Daily Kickoff
👋 Good Wednesday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we talk to Michèle Taylor, the U.S. envoy to the U.N.’s Human Rights Council, and look at the outcomes of a pair of New York City Council primary races. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff, Rabbi David Wolpe, Elliott Abrams and David Beckham.
Five rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel overnight, prompting IDF strikes on Hamas targets in the Strip, hours after Israel declared the end to a two-day military operation in the Palestinian city of Jenin in the West Bank.
The counterterrorism operation in Jenin, the largest seen in the West Bank in years, was focused on the Jenin refugee camp, where the army said it sought to neutralize terror infrastructure in what has become a terrorist stronghold. All Israeli troops withdrew from Jenin by early Wednesday morning.
Twelve Palestinians were killed in the operation, according to Palestinian health officials, at least five of whom were claimed by Palestinian militant groups as their members. An Israeli soldier was killed by live fire yesterday, the IDF said.
Israeli security forces said they confiscated over 1,000 weapons in the camp and the city of Jenin; among them explosive devices, ammunition, guns and explosives facilities. They questioned more than 300 suspects and apprehended 30 of them. The IDF said last night that reports on social media regarding Israeli fire toward a hospital were “not currently known to the security forces,” while noting that “since the entrance of the security forces in the area of the city, terrorist organizations have exploited civilian areas as a hideout and have exploited residents as human shields.”
“Over the past two years, Jenin has become a ‘production site’ for terrorism,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Tuesday night following a situation assessment with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “As a result of [our activities over] the past two days, this has come to an end. We have intercepted weapon production lines and confiscated thousands of explosive devices. We have demolished dozens of weapon manufacturing sites, hideouts and labs for the production of explosive devices.”
On Tuesday, a Palestinian terrorist from the West Bank carried out a car ramming and stabbing attack in north Tel Aviv before he was shot dead by an armed civilian. Eight people were wounded in the attack, including a pregnant woman who lost her baby as a result. Hamas said the assailant, Abd al-Wahab Khalaila, was a member of the movement, but stopped short of claiming responsibility for the attack.
Members of Congress weighed in on the events over the long weekend. “No country should be forced to stand down when there is overwhelming evidence of planned violence against its citizens,” Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) tweeted, describing Jenin as a “hub and safe haven for terror networks.” Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), Claudia Tenney (R-NY), Greg Landsman (D-OH), Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) and Eli Crane (R-AZ) all noted Iran’s role in destabilizing the region through its proxies.
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) charged that the Palestinian Authority “all but abandoned Jenin, leaving behind a power vacuum that has been filled by terrorists,” while Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) said he prays “that Israelis and Palestinians empower a new generation of leaders committed to two-states w/ security and economic opportunity for all.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), the most outspoken critic of the Jewish state in Congress, was the only lawmaker to denounce Israel, calling on Congress to “stop funding this violent Israeli apartheid regime.”
The Washington Post’s David Ignatius weighed in on the recent uptick in tensions, describing the clashes in Jenin as “a foretaste of what’s ahead” in the expected vacuum that will ensue when PA President Mahmoud Abbas, 87, and serving in the 19th year of the four-year term to which he was elected, is no longer in power.
One of the leading House Republicans is speaking out over the revelation that Iran Special Envoy Rob Malley is suspended and under investigation for potential mishandling of classified information.
On Friday, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-TX) sent a letter to Secretary of State Tony Blinken alleging that the reported investigation raises “serious concerns both regarding Malley’s conduct and whether the State Department misled Congress and the American public.”
McCaul noted that the State Department has been refusing efforts since April 11 to solicit testimony from Malley; the State Department told the committee Malley was on family medical leave. “The Department’s failure to inform Congress of this matter demonstrates at best a lack of candor, and at worst represents deliberate and potentially unlawful misinformation,” McCaul wrote.
McCaul demanded that the department provide information to the committee by the end of the day next Tuesday about the allegation against Malley, his leave from the department and the investigation into him. He also asked that Malley’s deputy provide a classified briefing to the committee by the end of the month.
the case for unhrc
In Geneva, an American ambassador makes the case for the U.N. Human Rights Council

Michèle Taylor’s first day on the job as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Human Rights Council, on Feb. 24, 2022, began as a normal Thursday. But by the time she went to bed that night, Russia had invaded Ukraine, and the entire international order in which she deeply believed — and that she had just been sworn in to try to uphold — was put to the test. “It was a pretty auspicious start to my time here,” Taylor told Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch in a recent interview.
Back at the table: Taylor is Washington’s first ambassador to the Human Rights Council since former President Donald Trump left the body in 2018, when he accused it of bias against Israel and a failure to hold human rights abusers to account. Early in his presidency, President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. would reenter the body. Taylor told JI that the only way the U.S. can effectively fight the challenges posed by the council is by serving as an active member, engaging other nations diplomatically and speaking out on Israel’s behalf.
Diplomatic engagement: “If I do my job well, I will make it clear to even the biggest naysayers how important it is that the United States is engaged here at the Human Rights Council,” Taylor said. “We have plenty of evidence now as to what happens when the U.S. is here versus what happens when the U.S. is not here.”