Judaism and Zionism: Two Conflicting World Views

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Rabbi Weiss is the Official Spokesperson for the Naturei Karta International (“Jews Against Zionism”), based in New York, USA. He is a descendant from the Hungarian Jewry and his grandparents were killed by the Nazis at Auschwitz.

With God’s help, may my words find favor in His eyes and increase the Glory of Heaven.

We Jews have shared much of our recent history with the Palestinian people. It is a linkage that has, of late, not been pleasant. In fact, though, this unpleasantness is a rather recent development. For centuries, Jews and Palestinians lived in peace. It is our goal that those past days of peace will yet yield many future days of peace. However, it is our conviction that this will be impossible until the religious and hence moral evils of Zionism are acknowledged and repented.

There is an image that is sadly fading from human consciousness. It is the picture of the Torah Jew, steadfast in his loyalty to the Creator and His Torah, moral and humble in his dealings with all men. His integrity is impeccable and his sense of empathy encompasses all mankind. His loyalty is towards his host nation. He understands that as a people in exile he must be always cognizant of the hospitality extended to him by other peoples.

We believe that it is this Jew, following the dictates of Sinai, whose life is a sanctification of the Divine Name and who will ultimately figure prominently in the ushering of the Messianic utopia, of peace and brotherhood among all men, solely through his Divine worship.

This image, which is nothing more or less than that of a Jew fulfilling the Divine mandates of the Torah. It used to be the common heritage of all the Jewish people. Zionism and the Zionist State are a massive rejection of this holy image and, more importantly, its underlying assumptions.

By seeking to end Jewish exile by this - worldly means, an endeavor strictly forbidden by God as is clearly stated in the Talmud (tractate Kesubos p.111), Zionism denies the Divine source of our exile and final redemption of all mankind. It thus rejects Divine Providence by viewing the events of Jewish history as the result of happenstance. It was repeatedly condemned by the Torah authorities who first confronted it.

At root it is denial of the spiritual essence of Jewish and all human history.  It sees Jewish weakness throughout the ages as a fault, as a situation capable of being rectified by economic pressure, political manipulation and military power. Zionism has employed and does employ all three methods and has failed miserably to achieve its goals. If fact, the reverse is true. Jews in America and the American government are always called upon to prop up and rescue the Israeli state.

The vast majority of Zionism’s early ideologues and supporters were almost uniformly recruited from the Torah ignorant elements of European society. Would time and format permit, we could spend much time analyzing the philosophy and history of the Zionist movement. Suffice it to say, that it has always evoked passionate opposition, from throughout the ranks of Orthodox Jewry.

Now, please keep in mind, that one should not confuse the deep love and reverence for the Holy Land itself, with the Zionist movement. The movement sought to seize political sovereignty from the land’s inhabitants, by driving out many of them and subjecting those that stayed to persecution and second class citizenship. This also, is a terrible sin and crime, expressly and totally forbidden by the Torah.

Conversely Torah Jews have always loved the Land but never sought to rule it politically. Over the centuries, many pious souls settled there. And, this is a most important point; those pious Jewish souls were never persecuted by their Islamic, Palestinian neighbors. They lived side by side, baby sat each other’s children and were both persecuted by assorted foreign powers.

This peaceful existence was shattered when the Zionist immigration began and sought to deprive the indigenous people of their basic dignity as human beings.

Following the Second World War, the suffering of the Jewish people led many nations to erroneously conclude, that Zionist sovereignty over the Holy Land would help alleviate anti-Semitism, by creating a “safe haven” for the wandering Jew.  This decision agreed upon by the United Nations was clearly well intentioned. Yet, it failed to take into account the teachings of the Jewish faith. It further failed to take into account the opposition to statehood by orthodox Jews around the world. And, it failed to consider the feelings and rights of the indigenous Palestinian population.

The decision to create the Israeli State, has over the past half century led to a seemingly endless river of bloodshed. Palestinians and Jews have died and continue to die. Instead of alleviating anti-Semitism and the Jewish suffering, they have only exacerbated it, both in Palestine and throughout the world.

It has been a total disaster for both peoples. It has delivered just the opposite of that which it promised. In place of a safe haven for Jews it created the most dangerous spot on Earth for the Jew.

Let us be clear about the sources of the suffering of both Palestinian and Jewish people. There are two. The first is the Zionist rejection of our G-dly decreed exile and of our G-dly task of being "a light onto the nations" and a people of compassion and kindness while remaining in exile. Secondly, the Zionist rejection of the commandments of the Torah: "Thou shall not steal" etc. with Zionism's insistence on the dispossession of the Palestinian people. These rejections have assuredly been subject to Providential punishments and have created the armed Palestinian resistance and its actions.

The only Torah sanctioned and moral solution to this problem; the only solution sure to yield peace, is to return sovereignty over the entire Holy Land to the Palestinian people. This would, of course, obviously include returning Al-Aqsa, Jerusalem. It would not need to mention the “right of return and adequate compensation thereof, to the Palestinian individuals who are entitled to them because this would be included in total Palestinian sovereignty.

This, would finally end the suffering of the Palestinian people. And, it would end the suffering for the Jews of the Holy Land as well. It would also bring to an abrupt halt the terrible cloud of growing anti Jewish sentiment that now engulfs Europe and much of the world.

We are not interested nor is it our place to dictate to the Palestinians what form their new government should take. We are quite prepared for the possibility that they will insist that large numbers, maybe even all the Jews now living in the Holy Land will have to leave. That decision is not given to an exiled people to make. Of course, we may petition a future Palestinian government in a spirit of humility to allow Jews to remain in the Land under their control and we are confident in the track record of compassion and hospitality of the Arab world. But, once again the decision is theirs.

And, as far as Jewry’s main tasks are concerned, it would allow us to return to our Divine calling, of Torah observance, prayer, kindness and study. We would once again be able to pursue our Torah centered lives, to serve as a source of inspiration and consolation to all men.

The Jewish people are required to be loyal citizens is every country wherein they reside, whether it is us in the United States, or our brethren in Iran, or our brethren in Palestine. In Palestine, the Jewish people must be loyal to the legitimate political authority of the indigenous Palestinian populace.

The Jewish people were not made to act as persecutors of the Other. They are to be a “kingdom of priests” ministering to the physical and spiritual needs of suffering mankind.

Zionism’s end will be the first step towards real, Jewish rebirth.