https://fremont.hostmaster.org/articles/zionisms_disregard_for_human_life/en.html
Zionism, emerging as a nationalist movement in the late 19th century under Theodor Herzl, has often been portrayed as a liberation ideology for the Jewish people. Yet its historical trajectory reveals a troubling pattern of actions and rhetoric demonstrating a profound disregard for human life - Jewish and non-Jewish alike. This essay argues that Zionism, despite its official acceptance of the 1947 UN Partition Plan, never genuinely pursued a two-state solution. Instead, it has consistently advanced a vision of a Greater Israel, extending beyond the borders of historic Palestine. This ambition has been realized through collaboration with Nazi Germany, false flag operations, the rejection of international diplomacy, and violations of core Jewish ethical principles, including pikuach nefesh - the sacred obligation to preserve human life.
Zionism’s ideological foundation mirrors Germany’s Blut und Boden (“Blood and Soil”) nationalism, transforming land into a golden calf - a false god - thereby violating the Torah’s command not to retake the Land of Israel by force before the arrival of the Messiah. Through this lens, Zionism constitutes not only a political betrayal but a theological heresy.
The Jewish principle of pikuach nefesh - that the preservation of human life overrides nearly all religious commandments - is a cornerstone of halakhic ethics. Rooted in Genesis 1:27 (“God created man in His image”) and expanded upon in Sanhedrin 4:5 (“Whoever saves a single life… it is as if he saved an entire world”), the Talmudic tradition (Yoma 82a) insists that even sacred prohibitions, including Shabbat and Yom Kippur, must be set aside to save life.
Yet Zionist leaders have repeatedly sacrificed this principle on the altar of state-building. David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, articulated this cold calculus in 1938:
> “If I knew it would be possible to save all the children in Germany by bringing them over to England, and only half by transporting them to Eretz Yisrael, I would choose the latter… because we are faced not only with the accounting of these children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People”
(Central Zionist Archives, S25/419).
This preference for demographic strategy over immediate survival directly contradicts pikuach nefesh. It reduces human beings - many of them children - to tools in a national project, undermining the very essence of Jewish ethics.
Zionist military operations similarly disregarded Jewish and Arab lives alike. The King David Hotel bombing (July 22, 1946) by the Irgun killed 91 people, including 17 Jews, even after a phoned warning. Irgun fighters wore Arab disguises, a tactic that increased confusion and the risk to civilians (British Intelligence Report, 1946). The Deir Yassin massacre (April 9, 1948), carried out by Irgun and Lehi, killed over 100 Arab villagers, again using Arab disguises to infiltrate. Both incidents show a willingness to accept collateral Jewish deaths for strategic gain.
Today, this disregard culminates in the genocide in Gaza. According to UN agencies, Amnesty International (December 5, 2024), and Doctors Without Borders (July 11, 2025), over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed. More than 80% of Gaza’s infrastructure has been destroyed (Wikipedia, “Gaza genocide,” 2025-07-17), and 1.9 million people displaced (UN OCHA, 2025). Such devastation flagrantly violates pikuach nefesh, reflecting a systemic devaluation of human life for territorial and ideological ends.
Though the Jewish Agency publicly accepted the 1947 UN Partition Plan, Zionist leadership viewed it as a tactical concession. Ben-Gurion, speaking days after the vote, said:
> “The acceptance of the plan is a tactical step and a stepping stone to future territorial expansion over all of Palestine.”
(Wikipedia, “United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine,” 2025-07-02).
Revisionist Zionists, like Ze’ev Jabotinsky, were more explicit. In 1935, addressing Betar youth, he declared:
> “We must build a wall of iron in Palestine, and if the weak or the unfit cannot breach it, they must be left behind.”
(Jabotinsky Archives, 2/12/1).
The assassination of UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte by the Lehi on September 17, 1948 - shortly after he proposed a return of some territories to Arab control - further illustrated Zionist rejection of peaceful coexistence. Bernadotte had rescued thousands of Jews during the Holocaust. Yet because his diplomacy interfered with the vision of a Greater Israel, he was murdered.
This ambition continues today through settlement expansion, annexation of Palestinian land, and military domination. Since 1967, Palestinian territory has been reduced by over 40% due to settlements (Carnegie Endowment, 2024), with Gaza’s destruction now completing the map of conquest.
