When criticism becomes collapse: J Street’s genocide reckoning

Once “pro-Israel, pro-peace,” its president now says the Jewish state may be committing genocide, raising urgent questions about where dissent ends and damage begins.

In the wake of Hamas’s brutal Oct. 7 massacre and the war that followed, most of the American Jewish community stood where they always have—on the side of Israel’s right to self-defense. But a vocal minority chose another path: undermining Israel at one of its darkest hours.

 

Kibbutz Be'eri in southern Israel, Dec. 19, 2023.
Photo by Moshe Shai/Flash90.

Organizations like Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow, and increasingly, even J Street, have not merely criticized Israeli policy. They’ve crossed a moral line—providing rhetorical ammunition to Israel’s enemies, weakening U.S. support and sowing confusion in the American Jewish community.

 Their rhetoric may be cloaked in humanitarian language, but their actions—and now their slander—raise an urgent question: Have these groups done harm to Israel during wartime?

 Start with JVP. This group responded to Hamas’s atrocities not with condemnation but with justification. Within days, JVP blamed Israeli “apartheid” and “occupation” for the slaughter of 1,200 men, women and children in southern Israeli communities. They demanded an end to U.S. military aid, accused Israel of war crimes and staged disruptive protests in congressional offices and on major highways.

 This is not moral clarity—it’s moral inversion.

 IfNotNow, a group that claims to represent young progressive Jews, joined the ceasefire chorus almost immediately, even before Israel had buried its dead or begun rescuing the 251 people taken hostage and dragged into Gaza. In August 2025, its activists led protests outside Trump Hotel and Columbus Circle in Manhattan, demanding that Washington halt arms shipments to Israel.

 One wonders if they would have protested U.S. arms to Britain in 1941.

 But perhaps the most troubling shift has come from J Street, long the self-described “pro-Israel, pro-peace” lobby. Until recently, many in the Jewish community believed that while J Street could be sharply critical of Israeli policy, it still operated from a place of concern for Israel’s survival. That illusion collapsed this week.

 In a shocking turn, J Street president Jeremy Ben-Ami announced that he now believes Israel may be committing genocide in Gaza. In a Tisha B’Av newsletter, he wrote:

 “I have … been persuaded rationally by legal and scholarly arguments that international courts will one day find that Israel has broken the international genocide convention.”

 He went further: “Until now, I have tried to deflect and defend when challenged to call this genocide. … I simply won’t defend the indefensible.”

 And as if anticipating the backlash, he added: “How can it be that Israel—the state founded by a people who experienced genocide—could itself be committing this most heinous of crimes?”

 Ben-Ami’s words are not merely irresponsible. They are inflammatory. Genocide is the most serious accusation one can level against a nation. It is not a policy critique; it is an allegation of premeditated, systematic mass murder. And to make that claim while Israel fights an enemy that openly calls for its annihilation is a betrayal of both truth and decency.

 This is not a fringe activist speaking. This is the head of a Washington lobby with access to lawmakers and influence in the halls of power. When Jeremy Ben-Ami accuses Israel of genocide, it sends a signal to the media, to Congress and to Israel’s enemies: The Jewish consensus is cracking.

 These groups insist that they are acting in defense of Jewish values. But their words and actions have made Israel’s job harder, not easier. They have given cover to anti-Israel resolutions, weakened bipartisan support and contributed to a global narrative that blames Israel for a war it did not start and never wanted.

 When Hamas, Hezbollah or Iran see Jewish groups denouncing Israel in terms indistinguishable from their own propaganda, they see weakness—and opportunity. These terror regimes aren’t interested in nuance. They are interested in victory. And when J Street speaks of genocide, they hear: “Keep going. The Jews are turning on each other.”

 Let’s be clear: Israel does not demand silence. Israelis themselves debate every aspect of this war. But there is a line between loyal criticism and disloyal defamation. These groups—and now, J Street, most shamefully—have crossed it.

 They do not represent most American Jews. Polling shows that a clear majority support Israel’s war against Hamas and understand that Hamas is a genocidal terrorist organization, not a national liberation movement. Most American Jews understand that this is not a war of choice. It is a war of survival.

 We can debate strategy. We can question policy. But accusing Israel of genocide—while under rocket fire, while grieving its dead, while rescuing hostages—is not righteous. It’s reckless. And it’s very, very wrong.

