Dear Editor,
In response to the commentary from the Shalom Alliance: “Vermont legislators have a chance to save Jewish lives — now”:
The Shalom Alliance’s mild-mannered self-description as a “a nonpartisan nonprofit working to build a bright future for Vermont Jews by fighting antisemitism and misinformation in Vermont schools, communities and media” belies several key facts.
First, the group lobbied aggressively against apartheid-free designations passed in five Vermont communities earlier this year by Vermonters who have been rightfully horrified seeing American political support and weapons aid in a massacre of tens of thousands of people in Gaza, and enforce what Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and countless other organizations define as apartheid in Palestine generally.
Second, the bill Shalom Alliance endorses, H.310, would not merely create Holocaust education standards in Vermont (a perfectly legitimate aim), but would define “negative references to … the right to self-determination in the Jewish people’s ancestral and indigenous homeland” — in other words, anti-Zionism — as “antisemitic harassment,” itself a dangerous and offensive conflation and an explicit threat to freedom of speech.
Third, the group’s incorporator, Mitchell Knisbacher, has donated via the Sandra and Mitchell Knisbacher Foundation to extremist Israeli organizations, including the Central Fund of Israel and the One Israel Fund, which support settlement activities in Palestine.
Despite what the anonymous editorial writers say, their views are extreme and probably anathema to most Vermonters. Voters and legislators should carefully read and reject H.310.
Will Solomon
Putney
