American Jewish Committee

Click here to view in browser

Attention Gmail Users! Don’t miss any AJC emails. If this email landed in your Promotions folder, please drag it to your Primary folder and confirm that you’d like Gmail to do this automatically for future AJC emails. This lets Gmail know that AJC emails are important to you!

AJC Shabbat Table

This week, in AJC’s Shabbat Table, we ponder the significance of praying for rain on the holiday of Shemini Atzeret, which falls on this Shabbat. Could the prayer for rain also serve as a symbolic call for equality and justice? We also provide some resources for discussing the unrest in Brooklyn neighborhoods where large Haredi Jewish populations now face additional regulations to control an alarming spike in Covid cases. And lastly, we go back in time to meet Mr. Biggott, the main character in a series of cartoons created by AJC in the 1930s to combat anti-immigrant sentiment. Read more

Advocacy Anywhere

Advocacy Anywhere, Powered by AJC, is AJC’s online platform bringing you top-quality content during the pandemic. Tune in Tuesday, October 14, for a conversation with AJC CEO David Harris about developments on the world stage, mounting challenges in the U.S., and the most pressing issues on the minds of Jews around the world. View the Advocacy Anywhere page for information on past and future programs.

On Air

Josh Kraft on ‘together beat hate'
People of the Pod / 22-minute listen
This week, we speak to Josh Kraft, a community leader, seasoned nonprofit executive, and six-time Super Bowl champion, by way of his family’s ownership of the New England Patriots. He recently took the reins of the Kraft family’s philanthropic efforts, and he joins us to discuss "[tbh]," or "together beat hate," an initiative of the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism. The Foundation focuses on creating replicable models for fighting antisemitism and other forms of prejudice, racism, and hate. Listen now

Must-reads

David Harris: Playing to His Strengths for Three Decades
AJC Global Voice / 4-minute read
For AJC CEO David Harris, assuring the safety and well-being of the Jewish people is the mission of a lifetime. His passion to fight for world Jewry is inspired by his late parents, both Holocaust survivors. It is also motivated by a firm grasp of world history – a history that shaped and has been influenced by the organization he leads – and a commitment to never again repeat the mistakes of the past. At a virtual event described by AJC President Harriet Schleifer as “the most successful in the 114-year history of AJC,” Harris was honored this week for his 30 years at the helm of the global Jewish advocacy organization. Read more

It’s Time to Ban Iran from the Olympics
JTA / 2-minute read
The execution of 27-year-old Iranian wrestling champion Navid Afkari last month is just one of Iran’s many abuses against its own athletes and should disqualify the Islamic Republic from the next Olympic competition, writes Avi Mayer, AJC Managing Director of Global Communications, in JTA. Mayer writes that Iran’s abuses make the Olympic Charter, the principles to which every competing country must commit, read “like a charge sheet against the Iranian regime.” Friendship, fair play, prevention of harassment and prohibition of discrimination – Iran has violated them all. “Whereas other countries view their sportsmen and women as the embodiment of national values and ideals,” Mayer writes, “Iran’s maltreatment of its athletes represents a distillation of the very worst elements of life under the ayatollahs.” Join thousands of others from 39 countries and sign the AJC petition to bar Iran from participating in the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games, set to take place next year in Tokyo. Read more

Europe Can’t Fight Jew-hatred Without a Working Definition of Antisemitism
The Times of Israel / 2-minute read
Thirty-one countries of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) have adopted the Working Definition of Antisemitism, which spells out clear examples of hatred and prejudice toward Jews, including stereotypes and conspiracy theories, Holocaust denial, and the demonization of Israel. The U.S. State Department, under Democratic and Republican administrations, also has applied the Working Definition in its worldwide efforts to monitor antisemitism. In this column in The Times of Israel, AJC Director of International Jewish Affairs Andrew Baker and AJC’s U.S. Director for Combating Antisemitism Holly Huffnagle call on social media companies to use the definition as a guide for identifying Jew-hatred. “The Working Definition fundamentally is an educational tool to help government authorities and civil society to understand antisemitism and recognize it in its multiple forms,” they write. “It is not a speech code.” Learn about the Working Definition here. Read more

Good to Know

Jewish Student Assaulted Outside German Synagogue
Jewish Journal / 2-minute read
Less than a year after a gunman tried to force his way into a synagogue in Halle, Germany on Yom Kippur, a suspect wearing camouflage and wielding a shovel attacked a student this week outside a synagogue in Hamburg where worshipers were celebrating Sukkot. The attack is one of many antisemitic crimes, which Germany has seen nearly double in the last three years. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas tweeted: “This is not a one-off case, this is vile anti-Semitism and we all have to stand against it.” AJC CEO David Harris tweeted: “Will the age-old & demonic pathology of #antisemitism ever end?” Read more

Neo-Nazi Political Party Ruled a Criminal Organization
The New York Times / 2-minute read
Last year, the people of Greece voted the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party out of the nation’s parliament. This week, an Athens court found the racist party guilty of running a criminal organization that targeted immigrants and critics. The three-judge criminal court tied the fascist party to a string of attacks including the fatal stabbing in 2013 of rapper Pavlos Fyssas, the attempted murder of three Egyptian fishermen in 2012, and assaults on members of Greece’s Communist Party trade union in 2013. AJC CEO David Harris tweeted: “Long-awaited & welcome decision by Greek court. Neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party has been declared a criminal organization. Its leaders are headed for jail. As a target of Golden Dawn, I know something about its methods. Justice has prevailed in #Greece.” Read more

Facebook Bans QAnon Across All Platforms
Axios / 2-minute read
Facebook announced on Tuesday that it would ban all accounts, pages, and groups promoting the far-right and antisemitic conspiracy theory QAnon from its platforms. Antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jewish elites, globalists, and bankers are central to the QAnon ideology. QAnon supporters often invoke the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a fabricated antisemitic text that purports to lay out a Jewish plan for global domination. AJC’s position paper on QAnon explains why AJC condemns its worldview in the strongest terms. AJC tweeted: “We commend @Facebook for banning QAnon across all pages, groups, and Instagram accounts. QAnon's racist, antisemitic conspiracy theories have no place in our society.” Read more

Farrakhan’s Channel Removed From YouTube
I24 News / 1-minute read
YouTube has finally removed Louis Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam (NOI) channel from its platform for violating the company’s hate speech terms and perpetuating antisemitic conspiracy theories. Last year, Facebook permanently banned Farrakhan from its platforms, including Instagram, for his antisemitic and homophobic language. In July, Twitter insisted Farrakhan delete a pinned tweet, comparing the Jewish people to termites. When Sean Combs (aka P. Diddy) broadcast Farrakhan’s Independence Day speech on his YouTube channel RevoltTV, it also was removed for violating YouTube’s hate-speech policy, though it had already been viewed more than 1.2 million times. AJC tweeted: “We applaud @YouTube for removing the channel of the Nation of Islam, the organization led by Louis Farrakhan, who for far too long has used the platform as a megaphone for his antisemitic and homophobic outbursts.” Read more

Tidings

Jewish Nobel Laureate (The Forward)
Etrog Deal of the Century (JTA)
UAE, Israel Foreign Ministers Tour Holocaust Monument (JTA)

The articles featured here do not necessarily reflect AJC’s positions.

Enjoy receiving the AJC Dispatch each week? Forward it to your friends! They can sign up for their own Dispatch here.

AJC’s mission is to enhance the well-being of the Jewish people and Israel, and to advance human rights and democratic values in the United States and around the world.

To unsubscribe or to manage your email preferences, please click here.