How do you stop good people from careening over a cliff?  How do you protect decent Jewish philanthropic women from aligning with groups who would be quite happy to hurt them in many ways?

A Women's March is scheduled for Saturday, January 21, 2017.  The National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW), which I joined over 30 years ago as a life member, is joining forces with groups that have neither Jewish nor American interests at hand.  And far too many of the NCJW members are either willfully blind or simply ignorant of the nefarious background of many of the "partners" marching at this event.  NCJW needs to review its principles, one of which includes "efforts that counter attempts to delegitimize Israel."

NCJW members were informed that "[a]lthough the values espoused by all the organizers are certainly those of NCJW, [the march is scheduled for] Shabbat.  But, given that [they] are an organization based on Jewish values, not an orthodox observant group, it was finally decided that it was more important to be a part of this coalition."

First of all, no one has to be an orthodox Jew to observe the Sabbath.  According to Jewish law, Shabbat regulations can be broken only if it is a matter of life or death.  Thus, "[w]hen treating on Shabbat a patient who is critically ill, or when dealing with an individual whose life is in danger ... one is commanded to 'violate' the Shabbat. This applies even if there's a doubt whether it is – or could evolve into – a life threatening situation."  The National Council of Jewish Women deems it acceptable to disregard a key pillar of Jewish life.

The first clue to the march is that it is a "social justice" event.  It is important to perceive that "[o]ppression is the fixed constant of Social Justice Warriors[.] The only thing justifying their oppression is their victimhood. To oppress, they have to perpetuate the myth of their victimhood. They are always the beleaguered minority under siege by the people who don't want to be oppressed or who don't even know they exist."

According to Marcus Ellsworth, the march "will be taking a stand against the racism, misogyny, Islamophobia and classism that Trump and his administration represent."  Furthermore, "with a strong socialist core, these protests are standing up to the entire political system and all forms of oppression." 

Some of the groups planning to march are DisruptJ20, Bend the Arc Jewish Action, Code Pink, Human Rights Watch, National Network for Arab American Communities, Oxfam, and Planned Parenthood, to name only a few.

So let us take a closer look at some of the groups participating in this march.

The DisruptJ20 site calls "on all people of good conscience to join in disrupting the ceremonies [because] Trump stands for tyranny, greed, and misogyny. He is the champion of neo-nazis and white Nationalists, of the police who kill the Black, Brown and poor on a daily basis, of racist border agents and sadistic prison guards, of the FBI and NSA who tap your phone and read your email. He is the harbinger of even more climate catastrophe, deportation, discrimination, and endless war. He continues to deny the existence of climate change, in spite of all the evidence, putting the future of the whole human race at stake."

Thus, "[f]rom day one, the Trump presidency will be a disaster. #DisruptJ20 will be the
start of the resistance. We must take to the streets and protest, blockade, disrupt, intervene, sit in, walk out, rise up, and make more noise and good trouble than the establishment can bear[.]"

An ostensible Jewish group, Bend the Arc "seeks to 'create a just, fair and compassionate America' by 'mobilizing ... Jewish resources' to promote 'equality and justice for disenfranchised residents of our nation.' Bend the Arc 'condemns voter ID laws as barriers that make it harder for communities of color, women, first-time voters, the elderly, and the poor to cast their vote,' and finally, Bend the Arc 'calls for comprehensive immigration reform that creates a path-to-citizenship for millions of illegal aliens currently residing in the United States.'"  Bend the Arc used to be known as Jewish Funds for Justice.  According to Daniel Greenfield, "it is currently headed by Stacy Cotler who is an anti-Israel protester."  "[A]n article in the Saudi lobby's Washington Report states that Cotler was working with Women in Black. She appears as a signatory on a Not In My Name petition calling for war crimes charges against Israeli soldiers."

What makes this particularly intriguing is that Bend the Arc is now getting a boost from George Soros's son, who wants "to play a more active role in the 2016 election with the launch of new political action committee focused on representing the views of Jewish Americans – beyond foreign policy."  Thus, Bend the Arc will "back progressive candidates by making direct contributions to their campaign committees. It will focus on issues such as income inequality, marriage equality, social justice and immigration reform."

