It's also not true that anyone who has criticised the motion has been labelled a Zionist. That hasn't been my experience as someone who has criticised it, and Greens for Palestine is now defending Zack, who has said that he wouldn't have voted for the motion without the amendments

I'm just repeating what I've heard from other Jewish anti-Zionists who were involved at that stage and from my own conversations with the motions drafters. I don't think it's true that 0 changes were or would be accepted

But the original text was changed? The motion I originally read, and the background papers, was not the one we voted on? I'm definitely not trying to re-write history, I wasn't involved in any of this until after spring conference which seems to have been a massive fall out

And also contributed to the drafters doubling down and not wanting to make any changes. I have been doing my best to build bridges over this but it's not easy when a few very loud voices immediately condemned this as antisemitic and refused to engage the points it was trying to raise

Yeah I also would have worded this policy differently, partly for this reason. But my concerns are not and have never been that the policy as worded poses some kind of particular threat to Jews, and I think those kinds of accusations are fuelling this response just as much as the motion itself

It's a complicated and difficult discussion, but it's definitely one that needs to be had

I think that one of the reasons this motion has sparked fury is because it hits too close to home, not just for Jews but for Europeans in general, forcing us to acknowledge that a lot of the privileges we enjoy are founded on colonialism and by extension on racism

I'm sort of playing devil's advocate, because I don't really believe that Zionism has brought freedom or security for Jews, including for Jews in Palestine. My point is: one can believe that it has, and still acknowledge that Zionism is racist

Fundamentally, it is about recognizing that one people's freedom and safety cannot come at the expense of another people, and this needs to be acknowledged if we are going to move forward

Saying that Zionism is racism doesn't mean erasing what Zionism has meant for many Jewish people. It means acknowledging that the (relative) safety granted to some Jewish people by the State of Israel has come at a price, and that that price is still being paid

I think a lot of the conflict around this motion revolves around the use of the word "racism". I was chatting to my french partner about this, and he said that even though colonialism is recognised as a crime in France, he thinks a lot of people would be furious if it were recognised as racism

The zionist movement was still a force for good for those Jewish refugees, providing them with a home, for the first time in Jewish history, a nation state. It was also racist, expelling and massacring Palestinians to make way for Jewish refugees and denying Palestiniens rights and even existence

But it did this at the expense of another people. I have read articles in the postwar Yiddish press talking about the "problem" of Jewish settlers, many of them refugees, feeling uncomfortable living in homes that they could see had been stolen from Palestinians...

The Zionist movement did provide a homeland for Jews fleeing persecution in Europe or languishing in DP camps after the Holocaust (I would argue it also provided a cop put for European states who failed to deal with the consequences of their own antisemitism but that's for another thread)

An objection I've heard from a lot of people is that for thousands of Jews, Zionism has been a force for good, the movement that rescued from persecution. That is true, it also doesn't make it not racist.

We could spend eternity debating whether it was the right move to make "zionism is racism" part of Green Party policy (and it seems like some people plan to do that). What if we actually talk about it 🧵

And I think all of these concerns are already covered by the content of the motion, but the background booklet answered a lot of questions and did so comprehensively

The speeches made were frankly quite wild - suggesting that the motion is an attack on religious freedom! Since when is Zionism part of our religion!

The wording of the amendment is very confusing, there is a bit about "Jewish members won't be penalised for opinions that wouldn't be penalised if expressed by a non-Jew" that would already be covered by the Party's antisemitism policy.