‘My Zionism’: Israel’s latest unsuccessful PR stunt

Using token Black Israelis in Israeli PR will not help make Israeli apartheid more acceptable to the world.

On June 1, Ashager Araro, an Israeli army reserve lieutenant of Ethiopian Jewish descent, released a video on Instagram captioned “My Zionism”. In the almost three-minute clip, Araro accuses those who consider Zionism to be an “imperialist idea”, of “actively” deleting “the history of Brown and Black Jews”. She claims that such a stance dismisses “our stories, struggle, and survival” and ignores “the fact that the Zionist cause have [sic] built a safe home for Jews like us”. She explains that the opposition to Zionism is “especially hurtful when it comes from people who know exactly how it feels when your history is being tossed aside, when your heroes are not being remembered.” You would be forgiven for thinking that the video is a harmless statement in which a Black Jewish woman is sharing her feelings, especially given the message of “peace” at the end. But the clip appears to be part of an Israeli PR campaign trying to repair its image after the latest bout of brutal violence against Palestinians caused worldwide outrage.