STATEMENT FROM THE JVP RABBINICAL COUNCIL: In solidarity with Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian communities under attack 

The Torah instructs us, unequivocally, to love the stranger, וַאֲהַבְתֶּ֖ם אֶת־הַגֵּ֑ר (Deuteronomy 10:19); and yet, this week far-right Zionist organizations have literally called for their followers to converge upon a mosque in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn with intimidation and violence. As the tide of fascism rises, we will continue to stand with Palestinian organizers, community members, and our beautiful movement to say no to Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism. We will not allow our neighbors to be terrorized. We will not normalize Zionist violence. We will act in alignment with our tradition, which teaches us we must never stand idly by as our neighbors’ blood is shed: לא תעמד על דם רעך (Leviticus 19:16). 

These extremists claim to be seeking revenge for protests of “Great Israeli Real Estate” events – events which illegally auction off occupied Palestinian lands to Jews, and Jews alone. These “real estate” events seek to hide and neutralize the blatant land theft and ethnic cleansing they promote. Many of them have taken place at synagogues, and these protests have been slanderously mischaracterized as targeting synagogues themselves, and as antisemitic. In the Talmud, our Sages teach that we must protest sinful conduct wherever it occurs (Shabbat 54b) — and we have heeded this teaching, alongside our comrades. Zionist agitators have already assaulted our comrades at these events, recently hospitalizing two. We will never stop condemning the sins of land theft, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and genocide. We denounce the abuse of our sacred spaces as cover for these sins. We reject the vicious and disingenuous accusations of antisemitism leveraged against our comrades.

Now, using these dangerous false accusations as a pretext, extremist right-wing Zionists are targeting our Muslim and Palestinian neighbors in Brooklyn. Meanwhile in the occupied West Bank, Israeli violence against Palestinian communities has only escalated; in the past 35 days the military and armed settlers have worked in tandem to further Israel’s brutal ethnic cleansing: expelling over 40,000 Palestinians from West Bank refugee camps and villages and killing at least 57 Palestinians, 8 of whom are children. As we see greater and greater authoritarianism in the U.S., we must scream from the rooftops: none of this is okay. Not sending weapons to commit genocide and ethnic cleansing, not attacking immigrants and trans people, not villanizing and assaulting Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian youth. Our silence will not protect anyone — it will only normalize these sins, inure us to violence, and embolden perpetrators. Our silence endangers everyone. 

Last week at CPAC, shortly after making a Nazi salute, far-Right extremist and antisemite Steve Bannon spoke of the “threat” posed by “American Jews who do not support Israel and do not support MAGA.” Many of us come from families who escaped and resisted fascism. We are steeped in the lessons of our lineage — lessons of survival and solidarity. If we pose a threat to fascism, white supremacy, Islamophobia, and all systems of oppression: may it be so. Ken yehi ratzon. We demand liberation for all and nothing less, and hereby summon the moral clarity of our tradition, the courage of our ancestors, and the sumud (steadfastness) we have witnessed in the Palestinian liberation struggle to keep going. We will be there in Bay Ridge today and we will be there whenever Proud Boys and other fascists threaten our communities. Join us. We call on all people of conscience to loudly reject fascism and Zionism, from Brooklyn to Palestine, now and always. 

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה אַדָנָי אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעולָם אֲשֶׁר קִדְּשָׁנוּ בְּמִצְותָיו וְצִוָּנוּ לִרְדּוֹף צדק 

Blessed are you, Adonai, Our God, who commands us to pursue justice.

JVP Rabbinical Council

### 

Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) is the largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world. JVP organizes a grassroots, multiracial, cross-class, intergenerational movement of U.S. Jews into solidarity with the Palestinian freedom struggle, guided by a vision of justice, equality and dignity for all people.