Daily Kickoff
👋 Good Thursday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we look at concerns surrounding an upcoming Palestinian literary conference at the University of Pennsylvania featuring Roger Waters, and report from yesterday’s N7 forum in Washington. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Sen. Tommy Tuberville, Deborah Lipstadt and Eyal Hulata.
On Wednesday, Secretary of State Tony Blinken delivered a major foreign policy address at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies touting “international cooperation” as Washington’s top diplomatic goal.
“Fellow democracies have always been our first port of call for cooperation. They always will be,” Blinken said at SAIS. “But on certain priorities, if we go it alone, or only with our democratic friends, we will come up short.”
That statement is a subtle acknowledgment of the limits of the Biden administration’s democracy-first approach to foreign relations, particularly at a time when President Joe Biden is trying to strengthen Washington’s relationship with Riyadh and normalize ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
“We’ve galvanized regional integration. In the Middle East, we’ve deepened both recent and decades-old relations between Israel and Arab states. And we’re working to foster new ones, including with Saudi Arabia,” said Blinken.
The limits of U.S. influence extend to UNIFIL, the U.N.’s peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon. In an August United Nations Security Council resolution meant to extend UNIFIL’s mandate, one word stood out: The resolution referred to the Shab’a Farms, an area in the Golan Heights, as “occupied.”
If Washington agreed with the resolution’s characterization of the region as “occupied,” it would signal a major policy shift. Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in the Six-Day War in 1967 and annexed the region in 1981. The United States, during the Trump administration, was the first country to recognize Israeli control of the Golan, a policy that the Biden administration continued.
“The Biden administration had effectively reversed the official American position recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, without having to make an official policy announcement,” Tony Badran, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, argued in a Tablet Magazine article published last week.
But a State Department spokesperson told Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch that no such policy change has occurred. In fact, the spokesperson said, Washington disagreed with the use of that language.
“The United States repeatedly relayed our concerns over that characterization of Shab’a Farms during the UNIFIL mandate negotiations,” the spokesperson said. “As with many U.N. Resolutions, the final text represents difficult negotiations and compromises required to ensure passage. U.S. policy on the Golan Heights has not changed.”
The UNIFIL resolution earned praisefrom Israel’s Foreign Ministry and support from the United States. The resolution rejected demands from the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah to limit the movement of UNIFIL. Read the full story here.
Elsewhere in Washington, the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia will hold a hearing today on policy responses to Iran’s malign activities. Former National Intelligence Manager for Iran Norman Roule, FDD Senior Fellow Behnam Ben Taleblu, activist Masih Alinejad and Brookings Institution Vice President and Director of Foreign Policy Suzanne Maloney are scheduled to testify.
Taleblu told JI he plans to tell the committee that “Washington cannot afford to keep disconnecting the dots on Iran policy. It means nothing to claim to stand with the Iranian people and have a policy of enriching their oppressors… Washington has an opportunity to stand with the Iranian people in practice and not just in principle. If it takes, it remains to be seen.”
poison pens
UPenn to host festival featuring speakers calling for the destruction of Israel
The University of Pennsylvania is facing backlash from a growing number of Jewish leaders, trustees and alumni for hosting a Palestinian cultural festival next week featuring several controversial figures who have espoused antisemitic rhetoric and called for the destruction of Israel, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports.
Mounting scrutiny: The Palestine Writes Literature Festival, which will take place Sept. 22-24 on UPenn’s campus in Philadelphia, calls itself “the only North American literature festival dedicated to celebrating and promoting cultural productions of Palestinian writers and artists.” But it has recently drawn mounting scrutiny as university officials resisted multiple private letters from local Jewish groups exhorting UPenn to publicly distance itself from the festival and take steps to ensure that Jewish students can seek support during the three-day conference, which overlaps with Yom Kippur.
