Synopsis
As Israel continues to receive unquestioning support from the US - whatever the cost - it is worth considering how that influence has been maintained to date.
There is a complex system of lobbying and influence groups in the US across multiple industries and institutions of civil society, bound by the common goal of maintaining a pro-Israeli narrative, silencing dissenting pro-Palestinian voices and ensuring political expediency in US Congress and importantly the UN with the US Veto vote on Israel’s behalf.
This article exams the lobby in detail.
‼️Note: Article regularly updated - see version history below
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Video Synopsis
⚠️ NOTE: ⚡️ LIVIING Article: As with most Sleekit Scotsman articles - this will be updated post date of original publication with an edit history below.
This reflects the addition of new information as it comes to light and is intended to keep the article relevant, up to date and more importantly a comprehensive reference with quoted public sources for pro-Palestine advocates to build on.
🙏 My only request is that you quote Sleekit Scotsman ☮️🏴 as a reference if re-using information: 🔗🌳👉 https://linktr.ee/sleekitscotsman
‼️Version History:
Article updated: Thursday 15th Aug (Sleekit Scotsman ☮️🏴 articles are updated periodically to add latest information on the subject of the article for relevance)
Update history:
15th Aug 2024: Updated AIPAC funding section to cover broader funding of three victorious challengers: AIPAC 2024: Direct action to install pro-Israel candidates
30th July 2024: Addition retrospectively a few new sections:
AIPAC: Funding of Pro-Israel Candidate George Latimer: AIPAC 2024: Direct action to install a pro-Israel candidate
10th July 2024: Six weeks after the US Antisemitism Envoy calls a meet with Meta and others - Meta agrees to censor criticism of Zionism: 9 Jul 2024: Meta censor criticism of Israel: criticising Zionism defined as antisemitic - six weeks after the US Government Special Envoy calls social media companies into a meeting to discuss
1st July 2024: Two updates;
Genocide Denial Bill: Congress votes to ban the Department of State from quoting death and casualty figures in Gaza here - 27 Jun 2024 - Genocide Denial Bill: Congress votes to prevent the Department of State from quoting death and casualty rates in Gaza
A Republican Congressman speaks out on AIPAC in detail on June 10th. June 30th his wife dies suddenly. Really? AIPAC: Rep. Thomas Massie reveals “Your AIPAC guy” and a tragic coincidence
21st Jun 2024: Wiki Ban now coming because the ADL doesn’t like questioning of their “statistics” ?
7th May 2024: ICC to issue arrest warrants for war criminals Hamas and Israel leaders - so the US Congress passes a law sanctioning the individual legal staff in the ICC. This is going beyond Stalin-seque - see “SHUTTING DOWN INTERNATIONAL LAW“
Also Netanyahu’s address to Congress in July 2024 “And if you weren’t clear on direction - from the horse’s mouth“
16/5/2024 - House Bill HR.8369 - making it ILLEGAL for anyone to hold up an arms shipment to Israel. What the actual f*ck?
Contents
🏛️ CONGRESS: Ensuring US Political Advocacy
AIPAC: Rep. Thomas Massie reveals “Your AIPAC guy” and a tragic coincidence
And if you weren’t clear on direction - from the horse’s mouth
21 Jun 2024 - Wiki Ban now coming because the ADL doesn’t like questioning of their “statistics” ?
15 March 2024: Bill to ban Tik Tok - identified as a major threat to the pro-Israeli agenda
December 2023: Motion equating criticism of Zionism as antisemitism
The Ultimate Bill: Creating a Federal Israel-defined “Antisemitism” Department in Government
May 14th 2024: Making it illegal to stop unconditional arms shipments to Israel
April 21 2024: Largest aid package to Israel approved since Oct 7: $17Bn USD
January 2024: $14Bn USD Israel Aid Package passed through the House
SHUTTING DOWN INTERNATIONAL LAW
🇺🇳 UNITED NATIONS: Ensuring A Free Rein
APPENDIX A - Criticism of structured pro-Israeli lobbying is not antisemitic
APPENDIX B: EXISTING ANTISEMITISM MEASURES IN THE US
Introduction
It is absolutely critical Israel maintains its strongest possible lobby in the US who provide direct aid, weapons supply, military intervention and importantly a veto blocker vote and/or resolution wording influence in the UN Security Council preventing any real action against Israel.
Israel cannot take any chances with voices of dissent at any level within the US and maintains the narrative through the silencing of pro-Palestinian voices through organisation and senior industry figures in addition to the obvious political funding.
Specific examples of this are listed in this article.
What is NOT included in this article:
The Fourth Estate - media influence in the US
Other Institutions - Other Institutional Influence; Finance etc.
Arts & Entertainment Advocacy - covered in other article, see Related Articles section at the end.
Nixon’s Take
Someone I am loathe to quote - but on the subject of Israeli lobbying nonetheless gives a valid historical voice on the issue - President Nixon.
“an American President must make a decision that does not in effect give Israel a blank cheque”
From the Richard Nixon Foundation:
In the end - Nixon saved Israel by sending “everything that can fly” to Israel to fight in the surprise 1973 Yom Kippur War as a foreign policy decision - but his views remained stern on internal lobbying in the US.
Calling out foreign nation influence not Antisemitism
We should be clear that criticising a system of pro-Israeli advocacy within a society - as a criticism of the State itself - is not antisemitic. APPENDIX A: Criticism of structured pro-Israeli lobbying is not antisemitic at the end of this article covers this in some detail for reference.
The reason is it in an Appendix is that I think we’re all tired of the false flag blanket antisemitism accusations that have been bandied about the last six months and its transparent enough.
🏛️ CONGRESS: Ensuring US Political Advocacy
The Pro-Israeli Lobby in US Politics is the largest most influential international affairs lobby in the US. It is composed of a number of pro-Israeli lobbying groups, the largest being the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) that works hand-in-hand with the American Defamation League (ADL) as PR for lobby policies.
In Politics, Modus Operandi is typically:
Political influence individuals - heavy campaign funding, political lobbying, sponsored private trips to Israel (particularly here in Australia).
Political use of antisemitism - examples below - essentially continuing to band criticism of Israel with criticism of all Jews and hence antisemitic, and taking recorded action in Congress whether legally binding or not. Nobody wants to be tarred with antisemitism and who's going to look at the technicalities.
Antisemitism Smearing
Antisemitism smearing - there’s been an incredible amount of McCarthyite hysteria on this in the US in particular and here.
This ranges from the ignorant association of a Palestinian flag or keffiyeh with Hamas, terrorism and some sort of condoning of the events of October 7th to influential lobby groups dangerously associating peaceful protest with antisemitism.
Indeed an independent AP News Factcheck in 20191 confirmed that the keffiyeh scarf is NOT associated with Hamas, in the context of a complaint then at Palestinian US Congresswoman Senator Rashida Tlaib wearing the scarf.
Senator Tlaib gave an impassioned speech on human rights on the floor in Congress on November 7th (video below 4m36s):
“"I can't believe I have to say this, but Palestinian people are not disposable."
Soon after this address on 7 Nov 2023, she was censured by Congress2 234 votes (including 22 Democrats) to 188 (including 4 Republicans) for allegedly:
“defending terrorism” - calling for the end of “the apartheid system that creates the suffocating, dehumanizing conditions that can lead to resistance” - when multiple United Nations and other NGO reports state this, and the Secretary General himself effectively said this on the floor of the UN Security Council two weeks earlier on 24 Oct - “these events have not occurred in a vacuum”
“calling for destruction of the State of Israel” - sharing a video with peaceful protesters chanting “From the River To The Sea, Palestine Will be Free” (despite multiple evidence that this is not an antisemtic chant, most recently see example of this from the march today and why NOT antisemitic).
It’s a bullshit narrative and people need to get wise to that.
Note: Rashida Tlaib was named by vile pro-Israeli website StopAntisemitism.org as “Antisemite of the year”3. Appalling hate.
I have gone to lengths to research this and call out what is and what isn’t antisemitic and why (including “from the river to the sea”) and have this statement available to read, guiding the intent of my writing (article below).
Statement on Antisemitism v Free Speech with review and examples of terminology and nuance:
Funding pro-Israeli internal and opposition candidates
A huge part of pro-Israeli lobby funding and effort is spend negatively campaigning against the opponents of candidates it wishes to endorse.
The funding is either for Republican opponents or in Democratic primaries - the key being to remove the progressive pro-Palestine or less Israel-supporting incumbent.
This can take the form of negative TV advertising, grassroots campaigning on behalf of the official politician campaigning, cash donations to the political campaign and others.
Particular targets are “The Squad” - progressive Democratic candidates (and 1 Republican)4. As at August 2024 - AIPAC has ousted TWO of the Squad below with incredible amounts of funding:
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: NY-14
Jamaal Bowman: NY-16Rashida Tlaib Michigan-12
Cori Bush Missouri-1(ousted by AIPAC funded campaign August 2024)Ilhan Omar Minnesota-5
Ayanna Pressley Massachusetts 7
Greg Casar Texas 35
Delia Ramirez Illinois 3
Summer Lee (Republican) Pennsylvania 12
Notably two of “The Squad” are Muslims - Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar. The Third Muslim member of Congress Andre Carson is a black centrist democrat (an Islam convert from Baptist) not in the Squad.
For details on the AIPAC funded campaign targeting candidates who have spoken out against Israel see section: AIPAC 2024: Direct action to install pro-Israel candidates
Islamophobia in Congress - Commending Heritage Months
There are motions every year to celebrate Black History Month and Jewish Heritage Month which are proposed on the floor and passed immediately as a formality recognition.
In 2023 two similar formality motions were introduced to the House by a Muslim Senator to celebrate Arab American Heritage Month - they were both not passed5.
Demographically Muslim Congress members make up 0.5% of Congress (3), Black members 11% (60) and Jewish members 7% (37)6.
Conflating Anti-Zionism with Antisemitism
Throwing in the whiff or suggestion of antisemitism is a common disruptive debate tactic. If you can keep someone on the front foot defending themself on a thing we all agree is BAD - you obfuscate and deflect the actual issues.
