The self-described ‘largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world’ has a history of supporting anti-Israel terrorism
The terrorist who gunned down a young couple in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday previously promoted a radical anti-Zionist group that claims to represent “peaceful” American Jews.
Elias Rodriguez—who fatally shot Israeli embassy staffers Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim outside the Capital Jewish Museum before screaming, “Free, free Palestine!”—shared social media posts boosting a pro-Hamas demonstration led by the Chicago chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a group that describes itself as the “world’s largest Jewish organization standing in solidarity with Palestine.”
Rodriguez retweeted an X post from JVP advertising one of the group’s protests in Chicago in November 2023.
“BREAKING: Hundreds of American Jews and allies from the Midwest have rallied in Chicago to shutdown the Israeli consulate at Ogilvie Station,” the post reads. “Our grief is being used to justify genocidal violence against the people of Gaza. We’re ready to stay here as long as it takes!!!”
The post includes an image of a few dozen masked JVP protesters, many of whom wear terrorist-style keffiyehs. The activists purported to be Jewish, wearing t-shirts that read “Not in Our Name” and carrying signs that said “Jews Say Ceasefire Now.”
Photos from a police raid on Rodriguez’s home in Chicago on Thursday indicate his familiarity with JVP.
A hand-written sign displayed in Rodriguez’s window reads “Tikkun Olam Means Free Palestine,” alongside a drawing of a Palestinian flag. Tikkun Olam is a Hebrew phrase that translates to “healing the world.”
JVP often equates “Tikkun Olam” with opposing Israel’s existence. JVP’s Northwestern University chapter, close to Rodriguez’s home in Chicago, painted nearly the same phrase—”Tikkun Olam Says Free Palestine”—on a large rock on campus last October.
The news comes just months after the legal nonprofit National Jewish Advocacy Center filed a lawsuit against JVP on behalf of Hamas’s Oct. 7 victims, alleging that the organization, among other anti-Israel groups, acted as a “propaganda arm” for the terror group.
JVP, the self-described “largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world,” has a history of supporting anti-Israel terrorism and disseminating false information aimed at demonizing the Jewish state.
Hours after Hamas launched mass terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians on Oct. 7, Jewish Voice for Peace issued a statement justifying the attacks and blaming them on Israel.
“Israeli apartheid and occupation — and United States complicity in that oppression — are the source of all this violence,” the statement read. “Reality is shaped by when you start the clock.”
In 2023, JVP called for the release of Khader Adnan, an imprisoned senior member of the Islamic Jihad terrorist group. The group also hosted an event featuring Rasmea Odeh, a Palestinian terrorist convicted of involvement in a Jerusalem supermarket bombing, describing her as a “deeply respected Palestinian organizer” and “feminist leader.”
JVP has also celebrated Leila Khaled—a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group and airplane hijacker—and has referred to Palestinian terrorists as political prisoners.
The organization often works with Samidoun, a group that seeks the release of all imprisoned Palestinian terrorists and has a close relationship with Iran.
JVP did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In a statement on X, the group said it “condemn[ed] last night’s fatal shooting of two staff of the Israeli embassy in Washington D.C.”
JVP is not the only far-left anti-Israel group with which Rodriguez has been associated. He participated in events with the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a Marxist group that celebrated Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks and has advocated for continued violence against the Jewish state.
The PSL said on Wednesday that Rodriguez hasn’t been associated with the group since 2017, and it “reject[ed] any attempt to associate the PSL with the DC shooting.”
He also worked for a progressive nonprofit supported by the Ford and MacArthur Foundations, the Washington Free Beacon reported Thursday.
