Unofficially, using mainly common sense as our guide, we can think of two definitions of terrorism.

The term gets thrown around rather freely, and is used by governments to police and invalidate a wide range of individual and social behaviors.

Definition #1: Deliberate Attacks on Civilians

Part of the terrorist playbook is to exact maximum psychological damage, and in this definition attacks on civilians are a core part of the strategy. This behavior compensates for a lack of resources and abilities and the ineffective amount of tactical damage that a typical non-state resistance movement might employ.

By horrifying people, which is best done by deliberately breaking the rules of war and being as brutal as possible, a terrorist group can create outsized fear relative to their actual size, which can evolve into disproportional unrest. Yuval Noach Harari describes this as a wasp that stings a bull in a china shop.

According to this definition, a state can easily be guilty of terrorism as well. There could be a range of incentives for a country might want to strike fear into a civilian population, a top reason being to prevent further uprising and extract obedience.

However, while a terrorist organization would deliberately link themselves to an attack on civilians in order to extract the psychological capital for their cause, a state actor would prefer to create an amount of distance from the act, allowing them to hide behind plausible deniability while still achieving their desired goal.¹

With this definition, Israel is definitely guilty of multiple acts of terror, not just before its founding, when it was a non-state actor, but also afterwards. Sometimes this was overt, such as its deliberate massacre of civilians in Jordan’s Qibya in 1953 (69 civilians killed) or Gaza in 1956 (over 900 people killed).

Other times they allowed others to do the dirty work for them, accomplishing their goals with none of the responsibility, such as Sabra and Shatila (thousands killed), funding Hamas, or supporting multiple nefarious regimes such as Iran and Rawanda.

Airstrikes against “power targets” that don’t create a tactical advantage and are just intended to harass or strike fear into a population should fall into this category as well, especially when these strikes undoubtedly cause civilian casualties. When a terrorist organization blows up a school it’s an act of terror, when Israel blows up a school it should be the same.²

Definition #2: Non-state Attacks

In this view, the definition of terror is any attack made by a non-state actor, period. This is the inverse of the principle pointed out by Max Weber, that the state is the only institution that is granted a legitimate monopoly on violence. Acts that would be normally considered heinous in any other circumstance are accepted under the guise of “military operations” when conducted by a state. It therefore becomes clear why statehood is such a valuable status to attain – it suddenly affords a huge amount of legitimacy to wield power and violence.

According to this view, Palestinian resistance groups will always be terrorists, regardless of who they target, and Israel will always be valid, as it is a state defending itself.³

And this might be true, but we need only point out Israel’s own pre-state militias, that should, and were, classified as terrorist organizations. The Israel Defense Forces of today are an amalgamation of “resistance groups” that, depending on their ideologies, did everything from bombing railroads and attacking police stations to massacring civilians and blowing up markets. All this in a bid for self-determination and a belief in their right to a piece of land.

One man’s terrorist is truly another man’s freedom fighter.

It behooves us, when casting broad sweeping generalizations and moral judgements, to retain a sense of nuance. How would it feel if the tables were turned, as they already have many times in the past? We so often allow means to justify ends when it fulfills our own agendas, and forget everything but implied intent when it comes to the other.

The amount of Palestinians who support violence against Israel is an oft-cited statistic in the Israeli propaganda machine. The amount of Israelis who support violence against Palestinians is cited nearly as often. And maybe this is because of, or rendered irrelevant by, the fact that Israel has been disproportionately violent against Palestinians for over 75 years regardless of whether Israelis support it or not.

1. For a small resistance group, a terror attack can take a tremendous amount of time, money, and risk, and they will do anything they can to take credit for it in order to further their goals (Although even Hamas seems to be trying to distance itself from some of the heinous acts it committed on that day).
   
   A state actor, meanwhile, needs to work less hard to terrorize a population, but at the same time usually prefers to preserve at least a semblance of civility and distance itself from the acts. A state can easily terrorize a population while simultaneously denying, diminishing, or justifying their action to the rest of the world. (Russia’s preference to make its assassinations look like suicides speaks to this point.)
   
   In a way, the ability to terrorist a group from afar, by dropping bombs, using drones, building fences with remote controlled machine guns, while controlling the presence of journalists and international observers, is a privilege afforded to a state, allowing them to commit their atrocities at arms length in ways that neither they nor the rest of the world need to look too closely at. ↩︎
2. Israel invokes the “human shield” argument ad nauseam to allow them to bomb an entire population with impunity. This is not the point of this article, but it’s worth pointing out that the IDF is also deeply embed within its civilian population – soldiers roam the streets and ride buses, reserve soldiers and officers are on call while living with their families, and Israel has bases in the middle of populated areas like Tel Aviv.
   
