It is ludicrous, nonsensical, unseemly and harmful that the far leftwing J Street, New Israel Fund (NIF) and Women of Reform Judaism (WRJ), etc. defend the Israel-hating, antisemitic Reps. Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, the Black Lives Matter/M4BL organization, funder of anti-Israel radical groups George Soros, and radical Israelophobic Muslims and Palestinian-Arabs – but condemn and try to censor Morton Klein, whom the Forward newspaper has chosen a dozen times as one of the most influential leaders in America and the Jewish Exponent has named as one of the top dozen Jewish activists of the last 100 years; and attempt to censor the oldest pro-Israel group in the United States, the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), whose presidents have included Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, Rabbis Stephen Wise and Abba Hillel Silver.
Mr. Klein was arrested for registering Black voters in Mississippi. Mr. Klein’s friend, Ice Cube, the great Black rapper/actor, recently wrote to Mr. Klein about how close they felt to each other: “We are brothers from a different mother, call anytime to talk.” Clearly a great Black
entertainer wouldn’t be saying that to someone who had a hint of anti-Black racism. ZOA and Mr. Klein have made it clear that we strongly oppose and condemn anti-Black racism.
The distorted, falsehood-filled J Street/NIF/WRJ “cancel culture” petition is another instance of those radical Israel-bashing groups’ ongoing harassment, name-calling and defamation of ZOA’s president, civil-rights-activist Morton Klein, aimed at silencing and undermining ZOA’s and Mr. Klein’s strong, courageous defense of Israel and the Jewish people.
J Street/NIF, etc. have also targeted, and attempted to demonize and/or “cancel” other pro-Israel groups including: CUFI, AIPAC, Herut, the Americans4Israel coalition (which includes EMET, the Bnai Zion Foundation, the Baltimore Zionist District, Fuel for Truth, Young Judea, the Am Yisrael Foundation, and the Israel Forever Foundation), and the entire ZOA Coalition of 27 pro-Israel organization, including Aish HaTorah, Students Supporting Israel, Hasbara Fellowships, Z Street, NORPAC, the Lawfare Project, One Israel Fund, Americans Against Antisemitism, Chovevei Zion, the Council on Jewish Affairs, I-Lead, Young Jewish Conservatives, American Friends of Likud, Russian-Jewish groups, Persian-Jewish groups, other ethnic Jewish groups, and more.
J Street/NIF’s virtually identical claim to the present one, recently filed against ZOA at the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations (which correctly rejected J Street for membership) and J Street/NIF’s etc. claims against the ZOA Coalition, the Americans4Israel coalition and Herut, recently brought to the American Zionist Movement tribunal, were all thrown out.
ZOA looks forward to the Boston-JCRC likewise throwing out J Street/NIF’s latest absurd claim.
J Street’s relentless harassment has also included secretly sponsoring a so-called “young Jews’” letter condemning ZOA (signed by J Street U officials who failed to disclose that they were affiliated with J Street). In addition, an organization headed by J Street’s treasurer posted tweets insulting and harassing other members of the Conference of Presidents (AEPi and Hillel) for not joining the false attacks on ZOA.
The J Street/NIF petition to JCRC-Boston attributes items to Mr. Klein that he had nothing to do with. For instance, J Street falsely claims that Mort Klein “retweeted” a statement that George Soros assisted the Nazis by identifying Jews. In fact, Mr. Klein never retweeted that statement. Someone named “Izzy100” wrote that statement as a “reply” after Mr. Klein posted a completely unrelated tweet.
Incidentally, Soros admitted during a 60 Minutes interview (video) that he helped his godfather, a Nazi official, confiscate Jews’ property, and stated that Soros felt no guilt about this and added “why should he?” Soros also declared “I am not a Zionist,” falsely claimed that terror group Hamas has a “moderate” wing, and funds numerous anti-Israel groups, including
B’tselem, Adalah, and of course J Street – which for years lied about receiving funding from Soros.
The J Street/NIF petition also conveniently omits key context. Mr. Klein’s promptly deleted “filthy Arab brethren” tweet, which Klein wrote at the height of his grief, specifically referred to Arab murderers – who earlier that day (Sept. 16, 2018) murdered Mr. Klein’s dear friend and father-of-four-children Ari Fuld by stabbing Ari in the back while Ari was grocery shopping. J Street/NIF also omitted that the “American Palestinian group” to which Mort Klein was responding and directed this statement was Electronic Intifada – a notorious demonizer of Israel that, as its name reveals, helps foment Intifadas against Israel in which Arab terrorists such as Ari Fuld’s killer murdered and maimed over 10,000 innocent Jews in stabbing, bombing, shooting, and ramming attacks, and are paid by the Palestinian Authority to do so. Arab murderers of innocent Jews are Electronic Intifada’s brethren.
