Daily Kickoff
👋 Good Wednesday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we talk to Amb. Tom Nides about Israel’s growing Fulbright Scholars program, and look at the growing field in the race to succeed Sen. Dianne Feinstein in California. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Rep. David Cicilline, Rep.-elect Jennifer McClellan and Ben Platt.
While this week’s Tikvah Fund Hertog Forum in Tel Aviv is largely off-the-record and fully closed to the press, one event on the agenda — a conversation between Walter Russell Mead and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — was made available late last night. Read on for snippets from their conversation:
On China and international alliances: “China has interests everywhere,” Netanyahu said. “Everywhere. But especially with Iran, which is a source of energy and other other things that interest them. China also has an interest in Israel, especially technology, technology, more technology… What we need today in the world that we’re entering, this multipolar world where you do have cooperation between authoritarian dictatorial regimes who are developing formidable weapons, is we have to have an alliance of the like-minded smarts. This means countries that are like-minded, like-valued. You have the Five Eyes? [referring to the intelligence alliance between the U.S., Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the U.K.] There’s a sixth “eye” and the sixth “eye” is an “I” and it’s Israel, and Israel’s value as a supplier of intelligence and other things is growing by the day as our capacities grow.”
On expanding the Abraham Accords to Saudi Arabia: “If we expand the circle of peace to Saudi Arabia, then I think we effectively end the Arab-Israeli conflict, which means we work our way not inside out, solve the Palestinian problem,” Netanyahu said. “I believe that pursuing a peace that is based on common interests, of using Israeli power – military, intelligence, technological and economic – to buttress local, that is, peace agreements and normalization agreements with our neighbors can help achieve two things. One, it can expand the circle of peace. Second, it can serve as a bulwark against Iran.”
On the relationship between the U.S. Jewish community and Israel: “There are obvious tensions — for god’s sake, these are Jews!” Netanyahu quipped. “It’s quite incredible to hear some of the people, and I don’t think they represent the majority of those who are going into the streets, who also represent a minority, but to call for civil war — that I don’t think will happen. It won’t happen because of our history, because of our shared fate. But there are differences obviously, no question about it. I think the question of American Jews, I think is a question first of all, of the tensions between assimilation and antisemitism. And assimilation is a powerful force. It’s the decision of any individual Jew. If they want to come to Israel, they will be obviously received with open arms, and the best thing you can do is to increase Jewish education, study of Hebrew, the understanding of Jewish history.”
On antisemitism: “The question of antisemitism I say, straight out: fight it, fight it, fight it, and fight it as forcefully as you can. When you have this rapper, Kanye West, who doesn’t represent the West. You stand up and speak against it and this should not be a left-right divide. That should be a common position. Because ultimately the fires of antisemitism consume all Jews and they go beyond the Jews. And I think that is not merely a Jewish issue. I think it’s an American issue. Will America prove to be another Vienna? The world that [Mark] Twain saw and the Jews were so proud of in 1900 Vienna went up in smoke and nothing remained. I mean, really the height of human cultural and scientific and literary activity, medicine, everything went up in smoke, nothing was left.”
The inaugural I2U2 Business Forum took place in Abu Dhabi today, bringing together stakeholders from India, Israel, the U.S. and the United Arab Emirates. Speakers at the daylong convening included UAE Minister of State Ahmed Al Sayegh, U.S. Under Secretary of State Jose Fernandez, Indian Economic Relations Secretary Shri Dammu Rav and Aliza Bin-Noun, the political director of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
exclusive
Nides aims to make Israel’s Fulbright program the largest in the world

For more than 75 years, the Fulbright program has enabled hundreds of thousands of American students, scholars and professionals to study or conduct research in academic institutions abroad, and brought the equivalent number of top-notch academics from around the world to the United States. Now, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides is aiming to put the Jewish state at the pinnacle of this flagship cultural and educational exchange initiative. “Israel already has one of the largest Fulbright programs, but we can easily double the numbers,” Nides told Jewish Insider’s Ruth Marks Eglash in an exclusive interview this week. “My goal is for Israel to have the largest Fulbright program in the world.”
Back to the community: Founded by U.S. Sen. J. William Fulbright, a Democrat from Arkansas, in 1946, the Fulbright program supports some 8,000 students, scholars and professionals from more than 160 countries annually, providing them with grants to work, study or conduct research in a wide variety of academic and professional fields. “I’ve been a big believer in the Fulbright program since I was a deputy at the State Department, because I realized how beneficial it is,” Nides said. “It’s a program where ultimately these individuals come back to contribute to their communities, and there’s been Nobel Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, top scientists and doctors who have come out of this program.”
Full steam ahead: Nides, who began his posting in Jerusalem in November 2021, continued: “When I got here, I just said to myself, ‘Why don’t we have the biggest program in the world in Israel?’ The bilateral relations are already so strong; this will make them stronger.” Working together with the Fulbright teams in Israel and in the U.S., Nides said they have already secured the necessary funds (U.S. covers 60% of funding, Israel 40%) that will enable the current number of participants to double from 60 (30 Israelis to the U.S. and 30 Americans to Israel) to 120.
Changing of the guard: In addition, the U.S. envoy revealed to JI that Sender Cohen, chief investment officer of Schusterman Interests LLC, will take over from Shira Ruderman, the executive director of the Ruderman Family Foundation, as Fulbright Israel’s new chairperson. Cohen told JI that he was “very excited to dig in. I’ll do anything to help strengthen the relationship between the United States and Israel,” he said. “I love the new expansion plans; there are a lot of really creative ideas, both bilaterally between the U.S. and Israel, as well as in the region.” Cohen also said he believes Nides’ goal to make Israel’s program the largest was a realistic one.
Talent on tap: Anat Lapidot-Firilla, executive director of Fulbright Israel, said that plans were already underway to increase the number of participants and that there was no shortage of qualified applicants in Israel. “We have the capacity in terms of talented people and with the new funds, we can send new people, which will contribute more and make more to making an impact on Israeli society and also by exchanging knowledge with the U.S.”