Tagged IfNotNow

The Jews getting arrested at ICE centers are just getting started

NEW YORK (JTA) — If you’re going to physically block an entrance to an ICE detention center, the handbook says, don’t act nice about it. Do chant in Yiddish. Do sing Hebrew prayers. “Defiant, angry, urgent, Jewish,” reads the #NeverAgainIsNow Action Toolkit, a six-page Google Doc meant for Jews… Read more »

36 Jewish protesters arrested at ICE detention center in New Jersey

NEW YORK (JTA) — Thirty-six protesters from a new Jewish group were arrested at a demonstration in front of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The arrests Sunday afternoon followed a protest outside the Elizabeth Contract Detention Facility organized by a group called Never… Read more »

Here’s how Birthright guides talk about the Palestinians

A Palestinian man walks by Israeli troops standing guard in the West Bank city of Hebron, April 13, 2017. (Wisam Hashlamoun/Flash90)

(JTA) – When Samuel Green talks about Israel’s West bank security barrier with the Birthright groups he guides, he first explains the Israeli view that the barrier was built to prevent Palestinian terrorists from breaching Israeli territory and that Israelis generally feel it has saved lives. But then he’ll… Read more »

Jews agree that Farrakhan is anti-Semitic. After that, it gets complicated.

Louis Farrakhan at a basketball game at the UIC Pavilion in Chicago, July 23, 2017. (Streeter Lecka/BIG3/Getty Images)

(JTA) — Both have unequivocally condemned Louis Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism. Both say that fighting anti-Semitism is a necessary part of the broader struggle against bigotry and oppression. Both seek to build alliances with other minority groups in that fight. So an alliance would seem natural between the Anti-Defamation League, a… Read more »

When politics gets in the way of Jewish giving

Jewish Voice for Peace members at the Jewish United Fund of Chicago protest donor-advised funds from JUF going to groups that have been deemed Islamophobic, March 24, 2017. (Inbal Palombo)

NEW YORK (JTA) — Lisa Greer didn’t think twice when she used her cellphone to donate to IfNotNow, a Jewish organization that protests Israel’s West Bank occupation. Greer and her husband, Joshua, had given millions to progressive Jewish and Israel causes, and she sits on the board of the… Read more »

Protesting Trump and Jewish organizations, IfNotNow brings young left-wing Jews to the streets

IfNotNow activists march to demand that President-elect Donald Trump fire Stephen Bannon, Philadelphia, Nov. 22, 2016. (Courtesy of IfNotNow)

NEW YORK (JTA) — “This Jew says no to white nationalism,” one sign read. “Silence is akin to consent,” another said, quoting the Talmud. A third displayed a lyric from a Yiddish song: “We will outlive them.” The signs, along with chants like “Donald Trump, it’s your fault; Stephen… Read more »