Israel has always been a project promoted by Imperialist powers, and this has profound implications for the history of anti-Semitism, argues David Cohen

Israel’s mass murder of Palestinians, with the open support of Britain, the USA and other powers, continues unabated. This genocidal assault on the Palestinian people has triggered massive demonstrations throughout the world. Not content with backing Israel to the hilt, Western governments have shamelessly sought to criminalise any outward show of opposition to Zionism. Those who chant or display the slogan ‘From the river to the sea Palestine will be free’ have been branded ‘hate-mongers’. Some have been arbitrarily detained, others sentenced to fines or imprisonment, and still others deported, all in the name of combatting anti-Semitism.

At a time like this, when Western governments are ceaselessly bandying about the label ‘anti-Semitism’, anti-Zionist Jews must make their voices heard. They must not allow the imperialists to speak in the name of the global Jewish community, not when it is wracked by internal divisions, not when ‘good Jews’ and ‘bad Jews’ (to borrow from Winston Churchill) are at each other’s throats over the conduct of the Israeli state. To conceal the true nature of this schism, the imperialists sing the praises of the Zionists (Churchill’s ‘good Jews’) while at the same time denigrating anti-Zionist Jews (Churchill’s ‘bad Jews’). Some go so far as to assert that anti-Zionist Jews have forsaken their Jewish heritage to become ‘self-loathing Jews’. Precisely the opposite is the case. Anti-Zionist Jews uphold what Lenin called ‘the great world-progressive features of Jewish culture’,¹ most notably its internationalism and strong identification with oppressed peoples, whereas pro-Zionist Jews have abandoned that long historic culture.

‘Good Jews’ and ‘Bad Jews’: Jewish opposition to Zionism

There is no doubt that the Jews were for long an oppressed people. For centuries they were denied the right to choose their places of residence, to travel freely, to buy or rent land, to gain access to educational institutions, to pursue a range of occupations, and so forth.

Jewish people were oppressed in all spheres, including the economic, political, social, and cultural, and in all types of societies, whether slave owning, feudal or capitalist. The emergence of large-scale capitalist industry did not ease their burdens but added to them considerably. In the Tsarist Empire, a vast expanse embracing most of Eastern Europe, the combination of feudal relics, naked state terror and industrialisation, made life unbearable for Jewish workers. Living in industrial slums, where they occupied the poorest and most squalid tenements, they were vulnerable to attacks by marauding gangs of anti-Jewish thugs, who were given free reign by the police. Returning home from a long and exhausting day’s work in a grimy factory, Jewish workers would find their homes in flames and their loved ones murdered. Highlighting the position of Jews in Russia in 1914, Lenin wrote:

‘… no nationality in Russia is so oppressed and persecuted as the Jewish. Anti-Semitism is striking ever deeper root among the propertied classes. The Jewish workers are suffering under a double yoke, both as workers and as Jews. During the past few years, the persecution of the Jews has assumed incredible dimensions.’²

Yet as oppressed as the Jews were, they showed little interest in the idea of a Jewish ‘homeland’ and many actively opposed it. In those days, the majority of Jews were workers. Not surprisingly, given their status as a downtrodden and super-exploited section of the working-class, many were highly militant and internationalist in outlook. Rather than set their sights on a ‘homeland’ abroad, they strove to unite with non-Jewish workers to achieve democracy at home. In keeping with their internationalist perspective, they rejected the Zionist argument that a Jewish ‘homeland’ would provide the solution to the workers’ problems.

The nature and the degree of the oppression of Jewish people differed widely throughout the West. Yet despite these variations, the basic pattern persisted: the more Jewish workers were oppressed, the more they turned their backs on the idea of a Jewish ‘homeland’. By the beginning of the twentieth century a split emerged in the international working class over the question of whether to support imperialism, and again a clear pattern emerged. Jewish workers who remained consistently internationalist were implacably opposed to Zionism, while those who sided with imperialism tended to support the Zionist call for the formation of a Jewish ‘homeland’. This division within the Jewish working class was a source of intense frustration to the British imperialists.

In February 1920, in an article in the Illustrated Sunday Herald, Winston Churchill, then the Secretary of State for War, laid bare his hostility towards Jewish radicalism. As an ardent champion of Zionism, he welcomed the fact that a section of the Jewish working-class favoured the formation of a Jewish ‘homeland’. Referring to the pro-Zionist Jews as ‘good Jews’, he contrasted them with ‘bad Jews’, and here his anger rose to fever pitch. The ‘bad Jews’ were mindless creatures who had forsaken civilised standards for the terroristic creed of ‘Bolshevik internationalism’.

