Just when you thought the people at the tragicomically misnamed "Jewish Voice for Peace" couldn't stoop any lower into the gutter, they have decided to embarrass themselves with a rant breathtaking in its ignorance. Cecilie Surasky, posting on their house organ Muzzlewatch , decided that a group of Jewish students and Darfurian refugees demonstrating in Geneva against the farcical UN human rights conference were actually "being used as part of a hateful effort" by "scary right wing group StandWithUs". She goes on to deplore that there was tension between African and Arab delegates over Darfur (not that there would be any good reason to have tension over the wholesale slaughter of Africans by an Islamic regime). She must have been paying close attention to all those conspiracy websites that blame the evil Zionists for the conspiracy to save Darfur.

Cecilie did, in a different post, lament that Ahmedinijad's tirade against Israel undermined the work of the conference; but of course couldn't resist blaming the nefarious Israel Lobby for that ("He handed over to the pro-Israeli-occupation groups all they needed to make their point, that Durban II is just an Israel-hate fest."). But she doesn't appear to have a problem with a "human rights" conference run by the likes of Libya and Cuba, or the fact that the Arab states would block any consideration of the genocide in Darfur. And of course, in JVP-world, ANY group that supports the Jewish people's right to self-determination is a scary-right wing group-- in the same way that if you are standing at the North Pole, every direction that you look is south. I would also have thought that Cecilie would have no problem with the symbolism of the tape over one's mouth used by the demonstrators in Geneva to highlight the UN conference's silence over Darfur and other human rights issues in the Arab world-- after all, Muzzlewatch uses a similar image on its website. Of course, in JVP's case, it's just not quite the truth, since their anti-Israel perspective receives a steady roar of publicity thanks to Jimmy Carter, Walt and Mearsheimer, and other self-styled proponents of "peace". But then again, truth has never really been JVP's strong point.

So, in summary, a group of people shows the hypocrisy of the Geneva conference by holding hearings and public demonstrations on grave human rights violations--violations ignored by the UN conference under pressure from Islamic regimes. Yet JVP, which has shown no hesitation about standing with the racists of International ANSWER , calls this a "hateful effort"? Tell me, Cecilie, what signs did they hold that showed hatred? Where were their signs calling for extermination of an entire people, or glorifying tyrants like Hitler (contrast this to the NGO forum in Durban in 2001 which featured overt celebrations of Hitler and the Shoah)? Or do you define as "hatred" anything that affronts the delicate sensibilities of your Islamist friends?

No, addressing human rights is not a joke. Attempting to use a human rights conference to further a political vendetta against Israel is what turned the Geneva and Durban conferences into a sick joke; Ahmedinejad's presence turned it into a full-fledged circus. The clown nose fits him, as well as all those who see the world through the fun-house mirror of hatred of Israel that distorts reality. We've got one that fits you too, Cecilie.

The ISM's "Jewish Voice for Peace"
By Lee Kaplan and Bill Levinson
FrontPageMagazine.com


In 2003, anti-Israel groups such as the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), and its university-based student arm, the Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSM), unveiled a new strategy aimed at undermining support for Israel among American Jews. Members were told how to infiltrate Jewish organizations in America, while claiming to present “another point of view” on Israel. Their mission: To advance the notion that enlightened Jews do not support Israel.

A leader in this strategy is a Berkeley, California, group called A Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). JVP was founded by Mitchell Plitnick, a former 60’s Berkeley radical who emerged on the activist scene as the Palestine Solidarity Movement grew after its creation in 2001. As a tax-exempt nonprofit organization, JVP’s platform is to convince American Jews that Israel is the main hindrance to any peace because of its “occupation” of Arab lands. This means all of Israel, not just lands taken in 1967. Consequently, JVP views any effort by Israel to defend itself simply as a perpetuation of this unjust "occupation."

