionist Jewish instance since I think there are a lot of people who would like that. But it would face steep challenges. I fully support anyone that wants to make it work and prove me wrong. And this isn't bluster, get 20 active users and I'll cover your costs for a month
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@raf I'm sure a lot of people would like that. But not sure how many would be Jews. Non-Zionists, possibly. But actually anti-Zionist? For that they'd have to have a reason to oppose Zionism. Some fundamentalist Frum who think a secular state before the arrival of Moshiach is sinful. Some ideological left who dislike nation states and/or believe in the Workers' International. And maybe there are some who just want to be "of a Jewish persuasion" and feel uncomfortable with a Jewish identity to the point of wanting to deny or minimise it. I know a lot of Jews. In 6 decades I've only met a small proportion who'd fit into those categories and almost by those definitions they wouldn't want to be on any kind of Jewish network. It's virtually an oxymoron.
@terryb @raf
I believe it's more complicated than that. There are many (in fact most anti-Zionists or post-Zionists I know), who simply believe in a full democractic (meaning: not Jewish) country from the river to the sea for both, or to be more precise, all people.
Now things get more interesting when you realise that some Zionists from the 40s 50s and even before did actually promote such a solution, and today would be considered ironically as anti-Zionists by Zionists.
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@terryb @raf
Personally I thank raf for these interesting thoughts he shared. I also didn't know some anti-Zionists instances existed before.
I too don't know how much would it make sense to have such an instance. I believe dialog is always good. I also think calling out people around you who say redonkulous things like "anti-Zionists are antisemites" and confronting them is the right way forward. And if that doesn't work, you can always desociate (?) from them and criticise them.
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We have to confront the antisemites as well. The antisemities and the harassment they bring is what curtails the autonomy and agency of Anti-Zionist Jews. They aren't given the room to explore complex policies and positions. They must conform to what other people (often non-Jewish) have deemed acceptable Jewish expression.
@raf One of the most infamous anti-Zionist-enough-for-JVP Jews on the Internet played a role in getting people not to use Fedi at all and stay on Twitter (Chanda Prescod-Weinstein), due to petty grievances. It takes that kind of personality for a Jew to be in communion, so to speak, with JVP; no shit, there's no instance catering to that.
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein also experienced some pretty intense racism on Fedi, and relatively little has changed since then.
@raf "It's racist not to have quote-boosts" is a petty grievance, sorry not sorry. And generally, someone who thinks there's a plot by Zionist doctors in the US to discriminate against black and brown patients and that's why black people have worse health outcomes than whites, and says that pushing back against that conspiracy theory is racist, doesn't get the benefit of the doubt to say "people are racist toward me."
It's more than that, and fairly well-documented
https://blacktwitter.io/@chanda/109390933214864856
Even if you disagree with other things Chanda said, it goes far beyond there not being quote boosts. No one deserves to be sent death threats and called slurs.
@raf Well-documented that she said she got threats, yes. She then responded like an asshole to someone asking if the admin of the instance could block instances ("why are you assuming it was on this instance?"). The most charitable assumption is that it's like with Brianna Wu, who got really bad harassment in GamerGate and ended up being so difficult to deal with that she's an asshole to other, often worse-marginalized people. (See also all the cis people asking "what about black trans people?")
I think this is sufficiently off-topic that it's better to have this discussion in a different thread
@raf Is there really a point of anti-zionist jew instance ? That seems very restrictive and I don't think it's good to be defined negatively (except for antifascism of course). As far as I understood jews.international was more for internationalist than explicitly anti-zionist.
My recollection is they were explicitly Anti-Zionist as well. But I welcome corrections from those with a better memory
@raf That would not be from me. I don't think I have ever looked at the about page, I just followed kittybecka and witnessed the endless antisemitic campaign against her
@alter_kaker It depends of the mean and intends I guess. Is the internationalism only for the Jews ? Is it for everyone but a long therm goal and Zionist is a step towards the abolition on nation state for oriental Jews not to be wiped out before it happens ?
Pure internationalism would be antithetical with zionist but then, people don't live in a world of theory and are not (and it's ok for me) fully coherent with every theory in which they believe for some degree
@raf
These are all ideas. I suspect all Anti-Zionist Jewish instances if given the room would evolve towards a focus on cultivating דאָיִקייט with less emphasis on discussing nationalism. This emphasis on what the instance is for vs what it is against will be fruitful.
The challenge is that stance doesn't neatly fit into conventional understandings of Zionism/non-Zionism/anti-Zionism/post-Zionism so the instance will be dragged into endless rudimentary discussions the community has long outgrown.
Discussions where "wrong" answers will invite harassment.
@alter_kaker I'm a bit frustrated with my English in this one, I'm not sure if what I'm writing is what I mean @raf
@raf this is why I have always chosen not to play in the zionist/antizionist sandbox.
Cutting yourself off from other Jews may seem like a great idea because zomygod that other ideology is so terrible but the masses of political allies out there still fucking hate you.
You can't win a rigged game and it doesn't really matter if it's a soviet-infused antisemitic left or a batshit crazy evangelical end-of-the-worldist right. They will not allow you to exist after you disagree with them.
I probably disagree politically with most of my instance and couldn't care less because no one intrinsically wants me to cease existing.
The only way an antizionist instance could make it is if there were several hundred antizionist Jews who wanted to commit to it, they refused to talk to any other Jews and cut themselves off completely, and prohibited nuanced complex commentary on global Jewry.
It's silly to think they could make it.