Waters and Hill: Among the most prominent speakers is Roger Waters, the Pink Floyd co-founder and outspoken anti-Israel activist who has compared the Jewish state to the Third Reich and recently wore a Nazi-style uniform while performing onstage in Berlin. The festival will also include Marc Lamont Hill, a former CNN commentator who was dismissed from the network in 2018 after he advocated for a “free Palestine from the river to the sea,” a formulation that is widely interpreted as a call for Israel’s elimination as a Jewish state.
‘Mind-boggling’: “In a moment when antisemitism has reached an indisputably historic level, it is mind-boggling to think that University of Pennsylvania is hosting this event,” Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a sharply worded statement to JI on Tuesday. “If this were a conference to explore and celebrate Palestinian literature, none of us would object. However, it is not. It is a gathering of anti-Israel and anti-Zionist activists, some of whom have a long history of antisemitic statements and comments.”
military matters
How is Tuberville’s military promotion blockade impacting the Middle East?
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) shows no signs of relenting on his monthslong blockade of more than 300 military promotions — a situation that analysts warn could have severe repercussions for American military efforts throughout the world, including in the Middle East. Tuberville has been singlehandedly blocking the fast-track, unanimous confirmation of military promotions for months — the usual procedure by which such nominations are processed, skipping votes and extended floor debate— in protest of the Pentagon’s abortion travel policy. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, it would take the Senate more than 689 hours of floor time to individually consider and vote on the pending promotions. Tuberville’s actions have garnered bipartisan criticism on and off the Hill, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Senior posts: Tuberville’s “hold” is impacting senior appointments within Central Command (CENTCOM), the U.S. military forces in the Middle East, such as the deputy commander of CENTCOM, the reserve vice commander of CENTCOM, the deputy commander of CENTCOM naval forces, the deputy commander of CENTCOM air forces, the deputy director of strategy, plans and policy for CENTCOM, and the commanders of U.S. air wings based in Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. It’s also freezing top-level military promotions, including the nominees to be the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, army chief of staff, chief of naval operations and Marine Corps commandant.
Regional ramifications: Without the requisite officials in place, analysts said that CENTCOM officials could struggle to cement relationships and secure meetings with key counterparts in key partner countries in the region, a serious detriment at a time when the U.S. seeks to grow its unilateral and multilateral partnerships in the region. “In many places, in many countries, in many relationships, that rank and prestige matter,” Bradley Bowman, the senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a former advisor to multiple Senate Republicans, told JI. “Whether that meeting happens, whether their interlocutors take them seriously depends on some of those perceptions.”
eye on the accords
Lawmakers, administration officials, ambassadors discuss the future of the Abraham Accords
At a forum on Capitol Hill yesterday organized by the N7 Initiative, a partnership between the Atlantic Council and the Jeffrey M. Talpins Foundation, members of Congress joined officials from the State Department and National Security Council, as well as ambassadors from Abraham Accords countries, to discuss topics including potential normalization between Saudi Arabia and Israel and ways to deepen existing Abraham Accords partnerships, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Status update: Ambassador Daniel Shapiro, the senior advisor for regional integration in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department who previously served as director of the N7 Initiative, spoke cautiously about the prospects for a trilateral U.S.-Saudi-Israel agreement, explaining that there is a “real opportunity” and that administration officials “are working hard on that, to see if the elements of a deal… can all come together.” Shapiro continued, “With dedicated focused effort over the months ahead, it definitely … has a chance… One can’t accurately predict what the percentage chances are.”
View from the Hill: Some lawmakers appear to remain uncertain about an agreement with Saudi Arabia. Rep. Kathy Manning (D-NC), who is among the most vocal pro-Israel Democrats in the House, said that Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords would be “transformational” but also expressed caution. “I don’t want to jump ahead of myself, we’d like to see what the components of the deal might be, make sure that they are not only in the interest of the region, but also in the U.S. interests,” she said. “But of course, we have to say that adding Saudi Arabia will make an enormous difference.”