 At moments like this, solidarity matters. So does truth. And the truth is this: When Jewish leaders like Jeremy Ben-Ami repeat the slanders of Israel’s enemies, they don’t defend peace. They damage the one Jewish state we have.

 That’s not dissent. That’s betrayal.

Stephen M. Flatow

This column originally appeared on JNS.ORG.  You can read it and others by me here.

 

 

American Jews know anti-Semitism when they see it

By Stephen M. Flatow

 While the Jewish left keeps trying to convince us that most anti-Israel hatred is not anti-Semitism, a new poll has found that a large majority of American Jews see things such more clearly.

The poll, sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League, asked Jews whether certain types of anti-Israel statements or actions are anti-Semitic:

•  “Saying Israel should not exist as a Jewish state” — 75 percent say it’s anti-Semitic
• “Comparing Israel’s actions to those of the Nazis” — 70 percent
• “Protesting Israeli actions outside an American synagogue” — 67 percent
• “Calling Zionism racist” — 61 percent
• “Calling for companies and organizations to boycott, divest from or sanction Israel” — 56 percent
• “Calling Israel an apartheid state” — 55 percent

 Why are these results significant? Because for the past year, the U.S. Jewish left has been fighting against the acceptance of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism. According to that definition, comparing Israel to the Nazis, calling Israel’s existence racist and applying double standards to Israel are examples of anti-Semitism.

 Jewish left-wing activists have grown worried because many governments, Jewish organizations and others have embraced the IHRA definition. The Jewish left has good reason to worry since many groups and individuals in their camp indulge in precisely that kind of rhetoric. Being labeled “anti-Semitic” means that their views are illegitimate.

 So, in a desperate ploy, they organized several hundred left-wing academics to come up with their own definition, called the “Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism.” The Declaration’s extremely narrow wording effectively excuses most anti-Israel vitriol as being just “criticism of Israeli policies.”

 Obviously, no reasonable person claims that every single criticism of an Israeli policy is anti-Semitic. But it’s also clear as day to most American Jews that a lot of extreme anti-Israel rhetoric, such as the examples cited above, is indeed anti-Semitic. Most Jews don’t need a legal definition to know, instinctively, that something or somebody is anti-Semitic. We’ve all experienced enough in our lives to know that if it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck …

 This is a problem for several of the leading Jewish left-wing organizations, which in recent months have been edging closer and closer to the positions that most U.S. Jews consider to be anti-Semitic.

Calling for sanctions against Israel, for example. According to the ADL poll, 56 percent of Jews think that’s anti-Semitic. Well, in April, J Street and Americans for Peace Now publicly endorsed legislation that would stop U.S. aid to Israel if the Israeli army arrests Palestinian-Arab terrorists who are younger than 18 years old. That’s what we call a sanction.

 And just last week, the head of Americans for Peace Now went beyond that one bill and announced that there should be “U.S. aid reductions” if Israel is guilty of any “human-rights violations.” And who, exactly, will be the judge of what constitutes a “human-rights violation”? The United Nations? Amnesty International? Jimmy Carter? Clearly, the new Americans for Peace Now position is setting up Israel to be sanctioned.

Or the apartheid charge—most American Jews say that’s anti-Semitic, too. In recent weeks, J Street has publicly defended the outrageous Human Rights Watch report that accuses Israel of apartheid. While not directly using the “A” word, J Street has skated right up to the edge, by praising the report for “raising critical concerns,” and declaring that all criticism of the report is “vitriol” and “profoundly harmful to Israel’s survival.”

 J Street is now loudly complaining about the rejection of its recent application to join the American Zionist Movement. The J Streeters need only look in the mirror to understand why. Calling for sanctions on Israel and praising those who promote the apartheid smears are the kinds of positions that most American Jews consider anti-Semitic. And not too many Jewish communal umbrella groups are likely to admit an organization that advocates anti-Semitic policies.

 

(Stephen M. Flatow is a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, an attorney in New Jersey and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is the author of “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror.”)

This column first appeared on jns.org. 

 What is it with J Street and anti-Semites?

One would think that J Street, an avowed pro-Israel organization would distance itself from anti-Semites. Yet, it just can't seem to stay away.

I don’t pretend to know what goes on inside the heads of Jews so committed to bullying Israel that they will honor and even defend individuals who have made anti-Semitic remarks, as long as those individuals further the cause of undermining Israel.

This is my latest column from JNS.ORG.

Why does J Street keep honoring and defending individuals who have made anti-Semitic remarks?

