James Fishback, the GOP candidate for Florida governor whom critics call “openly racist” and “openly antisemitic,” ostensibly sits at the opposite end of the political spectrum from the likes of Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan.

But the far-right and far-left politicians share more than just an aversion to Israel — they also overlap in donors, Jewish Insider has found. 

As a candidate, Fishback has embraced and celebrated neo-Nazi podcaster Nick Fuentes’ “groyper” movement, propagated the “white genocide” and “great replacement” conspiracy theories, told a Black Floridian they should be lynched and repeatedly taunted Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) — his rival to replace Gov. Ron DeSantis — over his race. The radical right candidate has also called the Western Wall “stupid,” referred to fast food as “goyslop,” promised Tucker Carlson he would dump the Sunshine State’s holdings in Israeli bonds, blamed the Iran war on AIPAC and released an ad vowing that no one would be “convicted of antisemitism” for criticizing the Jewish state under his leadership.

But his campaign has proven a magnet for donors to progressive candidates, who have poured tens of thousands of dollars into a PAC supporting his election.

Among the 27 donors to give the maximum $3,000 contribution to Fishback’s bid for Tallahassee is New York-based philanthropist and financier Amed Khan. A longtime associate of the Clinton family and contributor to former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, as well as to the Democratic National Committee, Khan’s public commentary and political giving has pivoted leftward since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel.

Besides maxing out to Fishback, this cycle the investment banker and Quincy Institute board member has kicked $7,000 to former Maine Senate nominee Graham Platner, the progressive Democrat whose tirades against “oligarchs” and “the establishment” — not to mention his rhetoric on Israel — made him a favorite of the online left before a rape allegation derailed his campaign. In March, Khan donated the maximum $5,000 to Peace, Accountability, and Leadership PAC, an arm of the Institute for Middle East Understanding Policy Project, a dark money nonprofit dedicated to advancing pro-Palestinian narratives and candidates.

And just weeks before contributing to the Republican Fishback in February, Khan gave $3,500 to Gaza flotilla activist Greg Stoker, who is running against Rep. John Carter (R-TX) and Democratic candidate Justin Early on the Green Party line. On the same day he cut a check to the far-right Floridian, Khan donated $3,500 to another Green House hopeful: former Gaza Humanitarian Foundation contractor Anthony Aguilar, who has accused his former employer and the IDF of war crimes.

Khan also gave $3,500 in January to Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), part of a pattern of support for the increasingly anti-Israel lawmaker that stretches back to 2019.

In the 2024 cycle, Khan gave $5,000 to Justice Democrats, and donated smaller amounts to Rep. Summer Lee (D-PA), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and then-Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), all figures linked to the Democratic Socialists of America and the left-wing “Squad” in Congress.

But Khan has also maintained support for more mainstream liberal figures, donating $7,000 in June 2025 to former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bridget Brink’s bid for Congress in Michigan, and $14,000 that March to committees affiliated with Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), a Jewish Democrat who has lately clashed with AIPAC and opposed military aid to Israel. 

Another of Fishback’s max-out donors is similarly a historic backer of Democrats who lately has ventured into supporting figures on the fringes of both parties: Parviz Tayebati, a Port Biscayne-based tech investor. 

Tayebati has donated a total of $19,000 to committees linked to Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and $6,600 to former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), both hard-right figures who have increasingly leaned into an anti-Israel identity toward the end of their tenure. He has also donated $3,500 to a PAC supporting one of Greene’s unsuccessful replacements, former state lawmaker Colton Moore, who once was a firm supporter of Israel but more recently became the lone Republican in the state Senate to oppose adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism.

In May, Tayebati gave $2,000 to Platner and another $1,000 to Effie Phillips-Staley, a left-wing Democrat who picked up an anti-Israel drumbeat in her failed bid to become the Democratic nominee against Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY).

One of the few donors to comment for this story, Tayebati told JI he donated to Fishback after seeing a social media video of him criticizing Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip. However, he called his decision to give money to the candidate “short sighted,” and pleaded ignorance of Fishback’s full views at the time of the donation in January.

“After I found out how extreme and actually antisemitic he is I regretted my support,” Tayebati wrote in a text message, adding that he has changed parties several times in the years since he arrived in the U.S. from Iran. “I am an American citizen and believe anyone who becomes a citizen [in] this country must have their loyalty only to America first and view anyone who is a U.S. citizen but uses their rights and freedom to promote another country as traitors and should be deported.”

Tayebati has also supported a few less extreme candidates, including Dr. Annie Andrews, a Democratic challenger to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC).

Fitting a similar pattern is physician Mohamad Naem of Tampa, Fla., who has given the maximum to Fishback while also donating $7,450 to El-Sayed’s campaign in Michigan, blowing past the $7,000 campaign contribution ceiling. The Senate candidate’s team told JI they would refund the over-the-limit funds, but declined to comment for this piece beyond vowing they had never shared any donor list or had other contact with Fishback. 

A longtime supporter of Tlaib, in late 2023 Naem began also sending cash to her Squad colleagues Lee, Bowman, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and former Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO). Also in the 2024 cycle, he donated $2,000 to Pervez Agwan and $1,000 to Preston Nouri, both left-wing upstarts who made criticism of Israel and AIPAC a central theme in their campaigns.

Last year, he contributed $3,333.34 to the committees of Rep. Andre Carson (D-IN) and $1,500 to Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL), both key backers of legislation that would sever military aid to the Jewish state and of resolutions condemning its actions, while keeping up his support for Omar and Tlaib. 

In recent months, along with donations to El-Sayed, Naem has given smaller amounts to Phillips-Staley and to Eric Yonce, another unsuccessful Israel critic who ran for Congress in Florida.

As with Khan and Tayebati, Naem has made a few donations to candidates supportive of Israel, including Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), Rep. Abe Hamadeh (R-AZ) and Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL). He also gave $1,000 in 2025 to Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), who in June proposed winding down U.S. aid to Israel, although the congressman has aligned his position with that of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But Fishback’s other underwriters have shunned centrists in favor of candidates on the party’s margins. Another of his contributors is Hassan Shibly, who left his position as the head of the Florida chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in 2021 following domestic abuse allegations from his wife. 

On the federal level, Shibly has given this cycle to Aaron Baker, running as a right-wing, anti-Israel alternative to Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) and to Mussab Ali, who challenged Rep. Rob Menendez (D-NJ) as an AIPAC-bashing left-wing insurgent. And beginning in November 2023, Shibly has donated $200 each month to Omar in Minnesota.

In an email to JI, Shibly fiercely disavowed all of Fishback’s controversial stances — save one.

“One of the most significant reasons for my support is his stated position that American taxpayer dollars should be prioritized for the needs of Americans rather than funding foreign governments,” Shibly wrote. “I have been outspoken in opposing continued U.S. funding for the Israeli government’s military campaign in Gaza because I believe Israel has committed genocide against the Palestinian people. Ending or substantially reducing U.S. taxpayer funding for that campaign is an issue of profound moral importance to me.”

Current CAIR-Florida director and attorney Mohammad Mubarak gave $1,000 to Fishback, but at the federal level has given thousands more to El-Sayed, Tlaib, Omar and Carson. Radiologist Nabeel Hamoui gave the GOP gubernatorial contender the full $3,000 allowed under law in May, three months after maxing out to El-Sayed’s Senate campaign. In recent cycles, he’s given to Carson, Omar, Bowman, Lee, Bush and Tlaib. 

Tampa investor Ramsy Dahla gave the maximum to Fishback, but has never donated to a federal official other than Tlaib. Another longtime Tlaib backer from Tampa, Ymad Elabed, appears to have given double the largest legally permitted contribution to Fishback by donating from two separate addresses. 

Meanwhile, another Tampa businessman, Yasin Saad, gave $3,000 to Fishback but has favored Tlaib and recurring Palestinian American congressional candidate Ammar Campa-Najjar at the federal level.

Texas supermarket magnate Salah Nafal is also a member of Fishback’s $3,000 club, even as he’s given strictly to left-wing Israel critics for national offices, including El-Sayed, Platner, Omar and Tlaib, as well as Rep. Analilia Mejia (D-NJ), Michigan democratic socialist Aisha Farooqi and failed Texas congressional candidates Zeeshan Hafeez and Tanya Lloyd.

Meanwhile, Florida First PAC — a state committee dedicated to backing Fishback for governor — picked up a $35,000 contribution in June from Jacksonville law office Farah & Farah. The firm’s founding partner, Eddie Farah, has given $6,000 this cycle to Tlaib while also kicking $2,000 to the committees of Georgia’s Greene. In 2024, he backed Cornel West for president, while also donating to the PAC Counter Coalition, which subsequently ran a small independent expenditure for New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Oil distributor Basem Ali gave Florida First $5,000 in May, nearly a year after he gave to the Tlaib campaign. Ali has given tens of thousands to the Michigan congresswoman over the course of her career, and also supported Omar and Campa-Najjar, though he has also donated to Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), a strong Israel supporter.

Major AI chatbots consistently fail to reject antisemitic inquiries in Persian as effectively as they do in English, according to a report released on Wednesday by the Anti-Defamation League. The group argues the safety flaw has broad implications as millions rely on these platforms to understand conflicts such as the U.S.-Israel war against Iran. 

The report, “Lost in Translation: How AI Chatbots Fail Persian Speakers on Antisemitism,” looked at responses by the most widely-used chatbots — OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude, Google’s Gemini and xAI’s Grok — over several weeks in March, amid the Iran war.

After assessing eight prompts and 800 total responses, researchers identified a “systemic” bias in how AI models process sensitive topics, heavily dependent on the language used. Across the tested chatbots, English responses proved superior to ones in Persian — a major language with over 110 million speakers primarily in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan — in identifying and rejecting antisemitic conspiracy theories.

Persian-language responses frequently hedged or avoided direct answers where English responses were unequivocal, the ADL found. For instance, Gemini’s English answers consistently acknowledged Iran’s role in spreading antisemitism, while its Persian responses softened or deflected the same claims. Several models also failed to recognize antisemitic framing when questions were posed in Persian. Asked whether U.S. behavior toward Iran had been “Jewlike” — a normalized derogatory term in Persian —- models largely engaged with the question as a neutral political inquiry rather than flagging its antisemitic premise.

The report also identified gaps in depth and sourcing between languages. English responses were generally longer, more thoroughly cited and more up-to-date. Gemini’s English answers referenced the 2026 Iran war and U.S. casualties by name, for example, while its Persian responses only described hypothetical future conflicts. Citations were similarly not consistent. ChatGPT supplied close to 300 links in English responses but none in Persian, and even where other models did cite sources, reliability was inconsistent. Grok cited X accounts including a “Star Trek” fan page and one apparently impersonating Ali Khamenei, the late Iranian supreme leader. 

“The gaps we found are not minor inconsistencies, they are systemic failures,” said Daniel Kelley, senior director of the ADL Center for Technology and Society. “When a platform tells a Persian speaker that antisemitism is a matter of ‘blurred boundaries’ while telling an English speaker it is state policy, those are not the same product.”

Kelley called on AI companies “to invest the research and resources necessary to ensure their guardrails work for every person, in every language, and that means starting now.”

While English responses were found to be more conscientious than those in Persian, the ADL raised concerns last year with leading AI developers like Meta and Google regarding antisemitic and anti-Israel biases in English as well. At the time, Meta claimed ADL was using an older model for its study, and not the most current version. 

An ADL spokesperson told Jewish Insider that the study on Persian chatbots used the most recent models at the time of the research. 

Bruce Pearl, the veteran Auburn University men’s basketball coach, said that Vice President JD Vance needs to “make a decision” about his continued association with far-right commentator Tucker Carlson, warning that his support of Vance’s expected 2028 presidential bid will be contingent on the vice president severing ties with the antisemitic podcaster.

The former Auburn coach, who is currently splitting his time between pro-Israel political advocacy and serving as an analyst for TNT and CBS Sports, made the comments in an interview with Jewish Insider on Monday while discussing the rise of right-wing antisemitism and the prominence of Carlson, neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes and other commentators who promote antisemitic ideas within the America First right-wing movement. 

Pearl argued that Carlson and Fuentes “are absolutely enemies of the state. What they’re doing is treasonous, it’s disgusting and it’s not based on fact. It’s based on lies and propaganda and antisemitism. They’re bought and paid for, but they’ve got huge followings.”

“On the right we have taken Tucker Carlson on. He’s been basically kicked out of the White House. You won’t see him at Mar-a-Lago anymore,” Pearl explained. “JD Vance is going to have to make a decision at some point about whether or not he’s going to stay in that camp or not.”

