From the News Desk: FMEP’s Lara Friedman on new Senate antisemitism bill (Jewish Currents Newsletter)
“NOT SO FAST: Last week in this space, we reported that a new Senate bill, the Jewish American Security Act, had been amended before introduction to remove language codifying the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which considers much criticism of Israel to be antisemitic. We suggested that the bill as it stands would not push forward the longstanding Jewish establishment goal of enshrining IHRA in federal law. Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace and an experienced tracker of Hill legislation related to Israel/Palestine and antisemitism, disagrees with our analysis. In her legislative round-up last week, Friedman wrote that the language on IHRA that was removed from the bill was immaterial, given that the bill still cites President Trump’s 2019 executive order endorsing IHRA. ‘Absent an affirmative repudiation of the IHRA definition and/or the articulation of a clear alternative definition—something the forces behind this bill would never accept—any antisemitism legislation adopted under the Trump administration will, first and foremost, codify into law and expand enforcement of the IHRA definition,’ Friedman told Jewish Currents today. ‘Removal of explicit references to the IHRA definition from the bill is performative—it is about appearances, not impact. Doing so did little more than offer a pretext for some who are ostensibly concerned about that definition to demonstrate they can be part of a big tent solution.’”