   Would a Hamas suicide bombing that kills a soldier alongside 20 civilians be considered a “proportionate use of force”? Because this is Israel’s acceptable ratio on the daily (“for every junior Hamas operative that Lavender marked, it was permissible to kill up to 15 or 20 civilians“). ↩︎
3. I believe that the October 7th massacre’s biggest moral failing was its attacks on civilians, and taking of civilian prisoners. Attacks on military institutions were far more justified, and should have been the sole focus of the attack.
   
   It is unfair to the Palestinian cause to group the military and civility casualties it created into one group; it is also quite possible that Israel would have responded in a similar disproportionate fashion even if all the casualties and prisoners they took were military personnel. ↩︎

Much as militant religion is full of contradictory claims, each invoked at the right moment, militant ethno-nationalism suffers the same fate.

For every Israeli killed since 1948 (9,000), there are 10 Palestinians dead (90,000).

For every Jewish child killed in October 7th (38), there are 300 Palestinian children killed in the days that followed (11,000).

For every suicide bombing (165 over 20 years) there are three 2,000 pound bombs dropped on an apartment building (600 in 40 days).

For every shooting attack on Jews in the West Bank there are Palestinian civilians shot in the head by snipers.

For every accusation of Hamas using human shields, there are cases of IDF using human shields.

For every case of sexual assault on October 7th, there’s a case of sexual assault of Palestinian prisoners, male and female.

For every “Hamas does not distinguish between civilians and militants” there is a “1,200 people were killed on October 7th” (of which 45% were combatants).

For every image of Palestinian rejoicing at Israel’s downfall, there are Israeli soldiers rejoicing at Gaza’s destruction.

For every Israeli hostage held in Gaza (251), there are 13 Palestinians held without charges in Israeli jails (3,340).

For every story of abuse of Israeli hostages there is a story of abuse of Palestinian prisoners.

For any accusation of Palestinian indoctrination and hate, there is a Zionist campaign of whitewashing, cultivating ignorance, and military glorification.

For every Yasser Arafat, reviled as a terrorist for attacks on civilians, there’s a Menachem Begin and Ariel Sharon, hailed as heros for attacks on civilians.

For every dismissal of the Palestinians as wallowing in victimhood and delusions of return, there are tales of the resilient Jewish spirit and the weponization of their victimhood.

For every protest against the term genocide and ethnic cleansing is a flippant cry of “antisemitism!”.

For every UN resolution justifying the creation of Israel are 45 resolutions condemning its subsequent behaviors.

For every claim of being the only democracy in the Middle East, there is the neglect of the basic human rights of half the population under its control.

Zionism is a walking, talking, contradiction that has meted more destruction on its own population than anything seen since World War II. And yet the “hasbarah” propaganda persists: Israel is the most moral, just, and ethically indignant country that could ever be put-upon by its oppressive neighbors across the globe.

Facts be damned.

Without the Holocaust, Zionism would not have succeeded. It was a fringe movement, ignored by assimilated secular Jews as unnecessary, and by religious Jews as oppositional to its beliefs.

The Holocaust was critical for the formation of the state of Israel – it shifted the views of Jews around the world, it pushed world opinion to support the founding of the state, and it drove millions of Jewish refugees to the country.

Zionism was founded on the idea of Jewish self-determinism, that no longer would Jews go “like sheep to slaughter”. And yet Zionists failed the Jews of Europe – they were so concerned about creating a better future that they failed to create a better present.

“One cow in Palestine is more important than all of the Jews in Poland,” said Zionist leader Dr. Issac Greenbaum. In 1944, Zionist leaders were offered the chance to ransom tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews for 25 million dollars. They refused.

The more Jews died in Europe, the more valid the Zionist cause. Here is a direct quote from Sol Meyer, who turned down the deal to save Hungarian Jews: “if we do not have sufficient victims we shall have no right to demand an independent state.” Stated differently, the holocaust was the best thing that happened to the Zionists.

It did not stop there. Holocaust survivors were treated terribly after the war, looked down upon as victims, and their individual stories remained untold and invalidated until the Eichmann’s trial in the early 60’s.

Now, of course, things are different. Zionists will have you believe that Israel exists to ensure that the Holocaust happens “never again”. They take great pains in dragging everyone with a pulse to holocaust museums in Israel, Poland, and across North America. And anyone who questions any part of Zionism is equated with condoning the holocaust and marked with the ultimate accusation of being either an anti-Semite or a self-hating Jews.

