#american jewish committee

[sweaterkittensahoy]

For my fellow non-Jewish people, a list of terms to watch out for

Here's a whole PDF of antisemitic vocabulary and examples and history that was put together by the American Jewish Committee. Read it. Understand it. Learn from it.

[eretzyisrael]

The world has overlooked an important episode in modern history: the 800,000 Jews who left or were driven from their homes in Arab nations and Iran in the mid-20th century to forge new lives for themselves and future generations. The Forgotten Exodus, a new limited podcast series brought to you by American Jewish Committee (AJC), explores the lessons we can learn from this pivotal moment of Jewish history. The series delves into the rich, yet little-known heritage of Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews from Arab nations, as some of those countries normalize relations with Israel, and the moving stories of courage, resilience, and reconciliation that illustrate how Jews in the Middle East and North Africa overcame tremendous challenges.

You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. If you like what you hear, subscribe, rate it, and spread the word.

[magic-can]

Senators are going to vote on whether or not we should continue to send aid to Israel on Wednesday, November 13th. Call them, bombard their phone lines with calls. Every fucking day. We have a chance of doing something about this.

EDIT: the vote will be the week after the 13th, so as of today, the 14th, we still have time to call them

While you are at it, please share @zinaanqar ‘s campaign (link here)

[plitnick]

How long can Israel keep insulting its benefactors

The increasing gap between Israel and its liberal defenders and supporters in the US did not come about accidentally. Nor was it due to any great ethical awakening by Americans, Jewish or otherwise. Rather, it was created and is being greatly exacerbated by Israel and Israeli officials. This isn’t a new phenomenon, but it is increasing. It’s really shocking in its dimensions considering the…

[theredqueenandthebloodwyrm]

(I voted 4-6 but actually counting my answers it would have been 7 for my first reblog)

Holidays that I should have remembered to put down because I know them and corrections about what I said are in the tags.

So in total after fact-checking and looking up for clarification AFTER THE FIRST POST, I DID NOT CHEAT (promise)-- I know nine holidays in total after checking my initial answers + seeing what I forgot the first time around. Plus Eden provided me that lovely spreadsheet about the list of Jewish Holidays and feasts so I can go memorize that now.

Non-jews of tumblr:

If possible, please write your answers in the tags!

[heritageposts]

Harris has been a staunch supporter of Israel for years. In 2017 she addressed the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s (AIPAC) annual conference and reminded attendees that the first resolution she co-sponsored as a senator was aimed at combating “anti-Israel bias” at the United Nations. “Let me be clear about what I believe. I stand with Israel because of our shared values, which are so fundamental to the founding of both our nations,” she told the crowd. In 2018 she gave an off-the-record speech to the organization, but eventually released her comments. In that speech she claimed that she raised money for the Jewish National Fund as a Girl Scout. “Having grown up in the Bay area, I fondly remember those Jewish National Fund boxes that we would use to collect donations to plant trees for Israel,” she told the audience. “Years later, when I visited Israel for the first time, I saw the fruits of that effort and the Israeli ingenuity that has truly made a desert bloom.”

For those unfamiliar with the Jewish National Fund (JNF), they're a Zionist organization that has been instrumental in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

See Stop the JNF for more information on their history, the way they operate, and their decades-long campaign of greenwashing (i.e. destroying native plants, crops, and agriculture under the banner of 'making the desert bloom').

Continuing, the Mondoweiss article goes:

“The vast majority of people understand the importance of the State of Israel,” she added later. “Both in terms of its history and its present in terms of being a source of inspiration on so many issues, which I hope we will talk about, and also what it means in terms of the values of the United States and those values that are shared values with Israel, and the importance of fighting to make sure that we protect and respect a friend, one of the best friends we could possibly have.” While running for President in 2019, Harris was praised by the lobbying group Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) for running to the right of Obama on the Iran deal. On the campaign trail Harris told Kat Wellman, a voter affiliated with DMFI, that she would reenter the agreement but “strengthen it” by “extending the sunset provisions, including ballistic missile testing, and also increasing oversight.” “I was very impressed with her. I thought she gave an excellent speech, she gave a very detailed, responsive answer to my question,” Wellman told a local paper after the exchange. “I’m pro-Israel, so I was I was very concerned and all about making sure we limit nuclear missiles in any country that could possibly destroy us all. I thought her answer was very good.” Harris has condemned the BDS movement and claimed that is “based on the mistaken assumption that Israel is solely to blame for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” However, she voted against an anti-BDS bill in 2019 citing First Amendment concerns.

