What the hell is a Zionist and why should we be concerned with them?

Question

I may be sorry I asked this but here goes...answer away.

Thank you for the mostly thoughtful answers...articchick, I get your superb subtlety, however I was mainly looking for opinions as to "why we should be concerned" part. Or even, "should we be concerned." But I'll be nice.

Answer 1

The movement known as Zionism which meant establishing a Jewish home in Palestine is a continuation of the reverence to Zion or Jerusalem. (It's an ideology of Jewish oneness in Israel and nowhere else.)

By acting as the center of the Jewish faith and aspiration, Zion or Jerusalem has kept alive the national spirit of Jewish oneness though they have been scattered all over the world for many centuries.

It is for this reason that they would not set up a common homeland in the Gentile lands though they had many chances to do so, if they wished.

One further point to note in this respect is, that most of the Jews are racially Jews, and the Jews converted from the other races are a few, indeed. But even these converted Jews, who strictly speaking, are foreigners, think of Jerusalem as their home owing to the divine sanctity attached to it, and give it preference over their own homelands.

Answer 2

Zionists are NOT Jews who believe they are the supreme race, despite what some ignorant anti-Semites might think.

Zionists are Jews who believe that a Jewish homeland or country should exist. At one point, the Zionist movement was split over the location of that country, with most feeling it should be what was then called the British Mandate of Palestine. However, some thought it should be in part of Canada or elsewhere. With the establishment of Israel in 1948, Zionists and Zionism became terms used to describe Jews who believe Israel has a right to exist.

Zionism and Zionist also are terms used by anti-Semites, especially many of those on the left, who believe Jews are evil, control the media/international banking/United States government, etc. It's the same kind of hateful ignorance found in Nazi Germany, only now it's found on American university campuses.

Finally, no, there's no need to be concerned. But you should be VERY concerned by people who tell you that you should be.

Answer 3

Since Zionism is really at its heart merely a political movement of a few million people who wish to have a homeland like any other ethnic group, we should not be any more concerned with Zionism than any other from of nationalism like French nationalism, Romanian nationalism, or Guatemalan nationalism.

The problem is that because of overwhleming and worldwide bigotry against Jews, their form of nationalism, which is called Zionism, is given unfair and unwarrented attention from the world. In other words, the nationalism of no other group of 14 million gets that much attention. The amount of attention is itself a form of bigotry.

So, I say this. We should not be concerned about Zionists, but we are. We should all get over our fascination with Jews and let them be. They're just people who want a homeland like anyone else.

Answer 4

it is not a "Jewish" belief, and being anti Zionist is not antisemitic .. those answers are both wrong.

There are many, a majority of the under 50 crowd of Jews that are not anti Israel, but anti Israel policy. Much like many Americans. ..We do not believe in Israels supreme right to dominate by force that holy land, rather an equaling and true peace be explored, this has never happened. Zionism as a mode of thought is Dogmatic, therefore it can never be in harmony with it's neighbors.. Zionist does not equal Jew, that's ignorance..
there are many Zionists that are not Jews believe me, Big American oil is predominantly Anglo Christian, and the Evangelical movement is all for Israel as a state... Much of the hostility portrayed by the media against Arab Muslims stems from this corporate oligarchy..

Jews are Jews..

Zionists are Zionists.. don't be confused.

Answer 5

Megan, since you *did* say you might be sorry you asked, I'll be nice. ;o)

American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source
Zi·on·ism (zī'ə-nĭz'əm) Pronunciation Key
n. A Jewish movement that arose in the late 19th century in response to growing anti-Semitism and sought to reestablish a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Modern Zionism is concerned with the support and development of the state of Israel.

Answer 6

A Zionist is someone who believes that Jews have a right to live in their ancestral homeland. Anti Zionists are really antisemites.

Answer 7

A Zionist is one who believes that the Jewish People, like every other people on Earth, is entitled to a country of its own. That is it in its essence.

Just as the Arabs have 22 countries, the Jews have one country, Israel.

Of course, the enemies of the Jewish people are trying as hard as they can to dismember Israel, but they will not succeed.

Now, other answerers are trying to distort the issue, and they must be understood as pushing a certain dangerous agenda. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed this question. He stated:

". . . You declare, my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely 'anti-Zionist.' And I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops, let it echo through the valleys of God's green earth: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews--this is God's own truth.