Unsurprisingly, this obsession with the holocaust is all about image. A friend of mine developed an app that uses AI to help decedents of survivors identify their ancestors in holocaust photos. He approached multiple holocaust museums for support, but was turned down, because their goal is not to remember those who died or to help their decedents mourn. It’s to shove the holocaust into the faces of non-Jews. Holocaust museums are not for Jews. They are for everybody else.

Zionism’s ethnic Nationalism is essentially the mirror of Hitler’s racism. Jews are genetically different, says both Hitler and the Zionists. It’s just that Hitler saw them as the worst and the Zionists think they are the best. They are the most moral army in the world. They are the only democratic country in the Middle East. They are a beacon of morality, and the mounting evidence to the contrary is simply a gigantic pile of bad apples.

In reality, this concept of “never again” is highly specific. Israel has refused to recognize the Armenian genocide. It has colluded with countless countries with human rights violations to serve its own specific needs. And, of course, it is perpetuating some of the most violent acts against civilians in modern history, a brutal suppression of a similar desire for self-determination by a people who were there before they arrived and who rely on their good graces for their very survival. “Never again” indeed.

My father is currently on a book tour, a book whose entire thesis is founded on Hitler’s opinions around the Jews. These are analyzed and interpreted and turned, with a triumphant “aha!” into proof of Jewish superiority. Jews are innately spiritual, imbued with a drive to be righteous and good in their very DNA. They’re just different. They’re just better.

We’re right back where we started.

An earlier version of this post was entitled “why Zionists love Hitler”, which I changed after realizing the current title would be more accurate.

I have been on a journey of deconstructing religion for the last 9 years, and this site is a testament to the variety of angles in which I’ve (literally) attacked the subject.

In many ways, the challenges I grapple with around religion were ones that were issues for me even when I was religious. I was able to hold out for years, but when the framework gave away, all those gaping issues stood out for me, and were available for immediately mockery.

Zionism has been more elusive. I have long known that nationalism is not something I relate to. I was definitely aware that too much patriotism just feels like a secular religion. But Zionism had a special place, because it was linked to survival.

Most Jews are pretty much fine with you being non-observant, or an atheist. Tell a Jew that you don’t believe in God, and they very well might tell you they don’t either. Tell a Jew you don’t believe in Israel, and you’re a self-hating antisemite.

Jews are more religiously attached to Israel than they are to the religion of Judaism. And although I was raised in a grey zone, with parents who purported to be anti-Zionist, like most Orthodox Jews, it was explained that this pertained only to Israel’s secular government. The importance of the land was intertwined with both religion: “this is our. homeland, a holy spot chosen by God”, and safety: “no one else will protect us, we need to protect ourselves”.

When I left religion, the spiritual significance of the land fell away, but its need as a defense against antisemitism remained. And because Israel is such a pervasive assumption for most Jews, and antisemitism is such a salient feature in my upbringing, unpacking all of it has been complex, slow, and non-linear.

A couple things come to mind:

