Israelism - another side to the story of Israel

I finally got around to watching Israelism, a hard-hitting documentary about indoctrination and misinformation about Israel among American Jews.

Subtitled "The Awakening of Young American Jews", the 2023 film didn't really tell me anything I didn't already know because I have read around the subject, although I'm sure it will be a shocking eye-opener for a lot of people.

It looks in some detail at the way in which young Jewish people in America are fed a very one-sided and often false story about the creation of Israel, the way Jews are treated, and how the state of Israel is a paradise for Jews. It explains how well-funded this movement is, and how young impressionable American Jews are being indoctrinated and even recruited into the Israeli army.

It also shows that there is a whole cohort of young American Jews who are questioning this indoctrination, and visiting Israel and Palestine personally to see for themselves. They come away with a very different impression - a place where Palestinian lands are illegally settled by a rapacious Israeli political machine and fanatical fundamentalists, and Palestinian people are subjugated and oppressed in an apartheid system at least as brutal and absolute as anything in 20th century South Africa.

This has led to a plethora of activist groups in America of Jews opposed to the politics of the Israeli state, and supportive of Palestinian freedom and human rights. These groups are being routinely harassed and threatened online and in person by angry Zionist elements, and subjected to regular death threats, but they are bravely persisting because they have seen the injustice and feel they cannot remain silent.

The film makes no secret of the fact that there is indeed a burgeoning antisemitic movement in America (and worldwide) as the far right gains a foothold and unquestioningly pro-Israel populist politicians and demagogues proliferate. But it makes the point that, notwithstanding, the propaganda we are being fed about Israel remains wrong, and that criticizing Israel is not in itself antisemitic, as we are also told.

The documentary was produced before the October 7th 2023 incursion by Hamas and the bloodbath in Palestine that ensued in its wake. Perhaps not surprisingly, after the attack and the start of the war in Palestine, there was a concerted effort to get the movie banned on the grounds that it is antisemitic - it's not, and the movie itself explains why it's not.

It should be required viewing, but so entrenched are the pro-Israel views of many people, Jews and non-Jews, that I don't hold much hope that it will change many minds.