"Antisemitism, the hatred of the Jewish people, has been and remains a blot on the soul of mankind. In this we are in full agreement. So know also this: anti-Zionist is inherently anti-Semitism, and ever will be so.

"Why is this? You know that Zionism is nothing less than the dream and ideal of the Jewish people returning to live in their own land. The Jewish people, the Scriptures tell us, once enjoyed a flourishing Commonwealth in the Holy Land. From this they were expelled by the Roman tyrant, the same Romans who cruelly murdered Our Lord. Driven from their homeland, their nation in ashes, forced to wander the globe, the Jewish people time and again suffered the lash of whichever tyrant happened to rule over them.

"The ***** people, my friend, know what it is to suffer the torment of tyranny under rulers not of our choosing. Our brothers in Africa have begged, pleaded, requested--DEMANDED the recognition and realization of our inborn right to live in peace under our own sovereignty in our own country.

"How easy it should be, for anyone who holds dear this inalienable right of all mankind, to understand and support the right of the Jewish People to live in their ancient Land of Israel. All men of good will exult in the fulfillment of God's promise, that his People should return in joy to rebuild their plundered land.

"This is Zionism, nothing more, nothing less.

"And what is anti-Zionist? It is the denial to the Jewish people of a fundamental right that we justly claim for the people of Africa and freely accord all other nations of the Globe. It is discrimination against Jews, my friend, because they are Jews. In short, it is antisemitism."

Answer 8

Pretty much anymore, the word Zionist is used as a derogatory term. But in reality, it means Jewish, and those things Jewish.

You shouldn't be concerned about them, you should embrace them as your allies and friends.

Answer 9

Zionism is an international political movement that supports a homeland for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel. Formally organized in the late 19th century, the movement was successful in establishing the State of Israel in 1948, as the world's first and only modern Jewish State. It continues primarily as support for the state and government of Israel and its continuing status as a homeland for the Jewish people. Described as a "diaspora nationalism", its proponents regard it as a national liberation movement whose aim is the self-determination of the Jewish people.

While Zionism is based in part upon religious tradition linking the Jewish people to the Land of Israel, where the concept of Jewish nationhood is thought to have first evolved somewhere between 1200 BCE and the late Second Temple era, the modern movement was mainly secular, beginning largely as a response to rampant antisemitism. At first one of several Jewish political movements offering alternative responses to the position of Jews in Europe, Zionism gradually gained more support, and the Holocaust accelerated Jewish immigration to the Land of Israel. On 14 May 1948, the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel stated: "In the year 5657 (1897), at the summons of the spiritual father of the Jewish State, Theodore Herzl, the First Zionist Congress convened and proclaimed the right of the Jewish people to national rebirth in its own country."

Terminology
The word "Zionism" itself derived from the word "Zion" (Hebrew: ציון, Tziyyon), one of the names of Jerusalem, as mentioned in the Bible.


1892 issue of Self Emancipation by N. Birnbaum describing the principles of ZionismIt was coined as a term for Jewish nationalism by Austrian Jewish publisher Nathan Birnbaum, founder of the first nationalist Jewish students' movement Kadimah, in his journal Selbstemanzipation (Self Emancipation) in 1890. (Birnbaum eventually turned against political Zionism and became the first secretary-general of the anti-Zionist Haredi movement Agudat Israel.)

Since the founding of the State of Israel, the term "Zionism" is generally considered to mean support for Israel as a Jewish nation state. However, a variety of different, and sometimes competing, ideologies that support Israel fit under the general category of Zionism, such as Religious Zionism, Revisionist Zionism, and Labor Zionism. Thus, the term is also sometimes used to refer specifically to the programs of these ideologies, such as efforts to encourage Jewish emigration to Israel.

Certain individuals and groups have used the term "Zionism" as a pejorative to justify attacks on Jews. [citation needed] According to historians Walter Laqueur, Howard Sachar and Jack Fischel among others, in some cases, the label "Zionist" is also used as a euphemism for Jews in general by apologists for antisemitism.

Zionism should be distinguished from Territorialism which was a Jewish nationalist movement calling for a Jewish homeland, but not necessarily in Palestine. During the early history of Zionism, a number of proposals were made for settling Jews outside of Europe but these all ultimately were rejected or failed. The debate over these proposals helped define the nature and focus of the Zionist movement.

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Answer 10

Zionism is a Jewish belief that they are the supreme race and they should unite to go back to Israel to make their movement formidable with networks in outside world just like the US.