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Like Israel has been a word used by jews to describe jews for centuries, far before Israel, the country existed. For example, am yisrael chai means the Jewish people live.

"Oh but I'm talking about the country not jews"

Cool yeah sure that may be your intention, but the other month a synagogue in the US as Israel crossed out and replaced with Palestine by antizionists who thought that the passage on the outside of the synagogue was referring to the country of Israel, when in reality it was referring to jewish people. Essentially the word jewish/jewish people was crossed out and replaced with Palestine.

Hopefully most people can look at that and go "damn that's fucked up and antisemitic".

And I get that there is the very likely that they did not know that Israel also means jewish people, however it takes 2 minutes to Google search + vandalizing a synagogue bad full stop. And the whole not knowing that it has multiple meanings in of itself causes antisemitism.

And ignoring the fact that people aren't pulling this shit with other countries they don't support, as a jew I feel unsafe when i hear people saying that shit as I A) have no clue if it's has or will result in them pulling similar shit at synagogues or even with posts using Israel meaning the Jewish people and B) I also have no clue if they genuinely mean Israel the country or Israel as in the Jewish people.

being a zionist ≠ supporting bibi netanyahu

being a zionist ≠ wishing all gazans to die

being a zionist ≠ supporting the israeli government

BUT

Let me tell you a common situation I encounter:

So, being a college student away from home, I don't have a car here. This means that if I ever need to go anywhere, I need to get an Uber or Lyft or something along those lines.

I always tuck in my Bring Them Home tag, magen david, turn my "am Yisrael chai" pin to the inside of my clothes, etc. I hate doing it, but I have heard of violently antisemitic drivers, and I'd rather not risk it, considering I'm alone in the car with them.

Every time, I call my mom. It makes me safer to have someone on call. And every time, she makes the same two recommendations.

The first is to put in an address of a neighboring house for pickup, because the house I live in has my landlord's car out front, and his car has stickers in Hebrew on it.

The second is, if asked where I'm from, to say Russia. I don't get asked where I'm "really from" unless I'm with my parents usually (they both have strong accents). But it's a warning my mom repeats every time anyway. The choice of Russia isn't random, I was raised fluent and can back up the claim if need be with random knowledge. But I have never been to Russia, except for the airport once to catch a connecting flight to Israel. I was, however, born in Israel, and I've been there multiple times (unfortunately not since 2014 though). So to say I'm from Russia is a lie, and to say I'm from Israel is the truth.

Both are countries at war. Russia, unlike Israel, actually started the war. Unlike Israel, Russia actually does have a history of colonialism, genocide, imperialism, and worse.

So why is it safer for me to lie about being from an aggressor country than to tell the truth about being from a country caught in a war it didn't want?

Antisemitism. Anti-Russian hate crimes globally didn't spike, Russian women haven't been raped as "justice" for Ukraine. Russian businesses weren't commonly vandalized simply for being from Russia. Meanwhile, all of these things were done to Jews as a result of a war Israel did not start.

If this global response to the war wasn't antisemitism it would be equally safe or unsafe for me to give either answer.

But in reality, it's safer for me to lie about being from Russia than to tell the truth about being from Israel.

idc where you stand on the territorial dispute. that's not the problem here. the problem is the blatant global antisemitism on display for the world to see and the world is agreeing with it. when you have people literally shouting "gas the Jews", when you have people who talk about atrocities of the israeli government (again, not the point here) and then the solution is mass murder of--not even the inhabitants of the country--but the entire race, internationally? THAT is not something you can side with. and when Hamas has said, blatantly clear, that THAT IS THEIR GOAL? ERADICATION OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE? like it's in their CHARTER guys i don't see how you can side with Hamas in this. it's sick.

my heart goes out to the palestinian civilians being killed because of hamas. my heart goes out to the israeli civilians being killed because of hamas. my heart goes out to arabs living in israel who are sure to face who knows what kind of trials because of hamas. my heart goes out to jews across the globe because of hamas.

none of this is meant to be a defense of Israel’s actions in palestine. I have simply seen far too many uninformed posts.

Judaism isn't only a religion, it's also an ethnic group. there are atheist Jews, and people who have converted to Judaism who are not ethnically Jewish.

of the ethnic groups, there are the Ashkenazi (the European Jews— from countries like Germany, Poland, Russia), the Sephardi (the Jews of the Iberian peninsula, North Africa, and some other spots along the mediterranean), and the Mizrahi

some Ashkenazi Jews who are descendants of Holocaust survivors are eligible for some European citizenships

however, somewhere between 50-60% (I've seen various percentages) of Israeli Jews are Mizrahi, as in, literally native to the Middle East (as are some Sephardi)

where did they come from? following the Arab-Israeli war, many of the Arab countries surrounding Israel either expelled their Jewish populations or had such serious antisemitism that much of the Jewish population decided to leave

treatment of non-Ashkenazi Jews within Israel has a complicated history. the Israeli government, at one point, stole Yemeni Jewish children in hospitals, adopted them out, and then told the parents their children had died. it's estimated at this time 1 in 8 Yemeni children were taken.

IDF service is compulsory in Israel. both men and women are conscripted. conscription can only be avoided due to medical issues, criminal record, living outside Israeli, religious objection, or or conscientious objections