Lila Weintraub disrupts the Senate hearing concerning David Friedman’s US ambassadorship to Israel on February 16, 2017. (Photo: Courtesy of Lila Weintraub)
On the morning of David Friedman’s Senate hearing for the US ambassadorship to Israel, I stood with five Muslim and Jewish partners, faced the ranking members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and demanded the attention of an audience packed with white male decision-makers and press, along with elite members of the American Jewish community.
In the 20 seconds I had before being escorted out and arrested, it seemed that for the first time in my life, my young, female, proudly Jewish voice would be heard by so-called American Jewish leaders.
In loud and unambiguous terms, I explained to the room that Friedman’s potential ambassadorship is devastating on two levels: for Palestinians and for the American Jewish community itself.
On one level, Friedman’s far-right vision for the region is based in Islamophobic ideology that would permanently deny Palestinians the freedom and dignity of self-governance. He lacks any formal qualifications for the position and represents an urgent danger to Palestinian and Israeli lives alike.
The second level of devastation became even more visible to me as my words were coming out. As I stood and spoke, I was showered with the disgruntled shouts of Jewish establishment figures telling me, “There’s a special place in hell for Jews like you!” and “Enjoy your time in jail!” A member of the Zionist Organization of America even shuttled the police over to a fellow movement member standing beside me, shouting, “He’s the one who blew the shofar! Get him!” (To begin our protest, we had blown the shofar — the traditional Jewish ram’s horn — to symbolize the speaking of truth, as a call to action.)
It was these words coming from the Jewish audience around me…