Despite its hubris and bluster, Churchill’s article is noteworthy for two important reasons. On the one hand, it acknowledged that opposition to Zionism was widespread among Jews; on the other, it recognised that there was a close connection between the oppression of Jews and the failure of Zionism to strike roots in the Jewish community. Wherever Jews are ‘the most cruelly treated’, he wrote, there you will find ‘bad Jews’. To break the cycle of anti-Semitism and Jewish opposition to Zionism, Britain must ensure that Jews not only feel at home in the West, but also have the added security of a ‘homeland’ in the Middle East. He continued:

‘It has fallen to the British Government, as the result of the conquest of Palestine, to have the opportunity and the responsibility of securing for the Jewish race all over the world a home and a centre of national life. … Of course, Palestine is far too small to accommodate more than a fraction of the Jewish race, nor do the majority of national Jews wish to go there. But if, as may well happen, there should be created in our own lifetime by the banks of the Jordan a Jewish State under the protection of the British Crown, which might comprise there three or four millions of Jews, an event would have occurred in the history of the world which would, from every point of view, be beneficial, and would be especially in harmony with the truest interests of the British Empire.’³

In his article, Churchill refrained from elaborating on what the ‘truest interests’ of British imperialism were in the Middle East, though in many of his other writings he spelt out in unmistakeable terms how essential it was for Britain to maintain a substantial military presence in the region. The ‘good Jew’ of his 1920 article was essentially a warrior Jew.

It was only when the USA supplanted Britain as the custodian of the Middle Eastern oilfields that the role of Zionism became abundantly clear. Until then, the Jews’ status as an oppressed people continued to act as a barrier to the spread of Zionism.

Jewish collaboration with imperialism

What happened after World War II? Why did so many Jews become collaborators in the Zionist project? The answer is not far to seek. Following the defeat of Nazi Germany, the imperialist powers, headed by the USA, realised that Zionism was vital to the establishment of the new imperialist order. Although the rudiments of a Zionist state already existed, more needed to be done. At the same time as the post-war imperialist powers gave final shape to the Zionist state, they took steps to end the oppression of Jews at home. As the barriers to Jewish advancement came down, large numbers of Jewish workers rapidly rose to become members of the middle class, which explains why the old Jewish radicalism waned.

In effect, the imperialists said to the Jews: ‘We have ended your oppression, now you must help us to keep in check the oil-producing Arab nations.’ The majority of Jews accepted this arrangement, deluding themselves that collaboration with imperialism was the best way forward for the Jews. The intensification of the oppressive activities of the Israeli state and the changing class composition of Jews internationally went hand in hand, each tendency reinforcing the other.

Today, the overwhelming majority of Jews enjoy a relatively high standard of living, far above the national average in each of the countries where they live. They are less likely to experience unemployment, to live in squalid tenements, to work in low-paid occupations, and to face the threat of homelessness than any other ethnic group. In keeping with their Herrenvolk mentality, the Zionists attribute this change to what they consider to be the Jews’ unique ability to better themselves, rather than to the imperialists’ need for a militaristic outpost in the Middle East.⁴

There is no denying that prejudice against Jews persists; it could not be otherwise in capitalist society. What is crucial, however, is that state-sponsored anti-Semitism has ceased to exist. This situation arose, not because Western ruling classes had a change of heart, but because they needed, and eventually succeeded in establishing a dependable Zionist state in the Middle East.

It is therefore wrong to conflate the anti-Semitism of today with the anti-Semitism of the past, yet this is precisely what the mainstream political parties in the imperialist countries repeatedly do. In their endeavour to legitimise Zionism, they have adopted a two-pronged approach. On the one hand, they have conducted smear campaigns against all those who have dared to draw parallels between Israel and Apartheid South Africa, let alone Nazi Germany (perish the thought!). On the other hand, they have attacked those who have hinted – no more than hinted – that the Jews are no longer an oppressed people. When Diane Abbott said that Jews do not suffer the same degree of discrimination as black people, the Labour Party fell into paroxysms of rage. Keir Starmer, complicit in Israel’s genocidal activities, immediately suspended her from the Labour Party, describing her comment as anti-Semitic.

Once instrumental in the persecution of Jews, ruling-class parties now present themselves as the enemies of anti-Semitism, but only because a) they remain committed to preserving the Israeli settler-colonial state, and b) they enjoy the support of the West’s ‘good Jews’, who, thanks to the realisation of Churchill’s vision for a Zionist-imperialist alliance, now predominate over the West’s ‘bad Jews’. 

This raises the question: If the majority of Jews were again to champion the cause of oppressed peoples, would the imperialists revert to their old anti-Semitic ways? For anti-Zionist Jews, this is an irrelevant question. Under no circumstances will they abandon their opposition to oppression. Anti-Zionist Jews are opposed to all forms of oppression, particularly those perpetrated by ‘good Jews’ against Palestinians. Like the oppressed Jews in Nazi Germany, Palestinians face the threat of extermination, but with this difference: The Zionists are carrying out their murderous assaults against the Palestinian people – aptly called the twenty-first-century Holocaust – in the name of the victims of the twentieth-century Holocaust. A more perverse twist of history is difficult to imagine.

