NETUREI KARTA

Neturei Karta is an anti-Zionist Orthodox Jewish political group. Originally created in 1939, the group is against the existence of Israel, primarily due to a core religious belief that the Jewish exile must continue until the coming of the Hebrew Messia. They are primarily active in parts of Israel and the Western world, where they partake in activism supporting a one-state solution in which the Palestinian people control the combined territory of Israel and the State of Palestine.

I interviewed and photographed the Brooklyn contingent of Neturei Karta, hoping to gain a better understanding of the group’s motivations and background.

INTERVIEW EXCERPT

Did the Holocaust change the thinking around Jewish migration or the need for a Jewish homeland? What was the group’s take on where Jewish refugees should go?

Joseph Kohn (New York Spokesperson): After the Holocaust, people were very overwhelmed by what happened. A lot of Jews thought that it wouldn’t be possible anymore to live in Europe. They were looking at Europe like Jews are not accepted over there and they were looking to settle in other places. So a lot of Jews would go to places in the USA, in North American countries and other parts of the world. But Zionists created a propaganda that you will only settle in Palestine. And Palestine at that time was under the British, so they created mass rallies to demonstrate and to ask and protest the British government, because the British at that time didn’t want mass immigration, Jewish immigration to Palestine because they knew it was going to create big problems in Palestine. Also at the time, the Zionists in Palestine had created at least two militant groups. They were actually involved in attacks against … Civilians, Palestinians.There was a famous ship with immigrants, Jewish immigrants that they sunk, because the British didn’t want to allow it into Palestine and they wanted to redirect it.

So the Zionists said no, they’re only going to Palestine, if not we’re going to sink it and so then they blamed the British and they said you see what happens when you don’t allow Jews to Palestine. (This is known as the Patria disaster.)So they used all kind of tactics to … help Jews immigrate only to Palestine. So the Holocaust happened in Europe, on European soil. But what about the Jews who lived peacefully in Arab and Muslim countries throughout the Middle East? So for them they have created a different set of propaganda machine to have them move to Israel. First they tried to promise them a better future and the newly created Israel they’ve created in Palestine. And again, they didn’t know that this was created at the expense of another people …. And a lot of people bought the propaganda, even though it was obvious that it didn’t correlate with what we know about Messiah. So, a lotta other communities, they say well things have changed and the tools no longer are required to be an exile and we freed ourselves and again they promised them a better future, they promised them we will give you homes and jobs.