The Green Party’s presidential candidate in the US, who was briefly detained at a student-led protest at Washington University in Missouri, said legitimate criticism of Israel is often incorrectly deemed as anti-Semitism.

“Zionism is not Judaism,” Stein, who is Jewish, told Al Jazeera.

• “And Zionism has been controversial within the Jewish community. In fact since its origins in the 1800s, and that controversy continues today. And the consequences of Zionism is that Jews came in as refugees and said, ‘This land is ours, and we are ethnically cleansing this land.’ And that’s not OK.”

Stein said the current crisis did not start with the Hamas attacks in southern Israel.

• “October 7 was just the latest phase of violence that has been mostly perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinians, starting from the Nakba, some 75 years ago.
• And unfortunately, Jews – and I know myself because I was raised as part of this – have been taught a certain version of history which is not quite accurate. As more and more historical documents come to light, it’s very clear there has been an outrageous tradition of violence against Palestinians from the get-go.”

• She added, “So Zionism is something that needs to be debated and being anti-Zionist is not the same as being anti-Semitic.”

Source: Al Jazeers