More damaging - it disempowers the ability to call out a true act of antisemitism, whether the perpetrator is aware or not (with a follow up Act now proposed, see below).
As public opinion for Israel’s actions in Gaza rapidly dropped from February 2024 culminating in 1st April 2024 deaths of World Central Kitchen aid workers - the rhetoric on broadening the definition of “antisemitism” greatly increased. There was much more legislation being introduced on the floor of the House from a heavily AIPAC-funded Congress together with campus crackdowns on protests against Israel and support for the Palestinians - again defining this as “antisemitic”.
If legislative crackdowns continue (see next sections) by a political class operating separately from the general populace there is bound to be open dissent at the crackdown on free speech.
Greens Presidential candidate Jill Stein has been a breath of fresh air in positioning the discussion - however challenging to counter the pro-Israeli rhetoric and huge AIPAC spending working against her and other reasoned voices7.
On 6th December 2023: A House of Representatives non-legally binding motion on antisemitism passed on the floor set a dangerous precedent by redefining anti-Zionism as equivalent to Anti-Semitism amongst other statements.
🇺🇸🇵🇸🗣️🚫🇮🇱 It has contributed to laying the groundwork for shutting down free speech and increase the weaponisation of the accusation. I wrote an article on the dangers of this below:
Congress opportunistically redefining antisemitism (6 Dec 2023):
Political Action Committee (PAC) Funding
Money talks of course.
Funding from political lobby groups is by far the greatest influence in US politics and spread across both parties.
The pro-Israeli lobby in America is the largest contributor of funds to political candidates. Of the 400 members of Congress 80% of them have been given funds by pro-Israeli organisations.
There are registers of members interests where donations to individual Members of Congress can be reviewed and tracked but there are also huge donations to political parties by megadonors.
All political lobby groups no matter their organisational legal status or broader activities - must be registered and reported under “Political Action Committee” legislation.
The largest and most powerful lobbying group in the US across all issues (including the NRA lobby) is the America Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC).
They are clear on their stated aims with regard to lobbying and transparent on donations.
This gives clarity in cause and effect.
With the current crisis the direct correlation between AIPAC funding of political candidates and their advocacy is becoming painfully transparent.
Fortunately there are various monitoring groups that are calling out the hypocrisy:
Political funding monitoring group - OpenSecrets.Org
Social Media activism and monitoring - TrackAIPAC with highly effective Infographics posted on politicians timelines post pro-Israeli pronouncements, virally shared, increasing the transparency.
Note: the figures in PAC funding are only disclosed contributions to individual politicians.
What is not included are:
“dark money” - where the source of funding is not disclosed (and legally protected)8
donations not to individual politicians but to political parties - see next section - a Jewish billionaire donating $424M over a 5 year period to the Republican Party.
AIPAC 2024: Direct action to install pro-Israel candidates
AIPAC had vowed to target “The Squad” - a progressive group of Congressmen speaking out on Israel’s actions, the elephant in the room.
So far they have targeted:
Jamaal Bowman (NY-16 DEM) - ousted July 2024 ($20M spend in total - staggering)
Bob Good (Virginia-5 REP) - ousted July 2024 by pro-Israeli lobby backed candidate (AIPAC and RJC)
Cori Bush (Missouri-1 DEM) - ousted August 2024 ($9M spend - will be more when records come in)
Ilan Omar (Minnesota-5 DEM) - targeted with hugely AIPAC funded opponent but prevailed
AIPAC funds these candidates through its transaction arm the generically named “United Democracy Project”.
This is the most transparent corruption of US politics for Congress members to tow the line.
Jamaal Bowman (NY-16 DEM) ousted
AIPAC promoted a new candidate George Latimer to campaign against Congressman Jamaal Bowman.
In November he was flown to Israel to meet President Hertzog.
AIPAC laterally spent $15M on his primary - the most EVER spent on a primary election covering 90% of his funding. Plus soft funding through indirect attack ads, people out on the streets - Latimer won by 17%.
Bob Good (Virginia-5 DEM) - ousted
The lobby of course works both sides of the House - any slight dissent against Israel is the factor to remove with heavy funded and influenced campaigns.
Good lost his seat to John McGuire - a candidate heavily backed by both the Republican Jewish Coalition and AIPAC.9
The ultra right-wing Senator was targeted for his insistence on attaching conditions to emergency funding to Israel.
“Let there be no doubt that the Republican Jewish Coalition means it when we say: If you stand against the Jewish community, if you stand against America’s strategic ally Israel, the RJC will work to defeat you,” the RJC said Tuesday in a statement, noting that it had also opposed Good-backed candidates who lost in Nebraska, Texas and West Virginia in earlier primaries this year.
It would appear there are more direct targets on the Republican side for the upcoming Election.
Cori Bush (Missouri-1 DEM) ousted
After another hugely funded campaign - both $9M at least in direct funding from AIPAC plus soft funding through heavy media, print and bill advertising - Bush was unseated from Missouri by Wesley Bell by 51% to 46%.10
Bell is the perfect candidate - a black leader with staunch support for Israel11.
And AIPAC claim to be strengthening democracy with their chutzpah 2024 social media campaign as the light is shone on them - the blatant bias and agenda in full view - and people not happy.12
Ilan Omar (Minesotta-5 DEM) - prevails
Omar prevailed in her Minnesota Primary winning comfortably against Don Samuels.
Notably - AIPAC strategically decided to stay out of the race - noting they had spend a six-figure sum on Samuels in 2022 who failed to beat Omar then.13 AIPAC tried to recruit an alternative candidate this time around saying Samuels had “reached capacity” but failed to do so.
One strong voice in Congress - no doubt funds held back for Tlaib.
AIPAC: Rep. Thomas Massie reveals “Your AIPAC guy” and a tragic coincidence
It is a well known fact that AIPAC lobbyists are all over Washington - pursued down the corridors of power and challenged as they seem to be very regular visitors.
An outspoken Republican Congressman Thomas Massie from Kentucky has taken a stand and frequently called out AIPAC political funding and influence, and has voted against funding Israel at every opportunity.
Recently on June 10th 2024 he made detailed revelations on Tucker Carlson about how AIPAC operates, stunning Carlson and confirming the structured and methodical control that is denied.
On June 30th the Massie’s returned from a family vacation and his wife Rhonda Massie died suddenly. At this time no details have been announced - other than she was a relatively young 51 and it was completely unexpected.
I do hate a salacious conspiracy theory but this isn’t passing. If Mossad can literally go and threaten the previous ICC Prosecutor for pursuing a 2014 case against Israel (see further down on the recent Congress Bill against the ICC to pre-emptively protect Israel from arrest warrants) then I wouldn’t put it past them to nip in the bud an even more important strategic source for them - the root of all funding and political power and therefore expediency.
Short video of the interview below but a longer video (3m) is here and more tellingly full transcript following.
Full Transcript of longer interview
Carlson: “[so there are representatives] of a foreign government playing in our political campaigns openly?”
Massie: “Openly in that uh they are showing you they're doing it but opaquely in that you can't track it because they're not registered.”
Carlson: “Is there any other Republican who has your views on this?”
Massie: “Well I have Republicans who come to me on the floor and say ‘I wish I could vote with you today - yours is the right vote but I would just take too much flak back home’.
And I have Republicans who come to me and say ‘that's wrong what AIPAC is doing to you - let me talk to my AIPAC person’.
By the way everybody but me has an AIPAC person”
Carlson": “what does that mean an AIPAC person?”
Massie: “It's like your babysitter - your AIPAC babysitter who is always talking to you for AIPAC. They're probably a constituent in your District but they are firmly embedded in AIPAC and every member has something like this.
I don't know how it works on the Democrat side but that's how it works on the Republican side.
When they and when they come to DC you go have lunch with them and they've got your cell number and you have conversations with them”.
Carlson: “that's absolutely crazy”
Massie: “I've had four members of Congress say ‘I'll talk to my AIPAC person’ - and it's really what we call them my AIPAC guy - ‘I'll talk to my AIPAC guy and see if I can get him to you you know dial Those ads back’ ”
Carlson: “why have I never heard this before?”
Massie: “it doesn't benefit anybody why would they want to tell their constituents that they've basically got a buddy system with somebody who's representing a foreign country.
It doesn't benefit the congressman for people to know that so they're not going to tell you that.”
Carlson: “have you seen any other country do anything like this like Russia? ‘Russia obviously determines the outcome of our elections’ - we keep hearing that. Does anyone have a Putin guy that they talk to?”
Massie: “not only do they not have a Putin guy - they don't have a Britain guy, they don't have an Australian guy, they don't have a Germany dude - it's the only country that does this that has somebody uniformly.
I guarantee there's some spreadsheet at AIPAC where the AIPAC dude is who's matched up with the Congressman, then all the congressman's votes on the issue - oh has the Congressman been to Israel.
They pay for trips for Congressmen and their spouses to go to Israel. I'm not the only Republican who hasn't taken the AIPAC trip to Israel but I'm probably one of a dozen that hasn't taken that trip and the other ones just haven't got around to it”
Billionaire MegaDonors
There are many rich individuals who donate directly to political parties. In 2021 USA Today reviewed media moguls revealing millions of dollars of donations including Bob Iger of Walt Disney, David Zaslav of Warner Bros (the highest paid Executive in Hollywood) and Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook14.
By far the greatest political donor to the Republican Party is the Adelson Foundation a family foundation to “strengthen the State of Israel” run by late Jewish business magnate Sheldon Adelson and his wife Miriam.
Sheldon’s widow Miriam Adelson is a billionaire and the richest Israeli in the world. The Foundation is a long-term “megadonor” to the Republican Party and described as “Kingmakers”. They supported and heavily funded Trump’s 2016 election and between 2016 and 2021 gave over $424M to the Republican Party15.
Adelson controversially funded an Occupied Territory new university, the Ariel University. A University “to benefit all” yet named after the former Israeli PM who visited Al-Aqsa Mosque in 2000 triggering the second intifada - provocative in the least.16
Adelson returned the following year with various Republicans he had funded in tow including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to receive an honorary fellowship from the University.
Miriam Adelson was controversially presented with America’s top Honour, the Medal of Freedom, the following year to intense criticism17.
