John, an alarming new antisemitic attack called “The Mapping Project” has been launched against the Jewish community in Massachusetts by a secretive organization. We are asking you and the entire ADL community to call on your elected officials to loudly condemn this appalling attack as a form of intimidation deeply rooted in antisemitic tropes.

It is vital that elected leaders from across the country speak out to ensure that this hatred finds no home in Massachusetts or any other state.

THE VERY REAL DANGER OF THIS ONLINE ATTACK

Just last week, this anonymous group released a website that depicts what they claim is a conspiracy of “Zionism, Policing and Empire” throughout Massachusetts, drawing on antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jewish power, wealth and control to claim sinister connections. They targeted the places where the Jewish community sends young people to learn, where families volunteer and where congregations pray.

Sadly, the “Mapping Project” is not a one-off from a fringe group. Rather, it exemplifies how the increasingly aggressive purveyors of anti-Zionism are spewing raw antisemitism into the mainstream. The movement barely attempts to use the fig leaf of opposition to Israeli policies to cover a venomous hostility to the Jewish people.

A “Mapping Project” graphic (via screen grab)

Among this secretive project’s targets in addition to ADL: a Jewish high school, an arts collaborative, a coordinating body of synagogues, Harvard Medical School and the local Jewish Federation. Their map pinpoints the names and addresses of many individuals and institutions integral to the Jewish community and identifies the institutions over which they supposedly have corrupt influence. What is their stated goal? To “dismantle them.”

By demonizing the Jewish community while simultaneously calling for “resistance” and saying that “every entity has an address, every network can be disrupted,” it is not hard to imagine what this misguided call to action could incite. After discussions with ADL and our partners, the FBI is now engaged, tracking the Mapping Project website and working to ensure the safety of the community.

Some of ADL’s critics disagree with us when we address the threat of anti-Zionist organizations in addition to the threat posed by extremist far-right organizations. To be fair, these are very different threats. Far-right extremism is singularly lethal compared to anti-Zionist activity from the far left; for years, individuals have been driven by white supremacist conspiracy theories to murder Jews along with other minorities. From Pittsburgh to Poway to Buffalo, it is a violent danger that should not be underestimated.

IT’S TIME TO TAKE ACTION

But whether the antisemitism is voiced by progressives, right-wing extremists or anyone in between, all of us have an ongoing role to play in disrupting it by speaking out at work, in schools, online and in the public square.

Right now, with this very public danger to the Jewish community surfacing in Massachusetts, we ask you to ensure that the Jewish community throughout the country is not standing alone. Please click here to urge your elected leaders to make a public statement against the Mapping Project and against antisemitism.

You and I and the rest of the ADL community will not be intimidated, and we and our allies will not be silent.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Greenblatt

CEO and National Director

ADL