The Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) – the global think-tank of the Jewish people – just published my Essential Guide to Zionism, Anti-Zionism, Antisemitism, and Jew-hatred. It’s the second in a series addressing today’s burning issues thoughtfully and soberly.
Last January, a 40-something-year-old friend from Boston told me her peers and teenage children couldn’t explain the challenges facing Israel – and Israel’s reactions. I responded: “Wouldn’t it be great if we had short, punchy, user-friendly guides to the big questions vexing so many about Israel today?”
When people enter Jewish community centers, synagogues, schools, and non-Jewish spaces, they should find welcoming, non-partisan, fact-driven, non-polemical books, which are also shared online.
The first guide
That conversation inspired The Essential Guide to October 7th and Its Aftermath: Facts, Figures, History. Since JPPI published it in July 2024, then updated it in July 2025, The Guide was shared on the 100,000-person network of the Jewish Community Centers Association, in addition to many Jewish Agency and Federation networks.
The Montreal Federation-CJA printed 10,000 copies, while organizations, schools, and synagogues printed hundreds of other copies. The Jerusalem Post, Jerusalem Report, and Jewish Journal ran lengthy excerpts.
My friend and JPPI colleague, Dov Maimon, translated The Guide into French – tailored for Francophones – and distributed over 20,000 copies in France, Switzerland, and Belgium. The Guide was translated into Hebrew, and we’re working on Spanish, with some interest in a Chinese translation.
It’s a joint publishing venture with the Jewish world. JPPI supplies the printer-ready PDF of the cover and text. Organizations and foundations then print it out – or share it online.
I urge people to print it. I still believe in the power of the printed word. There’s nothing like reading a text – especially when brought alive with charts, graphs, and maps.
After the first success, we wondered “What’s next?” During “transaction week,” when US President Donald Trump went to Qatar, receiving a jet and billions of investments, I thought the Jewish world most needed a guide emphasizing the mutually beneficial US-Israel partnership. I’m halfway through writing that as the third guide.
Exploring our identity
Yet, even more important than the US-Israel dynamic is our own identity journey. That’s why this one is The Essential Guide to Zionism, Anti-Zionism, Anti-Semitism, and Jew-Hatred – published simultaneously in French, thanks again to the talented Maimon.
The insane surge in Jew-hatred, from the Left to the Right, has betrayed us all. But I fear this negativity is hijacking our communal agenda. I don’t want a Zionism that’s merely anti-antisemitism or anti-anti-Zionism. For years, I refused to be a post-Holocaust Jew. Now, I don’t want October 7 Jews. Let’s be 1948 Jews – or 3,500-year-old Jews!
As with the first guide, before building into five chapters, illuminated with fact-boxes and charts, I posed five basic questions:
- What is Zionism?
- What is anti-Zionism?
- How do anti-Zionism and antisemitism overlap, how do they differ, and why are both surging now?
- Are all pro-Palestinian activists and critics of Israel antisemitic?
- What can Jews and Zionists do to lessen the hatred against them?
After short responses, The Guide deepens the answers in five chapters:
- Chapter 1: Zionism: The People of Israel Enjoying the State of Israel in the Land of Israel
- Chapter 2: The Evil Overlap: How Anti-Zionism Became The New Antisemitism – and Mainstreamed Jew-hatred Again
- Chapter 3: The Global Surge in Jew-Hatred: Why Now?
- Chapter 4: Boundaries and Balance: How Israel’s Critics Can Avoid Antisemitism, How Israel’s Supporters Can Avoid Confusing Critics with Bigots
- Chapter 5: Liberal Living and Zionist Dreaming in a World Gone Mad
- Epilogue: The 6 Ps to Responding to Antisemitic Anti-Zionism
The Jew makes the Jew
Admittedly, the title’s a mouthful – but these are complicated times. The book’s a sandwich, starting and ending on positive notes. That’s an ideological and historical statement, putting the hatred in proportion.
The French existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre claimed in Anti-Semite and Jew, written as the Holocaust ended, that the antisemite makes the Jew. Zionists say “no!” The Jew makes the Jew.
Second, while acknowledging the validity of some anti-Israel criticism, even some anti-Zionism, I put the burden of proof on them, not us. They must prove they’re not antisemitic, because Jew-hated is deeply embedded within the Palestinian national movement. That’s not my fault – but theirs.
Finally, I distinguish. Antisemitism is the conspiratorial theory, obsessing about “the Jew,” and now “the Jewish state,” which even pacifist professors can foment. Jew-hatred is the brutal, often violent, expression, targeting Jews.
Kudos to graphic artist Tal Shimshoni. He made extraordinary “fact boxes” – or “infographics.” A map on page 19 shows “Ancient Signs of Jewish Life in Israel Archaeologists have Uncovered” – going back 2,000 years, from north to south, confirming Jews’ indigeneity.
Page 26 charts how the international community recognized Jewish rights to the Jewish homeland, from the Balfour Declaration, through the League of Nations and the UN, to America’s recognition. Zionism’s seven defining achievements appear on page 28 – while acknowledging ongoing challenges.
Then, trigger warning – truth bomb coming: I’m rude enough to detail on page 60 Israel’s repeated attempts at compromise amid constant, sweeping, and yes, truly genocidal Palestinian rejectionism.
Similarly, page 62 showcases terms used to judge war, defining what they really mean, from “Just War” to “Proportionality” to “Genocide.” Page 73 claims the “eyes” have it… illustrating Zionism’s Six I’s responding to Jew-hatred: Idealism, Identity, Industriousness, Independence, Indifference, Incorruptibility.
If you don’t understand what I’m talking about – great! Download the book here (jppi.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/The-Jewish-Peoples-The-Essential-Guide-to-Zionism-WEB-1.pdf). Better yet, arrange to have thousands of copies printed and distributed at your favorite Jewish – or non-Jewish – institution with integrity.
The writer, a senior fellow in Zionist thought at the Jewish People Policy Institute, is an American presidential historian. His latest books, To Resist the Academic Intifada: Letters to My Students on Defending the Zionist Dream and The Essential Guide to October 7th and its Aftermath, were recently published.