Nevadans for Palestinian Liberation (NPL)

Starting in 2024, NPL sponsored a campaign in which trucks dove around major cities with digital billboards featuring anti-Israel messages that the Anti-Defamation League has characterized as antisemitic. Billboard messages included “Israel has more control over America than Americans do,” “Israel is committing a Holocaust in Gaza,” “Zionism = Fascism,” and “Israel is the New Nazi Germany.” ²

NPL’s University of Nevada, Las Vegas chapter was accused of antisemitism in March 2024 after members disrupted an Israeli professor’s lecture on black holes, chanting that the professor was “not welcome on UNLV campus.” ³

Background

Nevadans for Palestinian Liberation (NPL) is an anti-Israel coalition of individuals and organizations based in Nevada. It also has a student chapter at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. ¹

The organization’s website links to anti-Israel campaigns including #DropTheADL, a coalition of advocacy groups that wrote an open letter to “progressives” claiming “The ADL is not an ally,” while calling for reconsidering the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) as a “partner in social justice work.” ^{4 5}

NPL’s website also links to sites that promote and support the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, and anti-Israeli campaign meant to delegitimize the State of Israel. ^{6 7 8}

Other links on NPL’s website include “How to Respond to Israeli Propaganda,” which links to anti-Israel commentator Richard Medhurst. ^{4 9 10}

Controversy

In early 2024, Nevadans for Palestinian Liberation (NPL) sponsored a campaign in which trucks drove around major cities with digital billboards that spread anti-Israel messages that the Anti-Defamation League, (ADL) a left-of-center advocacy group that opposes antisemitism, characterized as antisemitic. The billboard messages included “Israel has more control over America than Americans do,” “Israel is committing a Holocaust in Gaza,” “Zionism = Fascism,” and “Israel is the New Nazi Germany.” The campaign was also sponsored by the Voice for Humanity Project and Taxpayers for Peace. NPL, in partnership with the Ibn Asheer Institute of Islam, generated over $9,000 for the campaign on Every.org. ²

NPL also assisted in the organization of an “International Day of Action,” called “One Year of Genocide, One Year of Action,” on October 5, 2024. ¹¹ That same day, NPL posted an announcement on their Facebook page for an October 5, 2024 rally marking the first anniversary of the October 7, 2023 Hamas terror attacks against the State of Israel. The post on its Facebook page read, “Resist by any means necessary.” The post continued by claiming the rally marked “one year of mass genocidal aggression against Palestinians,” and “over a century of relentless resistance against colonial Zionism.” ¹¹

According to the ADL, Nevadans for Palestinian Liberation made antisemitic posts on Instagram including some claiming that politicians are “bought by Israeli lobbyists.” ¹²

In January 2024, NPL and its student chapter from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) participated in the Week of Action to Free Ahmad Sa’adat and All Palestinian Prisoners, which was launched by Samidoun, also known as the Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, an international advocacy group which opposes the detention and prosecution of pro-Palestine activists and militants by the State of Israel. ¹³ Ahmad Sa’adat is the general secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, an umbrella organization for a number of Palestinian militant groups. As of April 2021, the U.S. State Department has designated the PFLP as a foreign terrorist organization. ^{13 14 15}

The UNLV, chapter of NPL has also been accused of antisemitism by the ADL, Jewish Nevada, and the Israeli-American Council. ¹

In March 2024, members of the UNLV chapter of NPL interrupted a lecture by Israeli astrophysicist Asaf Pe’er on black holes at the university, claiming he was “not welcome on UNLV campus.” ³

Funding

Nevadans for Palestinian Liberation receives funding from the Third Wave Fund. Third Wave Fund. announced that NPL was a March 2024 grantee of its Mobilize Power Fund, which offers grants of up to $10,000. ^{16 17}