O G San, thank you once again for an insightful and thought-provoking post.
This thread has wandered a bit from the original post (in my humble opinion.) The original assertion that "there is a growing tendency among those who are pro-Israeli to label any and all criticism of the Jewish state as anti-semitic" is accurate as is the further statement that "to say that none of the criticism is anti-semitic, or that all of it is anti-semitic, seem equally ludicrous to me." Good points.
Within the Jewish communities of the world, there are great diversities of opinion. I am not disloyal to my race or to my religion if I criticize Ariel Sharon's policies nor is it an affirmation of my race or religion if I support them. Many Israelis disagree with those policies while others support them. The same freedom of expression is the right of every person. So, no one should be labeled as an anti-Semite for disagreement with a political agenda.
As O G San points out, labeling someone an anti-Semite for political disagreement dilutes the meaning of the word. It weakens the case against the true anti-Semite, like the Boy That Cried Wolf. And there are plenty of real anti-Semites still in the world.
But it should also be pointed out that, for Jews, the existence of Israel is inextricably tied to our survival as a race and a religion. The World Zionist Congress was begun after Theodore Herzl witnessed the anti-Semitism that accompanied the trial of Alfred Dreyfus in France. "Herzl concluded that anti-Semitism was a stable and immutable factor in human society." Source http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Herzl.html Dreyfus, a Jewish officer in the French Army, was wrongly accussed of giving intelligence to the Germans. He was eventually exonerated after spending years in Devil's Island. During his trial, large inarguably anti-Semitic protests took place outside the courtroom.
The first waves of Jewish settlers to return to Israel occurred between 1882 and 1903 as a reaction to the pogroms or riots in Russia. The were government sponsored and sanctioned attacks on a law-abiding population. This time, the Jews were accussed of aiding the Japanese against the Russians. The second wave of returnees also came from Russia, between 1904 and 1914. Again, they were fleeing brutal anti-Semitism. Between 1919 and 1923, emboldened by the Balfour Declaration, Jews came from Russia, Hungary and Poland, all of which were brutalizing their Jewish populations. The fourth Aliyah came primarily from Poland between 1924 and 1929. Again, anti-Semitism was the motivation for people leaving their homes and traveling half-way across the world. The fifth Aliyah, 1929 to 1939, was caused by the ascension of the Nazis in Germany. Almost a quarter of a million Jews went to Israel for their safety. The number was limited by British laws restricting immigration. I assume that there is no need to chronicle what happened to the Jews who were unable to leave Europe. The population of Israel had grown. It is during this time that Arab attacks against Jewish settlers began. For a full chronicle, see http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Immigration/immigtoc.html
From 1939 to 1948, Eastern European Jews were desperate to get to Israel. During the Shoah or Holocaust, getting to Israel was literally a matter of life or death. It has not ended with the establishment of the State of Israel. The Jews of Ethiopia, called Felasha by their Moslem neighbors, were almost exterminated. Jews have been exiled from or brutally mistreated in many of today's modern Islamic countries. If not for the existence of Israel, where would they have gone?
For many Jews, there are only two "safe" places in the world: Israel and the United States. Canada should probably be added to that short list. England expelled its Jews in 1290 and they were not permitted to return until the time of Cromwell. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/britain/mid_eng_jews.shtml France and Poland and other European countries turned their Jewish populations over to the Nazis. There were noteable exceptions, including Schindler and the town of Le Chambon-Sur-Lignon, where today President Jacques Chirac spoke out against "rising intolerance, racism, anti-Semitism" in France. See http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1089257371489
So, for Jews, the issue of Israel is an emotional one. It goes beyond rationality. There is a sense that Israel, because it is a Jewish state, is held to a higher standard of conduct than other countries. While not everyone that disagrees with Israeli policy is an anti-Semite, and some are in fact Jews, it is also true that anti-Semites will always oppose Israel's survival. So, if my esteemed colleague (and I mean that most genuinely) O G San disagrees with Israeli policy, he is by no means an anti-Semite. However, the European Union's report on anti-Semitism in the EU concluded "The main report shows that there has been an increase in antisemitic incidents in five EU countries, (Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK). These incidents ranged from hate mail to arson." So, anti-Semitism is real, growing and dangerous. It is often tied to anti-Americanism as is commented on on the Christain Action for Israel site (http://christianactionforisrael.org/antiholo/repeating.html) which comments "The same stereotypes of wealth and power that Hitler used against the Jews are also used to condemn the United States."
But being able to distinguish between real anti-Semites and those who exercise their legitimate right to disagree with the policies of a human,not divine, government may be a survival trait too.