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Indigenous Zionism Is Peoplehood Zionism
Israel’s First Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion (C) stands under a portrait depicting Theodore Herzl, the father of modern Zionism, as he reads Israel’s declaration of Independence in Tel Aviv, May 14, 1948, in this handout picture released April 29, 2008, by the Israeli Government Press Office (GPO). Photo: REUTERS/Kluger Zoltan/GPO/Handout
Zion has figured powerfully in the Jewish imagination for millennia, at least from the time of the Babylonian exile, and the pre-exilic Psalms. Enter the “-ism” of the late 19th century, when Theodor Herzl translated that longing into a political movement — Zionism.
Even since Herzl, Zionism has existed in various forms — whether named or simply as an idea: Labour Zionism, Religious Zionism, Political Zionism, Practical Zionism, Cultural Zionism, Christian Zionism, Revisionist Zionism, and more. What most have in common is the conviction that the Jewish people have an ineradicable connection to the Land of Israel.
Enter Indigenous Zionism: a Zionism that recognizes that such connection is an indigenous bond, one in which Jewish Peoplehood is seen to have been forged through the relationship between land, ancestry, Hebrew writings, and the language itself, from which arise cultural and spiritual practices.
In the current torrent of academic fashions and activist orthodoxies, one idea that has captured the imagination of progressive movements is settler colonialism and the associated rhetoric of decolonization.
This theoretical framework purports to explain global history through a tidy dichotomy of settlers and indigenous peoples, of Western power and non‑Western victimhood. Yet when that model is applied beyond the contexts in which it was originally developed, especially in regions with complex histories, it does more harm than good.
Nowhere is this more clearly seen than in the debate over Israel and Zionism. What is too often caricatured as settler colonialism is better understood through the lens of indigenous peoplehood, observing parallels that exist between Jewish historical experience and the stories of other ancient peoples. In this sense, Indigenous Zionism is above all Peoplehood Zionism: a recognition of ancestral connection, continuous presence, and deeply rooted land-based identity.
At its core, Zionism is the expression of a people’s right to self‑determination in its ancestral homeland. For the Jewish people, this is not an abstract political invention of the modern era, but rather the resumption of an identity shaped over millennia in the Land of Israel.
Long before Europe’s age of imperial expansion, Jews maintained a continuous presence in the Levant, a presence expressed culturally, spiritually, linguistically, and demographically. Settler colonial theory, which originates largely in Western academic circles, typically defines settlers as intruders acting on behalf of an external metropolis to subjugate indigenous populations; this definition simply does not fit the historical trajectory of the Jewish people in their homeland.
Contrary to reductionist narratives, Jews did not arrive en masse as white Europeans with the trappings of Western economic power. Firstly, there remained throughout centuries of exile, a small presence of Jews in the land. In Māori thought, this is the concept of “keeping the fires burning.”
The return of Eastern European and Russian Jews during the late 19th and early 20th centuries was a two-fold response. On the one hand, Jewish settlement in Ottoman Palestine was legally enabled within an imperial reform context, whereupon, Jews embraced the opportunity of re-establishing themselves as a people in their ancestral land. On the other hand, it was — in so many cases — a direct reaction to persecution, marginalization, and threats to their existence. These were populations motivated by survival-driven desperation, not imperialist ambition. Whichever the driver, Jews overwhelmingly regarded the Land of Israel as the ancient cradle of their people, not as foreign soil. Even Arab leaders of the time acknowledged the Jewish historical connection. This historical reality is crucial: it differentiates a movement of return rooted in indigeneity from the archetype of colonial conquest.
A core problem with applying settler colonialism to Israel is that the theory collapses complex histories into a binary moral narrative: oppressor versus oppressed. Few human histories are so simple, and the Middle East is a region where multiple layers of civilization, conquest, displacement, and cultural survival overlap.