For the full article, which includes Kamala's response to Israel post Al-Aqsa Flood, see Mondoweiss (July 22, 2024)

[slyandthefamilybook]

since we now know that all those "my blog is safe for Jewish people" posts are bullshit, here are some Jewish organizations you can donate to if you actually want to prove you support Jews. put up or shut up

FIGHTING HUNGER

Masbia - Kosher soup kitchens in New York

MAZON - Practices and promotes a multifaceted approach to hunger relief, recognizing the importance of responding to hungry peoples' immediate need for nutrition and sustenance while also working to advance long-term solutions

Tomchei Shabbos - Provides food and other supplies so that poor Jews can celebrate the Sabbath and the Jewish holidays

FINANCIAL AID

Ahavas Yisrael - Providing aid for low-income Jews in Baltimore

Hebrew Free Loan Society - Provides interest-free loans to low-income Jews in New York and more

GLOBAL AID

American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee - Offers aid to Jewish populations in Central and Eastern Europe as well as in the Middle East through a network of social and community assistance programs. In addition, the JDC contributes millions of dollars in disaster relief and development assistance to non-Jewish communities

American Jewish World Service - Fighting poverty and advancing human rights around the world

Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society - Providing aid to immigrants and refugees around the world

Jewish World Watch - Dedicated to fighting genocides around the world

MEDICAL AID

Sharsheret - Support for cancer patients, especially breast cancer

SOCIAL SERVICES

The Aleph Institute - Provides support and supplies for Jews in prison and their families, and helps Jewish convicts reintegrate into society

Bet Tzedek - Free legal services in LA

Bikur Cholim - Providing support including kosher food for Jews who have been hospitalized in the US, Australia, Canada, Brazil, and Israel

Blue Card Fund - Critical aid for holocaust survivors

Chai Lifeline - An org that's very close to my heart. They help families with members with disabilities in Baltimore

Chana - Support network for Jews in Baltimore facing domestic violence, sexual abuse, and elder abuse

Community Alliance for Jewish-Affiliated Cemetaries - Care of abandoned and at-risk Jewish cemetaries

Crown Heights Central Jewish Community Council - Provides services to community residents including assistance to the elderly, housing, employment and job training, youth services, and a food bank

Hands On Tzedakah - Supports essential safety-net programs addressing hunger, poverty, health care and disaster relief, as well as scholarship support to students in need

Hebrew Free Burial Association

Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services - Programs include early childhood and learning, children and adolescent services, mental health outpatient clinics for teenagers, people living with developmental disabilities, adults living with mental illness, domestic violence and preventive services, housing, Jewish community services, counseling, volunteering, and professional and leadership development

Jewish Caring Network - Providing aid for families facing serious illnesses

Jewish Family Service - Food security, housing stability, mental health counseling, aging care, employment support, refugee resettlement, chaplaincy, and disability services

Jewish Relief Agency - Serving low-income families in Philadelphia

Jewish Social Services Agency - Supporting people’s mental health, helping people with disabilities find meaningful jobs, caring for older adults so they can safely age at home, and offering dignity and comfort to hospice patients

Jewish Women's Foundation Metropolitan Chicago - Aiding Jewish women in Chicago

Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty - Crisis intervention and family violence services, housing development funds, food programs, career services, and home services

Misaskim - Jewish death and burial services

Our Place - Mentoring troubled Jewish adolescents and to bring awareness of substance abuse to teens and children

Tiferes Golda - Special education for Jewish girls in Baltimore

Yachad - Support for Jews with disabilities

[tartrazeen]

WAIT - THAT'S WHERE THE PHRASE 'POISONING THE WELL' COMES FROM?!?!

Omgggggg - I even googled it 😭😭😭😭😭 Are you kidding me?! (rhetorical question) WOW, WOW, WOW, that just put how casually ingrained this shit is into perspective 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Yeah yeah you say "punch nazis" but do you understand why nazis are bad? Can you even recognize a nazi and their beliefs? Do you recognize antisemitism?

[komsomolka]

The unification process, which in practice amounted to an annexation of the GDR, had all the hallmarks of a colonisation. The intellectual elite was stigmatised, marginalised and dismissed, so that it could be replaced by personnel from Western Germany.

Among the institutions that were to be closed were prestigious intellectual centres like the GDR’s Academy of Sciences and the Academy of Arts. [...] The result of which was that thousands of lecturers and researchers were purged. They not only lost their tenured jobs but were also stripped of their legal contracts and seniority protections.

