The Jewish Left is Taking on Deportations and the ADL
While many are gathering this weekend to hold seders on the first nights of Passover, a number of Jewish organizations are inviting us back into the streets to take the message of liberation further. On Monday, April 14, the anti-Zionist group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) will lead over a thousand Jews in a Passover seder directly in front of the New York City headquarters of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This “emergency seder” is part of their now weeks long campaign, led in coalition with other Jewish leftist organizations, to confront Trump’s mass deportations and, specifically, the targeting of former Columbia student Mahmoud Khalil.
“This year, all over the U.S., Jews are holding emergency Passover Seders calling for the release of Mahmoud Khalil and an end to the criminalization of all those calling for an end to the Israeli government’s genocide of the Palestinian people,” JVP said as it announced the action. This seder is part of a long tradition of using Jewish rituals as a protest tactic, uniting the prophetic spiritual tradition of Judaism with the practical strategies of physical resistance and blockade. This action, offered with relatively short notice and promising to mobilize huge numbers of Jews and allies, is the result of the relationships that have been built across Jewish organizations as they try to confront the repression coming in Trump’s second term.