Anti-Zionism = anti-Semitism: an unacceptable conflation!

The subject is highly inflammatory with politicians in most Western countries, and the right and far right have seized upon this conflation. This theme suits them, allowing them to chip away at our rights and freedoms in general. In England, for example—the mother of democracies—hundreds of people are imprisoned for showing support for Palestine, and in France, you can display the flag of any country except that of Palestine, which is now recognized by more than 150 countries, including France. We have the right to defend anything except the Palestinians. Let’s not kid ourselves: banning demonstrations against genocide opens the door to serious attacks on our freedoms.

The Israeli government’s message behind this conflation is well known: there is nothing but HAMAS and terrorists over there, we are the victims today and you will be tomorrow, Israel is in mortal danger, peace is impossible because we want it but they don’t, and so everyone in Gaza must be killed, including babies and children, because they will become terrorists later on. Moreover, Israeli politicians officially proclaim this (1)! As a scientist, I strive to look at the facts and nothing but the facts in order to explain the dangers of this conflation and the real goals of Netanyahu and his clique.

A brief reminder (with references)

1. There is not and never has been genocide! There are between 300 and 600,000 dead in Gaza—counting those under the rubble, according to expert estimates published in The Lancet—and destroying a 6- to 8-story building at night does not only kill the terrorists who live there. There are tens of thousands of children who have died, often of starvation, babies without limbs and orphans wandering among the rubble. More than 80% of the dead are civilians, particularly children, women, and the elderly. Children have been killed by snipers, sometimes with two bullets to the brain, according to foreign surgeons who have seen all kinds of wars and report never having seen this anywhere else. These massacres have been highlighted by Israeli intellectuals, filmmakers, Holocaust survivors and their children, the UN, Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, foreign and independent war reporters, Doctors Without Borders, and all international organizations. The snipers are often foreigners (Americans and French in particular) who proudly declare on social media that they kill a dozen people a day and boast that they could kill more (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16). This is accompanied by “urbicide”—the destruction of all buildings, with five times more bombs than Hiroshima and people given five minutes to leave their homes before they are destroyed—sometimes with private bulldozers coming in to demolish all the buildings (17). This accumulation of indisputable evidence is difficult to share but crucial in order for the blind supporters of this policy in our country to open their eyes, if possible.

2. In Israel, brainwashing is in full swing, and a people—whom I knew well, having lived there for 10 years—has become, with a few exceptions, insensitive to any criticism and suggestion that this is indeed a massacre and genocide (17). Settlers and ministers are calling for everyone to be killed (1). Fortunately, some are saving face and recalling the foundations of the Jewish religion (18, 19, 20, 21), notably the national organization of Israeli doctors, Bezalel, which collects evidence of all the atrocities and defends Palestinians in court whenever possible. Unlike elsewhere (e.g., Afghanistan or Iraq), these massacres have consequences for the perpetrators. Soldiers returning from the front testify to the horrors they have committed before the Knesset committee, throwing away tons of antipsychotic drugs that enable them to live, attesting to how much they suffer from post-traumatic depression and sometimes commit suicide; Many no longer want to return (21b) – something that was unthinkable just a few years ago…

3. Victimization: a very Israeli attitude. Israel is in danger of destruction by Hezbollah or Hamas; even Goebbels would not dare to go that far. One of the best armies in the world, equipped with hundreds of aircraft, thousands of tanks, atomic bombs and missiles, and the best intelligence service in the world—remember the targeted assassinations in Iran and Qatar—is in danger of destruction by terrorists armed with stones (in the West Bank), a few Kalashnikovs, low-quality missiles, no planes, tanks, nuclear missiles, or intelligence system! Israel has fought and won every war for 80 years, currently waging war against six countries at the same time, while destroying most of the forces of Hezbollah and Hamas in a matter of days or weeks and killing Hamas leaders in Tehran or Qatar (and, according to Netanyahu, soon elsewhere).

