The DSA’s War on Zionism
The Democratic Socialists of America has declared war on Israel. I understand that most Americans are more concerned about the DSA’s policies affecting America than its position on Israel. But for me, neither can be ignored.
This piece focuses on Israel. A separate piece examining the DSA’s agenda for America will follow in a day or so.
The DSA is not merely critical of Israeli policies or opposed to Israeli governments. Its national organization has moved into an explicitly anti-Zionist camp—one that challenges the very foundation of the modern Jewish state. DSA has endorsed the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, called for an end to U.S. military aid to Israel, opposed normalization with Israel, and repeatedly portrayed Israel as a settler-colonial, apartheid state built on oppression.
There is nothing inherently wrong with criticizing an Israeli government. Israelis do it every day, often with far greater intensity than Israel’s foreign critics. A democracy not only permits such criticism; it depends upon it. But there is a fundamental difference between opposing the policies of a government and opposing the national existence of the country itself.
Zionism is not a synonym for support for every Israeli policy, or every Israeli government. It is the belief that the Jewish people, like other peoples, have the right to national self-determination in their historic homeland. To reject Zionism is therefore not simply opposing an administration, or a particular military operation. It is to challenge the legitimacy of Jewish national self-determination itself.
DSA’s evolution concerning Israel is revealing. The organization once supported a two-state solution and recognized the legitimacy of both Jewish and Palestinian self-determination. Today, its national leadership increasingly embraces the rhetoric of Palestinian “liberation” while portraying Israel itself as the fundamental problem. Its embrace of “from the river to the sea” rhetoric and its characterization of Israel as a settler-colonial state leave little doubt about how far down the antipathy-road toward Israel’s existence the DSA has traveled.
This is not some harmless intellectual exercise taking place on the fringe of American politics. DSA has become an increasingly influential force within the Democratic coalition, particularly among younger activists and progressive candidates—thanks to an education system that prioritizes leftist indoctrination over fundamental education. When Democratic politicians seek DSA endorsements, embrace its activists, or echo its rhetoric without confronting its position on Israel, they are not merely associating themselves with criticism of Israeli policy. They risk legitimizing an ideology that increasingly treats the existence of the Jewish state itself as an injustice.
Democrats who want to appeal to the broad American electorate face a choice they can no longer evade. They can affirm Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people, or they can accommodate a movement whose agenda has moved far beyond opposing Israeli policies to challenging the very legitimacy of Jewish sovereignty in its ancestral homeland. There is no middle ground between defending Israel’s right to exist and embracing a movement determined to dismantle the Zionist framework that made a sovereign Jewish state possible.
