Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) was awakened last Thursday morning by an announcement made through his Jerusalem hotel’s intercom system, alerting guests to an incoming ballistic missile attack by the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.

“I explained to my wife, and I said, ‘Well, this is the kind of reality of Israel, where they have these things,’” Fetterman told reporters in Jerusalem hours later.

Representing one of the most heavily Jewish congressional districts in America — California’s 30th, which encompasses Hollywood, Burbank and Glendale — freshman House Democrat Laura Friedman has made the issue of antisemitism a priority in her political life. 

As a legislator in the California Statehouse, she and her fellow Jewish caucus members had supported establishing an ethnic studies program, and later fought back against efforts to include antisemitic material in it, working with other identity caucuses in the state Legislature. And she authored a bill, which passed, requiring Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs to include education on antisemitism and the Jewish experience.

Steve Witkoff, President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy, suggested to Tucker Carlson in a new episode of Carlson’s podcast on Friday that Hamas could end up being “involved politically” in Gaza if and when the terrorist group demilitarizes.

Witkoff made the comments while offering his assessment of what Hamas is seeking out of negotiations to end the war in Gaza, which he argued was important to understand in order to reach a deal to stop the fighting. Carlson, who began inviting guests onto his program who espouse antisemitic conspiracy theories after growing critical of Israel’s handling of its war with Hamas, asked Witkoff to explain Israel’s long-term vision for achieving peace in the region.

A bipartisan group of 79 House members wrote to the Trump administration on Friday seeking answers about the pause in funding disbursements for a program that provides security grants to vulnerable nonprofits, one of many grant programs affected by an across-the-board funding freeze at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The lawmakers, led by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), called it “critical” for all institutions that have been awarded a grant from the Nonprofit Security Grant Program to receive their funds. 

A bipartisan group of House lawmakers will reintroduce legislation on Friday reauthorizing the Binational Industrial Research and Development Energy program, an initiative aimed at boosting the energy partnership between the U.S. and Israel, Jewish Insider has learned.

Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), Buddy Carter (R-GA), Brad Schneider (D-IL) and Joe Wilson (R-SC) will reintroduce the BIRD Energy and U.S.-Israel Energy Center Reauthorization Act during Friday’s pro forma session. The legislation “extends and expands the successful U.S.-Israel energy partnership through 2034, ensuring continued collaboration on clean energy innovation, energy security, and economic growth in both nations,” according to a release set to go out Friday. 

Just hours before President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday directing Education Secretary Linda McMahon to start dismantling the Department of Education, the department’s Office for Civil Rights opened its latest batch of antisemitism investigations into several universities. Jewish legal and education experts were left divided over how the cuts will impact the newest Title VI complaints — and the government’s ability going forward to hold schools accountable for rising antisemitism.  

“We have heard directly from OCR that complaints that we have filed — some of them a while ago and some of them more recently — are being opened for investigation,” Denise Katz-Prober, director of legal initiatives at the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, told Jewish Insider. “The opening of these investigations does signal that the Department of Education and OCR are being active and forceful in addressing the antisemitism that’s plaguing so many campuses,” she said.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee will hold a hearing on the surge of campus antisemitism since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on March 27, Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), the committee’s chairman, announced.

The hearing, scheduled for 10 a.m. ET, is titled, “Antisemitic Disruptions on Campus: Ensuring Safe Learning Environments for All Students,” according to an announcement from Cassidy. Witnesses’ names have not been made public yet. 

A group of 44 House Democrats is demanding that the State Department immediately fire Darren Beattie, the acting undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, who has come under bipartisan criticism for past offensive comments and far-right affiliations.

Beattie, who was fired from the first Trump administration for attending a white nationalist event, has voiced white supremacist views, demeaned Black people, women and other minorities and promoted a series of stances at odds with U.S. policy, including brushing off Chinese aggression and genocide of the Uyghur population and expressing support for Russia. Beattie had also personally attacked Secretary of State Marco Rubio online.