• Israel is indoctrinated into Jews worldwide, from a young age. Even if you don’t plan on ever living there, you must still celebrate and venerate it. Like a letter left in the western wall to perpetually beseech God on your behalf, Israel perpetuates your sense of safety and identity on autopilot.
• The blatant militarism of Israel is celebrated and embraced. Instead of it being strange, or sad, that 18-year-olds must go to war or stomp around carrying guns, this is normalized and celebrated, from social media posts celebrating their hotness, to including soldiers on every birthright trip, to post-high-school military camp experiences for international Jews. I have a photo of my 4-year-old daughter wearing a military beret as part of her kindergarten’s independence day celebrations.
• I was never taught history. Whatever history I was taught was entirely from a Jewish lens: what happened to the Jews and when, and if it didn’t happen to Jews was it good for the Jews? I had no context for the wider sense of our place in the world, what else was going on at the time, and just as importantly, why? Beyond the blanket “they hate us because we are Jews” that is the Response to All Questions, it’s been fascinating to begin to understand the contexts of how Jews presented at different points in history, and how that contrasted with society around them. I certainly was not taught about the multiple massacres and attacks on civilians that Israel perpetuated or abetted throughout its history.
• Racism played a big part in how I was raised. Arabs were inferior, barbaric, dumb, unable to organize themselves, did shoddy work (“Arab work” we called it), and just as importantly, all grouped into one category. Israeli Arabs, Palestinian Arabs, Jordanian or Egyptian, it didn’t matter. They were all the same, they were all not to be trusted. If one of them had wronged the Jews, all of them had. It was not our job to take care of the Palestinian problem, it was the other Arab countries responsibility to “take care of their own”. And, since “even the Arabs don’t like the Palestinians”, this proof of pervasive persecution was itself a justification to persecute them further. Sound familiar?
• I never got to meet Palestinians, growing up. Israel does a great job ensuring you have almost no contact with Palestinian Arabs. There can be no overlap, even though they live in the same country. They choose not to learn Hebrew, we choose not to learn Arabic, even though it’s supposedly Israel’s official language. I got to meet a Palestinian once in my entire 27 years in Israel, and I did so using my American passport. Israelis are thus largely oblivious to the types of shit Palestinians are subjected to by their own government on a daily basis.
• If Jews have a right to self-determination, then Palestinians should too. In fact, Palestinians, at least, hail from the same geographical location, whereas Jews came from all over world and their only unifying factor is their race and religion. What you end up with is a country founded on religion and racism, and we should be doing better than that.
• It’s true that Israel often seems singled out on the world stage, and this obsession with it, either positive or negative, feels unique and at times discriminatory. Certainly it makes it easy for actual antisemites to hop on this bandwagon of hating Israel, or more insidiously, Jews worldwide, and hide behind justified criticism. But the fact remains that Israel as a supposedly western democratic country operates with an amount of military force against its own population in ways that the Western world does not typically stomach. In a time when religion is waning and racism is on the decline, at least rhetorically, founding a country around race and religion is not a great look.

I am still trying to make sense of it all.

Understanding antisemitism beyond a simplistic “God decreed that it would be so” and “they hate us because we are so moral”.

Understanding the nuance and context around the Middle East, both historically and geographically. Jews picked one of the most complicated places in the world to colonize, at a time when colonialism was a justified and celebrated behavior. And while other colonists can simply go back to their home country, Israel has nowhere to go. The situation really is complicated.

At the same time, Israel operates with a tremendous amount of entitlement. It continues to operate with excessive military force even though there are no existential threats to its existence, and it does little to try to alleviate the plight that it has caused. Just as more of the world is waking up to the inappropriateness of antisemitism and racism, the world is also shunning colonialism. And just as the western world has taken steps (typically not enough) to amend its past antisemitism, racism, and colonialism, it behooves Israel to do the same.

Personally, I see no correlation between criticizing Israel and antisemitism, and I don’t care how many holocaust survivors or academic scholars weigh in on this topic. Jews deserve access to the same rights as any other citizen of the country they hail from. Any less rights is a fatal flaw in the country they reside in. Any special rights is unfair to the rest of the population.

A collection of Jews from Poland, Germany, and Morocco do not necessarily have a right to declare their own country. If they do declare their own country, they must grant everyone in that country the exact same rights, or deal with the consequences of not doing so.

The assumption that Israel is a necessity for Jewish survival is just that, an assumption. Jews will continue to survive even without a country, and it remains to be seen if having a country helps them survive. But this assumption is so basic, and so ingrained, that I am still hacking away at it years after leaving religion behind.

If criticizing Israel’s colonial roots and current entitlement behavior makes me an antisemite, then so be it.

“Those delusional Palestinians,” I remember my father telling me as a child. “It’s been 60 years since they declared a war, and lost. Now, they stick to themselves in refugee camps, carry the keys to their lost homes, and keep dreaming of coming back. The should shut up, get over it, and move on. It’s over.”

In the year 132 CE the Jews living in Israel, led by Shimon Bar Kochba, led a valiant but futile revolt against the colonizing Roman forces¹. They briefly managed to establish independence before the Romans returned in force, killed over half a million of them and exiled the rest. The refugees often carried the keys to their homes. This effectively ended the Jewish presence in Israel, and is referred to historically as a “disaster” for the Jews.

For the last 1,900 years, Jews haven’t shut up about it and have dreamed of coming back. Thousands of years later, they invoked their right to return to their “homeland”, even though the reason they had left in the first place was because they had declared a war against their oppressors, and lost.

Bar Kochba, who led this devastation, effectively transforming Jews from a major population in the Middle East to a “dispersed and persecuted minority“, is celebrated by Zionists as a hero, exemplifying the Jewish right to self-determination.

1. This was the third, and best planned, of the Jewish revolts. The second had occurred about 20 years earlier and was perpetrated by Jews living outside of Israel, in the “diaspora”. As part of the rebellion, Jews killed almost half a million Roman civilians. ↩︎