Why is it if anyone questions the authority of Israel they are automatically anti-Semitic?

Question

I am an atheist. I see Israel's right to exist as a nation and to govern itself. I also believe that Palestinians have the right to exist.

I also recognize the mass murder that both Israel and Palestinians commit against each other.

Both parties are wrong, two wrongs do not make a right.

However, Israel's violence and oppression against the Palestinians has been far more effective. The Israelis are killing about 7 Palestinians for each Israeli. Both sides have been killing civilians and children.

I personally think both sides are INSANE because they kill each other in the name of a god that doesn't exist.

Now when I express such an opinion I am called anti-Semitic - how ignorant is that?

I am like 1/10th or 1/8th Jewish on my Grandma's side. How can I hate Jews?

I'll tell you what I hate -I hate violence in the name of a god and oppression in the name of a god.

That is just anti-human. I am Pro-Human

Answer 1

Stop the insanity!!! I agree both sides are wrong yet both sides have God on their side go figure.
I have to agree that religious beliefs have become violent and cruel on all fronts.
I am beginning to think Armageddon is going to be ego against egomaniac religious idiots.
Seems all have lost the true meaning of the words peace & love for each other.

Answer 2

It depends upon how they present their criticisms.

One of the more common comments that are made is comparison of the deaths as if how they occur are somehow equal. IE: Your comment, "I also recognize the mass murder that both Israel and Palestinians commit against each other."

How is strapping 20 pounds of explosives, surrounded with nails and glass, walking into a cafe full of women and children and blow them all up the same as a military strike against a site where the enemy is launching rockets into your nation? To equate a clear attack on civilians with a counter attack on a rocket launch site is just one example of how anti-Semitism works its way into the discussion.

Also, you need to read the Geneva Conventions to get an idea of the constraints that Israel has imposed upon itself. Israel signed the conventions and while the Palestinians have a government that is recognized by the UN, you will notice that is one part of international law they so nicely have avoided signing.

Lastly, you seem to equate the issue of Israel and the Palestinians as resulting from the 67 war. The Palestinian Liberation Organization was started in 1964, three years before the war. And one of the most damming lines in the Charter of the PLO is a clear statement that the goal of the PLO is to destroy Israel. Since this took place in 1964, it is clear the issue is not about land but about the very existence of Israel.

The Arabs and Israel had not had a war since 1956, Egypt controlled the Gaza strip and Jordan controlled the West Bank. At any time from 1948 to 1967 those two nations could have given the Palestinians "their" land but did not. Did you see the PLO demanding "their" land back from Egypt and Jordan? Did you see the PLO launching terrorist attacks against those nations? It was only when Israel captured the land after the 67 war (which we now know was planned by the USSR as a cover to destroy Israel's nuclear reactor) that suddenly the land of Gaza and the West bank became an issue.

It is not politically correct to be openly anti-Semetic so people hide their anti-Semitism in commenting about Israel. But if you look at how they comment, how they compare apples to oranges, how they conveniently forget dates and the past, their anti-Semitism is clear for all to see.

By the way, you can not be "1/10th" Jewish. Genealogy has to be in factors of two. Putting that aside, you can hate Jews even if you are a Jew. There is even a term for it, "the self hating Jew."

Answer 3

There is no such thing as being "a little Jewish." One is either a Jew or a non-Jew.

One of the big lies that are being passed off as truth by politics and mass media is the "Palestinian refugees" issue: the allegedly "native" population that were "evicted" by the Israelis. Actually, in 1948 the Arab so-called refugees were encouraged to leave Israel by Arab leaders, who promised to purge the Land of Jews. Almost 70 % of them left without having ever seen a single Israeli soldier.

lsrael is not oppressive of anyone, certainly not of any Arabs.

Out of the 100,000,000 refugees since World War II, the so-called Palestinians are the only refugee group in the world that has never been absorbed or integrated into their own peoples' lands. On the contrary, Jewish refugees were completely absorbed into Israel.

The truth is that the Arab League keeps the Palestinian refugees issue as a political weapon against Israel, with which they continue to fool the United Nations and propagate their perfidious policy.

The proofs of such intention are given by Arab sources themselves: At a refugee conference in Homs, Syria, the Arab leaders declared that «any discussion aimed at a solution of the Palestine problem which will not based on ensuring the refugees' right to annihilate Israel will be regarded as desecration of the Arab people and an act of treason». In 1958, former director of UNRWA Ralph Galloway declared angrily while in Jordan that «the Arab states do not want to solve the refugee problem.