Zionist groups have repeatedly used false flag tactics to manipulate international opinion and frame Arabs. The Irgun’s King David Hotel bombing involved operatives dressed as Arabs, a fact documented by British intelligence (National Archives, UK, 1946). In July 1947, the Irgun planted Arabic-language signs during the hanging of two British sergeants to frame Arabs (MI5 Files, 2006). The Lavon Affair (1954) escalated this pattern: Israeli agents in Egypt, posing as Arabs, bombed Western targets to sabotage British-Egyptian relations. Four agents died, and the operation’s exposure nearly caused diplomatic collapse (Wikipedia, “Lavon Affair,” 2025-04-01).
These incidents show a callousness toward both Arab and Jewish life - where deaths are strategically accepted to advance a narrative. This same strategy appears today as Israel labels all resistance in Gaza as “terrorism,” even while targeting civilians at UN shelters and aid sites, framing victims as threats to justify annihilation.
Perhaps the most damning contradiction of pikuach nefesh lies in Zionism’s early collaboration with Nazi Germany. The Haavara Agreement (August 25, 1933), signed between the Zionist Federation of Germany and the Nazi regime, facilitated the transfer of over 50,000 Jews and their assets to Palestine. This effectively broke the global Jewish boycott of Germany, which had been declared by the American Jewish Congress and others (Daily Express, March 24, 1933: “Judea Declares War on Germany”).
Zionist leaders prioritized colonization over collective rescue. Yitzhak Gruenbaum, head of the Jewish Agency’s Rescue Committee, stated in 1943:
> “If we divert funds to save Jews from Europe, we will undermine the Zionist enterprise in Palestine. One cow in the Land of Israel is worth more than all the Jews in Poland.”
(Yad Vashem Archives, M-2/23).
This utilitarian calculus - sacrificing millions for the sake of a future state - stands in direct opposition to Jewish teachings on the infinite value of a single life.
The betrayal of the 1933 boycott through Haavara finds a modern echo in opposition to the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. BDS, now supported by UN rapporteurs, Amnesty International, and Doctors Without Borders in light of the genocide in Gaza, aims to end occupation and apartheid. The Hague Group’s July 16, 2025, sanctions - including arms embargoes and port restrictions - mark the first major international enforcement mechanism. While the 1933 boycott lacked state support and was sabotaged by Zionist collaboration, BDS now stands bolstered by international legal frameworks. The U.S., however, continues to send $3.8 billion annually in military aid to Israel (2025 budget) and sanctioned the prosecutor and some judges of the International Criminal Court as well as UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories Franceska Albanese, illustrating a moral impasse between grassroots ethics and geopolitical interests.
The Torah forbids Jews from forcibly retaking the Land of Israel before the arrival of the Messiah. Jeremiah 29:7 commands: > “Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile… for if it prospers, you too will prosper.”
This teaching was codified in Ketubot 111a as the “Three Oaths”:
1. Jews must not ascend to the Land “as a wall” (i.e., by force).
2. They must not rebel against the nations.
3. The nations must not oppress Israel excessively.
Rashi and many sages interpreted these oaths as prohibiting a premature return to sovereignty, warning that such defiance would incur divine punishment. Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum, in VaYoel Moshe, called Zionism a heresy and warned that it would lead to catastrophe.
Zionism’s violation of these oaths transforms national aspiration into a theological transgression. Like the Israelites worshipping the golden calf in Exodus 32 - building a substitute for divine timing - Zionism constructs a premature “redemption” through violence and blood. The ideology of “Greater Israel” mirrors Blut und Boden nationalism: a belief that identity is derived from bloodlines and territorial dominion (Marxists.org, “Blut und Boden”).
In doing so, Zionism forsakes pikuach nefesh, replacing life’s sanctity with land’s idolatry.
Zionism’s history - through its collaboration with Nazis, rejection of peaceful diplomacy, false flag operations, and strategic disregard for human life - constitutes a profound betrayal of Jewish ethics. Its ideological roots mirror nationalist idolatries condemned by the Torah. Its violations of pikuach nefesh - from Ben-Gurion’s cold calculations to the genocide in Gaza - undermine the very moral foundations of Judaism.
True Jewish redemption, according to Torah, does not come through conquest but through humility, justice, and divine timing. Until then, preserving life - not land - must remain the highest commandment.