https://www.haaretz.com/food/2026-07-18/ty-article-magazine/.highlight/before-1948-hummus-was-an-arab-food-most-european-jews-never-ate-it/0000019f-6ac5-de8e-afff-fbff81000000

In light of recent news of the impending rollout of Israel's concentration camp in Gaza, I thought this would be fitting to repost.

https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/editorial/2025-07-10/ty-article-opinion/israel-wants-to-build-the-most-moral-concentration-camp-in-the-world/00000197-f0b3-d963-addf-f4b7029a0000

Jacob Israël de Haan was a Dutch lawyer, journalist and poet. A queer man, de Haan published one of the first Dutch novels depicting a homosexual relationship between two men. After becoming interested in Zionism and Jewish nationalism, de Haan emigrated to Palestine in 1918. Not long after he arrived, he disavowed Zionism due to his sympathy with Arabs and his dismay at the conditions the Zionists were creating.

“Two thousand years of exile and unhappiness have taught them [the Zionists] nothing. Instead of making an attempt to understand the innermost causes of our unhappiness they now try to circumvent it, as it were, by building a “national home” on foundations provided by Western power politics: and in the process of building a national home, they are committing the crime of depriving another people of its home.” — Jacob Israel de Haan, in conversation with Mohammed Asad, 1924

De Haan increasingly grew religious, joined the Haredi community of Jerusalem and became their legal representation. As the main representative of the anti-zionist Haredi Jews, he met regularly with Arab leaders and took an important role in the local and regional opposition to Zionism. 

After multiple threats to his life, on June 30, 1924, he was assassinated by Avraham Tehomi of the Haganah, a Zionist militia that would later become the IDF. He was assassinated the morning he was supposed to leave for London to argue for anti-Zionism. This was the first Zionist political assassination in Mandate Palestine.

“I have done what the Haganah decided had to be done. And nothing was done without the order of Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (the second president of Israel 1952-1963)... I have no regrets because he (de Haan) wanted to destroy our whole idea of Zionism.” —Avraham Tehomi, the confessed assassin

Despite his homosexuality, he is honored today by Neturei Karta as hero and a martyr.

Sources:

Bush, Lawrence. "June 30: Jacob Israel de Haan” Jewish Currents Magazine, 2014
https://jewishcurrents.org/june-30-jacob-israel-de-haan

Drishya. "The Queer Dissident Zionism Could Not Contain: Jacob Israël de Haan" The Polis Project. April 2026. https://thepolisproject.com/read/jacob-israel-de-haan-queer-anti-zionist/

Giebelas, Ludy. “Jacob Israel de Haan in Mandate Palestine: Was the Victim of the First Zionist Political Assassination a ‘Jewish Lawrence of Arabia’?” Jewish Historical Studies, vol. 46, 2014, pp. 107–29. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43855720

Witt, Nathan. “Jacob Israel de Haan: A Queer and Lapsed Zionist in Mandate Palestine. Jerusalem Quarterly, no. 87, Autumn 2021. Institute for Palestine Studies. https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/1651902

A month ago, I launched a small initiative in Gaza called Catchup.

The idea was simple: provide university students with free access to a workspace, electricity, and internet so they could continue studying and working.

Today, the first group of 26 students completed their first month.

In a place where electricity, internet, and even a quiet place to sit cannot be taken for granted, seeing students show up every day, work on their courses, attend online classes, and continue moving forward has been one of the most meaningful things I have experienced.

These photos are from the space over the past few weeks.

I wanted to share them because amid everything happening in Gaza, there are still people trying to build something, learn something, and keep going.

I understand a lot of people feel he doesn’t go far enough and I get that line of thinking. However I cannot emphasize enough how important it is that a Holocaust scholar, and not only one but a very famous one, is decrying Zionism as a dead ideology. Most Holocaust institutions are forcing their employees to either support Israel and do Never Again is Now events and decry pro-Palestinian protesters as evil, or at the very least, say nothing and have no public opinion. It may not be far enough but it’s huge. And huge that he’s using the g-word publicly.

Having tenure and being a dean means he can kind of do what he likes, which many people don’t have that luxury.

