Daily Kickoff
Good Friday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we report on Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s withdrawal from a conference over its organizers’ praise of Oct. 7, report on a new travel authorization program for foreign visitors to Israel and talk to experts about how Oct. 7 and the subsequent war in Gaza has enabled Iran to advance its nuclear program. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Mike Rogers, Rep. Rob Menendez and Michael Makovsky.
For less-distracted reading over the weekend, browse this week’s edition of The Weekly Print, a curated print-friendly PDF featuring a selection of recent Jewish Insider and eJewishPhilanthropy stories, including: ‘Opposite of inclusive’: A look inside the increasingly hostile environment for Jewish therapists; L.A.’s Academy Museum (finally) acknowledges Jewish founders of ‘Hollywoodland’; How the ICC, ICJ rulings could have deeper, long-term implications for Israel. Print the latest edition here.
A newly released Pew Research Center poll of Israelis found widespread support for the country’s war against Hamas, with nearly three-quarters of respondents (73%) expressing satisfaction with the country’s military response or saying that it hasn’t gone far enough.
At the same time, support for President Joe Biden in Israel — which peaked in the immediate aftermath of Oct. 7, when the president visited in solidarity — has been on the decline, with a 54% majority of Israeli Jews (and 60% of Israelis overall) expressing disapproval over how he’s handled the war between Israel and Hamas.
Jewish Israelis broadly view the U.S. positively: 77% have a favorable view of the country, including 43% who say they have a very favorable opinion. But among Israeli Arabs, views of the U.S. are at an all-time low, dropping 15 points since 2023.
Israelis are generally optimistic about the direction of the war, even though Hamas hasn’t yet been militarily defeated. Over two-thirds of Israelis believe the war will either “definitely succeed” (40%) or “probably succeed” (27%). Among Israeli Jews, 76% express confidence over the outcome of the war.
And over half of Israelis (53%) said they’re optimistic about the future of Israel’s overall national security, with only 28% expressing pessimism.
There’s a general consensus among Israeli Jews that Israel will need to have some role in a postwar Gaza. A 50% majority said Israel should “govern the Gaza strip” after the war is over, and there was no consensus alternative among those who disagreed. Just 12% said they preferred the Palestinian Authority without Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), 6% said they preferred PA control with Abu Mazen, and 14% said “the people that live there should decide.” (Just 3% of Israeli Arabs wanted an Israeli presence in postwar Gaza, by contrast.)
There’s deep pessimism across the ideological spectrum that peace is possible with their Palestinian neighbors. Only 19% of Jewish Israelis said they thought peaceful coexistence with a Palestinian state is possible — down 13 points since 2023. Israeli Arabs were somewhat more hopeful, with 49% believing it’s possible.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s job approval rating in the poll, which was conducted between March and April, stood at a lowly 41%, with 58% disapproving.
But a new poll, conducted by Channel 12 in Israel, found that for the first time since the Oct. 7 attacks, Netanyahu led rival and war cabinet member Benny Gantz as respondents’ preferred choice for prime minister.
Gantz held an 18-point lead over Netanyahu last December among the same pollster; in the new snap survey, Netanyahu has emerged with a six-point edge.”The simple passage of time has been gradually working to Netanyahu’s advantage,” Times of Israel founding editor David Horovitz wrote, analyzing the new data.
On the campaign trail: The AIPAC-affiliated United Democracy Project is launching a digital advertisement today narrated by Elisha Wiesel, the son of famed Holocaust survivor and activist Elie Wiesel, blasting Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) as an “antisemite,” Jewish Insider‘s Marc Rod reports.
In the ad, which features footage from the Oct. 7 attacks, Wiesel says, “My father taught that antisemitism begins with lies and conspiracy theories and it ends with violence that consumes any society that tolerates it. So I ask you, will you stand up to Jamaal Bowman’s likes and conspiracy theories? Or will you sit by silently?”
Wiesel says in the ad that Bowman “repeated Hamas lies” denying the Oct. 7 atrocities, and criticizes him for co-sponsoring a resolution referring to the founding of Israel as the Nakba — all while voting against a resolution condemning the Hamas attack.
scoop
Elizabeth Warren withdraws from Palestinian conference over organizers’ Oct. 7 praise

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is backing out of appearing at a conference next week for an organization whose leaders have expressed support for Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and have ties to U.S.-designated terrorist groups, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs and Lahav Harkov have learned. The Palestine Digital Activist Forum is a two-day online event that aims to “empower and enrich Palestinian digital activity,” with sessions this year that include “The Palestinian Telecommunications Sector: Between War, Destruction, Innovation and Artificial Intelligence” and “AI in Wartime: Gaza, Automated Warfare, Surveillance and the Battle of Narratives.”
Nixed speech:Warren’s two-minute videotaped speech, which her team tells JI has since been canceled, was titled “How do we protect the public and develop ethical artificial intelligence?” A spokesperson in Warren’s office said, “Senator Warren will not participate in the digital forum. Her office has received a large volume of claims about individuals associated with the event, and, although we do not assume any of the claims are true, we have not had capacity to sift through it all and have decided to focus our time and energy opposing [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s unfolding catastrophe in Gaza in other ways.”
Forum focus: The forum is hosted by 7amleh (pronounced “hamleh”), an organization that “advocates for Palestinians’ digital rights.” A large part of its advocacy efforts push back against Jews’ and Israelis’ efforts to fight antisemitism on social media. The organization has campaigned against Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) policies against incitement to violence, as well as the use of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism, calling them an attack on free speech.