HonestReporting is extending support to the Anti-Defamation League after the latter organization has come under attack by a coalition of radical and far-left groups.
The ADL, known historically as a non-partisan organization whose aim is to combat antisemitism, has in recent years faced criticism from some Jewish groups for leaning politically to the Left. It is therefore ironic that far-left groups are attacking the ADL for not being left-leaning enough, and for not sufficiently blaming Israel for all the world’s ills.
An open letter posted to a dedicated website is calling on various movements and communities to “Drop the ADL” for alleged “harmful practices.”
The ADL is branded as “not an ally” due to its alleged “right-wing activities undermining the rights of Black, immigrant, queer, Muslim, Arab, and other marginalized communities.”
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
The misguided campaign follows months of attempts by some of the signatories to conflate African-Americans’ fight for equality with that of the Palestinians. This has included accusing the ADL of facilitating cooperation between US law enforcement agencies and their “brutal” Israeli counterparts.
As respected Israeli journalist Haviv Rettig-Gur wrote: “This is a tendentious and ill-informed trope… The exchanges actually focus on the opposite: sharing best practices in community engagement, nonviolent policing, intelligence.”
Sorry, but this is a tendentious and ill-informed trope. Neither country needs the other's help to "militarize" its police.
I've seen this program. The exchanges actually focus on the opposite: sharing best practices in community engagement, nonviolent policing, intelligence. https://t.co/7K7wUxhews
— Haviv Rettig Gur (@havivrettiggur) June 1, 2020
The Anti-Zionist Jews
The list of some 100 signatories includes an array of far-left, Islamist and openly anti-Zionist groups, such as the Democratic Socialists of America, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, Jewish Voice for Peace and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice.
The appearance of IfNotNow on the list is no great surprise, as it has been accused of making lying by omission its “specialty,” Founded in 2014 after Israel fought a war against the Hamas terrorist group that was precipitated by the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens and the firing of hundreds rockets at Israeli towns, IfNotNow has a clear record of laying the blame squarely at Israel’s door, while ignoring Palestinian war crimes and belligerence.
IfNotNow co-founder Simone Zimmerman made headlines over a 2015 Facebook post in March 2015 that called Benjamin Netanyahu an:
arrogant, deceptive, cynical, manipulative asshole…. F*ck you, Bibi … you sanctioned the murder of over 2,000 people this summer.”
Not exactly a voice of reason.
Another group, Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), takes a similarly one-sided view of the Arab-Israeli conflict. So extreme are its positions, the organization has been described by the ADL as:
a radical anti-Israel activist group that advocates for a complete economic, cultural and academic boycott of the state of Israel.”
JVP promotes the false narrative that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the result of Israeli intransigence alone, ignoring decades of history and the fact that the Palestinians have on several occasions rejected generous offers for peace.
The Islamists and the Far Left
Also encouraging a boycott of the ADL is CAIR, a group regularly accused of pursuing an Islamist agenda that has possible connections to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. Naturally, CAIR has described these claims as “Islamophobia.”
CAIR, ostensibly an Islamic civil liberties advocacy group, was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2007 trial of the Holy Land Foundation in Texas. Officials from the Holy Land Foundation were later found guilty of diverting funds to Hamas. As a result, some American lawmakers have called to ban CAIR. In fact, CAIR was designated a terrorist group by the UAE in 2014.
CAIR employees have promoted “the modern variation of the long-debunked blood libel that claims Israel kills Palestinians to steal their organs,” and shared an article from white nationalist website Information Clearing House that alleges Israel controls American politics.
Then there is the Democratic Socialists of America, a far-left political faction. Two DSA members, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, are members of the US House of Representatives and have repeatedly courted controversy for maligning Israel and Jews.
Backing the ADL
The petition against the ADL is straight out of the CAIR playbook: Periodically, the organization fires off a report backed by a press release and other public statements smearing its detractors as “Islamophobic” or “hate-filled.” And now a plethora of other organizations have joined together to attack one specific Jewish organization: the ADL.
But the reality is that CAIR, IfNotNow, JVP et al are intent on discrediting their critics. News outlets owe it to readers to make clear the true circumstances of the ongoing mud-slinging.
The Jewish Telegraphic Agency has reported that:
liberal Jewish organizations that have worked with the ADL are publicly defending its record as a Jewish civil rights organization with a long track record of standing up for marginalized communities.”
For years, the ADL has had a record of standing up to all kinds of hatred, bigotry and intolerance. Those groups currently attacking it are doing a grave disservice to that mission — which they ostensibly share.
