Pro-Palestinian organizers in Denver have planned protests this week to coincide with the beginning of the Jewish National Fund-USA's Global Conference for Israel.
Conference organizers say they expect more than 2,000 people, including Gov. Jared Polis and Gilad Erdan, Israel's U.N. ambassador, to attend. The conference, one of the United States' largest pro-Israel gatherings, began Thursday and programming is planned through Sunday.
Both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrations have taken place in Denver since Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing around 1,200 people and taking about 240 hostages. Israel's retaliatory airstrikes have so far killed more than 13,000 Palestinians.
Demonstrators have gathered at the state Capitol, the City and County building, local houses of worship and in Denver's streets in response to the Israel-Hamas war, and the JNF-USA event has become the focal point of some protests.
Pro-Palestinian demonstrators marched and rallied at the convention center while the event kicked off Thursday night. More demonstrations educational events are planned around the Colorado Convention Center and throughout the city until Sunday. Conference organizers and local authorities say security will be heightened around the convention center through the weekend.
Here's what we know so far about the event, and why local pro-Palestinian activists are protesting it.
What is the Jewish National Fund-USA, the group organizing the conference?
JNF-USA is a non-profit organization with headquarters in New York City and an office in Jerusalem.
It was established in 1926, more than two decades after a similarly-named organization, the Jewish National Fund-Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael, which is headquartered in Jerusalem. The USA-based non-profit organization works "very closely" with the Israel-based organization, but has "no role in the management of KKL-JNF," according to its website.
The organization has been an instrumental part of the Zionist movement, a Jewish nationalist political project to create a homeland for Jews where they would be safe from antisemitic violence.
In the early 1900s, the Jerusalem-based Zionist organization became famous for raising money across the world via JNF Blue Boxes, with the purpose of purchasing and developing land in Ottoman-controlled Palestine.
Over time, the organization has acquired vast amounts of land reserved for Jewish ownership and development. JNF-USA does not own land in Israel, according to its website, but funds environmental projects on Jewish settlements, such as tree-planting and water developments, according to its website.
It also develops and promotes pro-Israel education programs in the United States.
What's scheduled to take place at the conference?
Organizers are billing the conference as the "largest gathering of Jews west of the Mississippi."
"The purpose of the conference is to celebrate the humanitarian work that we do in Israel and celebrate the accomplishments that we've had over the year," said Yaron Marcus, vice president of fundraising for JNF-USA in Colorado and other western states.
The conference's lineup includes dozens of scheduled speeches, panel discussions, religious services and JNF-USA fundraising activities.
At an opening reception titled "We Stand With Israel," Gov. Polis, who is Jewish, welcomed attendees and said the Oct. 7 attacks were proof of why the world needs the Jewish state of Israel, adding that "the evidence is even more self-evident than ever before."
Before the event, a spokesperson for Polis said in a statement that "He has made it clear that hate against Jews, Muslims, or Christians will not be tolerated and that includes ensuring that any effort to intimidate or prevent people from speaking to a group of Jewish Americans convening in Denver does not succeed."
Panel topics through the weekend will focus on geopolitics, pro-Israel advocacy, Jewish identity, the Oct. 7 attacks and the ongoing war in the region.
"There's going to be difficult questions posed and answered," Marcus said. "And I'm sure there's going to be many wide-ranging feelings and opinions about what has transpired and what should transpire."
As registration opened on Thursday, conference attendees walked through a multi-layered security blockade to pick up event lanyards.
Ron Werner, owner of HW Home, a Denver-based furniture store, said he expected the conference to have a more somber tone this year, with a lot of discussion around Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israel.
"I'm still coping and I'm traumatized," Werner said. "This is the first opportunity for me to really be with a large group of friends and family."
Conference organizers with the Jewish National Fund-USA say they expect the ongoing Israel-Hamas war to dominate conversations at panels and fundraising events. The non-profit has launched an emergency effort to help rebuild settlements in southern Israel that were damaged during Hamas' attack.
So why are people protesting JNF-USA's event in Denver?
The coalition of groups protesting JNF-USA's conference include the Colorado Palestine Coalition, various socialist organizations and Jewish groups, such as Jews Against Genocide and Jewish Voice for Peace. They've organized protests around the city since Israel began retaliatory airstrikes after the Oct. 7 attack.
These groups are demanding public support for a permanent ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, something some Israelis and American Jews are calling for as well.
Those who have joined protests against JNF-USA's Denver conference say the organization has played a key role in what they describe as Israel's occupation of Palestinian land.
"The Jewish National Fund's history as an organization is chock full of actions that have had a deep and profoundly negative impact on indigenous Palestinians well before the founding of Israel," said Abdullah Elagha of the Colorado Palestine Coalition at a Nov. 9 rally at the statehouse.
In particular, Elagha, who is Palestinian, is critical of the JNF's instrumental role in acquiring land for a Jewish state built on Palestinian lands. The Zionist project, as he sees it, is predicated on the destruction of Palestinians.
"We can expose the JNF for what they truly are, which is nothing more than an extension of the settler-colonial machine hell-bent on erasing every last Palestinian from Palestine," he said.
Elagha is critical of JNF's tree-planting campaigns in particular.
