Sophia Gallagher

Overview

Sophia Gallagher has demonized Israel, condoned the anti-Semitism of Jeremy Corbyn and promoted the #returnthebirthright initiative launched by the anti-Israel Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) organization against the Birthright Jewish heritage tour.

Gallagher also condemned the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act, a bipartisan bill drafted in response to growing anti-Semitism in the United States.

In October 2017, Gallagher’s Facebook and Instagram accounts indicated she was a student at New York University (NYU), slated to graduate in 2021.

As of August 2019, her Facebook page also said that she had “Studied at New York University” and was living in Philadelphia, PA. As of 2019, Gallagher was reportedly slated to graduate in 2021.

Also as of August 2019, Gallagher used the alias “Sophia Chororos” on Facebook.

Condoning Anti-Semitism

On July 30, 2018, Gallagher tweeted: “jeremy corbyn can be antisemitic i condone it.”

Approximately 50 members of Jeremy Corbyn’s party were quietly suspended from the party due to their anti-Semitic comments exposed on social media.

In 2012 Corbyn invited Sheikh Raed Salah, leader of the extreme wing of the Islamic Movement in Israel, to Parliament and described Salah as "a very honored citizen."

Salah's record included endorsing the conspiracy theory that was started by Syria’s government-owned newspaper, Al Thawra, about Jews being warned not to come to work at the Twin Towers on September 11. In a 2007 sermon, Salah also repeated the medieval European blood libel that Jews use the blood of gentile children to make matzah, for Passover.

In another incident, Corbyn stated he looked forward to hosting "our friends from Hezbollah" at an event at Parliament, and described that group and Hamas as being “dedicated toward bringing long-term peace in the entire region.”

Although he eventually expressed regret for those statements — during an investigation on anti-Semitism in his party in July of 2016 — Corbyn went on to back-handedly compare Israel’s government to ISIS.

In October 2020, Corbyn was suspended from the Labour Party after he downplayed a report that found the party “did not do enough to prevent anti-Semitism and, at worst, could be seen to accept it".

Condemning the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act

In April of 2019, Gallagher signed an INN-launched petition opposing the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act (AAA), which was introduced to the U.S. Senate in March 2019.

The AAA directed the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) to use the U.S. State Department’s definition of anti-Semitism when evaluating hostile environment complaints. The INN petition asserted that “support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, is not inherently antisemitic” and complained that the bill “conflates legitimate criticism of the policies of the Israeli government with antisemitism.”

Demonizing Israel

On December 9, 2017, Gallagher attended a Shabbat dinner at the Jewish student center of NYU, where she and two other [00:00:04] NYU JVP members stood up and read [00:00:21] prepared remarks demonizing Israel.

Gallagher said [00:01:24]: “Two people were killed today in Palestine, protesting Trump’s decision to move the embassy...they were killed by Israeli fire for participating in a political protest...This is characteristic of the violent, disproportionate response the IDF consistently employs against Palestinian dissent.”

The two people Gallagher referred to, Mahmoud al-Masri and Maher Atallah, were killed in violent “Day of Rage” riots on Israel’s border with Gaza. The funeral of al-Masri, who was draped in a Fatah flag, was punctuated [00:00:11] by gunfire and pictures of Atallah’s funeral, showed his body was draped in a Hamas flag.

Gallagher concluded by promoting JVP, claiming [00:01:59] that “there is no group...adequately prepared to create a space to cope with the consequences of seeing the Jewish state do decidedly un-Jewish things.”

Condemning Jewish Heritage Tour

On December 3, 2017, Gallagher attended a Return the Birthright protest outside the Taglit-Birthright offices in New York City. JVP members from all over the country assembled to chant anti-Birthright slogans outside the Birthright offices.

During the rally, Gallagher held up [00:04:59] a sign depicting a Hanukkah candle with the word “Tikkun” while a JVP representative used Hanukkah imagery to explain JVP’s largely anti-Israel [00:03:02] agenda, which he referred to as “holy work.”

In an April 16, 2018 interview with the Washington Square News about another Return the Birthright protest held that day outside the Taglit Birthright Gala in New York City, Gallagher claimed that it’s “very unfair” for Jews to be allowed to go to Israel for free and that “Palestinians should be able to have the right of return.”

She added that “A free trip on stolen land is not what I would describe as something that’s helping the Jewish future.”

The “right of return” is a Palestinian demand discredited as a means to eliminate Israel.

