‘Zionism Is Racism’: Israeli Historian Ilan Pappe Dissects the Outrage

The hysterical reaction by politicians and the media to the Green Party’s ‘Zionism is Racism’ policy is ignorant, manipulative – and entirely predictable. The Greens are on the right side of history.

Green Party leader Zack Polanski at the party’s annual conference on Oct. 2, 2026. Photo by Alishia Abodunde/Getty Images

The Green Party endorsement of the 1975 UN General Assembly resolution equating Zionism with racism has caused a predictable barrage of condemnation. As soon as the Greens of England and Wales adopted a policy declaring “Zionism is racism”, Conservative and Labour politicians heaped angry and simplistic accusations of antisemitism on the party, joined by most of the British media. Even the European Greens were quick to condemn the resolution.

If we sum up the arguments against the Green Party’s resolution and, by association, against what was a global non-Western consensus about the nature of Zionism in 1975, they boil down to the statement that the Jews, like everyone else, have the right to self-determination. To this one can add the assertion that since the majority of the Jews in Britain are Zionists, such a resolution constitutes racial abuse towards this community.