As we've said before... solidarity not assimilation, MFers.
@raf dukayt has such different meaning depending on who you ask, that I'm not sure your statement about it is meaningful. Moreover, remember that invoking a slogan from the lineage of Jewish thought actively hostile to traditional Judaism excludes people like me from the conversation.
But yes, I don't see the point of a public Jewish instance, especially centered around anti Zionism. I'd be more interested in a private or at least posting-restricted forum.
It's honestly shocking how many Jewish spaces are actively exclusionary to traditional Judaism. That's something that took me too long to understand.
@raf most of the modern jewish US left thinks because the historicsl political debate between bundists and zionists was highly charged doikayt in a modern context basically means Jews should go back to Poland. Can't even take that stuff seriously.
@raf @alter_kaker @derle this is a thing that is super present in my mind. I don't like going to my Hamburg shul because they have extra prayers for IDF soldiers but none for innocent Gazans and it feels super alienating. But I also feel pretty out of place in the secular groups, bc they are often subtly (sometimes more overtly) hostile to frumkayt.
I just want to be in religious community and be unapologetically queer, in queer community and be unapologetically Jewish, and in Jewish community and be unapologetically an anarchist and a mystic.
@derle look, I don't usually use the expression "anti-Zionist" except to mean something very specific, along the lines of anti fascist. Meaning actively engaged in research and action countering Zionist organizing and so on. I haven't been anti-Zionist in this sense for a long time. But most people say this they mean generally opposed to Zionism. And I don't see how one can be an internationalist without being generally opposed to a violent territorial-nationalist program
@raf
@derle I'm talking specifically about Jews. I think that it would be absurd to expect anyone to be specifically opposed to every nationalism, but surely it can be expected for an internationalist to be aware of and at least by default opposed to the exclusive territorial nationalist program of their own nation. Anyway, this is why Jews.international didn't (as far as I recall) have specific references to anti-Zionism, but rather a "no nationalism" clause.
@dukepaaron not trying to get into a big argument, but briefly the answer is עמךָ ישראל. How well that maps onto European notions of nation is an interesting conversation in a different context
@derle @raf
@alter_kaker In Europe the main alternative to zionism is assimilation, and it's by far dominant, because, going to Israel is not hard to do.
In France, Internationalism has disappeared from mainstream politics. Even most of the far left has stopped promoting it, the closes mainstream thing would be European federalism which is grossly equivalent to make Europe US
@dukepaaron @raf
@derle my perspective is that the best alternative to Zionism, and the one I chose, is traditional Judaism. We also have a non-territorial nationalism available. Unfortunately those are not easy choices to make because they require a break with dominant Western modes of thought.
@alter_kaker dont you think de-assimilating has to mean not just breaking from western zionist thought but also western antizionist thought as well. This is a difficult ideological road to build given our social contexts? Or are you just rejecting zionism's western influence?
@dukepaaron I think that neither Zionism nor anti-Zionism are really relevant to traditional Judaism. I'd even say that they're incompatible. So yes, I agree with you. And it's a very difficult road, and I don't know where I can even develop these ideas, because it's necessary to have a group, and one that includes both people with a traditional education and people who come from what used to be called the secular Left
@alter_kaker yes and it doesn't help that it's a marginal idea and we're so dispersed. @derle @raf
@dukepaaron @alter_kaker @derle
I remember a while back posting https://babka.social/@raf/111399770685398013 and having a surprising number of people resonate with it. If it's marginal it's no more than any of the other non-mainstream currents of Jewish thought
@raf a coherent left neo-hasidism? I'd join that cult.
@raf @alter_kaker @derle since this got a couple re-toots I'll also shout out https://www.shelmaala.com/ which calls itself a Queer, Online Yeshiva which is explicitly anti-zionist, but I find it somehow unfulfilling. Maybe basic is the word. Lots of "who knows where I can get BDS approved matzah" and, I duno, I'll never be fulfilled in this way I guess.
I'm the guy alone on the island with the shuls he'd never step foot in.
I'm also ready for some singing and dancing
What would an "anti-Zionist" instance promote? Flourishing diaspora life? The vibrant Jewish communities that exist all over the world and the unique customs associated with each one. This is one use for a "non-Zionist" instance.
Or is it considering ways to bring down the state of Israel and its 7 million Jewish citizens. or throwing out the red carpet for antisemitic trolls.
Diasporic languages is another good topic for a "non-Zionist" instance. We all know about Yiddish and Ladino, but there is also Jewish-Turkish, Jewish-Arabic Rashi wrote a form of Jewish-French.
And honestly a lot of that stuff can be also done on a regular Jewish instance like Babka
To my best understanding, opposition to Zionism hinges on one of the following beliefs:
* That Jews are not a people, and therefore have no right to national self-determination;
* That Jews are perfectly safe and can prosper just fine in diaspora, and therefore have no need of national self-determination; or
* That national self-determination in itself is bad and should be abolished.
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The first is objectively false, the second is historically false, and the third is singling out the Jews for no good reason. As such, it seems to me, opposition to Zionism has no solid ground to stand on. Is there any other perspective you could offer?
I am interested in a political program for autonomy, agency, and flourishing of Jews in the diaspora. Mostly, since I live in the diaspora. Something Zionism is ill-suited to provide.
Nonetheless, the point of my thread is not to argue the merits of Zionism, but highlight the challenges Anti-Zionist Jews face online. It's an opportunity to reflect on the ways antisemitism on Fedi hurts all Jews no matter what they think about Zionism.