4. We Israelis are the descendants of Holocaust survivors and we are going to suffer a second one! Shamelessly exploiting the Holocaust and the millions of Jews killed for political reasons and portraying ourselves as victims is also a classic Israeli tactic: “We are the only haven of peace for Jews and the descendants and representatives of the Holocaust.” This amounts to killing them a second time; after all, how can anyone decide what their opinions would be if they were among us? Many would be pro-Palestinian and would prefer to live in the diaspora, as was the case in 1945 when Holocaust survivors chose the US over Israel. This system, repeated ad nauseam for 80 years, has allowed Israel to expand from 22% of the territory to more than 100% if we count Gaza, territories in Syria, Lebanon, etc. According to their “chief terrorist” Smotrich, the true map of Jewish territory extends to Damascus, part of Jordan, Egypt including the Sinai, and Saudi Arabia. Fortunately, it seems that France is not included for the moment! This new Sparta will never stop conquering and subjugating neighboring peoples, forgetting the history that has already led to its downfall. Being the de facto 51st state of the US in a hostile environment is a bad idea, because alliances can change. This happened twice to the Kingdom of Israel when the wrong choice of protector was made, resulting in the destruction of the temple and exile to Babylon.

5. YES, but all this is due to Hamas, which committed massacres on October 7 and is holding hostages. Undoubtedly, Hamas committed an act of terror in Israel, even if many of the claims made, such as the massacre of babies in ovens and sexual violence on October 7, have been refuted by Israeli prosecutors and proven to be Israeli propaganda (21c and 21d). Be careful, this government is a master at spreading fake news. The hostages must be released, but so must the tens of thousands of Palestinians who have often been held for years in appalling conditions. The youngest is 6 years old, and rape cases are reported but not tried. It is worth recalling a few points about Hamas-Israel relations:

a) Israel, or rather Netanyahu, has allowed Qatar to host and finance Hamas for years (under the aegis of the US), the aim being to have an indefensible enemy in order to prevent the PLO from obtaining a Palestinian state. He created Hamas and allowed it to become powerful. This is a well-known technique: it is always better to have an indefensible enemy. Millions of dollars have gone to Hamas thanks to Netanyahu, enabling it to finance all its projects in Gaza, including charities and the construction of schools and hospitals, which explains the votes in its favor.

b) Israel has occupied the entire territory and bombed Gaza for 80 years. It is an open-air prison with no authorized exit without the consent of the occupying country, resulting in 50%+ unemployment. Israel controls water, electricity, and energy, and turns off the taps whenever it decides to. From the start of the war, its army blew up all the water control facilities, destroyed the water wells, and all the market gardens (Gaza was particularly famous for its strawberries); Everything has been plowed up and rendered unfit for consumption. This is clearly urbicide and a war of annihilation intended to make this land uninhabitable so that the Palestinians will migrate yet again and leave the land to Jewish settlers. Israel is blocking funds owed to Gaza and Palestine (notably VAT owed on exports), prohibiting fishermen from fishing—boats have been blown up—prohibiting the activities of UNRWA, which has maintained Gaza for 80 years, building and running hundreds of schools, 11 universities, with Palestinians having a literacy rate comparable to that of Israelis and far higher than that of Arab countries. The same goes for health services, etc. All this has been replaced by US military personnel who make money while killing the unfortunate people who come looking for food. Can we imagine the damage caused by the destruction of a building at night? Or having five minutes to leave a house in which we have lived for decades before its destruction (21st)? Revenge is not a valid argument because in all international law, it does not legally allow for the rights of civilians to be disregarded. Oradour-sur-Glane was an act of “revenge” carried out by the Das Reich division because the resistance fighters (terrorists, according to the Nazis) had done everything they could to delay their arrival in Normandy and stop the landing (which, according to Churchill, played a major role in the success of the landing). Yes, revenge for 7/10 is necessary, but it must be carried out in accordance with the rules of proportionality. I must say that I find it difficult to bear the images of these babies dying of hunger and these 2-3-year-old girls having to carry water barrels for miles when they are not being killed by snipers at point-blank range.

c) All this began well before the sinister 7/10. Need we remind ourselves that the majority of Gazans are people who were expelled in 1947 from Beersheba and Migdal and their descendants by the generals of the Haganah, which preceded the creation of the IDF. The Nakba is widely described with thousands of villages destroyed, 800,000 Palestinians who had lived here for ages expelled by force, their homes confiscated and made available to Jews—I lived in one of these houses when I was studying at the University of Jerusalem—see the books by Ilan Pape and Shlomo Sand to better understand how the Nakba, which the Israelis continue to deny just as the Turks deny the Armenian genocide, makes agreement between these two peoples impossible.

