Vice President JD Vance warned pro-Israel advocates against seeing Israel and the U.S. as always aligned and cautioned against conflating criticism of the Israeli government with antisemitism, saying that “if everything is Jew hatred, then nothing is Jew hatred.”

In an episode of Christian conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey’s podcast podcast released on Friday, Vance said that “pro-Israel people in the United States make two critical mistakes. One … is not delineating between America’s interests and Israeli interests, because they’re not always the same.”

“But the second is conflating criticism of a particular government with Jew hatred. Because if everything is Jew hatred, then nothing is Jew hatred,” he continued. “And we have to be very careful not to, you know, in order to serve a certain foreign policy objective, try to criticize somebody as antisemitic when they’re just not.”

Asked by Stuckey if Israel has an “outsized influence in the U.S.,” Vance said, “I certainly think that Israel, like a lot of other countries, tries to influence American politics. I sort of take that as a given. And what I think is that American leaders have to be very careful that when we pursue something, we’re doing it for America’s best interest and not for any other country’s best interest.”

Vance added that the late conservative influencer Charlie Kirk “was very worried about Israeli influence in American politics. He also really disliked antisemitism.”

Stuckey raised the “the obsession that some people have, I would say on the right, with blaming all of their problems on Israel, all of their disagreements with Trump on some secret Israeli influence,” which she said she sees “more prominently on the right than I see the true ‘Israel first’ kind of obsession that you seem to be describing.”

“I see both, and I think both are bad,” Vance responded. But he said he’s “particularly sensitive” to what he views as the elevation of Israel’s interests because he’s “been defending the president’s decision to end the Iran [war], and I find often the arguments are, ‘Well, Israel doesn’t think this is good, therefore it’s bad.’ And my reaction is: Israel’s opinions matter, but fundamentally they are separate.”

“But you’re right. I mean, there are certainly people who take every frustration with the Trump administration, every policy disagreement becomes because of Israel, and that is absolutely wrong. And again, I think that that is one of those things that can bleed into some very dark places,” he continued.

Vance also defended the emerging deal with Iran, prior to departing over the weekend for direct negotiations with Tehran’s representatives in Switzerland. “You do still have terrorist elements within the regime, but you also have pragmatic elements within the regime who are actually affirmatively trying to have a better relationship with the United States,” he said.

Far-left antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker, replying to a video of Vance’s comments about criticism of the Israeli government and antisemitism, wrote on X, “I GOT BANNED FROM THE UK FOR SAYING THIS VERBATIM BTW.”

Amid the rise of a DSA-aligned mayoral candidate in the city, a senior Jewish community leader in Washington, D.C., excoriated the Democratic Socialists of America as an “evil” organization committed to driving Jews out of society.

Speaking on a webinar with other Washington-area Jewish leaders on Tuesday, Ron Halber, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington, stridently criticized the far-left group.

“I think they’re a fringe, radical, antisemitic organization, and I happen to even think they’re evil,” Halber said. “They are trying to do in America what [the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement] seems to do internationally, which is to make being Jewish unacceptable in polite society.”

He said that the group wants to make Jews feel “isolated” and force them to “renounce Zionism” and their connection to Israel in order to participate in the political process. Antisemitism is “core to their belief,” he continued.

Halber described the activist group as emboldened and energized during the second Trump administration — as numerous DSA-aligned candidates make gains in local and national elections — and said that the Jewish community “should view DSA with alarm, because they are having a radical impact.”

And, he added, the Jewish community should be “very, very wary of political candidates who go out and seek their endorsement and who wish to affiliate.”

The Metro DC DSA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Halber said it’s the responsibility of Jewish organizations to come together with allies to expose the DSA as “the fringe of American society that most people in America would be repulsed by.”

Tali Cohen, the Anti-Defamation League’s Washington regional director, said on the webinar that she has been “astonished by the rhetoric coming out of the D.C. DSA chapter.” 

Cohen said the group is attempting to “isolat[e] the Jewish community through exclusionary policies” — requiring endorsees to cut ties with “the overwhelming majority of organized Jewish community institutions” — and has “embrace[d] antisemitism as an organizational orthodoxy” through its embrace of anti-Zionism.

“If you read DSA’s platform, they have disproportionately and overwhelmingly chosen to focus on the world’s only Jewish state,” she continued. “The selective focus can suggest that something else is at work beyond just policy concerns.”

Cohen also raised concerns about the group’s opposition to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism and its efforts to defund the D.C. police, a project she said endangers the Jewish community.

The event comes following a high-profile clash between Jewish communal groups and the Washington DSA chapter over its endorsement questionnaire for the city’s mayoral race that required candidates to pledge to refrain from engaging with “Zionist lobby groups.”

Mayoral candidate Janeese Lewis George, a DSA member endorsed by the group, said in response to the questionnaire that she would not attend events “promoting Zionism and apartheid.”

Alan Ronkin, the regional director of the American Jewish Committee in Washington, and ADL experts also spoke on the webinar.

Dan Osborn, a Democratic-aligned independent candidate running for Senate in Nebraska, received and touted an endorsement from an anti-Israel group.

The group, A New Policy PAC, is a campaign and lobbying group that aims to alter U.S. policy toward Israel, in part by electing candidates critical of the U.S.-Israel relationship. The group’s endorsements — just nine so far — include high-profile far-left critics of Israel, including congressional candidates Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, Graham Platner in Maine, Kat Abughazaleh in Illinois, Robert Peters in Illinois, Frederick Haynes III in Texas and Adam Hamawy in New Jersey.