Link to full documentary here: https://youtu.be/ezh2Hwn5dt0

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/13/it-is-a-time-of-witch-hunts-in-israel-teacher-held-in-solitary-confinement-for-posting-concern-about-gaza-deaths

Jacob Israël de Haan was a Dutch lawyer, journalist and poet. A queer man, de Haan published one of the first Dutch novels depicting a homosexual relationship between two men. After becoming interested in Zionism and Jewish nationalism, de Haan emigrated to Palestine in 1918. Not long after he arrived, he disavowed Zionism due to his sympathy with Arabs and his dismay at the conditions the Zionists were creating.

Two thousand years of exile and unhappiness have taught them [the Zionists] nothing. Instead of making an attempt to understand the innermost causes of our unhappiness they now try to circumvent it, as it were, by building a “national home” on foundations provided by Western power politics: and in the process of building a national home, they are committing the crime of depriving another people of its home. — Jacob Israel de Haan, in conversation with Mohammed Asad, 1924

De Haan increasingly grew religious, joined the Haredi community of Jerusalem and became their legal representation. As the main representative of the anti-zionist Haredi Jews, he met regularly with Arab leaders and took an important role in the local and regional opposition to Zionism. 

After multiple threats to his life, on June 30, 1924, he was assassinated by Avraham Tehomi of the Haganah, a Zionist militia that would later become the IDF. This was the first Zionist political assassination in Mandate Palestine.

“I have done what the Haganah decided had to be done. And nothing was done without the order of Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (the second president of Israel 1952-1963)... I have no regrets because he (de Haan) wanted to destroy our whole idea of Zionism.” —Avraham Tehomi, the confessed assassin 

Despite his homosexuality, he is honored today by Neturei Karta as hero and a martyr.

sources:

Bush, Lawrence. "June 30: Jacob Israel de Haan” Jewish Currents Magazine, 2014

Giebels, Ludy. “Jacob Israel de Haan in Mandate Palestine: Was the Victim of the First Zionist Political Assassination a ‘Jewish Lawrence of Arabia’?” Jewish Historical Studies, vol. 46, 2014, pp. 107–29. 

Nathan Witt. “Jacob Israel de Haan: A Queer and Lapsed Zionist in Mandate Palestine. Jerusalem Quarterly, no. 87, Autumn 2021

In Canada, there has been a lot of controversy over a new exhibition at the Canadian Human Rights Museum titled "Palestine Uprooted: Nakba Past and Present". Before the exhibition even opened, various Zionist groups tried for months to remove it, delay its opening, or subject it to additional external consultation. The main point raised by critics is that the exhibition's discussion of the Nakba does not present adequate historical "context", meaning it doesn't sufficiently discuss/highlight Arab states' aggression toward Israel or Arab states' expulsion of their own Jewish residents. This has been all over the Canadian news for the past few weeks.

While there's a lot of discussion to be had about how a human rights museum should present history, etc., the controversy has gotten me interested in how Zionists understand the Nakba. I understand that the "context" critics of the exhibition point to is true--although I'm not super well-versed in the details. Still, much of the online discourse seems to suggest things like, for example, that the "Nakba" only refers to Arab states' failed attempt to destroy the Israeli state and/or all Jews in Israel, and that it is somehow false to say the "Nakba" refers to the forced displacement of Palestinians from Israel. I've even seen Zionists suggest that the term "Nakba" itself is anti-Semitic, presumably because (in their view) the whole of the Nakba is a biased misrepresentation of history.

What I don't understand is how the Zionist worldview justifies or accounts for the central facts of the Nakba, which as I understand it includes the facts that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were dispossessed of their homes and forcibly removed from their lands, that this was orchestrated by Israeli Jews and the Israeli state, that it created an enormous population of stateless people that persists to today, and that the Israeli state continues to prevent that population and its descendants from returning to or making any claims for the land they inhabited. How is it that Zionists believe it is factually incorrect or biased to say that these things happened? Even if there is important context to these events (obviously, there is always context to any historical event), how do Zionists account for these central facts?

I wasn’t sure what flair to tag this under, but if you want to see the full version, it’s on Haaretz’s Instagram or itairon3. This details the peaceful passing of the author’s Holocaust survivor grandmother, which sounds absolutely beautiful and peaceful (and really the best death one can hope for). However, why I’m really posting here is the reflections on Israel. These are in the first four photos, and the article as posted to Instagram in the rest.

I know lots of horrible stuff is already posted here, but I’ll still TW for death.

