Stefanie Fox
Overview
Stefanie Fox [Stefanie L. Fox] has spread hatred of Zionism, promoted incitement and demonized Israel. Fox has also dismissed contemporary anti-Semitism and promoted hatred of American Jewish organizations.Since April 2020, Fox has served as the Executive Director of the anti-Israel group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), when she replaced Rebecca Vilkomerson.
In March 2020, JVP announced Fox’s new position and said she had “10+ years at JVP, as an organizer, then Co-Director of Organizing, then Deputy Director, and currently as Acting Co-Executive Director.”
Fox is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. As the leader of JVP, she has conducted activism with other prominent anti-Israel figures like BDS founder Omar Barghouti.
In July 2014, thestranger.com reported that before Fox joined JVP, she had been a graduate student at the University of Washington (UW) “studying community organizing for public health.” Before that, she “went to college” at Swarthmore College (Swarthmore).
As of September 2022, Fox’s Facebook page said she was located in Seattle, Washington.
Hatred of Zionism
On April 15, 2022, during a wave of deadly Palestinian terror attacks, Fox tweeted: “Tonight, Israel uses a Muslim holiday to brutalize and terrorize Palestinians. Tomorrow, Israel will weaponize a Jewish holiday to foreclose Palestinian freedom to move. This is not ‘religious conflict.’ This is zionism--by design and with intention--desecrating all that is holy.”Zionism is the belief that Jews have the right to self-determination in their own national home, and the right to develop their national culture.
On March 20, 2021, Fox spoke as JVP Executive Director in a YouTube video, where she said [00:34:05]: “We also have a statement opposing Zionism directly. As a Jewish organization and understanding the foundations of the state and the Nakba are incredibly vital to JVP’s political analysis.”
The term “Nakba” is generally translated as “catastrophe” in Arabic, referring to the outcome of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. It is a term often used to delegitimize the creation of the State of Israel by defining it as a catastrophe.
On March 25, 2021, Fox tweeted: “Glad to see 200+ academics affirm what we’ve always said: Boycotts of Israel, calling Israel a settler colonial state, or opposing Zionism - is not antisemitic.”
Spreading Incitement
On May 9, 2021, Fox was quoted in a JVP newsletter that featured a graphic that said: “Save Sheikh Jarrah” and “End Israel’s Ethnic Cleansing and Apartheid.”In May 2021, Palestinian violence erupted in anticipation of an Israel High Court ruling on eviction proceedings concerning over 70 Palestinian tenants illegally residing in Jewish-owned properties in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
In the same newsletter, Fox alleged that the Israeli government “storms Al Aqsa mosque to attack Palestinians at prayer.” She also claimed: “The regime of colonialism and apartheid in Israel is implemented through an interlocking, holistic system of state violence: adminstrative, judicial, pyschological, military.”
Demonizing Israel
On May 11, 2022, Fox tweeted that Israel is a “violent apartheid regime.”On February 7, 2022, Fox co-authored an article with BDS movement founder Omar Barghouti titled: “Is This Israel’s South Africa Moment?” Fox’s article praised a report accusing Israel of “apartheid.” Fox and Barghouti accused Israel of maintaining a “regime of racial supremacy” and that “apartheid is a crime against humanity.”
In February 2022, Amnesty International released a 280-page report titled: “Israel’s Apartheid Against Palestinians: Cruel System of Domination and Crime Against Humanity.” The report vilified Israeli military action and policy. It briefly mentioned rocket fire from Gaza, but failed to mention suicide bombings, shootings, stabbings or any other form of terrorism as the reasons behind Israel’s security measures.
On May 8, 2021, Fox tweeted: “The brutal Israeli police and settler violence against Palestinians in Jerusalem is not a ‘clash,’ a ‘conflict’ or an ‘eruption.’ It is the deliberate execution of Israel’s longstanding attack on Palestinian lives, land, and freedom; it is the unabated, ongoing Nakba.”