“If he doesn’t stay there and he’s the Republican candidate, I’ll consider voting for him, but if he maintains that connection to that antisemite, I think that’s going to be bad for antisemitism, because he will bring a lot of Tucker Carlsons with him,” he added. “He’ll uplift them. I hope he doesn’t go that route.”

Reached for comment, a Vance spokesperson referred JI to the vice president’s comments in an UnHerd interview in December. Vance told the outlet that “antisemitism and all forms of ethnic hatred have no place in the conservative movement,” though he rejected that the rise in anti-Israel sentiment in the Republican Party was the result of antisemitism.

“What is actually happening is that there is a real backlash to a consensus view in American foreign policy. I think we already had that conversation and [should] not try to shut it down,” Vance said in the interview. “Most Americans aren’t antisemitic. They’re never going to be antisemitic, and I think we should focus on the real debate.”

While Vance has repeatedly denounced Fuentes over the years, he has refused to disavow or distance himself from Carlson, despite the former Fox News host regularly pushing antisemitic conspiracy theories and hosting controversial figures including Fuentes on his podcast. 

The vice president has also condemned antisemitism and argued that it has no place in the GOP, though he has also rejected the notion that Jew hatred is spreading in the conservative movement.

Pearl, who cofounded the Jewish Coaches Association in 2005 and is chairman of the board of directors for the U.S. Israel Education Association (USIEA), maintained his belief that antisemitism is worse on the political left than on the right, pointing to the battle taking place within the conservative movement over the future of the Republican Party’s support for Israel. He argued that the Democratic Party had caved to its leftward fringes, while some in the GOP were still fighting the rise of the antisemitic right. 

“The Democrats had this same issue about 10 years ago. They quit. They bailed on it. Now, it’s taken over the direction of their party,” Pearl said. “The Democrats chose to let [Sen.] Bernie Sanders (I-VT) or [Reps.] Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) or Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) or Ilhan Omar (D-MN) in because they’ve got such a big tent.”

“The Republicans, to their credit — including the president, Sens. [Ted] Cruz (R-TX), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), [House Speaker] Mike Johnson (R-LA), and many others — aren’t having it and are taking this head on,” he added. “President Trump said that Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens aren’t welcome in our tent and he’s right, they’re not. These are Jew-hating, Qatari-bribed podcasters. Yes, there is a battle in the Republican Party. We’re not denying that there’s not a battle, but at least we’re having it.”

While Pearl, a senior fellow at the Trump-aligned America First Policy Institute (AFPI), remained noncommittal on his future support for Vance, the former Auburn coach reiterated his support for President Donald Trump amid his diplomatic efforts with Iran, despite the ongoing negotiations causing alarm among pro-Israel Republicans. 

“I’m optimistic about President Trump and what he’s doing [in the Middle East]. I believe he’s trying as best he can to shift gears because he doesn’t want to be impeached all day, every day,” Pearl said. “We’ve got a chance to keep the House. We’re going to keep the Senate. He’s trying to see if we can put this war on hold, get the economy going again, start reaping the benefits of unleashed oil, see if they can start to get gas prices down and food costs down.”

Pearl predicted that Iran would continue to violate its ongoing ceasefire with the U.S. as part of the 60-day memorandum of understanding, forcing Trump to eventually respond by restarting military operations and abandoning peace talks. 

“We recognize how crazy the Democrats are, and maybe we can maintain what numbers we have on Capitol Hill,” Pearl told JI. “I understand what he’s doing. I think at the end of the day, after the midterms, he’s going to do what he needs to do.”

“The Iranians are gonna continue to show everybody who they are,” he added. “President Trump, after the midterms, is going to save the world.”

Pearl, who declined to run for Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s (R-AL) seat after the outgoing senator announced his bid for Alabama governor last spring, told JI that he was motivated to get more involved in pro-Israel activism despite not seeking public office because he is alarmed the level of antisemitism domestically. 

“What happened to me over the last couple of years is this: I stopped waking up every morning and going to bed every night thinking about how to beat Kentucky and win an SEC championship, and I started waking up and going to bed thinking about our country beginning to see this rising antisemitism that I had never seen before,” Pearl said. “I realized that the SEC is no longer my opponent. People that hate this country and people that hate Israel, those are my opponents.”

“I’m less concerned about Israel’s survival than I am about what I’m seeing in this country,” he continued. “People say: don’t talk about religion and politics. They say it all the time. Well, as a result, we don’t know how to talk about religion and politics.”

In addition to releasing an essay for AFPI in February defending Trump’s decision to launch the war in Iran as an “America First” approach, Pearl said he has appeared at 76 pro-Israel events across the country since January, connecting with as many Republican and pro-Israel political operatives and speaking to as many young Americans as possible as he looks to increase his visibility as a political activist. 

He told JI he planned to assess at the end of the year his next professional steps. He said he “loves” his work with USIEA, which involves leading a $3 million annual fundraising effort, and noted that the House speaker offered support for Israel asserting full sovereignty over the West Bank — which Pearl refers to by its biblical name, Judea and Samaria — during an USIEA-organized trip to the settlement while visiting Israel last August. 

“I want to do advocacy for our country. I want to do advocacy for Israel. I’m just trying to figure it out. Right now, I say yes to almost everything and no to almost nothing that comes my way,” Pearl said. “I’m going to sit back at the end of the year and ask myself what’s working and what’s not.”

New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin — the first Jewish person to hold her role — slammed a newly elected Brooklyn Democrat’s promotion of antisemitic conspiracy theories, but declined to call her commentary disqualifying.

Jewish Insider reported on Friday that Carmella Charrington, elected in Tuesday’s far-left wave to the unpaid but important party position of district leader with help from politicians in the Democratic Socialists of America, last November shared an antisemitic video endorsing industrialist Henry Ford’s infamous antisemitic pamphlet series The International Jew.

The video, which Charrington declared “the truth” and demanded become “the topic at the table,” blamed Jews for everything from gay rights to slavery and rehashed paranoid fantasies about a world-spanning plot to dominate the media, banks, controlled substances, and the education system.

“Obviously I strongly disagree with those views, and those views are deeply, deeply offensive,” Menin, a Manhattan lawmaker, told JI at an unrelated press conference at City Hall. “It’s unacceptable, it’s abhorrent, and there’s no place for that, and I’ll leave it at that.”

However, she did not answer JI’s question as to whether Charrington’s views should bar her from holding the role to which she was elected, which wields significant power over local party leadership and judicial nominations, as well as positions in the city Board of Elections. 

Charrington, who deleted the post after speaking to JI, did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story. She initially defended her post as “facts” on Friday, and told a JI reporter to “get your rabbi,” before issuing a written apology to The New York Times and on social media, vowing to “start a dialogue with my Jewish neighbors.” 

To date, none of the officials JI has pressed have called for her to resign. This includes state Sen. Jabari Brisport and Assembly nominee Eon Huntley, both prominent DSA leaders who campaigned alongside her and helped her make the ballot, although both denounced her remarks.

Councilman Chi Ossé, another prominent DSA member who helped make Charrington’s legal battle to recover control of her family brownstone a citywide cause celebre, also condemned the content of her post without calling her out personally. Similarly, fellow district leader Mark Hanna — who served as Charrington’s election attorney and also is the treasurer of the anti-AIPAC American Priorities PAC — argued her commentary “can be a teachable moment” rather than an occasion for criticism.

Charrington has long claimed to have been a victim of deed theft, a form of fraud, and on Friday blamed some of her legal problems on Jewish investors and a Jewish judge. 

New York state Attorney General Letitia James found that her residence was sold as part of a complicated dispute over the estate of her infirm father, who the New York City Sheriff’s office took custody of in Brooklyn on Saturday and returned to Georgia, where a court had declared him a ward of the state.

An activist that two politicians from the Democratic Socialists of America helped elevate to a leadership position in the Brooklyn Democratic Party on Tuesday posted a vitriolic antisemitic screed to her Instagram last year — declaring as “the truth” a notorious work beloved by Adolf Hitler that describes a Jewish world conspiracy.

Carmella Charrington was part of an army of left-wing insurgents who captured office on Tuesday: in her case, the role of district leader in the Brooklyn Democratic Party, an unpaid but important position that elects the party’s influential chairperson and plays a significant role in nominating judges and filling jobs at the city Board of Elections. 

Although the DSA itself did not formally endorse Charrington for the post, two of its most important local figures campaigned with her and helped her make the ballot: state Sen. Jabari Brisport and state Assembly candidate Eon Huntley, who defeated an incumbent lawmaker in a closely watched race earlier this week. 

Charrington’s candidacy was part of a broader campaign to depose the present centrist leadership of the official party organization. But in November 2025, Charrington shared a video to her Instagram account — which features various photos and videos of herself at Brisport and Huntley’s joint campaign headquarters — promoting the “hidden history” in industrialist Henry Ford’s notorious 1920s series of conspiracy pamphlets, The International Jew.

“This better be the topic at the table#dad #deedtheft #ceo #love #ericadams #brooklyn #lovers #lovers #corruption #diddy #nyc ##cardio#cardib #trump,” Charrington captioned the since-deleted post, adding in the comments: “The only way to change is understanding the truth!”

The video itself is a summary and update of Ford’s century-old conspiracy theories, presented by a wellness influencer.

“You find out who owns all the social media, and then who also owns the tobacco industry, the cotton industry, the banking industry, the theater, the newspaper, the radio, and then we can clearly see who owns the government as well,” the speaker in the video says. “This is why in school things like reading the Bible, praying, celebrating Christmas, got to get rid of all that. Then it gets deeper when you find out who brought in all the liquor and all the drugs, and also made people into drunks during the Great Depression, because the same people caused the Great Depression.”

The video further asserts that Jewish people created plastic surgery to “blend in,” “brought the slaves” to America, established the gay rights movement and plotted the infamous 1921 massacre of Black residents of Tulsa, Okla. It asserts Jewish people are “always changing their names” and variously call themselves Zionists, Communists and Bolsheviks.

It then pivots to the issue that propelled Tuesday’s socialist sweep: Israel.

“It gets deeper when you talk about Palestine and the takeover of that with the Rothschilds, same people, and the whole Palestine thing connects back to the Rothschilds, who are the bankers, who then control everything, including the schools,” the speaker continues. “All the media and the newspapers and the radios are owned by a small group of people who control everything.” 

The video concludes with an image promoting the Swedish neo-Nazi film series “Europa: The Last Battle,” the conspiracy tome The Curse of Canaan: A Demonology of History, the Holocaust denial tracts of Fred Leuchter and the anti-Israel pamphlet Zionism: The Terrible Secret of the Cold War.

Reached by Jewish Insider, Charrington maintained that she was not prejudiced, but also insisted the video “was some facts.” She repeatedly told the reporter to “get your rabbi,” as she intended to hold a future “roundtable” on what she called a “bullying community.”

“There’s so much harm that your community has done to me,” she said. “It’s a problem in our community and it needs to be addressed.”

Charrington rose to prominence as part of a legal fight over possession of her family’s brownstone in the historically Black but fast-gentrifying Brooklyn neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant. She alleged in numerous media appearances that she was the victim of deed theft, a form of fraud, but New York state Attorney General Letitia James’ office determined it was a complicated but legal inheritance dispute.

In one of several phone calls with JI, Charrington railed against Jewish investors she accused of gaining access to her home and a Jewish judge who sentenced her to six days on Rikers Island for contempt of court.

Helping to promote her cause has been another leading DSA official: New York City Councilman Chi Ossé, who was arrested demonstrating outside the home in April. The incident inspired New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to create a new Office of Deed Theft Prevention.

Ossé, for his part, stressed in a phone conversation with JI that he had not endorsed Charrington for district leader and was unfamiliar with her posting history.

“We condemn this antisemitism and bigotry in the harshest possible terms,” Ossé said in a subsequent written statement to JI. “There is no room for this kind of hate in Brooklyn. I reject it completely.” 

Brisport similarly said he was unaware of Charrington’s views but repeatedly refused to answer whether he would have supported her for party office had he seen the video she shared — or if he considered such beliefs disqualifying for a person to hold power in the Democratic Party. Huntley, the nominee for Assembly, did not respond to repeated calls or emails.

However, the two DSA leaders subsequently sent a joint statement denouncing the content of the video, and harping on the right-wing elements of its message.