The PAC was founded by Josh Paul, a former State Department official who left government in protest of U.S. support for Israel after Oct. 7, 2023, and since joined the anti-Israel group DAWN and become a vocal critic of Israel.

A New Policy’s advocacy arm has accused Israel of genocide, urges cutting off and conditioning U.S. aid to Israel; supported efforts to block certain arms transfers to Israel; urges direct American support for the Palestinian Authority, which is currently illegal under U.S. law; calls for eliminating barries to support for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency; and opposes a host of pro-Israel legislation.

The group also opposes the Antisemitism Awareness Act and the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism.

Paul also argued that the U.S.-Israel relationship is not in U.S. interests, and said “AIPAC puts Israel first, and makes our own elected officials do the same.”

Osborn said in a statement last month he was “happy to receive the endorsement of A New Policy PAC.”

“We deserve a foreign policy that honors the decency and moral center of the American people,” Osborn, who has not previously spoken extensively about Israel policy, said. “Right now our priorities are out of whack. Americans go bankrupt from unplanned hospital visits while their tax dollars pay for bombs that knock over hospitals in other countries.”

“‘Made in the USA’ should be a point of pride, not a point of shame when it’s written on bombs that kill kids,” he continued. “Every child born in this world deserves a shot at a future. That belief should be at the heart of our foreign policy. That’s why I’m proud to stand with A New Policy PAC in that calling.”

Asked by Jewish Insider about the endorsement and the group’s positions, Osborn told JI, “I will always stand against anti-Semitism, and completely agree we cannot allow a nuclear Iran.” 

“Right now, I do have concerns about the United States participating in an unpopular conflict with Iran that may draw us into another open-ended, costly war in the Middle East during a moment where large swaths of our citizens, including veterans, can’t afford groceries or medicine,” Osborn continued.

A New Policy’s co-founder, Tariq Habash, said in a statement that Osborn “deeply understands both the economic and moral weight of our foreign policy; he knows that ‘Made in the USA’ should be a source of pride, not a label on weapons used against Palestinian families. In Washington, Dan will be a fearless advocate for Americans and our values.”

Osborn, who is making his second run for the seat, with tacit support from Democrats, has said little about his views on the U.S.-Israel relationship.

This week, he criticized the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, saying “I think there’s something else going on.” In a 2024 debate, he expressed support for Israel, according to a local news channel.

“Hamas is a terrorist group and Dan thinks Israel’s response [to the Oct. 7 attacks] was justified. At this point, Dan is concerned about mounting casualties and thinks America should do whatever it can to assist in bringing about a resolution and resume the long, hard road to stability,” an Osborn spokesperson told The American Prospect in April 2024.

Running in 2024 against Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE), Osborn lost by seven points in a state President Donald Trump carried by more than 20 points. He now faces Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE). An early February poll by Osborn’s campaign shows them essentially tied.

A new super PAC launched by aides to President Donald Trump aimed at unseating Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) placed its first ads in a $1 million blitz in Kentucky targeting the isolationist lawmaker for his refusal to support key parts of the president’s agenda, Jewish Insider has learned.

The Kentucky MAGA PAC was launched earlier this month by Chris LaCivita, who co-managed Trump’s 2024 campaign, and Tony Fabrizio, the president’s pollster, with the goal of defeating Massie in the GOP primary for his House seat next May. LaCivita told Axios at the time that the PAC would spend “whatever it takes” to defeat the Kentucky lawmaker.

Trump and those in his orbit have been discussing the idea of primarying Massie for months, as the congressman criticized the president’s reconciliation package and his approach to foreign policy. Most recently, Massie decried Trump’s decision to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities as part of Israel’s military operation to destroy the regime’s nuclear program as unconstitutional. 

The ad, which opens with the question, “What happened to Thomas Massie?” criticizes Massie for voting against Trump-backed legislation on sex reassignment surgery for minors, tax cuts, border security funding and his opposition to the Iran strikes.

“After Trump obliterated Iran’s nuclear weapons program, Massie sided with Democrats and the Ayatollah,” the ad’s narrator intones. “Let’s fire Thomas Massie.”

The ad superimposes Massie’s face and his tweet calling the strikes unconstitutional next to pictures of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).

Massie is among the most outspoken Republican critics of the U.S.-Israel relationship in the House, and consistently opposes U.S. aid to Israel and nearly all measures to combat antisemitism.

He’s also been repeatedly condemned by colleagues on both sides of the aisle and Jewish leaders in his home state for antisemitism, often over comments about AIPAC and other pro-Israel advocates.

Thus far, Massie does not appear to have any serious primary challengers. 

“Massie sided with Democrats and the Ayatollah.”

President Trump’s anti-Thomas Massie SuperPAC is out with its first ad against the Kentucky Congressman. pic.twitter.com/OwpfP3P6ql

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) June 26, 2025

The Republican Jewish Coalition said earlier this year it would join Trump in backing a primary challenger to Massie. “The RJC is proud to join with President Trump to defeat Massie,” the group’s spokesperson, Sam Markstein, said Thursday, when asked about the new PAC.

Past primary attempts against Massie — a Trump antagonist dating back to his first term — have fallen short.

Though it did not make a direct attempt to challenge him in his primary race last year, where he faced no serious competition, the AIPAC-affiliated United Democracy Project super PAC spent several hundred thousand dollars on ads criticizing Massie.

Massie was seen as a potential Senate candidate to run for Sen. Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) seat, but hasn’t yet announced any plans to run. He’s also been floated as a Kentucky gubernatorial candidate.

The RJC pledged it would spend an “unlimited” budget to oppose a potential Massie Senate run.