Jewish anti-racism is Jewish opposition to racism. Significant numbers of Jewish anti-racism activists have participated in the American civil rights movement, the South African anti-apartheid movement, the international Palestinian solidarity movement, and other anti-racist movements.
By country
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France
The International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism was founded in 1927, mostly with the intent to combat antisemitism. The organization has since expanded its mission to include opposition to racism and Islamophobia.[1]
The Jewish collective Tsedek! (Hebrew for "Justice!") describes itself as an anti-racist, anti-Zionist, and decolonial organization.[2]
Israel
Ethiopian Jews in Israel have played a central role in opposition to anti-Black racism, as Ethiopian Jews and other Black Jews experience anti-Black racism within Israeli society. The July 2019 Ethiopian Jews protest in Israel was lead by Ethiopian Jews and their allies, reacting to anti-Black police brutality in Israel.[3]
South Africa
South African Jews played a notable role in the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. A substantial number of white South Africans who were actively involved in the anti-apartheid movement were Jewish. Although the majority of South African Jews and the Jewish establishment in South Africa initially did not condemn the apartheid government, those Jews who participated in the anti-apartheid movement were disproportionately represented in light of the fact that Jews were only 0.3% of the South African population and they were only 2.5% of the white population. More than half of the white South Africans who were charged during the Rivonia Trial were Jewish.[4]
United States
Abolitionist movement
While some American Jews who lived during the Antebellum Period were in favor of or took no actions against slavery, others were actively involved in the abolitionist movement. Jews were noted as members of abolitionist organizations during the early 1830s. An 1853 report by the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society noted that some Southern Jews had "refused to have any right of property in man, or even to have any slaves about them" and that the history of antisemitic persecution was a motivating factor for those Jews to support abolitionism.[5]
Civil rights movement
2020s anti-racist organizing
Many American Jews have participated in anti-racist movements during the 2020s, including the George Floyd protests and the Black Lives Matter movement. In 2020, over 600 Jewish organizations representing the majority of American Jews signed onto a letter published in The New York Times on the anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington endorsing the Black Lives Matter movement.[6]
Jewish pro-Palestinian activism
Jewish activists, many of them Jewish anti-Zionists, have played a notable and highly visible role in international pro-Palestinian activism. Jewish organizations such as IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace have played a prominent role in the 2024 pro-Palestinian university campus protests.[7]
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