When They Say ‘Zionist,’ They Mean Jews

Every January, a quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. makes the rounds: a long, eloquent “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend” that ends by calling anti-Zionism anti-Semitism. The problem is – he didn’t write it. The letter claims to come from a 1967 magazine, but no such letter was ever printed, and people who want to wave away his real views just love to point that out.

So let’s set the fake aside. We don’t need it. Dr. King said what he thought about Zionists and Israel in his own voice, months before he was tragically killed. And this weekend, on the eve of the Kristallnacht anniversary, his words have never mattered more in the city I called home for almost twelve years.

On October 27, 1967, King was in Boston for a fundraising concert. Afterward he went to dinner at the Cambridge home of Martin Peretz. Around the table were academics and students, including the sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset.

At some point a student made a remark against “Zionists.” According to Lipset, King cut him off: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking anti-Semitism!”

Lipset wrote this down in Encounter magazine in December 1969. For years skeptics called it hearsay. Then in 2012 the historian Martin Kramer went looking and found the invitation letter, King’s acceptance, coverage of the concert, and a thank-you note from Andrew Young after the evening. Asked whether it happened, Peretz answered in one word: “Absolutely.”

On March 25, 1968, King spoke to the Rabbinical Assembly. Ten days later he was murdered. We don’t need a witness for this (although there are many), because the transcript survives:

“Peace for Israel means security, and we must stand with all of our might to protect its right to exist, its territorial integrity. I see Israel, and never mind saying it, as one of the great outposts of democracy in the world … Peace for Israel means security and that security must be a reality.”

Full stop.

In the same breath, he said peace for the Arab world meant economic security, and called for “a Marshall Plan for the Middle East.” King wanted a future for both peoples. What he wouldn’t accept was a world where Israel’s right to exist was some sort of debate.

Today, a “boycott bike ride” took place through Philadelphia, circling restaurants and cafés its flyer calls “Zionist establishments.” Every one is owned by Jews.

As I said, I lived in Philadelphia for more than a decade, and I can tell you one thing: Philadelphians are better than this. I saw so many signs over the years. “Black Lives Matter.” “Trans Lives Matter.” “This is a safe space for every race, religion, creed, sexual orientation and economic background.” It’s strange that as soon as that means Jews, people look the other way.

I worked for several Jewish-owned businesses there. Several restaurants. Even the deli- Schlesinger’s. We had the best pickle bar for years, until Covid-19 shut it down.

Now imagine if people circled women-owned businesses and boycotted them. Or LGBTQ+-owned businesses. The same people who hang those signs would rightly call it a targeted, bigoted attack. When it’s Jews, though, its suddenly a free pass?

And what do the organizers hope to do? Make these owners less Jewish? Change Israeli policy from a bike seat in Rittenhouse Square? No. The point is to intimidate and isolate their Jewish neighbors. That doesn’t sound like “acceptance of every race and religion” to me.

People spent years helping the world understand that feminism doesn’t mean hating men. It means equality for women. In the same way, Zionism doesn’t mean hatred of Palestinians. It doesn’t mean “genocide.” It means that Jews have a right to self-determination in the land of their ancestors: Israel. If you can understand one, I promise you can understand the other.

And this isn’t a fringe view. In a 2025 survey by the Jewish Federations of North America, nearly 90%. Read that again- 90% of American Jews said Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish, democratic state. The belief is nearly universal. You can’t talk about Jews without talking about Zionism, and you can’t talk about Zionism without talking about Jews. If you believe in Birthright, you’re talking in part about Zionism.

The longing is ancient. The prophet Jeremiah wrote: “In those days, and in that time, says Hashem, the children of Israel shall come, they and the children of Judah together; they shall go on their way weeping, and shall seek Hashem their God. They shall inquire concerning Zion with their faces hitherward” (Jeremiah 50:4-5, JPS 1917, adapted). And Isaiah: “He will assemble the dispersed of Israel, and gather together the scattered of Judah from the four corners of the earth” (Isaiah 11:12).

Many see 1948 as the beginning of that promise coming true. Two years after the Holocaust ended, after the world had largely stood by while six million Jews were murdered, the United Nations voted for a Jewish state. In May 1948 Israel declared its independence, and the next day its neighbors invaded. Israel survived. That is what Zionism is: a people coming home and refusing to be destroyed.

So when you say “Zionist,” and you mean Jews, King already told you what that is. Anti-Semitism. Trying to turn “Zionist” into a slur is backwards, and using it as one is reprehensible. It’s not what Philadelphia stands for. Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love: kindness, culture, acceptance.

King corrected a friend at a dinner table, in a room where it would have been easier to let it slide. That’s the standard I want for myself, and for the city I love. When someone says “Zionist” and means “Jew,” say so. Kindly, clearly, and right then.