Jonathan Greenblatt Rolls Out Plan to Activate Hispanic Evangelical Golems

As Israel’s image has suffered from its genocidal campaign in Gaza, ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt and broader Jewry are targeting Hispanic evangelical communities in the United States and Central America to cultivate a fresh base of golems who will back Zionist causes.

Greenblatt recently announced a formal partnership with the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference during a speaking engagement at Sinai Temple in Los Angeles, revealing an extensive outreach initiative targeting Hispanic evangelical communities. “We have roughly 2,000 active synagogues in America. There are 42,000 active Hispanic evangelical churches,” Greenblatt told the audience. “Right now, the ADL is co-writing Sunday school curriculum with them. Right now, the ADL is working on joint lobby days with them.”

The ADL announced the partnership on October 16, 2025, creating educational materials for distribution across Hispanic evangelical churches in the United States. The collaboration encompasses a 12-month antisemitism awareness curriculum distributed to pastors, youth leaders, and congregants, with specific modules designed for K-12 private schools. Faith-based resources include sermon guides and prayer materials promoting solidarity with Jewish communities.

Multilingual digital campaigns targeting Generation Z and Millennial congregants will feature short-form videos and social media content. The partnership also includes Prayer and Justice Gatherings, with roundtable discussions planned across California, Florida, New York, Texas, and Washington DC. According to the official announcement, the curriculum will provide resources specifically for Sunday school implementation, representing the first time ADL has directly contributed to Christian religious education programming. The National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, led by President Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, also operates the Hispanic Israel Leadership Coalition, a specific arm dedicated to Israel advocacy.

The partnership targets a growing demographic within the United States. Approximately 15 percent of U.S. Hispanics identify as evangelical Protestants, according to 2022 Pew Research data. Among Hispanics with Central American origins, that figure reaches 31 percent, more than double the rate among Mexican-Americans at 12 percent. The evangelical identity is stronger among foreign-born Hispanics (19 percent) than U.S.-born (12 percent), suggesting that Central American evangelical growth is being exported northward through immigration patterns. Some 28 percent of Hispanic Republicans identify as evangelical versus 10 percent of Hispanic Democrats.

Hispanic evangelical churchgoers demonstrate strong religious commitment, with 73 percent saying religion is very important in their lives, compared to 46 percent of Catholic Hispanics. Some 57 percent of Hispanic evangelical churchgoers report speaking in tongues during services, indicating Pentecostal dominance.

This domestic outreach reflects a broader hemispheric trend. Guatemala and Honduras now have evangelical populations reaching 40 to 41 percent of their total populations. Only 60 years ago, evangelicals represented barely 3 percent of Latin America’s population. Today they exceed 20 percent regionally, with Pew Research documenting that more than half are converts from Catholicism.

Evangelical churches across Central America have adopted Christian Zionist theology, which frames support for Israel as theological obligation, directly referencing Genesis 12:3 that “those who bless the Jewish people will themselves be blessed.” Churches prominently display Stars of David, menorahs, and Hebrew lettering, while organizing pilgrimage tourism to Israel that creates personal investment in Israeli narratives. Organizations like the Latino Coalition for Israel coordinate pro-Israel advocacy across the region, mobilizing evangelical leaders for Jerusalem embassy moves and other policy initiatives.

This evangelical political mobilization among Hispanics is also present across Latin America. Guatemala and Honduras have distinguished themselves as Israel’s most reliable supporters in Latin America, maintaining or strengthening diplomatic ties even as most regional nations adopted critical stances following the October 7, 2023 attacks. This alignment contrasts sharply with broader Latin American sentiment, where Bolivia, Chile, and Colombia recalled ambassadors and Mexico joined South Africa’s International Court of Justice genocide case.

Following World War II, Guatemala performed a pivotal function in Israel’s establishment as a sovereign nation, becoming among the first countries to support UN Resolution 181 in 1947. This resolution advocated for Palestine’s partition and the formation of a Jewish state. In 1948, Guatemala joined 21 nations in the United Nations to formally recognize Israel as a state, with Guatemalan Foreign Minister pledging his country would be Israel’s best Latin American ally.

Guatemala’s backing of Israel’s 1948 creation established the groundwork for extensive military cooperation between both countries. As an early recognizer of Israel, Guatemala became a crucial partner during the Cold War era, especially as Guatemala confronted international condemnation for its role in combating indigenous insurgents during a devastating civil war spanning 1960 to 1996—a struggle resulting in more than 200,000 deaths.

During the presidency of Carlos Arana Osorio (1970–1974), Israel commenced providing weapons and counterinsurgency training, which expanded after the United States curtailed military assistance to Guatemala in 1977 due to human rights violations. Israeli military advisers progressively introduced methods derived from Israel’s occupation approaches in Palestine. These included devastating scorched-earth campaigns that Guatemalan military forces replicated in operations that obliterated over 600 villages.