“The antisemitic post that Carmella shared has no place in our movement. This incident illustrates exactly what antisemitism does — it misdirects the justified anger of working people and oppressed communities away from systems of power and onto Jews,” they wrote. “We are committed to working with all constituents and fellow electeds alike to unlearn and dismantle these deeply antisemitic, anti-LGBT, and anti-communist narratives which hurt and divide our communities.”

JI also contacted Mark Hanna, a Mamdani ally and Brooklyn district leader who served as election attorney for the insurgent slate on which Charrington ran. Hanna is also the treasurer of American Priorities PAC, a committee dedicated to combatting the influence of AIPAC and uplifting anti-Israel candidates.

“Any kind of antisemitism or Islamophobia or hatred I’m not going to be supportive of,” Hanna said in an initial phone conversation.

After JI sent him the video, he wrote back that he hoped the post “can be a teachable moment.”

“I will have to speak with her about it,” he wrote. “I want to work with Carmella on issues related to deed theft and the other concerns she has in her community, and I think calling her in to learn and ensure inclusivity, rather than calling out for a repost, will be more fruitful.”

Hitler reportedly kept German translations of The International Jew in his office, where he also displayed a portrait of Ford. He praised the American industrialist in Mein Kampf, and in 1938 awarded him the Grand Cross of the Order of the German Eagle, a medal the Nazi leader created to honor foreign allies of his genocidal regime.

A manifesto allegedly left by the gunman behind Monday’s rampage in Côte-des-Neiges, a heavily Jewish neighborhood in Montreal, repeatedly targeted Jews and Zionists, specifically identifying “influential Zionists” among his intended victims, according to a copy of the document published by Rebel News.

A Jewish civilian, a police officer and the suspect were killed in the attack, while one other police officer was seriously injured but is in stable condition. On Tuesday, Quebec authorities identified the alleged suspect as Seth Hatfield, a 25-year-old man from Alberta. Police have not yet released a motive for the attack. 

The 104-page document, published in full by Rebel News, lists “valid potential class A targets,” including large investment banks, powerful politicians and “influential Zionists.” 

The manifesto included antisemitic conspiracy theories, stating, “The influence of Zionist Jews upon the western bourgeoisie is in fact so strong that in my other works I sometimes refer to the western ruling class itself as the Judaeo-bourgeois class.” It also repeatedly laments male loneliness and capitalist ideology. 

The Quebec coroner’s office confirmed that the civilian killed was Michael Mizrachi, 64. He has been described as an active member of the Jewish community and father of three who sold suits for a living. His local rabbi, Mendel Raskin, told Canadian media that Mizrachi was originally from Lebanon and had moved to Israel before settling in Montreal.

Montreal police declined to comment to Jewish Insider Tuesday on the ongoing investigation. 

The shooting comes as Jewish leaders across Canada have warned that law enforcement and the government have failed to properly address a historic rise in “systemic” antisemitism. 

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani doubled down on his rhetorical assault on AIPAC on Monday, after Jewish groups over the weekend criticized his comments about the pro-Israel organization at a Thursday rally last week that they argued evoked classic antisemitic tropes.

Mamdani defended naming AIPAC among the “monsters who move dark money,” maintaining that he was quoting 20th century Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci’s comment about living in a “time of monsters.” But the phrase is a notorious and widely known misquote of Gramsci’s, though the mayor evinced no awareness of the inaccuracy — and backed up his argument with statistics from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry alleging the death of more than 1,000 Palestinians at the hands of the IDF since the ceasefire last fall.

“When I am speaking about AIPAC, I am speaking about an organization that has been supportive of the status quo, that has fought any attempt to actually deliver to not just people in Palestine but frankly through much of the region,” he asserted on Monday following an unrelated event at City Hall. “Oftentimes they also support the status quo through dark money, by filtering money that would’ve previously been directed from AIPAC, now through other shell organizations whose identities of their contributors are only made clear after the election.”

Candidates Mamdani has endorsed for Congress have received the backing of multiple large PACs, including Justice Democrats, that received money through organizations that mask the identities of their contributors through the exact mechanisms he lamented on Monday. 

Mamdani himself attended the April gala of one such organization, the Institute for Middle East Understanding — which Jewish Insider recently revealed had stood up a dark money arm of its own, the IMEU Policy Project. This has enabled the organization to pump hundreds of thousands of dollars from anonymous donors into the Justice Democrats PAC as part of a nationwide effort to defeat pro-Israel candidates for Congress. 

The mayor’s original remarks, which included claims that AIPAC and similar organizations are “turning us against one another,” sparked alarm among prominent Jewish groups, who connected them to tropes historically used to target Jewish and pro-Zionist individuals and movements.

“Soviet anti-Zionist campaigns and earlier antisemitic movements similarly portrayed Jewish organizations as pursuing power not to achieve political goals, but because Jews themselves were said to crave influence and control,” Jim Berk, CEO of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said in a statement on Friday. “The suggestion that Jewish political participation is inherently suspect, illegitimate, or secretly manipulative is abhorrent. This is the same old story, retold in a new language.”

Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt voiced outrage on Sunday that the mayor had not walked back or clarified his statement.

“This is the kind of bigoted conspiracy mongering that you expect from unhinged streamers or white supremacists. It’s not the language that we should expect from the mayor,” Greenblatt posted to social media, highlighting the dramatic spike in antisemitic incidents in New York following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza. “This is not a principled disagreement. This is prejudice pure and simple. It is deliberate, dangerous and disgraceful.”

Ted Deutch, CEO of the American Jewish Committee, wrote on X, “When you use your position to label people you disagree with as monsters — people who live and work and pay taxes in the city you lead, people who loved the Knicks championship parade as much as you did, people who spent yesterday celebrating their fathers and grandfathers — you are turning people against one another.”

“You want to debate ideas? Fine. But when you call people monsters, you’re not debating ideas, you’re dehumanizing the people you disagree with. And when that comes from a mayor, it creates an environment where people hear clearly who is being cast as outside the community, one where they wonder whether they can safely live and speak as themselves,” he continued.

And Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) noted that the mayor’s speech on Thursday included no words of criticism for Hamas or Hezbollah, or their sponsor Iran.

“Swap ‘AIPAC for ‘Jews’ and it’s the oldest antisemitic conspiracy theory in the books,” the Garden State lawmaker wrote on X. “That’s not criticizing a lobby. That’s laundering antisemitism from your podium as Mayor of a city with more than a million Jews. This bullshit is dangerous.”

Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) grilled Trump administration nominee Charlton Allen on Wednesday at a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing about a seemingly antisemitic cover and article published by a student newspaper while Allen was overseeing the publication as a college student.

Allen, the nominee to be the general counsel of the Federal Labor Relations Authority, which oversees federal workers’ labor issues, was the publisher of the Carolina Review when he was a student at the University of North Carolina.

Decades ago, under his leadership, the newspaper published a cover illustration depicting a Jewish student running for a student government position with devil’s horns and a pitchfork, connected to an article that, according to Gallego, highlighted the student’s Jewish faith in criticizing him for voting against funding for a campus Christian organization while supporting funding for Jewish and other groups.

Allen acknowledged at the hearing that the cover was a “mistake” but argued that it was not antisemitic and said it was being taken out of context. He claimed that the cover was intended to compare the Jewish student in question to the Blue Devils, the mascot of UNC’s rival, the Duke Blue Devils.

Allen also maintained that the student in question had discriminated against Christian student groups while supporting Jewish and other student groups.

Also during Wednesday’s hearing, Cameron Hamilton, the nominee to be the Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator, said that he plans to offer lawmakers recommendations on reforms and potential additional funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program in his first 30 days in office, in consultation with interested community groups. 

He acknowledged calls for additional funding from religious groups, as well as for steps to ensure that funding flows quickly, though he did not definitively commit to supporting greater funding, saying he wanted to study the issue and speak to community groups first before providing a funding recommendation.

“I just want to convey to you the urgency, which I hear from my constituents, and it’s not just mine,” Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) said. “We see the rise of antisemitism surging across this country. I visited a temple that also has a school attached to it. They are so worried about what’s going to happen, and it’s not just our Jewish community.”

He also emphasized that the needs of these communities are ongoing, not periodic.

“This is now the highest line on the budget of so many of these institutions,” Kim said. 

Colorado’s elected officials remained largely silent after the University of Colorado Boulder chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine posted a statement supporting the perpetrator of a deadly antisemitic firebombing on the attack’s one-year anniversary.

“Today, Boulder Students for Justice in Palestine publishes this statement in support of Mohamed’s decisive act of resistance against a genocidal global order,” Boulder SJP — which is an unsanctioned campus group — wrote Monday in a since-deleted Instagram post. “We stand with him.” 

Last June, Mohamed Soliman attacked a “Run For Their Lives” march — held in solidarity with Israeli hostages held captive by Hamas — on Boulder’s Pearl Street Mall using Molotov cocktails. The attack killed 82-year-old Karen Diamond and injured a dozen others. Soliman pled guilty to murder and was sentenced to life in prison without parole. 

SJP praised Soliman for taking “direct action against one manifestation of the zionist death cult that we have allowed to fester in our city.” The group called his attack “the only sane response available to a rational human being confronted with the normalization of genocide.”

In a statement to Jewish Insider, Rep. Gabe Evans (R-CO) condemned SJP’s statement as “utterly deplorable.” 

“To not only justify but praise a terrorist who murdered an elderly woman and left other innocent victims suffering from severe second- and third-degree burns is beyond reprehensible. How can members of the Jewish community ever feel safe living, working, worshiping, or attending school in our country when individuals openly celebrate acts of antisemitic violence?” said Evans, who is running for reelection in a battleground district. 

“Antisemitism is never acceptable. It must be condemned wherever it exists, regardless of the perpetrator or political cause. I urge the Boulder Police Department and the University of Colorado Boulder to take these threats and rhetoric seriously before more lives are put at risk,” he continued.  

After this story was published, Rep. Brittany Pettersen (D-CO) told JI, “The antisemitic attack in Boulder last year was a horrific act of terror that has left a permanent scar on our state and the Jewish community in Colorado and across the country. These disturbing posts are vile and should absolutely not be tolerated. Our words matter. Disgusting, antisemitic remarks like this only pave the way for more hate-fueled violence. I condemn them wholeheartedly and will always stand up against antisemitism and all forms of hate.” 

Reps. Jason Crow (D-CO) and Jeff Crank (R-CO) both condemned the attack in statements to JI on Tuesday, but neither addressed the SJP statement directly.  

Crow said, “The Boulder attack was a horrifying act of hate that every American must condemn. We must reject antisemitism and all senseless acts of violence.” In the aftermath of the attack, Crow voted for a resolution condemning it and reaffirming a commitment to combat the rise in antisemitism.

Crank said, “The attack on our Jewish community a year ago in Boulder was horrific and the terrorist who committed this crime must be brought to justice under the fullest extent of the law.”

Other members of Colorado’s congressional delegation, including Democrats Diana DeGette and Joe Neguse and Republicans Jeff Hurd and Lauren Boebert, did not respond to requests for comments from JI. Neguse represents the area where the attack occurred. 

Melat Kiros, a democratic socialist running to unseat DeGette, did not respond to a request for comment. 

Neither of Colorado’s Democratic senators, Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, responded to requests for comment. Bennet is running for governor to succeed the term-limited Jared Polis, facing a primary challenge from state Attorney General Phil Weiser — who also did not respond to a request for comment. In the wake of the gubernatorial race, Crow and Neguse are considered leading contenders for Bennet’s Senate seat. Julie Gonzalez, a DSA-backed Colorado state senator running to replace Hickenlooper, also did not respond to a request for comment. 

The SJP statement received condemnation from Jewish groups including the Anti-Defamation League and J Street.  

“The content of the post is beyond reprehensible. It is so detached from basic facts, human decency and reality that it would be difficult to take seriously if its message were not so dangerous,” the ADL wrote on X. 

J Street wrote, “When violence against Jews is openly celebrated, it is not activism. It is antisemitic incitement.” 

Editor’s note: This story was updated on June 3 to include a statement from Rep. Brittany Pettersen.

House Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-LA) political spokesperson denied on Wednesday allegations that Johnson was involved in boosting Maureen Galindo, an antisemitic Democratic candidate in Texas’ 35th Congressional District.

The spokesperson said that Johnson had no involvement in the district’s Democratic primary, which Galindo lost on Tuesday.

The statement came after the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee blasted Johnson in response to an article in the newsletter Popular Information that linked Lead Left PAC, the shadowy super PAC that supported Galindo, to a prominent GOP compliance consulting firm. One of the founders of that group, Caleb Crosby, has served as the treasurer for the Congressional Leadership Fund and Senate Leadership Fund, the primary super PAC arms of House and Senate leadership.