 The latest is former President Jimmy Carter, who will receive an award from J Street at its upcoming convention on April 18. I’m not saying that Carter’s numerous attacks on Israel—as ugly and unfair as they were—constituted anti-Semitism. Not even his accusation that Israel’s treatment of Palestinian Arabs is worse than the Rwandan genocide in which 800,000 people were massacred.

No, I am referring to what Professor Deborah Lipstadt wrote in her essay, “Jimmy Carter’s Jewish Problem,” in The Washington Post, on Jan. 20, 2007. She wrote that in his responses to criticism of his anti-Israel book, Carter “has relied on anti-Semitic stereotypes in defense.”

 Lipstadt continued: “Carter has repeatedly fallen back—possibly unconsciously—on traditional anti-Semitic canards. … Carter reflexively fell back on this kind of innuendo about Jewish control of the media and government. Even if unconscious, such stereotyping from a man of his stature is noteworthy. When David Duke spouts it, I yawn. When Jimmy Carter does, I shudder.”

 Lipstadt was referring to the media appearances by Carter in 2006 in which he repeatedly suggested that all criticism of his book emanated from attempts by Jews to control the media and silence him. On “Larry King Live” on Nov. 26, 2006, Carter claimed that he had “witnessed and experienced the severe restraints on any free and balanced discussion of the facts.” On “Meet the Press” on Dec. 3, 2006, Carter specifically singled out what he called “the Jewish lobby” as “part” of the alleged conspiracy to silence him.

 Before Carter, J Street’s favorite ex-politician was James Baker.

 The former Secretary of State was the keynote speaker at J Street’s 2015 convention. At first, it must have seemed odd that the overwhelmingly liberal and Democratic members of J Street would be honoring and applauding a lifelong conservative Republican. But apparently, Baker’s views on abortion and taxes were forgiven and forgotten in J Street’s enthusiasm for Baker’s harsh anti-Israel policies.

 Evidently, J Street was not bothered by the fact that Baker’s hostility to Israel sometimes crossed over into hostility to Jews.

 There was, of course, Baker’s infamous 1992 outburst, “F*** the Jews. They don’t vote for us anyway.” (The quotation came from unimpeachable sources. It was first revealed by former New York City Mayor Ed Koch, who later said his source was then-Secretary of Housing Jack Kemp, who heard Baker say it firsthand.)

 But that wasn’t all. Baker was also reliably reported to have said: “Jews remember the Holocaust, but they forget insults as soon as they smell cash.” (The source was David Bar-Ilan, then one of the editors of The Jerusalem Post, quoted in Ma’ariv March 5, 1992.)

 And according to The Los Angeles Times (March 7, 1992), Baker also referred to pro-Israel members of Congress as “the little Knesset.”

 We need to add Linda Sarsour to the list of prominent individuals whose anti-Semitism has not deterred J Street from embracing them.

 Sarsour’s hostile statements about Israel and Zionism have been as vicious as they come. She actively promotes the anti-Semitic BDS movement. She tweeted (in 2012): “Nothing is creepier than Zionism.” She told The Nation that “There can’t be … room [in the feminist movement] for people who support the State of Israel.” She calls for the replacement of Israel with a “State of Palestine.” Sarsour shared a stage with Rasmea Odeh, the convicted murderer of two Hebrew University students, and declared that she was “honored to be on this stage with Rasmea.”

 Does this record constitute anti-Semitism? ADL national director and CEO Jonathan Greenblatt has said that Sarsour’s BDS advocacy “encourages and spreads anti-Semitism.” Greenblatt’s predecessor, Abraham Foxman, has called Sarsour “bigoted.”

 Yet J Street founder and president Jeremy Ben-Ami signed a 2017 letter declaring that criticism of Sarsour is “dangerous, disingenuous and counterproductive,” charging that she has been “falsely maligned, harassed and smeared.” The letter’s only caveat was this tepid sentence: “We may not agree with Sarsour on all matters.”

 Ben-Ami “doesn’t agree” with anti-Semitism? Can anyone imagine him saying merely that he “doesn’t agree” with white supremacist David Duke or Holocaust-denier David Irving?

 So, what’s going on here? What is it with J Street and anti-Semites? I’m not a psychiatrist. I don’t pretend to know what goes on inside the heads of Jews who are so committed to bullying Israel that they will honor and even defend individuals who have made anti-Semitic remarks, as long as those individuals further the cause of undermining Israel. All I can say is that the decision by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and other umbrella groups to reject J Street’s applications for membership has been proven right time and again.