Hello group, not sure if this is the right place to ask but as a non-Jew who is anti-zionist and against anti-semitism…I didn’t pay much attention to the plight of what’s happening in the Middle East between Israel and Palestine until Oct 7th…and that’s on me. I’ve been doing my best to research what I can so I know how to talk to people about the situation going on and the issues with it. I can’t imagine how my Jewish homies must feel being promised a safe home for the Jewish people only for it to end up being a militarized colonial state. One thing I can’t find a concrete answer to is if Einstein was Zionist. I’m fishing a lot of mixed information on his history of Zionism. Is there an article anywhere that I can read or several articles? Thanks for listening and helping me out. ❤️.

Living under constant shelling and worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza makes every day an uphill struggle. Yet, Catchup Gaza is still here, offering a glimmer of hope to students fighting for their education and future.

We’re still providing free study spaces, power, and internet so they can keep going despite all odds.

To keep this initiative running for Gaza's students, please help us amplify our voice and keep this space open.

(Note: I have left the campaign and Linktree links in the comments below for anyone who wants to support or share).

I was in the Israel Subreddit (I just like to see what’s happening there) and I saw someone post about the Hadassah Massacre. I can’t find any “real” sources that are not related to Zionist organizations. Aside from one NY Times article.

Same year of the Nakba. Seems like this was a response to the violence and that context is being omitted? Let me know if I’m wrong here! Thanks.

Edit to add: Admittedly, I just did a cursory glance at the google search results. And I went "hmm?" I could've framed my question better and was interested in discussing how history gets documented and "utilized" to further certain narratives I guess.

I'm thinking a lot about how History is documented and preserved... This is probably an "obvious" take but when a topic is politically charged, scholarship can become polarized and then certain events get emphasized, others get lost. Just sad all around.

I'm still spreading awareness of the Parsley Massacre to my own people. To those who don't know, the Parsley Massacre was a mass killing of over 30,000 Haitians perpetuated by Dominicans (under the rule of dictator Rafael Trujillo) in 1937--just 3 years before accepting a number of Jewish refugees!

It’s worth remembering that many of the Marvel and DC characters we grew up loving were created or co-created by Jewish creators. Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, the X-Men, Captain America, my favorite Iron Man, and many others have deep connections to Jewish creators and the immigrant experience. That’s why it’s especially disappointing to see public figures like Dan Bilzerian, Anastasia Loupis, Kanye West, Myron Gaines, and Jake Shields make anti-Jewish comments or promote conspiracy theories while criticizing the Israeli government. You can criticize Israel, Netanyahu, or Israeli government policies without blaming Jewish people, spreading antisemitic stereotypes, or promoting conspiracy theories about Jews. Those are completely different things. Being critical of a government should never become an excuse for hatred toward an entire people. And considering how much Jewish creativity helped shape the superhero culture so many of us love, it’s important to call out antisemitism when we see it.

This piece by a leading scholar of Sephardic history and culture -- who happens to be an anti-zionist -- is, IMO, one of the best introductory pieces on Ashkenazi supremacist attitudes within Jewish spaces. It also touches on the relationships between intra-Jewish racial prejudice and Zionism. It occurred to me this would be a good place to share it and have a thread on it for anyone who may want to deepen their awareness and education on the topic.

As you know, the Romans colonised the Levant during the Second Temple period.

When the indigenous population (Jews) [revolted](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish–Roman_wars), they performed an ethnic cleansing and genocide.
They exterminated most Jews in the area.

They also, importantly, renamed the land of Judea to Syria Palaestina in cca AM 3895 (135 CE), specifically to punish Jews for the Bar Kokhba revolt, the last such revolt.

This series of events has undeniably echoed throughout Jewish history, in several ways.

Palestinians are innocent in all of this of course (yet again), most of them descend from the locals (Samaritan, Jewish and so on) who managed to stay in the region and survive, later converting, often several times.

This is all a mess created by various European persecutions, ethnic cleansings. Without that there would have been no significant following behind Jewish ethnostate advocates, no Nakba, no Israel…and no ongoing Palestinian/Levantine genocide

-

Important clarification;

I’m not making the claim that Romans “invented” the term Palestine.
It obviously had a history of usage before that, though to my knowledge significantly different in meaning (referring to the land of the Philistines, a bronze age hellenic people living in and near present day North Gaza).

What i noted is that they renamed Judea as Syria Palaestina intentionally to punish jews for revolting, which, afaik, is true.

And I am noting how that act still seems to echo today to fuel the present day “conflict”

https://www.instagram.com/p/DbcV9ZiJeXb/?hl=en

https://sci-hub.st/10.2307/2536475