Those who did manage to hold on to their jobs were subjected to a vetting process in which so-called evaluating commissions (staffed only by West German academics) assessed the professional competence and personal integrity of all academics. The reason given for the necessity of this vetting was the alleged low academic standard of research in the GDR, i.e. the assumption that it was all manipulated to serve the ideological demands of the regime. The assessments were, it seemed, an attempt to denigrate East German intellectual achievement and to break up key centres of research. The process was demeaning and humiliating, and a number of internationally renowned academics refused to undergo it and so were dismissed on the spot. During this process those academics and researchers not immediately sacked were placed ‘on hold’ (Warteschleife). This also meant that they lost their employment rights and could easily be dismissed once the ‘holding period’ came to an end. The actual result of the evaluation surprised the assessors themselves since they had to admit that the standards were, despite often inferior material conditions, comparable to those in the West. Yet it was too late, the assumption of an ‘academic desert’ or, more to the point, the imposition of an ideologically-determined plan to oust the GDR intellectual elite, had led to the decision to close down these centres of research. [...]

The third method of cleansing the intellectual elite was the political vetting of every employee in education (schools, colleges and universities). All staff had to complete questionnaires that, in addition to professional qualifications, asked for detailed information on their present and former party affiliations, political opinions and activities. Although such questions are illegal under the German constitution, people from the GDR were told that the completion of the questionnaires was a pre-condition of further employment. [...] Teachers were found politically unacceptable on the basis of trivial activities, such as being a choir leader, because this was considered to be an activity supportive of the system. [...]

The closing down of academic institutions and university departments as well as political vetting resulted in more than one million people with a university degree or its equivalent losing their jobs. This constituted 50 per cent of that group and it meant that, percentage-wise, the Eastern part of Germany, following unification, had the highest unemployment rate for university graduates in the world. [...]

In this context, it is perhaps of interest to note the comments made by Dr. Ingeborg Syllm-Rapoport when she was granted her doctorate in Hamburg over seventy years later, at the age of 102! Her case made headlines in Germany.

She had completed her medical studies in Germany during the 1930s, but was denied her doctorate when the Nazis came to power. Being an active communist and Jewish, she was forced to flee the country and found exile in the USA. But with the rise of McCarthyism in the post-war period she and her husband, also a doctor, were summoned to appear before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. Persecution once again forced them to leave the country and they eventually settled in the GDR.

Happy as she was to receive her degree belatedly in 2015, she said that the preparations recalled enough bad memories to rob her of sleep - of brown-shirted Nazis shouting and trampling at lectures by partly Jewish professors, but also of the years after the end of the GDR in 1989. She learned of its demise during a scientific congress in the USA, but when Americans congratulated her on ‘German unification’ she felt no joy. Of the years that followed she wrote: ‘I would never have believed, more than 45 years after the victory over Hitler fascism and 40 years after the McCarthy era, that I would again experience such a flood of sackings, such mass destruction of livelihoods and contempt for talents.’

Stasi State or Socialist Paradise? The German Democratic Republic and What Became of It by Bruni de la Motte & John Green with Seumas Milne (Contributor), 2015.

[argumate]

thinking through the categories of people who "support Israel" in the conventional sense of the term (i.e. support the overall ideology that underpins the current state of Israel and the actions that it takes) and it seems like there are five main categories:

those who think that the Jewish people need a state devoted to the defence of their interests, generally backed by an appeal to history, which is at least a simple belief to explain and argue with

those who are specifically fixated against Islamic religion or Arab nationalism and see Israel as a bulwark against it, there was a lot of this in the early stages of the second Iraq War and the previous Israeli invasion of Lebanon and it is at least still debatable

those who look to Jewish prophecies of Israel as delivered by supernatural covenant, which is an easy belief to explain but basically impossible to argue with as it's crazy iron age shit

those who look to Christian prophecies of Israel, like book of revelations filtered through 1980s American evangelical preaching hastening the end times shit, which is a belief so crazy it makes Jewish prophecies seem restrained and rational (and also mildly paradoxical in that it seems to suggest that Israel should be protected now so that Jesus gets to trash it later, but again you can't argue with somebody uninterested in making sense)

those who buy in to QAnon-style new age antisemitic conspiracy but invert the polarity, so they believe that the world is run by a secret committee of Jewish overlords but they are okay with that as Israel protects us from the moon men invasion or the demons that lurk in the planet's core, a belief you struggle to argue with as it's not even clear where you would possibly start

[metamatar]

