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Friday October 10, 2003

Anti-Zionist Jews renounce aliyah in protest at JCF

by joe eskenazi
staff writer

A group of anti-Zionist Jews renounced their right to emigrate to Israel in a protest last week in front of the S.F.-based Jewish Community Federation’s Steuart Street building.

The group of 40 or so protesters at the Oct. 2 demonstration, organized by Jews for a Free Palestine, also excoriated the JCF for its support of the Jewish Agency for Israel and the Jewish National Fund.

The Jewish Agency is one of the primary organizations involved in encouraging and facilitating aliyah, and the JNF is guilty of appropriating Palestinian land and planting forests on it, charged JFP member Eric Romann.

“We’re saying that, considering that 4.5 million Palestinian refugees living around the world don’t have the right of return, we don’t believe Jews should — purely as a virtue of their identity— be legally allowed to return to Israel,” he said.

The anti-Zionist group demonstrated in front of the federation’s headquarters, Romann said, to “put them on notice and let the public know that while we’re encouraged with some of the programs they support, we’re against the support of the Jewish Agency for Israel.”

After hearing about the planned protest, Romann said federation CEO Sam Salkin contacted JFP about a possible meeting. As of Tuesday no meeting date had yet been scheduled.

When asked if he expected to make any headway on convincing the federation to oppose Jewish right of return and, instead, support Palestinians’ right to return, Romann replied, “Realistically, we think they ought to seriously consider voices in the Jewish community who bring that perspective to the table, and we believe they don’t.”

According to Rabbi Doug Kahn, executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, this was the first protest in front of federation headquarters in 18 years.

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