Organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), established in 1913, were designed to fight against this scourge of anti-Semitism in particular, and racism in general. However, sadly, the ADL has long since strayed from its original core mission "to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all."
In recent decades, the ADL has racked up a checkered history of spying on domestic peace and justice organizations, fanning the flames of Islamophobia, and ironically defaming many who speak out against Israel's human rights abuses of Palestinians and dare to believe that "justice and fair treatment to all" should also apply to Palestinians.
Last week, the ADL added to its clownish "boy-who-cried-wolf" reputation by publishing its list of what it calls the top ten "anti-Israel" organizations in the United States. Unsurprisingly, the organization for which I work--the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation--made the list.
The US Campaign is a national coalition of more than 325 organizations working to end U.S. support for Israel's illegal 43-year military occupation of the Palestinian West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip, and to change U.S. policy toward Israel/Palestine to support human rights, international law, and equality. Hardly the white robe-wearing, cross-burning stuff that the organization should be challenging.
If the ADL considers supporting human rights and international law to be "anti-Israel," then it reveals more about the organization's narrow-mindedness, McCarthyite silencing tactics, and support for Israel's oppressive treatment of Palestinians than it does about our alleged motivations.
Indeed, it would seem that for an organization to be considered "pro-Israel" by the ADL, it would need to march in virtual lock step with Israel's ongoing efforts to colonize and ethnically cleanse the Palestinian West Bank and East Jerusalem, besiege the Gaza Strip, repress nonviolent Palestinian organizers (both citizens of Israel and those living under Israeli military occupation), and deny the claims of Palestinian refugees to their right of return home.