d) In the West Bank—where there is no Hamas—everything is being rapidly massacred and destroyed in order to make a two-state solution impossible. The minister in charge, Smotrich, a true fascist, wants the West Bank to be entirely Jewish, and Netanyahu clearly states that this land is ours and will remain so, and that there is no question of having a Palestinian state next door. It should be noted that Palestinians are almost never allowed to build a house, and since it becomes illegal, it is destroyed when the land is wanted back. The settlers are often foreigners who have recently emigrated from the US or France and have no particular rights to this land unless one accepts the messianic ravings that God gave them this land by divine decree. They can therefore destroy and burn Arab and Christian villages, cut down hundreds of olive trees, etc. All of this is widely documented (22). The massacre of journalists and targeted assassinations of journalists in Gaza and the West Bank (23, 24, 25, 26, 27) are the largest assassinations of journalists in history (28), whatever the purveyors of fake news such as BHL, S Aram, or Einthoven/CRIF etc. may say, shamelessly exploiting this situation and toning down their hatred of Arabs in general. Historians who are unlikely to be suspected of being anti-Zionist say it clearly: we must look at the whole picture. Crif, etc., who shamelessly exploit this situation, muting their hatred of Arabs in general. Historians who are unlikely to be anti-Zionist say it clearly: we must look at the whole picture if we want to understand what is happening (29, 30).

In short, no reasonable person can ignore or deny that a people is being annihilated for colonial reasons. Contrary to the Zionist slogan since Herzl, “a land without a people for a people without a land,” there has always been—for thousands of years—a Palestinian people composed of Muslims since the Arab conquest, Christians who remained after the Crusades, and Jews (a large minority), and all these people have mixed together. Moreover, genetically speaking, the indigenous population is closer to Sephardic Jews than to Ashkenazi Jews, who have dominated the country since its creation. In Egypt, until the Franco-Anglo-Israeli War of 1956, there had been nearly 100,000 Jews for centuries, but now there are only about 70 left, often women married to Muslims. That’s life, and history teaches us that it is immigration and intermingling that make up peoples. There has never been an exclusively Jewish people in this territory, which has been occupied by indigenous peoples who have successively adopted the religions of the occupying powers, with the Palestinians being the descendants of this long history.

And now? The Jews of the diaspora who tend to support Israel no matter what it does are making a double mistake. On the one hand, this reinforces anti-Semitism. We can expect that children who have seen their parents massacred by Jewish soldiers, but especially Israeli soldiers, will want to take revenge on the Jews who supported and are responsible for the trillions of dollars of weapons that destroyed Gaza. As a reminder, AIPAC, the official US Jewish lobby organization, with its billions, prevents the election of any senator or member of the US House of Representatives if he or she has the misfortune to criticize US support for Israel! The term “Jewish lobby” is not anti-Semitic; it allows Netanyahu (along with Trump and US billionaires) to control the US Congress, and it has been working well for decades—see the testimony of a Republican/conservative US congress member (31).

As a Jew and former Zionist—having served in the military and even participated in the Six-Day War—it will be difficult to accuse me of anti-Semitism or anti-Zionism. I prefer to consider myself a descendant of the Diaspora, in which Jews have played an unparalleled role in philosophy, science, and art—the quotes would be too long to list here (from Marx, Einstein, Freud, and Spinoza). Supporting a country at all costs, linked to all the illiberal, fascist regimes on the planet (from the anti-Semitic Orban, to Milei in Argentina, to Trump, who is destroying what remains of democracy in the US), as well as the far right in France, is, in my opinion, questionable. This country supplied weapons to the Bosnian Serbs to massacre Bosnians, to the Afrikaners to massacre blacks in the country of apartheid, and is linked to the far right, forgetting its historical anti-Semitism. This country has the highest rate of arms financing in the world, and the military-industrial complex is unparalleled, controlling everything. One day, our leaders will have to pay for their actions in allowing genocide to take place before our very eyes, without taking into account the population, which is generally opposed to these massacres. I hope that those who dispute this reality—that Jews have all the rights—do not have the nightmares that honest people like the author of these lines have when faced with these unacceptable images. To each his own conscience!

A brief reminder (with references)

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