In the earliest JVP newsletters, Plitnick even went so far as to write that it is doubtful that Jews ever lived in the Holy Land at all and that they were probably from Khazaria in Russia, thus not indigenous to the region like their Arab cousins. He has written that the exodus and the First Temple were just myths, designed to legitimize a Jewish state in the region, and now used as a publicity ploy by modern Jews to steal a state from the Arabs. Similar canards were used by the PLO to legitimize its terror war against Israel.
JVP wages war by other means. For instance, JVP’s website encourages IDF soldiers to desert. It also promotes divestment from Israel, along with support for Arab leaders like Mazen Qumsiyeh, who called Jews living in Israel “a disease.” (Unsurprisingly, JVP has mourned the deaths of Yasser Arafat and Sheik Ahmed Yassin of Hamas, who murdered hundreds of Jews in terrorist attacks.) Plitnick and his acolytes in JVP attend conclaves held by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. The latter is a Saudi-funded front group that promotes divestment from Israel and boycotts of Israeli products. JVP’s fellow attendees at these events speak volumes: Al Awda, the openly anti-Semitic organization that seeks the end of Israel, Alison Weir of the group If Americans Knew, and assorted ISM groups, all calling for the dismantling of Israel. JVP also praised the Presbyterian Church's boycott of Israel.

In sum, JVP sells an ideological bill of goods to pacifist and liberal American Jews who do not always know what it is really doing or promoting. In effect, it is a Jewish front for anti-Israel activities by Arab and American anarchist groups. Yet dishonesty has paid political dividends: JVP has already made inroads in Hillel, particularly at UC Berkeley, where it posed as a "liberal voice on campus." Falsely claiming support for Israel, it worked with the Students for Justice in Palestine to boycott Israel.

Equally dubious are the JVP’s accounting practices. JVP engages in lobbying that it has not reported to the IRS. Its civil disobedience activities, as reported by Counterpunch, may also violate IRS Rev Rule 75-384. Civil disobedience encourages lawbreaking, a reason for revocation of nonprofit status. Extensive lobbying or propaganda is also not permitted.


http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=6652C4F0-2016-492B-9F97-4056D4187E99

I recently wrote about a move among anti-Israel activists in Seattle to put a referendum on November's ballot which would mandate that the city's pension funds divest stock in corporations doing business in Israel (read here). Divestment advocates have been using the endorsement of a group called "Jewish Voice for Peace" (or "JVP") to deceive Seattle voters into believing that progressive, pro-peace Jews consider divestment a legitimate tactic. In fact, there is no indication that this is true.

JVP is an extremely small group. They do not make their membership figures public, but there are some indications that actual membership in the group is in the range of 500 - 1,000. A recent petition drive by JVP collected 4,000 signatures, and a recent letter writing drive collected 1,400 signatures. Assuming that their mailing list is larger than their formal membership, and that their petitions are forwarded to others by those on their mailing list, 1,000 members would be a very generous estimate of their formal membership. Assuming that JVP's membership is 100% Jewish, the organization represents between 0.008% - 0.015% of American Jews. In spite of this, JVP's leaders and their political associates portray the group as having a wide constituency.

JVP has made a name for itself as a supporter of divestment from companies doing business in Israel. In doing so, they, on the one hand, associate with extreme anti-Israel groups like ANSWER (read the ADL's take on ANSWER here), and, on the other hand, market themselves to groups that actually have mainstream, moderate constituencies like the United Methodists. Depending on their target audience, they sometimes represent themselves as mainstream and moderate themselves, saying to those audiences that they advocate very limited divestment targeting only corporations providing direct material support to the so-called "occupation" of the West Bank, Gaza and "East Jerusalem", sometimes naming specific individual corporations. The truth, however, is that JVP has a history of calling for a complete boycott of Israel, including of Israeli artists wishing to perform in the United States.

In one instance, JVP supported the group called "Women in Black-Los Angeles" (or "WIB-LA") in demanding that the individual members of the Israel Philharmonic sign a sort of loyalty oath with respect to their views of the political situation in the Middle East if they wanted to avoid a boycott of a planned concert in Los Angeles. WIB-LA sent, and JVP's leaders co-signed, a very polite letter to the orchestra's musicians, referring to the musicians as "representatives of the State of Israel", and giving them an ultimatum to sign a letter of support for the views of WIB-LA and JVP and return it three months prior to the concert in February 2007. (The letter containing this demand bore the closing "Peace and blessings". Nice touch.)

