American Psychological Association brushed off antisemitism complaints — US House report

American Psychological Association leaders and members dismissed antisemitism concerns, rejected identifying Jews as a minority group and justified terrorism against Israel, according to a Congressional report released on Thursday.

The American Psychological Association (APA) is the leading professional organization for US psychologists with more than 190,000 members. The association accredits psychologists and publishes research.

Jewish members and federal authorities have alleged antisemitism in the association in recent years.

The 24-page report released Thursday by the Republican-led House Committee on Education and Workforce included internal communications from APA staff, leaders and members.

The report showed that after the October 7, 2023, Hamas invasion of Israel, APA leaders, while formulating a statement on the attacks, consulted the nonprofit American Arab, Middle Eastern, and North African Psychological Association (AMENA-Psy).

AMENA-Psy’s October 7 statement called the onslaught “resistance” to genocide and said the psychology group was in “full solidarity” with the “decolonial struggle for justice.”

AMENA-Psy told APA leaders that the association’s statement on October 7 contained “problematic and racist language” that would “upset MENA membership,” specifically calling for the phrase “terrorist attacks” to be changed. MENA refers to the Middle East and North Africa region.

AMENA-Psy also advised that the statement should refer to “violence on both sides” and the “cost to Palestinians so it can balance out the Israeli focus.”

The APA’s October 7 statement did not refer to the attacks as terrorism.

The APA also consulted AMENA-Psy about the association’s antisemitism resolutions, calling the nonprofit an “antisemitism stakeholder,” the report said.

On October 12, 2023, then-APA president Cynthia de las Fuentes linked the Hamas attack to the killing of George Floyd by US police in 2020, according to the House report.

“George Floyd is representative of Gazans,” she wrote in an email. “The themes of domination and submission are clear in both cases.”

APA leadership was also connected to and offered support to Lara Sheehi, a prominent member who has demonized Zionism and defended Hamas.

When an APA employee asked the organization to sign the Anti-Defamation League’s Workplace Pledge to Fight Antisemitism, a human rights staffer at the APA warned against doing so because the ADL had criticized Sheehi.

Months later, in February 2024, Sheehi emailed APA a warning about a planned protest against antisemitism by Jewish APA members, saying the demonstration would be a “PR nightmare” and disputing that Jews were indigenous to Israel.

De las Fuentes wrote back, “Yes, thank you, Lara, for bringing this to our attention. <sigh>”

Internal communications showed that APA leaders sought to package antisemitism with other forms of discrimination or dismissed complaints.

When then-president de las Fuentes asked her predecessor, Thema Bryant, for feedback about a speech in 2024, Bryant said the speech “mentioned antisemitism multiple times and Islamophobia only once.”

Bryant added that the speech called the Holocaust “one of the ‘most’ horrific acts with no mention of the thousands recently killed in Gaza,” according to the House report.

In May 2025, when US Representative Ritchie Torres wrote a letter to the association about antisemitism, an APA advocacy officer said the letter was “very thin factually.” A former APA president wrote back, “Sigh……”

In June 2025, after a Jewish psychologist wrote to association leaders about antisemitism, the APA’s chief diversity officer, Maysa Akbar, wrote to other APA leaders, “Sigh!”

Months later, when the ADL sent the association an antisemitism survey, an APA communications director said the association should not respond “because it was so biased.”

The report said that, in 2024, the APA declined to recommend trauma psychologists who could attend to a White House screening of “Screams Before Silence,” a documentary about October 7 sexual violence.

“I fear providing some names might insert us into the politics of the film,” an APA official said. Another staffer recommended the APA “kick the request” to a Washington, DC, psychological association.

Earlier this year, Jewish APA members introduced a resolution to create a Jewish “ethnic psychological association,” similar to groups for other minority members such as Arabs, Asians, Native Americans, Latinos and Black psychologists.

Other APA members pushed back, saying that Jews were white and therefore not a minority. One said that “folks who have been conscripted into whiteness and benefited from white privilege” were “seeking a seat and voice at the table with folks who have historically been marginalized.”

A member of an Indian minority association said Jews were not an “underrepresented marginalized and disadvantaged ethnic minority,” and that if Jews were recognized, “it would open other predominantly White privileged religious groups” for recognition.

An internal APA group that provided feedback on resolutions reported that other identity groups had said, “Many Jewish individuals (the majority of whom are white) do not face the same anti-Blackness, racism, white supremacy, coloniality, systemic, or structural oppression as People of Color.”

In August, the APA postponed a vote on recognizing the Jewish group for the second time.

The House report included details of internal discussion on APA listservs.

After October 7, a member said that claims Hamas wanted to exterminate Jews were “quite hilarious” and that the attack was “the only signs of life and resistance” from Palestinians, and shared the Hamas charter.

Other comments referred to the “humanity” shown by “Hamas fighters,” said the terror group was “protecting civilians” and had earned “kudos,” and said Israel was a “terrorist state,” according to the House report.

The APA did not respond to a request for comment.