The origins of the pro-Galindo effort have been heavily shrouded in mystery, but national Republicans would have had an interest in boosting the less-electable Galindo in a swing-district race that Democrats hope to win. It’s unclear the extent to which Crosby or his firm, which advertises compliance reporting, budgetary and fiscal management and other similar services, would have been involved in any strategic decision-making for the Lead Left PAC.

“Mike Johnson’s political operation boosted a dangerous antisemite in the TX-35 Democratic primary runoff in an attempt to gain political power,” DCCC spokesperson Courtney Rice said in a statement. “This should shock the core of the Republican Party, and every single Republican needs to stand and speak out against this cynical political move.”

CLF and Crosby’s consulting firm, Crosby Ottenhoff Group, did not respond to a request for comment.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee announced plans for a last-minute spending campaign against Maureen Galindo, an antisemitic Texas Democratic candidate who garnered condemnation this week for comments calling to imprison and castrate Zionists.

Texas’s primary is set for Tuesday and Galindo’s antisemitic activity is not new, but the race has garnered significant national attention in the past week after a local reporter shared her comments about internment camps for Zionists.

The DCCC is spending $34,000 on the ad spot, which describes her as “MAGA Maureen,” emphasizing an allegedly Republican-linked outside spending campaign to boost her campaign.

“Why is MAGA spending big on Maureen Galindo while lying about Johnny Garcia? Is it MAGA Maureen’s conspiracies? Her hateful words? Or that when we were fighting Trump, Galindo didn’t even vote,” the ad states.

Galindo came in first in the March primary by a narrow margin, beating former sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia, a moderate Democrat who has picked up endorsements and support across the party as leaders rush to condemn Galindo.

The DCCC ad boosts Garcia, in addition to attacking Galindo.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), in a video interview released Friday, also emphasized that Democrats were “supporting Johnny Garcia before this because we knew his opponent was vile and antisemitic and unworthy of anyone backing her.”

“She’s been roundly condemned by Democrats across the ideological spectrum, which is exactly the right thing to do, particularly in a moment where we know that Jewish Americans across the country are facing such a rough climate,” he continued.

He emphasized the GOP-linked efforts to boost Galindo and called on House Republicans to urge the super PAC backing her to stop doing so.

A newly launched super PAC with ties to Republicans has spent nearly half a million dollars to help boost a Democrat running for a competitive open House seat in Texas who is facing growing bipartisan furor over a series of virulently antisemitic social media remarks.

Lead Left PAC, the GOP-linked group, has been aggressively promoting Maureen Galindo, a fringe San Antonio activist who finished first in the primary and has said that Jews “own Hollywood” and “worship the synagogue of Satan.” Last week, she said that, if elected, she would turn a local immigration detention center “into a prison for American Zionists and former ICE officers for human trafficking,” while adding, “It will also be a castration processing center for pedophiles which will probably be most of the Zionists.”

The comments, which circulated online Tuesday, fueled widespread condemnation from members of both parties, and drew further scrutiny to Lead Left, which has faced accusations of meddling in the race to prop up a weaker candidate in the redrawn district. Democrats see the district as winnable in November if they elect Johnny Garcia, Galindo’s moderate rival, in the May 26 runoff. 

Lead Left, which has not returned requests for comment, had invested around $430,000 in the runoff to elevate Galindo as of Tuesday, according to federal filings. The shadowy PAC was expected to double that figure on Wednesday with a roughly $500,000 investment, bringing its total spending in the district to around $1 million with less than a week until the election, according to media buying figures from an internal reporting database that were shared with Jewish Insider.

Lead Left, which has not yet disclosed its donors, has also recently spent in other Democratic races across the country. While no Republicans have taken credit for the group, the metadata for its website links to a major GOP fundraising platform, strongly suggesting Republican fingerprints.  

In a joint statement on Tuesday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-WA), chair of Democratic Congressional Campaign Campaign Committee, said that “House Republican leadership must immediately cease propping up this antisemitic candidacy, pull spending in the race and forcefully condemn these comments.”

“This vile language by her is disqualifying and has no place in American politics, and certainly not in the Democratic Party,” the Democratic leaders added on Tuesday. “To embrace and uplift a fringe candidate with antisemitic — and extremely dangerous — rhetoric and views in order to win an election is beyond the pale.”

The DCCC recently added Garcia, a sheriff’s deputy in Bexar County, to its “Red to Blue” program for House candidates in battleground districts key to reclaiming the majority.

Democratic Majority for Israel’s political arm, which is also supporting Garcia, accused Republicans of “deliberately elevating one of the most grotesque antisemites in American politics this cycle because they think it helps them win.”

“It is sick, it is cynical, and it tells you everything about a party that will fund anyone, including someone openly invoking the language of pogroms, as long as it serves their politics,” Brian Romick, who leads DMFI PAC, said in a statement after Galindo’s most recent comments came to light. “Democrats across the ideological spectrum reject Maureen Galindo and everything she stands for, completely and without qualification. Republicans should explain why they’re paying to keep her viable.” 

Galindo, whose endorsement from the extremist anti-Israel account Track AIPAC was rescinded on Tuesday, garnered nearly unanimous denunciations from across the political spectrum, including Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and others who expressed outrage over her remarks.

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) called Galindo’s recent comments about imprisoning and castrating Zionists “straight out of the Nazi playbook,” while Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) urged Democratic leaders to speak out against rhetoric “suggesting concentration camps for American Jews.”

Galindo, who has gained prominence on social media promoting conspiracy theories about Jews and Israel, narrowly finished first in the crowded March primary with 29% of the vote, two points ahead of Garcia, who placed second. She did not respond to a request for comment.  

Galindo has attributed the surge of spending from Lead Left to “a billionaire zionist who made the pac to sabotage candidates,” according to a text message to The New York Times last week.

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.

Good Tuesday morning.

In today’s Daily Kickoff, we do a deep dive into the race to succeed Rep. Nancy Pelosi, in what has become something of a proxy battle in the war for the identity of the Democratic Party, and report on an effort by Democratic Majority for Israel to boost a Texas congressional candidate whose far-left opponent has trafficked in antisemitic tropes. We talk to Senate Republicans about the possibility of resuming military operations against Iran, and have the scoop on Gerald Steinberg’s decision to step down from the helm of NGO Monitor early next year, and the first interview with his successor, Olga Deutsch. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Daniel Septimus, Rom Braslavski and Ben Shapiro.

Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by JI Executive Editor Melissa Weiss and Israel Editor Tamara Zieve, with assists from Danielle Cohen-Kanik and Marc Rod. Have a tip? Email us here.

What We’re Watching

• Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine are both slated to testify this morning at back-to-back House and Senate Appropriations Committee budget hearings. In the afternoon, FBI Director Kash Patel will testify before Senate Appropriations.
• The Anti-Defamation League is holding a Jewish American Heritage Month reception this evening on Capitol Hill.
• Elsewhere in Washington, the Jewish Democratic Council of America is kicking off its annual summit tonight with a reception at the Watergate Hotel. The group will honor Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD), and will hear from Sens. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) and Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), Jason Crow (D-CO), Chris Deluzio (D-PA), Maggie Goodlander (D-NH) and Chrissy Houlahan (D-PA).
• The funeral for former Anti-Defamation League head Abe Foxman, who died on Sunday, will take place this morning at Park Avenue Synagogue.
• In New York City tonight, three of the top candidates in the open congressional race in NY-12 — George Conway and Assemblymembers Alex Bores and Micah Lasher — will participate in a forum at the West Side Institutional Synagogue moderated by Jewish Insider Editor-in-Chief Josh Kraushaar.
• Elsewhere in New York, the American Jewish Committee will present Cardinal Timothy Dolan with the group’s Nostra Aetate at Sixty Award, honoring Dolan’s interfaith efforts on the 60th anniversary of the groundbreaking Vatican declaration.
• Across the Hudson, the New Jersey Globe is hosting a primary debate for the Democrats running in New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District. ER physician and former government official Tina Shah, former Navy pilot Rebecca Bennett and businessmen Brian Varela and Michael Roth will participate in tonight’s debate, which starts at 7 p.m. ET.
• Israeli Eurovision entrant Noam Battan will perform tonight when the contest’s semifinals kick off in Vienna.

What You Should Know

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S GABBY DEUTCH

Over the last two years, the second semester of the academic year at American universities coincided with crisis and chaos. In 2024, it was anti-Israel encampments overtaking campus quads across the country; last year, it was threats from the Trump administration to slash hundreds of millions of dollars in funding and ban foreign students. 

By comparison, the spring of 2026 has been relatively smooth sailing for research universities, even with a bit of hubbub over graduation speakers scrutinized for their stance on Israel and Gaza at a few schools, including the University of Michigan and Georgetown Law. 

But it’s not that things have gone back to the pre-Oct. 7, pre-Donald Trump normal. University administrators have just gotten better at managing an ambient sense of friction: Conflict between university leaders and activist faculty and students is still bubbling under the surface, and the threat of funding cuts at the federal level lingers. 

According to several university presidents who gathered last week at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles, the task before universities is to win back the trust of skeptical Americans. 

“The world of higher education, I think, is still in turmoil,” Vanderbilt University Chancellor Daniel Diermeier told Jewish Insider in an interview at the Milken confab. “I think the time when a university does say that’s all overblown and everything is great, that’s over. At least the vast majority of university presidents know that there are challenges, and they want to take them on.” 

Read the rest of ‘What You Should Know’ here.

democratic fault lines

Race to replace Pelosi offers early test of whether progressive Jews welcomed on the left

The race to fill the seat of Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in California’s 11th Congressional District has become somewhat of a proxy battle in the war for the identity of the Democratic Party, where describing Israel’s war in Gaza as a genocide, supporting arms embargoes to Israel and attacking Zionism as a racist ideology have become much more common since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza, Gabe Stutman reports for Jewish Insider. The outcome of the race will help answer an important question: Can a progressive candidate still win in a deep-blue district like San Francisco without fully embracing the politics of the anti-Zionist left?

State of play: The race is by most accounts a three-way contest between state Sen. Scott Wiener, Connie Chan, a progressive member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors who has the backing of major labor organizations but has struggled to compete in fundraising, and Saikat Chakrabarti, a wealthy tech entrepreneur who entered progressive politics working for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) during his 2016 presidential bid and later served as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY) chief of staff.

Read the full story here.

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EXCLUSIVE

DMFI works to block antisemitic activist from winning Dem nomination in Texas swing district

Democratic Majority for Israel’s political arm is kicking off an ad campaign on Tuesday to boost Johnny Garcia, a sheriff’s deputy in Bexar County, Texas, in his Democratic runoff election later this month against Maureen Galindo, a San Antonio activist who has faced scrutiny for trafficking in antisemitic tropes, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports.

Getting behind Garcia: “Democrats need candidates who can build broad coalitions and win in November,” Brian Romick, the chair of DMFI PAC, told JI. “Johnny Garcia is a coalition builder who supports a strong U.S.-Israel relationship and has been clear in standing against antisemitism. His opponent, on the other hand, proudly embraces vile, antisemitic conspiracies and if she advances could put a Democratic House majority at risk.”

Read the full story here.

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TEHRAN TALKS

Senate Republicans split over the prospect of resuming military operations against Iran

With President Donald Trump publicly mulling the resumption of military action against Iran, fault lines are opening up among Senate Republicans over the prospect of a renewed military effort, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.

State of play: Some Senate Republicans are publicly calling for the U.S. to resume military operations. Others are leaving the prospect of military action on the table without fully ruling out a diplomatic path, while offering varying degrees of skepticism about how realistic a deal actually would be. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) urged Trump to ignore calls from some of his more hawkish colleagues to restart military operations.

Read the full story here.

Pakistan problems: Senators on both sides of the aisle, including Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Ted Budd (R-NC), on Monday expressed concerns about a report by CBS News that Pakistan had sheltered multiple Iranian military aircraft at an air force base in the country since shortly after the U.S.-Iran ceasefire in April, raising questions about the country’s neutrality as a mediator, JI’s Marc Rod reports.

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PARTY SWITCH

Israel’s business leaders see opportunity amid war, political shifts

The Israeli financiers, investors and entrepreneurs who attended last week’s Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills brought an upbeat attitude about Israel’s economy, even two-and-a-half years into near-constant war that began with Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.

