Zioness Basics

Zioness is a multi-ethnic movement of Jewish activists and allies across the country who are fighting for domestic progressive policies and values. We are proudly progressive and unapologetically Zionist. We are rooted in Jewish values, stand for justice and equality, and fight against all forms of oppression.

We need Zioness because too many Jews and our allies are being told we must choose between our deeply held progressive values and our identities as Zionists – and we refuse to compromise on either. In a political landscape where support for Jewish safety and self-determination (Zionism) has become a litmus test, leading to ostracization and harm inside the progressive movements our community helped build, Zioness offers a home — a place to be fully Jewish, fully Zionist, and fully committed to social justice, human dignity, equality and opportunity for all Americans.

In a time when antisemitism is being laundered through “anti-Zionism” and Jewish safety is dismissed as “colonialism” or “imperialism,” Zioness insists that Jewish liberation is a bedrock of any true progressive movement, and that Zionism is inseparable from collective liberation.

Zioness honors the urgency of the moment; uplifts the demand for safety and dignity of the Jewish nation; exists as the only organization to reject the false binary and unite our community at the intersection of Zionism and progressivism; and fights unapologetically for liberation for all – including Jews.

Zionism is the original progressive movement: a movement of liberation for a long-persecuted minority community, and a veritable miracle in the global fight for justice. Despite cynical efforts to pervert its meaning, Zionism remains both a deeply progressive commitment and an intrinsic identity for the vast majority of Jews. Those who claim that Zionism is not progressive are (knowingly or unknowingly) denying an inalienable right to the Jewish people, often while fighting for the same rights for others. 

Those who say Zionism isn’t progressive have accepted a false frame: that Jewish self-determination is uniquely illegitimate. But supporting the right of all peoples—including Jews—to safety, sovereignty, and liberation is foundational to progressivism. Zionism doesn’t mean supporting every Israeli government or policy–or really any Israeli government or policy. It means believing the Jewish people deserve a homeland, just like every other nation, and that the existing State of Israel should be protected.

If your progressivism excludes Jews for insisting on our right to exist as a people, then it’s not progressivism—it’s prejudice. The reality is that anti-Zionism is what’s not progressive.

Zionism is a movement for the Jewish people. Being Zionist does not negate one’s right – nor for us, commitment – to the fight for collective liberation via self-determination for all other peoples. Zionism is consistent and compatible with other movements for self-determination, including Palestinian self-determination. The binary framework forced on many of us to choose one or the other is dangerous and inconsistent with true progressivism.

Because we are Zionists, Zioness supports Palestinian self-determination and prays for a future in which the Palestinian people are self-governed by leaders who prioritize their safety, dignity, opportunity and prosperity. Justice and liberation are not zero-sum. We believe in a future where both Palestinians and Jews can live in safety, dignity, and freedom, not in one state but side-by-side. That means acknowledging Palestinian suffering and rights—including the right to national identity—while also affirming the Jewish right to self-determination in part of our ancestral homeland.

Progressivism demands that we hold both truths, reject dehumanization, and fight for a solution rooted in mutual recognition, not erasure or false binaries.

The political right fuels violent, organized antisemitism—from Charlottesville Pittsburgh to Poway to white nationalist terror. We don’t ignore that—we fight it with our full chests.

But the betrayal of the political left hits differently. These are the spaces where Jews have long stood shoulder-to-shoulder with others for justice and liberation. So when those ostensible progressive movements same spaces deny our identity, demand we disavow Zionism (our progressive liberation movement) in order to pass a test to belong, or when the left excuses antisemitism of any type or flavor, it creates a deep rupture that harms Jews and all Americans.

The integrity of the left – and our ability to advance social justice in America – depends on our ability to confront antisemitism within it. A movement that claims to fight oppression but tolerates bigotry against Jews is not just hypocritical—it’s compromised. Antisemitism isn’t a “Jewish issue.” It’s a tool of white supremacy and global authoritarianism. When it festers inside progressive spaces, it corrodes solidarity, distorts our analysis of power, and makes our movements less effective, less inclusive, and less just.

At Zioness, we don’t call out antisemitism from the sidelines, or by politicizing it—we do it from within. Because if we leave, antisemitism doesn’t go away, it gets worse. When antisemitism is politicized or used as a wedge issue, it is a partisan weapon in the hands of bad-faith actors who don’t actually care about Jewish safety. We stay in this fight because antisemitism must be a progressive concern. Only by naming and expelling it from our own ranks can we build the kind of left that lives up to its values—and is truly capable of creating collective liberation.

Zioness focuses on the political left not because it’s the only source of antisemitism, but because it’s our political home—and we’re not willing to be pushed out of it.

Zioness proudly and unequivocally supports Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, grounded in the belief that the Jewish people have the inalienable and inextricable right to national self-determination in our ancestral homeland. We believe Israel—like every country—should face reasonable critique for its government’s policies and actions. But supporting Israel’s existence does not mean endorsing every decision its government makes. It means affirming that Jewish safety and sovereignty are urgent and not up for debate.

Zioness long ago saw the way that Israel and Zionism were being caricatured and weaponized as an excuse to ostracize, marginalize or even attack American Jews inside the domestic progressive movement. This is unacceptable antisemitism, and would not (and should not) be tolerated against any other activists in the left who have relationships with foreign countries.

Zioness is committed to protecting Israel – even when its governments or policies contravene our progressive hopes – because there’s no other country on Earth whose legitimate existence is questioned. We reject the false choice between supporting Israel’s existence and advocating for Palestinian rights. We believe in a just, secure, and peaceful future for both peoples, in separate pieces of the land. That future begins with mutual recognition, not erasure.

Zioness doesn’t take positions on specific Israeli politics or policies for the same reason that we don’t expect Chinese Americans to answer for the Chinese government, Nigerian Americans to answer for the Nigerian government, or Palestinian Americans to answer for Hamas. Just as progressive Americans don’t have to agree with every U.S. policy to believe in America’s right to exist, Zionists (and/or Israelis) don’t have to agree with every Israeli policy to affirm the right of Jews to a sovereign national homeland. The Zioness mission is to fight for Jewish inclusion, safety, and dignity in progressive spaces that have long been Jewish Americans’ ideological home in America, the country in which we live and in which the policies enacted affected our rights, our bodies and those we love. We are a movement for domestic social justice that insists Zionism and progressivism are not only compatible—they are inseparable. We are a movement for domestic justice that understands that antisemitism/anti-Zionism inside the left will harm our coalitions and movements, potentially beyond repair, and litmus tests on Israeli policy are a distraction from that sacred and urgent work.

By staying focused, we keep the fight where it’s needed: pushing the Left to confront antisemitism, to embrace Jewish identity, and to live up to its own values of justice for all people.

Zioness members fight for domestic social, racial, economic, gender and environmental justice in America. We organize inside of our communities in support of, and alongside, all marginalized communities, by taking civic and nonpartisan political action to support causes that will make America safer, more just, and more inclusive for all.