Today we have an interview with anti zionist JVP activist Dr Wendy Elisheva Somerson (Wes) who will be talking about their brand new book called “An Anti-Zionist Path to Embodied Jewish Healing: Somatic Practices to Heal Historical Wounds, Unlearn Oppression, and Create a Liberated World to Come”
This book is an Unapologetically anti-Zionist book that is firmly rooted in Jewish spiritual values and a liberatory model for healing for all activists and in particular for anti zionists and Zionist
“An Ani-Zionist path to Embodied Jewish Healing” provides Body-based tools and faith-based practices for processing trauma, reclaiming our agency, and building a world where “never again” means “never again for anyone”
Deftly addressing how ancestral grief from colonialism lives on in all our bodies and keeps us from feeling safe—and how that fear can become enacted on other people, Somerson also addresses how Israel manipulates its citizens to remain stuck in trauma and fear from the Holocaust and anti semitism and asks how do we reconcile a history of persecution with the state power of Israel today?
Somerson’s book An Anti-Zionist Path to Embodied Jewish Healing shows us how thru somatic healing we can strengthen our movement to build effective solidarity and purposeful power. They do this by showing how oppressive systems that exist outside of us also exist in our own bodies and how somatic healing and healing justice can help us find our aliveness to better understand our relationship to collective power to become better activists rooted in creating solidarities and collective power that will last and not turn against itself.
Wendy Elisheva Somerson (Wes) is a queer non-binary, disabled, Ashkenazi Jewish somatic healer, writer, activist, and visual artist and One of the founders of the Seattle chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace. They have been active in Palestinian solidarity work for over two decades. As a politicized healer, Wes works at the intersection of personal and collective healing with individuals, groups, and organizations.
