The first weekend of December, a variety of pro-Israel and Zionist speakers took turns addressing participants of the Jewish National Fund (JNF) Global Conference inside the Colorado Convention Center and the Hyatt Hotel in Downtown Denver.
“Our time is the beginning of the golden era of Jewish history,” Sam Goldberg, head JNF representative for the Rocky Mountain region, told the crowd of conference-goers. “Why? Because we have Israel.”
General admission tickets for the four-day event started at $550. Declaring the conference “the place to be for Israel supporters,” the JNF website offered participants sessions on topics like “winning the global media war” and “building your Zionist identity,” as well as a variety of speeches and performances by public figures including comedian Alex Edelmann and Colorado Governor Jared Polis.
A very different environment awaited conference-goers outside the convention center.
Toting Palestinian flags and signs reading “Genocide Jared, Genocide Joe,” protestors came out to march, rally and pray on each day of the conference to express opposition to the JNF and the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, which some scholars and United Nations (UN) officials have called a “genocide.”
An eight-foot tall chain link fence separated the protestors from the participants on Thursday, Nov. 30, and police in full riot gear looked on as the crowd echoed chants of “shame,” “blood on your hands” and “free, free Palestine” towards conference-goers as they walked between the convention center and the Hyatt.
Lina El Fadili, a DPS student, said she was protesting the conference “to raise awareness and let our state representatives know, as well as the founders of the JNF conference, that Zionism is not allowed here.”
The definitions of Zionism and anti-Zionism have been under significant contest in recent months. Despite the House’s recent adoption of a resolution which stated that “anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism,” advocates maintain that anti-Zionism criticizes the Israeli project and the ongoing displacement of Palestinian people from historic Palestine, not Jewish people themselves.
On Sunday, Dec. 3, Denver police arrested 15 Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) members for chaining themselves together in the middle of the Speer/Colfax intersection. Surrounded by over 100 fellow demonstrators, the 15 activists shut down traffic for over an hour. They have since been released on bail but are still facing charges.
To Ahmed Husain, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) who attended Thursday’s protest, opposing the conference was obligatory. “It is because of us, because of our tax dollars, because of our silence, that there is a genocide happening in the Middle East right now,” he said. “There is blood on our hands.”
While the JNF is legally a 501(c)(3) non-profit, its activities have long been intertwined with those of the Israeli government. Founded in 1901, the JNF was a primary buyer of Palestinian land in the early 20th century; JNF surveyors also collected “village files” of Palestinian cities, which Zionist paramilitaries like the Haganah later utilized to invade Palestinian land during the 1948 Nakba. Today, the organization holds six seats on the Israeli Land Council.
With over $428,000,000 in net assets according to 2022 tax documents, the JNF is one of Israel’s largest fundraisers. In addition to starting an emergency aid fund after Oct. 7, the organization says it plans to put $1 billion towards building communities and land developments in Israel, promoting environmental innovations and advocating for “Zionist education” in the coming years.
The JNF’s annual international conference came as the five-day humanitarian pause in Gaza ended on Dec. 1. Since resuming air and ground attacks, Israeli forces have killed at least 5,000 Palestinians, bringing the total death toll since Oct. 7 to more than 20,000, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
UN officials now estimate that the Israeli military’s ongoing invasion has displaced 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, with Special Rapporteur Paula Gaviria Betancur criticizing the Israeli military for “frustrating any realistic prospects for displaced Gazans to return home” by “razing” housing and civilian infrastructure. Gaviria Betancur went on to call this a “[repetition of] a long history of mass forced displacement of Palestinians by Israel.”
Husain also recognized the long-term impact on Gaza’s children. “These children who are pulled from the rubble, orphaned, their schools in rubble, their hospitals in rubble, their classmates dead, they don’t have clean water to drink and they don’t have food to eat,” he said. “What future waits for them?”
While the pause offered a brief respite from the bloodshed of the past two months, Husain and other protestors at the conference were calling for a permanent ceasefire.
“We’re actually asking for peace, and yet everyone will say that these Arabs, these Muslims, are the ones that are terrorists when we’re literally calling for a ceasefire,” said Ayatt Drera, a college student protesting on Thursday. Drera hoped to see state and national officials call for an immediate ceasefire and to show “full solidarity” with Palestine.
So far, few elected officials in Colorado have supported a ceasefire. One of the state’s most outspoken Israel supporters, Gov. Jared Polis has instead called for President Joe Biden to send additional aid to the Israeli government. To some protestors, this felt like a betrayal.
“I actually volunteered in a lot of campaigns to elect our democratic majority here, and I’m extremely disappointed,” said Gazala Hays, a long-time Castle Rock resident. “When [democrats] were running for election, they were running around the Islamic Muslim community wanting their votes because they knew how important it was, but when it came to this, they would not stand by the Palestinians.”
Gazala, who was protesting the JNF’s financial support for “the Zionist movement,” said she planned to boycott the 2024 election.
“Everyone who supports this? I don’t ever want to see them in office again,” she said.
This sentiment was echoed by Husain, who said this would affect how he votes “up and down the ballot.” But beyond influencing politicians, Husain wanted to push conference-goers and Israel supporters to consider another perspective.
“I hope, when [conference attendees] see these protestors, they do not go on the defense,” said Husain. “I want them to reflect.”
