Jacob Kupin wants everyone to know that he’s “a proud Jew”.
Nevertheless, Kupin has aligned himself with Aftyn Behn and Zulfat Suara, two far left purveyors of the grossly false “Israel genocide” lie.
Kupin’s fellow council member Zulfat Suara is a current board member of the TN American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC), (having been its chair for over seven years). Recently, AMAC signed onto an August “free palestine” “stop the genocide” event held in Nashville, “to decry Israel’s genocide and forced starvation of the people of Gaza, all funded and enabled by the U.S. government.”
Eight months after the Hamas massacre, TN General Assembly House member Aftyn Behn visited the pro-Hamas encampment at Vanderbilt and then posted her solidarity with opposition to “state violence and calling for the end of genocide.”
Why has Kupin remained silent while his friends spread the “Israel genocide” lie?
Zulfat Suara
Suara is a second term, at-large Metro Council member who led the TN American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC) since 2012, until she ran for public office in 2019. She remains active with the organization as a board member.
She wants to be Nashville’s next mayor.
Three weeks ago, Suara’s AMAC organization signed onto a “free palestine” “stop the genocide” event held at the beginning of August in Nashville, “to decry Israel’s genocide and forced starvation of the people of Gaza, all funded and enabled by the U.S. government.”
That Suara’s organization would endorse falsehoods about Israel should come as no surprise. Indeed, AMAC’s founding board member and current executive director Sabina Mohyuddin, questions “whether anti-Zionist views are antisemitic”.
According to Martin Luther King Jr., often cited by progressives as a symbol for social justice, anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. As he said, “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You are talking anti-Semitism.”
The truth of King’s statement is on full display today as confirmed by the work of Liora Rez, Executive director of StopAntisemitism.org, that -“wherever anti-Zionism goes, anti-Semitism quickly follows.”
AMAC originally tried to conceal its antisemitism under the cover of anti-Zionism. In 2016, AMAC hosted an event featuring Linda Sarsour who is among the country’s leading proponents of the BDS movement who also refuses to say that Israel has a right to exist. BDS is known as the new antisemitism because it is a driver of hatred and violence against Jews.
Additionally, AMAC board members and Suara herself have cultivated close relationships with Jew-haters like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib.
In 2018, while Suara was chairman, AMAC sponsored a program challenging Zionism, with speakers that included their own vocal anti-Semite founder and board member, Drost Kokoye, and active BDS promoters, Ash-Lee Henderson and Amira Sakalla, former UT Knoxville Students for Justice in Palestine leader.
AMAC’s speaker Ash-Lee Henderson serving as co-director of the Highlander Center at the time, was also a member of the Movement 4 Black Lives (M4BL) policy leadership team that crafted the extreme anti-Israel platform labeling Israel an apartheid state and accusing Israel of committing genocide against the palestinian people. M4BL is the revolutionary umbrella group for black activist organizations including BLM.
The United States Commission on Civil Rights has stated, that “anti-Semitic bigotry is no less morally deplorable when camouflaged as anti-Israelism or anti-Zionism.”
Neither Suara’s support for AMAC’s anti-Israel advocacy, platforming speakers spreading lies about Israel, nor her refusal after the October 7th massacre to condemn Hamas, got in the way of Kupin co-sponsoring Suara’s (post October 7th) ceasefire resolution. No surprise then that Suara’s resolution did not condemn Hamas for the unprovoked slaughter, torture, mutilation and rape of Jewish civilians.
Author and social media influencer Alyssa Rosenheck exposed the fact that Suara’s resolution was “a template taken from the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR) website, a group reported to have funneled tax-exempt donations to Palestinian organizations, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other U.S.-designated terrorist groups.” “BDS Umbrella Group Linked to Palestinian Terrorist Organizations”
The Jew-hating USCPR’s focus is to turn Americans against Israel.
Despite Kupin’s support for Suara’s resolution, she was unable to defend its lopsided content that attempted to draw some imagined moral equivalency between the Hamas massacre, the taking of hostages and Israel’s defense of its citizens. She ultimately withdrew the resolution for consideration.
