The atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7, 2023, plunged the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into a new, more radical phase. Israel’s response went beyond self-defense to unrestrained vengeance, destroying Gaza and its population. This violence undermined any chance of reaching a lasting compromise. Shortly after the October 7 event, I remember a conversation about the war in Gaza with a Jewish friend who is a former classmate from graduate school. As we talked, our voices slowly rose. Before long we started arguing. In its own way, our conversation mirrored what has been happening in Israel-Palestine for decades. Here are the kind of questions I was raising: Is Zionism ruining Judaism? Is boycotting Israel anti-Semitic? Is criticizing Israel’s policy antisemitism? Are Israelis guilty of human rights violations? How much responsibility should Palestinians take for their situation in Gaza? Is confronting Zionism racist? Is it ethical?
No matter what one says about Israel and Gaza, someone will get angry. Questioning the Jewish state gets you labeled an anti-Semite by right-wing Zionists, but in my experience, left-wing activists can be just as vicious. While we argue, the struggle for Palestinian rights has never been more important. There is a massive humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the war today is the deadliest ever for Palestinians. Leading scholars, experts in international law, and respected human rights organizations have warned that the world is witnessing a genocide in real time, along with unchecked war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity committed by the state of Israel.
At the same time, the demonization of pro-Palestinian voices in the United States has risen dramatically. Zionists have attacked critics of Israel’s policies and practices by conflating anti-Zionism with antisemitism and sought to censor discussions within the context of the 75-year-long (and I would argue illegal) Israeli occupation and the Nakba. While criticizing Zionism is viewed as antisemitism in the West, there is a need to acknowledge the Palestinian experience of displacement and dispossession resulting from the Zionist movement. Is seeking to understand the lived reality of the Palestinians antisemitism? It is also important to acknowledge much of the U.S. support of the modern state of Israel comes from Christians. Is it anti-Semitic to oppose Christian Zionism?
When Edward Said published The Question of Palestine in 1979, he brought the Palestinian point of view into mainstream North American politics. Said had published Orientalism, the book which made his reputation as a literary critic, the previous year. Before Said, no major public intellectual had clarified the Palestinian experience in English. Said’s influential chapter “Zionism from the Standpoint of its Victims” highlighted the limitations and costs of Zionism for the Palestinian people. He argued that Zionism, in practice, led to the marginalization and dispossession of Palestinians, and his words ring true today.
Said dedicated much of his work to addressing the Palestinian experience of displacement and exile, highlighting the profound and lasting impact of displacement on Palestinian identity and culture. The loss of land, homes, and subsequent sense of belonging began in 1948. The cycle of dispossession was repeated in 1967 (known as the Naksa or “Setback”), leading to another wave of displacement. Today, Israel’s war in Gaza has resulted in massive displacement—with over 90% of Gaza’s population becoming internally displaced as of November 2024, according to Human Rights Watch. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic, with the Israeli government engineering starvation and unprecedented levels of death, destruction, and suffering.
However, when voices are raised in criticism of the Israeli government’s policies, actions, or officials (similar to criticism directed at any other government), it is quickly labeled anti-Semitic. This raises the question of what antisemitism is. According to the American Jewish Committee (AJC), antisemitism is a “certain perception of Jews that may be expressed as hatred.” AJC also noted that “criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitic.”
Proponents of the Israeli government argue that anti-Zionism wishes to deprive Jews of a state simply because they are Jews. This argument is weak, however, because Palestinians do not say that Jews cannot have self-determination. The issue is how Zionism has sought to exercise that self-determination in Palestine at the expense of Palestinian self-determination. Israeli officials deliberately conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism to silence criticism of Israel’s human rights violations, in particular its war crimes in Gaza. For example, when the United Nations secretary general called for a ceasefire to protect civilians in the Gaza Strip early in the war, the Israeli representative immediately branded his position anti-Semitic. This is a clear example of deploying the conflation strategy to deflect legitimate criticism of Israeli policy.
Just as it is a mistake to conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism, it is also a mistake to conflate Zionism with Judaism. Not all Jews are Zionists. A few years ago, I introduced Robert Cohen, a British Jewish blogger,to our faculty, staff, and students at Hope College. He was invited to speak about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and in my introduction I said that he was an Israeli scholar. After my introduction, Cohen gently corrected me saying, “I am not an Israeli. I am Jewish.” I realized in that moment that Jewish people do not always identify themselves with Israel. After the lecture, Cohen and I had a few moments to talk about our own experiences on the question of Palestine. I shared that the Palestinian struggle was against Zionism as a political ideology that caused displacement from our homes. Cohen responded, “I understand why you feel this way.” We had an honest conversation.