As Greenfield ruefully explains, "who better to show the real experience of American Jewry than the son of a Hungarian Nazi collaborator whose father described his own mother as a Jewish anti-Semite and who blamed Jews for anti-Semitism. Anyway this whole thing is already as incestuous as any Soros project. The PAC is drawing on Soros' Democracy Alliance donors, a project for using big money to hijack elections. The whole thing will officially be run by Hadar Susskind of Soros' J Street."

Oxfam is an international relief organization that condemns Israeli defensive measures against terrorism and supports the boycotts of Israeli products.  In fact, on January 29, 2014, actress Scarlett Johansson announced she was quitting her role as an ambassador of Oxfam, since the group "is opposed to all trade with products from Israeli settlements which it holds are illegal under international law. Ms. Johansson signed a contract to be the first brand ambassador and spokesperson for SodaStream, the Israel business making products that allow people to produce carbonated sodas."  Ironically, the "SodaStream factory in Ma'ale Adumim employs 1,300 workers; of these 442 are Palestinians from the West Bank and 237 are Palestinian citizens of Israel, all of whom receive the same benefits as Israeli workers. Apparently their salaries are far higher than those paid by Palestinian employers. Unquestionably, Palestinians would suffer from the closure of this factory."

Human Rights Watch "directs a disproportionate share of its criticism at Israel. Following an April 2002 counterterrorism operation by the Israeli military in the Palestinian refugee camp of Jenin, the organization issued a report charging that 'IDF [Israeli Defense Forces] military attacks were indiscriminate,' and that 'Israeli forces committed serious violations of international humanitarian law, some amounting prima facie to war crimes.' Contrary to HRW's charges, which echoed Palestinian propaganda, a United Nations report later exonerated the Israeli forces." 

As Gerald Steinberg notes, "similar political attacks using the language of ethics and morality have taken place in connection with false massacre claims, related to the intense fighting information."  "Almost nobody checks their accuracy, and this process is a central pillar in the war to delegitimize Israel."  In fact, between 2004-2006, "ideological attacks against Israel took up one-third of the entire activity of Human Rights Watch."

More recently in January of 2016, Human Rights Watch issued a lengthy report claiming "how [Israeli] settlement businesses contribute to Israel's Violations of Palestinian Rights" – a continuing demonization of Israel amidst high-sounding ideas, many of which are factually incorrect.

Then there is Code Pink.  According to John J. Tierney, "Code Pink are serious and very radical political activists. They subscribe in varying degrees to strands of Marxist, neo-Marxist, and progressive left-wing thought[.]"

"Code Pink describes itself as a 'grassroots peace and social justice movement.' It is anti-everything about America – against the U.S. economic system, against U.S. foreign and domestic policies and against the American culture of 'racism' and 'sexism.'"

Tierney asserts that "Code Pink's leaders are not pacifists – they are revolutionaries. They are not devoted to peace – they are dedicated to political turmoil."  Like so many of the Women's March groups, "Code Pink is part of a global network of leftwing activists. Individuals in the network may pursue diverse issues and programs, but all are united in opposition to the U.S."

Finally we have Linda Sarsour, one of the national co-chairs of the anticipated January Women's March.  Billed as a "social media maverick," Sarsour has been the civic engagement coordinator for the National Network for Arab American Communities (NNAAC).  Honored by Obama as a "Champion of Change," Sarsour "supports the Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) Movement, a Hamas-inspired initiative that uses various forms of public protest, economic pressure, and court rulings to advance the Hamas agenda of permanently destroying Israel as a Jewish nation-state." 

Sarsour favors a one-state solution, where an Arab majority and Jewish minority live together within the borders of a single country.  In October 2012, she stated that "nothing is creepier than Zionism."  In addition, she has maintained the falsehood that "Palestine existed before the State of Israel."  On Rachel Maddow's television program, Sarsour maintained that there is a nationwide epidemic of Islamophobia and Muslim "kids being executed in the United States."  Sarsour played a central role in pressuring the New York Police Department to terminate its secret surveillance of Muslim mosques and organizations suspected of promoting extremism or terrorism.  Furthermore, Sarsour is deeply involved in the Black Lives Matter Movement – despite its anti-Semitic overtones.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Eileen can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com.