Indeed, the Arab conquests of the seventh to ninth centuries brought a sweeping linguistic and religious transformation across the region, one that subsumed many ancient peoples. Kurdish, Assyrian, Chaldean, and Amazigh communities, among others, maintained continuous links to their lands yet were subjected to cultural and political marginalization. This complexity underscores a fundamental flaw in settler colonial frameworks when applied universally. Indigeneity is not merely dispossession or victimhood; it is about genealogy, continuous presence, language, ritual, and identity anchored in a specific geography.
The broad misapplication of settler colonialism has very real political consequences. Once adopted unquestioningly by activists and academic institutions, it provides a convenient but woefully simplistic moral certitude: all historical wrongs arise from a single dynamic, and dismantling alleged structures of colonial power is supposedly the path to justice.
In practice, this framework frequently morphs from analytical model into ideological dogma. It becomes a “religion of grievance” with its own categories of original sin, penance, and absolution, where dissolving complexity via the dogma of colonial guilt eclipses other narratives of agency, resilience, and reconciliation. Those who resist this mode of thought are not simply arguing for historical nuance; they are confronting a contemporary orthodoxy that has profound consequences for real peoples and nations.
Consider, for example, the persistent accusation that Israel commits genocide against Palestinians. This claim often rests on rhetoric rather than careful historical and legal analysis, and well established definitions. The “religion of grievance” leads accusers to ignore the atrocities committed by non‑state actors such as Hamas, which has openly declared its intent to destroy the Jewish State. The machinery of international opinion, when driven by such problematic and simplistic narratives, tends to silence any call for impartial and disciplined inquiry.
Indigenous Zionism or peoplehood Zionism recognizes that nations are more than juridical entities. They are living communities formed by shared history, culture, memory, and connection to land. For Jews, this peoplehood has been further forged by exile, persecution, revival, and more recently statehood. In many respects, such experiences are consistent with what indigenous peoples around the world know intimately: that identity persists beyond displacement, and that belonging is more than presence. It is this peoplehood — not colonial conquest — that underpins the legitimacy of Zionism as a movement of self‑determination.
Further, Indigeneity is not contingent upon whether individual members of a community consciously affirm that identity. A Jew, Māori, or Native American person may choose not to self-identify as Indigenous for a range of reasons: cultural dislocation, assimilation pressures, internalized stigma, or the mistaken belief that indigeneity is synonymous with marginalization rather than cultural continuity and pride, or progressive politics rather than an authentic identification. Yet such individual positioning does not determine the status itself. indigeneity refers to the historical emergence, formation, and ongoing development of a people in relation to a specific ancestral land. It is a collective, relational, and genealogical reality, not merely a matter of personal declaration.
Detractors may object that indigeneity, like Zionism itself, is a political construct. Indeed, both movements have a political element, developed in response to historical circumstances. However, at the core there is a deeper meaning that transcends politics and historical contingency, which speaks to the essential element of peoplehood and its genesis in a particular place.
In an age of narrative wars, Jews have been falsely accused of being foreign white colonizers. The denial of indigeneity to Jewish people maps directly onto the experience of other Indigenous peoples, in which ideologies formed in the Western academy seeks to determine identity. Māori academic Linda Tuhiwai Smith emphasized that Indigenous Peoples must define and assert their own realities: “Our survival, our humanity, our worldview and language, our imagination and spirit, our very place in the world depends on our capacity to act for ourselves, to engage in the world and the actions of our colonizers, to face them head on.”
Jews can take their place in the Indigenous world, forerunners of decolonization, having regained sovereignty and restored their Indigenous language. They will write their own story rather than have it imposed on them by their ideological opponents.
To those ignorant of the deep layers of history involved, the accusation of settler colonialism may seem persuasive. To those who have examined the evidence, and who understand the dangers of flattening complex identities into politically expedient constructs, such claims fall short. Indigenous Zionism is not an oxymoron; it is the affirmation that the Jewish people’s claim to their land arises from continuity, culture, and unique identity — the hallmarks of genuine indigenous connection.
