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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 30m

I’m more than happy to confront support for fascism within my community, and do. But that you’d confuse that with your mischaracterizing and ignorant generalizations is disingenuous at best.

שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 32m

She didn’t accuse you of antisemitism.

That said, you’re being very weirdly antisemitic. The Jewish diaspora has existed for around 2,000 years.

Having nationality elsewhere doesn’t erase our diaspora status. To wit, my partner is Ghanaian, but a US citizen. Still part of the African diaspora.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 2h

Typical white Westerner, though. Responding to substantive criticism of an aspect of your argument as though it’s a personal attack, trying to Uno reverse to play the victim. DARVO-ass motherfucker.

שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 2h

The post was about Israel. The criticism had to do with antisemitic interpretations of Christian scripture that trace back to medieval Europe, not Israel. Calling that out isn’t “anti-Christian,” which is as absurd as claiming criticism of white supremacy is “anti-white.”

Very Ted Cruz-esque.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

You also keep accusing me of trying to “take the blame away from the Jews,” which wouldn’t be something you’d be concerned about if you didn’t see this as a matter of Jewish accountability.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

You’ve also tried to explicitly claim that Jews, as a group, are funding and lobbying for discriminatory laws that target anti-Zionism as antisemitism.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

And, again, the diaspora relates to the LAND of Israel, not the STATE of Israel.

We’ve been saying “next year in Jerusalem” at Passover for centuries before Zionism existed.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

The Jewish diaspora is older than Israel.

And I’m not claiming Turks don’t trace themselves back to Mongolia. I’m claiming that they developed into a distinct ethnic group after leaving. Jews developed into their distinct ethnic group within the Levant before they left it.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

It would be like holding all Arabs (or even just all Yemenis) accountable for the Houthis ethnically cleansing Yemen’s entire Jewish population.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

I’m trying to teach you that ascribing moral blame categorically to an ethnic group because of members of that ethnic group’s actions in one particular nation where they’re dominant is a category error that leads to bigoted rhetoric, regardless of which groups we’re slotting in there.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

Turks are a distinct ethnic group from Mongolians.

Jews are an ethnic group that originated in a particular place and now exists spread out throughout the world. Thus, a diaspora.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

A diaspora is the spread of a people from their original homeland. That is expressly what happened after the Roman occupation of Judea.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

Evangelical Christians both want Israel to exist as an exclusively Jewish state AND want to drive all us Jews there to die off and trigger the Rapture.

I’m not even being a little silly, this is their raison d’etre.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

The Jewish people originated in Eretz Yisrael (“the land of Israel,” distinct from Medinat Yisrael, the modern nation-state of Israel). During the Roman occupation of the Kingdom of Judea, they spread throughout the Roman Empire. After the Bar Kokhba revolt, Rome dissolved Judea.

Thus: diaspora.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

Not even close. But if you’d done your research into why Palestinians consider their current struggle a continuation of their fight against the British, pre-Israel, you’d understand who’s truly benefiting most.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

So should I go and target ethnic Russians in the US for Russia’s actions in Ukraine? Last time I’m aware of that kind of thing happening in the US, it was Japanese internment camps during WWII.

I’m “taking the blame from the Jews” because the Jews aren’t the ones driving this shit.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

To clarify, “Diaspora Jews are not benefitting, by and large.”

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

Israel is the biggest beneficiary. Jews are not benefitting by and large, and have been outright discarded by Israel’s government, which holds that Evangelical Christians are its closest friends. They’ve been explicit about this.

Guess, also, where much of the money is coming from.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

And then, on top of that, you’re getting on TV to call out and target, at most, 1.6% of the country.

You really think this is all driven by that small proportion of the US electorate?

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

Especially because, when you scratch at the surface of that number, you end up with significantly deeper splits over their feelings on Israel’s actual formation, governance, and treatment of Palestinians.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

If you’re making that specific claim, yes, you’re being antisemitic. The data isn’t there to support it.

You can make the claim that studies by, for example, Pew show a given proportion of US Jews identify as Zionists, or believe Israel has a right to exist. But projecting specifics onto that? No.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 4h

This is exactly the kind of unforced error in talking about, btw.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 5h

There is no “Jewish lobby” in the US. Hell, the majority of Zionists in the US aren’t even Jewish.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 5h

That’s on par for the Germans. Lines up well with their history.

And I’m not claiming that accusations of antisemitism don’t get weaponized, but it’s only so easy to weaponize it against substantive anti-Zionist actions because so many Western anti-Zionists are making unforced, antisemitic errors.

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שלמה לוי @shelbyarr.bsky.social · 5h

And so you do end up with a lot of antisemitism from them, at which point they traffic in the other Western specialty: playing the victim, largely because they see being perceived as the bad guy in an interaction as anathema, so their original actions MUST be justified.

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