British activist and author Tony Greenstein said in a May 2, 2023 interview with Al-Hiwar TV (UK) that the Zionist movement had collaborated with the Nazis. He said that the Zionists had “no problem” with antisemitism and that in fact, they were threatened by Jews who fought for their rights in the places where they lived, because “if Jews fought for their rights where they were, then they would not want to go to Palestine.” Goldstein continued to claim that the Zionists were “not unhappy” when Hitler came to power in 1933, because this would mean an “immense boost to the movement for a Jewish state.”
Tony Greenstein: “When the Nazis came to power in 1933, most Jews were horrified. Absolutely. Here was a fascist government dedicated, at that time, not to exterminating the Jews, but to expelling them from Germany. There was one group amongst the Jews who didn’t react with horror, and that was the Zionist movement, and that was the basis of their collaboration with the Nazis.
“And the attitude of Zionism to antisemitism was that it was very useful. Theodor Herzl, the founder of political Zionism said he pardoned and understood antisemitism. And he said he had the divine will to good about it. Because without antisemitism there is no Zionism. And the purpose of Zionism is to perpetuate what they call the Jewish nation-race in Israel. They do not care particularly about the fate of individual Jews.
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“The Zionists had no problem with antisemitism. What they did have a problem with was people who actually defended their rights, because if Jews fought for their rights where they were, then they wouldn’t want to go to Palestine, and it of course later became Israel.
“And so, when Hitler came to power in January 1933, the Zionists were not unhappy about that, because this would mean an immense boost to the movement for a Jewish state.”