Exceeded expectations: “When the war began, I think none of us — none of the regulators in Israel, and almost none of the players or the investors in Israel — thought or believed that after two-and-a-half years of war, Israel would show such growth, such resilience,” Seffy Zinger, chair of the Israel Securities Authority, told JI in an interview. “I’m not an investment advisor, but you can see that if you were not in Israel in the past two years, you probably missed out, if Israel was not part of your portfolio.”

Read the full story here.

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SPEAKING OUT

Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice leaves Democratic Party, citing rise in antisemitism

Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice David Wecht, a former vice-chair of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, announced Monday he has left the party, citing “anti-Jewish” actions and “acquiescence to Jew-hatred” within the party, including from elected officials, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.

What he said: “Acquiescence to Jew-hatred is now disturbingly common among activists, leaders and even many elected officials in the Democratic Party. I can no longer abide this,” wrote Wecht, who was elected as a Democrat in 2015. He added that he is no longer affiliated with any political party. “That terror came from the right,” he wrote. “Jew-hatred has always festered on the fringe of that sector.” But, Wecht continued, “in the quarter century that has passed” since his leadership position, “the Democratic Party has changed.”

Read the full story here.

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scoop

Olga Deutsch to succeed Gerald Steinberg as president of NGO Monitor

NGO Monitor President Gerald Steinberg is set to step down in January, 25 years after founding the Jerusalem-based watchdog group focused on scrutinizing nonprofit organizations critical of Israel and their funding sources, Jewish Insider’s Tamara Zieve reports. Olga Deutsch, 47, currently NGO Monitor’s vice president, will succeed Steinberg following a months-long transition process at the organization, which since its inception has been closely associated with its founder.

Passing the baton: Steinberg, 74, who resigned from his position as a professor of political science at Bar-Ilan University seven years ago, told JI, “There is a point in one’s life where one has to decide the different priorities. And I’ve done this long enough, and other people can have more energy and can take over.” Deutsch told JI that she hopes to “open the next exciting chapter,” while preserving the “character of the organization that Gerald created, which is serving as pioneers and continuing to flag the new fronts through which the Jewish state and the Jewish people are being attacked or put in danger.”

Read the full story here.

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Worthy Reads

Abe as Mentor: In eJewishPhilanthropy, William Daroff, the CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, eulogizes former Anti-Defamation League head Abe Foxman, who died on Sunday. “He combined toughness and warmth in a way few leaders can. He expected seriousness. He spoke with moral clarity. He pushed younger Jewish leaders to think bigger about our responsibility to the Jewish people and the broader democratic society in which we live. He also challenged me, usually in private, though occasionally in the public pages of newspapers. Abe Foxman knew exactly when to make a point, and exactly how to make it land.” [eJP]

Miller Lite: The Atlantic’s Michael Scherer and Nick Miroff spotlight the waning influence of Stephen Miller in the second Trump administration. “White House insiders said that Miller remains a top adviser to the president, that he has a singular relationship to Trump built over the past decade, and that his job is not in jeopardy. Immigration enforcement remains a central theme of the administration and is expected to feature prominently in Trump’s midterm-election messaging. … But Trump, who has previously joked that Miller’s ‘truest feelings’ are so extreme that they should not be aired publicly, has also told others in recent weeks that he understands Miller sometimes goes too far, advisers told us.” [TheAtlantic]

Word on the Street

President Donald Trump said that the ceasefire with Iran was on “life support” following Washington’s rejection of Tehran’s latest response to the U.S. proposal to end the war, Jewish Insider‘s Emily Jacobs reports…

CNN looks at efforts by Iran to recruit operatives in Europe to carry out attacks on Jewish targets…

The United Arab Emirates reportedly carried out strikes on Iran during the active military campaign launched by the U.S. and Israel, targeting among other things an oil refinery on the Lavan Island in the Persian Gulf…

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, speaking at the Tel Aviv Conference today,confirmed that Israel sent missile-defense batteries and operating personnel to the UAE during the war with Iran…

The Financial Times spotlights Iran’s “mosquito fleet” of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps fast-attack boats that are engaging commercial and military vessels in the Strait of Hormuz…

Rep. Pat Ryan (D-NY) and 17 other Democrats introduced a bill to ban further funding for military operations against Iran…

Trump nominated Cameron Hamilton to head FEMA, a year after Hamilton, who mounted a failed 2024 bid for Congress, was fired as the interim head of the agency…

Kevin Warsh is expected to be confirmed as the next head of the Federal Reserve as early as tomorrow…

Trump invited several business leaders to join him on his trip later this week to China, including Elon Musk, outgoing Apple CEO Tim Cook, BlackRock’s Larry Fink, Meta’s Dina Powell McCormick, Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon, Citi’s Jane Fraser and Blackstone’s Stephen Schwarzman, among others…

Trump announced the nominations of Kari Lake, the former head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, and Pennsylvania state Sen. Doug Mastriano to be, respectively, the ambassadors to Jamaica and Slovakia…

Former Rep. Billy Long (R-MO), who has been nominated to be U.S. ambassador to Iceland, shared a three-minute clip of a speech by neo-Nazi influencer Nick Fuentes on X on Sunday, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports…

The New York Times spotlights the work of Fuentes’ acolytes to build on the antisemitic conspiracy theorist’s political movement, an effort that coalesced around a conference of influencers and fringe candidates from both parties in a sparsely attended summit; the low turnout was attributed in part to the absence of Fuentes, who distanced himself from the gathering…

Puck News does a deep dive into the recent layoffs at Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire, finding that the recent decision to cut approximately 20% of the company’s staff was fueled by a combination of internal business disagreements and the “‘vibe shift’ among the MAGA base” that has divided conservatives in recent years…

A judge in Santa Clara County, Calif., ordered a Jewish prosecutor to recuse himself from a case against anti-Israel student protesters at Stanford University after the prosecutor described the incident as antisemitic in campaign literature, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports…

The Wall Street Journal’s Shira Kaplan reflects on the sanctity of Shabbat following President Donald Trump’s call for the American Jewish community to observe a “national Sabbath” this weekend…

Daniel Septimus is departing Sefaria after 13 years atop the organization, eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher reports…

Australian Jewish musicians testifying on Tuesday before the country’s royal commission into antisemitism in the country detailed the yearslong ostracization they experienced from the arts community for their support for Israel…

Israeli journalist Haviv Rettig Gur breaks down the “obvious propaganda” in a recent New York Times opinion piece by Nicholas Kristof about alleged Israeli abuses of Palestinian prisoners…

Former Israeli hostage Rom Braslavski, who was one of the last hostages to be freed after spending more than 700 days in Hamas captivity, called for the resignation of all members of the current Israeli government, whom he called “miserable cowards”…

Israel’s Civil Commission on October 7 Crimes Against Women and Children released its comprehensive report on sexual violence during the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks and during hostages’ time in captivity…

The Knesset passed, with the support of 93 of the body’s 120 lawmakers, a law establishing a military tribunal to try terrorists who took part in the Oct. 7 attacks…

E.U. member states unanimously voted to sanction Hamas leaders as well as Israeli settlers in a bid to target extremism; the vote came after Hungary, no longer under the leadership of Viktor Orbán, removed its longstanding opposition to the measure…

Israel denied entry to YouTuber Tyler Oliveira, who in recent months has posted videos suggesting that Jews were “invading” communities in New York and New Jersey…

The Israeli soldier photographed desecrating a statue of the Virgin Mary in a southern Lebanese village was sentenced to three weeks in a military prison, while the soldier who took the photo received a sentence of two weeks…

Iran executed a graduate student convicted of spying on behalf of the CIA and Mossad; Erfan Shakourzadeh, who attended the prestigious Iran University of Science and Technology, denied the charges in a letter written before his execution…

Pic of the Day

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (left) met in Kyiv earlier today with Palantir CEO Alex Karp.

Birthdays

Acclaimed architect and master planner for the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan, he also designed the Jewish Museum in Berlin, Daniel Libeskind turns 80…

Israeli agribusiness entrepreneur and real estate investor, he was chairman and owner of Carmel Agrexco, Gideon Bickel turns 82… Former member of the California state Senate for eight years, following six years as a member of the state Assembly, Lois Wolk turns 80… Chairman of the Israel Paralympic Committee, he served for four years as a member of the Knesset for the Yisrael Beiteinu party, Moshe “Mutz” Matalon turns 73… Former Washington correspondent for McClatchy and then the Miami Herald covering the Pentagon, James Martin Rosen turns 71… SVP and deputy general counsel at Delta Air Lines until 2024, now chief legal officer at private aviation firm Wheels Up, Matthew Knopf turns 70… Professor at Emory University School of Law, he has published over 200 articles on law, religion and Jewish law, Michael Jay Broyde turns 62… Actress known for her role as Lexi Sterling on “Melrose Place,” she also had the lead role in many Lifetime movies, Jamie Michelle Luner turns 55… Founder of strategic communications and consulting firm Hiltzik Strategies, Matthew Hiltzik turns 54… Communications officer in the D.C. office of George Soros’ Open Society Foundations until last year, Jonathan E. Kaplan… First-ever Jewish governor of Colorado, he was a successful serial entrepreneur before entering politics, Jared Polis turns 51… Professor of mathematics at Bar-Ilan University and a scientific advisor at the Y-Data school of data science in Israel, Elena Bunina turns 50… Italian politician, she is the first-ever Jewish mayor of Florence, Sara Funaro turns 50… Israeli pastry chef and parenting counselor, she is married to former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, Gilat Ethel Bennett turns 49… Author, blogger and public speaker, Michael Ellsberg turns 49… Senior advisor at Accelerator for America Action, Joshua Cohen… Technology and social media reporter at Bloomberg, Alexandra Sophie Levine… Executive director of government affairs at BridgeBio, Amanda Schechter Malakoff… A government affairs and public policy manager for YouTube, Erica Arbetter… Haifa-born actress and model, she is known for her lead roles in seven films since 2014, Odeya Rush turns 29…

A judge in Santa Clara County ordered a Jewish prosecutor to recuse himself from a case against anti-Israel student protesters at Stanford University after the prosecutor described the incident as antisemitic in campaign literature. 

District Attorney Jeff Rosen “is allowed to take a strong stance against crime in the community, against antisemitism. But caution and care need to be taken when utilizing active litigation in campaign communication,” Judge Kelley Paul said last week from the bench. 

Rosen’s case against five anti-Israel protesters who occupied Stanford President Richard Saller’s office in June 2024 ended in a mistrial in February following a hung jury. He quickly announced plans for a retrial. 

But the defendants’ attorneys alleged that Rosen had a conflict of interest, which included utilizing the case on a campaign page titled “fighting antisemitism” and using the website — which includes a video of Rosen giving a speech at San Jose Hillel claiming “antisemitism is anti-American” — in a December fundraising email blast, The Stanford Daily reported. Rosen is seeking reelection to the district attorney’s office this November.

Referencing that video, Paul said that the lawsuit “is not a hate crime” and that Rosen had overstepped when framing it as such. 

The protesters, who barricaded themselves in a university building to demand divestment from companies linked to the Israel-Hamas war, face felony vandalism and conspiracy charges following the break-in that caused an estimated $300,000 in damages. They do not face hate crimes charges.

Multiple Jewish homes, a synagogue and a Jewish center in Queens — which contains a preschool — were vandalized with swastikas and other antisemitic graffiti overnight on Monday, leaving Jewish residents questioning their safety amid a spate of antisemitic incidents. 

“When rabbis and congregants arrived to pray this morning, they expected to be met with their usual loving community. When a family woke up, they were prepared to begin an otherwise normal week. Instead, they were met with terrifying signals of hatred and threats of violence,” New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin, the city’s first Jewish council speaker, wrote on X. 

Menin, alongside Queens Councilmembers Lynn Schulman and Phil Wong, visited Congregation Machane Chodosh in Forest Hills, the impacted synagogue, on Monday morning. The Rego Park Jewish Center and two residential houses in Forest Hills were also targeted.  

The NYPD is searching for at least four individuals responsible for the vandalism, according to Menin. 

“With antisemitism on the rise here and across the globe, we will always stand up for our Jewish community and fight back against hate,” said Menin, adding that the graffiti will be removed once the NYPD completes its investigation.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a statement on Monday afternoon that he was “horrified and angered” by the vandalism, which he called “a deliberate act of antisemitic hatred meant to instill fear.”

“I stand in solidarity with our Jewish neighbors. Their safety, dignity, and belonging are non-negotiable,” Mamdani continued.

