I appreciate you asking a genuine question.
Here are my answers:
Judaism is not simply a religion. It is a religion, culture, and ethnic identity. People who are born into ethnically Jewish families may choose another religion; people who are born into families that are not Jewish may convert. Children may be adopted into Jewish families. All are Jews.
Being Jewish has very little to do with Israel. People who can only talk about Jews in the context of Israel ARE antisemitic, because they do not imagine that Jews exist apart from their relationship to Israel. The approximate equivalent would be if every white Christian person in the world were blamed for the actions of Russia, because Russia is a white Christian country. Does that seem foolish and rather silly? Good.
There are countless Jews all over the world who have zero relationship with Israel, just as there are countless Christians all over the world who have no relationship with Russia. The idea that every Jew on the planet is responsible for the actions of one tiny country that happens to be governed by Jews is ridiculous. It is antisemitic. It is foolish. It gives no thought to the existence of Jews of Color, no thought to biracial Jews like me, no thought to Jews who actively confront Zionist politics like I do.
I do not deny the importance of critiquing Israel. Personally, I have participated in an organization that pushes back publicly and legislatively against the actions of Zionist colonialism. Yet I am still a Jew.
This organization has communities all over this nation. There are dozens of organizations of Jews in this country dedicated to fighting Zionism, on our own time, in an unpaid volunteer capacity.
We are also Jews. Our existence, the thousands and tens of thousands of us, are ignored and made invisible by the critiques you mention, by the idea that hating all Jews everywhere is acceptable because of the actions of one nation.
Jews choose not to assimilate. People do not always appreciate this about us. Occasionally, people hate this about us. Is that any different from hating Black people, disabled people, or anyone else who is different from the "norm."
If people hate me for being a Jew, they hate me regardless of what I do or say, think or feel.
That is how hate based on identity works.
It sounds like you have chosen to try to assimilate to the dominant culture. That is your choice. You frame this, though, as the absolute idea to which others should strive. If that were true, why have you not converted to Christianity? Why are you not ashamed to be Brown, in a country that hates Brown people? Presumably, it is because you find value in your own heritage. That is good. So do I.