Notably Trump then took a staunch pro-Israeli position announcing a move of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in 2017 enacted the following year.
Presumably Adelson will also be heavily bankrolling Trump in the current 2024 campaign.
In addition to political donations the Adelson Foundation funds global programs targeted at developing pro-Israel advocacy in youth outside of Israel:
Macabee Task Force - a US-based not-for-profit furthering pro-Israeli advocacy on US college campuses and also funds national Jewish student groups in other regions for similar outcomes (in Australia Macabee funds the Australasian Union of Jewish Students networked across ANZ Universities)
Birthright Israel which provides free trips to Israel for young people 18-26 globally to encourage migration to Israel at the grass roots level
Post October 7th Miriam Adelson was interviewed in a Forbes Israel article18 and essentially described anyone supporting the Palestinian cause as:
“If you condemn Hamas and then add a “but” followed by condemnation of Israel, you’re dead to us”
and calling for
“…we must disavow and shame them, deny them employment and public office, defund their colleges and political parties…”
Is furthering this objective and speaking out on behalf of Israel a precondition of receiving Adelson Foundation funding?
Other Billionaires
Other billionaires funding Super PACs to fund candidates and negative campaigning against others.
In seats where Democrats would be likely to win the pro-Israeli lobby focuses on the Democratic candidate pool. Democratic candidates are funded in primaries who are sympathetic to Israel to run against progressive sitting Democrats.
The greatest victory for AIPAC in 2022 was to reset Andy Levin from his House seat in Michigan. Levin was one of the most prominent Jewish members of the house and a former synagogue president but he had indicated support for a two-state solution. He was replaced by a non-Jewish Israel sympathetic candidate Haley Stevens19.
Republican Billionaires who have done this:
Steve Schwarzman CEO of Private Equity house announced in May 2024 he is backing Trump due to “the rise of antisemitism” (re. criticism of Israel). Schwarzman notably was a business policy and trade adviser to Trump during his office. Conflict of interest - private equity billionaire as an adviser??20
Charles Schwab Chairman of Charles Schwab Corporation: Republican donor who also contributes to various right wing causes.21 He donated millions of dollars to Republicans over the years including for Trump’s inauguration securing a position at the White House for his grand daughter Samantha Schwab.
Bernard Marcus: ex-CEO of Home Depot; gave $7M to Trump in 2016 and $1M to Trump directly in 2020 and $10M to PACs supporting Trump. He has signed a pledge to give 50% of his funding back to Israel related causes.
Bob Kraft: New England Patriots owner; gave $1M to Trump; pulled funding from Columbia over pro-Palestine protests and organised other Jewish funders to pull funding.
Paul Singer: hedge fund manager, largest contributor to Republic PAC National Republican Senatorial Committee. He funds the pro-Israel Christian organisation The Philos Project and other pro-Israel causes.
Jan Koum: founder WhatsApp. Donated over $10M to right-wing Israel causes Macabee Task Force, Friends of Israel David, Central Fund of Israel.
Jonathon Jacobson: Financier - gave $2.5M funding last year UDP against pro-Palestine Democratic incumbents.
David Zalik: Israeli entrepreneur gave $2M funding to UDP.
Jeff Yass: Fund Manager, largest 2024 donator of $46M to GOP PACs ($30M in 2020, $5M 2016) inc. $6M to Texas Governor Greg Abbott (“the largest single contribution in Texan history”). Yass does own most of TikTok so perhaps he can persuade Trump on election to reverse the proposed ban!22 Yass donated over $16M to right wing anti-Muslim and pro-Israel groups advocating for a US war with Iran23. He is also the biggest funder of a campaign to oust Republican pro-Palestine incumbent Summer Lee.
The above list of political donators is from The Guardian24 and also The Slate and New Yorker. These are the biggest donators in US Politics - and the common denominator is that every single one of the biggest donators to political funding in US Politics is pro-Israeli.25.
Money talks and the biggest funding of candidates will usually get the result (wouldn’t it be nice if that money was spent on things that make a humanitarian difference?).
But like the protestors out on campus against already pro-Israeli Congress who are not accountable to public opinion - is this right?
A huge demographic of incredibly rich people all dedicated to supporting Israel and getting rid of voices of dissent in the law making body, against public and world opinion.
This is vicious circle. It’s transparent but what can you do - short of a foreign influence campaign funds law, or Foreign Agents Registration with the Department of Justice of AIPAC (good luck to the last person who tried FARA registration with AIPAC - Kennedy!).
Anti-Defamation League: concerns fast-tracked to legislation
The Anti Defamation League (ADL) is a long established organisation in the US whose primary mission was combatting antisemitism.
The ADL has been criticised for having a heavily right-wing and very much pro-Israeli agenda26 and have conflated criticism of Israel with antisemitism for many years, becoming only too transparent now. Ironic that fighting true antisemitism was the remit of the original organisation The Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith.
Congress seems to immediately respond to concerns raised by the (ADL) which are fast-tracked through to legislation, working together with AIPAC.
Political scientist John Mearsheimer writes on the lobby in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs in April 202427 noting:
“the lobby is the primary reason US politicians continue to overwhelmingly support Israel despite growing alarm among Americans regarding its actions”
adding
“the key to understanding how the lobby works is that they focus most of their attention on the elites. What they're really interested in doing is putting tremendous pressure on people who formulate policy, both in the Executive Branch and in Congress”
James Zogby, the founder and president of the Arab American Institute is quoted in the article saying
“… AIPACs campaign contributions have two purposes:
to reward candidates who vote their way” and
as “a cudgel that is used to keep people in line,” citing AIPAC’s past attack ads against Sen. Bernie Sanders, Rep. Summer Lee and Rep. Jamaal Bowman (Case in Point: Bowman ousted in June 2024 with AIPAC funded campaign - the most expensive primary in history: see AIPAC 2024: Direct action to install a pro-Israel candidate )
This image (with some questionable spelling!) gives an illustratory relative view of funding underscores a fairly logical return on investment:
Interestingly the article notes the America Israel Education Foundation - a sister organisation to AIPAC - funds trips for politicians to Israel, and is “considered a right of passage for Congress”.
The operating model of funded politician trips to Israel is precisely the same in Australia via the Australia Israel Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC - an affiliated organisation with the American Jewish Committee) albeit less visible and on a targeted basis.
For a more detailed article on pro-Israeli lobbying in Australia see here:
ADL use of own inflated hate crime statistics
We hear about the huge increase in antisemitism the argument used by the ADL to pressure Congress to pass multiple motions and even legislation to combat the issue.
On reviewing the statistics quoted by the ADL and the only official FBI data reveals:
The ADL makes up its own data which is inflated and this is what is quoted by the ADL, politicians and media
Using OFFICIAL data - Muslim and anti-Arab hate crime is in fact a greater issue than antisemitism
The bottom line - Muslim & Arab American hate has been a larger issue than Antisemitism over a 10 year period.
Let that sink in.
The official Government data provided by the FBI shows that statistically Islamophobia is a bigger issue than antisemitism
ADLs proprietary data which it produces itself grossly inflates the antisemitism figures and cannot be cross referenced with other populations to validate statistical significance (even assuming those populations used exactly the same capture methodology which they would not)
Other minority groups likely do not have the resources or time to run proprietary surveys and data capture as the ADL do even if they wanted to.
Regardless a central source of truth using consistent data needs to be used for comparison and that must be the FBI store.
How can a case be made for exceptional treatment as a minority population when claims are based off statistics that cannot be compared with other populations to justify the exceptional measures?
Who actually questions these stats? Clearly not the media or politicians.
For a review of the statistical data behind this if required see article below:
Statistic review of official religious hate crime statistics:
Jewish Americans Opposing AIPAC
There is a huge backlash against AIPAC currently noting the irrefutable connection between the voting in unison between both major Parties with very few exceptions on favourable pro-Israeli issues cross referenced with the fact every single one of the members voting has taken huge funds from the pro-Israeli lobby.
Various groups have sprung up and various petition groups have sprung up including Jewish Americans Opposing AIPAC.
Perhaps another one for the ADL to add to their monitoring list together with Jewish Voices for Peace and Students for Justice for Palestine, those “long-tracked, problematic organisations”.
One unbiased Congressman
On 21st April Congressman Jonathan L. Jackson of Illinois District 1 tweeted in honesty the situation in Gaza after Congress voted for a $17Bn aid package to Israel in the face of unparalleled transnational aggression and domestic genocide.
The responses to his tweet are shocking - no longer “but Hamas” - blind hatred.
🇺🇸🇮🇱💰🏛️ Out of interest, I had a look at the other Illinois Representatives (not Senators) and noted 13 out of 17 were funded by AIPAC two in particular very heavily:
Jackson is in his first term ... so watch how much 💰💰AIPAC dump on the other candidates for his place at the Election (together with the 3 Muslim Representatives in the House - note: wonder how AIPAC and pro-Israeli lobby political funding tracker TrackAIPAC will do just that for candidates also).
Israeli Influence Hiding in Plain Sight and changing the laws as quickly as they can whilst there's some momentum and hysteria from the media. Top-down enforcement of a foreign power’s influence against the clear will of the people protesting for humanity. Shame.
And if you weren’t clear on direction - from the horse’s mouth
And after the ICC announce the intention to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu in May - the US Congress responds with sanctions on the ICC judges and their families and then invites Netanyahu himself to address a joint session of Congress.28
July 24th. Bit noisy that one.
🏛️ CONGRESS: Bills and Motions passed addressing perceived antisemitism or assisting Israel
The follow are a list of examples of the disproportionate number of highly visible high-impact motions and legislation bills that bipartisan are passed through Congress.
Organised by category, and then reverse-chronological order to see the building pattern:
Shutting down free speech
The Ultimate Bill: Creating a Federal Israel-defined “Antisemitism” Department in Government
Aid Package Bills
Exceptionally these are often passed through at short notice - and the issues addressed are often aired publicly (or behind closed doors by ADL).
Considering the majority of the House receives funding from AIPAC - how could you possibly not draw a direct correlation?
Note: This list is constantly being updated as the goalposts are shifted. You can see the building pattern here.