They want to keep it as an open sore, as an affront to the United Nations, and as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders do not give a damn whether Arab refugees live or die». King Hussein, the sole Arab leader that directed integration of the Arabs, in 1960 stated: «Since 1948 Arab leaders have approached the Palestine problem in an irresponsible manner.

They have used the Palestine people for selfish political purposes. This is ridiculous and, I could say, even criminal».

Answer 4

Let me ask you a basic question: What is Israel supposed to do in the face of the existential threat posed to it by various terrorist groups? It should be clear to anyone that Israel has the full right to wage deadly warfare against such groups if necessary. You think it isn't necessary? Well, come up with a better alternative and argue your case.
Your simple numbers game (more Arabs have been killed than Jews!) is just that, simplistic, and indicates that you haven't given it much thought.
How many innocent Arabs have been deliberately targeted by Israel vs. how many innocent Jews have been targeted by these terrorist groups? That's a numbers game few are willing to discuss because they may end up realizing that yours (and others) pathetic attempts at moral equivalence are actually quite immoral.

As is the case, please cite for me any Israeli general or government spokesman who has said that the reason they are going after terrorists is in the name of G-d. You won't be able to since no such thing exists.

And for the record, just because someone has some Jewish blood in them (or is completely Jewish) does not absolve them of the charge that they are anti Semitic, though, based on this single question, I wouldn't judge you as such.

Answer 5

Okay, first of all. If you're Jewish on your mother's side from her mother, etc. you're 100% Jewish. There's no being partially Jewish. You either are or you aren't.

Secondly, war is war. Neither side is worse than the other when it comes to killing people. Just because one side is more effective does not equate to them somehow being worse.

Thirdly, I personally don't see why they can't share the land. The fact is that there has been talks for years about creating borders and acutally setting up two states, but agreements can't seem to be reached.

Lastly, MOST of Israel is secular, so please don't equate what the government is doing to Judaism. They're separate.

Why do you feel the need to defend your position by stating your "jewishness" and saying that because of that you cannot possibly hate Jews. You're pro-human, but your entire argument, while criticizing both sides, is clearly aimed more against the Jewish side (you equated it to Jewish rather than Israeli). Does this make you anti-semitic? Not necessarily. But you should probably examine why, if you're simply "pro-human" as it were, you are attacking one side more than the other.

Answer 6

You are correct! I think the U.S. media keeps the truth somewhat filtered since the U.S. funds Israel by giving them billions annually. Most people support Israel without even knowing the facts. Both, Israel and the Palestinians are guilty of acts of terror. Israel soldiers shoot kids that throw rocks a tanks, they bulldoze Palestinians homes, shut off water supply to the Gaza Strip when the feel like it, and go against U.N. policies. Israel is just as much a part of the terrorism as the Palestinians that blow themselves up. Maybe people call truthsayers anti-semitic for the same reason we are called unpatriotic when we bring forth short commings of our own government. It's like a trump card that allows the truth to be hidden by labeling and attacking the person who speaks it.

Answer 7

I agree with you. But I think that people really aren't that familiar with Israel's crimes, and so they think you are making it all up. I've tried to argue this point with people myself, and everyone thinks that Israel is innocent. I don't know how this becomes anti-Semetism, since it is criticism directed against a state, and not the people of the state, or their religious beliefs. I suspect it's a way to silence the opposition. Still, would people reasonably argue that you can't teach about the Inquisition because to do so would be manifesting hatred against Catholics? Of course not, and yet Catholicism as a doctrine had a lot more to do with the Inquisition that Judaism has to do with Israel's foreign policy.

Answer 8

They aren't killing over God, they're killing over real estate. The Palestinian's would have been taken into any number of countries in the mid-east, except that the rest of the mid-east doesn't want them either, which is why they support giving them Israel. The Palestinian's were rejected by the other mid-east countries long before the Jews came back.

Answer 9

becuase of the intentions behind it.

it is one thing to question in a historical or educational sense.

most of the time people are just trying to slam the jews by adopting hate-filled rhetoric from the nations that surround them trying to kill them.

almost always these questions come with an intent to crap on the jewish people, not explore modern or historical fact.

just like when people say "jesus was a homo" or "jesus never existed" then the intent is usually just to crap on christianity, not logically analyze the historical figure known as jesus.

Answer 10

The day this makes sense is the day that Israeli culture starts glorifying a death-cult for martyrs who think nothing of walking into a pizza parlor or a public bus with a bomb strapped to the waist.