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DL removes ‘Protect Civil Rights’ from website as it narrows its mission amid right-wing attacks
The Anti-Defamation League has removed entirely from the “What We Do” page of its website a section called “Protect Civil Rights.”
The removal eliminated a passage that read, “Our founders established ADL with the clear understanding that the fight against any one form of prejudice or hate cannot succeed without countering hate of all forms.”
The change to the website, which has not been previously reported, was made amid other website edits following a flurry of right-wing criticism and an unprecedented attack on the organization earlier this month by FBI Director Kash Patel.
On Oct. 1, just hours before Jews on the East Coast would start fasting on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year, President Donald Trump’s handpicked top cop said the law enforcement agency was cutting ties with the ADL. The Jewish group was “functioning like a terrorist organization” because of how it tracks and reports extremism on the right, Patel told Fox News.
Patel’s announcement came days after Elon Musk mischaracterized a section of the ADL website to accuse the group of anti-Christian hatred. His post on X triggered a pile-on of condemnation. The ADL removed the section from its website as part of a purge of more than 1,000 other entries making up its Glossary of Extremism and Hate.
An ADL spokesperson told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the passage committing the ADL to the protection of civil rights was removed as part of an “ongoing review” of its website and its contents.
“This month, ADL has conducted deferred maintenance on the website, which had grown in recent years to more than 25,000 pieces of content — some even dating back to more than 30 years ago and clearly no longer relevant or reflective of ADL’s work today,” the spokesperson said.
A recent article by ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt makes clear how the ADL’s focus has changed: He outlined a withdrawal from the group’s commitment to the protection of all vulnerable minorities in favor of a mission centered more exclusively on anti-Jewish hatred.
The ADL is not commenting on its relationship with the FBI or Patel’s attack beyond the statement praising the agency it issued in the immediate aftermath.
“ADL has deep respect for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and law enforcement officers at all levels across the country who work tirelessly every single day to protect all Americans regardless of their ancestry, religion, ethnicity, faith, political affiliation or any other point of difference,” the statement said.
It’s still not yet clear what impact Patel’s announcement will have — in part because the ADL didn’t receive an official notice that might have offered details.
“ADL has not yet received any formal communication from the Administration, and we are working to learn more,” Greenblatt said in a note to Jewish groups that arrived in inboxes just hours after Fox News published its exclusive interview with Patel and minutes before Yom Kippur started.
A longstanding partnership that provided FBI agents training on topics such as hate crimes, violent extremism and antisemitism through a workshop at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum is thought to be terminated.
Meanwhile, however, the ADL’s extremism trackers continue to exchange tips with the FBI, JTA has learned.
The ADL’s initial reaction may have been shaped by the shock of Patel’s decision, but the group’s ongoing silence on the issue appears to be part of a strategy.
The group never sought to rally a communal outcry from Jewish organizations. In fact, it did the opposite, pleading behind the scenes for them to shut up, an extraordinary move for an organization — and a community — that has in the post World War II era prided itself in speaking out against injustice.
“We’re really following ADL’s lead here,” said a senior official of a major Jewish group that has refrained from commenting on the FBI letter, and who asked for anonymity to speak candidly. “They’re determining how to navigate it in the way that makes sense for them.”
The muted reaction by Jewish legacy organizations can be read, their critics say, as acquiescence to an administration accused of leveraging government power to silence and destroy civil society critics.
Another factor is a community profoundly roiled by the hostility to Israel and Jewish attachment to the country that has emerged among the left and Democrats, the community of American thought where most Jews have thrived for more than a century.
But not everyone is willing to go along with the approach.
Amy Spitalnick, the CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said Patel’s attack was evidence that it was futile to hope that the trumpeting of common ground with the Trump administration, as the ADL and others have done on Israel policy, would lead to comity.
“This is a reminder that they’re coming for everyone that doesn’t 100% align with their agenda and their approach,” Spitalnick said. “This is about a far more systemic abuse and weaponization of the federal government to advance a political agenda. And that should frighten all of us.”
