The group’s pathetic response to Trump’s hate rally proved once and for all that it is no friend to anyone fighting bigotry, antisemitism, or far-right extremism.
Jonathan Greenblatt participates in the “Building Coalitions to Fight Hate” panel during the TAAF Heritage Month Summit at The Glasshouse on May 5, 2023, in New York City.
(JP Yim / Getty Images for The Asian American Foundation)
Donald Trump’s fascistic rally at Madison Square Garden last weekend would seem to be the exact kind of thing a so-called leading civil rights group, particularly one that purports to fight antisemitism, would condemn wholeheartedly.
The event came soon after reports that Trump had expressed a longing for “the kind of generals Hitler had.” It was held in the same exact venue as an infamous Nazi rally 85 years ago. It was a campaign stop for a party hell-bent on enacting Project 2025, a blueprint for fascist repression of and violence toward Jewish, Muslim, Arab, Black, brown, immigrant, and queer and trans Americans. It coincided with the anniversary of the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue, when a white supremacist inspired by Trump’s racist and antisemitic conspiracy theories carried out the most deadly act of mass violence against Jews in US history.
And even if none of those things had been the case, the racist, anti-Black, anti–Puerto Rican, antisemitic, anti-Palestinian, and misogynistic vitriol spewed by Trump and his allies at the rally should have appalled any group professing to stand up for basic human rights.
As Jews, we at IfNotNow know a Nazi rally when we see one, and so we followed what we see as the obligation of our heritage by showing up this past weekend to protest the gathering, alongside comrades from a variety of movements for peace, justice, and liberation.
But one group was conspicuously muted: the Anti-Defamation League, which calls itself “the leading anti-hate organization in the world” and which, historically, was regarded by many as the United States’ most important and respected voice in opposition to antisemitism. The ADL wouldn’t even condemn Trump by name, instead offering abstract criticism of “offensive jokes” at “political rallies.”
This response—or lack thereof—should have been surprising. But it’s merely the latest evidence that the ADL has completely abandoned the civil rights part of its mission, which has long been in tension with its Israel advocacy—a contradiction that movements have pointed out for years. These days, the organization, under CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, appears to have one primary objective: demonizing those of us in the movement for Palestinian human rights.
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Neither the ADL nor Greenblatt saw fit to offer so much as a word of denunciation for Trump’s praise of Hitler’s generals. When President Trump said he would blame American Jews if Harris wins the election, the ADL stumbled over itself to laud Trump before offering a mealy-mouthed critique of the former president’s phrasing. In recent years, Greenblatt has praised Elon Musk, given an award to Jared Kushner, and continued to insist that students on college campuses are just as big a threat as torch-carrying white nationalists.
To be clear, the ADL is far from alone in this regard. Many center-right and right-wing organizations have long chosen to stay silent about, or even join forces with, MAGA extremists because of their alignment over Israel. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee has welcomed Trump—and his top donors—with open arms, while refusing to condemn his blatantly antisemitic remarks. A review of recent press releases by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations shows none containing condemnations of Trump’s antisemitism. The group did see fit to call out even the most milquetoast critiques of the Israeli government by public figures like Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, as well as attack those who dare to speak out against the Gaza genocide.
It is time to firmly count the ADL among these groups.
Are the ADL and others of its ilk simply scared to stand up to Trump, who has already made it known that, should he lose, he intends to blame Jews? Are they cynically eager to curry favor with a candidate they predict will win in November, notwithstanding his neo-Nazi proclivities? Or, perhaps worst of all, do they actually welcome fascist praise, just so long as it doesn’t come with criticism of Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right allies? Whatever the explanation, it is clear that these organizations have completely abandoned the cause of safety for US Jews, right when we need it most—with a fascist within striking distance of once again assuming the presidency, having largely escaped punishment for launching a coup attempt.
This is the horrible result of the decades-long move by the ADL and other groups to place the defense of Israel at the center of Jewish American life—even as Israel’s government maintains and expands an apartheid system of legal, economic, and military domination over the Palestinians. As we can plainly see, not only does this not make Jews safe but it puts them in greater danger—in Israel, the United States, and all over the world.
That’s why we recognize that Jews can be truly safe only in a world where all of us can live free from violence and repression. Shared safety means safety for Black and Indigenous people, people of color, queer and trans people, immigrants, Muslims, communities on the front lines of the climate crisis, those whose reproductive rights are under attack, and all others targeted by Trump and his far-right allies. And it means safety for Palestinians—specifically, an end to the flow of US-produced and -funded weapons to the Israeli military, an end to the genocide in Gaza, and an end to the apartheid system oppressing Palestinians.
The ADL, by contrast, has undermined its own reputation by seeking approval from Trump and his fascist friends. Wikipedia editors have stopped citing the ADL as a credible source on antisemitism. A Biden administration official told a reporter, “What’s the point of the ADL if you’re not going to condemn this when it happens?”
As Greenblatt continues to cozy up to the MAGA movement while attacking college students and anti-war activists—many of whom are Jewish—the ADL is increasingly seen for what it is: a laundry service for the reputation of Benjamin Netanyahu and his fascist associates. Anyone committed to fighting antisemitism, fascism, and bigotry should, once and for all, stop partnering with the ADL or looking to it for guidance.
The fight against fascism should be supported by well-resourced organizations like the ADL, not just by a ragtag coalition of movements and organizations with a collective tenth of its budget. And yet, with the ADL having abandoned its ostensible reason for being, it is groups like IfNotNow filling the gap, advancing a credible analysis of antisemitism based on the fundamental reality that Jewish and Palestinian safety are intertwined. On the eve of a potential Trump presidency, and as Netanyahu escalates genocide in Gaza and the West Bank and fuels regional war in the Middle East, we invite our community to join us—to have a reckoning, wrestle with some hard questions, and fight together for safety, freedom, and a thriving future for all.
Can we count on you?
In the coming election, the fate of our democracy and fundamental civil rights are on the ballot. The conservative architects of Project 2025 are scheming to institutionalize Donald Trump’s authoritarian vision across all levels of government if he should win.
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