SHUTTING DOWN FREE SPEECH
9 Jul 2024: Meta censor criticism of Israel: criticising Zionism defined as antisemitic - six weeks after the US Government Special Envoy calls social media companies into a meeting to discuss
And there we have it. Six weeks after the US Special Envoy on Antisemitism calls a global media conference with Meta et al to discuss cracking down on antisemitism online - as defined by the envoy - Meta put a ban in place.
Here’s it the announcement by Meta - defining “Zionism” as a proxy for hate speech.29
“…claims about controlling the media….” - at what point does statistical inference kick in to link cause and effect?
You can bet your bottom dollar that the pro-Israeli (a term I always use that it bound to be antisemitic now through inference) censorship teams will be mass-reporting posts to Meta for removal, the ones not cut by the bots.
And what about Islamophobia? The constant reference to those protesting at Israel’s indiscriminate bombing as “rapist apologists” and “terrorist sympathisers”. Should it not be illegal to refer to Palestinians as a terrorist monolith and by extension same criticism of peace protestors?
Interestingly - on the day the Meta announcement went out - I suddenly had a strike and video banned on TikTok that was previously posted on Facebook, Instagram, X with no issues on the ADL statistics - a factual note as defined in this article with more detail backing up including methodology and working in another article.
The crux being: the ADL defined “antisemitism” from Oct 8th to included criticism of Israel - so of course by their own stats & definition it is going to “rise”.
Is the TikTok censorship a function of:
a) The ADL realising that actually banning TikTok in the US will be a complex long and protracted legal process as earlier proposal then US 15 March Bill.
b) The primary owner of TikTok being a prominent anti-Muslim/pro-Israel fund manager Jeff Yass, also the biggest 2024 donator to the Republican Party.
27 Jun 2024 - Genocide Denial Bill: Congress votes to prevent the Department of State from quoting death and casualty rates in Gaza
Yep. Sneaked in as an amendment on a foreign aid appropriate Bill.
Amendment H.Amdt.1052 by AIPAC-sponsored Rep. Senator Jared Moskowitz on Bill HR.8771 “Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2025“.
Voted in 261 to 144, breakdown here.
“prohibit funds appropriated by this act from being made available for the State Department to cite statistics obtained from the Gaza Health Ministry”
Noting these are the only statistics available and quoted by the UN - and are most probably vastly understated.
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib: ““My colleagues don’t even want to acknowledge that Palestinians exist … not even when they’re dead”30
Just inhuman.
21 Jun 2024 - Wiki Ban now coming because the ADL doesn’t like questioning of their “statistics” ?
The ADL going after Wiki for questioning their antisemitism data31. There is no irony here. Despite ADL’s own staff resigning in January over the misrepresentation of data and the damage the pro-Israel representation does to the organisation’s credibility.
Usual route - slick campaign out to members with links to petition. Petition passed to AIPAC funded Congress member (take your pick) along with “statistics” infographic package.
I predict a “coincidental” Bill appearing in Congress suddenly sanctioning or regulating Wiki in some way as they magically did with TikTok. Watch this space.
24 May 2024 - US Hosting Global Symposium summoning social media companies for “antisemitism in social media” - which definition of antisemitism?
Not a domestic law per se but it might as well be - one will be coming.
This is the US attempt to circumnavigate international institutions to push the pro-Israeli lobby definition of anti-semitism.
With further exceptionalism in March 2022 a brand new position in the US State Department was created - the “Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism”.
The Symposium was called with representatives from social media companies and multiple Jewish NGOs - with the following vague commitment:
“taking independent actions to address antisemitism on their respective platforms, including establishing dedicated expert positions on policy teams, implementing antisemitism training for key personnel, and increasing transparency by publicly reporting on trends in antisemitic content”
Though this is not legally binding, and a voluntary initiative you can bet your bottom dollar the US State Department with a strong global pro-Israeli lobby will be pressuring these companies more and more to “comply”.
And I wonder specifically what definition of antisemitism is being used? If IHRA - then it would ban all criticism of Israel.
Also with the recent heated exchanges on pro-Palestinian language - will social media companies now be screening for:
from the river to the sea
intifada
etc. etc.
We will see.
I predict the next one here will be a follow on Congressional Committee with social media companies in the US to force them to comply domestically - since the IHRA definition is being legally pushed elsewhere.
Addendum 10 July: “ you can bet your bottom dollar the US State Department with a strong global pro-Israeli lobby will be pressuring these companies more and more to “comply” - well that didn’t take long - with the Meta censorship some six weeks later posted up the page.
2 May 2024 - Legally imposing IHRA definition of antisemitism on Universities: Shut down freedom of protest
This is a shameful response to the peaceful protests on US College campuses - literally shifting the goalposts so students cannot criticise Israel.
Bill HR.6090 was introduced by NY Republican Mike Lawler (AIPAC funded: $185,540) on 26th October 2023 and was rapidly passed through on 2nd May in response to perceived unrest in campus protest camps. A calculated reaction doubling-down on Trump’s 2019 Executive Order to extend IHRA to Federal Government32.
They didn’t like language criticising Israel. Literally.
The bill legally imposes the IHRA definition of antisemitism on educational institutions in applying their disciplinary procedures to students on campus.
The IHRA definition basically outlaws criticism of Israel - never mind the actual interpretation of chants (intifada, from the river) - but that legislation will be coming soon.
IHRA Contemporary Examples and extending the logic proposed
The IHRA definition contains “contemporary examples” of antisemitism - many of which are indisputably antisemitism and repulsive including Holocaust denial.
However the troubling ones are more general.
It is VERY clear that the protests are NOT against Jewish people worldwide - a logical conclusion;
Still the protests are conflated with antisemitism. It’s anti-Israel.
The reality of course is:
It is NOT Jewish people protesting against (which WOULD be antisemitic)
It is protesting against Israel Government policy, and therefore disagreeing with those that blindly support Israeli Government policy no matter what (pro-Israeli supporters) - direct cheerleaders and enablers (e.g. University research ties, AIPAC-Funded politicians, those bribing institutions by threatening to remove funding unless a pro-Israel position is taken)
Therefore in the contemporary examples given in IHRA - to see what they are really talking about banning, in the language of IHRA substitute the word “Jew” with “Pro-Israeli Supporter” and you get the below:
Seriously?
By contrast, consider the definition put forward by 100 prominent Jewish leaders from the Israel & Antisemitism Task Force33. They met specifically to discuss the intersection between Judaism and Zionism (“Nexus”) to help clarify the issue - and provided the definitions to President Biden in defining his 2023 strategy.
This is the distilled clarity they have produced:
This is the reality that should be used - in addition to shutting down the accusations of making statements about all Jewish people collectively - when it is clearly against Israeli State Government Policy - the current murderous Gaza crisis and the indisputably racist apartheid laws applied in the country.
2023 European Study of the impacts of IHRA on College Campuses
To illustrate the impacts of this - a study was conducted in 2023 in Europe which gives insight into the issues here.
The European Legal Support Centre - an NGO monitoring the legality of free speech on Palestine in the EU - produced two reports on legal violations of free speech and right of assembly, citing generalisations of interpretation of the IHRA definition.
Violating the rights to freedom of expression and assembly
in the European Union and the UK (June 2023)34
Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom in UK Higher Education: The Adverse Impact of the IHRA Definition of Antisemitism (Sep 2023)35
Both reports look at 96 cases studies between them over a 5 year period between 2017 and 2022 and conclude adoption of the IHRA definition leads to suppression of freedom of speech in its “catch all” phrasing.
This is off the back of an open letter to the UN General Secretary in April 2023 from 104 human rights organisations, raising concerns on the IHRA definition and possible use by the UN making it more difficult to call out human rights violations.36
2016 Legal Review of the UK Government acknowledgement of IHRA
The IHRA definition - which is merely a non-legally binding working definition “acknowledged” by institutions - is problematic because it conflates criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
This was noted by one of the world’s foremost human rights lawyers Geoffrey Robinson AO KC in 2016 when the UK Government under David Cameron acknowledged the definition.
Robinson wrote a 28 page legal review outlining the problems that the British Government would have working with the definition “ANTI-SEMITISM: THE IHRA DEFINITION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES FOR FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION”.37 It makes for interesting reading, quote below from a later interview:
You won’t be able to accuse Israel of being an Apartheid state
Specifically the right to call out Israel’s Apartheid ('“calling Israel a racist state” is against IHRA). So who has said Israel is an Apartheid State:
The ICJ Case 186 Feb 2024: 50 Countries gave evidence at the ICJ case on the impact on Palestinians of Israel’s occupation. MULTIPLE countries called out Israel’s Apartheid Regime.
The United Nations rapporteurs: called out multiple times in their reports to the UN over the years (not that Israel lets them on their territory to review)
Independent International Commission of Inquiry (COI) UN Human Rights Council: Source Report A/78/198 The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel: Latest Report 5 Sep 202338
UN Office of Human Rights: Source Report A/78/545 Situation of human rights in the Palestinian Territories occupied since 1967 (20 October 2023)39
Amnesty International: detailed 2022 “Israel’s Apartheid against Palestinians: Cruel System of Domination and Crime against Humanity”40
B’TSelem NGO: 2021 report “Why Israel Meets the Apartheid Threshold”41.
Coded Protests? Welcome to the United States of Israel. Or the People’s Republic of the United States.
So in order to protest - are protestors in the “democratic” United States of America now going to have to adopt the measures in Palestine on Israel’s crackdown?
Just as the watermelon image was adopted in lieu of the Palestinian flag, is coded language going to now have to be used in lieu of certain outlawed phrases? Similar to China’s monitoring of Chinese social media and how people get round this using certain phrases.
Unbelievable.
Who Voted?
A lot more Congress people voted AGAINST the Bill including many Republicans citing just the above concerns on free speech but it still went through 320-91 (18 not voting)42.
Republican Nays (21):
US: Against World Opinion again
So in the face of the above opinions on IHRA, the Apartheid nature of the Israeli regime and the consensus votes in the United Nations General Assembly against Israel - the US - over a barrel by Israel - goes against global opinion again.
If there was ever a more blatant heavy handed imposition of the silencing of free speech - this is it.
