A newly formed group calling itself “Doctors Against Genocide” has canceled an anti-Zionist protest it planned to hold on Thursday at the US National Holocaust Memorial Museum to call for a ceasefire in Israel’s war against Hamas, claiming that “parties with ill intentions” mistook the event for an antisemitic demonstration.
“The goal of our event was to visit the Holocaust Museum to express our empathy for the horrors of that genocide. Additionally, we wanted to bring awareness to the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” the group said in a statement on Monday.
“Our initial communication did not sufficiently convey this, leading to misinterpretations and unfounded accusations,” it continued. “As DAG we stand against all hate of vulnerable people, whether that hate comes in the form of antisemitism, anti-Palestinianism, anti-Black hate, anti-White hate, or any other prejudice. Never again for all.”
In a later statement, the group apologized for a “lack of clarity” but continued to imply that the Holocaust is comparable to Israel’s military operations against Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that launched the war with its Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
Comparing Israel to Nazi Germany is antisemitic, according to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which has been adopted by dozens of governments and hundreds of civic institutions around the world. The definition includes examples of anti-Israel bias, such as “claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor,” “denying the Jewish people their right to self determination,” and “applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”
Announced over the weekend, DAG’s protest was decried by Jewish groups and activists who called it a “sickening” and clear attempt to denigrate Jewish suffering by equating Israel’s efforts to defend and sustain the Jewish state to the Holocaust during World War II, when the Nazis murdered six million Jews.
“They have canceled this stomach churning event,” the watchdog group StopAntisemitism said on X/Twitter. “Again, this group was formed last month. They have never posted regarding actual genocides prior to this clarification. They also refuse to condemn the terror group Hamas, who is inflicting death on both Palestinians and Israelis.”
Heidi Bachram, a columnist from the United Kingdom, tweeted that the protest amounted to an “invasion” and wasn’t “misinterpreted,” adding that “everyone got the antisemitic message loud and clear.”
According to Roll Call, a news outlet based in Washington, DC, DAG is a nonprofit organization co-founded by Michigan physician Nidal Jboor, and in November, its members participated in a protest held on Capitol Hill. The group’s website claims that DAG comprises “health care professionals from all around the world” and describes its mission as “identifying, opposing, preventing, and eradicating genocide by uniting health care professionals in action.”
The controversy over the now-canceled protest comes amid a meteoric rise in antisemitic hate crimes across the world following Hamas’ Oct. 7 onslaught. In London, for example, antisemitic offenses increased 162 percent in 2023 through November compared to the prior year.
In France and Germany, meanwhile, the Jewish communities have been targeted at record rates since Oct. 7. In the US, antisemitic incidents — including assaults, vandalisms, and verbal attacks committed by both far left and far right agitators — surged by over 330 percent percent between Oct. 7 and Dec. 7, many of which occurred on US college campuses and caused some Jewish students to conceal their identities.
“This terrifying pattern of antisemitic attacks has been relentless since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, with no signs of diminishing,” ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said earlier this month. “The lid to the sewers is off, and Jewish communities all across the country are being inundated with hate. Public officials and college leaders must turn down the temperature and take clear action to show this behavior is unacceptable to prevent more violence.”