In a world increasingly shaped by monolithic narratives, reclaiming the richness of human histories — including the Jewish story — is not an indulgence in academic detail. It is a defense of a people’s right to define themselves on their own terms, rooted in their own histories. Indigenous Zionism, then, is simply peoplehood Zionism — an assertion that identity and belonging are not abstractions to be judged or negated by a fashionable but woefully superficial ideological dogma, but truths grounded in the enduring experience of a people with their land.
Dr. Sheree Trotter is Māori (Te Arawa). She earned her PhD in history from the University of Auckland, is the Director of Indigenous Embassy Jerusalem, a Fellow of London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism, and Alumna of the ISGAP-Oxford Institute.
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Javier Bardem Slams Trump, Netanyahu for Iran War Before Declaring ‘Free Palestine’ at Academy Awards
Javier Bardem and Priyanka Chopra Jonas on stage during the Oscars show at the 98th Academy Awards in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, US, March 15, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Mike Blake
Spanish actor Javier Bardem protested the US-Israeli war with Iran while speaking to reporters on the red carpet at the 98th Academy Awards on Sunday night, before taking to the stage at the awards show in Los Angeles and declaring “Free Palestine.”
The Oscar winner, 57, attended the ceremony at the Dolby Theater wearing on his tuxedo lapel a pin that said, “No a la Guerra,” which in Spanish means, “No to War.” He wore the same pin in 2003 to protest the US invasion of Iraq.
The “F1” star has been a vocal critic of Israel’s military actions in the Gaza Strip during the Israel-Hamas war and has publicly voiced support for a “Free Palestine” several times in the past. While speaking to reporters at the Academy Awards, he blasted the US and Israel for their joint strikes against Iran, specifically calling out US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“I’m wearing a pin that I used in 2003 with the Iraq war, which was an illegal war,” Bardem told The Hollywood Reporter on Sunday night on the Oscars red carpet. “And we are here, 23 years after, with another illegal war, created by Trump and Netanyahu with another lie, which is to defeat the regime. But they are radicalizing the regime by their horrific actions. So that’s not the reason, as it was not the reason weapons of mass destruction in 2003.”
Bardem also wore to the Oscars this year a pin in support of Palestinian resistance on his tuxedo lapel. On the pin was a drawing of Handala, a character created by Palestinian newspaper cartoonist Naji al-Ali in 1969. Handala is a 10-year-old Palestinian refugee who is turning his back to the world and has become a long-standing symbol for Palestinians. Bardem said it is a “Palestine symbol of resistance.”
Later on in the evening, while co-presenting the award for best international feature film with actress Priyanka Chopra Jonas, Bardem made more political comments, but this time about “Palestine.” When he walked on stage, the first thing he said was, “No to war. Free Palestine,” before presenting the nominees for the category.
After getting off stage, he told Variety he felt compelled to take about the “injustice” he feels is taking place in the Middle East. “Which in this case is the genocide in Palestine that is still going on … what is going on in the West Bank, the abuse of civil rights and human rights and ethnic cleansing,” he added. “It’s horrible … and then the illegal war [in Iran].”
“They are not defeating any regime, they are radicalizing the regime, bombing innocent people,” Bardem claimed about the US-Israeli joint strikes against Iran.
Before entering the Vanity Fair afterparty, he told USA Today: “We are going back to the same beginning of lying and manipulating us … it’s not about freedom. It’s not about changing any regime. It’s about creating a chaos that only benefits the richest and the people that have the power to control the area.”
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College Republicans Federation Disbands University of Florida Chapter Over Nazi Pictures
An entrance to the University of Florida in Gainesville, Dec. 4, 2020. Photo: USA Today Network via Reuters Connect
The Florida Federation of College Republicans (FFCR) has disbanded its chapter at the University of Florida and asked the school to deactivate it following an investigation which revealed that student leaders photographed themselves pantomiming the Nazi salute.
“This request is based on the FFCR’s findings that some Local CR [College Republicans] members engaged in a pattern of conduct that violated its rules and values, including a recent antisemitic gesture,” the university said in a statement on Saturday. “In compliance with its policies, the University of Florida is in the process of deactivating the Local CR as a registered student organization. When the FFCR is ready, the university will also assist it with reactivating the Local CR under new student leadership.”
