Jewish Voice for Peace: A Hate Group Masquerading as a Social Justice Organization

(and probably not even majority Jewish)

When I first started seeing social media posts from the inaptly-named Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) years before the Israel-Hamas War, they were easy enough to dismiss. When you see crazy people acting crazy, it’s usually just best to hit the ignore button.

After the events of October 7th, however, JVP has gone completely viral, taking on a life of its own. They are among among the loudest anti-Israel voices, blaming their fellow Jews for Hamas’s acts of brutality that sparked this war. Worse, they use their expanding following in an effort to “prove” that there are Jews out there “committed to social justice.” The problem is that JVP is not interested in justice as much as it is in spreading hate.

In what way do any of the above illustrations promote social justice, for anyone? If the intent is to help Palestinians in their fight for equality, why not keep the focus on their actual needs, rather than invoking blood libel stereotypes against Jews from the Middle Ages? None of their content thoughtfully addresses the needs of the people for whom they are claiming to advocate. Has anyone from JVP’s leadership actually consulted with ordinary Palestinians currently living in Gaza or the West Bank about their actual goals? And if they have, then why not focus on those issues, rather than just using their voice to accuse other Jews of ‘genocide’?

Some of the outrageous claims that JVP made in the aftermath of the deadliest day for Jews since 1945, before the IDF began its ground operation in Gaza:

• “The Palestinians and all colonized and oppressed people have the right to armed self-defense.”

• “The anti-colonial armed resistance out of the Gaza Strip was provoked by decades of Israeli State sanctioned violence and to report it otherwise is false and misleading.”

• “Let us be clear: This is genocide. This isn’t a war on Hamas. It’s a war on the Palestinian people. Israeli settlers are being armed by the Israeli state, and have become indistinguishable from Israeli soldiers. Both abuse Palestinians with impunity.”

Perhaps most sinister is JVP playing the “Jew card” to lend false legitimacy to their claims. JVP implements a clean ‘oppressor/oppressed’ binary that has become all too common in “social justice” circles, but does not actually reflect reality or basic facts. Unfortunately they seem to ignore that that October 7th was a coordinated attack on Jews involving the intentional rape, butchering, and hostage-taking of women, children, and the elderly. How is that “self-defense”? They also seem to conflate the actions of Hamas with those of the IDF; it’s well known, for example, that Hamas militants regularly dress in civilian clothes to become indistinguishable from real civilians. Gaza was not “occupied” for the 17 years that Hamas was in power there, nor was it occupied on October 7th. From 2005, Gaza was a completely Jew-free zone. During that extended time period, what did JVP do to support regular Gazans in their quest for self-sufficiency?

JVP has gained a broad following using the tired, antisemitic tactic of accusing Israel of moral failure, guilty of the worst sins that westerners apply to social problems — namely colonialism and genocide. Unfortunately, they seem not to understand the meaning of any of these terms. Perhaps most important of all, this group does not really know the definition of the term Zionism — so they use the term as a pejorative.

JVP’s presence on college campuses is troubling

Most students and faculty at U.S. colleges have scant knowledge of Middle Eastern history, making them susceptible to schemes like the one that JVP is perpetrating. JVP’s close alliance with Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) is particularly damning. With friends like that, one does not need enemies.

Here are a few examples of JVP’s actions on U.S. college campuses in the aftermath of October 7th:

• Organizing a walkout at Columbia in collaboration with SJP as a protest against “the siege and genocide in Gaza” and to demand divestment from Israel. This act resulted in both student groups being temporarily banned for not complying with the university’s demonstration rules. During its suspension, JVP then encouraged students to attend events headed by both Within Our Lifetime, a rebrand of SJP, and Samidoun. WOL has called Saleh Al-Arouri, who made the U.S. Department of State’s terrorist list after orchestrating the kidnapping and assassination of 3 Israeli teens (1 of whom was a U.S. citizen) a “martyr.” Samidoun headed the infamous ‘Resistance 101 Seminar’ promoted by the Barnard Center for Research on Women, during which its intrepid leader stated of Hamas: “we need to say that we stand with the Palestinian armed resistance, and that we support them, and that this is a struggle we want to be part of.”

  Do these look like efforts to advocate for innocent civilians?

  

  

• Organizing campus protests where chants like “globalize the intifada,” a direct call for violence against Jews and Israelis (and one could argue against the West in general), were repeated over and over.

• Distributing their updated anti-Zionist Haggadah, “Exodus from Zionism, which various anti-Israel campus encampments headed by both JVP and SVP used widely. Highlights included ‘Four Questions in Times of Genocide’ and ‘The Ten Plagues of Genocidal Zionism.’ Perhaps most cringe-worthy was their decision to destroy the classic tune “Dayenu”: “As we work for Palestinian liberation/Not In Our Name/a sacred incantation/May there be full end to genocide and occupation/Dayenu.” Barf.

  

Call for an investigation into JVP

JVP does not represent the mainstream views of Jews en masse, in any part of the world. There are only 15 million Jews globally (a whopping 0.2% of the global population), and 7 million of them live in Israel, the country they are demonizing. There is simply no way that the majority of their 1.3 million followers on Instagram are Jewish. I would suggest a full accounting of how many actual Jews belong to this organization.

The most significant question to ask: other than pointing the finger at Israel, what are their actual goals for the group whose rights they are claiming to defend? JVP is very good at articulating what they are against, but have presented little thoughtful analysis about the real aspirations of ordinary Palestinians, the root of their suffering, and what they can do, productively, to help in a way that does not play into the hands of Hamas. I am open to hearing ideas that do not involve eliminating Jewish sovereignty “from the river to the sea.”

Another inquiry: is JVP a community of Jews concerned for the welfare of Israel’s opponents, or perhaps just a place where either white supremacist types and/or representatives of Iranian-backed terrorist regimes can blend into public/campus life? We have witnessed a similar phenomenon during the George Floyd protests, when it became common for far-right infiltrators to blend into the demonstrations as a way to shield themselves from scrutiny while engaging in extremist violence. When an organization decides to throw around terms like Jewish supremacy to their international audience, it begs the question of who the real mouthpiece is. The last thing any of us need is another antisemitic organization gaining influence here in the West, especially one self-identifying as ‘Jewish.’