Just wait until you see the new Government Department for “Antisemitism” applied below to apply this across the rest of Civil Society. No joke.
Israel has played the master-stroke of getting onside the right-wing Nazis who used to be truly antisemitic to support them in demonising humanitarian protestors and make illegal criticism of them as a State.
Welcome to America.
April 2024 - Resolution - non-legally binding - on “from the River to the Sea” chant and cynical timing
And sure enough … whilst the above Bill goes through Congress - a Motion was put on the floor on the “From the River Chant” as antisemitic - and duly passed.
This is on top of earlier motions in December and as above … seeding the ground for later legislation on these words. Despite Netanyahu presenting a map in the UN in September 2023 showing just Israel in “The New Middle East”.
The Motion
H.RES.883 was introduced by Republican Anthony D’Sotta of NYC - who is sponsored by AIPAC together with 20 cosponsors also funded by AIPAC43. This echoes an earlier Motion introduced in The Senate (S.RES.497) by Senator Tom Cotton also sponsored by AIPAC.
The Bill goes further than decrying a slogan as antisemitic - which it is not (calling for peace and equality in a geographic area - see article here in the context of weaponising antisemitism). It is poorly written, opinionated - which is the point of a Motion but not written like this.
First off - tucked away on page 4 the real driver behind this bill backed up with AIPAC money:
With the motive of shutting down discourse.
Selected points:
Hamas Condemnation Motion: - the Motion condemns Hamas in great detail which is a central tenet of the Bill. It’s like getting out frustration for what wasn’t in any UN Resolutions on the floor of Congress.
Conflates “Jewish” with “Israeli”: calls Oct 7th attack against the “Jewish” people. It was the Israeli people. Many Jewish people do not consider the actions of the state representative of them never mind an attack.
Questionable salacious detail - carefully worded: “REPORTEDLY … beheaded babies .. “
Nonsensical excuse to mention hostages: “Whereas this slogan neglects the fact that innocent civilians are used as human shields by Hamas”..
Supposition and Assumption:
“this cry CAN promote violence …against the Jewish community globally”
“this slogan incites fear within the Jewish community in the US and around the world”
Generalisation and Demonisation:
Generalisation/Supposition/Demonisation: “slogan used by same people who utter “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” - implication: terrorists or pro-Palestinian protestors in America? Seeds it for the “U-S-A” crowd
Demonisation of Students, Supposition of Jewish student impact and characterisation of VIOLENT PROTESTORS - as a small subset.
And finally:
Israeli Deaths regretted / Nothing on Palestinian- the Motion goes into great detail on Israeli Deaths - whilst not acknowledging the deaths of any Palestinians
An utter ridiculous Motion that might as well have been written by the Israeli Ambassador to the UN as a statement.
Background on the Motion and Timing
The timing of the Motion is awful. Off the back of Iran launching missiles in a “phony war” pre-announced, staged to be shot down measured as ineffective “attack” on Israel - in response to attacking a sovereign Consulate in Syria - the House introduced a suite of Bills sanctioning Israel.
Whilst Israel appeared to have the moral high ground after the Iranian response - the motion was passed with a suite of anti-Iran sanctions.
On Israel’s original attack on the Iranian Embassy in Syria - it was a calculated and cynical move:
To deflect attention from Gaza: from the continuing slaughter of civilians, but after the 1st April murder of western aid workers.
To try to draw the US in to open conflict with Iran by provoking them (the US said they would NOT attack Iran with Israel in response… but clearly these bills a softer for Netanyahu)
On that second point … the last time an aggressive nation attacked a sovereign state territory in order to provoke a regional war was 1991 - ironically Saddam Hussein back against the wall - launching Scud missiles into Israel. Israel themselves had the same calculation here44.
The Vote and Impact
Back on the Motion.
Although the motion passed (377-44)- as people get wise to AIPAC’s control and as Israel’s behaviour in Gaza is revealed - with many more votes against that the motion in December at the height of “antisemitism” hysteria - 43 Democrats and 1 Republican45.
This Motion has the same goal - to shut down pro-Palestine rallies and give a “moral” reference point in the House. Who cares about the difference between legally binding and non-legally binding, the timing of the motion with a suite of other measures and the influence of AIPAC on voting?
15 March 2024: Bill to ban Tik Tok - identified as a major threat to the pro-Israeli agenda
A recording reputing to be the voice of the CEO of the Anti Defamation League was leaked in which he heavily denounces TikTok as the tool turning a generation against the pro-Israeli cause, requiring focused effort to “solve” and also confirms monitoring of named pro-Palestine groups “that we’ve long tracked and have long been problematic”.
It is unclear of the date of the recording but October 7th is mentioned so clearly this is in the last six months.
The two pro-Palestine groups named specifically in the recording were banned suddenly at Columbia University in November 2023 citing a rule-change that the University had made in their policies 17 days earlier behind closed doors without announcement or consultation.
“… and so WE REALLY HAVE A TIKTOK PROBLEM ... A Gen Z problem that our community needs to put the same brains that gave us all these other amazing innovations, need to PUT OUR ENERGY TOWARD THIS LIKE FAST …
…because again like we've been chasing this left right divide it's the wrong game the real game is the NEXT GENERATION and the Hamas and their accomplices…
the USEFUL IDIOTS IN THE WEST are falling in line in ways that are terrifying
last thing I'll just say we saw a dramatic change in the language of the activists here in America on October the 8th the language of groups that WE'VE LONG TRACKING WHO'VE LONG BEEN PROBLEMATIC like Students For Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voices For Peace they flipped like this and went to like Iranian propaganda….”
On March 16 2024 a Bill was RAPIDLY passed in Congress to ban TikTok in the US unanimously by both parties. It is currently in the Senate for review46.
It has been pointed out that accelerating a bill through Congress so quickly coincidentally with his comments indicates a rapid response by the Government in stark contrast not seen for long-standing critical domestic issues that would greatly benefit Americans.
The vast majority of members across both parties voting on the legislation had taken funding from pro-Israeli Lobby groups.
And sure enough on 24th April 2024 bundled up with a Bill to fund Ukraine, the President signed the TikTok ban into law.
Owners Bytedance have 9 months to sell the company to a US-owned company with servers based onshore in the US or they will be shut down and banned in the US47.
Unbelievable.
Surely Bills like these need to go through rounds of committee review before being passed into law? The reality is the other way round and (hopefully) longer. Legal action and appeal to the Supreme Court may take years in response to the ban.
Although I suspect somehow the backlog may clear at the Supreme Court to make a ruling here the same empirical way Congress bipartisan rushes through legislation proposed by the ADL months earlier.
Interestingly - here’s Professor John Mearsheimer’s take on Tik Tok and the bigger picture from an offensive realist perspective:48
December 2023: Motion equating criticism of Zionism as antisemitism
The non-binding motion in the house equating anti-Zionism as anti-semitism as above, discussed in a speech given by CEO Jonathan Greenblatt in March 202349 during which he also denounced Palestine rights groups in the US as “extremist” - noting this was over six months before the current conflict.
The Ultimate Bill: Creating a Federal Israel-defined “Antisemitism” Department in Government
This is the one to worry about.
9th April 2024 - THE ULTIMATE Pro-Israeli Lobby Bill - “Countering Antisemitism Act”
The most concerning measure yet in summary:
Institutionalising Israeli Influence: Essentially making anti-Israeli speech illegal by Federal Law (couched in “antisemitism”) and creating new Government Departments to police
Note: This Bill is so impacting long-term for Israel influence in the US that I will later take this out into its’ own article. Surprised at the lack of Press coverage here.
On 9th April 2024 a new bill was introduced into Congress by Senator Jacky Rosen. Senate Legislative Bill S.4091 is described simply as “A bill to strengthen Federal efforts to counter antisemitism in the United States” and proposes a structure that would effectively embed exceptionalism of one minority group into the United States Government.
The Bill has also been sponsored by six staunchly pro-Israeli politicians who have received jointly $2,330,477 from pro-Israeli lobby groups including Katherine Manning (received $550,806 from the lobby50) who Chairs the already existing Bipartisan Task Force to Counter Antisemitism.
This group - explicitly dedicated to counter Antisemitism across politicians - has existed since the 1990s but seems to be in for a long-haul campaign here with a new Twitter Account set up in March 202451.
Main Proposals
The Bill would create a new Government Departments, and new roles and activities:
Create a new Federal Government Department of Antisemitism: a new taxpayer funded Government Department with the new roles of a federal coordinator to oversee efforts to counter domestic antisemitism and create an interagency task force to coordinate the implementation of federal strategies.
New department conduct an analysis of antisemitism online.
New role in the Department of Education: to serve as advisor on the agency’s efforts to combat discrimination in higher education
Police the Campus: In the ADLs own words: “[the Bill will] address the scourge of antisemitism on college and university campuses across the country”
Provide additional Federal funding for Jewish security firms - via the Non-Profit Security Grant Program
New “Jewish Heritage Month” designated in May (it is already designated “Jewish AMERICAN Heritage Month” - the same format as other minority group months)
The Bill is couched simply as “Countering Antisemitism Act” and welcomed (not written of course!) by the ADL52.
The ADL themselves summarise the proposals in this document on their website:
Recap that the “justification” used for this Bill is the ADL’s own over-inflated data on anti-semitism. In fact at the end of the report on the “audit” data accompanying the Bill the ADL states:
“The 2023 Audit of Antisemitic Incidents documents historic levels of antisemitism in the United States which require a concerted whole-of- government, whole-of-society response”
The data is clearly not correct and completely self serving.
Why the ADL Data DOES NOT document “historic levels of antisemitism” as it claims
The data is so convoluted it is not open to fair comparison with other minority groups using standardised reported data - which shows Islamaphobia to be a greater problem.