To counter what they view as a rising tide of prejudice, the HAF and other Hindu American groups have turned to American Jewish organizations, which they have long seen as “the gold standard in terms of political activism,” as Maryland State Delegate Kumar Barve said in 2003. Since the early 2000s, Indian Americans have modeled their congressional activism on that of the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and AIPAC; Indian lobbyists have partnered with these groups to achieve shared defense goals, including arms deals between India and Israel and a landmark nuclear agreement between India and the US. Along the way, these Jewish groups have trained a generation of Hindu lobbyists and advocates, offering strategies at joint summits and providing a steady stream of informal advice. “We shared with them the Jewish approach to political activism,” Ann Schaffer, an AJC leader, told the Forward in 2002. “We want to give them the tools to further their political agenda.” Shukla told Jewish Currents that the HAF continues to work closely with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the AJC, whether by “being co-amici curiae on briefs to the US Supreme Court,” or by “lending our support to one another’s letters to Congress.”

[...] Faced with rising scrutiny over India’s worsening human rights record, Hindu groups have used “the same playbook and even sometimes the same terms” as Israel-advocacy groups, “copy-pasted from the Zionist context,” said Nikhil Mandalaparthy of the anti-Hindutva group Hindus for Human Rights (HfHR). Hindu groups have especially taken note of their Jewish counterparts’ recent efforts to codify a definition of antisemitism—the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition—that places much criticism of Israel out-of-bounds, asserting that claims like “the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor” constitute examples of anti-Jewish bigotry.

[...] In 2003, Gary Ackerman—a Jewish former congressman who was awarded India’s third-highest civilian honor for helping to found the Congressional Caucus on India—told a gathering of AJC and AIPAC representatives and their Indian counterparts that “Israel [is] surrounded by 120 million Muslims,” while “India has 120 million [within].” Tom Lantos, another Jewish member of the caucus, likewise enjoined the two communities to collaborate: “We are drawn together by mindless, vicious, fanatic, Islamic terrorism.”

Driven by that sense of shared purpose, the AJC and AIPAC helped train new Indian American political groups—such as the Indian American Political Action Committee and the United States India Political Action Committee—to achieve their aims in Washington. The AJC hosted seminars on political activism in DC and New York; it also brought several delegations of Indian Americans to Israel to meet with members of the Israeli government and military. “We’re fighting the same extremist enemy,” the AJC’s capital region director Charles Brooks told the Forward in 2002.

[cottoncandylesbo]

game awards fiasco has left me with a conclusion . the "cool woke" people in spaces online are still embarrassingly ignorant (or worse, tolerant) of antisemitism to the point where people can straight up explicitly say the most obvious bullshit and it'll be memed within five minutes. this has seriously hurt the credibility of some people i really care about, so im writing this in hopes the next time an antisemite makes the news i dont see thirty posts regurgitating their trash on my feed again.

if you want to do your part in preventing this, please do some reading into what antisemitic dogwhistles look like and how to avoid giving them a platform. the american jewish committee has a pdf with a list of many antisemitic dogwhistles here, and though it isn't comprehensive to everything antisemites come up with, it's a good start for helping you identify these phrases if you've never spoken to any jews about this before.

i will say this though. much of identifying dogwhistles is using your brain because they're hidden and cryptic on purpose, but learning about what they mean and how they're used can help you stop spreading this trash.

[historicity-was-already-taken]

i have a curiosity question thats niggling in my brain....how did jews outside of europe react to the holocaust while it was happening? thanks! 💖

First of all I want you to know that I answered this BEAUTIFULLY last night while hanging out in my bathrobe after my shower and watching parks & rec, and then tumblr ate it and i was furious.

Jews outside Europe reacted very much the same as Jews within Europe did when they encountered the first rumors of massacres: denial; disbelief; insistence that these are just local pogroms; insistence that "maybe they can pull that off in [Place Name], but it could never happened Here; accusations of fear mongering; "that could never be allowed to happen in our modern, evolved world;" etc.

It wasn't until about 1944, when the accounts that made their way out of Europe via clandestine courier became so consistent and overwhelming, that Jews outside Europe had to begin to accept that it was Happening. But acceptance still doesn't mean "understanding," or "comprehending." And, by 1944, Hitler had already killed the majority of European Jewry.

Now, this is a very general and US-focused response. In the United States, many Jews believed the rumors, and tried to help, usually through either HIAS, or the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (or simple, the Joint/JDC), but that became much more complex after the US entered the war in Dec 41.

