An Antizionist Chanuka Party
I recently saw a flyer advertising an Antizionist Chanuka party. I thought this was hilarious given that Chanuka is perhaps the most Zionist Jewish holiday of all. We celebrate the indigenous Jewish resistance over the Greek colonizers and the restoration of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel.
To be clear, the Hellenistic Greeks didn’t initially set out to kill the Jews. Known for their reverence of philosophy and civilisation, the Greeks embraced Judaism as a culture, and respected our Torah as a book of great wisdom. What they had a problem with was the idea that Judaism was not just a philosophy, but rather a religion which set Jews apart from other nations.
As Chanuka approached this year, I couldn’t help but note the parallels to the BDS movement that is gaining traction at the Park Slope Food Coop, which I am a member of.
Similar to the Greeks, the Park Slope Food Coop Members for Palestine members insist that they are not anti-Jewish. Antizionism is NOT antisemitism, they ferociously declare. They have no issue with Jewish people per-se, as evidenced, they will quickly point out, by those Jews who support them.
Their issue is with the idea of Jewish self-determination in the form of statehood.
This has nothing to do with “apartheid”, “genocide” nor any other ridiculous claims made by BDS supporters. A simple google search easily debunks all of these, exposing them as the same age old blood libels that have plagued Jews throughout our history couched in today’s terminology.
What it boils down to, is the refusal to accept that the Jewish people have a claim to ownership over the Land of Israel, in spite of this being part and parcel of what it means to be Jewish.
As for the Jewish BDS members, this too is nothing new. Hellenistic Jews fought against the Macabees, Jewish Communist Party Members (the Yevsektziya) imprisoned other Jews, and the “Association of German National Jews” voted for Hitler. And tragically, each of these groups fell to the same fate as their “less liberal” brethren.
To be clear, supporting the idea that the Land of Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people does not mean one must endorse everything the current government in Israel says or does or that it is in any way above critique.
But to call oneself an Antizionist and at the same time celebrate Chanuka, the holiday which solidified the Jewish connection to the land of Israel, is oxymoronic.
Let’s learn from the Macabees who rather than cave to Hellenisitc pressure overpowered the Greeks after they desecrated our Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
The miraculous nature of their victory is represented in Chanuka’s eight branched menorah, as Kabbalistically the number eight represents rising above nature.
The BDS movement may try to bring us down, but as evidenced from the public Menorah lighting outside of the coop that is being organized for this year, we are only getting more robust.
Pro-Israel Jews and friends at the Park Slope Food Coop and beyond- stay proud and stay loud. Show the opposition how much stronger they have made us.