When the musicians did not sign this loyalty oath, WIB-LA picketed outside the concert with signs reading "BOYCOTT ISRAEL".

vigil in front of Disney Hall 1
vigil in front of Disney Hall 2

(Read about the protest action supporting a complete boycott of Israel at Women in Black - Los Angeles. Read the letter demanding the musicians sign a loyalty oath here at the so-called "OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF NORMAN G. FINKELSTEIN".)

Now, JVP (via their blog, "Muzzlewatch") is protesting two institutions (Spertus Museum and the University of Michigan Press) banning intellectual content deemed to be biased against Israel and, in the case of one, overtly anti-Semitic (read JVP's views on this here, a press report here, and the views of Stand With Us here). JVP's reasoning? They believe in freedom of expression. Their action against the Israel Philharmonic has apparently been forgotten.

JVP did not mention their push to boycott Israeli creative artists on "Muzzlewatch", the hypocrisy of doing so being too apparent. Maybe they need to have an alternate blog for such actions. They could call it "Muzzle".

Jewish Voice for Peace needs a new motto, something like “We’re not really anti-Zionist, but we always act that way.” Their latest screed about the Palestinian Nakba reads like a textbook produced by the Palestinian Authority, full of allegations designed to incite hatred and prevent peace. It levels charges of atrocities allegedly committed against Arab civilians by the Jews of 1948 Palestine, who had the temerity to try to defend themselves not only against 5 invading Arab armies, but also against local villages that had long been launching attacks against Jewish civilians and besieging Jewish Jerusalem.

Their “fact sheet” accuses Israel of war crimes, in blood-curdling detail that brings to mind accounts of the horrors of the Holocaust. This of course is not by accident. There are three themes that anti-Zionists use to try to relate the Palestinian narrative to the Holocaust. First, they attempt to present the Arabs as nothing more than peaceful innocent bystanders who became secondary victims of the Holocaust (ignoring the fact that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Amin al Husseini spent the war years in Berlin where he encouraged the Nazis to commit full scale genocide against the Jews, recruited Muslims for the Nazis, and toured Auschwitz with Eichmann, probably to help plan a similar facility should the Germans have overrun Palestine). Secondly, they insist on the false equation of the mass industrial-scale extermination of European Jewry based on a horrific racist ideology, and the dislocation of Palestinian Arabs caused by another war of extermination against the Jews—this one started by their fellow Arabs. Finally, and most outrageously, they claim that current Israeli self-defense actions against the terrorist organizations Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are morally or legally on a plane with Nazi Germany’s treatment of the Jews.

The descriptions used by JVP are almost all credited to one source: Ilan Pappe’s book The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine. Pappe, for those unfamiliar with him, is a former Israeli lecturer at the University of Haifa who has since relocated to the University of Exeter in the UK. A doctrinaire Marxist who once ran for Knesset with the Communist-led Hadash party, he opposes the existence of Israel as a Jewish state but nonetheless supports "resistance" by Hamas, a radical Islamist movement that seeks to impose sharia law and at least tolerates, if not incites, violence against Christian "infidels" . Most tellingly, he also frankly admits that he is not really interested in facts: “‘We do [historiography] because of ideological reasons, not because we are truth seekers... ‘there is no such thing as truth, only a collection of narratives’.” This philosophy was exposed when one of Pappe’s graduate students, Teddy Katz, was shown to have falsified evidence about an alleged massacre at Tantura in 1948 by claiming that his interview subjects said one thing while the tapes of the interviews proved otherwise.

There are historians such as Benny Morris who have indeed documented incidents of expulsion and even murder of Arabs during Israel’s War of Independence, when the Jews were fighting for their lives and the Arabs were fighting to kill Jews. Israel, no more and no less than other countries, was not born without violence, without wrongs being committed, without people being displaced. All Americans who are not part of the original Native American population live on their land by virtue of military conquest, much of it involving acts worse than anything Israel is accused of by its worst enemies-- and Americans are not returning to a homeland for which we have pined and prayed for centuries. The same holds true for Canadians and Australians. So by what moral right do those who point the finger at Israel and bellow “J’accuse!” continue to reside in their own comfortable homes?

