Emily Bloch

In her post, Bloch thanked “IfNotNow for your very needed work, words and leadership. #JewishResistance.”
 
Bloch’s post also contained the comment: “As hundreds of us poured into the lobby today, we sang the shehecheyanu, the Jewish prayer for new beginings [sic], loud and proud. That's because we are just fu**ing getting started."

On February 1, 2016, Bloch was tagged in Facebook photo participating in an INN Boston training, which was described by one of the trainers as “our first #IfNotNow training in Boston, a movement led by young Jews to end American Jewish support for the occupation in Israel/Palestine and for freedom and dignity for all people.” 

In 2016, Bloch had tweeted “I called Birthright and said I couldn't go. couldn't live with myself if I ignored the violence of the occupation.”

On December 23, 2018, Bloch and fellow INN leaders, Ben Doernberg and Shira Tiffany filmed the aftermath [00:36:42]of their disruption of a Birthright Israel heritage trip that they were on. 

Birthright’s administration said Doernberg, Bloch and Tiffany broke the terms [00:51:16] the initial waiver they had signed and asked them to leave the trip. 

On December 24, 2018, it was reported that a “new clause in the Birthright contract signed by participants stipulates that if participants disturb the trip they can be removed from the program.” 

Tiffany posted a video on Facebook that was taken of herself, Bloch and Doernberg after they were asked by Birthright to leave the trip. Birthright offered all three plane tickets home for the same day.

Tiffany added to her Facebook post the hashtags “#NotJustAFreeTrip” and “#NoSuchThingAsAFreeTrip.” The hashtags are part of an INN campaign titled “Not Just a Free Trip” that declared “we can no longer allow a free trip that hides the truth about the Occupation be synonymous with being a young Jewish person in America.”

In the video, Doernberg accused Birthright of presenting [00:05:12] the perspective that “Arabs are crazy terrorists.” Doernberg labeled [00:14:42] Birthright “Sheldon Adelson’s Right-wing propaganda trip” and characterized [00:15:15] the soldier providing security for the Birthright participants as “scary” “intimidating” and “not friendly.”

In the video, Doernberg claimed [00:16:05] that Birthright was kicking them off because they had “the wrong views on the occupation.”  

Towards the end of the video, Doernberg said [01:18:07] to Bloch and Tiffany “this has been really interesting getting to know you guys over the course of this process.”

None of the three admitted to being INN leaders or of knowing each other prior to the trip, however, Doernberg and Tiffany were two of the eight INN activists who were arrested while blockading Boston’s AIPAC office, after blockading Boston’s Israeli Consulate, in April  2018.

On December 23, 2018, INN posted a video on Facebook featuring Bloch and Doernberg after they had disrupted the trip. INN wrote: “Emily and Ben Were Kicked Off Birthright for Asking Questions. We've been in touch with Emily Dora, Shira Leah, and Ben who were just kicked off their Birthright trip for asking questions about the Occupation. They asked to share this video explaining what happened.”

Also on December 23, 2018, INN posted a graphic on Facebook describing Bloch only as a “Birthright participant” and quoting her as saying “I WAS KICKED OFF for just asking about the relationship between Trump and Netanyahu’s policies. For me this makes it clearer than ever that the people who control Birthright’s agenda are the same people who support Trump and his wall.”

The INN post urged people to harass the Birthright office, claiming: “We are horrified to discover that Birthright just kicked 3 people off of their trip for asking questions about the Occupation. They are enforcing their new code of conduct which punishes people for asking questions. Birthright needs to know that our generation will not accept their bribe — we will not stay silent.”

The post also asked people to phone Birthright and demand that they “change their code of conduct today.”

On that same day, INN posted a statement to Twitter claiming that the three were “kicked off for asking questions about Palestine” and claimed that the Birthright Code of Conduct “will be seen as a sign to be intimidated from seeking the truth.” 

In the same Twitter thread, INN stated that Bloch, Tiffany and Doernberg would join INN activists Harry Weisman and Rachel Salzberg, who had walked off their Birthright trip the previous Friday.

That same day, Doernberg tweeted an extensive thread demonizing Birthright, where he said: “Basically, throughout the entire trip it was pretty standard right-wing propaganda. *Literally* every single time an Arab or Palestinian was mentioned in a story, it was to talk about someone who was a crazy terrorist murderer who likes killing Jews for fun. Every. Single. Time.”

On December 23, 2018, the activists created a fundraising page was “to ensure that anyone else who gets kicked off because their politics or values are deemed unacceptable to Birthright are able to get home.”

The activists also demonized Birthright, claiming: “Accepting their Code of Conduct is accepting their bribe: we give you a free trip, and you accept our talking points as facts.”

On December 24, 2018, The Jerusalem Post released Birthright’s statement that said: “When activists aggressively disrupt the experience of the other participants then, like in any organized group experience, we have to ask them to leave regardless of their agenda.” 

Birthright added that they welcome participants views and questions, however, they “will not condone any coordinated plans to ruin the experience for others in order to promote a specific agenda.”

That same day, The Forward published an update admitting Doernberg, Bloch and Tiffany’s INN membership, and that INN provided contact information for the three to the Forward.

On December 22, 2018, Bloch posted a video on Facebook discussing the trip so far alongside fellow INN activists Shira Tiffany. She continued promoting INN’s demonization of Birthright, writing under the video: “#NotJustAFreeTrip #NoSuchThingAsAFreeTrip.”

In the video, Tiffany said [00:04:37] “there’s no such thing as a free trip, there’s an agenda.” Bloch added [00:04:44] “the major funder of Birthright is also, like, one of Trump’s major funders… so it’s not a shock that I feel like we’re being asked to give up our values to be here.” 

On August 8, 2016, Bloch participated in an INN protest against the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston (JCRC) for its condemnation of the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) policy platform, which promoted BDS and accused Israel of apartheid and genocide. The event was titled “OurVisionOrTheirs - Jews 4 Black Lives & Against the Occupation.”

On the same day, Bloch published a photo of herself on Facebook holding a sign that read “OUR VISION: A Jewish Community that stands with the Movement for Black Lives and Against the Occupation because social justice is my heritage #OurVisionOrTheirs #IfNotNow.”

The JCRC issued a statement on August 3, 2016, saying that it was “deeply dismayed” by elements of the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) policy platform, which JCRC saw as co-opting and manipulating concerns about racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system to advance “a biased and false narrative about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.”

JCRC added it would be severing ties with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, of which M4BL was a major part, since the affiliated statement promoted the Boycott Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and claimed Israel was committing “genocide.”

INN’s Facebook event description said: “We refuse to be distracted or lose sight of the real threat facing our community today. It’s not 11 words in the Movement for Black Lives platform -- it’s the occupation and our community’s support for it.. We recognize the explicit links between Black, Palestinian, and Jewish liberation.”

On August 5, 2016, INN released a statement that called “on the JCRC to Retract Their Statement Condemning the Vision for Black Lives and the movement behind it.” INN wrote: “Instead of embracing the core values of the Movement for Black Lives — dignity and freedom for all people — the JCRC has chosen to prioritize its support for Israel and endless occupation.”