Fast forward one year and Suara’s AMAC is now spreading the Israel genocide” lie. A truer reflection of what Suara believes or whispers behind closed doors???
Then there’s Aftyn Behn – the wannabe Mamdani?
TN General Assembly Rep. Aftyn Behn a former progressive community organizer and self-described “pissed off social worker”, is running for the 7th District Congressional seat formerly held by Mark Green. Reportedly, Behn does not live in the 7th District.
Even though Behn doesn’t live in the 7th District, there is no rule requiring a candidate to live in the district they want to represent; Behn, however, will not be able to vote for herself.
Kupin is stumping for Behn’s Congressional run.
Last year when white supremacist groups like the Patriot Front marched through downtown Nashville, Behn launched her “Nashville Against Nazis” campaign to help educate others about the danger of “white nationalism.” Behn says that her background in organizing against white nationalism was part of her campaign that helped her get elected.
Behn ignored the overt and documented antisemitism of Patriot Front and instead, used her campaign as a political tool to attack Republicans and businesses that make donations to Republican candidates:
“Republican leadership in our state has failed to adequately respond to the rise of hate groups and white nationalist activities within our communities. This lack of decisive action and leadership has allowed hate groups to feel increasingly comfortable and bold in their activities, as evidenced by the recent Patriot Front rally in downtown Nashville. I will continue to demand accountability from Tennessee’s leadership.” https://aftynbehnfortn.substack.com/p/nashvilles-nazi-problem
It is common knowledge that the swastika was the branded symbol of the Nazis, the ones that planned and systematically killed six million Jews. It is the same swastika symbol that was held high by pro-Hamas demonstrators who marched through downtown Nashville three weeks after the October 7th Hamas massacre while also calling for the complete erasure of the Jewish state.
Neither the original Nazis nor the swastika carrying pro-Hamas demonstrators were part of Behn’s campaign. In fact, she never mentions Jews, focusing instead on state policies affecting transgender and immigrant rights.
Dickson County is in the 7th District which Behn wants to represent in Congress. The Dickson County Democrat Party has crowned Behn “the AOC of Tennessee”, presumably intended as a compliment. Whether the comparison includes ACO’s accusing Israel of committing genocide or failing to condemn the sexual violence committed by Hamas, is not known.
Regardless, in a recent live interview with CNN’s Audie Cornish, Behn chose to compare herself to the extreme anti-Zionist, pro-BDS, self-described socialist, Zohran Mamdani who could be New York City’s next mayor.
When Cornish raises the issue of establishment pushback against young (progressive/socialist) candidates like Mamdani who “has the buzz” right now, Behn says she sees his campaign progress and what he stands for, helps her in Tennessee.
Cornish then pivots to Mamdani in the context of the Democrat party’s overwhelming antipathy towards Israelis as compared to its overwhelming support for palestinians which she suggests also includes a generational component. Then comes the question that Behn side-steps and dismisses as a “culture war” …”a distraction from the real issue which are economic issues”:
“Cornish: Are there some issues like Israel where Mamdani becomes a problem, where just the position of young Democrats becomes a problem?”
“Behn: I think it’s a moment of reckoning for the Democratic party, and I think they need to look at where young voters appetites are, where their policy and their hunger is towards the political processes. And I think that they, you know, really need to lean into it. Young voters are the future.”
Perhaps if Behn had answered the Israel question honestly, she might have had to address her own failure to call out the antisemitism and anti-Israel falsehoods of her comrades on the progressive left.
On May 1, 2024, eight months after the Hamas massacre, Behn visited the pro-Hamas encampment at Vanderbilt, posting her solidarity with opposition to “state violence and calling for the end of genocide.”
Mamdani also supported the student encampments and the accusations of Israel as an apartheid state committing genocide in Gaza.
Behn appears to be an amalgam of both AOC and Mamdani.
Nevertheless, Jacob Kupin appears to be endorsing her candidacy for Congress. Shame on him. What a shame for Tennessee.
Drop Jacob a line and tell him what you think Jacob.Kupin@nashville.gov