Since Vermonters launched the Apartheid-Free Communities campaign in our state, which ultimately passed in five towns at annual Town Meeting Days this month, the campaign has faced coordinated opposition. This opposition has come primarily from the Shalom Alliance, which is headed by local Zionists, including recent and newly-elected Vermont political figures. The group has used intimidation and pressure campaigns in an attempt to thwart and silence pro-Palestinian voices, taking an approach similar to national efforts to punish activists and quell a people-led movement that has drawn support from most Vermonters.
What is the Shalom Alliance?
Registered as an incorporated non-profit in August 2024, the Vermont Shalom Alliance states among its goals are to “promote awareness and appreciation of the Jewish Community’s relationship with Israel” and to increase “knowledge about Israel among diverse groups in Vermont and nurturing opportunities for nonpartisan, peaceful, and constructive dialogue.” One section on the website, titled “Take Action,” specifically refers to efforts to defeat Apartheid-Free Communities pledges, claiming it contains “divisive language” and decrying that the pledge was proposed during open-floor meetings, “giving little time to get the facts or make an informed decision.” However, Pro-Palestine activists, including those from Jewish Voice for Peace Vermont/New Hampshire, an anti-Zionist group of Jewish Vermonters, have been discussing the campaign in local communities across the state for over a year.
Part of the Shalom Alliance’s efforts to block the passage included sending emails to town and city officials that accused the Apartheid-Free Communities pledge of “jeopardizing jobs” for Vermonters who work for Israeli corporations, along with familiar complaints that it is not a “local issue,” despite Vermonter’s tax dollars being used to fund Israel through the United States aid.
Its website also has an intake form to “report antisemitism in schools” via a Google form that goes directly to the group, and it is unclear whether there is a quality assurance process for vetting allegations.
Who are its Members?
The Vermont Shalom Alliance doesn’t publicly list its members, but thanks to public records, we know that the group was incorporated in the state by its Co-Director and Chair, Yoram Samets, a businessman and founding partner in local marketing and communications firm Kelliher, Samets, and Volk (KSV). While Samets sold his shares of KSV in 2020, he has long been part of many local pro-Israel groups, such as the Israel Center of Vermont, and Jewish Communities of Vermont, the latter among those leading their successful charge against Burlington City Council’s BDS resolution in 2021. Samets’ organizing against pro-Palestinian voices goes back to at least 2008, when he helped silence Palestinian activists and Bread & Puppet Theater founder Peter Schumann over an exhibit and lecture on the plight of the Palestinian people. That same year, the Israel Center unsuccessfully attempted to get Burlington Telecom to remove Al Jazeera English from its cable lineup, calling the outlet’s coverage of the Israel-Palestine conflict “hate speech.”
Per its business filing, the group was incorporated by Dr. Mitchell Knisbacher, the founder of Vermont-based company 800Response. He is the president of the Sandra and Mitchell Knisbacher Foundation, which, according to their 990 non-profit forms, cites “giving to Jewish organizations” as its primary cause. Knisbacher is also the Treasurer at UVM Hillel and has served in officer roles with the Israel Center of Vermont. A former lawyer, he taught in Israel and at Harvard, and is the author of multiple books and contributed to research ranging from legal analysis of Israel’s response to Operation Entebbe, to contributing to a legal journal that referred to the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) as a “Menace to World Public Order.”
Other members were identified as signatories of an email to Burlington City Councilors, which accused four councilors who wore keffiyehs in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza during an October 2024 meeting as supporters of “the terrorist activities of Hamas.” Along with Samets, they include:
- Ilana Siegelman: Siegelman is president of the Vermont Shalom Alliance. She is also an independent apparel designer and the former lead designer for Burton Snowboards. With family in Israel, including a brother who served in the IDF, she authored an op-ed for the Vermont Community News Group that cites claims about the October 7th attacks that have now been credibly refuted.
- Allie Schachter: recently elected to represent Burlington’s East District on the city council, Schachter is the Director of Development for the Flynn Theater. In the waning days of her campaign, Schatcher’s ties to the Shalom Alliance and its email accusing sitting city councilors of aligning with terrorists came to light after councilor Melo Grant went public with the email.
- Rachel Feldman: dubbed the Shalom Alliance’s “Community Organizer” on her LinkedIn profile, Feldman is a longtime Republican party operative. She is the former chief of staff for Governor Phil Scott and served as a public information officer for the Vermont Department of Corrections and Agency of Human Services. She is a former WCAX reporter, and her social media presence includes posts and reposts of Zionist propaganda, making unfounded and racist accusations about Palestinians and pro-Palestine activists, and claiming criticism of Israel’s genocide is both anti-semitic and supporting “terrorism.”
