A synagogue holds a fundraiser. No big deal, right?

A synagogue holds a fundraiser for someone with a history of supporting Islamic terrorists? That’s a red flag.

The synagogue leadership shuts down discussion of the terrorist supporter in advance of the fundraiser?

That’s gatekeeping on a suicidal level.

The Mohsen Mahdawi Video

Ever since the U.S. administration arrested Mohsen Mahdawi in April 2025, I have been investigating his background. Working alongside Vermont researcher Rachel Feldman, we uncovered evidence that much of the narrative Mahdawi had used to build support within progressive circles was misleading. He had portrayed terrorist relatives as innocent victims and, over many years, repeatedly glorified and honoured Palestinian terrorists.

What we lacked was a recent piece of evidence showing that these views were not confined to the past. Then, a few weeks ago, we found it.

In a video Mahdawi posted in December 2024, he spoke in Arabic to a restricted audience, making it unlikely that most of his American supporters would ever see – or understand – what he was saying.

In the video, Mahdawi describes himself as part of a unified “resistance” movement and his words identify him with the same terrorist movements responsible for the October 7 atrocities.

Taken together with our earlier findings, the video completed a consistent picture of support for violent Palestinian militancy stretching back more than fifteen years.

The evidence was no longer ambiguous. Those presenting Mahdawi as a peace activist now had to explain how that claim could be reconciled with his own words.

The Reform Synagogue That Did

Just as news of the video began to spread, Mahdawi’s supporters were preparing a major fundraising event to finance his legal campaign against deportation:

I knew Mahdawi enjoyed a substantial support network and had become something of a cause célèbre for anti-Trump activists. But it had never occurred to me that a Jewish organisation would help raise money on his behalf. Mahdawi is a man who has repeatedly praised and honoured leaders of terrorist organisations committed to murdering Jews. I had assumed that, whatever the political divisions within the American Jewish community, that would remain a clear red line.

But I was wrong.

I learned that one of the principal organisers of the August 9 fundraising event was Beth Jacob, a Reform synagogue in Montpelier, Vermont:

Worse still, Mahdawi had even been personally invited to the synagogue for a discussion to take place prior to the main fundraising event.

That a Jewish congregation would lend its name and credibility to a fundraiser for a man with Mahdawi’s record was something I found almost impossible to comprehend.

The Internal Division

There was some pushback.

Beth Jacob has a members’ email discussion list, and after some members saw our research – including the recently uncovered December 2024 video – they began questioning the synagogue’s support for both the pre-event discussion with Mahdawi and the fundraising event itself.

What followed should serve as a case study. It is not simply that parts of the diaspora Jewish community are willing to embrace people who support organisations committed to murdering Jews. It is that some within those communities act as gatekeepers, introducing conspiracy theories and extremist thinking into the discussion while attempting to silence those who challenge their narrative.

“I Have Never Heard of Him”

Inside the group, one of Mahdawi’s leading Jewish supporters – who was himself scheduled to speak at the fundraiser – responded by questioning me personally rather than engaging with the research.

In an email circulated to synagogue members, he introduced himself by listing his academic credentials in Jewish Studies before explaining that he had “never heard” of me and that I was “not a known or respected scholar of antisemitism.” He also questioned my Arabic and suggested that discussing my research was not an appropriate use of the synagogue.

I found this revealing. He had no objection to the synagogue being used to raise money for Mohsen Mahdawi, yet objected to it being used to examine whether Mahdawi was deserving of that support.

Notice, too, what was missing.

There was little attempt to show that the evidence was inaccurate. No serious effort to argue that the videos had been mistranslated, misunderstood, or taken out of context.

Instead, the focus shifted to the person presenting the evidence.

It was through this email exchange – shared with me by members of the synagogue – that I was first introduced to Eric Jacobson.

Jacobson Goes Conspiratorial

Wanting to underline the risks of associating with an extremist such as Mahdawi, I replied to the synagogue and copied Jacobson into my response.

I pointed out that my research was evidence-based and that, despite dismissing it, neither he nor anyone else had challenged a single factual finding.

His reply was extraordinary.

