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The conflation of Jews and Israel is real - it is a historical development of the past several decades. It has to do both with the history of Zionism and Israel on the one hand, and the history of Jews in the rest of the world, especially in the United States. /1
The reality is that Israel and Jews, at this point, are almost entirely, hopelessly, and dangerously conflated. Israel has always defined itself as representing, and working in the interest of, all Jews in the world. It also invites all Jews to emigrate and become Israelis. /2
Antisemites and, occasionally, anti-Zionists (those two things are NOT the same) share in this conflation. But they are participating in a political universe created over the past several decades, in which for most people, Israel and Jews means nearly the same thing. /3
If anyone has been doing their best to tackle this conflation and make the separation between Israel and Jews clear, it is critics of Israel - often themselves Jews - who combat antisemitism even while they criticize Israel, sometimes harshly. But it is an uphill battle. /4
It seems to clear to me that Ilhan Omar is not being attacked for "conflating" Israel and Jews. Almost everyone else does, including Israel itself, Trump, Congressional leaders, and many Jewish leaders. Her "sin" is responding to that conflation in the *wrong* way. /5
In US public life, you are supposed to treat the conflation - which almost everyone perpetuates - as something to be celebrated. You can see this in AIPAC's conference every year. But if you *call out* AIPAC in the context of criticizing Israel, you will get in hot water. /6
Omar is not the first nor the last to get in hot water, and it doesn't just happen in politics - Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer ran into a firestorm a decade-plus ago for merely laying out how the Israel Lobby works, and why its interests may not be US national interests. /7
But Omar is a particularly troublesome target because she is a Muslim woman and also one of the new challengers to political pieties about Israel and foreign policy generally. This, too, has its roots in the history of the past several decades - but that's for another thread./END