On another occasion, Cohen spoke at an Iftar Gaza Fundraising event in Bradford, UK. The title of his speech was: “To be a Jew in Solidarity with Gaza,” and he opened by saying, “I hope you will realise that for a Jew to be in Palestinian solidarity is not an easy place to stand, especially if you remain connected to mainstream Jewish spaces and synagogues as I do. For much of the time it can feel like swimming against the tide or walking into the wind. You are seen as at best naive and misguided and at worst a dangerous traitor who needs to be formally excluded from organised Jewish life.”
Cohen is doing what few have the courage to do. He recognizes that there is a need to acknowledge the Palestinian experience of displacement and dispossession from their lands resulting from the Zionist movement.
I am a Christian Palestinian American. Although born in Bahrain, where my father worked as a nurse in the Mission Hospital, we moved to Beit Sahour, a town in Palestine east of Bethlehem, when I was five and I grew up there. Last summer, I visited my family in my hometown and was worshiping at the Presbyterian church in Bethlehem. There was a group of ministers and young people from the United States attending the service, which was in Arabic with English translation provided. After the service, we headed to the refreshment area to socialize and I introduced myself to some of the guests from the United States. One of them immediately asked for my personal view of the Israeli settlements. Her question took me by surprise. I told her that the Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories are widely considered illegal under international law. She then accused me of antisemitism because I criticized Israeli policies. I explained that criticizing Israeli policies and practices was not at all anti-Semitic—I was not exhibiting hostility, hatred, or discrimination against Jews as a people. I walked away disturbed by the encounter.
In The Question of Palestine, Edward Said writes: “It is a simple fact that most Americans who feel they must declare their support for Israel as a state have no idea that the Palestinians lived where Israel now is, and are refugees not because they are anti-Semites, but because the Zionists simply kicked many of them out.” Similarly, Munther Isaac explains in his recent book Christ in the Rubble: Faith, the Bible, and the Genocide in Gaza, the Western church has not spoken up and demanded an immediate cease fire in Gaza because of “church diplomacy” that tends to “avoid controversy, and not offend” their “vested interests.” As a result, Isaac points out that “Palestinian Christians have been ignored, dehumanized, and even demonized by our fellow Christians.” Isaac, like me, is a Palestinian Christian. He calls Zionism a racist ideology, writing, “Zionism is Jewish supremacy, and any form of racist supremacy is racism.”
Christian Zionism is motivated by a belief that the establishment of the state of Israel and the rebuilding of the Jerusalem temple are necessary steps in God’s plan for end-times. According to Christian Zionists, anyone who gets in the way of that agenda is interfering with God’s will and Palestinian grievances are nothing more than noise that should be ignored. Christian Zionists see the conflict as between Jews and Muslims, often unaware of the existence of Palestine’s Christian population. Understanding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict requires acknowledging the perspectives of Christian Palestinians and the concerns they raise regarding the impact of Zionism in their lives.
The atrocities of October 7 were horrible, but the world community failed to hold Israel to account for the events which led to October 7. Israel has struck back with a violence thousands of times more deadly. The current images coming out of Gaza are heart-breaking, and starvation and death are happening daily. People around the globe have taken to the streets protesting the Israeli massacre of Palestinians, but so far world leaders have paid lip-service to condemning the war and have not taken concrete steps to stop it. Recently, some Western governments have indicated that they will recognize a Palestinian state. This is an important step towards guaranteeing human rights for Palestinians, and is undoubtedly a response to the horrific images coming out of Gaza. While I welcome this news, I cannot help but wonder why it has taken mass starvation to move world sentiments. One answer to the question of “Why did this take so long?” is the fear of being labeled anti-Semitic. It is important to understand that antisemitism is not at the heart of this crisis. It is about the value of human life. There is a need to unpack the powers that are at play. To do so will help us search for justice.
A Brief Reading List for Those Looking to Know More
Beinart, Peter. Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning. New York: Knopf, 2025.
Cohen, Robert. “To be a Jew in Solidarity with Gaza”. Facebook, March 3, 2023. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1GQJcqAMaW/?mibextid=wwXIfr.
Waxman, Dov, David Schraub, and Adam Hosein. “Arguing about Antisemitism: Why We Disagree about Antisemitism, and What We Can Do About It.” Ethnic and Racial Studies 45, no. 9 (2022): 1803–24.
Isaac, Munther. Christ in the Rubble : Faith, the Bible, and the Genocide in Gaza. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 2025.
Lipstadt, Deborah. Antisemitism: Here and Now. New York: Schocken, 2019.
Mulhall, John W. America and the Foundation of Israel. Los Angeles: Deshon Press, 1995.
Said, Edward. The Edward Said Reader. New York: Vintage, 2000.
Said, Edward. The Question of Palestine. New York: Vintage, 1979, 1992.
14 Responses
Habeeb,
For such a disturbing and complex issue, it’s so helpful to read such a clear, knowledgeable, and wise essay from someone who knows, firsthand, what is happening there. Thank you for this, Habeeb. The greater Christian community, especially, needs your voice. I will urge others to read this as well.
