You cannot separate Zionism from the formation of the state of Israel and how the history of the conflict has been shaped since.

In order to obtain a more holistic perspective of the conflict people need to know about Zionism, it’s history, and how it currently affects Israeli leadership.

There are still people alive on both sides that lived through Zionist conflicts with the British Mandate and the Nakba.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionism

https://uca.edu/politicalscience/home/research-projects/dadm-project/middle-eastnorth-africapersian-gulf-region/british-palestine-1917-1948/

https://www.npr.org/2019/03/11/702264118/netanyahu-says-israel-is-nation-state-of-the-jewish-people-and-them-alone

People should really stop conflating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism. Unfortunately it's very common and even part of the official classifications used by some countries. To me it seems obvious that this is another attempt to cut off any criticism of the state of Israel by labeling critics as anti-Semitic. Here's an interesting read about how flawed that logic is:

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/mar/07/debunking-myth-that-anti-zionism-is-antisemitic

The problem is a lot of people don't differentiate between the israeli government and the israeli people as a whole - i've seen some straight up 'they had it coming' style bullshit that is verrry careful to place Good Jews and Bad Jews (the festival goers) to try and get a pass on antisemitsm and maaaan it is transparent as fuck.

I must admit, it’s quite refreshing to hear a critical take on the Israeli government from a Jewish person. I don’t know if it’s due to the news sources and forums I typically frequent (e.g. BBC, Guardian, etc), but I feel like it’s quite rare to hear an opinion from someone who actually lives there or who practices the religion.

It’s also quite reassuring (as a fairly ignorant outside observer who is only beginning to learn the tiniest bit about the complex and bloody history of this region) to hear that not every Jewish person or every Israeli likes the way that the state is developing.

Edit: I made some language changes because upon re-reading the parent comment I realised that the poster didn’t actually say whether they lived in Israel or not and I had made a faulty assumption.

Could you elaborate on the “zionist” thing? I haven’t really followed the Israel situation (I tried, but it’s just so complicated). What I heard, is that “zionist” is used when talking about the Israel activity in “taking” territory from the surrounding area, is that correct or did I just misunderstand? If I’m not wrong, then what happens when people start going on about it?

This is probably the only time I will agree with the "both sides" take on this. My view on this is that it doesn't mean I agree with killing innocents though. People at the top doing terrible things is no reason to condemn a whole people who very likely had little say in the matter.

Israelis and people of Jewish faith are fine and nice people.

The current state of the Israeli government and the intense fascist impulse driving its leaders to genocide would suggest "the average (enfranchised) Israeli" is maybe not as fine or as nice as we'd like to believe.

Engaging with any kind of online community of Israelis feels like I'm stepping into a Der Sturmer article, what with all the intense hate and vitriol aimed at virtually any non-Israeli.

Hamas leadership are monsters

Who, specifically, in Hamas leadership is a monster? Name some names. Is it the head of UNWRA? The chief physician at the Al-Shifa Hospital? The press editor at Al Jaazera magazine? The folks working at the World Central Kitchen?

Because I've heard all of these organizations are hosting Hamas leadership. I've yet to hear anything else about them that explains why they deserved to die, other than that they're "Hamas Leadership" and "Hamas Leadership are monsters".

What's funny is that Palestinians are literally Semitic

Apparently criticising Ukraine is unacceptable though

If this had been Reddit, I'd have bought credits to award you a gold star.

Yeah. I am really sick of seeing the argument that any condemnation of the government of Israel is anti-Semitic. It has nothing to do with them being Jewish and everything to do with how they have handled that conflict over the years.

Out of the loop, what do dogwhistles mean regarding antisemitism?

Go actually look at the .ml worldnews community. There is full mask off "death to Israel" shit all over the place.

People who like to put the milk in with the teabag before the hot water

Unfortunately, this does not seem to be the case, as the comments of lemmy.ml users here show.

Unless they painted their antisemitism in a thin veneer of ~~fetishizing~~ supporting Palestinians