The blood libel is an old staple of anti-Semitism. Jews through the centuries have been slaughtered because of the now-rejected Catholic teaching that the Jews were responsible for killing Jesus, then for the myth that Jews killed Christian children to use their blood for matzah. Now we have the new blood libels against Israel. The most prominent has been the al-Dura affair, used as a bloody shirt to create a jihadist frenzy during the Arafat’s terror war—and now that the entirety of the filmed evidence has been aired in a French courtroom, the questions about what might have been a fully staged hoax are larger than ever. Other examples of media gullibility to Arab manipulation abound—the “Jenin massacre” in 2002 during which world media eagerly swallowed Palestinian claims of hundreds of deaths during Operation Defensive Shield, the doctored pictures from Lebanon , blame placed on Israel for the deaths of civilians killed by Hamas mines on a Gaza beach. Of course, while the sensationalist false reporting of these incidents makes headlines, the “corrections” are always buried in small type at the bottom of page 10.


JVP has chosen to perpetuate the tradition of the blood libel, hiding behind anti-Zionism as a politically correct shield. As self-described experts on anti-Semitism, their leadership can’t claim to be ignorant of what they are doing. So one can only conclude that they agree with Pappe: facts aren’t important, advancing the ideology is. And the ideology, sadly, is not one of peace, but of fanning the flames of anti-Israel hatred.

The ISM's "Jewish Voice for Peace"
By Lee Kaplan and Bill Levinson
FrontPageMagazine.com


In 2003, anti-Israel groups such as the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), and its university-based student arm, the Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSM), unveiled a new strategy aimed at undermining support for Israel among American Jews. Members were told how to infiltrate Jewish organizations in America, while claiming to present “another point of view” on Israel. Their mission: To advance the notion that enlightened Jews do not support Israel.

A leader in this strategy is a Berkeley, California, group called A Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). JVP was founded by Mitchell Plitnick, a former 60’s Berkeley radical who emerged on the activist scene as the Palestine Solidarity Movement grew after its creation in 2001. As a tax-exempt nonprofit organization, JVP’s platform is to convince American Jews that Israel is the main hindrance to any peace because of its “occupation” of Arab lands. This means all of Israel, not just lands taken in 1967. Consequently, JVP views any effort by Israel to defend itself simply as a perpetuation of this unjust "occupation."

In the earliest JVP newsletters, Plitnick even went so far as to write that it is doubtful that Jews ever lived in the Holy Land at all and that they were probably from Khazaria in Russia, thus not indigenous to the region like their Arab cousins. He has written that the exodus and the First Temple were just myths, designed to legitimize a Jewish state in the region, and now used as a publicity ploy by modern Jews to steal a state from the Arabs. Similar canards were used by the PLO to legitimize its terror war against Israel.
JVP wages war by other means. For instance, JVP’s website encourages IDF soldiers to desert. It also promotes divestment from Israel, along with support for Arab leaders like Mazen Qumsiyeh, who called Jews living in Israel “a disease.” (Unsurprisingly, JVP has mourned the deaths of Yasser Arafat and Sheik Ahmed Yassin of Hamas, who murdered hundreds of Jews in terrorist attacks.) Plitnick and his acolytes in JVP attend conclaves held by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. The latter is a Saudi-funded front group that promotes divestment from Israel and boycotts of Israeli products. JVP’s fellow attendees at these events speak volumes: Al Awda, the openly anti-Semitic organization that seeks the end of Israel, Alison Weir of the group If Americans Knew, and assorted ISM groups, all calling for the dismantling of Israel. JVP also praised the Presbyterian Church's boycott of Israel.

In sum, JVP sells an ideological bill of goods to pacifist and liberal American Jews who do not always know what it is really doing or promoting. In effect, it is a Jewish front for anti-Israel activities by Arab and American anarchist groups. Yet dishonesty has paid political dividends: JVP has already made inroads in Hillel, particularly at UC Berkeley, where it posed as a "liberal voice on campus." Falsely claiming support for Israel, it worked with the Students for Justice in Palestine to boycott Israel.

