Al Jazeera: “‘Not in my name.’: The Jewish communities fighting the consensus on Israel”

For Al Jazeera, Simon Speakman Cordall reports on the controversy caused by Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s Finance Minister, and other far-right Israeli legislators’ attendance of the annual Israel Day Parade in New York City. With the ongoing genocide in Gaza and some of its architects on parade, the event has been particularly contentious this year. Jewish activists in Europe and the US say they are frustrated by politicians such as Smotrich using them and their religion to justify the genocide in Gaza and the occupation of the West Bank.

“For far too long, American Jewish institutions have supported the actions of the Israeli government and parroted its justification that what it did was done for the sake of Jewish people everywhere. In doing so, they not only engineered support for the Israeli occupation, apartheid and genocide of Palestinians, but they also silenced and excluded Jews who opposed these actions, or tried to hold the Israeli state accountable for its war crimes.”

– Sonya Meyerson-Knox, Communications Director, Jewish Voice for Peace

Read the full story in Al Jazeera.