'Anti-Zionism' has become the most acceptable form of hate.

Hate doesn’t stop being hate because it sounds “progressive.” This isn’t activism; it’s anti-Jewish obsession, and it’s growing more dangerous by the day.

photo: t s/Unsplash

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This is a guest essay by Andrea Tovah, a social worker and clinician.

You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.

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I know — yet another piece about Jews and Israelis, you might be thinking. Maybe it feels repetitive or obsessive. I get it. But I need you to hear this: This is not normal.

And let me be clear: This is not a “trauma response,” or warranting the kind of Holocaust inversion we’re seeing from “anti-Zionists” who dismiss Jewish and Israeli experiences while using it to advance their own agenda.

This is a plea from someone watching a hate movement embed itself into mainstream discourse with startling ease. This is a response to hate that is manifesting without critical reflection, and harming real people. And I am asking those of you who still hold compassion to stay with me and refuse to remain silent.

The flattening of Jews and Israelis by the mainstream has a historic echo for many of us — the same stories we heard from our parents and grandparents describing shifting harmful ideologies, the history of atrocities toward our people, the losses in the diaspora, and the Holocaust.

And now we’re told to stay quiet when mocked, harassed, or gaslit, while supposed “social justice warriors” casually invoke an extremist organization whose history includes incitement, conspiracy, documented violence, and virulent hostility toward Jews and Israelis. As if colleagues stating, “One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” is an acceptable stance.

Many of us have been speaking out about the hijacking of our most sacred spaces, especially in the healing professions, like psychology and social work. We watched colleagues, mentors, and even close friends revealed themselves as Hamas apologists, or meet our grief and shock with silence or “whataboutisms” when compassion should’ve been instinctive.

“Anti-Zionism” has been growing exponentially, treated as a righteous ideology when it’s anything but. It has a long history steeped in hate, fixation, and ideological purity tests that target Jews, Israelis, and any supportive non-Jew.

When we speak up, we’re smeared as Right-wing tools, flattened into caricatures despite decades of standing firmly in liberal democracy and progressive ideals. It’s a tactic meant to shame us into silence, as groupthink tightens on both extremes on the Right and Left. Deborah Lipstadt, Professor of Modern Jewish History and Holocaust Studies at Emory University in Atlanta, calls this the horseshoe theory — and she’s right.

Some ask why we focus so much on the Left. The answer is simple: For me, it’s been my home. The Left claimed justice, empathy, inclusivity, curiosity. I ignored the warning signs, not noticing the demonization of all Israelis and “The Bad Jews” in the progressive circles I held dear. Simply put, I ignored those realities while focusing on “justice” for every other marginalized group, not paying attention to what should’ve been clearer.

Then October 8th shattered that illusion. Allies, close friends, and especially the people in my own field of social work showed so many of us they simply did not care for Jews and Israelis (who are not a monolith) without caveats.

For many of us, this was traumatic invalidation, the profound shock of having your pain dismissed by the very people who claim to fight for the marginalized or for anyone who’s been caused harm and pain. It shook so many of us to our core. And most importantly, it clarified everything.

The fixation on Israel, the doxxing, the purity tests, the moral inversions, the hate under the guise of the impressive sounding term that has weaved its way into the mainstream discourse. “Anti-Zionism” became unmistakable. The more we were told it was not hate, the more obvious the hate became, and the more determined we are to fight this pattern. And in the process, many of us have found each other and built community.

So, we speak up. Loudly. Perhaps mostly for those of you who we know have compassion but still might not fully grasp what is being normalized.

I’m asking you to stay with me. You may even think this is propaganda but my people — imperfect, human, diverse — are are being discriminated against in broad daylight, and we will not accept this as normal. Silence in the face of hate is not neutrality (as many of you espouse for every other group); it’s complicity, and it’s how things only get worse.

We cannot allow rhetoric based on distortion and obsession to replace pluralism and truth. We cannot allow the helping professions to continue on this path of hostile territory for Jews and Israelis. Anyone who cares about justice should oppose that, period.

“Anti-Zionism,” an antisemitic hate movement with clear historical roots, is often brushed off as a simple political stance “against Israel.” But it is not simply opposition to Zionism, the Israeli government, or policy, or even Right-wing fringe extremists. It targets the very existence and safety of an entire people: Israeli people and Jews who don’t pass its ideological litmus test. It becomes a fixation: unchecked discrimination, libel, Holocaust inversion, generalizations, and hostility presented as activism.

Like other hate movements throughout history, it spreads quickly once the right conspiracy takes hold. We’ve seen this pattern before: During the eugenics era, when respected institutions and museums like the Museum of Natural History hosted conferences claiming scientific justification for racism and bigotry, endorsed by highly respected academics. These movements thrived on repetition and social acceptance. Not truth.

In psychology, cognitive behavioral therapy, for example, distinguishes between cognitions and facts, emphasizing the need for reality testing and the need to evaluate beliefs for evidence and distortion. Just because you think or say something doesn’t make it true. “Anti-Zionist” rhetoric operates on the exact opposite principle: It treats suspicions and conspiracies, distorted thoughts, libel, misinformation, and dehumanizing narratives as fact — simply because they are popular.

Today, Israelis, Zionists, and many Jews are compared to rape culture, colonizing oppressors, and the world’s worst social ills, with objectifying rhetoric and generalizations largely unchallenged, even in mental health fields. Clinicians who speak this way face little-to-no accountability by our institutions and governing boards. Core ethics like “Do no harm” and cultural humility don’t seem to apply.