Gov. Kathy Hochul similarly condemned the “vile, targeted hate.”

Democratic state Assemblymember Sam Berger, who represents Queens’ nearby heavily Jewish neighborhood of Kew Gardens Hills, told JI that his grandparents, who are Holocaust survivors, “lived around the corner from this shul. It’s mortifying.”

“I have a Jewish community that is seriously questioning whether it is still welcome in this city,” said Berger. 

“One of the sites houses a pre-K program, where young children, their families, and staff were greeted with swastikas and other hateful vandalism,” said Mark Treyger, CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York. 

“This is not normal,” said Treyger, “and we need city leaders to act now.”

Sydney Altfield, CEO of Teach Coalition — which oversees security grants for Congregation Machane Chodosh and most other synagogues and schools in the area — said in a statement, “Waking up to swastikas on a synagogue, homes, and a Jewish center that houses a preschool is not just vandalism, it is a direct act of intimidation against an entire community. We’re working closely with synagogue leadership and guiding next steps to protect families and strengthen security in the short term.”

“This is exactly why sustained investment in security for Jewish institutions is so critical. It also underscores how important it is not only to secure that funding but also to ensure institutions can access it,” Altfield continued.

In January, Queens played host to a pro-Hamas protest that caused nearby schools and a synagogue to close early, where dozens of masked protesters chanted “We support Hamas” near the synagogue.  

Duke University suspended its Students for Justice in Palestine chapter on Tuesday, one month after students began submitting complaints about an antisemitic Instagram post from the group, which depicted the U.S. and Israel as two pigs frothing at the mouth. 

The post, which has since been removed from Duke SJP’s Instagram page, was advertising a March 19 general meeting of the group, an on-campus discussion about “Iran, Zionism and US imperialism.” 

The flyer featured an illustration by artist Emory Douglas originally published in the newspaper The Black Panther in 1970, depicting the snarling two pigs holding the torch of liberty and the Star of David, labeled “U.S. Imperialism” and “Zionism.” 

According to The Duke Chronicle, the university’s student newspaper, 10 students filed complaints with Duke’s Office of Institutional Equity after the flyer was published on March 13. Citing the complaints and previous conduct issues, Duke Student Affairs suspended the group and froze its funding, according to the Chronicle. 

Noah Hamid, a sophomore political science major, commended the suspension, telling Jewish Insider that “part of the reason I chose Duke is that the administration has done a good job of protecting students on both sides.” 

Duke’s SJP chapter has been “less aggressive” than chapters on other elite campuses, said Hamid, who serves as a community impact fellow for the Israel on Campus Coalition. 

Still, the group has been behind several disruptive incidents on campus since the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in Israel. Demonstrators from Duke SJP disrupted a November 2024 on campus event featuring former Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, accussing him of supporting illegal occupation and genocide, leading to an investigation by Duke into violations of its Pickets, Protests, and Demonstrations policy. 

“A decision like [the SJP suspension] is not made relative to a single action but reflects a broader pattern of behavior that SJP has exhibited,” continued Hamid. “This is the right decision and the timeline [it took for administration] to make the decision is also a sign of it being fair. This isn’t a rash response. It’s them responding appropriately to reactions from the community.”  

Duke University did not respond to a request for comment from JI asking how long the suspension is expected to last. 

Given the chance to walk back some of his most incendiary commentary on an episode of the “Pod Save America” podcast released Sunday, antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker instead doubled down on his support of Hamas and other inflammatory rhetoric. 

“This [quote] is from January,” host Jon Favreau, a former speechwriter to President Barack Obama, told Piker in a segment looking back on some of Piker’s comments that have been picked up by national media. “‘Hamas is a thousand times better than a fascist settler colonial apartheid state,’” Favreau quoted.

Piker responded quickly, “I stand by that.”

Favreau then said, “[T]his is the one that bothered me most when I first heard it …. Even if you believe what happened in Gaza is genocide and what’s happening in the West Bank is apartheid, those are different claims from ‘Hamas is a thousand times better,’ because Hamas is an organization that has massacred, raped, kidnapped civilians on Oct. 7. They’ve also been catastrophic for Palestinians by almost every measure. … Do you actually mean that or is that a rhetorical move or like a solidarity signal?”

“I mean, it’s all of the above. I do mean it,” Piker responded. “I’m a lesser-evil voter and therefore I would vote for Hamas over Israel every single time.” He described Hamas as a “paramilitary organization that has like a political party as well, a politburo as well, that is entirely comprised, not as an alien force, but of orphan children that have had their parents killed by an apartheid state that has been dominating the lives of Palestinians for 80 years at this point.”

“So my perspective on this has always been that I think that Hamas’ tactics, which I oppose at times, or its like internal governance issues, are secondary to the conversation,” he continued. “And it makes me feel silly to consistently talk about what Hamas has done, especially when there has been an Oct. 7 times a thousand, if not more than a thousand at this point, in the hands of Israel against the Palestinian population in its entirety. I mean, they’re doing an Oct. 7 to Lebanon right now as we speak.”

Piker also reiterated his denunciations of Zionism, calling it “an ethno-religious supremacist ideology that is exterminationist” and comparing it to Nazism. 

The streamer invoked the often-misused claim that Albert Einstein had made the same comparison, which is based on a letter to the editor of The New York Times published on Dec. 4, 1948, signed by nearly 30 liberal intellectuals of their time, including Einstein, who called the rise of Menachem Begin’s new right-wing political party Herut, which later became part of Likud, “closely akin … to the Nazi and Fascist parties,” but did not condemn Zionism as a whole. 

About his comment that the U.S. “deserved” 9/11, Piker affirmed he believes that “we have been messing around in the Middle East for upwards of 60 years, and that’s precisely the reason why 9/11 happened, and that’s precisely the reason why these guys say ‘death to America’ in Iran, for example.” 

But, he said, “it was a heated response … and people will consistently use that against me over and over again.”

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) called for the federal government to “immediately” pull funding from Yale University over Yale Political Union’s decision to host Hasan Piker, an antisemitic streamer who previously suggested that the senator should be killed. Piker is scheduled to speak on campus Tuesday for a debate titled “Resolved: End the American Empire.”

Scott, who spoke last year at YPU, a storied debate society at the Ivy League university, wrote on X on Friday that “Yale receives billions from the federal government —  President Trump and Congress need to IMMEDIATELY revoke it.”

Piker, a far-left Twitch streamer, has recently been invited to speak at several high-profile events, despite a laundry list of antisemitic, anti-American and terror-supporting rhetoric, which includes justifying Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks in Israel. He has also called Orthodox Jews “inbred” and claimed America deserved 9/11. 

For Scott, Piker’s incendiary language is personal; the streamer was briefly suspended from Twitch last year after urging followers to “kill Rick Scott.” 

“An elite private university that hosts an antisemite who says a Senator should be killed, capitalists should be killed, and the U.S. deserved 9/11, shouldn’t get ONE CENT from taxpayers,” Scott wrote. 

Asked about YPU hosting Piker, a spokesperson for Yale told Jewish Insider last week ​​that “student organizations are responsible for issuing their own invitations to speakers.”

“At the same time, Yale is committed to maintaining a diverse, vibrant, and respectful community in which free expression is a fundamental value and a shared responsibility. The university is dedicated to providing a space where differing views can be expressed and heard respectfully,” the spokesperson said.

Unlike several Ivy League counterparts, including Harvard and Columbia, the Trump administration has not slashed Yale’s federal funding over antisemitism concerns. 

The Yale Political Union, a storied debate society at the Ivy League university, is slated to host antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker on campus on Tuesday for a debate titled “Resolved: End the American Empire,” according to the organization’s social media.

YPU — a registered student-run group, which is the oldest and largest collegiate debate society in America, according to its website — has hosted a range of elite figures such as former Presidents Ronald Reagan, Joe Biden and Jimmy Carter; media figures like Walter Cronkite and George Stephanopoulos; and leading intellectuals including economist Milton Friedman and Margaret Mead. 

Several alumni of the institution have held prestigious roles in politics, media and law, including former U.S. National Security Advisor McGeorge Bundy and former Secretary of State John Kerry. 

A spokesperson for Yale University told Jewish Insider ​​that “student organizations are responsible for issuing their own invitations to speakers.”

“At the same time, Yale is committed to maintaining a diverse, vibrant, and respectful community in which free expression is a fundamental value and a shared responsibility. The university is dedicated to providing a space where differing views can be expressed and heard respectfully,” the spokesperson said.  

Piker, a far-left Twitch streamer, has recently been invited to speak at several high-profile events, despite a laundry list of antisemitic, anti-American and terror-supporting rhetoric, which includes justifying Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks in Israel. He has also called Orthodox Jews “inbred” and claimed America deserved 9/11. 

Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is facing criticism from fellow Democrats and Jewish leaders for hosting rallies with Piker at two Michigan universities last week. 

Uri Cohen, executive director of the Slifka Center, Yale’s Hillel, told JI that “as an organization that holds foundational commitments to the free exchange of ideas — even those with which we deeply disagree — Slifka maintains that there must be a clear line between engaging with difference and platforming hate speech. We expect that Yale will continue to enforce applicable university policies to make sure that line gets reinforced for the good of Yale’s Jewish community and the larger campus as a whole.”

YPU did not respond to a request for comment from JI about its decision to host Piker. 

Tucker Carlson, the anti-Israel and antisemitic podcaster whose outspoken opposition to the Iran war has strained his relationship with President Donald Trump, has seen his personal ratings nosedive including among Republicans, according to a new YouGov poll. 

The survey, commissioned by UMass-Lowell between March 26-30, finds Carlson’s overall favorability rating at a dismal 17%, with 38% viewing him unfavorably. Nearly one-third of respondents said they had no opinion of him, and 15% had never heard of him.

Among Republicans, Carlson’s favorability rating is now just at 31%, with 24% viewing him unfavorably, and 35% offering no opinion. (For context, a Manhattan Institute poll of Republicans conducted in December 2025 found 63% of Republicans viewed Carlson favorably, with 21% viewing him unfavorably.)

On Thursday night, Trump launched a scathing social media attack against Carlson and other like-minded podcasters, referring to Carlson as a “broken man” who never recovered from being fired by Fox News in 2023. Trump’s post also included biting attacks against conspiracy-theorizing podcasters Candace Owens, Megyn Kelly and Alex Jones, calling them all “nutjobs,” “troublemakers” and “low IQ” individuals.

The poll was conducted two weeks before Trump’s harsh salvos against Carlson and the far-right podcasters. That would suggest that their standing with conservatives has more room to fall in future polling.

At a Tuesday night event with antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker at the University of Michigan, Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed doubled down on claims that the man who attacked Temple Israel in West Bloomfield last month did so as a result of the pain he felt from the war in the Middle East. 

“Nothing justifies the heinous attack that we saw on Temple Israel,” El-Sayed, a Democrat, said at a press conference alongside Piker, with whom he appeared at two campaign rallies in Michigan on Tuesday. “I also think it’s just critical for us to understand that hurt people do hurt people, and the circumstances happening 6,000 miles away can affect the lives that we live here, and if we stand against violence, we’ve got to stand against violence, all violence.” 

El-Sayed’s comments reiterated a sentiment he expressed the day after a Lebanese American man drove a car packed with explosives into the synagogue. No one lost their lives in the incident. The assailant, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after shooting at a security guard, had family members killed in Israeli strikes in Lebanon — including his brother, a commander in Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia. 

Since El-Sayed’s initial statement, more details surrounding the attack have surfaced. The FBI said the attack was “a Hezbollah-inspired act of terrorism purposely targeting the Jewish community.” 

When a reporter from The Free Press pressed El-Sayed on his claim, asking whether a similar argument would have allowed sympathy for a Jewish person attacking a mosque after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Israel, he suggested the circumstances were not the same. 

“After Oct. 7, there was a whole genocide against Palestinians,” El-Sayed said.

Hasan Piker, the far-left, antisemitic streamer, was recently asked by Politico who his favorite presidential candidates are for the Democratic nomination in 2028. He offered a few unsurprising names: progressive Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA), United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain… and Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), the mild-mannered purple-state senator up for reelection this year.

Piker, in the interview, called Ossoff, “my dark-horse pick, depending on how he presents himself if he has ambitions for higher office.”

But does Ossoff, a Jewish senator who is facing a tough reelection in a state President Donald Trump carried twice, return Piker’s affections? His team has been unresponsive about his views on Piker, even as some leading Democrats have spoken out against the influencer and kept their distance.

