Meet the Jews defending Hamas
Demonstrators gather during the Emergency Rally for Gaza at the Consulate General of Israel Monday in New York City. Several Jewish organizations sponsored the event, which celebrated Saturday’s attack by Hamas militants in Israel. Photo by Getty Images
By Arno Rosenfeld October 9, 2023
Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Israeli consulate in New York City Monday for what might be considered the opposite of a peace rally: “No peace on stolen land,” the demonstrators chanted.
The Emergency Rally for Gaza was organized after Palestinian militants broke through the fence enclosing the seaside enclave Saturday and rampaged through towns in southern Israel, killing dozens of soldiers and hundreds of civilians, and kidnapping more than 150 others, including women, children and the elderly.
A graphic promoting the rally on social media declared that its goal was to “defend Palestinian resistance” and “honor the martyrs of Palestine.”
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Among the event’s key sponsors were three anti-Zionist Jewish groups including Not In Our Name, which is based at the City University of New York, and Judaism On Our Own Terms, which was founded more than a decade ago as Open Hillel.
They are among a small segment of the Jewish left that cheered on the operation, which was orchestrated by Hamas, arguing that it was a legitimate response to nearly two decades of Israel’s blockade of Gaza and a history of disproportionate military force used against Palestinians. Since Hamas took over Gaza in 2006, Israeli forces have killed more than 4,300 Palestinians, while — until Saturday — Hamas militants had killed fewer than 90 Israelis during these clashes.
“Glory to the resistance and the people of Palestine,” Dylan Saba, an attorney with Palestine Legal whose family is both Jewish and Palestinian, wrote Saturday on the X (formerly Twitter). “Though I fear for my family in Gaza and am already mourning the dead, I could not be more proud of my people who continue to demonstrate unthinkable bravery in their struggle for liberation.”
Norman Finkelstein, the Jewish academic and longtime critic of Israel, said the same day that the Hamas militants were “trying to free 1 million children, who have been held hostage in Gaza for nearly two decades.”
“They were born in that concentration camp and they were never able to leave,” Finkelstein said in an interview Monday, referring to Israel’s blockade of Gaza. “What are you supposed to do?”
Split over blame
The vast majority of Jewish progressives, including those who are harshly critical of Israel, condemned Hamas for Saturday’s attack, which killed at least 900 Israelis, more than on any single day since the country’s founding. But they also often said that the operation was rooted in Israel’s policies toward Palestinians.
For example, IfNotNow, a progressive group that opposes the Israeli occupation, condemned “the killing of innocent life” and said “their blood is on the hands of the Israeli government” in a statement Saturday.
“I wouldn’t say that they’ve taken Hamas’s side,” said Dov Waxman, director of Israel studies at UCLA. “But I would say they’ve laid the blame for the terrorist attack squarely on Israel.”
Eva Borgwardt, IfNotNow’s political director, said that the organization did not intend to avoid condemning Hamas. The script that the organization has used in a series of events across the country to mourn both Israeli and Palestinian deaths includes a line reading: “There is no glory in Hamas’ actions.”
“Cruel tactics of kidnapping and murdering children and the elderly are despicable no matter who perpetuates them,” Borgwardt said in an interview. “And at the same time we, it’s really important to acknowledge the context under which these horrific attacks were perpetuated.”
Borgwardt said IfNotNow had organized its own events, where participants recite the mourner’s kaddish for both Israelis and Palestinians, as an alternative to gatherings sponsored by some mainstream Jewish organizations that she described as “war mongering” by only focusing on Israeli deaths and cheering on “genocidal levels of military action in Gaza.”
(Israel’s defense minister said Monday that the country was fighting “human animals” and would implement a “complete siege” of Gaza, cutting off food, fuel and electricity.)
Jewish Voice for Peace, which unlike IfNotNow is anti-Zionist and supports a boycott of Israel, also mourned the civilian deaths while emphasizing the context surrounding the attack.
“For everybody who has people on the ground, who have loved ones — Israelis, Palestinians — it’s been incredibly shocking,” said Sonya Meyerson-Knox, a spokesperson for the group. “And at the same time, it’s been utterly devastating to watch the way mainstream media, politicians and Jewish organizations start the clock from Oct. 7.”
Meyerson-Knox said more than 800 people attended an online call Sunday, and several dozen participated in a protest outside the home of Sen. Chuck Schumer opposing military aid to Israel.
Reconsidering support
Some who initially supported the attacks Saturday began walking back their comments after more details emerged. Images and videos circulating on social media showed Hamas gunmen mowing down Israelis attending a music festival near the Gaza border, kidnapping Israelis and desecrating the bodies of murdered civilians.
Other footage showed militants pledging not to harm the hostages.
Rivkah Brown, a Jewish editor at the progressive British media outlet Novara, initially said that Saturday “should be a day of celebration for supporters of democracy and human rights worldwide, as Gazans break out of their open-air prison.”
The following day she clarified that she did not condone “rape and other atrocities.”
“I’m celebrating Palestinian armed resistance,” she wrote on X. “I don’t condone every act taken by that resistance.”
A representative from Judaism On Our Own Terms clarified Monday night that while the organization had endorsed the rally to “honor the martyrs of Palestine,” it had not yet taken an official position on recent events in the region.
And although Jewish Voice for Peace never sponsored any of the events supporting Saturday’s attack, it did “like” a post on X celebrating “the latest unprecedented wave of resistance.”
The organization removed its support for the post, which the Palestinian Youth Movement was using to promote rallies, after questions from the Forward.
“Every human life is precious, and attacks on civilians are always unacceptable and are war crimes,” Meyerson-Knox said. “And because not all the protests have been able to center that aspect of international law, we took that ‘like’ away.”
Finkelstein favorably compared Saturday’s attack to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, but demurred when pressed on whether he believed Israeli civilians were legitimate military targets.
“Neither I, nor you, have a clue as to what happened,” he said. “I simply need to know the facts about exactly what happened and then I will render judgment.”
And yet Finkelstein also defended the spirit of the attacks. He said it reminded him of when he asked his mother, a Holocaust survivor, how she felt about the American fire bombings of German cities during World War II, which killed thousands of German civilians.
“She said, ‘If we’re going to die, let us take some of them with us,’” Finkelstein recalled. “Moral judgment? Hey, I never quarreled with my parents about those issues.”
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