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Philadelphia Jewish Organizations Respond to Banning of Israeli Food Truck from Diversity Event

  • June 23, 2021

June 23, 2021 Statement:

The Jewish Federation, JCRC, ADL, AJC, Jews in ALL Hues, and the Philadelphia Board of Rabbis welcome the statements from Eat Up the Borders and Sunflower Philly apologizing for disinviting the Moshava food truck from the Taste of Home event on June 20th and recognizing that they must take additional steps to rectify this situation.

Representatives from our organizations will be meeting with the Taste of Home event organizers on July 13th to understand the threats of violence, provide education and urge further action to ensure their events are truly inclusive. We look forward to continuing this dialogue in order to realize our shared vision of a more just  and equitable Philadelphia, in which people of all backgrounds and beliefs are treated with dignity and respect.

We all remain steadfast in our commitment to combat anti-semitism and call on all community leaders and organizations to speak out against all forms of bias and discrimination. We are grateful to the many elected officials, civic leaders and community partners who have joined with us to call for a meaningful resolution to this incident

June 21, 2021 Statement:

Jewish Federation, JCRC, ADL, AJC, Jews in ALL Hues, and the Philadelphia Board of Rabbis are continuing to respond to the recent incident in which the Israeli food truck Moshava was barred from participating in the “A Taste of Home” event organized by Eat Up the Borders and Sunflower Philly. In response to the public outcry from this decision, the event organizers cancelled the event yesterday.

In our ongoing conversations with Eat Up the Borders, which allegedly received threats about the Israeli food truck’s participation, we communicated that the organizers should have reported the threats to law enforcement and stood up for Moshava’s participation. By not doing so, they failed to honor the event’s stated goal of “celebrating diversity through food, art, entertainment, community.” We urged them to issue a sincere public apology, reject anti-Israel rhetoric and highlight Israeli food in upcoming events as a way to make amends for this incident. We also agreed to set up a meeting with all our organizations to discuss the incident, provide education on antisemitism and share communal security resources.

However, an executive at Sunflower Philly claimed late Sunday that the food truck was disinvited because no Palestinian food truck was in attendance due to scheduling issues, and “that an agreement had been made in the past that one truck would not be present without the other.” In our conversation with Eat Up the Borders organizers, they disputed this characterization and said that this newly-formed “agreement” consisted of ensuring that both Israeli and Palestinian or Middle Eastern food trucks were invited to the same events, not that they both had to be in attendance.  Moshava was never informed of any such position.

The “agreement” Sunflower Philly has described is discriminatory and constitutes a clear double standard, as it does not appear to apply to Tibetan and Chinese food trucks, Turkish and Kurdish food trucks, Russian and Ukrainian food trucks or any other cuisines hailing from countries engaged in conflict. We call on Sunflower Philly to provide equal opportunity to all vendors, regardless of country of origin, religious or ethnic background, in all of their events. To that end, and given the current situation, we call on Sunflower Philly to issue a public apology to Moshava and the community at large in the name of peace. We also call on the entire team at Sunflower Philly and Eat Up the Borders to engage in ongoing education and outreach so they can truly honor their mission to “create a positive and inclusive community space in Philadelphia.”

We will continue to advocate for fair treatment in this matter, and will not stop until a just and satisfactory resolution is reached.

June 19, 2021 Statement:

The Jewish Federation, the JCRC and ADL Philadelphia are deeply disturbed that the Israeli cuisine food truck, Moshava, was removed from the A Taste of Home event organized by Eat Up the Borders at Sunflower Philly tomorrow.

We have spoken with the event organizers and expressed that we unequivocally disagree with their decision. We do understand that threats to the organizers were made, and we understand the fear and confusion that comes when your community faces that intimidation. The vile anti-Semitic rhetoric and threats of violence lobbied at the organizers was utterly despicable.

This event was planned to celebrate diversity and tolerance, and to see individuals on social media respond with open prejudice and anti-Jewish hate was shameful and deeply upsetting. However, the decision to bow to this antisemitic intimidation by disinviting Moshava was wrong.

In the next few days, we will be meeting with the organizers to discuss what happened, provide education on anti-Semitism and share communal security resources. We look forward to future events where the Moshava food truck, and other Jewish and Israeli ethnic foods, are welcomed and enjoyed by all.

Source: Press Release
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