Since reports of the action emerged, the UF College Republicans chapter has alleged that the Florida Federation lacks jurisdiction over the organization, insisting that it is registered with the College Republicans of America group. There are several contending “College Republican” groups, including the original College Republican National Committee founded in 1892, College Republicans United, the National Federation of College Republicans (NFCR), and College Republicans.
“They cited the FFFCR, an organization that we are not a part of that has no authority over our chapter [sic],” College Republicans of America said in a statement. “We look forward to the university reinstating our club and correcting this statement. We have retained counsel and have received information that this is not the first time that FFCR has lied to silence Christian conservative groups on campus.”
Regardless of the outcome of the dispute, the incident marks the second time this month that conservative youth were publicly outed for indulging Nazism and the white supremacist movement. Earlier this month, leaked texts revealed dozens of antisemitic and racist texts exchanged by young Republicans in Miami-Dade County, Florida, some of which fantasized about engaging in onanism in an all-white country.
As first reported by The Miami Herald, the group chat, created on WhatsApp, was described by its members as “Nazi heaven” for the daily barrage of extremist comments contributed to it. Individuals affiliated with the Miami-Dade Country Republicans, Turning Point USA, and College Republicans casually said “ni—er,” denounced women as “whores,” and spoke rapturously about Adolf Hitler.
Dariel Gonzalez, according to the Herald, was one of the chat’s most prolific contributors, bandying about comments regarding “color professors” and telling members that “You can f—k all the k—kes you want. Just don’t marry them and procreate.”
The group chat’s exposure comes at a time when, according to recent polling, young Republicans have increasingly embraced antisemitism and conspiracy theories.
As The Algemeiner has previously reported, antisemitism has permeated college campuses across the US for years, even before the recent surge in incidents amid the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
In 2022 alone, anti-Zionists at State University of New York (SUNY) New Paltz expelled a sexual assault survivor from a victim support group over her support for Zionism; a former University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) lecturer threatened to commit a mass shooting of Jews on campus, saying in a note to former colleagues that “Violence against Jews should happen. Retaliation and retribution for what they have stolen is legitimate and a good thing”; and students at Indiana University posted messages on a social media forum which lambasted “east coast Jews” as rapists, charging that their “huge noses, afros, and smelliness prevent them from being attractive.”
The Palestinian terrorist group’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel unleashed a historic surge in such outrages on US campuses. College students, joined by faculty, carried out a number of antisemitic incidents and hate crimes — spitting on Jewish students at the University of California, Berkeley while calling them “Jew”; gang assaulting Jewish students at Columbia University’s Butler Library; vandalizing public spaces with swastika graffiti; and chasing Jewish students out of graduate programs by denying them religious accommodations and smearing their reputations.
While much of the anti-Zionist movement on campus has been associated politically with the far left, the far right has recently been involved with a series of antisemitic incidents on campuses,
In October, for example, a conservative student magazine at Harvard University published an essay which bore likeness to key tenets of Nazi doctrine. In January, a sophomore and right-wing social media influencer at the University of Miami verbally attacked a Jewish student group, calling its members disgusting while accusing rabbis of eating infants.
Campus antisemitism has changed the college experience for American Jewish students, affecting how they live, socialize, and perceive themselves as Jews, according to new survey results released by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) in partnership with Hillel International.
A striking 42 percent of Jewish students reported experiencing antisemitism during their time on campus, and of that group, 55 percent said they felt that being Jewish at a campus event threatened their safety. The survey also found that 34 percent of Jewish students avoid being detected as Jews, hiding their Jewish identity due to fear of antisemitism. Meanwhile, 38 percent of Jewish students said they decline to utter pro-Israel viewpoints on campus, including in class, for fear of being targeted by anti-Zionists. The rate of self-censorship is significantly higher for Jewish students who have already been subjected to antisemitism, registering at 68 percent.
