Comparing and Contrasting Anti-Zionist Statements

I am struck both by the sophistication of the two video-critiques of Zionism below. Rabbi Weiss talks about modern Zionist identity politics while Adam Gadahn explains (in Arabic which seems to me quite clearly enunciated and easy to understand) how his grandfather attempted to indoctrinate him and to enmesh him in Zionist ideology. The similarity of the analysis from the two men may relate to the secret historical connection between ethnic Ashkenazim and Islam.

In the middle 19th century there was a good deal of conversion from Judaism to Islam within the Czarist Empire even after the ill-conceived reforms of Czar Nicholas I were reversed. The Russian government was so disturbed by the trend that it enforced a law to guarantee that Jewish converts to Islam kept and used their Jewish patronymics so that the Russian government would know who was a born-Muslim and who was a Jewish convert to Islam

Some scholars have suggested that Jews were trying to escape the numerus clausus at Russian universities, but I have found little evidence that restrictions on Jewish matriculation were actually enforced.

Some Russian Jewish converts to Islam became quite noteworthy like Lev Nussimbaum, who was recently the subject of a biography entitled The Orientalist, Solving The Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life.

Other recent interesting Jewish converts to Islam have included Maryam Jamila (originally Margaret Marcus of American Russian Jewish ancestry), who seems to have had some influence on Mawdudi, and Mohammad Asad (originally Leopold Weiss of Austro-Hungarian Ukrainian Jewish ancestry), who is the father of the eminent anthropologist Talal Asad.

I have found The Message of The Qur'an Translated and Explained by Muhammad Asad to be quite helpful even if he seems to make an effort to avoid discussing how the Qur'an addresses and critiques Jewish oral traditions.

Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss of "Orthodox Jews United Against Zionism" and of "Neturei Karta International"

Mujahid Adam Yehiye Gadahn Azzam (the American)

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