Why Mahatma Gandhi refused to support Zionism?
Supporters of Hindutva often make strange alliances with the fascists of other nations. This time it is with the Zionists. As absurd this alliance is, considering India's history of anti-colonial struggle, it is also based on falsehoods. One of such misinformation is that Mahatma Gandhi wanted the Jews to let themselves be killed by Hitler. Amusingly, many have accused Mahatma Gandhi to be an anti-Semite. Yet, this propaganda is not just untrue, but also in direct contradiction of what he said.
Gandhiji wrote about the persecution of Jews by Nazis in 1938, at the time when the leaders of Europe and America were happy to endorse and support Hitler. He expressed his sympathies with the Jewish people, and called the persecution of Jews by the Nazis unparalleled in history. He says, “If there ever could be a justifiable war in the name of and for humanity, a war against Germany to prevent the wanton persecution of a whole race, would be completely justified.”
Gandhiji was a believer in the idea of non-violence and satyagraha. He called upon the Jewish people to resist and fight against the oppression. He said, “If I were a Jew and were born in Germany and earned my livelihood there, I would claim Germany as my home even as the tallest gentile German might, and challenge him to shoot me or cast me in the dungeon; I would refuse to be expelled or to submit to discriminating treatment.”
The Nazi press assaulted Gandhi savagely for these words. It threatened reprisals against India. 'I should rank myself a coward,' he replied, 'if for fear of my country or myself or Indo-German relations being harmed I hesitated to give what I felt in the innermost recesses of my heart to be one hundred per cent sound advice.'
Jewish Frontier, a New York magazine, ridiculed Gandhi's proposal in March 1939, and sent him a copy. He quoted at length from the attack. 'I did not entertain the hope... that the Jews would be at once converted to my view.' Gandhi replied. 'I should have been satisfied if even one Jew had been fully convinced and converted... It is highly probable that, as the (Jewish Frontier) writer says, "A Jewish Gandhi in Germany, should one arise, could function for about five minutes and would be promptly taken to the guillotine." But that does not disprove my case or shake my belief in the efficacy of non-violence. I can conceive the necessity of the immolation of hundreds, if not thousands, to appease the hunger of dictators.... Sufferers need not see the result during their lifetime... The method of violence gives no greater guarantee than that of non-violence...' Millions sacrifice themselves in war without any guarantee that the world will be better as a result or even that the enemy will be defeated. Yet who does not fiercely resent the suggestion that anybody should die in deliberate non-violent sacrifice?
Gandhiji likened the discrimination against Jewish people to the untouchability in India. He said that the entire world is the homeland for the Jews, but refused to endorse the colonial programme of Zionism. He wrote, “if they [the Jews] must look to the Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb.”
Gandhiji wrote, “Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct. The mandates have no sanction but that of the last war.”
Gandhiji refused to support an ethno-religious state of Israel,
The cry for the national home for the Jews does not make much appeal to me. The sanction for it is sought in the Bible and the tenacity with which the Jews have hankered after return to Palestine.
Why should they not, like other peoples of the earth, make that country their home where they are born and where they earn their livelihood?... The nobler course would be to insist on a just treatment of the Jews wherever they are born and bred. The Jews born in France are French in precisely the same sense that Christians born in France are French.
Gandhiji was opposed to war and violence. One can say that his belief was idealistic, or even flawed. But to claim that he was against the Jews is absurd.
Today, the Zionists' oppression and violence against Palestinian Arabs bears stark resemblance to the Nazi's treatment of Jews. The ethnic cleansing of Palestinians to establish Israel, emanates from a similar ideology as Lebensraum. Yet, this fascist violence is backed by the powers of the West, who claim to be the torch-bearers of democracy and peace.
UN Secretary General António Guterres has rightly described this ongoing conflict as a “crisis of humanity,” and Gaza as a “graveyard for children.” The Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories in the West Bank and Gaza is the longest military occupation in history since The Hague Convention of 1907 and a “flagrant violation of international law”.
At the same time, Modi Government's refusal to vote for UNHCR resolution condemning the Israeli occupation of Gaza has brought a shame to the entire nation. We must stand together in condemnation of Israeli brutality in Gaza. India, which has a history of anti-colonial struggle, and has advocated for world peace, must refuse to endorse Israeli war crimes.