Definition of Antisemitism is what suits ADL’s own Agenda (“ADL-Defined Antisemitism”):
Uses much broader definition of “antisemitism” via the IHRA definition - which takes into account political factors
Protest defined “antisemitic”: from October 7th - the definition was actually changed to specifically include “criticism of Israel” and “criticism of Zionism” - e.g. protest against war atrocities and protest against apartheid regime
So rather than “Antisemitism” this must be called “ADL-Defined Antisemitism”
Includes the not just real-world but online: vastly over-inflate numbers
Online ADL-Defined Antisemitism: it is easier to be a biased keyboard warrior than it is to commit a physical crime (as FBI Data)
Includes Multiple self-reporting channels open to bias - all internal to ADL:
Public reported ADL-Defined Antisemitism incidents to ADL direct (online form, email, phone)
Partner institution reported ADL-Defined Antisemitism incidents reported to those institutions and passed on to ADL:
BBYO
Community Security Initiative (CSI)
Community Security Service (CSS)
Chabad
Hillel International, Israel on Campus Coalition (ICC) - monitoring campus protests
Jewish Federations of North America
Secure Community Network (SCN)
Union of Reform Judaism
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Israeli American Council (IAC)
ADLs own creation of ADL-Defined Antisemitism incidents from other channels not in any of the above (bear with me):
ADL monitoring media outlets and recording ADL-Defined Antisemitism
ADL online monitoring and record ADL-Defined Antisemitism
This is quite staggering when you think about it. These are the numbers that all the AIPAC-funded politicians have readily available in press conferences and pretty infographics to justify this Bill.
It’s as ridiculous as asking the IDF to investigate themselves…
So the Bill is…
Relying on statistics produced by a minority group themselves, unverified and uncheckable, to…
Justify introduction of legislation to benefit that minority group, and…
Passed by politicians paid for by agents of that minority group.
The blatant skewing of this data to support a pro-Israel narrative should concern “the whole-of-society” expected to support it. And to present this as a “fait accompli” says a lot more about the people pushing it.
Issues:
Hate Crime Statistics Unreliable/Overstated - quite frankly contrived: Scandalously inaccurate.
Duplication - Antisemitism is already treated differently in multiple places in Government and Institutions. On March 30th 2022 there was even a brand new Government position ALREADY specifically created - the “Office of the Special Envoy To Monitor and Combat Antisemitism”53 throughout the world.
So with this specifically already in US Government, in particular an issue is…
Exceptionalism - With existing laws in place on Hate Crime and other provisions, Why does Antisemitism need to be treated differently with its own legislation? Other forms of bias do not have legislation associated with them specifically and as above there are already a number of measures in place Federally and also at the State level.
Government Department & New Role - not just changing speech in existing legislation to cover certain terms or symbols (e.g. recent change in Hate Speech in Australia specifically outlawing Nazi Salutes and Swaztikas) - the legislation proposes a whole new Government Department with Inter-Agency responsibilities with a whole level of specific reporting and bureaucracy. Why is this appropriate never mind needed for one particular bias in the US?
Definition of Antisemitism: exactly what definition of antisemitism would be policed by this new Department? In the UK as at April 2024 the pro-Israeli Lobbies are pushing the Police and the Government to use the IHRA definition to police pro-Palestinian rallies - conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism and making their job even harder never mind being incorrect.
Look at the definition of antisemitism the ADL use in their own data “criticism of Israel or criticism of Zionism” - is that political and State definition (Israeli atrocities, Israeli Apartheid laws) what is expected to be outlawed?
Pro-Israeli Language
On the definition of antisemitism - there was a non-legally binding Motion passed in Congress last December which equated anti-Zionism (criticism of Israel) with Antisemitism amongst other dangerous proposals affecting free speech.
The key points in the December Motion - which is now a “tested” reference point whether legislative or not at this point:
Defining Anti-zionism as antisemitism
“From The River to the Sea” interpreted as calling for the destruction of the State of Israel - and hence would be illegal hate speech
“Free Palestine”, “Free Gaza”, “Gaza will win” language implied as antisemitic
IHRA definition of antisemitism - legally adopting this in legislation - which is open to defining criticism of Israel as antisemitic
Many of the politicians who voted on this legislation - at the height of the hysteria and witch hunt around antisemitism in the US early December as a domestic political distraction and silencing tactic - felt pressured into voting. Hey, who’s going to vote against something that says “antisemitism” or explain the nuances to constituents?
See article below outlining the issues with this motion and precedent below, which now seems to be ringing true:
When you consider the ADL Data - including political criticism of Israel and Zionism - clearly the December motion was testing the waters for a definition. This is the legislative follow-up - effectively making specific anti-Israel language illegal with a legal enforcement and monitoring mechanism behind it.
US Government - Already heavily invested in combatting antisemitism and Islamaphobia is as much of an issue
So the question remains on the Bill to create a new anti-Government antisemitism inter-agency department - why do you need it?
In fact when you look into this it is clear that the US Government has already heavily invested in combatting antisemitism compared to other minority groups over and above need (APPENDIX B).
As noted - the true picture on the only reliably comparative data - reported by the FBI in a standard agreed legally defined format - is that on a tiny Muslim and Arab American population - Muslims/Arabs are experiencing a higher level of hate crime than antisemitism.
This has not been presented, has been understated or completely absent from debate.
And remember this is just REPORTED crime. A large number of Arab Muslims feel oppressed by authorities in particular with the US ongoing conflicts with Middle Eastern Countries. Who is to know the difference between an Iranian and a Jordanian speaking Arabic or even know that person’s religion?
If anything - Islamophobia and other forms of hate crime need investment in particular when so many other exceptional measures to combat antisemitism are already in place and frequently referenced in house motions and Bills.
There bill is clearly driven by the Israeli lobby political agenda.
Long reaching impact: Institutionalising Pro-Israeli Department in the Federal Government
This is a disturbing development. Considering the majority of Congress have taken funding from AIPAC and the speed they get legislation through the house - it’s clearly future planning to shut down pro-Palestinian free speech and in fact protect Zionism in law and mechanism.
Utterly preposterous.
However… perhaps the tide has turned post April 1st murder by the IDF of western aid workers - where a cross party of MPs are calling for an arms embargo to Israel.
Is it now acceptable to criticise and drill-down on antisemitism without recursively being called antisemitic?
Will politicians feel ready to speak out on this at the different stages of scrutiny rather than get railroaded like the motion?
You can only hope.
Update 22 April. President Biden slipped reference to the Bill into the end of his lengthy Passover Statement54:
Aggressively implement - with the level of scrutiny and questioning above I would hope to reveal the true purpose of the Bill and long term implications for Free Speech.
AID PACKAGE BILLS
May 14th 2024: Making it illegal to stop unconditional arms shipments to Israel
What in the actual f*ck?
So on Israel yet again ignoring world opinion and the previously stated ‘red line’ of invading the refugees camps of Rafah with 1.3M people packed in which would be a murderous slaughter - Joe Biden grew a pair and finally took symbolic action - and paused a small bomb shipment to Israel.55
About a week later he planned to authorise yet another $1Bn arms shipment56.
But to have the audacity to pause the weapons…
Congress have just passed SPECIFIC legislation for Israel to ensure:
no weapons shipment to Israel can ever be delayed in future, and if is is we will hold Federal funding for … ah … running the United States until the delivery is made
Again - what the actual f*ck? This is in the realm of investing Guantanamo Bay - but in plain sight.
Well I suppose this is the point - this incredible bias and control always was “hiding in plain sight”.
House Bill HR.8369 “Israel Security Assistance Support Act“ passed in the Senate - here’s the summary:
You CANNOT pause deliver of weapons to Israel
If any Federal employee does this they won’t get paid
You will ensure PROMPT DELIVERY of all weapons to Israel
If there is any delay - no funding for ANY OTHER INITIATIVE will be released or approved by Congress until the weapons are delivered
You will REPORT REGULARLY to ensure compliance
The Bill passed 224-187 with 16 Democrats crossing the floor to vote with the Republicans57. The Bill goes to the Senate next and Biden has threatened to veto.
You couldn’t make this up. But then - in this entire section on legislation passed through specifically for Israel since the crisis started - you could say that about pretty much all of them..
April 21 2024: Largest aid package to Israel approved since Oct 7: $17Bn USD
On 21st April 2024 the House passed a Bill to provide $17Bn of aid to Israel - in the face of their escalation with Iran to try to draw in regional powers, world revulsion of their killing of Western Central Kitchen aid workers on 1 April (white people die - people sit up) and the ongoing genocide in Gaza including imminent assault on Rafah and other regions58.
The package came with some additional aid for Gaza on the stipulation NO FUNDS WOULD BE SENT TO UNRWA.
UNRWA - Recap
Recap on UNRWA - the central relief and services agency for Gaza:
After the ICJ verdict of “plausible genocide” Israel’s vindictive pre-prepared Plan B was to suddenly unveil “evidence” of a small number (13) of 13,000 UNRWA staff allegedly participating in October 7th activity. UNRWA immediately stood down the staff whilst investigation took place.
Immediately the US ceased all funds to UNRWA - as did multiple countries around the world - on zero evidence - just at the time the ICJ demanded the additional protections of sending more aid to Gaza to prevent genocide.
Over a period of months as countries realised essentially their mistaken knee-jerk reaction on no evidence, they began restoring aid.
The US by comparison passed a Bill outlawing any aid to UNRWA to 2025
On 23 April 2024 an independent investigation by a French team confirmed that there is no evidence of any participation in October 7th activity by UNRWA staff and Israel are yet to provide any evidence59.
On 24 April 2024 possibly Israel’s biggest supporter after the US 🇩🇪 Germany restarted funding back to URNWA in response to the UN Report60. Unlike other countries who realised quickly the inhumanity and ludicrous response on zero evidence they were obliged to wait for a report to save face and still point to their self-claimed “special obligation” to Israel - in the face of whatever behaviour Israel shows. Hopefully this decision will mark a break in this.
Recap the decision to cut funding to UNRWA - relying solely on IDF claims with no evidence provided then or to date - ceased funding the critical agency for food aid and services in Gaza - at the time plausible genocide was determined by the ICJ specifically noting that humanitarian aid needed to increase.
Just breathtaking.
Use of the $17Bn Funds to Israel
The confirmed use of the $17Bn funds are:
$5.2 billion for the Iron Dome
$3.5 billion for advanced weapons systems
$1 billion to enhance weapons production
$4.4 billion for other defense supplies and services provided to Israel
$2.4 billion to US operations in the region amid the Gaza war
Never mind the hypocrisy and lack of humanity - how does the American taxpayer feel about these decisions taken by an Israeli-influence stacked Congress?
