Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism

There is a dangerous confluence between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, though the two concepts are not always identical. Anti-Zionism is often used to conceal hatred of Jews. Anti-Semitic views can be easily distinguished from legitimate criticism of Israel.

• Consider the source. Is the speaker someone with a history of anti-Jewish attitudes?
• Critics who habitually single out Israel for condemnation while ignoring far worse actions by other countries (especially other Middle Eastern countries) are anti-Semitic.
• Likening Israel to Nazi Germany, or to traditional anti-Jewish stereotypical behavior is another sure sign of Jew-baiting.
• Attacks on the merits of Israel's existence rather than individual government policies are anti-Semitic.

When approached by a student who attacked Zionism, Dr. Martin Luther King responded: “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You're talking anti-Semitism.”

(From Seymour Martin Lipset, “The Socialism of Fools—The Left, the Jews and Israel,” Encounter, (December 1969), p. 24.)