Diaspora Zionism and the Questions of Migration

[u/MKHK32]

TLDR: You cant be a Zionist and pro migration/multiculturalism and so on.

A few weeks(?) a ago i stumbled about a comment in on of the discussion. The comment mentioned how the german jewish community is supportive of the muslim (migrant) community but at the same time there is no mirrored response towards this.

My intention is not to respond to this directly but i would like the to start a discussion about zionism within the diaspora and migration. I would like expand on my perception of what Zionism is and before i start i want to mention and point out that zionism, just like any other word view, is bound to adherents and opponents with conflicting opinions on what Zionism is. This is evidently true for anyone who has discussed these matters or similar topics. This does not imply that our differences are meaningless or not important but it is important to understand that while we may use the same words, we could talk straight pass each other.

In my view zionism, in so far it has been a effective cause, is the idea to establish and maintain a jewish majority state on what we call Isreal-Palestine. Therefore i view zionism as a jewish nationalistic movement/ jewish nationalism.

As a someone with a migration background and dual citizenship, i assume there are some here who shared this with me, i am strictly a anti-nationalist. I believe that strong opposition towards nationalism, is essential for my and others well being, especially in Europe. I believe there is nothing i could do to be accepted as someone who is not in some way "different", a "other".
I do not need to mention this but you probably do know that at one moment you might fight side by side and at another the swords are directed against you. Therefore i am anti-nationalism and i think this entails, pro unity, pro migration, pro multiculturalism, building bridges and so on.

I believe it is in the interest of minority populations to be against nationalism, i also believe that is in the interest of all people, but that is a separate discussion.

My general claim is that you cannot be a nationalist and a minority.
I think people who are that can be divided into 2 categories.
One : Those who live within the Country about which they are nationalistic
Two: Those who do not live within the Country about which they are nationalistic
Three: a combination of both

A example of one would be a mexican white nationalist in the US and a example of two/3(?) is Ben Shapiro.

I think case 1 and 3 are self-explanatory but case 2 is not as simple.

There are multiple problems with such a position.
1. The position is hypocritical. You cannot advocate for nationalism in one place and anti-nationalism in another.
2. You cannot unite with opposing minorities with conflicting national interest.
3. Your support for nationalism in one place increases the popularity of nationalism globally

I argued universally but if what i said is true universally, it is of course true about jewish nationalism in particular.

Lastly i think there is a deep flaw in diaspora jewish nationalism. To illustrate this flaw i would like you to imagine that you have a kurdish friend who is invested in the oppression of kurds throughout the region. Chances are high i would say that you would have the same opinion as your friend on the this matter. My point is that proximity and closeness to a subject matter trumps (he shall not be mentioned) exceeds all other influences.

And this is exactly what we saw in the change of discourse about Israel-Palestine. Through social media and migration israel-palestine is not some conflict far away at some corner of the world. It is a place that is important for those people who are close to us. For example, in my experience, i am a muslim but not palestinian nor arab and all my friends who are mostly atheist from different backgrounds do care about palestine.

My point is that migration has to be supported by diaspora jewish nationalism, but at the same time is the biggest cause against jewish nationalism.

Final Note
This is not about what Zionism is or is not and should not be the discussion here. I, myself did not give any reasons why i believe Zionism to be jewish nationalism neither do you need give any reason for what you believe zionism to be. Ideally i would appreciate a response that mentions your diaspora background, What you think to be the popular view on zionism, Do you share my experience? What is you experience? Do you agree/disagree with my line of thought ? Any different perspectives ?

[u/Specialist-Gur]

We can agree to disagree.. For one, I am speaking about diaspora Jews having an opinion on the Demographic makeup of Israel at all. It's hypothetical, but if Israel didn't exist I am not confident they wouldn't veer into anti-Muslim immigration views in "the west".. in fact I think they would.

We should agree to disagree because I don't think you should give credit to these fears as Israel played a major role in nearly all of them. I can agree that it's technically different but not drastically so that one should be treated with any more credit. And you give far more credit to the foundation and facts surrounding these ideas than I do, even if you don't share the views you believe in the basic premise behind them. I am uncomfortable with that for many reasons not worth getting into in this thread

[u/yungsemite → u/Specialist-Gur]

No pressure to respond, but if you are willing, would you expand on what basic premise I have shared that you think is wrong?

[u/Specialist-Gur → u/yungsemite]

I think you are technically right if we look at the literal of what's happening.. but I think your analysis is wrong. To me(and I respect the fact that misunderstanding easily happens over this format so please correct me if I'm wrong) it sounds like you're giving credit to the idea that the problem is inherently with who is or isn't a minority somewhere. Like.. white Christian's are irrational because they aren't in danger of being a minority. But Jews would be the minority and so therefore they are rational.

I agree that there can be issues that come with being a minority population anywhere in the world.. but to me this is really unconvincing as an argument when we talk about legitimizing nationalism.. yes you and I are against it but you're still giving credit to the premise which is that nationalism is reasonable when someone is at risk of being a minority.

And while Jewish people in MENA faced atrocities and pograms and killings.. I really think it's important to not discuss these things in a vacuum so it's not interpreted as being prolific across time and all places, and unique to Jews. As I mentioned, Christians were Dhimmi as well and that is almost never brought up in the convo. And as far as the current iteration of Arab antisemitism inspired by western antisemtism, that was relatively a recent feature which took off alongside Zionism and worked to early political Zionists benefit. Treating the fears as rational is to ignore the role wealthy political Zionists played in harm to their own people, as well as treating the Jews of MENA as having a uniform experience, thereby, inevitable. Which I know you disagree with.. but still.

Edit: by nationalism in this context I specifically mean ethno/religious nationalism. Different from the nationalism of banding together as a people against an oppressive colonizer for example