In the weeks leading up the passage of Israel’s new Basic Law affirming the country’s identity as “the nation-state of the Jewish people,” and in the two weeks thereafter, Arab members of the Knesset have loudly opposed it. Bassam Tawil investigates the motives behind their reactions:

Israeli Arab leaders, specifically the Knesset members, say they are outraged not only because the law defines Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people but also because the new legislation does not include words about full equality of rights for all citizens. If there ever was a tempest in a teapot, this is it. It would have been redundant to add those words: the new law does not rescind any previous law or Israel’s Declaration of Independence, which already encompass all that. In Israel, there are also other Basic Laws that guarantee equal rights to all. . . .

The dirty little secret is that even if words about equality for all citizens were added to the new law, [these politicians] would still have opposed it. They are simply vehemently opposed to the very idea of Israel being a Jewish state. . . .

Some Israeli Arab leaders speak disparagingly about Israel for publicity. They know that no newspaper would ever mention them if they were dealing with issues like sewage or a shortage of classrooms in Arab schools. However, if they say something bad about Israel or provoke the Jews, they will certainly receive a headline in the press.

The number-one priority for Israel’s Arab citizens is lowering the high rate of unemployment among Arab university graduates. Israel’s Arab citizens want to be fully integrated into Israel. They are fighting for better government services, especially with regard to infrastructure in their towns and villages. But instead of representing the real interests of their constituents, [these parliamentarians] spend their time condemning Israel and identifying with its enemies. The actions and words of these Arab Knesset members have only served to deepen the rift between Jews and Arabs, at a time when serious efforts are being made by the Israeli government to improve the lives of Arab citizens.

Two extraordinary events demonstrate something important about Israel’s most fervent adversaries. One was a speech given at something called The People’s Forum (funded generously by Goldman Sachs), which stated, “When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism and imperialism.”

The suggestion that this tiny state is the linchpin of a global, centuries-old phenomenon like capitalism goes well beyond anything resembling rational criticism. Even if Israel were guilty of genocide, apartheid, and oppression—which of course it is not—it would not follow that its destruction would help end capitalism or imperialism.

The other was an anti-Israel protest that took place in front of New York City’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, deemed “complicit” in Israel’s evils. At organizers’ urging, participants shouted their slogans at kids in the cancer ward, who were watching from the windows. Given Hamas’s indifference toward the lives of Gazan children, such callousness toward non-Palestinian children from Hamas’s Western allies shouldn’t be surprising. The protest—like the abovementioned speech—deliberately conveyed the message that Israel is the ultimate evil and its destruction the ultimate good, cancer patients be damned.

The fact that Israel’s adversaries are almost comically perverse does not mean that they can be dismissed. If its allies fail to understand the obsessive and irrational hatred that it faces, they cannot effectively help it defend itself.