Reminder: it’s OK to oppose Isreali government policies

It’s okay to oppose the policies of the Israeli government. Doing so does not make you antisemitic, even though misguided people will falsely claim it does. And the reasoning is very simple.

Opposing the government policies of Saudi Arabia doesn’t make you anti-muslim. Neither does opposing the government policies of Iran, or Egypt, or Indonesia.

Opposing the government policies of Italy or Brazil or the Philippines doesn’t make you anti-Catholic.

Opposing the government policies of China or Myanmar doesn’t make you anti-Buddhist.

Opposing the government policies of India doesn’t make you anti-Hindu.

Hell, opposing the policies of the US government doesn’t even make you anti-American, so it certainly doesn’t make you anti-evangelical or anti-protestant.

Opposing any government’s policies doesn’t make someone anything other than against those policies, although there will always be people who try to claim otherwise.

I oppose the Israeli government policies of dehumanization, of collective punishment, of illegal seizures of Palestinian land for settlements, of human rights violations and apartheid. That doesn’t make me antisemitic – it makes me against those policies and in opposition to the many Israeli governments that have imposed them over the course of decades.

And for the record, I oppose the dehumanization of Israelis, the slaughter of noncombatants, and the use of rape as a war tactic by Hamas and, when applicable, the Palestinian government in the West Bank too.