Thank you for this. More of us in the United States need to hear this.
Thank you Habeeb. Anything written by Said is worth a read. He is brilliant.
Habeeb, thank you. I need to be reminded that Judaism is not Zionism. I watched a video recently suggesting that the murder of tens of thousands of Palestinians by Israel is resetting all we say about history of WWII, because any criticism of the Israeli state now gets labeled as antisemitism. I’m no historian, but your blog and this video help me realize I understand so little about this horrible conflict.
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT6UnHoqP/
So well articulated, Habeeb, all the more impact-full given that you speak as a Palestinian Christian which is a voice too few American Christians have heard.
And thanks for bringing another Palestinian Christian voice into the conversation. Edward Said’s book on Palestine, as you note, is one of the best ever written on the conflict. Anything he wrote is worth reading.
Well said, Habeeb Awad. Thank you for putting it so clearly. This lines up with my brief experiences during two visits to Palestine and conversations there with Christians and Muslims. I have long admired President Carter’s insistence that we should advocate at least for the 1967 borders and a 2-state solution. It would not undo all the displacement, but might go a long way toward acknowledging the unjustified “overreach” of Zionism.
Thank you, Habeeb. We so very much need to hear what you have said so well.
Add to the reading list _A Wall in Palestine, by French journalist Rene’s Backmann (2006), describing the network of concrete walls, trenches, and barbed-wire fences in place / in progress 20 years prior to Oct 7, not just simply dividing Israel/West Bank, but in effect separating, encircling, imprisoning Palestinian communities _within the West Bank–and Jerusalem —with all the pre-requisite checkpoints and accompanying harassment. Communities are separated from their farmland, the majority of their livelihood, which is then open to Israeli occupation. As horrific events have been since the Oct 7 murders, and subsequent devastation in Gaza, they did not erupt spontaneously but are deeply-rooted in past ideology and ongoing policy. This is to be the Jewish Zion? The Peaceable Kingdom? Hardly.
Hi Habeeb,
So glad you are coming out publicly with your point of view.
I’m also glad Kairos West Michigan shared Robert Cohen with you at Hope College, when we brought him to W. MI in May of 2018.
He is still a Jewish voice to be listened to.
The public is finally getting your message. Hopefully, the days of Zionism are numbered.
The so-called “Two State” must give way to One, Pluralistic, democratic state with liberty and justice for all.
Palestinian Arabs are a presence to be reckoned with, not dismissed as a brood of terrorists.
And the Hamas emphasis on the violent overthrow of the Israeli State is also problematic.
I’m praying that the extremists who are ruling the agenda now, will be transcended by better leadership, and resolution of relationships.
Thank you for these insights. I think it is important to note that not all “Zionisms” are the same, just as not all Palestinian nationalist movements are the same. One unfortunate characteristic of seemingly zero-sum conflicts such as this is that the most extreme versions of each perspective have outsize power to define the terms of our understanding and response.
Thank you, Habeeb. In trying to understand how Bible verses about God’s promise of land to the Jewish people fit with Bible verses about showing justice, I have found Jeremiah 22:1-9 to be insightful. Jeremiah says that the Jewish people can remain on the land, but only if they “Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place” (verse 3). That’s not happening in the current crisis at all. So when Israel acts unjustly toward the Palestinians they jeopardize and delay the good God could give them. Zionists think they’re fulfilling God’s promise of land in the current war, but what they’re actually moving toward is God’s promise of their own near-term destruction (verses 8-9). Zionist Christians don’t realize that by turning a blind eye toward Palestinian justice in their support of Israel, they are actually hindering the good future God has in store for them all.
Thank you Prof. Awad for writing this, thank you RJ for publishing it. It amazes and frustrates me that this is not all obvious to the majority of Christians in the US. If the “popular” view of anti-Semitism were correct, then all the Old Testament prophets were anti-Semitic, but as David Landegent so clearly points out, they were simply calling the people of Israel to fulfill their calling, to practice justice and righteousness so that the nations would want to serve the God of Israel.
It seems that the difference between the identity of an Israeli vs a Jewish person is increasingly diffused, perhaps intentionally. But Zionists seem to fit the mold of zealots, who have been extremely problematic throughout history. Any kind of exceptionalism, a favored-by-God ordination, runs counter to the gospel of Jesus. The people of Abraham were to live “set apart” lives FOR the entire world, not just from it. The exceptionalism, if it exists, was meant to be the privilege of bringing in and modeling the way of the Christ. It is hard for me to imagine that the blood lines of Israelis and Palestinians are not mixed over thousands of years. So what defines one as Jew, Israeli, or Palestinian? Is it percentage of blood line? Or faith walk? Or chosen identity? The people of the nation of Israel should not be categorically blamed for the actions of their autocratic regime any more or less than Palestinians should be blamed for Hamas.
Thank you for this reasoned and courageous illustration.
Thank you. Your testimony is important.