The owners of a Denver restaurant recently posted on Instagram, “Jews are welcome, Zionists are not.” At the same time, a controversy has erupted over allegations that a Denver Board of Education member referred to a Jewish colleague as a “racist Zionist (expletive)” and objected to sitting next to her. These very public occurrences mirror what is happening in the private lives of Jewish adults and children throughout our community.
The word “Zionist,” and the meaning of Zionism itself, have been co-opted, corrupted, and conflated with evil.
And so we ask: What does “Zionism” actually mean?
As committed Zionists, we are happy to answer. Zionism is the belief that the Jewish people have the right to national self-determination in their ancestral homeland, the land in which the modern State of Israel exists. Full stop.
Being a Zionist does not mean supporting everything the Israeli government does. Being a Zionist no more obligates us to support every Israeli policy than being an American patriot requires supporting every policy of our government.
We are two retired Jewish communal professionals who support a two-state solution and condemn violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians. We believe the Israeli government has a responsibility to protect innocent Palestinians and hold perpetrators accountable. None of those criticisms diminishes our connection to Israel, just as our criticism of the Trump administration’s immigration, healthcare, or voting policies does not diminish our attachment to the United States.
Like generations of Jews before us, we are connected to the land of Israel through history, culture, tradition and prayer. According to a 2020 Pew Research study, 80% of U.S. Jewish adults said Israel was either essential or important to what being Jewish means to them. Simply put, Israel is part of our Jewish identity. As a result, we struggle to understand why Jews would uniquely be expected to renounce that identity as a condition to participation in public life. Americans of many backgrounds maintain connections to ancestral homelands even when those countries are involved in wars or governed by regimes they oppose. Jewish Americans should be treated no differently.
As a rabbi and a former regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, we want to be unequivocal: criticism of Israel is not inherently antisemitic. People have every right to criticize Israel’s government and policies, just as they have the right to criticize the policies of any other government.
That said, we do not believe it is criticism of policy when people advocate for the elimination of Israel as a Jewish state and deny Jews the right to national self-determination. It is also not an acceptable form of criticism to hold American Jews responsible for the actions of the Israeli government and to require them to renounce their support or otherwise be excluded from public life. Demonizing Zionism without understanding its historical, cultural, and spiritual importance to the vast majority of the Jewish community only serves to create fear and division, and triggers historical trauma.
The consequences of such antisemitism are not theoretical. When Jewish exclusion and hateful words are used, there is justifiable fear that someone will hear it as a call to do much worse. FBI statistics demonstrate that even before Hamas began the current war on October 7, 2023, Jews have been the targets of nearly 70% of all reported religion-based hate crimes. This is why most American synagogues must now hire security guards to protect children attending religious school and congregants when they enter to pray.
We should be able to debate Israel’s policies passionately, including condemning its government when we believe it is wrong. But disagreements over Israel should never become a test for whether a Jew is welcome. Jews — including Zionists — should be welcome in restaurants, on school boards, in workplaces and throughout American society.
Scott L. Levin is the former Mountain States director for the Anti-Defamation League. Rabbi Joseph R. Black is rabbi emeritus of Congregation Emanuel in Denver.
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