CODEL conversation: Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN), the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Mideast subcommittee, discussed his recent trip to Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region, a trip he once thought would have been impossible. Lawmakers met with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan al-Saud during the visit. “What I discovered is the most fertile ground I’ve ever seen in my lifetime, the potential for peace and prosperity and security in a region that has been so devoid of it for so long,” Phillips said, and added that it offered a reminder of the importance of face-to-face diplomacy. “Not only is [Israeli-Saudi peace] possible, it’s necessary… I’m thrilled by the possibility.”
Worthy Reads
🍏🍯 Keeping the Faith: In The New York Times, Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt expresses hope that members of the Jewish community will respond to hate by embracing their faith ahead of the Rosh Hashanah holiday. “We need, to borrow an old phrase, to accentuate the positive among our diverse cultures, and shine a light on how Jews, and anyone confronting persecution, live rather than how they suffer. We need to embrace approaches that are Jewish by tradition yet universal in their application: greeting each new moment with a prayer, gathering for each meal with a note of gratitude, reveling in the dynamic facets of our faiths not out of fear, but joy — whether it’s a festival in Djerba or a weekly worship service or an apple dipped in honey at the Jewish New Year. This shapes my ultimate wish on this Rosh Hashana: that Jews will respond to antisemitism by combining a relentless push against antisemites with an even more energetic pull toward their tradition in all its manifestations. That they will respond by demonstrating pride in who they are and solidarity with others facing persecution for who they are. That it will be shaped by a sincere accounting of the beauty and power and wisdom of Judaism and its values. That this can serve as a model to other groups who face relentless hatred.” [NYTimes]
🤔 Oslo’s Lessons: In Foreign Policy, Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, analyzes the reasons for the failure of the Oslo Accords and his main takeaways from it. “On paper, the Oslo Accords seemed logical and compelling. Territory would be transferred gradually to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for its assumption of security responsibilities. As we’ll see, the perverse dance between the occupier and the occupied would doom this approach. But it might have survived had the two sides been willing to make it clear from the outset what final outcome the interim period was supposed to produce, and then taken mutually reciprocal actions on the ground to prepare for it.” [FP]
🇸🇦🇺🇸🇮🇱 Deal Discussion: Former Israeli National Security Advisor Eyal Hulata, now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, looks at Israeli security concerns around any agreement with Saudi Arabia and the U.S. “What do the Saudis want? First of all, they want to improve their position with the United States, which weakened following a dispute over the policy of exporting oil and cooperation with China, not to mention the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Saudi Arabia is interested in advanced weaponry and a defense pact with the United States to defend it from Iran, and Riyadh also aims to develop a civilian nuclear program with a complete fuel cycle that includes mining uranium, conversion, enrichment, and activating reactors. Saudi Arabia claims, and rightfully from its standpoint, that after the nuclear deal of 2015 gave Iran the right to a fuel cycle, it [was] also entitled to a fuel cycle. The Saudis warn that if they don’t receive this from the United States, it will receive it from China. If Saudi Arabia, God forbid, were to receive a complete fuel cycle, this means it would potentially be able to build a clandestine program and develop a nuclear weapon. Moreover, many other countries would likely demand to follow in its footsteps – leading to a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. Israel cannot confuse its priorities. Normalization with Saudi Arabia cannot come at the expense of preventing the nuclearization of countries in the region.” [FDD]
