American Psychological Association members urged to wear keffiyehs to show support for Palestinians

Mel Brooks’ band of psychiatrists in High Anxiety went goofy when they shielded two young girls from adult language as they scrutinized “woowoos” and “balloons,” but modern-day psychologists now sport keffiyehs at mental-health conferences and attend programming focused “on Palestinian liberation.”

On July 31, an organization calling itself Psychologists for Justice in Palestine – how did they come up with that name? – shared an email on a listserve encouraging attendees at a convention to “send a clear message to APA and our fellow psychologists: Psychologists do – and must – care about justice, liberation and the lives of Palestinians.”

It does not mention justice for the lives of Jews and others massacred in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Or the liberation of Israeli hostages that were held in Gaza.

Psychologist Daniel Balva recalled the email’s contents in a Times of Israel op-ed prior to last week’s American Psychological Association 2026 Annual Convention that was held in Washington, D.C. He states that the convention was promoted as the “largest gathering of psychologists in the world…to share research, build collaborations and discuss ways to advance the profession.”

Balva goes on to write: “The email urged conference participants to show solidarity by wearing a keffiyeh or ‘Palestine colors,’ read a prewritten ‘Land and Genocide Acknowledgement’ before professional presentations, attend programming focused on Palestinian liberation and participate in an open meeting hosted by the Psychology Coalition for Justice in Palestine, comprised of Psychologists for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Psychologists for Justice, Society for the Psychology of Women, Society for the Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity…Psychoanalysis for Social Responsibility and the Asian American Psychological Association.

His listing of all these groups makes me wonder if he mistakes the word “psychologists” for patients seizing control of the asylum.

Balva raised further concerns, but readers should get the idea by now. He serves on the executive board of Psychologists Against Antisemitism and he is a Council Member for the Voice of the People Global Cohort led by Israeli President Isaac Herzog where he collaborates with Jewish leaders worldwide to address challenges facing Jewish communities.

After APA wrapped up its convention last Friday, the Anti-Defamation League expressed “deep disappointment” over the organization’s decision that day “to delay the vote – for the second time this year – on recognizing the Association of Jewish Psychologists as an Ethnic Psychological Association” in a press release published on San Diego Jewish World.

“By denying Jewish psychologists the same representation afforded to other ethnic minority groups, APA is applying a double standard to Jewish identity and acting in direct contravention of APA’s own rules,” the press release states.

ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said, “With antisemitism rising within the psychology profession and the APA itself, recognizing American Jewish psychologists is long overdue. APA had two opportunities to acknowledge the lived experiences of Jewish psychologists but instead failed to act…It’s about whether APA is willing to confront antisemitism within its own ranks with the same seriousness it brings to other forms of bias.”

“AJP’s application became entangled in political debates that had nothing to do with the APA’s criteria for Ethnic Psychological Association status,” said ADL Vice President Shira Goodman. It was not “the Council’s responsibility…to referee political disagreements or impose ideological litmus tests on a Jewish professional organization.”

The ADL also cited “reports from Jewish psychologists who have experienced harassment, exclusion and hostility because of their Jewish identity or their views.”

I cannot cease wondering how masses of highly educated professionals can buy into the “Free Palestine” mob’s rigid and distorted tales about the Arab struggle. While legitimate concerns exist, anyone who believes their version must be mentally unstable. Here we have mental-health professionals sporting keffiyehs. They’re the ones who need help.

The convention was yet another jaw-dropping moment in this Israel-bashing era. This occasion constitutes another sickening milestone. It is one matter for mathematicians or engineers whose work is technical to tout this propaganda, but not for a profession where thinking and empathy are the core elements of their scholarship.

Mel Brooks – possibly the sickest mind in comedy writing – has yet to create a movie that rivals the APA convention for “ludicrous speed” caliber, to paraphrase a line in Brooks’ Spaceballs. The best he ever accomplished to spoof MH professionals was a scene in his 1977 High Anxiety when Brooks addresses a conference of fellow patients…er, psychiatrists…on “the female erogenous zone.”

The conferees were already speaking in code because one member walked in late with his two young daughters. When Brooks mentioned the zone, a Dr. Colburn corrected, “You mean the balloons?”

Brooks: “Lower, much lower. Where the babies come out. The woo…The woowoo.”

Colburn: “The woowoo?”

Brooks: “Yes! The woowoo. Perhaps the most significant psychological feminine component known to mankind.”

The scene was funny enough, but it would not be nearly as sidesplitting if a comic would exploit the material produced by the APA convention. What a gifted comedian can do with keffiyehs at a psychological convention.

Hopefully Jewish and other rational mental health professionals can shake up the APA over this. I wonder if anything can be done to punish members who politicized the convention.

My only other suggestion: If in the future the anti-Israel mob arrives with keffiyehs wrapped around their shoulders, then Jewish attendees should dip into their pockets and adorn their heads with yarmulkes.