Imperialist interests and imperialist lies

The argument that Israel was established so that the Jewish people would never again face the threat of extermination is a deception, an emotional ploy designed to win sympathy for the Zionist cause. The imperialists threw their weight behind the formation of a Zionist state, not out of concern for the Jewish victims of fascism, but because the Zionists agreed to act as the gendarme of the Middle East. Even a cursory reading of the Balfour Declaration, issued by the British Government in November 1917, would reveal how closely aligned the Zionists and British imperialists were. Well before the Holocaust, British imperialists had set about helping the Zionists to achieve their reactionary objectives.

On the eve of World War II, Ronald Storrs, a former Military Governor of Jerusalem, lauded Britain’s efforts in establishing ‘“a little loyal Jewish Ulster” in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism’. Citing the Balfour Declaration as a landmark in the development of Zionist-British relations, he expressed glowing admiration for the way in which Jewish settlers were clearing the path for the creation of a Jewish state. Rather than try to disguise his racism, he revelled in it. With an utter disregard for Palestinian rights, he declared:

‘In spite … of non-Zionist and anti-Zionist Jews, world Jewry was at last within sight of home. … No longer would the Jews remain a people without a land, in exile everywhere; Consuls of the Spirit, bearing witness among aliens to the invisible glories of a vanished kingdom. Civilization had at last acknowledged the great wrong, had proclaimed the word of salvation. It was for the Jews to approve themselves by action worthy of that confidence: to exercise practically and materially their historic “right’’. The soil tilled by their fathers had lain for long ages neglected: now, with the modern processes available to Jewish brains [yes, that is the expression he used, ‘Jewish brains’], Jewish capital and Jewish enterprise, the wilderness would rejoice and blossom like the rose.’⁵

As for the Palestinians, their fate had been determined by the Zionists well in advance of World War II. In his diaries, Theodor Herzl, the father of modern political Zionism, wrote:

‘When we occupy the land, we shall bring immediate benefits to the state that receives us. We must expropriate gently the private property on the estates assigned to us.

We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our own country.

The property owners will come over to our side. Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.’⁶

We know what the expropriation and removal of the Palestinians meant in practice. Far from acting ‘discreetly and circumspectly’, the Zionist settlers used unbridled terror to expel hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their ancestral homeland. The ‘genteel’ framers of Zionism had no choice but to rely on raucous ruffians to give concrete meaning to their plans, and only those with ‘Zionist brains’ could have thought otherwise.

The formation of a Zionist warrior state became all the more pressing after World War II, when the imperialist powers turned from colonial methods of domination to neo-colonial ones. Unwilling to place their trust in economic muscle alone, the imperialists hankered after a Middle Eastern enclave to play the role of armed caretaker in the region. Neo-colonialism, for all its pretence of non-violence, rested on raw military might.

Despite the growing rivalry among the imperialist powers, there is little to distinguish between them in terms of their support for Israel. All welcome the role which Israel plays in safeguarding imperialist interests; all recognise the importance of curbing the growth of a pro-Palestinian movement in the west. A resurgence of the old Jewish radicalism in the imperialist heartlands would place a limitation on the West’s ability to suppress pro-Palestinian demonstrations. One can imagine the difficulties the imperialists would face if, under the guise of combatting anti-Semitism, they were to carry out reprisals against large numbers of Jews. This explains why extreme right-wing politicians, traditionally the bastions of anti-Semitism, are now pretending to be the friends of the Jewish people.

Suella Braverman, who has the audacity to present herself as an opponent of anti-Semitism, is typical of these politicians. If she now loves the Jews, it is only because she loves imperialist interests in the Middle East more. Besides, her warnings about the dire threat posed by anti-Semitism suit her purposes perfectly, for they not only provide her with an ideological cover to attack the pro-Palestine demonstrators but also serve to remind Jews of how rampant anti-Semitism was before the establishment of Israel. Her message is clear: if Jews wish to continue enjoying ruling-class patronage in the West, they must forsake their centuries-old opposition to oppression, that is, must remain ‘good Jews’. Since the cry of anti-Semitism is now the false cry of former anti-Semites, it is left to progressive peoples of all faiths both to champion the cause of the Palestinian people and to combat anti-Semitism when and where it actually arises.