💸 Philanthropy Problems: The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s Maria Di Mento interviews nonprofit leaders who say that the philanthropy world still lacks awareness of the threat of antisemitism as a threat to society as a whole. “‘Primarily, funding is going to Jewish organizations from Jewish funders, and the analysis tells us that actually this is a threat, and it’s a physical threat to people of all backgrounds,’ says Shayna Triebwasser, who leads the Righteous Persons Foundation, a nonprofit that works to reduce antisemitism and racialized hate. She points to the antisemitic ties of the gunmen in the 2022 mass shooting at a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery store and this year’s attack at a Dallas-area mall. ‘The victims of those shootings, it’s not as if those were all Jewish bodies; they weren’t. We are not funding as if that’s the case.’ Amy Spitalnick, now CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, knows firsthand how challenging it can be to raise money to fight anti-Jewish hate. In her previous job, she led the civil-rights group Integrity First for America, which filed a federal lawsuit, Sines v. Kessler, against the white supremacists and other groups responsible for the violence that erupted at the Charlottesville rally. Both individual donors and foundations were slow to respond as she raised money for the lawsuit, even as acts of violence proliferated.” [Philanthropy]
🇮🇷 Prisoner-Taking: The Wall Street Journal editorial board weighs in on the Biden administration’s prisoner-exchange agreement with Iran. “We’d feel better about this deal if the Biden Administration had negotiated from a position of strength. But the White House has been eager to give the Iranians what they want, such as reviving the failed nuclear deal. The Iranians should have at least come clean about retired FBI agent Robert Levinson, who was abducted in Iran in 2007 and whose body still hasn’t been returned though he is thought to have died in Iranian custody. The worst result is that this ransom will encourage more hostage-taking. Iran has profited from grabbing these Americans, and the U.S. has given other nations no reason to fear doing the same. Until the U.S. demonstrates that snatching Americans will have significant costs, the world’s rogues will keep taking them.” [WSJ]
Around the Web
🎤 Pelosi’s Play: Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), formerly the House majority leader, declined to answer a question from CNN’s Anderson Cooper about whether Vice President Kamala Harris is President Joe Biden’s best option for a running mate in 2024.
👋 End of an Era: Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) announced that he will not seek reelection next year, and called for “a new generation of leaders” whom he said will have “to make the decisions that will shape the world they will be living in.”
❌ Crossed Signals: Gen. Mark Milley, formerly the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told CNN that he did not recommend an attack on Iran, pushing back against claims to the contrary by both former President Donald Trump and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.
✋ Friendly Fire: House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) laid out a plan for passing legislation to keep the government funded after the end of September, but immediately ran into new roadblocks from right-wingers in his caucus.
⛳ In the Rough: Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) issued a subpoena for the Saudi Public Investment Fund’s U.S. subsidiary in an effort to obtain documents related to LIV Golf’s agreement with the PGA Tour.
🚑 Plane Fatality: The husband of Rep. Mary Peltola (D-AK), Eugene “Buzzy” Peltola Jr., was killed in a plane crash in Alaska.
✖️ Isaacson on Musk: New York magazine’s Shawn McCreesh interviews Walter Isaacson about his recently released book on X owner Elon Musk.
☕ Coffee Break: Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz is stepping down from the company’s board of directors.
🖼️ Schiele Seizures: Investigators in New York seized three Egon Schiele paintings that had been displayed in museums in Pittsburgh, Ohio and Chicago and had belonged to a Jewish art collector who was killed in Dachau, with the intent to return the art to the man’s surviving heirs.
📚 A Closed Book: Authorities in Argentina raided and closed down a publishing house that printed and distributed antisemitic and Nazi content.
🇺🇸🇧🇭 Move Toward Manama: The U.S. and Bahrain inked an agreement deepening the U.S. security commitment to Manama.
🌐 Changes in Attitude, Changes in Latitude: The U.S. plans to redirect some of its foreign military financing allocated for Egypt to Taiwan over Egypt’s failure to make progress on human rights.
😡 Abbas Backlash: Palestinian politicians slammed an open letter signed by over 100 Palestinian academics, activists and artists denouncing antisemitic remarks made recently by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
🇸🇦 Conflict of Interest: Major Western defense companies are reconsidering business agreements with Saudi Arabia largely because of the concerns around engagement with Russian and Chinese entities.
➡️ Envoy Appointments: Israel’s Foreign Ministry, in a round of new appointments, named Michal Cotler Wunsh and Fleur Hassan-Nahoum, respectively, special envoy for combating antisemitism and special envoy for innovation.