On March 20, 2021, Fox spoke at the KPSC 6th Annual Meeting, where she said: [00:05:26]: “And in the case of Israel/Palestine, you know, of course, we see that the apartheid regime is then enacted in the midst of a pandemic as medical apartheid…”
On February 21, 2021, Fox tweeted a link to a petition titled: “Tell Congress: Demand that Israel provide the COVID-19 vaccine to Palestinians.” She tweeted: “If you’re more outraged about medical apartheid than comedians who comment on it, it’s a good day to ask congress to join in.”
On November 13, 2019, Fox tweeted during an Israeli airstrikes on terrorists in Gaza: “Unacceptable. @JoeBiden and @PeteButtigieg recycling the same age old, utterly dehumanizing, and completely detached from reality taking points about ‘self-defense’ as Israel bombs a captive population with nowhere to go by land, sea or air.”
In November 2019, Israel launched Operation Black Belt to stop rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel. From November 12 to November 14, 2019, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terror group sent hundreds of rockets into Israel, targeting major civilian population centers.
On May 8, 2017, Fox authored [p.74] an article for Tikkun where she wrote: “From the beginning, the Zionist movement ignored or sought to displace the indigenous population of Palestine, and the state it established is predicated on that erasure.”
In the same article, Fox also wrote that “we can’t uproot the policies of Occupation if we don’t understand them as a manifestation of a broader dehumanizing logic that predicates Jewish (most particularly white Ashkenazi Jewish) safety on the domination over, and disappearing of, another people.”
On July 16, 2014, during Israel’s Operation Protective Edge (OPE) against Hamas in Gaza, Fox spoke at a JVP rally in Seattle. She said: [00:00:07] “Israel’s attack on Gaza is a one-sided war of destruction, fueled by Israel’s machine of war and occupation.”
Dismissing Contemporary Anti-Semitism
On March 25, 2021, Fox tweeted: “...the Israeli government and its supporters push the IHRA to evade accountability for its human rights abuses and violations of international law, levying accusations of antisemitism at Palestinians and advocates for Palestinian human rights.”The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) highlights multiple forms of contemporary anti-Semitism related to Israel. The list includes: “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.” Another definition states: “Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.” The U.S. State Department adopted the IHRA’s working definition of anti-Semitism in 2016. A total of 35 countries have adopted the definition.
On November 25, 2020, Fox tweeted a JVP petition titled: “Tell the State Department: Dismantle antisemitism and protect human rights,” which sought to negate the U.S. State Department’s policy that the BDS movement be declared anti-Semitic.
Fox tweeted: “Please sign and share! For the sake of justice, freedom, and equality. For the sake of Palestinian rights. For the sake of the fight against antisemitism and racism. And for the sake of words having any semblance of meaning.”
Promoting Hatred of American Jewish Organizations
On July 30, 2020, Fox tweeted: “Federal troops kidnapping protesters: HOT or NOT? The Jewish Institute for National Security of America, a major purveyor of @DeadlyExchange trips, will share their take privately today.”In 2017, JVP launched the “Deadly Exchange” campaign that accused American Jewish organizations of promoting human rights abuses. JVP also released a video that blamed [00:04:04] U.S.-based Jewish organizations for violence that occurs against Black and Brown communities, immigrants and activists in the U.S.”
On January 7, 2020, Fox changed her cover photo on Facebook to a graphic that said: “End the Deadly Exchange” and linked to a petition that targeted the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). The petition claimed: “Dispatching US law enforcement to trade tactics with Israeli police and military agents defends and deepens Israel's systems of military occupation, and and exacerbates the existing crisis of police violence in the US.”
On December 6, 2018, Fox published an article in Haaretz defending the “Deadly Exchange” campaign. In the article she stated that JVP wanted the partnership between U.S. police and the Israeli army to end because “they validate and encourage Israel’s policies of Apartheid and occupation, while contributing to further militarization of U.S. borders and policing.”
On October 5, 2017, Fox was interviewed for an article in In These Times. Fox claimed: “These programs treat Israel’s seventy years of dispossession and 50 years of occupation as best practices for policing in the U.S. We want to denormalize the valorization of what we think is a horrifying human rights abuse.”
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.”
BDS
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true.
One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”
Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”
In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”
The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.
BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.
The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.
Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.
BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/StefanieLFox/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stefanie-fox-94393a1a3/
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