XPost: alt.atheism, soc.culture.israel, alt.bible.prophecy   
   XPost: sci.electronics.design   
   From: bill.sloman@ieee.org   
      
   On 11/05/2025 10:18 am, john larkin wrote:   
   > On Sat, 10 May 2025 18:31:48 -0400, NefeshBarYochai    
   > wrote:   
   >   
   >> Straight Talk About Zionism: What Jewish Nationalism Means   
   >> By Mark Weber   
   >>   
   >>   
   >> It’s important to understand Zionism, not just because it’s an   
   >> influential ideology and a powerful social-political movement, but   
   >> also because there’s a lot of ignorance, confusion and deliberate   
   >> misinformation about it.   
   >>   
   >> If you look up the word “Zionism” in a standard American dictionary,   
   >> what you’ll find is likely to be inaccurate, or at least misleading.   
   >> For example, a popular and supposedly authoritative American   
   >> dictionary in my office defines Zionism as “A movement formerly for   
   >> reestablishing, now for supporting, the Jewish national state of   
   >> Israel.” / 1 This definition, which is typical of American reference   
   >> works, is more than just misleading. It’s deceitful.   
   >>   
   >> The founder of the modern Zionist movement was a Jewish writer named   
   >> Theodor Herzl. In the 1890s he was living in Paris, where he was a   
   >> journalist for a major newspaper in Vienna. He was deeply troubled by   
   >> the widespread anti-Semitism, or anti-Jewish sentiment, in France at   
   >> the time. He thought a lot about the pattern of tension, distrust and   
   >> conflict between Jews and non-Jews that had persisted through the   
   >> centuries, and he hit upon what he believed is a solution to this   
   >> age-old problem.   
   >>   
   >> Herzl laid out his views in a book, written in German, entitled The   
   >> Jewish State (Der Judenstaat). Published in 1896, this work is the   
   >> manifesto or basic document of the Zionist movement. A year and a half   
   >> later, Herzl convened the first international Zionist conference.   
   >> Fifty one years later, when the “State of Israel” was solemnly   
   >> proclaimed at a meeting in Tel Aviv, above the speakers’ podium at the   
   >> conference was, appropriately, a large portrait of Herzl.   
   >>   
   >> In his book Herzl explained that regardless of where they live, or   
   >> their citizenship, Jews constitute not merely a religious community,   
   >> but a nationality, a people. He used the German word, Volk. Wherever   
   >> large numbers of Jews live among non-Jews, he said, conflict is not   
   >> only likely, it’s inevitable. He wrote: “The Jewish question exists   
   >> wherever Jews live in noticeable numbers. Where it does not exist, it   
   >> is brought in by arriving Jews … I believe I understand anti-Semitism,   
   >> which is a very complex phenomenon. I consider this development as a   
   >> Jew, without hate or fear.” / 2   
   >>   
   >> In his public and private writings, Herzl explained that anti-Semitism   
   >> is not an aberration, but rather a natural response by non-Jews to   
   >> alien Jewish behavior and attitudes. Anti-Jewish sentiment, he said,   
   >> is not due to ignorance or bigotry, as so many have claimed. Instead,   
   >> he concluded, the ancient and seemingly intractable conflict between   
   >> Jews and non-Jews is entirely understandable, because Jews are a   
   >> distinct and separate people, with interests that are different from,   
   >> and which often conflict with, the interests of the people among whom   
   >> they live.   
   >>   
   >> A prime source of modern anti-Jewish sentiment, Herzl believed, was   
   >> the so-called “emancipation” of Jews in the 18th and 19th centuries,   
   >> which brought them from the confined life of the ghetto into modern   
   >> urban society and direct economic competition with non-Jews in the   
   >> middle classes. Anti-Semitism, Herzl wrote, is “an understandable   
   >> reaction to Jewish defects.” In his diary he wrote: “I find the   
   >> anti-Semites are fully within their rights.” / 3   
   >>   
   >> Herzl maintained that Jews must stop pretending – both to themselves   
   >> and to non-Jews – that they are like everyone else, and instead must   
   >> frankly acknowledge that they are a distinct and separate people, with   
   >> distinct and separate goals and interests. The only workable long-term   
   >> solution, he said, is for Jews to recognize reality and live, finally,   
   >> as a “normal” people in a separate state of their own. In a memo to   
   >> the Tsar of Russia, Herzl wrote that Zionism is the “final solution of   
   >> the Jewish question.” / 4   
      
   Sadly for that argument, there are lot of other "separate and distinct   
   people" around. Muslims, Hindus and Christians are no less distinct, and   
   when I was growing up in Australia, my parents though that Catholics and   
   Protestants were equally distinct. It didn't stop my brother marrying a   
   Catholic wife, or my parents from getting deeply involved in looking   
   after his five kids.   
      
   Some politicians exploit these differences for political advantage. It's   
   decidedly immoral, but it isn't the kid of immorality that religious   
   groups can be relied on to deplore.   
      
      
      
   --   
   Bill Sloman, Sydney   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)