Multiple spokespeople for Ossoff didn’t respond to several inquiries this week from JI. 

Ossoff’s silence about Piker could strain his already rocky relationship with Georgia’s Jewish community. Key Jewish leaders and donors have repeatedly expressed outrage with the senator over his votes in favor of resolutions to block U.S. arms sales to Israel, and some have threatened to withhold support from his presidential campaigns.

Piker’s record is well-documented at this point. He said America deserved the 9/11 attacks, repeatedly described Orthodox Jews as inbred, downplayed sexual assault on Oct. 7, said he supports Hamas over Israel, hosted a friendly interview with an alleged Houthi terrorist and laughed at Jewish students who faced antisemitism on college campuses. 

It’s a record that’s led a number of Ossoff’s colleagues in Congress to speak out. Rep. Brad Schneider (D-IL), the chair of the New Democrat Coalition, called Piker an “unapologetic antisemite.” 

Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) and Michigan Senate candidates Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow have also condemned Piker. Leaders of major Jewish groups have also denounced the streamer, urging lawmakers to keep their distance from him.

It may be hard for Ossoff to remain silent on an issue that is separating more mainstream Democrats from the far left. And Georgia isn’t just a swing state, but one with a sizable Jewish population. 

Ossoff and his staff’s silence is surprising, given the growing salience of the issue of Piker’s extremism within the party. We’ll let you know if we hear back from the senator’s team. 

An AI-generated Instagram account portraying an Orthodox-looking rabbi is pushing antisemitic conspiracy theories to its more than 1.4 million followers, and it’s not the only one, a study published this week about antisemitic content on the social media platform has found. 

An account called “Rabbi Goldman” “uses fake, AI-created authority figures to spread hate” in “a troubling and growing tactic,” according to the report, published on Wednesday by the Combat Antisemitism Movement.

The 12-page report, titled “Engineered Exposure: How Antisemitic Content Is Pushed and Amplified to Millions Across Instagram,” documents 100 posts that researchers described as antisemitic, pushed directly to Instagram accounts over a 96-hour period from March 19-22. 

These posts, actively suggested by the platform’s recommendation systems, generated more than 5.3 million likes and 3.8 million shares, with an estimated reach of 150 to 280 million users, according to the report. 

CAM defined antisemitic posts as ones that invoke conspiracy theories — such as Jews controlling the media or manipulating global conflicts — and posts that claim Jews, often referred to as “Zionists,” are linked to demonic forces or satanic imagery, all of which have been used to justify antisemitic violence. 

The report raises particular concern around the creation of “closed content environments,” in which users are repeatedly fed similar antisemitic themes, with little or no countervailing content. 

“This type of algorithmic clustering reaffirms dangerous beliefs, contributing to a process of radicalization that can have lethal real-world consequences,” the report states. Researchers identified 12 AI-generated “rabbis” with a combined following of 2.1 million Instagram users, all of which promote classic antisemitic stereotypes. 

The “Rabbi Goldman” account features many of these, including one video in which the “rabbi,” wearing a tuxedo and seemingly seated in a luxury airplane, claims that Jews utilize empty private jets to evade taxes. The community note attached to the clip reads, “This is an AI generated rabbi who is trying to scam you by selling a fake 9$ get rich handbook. This account is ran by scammers based in south India.”

Meta, which is the parent company of Instagram — as well as Facebook and WhatsApp — did not respond to a request for comment from Jewish Insider about the report’s findings. 

“Simply put, this is evidence of a broad systemic failure on the part of Instagram and Meta,” Sacha Roytman, the CEO of CAM, said in a statement. “When a platform actively recommends content that dehumanizes Jews to mass audiences, we are no longer talking about a simple oversight or a mistake in the algorithmic design. We are talking about infrastructure that normalizes hatred at scale that must be addressed immediately.”

“CAM is calling on Meta to go beyond basic enforcement and take real responsibility. What’s been uncovered here must be taken seriously. This isn’t a fringe problem. Rather, it points to a broader, systemic issue with global reach, shaping how millions of people encounter and engage with antisemitic ideas in 2026,” the report states. 

Last year, Meta received pushback from Jewish leaders when it introduced a new community-driven fact-checking system, ending its third-party fact-checking program and replacing it with a system modeled after the community notes feature on Elon Musk’s X.  Some Jewish leaders expressed concern that the move would “open the floodgates to content” that could target Jewish communities and individuals, and called the decision a “step back” in the fight against rising antisemitism.

Dangerous implications of social media have extended beyond the Jewish community, with a jury in Los Angeles ruling on Wednesday that Meta, as well as Google, are liable for creating addictive products that caused a teenager’s depression and anxiety. The verdict marks the first time juries have decided that tech companies are at least partially liable for distress online and offline. 

Police in San Jose, Calif., are investigating a violent attack against two adult men outside an upscale restaurant as an antisemitic hate crime, a spokesperson for the police department confirmed on Tuesday.

On Sunday afternoon, three assailants approached the two victims outside Augustine, a restaurant and cafe located in the Santana Row shopping mall. The two men — Israeli Americans — were speaking Hebrew when the attackers allegedly overheard them, according to the San Francisco Jewish Community Relations Council. 

“The victims alleged that the suspects used antisemitic language during the altercation. The incident is currently being investigated by the Assaults Unit as a possible hate crime,” a spokesperson for the San Jose Police Department told Jewish Insider. 

A video shows the three young men repeatedly punching and kicking the victims directly in front of other diners and as bystanders walked past. The assailants then fled before police arrived.

Tali Klima, a spokesperson for the grassroots advocacy group Bay Area Jewish Coalition, urged elected officials in the Silicon Valley community to speak out against the attack. 

“We call on our local elected officials to finally take a strong stand against this hatred using not only their words but also concrete actions. It is time to take threats to the Jewish community seriously,” Klima said on Tuesday.

The Anti-Defamation League on Thursday urged public figures to refrain from promoting antisemitic rhetoric amid the U.S. and Israel’s operation against Iran, as some leading Democrats have invoked anti-Israel sentiment since the war began last week.   

“Since the start of hostilities with the Islamic Republic of Iran last weekend, we are witnessing an alarming pattern of escalating, inflammatory rhetoric from voices across the political and ideological spectrum,” said Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the ADL. “This rhetoric distorts reality and fuels dangerous antisemitic narratives.”

The ADL’s statement comes as several Democratic elected officials have condemned the joint U.S.-Israel ongoing strikes in Iran.  

Greenblatt expressed concern that “too many voices” have “engaged in this dangerous game,” which he said includes statements calling Israel an “apartheid state” or accusing it of “genocide,” which “inflame hatred.” 

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said on Tuesday on the liberal podcast “Pod Save America” that the U.S. should reconsider its military support for Israel. Amid the Iran operation, he told the podcast’s hosts that Israel could “appropriately” be described as an apartheid state.   

The comments marked a shift for Newsom — widely considered a 2028 presidential contender — who traveled to Israel less than two weeks after the Oct. 7 terror attacks in 2023 and said in an October 2025 interview that he would not consider eliminating U.S. military aid to Israel.   

Additionally, the ADL condemned rhetoric that claims pro-Israel organizations and supporters are “anti-American” for advocating for a U.S.-Israel relationship, as well as rhetoric that blames Israel or frames American policy as manipulated by Jewish influence. 

During an address at J Street’s convention in Washington on Sunday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) said the pro-Israel advocacy group “may call itself pro-American. They may call themselves pro-Israel. But they are neither.” 

“It is a sad irony that an operation against the world’s largest sponsor of antisemitism has prompted so much antisemitism,” said Greenblatt.

The ADL’s statement, which does not mention Newsom or any other figures by name, is a contrast from one put out by the American Jewish Committee on Wednesday, which directly condemned the governor.  

“Governor Newsom’s recent comments about Israel were confusing and problematic at a critical moment, as the United States, Israel, and their regional partners confront significant threats from the Iranian regime,” the AJC said.


“Invoking the term ‘apartheid’ is wrong and inflammatory, does not reflect the complex realities on the ground, and only risks inflaming tensions.
Policy disagreements between Israeli and U.S. leaders should not undermine the enduring importance of the U.S.–Israel relationship, grounded in shared values and strategic interests.” 

Weeks before Graham Platner promoted an antisemitic conspiracy theorist in a now-deleted social media post on Thursday, the controversial Maine Senate candidate appeared on a popular YouTube show whose host has spread specious claims about Jews and Israel.

Platner faced blowback this week for boosting a social media comment about a looming war with Iran by Stew Peters, a neo-Nazi influencer who has frequently espoused antisemitic tropes and engaged in Holocaust denial. Platner’s team said the post was made in error and “immediately” removed it after learning it elevated a “despicable account.”

In late January, however, Platner sat for a lengthy online interview with Nate Cornacchia, a retired Green Beret who has also promoted antisemitic conspiracy theories. Near the end of their hour-long conversation, Platner, a fellow military veteran, called himself “a longtime fan” of Cornacchia’s YouTube channel, “Valhalla VFT,” and said it was “an absolute pleasure being” on the show.

Cornacchia, whose show claims nearly 500,000 YouTube subscribers, has in recent months helped stoke a burgeoning far-right conspiracy theory alleging that Israel was involved in the assassination of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk. 

Two days before speaking with Platner, for instance, Cornacchia went on a podcast hosted by Jake Shields, a former mixed martial arts fighter who is now a prominent Holocaust denier, and pointed to what he described as “huge links” connecting Israel to Kirk’s killing. “The biggest one, the way I look at it, is because he was basically so important from the Zionist side to the young right wing, sort of that counter Nick Fuentes audience” that “Israel needs desperately,” he said.

“Charlie Kirk said that he was tired of being bullied by his Jewish donors” and that he “no longer could support the pro-Israel cause, and he was dead 48 hours later,” Cornacchia added on the show, where he also agreed with Shields’ assertion that President John F. Kennedy had “probably” been assassinated in a covert “venture between the CIA and Mossad,” the Israeli intelligence agency. “100%,” he replied.

In addition, Cornacchia has suggested that the global war on terror was conducted “on behest of Israel” and claimed Israel would benefit if another 9/11-style attack were carried out during the tenure of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, saying it would help to drum up Islamophobic sentiment and lead to another foreign military entanglement in the Middle East.

The Jewish state “got exactly who they wanted” in Mamdani, the city’s first Muslim mayor whom the Israeli government has accused of antisemitism, he argued on his own show in November. “That’s their candidate, guys. You got to pay attention.”

The conservative YouTube commentator has also questioned why George Soros’ son Alex was seen posing for a photograph with Mamdani on the night of his election. “You may immediately be thinking, ‘Oh, well, of course, that’s because Soros funds all the socialists,’” Cornacchia said of George, a Jewish billionaire donor to left-wing causes and a Holocaust survivor who is often a target of antisemitic attacks. 

“No, no, no, no, that’s surface level,” he told his viewers, claiming that the philanthropist “moves in coordination with our greatest ally,” a term he uses to sarcastically allude to Israel.   

Platner’s interview with Cornacchia, which he promoted on his social media channels, did not touch on such topics. His team did not respond to a request for comment on Friday about Cornacchia’s antisemitic remarks.

The 41-year-old Senate candidate, who is running in a competitive Democratic primary to challenge Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), faced skepticism from critics last fall after he denied knowing a tattoo that was on his chest for years closely mirrored a Totenkopf, the skull-and-crossbones icon adopted by an infamous Nazi SS unit. A former acquaintance of Platner who spoke with Jewish Insider said he had identified the symbol as such more than a decade ago, a claim he has denied. He had the tattoo removed last October. 

Still, even as he maintains a commanding polling advantage in the Maine Democratic primary against Gov. Janet Mills, Platner’s explanation of the tattoo — combined with past and recent online blunders — is raising questions about whether he can weather scrutiny in a general election that party leadership views as key to reclaiming the Senate majority.

Mills, for her part, strongly hinted at such doubts in a snarky X post on Friday. “For what it’s worth,” she wrote, “I don’t have any tattoos.”

And on the same day he was drawing backlash for amplifying a conspiracy theorist this week, Platner was fielding a combative call from a listener during an appearance on a podcast hosted by the comedian Tim Heidecker.

The caller cast suspicion on Platner’s claim that he did not know the tattoo represented a Nazi symbol until recently, citing his self-proclaimed knowledge of World War II history, and called on the candidate to apologize rather than “dodging around” the issue.

But Platner held firm. “I’m not going to apologize for something that I didn’t know about or do,” he insisted. “The moment that it was clear and I was putting it in that context I had it covered, because I don’t want that on my body.”