 (Stephen M. Flatow is a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, an attorney in New Jersey and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is the author of “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror.”)

It’s not ‘anti-Arab’ to criticize an Arab supporter of terrorism

My column from JNS.ORG about western Jewish liberal reaction to events in Israel.

It’s not ‘anti-Arab’ to criticize an Arab supporter of terrorism

Eight Jewish organizations this week signed a public statement accusing Israel of being, in effect, a racist state. Seven of them were left-of-center groups whose harsh criticism of Israel is old news. But one of them was the National Council of Jewish Women, a venerable American Jewish organization that ordinarily does not associate itself with such vile smears of the Jewish state.

The statement, distributed on July 31 as an Internet advertisement, accused “the Prime Minister and Government Ministers” of Israel of engaging in “shameful and dangerous incitement” against Israel’s Arab citizens.

That is an extremely serious charge. A regime that deliberately incites hatred against citizens of a particular ethnic and racial group is behaving on the moral level of some of the worst authoritarian regimes in memory.

So what’s the evidence? Where’s the proof that the Israeli government has degenerated into a mob of racist inciters?

The declaration cites three pieces of “evidence.”

The first refers to an incident in April. An Israeli news report claimed that some fans at a soccer game in the Israeli Arab village of Sakhnin refused to stand, or even booed, during a moment of silence for Israeli victims of a recent flood. The article was then posted on the Facebook page of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with a statement by the prime minister calling the fans’ behavior “an utter disgrace.”

Criticizing individuals for their behavior is not “racist,” and it’s not “incitement.” In this case, however, as soon as doubts arose concerning the accuracy of the report, the prime minister’s staff removed it from the Facebook page. Certainly, it was careless of them not to have looked further into the story before publicizing it. But that’s not the same as deliberately and maliciously trying to whip up hatred of all Israeli Arabs.

The other “evidence” in this week’s declaration was even less credible. It pointed to the fact that two cabinet ministers strongly criticized the pro-terrorist statements and actions of Arab Knesset member Ayman Odeh.

The ministers didn’t criticize Odeh for being an Arab. They didn’t call for Arabs to be banned from the Knesset. In fact, they didn’t call for any action against Arabs at all. They called for action against Odeh because of his indisputable record of supporting terrorism and terrorists.

For example, in an interview with Israel Army Radio on Oct. 6, 2015, Odeh was asked about that week’s Palestinian murders of U.S. citizen Eitam Henkin and his wife, Na’ama, in front of their four young children. At first, Odeh avoided endorsing the murders, but then he asserted that Palestinians have “a right to struggle” against Israel. He cited the first intifada—with its thousands of bombings, shootings and other attacks—as an example of “struggle” that is “fully justified.”

Pressed by the interviewer as to whether throwing rocks at Jews is legitimate, Odeh replied: “I always blame the occupation for being guilty. I cannot tell the nation how to struggle, where and which target to throw the rock. I do not put red lines on the Arab Palestinian nation.”

Knesset member Itzik Shmuly denounced Odeh’s statements as “angering and disappointing.” Shmuly represents the Zionist Union, better known as the Labor Party. One of the eight groups signing this week’s statement was Ameinu, better known as the U.S. wing of the Labor Party. I wonder why they didn’t include Shmuly in their denunciation of “incitement.” I guess if “our guy” says it, then it’s not incitement.

In an interview with Al-Arabiya television on March 4, 2016, Odeh was asked about the wave of Palestinian knife attacks against Israelis. He replied: “We should examine our history and the history of the nations to determine strategies. There is no doubt that a popular intifada is most beneficial to the Palestinian people. I, from my place, cannot tell the Palestinian people how to resist.”

Just six weeks ago, on June 18, Odeh took part in a conference in eastern Jerusalem sponsored by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP). The PFLP and the DFLP are terrorist groups that have murdered and maimed many hundreds of Israelis—and Americans—since the 1960s. That’s who Ayman Odeh chooses to associate with. And that’s why he deserves to be criticized.

I’m not surprised that J Street and Americans for Peace Now signed the “anti-incitement” declaration. Pointing an accusing finger at Israel has become their trademark. But I am profoundly disappointed that the National Council of Jewish Women would sully its good name by allowing itself to be dragged into this smear of the Jewish state.

