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American Jews Protest Against Israel’s Killing of Unarmed Protesters
The Gaza protest is a weeks-long encampment near Israel’s self-imposed militarised barrier with Gaza, calling for the right of return to lands Palestinians and their descendants were expelled from in 1948, when Israel was founded. The Palestinian demonstrators have been met with sniper fire and tear gas fired by Israeli soldiers.
Schumer has been one of Israel’s most steadfast backers in the US Congress.
But JVP said it hopes to use this protest to pressure other US senators to urge Israel to stop using sniper fire on unarmed Palestinian protesters in Gaza.
The sit-in is the first in a series of JVP-led demonstrations to be held in front of the offices of US politicians across the country to press for enforcement of the Leahy Law, a US provision that prohibits American military aid from going to foreign army units that violate human rights. The US provides Israel with more than $3bn in annual military aid.
Growing Jewish Protests Over Gaza
There have been several indicators, including these latest sit-ins at politicians’ offices, of a growing split in the American Jewish community over Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinians.Since 30 March, at least 51 American Jews have been arrested protesting against Israel’s lethal response to the Great March of Return.
“The recent wave of actions reflects more broadly that the tide is turning in the American Jewish community, and its time that Jewish institutions took note,” said Noah Wagner, a Boston-based member of IfNotNow, a group of young American Jews that organise against the Israeli occupation.
“This is a moment of reckoning, a moment when young Jews are exhibiting moral leadership and showing a sense of clarity and integrity when it comes to putting fundamental human dignity first,” Wagner told Middle East Eye. “The violence in Gaza laid bare, exposed the ugliest undercurrents of the occupation, the real overt brutality that is required to uphold it. And I think that young Jews no longer feel we can look away.”
American Jews Increasingly Critical of Israel
The memberships of IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace have steadily increased in recent years, the groups say, calling them a reflection of how Israeli human rights abuses of Palestinians are driving members of the American Jewish community away from supporting Israel.For decades, the American Jewish community has stood as a pillar of support for Israel. Washington has shielded Israel from diplomatic sanction at the United Nations and has given it more than $134bn in aid, most of it military assistance, since 1948.
But the 50-year-long Israeli occupation of Palestinian land – and the deaths, mass detentions and building of illegal settlements, all hallmarks of its rule – has eroded support for Israel among American Jews.
Various studies have shown that more American Jews are becoming critics of Israel. Two surveys conducted by the Brand Israel Group six years apart revealed a drop in support for the state, as between 2010, when one poll was taken, anf 2016, support for Israel by Jewish college students dropped by 26 points.
Dov Waxman, a professor at Northeastern University, said that American Jews will not be able to change US policy towards Israel single handedly.
The US-Israel relationship rests on a number of pillars, like Christian Evangelical support, intelligence sharing and US weapons companies that profit from Israeli purchases.
Still, Waxman, who authored Trouble in the Tribe: The American Jewish Conflict over Israel, told Middle East Eye that the wave of American Jewish protests against Israel’s killings in Gaza was important.
“People involved in these demonstrations are the future leadership of the American Jewish community. It does matter what their views are and what their positions are,” said Waxman. “[The Jewish protests] can make a difference, particularly for some congressmen – it can embolden them to speak.”
And as Israel continues to inflict violence on protesters in Gaza, the Jewish-led protests in the US will continue, the groups involved say, in the hopes that pressure will embolden members of Congress to criticise Israeli actions.
“With Nakba Day, and the move of the US embassy [to Jerusalem] coming up, we can expect to see more tragedy and more death in Israel-Palestine,” said Wagner, the IfNotNow member. “We will be watching that with a lot of compassion and concern. We will not let that go unaddressed.”
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