January 2024: $14Bn USD Israel Aid Package passed through the House
After a huge aid package was passed through Congress, The Intercept reported an increase in funding from AIPAC to Speaker of the House Mike Johnson61.
SHUTTING DOWN INTERNATIONAL LAW
I can’t believe I’m writing this and having to add another section to the categories of bullshit rushed through legislation from the US Congress to protect Israel at every turn. I thought enough was:
Shutting down free speech
The Ultimate Bill: Creating a Federal “Antisemism” Department - basically locking in Pro-Israeli Department to the US Government
Aid Packages
But no. They’ve gone one unprecedented step further.
It’s like Stalin’s Russia.
HR.282 4th June 2024 - Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act. No shit.
“Honestly guys, what are we going to call this one, it’s getting embarrassing trying to keep a straight face as we say it in the House”
… said the US Lawmaker on behalf of Israel. They’ve come up with …
“Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act”
So get this - the International Criminal Court is the world court for prosecuting war crimes, formed by UN request in 1997 and began operations in 2002 with 124 signatories of the Rome Statute.
Some countries have signed, some have flat refused and others signed but their Governments didn’t ratify - such as Russia and the US where the Republicans of course torpedoed this.
To be clear - it does not matter if you have signed the damn thing or not. If the Court issues an arrest warrant for one of your citizens - then 124 countries are bound to arrest that person if they set foot on their territory (either homeland or the grounds of an Embassy anywhere in the world).
So for example - with Russia not ratifying the treaty yet ICC arrest warrants issued for his conduct in Ukraine 2022 - he can’t travel to 124 countries or face arrest.
The US was completely overjoyed.
So fast-forward to 2024. The Courts have been investigating Israel since 2021 for their 2014 massacre of 2000+ civilians in Gaza during Operation Protective Edge (it took that long to start the case).62
Incidentally - it is revealed that Mossad had been harassing the ICC Prosecutor responsible for bringing the 2014 case for almost a decade as she investigated.63
With the Gaza crisis - the ICC combines the new evidence in with the existing criminal investigation proving a pattern of behaviour beyond doubt.
On 20th May 2024 the ICC Chief Prosecutor make the announcement that he is going to seek arrest warrants for perpetrators of war crimes during the Gaza Crisis. A balanced summons:
Hamas Leaders
Israel’s Netanyahu and Defence Minister Gallant
The US goes NUTS.
Let’s focus on the Bill, but the ICC case is detailed in the article below.
The ICC issues arrest warrants for Hamas and Israeli leaders:
So the US were happy when Putin was getting his summons - but when it’s Israel it’s something else.
They even misconstrue the “moral equivalence” of having Netanyahu and Gallant on the same ticket card as Hamas - when it has nothing to do with any comparison; it’s the war crimes of the individuals against civilians, each on its own merits. The Prosecutor could have issued the warrants at separate times for all that matter.
US Senators aggressively talk to going after the ICC - indeed one talks about “taking a tank to The Hague”. 12 Republicans actually write a letter to the ICC threatening sanctions of the Judges and their families for daring to issue and arrest warrant against one of their allies.
It is getting ridiculous - and then a Bill is hastily made up with a dodgy title to basically sanction the International Criminal Court.
The US - sanctioning the International Criminal Court for being about to make a ruling against one of their allies.
Unbelievable.
And so Bill HR.282 was passed in the House 247-155 on the Roll Call Vote with 42 Democrats going the unified Republicans and as at 7/6 now sitting with Senate.
Noting wording:
Well that’s a non-starter for one. So by the logic above - not being a signatory - does that mean that the US should also insist that no other state recognises the arrest warrants for Putin that they so happily welcomed as fellow non-signatories?
Just ridiculous.
But then Senator Graham’s logic below is impeccable. Just as the ICC gets around the P5 - perhaps it can assist where the US Congress is acting with impunity contrary to those that elected them.
🇺🇳 United Nations: Ensuring A Free Rein
Of course - the ultimate authority on the actions of a State is the United Nations which Israel has been a member of since 1949.
For actions against world peace you’d be called out and reined in, right? Not when you’ve achieved the above influence on US politicians with US Government representatives at the United Nations with your back.
🇺🇳 United Nations: International Political Advocacy - The UNSC
The sum total of US Advocacy for Israel is the continued political support for Israel as essentially a representation of their interests on a key body the US sits on.
The UN Security Council (UNSC) is the only legally binding resolution making body in the UN and votes on issues that can compel a state to cease actions.
The Allied victors of WWII when the UN was formed bestowed themselves with veto votes on the UNSC - if a resolution comes up that any one of them does not like, any member can veto the resolution.
Over the years multiple resolutions have come up to compel Israel to comply with International Law and unanimously the US has vetoed on Israel’s behalf.
It is blatantly obvious how Israel is supported by the US in the UNSC and empirically measurable. The charts below are telling.
What has essentially happened - and we have seen most visibly from the Gaza crisis - is that the US has historically and continues to veto or water down virtually every single UNSC Resolution that could have the the power to affect Israel’s behaviour.
This is hypocritical double-standards - achieved through extensive campaign funding, political lobbying and other influence in the US.
🇺🇳 UN: Blocking Palestinian Full Member Status
On 18th April 2024 there was a vote to determine if Palestine’s UN Observer status could be upgraded to full member status64.
Of course the US vetoed this resolution.
Notably there was a shift in voting. Rather than abstaining indicating surruptious support for the US line, many voted for the motion notably:
Russia (P5)
France (P5)
China (P5)
Japan
Republic of Korea
This clearly indicates the US’s further isolationism due to its hypocritical unquestioning support for Israel during the Gaza crisis.
It is clear the veto is the only thing propping up Israel in the international community - hence why the lobby of US Congress and influence across Government and Civil Society is the most important influence Israel must maintain.
Haaretz Counter-narrative
On Apr 24 2024 Haaretz printed an alternative view on the US Veto.
❝ On the face of it, these are important measures that reflect a change in the U.S.' approach to symbols of the occupation, the settlements, apartheid and Kahanism.. Look, the Biden administration is imposing sanctions on the right-wing extremist Benzi Gopstein and the Lehava organization, a few weeks after levying sanctions on violent settlers.
For the first time, the U.S. government is planning sanctions on the Netzah Yehuda Battalion, whose name has been linked to several incidents of extreme violence against Palestinians in recent years. The most notorious involved the death of Omar Abdalmajeed As'ad, 80, an American citizen, after he was detained by soldiers from the battalion who placed him in restraints and then beat him, gagged and blindfolded him, threw him on the ground and left him to die, lying face-down.
Apparently, the measures are meant to show Israel the route it must take if it wants to continue enjoying international legitimacy and the special protection it receives from its best friend in the world, the United States. It is the way to set boundaries for Israel, literally and metaphorically: yes to a democracy that respects international law and human rights within its sovereign territory, no to the settlement enterprise and the plunder and apartheid beyond the Green Line. ❞
I recall early in the crisis Netanyahu calling for the cancellation of Haaretz. With his call to ban Al Jazeera in Israel for publishing non-editorial news surely Haaretz’s days are numbered with the current Government in publishing with a conscience?
🇺🇳CONCLUSION
The US is the most important partner for influence for Israel and they cannot put a foot wrong in lobbying in the country.
When you holistically look at the lobby top to bottom it is clear as day the direct correlation between this influence and the inhumanity and frankly irrationality of the US Government response to current events in Gaza, contrary to mainstream media narrative.
The influence is clear to see across multiple institutions and maintained with an iron grip, leading to the current climate of fear of retribution.
Almost a return to McCarthyite days.
APPENDIX A: Criticism of structured pro-Israeli lobbying is not antisemitic
By noting a multi-pronged approach to advocacy for the Israeli position - typically through silencing smears of antisemitism for any criticism - invites itself to “conspiracy theory” accusations - noting that any concept of a “Jewish Conspiracy” is defined antisemitic but the IHRA definition of antisemitism65:
Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.
HOWEVER - this is NOT a “Jewish Conspiracy” - if anything it’s an “Israeli State Influence Conspiracy” - as much as Chinese spies or other actors embedding themselves in a country in influential positions acting on behalf of a foreign State.
Yet again - JUDAISM should not be conflated with Israeli Nationalism (ZIONISM) - otherwise you remove all avenues for criticism of Israeli State actions as a political strategy.
Just as pro-Israeli organisations try to tar any criticism against Israel as “Jewish” and therefore antisemitic you need to take the same approach of literally cutting and pasting the word “Jew” and replacing with “Israeli State Lobby” to be fair on people of the Jewish faith and reflect the reality.
See below cut and paste on the IHRA statement above - replacing the word “Jews” with “Israeli State Lobby” and you have a more accurate non-antisemitic statement which is closer to reality:
Making
mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegationsfactual statements about the Israeli State Lobby as such or the power of the Israeli State Lobby as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, themythreality about a world pro-Israeli State Lobby conspiracy or of pro-Israeli actors controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions - [is NOT antisemitic]
Comments on above adjusted statement:
Let’s not get too carried away; the “world pro-Israeli State lobby conspiracy” is to me melodramatic and implies evil intent and a bit of paranoia as opposed to furthering the cause of a State through advocating State policy mostly in individual institutions vs. globally (as many other States would like to do).
You would not “dehumanise or demonise” when talking about an organised approach, not talking about the individual who is just a spokesperson whether they happen to be of the Jewish Faith or not.
These claims are not “mendacious” or “sterotypical allegations” - based on the track record of suppression of pro-Palestinian speech - just as the track record of US Vetos in the UNSC is empirically measurable - it is a statement of fact.
The above is not antisemitic in particular when the IHRA definition states:
“criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic”
As stated - I would be just as critical of the same approach taken by Chinese or other actors influencing different areas for a State cause. In the case of China there is clear and open criticism:
In 2017 an Australian Senator Sam Dastyari quit parliament after being accused of being an agent of influence for the Chinese Government66
In 2019 an Australian MP Gladys Liu was heavily criticised for not declaring her membership of organisations linked to the Chinese Government’s foreign influence operations67
In 2023 Malcolm Turnbull criticised the blatant Chinese foreign influence operation in Australia, not declared on the AUS Government Register Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme (FITS). There is a loophole in FITS regulation that allows not-for-profits not to register their lobbying activities or links with foreign Governments which is exactly how the local pro-Israeli lobbies get around this.