Rather than addressing Mahdawi’s statements or the evidence itself, Jacobson asked whether I was employed by Israel’s Ministry of National Security or funded, directly or indirectly, by the Israeli government:

Here I was, trying to persuade a synagogue not to align itself with a man who openly celebrated terrorist leaders, and the response was to imply that I was secretly acting on behalf of the Israeli state.

It became stranger still. In the synagogue discussion group, Jacobson portrayed my email to him as somehow suspicious or inappropriate, even though he had publicly criticised my work and I had done nothing more than reply directly to his message.

His position was impossible to reconcile with the facts.

The Questions That Must Not Be Asked

Yet the most revealing email came later.

Faced with growing concern inside the synagogue, the organisers decided to postpone the synagogue reception. At first glance, this might appear to have been a victory for those urging caution.

It was not.

Writing on behalf of the synagogue’s Social Action Committee, Alice Silverman explained:

“We realize that some synagogue members have concerns,” the organisers wrote. “An event to address that would serve a very different purpose than what we are hoping and planning for on August 9, which is to show our full support.”

The organisers acknowledged that concerns existed. They acknowledged those concerns were significant enough to warrant discussion. Yet they decided that discussion should not take place because it would interfere with the purpose of the August 9 event: to show “our full support.”

They did not say the concerns lacked merit or claim the evidence had been disproved. They did not argue that Mahdawi’s statements had been mistranslated or misunderstood.

The obvious implication is that the organisers did not want the August 9 reception to become a forum in which Mahdawi’s record was challenged. They wanted it to remain an event expressing support.

That, to me, is the real story.

When The Loudest Voices Become the Problem

There is a profound difference between reaching a conclusion after examining uncomfortable evidence and deciding that examining the evidence is itself an obstacle to the desired outcome.

This episode also speaks to something larger than one synagogue in Vermont.

Across parts of progressive Jewish America, there is an increasing tendency for political identity to shape moral judgement. Opposition to Benjamin Netanyahu and opposition to Donald Trump become the only lens through which Jewish institutions evaluate the people they choose to support.

At some point, there must still be red lines.

One might reasonably expect that a man who publicly praises leaders of organisations responsible for murdering Jews would be one of those red lines.

Instead, in this case, the synagogue’s internal emails reveal something more troubling than simple disagreement. Members raised concerns. Those concerns were acknowledged.

Yet what followed serves as a warning to us all.

The first loud voice was Eric Jacobson, the man boasting of academic credentials. He relied on them, and not evidence, to discredit all opposition.

The second loud voice came from Alice Silverman, a member of the synagogue’s Social Action Committee. She used her authority to ensure that her plan would not be disrupted regardless of the evidence, and in spite of local dissent.

The Shame of the Synagogue

The facts remain unchanged and beyond dispute:

• The family members Mohsen Mahdawi mourned as innocent civilians were, in fact, armed fighters.
• He fabricated key elements of his personal story to elicit sympathy.
• He created a Facebook group glorifying terrorists and shared explicit antisemitic and violent material.
• Even after arriving in the United States, he referred to Hamas’s armed wing as “heroic lions.”
• Following a domestic dispute, his then-wife asked police to remove her firearm for safety.
• As recently as December 2024, he explicitly aligned himself with the armed “resistance.”
• In 2026, he rejoined the Facebook group that glorifies terrorists.

Yet despite all of this evidence, Mahdawi continues to enjoy support from some Jewish activists and institutions. Rather than confronting the evidence, dissent within those communities was discouraged while Mahdawi continued to be presented as a peace activist.

And in just a few days time, Jewish members of the Beth Jacob synagogue will gather to help fundraise for him.

How shameful is that.

In the coming days we will upload a detailed timeline of Mohsen Mahdawi, along with evidence to support every single claim we have made.

In addition, we will be sharing the emails sent to leading journalists and elected officials – which laid out exactly why their support for Mahdawi was misplaced.

We want it on the record that all of these people knew – and chose to ignore – the evidence of Mahdawi’s support for terrorism.

Because the loudest voices in the room should not be allowed to silence the truth.

 

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