by Dr. Samir Abed-Rabbo
Consider for a moment the following three entities: Judaism, Zionism, and Israel. Judaism is a religion that is adhered to by many well-meaning individuals; Zionism is a modern political ideology which advocates that Jews are not safe in the Gentile world and must be relocated and gathered in a state of their own; and Israel is a state that was founded by Zionists in Palestine in 1948 for Jews after the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. But the propaganda machine want us to believe that Judaism, Zionism, and Israel are the same and are the fulfillment of Jewish aspirations. This deliberate confusion is not helped by the deafening silence maintained by the majority of Jews. Zionists would like us to accept that Zionism-the political ideology which originated in Europe is God’s chosen national movement for the re-establishment and maintenance of a “Jewish homeland” in “biblical lands”. Moreover, they want us to accept that Zionism is Judaism and that present-day Israel is the reincarnation of the ancient Jewish “promised land”. As a religion, Judaism considers the return of Jews to Palestine before the coming of the Messiah a sacrilege. This core belief in Judaism has to be manipulated by Zionism to overcome that clear prohibition in order to achieve its political objective: the dismantling of Jewish communities around the world and the creation of Israel in Palestine. This book provides the reader with a brief history of Palestine and the Palestinians; an analysis of Zionism and its historical and ideological development that led to the establishment of Israel in Palestine in 1948; an examination of Israel’s laws, policies, and practices that keep people a part and discriminate against them on the basis of religion and national origin; a determination as to whether Israel is an apartheid and/or a colonial state; and a comparison of the one-state/two-states options for a viable solution for the ongoing conflict in historic Palestine.
