Earlier this month the Jewish Federation of North America (JFNA) released a survey which concluded that while nearly 9 out of 10 Jews support Israel only a third identify themselves as Zionist.
In response to this survey, Jerusalem based communications strategist Laura Kam welcomed his development:
Communications strategist Frank Luntz saw this problem years ago, long before today’s campus upheavals and social media wars. In his work for The Israel Project (where I worked on enhancing Israel’s image internationally), including his 2003 report “Israel in the Age of Eminem,” Luntz explicitly and repeatedly warned pro-Israel advocates not to use the word “Zionism” on college campuses. His reasoning was blunt and strategic. Whatever the word once meant to Jews, it no longer meant that to the audiences’ advocates were trying to persuade. On campus even then, “Zionist” functioned as a negative identity marker, not a neutral description. Once a word triggers hostility, Luntz argued, you have already lost the argument.
From where I stand, this is a copout. Because if one cannot utter the word Zionist because it triggers hostility, then what of other words such as Jew or Israel? Indeed, I would make the case both words trigger even more hostility than Zionism.
This argument, taken to its logical conclusion, would mean Jews would cease calling ourselves Jews.
On this note, Kam addresses the language around Zionism:
Words do not operate in a vacuum. They operate in ecosystems shaped by repetition, repetition, repetition, as well as media framing. Today, Zionism is widely understood — particularly among younger Americans — not as Jewish self-determination but as a synonym for occupation, oppression and/or racism. That definition is historically wrong, but Luntz’s core insight from his seminal book Words That Work still applies: It’s not what you say; it’s what people hear.
Some within the Jewish community have responded by trying to reclaim or redefine the term. We see earnest campaigns insisting that “Zionism simply means…” followed by careful lessons in Jewish history. These efforts are sincere — and largely failing. You cannot successfully rebrand a word whose public meaning has hardened, especially in hostile environments like college campuses and social media.
Luntz’s insight was not ideological; it was tactical. He was not arguing against Israel or Jewish self-determination — nor am I, having moved to Israel and raised a family here. He was arguing that clinging to language that alienates persuadable audiences is self-defeating. Defending a word is not the same as defending values, Israel’s legitimacy or Jewish safety.
Words are indeed shaped by repetition. But what happens when the words which are repeated are false? Well, Hitler's Big Lie answers that question. Unfortunately, a great many Americans (Jewish or not) have been subjected to yet another big lie when it comes to Zionism. Even more unfortunately, being passive consumers of what we are told, we either accept things at face value or accept them because we want to believe them.
Kam argues that "defending a word is not the same as defending values". Alas, she utterly misses the point. The fact is Israel does not come into existence as a modern state without Zionism. To ask Jews to stop using the term Zionism not only emboldens our enemies but it renders us ignorant of our own history.
Let me put it this way. How many Jews who object to the term Zionism are aware of The Dreyfus Affair or of Theodor Herzl's response to it?
If those who oppose Zionism think I'm referring to Richard Dreyfuss then they have no business being anti-Zionists.
Should one ultimately oppose Zionism then one ought to know what Zionism actually is not as it is defined by the Zohran Mamdanis or the Carrie Prejean Pollers of the world.
As for me, I am a Jew and I am a Zionist. If you don't like it then too damn bad.
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