The media in imperialist countries often imply that anti-Zionist Jews do not exist. To take one glaring example from Berlin: Samuel Salzborn, the city’s so-called Antisemitism Czar, told the pro-Israel weekly Jungle World that today, Zionism is only questioned by Jews “here and there” — and that “nearly everyone who expresses anti-Zionist views is also an Antisemite.”

Such fantasies have nothing to do with facts. A study published in February about the Jewish community in the U.S. — the largest in the world — showed that just 37 percent identify as Zionists. Young Jews, in particular, are increasingly identifying as anti-Zionists — which is no wonder, given that Israel is committing a genocide in their name.

Jewish anti-Zionism is nothing new. Despite conspiracy theories claiming that anti-Zionism was invented by the KGB in the 1970s, it is, in fact, older than Zionism itself. The idea that all Jews should emigrate to Palestine was first formulated in the 19th century by antisemitic Christians. Jews who had fought for their rights indignantly rejected this notion.

Benjamin Moser’s new book, published quickly in half a dozen languages, comes at the right time. Young Jews are rediscovering the erased history of their community. Moser addresses them, but also belongs to this generation. He was brought up with Zionist ideology without ever giving it a second thought, “because everyone in America — at least as far as I knew — was a Zionist.”

Later, he discovered the anti-Zionist tradition, which he now presents in the form of 12 profiles of Jewish intellectuals. He does not provide a linear history of Jewish anti-Zionism, but rather a broad spectrum from the Old World, represented by Rabbi Aaron Samuel Tamares in Belarus, to the present day, with the photographer Nan Goldin in New York City. These individuals criticize Zionism from religious, political, or ethical perspectives.

Among them is Hannah Arendt, who is widely honored in the Federal Republic of Germany but would not be allowed to speak at any German university today (what luck that German elites do not read her books!). Arendt once described the predecessor party of the Likud as “a political party that, in its organization, its methods, its political philosophy, and its social appeal, is very similar to the Nazi and fascist parties.” She drew attention to the similarities between Israel’s racist laws and the Nuremberg Race Laws.

Today, Zionism is presented as the antithesis of Antisemitism, with the German bourgeoisie supposedly atoning for its crimes by supporting Israel. This ignores the fact that leading Nazis such as Adolf Eichmann, Reinhard Heydrich, and Alfred Rosenberg all viewed Zionism favorably. They agreed with the Zionists that Jews constituted a “foreign race” — and Jewish critics of Zionism repeatedly emphasized that Zionism indirectly adopted the worst Antisemitic stereotypes.

The most moving part of the book is the long autobiographical foreword. Moser describes an heirloom from his grandfather Franz Moses of Breslau, who later adopted the less “Jewish-sounding” name Moser. He managed to flee to the U.S. in 1938, and he carried a heavy, stately book with him all the way from Europe to Houston: the Zionist Writings of Theodor Herzl. His grandson notes that the book must have meant something to him — and that it had never been opened.

When Moser began reading the book, he was shocked by “Herzl’s dislike of Jews” — a hatred so “extensive,” “conspicuous,” and “offensive” that it places him “among the most antisemitic extremists of all time.” Moser realized that Jewish readers from the early 20th century must have been just as bewildered. Thus began a reckoning with the ideology of his childhood. Israel is supposedly a safe haven for Jews, yet as Moser points out, since 1945 it has been “by far the most dangerous place in the world” for them.

What is missing from this book, however, is a look at Marxist critiques of Zionism. There is no mention of the General Jewish Workers’ Union, known as the Bund, which is the subject of a recent bestseller by Molly Crabapple — Bundists were attacking Zionism as early as 1906. Communist critiques, such as those by Leon Trotsky and Abram Leon, are absent. Israel’s anti-Zionist radical Left, including Matzpen, is also missing. This is an important gap because Jewish Marxists formulated the most convincing program to fight against antisemitism with a program for universal human liberation.

Only a few of the profiles are related to the workers’ movement: Ahmad Sadiq Saad from Egypt, Maxime Rodinson from France, Felicia Langer from Israel, and Ronnie Kasrils were all their respective communist parties for a time. But they were communists in the era of the popular front and peaceful coexistence, so they worked mostly as patriotic liberals. Kasrils, for example, ended up running South Africa’s spy agencies in the 2000s as a minister in neoliberal ANC governments.

Moser has thus written a history of liberal Jewish anti-Zionism. But the one-sidedness of this book also highlights something noteworthy: anti-Zionism is no longer a radical left-wing phenomenon, but has entered the mainstream of Jewish public opinion.

Benjamin Moser, Anti-Zionism: A Jewish History (New York: Penguin Random House, 2026), 400 pages, $35.

First published on October 19 in German in junge Welt. Translated and expanded by the author.

The post Anti-Zionism Hits the Mainstream: A Review of Benjamin Moser’s New Book appeared first on Left Voice.

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