Instead of trying to censor ZOA for standing up against the BLM organization’s antisemitism, every caring Jew and Jewish group should join with ZOA, Mort Klein, Alan Dershowitz, and Caroline Glick and Melanie Phillips in condemning the antisemitic Israel-hating platform and activities of the Black Lives Matter/M4BL organization. The hateful BLM/M4BL platform is still online today[1], and promotes antisemitic BDS, falsely accuses Israel of perpetrating genocide and apartheid against Palestinians, and was largely written by a group intertwined with designated terror organization PFLP. Jewish groups should join ZOA in condemning the BLM- Los Angeles chapter head for instigating BLM’s recent frightening, targeted pogrom, in which BLM destroyed and defaced synagogues, Jewish schools, and Jewish shops and businesses in the Jewish Fairfax district.
It is also downright Orwellian that J Street and NIF are maligning ZOA for condemning Omar’s and Tlaib’s promotion of anti-Israel BDS, praising convicted Jew-killer Rasmea Odeh, and calling to end all aid to Israel.
Every group that cares about the future of American Jews and U.S. support for Israel should also join ZOA in criticizing HIAS for advocating to bring into the United States large numbers of unvettable refugees from 5 Mideast majority-Muslim countries, including designated state sponsors of terrorism. Only 8% of worldwide Muslims live in those nations. Numerous bipartisan experts (including top Obama administration officials), testified that vetting those refugees was impossible. ADL’s polls show that 74% to 93% of the population in such countries is antisemitic.
Every group that cares about Israel should also join ZOA in condemning former President Obama’s refusal to veto a UN resolution that falsely declared that all of Israel’s land past the 1949 Armistice lines is “Arab land,” including the Western Wall, Temple Mount and Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter.
Horrifyingly, J Street lobbied for Obama to take such hostile actions against Israel at the United Nations.
ZOA’s thoroughly documented online book, “ J Street Sides With Israel’s Enemies & Works to Destroy Support for Israel,”[2] thoroughly documents many of J Street’s additional unrelenting hostile-to-Israel activities, including lobbying against anti-BDS laws, military aid to Israel, sanctions on Iran, moving the U.S. embassy to Israel’s eternal capital Jerusalem, and the confirmation of pro-Israel appointees (including Ambassador David Friedman). J Street works to turn national political platforms against Israel; brings and features BDS speakers on campuses and to their convention; brought students to pay homage to terrorist Yasser Arafat’s grave; and raises money to elect anti-Israel Congresspersons and defeat pro-Israel Congresspersons. J Street also condemned Israel for defending herself from Hamas; promoted the catastrophic Iran deal; supports ethnically cleansing Jews from the lawful, Jewish historic homeland in Judea and Samaria; and justifies and legitimizes Arab terror, including falsely
claiming that Israeli treatment “forces” Arabs to become terrorists. J Street’s co-founder and certain prominent members also made statements opposing Israel’s existence. Prof. Alan Dershowitz noted that: “J Street has done more to turn young people against Israel than any organization in the whole of history.”
Both the U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism and the Simon Weisenthal Center declared that J Street’s recent tweet opposing Israel’s sovereignty is antisemitic. Special Envoy Carr explained that J Street’s “imagery uses #Antisemitism and crude anti-Semitic conspiracy theories to advance their agenda.”
J Street’s petition partner NIF spends millions of dollars funding groups that demonize and defame Israel, promote BDS and bring harassing “lawfare” claims against Israel, including Breaking the Silence, Adalah, Yesh Din, Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity Movement, Human Rights Defenders Fund and +972 Magazine. See NGO Monitor’s report.
ZOA is considering bringing a counterclaim against J Street, NIF and their petition partners to remove them from the Boston-JCRC. There is more than ample evidence for ZOA to do so.
With rapidly increasing antisemitism here and abroad, now is the time to join ZOA’s robust efforts to defend and protect the Jewish people and Israel.
ZOA and Mr. Klein invite any JCRC Board member to call him at (212) 481-1500 and to discuss any detail of this matter. ZOA urges the Boston-JCRC to promptly dismiss the baseless J Street/NIF/WRJ petition. Additionally, Morton Klein would be happy to engage these “cancel culture” leftwing groups to a public discussion/debate of these issues.