Not Quite Normal

These images illustrate how the Soviet Union visually equated Zionism with Nazism and colonialism throughout the 1960s and 70s.

You’ll notice striking similarities between these graphics and the infographics commonly seen on social media today.

This is not coincidence.

Most of the slogans and frameworks used in the "Free Palestine" movement today weren't created by Gen Z activists. They were engineered by the KGB and Soviet Agitprop (Agitation and Propaganda) departments over 50 years ago.

The Great Pivot

In 1948, the USSR actually supported Israel. But when Israel aligned with the West, the Soviets needed a way to turn the "Global South" against them. They launched a massive ideological campaign to rebrand Zionism (the movement for Jewish self-determination) as a form of "white supremacist colonialism."

They created a state-sponsored "science" called Zionology. The goal was simple: make Zionism synonymous with the world’s greatest evils (Nazism, Racism, and Imperialism) so that opposing Israel became a "progressive" moral requirement.

"Zionism is Racism" (UN Resolution 3379)

The crowning achievement of this era was the 1975 UN Resolution declaring "Zionism is a form of racism." This wasn't a grassroots human rights initiative; it was a Soviet-led diplomatic hit job.

Though the UN revoked it in 1991, the damage was permanent. It gave activists a "scholarly" and "international" license to treat the Jewish state as uniquely illegitimate. When you see modern infographics using these exact terms, you are seeing the tail-end of a 50-year-old Soviet PR campaign.

And yes, Russia is doing this again (along with Iran and Qatar).

Why Russia is doing it again

Today, Russia (and its modern disinformation machine) uses the Israel-Palestine conflict in the West as a wedge issue. They don't have to invent new lies. They just amplify existing tensions. By flooding platforms like Tumblr or Twitter with high-emotion content, they force Westerners to pick sides and fight each other.

If Russia can make young Americans believe their government is funding a genocide, it weakens domestic support for all Western foreign policy, including support for Ukraine.

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It is surprisingly easy to fall for it because this propaganda is designed to look like social justice. It uses the language of liberation to hide its origins in Cold War geopolitics.

When you see a post that frames a 3,000-year-old indigenous connection as settler-colonialism, or equates the Star of David with a Swastika, you're seeing a Soviet turd that's been polished for 21st century "progressives."

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The Essential Guide to Zionism, Anti-Zionism, Antisemitism, and Jew-Hatred by American Historian Gil Troy

https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA066235.pdf

https://www.nytimes.com/1949/05/02/archives/antizionism-in-soviet-union-turning-into-antisemitism-developing.html

https://www.timesofisrael.com/why-are-us-socialists-so-anti-israel-scholar-lays-out-soviet-roots-of-anti-zionist-rhetoric/

Mapping the New Left Antisemitism (Edited by Alan Johnson)

https://www.abc.net.au/religion/zionism-and-the-big-lie/11519628

https://quillette.com/2024/02/13/izabella-tabarovsky-on-the-soviet-roots-of-anti-zionist-discourse/

See also from 1999:

and 2011 (Links are good)

Various state department pages that are still un-fucked with as of yet (Links are good)

In The Storm, we cut from a flashback about Aang’s life with the Air Nomads to Zuko’s life in the Fire Nation. We get an entire episode just about him in Zuko Alone. We watch him steal food for refugees with Jet in The Serpent’s Pass while the Gaang escort more refugees through the titular pass. He learns how to redirect lightning while Toph teaches Aang earthbending in Bitter Work. He and Aang learn about their predecessors’ shared past together in the perfectly named episode The Avatar and The Fire Lord. During The Day of Black Sun, we jump between Aang reach the beginning of the end of his journey and Zuko beginning on his newly chosen path as the Avatar’s ally.

Every step of Zuko’s journey is in tandem with Aang’s, right from the first episode. He’s learning and growing right there alongside the Gaang, even when they’re miles apart. Him and Aang doing the Dancing Dragon in The Firebending Masters is the culmination of three seasons worth of buildup. Two young men who were once enemies become allies, as Zuko restores firebending’s true spirit and Aang overcomes the last thing holding him back from his full potential.

It was the failings of the Avatar and the Fire Lord that started the war, and it’s the successes of the new Avatar and the new Fire Lord that ends it.

And my manager was like no!!!! If that happened, I would drive to find you guys in my truck and we could eat stuff from my wife's garden and I would make sure everyone I know survived!! I would carry you all on my shoulders away from the zombies!!

The idea that societal collapse exposes mankind’s true nature ignores one thing: society IS mankind. We make it, just by being around each other. Social mores and customs aren’t arbitrary rules inflicted on us by some unseen force, they’re our own behaviors and views. We say please and thank you because we want to be kind. We establish charities because we want to help others. We set up garbage cans because we want to be clean. We’re the ones setting the standards and frowning at the people who don’t rise to meet them. We’re the ones who are appalled by the cruelties in our history.