Unpacking the ‘INSANE’ Premise of Zionism, with Mehdi and Alana Hadid

 

Mehdi is joined by returning co-host Alana Hadid — an activist, designer, and Creative Director of the Palestinian film company Watermelon Pictures — for a special LIVE taping of ‘We’re Not Kidding’ in Los Angeles. They also took great questions from the audience which made for an episode you don’t want to miss. 

Mehdi and Alana dig into the “insane” premise of Zionism and the foundational double standard the entire movement is built upon. They also talk about the weaponization of religion by Christian Zionists and the hypocrisy of Evangelical Christians for not speaking out against the murders of Palestinian Christians in Gaza, the recent ICE raids in Los Angeles and the massive protests that erupted in response, and how Ted Cruz made the US-Israel relationship “Instagram official” during his Tucker Carlson interview.

Also be sure to check out the Q&A that begins 32 minutes into the episode. Zeteo subscribers asked Mehdi and Alana important questions about how to change the minds of PEPs (Progressive Except for Palestine), Israel’s pinkwashing, and Benjamin Netanyahu’s endgame — one questioner even challenged Mehdi’s own political views! 

Abby Martin Exposes Shocking Level Of Racism At Tel Aviv Rally

 

They touch on the relationship between Zionism and White Supremacy, with help from anti-immigrant protesters in Tel Aviv, before relating it to the domestic politics in the US and the solidarity between communities marginalized by American Empire.

UK chief rabbi owes us Palestinians an apology

The chief rabbi of the United Kingdom has weighed in on the row over alleged anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.

Writing in The Telegraph this week, Ephraim Mirvis claimed that Zionism is not separate from Judaism as a faith. He astonishingly implied that no one can have a view on this except Jews and Zionists.

So much for open debate and discussion!

He further claimed that “Zionism is a belief in the right to Jewish self-determination in a land that has been at the center of the Jewish world for more than 3,000 years.” The reality is that not all Jews agree with his definition, let alone non-Jews.

A survey of British Jews by City University London last year shows deep disagreement on the term, with 41 percent not taking up the political identifier “Zionist.” Thirty-one percent identified as anti-Zionist or non-Zionist, while 10 percent said they were unsure.

The survey also found that the number of British Jews who call themselves “Zionist” dropped from 72 percent in 2010 to 59 percent in 2015.

Muslims have a strong attachment to the cities of Mecca and Medina – and of course to Jerusalem – but should all Muslims have a right to move to Saudi Arabia?

And what about Christians? Where was Christianity born? The answer is in historic Palestine. Should all Christians have a right to go and live there?

The chief rabbi and Zionism both ask us to accept that only Jews have a right to determine where they live and never mind the impact of their demand on whoever already lives on that land.

In his article, Mirvis astonishingly fails to mention my people, the Palestinian people, even once. His anger with the left has unfortunately left him ignorant of our plight.

To the chief rabbi, we are invisible.

He did not once acknowledge our existence on the land, our own unshakable connection to it or that it was and still is our home – whether for those living in historic Palestine or in the diaspora.

We are in the diaspora because of Zionism.

The chief rabbi implies that we cannot disassociate Zionism from Judaism – by implication accusing all Palestinians who oppose Zionism – as indeed we do – of anti-Semitism.

This is why Ephraim Mirvis is wrong, with the greatest respect to him, to conflate the two – a religion and a political ideology.

Palestinians do not have a problem with Jews – or with any other group – wanting to live in a state or entity of their own.

However, Zionists chose a land with a people, not an empty land for their state. That is the key issue here. In 1948, 750,000 Palestinians were violently driven from their homeland to make way for the realization of Zionism’s goal, and since then millions of Palestinians have been deprived of their most fundamental rights.

As British Palestinians we abhor all forms of racism including anti-Semitism. We will stand with our fellow citizens who follow the Jewish faith in striving to eradicate the scourge of all racism in this country, including anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.

However, we will not accept the conflation of Judaism and Zionism to label us and those who support our legitimate right to self-determination in our homeland as anti-Semites.

