Thank you, Jeremiah Wright

I’m Thinking

By Micah D. Halpern

Issue of June 26, 2009 / 4 Tammuz 5769

Your comment about being prevented from talking to your friend Barack Obama by the Jews was nothing short of anti-Semitic blabber, but you opened up a Pandora’s Box that has been sealed for too long.

It is for the correction made to your comment for which I am most

grateful. By saying that you misspoke and meant to say “Zionists,” not

“Jews,” you implied that it is the Zionist who is the danger to our

society, more so than the Jew.

According to Wright there exists a simple and obvious delineation

between Jews and Zionists. Jews are OK, Zionists are trouble makers.

Wright has bought into the Ahmadinejad line. The Iranian leader and

many of his colleagues in the Muslim world never refer to Israel by

name. In place of Israel euphemisms are used, the Zionist state, the

Zionist entity, or simply, the Zionists.

The Zionist is differentiated and separate from the Jews who are

considered interlopers. Zionists are in charge of Israel. Zionists are

gobbling up Palestinian land.  Zionists are the settlers. Zionism is

the external force, colonizing the land, ideologically encroaching on

Islam and the Palestinians. Zionism is a foreign transplant of

European nationalism superimposed on the Middle East causing turmoil

and conflict and serving no good. It is the Zionists who are

perpetrating a Holocaust on the Palestinians.

In the culture in which Jeremiah Wright thrives, Zionism is

politically correct shorthand for Jew hatred.

Many call this pastor by the title Reverend. I cannot do that.

“Reverend” means “respected.”  A Reverend is a person who is

respected, revered. “Pastor” means “leader of a group.” Jeremiah

Wright is undeniably a group leader, but he does not have my respect.

In the 1970s the United Nations passed the “Zionism is Racism”

resolution and Vanessa Redgrave called Jewish youth advocating for

Israel “Zionist Hoodlums.” I remember protesting Regrave’s statement

by proudly strutting a T-shirt that read “I am a Zionist hoodlum.”

Years later the resolution was repealed, not the hatred.

Zion is one of the many biblical names given to Jerusalem. Zionism

is a movement. Zionism is the Jewish movement to recreate a state in

the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people. The original objective of

Zionism was to normalize Jewish life by allowing Jews to be the

masters of their own destiny and creators of the Jewish future.

Zionism meant that Jews would be responsible for their own safety.

Zionists believe that Israel has the right to exist, the right to

flourish and the obligation to exercise power in determining Israel’s

destiny. A Zionist is a Jew, there is no way to distinguish Jew from

Zionist or Zionists from Jews.  Anyone who claims to be anti-Zionist

is a hater of Jews. Anyone who supports Zionism is a friend of Jews

and the Jewish state.

Jeremiah Wright, Israel is here to stay. Israel is not going away.

And the Zionists who live in Israel will continue to live and to work,

to create and to innovate and enhance the lives of all of us in the

areas of medicine and technology and agriculture.

Tirade away if you must. The Zionists have withstood worse.

Micah D. Halpern is a columnist and a social and political commentator

and the author, most recently, of THUGS. He maintains The Micah Report

at www.micahhalpern.com