Not in our name.

We condemn the occupation, encampment, the violence, destruction and starvation inflicted by Israel on the Palestinian population in Gaza.

We believe it is in Israel’s power to bring an end or the very least significantly lessen the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.

We condemn the brutality of the Zionist settlers in the West Bank, Jordan valley and Gaza. We condemn the apparent complicity of the IDF and the State with the settlers’ actions. We condemn the colluding role we know the IDF is playing with these settlers.

The majority of our group believe that genocide and/or ethnic cleansing is being committed in our name.

Jewish safety does not depend on Palestinian oppression. Never Again means never again for anyone.

We recognise that antisemitism is real and dangerous. Spurious attempts to conflate criticism of the Israeli government with antisemitism should be called out and robustly challenged.

Judaism is thousands of years old; Zionism is 150 years old. Newcastle Minyan was formed as a space where non-Zionist and anti-Zionist views can be expressed openly. We will not pray for the wellbeing of a state which is committing genocide.

We understand the discomfort and distress it causes many Jews with a deep connection to Israel to accept that the country is guilty of something so awful. Shul should be a place to process these feelings and fears in safety, not to be protected from truth and reality.

Zionism, anti-Zionism, and antisemitism.

We condemn antisemitism unequivocally, in all its forms, whoever it comes from, and whoever it is directed at. We condemn the vicious antisemitism slung at Jews who reject Zionism, often from within our own community.

We know that some in the Jewish community have been told that being a ‘Zionist’ means believing that Israel has a right to exist, and therefore anti-Zionism means agitating for the death of the seven million Jews in Israel. We understand the anxiety that criticisms of Israel can provoke for people who have been taught to view the state as synonymous with the Jewish people.

We unequivocally reject this zero-sum framing.

We do not think Palestinian safety and Jewish safety are incompatible.

We do not agree with the dominant iteration of Zionism that Jews have a greater right to safety than the six million Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank.

According to the JPR, 12% of British Jews now identify as anti-Zionist, with almost half of 20-29 year-old Jews identifying as either non- or anti-Zionist. It cannot be said that half of young British Jews are raging antisemites.

We could never hope to address every possible version of Zionism, and that is the point. In the words of Toni Morrison: “Racism keeps you explaining…And I urge you to be careful. For there is a deadly prison: the prison that is erected when one spends one’s life fighting phantoms, concentrating on myths, and explaining over and over”.

Zionism, broadly, is Jewish nationalism; Anti-Zionism is simply a rejection of Jewish nationalism. Members of our group include non-Zionists, anti-Zionists, and dissenting Zionists. As a community of Jews, we believe in trusting each other, not jumping to fear-based conclusions. Our variety of perspectives about what should come next in Eretz Yisra’el coexist with our shared belief that what is happening now is wrong.