I’m giving the leaders of the NCJW the benefit of the doubt, assuming that they were misled by the other signatories. Perhaps they did not see the final text before they gave their approval. Maybe they didn’t carefully research the claims that are made in the anti-Israel declaration. They can rectify this error by immediately disavowing the declaration.

* * *

Well, that's what I think and invite you to comment.

Look for my new book in October, "A Father's Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror"

How one raid tells all you need to know about Israel’s predicament

How one raid tells all you need to know about Israel’s predicament

You wouldn’t think that one isolated Israeli counter-terror raid could explode every major myth about Israel’s conflict with the Palestinian Arabs. But last week’s raid in Jenin came pretty close to doing just that.

https://www.jns.org/opinion/how-one-raid-tells-all-you-need-to-know-about-israels-predicament/

You wouldn’t think that one isolated Israeli counter-terror raid could explode every major myth about Israel’s conflict with the Palestinian Arabs. But last week’s raid in Jenin came pretty close to doing just that.

An IDF soldier who took part in last week’s counter-terror raid in Jenin. Credit: IDF.

Overnight Jan. 17, Israeli commandos entered the city of Jenin in search of two particular Arab terrorists. When the operation was over a few hours later, the Israeli forces withdrew. 

Wait! The Israelis withdrew? But isn’t Israel “occupying” the Palestinians? That’s what J Street and Jewish Voice for Peace are always telling us. Just this week, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, head of the Union for Reform Judaism, wrote that Israel is “ruling over millions of Palestinians.”

I guess Rabbi Jacobs hasn’t been to Jenin lately. In fact, I would imagine he hasn’t been there since at least 1995. That was the year Israel withdrew all its forces from the city (and the other areas where 98 percent of Palestinians reside) and a new ruler took over: the Palestinian Authority (PA). Counter-terror raids like the one in Jenin are the only occasions on which Israeli forces enter PA-ruled cities.

Back to the story. The Israeli commandos were searching for the terrorists who carried out last week’s brutal drive-by murder of Rabbi Raziel Shevach, father of six young children. As the Israelis were searching, The Times of Israel reports, “a violent riot broke out…Palestinians hurled improvised explosive devices, rocks and fired at the forces.”

Wait, what? The Jewish left has been telling us for decades that ordinary Palestinian Arabs are moderate, peace-seeking, and opposed to terrorism. The residents of Jenin should have been delighted that Israeli forces were coming to rid their city of terrorists. In fact, if they’re so moderate, they should have been actively assisting the anti-terror efforts.

Instead, the local residents impeded the hunt for the terrorists, by trying to shoot, stone, and burn the Israeli soldiers to death. Would some J Streeter please explain this? I’m so confused! Can these be Israel’s future peaceful neighbors?

I wonder if Jenin residents’ passionate support for terrorism and hatred of Jews and Israel has anything to do with the anti-Jewish textbooks that are used in PA schools, or the non-stop anti-Jewish incitement in the PA-controlled media and mosques.

Or maybe that’s all just a coincidence. Maybe how Palestinians behave has no connection whatsoever to what they watch, hear and read from their teachers, imams and political leaders 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Fortunately, the Israeli forces eventually caught up to two of the terrorists. They killed one and captured the other. They were both identified as members of a local Hamas cell.

Wait, that can’t be! The Palestinian leadership promised, in the Oslo Accords, to disband all terrorist groups, seize their weapons and outlaw them. In other words, to put them out of business. How can it be that, 23 years after the PA took over, Hamas still has active terrorist cells in the city?

Surely the PA has the means to do the job. After all, the PA has one of the largest per-capita security forces in the world. Yet the PA never outlawed Hamas. It never arrested its members or seized its weapons. The PA treats Hamas like brothers and allows them to operate freely in Jenin, and everywhere else.

But don’t take my word for it. Look at The New York Times. Every once in a while, the truth about the PA and the terrorists manages to slip into one of its articles. On March 23, 2014, The Times reported that Israeli troops were forced to enter the Jenin refugee camp in pursuit of terrorists because although Jenin is under the “full control” of the PA, “the Palestinian [security forces] did not generally operate in refugee camps.”

Let me repeat what The Times said: The PA’s security forces do not operate in refugee camps. It doesn’t matter what the Oslo Accords say about the PA’s obligation to fight terrorists. It doesn’t matter how many Israelis the terrorists murder. The PA is not going to shut them down. Never has, never will.

