The Heritage Foundation was once a bastion of interventionist foreign policy in the Republican Party. But on the occasion of its 50th anniversary, the influential conservative think tank has shifted toward what its president, Kevin Roberts, described to Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod as a more “selective” U.S. foreign policy — one in which Israel and Taiwan land at the top of the list of U.S. priorities; Ukraine, which for more than a year has struggled against a Russian invasion, does not.

Grand strategy: Roberts described Heritage’s grand strategy for foreign policy as “what we call the third way… which is to say neither interventionism nor isolationism.” The strategy aligns with the populist national conservative movement, which promotes a more isolationist foreign policy coupled with protectionist trade measures. The current approach, Roberts said, stems from “recognizing that America is a lot weaker 40 years after [Ronald] Reagan’s presidency. It’s weaker financially, it’s weaker socially and culturally, every branch of the services has a very difficult time not just in recruiting, but in retaining.” Roberts argues that the current policy remains consistent with Reaganite values. “We hope that we can help change [the current situation] by saying, ‘We believe in peace through strength, we want a very strong, robust American military,” he said, “but we have to be a heck of a lot more selective and just and constitutional when we decide to deploy the people’s resources.’”

Israel in focus: Although the prime focus for Heritage and its keynote speakers has been on shifting resources toward Taiwan and away from Ukraine, Roberts emphasized that Israel remains a key interest — and another example of why the U.S. needs to conserve the resources being sent to help Kyiv fend off the Russian invasion. The Heritage president classified Israel as “near the top of the scale” or potentially “at the very top” of vital U.S. interests because it is among the U.S.’ most “consistent all[ies] in world politics,” “geopolitically important for those of us who appreciate the shared [Judeo-Christian] heritage we have” and because the U.S. and Israel share the same existential enemies.

Eye on Iran: Iran received scant attention at the conference — at odds with the level of concern many in the GOP’s more traditional foreign policy wing hold about the regime in Tehran. But Roberts pointed to the potential threat from the Islamic republic as an additional reason the U.S. needs to cut off Ukraine, placing it alongside China as one of “our biggest enemies.” “This is a pie and these military resources are not infinite, and we have to be able to keep some of them in case the Iranians become an even bigger issue than they are,” he said. “I would actually say Iran is a much bigger threat to us than Russia.”

Read more here.

This is the third installment of a five-part series that we’re releasing over two weeks. If you missed Parts One and Two, catch up here.

A cloud of grief hung over Rabbi Philip Rabinowitz in the years before his murder. The Georgetown rabbi maintained his stature as the spiritual and intellectual beating heart of Kesher Israel Congregation, but after his wife died, something fundamental had changed. He was broken.

The rabbi had to navigate the difficult halacha, or Jewish law, around burial and matrimony in a way that few others had done before. He wanted his daughter to be able to enjoy life as a newlywed as much as possible while also mourning her mother. 

After a period of intense emotional whiplash, Rabinowitz was left to reenter normal life on his own. 

“At the time of her death, I’m reasonably certain that Rabbi Rabinowitz had no inkling of how to boil water, no idea how to do any cooking at all,” said Dan Klein, a longtime Kesher member. “But he learned, and there were a few members of the congregation who helped him out a little bit, and he eventually got to the point where he could invite a few people over for a Shabbat meal.”

The rabbi did not regularly have guests over, though, and congregants began to walk or drive him home after evening prayers. The neighborhood wasn’t particularly unsafe — Georgetown was spared the worst of the violent crime that racked Washington in the 1980s and 1990s — but Rabinowitz’s residence was closer to The George Washington University campus than it was to the multimillion-dollar Georgetown homes, and besides, “it was pitch black,” said Howard Rosen, who often walked with Rabinowitz on his way back to the GWU dorms. 

Still, Rabinowitz was not willing to only accept congregants’ pity and shrink from his duties. In 1979, he quit his teaching job at a local Jewish school to focus full-time on the congregation. He continued his responsibilities as a religious leader, but he also doubled down in his commitment to pastoral care. This, congregants say, is where he really shined: remembering the names of all of your kids, or visiting you when you were sick, and making it clear he saw you as a person, and not just as the 10th member of a prayer quorum. 