🪧 Draft Demonstration: Hundreds of young Haredim blocked traffic and light rail tracks in Jerusalem yesterday as they demonstrated against the military draft following the arrest of a youth for draft dodging.
🇲🇦 Concerning the King: The New York Times explores how the recent earthquake in Morocco has put the spotlight on the country’s King Mohammed VI, and the mystery that shrouds many aspects of his life.
💥 Gaza Blast: Five Palestinians were killed along the Israel-Gaza border when a bomb intended to be sent into Israel exploded prematurely, according to the IDF.
🕯️ Remembering: Journalist and historian Peter Newman died at 94.
Pic of the Day
🍏🍯 Keeping the Faith: In The New York Times, Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt expresses hope that members of the Jewish community will respond to hate by embracing their faith ahead of the Rosh Hashanah holiday. “We need, to borrow an old phrase, to accentuate the positive among our diverse cultures, and shine a light on how Jews, and anyone confronting persecution, live rather than how they suffer. We need to embrace approaches that are Jewish by tradition yet universal in their application: greeting each new moment with a prayer, gathering for each meal with a note of gratitude, reveling in the dynamic facets of our faiths not out of fear, but joy — whether it’s a festival in Djerba or a weekly worship service or an apple dipped in honey at the Jewish New Year. This shapes my ultimate wish on this Rosh Hashana: that Jews will respond to antisemitism by combining a relentless push against antisemites with an even more energetic pull toward their tradition in all its manifestations. That they will respond by demonstrating pride in who they are and solidarity with others facing persecution for who they are. That it will be shaped by a sincere accounting of the beauty and power and wisdom of Judaism and its values. That this can serve as a model to other groups who face relentless hatred.” [NYTimes]
🤔 Oslo’s Lessons: In Foreign Policy, Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, analyzes the reasons for the failure of the Oslo Accords and his main takeaways from it. “On paper, the Oslo Accords seemed logical and compelling. Territory would be transferred gradually to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for its assumption of security responsibilities. As we’ll see, the perverse dance between the occupier and the occupied would doom this approach. But it might have survived had the two sides been willing to make it clear from the outset what final outcome the interim period was supposed to produce, and then taken mutually reciprocal actions on the ground to prepare for it.” [FP]
🇸🇦🇺🇸🇮🇱 Deal Discussion: Former Israeli National Security Advisor Eyal Hulata, now a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, looks at Israeli security concerns around any agreement with Saudi Arabia and the U.S. “What do the Saudis want? First of all, they want to improve their position with the United States, which weakened following a dispute over the policy of exporting oil and cooperation with China, not to mention the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Saudi Arabia is interested in advanced weaponry and a defense pact with the United States to defend it from Iran, and Riyadh also aims to develop a civilian nuclear program with a complete fuel cycle that includes mining uranium, conversion, enrichment, and activating reactors. Saudi Arabia claims, and rightfully from its standpoint, that after the nuclear deal of 2015 gave Iran the right to a fuel cycle, it [was] also entitled to a fuel cycle. The Saudis warn that if they don’t receive this from the United States, it will receive it from China. If Saudi Arabia, God forbid, were to receive a complete fuel cycle, this means it would potentially be able to build a clandestine program and develop a nuclear weapon. Moreover, many other countries would likely demand to follow in its footsteps – leading to a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. Israel cannot confuse its priorities. Normalization with Saudi Arabia cannot come at the expense of preventing the nuclearization of countries in the region.” [FDD]