- Mike Kanarick: former Burlington Mayor Miro Wienberger’s first chief of staff, Kanarick has worked at Burlington Electric since 2015 as a member of its managerial leadership team. He is on the board of directors of Ohavi Zedek Synagogue in Burlington with Samets. According to Kanarick’s LinkedIn profile, since 2015 he has been a member of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and part of its National Council since 2018.
- David Geddes: as president of Temple Sinai in South Burlington, Geddes served as a panelist on multiple conversations regarding Israel and Palestine, and in a letter to the editor in Seven Days, he declared the publication’s article on the blockage of the Apartheid-Free Community pledge as “inaccurate,” stating the title of the piece should have been “Burlington City Council Blocks Antisemitic Item from Ballot” and not “Burlington City Council Blocks Pro-Palestine Item from Ballot.”
There is so far no record of any of those five putting out a statement condemning the slaughter of 20,000 Palestinian children by Israeli troops.
Gaining Dangerous Influence
While its campaign against the Apartheid-Free Communities this election cycle has passed, the Shalom Alliance, in line with the Trump administration’s crackdown on dissent, is aiming to further its goals of silencing critics of Israel statewide. The group has directly collaborated with Vermont state legislators to introduce Bill H.310, which proposes “to amend the definition of harassment in Title 16 to include ethnic harassment and antisemitism” and for the Secretary of Education to develop a curriculum for anti-semitism awareness in Vermont’s K-12 schools. On its surface, it’s a perfectly reasonable request, but as the bill continues, the influence and overreach of Zionist organizations like the Shalom Alliance become clear.
The bill is sponsored by Republican state representative Casey Toof of St. Albans, who regularly shares pro-Zionist and Israeli content on social media. He decried a letter signed by many Vermont Representatives calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza. Toof’s statement repeats a familiar Zionist refrain, which conflates Zionism and Judaism as the same, saying, “our Jewish neighbors care very much about what we say right now, and sending this letter says the wrong thing,” despite the fact that several signatories of the ceasefire letter from the legislature are Jewish.
A specific line in the bill states that harassment against Jewish people includes “negative references to Jewish customs or the right to self-determination in the Jewish people’s ancestral and indigenous homeland.” The bill also states that the Secretary of Education, “in conjunction with Shalom Alliance of Vermont, where appropriate, shall develop a sequential antisemitism awareness education curriculum for elementary and secondary schools. The curriculum shall include teaching about the evolution, effects, ethics, and legal consequences of antisemitism in Vermont, the United States, and abroad.”
In short, criticism and protest against the state of Israel and advocating for Palestinian self-determination would be redefined by this bill as illegal anti-semitic harassment. It would institute a policy that aligns with a fascist Trump administration that has detained activists like Mahmoud Khalil and continues to place activists, immigrants, LGBTQ+ people and other marginalized groups under threat.
Actions like these, which have been part of the pro-Israel playbook across America, and have appeared in Vermont on college campuses, should, especially as the Trump administration continues to erode our rights, be rejected and treated with concern as a trampling of First Amendment rights in Vermont. This bill would have a silencing effect on the many Jewish activists and Jewish politicians in the state who have spoken out against Israel’s genocide in Gaza. And it comes at a time when more Vermonters than ever see with clear eyes the plight of the Palestinian people: adding the combined vote totals in Vermont towns that considered the Apartheid-Free Communities pledge, 52% of Vermonters voted in favor of the measure.
The danger the Shalom Alliance poses in Vermont should be taken seriously. With Burlington city councilor-elect Schachter on their leadership team, their recent insertion of themselves into proposed state law, and Feldman using her industry connections to create a one-sided discourse in local media, those fighting fascism and Zionism in this country must remain vigilant. The Shalom Alliance regularly claims to speak for all Jewish Vermonters while attempting to silence Jewish anti-Zionists. It does not speak for all Vermont Jews. The group weaponizes Jewish identity while claiming the mantle of arbiter of what is anti-semitism, falsely insinuating all or most Jewish people support Israel, and trades in its own anti-semitism: equating Judaism, a diverse set of religious groups, with Zionism, a political ideology of Jewish supremacy and settler-colonialism. By targeting everyone from elected officials to Vermont residents who participate in marches and rallies for Palestine, the Shalom Alliance is a threat to our freedoms.
Despite the approval of Israel and its actions plummeting among the American public, it’s still clear that there needs to be plenty of organization and pushback against all Zionist groups, be it the liberal or fascist variety, that weaponize social justice language to defend genocide and ethnic cleansing and attempt to quash debate and silence Vermonters.
Update March 31, 2025: The article was updated to include information about Mitchell Knisbacher.
Matt Moore is a writer from Vermont. He is on the editorial collective of The Rake Vermont.
