We cannot lose sight of the fact that the global Zionist movement, since its inception over 140 years ago, has advanced a racist, genocidal, and settler-colonial agenda. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) are only one arm of this wider project. The structures enabling Israeli state terrorism extend far beyond the military, national-tourist-influential-industrial complex, into political, financial, and religious institutions globally.

At the highest levels, whether on Wall Street or within influential religious institutions (synagogues) we see ideologies being explicitly preached that endorse or excuse the mass killing of innocent civilians. This is not isolated to the battlefield. It is systemic.

To contextualize: consider the U.S. invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, responsible for the deaths of over a million people. Was the military solely responsible for that? Or was it a failure across American institutions, media, political leadership, and economic interests that allowed those crimes against humanity to occur with little to no accountability?

Similarly, when we talk about Israel, it’s not enough to condemn only the IDF. We must name the entire state apparatus for what it is: an apartheid regime that, since 1948, has displaced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians by violent force. The Israeli state, through its elected leadership and policy decisions, meets many of the definitions of state terrorism.

To those who argue that only the IDF should be held accountable: how do you justify ignoring the democratically elected leadership that openly calls for ethnic cleansing? How do you ignore the ideological infrastructure that has justified the murder and displacement of Palestinians for generations?

Consider that South Africa in the 1980s was labeled an apartheid state. No one insisted that only the South African police or military should be criticized. The world recognized that the entire state system was constructed to enforce racial domination. Why should Israel be treated differently?

Likewise, the United States has labeled all of Iran a "state sponsor of terrorism"; not just the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Sanctions target the entire Iranian economy and people, although the majority of Iranians do not support acts of terrorism. Why are we willing to sanction and isolate Iran wholesale, but refuse to do the same with Israel, which (unlike Iran) is in the midst of a god-awful bloody genocide? Is it appropriate to only label the Ordungspolizei, Gestapo, Kripo, Sicherheitsdienst, Reichssicherheitshauptamt, SS-Polizei Division as perpetrators of a genocide, or Germany as a whole in 1941? This isn't a straw-man; it may be redundant, but the importance of labeling the composition of Zionism which is the catalyst for this genocide, and NOT the IDF, is tantamount to identifying Germany as a terrorist state (if we were in that place and time).

Let’s be honest: the campaign for "Greater Israel" is not led by rogue elements within the IDF. It's preached at the United Nations by Israel's elected leadership. It’s embedded in state policy, education, and land theft.

Calling Israel a terrorist state is not extreme; it’s accurate, it's more than justified. It is the minimum level of clarity and moral responsibility we should hold as a party that claims to support human rights, international law, and ecological survival.

Thank you for your time and for being part of this important discussion. I’m proud of the Green Party for being willing to take this on.

Yours in resistance,
Joseph Naham