[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/jewish-voice-for-peace-jew-hater-billboard-truck.jpeg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tMiami City Commissioner David Suarez has confirmed to ARTnews <\/em>that he paid to send billboard trucks to personally attack pro-Palestinian protest organizers outside the Art Basel Miami Beach fair in December.\u00a0A filing in Southern Florida District Court from earlier this month had made the accusation, reported theIntercept<\/em>.<\/p>\n \n\tJewish Voice for Peace (JVP) was one of four groups that organized a rally outside the fair. The trucks called JVP an \u201cextremist group\u201d and called members Alan Levine and his wife, Donna Nevel, \u201cJew haters.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe groups were calling for a boycott over financial ties between Swiss bank UBS, which sponsors Art Basel, and Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cBefore everyone begins the predictable gymnastics routine where antisemitism gets rebranded as \u2018expressive freedom,\u2019 let me preempt it: They absolutely have the right to speak, protest, and express themselves any way the Constitution allows. And so do I,\u201d said Suarez in an email to ARTnews<\/em>. <\/p>\n \n\t\u201cI will defend their legal right to say things I believe are evil, antisemitic, and disgusting,\u201d said Suarez. \u201cBut free speech is not a one-way street. It does not mean they get to silence everyone who disagrees with them. If they want to bring their message into the public square, they shouldn\u2019t be surprised when others bring a response into the public square as well\u2026.even if that response is on wheels. I funded this myself and I will never back down from exposing antisemitism or any other hate, and neither should you.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tDemonstrations have been organized at each edition of the fair since 2023. Protestor Cristina Rivera, an artist and technologist, told ARTnews<\/em> in 2024 that organizers were using Art Basel, a major tourist attraction, as a platform to amplify concerns about Israel\u2019s war in Gaza. The organizers oppose Miami Beach\u2019s investment in Israel Bonds, which the city had doubled to $20 million the previous year. In 2023, the protesters also gathered outside the fair, calling for a ceasefire in Israel\u2019s war in Gaza.<\/p>\n \n\tEvidence filed with the lawsuit includes an invoice from Mobile Billboards of Miami to Suarez for $4,000 for the rental of three trucks and an message to a Gmail address allegedly belonging to Suarez.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cThe Commissioner has targeted me and called me a Jew hater because I differ with his views on Israel,\u201d Nevel told Intercept<\/em>. \u201cWhen we saw the billboards, we didn\u2019t know Commissioner Suarez was the one who created and paid for them, but having watched his destructive, taunting behavior in City Commission meetings over and over again, I can\u2019t say I was shocked to learn it was him\u2014though, even for him, it was extreme.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cAs a jew, I can spot a jew hater a mile away,\u201d Suarez told the Intercept<\/em> in an email.<\/p>\n \n\tJVP is suing the city over an ordinance it claims was passed to discourage its protests. This month\u2019s suit asks that Suarez, Miami Beach mayor Steven Meiner, and other officials be compelled to produce documents related to that case, reports Intercept<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/palestinian-protesters-art-basel-miami-jew-hater-billboard-1234787304\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/jewish-voice-for-peace-jew-hater-billboard-truck.jpeg?w=1024″] Miami City Commissioner David Suarez has confirmed to ARTnews that he paid to send billboard trucks to personally attack pro-Palestinian protest organizers outside the Art Basel Miami Beach fair in December.\u00a0A filing in Southern Florida District Court from earlier this month had made the accusation, reported theIntercept. Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-1956512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1956512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1956512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1956512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1956512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1956512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}