The Rabbi thereby implies that settler-colonialism and ethnic cleansing are ‘integral’ to Judaism: a dangerous claim. Theodor Herzl founded the modern political ideology of Zionism in the late 19th Century. See more here.
Via the Jewish Chronicle:
Writing in the Telegraph, Rabbi Mirvis said it was “astonishing” that those on the hard-left of British politics were “presuming to define the relationship between Judaism and Zionism despite themselves being neither Jews nor Zionists.
“The likes of Ken Livingstone and Malia Bouattia claim that Zionism is separate from Judaism as a faith; that it is purely political; that it is expansionist, colonialist and imperialist.
“It is unclear why these people feel qualified to provide such an analysis of one of the axioms of Jewish belief. But let me be very clear. Their claims are a fiction. They are a wilful distortion of a noble and integral part of Judaism.”
Directly addressing those who had sought to “redefine…vilify…and delegitimise” Zionism, Rabbi Mirvis wrote: “Be under no illusions – you are deeply insulting not only the Jewish community but countless others who instinctively reject the politics of distortion and demonisation.
Zionism is a belief in the right to Jewish self-determination in a land that has been at the centre of the Jewish world for more than 3,000 years. One can no more separate it from Judaism than separate the City of London from Great Britain.
Read the Telegraph article in full here.
No it isn’t. It is an ancient tribal yearning which was hi-jacked by a secular colonial movement in the late 19th century as a response to endemic Jew-hatred in Europe. But if course it was based on colonial theories of dispensible ‘natives’ and ‘inferior’ races and so was a mirror of European anti-semitism. Nobody had prevented Jews going to live peacefuly in Jerusalem and there were many there and in other Arab countries. The descendants of those communities largely condemn this man-made pretence at divine intervention as ugly golden calf worship, idolatry, state-worship. In truth had the zionists behaved better towards the Palestinian population and had blended in and showed some respect an entirely different relationship could have emerged. But zionism is and always was racist to its core.