Meanwhile, Israelis and Jews are being targeted in mental health spaces through accusations that would be unacceptable toward any other group. The same libels circulate endlessly: apartheid, genocidal, colonizing oppressors, child killers. They spread until they become normalized. Would people support any other minority being demonized this way while the public, especially in mental health spaces, remain silent or justify such libel?

The Far-Right’s antisemitism has rightly long been recognized, but the Left’s vitriol and complicity continue to be excused, ignored, or justified for “social justice” in my field. Are people comfortable with Israelis and Jews being excluded, demonized, shamed, and mocked?

All this unfolds while genocide and massive human rights crises, like in the Sudan, or Hamas’ torture and targeting of Palestinians, receive barely a whisper. “Anti-Zionism” doesn’t just harm Jews; it diverts attention from communities in dire need, including Palestinians. Israel becomes a political litmus test and identity marker. This obsession alienates and harms many Israeli and Jewish clients and colleagues, while hijacking other critical issues and pluralistic dialogue.

And this selective fixation isn’t limited to academia or the therapy world; it’s become a defining feature of political platforms. Consider the enthusiasm around Zohran Mamdani, the Mayor-Elect of New York City. For many, it’s framed as a celebration of youth energized for good, and “anti-Zionist Jews” are often platformed as symbols of that movement.

Some of his early statements — and several of the figures he has appointed or chosen to align with — reveal the same narrow fixation: Israel, Israelis, and those branded “The Bad Jews,” above all else. His response to the recent terror attack at a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi Beach near Sydney only underscores the contradiction. Describing the attack as “the latest, most horrifying iteration in a growing pattern of violence targeted at Jewish people across the world,” he speaks as though this violence emerged spontaneously, detached from cause or context.

For years, Mamdani publicly promoted and defended the slogan “Globalize the Intifada.” What unfolded at Bondi Beach last week was precisely that — the very reality he helped legitimize.

And Mamdani is not alone. Many politicians, public figures, and even alleged “human rights groups” who show almost no interest in mass atrocities elsewhere, while devoting extraordinary energy to condemning Israel and Israelis as if the world is perfect with the exception of Israel. This mirrors the distortion at the heart of “anti-Zionism”: a fixation that replaces principle with obsession and compassion with purity tests. It is not a matter of simply critiquing Israeli politicians or policies; it is simply hate, alienation, and hostility.

What does it mean that Jews are cast as the most “bloodthirsty” when those murdered, raped, tortured, and kidnapped with glee on October 7th were elderly and young people, children, and peaceniks, many working toward coexistence? How have people who claim moral grounding reached the point where they even ponder the notion that murder is justified in the name of “resistance”?

Is it normal to litigate an entire people’s right to live? To obsess over one country while countless others function as ethno-states — including Israel’s neighbors, many of which persecuted, expelled, or otherwise killed their Jewish populations over the centuries?

Notice that they do not become global obsessions despite ongoing human rights abuses. Israel is the only Middle Eastern country in which Jews can live safely as Jews. And Jews in the diaspora increasingly face slurs, threats, violence, and harassment outside their synagogues, in professional spaces, even in therapy rooms. Met with silence from people who otherwise champion empathy.

How can someone call themselves an ethical therapist when they engage in “decolonizing” therapy that actually colonizes the treatment space? Imposing one’s own personal or political agenda rather than meeting clients where they are violates one of our most fundamental ethical principles: supporting self-determination and compassion. That is not therapy; it is the therapist’s ego running the treatment room. And it is even being integrated as a modality in graduate-level mental health programs, at times as required coursework.

Ethical frameworks like “person-in-environment” exist to help us to understand how systemic inequities — racism, oppression, and other social forces — affect both our clients’ lives and our own practice. They encourage reflection on our own biases and the cultivation of cultural humility for all, not excluding Jews and Israelis.

By contrast, “decolonizing” therapy, even if founded in the best of intentions, often projects a rigid binary of “oppressor” versus “oppressed.” In this frame, Jews, Israel, and Israelis are cast as the ultimate “White oppressors” (despite Jews not being a monolith, for one), erasing nuance, flattening lived experience, and our diversity. “Person-in-environment” does not do this; it examines systemic forces without reducing any group to a static label.

What’s more, traumatic invalidation, the grave minimization of one’s feelings and experiences, is a form of gaslighting that Jews and Israelis are increasingly encountering across institutions, and even more concerningly, within therapy spaces. It is the antithesis of our most basic therapeutic model and violates principles of empathy, self-determination, and non-judgement. We must push this back into the shelves of history, and non-Jews have a role in doing so.

Colleagues here in the U.S. are being kicked out of professional groups meant for resource sharing and support — forced (no exaggeration) to declare their allegiance, to “stand with the resistance for Palestine” as the price of admission. This is now a standard in some groups for acceptance. Pluralism, compassion, and honest reflection on one’s biases (our core values) seem to apply to every group except Jews. Other communities, nationalities, and races are granted nuance, context and, most importantly, humanity, while Jews are regularly subjected to collective libel, a core element of “anti-Zionism,” the hate movement that is manifesting in the helping fields.

Jewish pioneers in the field are not simply being re-examined in historical context; they are being erased or flattened as colonizing oppressors. Jews built much of the modern therapeutic tradition at its roots, and we will not be erased or shamed into hiding.

It is a frightening moment. We hold onto light, the desire to heal and foster healing, and the commitment to remain present for anyone who needs us. We will not be erased, we will not stay silent as hate spreads — and I implore you to speak up too.

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