Now, for my "ummmm i think this book speaks to your question" reading list:

The Terrible Secret: Suppression of the Truth about Hitler's "Final Solution" by Walter Laqueur

My Brother's Keeper: a History of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, 1929-1939 by Yehuda Bauer

Beyond Belief: The American Press And The Coming Of The Holocaust, 1933- 1945 by Deborah Lipstadt

Readers are welcome to chime in with Nuance, more focused book recommendations, etc.

[plitnick]

89 Orgs Condemn Vote to Remove Rep. Ilhan Omar from HFAC

ReThinking Foreign Policy is one of 89 organizations that issued a joint statement in support of Rep. Ilhan Omar and condemning the party line House vote to remove her form the House Foreign Affairs Committee (HFAC). For some background on what has been a relentless attack on Rep. Omar since she took her place in the House, check this piece out. Also see this one, which includes a lengthy Twitter…

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Corey Walker

US Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) sent a letter to President Joe Biden on Wednesday demanding that his administration produce evidence that Israel has blocked humanitarian aid into Gaza, accusing Biden of engaging in a “politically driven” campaign against the Jewish state.

In the letter, Cotton wrote that he condemned “the Biden administration’s threat to impose an arms embargo on Israel.” He added that the president has made “unreasonable demands” on Israel to ramp up humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, the neighboring enclave ruled by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.

“Denying Israel military aid is in direct opposition to the will of Congress, as expressed in the Israeli security supplemental passed earlier this year,” Cotton wrote. “Unilaterally threatening to cut off aid by declaring Israel in violation of US law also ignores Congress’s oversight role. Your administration insists on protecting a terrorist organization in the name of humanitarian aid.”

Cotton demanded that the Biden administration release any “evidence” to congressional committees that Israel has systematically prevented humanitarian aid from entering the Gaza Strip. The senator claimed that, if the Biden administration could not produce the desired evidence, then it should rescind its threats to Israel. 

The White House had sent a letter, addressed to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, expressing concern over what it said was a significant drop in aid deliveries to northern Gaza in recent months. The letter stated that the decline raised questions about Israel’s compliance with a National Security Memorandum (NSM) issued by the Biden administration earlier this year.

The memo requires US security aid recipients, including Israel, to ensure that humanitarian aid is not obstructed in areas where American-supplied weapons are being used.

[hotvintagepoll]

Gregory Peck is not only a certified hunk of a man but a great actor and a genuinely good person.

He starred in the film version of the novel Gentleman’s Agreement which was “Hollywood’s first major attack on anti-semitism” which features Peck as a magazine writer who pretends to be Jewish so he can experience personally the hostility of bigots and then calls out and exposes antisemitism and this film was made in 1947 like only two years after the end of World War II so historically an important film(I love this film and think its underated like its great and like Greg looks amazing as he rails against bigots). I could make an argument, and I have honeslty thought about writing a paper on it, that a majority of his films tackle some important issue whether it be antisemitism (Gentleman’s Agreement), racism (To Kill a Monckingbird), nuclear war (On the Beach), post-war discontent and PTSD (The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit), the futility of war (Pork Chop Hill) etc.

His daughter Cecilia said “ My father was a champion of stories that needed to be told, like To Kill a Mockingbird, Gentleman’s Agreement, and On the Beach. He was not afraid of films that championed diversity, equality, and tolerance. He was deeply intelligent, and also very funny in real life.”

He was against the House Un-American Activities Committee and their investigation of “alleged communists” in the film industry and signed a letter deploring their actions in 1947. He was outspoken against the Vietnam War, while at the same time supportive of his son who was fighting there. He produced the film version of the play The Trial of the Catonsville Nine about the prosecution of a group of Vietnam protestors for civil disobedience. Peck said “I decided to make the film because the play confirmed my thinking that the Vietnam War [was] an abomination.” His outspoken-ness against the Vietnam war and general political activism put him on Nixon’s “enemies list” (honestly what an icon).

He was a vocal supporter of a worldwide ban on nuclear weapons and was a lifelong advocate for gun control.

He and his wife Veronique often hosted dinners at their home in support of the arts and humanitatian or social justice causes. His daughter

He was Catholic but took a pro-choice stance on abortion and supported gay rights.

He was the president of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (1967-1970) and postponed the awards following the assasination of MLK.

He was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 for his lifetime humanitarian efforts and he also won the Jean Hersolt Humanitarian Award.

He didnt just play the handsome hero on the big screen he was one in real life.

Now some photos of him looking good:

Gregory Peck vs Paul Robeson