Summary
Natan Sharansky’s “simple test” for distinguishing legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism, proposed in his 2004 article: criticism is anti-Semitism when it demonizes the Jewish state, applies double standards to it, or delegitimizes it by denying its fundamental right to exist (3D Test of Anti-Semitism: Demonization, Double Standards, Delegitimization, lines 345-351).
Details
- The test is introduced as the instrument for exposing the New Anti-Semitism, which hides behind the veneer of legitimate criticism of Israel and is advanced in the name of human rights (lines 343-345).
- Demonization: “when Israel’s actions are blown out of all sensible proportion; when comparisons are made between Israelis and Nazis and between Palestinian refugee camps and Auschwitz – this is anti-Semitism, not legitimate criticism of Israel” (line 347).
- Double standards: criticism applied selectively; Israel singled out by the United Nations for human rights abuses while the behavior of known and major abusers, such as China, Iran, Cuba, and Syria, is ignored; and Israel’s Magen David Adom, alone among the world’s ambulance services, denied admission to the International Red Cross (line 349).
- Delegitimization: “when Israel’s fundamental right to exist is denied – alone among all peoples in the world – this too is anti-Semitism” (line 351).
- The article gives no threshold for its operative terms, such as actions blown out of all sensible proportion, and works through no case of criticism that passes the test; each condition is stated with illustrative instances only (lines 347-351).
Where sources disagree
- Kenneth Stern’s testimonies answer the same classificatory question the other way for campus speech: the lead drafter of the EUMC Working Definition of Antisemitism argues an Israel-related definition should not be codified to police speech, and that anti-Zionism is sometimes clearly antisemitic, sometimes clearly not antisemitic, and sometimes simply unclear (Written Testimony of Kenneth S. Stern (2025), PDF p.33). Neither testimony names Sharansky or the 3D test.
- Chapter 7 of Palestine: A Socialist Introduction records the 2018 statement of more than forty international Jewish groups condemning the conflation of legitimate criticisms of Israel and advocacy for Palestinian rights with antisemitism, as a means to suppress the former (Palestine: A Socialist Introduction, lines 1415-1435) — a condemnation of the kind of classificatory move the 3D test performs, without naming it.
Related pages
3D Test of Anti-Semitism: Demonization, Double Standards, Delegitimization, Natan Sharansky, New Anti-Semitism, Antisemitism, Delegitimization, EUMC Working Definition of Antisemitism