ZF director issues parting broadside at critics of Israel

THE OUTGOING executive director of the Zionist Federation, Steve Winston, has lashed out at groups he said were obsessed with “the occupation”, accusing them of throwing Israel under a bus and cosying up to “woke culture”.

He also blasted the Liberal Zionist youth movement, LJY-Netzer, for “stoking the anti-Israel flames” last May, during the Gaza conflict.

Mr Winston, who was made redundant as part of the federation’s drastic measures to cut costs, emailed a farewell letter to members of the ZF National Council on his final day with the organisation.

The Jewish Leadership Council and Board of Deputies had called for people to join a virtual rally during the Gaza conflict by holding up photos of themselves with placards “which read something like ‘No to Rockets, Yes to Peace’”, Mr Winston recalled.

The ZF had supported it, he said, “yet LJY-Netzer… chose to oppose it directly naming the ZF on Twitter, maintaining that the placard’s words should be more along the lines of ‘No to Rockets, Yes to Peace, No to Occupation, No to Settlements’ [and other perceived ill-doings by Israel] etc’”.

Mr Winston wrote that to “ignore the many and actual hate-fuelled and often illegal practices of the Palestinian leaders against Israel and its people, LJY-Netzer, whilst stoking the anti-Israel flames when the whole of Israel was under attack… made its activity utterly disgraceful.” He added that “the Jewish community has lots of challenges ahead.

“To those who, either individually or through affiliation to some fringe groups, focus obsessively on ‘the occupation’, ‘those settlements’ and a whole variety of other perceived ill-doings by Israel, you are all too often throwing Israel under the bus whilst cosying up to the woke culture, something which certainly won’t help any of us.” He thanked acting ZF chairman Richard Woolf and council member Rabbi Lea Muhlstein for their sensitive handling of staff redundancies.

But he criticised the Masorti Zionist movement Mercaz and the Jewish Labour Movement, claiming they had not paid dues to the ZF.

A spokesman for LJY-Netzer said it would not comment on Mr Winston’s remarks.

But Masorti Judaism chief executive Matt Plan dismissed his claims, saying that Mercaz had “unfailingly paid its membership dues to the ZF every year. This year, our membership invoice unexpectedly increased by 600 per cent. We have not only raised the extra money to pay this bill but have also arranged an additional grant to help stabilise the ZF’s finances.”

Rabbi Muhlstein said: “We are working closely with JLM to ensure that they can pay as soon as possible.”

You are all too often throwing Israel under the bus