Photo by Levi Meir Clancy
Shatat-USA-Palestine Mental Health Network Calls on US Social Work to Demand the National Federation of Social Workers Vote to Expel the Israeli Union of Social Workers From the International Association of Social Workers
Israeli social workers serving as “combatants” in Gaza
In June of 2024, the Palestinian Union of Social Workers and Psychologists (PUSWP) wrote to the International Federation of Social Workers that, “the occupation kills our people in the most horrific ways, and your fellow social worker in the occupying state are participating in the killing of our people” (IFSW 2024). The PUSWP letter is in reference to the Israeli Union of Social Workers (IUSW), the primary social work association for Israeli social workers and member of the International Federation of Social Workers, the main international body for the social work profession representing social workers from 141 countries (Gal, Weiss-Gal, Binder-Eilat, 2025). Since Israel began its genocidal campaign on the people of Gaza, the IUSW has provided material support to the Israeli regime, providing its social worker members as combatants for the Israeli Defense Forces (IFSW 2025). This is not conjecture. It is a fact openly admitted to by the IUSW (IUSW 2025). Throughout this genocide, IUSW members have been on the front line in Gaza and the West Bank committing atrocities (PUSWP 2024; IFSW 2025; IUSW 2025). Social workers the world over should see this as an affront to the social work discipline.
As of January 6th, 2026, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports that Israel has killed 71,391 Palestinians in Gaza (OCHA 2026). Of those included in the total deaths of Palestinians, Israel has killed 20,179 children, 10,427 women, and 4,813 elderly. However, evidence points to a far greater death toll of the Israeli genocide (Khatib et al. 2024). In addition to deaths, Israel has injured 171,279 Palestinians, many of whom are now permanently disabled (OCHA 2026; HROHC 2025). Since 2024, Gaza has the highest rate of child amputees in the world (Devi 2024). After more than two years of onslaught, the IDF has waged a total war on the Palestinian people leaving Gaza without housing, without access to adequate nutrition, without hospitals, and without sanitation (UNRWA 2026). Furthermore, outside of Gaza, Israel’s genocidal campaign against the Palestinian people has accelerated state violence through settlers’ violence in the West Bank (Kubovich 2026).
International Federation of Social Workers Will Vote on Whether to Expel in 2026
In their June 2024 letter, the PUSWP called on the IFSW to expel the IUSW for its role in genocide, occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid, stating “You must move immediately to condemn what is happening, and demand the freezing and expulsion of this institution from a leading organization in social and humanitarian work.” Now, nearly two years later, on February 18th, 2026, the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW) will hold a vote on whether to expel the Israeli Union of Social Workers (IUSW). This historic vote was proposed through a motion by the Irish Association of Social Workers (IASW), the Consejo General del Trabajo Social (CGTS, Spain), and the Hellenic Association of Social Workers (HASW) at the IFSW Europe Delegates Meeting on October 8th, 2025 (IASW 2025). With explicit focus on Israeli social workers’ participation as “combatants” in Gaza, the IASW, CGTS and the HASW propose the IUSW’s expulsion for its role in the genocide of Palestinian people.
Censures of Israeli Social Work
This is not first time that the IUSW has faced scrutiny in the IFSW for its support for the genocide, occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid (Garret 2025). Previously, in 2018, the IUSW was also censured by the IFSW (IFSW 2018; 2025). Following Israel’s pattern of killings, arrests, and detentions of Palestinian social workers (PUSWP 2018), on March 26th, 2018, the IFSW voted to censure the IUSW for its inability to “exercise an independent social work voice,” and “complicity in ongoing violence against Palestinian people” (IFSW 2018). Despite the fact that neither the IUSW nor the Israeli regime had changed anything materially, the IFSW lifted the 2018 censure in 2022. During the four years of IFSW censure, the IUSW never renounced Israeli occupation, settler colonialism, or apartheid. In fact, just one year after the IFSW lifted its sanctions from the IUSW, Israel began its genocide in Gaza with the support of and participation by the IUSW.
In response to the accelerating human toll of the Israeli genocide in Gaza, on January 9th, 2025, a plurality of IFSW associations voted to censure the IUSW, leaving it under censure ever since (IFSW 2025). In a response dated June 11th, 2024, the IFSW explained in a letter to the IUSW that the IFSW Statement of Ethical Principles specifies that “social workers support peace and nonviolence,” that this “requires all IFSW members to call on their governments/authorities to make social workers exempt from military service,” and that “failure to do so would be a breach of the ethical principles and would result in action affecting their membership status” (IFSW 2025). In response, the PUSWP confirmed their support for peace and self-determination (IFSW 2025). The PUSWP further made clear that “its members are not engaged in military combat at any level” (IFSW 2025). In contrast to the PUSWP, the IUSW confirmed that its members have participated in military actions in Gaza (IFSW 2025).
