Jews Against the Occupation.

Jews Against the Occupation jatonyc.org

IN OCTOBER 2000, a group of Jewish activists had brunch together. As they discussed their frustrations over the second intifada and the myth of unanimous Jewish support for the Barak government, the social occasion turned into a work session. Out came the pens and paper. The dozen or so friends drafted a broadsheet, later distributed at a meeting of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice to much enthusiasm. Its title-Jews Against the Occupation-stuck.

"We're a Palestine activist group. A lot of peace groups take the position that it's a cycle of violence, that it's both the Palestinians and Israelis to blame for the conflict," says Eric Monse. "We explicitly blame the Occupation as the root of the problem and feel like the first step to solving the problem is ending this in between position of occupation. We don't necessarily take a position on a one-state or two-state solution, but we need to move away from the Occupation, where there's an entire population dispossessed, with no voting rights, no rights whatsoever. With no human rights to speak of."

JATO's membership consists of longtime activists and first-timers who come to JATO because, as one member says, "as Jews, they just can't take it anymore. They can't stand the abuse of Palestinians and the occupation of their land in the name of keeping Jews safe." Many JATO members have been active around queer and other social justice issues. It's multigenerational-some members have been activists since the 1940s and 50s-and comprises progressive, secular and religious Jews. JATO makes a firm distinction between critiques of Israel and anti-Semitism, which it condemns. The hundred or so members include both Zionists and non-Zionists: Unlike some other Jewish groups, JATO does not take an organizational stance on Zionism, defined as believing in Israel as a Jewish state.

Ending U.S. aid to Israel is central to the organization's mission. The U.S., which donates more to Israel than to any other country, provides billions in annual aid, most of it funding the military. JATO believes such aid is illegal: The U.S. Arms Export Control Act strictly forbids military assistance to any country that violates internationally recognized human rights. The Fourth Geneva Convention, to which Israel is a signatory, outlines rules of wartime behavior. Israel, JATO says, violates the Geneva Convention through the killing of civilians, the bulldozing of homes and farmland, arrest and detention without due process and the denial of basic amenities like running water.

"We spend a lot of time talking to Jewish folks within the Jewish progressive world [in the U.S.]. JATO has pretty close relationships with a number of other Jewish anti-Occupation groups, but mostly with those whose perspective doesn't stop at 1966," says Daniel Lang/Levitsky. "While we in some cases have perfectly cordial relationships with and have worked with groups that align themselves more with the Israeli Zionist left, we tend to have more political differences with them."

JATO members also spend a fair amount of time in the Occupied Territories-several members are usually in the process of going or returning. For the past several years, the International Solidarity Movement has coordinated humanitarian aid and direct action in the Occupied Territories, bringing people from all over the world to the area to document human rights abuses, to ride in Red Crescent ambulances, deliver food and assist with olive harvests.

The presence of white people and international citizens used to mean that the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) was less likely to use force against Palestinian civilians. But last March, Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old woman from Olympia, WA, was killed by an Israeli bulldozer as she stood in front of a Palestinian home about to be bulldozed. Such home demolitions have left more than 16,000 Palestinians homeless since the start of the second intifada.

In protest, about 20 Palestine solidarity activists, including some JATO members, locked down in a "die-in" in NYC's diamond district last March 26. Covered in fake blood, they wore signs that read, "Witness to Israeli War Crimes." A cardboard Caterpillar bulldozer stood nearby, though a bystander quickly destroyed it. On April 19, 16 of those activists go to court for sentencing: D.A. Morgenthaler wants 15 days in prison and three years' probation. "My clients are facing harsher treatment in this case than similarly situated protestors in the past," says attorney Stephen W. Edwards. "From the beginning, the D.A.'s office was eager to make an example out of them, tacking on charges higher than those which the police themselves...testified they saw in the conduct of the protest." o