“It’s incredible that people like this, who have gone through a life like that… He went through the worst experience in life — he was a survivor and refugee and it just made him more kind and generous,” said Rosen. Some would later question, only in hindsight, whether he had been too generous.

Read the rest of Part Three, ‘Love the Stranger,’ here. Part Four will land in your inbox on Thursday. 

On the most recent episode of Jewish Insider’s podcast, co-hosts Rich Goldberg and Jarrod Bernstein were joined by Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA), a newly appointed member of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, for a discussion on China, American foreign policy and the recent Pentagon document leaks.

The goal of the House Select Committee: “The goal of the committee is to rise above day-to-day politics and chart long-term sound strategy to outcompete the Chinese Communist Party,” Auchincloss said. “And to do that, it needs to, one, create shared awareness within the halls of Congress about the scope and severity of the challenge posed by the CCP, ideological, military, economic. And two, it needs to create shared conviction about a discrete set of policy recommendations that 70% of Congress can get behind. I say 70%, because that means that it’s a durable consensus that will guide foreign policy, regardless of who’s in the White House, and that has majorities within both caucuses — Democrat and Republican as well as of course, within the House itself. That’s really the goal here. We need members to be paying attention, and then we need members to be largely aligned on what to do about it.”

On the importance of global engagement: “I would reject the premise that global engagement is a zero-sum, or even a costly endeavor,” Auchincloss told Goldberg and Bernstein. “The Abraham Accords, for example, are a positive-sum endeavor. The United States is stronger, Israel is stronger, Arab states are stronger because of the Abraham Accords, and spending diplomatic time and spending American prestige on supporting and cultivating the Abraham Accords, that doesn’t cost us anything, that has huge returns, that is beneficial to us. Same thing with engagement with Latin America through Mercosur [the Southern Common Market] or the Organization of American States. That’s to our benefit. What costs us money is when we lie about weapons of mass destruction and spend 15 years fighting in the Middle East. That is expensive. That is why we need members of Congress who are going to call foul on commanders in chief who try to dissemble to the American people and get us bogged down in unwinnable wars.”

Read more here.

For the second time in his brief political tenure, Mark Robinson, the polarizing lieutenant governor of North Carolina, stands poised to test the limits of acceptability as he seeks higher office in a key battleground state. The 54-year-old Republican formally announced on Saturday that he is running for governor, setting up what is expected to be a fiercely contested race for the state’s top job, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports. “The establishment is scared because I can’t be controlled,” he told supporters in Alamance County, near his hometown of Greensboro.

Exception to the trend? Robinson launched his campaign with an extensive and well-documented history of antisemitic comments and derogatory remarks targeting Muslims and trangender people. The lieutenant governor, who first took office in 2021, has refused to apologize for his rhetoric, which has raised questions over his appeal in the general election. But while several GOP prospects struggled with electability issues in high-profile gubernatorial and Senate contests last cycle, Robinson’s candidacy will demonstrate whether he is an exception to that trend. 

‘A lot of concern’: His campaign will also be a test for North Carolina’s overwhelmingly Democratic Jewish community, members of which are now privately weighing how to respond to an increasingly powerful figure who enters the race as a clear Republican frontrunner. “There’s a lot of concern about it,” one Jewish leader told JI, speaking anonymously to discuss a sensitive topic. “We really think he could get elected.”

Favorable polling: Even as Robinson’s past statements have drawn condemnation, early polling suggests that the controversial conservative lawmaker, who would be North Carolina’s first Black governor, remains popular among a majority of Republican primary voters. “Any candidate who gets out of either party’s primary has a chance to win the governor’s mansion in North Carolina, even someone with extreme, polarizing rhetoric like Mark Robinson,” Chris Cooper, a professor of political science at Western Carolina University, said in an email to JI. 

The battlefield: Robinson will face at least one opponent in the GOP primary. Dale Folwell, the state treasurer of North Carolina, announced his campaign in March. Former Rep. Mark Walker (R-NC) is also reportedly planning to launch a bid soon. The primary winner would almost certainly go up against Josh Stein, the attorney general of North Carolina and a moderate Jewish Democrat. In a campaign launch video released in mid-January, Stein accused the lieutenant governor of sparking “division,” igniting “hate” and fanning “the flames of bigotry.”