The Zionists are fulfilling their end of the Zionist-imperialist bargain with Nazi-like zeal, while the imperialists, exaggerating the growth of anti-Semitism in the West, are raising a hue and cry against supposed ingrained Muslim hostility towards Jews. Some have gone so far as to state that Islam is incompatible with the Judaic-Christian values on which Western society rests. This was said by none other than Suella Braverman, that vocal cheerleader in the British Parliament for the Netanyahu gang. She is a consummate falsifier of history. For many decades, Muslims stood side by side with Jews in their struggle for freedom. When Jews were expelled from Christian Spain centuries ago, they sought refuge in Muslim lands, where they practiced their faith openly and freely, as well as contributed to the social and intellectual life of the wider community.

There were conflicts between Jews and Muslims, certainly, but these were contingent upon political developments and not religious ones. Zionist historians go to great lengths to conceal this truth. With fanatical fervour, they focus exclusively on examples of Muslim-Jewish antagonisms, in order to sow discord between the two faiths, and to portray Islam as inherently evil. The fact of the matter is that there was nothing in Islam, any more than there was in Christianity or Judaism, which necessitated Arab-Jewish conflicts. As Khaleel Mohammed wrote, in a review of the work of a Zionist historian:

‘Recently, a new genre of recollections about the Jewish past has emerged. It has the political agenda of establishing the rightfulness of an Israeli state, while at the same time delegitimizing Palestinian claims to the land on which the modern Jewish polity exists. This … approach seeks to debunk the idea of Muslim tolerance [towards Jews], trying to establish that the Arab and Muslim attitude toward Israel has little to do with modern political developments, but is rather simply the manifestation of a hate that comes from the very core of Islam.’⁷

The imperialists’ demonisation of ‘bad Jews’ (or, in contemporary parlance, ‘self-loathing Jews’) is inextricably bound up with their demonisation of Muslims. To counter the Zionists’ taunt about ‘self-loathing Jews’, anti-Zionist Jews bring into play a taunt of their own. Without hesitation, they retort: ‘We would rather be self-loathing Jews than loathsome ones.’

In an important respect, Churchill was correct. The character and direction of ‘the Jewish race’, he predicted, will be determined by the outcome of the battle between ‘good Jews’ and ‘bad Jews’ over the question of Zionism. As he wrote in his 1920 article:

‘The struggle which is now beginning between the Zionist and Bolshevik Jews is little less than a struggle for the soul of the Jewish people.’

The majority of Jews have clearly abandoned traditional Jewish opposition to oppression. In response to this betrayal, anti-Zionist Jews declare: ‘If our emancipation in the West is conditional on our support for Israel, then we reject such emancipation. Instead, we will join with our non-Jewish brothers and sisters in combatting fascism wherever it exists and wherever we happen to be. Never will we seek refuge from fascists by doing to other people what the Nazis did to the Jews. Above all, we will continue to stand with our Palestinian brethren in their struggle for dignity and freedom from occupation.’

Justice is on the side of the Palestinian people. They seek to reclaim their ancestral homeland, one and indivisible, a homeland which stretches majestically, from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. To counter this, the Zionists and their imperialist backers, all the forces of darkness, are carrying out deadly attacks on innocent Palestinian men, women and children. Jews who do not speak out against this outrage, this twenty-first-century Holocaust, are traitors to ‘the great world-progressive features of Jewish culture.’

¹ V.I. Lenin, ‘Critical Comments on the National Question’, Collected Works, Vol 20 (London: Lawrence and Wishart 1977), p.26.

² V.I. Lenin, ‘The National Equality Bill’, Collected Works, Vol. 20, p.172.

³ Winston Churchill, ‘Zionism versus Bolshevism: A struggle for the soul of the Jewish people’, Illustrated Sunday Herald, February 8, 1920, p.5.

⁴ In its comparative study of the occupations and incomes of the UK’s main religious groups, the Equality and Human Rights Commission stated: ‘Jewish men appear to be the most advantaged in the labour market (with a full 80% in managerial, professional and associate professional jobs) … Only 35% of Muslim men are found at this level, less than half that of Jewish men. Muslim men are found to a greater extent instead in plant and machinery factory work and in unskilled elementary jobs (36% combined) compared with around one quarter of Christians (23%) and Sikhs (25%), and 6% of Jewish men, who are the least likely to be in these lower-paid, lower-status positions.’ Equality and Human Rights Commission Triennial Review, October 2010, p.429. For average hourly wage rates and average annual incomes see pp.419 and 472 respectively. The review included the following groups: Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, and No religion.

⁵ Ronald Storrs, Orientations, (London: Ivor Nicholson and Watson 1937), pp.404-5.

⁶ The Complete Diaries of Theodor Herzl, Vol I, ed. Raphael Patai (New York: Herzl Press 1960), p.88.

⁷ Khaleel Mohammed’s review of Martin Golbert’s ‘In Ishmail’s House: A History of Jews in Muslim Lands’, in Journal of World History, Vol 23, No I, March 2012, p.159.