Impunity and Israeli Social Work
In their statement, the IUSW refused to make any statement against military action nor request any exemption from military service for social workers (IFSW 2025). Refusing to comply with the social work mandate to peace, and confirming their bigotry against Palestinians, the IUSW stated that “there is no equivalence between the PUSWP and the IUSW” (IUSW 2025). Proclaiming its benevolence while alleging that, opposition to genocide, occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid is “Jew hatred”, they stated that “IFSW action against IUSW in this matter is an antisemitic act” (IUSW 2025). They sought to justify the Israeli genocide in Gaza by rhetorical references to October 7th, parroting proven falsehoods about “burning babies (IUSW 2025). They also demanded that Israel’s genocide be conceived of as a justified defense (IUSW 2025). Since that time, the IUSW has refused to make any changes in its policies, enforcing social worker silence on the atrocities, and continuing to support social workers’ participation in the genocide with impunity.
It’s time that social workers listen to the PUSWP on this matter and demand action against the IUSW, expelling them from the IFSW. As a major development in the fight against Israeli genocide, occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid, the IASW, CGTS, and HASW motion to expel the IUSW answers the call by the Palestinian Association of Social Workers and Psychologists. Expulsion of the IUSW could serve as a course correction for global social work, a correction away from silence, repression, and collusion with settler colonialism and state violence (Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Wahab, & Abed Rabo Al Issa, 2022; Wahab, 2025).
The moment is now for BDS and Social Work
The lessons provided by the Boycott-Divest-Sanction (BDS) movement shows us how non-violent civil action targeting groups such as the IUSW is among the most powerful weapons against the Israeli regime. In 2005, one hundred and seventy Palestinian civil organizations began the BDS movement, a non-violent initiative against Israeli occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid. The BDS movement called “upon international civil society organizations and people of conscience all over the world to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era” (BNC 2005). In their call, the BDS movement proposed these non-violent measures should be used until Israel complies with:
ending its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall,
recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality
respecting, protecting, and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194 (BNC 2005).
Amongst the strongest and most effective initiatives of the BDS movement is the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI). Aimed at isolating Israel’s academic and cultural institutions for their participation in occupation, colonialism, and apartheid, PACBI calls on “academics, academic associations/unions, and academic — as well as other — institutions around the world, where possible and as relevant, to boycott and/or work towards the cancellation or annulment of events, activities, agreements, or projects” with Israeli academic and cultural institutions (PACBI 2014). PACBI calls to continue this institutional boycott until these institutions:
recognize the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people as enshrined in international law
end all forms of complicity in violating Palestinian rights as stipulated in international law (PACBI 2014).
The campaign against the IUSW is in line with the BDS call and PACBI, and it can function as a praxis of hope for social work (Wahab, 2024). In the PACBI Guidelines, they specify that “targeted and selective campaigns demanding the suspension of Israeli membership in international forums contribute towards pressuring Israel until it respects international law” (PACBI 2014). Such targeted and selective campaigns for suspension were an effective strategy against South Africa’s apartheid just as they are today against the Israeli apartheid (BNC 2014). Representing a selective campaign demanding the expulsion of a key Israeli association from membership in an international forum, the campaign to expel the IUSW from the IFSW puts pressure on both the IUSW and Israeli society to comply with international law.
Take action today: Write to Demand the NASW Vote to Expel the IUSW
As social workers in the center of empire, Shatat-USA-Palestine Mental Health Network and Social Workers For Palestine call on US-based social workers to take a stand. Finally, after more than two years of Israeli terror in Gaza, the IFSW may hold the IUSW accountable. And the motion to expel the IUSW has a real possibility of passing. It is our position that US-based social workers have a responsibility to push the IFSW for the expulsion of the IUSW. The best way to accomplish this is by putting pressure on our own association, the National Association of Social Workers (NASW), to vote for expulsion. The NASW has a long and sordid history of Palestinian exceptionalism, maintaining silence on any opposition to Israel’s occupation, apartheid, settler colonialism, and genocide (Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Wahab, & Abed Rabo Al Issa, 2022; Suslovic et al. 2024; Wahab, 2025). As a representative body on the IFSW, both in 2018 and in 2025, the NASW used their vote to attempt to block censuring the IUSW. US social workers have a different plan and are demanding that NASW live into it’s ethics.
