Refusing Zionist propaganda in Jewish communities

I was raised in a fairly standard Jewish upbringing — I spent my early summers at Camp Gan Israel, was a weekly synagogue attendee, attended Jewish Day School for most of my elementary school years and even had my Bar Mitzvah. I deeply valued my ethnic and religious identity. I saw it as my connection to a rich cultural history, shared traditions and a sense of belonging. It was, and still is, an important part of who I am as a person. But unbeknownst to me, for the vast majority of my life, my ethnicity and religion were being weaponized for the purpose of advancing political and ideological goals. This realization left me feeling that my deeply cherished identity had been corrupted and manipulated, transforming something profoundly personal into a tool for external agendas. 

The indoctrination of Zionist beliefs started as early as elementary school. I, like many Jewish children, was taught a sanitized version of Israel’s history. I was taught of “a land without a people for a people without a land,” which framed Israel as the Jewish people’s God-given inheritance, dismissing any other national or religious claims as illegitimate. I was taught that upon Israel’s declaration of independence, all neighboring Arab nations—described antagonistically as “hostile”—declared war with the intent to destroy the Jewish state and eradicate the Jewish population. I was taught that a Jewish victory was because we were God’s chosen people, and we were meant to inhabit the land. 

The early Jewish school systems are a terrifying memory for me to look back on. The curriculum frequently emphasized a singular, idealized narrative of Jewish history and the centrality of Israel, frequently glossing over or entirely omitting critical perspectives on these topics. There was no education on the Nakba and no attempt to understand why there may have been resistance to the creation of the state of Israel. This intense focus on reinforcing a specific ideological viewpoint left little room for questioning or exploring diverse viewpoints, creating an environment where dissent was discouraged and alternative perspectives were marginalized. It’s alarming how closely this system resembles the indoctrination tactics used by oppressive regimes that modern-day Jews vehemently oppose. 

While my days of Jewish Day School ended after elementary school, I wish I could say that was the end of my consumption of Zionist propaganda. 

Like many young, impressionable Jewish kids who internalized the belief that we were isolated in a world that didn’t fully understand or accept us, I looked towards major Jewish organizations like the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for guidance. These organizations were presented as beacons of support and security, promising to safeguard our community from external threats and antisemitism. However, what we get is a more divisive narrative that does more harm than good to the Jewish identity. 

Organizations like the ADL have been incredibly successful at changing what it means to be Jewish. The philosophy of our ancestors to build home and community wherever we found ourselves has slowly been replaced by a Zionist perspective that encourages viewing our neighbors with suspicion and asserts that safety can only be found among our own kind. Most troubling is the way Zionism has become conflated with Judaism—leading to the characterization of Anti-Zionism as inherently antisemitic. This conflation not only obscures the legitimate critique of political ideologies but also diverts attention away from actual instances of antisemitism. It has led to a situation where legitimate concerns about Israeli policies or Zionist ideologies are dismissed as expressions of hatred toward all Jewish people, thus trivializing real antisemitic incidents and making it difficult to address them effectively. Moreover, this conflation puts a target on Jewish individuals who may not align with Zionist views, as they are often unfairly associated with and blamed for the actions of the Israeli state. 

The ADL has labeled common Anti-Zionist slogans, such as “for the river to the sea,” as being antisemetic and has accused Anti-Zionist Jewish organizations like Jewish Voices for Peace of promoting violence and terrorism. Jonathan Greenblatt, Executive Director of the ADL, even compared a Palestinian keffiyeh to a Nazi swastika. The ADL has successfully established themselves as the premier Jewish organization for civil rights, so it’s deeply concerning when they claim to speak on behalf of all Jewish people whenever they go about vilifying Palestinians, Pro-Palestinian protestors and Anti-Zionist Jewish people/organizations. 

I have long distanced myself from Zionism and the associated propaganda, but that doesn’t make me any less Jewish. I still strongly identify with my ethnic and religious Jewish heritage. I would love to engage with other members of my community during my college experience, but that has proven challenging. My only option for Jewish organizations on the UConn campus is Hillel, whose guidelines on Israel policy have made it clear that they are not welcoming to those who seek to criticize the policies and actions of the state of Israel. Whether it be a new Jewish cultural organization that isn’t explicitly Zionist like Jewish Voices for Peace, or UConn Hillel distancing themselves from the policies of their international counterpart to allow for a forum of actual political discourse, changes need to be made regarding Jewish cultural organizations on this campus. 

I always think back to something one of my elementary school Judaic Studies teachers once told me. She said that the only thing separating the Jewish people of the present from those of the Old Testament enslaved in Egypt, is our ability to ask questions, because “free people ask questions.” We, the Jewish people of the modern day, are not free. We have failed to question and resist the censorship of Jewish and Israeli history in our education systems and the conflation of our identity with Zionism. We must liberate ourselves from our enslavement under the settler-colonial, apartheid, ethnocracy that is the Israeli government and its propaganda machine. Zionism is not Judaism. Anti-Zionism is not Antisemitism. Free Palestine.