Few calumnies have enjoyed more success than the slander that Zionism is a form of racism. That formula was approved in United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3379, which passed 50 years ago Monday and ordained that “Zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination.” The tally was 72 votes in favor, 35 votes against, and 32 abstentions. Even in the baleful history of the world body it is difficult to think of a more disgraceful démarche.

America’s ambassador to Turtle Bay, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, declared before the vote that “The United Nations is about to make anti-Semitism international law.” He added that America “does not acknowledge, it will not abide by, it will never acquiesce in this infamous act … A great evil has been loosed upon the world.” That evil enjoyed endorsement until 1991, when the formulation was repealed. The libel has never been put back in the bottle.

That is not to say that the effort to repeal Resolution 3379 was not heroic. President H.W. Bush himself introduced the motion for revocation. Quoth he: “Zionism is not a policy; it is the idea that led to the creation of a home for the Jewish people, to the State of Israel. And to equate Zionism with the intolerable sin of racism is to twist history and forget the terrible plight of Jews in World War II and, indeed, throughout history.”

Now Zionism is once again the subject of a concerted campaign of delegitimization in the wake of the Hamas atrocities of October 7, 2023. Anti-Zionism is one of the primary guises under which hostility toward the Jews travels. The most successful movement of national liberation in history is loaded with all the sins that can be imagined. The critic Adam Kirsch writes that “anti-Zionist rhetoric employs the traditional grammar of Jew-hatred.”

Take as just one example a recent column in the Harvard Crimson, where a perplexed student asks an advice columnist “Should I let go of my Zionist friends?” The answer is that “The matter is simple. The answer is yes.” Harvard Chabad asks rhetorically on X “Would the Crimson publish: ‘Should I let go of my Muslim friends?’ or, ‘Should I let go of my gay friends?’” Anti-Zionism is, apparently, an acceptable prejudice.

The scholar Ruth Wisse reckons that anti-Zionism is an “all-purpose ideology of grievance and blame” and that the resolution from 1975 was the “quintessential ideological expression” of the joint effort of the Soviet Union and its Arab clients to delegitimize Israel. The Soviet Union is no more, but an alliance, unholy as it is unlikely, between Islamists and the left is pursuing the same end with fresh fervor.

Fifty years ago Israel’s envoy to at the world body, Chaim Herzog, tore asunder the resolution equating Zionism with racism. Now Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani  proudly declares that he is not a Zionist and does not endorse Israel as a Jewish state. It is an article of faith on the left that Zionism is a form of racism, if not the worst prejudice of them all. The UN is still a bastion of hostility to Israel. The fight for Zion and Zionism rages fiercer than ever.

The very success of Herzl’s dream and Jabotinsky’s struggle is what appears to enrage the anti-Zionists then and now. Israel is a regional powerhouse that thrives even amidst astounding adversity. Some of the same countries that regularly denounce Israel could soon join the Abraham Accords. Maybe Israel would do well to consider commemorating this anniversary by sponsoring its own resolution to the effect that ant-Zionism is racism.