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Lecture

Trudy Gold
What is Zionism?

Wednesday 29.05.2024

Summary

In much of the world, Zionism today is a pejorative term. In this lecture, Trudy Gold explores the question, how has a movement for Jewish national rebirth become so loathed? She examines the factors and individuals who created what was once a dream, then looks at the dark forces that created a growing nightmare for the Jewish people.

Trudy Gold

An image of Trudy Gold

Trudy Gold was the CEO of the London Jewish Cultural Centre and a founding member of the British delegation to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Throughout her career she taught modern Jewish history at schools, universities, and to adult groups and ran seminars on Holocaust education in the UK, Eastern Europe, and China. She also led Jewish educational tours all over the world. Trudy was the educational director of the student resources “Understanding the Holocaust” and “Holocaust Explained” and the author of The Timechart History of Jewish Civilization.

Yes. Antisemitism is different from the old theological hatreds. Antisemitism was a modern secular movement, which says, it’s all to do with race theory. A Jew cannot be a German because a Jew is a separate race and you cannot convert out of antisemitism. Whereas theologically, it look a lot of the attitudes of Jew hatred from the past are entwined in it, but it’s about race and blood. Never forget that of our tragic victims of the Showa, many of them were not a luckily Jewish or had been converted. But to Hitler, the sin was Jewish blood.

There is a negative stereotype of the Jew, but it is not the day aside. We are not accused of killing God. Islam is monotheistic, completely monotheistic, doesn’t believe that Jesus was divine or Mohamed by that. He was the great prophet, but not divine. So, it’s a different kind of prejudice. I’m not saying it’s not a problem. And we will be talking about him.