IHRA and its Critics

Since its original publication in 2005, the so-called “International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism” has gained growing support in the political world and amongst the Jewish American establishment, which now relates to it as the “gold standard”. But the IHRA definition is far from the “Revelation on Mount Sinai”, and its framing of the Israel and Zionism questions, in particular, has been criticized by a diverse array of scholars and practitioners, non-Zionist and Zionist, Jewish, Palestinian, American, and others around the world. On Thursday, August 4 , our expert panel discussed the IHRA definition, critiquing it and presenting alternatives that could better shield critics of Israeli policy, occupation policy in particular, from an unwarranted accusation of Jew-hatred. As Prof. Deborah Lipstadt, U.S. Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, recently acknowledged, after all: “Differing with Israel’s policies, even differing in the extreme, that’s not antisemitism.”
Panelists
Stacy Burdett - Government relations and advocacy strategist on antisemitism
Prof. Amal Jamal – Tel Aviv University
Prof. Joshua Shanes (moderator) – College of Charleston and Partners for Progressive Israel board member

Q&A with the Zoom audience followed the discussion.