Pro-Palestine activists have slammed US President Joe Biden’s administration for “mischaracterising” a protest outside a California synagogue where real estate firms are accused of advertising properties for sale in the occupied West Bank, Middle East Eye reported on June 25.
The demonstration occurred outside the Adas Torah temple, an Orthodox synagogue near Beverly Hills in Los Angeles. Protesters wearing keffiyehs and waving Palestinian flags gathered outside the synagogue after seeing an advertisement that promoted residential homes for sale in “the best Anglo neighbourhoods in Israel”.
Biden waded into the protest on Monday, saying on X he was “appalled by the scenes outside of Adas Torah… Intimidating Jewish congregants is dangerous, unconscionable, antisemitic and un-American”.
Anti-war group CodePink, which organises pro-Palestine protests, slammed Biden for alleging that the demonstration was antisemitic.
“It is outrageous that President Biden and certain media outlets have misrepresented this protest as an antisemitic attack on worshippers,” the group said, noting no religious services were scheduled at the time of the real estate event and a counter pro-Israel protest held at the same time outside.
Biden’s swift condemnation of the pro-Palestine demonstrators elicited a rebuke on social media, where critics pointed out his measured response to the attempted drowning of a three-year-old Palestinian-American at a neighbourhood pool in Texas.