Shatat-USA-Palestine Mental Health Networks and Social Workers For Palestine request your aid. On January 6th, 2025, US based social workers began a campaign to pressure the NASW to vote to expel the IUSW. A simple way to get involved is by writing a letter to the executive board of the NASW, demanding that the Association vote to expel the IUSW from the IFSW. The campaign has provided a sample letter for social workers to email to the executive board of the NASW. Please, help us by sending your own email. The NASW executive board’s email addresses and the sample letter follows this text. The PUSWP tells us:
Nothing is more reprehensible, in our view, than the habit of Israeli social workers of avoiding over 70 years of their state’s violent racism and dispossession. Freire reminds us that conscientization is especially important to the process of empowerment, for it signifies an awareness of oppression with all the psycho-social and political implications it carries. In addition, Franz Fanon has contributed to our critical work by reminding us that the Israeli social work professionals should consider their role in the creation, perpetuation and consequences of racialized settler colonialism (PUSWP 2022).
Together, social workers can integrate the lessons of BDS and PACBI to hold Israel and the IUSW accountable. In the fight against Israel’s occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid, targeting the IUSW for expulsion from the IFSW would demonstrate to Israel that its atrocities against the Palestinian people will no longer be tolerated. It is up to us to all stand together with Palestinian social workers.
Shatat-USA-Palestine Mental Health Network is a grassroots collective organized by Palestinian and allied mental health practitioners with the mission to support the Palestinian struggle against genocide, occupation, settler colonialism, and apartheid. Shatat-USA-Palestine Mental Health Network is a part of the Palestine Global Mental Health Network,
Sample Letter
Thanks for joining us in telling the National Association of Social Workers to expel the Israeli Union of Social Workers from the International Federation of Social Workers due to their multiple violations of ethical codes.
Please use the email information below to email the executive leadership of the National Association of Social Workers. You can learn about NASW’s executive leadership here. Please do feel free to edit the body of the email as you see necessary.
Subject Line: Practicing Accountability for Participating in Genocide
To: ymchase@alaska.edu, K.Bullock@bc.edu, carly.ellman@gmail.com, ochi97@gmail.com, sharma@kutztown.edu, mbcarter@ssw.rutgers.edu, tony.raymer@gmail.com, shawntellef@shawntellefisher.com
Dear NASW Executive Committee:
I am writing to urge the NASW to vote to expel the Israeli Union of Social Workers (IUSW) from the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW) during the special General Meeting on February 18th, 2026. I understand this meeting was called following the multiple sanctions (2018 and 2025) imposed by IFSW on the IUSW as a result of their repeated violations of the Federation’s Statement of Ethical Principles.
The IUSW was censured in 2018 for not “acting on a human rights perspective” in regards to Palestinians. While the sanction was lifted in 2022, it was lifted without any discernible change in the union’s positions.
I am particularly disturbed by the IUSW’s admittance that their members were serving in combat roles during the accelerated Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, a clear violation of the ethical principle to support peace and nonviolence:
9.3 Social workers support peace and nonviolence. Social workers may work alongside military personnel for humanitarian purposes and work toward peacebuilding and reconstruction. Social workers operating within a military or peacekeeping context must always support the dignity and agency of people as their primary focus. Social workers must not allow their knowledge and skills to be used for inhumane purposes, such as torture, military surveillance, terrorism, or conversion therapy, and they should not use weapons in their professional or personal capacities against people.
As a result of violating this ethical principle, the IUSW was sanctioned again in January 2025, yet there has still been no change in their position on social workers actively participating in a genocide.
If social work is unwilling to stand against apartheid and genocide, let alone, reject direct and indirect social work participation in apartheid and genocide, our profession has no moral, or professional ground to stand upon. The Israeli Union of Social Workers should not continue to be treated as exempt from the social work codes of ethics as it has been, and NASW, as a member of the North American Chapter of IFSW, absolutely must vote to expel. Anything other than a vote to expel makes a mockery of social work stated values and ethics concerned with social justice, human dignity, peace, and nonviolence.
Sincerely,
[INCLUDE YOUR NAME AND AFFILIATION]
References
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Garrett, P. M. (2025). Hegemony and settler colonial subjectivities: The censure of the Israeli Union of Social Workers (IUSW) by the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW). Critical Social Policy, 0(0). 1-22 https://doi.org/10.1177/02610183251365192
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Palestinian Union of Social Workers and Psychologists (PUSWP) (2022). Dear colleagues.
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