One final fact from this week’s Jenin raid. The shots fired—by “moderate” Jenin residents and by terrorists whom the PA lets run free—wounded two of the Israeli soldiers. An Israeli military spokesman said one soldier was injured “seriously” and one was injured “lightly.”

According to IDF terminology, an injury is classified as “serious” if the victim’s life is in danger. A “moderate” injury means the victim could lose a limb. Anything short of losing a limb is categorized as a “light” injury. The victim might have to go through dozens of surgeries. He might have to walk with a severe limp, or he might suffer seizures for years to come. Technically, it’s still a “light” injury.

These two courageous young Israeli men risked their lives to protect their fellow Jews, and their lives may well have been shattered as a result. But you will never hear anything further about it. You will never hear on CNN or read in The New York Times about what these two Israelis suffered, or how their future lives will be affected. That kind of news is not considered fit to print.

Stephen M. Flatow, a vice president of the Religious Zionists of America, is an attorney in New Jersey. He is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995.

Democrats planning to condemn Palestinian Authority?

"Democrats planning to condemn Palestinian Authority?"

In a remarkable turnaround, Democratic Party activists who are known to be pro-Palestinian are calling on their party’s platform committee to condemn the Palestinian Authority (PA).

Or am I misreading something?

Two pro-Palestinian members of Congress, Reps. Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Luis Gutierrez of Illinois, issued their call last week on the blog of J Street. It happens that Ellison and Gutierrez are members of that same platform committee, so it may seem strange that they are taking a public position before the committee has finished its deliberations. But apparently they made up their minds on the Palestinian issue before being appointed to the committee, and no testimony by witnesses or discussions with their fellow committee members will change their minds.

Here’s the key sentence in the Ellison-Gutierrez proposal: “Palestinians struggle under an unjust occupation that deprives them of the rights, opportunities and independence that they deserve.”

Three cheers for Ellison and Gutierrez, for courageously speaking out against the PA’s unjust occupation and denial of rights!

That must be what they mean, right?

After all, 99 percent of the Palestinians live under the rule of the PA (in Judea and Samaria) or Hamas (in Gaza). So if the “occupation” is “unjust,” then it is the PA and Hamas that are committing the injustice.

And if the Palestinians are being “deprived of the rights that they deserve,” then it must be the regimes under which they live that are doing the denying.

The right to democratic elections is surely the most basic of rights. Mahmoud Abbas was elected head of the PA in January 2005 for a four-year term. Yet somehow he is still in office, seven and a half years since his term expired. And Hamas, of course, has not held a democratic election since taking over Gaza nine years ago.

So yes, the honorable members of Congress are absolutely correct. The PA and Hamas are depriving Palestinians of their right to free elections.

The Palestinians are also being deprived of their right to freedom of speech. Najat Abu Baker, a member of the Palestinian parliament, recently hid out in the parliament building for 17 days to avoid being arrested by the PA police. The warrant for arrest was issued because—as the New York Times put it—“Ms. Abu Baker said Mr. Abbas should resign and suggested that there would be money to pay educators if ministers were not so corrupt.”

Another right of which the Palestinians are being deprived—by the PA—is the right to free assembly. Earlier this year, 20,000 Palestinian public school teachers went on strike because they had not been paid (those were the unpaid educators to whom Abu Baker was referring). When some dissidents tried to hold a rally in support of the strikers, “the PA security services set up rings of checkpoints to prevent the teachers from attending the demonstration,” according to Haaretz. Twenty teachers and two school principals who did manage to reach the rally were arrested for doing so.

But don’t take my word for it. Look at the U.S. State Department’s most recent report on human rights around the world. It states that the PA is guilty of “abuse and mistreatment of detainees, poor and overcrowded detention facilities, prolonged detention, and infringements on privacy rights;” “restrictions on freedom of speech, press, and assembly;” “limits on freedom of association and movement;” “discrimination against persons with disabilities” and “discrimination based on sexual orientation and HIV/AIDS status;” and “limits on worker rights,” including “forced labor.”

The list of the PA’s violations of its citizens’ right is so long that one wonders if there are any rights at all that the Palestinians enjoy under the PA occupation.

So, hats off to Reps. Ellison and Gutierrez, for speaking out against the PA’s occupation and mistreatment of the Palestinians. It’s about time somebody raise their voices against this injustice.

That must be what they meant, right?

This column first appeared on JNS.org