Daily Kickoff
Good Tuesday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we have the scoop on a call from more than 100 members of Congress urging the Biden administration to take action against Hamas’ regional enablers, and talk to GOP donors about former President Donald Trump’s upcoming appearance at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual gathering. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Walter Russell Mead, Yair Rosenberg and Karen Sasahara.
President Joe Biden will travel to Israel and Jordan tomorrow, the White House announced last night. More on his trip below.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is traveling to Israel today for a “solidarity mission,” she announced, which will include meetings with Israeli officials and individuals from the communities targeted in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks.
In addition to Hochul, who represents the largest Jewish community outside of Israel, Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla, who leads U.S. Central Command, arrived in the country earlier today for an unannounced visit to meet with top Israeli military officials.
The Knesset opened its winter session on Monday with a moment of silence for the over 1,400 people murdered by Hamas and, in an unusual step, a prayer for IDF soldiers led by Yom Kippur War hero and former MK Avigdor Kahalani. The first plenary meeting after a three-month recess was repeatedly interrupted by an air raid siren, as Hamas launched rockets at Jerusalem, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports.
The meeting was entirely focused on the war, both in speeches and, in keeping with the emergency coalition agreement, in legislation. The legislature’s first vote was on postponing the municipal elections meant to be held across the country at the end of this month to January.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog focused on the united front being put up by Israelis following the Oct. 7 attacks: “Everyone talks about complexity, but this moment is not a complex moment. There is good — total good — and there is total evil. There is light and there is darkness. The entire nation — all of it — stands today behind the forces of light, behind the IDF and our security forces, while they are defending our land and risking their lives with the goal of destroying total evil and darkness, with God’s help.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu laid out the goals of the war: “total victory over Hamas, demolishing its regime and removing its threat to the State of Israel once and for all.”
With regard to anger at his government over intelligence lapses and its slow response to victims’ needs, Netanyahu promised that “we will investigate everything to the end, and we have already implemented lessons learned immediately. But now we are focused on one goal: to unite our forces and rush forward to victory.”
Netanyahu compared Hamas to ISIS and the Nazis, relaying a message to “our friends in the enlightened world: Our war is your war. If we do not stand together, they will reach you, too.”
As for Iran and Hezbollah, Netanyahu said: “Don’t test us in the north. Don’t repeat the mistake you already made, because today the price you will pay will be much higher.”
In his speech, Opposition Leader Yair Lapid was optimistic that Israel would come out stronger from this tragedy: “Look back at our history. Every time we had to find the strength within us, we found it. Every time we faced destruction and blood and fire and pillars of smoke, we chose to rebuild and from the destruction we built a better world.”
“Our goal is not to end the war and go back. Our goal is to win the war and be better than what we were. Our goal is to bring back the trust between this house and the citizens of Israel,” Lapid said.
Stateside, amid fears of increased antisemitism domestically following the Hamas attack on Israel, the FBI released its hate crimes data for 2022, showing another drastic increase in antisemitic incidents. Last year, 1,122 hate crimes were reported, up from 817 the year before — even with nearly 25% of agencies participating in the FBI’s data collection program not submitting any hate crimes reports. Anti-Jewish hate crimes again comprised more than half of all religion-based hate crimes nationwide.
The vast majority (775 reports) were for property crimes including vandalism, 358 were for intimidation, 103 were for simple assault and 38 were for aggravated assault.
gaza war: day 11
U.S., Israel to develop plan to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza

Israel and the United States have agreed to develop a plan that will allow humanitarian aid from donor countries and multilateral organizations to reach civilians in Gaza, Secretary of State Tony Blinken, who is in the region, said in a statement on Monday. Briefing journalists on Tuesday morning, IDF international spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said that there is no humanitarian cease-fire and that all crossings from Israel into the Gaza Strip remained closed. “Changes could happen quickly, so we’ll see where we are later,” he said, Jewish Insider’s Ruth Marks Eglash reports.
Concerns: Blinken, who confirmed that President Joe Biden will visit Israel on Wednesday, said there were some concerns the aid might be seized or destroyed by Hamas but that the U.S. will work with Israel on devising a way to prevent that from happening. If it does, he said, “we’ll be the first to condemn it.”
Hostage video: Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that carried out the brutal attack in Israel’s southern communities on Oct. 7, released for the first time a short video of one of the Israeli hostages captured in the attack, in which more than 1,400 people were killed. In the clip, the young woman is seen receiving medical treatment for what appears to be a broken arm and asks to be repatriated to Israel.