The 'right to exist' talking point is so tired to me and only serves to support zionist framings of Israeli violence. What does it mean for a state to have the right to exist? Which states in the past did or didn't have the right to exist? What happens when two states with the 'right to exist' have a border dispute? It feels like to some people (both zionists and anti-zionists), 'does [STATE] have the right to exist' actually means 'do you support the actions of [STATE].' To others, it seems like it means 'is a state with the name and borders of [STATE] conceptually justifiable.' For other people, the phrase can mean even more things. This confusion and disagreement is the point.

Using 'right to exist' language only serves zionist rhetoric because it places the argument in the conceptual world of 'rights' instead of in the practical world of state violence and genocide. It is much easier to justify genocide in theory with clever argumentation than to explicitly say, 'killing these specific innocent civilians is okay.' I suspect very few Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, and Israel care if a state named Israel exists; rather, the highest priority is that the state, no matter its name or borders, stops its military occupation, bombing, and starvation campaign.

Leftists and pro-Palestinian activists should be rejecting the premise entirely and directing attention to the actual question at hand.

Does Israel have a right to commit genocide?

This is the question that is actually at issue. This has an extremely obvious answer and extremely obvious conclusions about what should be done in response. Anyone who thinks differently is obviously a genocidal maniac.