The chief rabbi owes us Palestinians an apology for this conflation which suggests we are anti-Semites. Zionism owes us much more than an apology for our dispossession.

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Israeli town residents take to streets in hundreds to protest sale of house to Arabs

The only democracy in the Middle East! 

The deputy mayor of the northern Israeli town of Afula has joined a demonstration calling for a house in the community not to be sold to an “undesirable” Arab-Israeli family. 

Approximately 150 people marched through the town’s streets on Wednesday afternoon to protest against the owners of a house in the Yizrael neighbourhood who decided to sell to Arabs.

Flyers circulated before the protest called on Afula’s residents to “put a stop to this phenomenon… the sale of homes to those who are undesirable in the neighbourhood… from the beginning”.

Demonstrators carried flags and placards, one of which read: “Traitors against the Jews will get no rest.”

The protesters were joined by both Afula's deputy mayor, Shlomo Malihi, and its former mayor Avi Elkabetz, who is seeking a return to office.

“The residents of Afula don’t want a mixed city, but rather a Jewish city, and it’s their right. This is not racism,“ Mr Malihi said, according to Haaretz

Although around 20 per cent of Israel’s 8.6 million-strong population is Arab, a “nation state” bill currently being considered by the Knesset contains a clause that would allow the establishment of Jewish-only communities. 

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Israel is a Racist Country - Shaykh Hamza Yusuf

Here are 6 crazy things Israel has done to maintain racial purity

Israel bills itself as the Middle East’s only democracy, but it is increasingly clear that this label depends a lot on how you define the Middle East, and how you define democracy. Perhaps the sharpest dissonance between the description of Israel as a liberal democracy and its actual policies is the drive for racial purity.

Israel insists on being the historic homeland for the world’s Jews, something few would disagree with. But it also insists on being a Jewish-majority country, at all costs. In order to maintain its Jewish majority, it must demonize non-Jews, particularly Muslims and Christian Arabs, as “demographic threats.”

Here are six crazy things the Israeli government or the Israeli people have done to maintain this racial makeup.

1. No-Sex Contracts: In 2003, an Israeli company importing Chinese workers required them to sign a contract agreeing not to marry or have sex with any Israelis. No legal action was taken against the company, as Israel has no laws protecting workers from such demands.

2. Birth Control Without Consent: For years, the Israeli government was injecting Ethiopian Jewish immigrants with birth control, “often without their knowledge or consent.” When the practice was exposed in 2013, it was ordered to be halted.

3. Deporting Non-Jews: Anyone in the world with Jewish lineage can move to Israel and claim citizenship. But if you’re not Jewish, things can be dicey. Many refugees from African conflicts have fled to Israel to claim asylum. Israel has locked many of them into massive camps in the desert. It has granted asylum to 0.07% of those seeking it, deporting many others. NPR recently did a story on some refugees who were deported, only to be slain by ISIS.

4. Stripping Palestinians of Land Rights: The Israeli Supreme Court recently laid out two decisions essentially allowing Israel the right to demolish Palestinian communities within Israel itself—not the Occupied Territories—to clear land for Jewish Israelis.

5. Discriminatory Marriage Laws: In the United States, marriage is one of the ways a spouse can gain legal entry through a green card and citizenship. Israel prohibits its citizens from marrying Palestinians in the territories, by refusing to recognize their spouses as citizens. Israel also has no civil marriage law, leaving the institution in the hands of religious clerics who work to prevent interracial marriage.

6. Right Of Return, For Jews Only: The most systematic policy designed to maintain a Jewish majority is the Law of Return. Under this law, Jews can come to Israel from anywhere in the world and claim citizenship, but Palestinians expelled after various wars from homes that were in Israel cannot. The double standard was expressed by Ghada Karmi and Ellen Siegel, a Palestinian woman and a Jewish woman who met in London in the early 1970s. They have posed multiple times with these signs over the years:

These laws, norms, and practices form a matrix with one goal: to maintain a Jewish majority in Israel. (In the case of the birth control given to Ethiopian Jews, it was also an example of trying to maintain a certain type of Jewish majority.)

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