Appeals by Spitalnick and others for a united Jewish front against the Trump administration’s assault on civil liberties have not just fallen on deaf ears among legacy Jewish groups, they have encountered active resistance. The Jewish Federations of North America, the goliath umbrella body for 150 or so local federations, in April urged constituent groups not to sign onto a JCPA-led statement decrying the Trump crackdown on speech under the pretext of stemming antisemitism.
Six months later, Jewish officials are wondering whether traditional Jewish advocacy on issues such as civil rights will survive the onslaught.
Officials are closely reading a Sept. 25 National Security Presidential Memorandum, purportedly spurred by the killing of Charlie Kirk, that sets up a task force that includes nonprofits among the entities it will investigate for “support” of “political violence, terrorism, or conspiracy against rights; or the violent deprivation of any citizen’s rights.” It also identifies “common threads” of such movements as including “anti-Christianity” bias or “hostility toward those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”
These catchall phrases are so broad that they may place numerous NGOs in the government’s crosshairs, said Halie Soifer, the CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America.
“When the White House erroneously accuses the ADL of ‘anti-Christian’ bias and ‘functioning like a terrorist organization,’ it creates fear of who is next, and honestly, that fear is justified,” Soifer said. “It’s clear the Trump administration is aiming to expand the definition of terrorism, to weaponize it against Americans with whom they disagree.”
Close to 4,000 nonprofits, including dozens of liberal Jewish groups, signed an open letter last month expressing alarm at the presidential directive.
“This attack on nonprofits is not happening in a vacuum, but as a part of a wholesale offensive against organizations and individuals that advocate for ideas or serve communities that the president finds objectionable, and that seek to enforce the rule of law against the federal government,” said the letter.
Jonathan Jacoby, the president of the Nexus project, which seeks to combat antisemitism while mitigating its weaponization, said Trump had the Jewish community in his sights.
“The Trump administration’s actions are not just challenging liberals or progressives or Democrats, they’re challenging Jews to respond. They’re challenging every Jewish organization,” he said. “It’s a clear example of why every Jewish organization, or every organization that represents Jewish interests, should be calling this out loud and clear.”
One of the ironies of Patel’s attack is that it has brought out groups that have clashed with the ADL over whether the group has blurred the differences between antisemitism and legitimate criticism of Israel to the group’s defense, while the ADL and its allies remain silent.
“While we have had our differences with the ADL over the years, the organization has played a central role in combating antisemitism and extremism in the United States for more than a century,” J Street, the liberal Jewish Middle East policy group said in a statement. “Ending the FBI’s long-term partnership with the ADL, while smearing the organization in this manner, will only embolden extremists and make American Jews less safe.”
The organizations that have lobbied hardest for further protections of synagogues and other institutions have been silent on the FBI-ADL breach; the JFNA, the Orthodox Union and the Secure Community Network declined or did not respond to requests for comment.
Leaders of the Reform and Conservative movements released statements for this story emphasizing the necessity of the ADL’s work with law enforcement — but without criticizing or even mentioning Patel’s attack.
“For decades, the ADL has worked with our movement’s network of congregations and also with law enforcement at every level, whose commitment we deeply respect,” said Rabbi Jacob Blumenthal, the CEO of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism. “These partnerships protect our communities and must continue, and we are expressing our support for the ADL’s collaboration with law enforcement through the most appropriate and effective channels.”
Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism said his movement was “aligned with the ADL’s commitment to fighting antisemitism and advancing Jewish communal safety … We hope the FBI will continue to join in that effort as it has over many decades to the benefit of the nation overall.”
The ADL has endeavored since Jan. 20 to accommodate Trump 2.0, praising some of its actions targeting universities where pro-Palestinian activism has at times created a hostile environment for Jewish students. Greenblatt, in comments first reported by the Forward, in June praised the Trump administration’s crackdown on universities in an address to a conference of Republican state attorneys general.
“I don’t agree with everything the Trump administration is doing, I don’t want to shut down these schools altogether,” he said. “But you know what? God bless [Education] Secretary [Linda] McMahon.”