Gallagher posed for a photo posted to NYU JVP’s Facebook page on October 13, 2017, to promote JVP’s #returnthebirthright campaign. In the photo, Gallagher held a sign that read: “I #ReturnTheBirthright because Israel is not my home.”

NYU JVP photos of Gallagher and other anti-Israel activists were also shared on the Return the Birthright Facebook page, with a caption that read, in part: “We refuse to be complicit in a propaganda trip that whitewashes the systemic racism and daily violence faced by Palestinians living under endless occupation.

Our Judaism is grounded in values of solidarity and liberation, not occupation and apartheid. On these grounds, we return the Birthright, and call on other young Jews to do the same.”

On October 16, 2017, in a Twitter exchange with fellow NYU JVP member Ari Kaplan, Kaplan tweeted: “If only we went on birthright :(“ , to which Gallagher responded: “tbh id rather be a more miserable than usual jew than a jew complicit in settler colonialism.”

On November 4, 2017, NYU JVP posted a graphic on Facebook inviting people to their next meeting. The caption said: “(~~S/o (shoutout) to Sophia Gallagher for this awesome poster~~).”

Return the Birthright Campaign

In September of 2017, JVP issued its #ReturntheBirthright campaign manifesto, calling on American Jews to boycott the Birthright Israel (Birthright) program. Birthright was founded by Jewish philanthropists “in 1999 to address the growing divide between young Diaspora Jewish adults and the land and people of Israel.”

After decades of demographic decline in the American Jewish community, Birthright set out “to strengthen Jewish identity, build a lasting bond with the land and people of Israel, and reinforce the solidarity of Jewish people worldwide.” The program offers “the gift of a life-changing, 10-day trip to Israel to young Jewish adults between the ages of 18 and 26.”

JVP’s anti-Birthright campaign was launched precisely to coincide with “the very moment that college students across America are returning to campus and registration for Birthright winter visits are underway.”

The #returnthebirthright manifesto accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing” and alleged “the modern state of Israel is predicated on the ongoing erasure of Palestinians.”

The text claimed: “We reject the offer of a free trip to a state that does not represent us, a trip that is only ‘free’ because it has been paid for by the dispossession of Palestinians.”

The manifesto concluded: “And as we reject this, we commit to promoting the right to return of Palestinian refugees… Israel is not our Birthright… Return the Birthright.”

On June 22, 2017, just prior to the launch of JVP’s #returnthebirthright campaign, JVP received a $140,00 two-year grant for general support for its operations from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF).

Since 2015, JVP has received $280,000 from RBF, which has a history of supporting anti-Jewish causes, including BDS campaigns and various organizations that promote BDS campaigns throughout the United States.

JVP

JVP was founded in Berkeley, California in 1996, as an activist group with an emphasis on the “Jewish tradition” of peace, social justice and human rights. The organization is currently led by Rebecca Vilkomerson and its board members include Israel critics Naomi Klein, Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky and Tony Kushner.

JVP, which generally employs civil disobedience tactics to disrupt pro-Israel speakers and events, consists of American Jews and non-Jewish “allies” highly critical of Israeli policies. A staunch supporter of the BDS movement, JVP claims to aim its campaigns at companies that either support the Israeli military (Hewlett-Packard) or are active in the West Bank (SodaStream).

Although several Jewish groups critical of Israeli policies, like J Street and Partners for a Progressive Israel, make efforts to operate within the mainstream American Jewish community, JVP functions outside. The group is often criticized for serving as a tokenized Jewish voice for the pro-Palestinian camp and is widely regarded as the BDS movement’s “Jewish wing.”

JVP denies the notion of “Jewish peoplehood” and has even gone so far as to refer to its own Ashkenazi (Jews who spent the Diaspora in European countries) leadership as “white supremacy inside of JVP.”

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has accused JVP of being “the largest and most influential Jewish anti-Zionist group in the United States,” and said the group “exploits Jewish culture and rituals to reassure its own supporters that opposition to Israel not only does not contradict, but is actually consistent with, Jewish value.”

The ADL also claimed that “JVP consistently co-sponsors rallies to oppose Israeli military policy that are marked by signs and slogans comparing Israel to Nazi Germany, demonizing Jews and voicing support for groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.”

According to the ADL website, JVP “uses its Jewish identity to shield the anti-Israel movement from allegations of anti-Semitism and provide it with a greater degree of legitimacy and credibility.”