September 15, 2024
Jewish Voice for Peace – Milwaukee
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
We as Jewish Voice for Peace Milwaukee feel inclined to speak on the recent controversy surrounding the mural at Holton & Locust depicting a swastika combined with a Star of David along with the words, “The Irony of Becoming What You Once Hated.”
First and foremost, we would like to remind our broader community and local media that as an anti-Zionist Jewish organization, we *are* part of the Milwaukee Jewish community. As such, we have been continuously appalled by local headlines, especially since last Oct 7, such as the one recently put out by Sophie Carson of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that refers to outrage from “Milwaukee Jewish Leaders” over the mural when anti-Zionist Jews like ourselves are not reached out to or platformed to share our own thoughts about such topics. That said, we resoundingly reject this characterization that Milwaukee Jewish Federation speaks for the entire Jewish community, when we can assure you that they do not. They are not “Jewish community leaders” to us, but agents of Israel’s genocide and anti-Palestinian racism. They do not speak for Judaism. They speak for Israel.
In terms of our feelings on the mural itself, we understand why it is polarizing. There is a legitimate critique that can be made about it, particularly concerning the language of the mural implying that Jews, whom the Nazis persecuted and exterminated during the Holocaust, have become oppressors not unlike the Nazis in regards to Zionism and Palestine. It should be made abundantly clear that Judaism and Zionism are two different things, but it is understandable how someone might read the mural as conflating the two.
At the same time, it would be foolish to pretend that the state of Israel does not proclaim itself as the Jewish state, and it has used this notion to justify the systematic displacement, apartheid and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians since the dawn of the settler-colonial Zionist movement under the guise of
“self-defense.” Israel co-opts Jewish symbolism and culture while doing this, most obviously in its use of the Star of David on the national flag.
Because of this, many Palestinians understandably have a fundamentally different relationship with the Star of David than many Jews do. It has been the symbol used on the tanks, bombs, guns and soldiers that murder Palestinian children, and it has been the symbol branded onto Palestinian prisoners by Israeli police. We find it far more reprehensible and antisemitic that Zionists co-opted the historically Jewish symbol as it commits crimes against humanity onto the people of Palestine than anything this mural insinuates. For many Palestinians, it is a symbol that represents violence, murder and oppression, not unlike the swastika as it was used by Nazi Germany, and this is clearly stated by the mural’s artist in the Journal Sentinel article. It is not our or anyone else’s place to police Palestinians as they express their pain through creative means.
We understand the intention of the mural. Art throughout history has been used as a means of provocation and transgression, and this particular mural undoubtedly evokes a visceral reaction that starts an urgent conversation. That is the point of the mural, as upsetting and triggering to some it may be. If you have paid attention to Israel-Palestine, especially since last October 7 as we have observed the single most well-documented genocide in modern history, then you will know that the comparison is righteous. And our tax dollars as US citizens are funding it.
Zionism promotes racist Jewish nationalism and exceptionalism that we wholeheartedly reject. Existing Jewish institutions are not above criticism when they espouse revisionist narratives and endorse genocidal rhetoric. Holding them accountable does not make someone antisemitic.
From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.
Wisconsin Bail Out the People Movement 
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