I Am a Zionist

Reflections from Passover and Yom Haatzmaut

I am a Zionist.

Those are my politics.

I am not left-wing; I am not right-wing – I am bipedal.

I stand on my own two feet, and I look at the world and try to make sense of it the best I can.

And, in my 26 years on this earth, this is what I have seen.

I have seen politics pollute families. I have seen friends stop talking to one another over, communities with knives at each other’s throats, whole countries that have lost their national camaraderie to factionalism and brinksmanship.

This is what I have seen, and I do not like it.

My concern is that our fixation with the political differences of others has destroyed our ability to understand our common humanity.

And so I am a Zionist, nothing more, nothing less.

My concern is not with the politics of Israel. My concern is with its people.

Religious, secular, Ashkenazi, Mizrahi – these distinctions make no difference to me.

A Jew is a Jew is a Jew.

And if we cannot stand together as Jews, we will surely fall alone.

Our enemies have tried to pervert Zionism and make it into a dirty word.

But Zionism today is no different than it ever was.

It is the belief that the Jewish nation has the same right to national sovereignty as any other nation.

If the world has outgrown nationhood and nationalism, as so many antizionists claim, then fine – let the dissolution of nation-states begin with their nations, not ours.

There are many old and famous nation-states in Europe and the west – if we are truly living in a post-national world, let the oldest and most established nations lead the way.

Let England and France dissolve their nationhood and set an example for the rest of the world.

But if we are not in a post-national world, if we are still living in the world of nation-states and national sovereignty, then let Israel have its sovereignty like the rest of the world.

The internal politics of Israel, the divisions among its citizens, the inadequacy of its government – these are not unique to Israel. These are common features shared by all nation-states.

In a world that is so uniquely fixated on every step and misstep that Israel takes, we, the Children of Israel, cannot afford to let our divisions define us.

Our enemies celebrate nothing more than our division.

So let us celebrate nothing more than our unity.

We are united in our fight against those who would destroy us simply for being; we must never forget that.

In 2025, I have no political interests besides the safety and security of the Jewish people.

In Israel, in Diaspora, we are under siege.

We are besieged by the physical threat of our enemies at home, and we are besieged by the social threat of our enemies abroad.

As the world turns against the Jews, once again, as it always has, we must link arms with our brothers and stand firm in our resolve.

We must not give in to the petty politics of the world around us, nor the personal disagreements we have with one another.

There is no time for disunity.

We are not the cause of the world’s hatred of us.

They hated us long before we were born, and they will continue to hate us long after we die.

It would be easier to believe that their disdain was reasonable, that their hatred was justified, that we had done something to earn their hatred and that, if we had done something to cause it, we could do something to end it.

It would be easier to believe that.

But it’s not true.

They hate us for being too liberal, they hate us for being too conservative.

They hate us for being too religious, and they hate us for being too secular.

They hate us for being too white, and they hate us for not being white enough.

Sooner or later, one has to come to terms with this.

When I did, I left all of my other politics behind, and I became a Zionist.

Against the backdrop of global Jew-hatred, nothing could be more important than national Jew-love.

If they hate Jews, no matter what the Jew’s politics are, then I will love Jews, no matter what their politics are.

It is that simple.

They have tried to make Zionist a bad word because they know how powerful Zionism can be.

Zionism is the ideology that can bring Jews together because it exists outside of the mundane politics of the state.

It is about more than the political existence of the state; it is about the perpetual existence of the people.

Moses was the first Zionist.

He took our nation out of Egyptian vagrancy so that we could wander around the wilderness in search of a place to make a home for ourselves.

And that home was the Land of Israel.

No different today than it was then, long before any of the other nation-states of today were around.

So after celebrating Passover, the story of our first national liberation, and Yom Haatzmaut, the story of our most recent liberation, let us also look towards the future, towards our next national liberation, a liberation from politics and divisiveness towards a future of peoplehood and unity.

We are one people, with one heart, and one homeland.

Let us never allow politics to get in the way of that.

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Spread Love, Spread Light,

Am Yisrael Chai