Read the full story here.

Lawmakers from both parties and both chambers of Congress have come out in force in recent weeks to express support for continued funding for a range of cooperative U.S.-Israel defensive programs as part of the 2024 appropriations cycle, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. A series of four letters, which express support for cooperative counter-drone, counter-tunneling and missile-defense programs, highlight the continued robust support that these programs and the U.S.-Israel relationship broadly maintain in Congress. The funding itself is approved annually with little fanfare.

Missile defense: The letter from 170 House members on missile-defense funding affirms support for the $500 million in missile-defense systems, including Iron Dome, Arrow and David’s Sling, scheduled to be provided annually under the 2016 Memorandum of Understanding. It also acknowledges GOP efforts to pursue sweeping budget cuts: “During these challenging budgetary times we must prioritize federal funding for programs where federal involvement can have the greatest impact on the safety and security of the American people, our troops, and our allies. These highly advanced missile defense systems have consistently been a key factor in Israel’s self-defense and further technological and operational advancements will be crucial moving forward.”

Counter-drone: One of the counter-drone funding letters, led by Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Ted Budd (R-NC) with a dozen cosponsors, urges Senate appropriators to approve $40 million for counter-drone funding in the 2024 Defense Appropriations Bill. A nearly identical letter in the House, led by Reps. Pat Ryan (D-NY) and Carlos Gimenez (R-FL), makes the same funding-level request, with 63 other co-signers.

Tunnel trouble: Another House letter, led by Reps. Brad Schneider, Kathy Manning (D-NC), August Pfluger (R-TX) and Doug Lamborn (R-CO), urges support for $47.5 million for counter-tunneling projects, the same amount included in last year’s bill. Fifty-six additional lawmakers joined this letter.

Read the full story here.

Bonus: The Senate passed by unanimous consent a resolution — sponsored by Sens. Ben Cardin (D-MD), Marco Rubio (R-FL), Jacky Rosen (D-NV) and Tim Scott (R-SC) — recognizing the 30th anniversary of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

A bipartisan group of House lawmakers is calling out the Iranian government for failing to probe the poisonings of thousands of schoolgirls across Iran — in what experts believe to have been deliberate gas attacks — over the course of several months, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. Twenty-three lawmakers introduced a resolution last week condemning the Iranian government over the issue and outlining steps to seek answers. Lawmakers also announced last week, in connection with the resolution, the formation of the Iranian Women Congressional Caucus.

Pointing blame: The resolution outlines the role that the students and women more generally have played in leading protests in the wake of the September death of a 22-year-old Iranian woman in regime custody. The text echoes accusations by “angry parents” that the attacks are “‘targeted and deliberate’ to keep girls from getting an education,” accuses the regime of having “ignored the attacks for more than 100 days and has responded with blaming protestors for the gas attacks on schoolgirls” and outlines efforts by the regime to suppress information about the poisonings. The resolution calls on the U.S. government to “initiate a formal process” to launch an independent investigation of the poisonings, including a United Nations fact-finding mission and a World Health Organization report to determine who is responsible for the attacks.

Coming together: The resolution and the caucus are being led by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX). Other co-sponsors include Reps. Nancy Mace (R-SC), Deborah Ross (D-NC), John Curtis (R-UT), Donald Payne (D-NJ), Don Bacon (R-NE), Linda Sánchez (D-CA), Tom McClintock (R-CA), Jim Costa (D-CA), Scott Peters (D-CA), Al Green (D-TX), Jared Moskowitz (D-FL), Sylvia Garcia (D-TX), Chris Pappas (D-NH), Troy Carter (D-LA), Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD), Lance Gooden (R-TX), Steve Cohen (D-TN), Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA), Young Kim (R-CA), Bill Pascrell (D-NJ), Mike Garcia (R-CA) and Judy Chu (D-CA).

Read more here.

Bonus: In Politico, Foreign Affairs editor Daniel Block looks at disputes within the Iranian diaspora community over engagement with Tehran.

Bonus: The Senate passed by unanimous consent a resolution — sponsored by Sens. Ben Cardin (D-MD), Marco Rubio (R-FL), Jacky Rosen (D-NV) and Tim Scott (R-SC) — recognizing the 30th anniversary of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.