Such statements have spurred claims that Greenblatt is steering the organization right, perhaps at the behest of donors the ADL shares with Trump or to avoid clashing with an administration that has sought to punish its critics. A New York Magazine deep dive in August into Greenblatt’s apparent shifts laid out what it said was evidence of a rightward drift.
Greenblatt in a subsequent interview with The New York Times said the group remained steadfastly nonpartisan. “We’ve worked with presidential administrations over generations, right and left,” Greenblatt said. “We don’t agree with them on everything, but where we can find common ground, we try. And where we have a point of disagreement, we make that known.”
Attempting to assign to Greenblatt a place on the left-to-right continuum may not make sense. His trajectory is more outside to inside, expansive to insular. He is emblematic of the many American Jews who until Oct. 7, 2023, felt comfortably ensconced in the precincts of liberalism, and who have since felt politically homeless.
Multiple sources pointed to Greenblatt’s Oct. 16 op-ed in eJewish Philanthropy as representative of this sentiment.
“It is a sad truth that so many of our self-described allies simply disappeared or deeply disappointed us when we needed them,” he wrote. “In this environment, we have no choice but to concentrate our energies like a laser beam on our core purpose, the reason why the ADL actually was founded so many generations ago — to protect the Jewish People.”
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UK threatens sanctions after Israel opens bids for E1 settler homes
(JTA) — JERUSALEM – The United Kingdom threatened to sanction Israelis involved in West Bank settlement expansion after the Jewish state’s Lands Authority opened bids for 1,234 homes in the largely underdeveloped E1 section of the West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim.
Construction in E1 “would cut across the heart of Palestine and risks separating the West Bank from East Jerusalem, which would endanger the viability of a two-state solution,” the British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband said in a special statement he posted on X on Thursday.
Targeted sanctions, Miliband wrote, would be part of a series of measures his government would take. His office also summoned Israel’s charge d’Affaires Thursday to demand a closure of the bidding process, which first opened on Tuesday, and a withdrawal of the construction project altogether.
“Britain will not stand back and accept the destruction of the two-state solution,” he wrote. Miliband has held his position for a month and is part of the new leadership Labour Prime Minister Andy Burnham appointed when he took office in July.
Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar attacked Miliband on X, stating that Britain’s “decision to damage the relationship between our countries is deeply unfortunate.”
He said that the U.K. government’s “systematic policy of blaming only Israel while ignoring Palestinian extremism has already contributed to a massive wave of antisemitic hatred and attacks against the British Jewish community.”
The Jewish people have the same right to “live throughout the Land of Israel” just as the British people have a right to live anywhere in the U.K., Sa’ar wrote.
Plans to expand the built-up area of Ma’aleh Adumim settlement by constructing some 3,400 housing units on a largely underdeveloped hilltop within the city’s boundaries have been in place since 1994 when Yitzhak Rabin was prime minister.
Israel mostly froze those plans under pressure from the international community, including the U.S., with many countries warning that building homes in E1 would harm their diplomatic ties with Israel.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu began to advance the project in earnest in 2012 to protest the United Nations General Assembly decision to grant the Palestinians the status of a non-member state and has since pushed the project forward in spurts, particularly during election seasons.
The publication of the bidding process for the homes was first announced on Tuesday and is set to close on Oct. 19, one week shy of the Israeli elections on Oct. 27. Opening the bids is a move that plays well with Netanyahu’s right-wing voter base, which opposes Palestinian statehood and believes that settlements like Ma’aleh Adumim and the E1 area should be annexed into sovereign Israel.
But the move reverberated globally, with the U.K. signing onto a joint condemnation by France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Belgium, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, in which they warned that settlement building in E1 distanced peace and undermined the country’s international standing.
They also reminded businesses who might bid for E1 construction that they could face legal or reputational consequences, given that such companies could be in breach of international law.
Palestinian Authority Vice President Hussein Al-Sheikh said he welcomed the condemnation, explaining on X that such a position “reflects the importance of the international role in confronting settlement activity and safeguarding the two-state solution.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post UK threatens sanctions after Israel opens bids for E1 settler homes appeared first on The Forward.