"You can pay them to plant a tree in Israel in one of their national forests," he said. "But what they don't tell you is that these forests are planted over ethnically cleansed Palestinian villages, preventing us from ever returning."
Protesters took over Denver's City Council chamber on Monday night, speaking well over a 30-minute public comment section. Attendees asked City Council members to pass a resolution opposing JNF's conference and in favor of a permanent ceasefire agreement.
The demonstration caused council members to postpone their regular meeting.
At council, Jordan Killen talked about how his Jewish values informed his criticisms of Israel and his opposition to the JNF.
"I believe that Jews have a unique responsibility, as well as a powerful ability, to speak out against the atrocities committed in our name," he said. "When Israel enforces apartheid, when Israel massacres thousands of Palestinian children, when Israel sanctions land theft through the JNF in the name of security for all Jews, my silence would be complicity, and I sure as hell am not complicit."
Holocaust scholar and head of the Jewish Community Relations Council Daniel Leshem asserted Israel is not engaged in ethnic cleansing, and Zionism is not about eradicating Palestinians. Instead, he says, the ideology is about Jewish self-actualization and the establishment of a Jewish nation.
"Most Israelis support peace and dialogue and compromise with Palestinians," Leshem said. "Most Zionists don't believe that there should not be Palestinians or that they should be disappeared."
What's the relationship between the Colorado Jewish community and the JNF?
Some Jews active in synagogues have a nostalgic connection to the JNF Blue Boxes for donations for tree planting and land acquisition in Israel, said Leshem.
JNF's mission to acquire land in Israel was a big part of the Zionist dream embraced by many local Jews of creating a Jewish homeland, what eventually became the Nation of Israel.
"The JNF has a connection to a period of great idealism and hope before everything got so complicated," Leshem said.
The decision to make a nation, for many, felt existential, said Leshem, and the JNF provided hope.
"It wasn't like giving money to American Friends of the [Israeli Defense Forces], where you're in the moment you're giving, you're thinking about the sacrifice of soldiers, the loss of life, the tragic necessity of warfare," he added. "When you were giving to JNF you were giving to something positive."
While the current far-right Israeli government has drawn sharp criticism for human rights abuses from Israelis, the American Jewish community and local Zionists alike, many in the local Jewish community struggle to see how a conference of the Jewish National Fund -- a nonprofit -- is the target of criticisms.
"I think that one of the really troubling and difficult things for the Jewish community right now in the face of the opposition to JNF is that the JNF is absolutely not political," Leshem said.
The JNF conference and protests arrive amid an uptick in violent attacks on both Jews and Palestinians nationwide.
Nationally, reports of antisemitic incidents rose by 316% in the month after Hamas militants attacked Israel, according to a report from the Anti-Defamation League's Center on Extremism.
"The ADL Mountain States office has received approximately 250 incident reports and requests for assistance since Oct. 7," according to Jeremy Shaver, the senior associate regional director of the ADL Mountain States Region. "This is a significant increase in reports compared to the same time frame last year (more than 200 more incidents year to date)."
Locally, synagogues, rabbis, student groups and Israeli Jews have experienced threats and harassment, according to the ADL.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations told NBC News it also saw an increase in both bias incident reports and requests for help from Muslims nationally after the Hamas attack. From Oct. 7-24, the council received 774 requests and reports, a 182% increase from any other 16-day stretch last year.
There have been four anti-Arab and two anti-Jewish hate crimes tracked by the Denver Police Department since Oct. 7.
This year there have been 40 bias-motivated crimes based on religion, according to state data. The majority of these, 16 in total, have been against Jews and 4 have been against Muslims.
What will security look like and how will downtown see impacts?
JNF-USA organizers say their annual conferences normally draw protests, but they expect heightened activity due to the ongoing war.
"This year, this security firm is going to be particularly vigilant to make sure that everybody is safe and able to enjoy their conference experience," Marcus said.
In a statement, the Denver Police Department said it was working with conference organizers.
"As a precaution, the department will be providing additional resources to enhance security surrounding the conference," DPD said. "We will not share specific numbers or planning strategies for safety reasons."
DPD will also shut down a portion of 14th Street near the Colorado Convention Center starting at 6 a.m. on Thursday. Lanes between Stout and Welton streets will be off-limits to vehicle traffic, according to DPD.
The closure will remain until the conclusion of the JNF conference on Dec. 3. Many downtown streets will also be closed on Saturday for the annual Parade of Lights.
What is the current state of the ongoing war?
Since the Oct. 7 attacks, Israel's airstrikes on Gaza have killed at least 13,300 Palestinians and displaced about 1.8 million, according to the United Nations and Palestinian health officials.
A ceasefire has been in place since Friday, Nov. 24, as both sides exchange captives. More than 100 hostages held by Hamas have been released. Israeli officials believe Hamas still holds about 140 hostages.
The truce was extended for two additional days on Monday, Nov. 27, and then again for an additional day late Wednesday night.
CPR News reporter Bente Birkeland contributed reporting to this article.
Editor's note: This article has been updated with comments Gov. Jared Polis and a conference attendee from the first day of the Global Conference for Israel. A clarification has also been made to a quote from demonstrator Joran Killen.