Equally dubious are the JVP’s accounting practices. JVP engages in lobbying that it has not reported to the IRS. Its civil disobedience activities, as reported by Counterpunch, may also violate IRS Rev Rule 75-384. Civil disobedience encourages lawbreaking, a reason for revocation of nonprofit status. Extensive lobbying or propaganda is also not permitted. A review of Jewish Voice for Peace’s 501 (c) 3 nonprofit report for 2005 reveals the following possible violations under taxpayer ID #EIN 90-0018359:

www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=25618

"Jewish Voice for Peace" A Voice for Defamation
Steven Stotsky

Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) bills itself as an organization of "activists inspired by Jewish tradition to work together for peace, social justice, and human rights" who "support the aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians for security and self-determination." Its moral outrage, however, is decidedly one-sided, directed overwhelmingly at Israel. The group's hostility towards Israel was apparent in an Op-Ed timed to coincide with Israel's 60th anniversary, appearing in the Detroit Free Press on May 22, 2008. In “No Time to Celebrate as Palestinians Still Suffer,” Barbara Harvey and David Finkel, Michigan board members of the Jewish Voice for Peace, rehashed discredited allegations of massacres carried out by Jewish forces and accused the current Israeli government of intentionally starving the residents of Gaza.

CAMERA has previously discussed the agenda of the deceptively named Jewish Voice for Peace noting their involvement in divestment and boycott campaigns targeting Israel. JVP's mission statement — available on its web site — contains a list of demands on Israel, but from the Palestinians it asks only that they halt suicide bombings and attacks against Israeli civilians (emphasis added). JVP calls for the United States to "stop supporting repressive policies in Israel and elsewhere" and stipulates that "aid may not be delivered to countries that abuse human rights." Since it assails Israel as a human rights abuser, JVP also calls for an end to military aid to that nation.

Tantura Falsehoods
The authors cite an alleged Israeli massacre of 200 Arabs on May 22, 1948 in the village of Tantura by the 33rd battalion of the Alexandroni brigade. This allegation came from a graduate thesis by Theodore Katz, a disciple of revisionist historian Ilan Pappe at the University of Haifa. Katz was sued for libel by surviving members of the brigade, and it emerged during the trial that Katz's own notes and recorded interviews contradicted his claims that there had been a massacre. Katz then admitted under oath that he did not believe any massacre occurred. He apologized and agreed to publish advertisements at his own cost publicizing his disavowal of the massacre claim. Katz stated:

After checking and re-checking the evidence, I am now certain beyond any doubt that there is no basis at all for the allegation that after Tantura surrendered, there was any killing of residents by the Alexandroni Brigade, or any other fighting unit of the IDF. I would like to clarify that what I wrote was misunderstood, and that I did not mean to suggest that there had been a massacre in Tantura, nor do I believe that there ever was a massacre at Tantura.

The judge did not allow Katz’s subsequent attempt to recant his admissions. And a commission appointed by the University of Haifa re-examined Katz’s thesis and disqualified it after finding numerous further distortions and fabrications.

Since it is well-known that Katz lost the libel case, that his thesis was disqualified due to its inaccuracies, and that his own notes and recorded interviews showed there was no massacre, one must ask why the Jewish Voice for Peace is promoting Katz’s discredited and defamatory claims?

Gazan Distortions

The authors accuse Israel of deliberately starving Gazans because they voted for the “wrong political party.” Although conditions for Palestinians in Gaza are cause for concern, there is no evidence that Gazans are starving. Furthermore, Hamas is not just a “political party.” It is deemed a terrorist organization by the United States, the EU and Israel. Its charter and leadership call for the annihilation of Israel. Its media, mosques and education system promote extreme bigotry toward Jews. Hamas has murdered hundreds of Israelis in terrorist attacks inside Israel and, since taking power in Gaza, has fired thousands of rockets into Israeli cities, a war crime under international law.

Several UN reports discuss the food situation in Gaza in some detail; none indicates starvation is occurring.
This UN Report published on May 13, 2008 provides an overview of the situation in Gaza. The number of Gazan children classified as acutely malnourished is 1.4 percent And 13 percent are chronically malnourished. This is a substantial improvement from what was reported on November 18, 2002.
Another UN Report published on Feb. 19, 2008 discusses food insecurity, but gives no indication that starvation is imminent.

