Jews For Racial & Economic Justice (JFREJ)

Activities

• Jews For Racial & Economic Justice claims to be a “6,000-member grassroots organization and the home of New York’s Jewish Left.”
• In May 2022, JFREJ launched its “Israel-Palestine team,” which “developed a proposal for a series of trainings and political education to be offered to the full membership…We will offer members opportunities to learn from and discuss with Palestinian, Jewish, and Israeli scholars, organizers, and community leaders in New York and beyond.”
  • The team comprised activists from Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow, and Americans for Peace Now.

Political Advocacy

• JFREJ is a “proud supporter of the Not On Our Dime campaign to end New York State’s subsidization of Israeli settlements.”
  • In May 2023, JFREJ was a signatory on an open letter calling to “ensure that New York State does not give tax breaks to organizations that directly finance the illegal Israeli settlements displacing Palestinians from their homes and land.”
• Leads “The Jewish Vote” campaign, advocates for Jews to vote for left-wing candidates, including Jamaal Bowman and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. JFREJ refers to “The Jewish Vote” as its “electoral arm.”
  • In March 2024, The Jewish Vote co-sponsored the #LeaveItBlankNY campaign. According to the campaign, “casting a blank ballot is a protest tactic to pressure the Biden administration to use the U.S.’s incredible power and leverage to end the ongoing genocidal violence against Gaza and the Palestinian people immediately.”
• In July 2024, JFREJ participated in a sit-in in Congress with JVP, “refusing to leave Congress until our government listens to the will of the people and STOPS ARMING ISRAEL!” 
• In July 2024, JFREJ was a signatory on a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and Education Secretary Miguel Cardona urging a Justice Department investigation into “allegations of abuse by law enforcement” in response to the pro-Palestinian campus protests.
  • In May 2024, JFREJ members, alongside Columbia University faculty, testified to the NY City Council allegingthe “NYPD’s brutal assault on free speech and demand[ing] the disbanding of NYPD-SRG.”
• In June 2024, JFREJ wrote a “model ceasefire resolution” claiming the Palestinians are “currently facing a genocidal campaign of ethnic cleansing and collective punishment by Israel with support from the U.S. government,” and called on the Biden administration to “immediately end all U.S. military funding and aid to the State of Israel, and an end to U.S. tax dollars contributing to tremendous humanitarian catastrophe and loss of life.”
• In April 2024, JFREJ published a statement affirming, “we cannot mourn without demanding action: an immediate, permanent ceasefire; the release of all hostages — everyone for everyone; no more US military funding for Israel; an end to occupation and apartheid.”
• In January 2024, JFREJ condemned a proposal from New York governor Kathy Hochul (D.) to expand the list of offenses that can be charged as hate crimes. Those who commit hate-fueled crimes against Jews, the group said, should be met with “restorative, community-based education and healing,” not “a police-driven response with criminal penalties.”
• On October 7, 2023, after the brutal Hamas massacre, JFREJ published a statement claiming, “The scale of violence we are currently witnessing in Gaza is unimaginable. From our phones, we are watching war crimes carried out in real time—justified, enabled, supported, and denied by world leaders, US politicians, major media outlets, and many in our Jewish community.”
• In July 2023, following Rep Jamaal Bowman Ed.D. (NY-16) and Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) announcing they will not attend Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s joint address to Congress, JFREJ published a statement claiming, “delivering a joint session speech, Herzog speaks as a representative of the Israeli government — a government actively engaging in apartheid, land theft, and violence against Palestinians. We reject the premise that because Herzog is not Netanyahu’s political ally, he is not complicit or a representative of the Israeli government; he is simply a more palatable representative to cover up the violent reality on the ground.”
• In May 2023, JFREJ published a statement claiming, “We consider the battle over definitions to be an unhelpful distraction and diversion of resources. Conflating criticism of the State of Israel or Zionism with antisemitism hurts Jews, Arabs, and Muslims alike. Efforts to include IHRA in policy drive a wedge both within the Jewish community and between Jews and other groups experiencing bigotry and discrimination — and make our work of fighting antisemitism harder.”

Staff

Audrey Sasson (Executive Director) (2022 salary – $100,613)

• Before joining JFREJ, Sasson served as a Senior Organizer for the American Jewish World Service.
• Has called to “#StopArmingIsrael.”
• October 2023: Sasson, accused Israel of “genocide.” 
• July 2024, Sasson tweeted, “We’re being asked to cheer for an administration that backs genocide abroad and won’t get out of its own freaking way to mitigate fascism on US soil. It’s sociopathic, gaslighting behavior. Reckless and unforgivable.”

Shifra Sered (Deputy Director)

• Before JFREJ, Sered worked at J-Street, Gisha, Operation Groundswell, and New Israel Fund
  • At Gisha, Sered was responsible for “briefing international organizations and diplomats on Israel’s policy in Gaza.”
  • At Operation Groundswell, Sered was responsible for “leading groups of young adults from around the world to travel in Israel-Palestine.”
  • As a fellow at NIF, Sered worked with Sadaka Reut.

Leo Ferguson (Director of Strategic Projects)

• April 2024: Ferguson tweeted, “If there was a group of pro-mass murder Black students advocating for a Black-supremacist apartheid state where Arabs and Muslims were denied equality or were kept in ghettos at gunpoint I would be out there protesting against them. As would all the Black people I know.”
• June 2023: Ferguson tweeted, “You may believe otherwise, but I think CUNY students would have, let’s say, solid grounds to believe that a proudly Zionist identity is today indistinguishable from an actively anti-Palestinian ideology. That Zionism is premised on occupation, settlements, and apartheid.”