Discussion on Zionism and Racism

I was borrowing this book-

Okay. So, so the, the-

From Ben, from Ben Felon

... do you agree, do you agree with the Green Party stance

that

Zionism is racism?

Well, I, I...

Brianna, we're gonna have a serious discussion now.

You're trained as a lawyer,

and I'm gonna speak to you and hope that we, hopefully we can,

uh, be precise.

What the, what the, uh, Green Party did was

it contr- it

created a definition which was racist the way they

described Zionism. They created a definition which

was racist, and

then they condemned it as racism. So if you, if you

yourself make the definition-

Well, how would you define Zionism as something

other than an ethnonational

project?

You might... Okay. Fine. Good question.

Permit me, allow me a credential. I wrote my doctorate dissertation on

Zionism, on the theory of Zionism.

That was my, it was called From the Jewish Question to

the Jewish State: An Essay

on the Theory of Zionism. So I know it pretty well. Okay?

I know the subject even though it's a half century ago.

I still know the subject pretty well. How would I define Zionism?

I would say Zionism is the following.

Zionism came to the conclu- the Zionists.

What distinguished the Zionists from all the other branches, the Bund,

Jewish communists, Jewish socialists, what distin- what

distinguished Zionism was the following.

They said there's no future for Jews in what was called

the diaspora or Galut. Galut is the term for exile.

There was no J- uh, future for Jews there.

One of two things was gonna happen.

Either

they would be persecuted, continue to be persecuted,

namely antisemitism would persist in the non-Jewish,

uh, in the n- in the, uh, diaspora, or,

um,

antisemitism would disappear and then Jews would disappear.

They would just assimilate.

So either the two possible outcomes for Jews

in the non-Jewish world was either continued

persecution or assimilation.

So their view was we had to create a Jewish state, a

state which was predominantly Jewish, in order to

prevent or overcome persecution

and assimilation.

Now, the, the truth of the matter is, in my opinion, their

diag- their, uh, their analysis is probably fundamentally

correct. The reason we don't have huge levels

of antisemitism in Europe now, it's because Hitler

solved the Jewish question.

There is no-

What do you mean? What do you mean by that?

There are no...

The, the six million Jews were exterminated.

That solved the Jewish question. If they had still

stayed in Europe, had there not been the Nazi

extermination,

I suspect that the levels of antisemitism would still be

quite high

in Europe. So-

I, I don't-

But, but assuming-

Okay. But ju- just to reorient us-

Whatever. Yeah, yeah

... just to re-

Allow me, and then you go. And then the second aspect is the

assimilation.

You see that in the United States. Jews are disappearing in numbers.

Assimilation is happening at a very high rate.

Uh, 60% of Jews, you know, are intermarrying, and

intermarriage is essentially the death knell of an ethnical

group. Now, you may say of c- you know, love should triumph over

ethnicity, and I totally, I can get that.

But I'm just saying as an analysis, the

Zionists were fundamentally correct, that in a

non-Jewish state, the prospect was either

persecution or assimilation.

So their solution, quote, unquote, was to create a

Jewish state.

Now, that in itself, in my view, that in

itself

is not racist.

Uh, re-