It is NOT antisemitic - it’s anti-Israel influence - in particular when there are common patterns and inter-Institutional alignment.
APPENDIX B: EXISTING ANTISEMITISM MEASURES IN THE US
Looking at the April 2024 proposed Bill to Counter Antisemitism - it is worth considering the true need - and the raft of existing measures and exceptional treatment that already exists in particular in comparison to other minority groups.
The Bill Proposes:
Create a new Federal Government Department of Antisemitism: a new taxpayer funded Government Department with the new roles of a federal coordinator to oversee efforts to counter domestic antisemitism and create an interagency task force to coordinate the implementation of federal strategies.
New department conduct an analysis of antisemitism online.
New role in the Department of Education: to serve as advisor on the agency’s efforts to combat discrimination in higher education
New “Jewish Heritage Month” designated in May
It is worth reviewing the different points in turn.
Legislation for new “Jewish Heritage Month” to replace existing “Jewish American Heritage Month”
Designating May as Jewish Heritage Month dropping the word “AMERICAN”
It is unclear why legislation is needed as Jewish American Heritage Month (Jewish AHM) already exists as do equivalents Black History Month (Black HM) and Arab American Heritage Month (Arab AHM) for example along with other Heritage months and Identity Recognition Days68.
I would imagine “Heritage” already covers the culture of Black people, Jewish people and Arabic peoples outside of America by definition - it’s a celebration of culture brought to America from overseas shores.
Jewish Heritage Month was first proclaimed by President Bush in 2006 and proclaimed by every US President since then including a motion in the house passed just last year. It is an established tradition supported by multiple sponsors with 2024 events planned on the Jewish American Heritage Month website.
But Black History Month does not have a legal bill associated with it - so why does Jewish Heritage Month need one wrapped up in this Act?
Unless it is to secure taxpayer funding - in which case why does Black History Month not have the same?
Comparisons of Heritage Months
It is worth comparing different Heritage Months and their treatment in Congress - Jewish American Heritage Month (Jewish AHM), Black American History Month (Black AHM) and Arab American Heritage Month (Arab AHM) plus a proposed Islamic American Heritage Month (Islamic AHM).
Date of Establishment and Demographics
Date of Establishment and % demographics:
Jewish HM: MAY 2021 (1.9% of the population)
Black HM: OCTOBER 1976 (13.6% of population)
Arab AHM: APRIL 2021 (0.66% population)
Islamic AHM: Not established but proposed see below (0.6% of population)
Latest Presidential Declarations launching the month
Jewish AHM - Apr 28 2023
Black HM - Jan 31 2024
Arab AHM - Mar 29 2024
Islamic AHM: Not established
Latest House Commendation Motions of the Month
Jewish AHM
17 May 2023 S.RES.203 - Sen. Jacky Rosen (D) - AGREED
11 Jun 2023 H.RES.382 - Rep. Debbie Schulz Wasserman (R) - AGREED
Black HM
14 Feb 2023 S.RES.63 - Sen. Rory Booker - AGREED
8 Feb 2024 S.RES.551 - Sen. Rory Booker - AGREED
Arab AHM
10 Apr 2023 H.RES.286 - Rep. Rashida Tlaib (R) - NOT PASSED
13 Apr 2023 H.RES.297 - Rep. Rashida Tlaib (R) - NOT PASSED
Islamic AHM:
Proposed- Rep. Rashida Tlaib (R) - NOT PASSED
Websites:
Jewish AHM:
Central Page - https://jewishamericanheritage.org
Government Website 2023 - https://www.jewishheritagemonth.gov/index.html
Black HM
Central Page: https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/celebrating-black-history-month
Government Website - https://www.blackhistorymonth.gov
Arab AHM - TBC
White House Initiatives:
Jewish Americans:
23 May 2023 - First National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism announcement and strategy document
Notably the strategy document refers to Israel several times in the context of US support, but notes antisemitism is “when Israel is singled out BECAUSE of anti-Jewish hatred” (clearly delineating antisemitism and criticism of Israel) and does not mention “Zionism” once
One of the Jewish groups providing a detailed paper to the White House to formulate the Strategy was the Nexus Task force composed of 100 prominent Jewish Americans. In particular they define the “nexus” between Judaism and Zionism and hence assist defining antisemitism on their website here.
Bipartisan Task Force to Counter Antisemitism which has existed since the 1990s but seems to be in for a long-haul campaign here with a new Twitter Account set up March 2024.
Black and African Americans:
Arab Americans:
Federal Agencies Countering Hate Crimes:
FBI
Criminal and Counter-terrorism Division focus
Domestic Terrorism-Hate Crimes Fusion Cell est. 2019
National Anti Hate Crimes Campaign (2022)
Department of Homeland Security
RELATED ARTICLES
Other:
1 November Israeli Ambassador wearing Jewish Star to UN - (Original Sleekit Scotsman Facebook Post) - https://www.facebook.com/sleekit.scotsman2/posts/pfbid0kRYNrCPv4Mi8tWHiwg153hPZ3gvbED5U7ywaL5fwqsknRRvMFrV5GUVwj1vfZbBcl
Summary of Substack Articles Referenced in this article:
Pro-Israeli Influence in Hollywood - The Arts & Entertainment Industry:
Pro-Israeli Influence in Academdia:
Statement on Antisemitism v Free Speech with review and examples of terminology and nuance.
Congress opportunistically redefining antisemitism (6 Dec):
Australia pro-Israeli Lobby:
Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics: How the ADL uses artificially inflated hate crime data to justify legislative changes:
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The Guardian 14 Mar 2024 - “The House passed a TikTok bill. Will the US really ban the app?“ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/mar/13/will-us-ban-tiktok
BBC News 24 April 2024 “TikTok vows to fight 'unconstitutional' US ban“ - https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c87zp82247yo
TRT World 18 May 2024 “Palestine Talks | John Mearsheimer discusses Gaza“ - https: //www. youtube.com/watch?v=jqPQ5dUfSTw (added spaces so won’t preview YouTube)
Jewish Currents Mar 8 2023 “ADL Staffers Dissented After CEO Compared Palestinian Rights Groups to Right-Wing Extremists, Leaked Audio Reveals“ - https://jewishcurrents.org/adl-staffers-dissented-after-ceo-compared-palestinian-rights-groups-to-right-wing-extremists-leaked-audio-reveals
Source Opensecrets.org Pro-Israeli candidate fund receipts - https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/summary?code=Q05&cycle=All&ind=Q05&mem=Y&recipdetail=S
Bipartisan task force for combatting antisemitism twitter account (set up March 2024) - https://twitter.com/HouseBTFCA
ADL Website Press Release 10 April 2024 - “ADL Praises Members of Congress for Introduction of Historic Countering Antisemitism Act“ - https://www.adl.org/resources/press-release/adl-praises-members-congress-introduction-historic-countering-antisemitism
Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism May 3 2022 “Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt: SPECIAL ENVOY TO MONITOR AND COMBAT ANTISEMITISM
OFFICE OF THE SPECIAL ENVOY TO MONITOR AND COMBAT ANTISEMITISM“ - https://www.state.gov/bureaus-offices/under-secretary-for-civilian-security-democracy-and-human-rights/office-of-the-special-envoy-to-monitor-and-combat-antisemitism/
White House Passover Statement 21 Apr 2024 - https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/04/21/statement-from-president-joe-biden-on-passover
The Guardian 9 May 2024 - “US paused weapons shipment to Israel amid concern over Rafah, senior US official says“ - https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/may/08/us-weapons-shipment-pause-israel-idf-rafah-gaza-hamas-war-palestine
BBC 15 May 2024 “Biden plans to send $1bn arms shipment to Israel“ - https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-69013279
Congress Bill HR8369 “Israel Security Assistance Support Act” Roll Call https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2024217
Times of Israel 20 Apr 2024 “House okays $17 billion in military aid for Israel under major spending package“ -https://www.timesofisrael.com/house-approves-26-billion-in-aid-for-israel-and-gaza-under-major-spending-package/
The Guardian 23 Apr 2024 “Israel has yet to provide evidence of Unrwa staff terrorist links, Colonna report says“ - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/22/israel-unrwa-staff-terrorist-links-yet-to-provide-evidence-colonna-report?
The Times of Israel 24 April 2024 “Germany to resume funding for UNRWA after probe“ -https://www.timesofisrael.com/germany-to-resume-funding-for-unrwa-after-probe/
The Intercept Jan 20 2024 “AFTER HOUSE SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON PUSHED THROUGH ISRAEL AID PACKAGE, AIPAC CASH CAME FLOWING IN“ - https://theintercept.com/2024/01/20/israel-aipac-house-mike-johnson/
International Criminal Court Website Case ICC-01/18 “State of Palestine“ - https://www.icc-cpi.int/palestine
Common Dreams Julian Conoly May 28 2024 “'Jaw-Dropping': Mossad Chief Threatened ICC Prosecutor Over Israeli War Crimes Probe“ - https://www.commondreams.org/news/yossi-cohen-israel
Reuters 19 Apr 2024 - “US stops UN from recognizing a Palestinian state through membership“ - https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/un-security-council-vote-thursday-palestinian-un-membership-2024-04-18/
International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance website - “What is antisemitism?“ 2016 - https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/resources/working-definitions-charters/working-definition-antisemitism
Financial Times December 12 2017 - “Australian MP quits in Chinese influence scandal“ - https://www.ft.com/content/7ac14e70-ded8-11e7-a8a4-0a1e63a52f9c
ABC 12 Sep 2019 - “Gladys Liu did not disclose membership of Chinese Government-linked organisations before Liberal Party preselection“ - https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-12/gladys-liu-did-not-disclose-membership-of-chinese-groups/11506428
Harvard University Office for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging; Heritage Months - https://edib.harvard.edu/heritage-months
Love your photo of Neturai karta. I bet you think that’s a real religious mainstream group.