Israeli expertise further shaped military organization, with Guatemalan forces implementing Israeli-designed field installations, communications networks, and armaments including Galil assault rifles and Uzi submachine guns. Furthermore, Israel’s Nahal program—combining military preparation with agricultural settlement—became the model for Guatemala’s “Beans and Bullets” approach, designed to control rural areas by offering essential services like healthcare, education, and other advantages to Indigenous populations that aligned with the government, while imposing severe consequences on communities thought to be aiding guerrilla forces.

Guatemala moved its embassy to Jerusalem in May 2018, becoming only the second country after the United States to relocate its diplomatic mission to the contested capital. The Central American nation also renamed 14 streets “Jerusalem, Capital of Israel Street” in a symbolic gesture of solidarity. Guatemalan Ambassador Alfonso Quiñónez stated in 2023 that “being a friend of Israel pays off.”

In a similar vein, the foundation of Honduras’s strong ties with Israel was established in the 1950s when Honduran and Israeli diplomats formally established diplomatic ties, following Honduras’s decision to accept Jewish refugees during World War II. Former President Juan Orlando Hernández, who Donald Trump recently pardoned for a cocaine trafficking conviction, built upon this historical groundwork to reshape his nation’s foreign policy.

He transformed Honduras’s voting patterns at the United Nations, choosing to either abstain from or vote against resolutions perceived as antagonistic to Israel. During the 2017 General Assembly vote condemning America’s embassy relocation to Jerusalem, Honduras stood among a small minority of nations backing the United States and Israel against widespread international opposition.

Honduras recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in 2018 and opened a diplomatic office there, following Guatemala’s lead. Hernández subsequently pledged to transfer Honduras’s full embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, releasing coordinated announcements with Israeli and American officials that established public timelines for the transition. The relocation was finalized in June 2021. During the ceremony, Hernández announced his presence “in the eternal capital of Israel” and committed to combating “antisemitism, often presented as anti Zionism.”

Additionally, Hernández integrated Honduras into Christian Zionist circles. The Friends of Zion Museum in Jerusalem—an organization promoting Christian backing for Israel while opposing antisemitism and BDS—honored him with its Friends of Zion Award in 2019 for acknowledging Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and providing diplomatic support. According to the Jerusalem Post, he joined a distinguished roster alongside Donald Trump and other leaders recognized for their pro-Israel stances.

On security matters, Hernández adopted positions completely aligned with Washington and Tel Aviv. His administration classified Hezbollah as a terrorist organization—a designation praised by prominent American Jewish organizations.

This Hispanic evangelical demographic could prove valuable for Israel following the October 7, 2023 attacks, which significantly damaged its global image. According to Pew Research data from June 2025, majorities in 20 of 24 surveyed countries hold unfavorable opinions of Israel. Overwhelming majorities in Australia (74 percent), Greece (72 percent), Indonesia (80 percent), Japan (79 percent), the Netherlands (78 percent), Spain (75 percent), Sweden (75 percent), and Turkey (93 percent) express negative views.

Even in the United States, historically a strong supporter, 53 percent now view Israel unfavorably, marking an 11-point increase since 2022. The notable exceptions to this global trend appear in sub-Saharan Africa, where Kenya and Nigeria maintain more favorable views of Israel.

Against this backdrop, the concentration of evangelical support in Central America and among U.S. Hispanic evangelicals represents a demographic Israel and its advocates can mobilize as part of a broader Global South strategy. The pattern suggests Israel will likely pursue enhanced outreach among Christian evangelicals in developing nations to rebuild its international image, particularly in regions where evangelical Christianity is experiencing rapid growth.

Greenblatt is doing his part by conducting outreach among Hispanic evangelicals in the United States. He has promoted the partnership through targeted speaking engagements, including presentations to 350 pastors at the Museum of the Bible. Greenblatt framed the partnership within ADL’s post-October 7 strategic realignment. In March 2024, he stated the organization had “become clearer and clearer that we must prioritize the first part of ADL’s mission: ‘stop the defamation of the Jewish people’.”

“As antisemitism rises in the United States and around the world, we must build bridges of unity and courage,” Greenblatt said in the partnership announcement. Rev. Samuel Rodriguez added that “antisemitism is not just a Jewish issue, it is a moral and spiritual crisis that demands all communities respond with clarity, compassion, and conviction.”

The 42,000 churches versus 2,000 synagogues comparison highlights ADL’s recognition that Jewish communal infrastructure alone cannot address rising antisemitism. By creating sermon guides and prayer materials, ADL is embedding antisemitism education directly into Christian worship and religious formation.

This ADL scheme lays bare a pivot in Jewish outreach strategies. When global revulsion over Gaza lingers in the minds of billions of gentiles worldwide, the focus shifts to Hispanic evangelical networks across the United and Latin America, positioning these growing communities as fresh golems to bolster Israel’s image via educational partnerships and faith-based advocacy.