Jewish Anti-Zionists Are Trying To Legitimize Antisemitism

According to Beinart, the mere existence of one Jewish state is a form of racism and “Jewish supremacy” that should be opposed. In his eyes, the century-long Palestinian war on Zionism and opposition to a Jewish state, no matter where its borders are drawn, is a righteous cause. More than that, he argues that the willingness of Jews to defend their state, even while often criticizing it, as the ADL and Lipstadt do, discredits efforts to oppose anti-Semitism.

Like his Palestinian terrorist allies, Beinart is especially angry at those Arab and Muslim states that have made peace with Israel—either overtly via the Trump administration’s Abraham Accords or quietly, as is the case with Saudi Arabia—and thinks links to these admittedly authoritarian governments also discredits Jews. That his cause is discredited by the fact that those who agree with him among Palestinian groups or their Iranian allies have consistently rejected compromise and peace—and seek Jewish genocide—is a minor detail that he ignores.

Beinart’s own embarrassing history of wanderings from a neo-liberal supporter of the Bush administration’s war in Iraq to a virulent opponent of both it and U.S. foreign policy during his time as editor of The New Republic, then as a liberal Zionist supporter of Israel and advocate of a two-state solution to his current position in which he supports Israel’s dismantlement, makes it hard to take him seriously. He has always been an intellectually shallow writer whose willingness to spout his opinions is only matched by his often-breathtaking ignorance of many of the subjects he discusses, of which Israel is the most conspicuous example.

Yet Beinart, who was once included by Foreign Policy magazine on its list of 100 top global thinkers, is not only someone that is regularly given access to one of the largest publishing platforms in the world for his hateful views. He’s also a reliable weathervane that can usually tell us which way the wind is blowing among the left-wing elites who have such a stranglehold on control of the major institutions of journalism, academia and popular culture.

So it is significant that Beinart is not only venting his resentment at the way the overwhelming majority of Israelis, as well as most American Jews, haven’t taken his advice about surrendering to those who would endanger their existence. He is now embracing the intersectional narrative in which the effort to destroy Israel is identified as a cause that lovers of freedom should support.

The not-so-subtle warning implicit in his article is that the overwhelming majority of Jews who are Zionists—even liberals like the ADL and Lipstadt—are discrediting the Jewish people and leaving themselves open to what are, in his opinion, justified attacks from the left.