💸 Philanthropy Problems: The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s Maria Di Mento interviews nonprofit leaders who say that the philanthropy world still lacks awareness of the threat of antisemitism as a threat to society as a whole. “‘Primarily, funding is going to Jewish organizations from Jewish funders, and the analysis tells us that actually this is a threat, and it’s a physical threat to people of all backgrounds,’ says Shayna Triebwasser, who leads the Righteous Persons Foundation, a nonprofit that works to reduce antisemitism and racialized hate. She points to the antisemitic ties of the gunmen in the 2022 mass shooting at a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery store and this year’s attack at a Dallas-area mall. ‘The victims of those shootings, it’s not as if those were all Jewish bodies; they weren’t. We are not funding as if that’s the case.’ Amy Spitalnick, now CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, knows firsthand how challenging it can be to raise money to fight anti-Jewish hate. In her previous job, she led the civil-rights group Integrity First for America, which filed a federal lawsuit, Sines v. Kessler, against the white supremacists and other groups responsible for the violence that erupted at the Charlottesville rally. Both individual donors and foundations were slow to respond as she raised money for the lawsuit, even as acts of violence proliferated.” [Philanthropy]
🇮🇷 Prisoner-Taking: The Wall Street Journal editorial board weighs in on the Biden administration’s prisoner-exchange agreement with Iran. “We’d feel better about this deal if the Biden Administration had negotiated from a position of strength. But the White House has been eager to give the Iranians what they want, such as reviving the failed nuclear deal. The Iranians should have at least come clean about retired FBI agent Robert Levinson, who was abducted in Iran in 2007 and whose body still hasn’t been returned though he is thought to have died in Iranian custody. The worst result is that this ransom will encourage more hostage-taking. Iran has profited from grabbing these Americans, and the U.S. has given other nations no reason to fear doing the same. Until the U.S. demonstrates that snatching Americans will have significant costs, the world’s rogues will keep taking them.” [WSJ]
Birthdays
Artistic gymnast, she represented Israel at the 2020 Summer Olympics, Lihie Raz turns 20…
Actor, writer and director, first known for his role as Chekov in the original “Star Trek” television series, Walter Koenig turns 87… Basketball coach enshrined in the Hall of Fame, Lawrence Harvey (Larry) Brown turns 83… Executive chairman of MDC Holdings and the primary supporter of the Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem, Larry A. Mizel turns 81… Partner at San Diego-based CaseyGerry, Frederick A. Schenk turns 70… Mayor of Miami-Dade County, Daniella Levine Cava turns 68… Plastic surgeon and television personality, Dr. Terry Dubrow turns 65… Chairman and chief investment officer of The Electrum Group, he is the world’s largest private collector of Rembrandt paintings, Thomas Scott Kaplan turns 61… Founder of Mindchat Research, Amy Kauffman… Founder of Vermont-based Kidrobot and Ello, Paul Budnitz turns 56… British secretary of state for defense starting two weeks ago, he was a national president of BBYO, Grant Shapps turns 55… President of Strauss Media Strategies, during the Clinton administration he became the first-ever White House radio director, Richard Strauss turns 54…
Associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, Ketanji Brown Jackson turns 53… Managing director at Gasthalter, he is also a past president of the Young Israel of New Rochelle, Mark A. Semer… Comedian, television actor, writer and producer, Elon Gold turns 53… Managing partner of Berke Farah LLP, Elliot S. Berke… Senior White House reporter for Bloomberg, Jennifer Jacobs… CEO of San Francisco-based Jewish LearningWorks, Dana Sheanin… Public relations professional, Courtney Cohen Flantzer… Governor of Florida and 2024 presidential candidate, Ron DeSantis turns 45… Israeli-American actress, Hani Furstenberg turns 44… Artist, photographer and educator, Marisa Scheinfeld turns 43… Staff writer at The Atlantic, Russell Berman… Co-founder and co-executive director of the Indivisible movement, Leah Greenberg… Los Angeles-based attorney working as a senior contracts specialist at Sony Pictures Entertainment, Roxana Pourshalimi… New York Times reporter covering national politics, Matt Flegenheimer… EVP at Voyager Global Mobility, Jeremy Moskowitz… Founder and owner of ARA Capital, a British firm with holdings in e-commerce and energy, Arkadiy Abramovich turns 30… MSW candidate at Yeshiva University, Julia Savel…