A third UN Report discusses how aid covered 61% of food needs in Gaza and the rest was covered by the commercial markets.

Israel has assured deliveries of food and medical supplies into Gaza despite the onslaught of rockets fired from that territory into Israel.

Presenting Disputed and Unsubstantiated Charges as Uncontested Fact

The authors also cite another alleged massacre in the village of Dawayameh. Their account seems to be directly copied from a book by Katz’s thesis adviser, Ilan Pappe (The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine). Pappe calls the events in Dawayameh “probably the worst in the annals of Nakba atrocities,” but judging by his narrative of the “massacre,” Pappe is no more reliable than his student Katz. For example, Pappe bases his account on a “UN report from 14 June 1949,” and quotes extensively from this supposed report’s findings. However, he gives no citation for the report, instead saying it’s “accessible today on the Internet just by searching for the village name.”

In fact, it’s not at all easy to find, but it can be found by browsing the UN’s quite extensive site on Palestine. Having found the report, it becomes all too clear why Pappe gives no citation; contrary to his claims, the report is not a “UN report” at all. Instead, it’s a report submitted to the UN by something called the “Arab Refugee Congress of Ramallah,” and it is based entirely on the uncorroborated account of a single Arab official from the town.

No real historian would so mischaracterize the archival record.
Unfortunately, that’s not the end of Pappe’s distortions regarding Dawayameh. In a footnote Pappe also cites work by Benny Morris. But while Morris (in The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem) does present claims of a Dawayameh massacre, he also describes denials of any such event from an Israeli soldier who fought in the village, and notes that a UN investigation – not the one cited by Pappe – found “no evidence of a massacre.” Pappe deceptively shares none of this with his readers.

It should also be noted that the evidence Morris presents for a massacre is based on hearsay: news of the massacre was learned from Israeli man A, who had heard the story from man B, who had heard the story from man C, an Israeli soldier. And man C was not actually an eyewitness – he had arrived in the “second wave.”

Finally, the authors include the “infamous massacre at Deir Yassin,” while keeping from readers the fact that accounts of what happened at Deir Yassin are disputed. Although there is no question that Arab villagers were killed, CAMERA has previously noted that some Arab accounts admit that atrocity charges were exaggerated. For example, Ayish Zeidan, a survivor of the fighting in Deir Yassin, told a British newspaper that:

The Arab radio talked of women being killed and raped, but this is not true... I believe that most of those who were killed were among the fighters and the women and children who helped the fighters. The Arab leaders committed a big mistake. By exaggerating the atrocities they thought they would encourage people to fight back harder. Instead they created panic and people ran away. (Daily Telegraph, April 8, 1998)

The Jewish Voice for Peace should be recognized for what it is -- a radical fringe group that defames Israel to promote a one-sided agenda. Op-Ed page editors should be aware that providing this group a platform to disseminate baseless and distorted allegations damages their own credibility.


http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=108&x_article=1498

I can't tell if the person who posted the video agrees with JVP or not, but regardless, I agree completely--JVP is absolutely anti-Zionist. They accept every people's right to self-determination-- except the Jewish people's. They accept every group's own narrative-except the Jewish one. They define peace not as that between a Jewish state of Israel and an Arab state of Palestine, but between an Arab state that tolerates a Jewish minority (at least for now) and an Arab state that refuses to allow Jews at all (a la Saudi Arabia)

JVP never said any of that stuff the zionazis say they said. If they had, the zionazis could point to an URL to prove it. They don't They can't. The JVP never said any of that stuff. It's just more zZionazi lies.

Its from the JVP blog. Go check it out.
We can't have peopel concerned about Darfur- only Palestine matters.The only human rights that count are Palestinian human rights

JVP is funded by Islamists for Islamists- the paid staff has a Jewish veneer, but the events are filled with women in Hijabs.

They keep the sources of their funding invisible because it would blow their whole charade out of the water.

For more information On Jewish Voice For peace (90-0018359 ) check out the expose on NGO Monitor http://www.ngo-monitor.org/article/driving_a_wedge_jvp_s_strategy_to_weaken_u_s_support_for_israel_by_dividing_the_jewish_community