A Chicago Jewish group responds on Instagram to an alderman’s request for recommendations for an ‘anti zionist’ pediatrician on her personal Facebook page. Image by Instagram screenshot

By Debrah Miszak May 23, 2024

Jewish groups are calling out a Chicago alderman who on her personal Facebook page asked for suggestions for an “anti zionist” pediatrician. 

Alderman Rossana Rodriguez appears to have posted the inquiry earlier this week. On Wednesday, the Chicago Jewish Alliance, formed this year to combat antisemitism, wrote on Instagram that her post is discriminatory.

“Imagine if she requested no recommendations for black or Muslim doctors—outrageous, right?” read the group’s post. “We demand Alderwoman Rossana Rodriguez’s immediate resignation.”

Rodriguez holds a child in the picture whom she identifies as “this baby.” She did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Alliance blurred out the child’s face in its IG post.

The Midwest branch of the Anti-Defamation League posted to Twitter that Rodriguez’s post is “straight out of the playbook of authoritarian regimes” and called on Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and the rest of the board of aldermen to reject her “bigotry.”

The alderman’s post comes on the heels of several calls from pro-Palestinian activists to avoid patronizing Zionists, including authors. While some protesting Israel’s war in Gaza call Israel “the Zionist entity” and argue that Israel has no right to exist, most American Jews report feeling a connection to Israel, the world’s only Jewish majority country.

Rodriguez, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America and in her second term on Chicago’s governing board, has prompted outrage before for her remarks on Israel. 

In November, she tweeted, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” drawing condemnation from those who consider the slogan antisemitic. Widely used in protests against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, some interpret it as a call to wipe out the Jewish state and the millions of Jews within it. Others say the call for Palestinian liberation is misinterpreted as a threat against Jews. 

The Chicago City Council, on which aldermen serve, has been more supportive of war protesters than those governing other American cities. It passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire in January with Johnson as the tiebreaker, making it the largest city in the country to adopt such a resolution.

Many on social media defended Rodriguez, with several comparing Zionism to Nazism and white supremacy, a charge Zionists reject as discriminatory and ironic, noting that Israel was founded in the wake of the Holocaust.

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