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Argentina removes federal judge over antisemitic remarks in historic first
(JTA) — An Argentine federal judge was removed from office Tuesday for a series of antisemitic posts on his social media accounts that constituted misconduct incompatible with his role, an impeachment panel ruled.
Alfredo Eugenio López, who headed Federal Court No. 4 in the coastal city of Mar del Plata, was removed by Argentina’s Jury of Impeachment, a special panel composed of judges, lawmakers and lawyers.
It is the first time in Argentina’s history that a judge has been removed over antisemitic remarks.
In López’s social media posts, the judge referred to the Jewish people as “a brood of vipers,” Israel as a “fictitious state” and Argentinian Jews as “foreigners.” He has also used such terms as “Zionist” and “gay” as insults.
According to the panel, the judge committed acts of “discrimination and the denial of equal rights against the Argentine Jewish community. For the purposes of these proceedings, it is particularly significant that, by acting in this manner, he shattered public confidence in his continued fitness to administer justice impartially.”The case reached the panel through Argentina’s Council of the Magistracy, based in Buenos Aires, the constitutional body responsible for the selection and discipline of federal judges.
The first complaint against López was filed in February 2025 by the Delegación de Asociaciones Israelitas Argentinas, which is the umbrella organization representing Argentina’s Jewish community. One month later, the Argentine Forum Against Antisemitism also filed a complaint. In July 2025, attorney Yamil Santoro from Apolo Foundation added another one.
In his defense, López argued that his messages were “ subjective and decontextualized interpretations of exchanges on social media, which in no way affect the administration of justice or his impartiality” as a judge. He added that his remarks were unrelated to any pending case and that he had never been recused or removed from any judicial case.
Neither Lopez nor his attorney were immediately available for further comment.
“He was removed because he simply would not stop engaging in hate speech,” jury member Alberto Maques said during a live interview Tuesday on the A24 news channel. “It is absolutely disgraceful for a federal judge to engage in this kind of conduct.”
Maques said there were 15 social media posts that he acknowledged, but more than 50 posts in which he said “outrageous things that are not worth repeating because they truly constituted hate speech.”
“This is not merely an issue of hate speech against the Jewish community. This is someone who lacks common sense,” he added, interviewed by A24 news channel.
Prosecutors in the impeachment proceedings argued that the messages were not isolated political comments but reflected a pattern of hostility toward Jews, Zionism, and the State of Israel.
“No position of authority can shield hatred. This is not a matter of punishing an opinion. It is about sanctioning repeated conduct involving antisemitism, hostility and dehumanization, conduct incompatible with the impartiality, dignity and public trust required of the judiciary,” DAIA said Tuesday in a statement.
“This case sets a precedent: for the first time in more than a century, DAIA initiated proceedings of this nature against a judge. No office is above democracy.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Argentina removes federal judge over antisemitic remarks in historic first appeared first on The Forward.
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California progressive Wahab defeats AIPAC-backed Hernandez in close race
(JTA) — California progressive Aisha Wahab defeated AIPAC-backed moderate Melissa Hernandez in a congressional runoff this week, capping off a contest that had become unexpectedly tight after the pro-Israel lobby entered the fray.
The Associated Press called the race between the Democrats — who were vying to replace a disgraced former Rep. Eric Swalwell — a full two days after polls closed, when Wahab secured 53.1% of votes to Hernandez’s 46.9%, with 95% of ballots tallied. The gap between them grew by four percentage points from Tuesday evening, when Wahab had held a narrow 51% lead to Hernandez’s 49%.
“We stayed focused on the people, and I will fight for this district that raised me,” Wahab said in a Thursday statement, noting her journey “from foster care to Congress” in her East Bay community.
Although Wahab ended up victorious, the narrow initial margin on Tuesday shocked California’s 14th District, given that she had secured a double-digit lead in preliminary races two months ago.
But in the past few weeks, an unforeseen variable appeared to influence the trajectories of the two campaigns: a massive spending push from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee aimed at turning the tides for Hernandez.
