Tala Berro
Overview
Tala Berro [Tala M. Berro] has expressed support for terrorists and demonized Israel as an activist with the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.Berro was an activist with the anti-Israel group BDS Boston in 2017, 2019, 2020 and 2021. In May 2019, the BDS group Massachusetts Against Hewlett-Packard (MAHP) decided to rebrand itself as BDS Boston in order to focus on more campaigns.
In June 2022, BDS Boston launched the Mapping Project, a local BDS campaign targeting Jewish and pro-Israel institutions in Massachusetts.
As of October 2022, Berro was listed as an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Genetic Counseling Department on the website of the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Institute of Health Professions (MGH Institute). Berro’s CV on the MGH website said that Berro was on the Admissions Committee at the MGH Institute and that Berro was a clinical skills instructor.
Also as of October 2022, Berro’s CV said that Berro co-founded the Boston Minority Genetic Counselors in 2020 and that Berro was a reviewer of the Journal of Genetic Counseling (JOGC), since 2019. Berro authored multiple articles in JOGC from 2019 to 2021.
As of October 2022, Berro was listed on the website of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health as a Genetic Counselor with the License Number GC465. As of the same date, Berro’s National Provider Identifier (NPI) number was listed as 1386398055.
Berro was also listed on the MGH Institute website as a member of multiple professional boards or groups, including the National Society of Genetic Counselors (NSGC).
Berro graduated from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) with a master’s degree in Genetic Counseling, in 2018, and from Boston College (BC) with a bachelor’s degree in Biology in 2015.
As of October 2022, Berro used the handles “@talabthegc” on Twitter and “@talaberro237” on TikTok.
Supporting Terrorists
On May 10, 2017, Berro featured in a Facebook video leading a “Saltwater Challenge,” saying [00:00:01]: “We are members of the Massachusetts Against Hewlett-Packard, a municipal BDS campaign, and we are heeding the call by Aarab Barghouti to take the Saltwater Challenge. We are doing this in solidarity and respect for the 1700 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons…”Demonizing Israel
On May 25, 2021, Berro was quoted in a press release about a Policy Order in the Cambridge City Council (CCC), where Berro accused Israel of “apartheid.” Berro also said: “Now Cambridge must follow through, by ending city contracts with every company profiting from settler colonialism and violence against Palestinians.”On May 24, 2021, CCC held a hearing and vote on Policy Order #109 (POR #109), which, as originally worded, would prohibit Cambridge from contracting with any company “whose products are used to perpetuate violations of International Human Rights Laws and Cambridge’s policy on discrimination.”
The Order as originally proposed failed to pass. On May 25, 2021, the CCC adopted an amended Policy Order, which recognized Israel’s right to exist and defend itself.
On July 1, 2020, Berro was a featured speaker at a BDS Boston protest where Berro accused [00:10:43] Israel of “ongoing colonization” and then said [00:10:50]: “There is no true freedom anywhere in Palestine. The Nakba has been continuous since 1948.”
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.
At the event, protestors also chanted [00:07:55]: “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!”
“From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” is a chant calling to dismantle the State of Israel. It has also been employed by Hamas leader Khaled Mashal to call for the replacement of Israel with an Islamic state.
The “Day of Rage” protest where Berro spoke was held in front of the Massachusetts State House in Boston. The protest was in objection to then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement that Israeli sovereignty would be applied to certain areas of the West Bank. The annexation plan was postponed in August 2020.
Protesters also marched to the offices of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston (JCRC). Once there, Jon Russell, a BDS Boston organizer, read [00:00:46] from a prepared statement signed by BDS Boston and other groups that was against the JCRC and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).
Russell said [00:00:46]: “We demand that the ADL stop funding militarization trips for the police and that the JCRC stop funding propaganda trips to Israel for state and Congressional Representatives. These investments in the infrastructure of white supremacy harm our communities … We demand that the ADL and JCRC pay restitution to Black and indigenous communities that they have harmed in Massachusetts.”
One part of the BDS Boston statement that Russell did not read from said: “Zionism is a white supremacist ideology that originated in Europe in the late 1800's and has called for the continued colonization of Palestine and the displacement of the indigenous Palestinian people.”
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.
BDS Activism
On April 6, 2019, Berro, as an organizer for MAHP, participated in a protest titled: “Don’t Dance With Apartheid,” which aimed to boycott a performance in Boston by the Israeli Batsheva Dance Company.Berro reportedly said: “The Batsheva Dance Company is funded by the Israeli government, and they are a brand ambassador for Israel. That means they tour the world in order to promote an image of Israel as really progressive, really into the arts and really LGBTQ friendly. In reality, this is all done in order to mask their ethnic cleansing and occupation of Palestine.”
The demonstrators at the “Don’t Dance With Apartheid” protest chanted: “While we dance to liberate, Batsheva dances for a racist state!” Other speakers also said: “I’m up for dancing as much as anybody else. I love music, but there’s no dance in the world, and there’s no flag big enough to clean the blood of colonized people.”
On April 8, 2018, MAHP hosted a “panel and discussion” with Berro as an invited speaker, titled: “MAHP-ing Struggles: Palestine, Prisons, Immigration, and HP.”
The MAHP coalition was launched on May 18, 2016 and it called on “the elected officials of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and its municipalities to end contracts with Hewlett-Packard (HP) until the company ends its corporate complicity in the Israeli occupation of Palestine, U.S. deportations, and mass incarceration.”
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.
Social Media and Weblinks
Twitter: https://twitter.com/talabthegc [Private]https://twitter.com/tala_berro [Deleted]
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/talaberro [Deleted]
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@talaberro237
Zoominfo.com: https://www.zoominfo.com/p/Tala-Berro/2567673706
University Site: https://www.mghihp.edu/tala-berro-ms-cgc
Extra Videos
BDS Boston Day of Rage to Drop the ADL Facebook Jul 1 2020
Photos & Screenshots