“No Jewish student should have to hide their identity out of fear of antisemitism, yet that’s the reality for too many students today,” Hillel International chief executive officer Adam Lehman said in February. “Our work on the ground every day is focused on changing that reality by creating environments where all Jewish students can find welcoming communities and can fully and proudly express their Jewish identities without fear or concern.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Amsterdam’s New Warning to Europe on Antisemitism
Anti-Israel protesters clash with police outside Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, breaking through barricades and setting off smoke bombs during a demonstration against a performance by the IDF’s chief cantor. Photo: Screenshot
Amsterdam likes to present itself as a city of tolerance. It celebrates diversity, prides itself on openness, and often reminds the world of its history as a refuge for those seeking freedom. Yet something deeply troubling happened in Amsterdam last week that should concern not only the Netherlands, but all of Europe:
A municipal debate about antisemitism had to be held at a secret location because of security concerns.
Pause for a moment and consider what that means. In a democratic European capital, a discussion about protecting a Jewish minority could not take place openly for fear of threats and intimidation. If that does not signal a serious problem, what does?
That’s in addition to the bombing of a Jewish school, and another attack that just occurred.
During the meeting, a 15-year old Jewish boy addressed the room. His testimony cut through political rhetoric and statistics with the clarity only a young voice can bring. Since the October 7, 2023, massacre in Israel, he said, life for Jewish students in Amsterdam has changed dramatically. Many of his friends have already left the city. They no longer see a future there.
Imagine hearing those words in 2026 in one of Europe’s most celebrated liberal cities. A teenager speaking calmly about the disappearance of his community.
Amsterdam alderman Melanie van der Horst was visibly moved and struggled to hold back tears. The emotional moment showed that some political leaders understand the gravity of what is happening. Yet empathy alone will not solve the problem.
Another participant in the debate raised a painful but necessary question: How must it feel for Jewish residents to walk daily through public spaces where demonstrations take place in which their country and their people are shouted down? Pro-Palestinian protests have become a constant presence in parts of the city. Political protest is a democratic right, but when rhetoric turns into open hostility toward Jews, society has crossed a dangerous line.
One proposal during the debate illustrated the level of frustration. A politician suggested sending undercover police officers into the streets wearing a kippah in order to identify those who harass Jews. Critics called the idea controversial. But the fact that such a measure is even being discussed reveals how serious the situation has become.
The problem extends beyond the streets. Jewish organizations in the Netherlands increasingly report difficulties renting venues for events. Cultural gatherings and lectures sometimes struggle to find halls willing to host them. It rarely makes headlines, but this quiet exclusion sends a clear message: you are welcome in theory, but not visibly.
History has taught Europe where that kind of atmosphere can lead. Antisemitism rarely begins with violence. It begins with discomfort, social pressure, and the slow normalization of hostility toward Jewish identity.
Meanwhile, another factor fuels the problem. Much of the European media landscape presents Israel through a lens that reduces a complex reality to a simple narrative of aggressor and victim. When context disappears and facts are replaced by slogans, public perception shifts. The hostility directed at Israel easily spills over into hostility toward Jews living thousands of kilometers away.
That is why factual education and responsible journalism matter so much. Civil society organizations that work to counter misinformation often struggle to be heard. Yet without a commitment to truth, public debate becomes an echo chamber for activism rather than a search for understanding.
There is also a question for Jewish communities themselves. When fear grows, the instinct to become less visible is understandable. But invisibility comes at a cost. If intimidation forces people to hide their identity, those spreading hatred learn that their tactics work.
The lesson of Jewish history is painfully clear. Silence has never protected Jewish communities.
Strength does not mean confrontation. It means refusing to surrender identity and dignity to intimidation. It means raising a generation that is proud rather than afraid. It means understanding that resilience is sometimes the only answer to those who seek to erase a people’s presence.
The young boy in Amsterdam asked a simple question without even intending to pose a challenge to Europe: will the Jewish community still exist here in the future?
That question should echo far beyond the walls of the municipal chamber where he spoke. Because if a Jewish teenager in Amsterdam already doubts his future in the city, then Europe is facing not just a Jewish problem.
It is facing a moral test of its own values.