Decoupling Zionism from Judaism

JVL Introduction

Jewish Voice for Peace began in 1996 as a small Jewish peace group in the US and has grown into an organization with tens of thousands of members, explicitly anti-Zionist, supporting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and capable of mounting extraordinary pro-Palestinian actions such as the Grand Central Station blockade pictured above.

This is the story of its evolution, told through an in-depth interview with its former director Rebecca Vilkomerson, addressing challenging questions such as – How do you balance drawing attention to important shifts within the Jewish community with keeping the  focus on the Palestinians? Why do so many mainstream Jewish organizations remain tethered to Israel? How you go about decoupling Zionism from Judaism, when it’s so entrenched in the public consciousness?

NWI

This article was originally published by Mondoweiss on Sun 8 Sep 2024. Read the original here.