Since the beginning of August alone, AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project, and other affiliated groups spent more than $2.5 million on both boosting Hernandez and denigrating Wahab with negative ads and mailers, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
“This was not a landslide for Wahab by any means,” local Democratic strategist Noah Finneburgh, who is not affiliated with either candidate, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“They narrowed the gap for sure,” Finneburgh added, referring to AIPAC. “They spent millions of dollars attacking Wahab very aggressively.”
These attacks, he explained, did not involve Israel and instead focused on divisive issues for the Bay Area, such as public safety and protecting kids.
“Negative advertising with a persuasive message can be very effective,” Finneburgh said.
In her Thursday night statement, Wahab declared that her “district cannot be bought,” describing the race as “one of the ugliest, most expensive elections we’ve ever seen.”
Prior to this influx of cash and related ads, neither AIPAC nor Israel had played a significant role in this short-lived race — which began in April following Swalwell’s resignation over allegations of sexual assault.
When the district held a special primary to seek Swalwell’s replacement on June 16, Wahab and Hernandez finished as the top-two candidates and moved on to this week’s special general runoff election.
California primaries are “nonpartisan” or “top-two” races, in which the two highest ranking candidates move on to the general election, irrespective of their parties. The top-two in this case were both Democrats, like Swalwell, in a district that the Cook Political Report deems solidly blue.
Even though Wahab will now finish the remainder of Swalwell’s term, she will have to compete with Hernandez again in the November general election for a full term that begins on January 3, 2027.
In a June 16 special primary that preceded this week’s runoff, there was still a massive gap between the two candidates, with Wahab accruing 42.8% of the votes, compared to Hernandez’s 16.8%. A separate primary for the November race, which occurred two weeks earlier, placed Wahab at 38.3% and Hernandez at 17.2%.
Wahab, who will be the first Afghan American in Congress, has focused on affordability, civil rights, education and climate change. Her campaign calls for an end to wars and “prolonged occupations” but only specifically calls out U.S. military activity in “Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, and elsewhere.”
Though Wahab has been critical of Israel and its operations in Gaza, she has not been as vocal about the issue as many other progressive colleagues nationwide. She responded “yes” when asked if Israel was committing genocide in a primary debate, but she didn’t include Israel or Gaza in her campaign priorities.
During a recent appearance on far-right influencer Hasan Piker’s livestream, Wahab acknowledged that “it’s not a zero-sum game in the Middle East,” adding that “we can care for all people.” She also referenced a resolution she introduced last year in the California legislature, pushing for a ceasefire in Gaza but also condemning Hamas and demanding the release of the hostages.
“We talk about both Palestinians and the Israeli victims there,” Wahab told Piker. “We talk about holding the perpetrators accountable from both sides.”
Asked if she was in favor of “ending all U.S. aid to Israel,” she responded “yes,” while stressing that “humanitarian aid is important to me, too.”
Wahab has earned the backing of multiple labor unions, the California Democratic Party and Our Revolution, the group formed by Sen. Bernie Sanders to advance the progressive movement. The liberal pro-Israel group J Street also recently invested $108,000 in her campaign, according to the FEC. American Priorities, a pro-Palestinian PAC, also spent at least $200,000 on supporting her.
Hernandez has received endorsements from several police and fire unions, as well as Democratic Jewish Reps. Lois Frankel of Florida and Brad Schneider of Illinois.
Come November, Hernandez will gain one additional asset. Due to statewide redistricting, the 14th District will gain about 26,000 new voters from Dublin, where Hernandez previously served as mayor, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
But Finneburgh said he believes that Hernandez has only a minimal chance of winning that race, especially because Wahab will be heading into that election as an incumbent.
He also suggested that if “she plays her card right,” Wahab could even take some endorsements away from Hernandez.
“There’s going to be people who are going to probably move over from the Hernandez camp and back her,” Finneburgh added. “It’s going to be hard to unseat her.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post California progressive Wahab defeats AIPAC-backed Hernandez in close race appeared first on The Forward.
