The FBI is keeping tabs on the “Mapping Project” that targets Jewish institutions, The Boston Herald reported.
BDS [Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions] Boston tweeted on June 3 that their “friends at the Mapping Project” had released an interactive map and articles that “illustrate how local support for the colonization of Palestine is structurally tied to policing, evictions, and privatization locally, and to US imperialist projects worldwide.” Various elected officials and Jewish groups have denounced the map as being antisemitic since it lists Jewish institutions as well as “local governments, police departments, universities and corporations,” per the Herald.
FBI Boston Special Agent in Charge Joseph Bonavolonta said on June 14 that they are “tracking the Mapping Project website, and are working to identify additional information regarding this website.” However, Bonavolonta said that they have yet to see “any direct threats of violence in open sources related to this map as of its publication.”
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) tweeted on June 15 that they have “been working to get the #antisemitic BDS Boston-promoted ‘Mapping Project’ site taken down.” “We appreciate that the current hosting company agreed it’s a violation of their doxing rules,” the ADL added. “We will pursue this with any company irresponsible enough to host this dangerous threat.”
We’ve been working to get the #antisemitic BDS Boston-promoted "Mapping Project" site taken down. We appreciate that the current hosting company agreed it's a violation of their doxing rules. We will pursue this with any company irresponsible enough to host this dangerous threat.
— ADL (@ADL) June 15, 2022
ADL New England Regional Director Robert Trestan told CBS News that the Mapping Project amounted to “a Jewish hit list” and that they’re spreading “a conspiracy theory that at the center of all ills are the Jewish institutions of Boston.”
BDS Boston continues to double down on their support for the Mapping Project, including a June 14 Twitter thread stating that “imperialism, racism, militarism & Zionism are systemically connected in our communities.”
The Mapping Project visualizes elements of Massachusetts’ imperialist landscape.
Explore to see how imperialism, racism, militarism & Zionism are systemically connected in our communities: https://t.co/T6CmSHZjte
Covered today in @monthly_review: https://t.co/ewF7MONyzg pic.twitter.com/6ACwAoauk2
— BDS Boston (@BDSBoston) June 14, 2022
Trestan told CBS that the people behind the Mapping Project are hiding behind “proxy servers”; consequently, it is not known who is behind the project. It’s also unknown who is behind BDS Boston either. Regardless, the project has “achieved something unusual – uniting politicians of both parties and a broad array of institutions in disgust and horror,” CBS reported.