Graham Platner, a far-left Senate candidate in Maine, amplified a social media post on Thursday from a far-right conspiracy theorist well-known for viciously antisemitic commentary — before quickly deleting the statement.

In a comment to X late Thursday morning, Platner approvingly boosted a remark from Stew Peters, an extremist radio host who has frequently promoted antisemitic tropes and engaged in Holocaust denial, calling a war with Iran “the only thing Republicans and Democrats have both given a standing ovation for.”

“As always, there’s one thing that brings Republican and Democratic politicians together: sending other people’s children to die in stupid wars in the Middle East,” Platner, a 41-year-old Marine veteran turned oyster farmer who has sharply criticized U.S. military engagement abroad, wrote in his own post.

He deleted the post an hour or so after it had been flagged by online observers who noted that he was elevating a problematic figure with a long record of hostile rhetoric toward Jews.

The Anti-Defamation League has described Peters as a “prolific antisemite” who blames “‘the Jews’ for everything he believes is wrong with society,” while the Southern Poverty Law Center has said his radio show has “become a central hub for antisemitic and conspiratorial content.”

He has said Judaism is “satanic” and a “death cult,” promoted blood libels, called for a “final solution” to mass-deport American Jews and questioned the existence of gas chambers that exterminated Jews during the Holocaust, among other conspiratorial assertions.

In a statement to Jewish Insider, a spokesperson for Platner said the post had been published due to an oversight. “We were reposting a C-Span clip of Trump speaking about the potential war with Iran and didn’t realize that the video had been posted by a despicable account,” the spokesperson said. “When we learned who the poster was we immediately deleted the post.”

The social media blunder is a particularly sensitive issue for Platner, who earlier in his campaign faced scrutiny over a Nazi tattoo on his chest, which he had covered up last October. He has insisted he was not aware the tattoo closely mirrored a Totenkopf, a skull-and-crossbones icon used by an infamous Nazi SS unit, even as a former acquaintance told JI that he had years ago specifically identified it as such. He has denied such claims.

“I am not a secret Nazi,” Platner said in a podcast interview last year, while calling himself “a lifelong opponent” of “Nazism and antisemitism and racism in general.”

Despite such baggage, polling has shown Platner holds a commanding lead in the Maine Democratic primary race, where he is facing Gov. Janet Mills to challenge Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who is one of the most vulnerable Republican incumbents up for reelection in the midterms.

An unfolding scandal implicating Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX) could catapult an anti-Israel social media influencer with a history of antisemitic posts to Congress in Texas’ upcoming 23rd District Republican primary.

Brandon Herrera, who ran against Gonzales in 2024, came under fire from Gonzales and Jewish and pro-Israel groups in the previous election cycle over a series of YouTube videos replete with imagery, music and jokes about the Nazi regime and the Holocaust. He also expressed opposition to U.S. aid to Israel.

But Tuesday evening, corroborating a long-running rumor, the San Antonio Express News reported that Gonzales had been having an extramarital affair with a female staffer who died by suicide last year. The Express News reported that the relationship was allegedly well-known to staffers and cited multiple sources close to the woman, including a former colleague, and a text message she sent confirming the relationship prior to her death.

Both Gonzales and the woman were married to other people at the time of the relationship and had children. Gonzales’ campaign did not respond to a request for comment from Jewish Insider, though he has previously denied the affair.

The Express News’ editorial board announced, hours after the paper broke the story, that it was withdrawing its endorsement of Gonzales.

“The affair is troubling for many reasons,” the editorial board wrote. “First, it is an act of deception. Gonzales is married and has six children. Second, this was not an equal relationship but one involving a staffer. Third, while an attorney for Santos-Aviles’ husband has said he does not believe the affair played a role in the suicide by self-immolation at her home in Uvalde, it still looms over the tragedy.”

Herrera demanded that Gonzales drop out of the race and resign, warning that Gonzales clinching the Republican nomination could allow Democrats to flip the seat in November. 

“[Gonzales] not only broke House ethics rules by having an adulterous affair with a member of his congressional staff and by using taxpayer money to fund the affair, but he also broke trust with the public by insisting that the initial reporting of the affair was false,” Herrera said. “If he prevails in the primary and becomes our party’s nominee in the general election, Democrats will seize the opportunity to flip a reliable Republican seat blue.”

Democrats have an outside shot of flipping the district, which voted for President Donald Trump by 15 points in 2024, in November.

“It’s shameful that Brandon Herrera is using a disgruntled former staffer to smear her memory and score political points, conveniently pushing this out the very day early voting started,” Gonzales responded in a statement to The Texas Tribune. “I am not going to engage in these personal smears and instead will remain focused on helping President Trump secure the border and improve the lives of all Texans.”

The late staffer’s husband said in an interview on Wednesday, his first time speaking out about the situation, that Gonzales had “abused his power” and that his wife’s mental state deteriorated after he discovered the affair and the spouses separated. He said he did not believe she was trying to kill herself, but that it was “a cry for help that turned into a tragedy.”

He said he wants Gonzales to face accountability and criticized the congressman for “pushing, you know, family values and Christian morals … denying the fact that he’s ruined somebody’s life.”

Gonzales narrowly beat Herrera in a head-to-head primary runoff in 2024, 51%-49%, a margin of less than 400 votes. Herrera has spent the last two years on the campaign trail, gearing up for a rematch.

Even before the scandal broke, a Political Intelligence (PI) poll published last week by the Daily Caller showed that Herrera led Gonzales 33%-29% among likely Republican primary voters, growing his lead to 43%-34% in a head-to-head matchup. 

Neither the AIPAC-linked United Democracy Project nor the Republican Jewish Coalition, which collectively spent $1.4 million opposing Herrera in 2024, responded to inquiries about whether they plan to be involved in the race again this year.

Gonzales maintains a significant lead over Herrera in fundraising, closing out 2025 with $2.5 million on hand to Herrera’s $722,000. If neither candidate breaks 50% in the primary election, the highest vote-getters will advance to a head-to-head run-off election.

Two other Republican candidates, former Rep. Quico Canseco (R-TX) and veteran Keith Barton, are also in the race, but both trail significantly in fundraising.

Gonzales also has the backing of Trump, despite efforts by Herrera to tie himself to the president. Trump sent a cease-and-desist letter to Herrera’s campaign in January demanding that he stop using Trump’s image in campaign materials, which a Trump representative called misleading.

Brendan Steinhauser, a Texas Republican strategist, noted to Jewish Insider that the report came days into the early voting period, putting the issue front-and-center for voters as they head to the polls.

But the extent of the story’s impact, he continued, will depend on how much voters are aware of it — whether they’re seeing it repeatedly in conservative media and to what extent the Herrera campaign invests in spreading the news widely, and through what channels. He also noted that the latest reporting will likely be most voters’ first exposure to the story.

“I think it’s complicated, and I think it’s definitely not good,” Steinhauser said. “The news is tragic and horrible, and he clearly made bad decisions, and the voters are going to have their say on that, and we’ll see what they do.”

Steinhauser predicted that the race is likely to go to a runoff, and said some voters might also stay home, if they have negative views of both candidates.

When the results are tallied, the impact of the story may be measurable, he added, in whether Gonzales’ share of the votes drops from the start of early voting to later in the early voting period and election day ballots.

The revelations about Gonzales will also make it harder for Republicans to hold onto the seat in November, with both potential Republican nominees now carrying baggage into the general election. “If I were the Democrats, I would probably be looking at investing more money here,” Steinhauser said.

Mark Jones, a Texas pollster and political science fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy, said that Gonzales has “had a whirlwind” turnaround from solidifying the support of the president and the GOP establishment to the latest revelations. 

Though rumors had been circulating for a number of months about the affair, “it’s one thing to have them be allegations with him denying them, and another thing for it to be increasingly credible evidence that not only was he having an affair with this woman, but then he was disingenuous in terms of his responses and when questioned about it,” Jones said.

Jones added that Trump’s response, if any, to the news would be decisive, given the president’s immense popularity and the value of his endorsement with Texas voters.

He said that the Gonzales scandal is most likely to be a problem for Republicans in November if there is a “continued drip, drip of information that increasingly links Congressman Gonzales to this woman’s death.”

“Herrera has a fair point, certainly, the Tony Gonzales without this whole incident is a much stronger candidate than the Tony Gonzales with this incident,” he continued, while arguing that Gonzales is still likely to be “viewed more positively than Herrera” — and, as a moderate, is better aligned with the district — particularly if Democrats spend millions on an anti-Herrera campaign.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and his team refused to condemn social media posts from the co-founder of the group ‘Hot Girls for Zohran’ that boosted antisemitic and pro-Iran voices and bashed police and leading U.S. politicians.

The refusal came one day after Jewish Insider revealed Kaif Gilani — a finance professional who spearheaded a social media, merchandising and volunteer canvassing operation  supporting the mayor’s election last year — had shared conspiracy theories from a Holocaust revisionist and a video cheerleading ex-Hamas military chief and Oct. 7 mastermind Yahya Sinwar, along with posts insulting law enforcement and various political figures. 

From City Hall on Thursday, Mamdani would only stress that Gilani’s organization operated independently of his official election effort.

Asked by a reporter about his association with Gilani, Mamdani said, “This was an individual leading an outside group and was never paid for by our campaign. If New Yorkers want to know my views then they can hear it directly from me.”

When JI pressed the mayor directly whether he condemned the content of Gilani’s posts, Mamdani refused to respond and left the room, similar to how he fled questions on the matter from Politico on Wednesday. His press secretary maintained he had answered the question. 

Mamdani spokeswoman Dora Pekec acknowledged that the mayor had posed for photos with Gilani, but would not say anything about his view of the activist’s promotion of conspiracy theories of Israeli involvement in 9/11 and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, as well as the amplification of explicit pro-Iran and pro-Hamas messaging, or of posts asserting that “all cops are going to hell” and “there’s no such thing as a good cop.”

“As the mayor says, if you want to know what he thinks, you can hear it from him,” Pekec said.

The mayor also did not answer a question from another reporter of whether he knew Gilani or had given him a referral to the campaign of former City Comptroller Brad Lander, whose congressional bid Mamdani has endorsed. 

JI discovered that Gilani, through a company he formed in November, had been the highest-paid consultant to Lander’s congressional campaign — though Lander, a self-described progressive Zionist and outspoken Israel critic, insisted through a spokesperson that his team had been unaware of Gilani’s posts and terminated his contract after JI shared its findings.

A new candidate for Republican county chair in Virginia’s largest jurisdiction is facing scrutiny over a range of antisemitic social media posts in which she has told Jews to “move to Israel,” spread conspiracy theories about Jewish control of U.S. politics and expressed admiration for prominent neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers, among other extremist comments.

Shelly Arnoldi, who recently launched her bid to lead the Fairfax County Republican Committee, is stoking concerns among Jewish community leaders now seeking to raise awareness about her extensive public record of promoting antisemitic tropes while demonizing Israel.

While Arnoldi is not seen as a particularly viable candidate in the upcoming Feb. 28 election, local political observers say, her campaign has still given some pause to both Jewish and Republican activists who worry her radical views underscore a creeping embrace of antisemitic sentiment in the GOP fueled by leading far-right commentators including Tucker Carlson, whose interviews she has eagerly endorsed.

“She does not appear to be a serious person,” one Jewish community activist told Jewish Insider on condition of anonymity to address a sensitive topic. “But just because someone is a hateful antisemitic looney-tune doesn’t mean they can’t win office. She strikes me as someone who would continue to run, and in that regard I consider her to be a real threat.”

In recent months, Arnoldi has instructed Jewish social media critics to “move to Israel,” where she has said they “belong,” while promoting antisemitic materials alleging Zionist plots to subvert American governance and to weaken Christian representation. She has also suggested that Jews “appear to control the world,” said that “nobody cares about Jews” and claimed that “Israel owns us,” among multiple other derogatory and conspiratorial remarks posted to X.

Meanwhile, Arnoldi has frequently voiced her enthusiastic support for antisemitic influencers and conspiracy theorists on the far right, such as Nick Fuentes, Candace Owens and Ian Carroll, the latter of whom she has called a “brave man.”

Several posts were flagged by antisemitism watchdogs on social media this week. Arnoldi, who has accused her critics of attempting to smear her, did not return a request for comment from JI.

A new letter circulated on social media by Jewish community activists on Monday called attention to what it described as Arnoldi’s “sustained pattern of antisemitic rhetoric,” saying it is “incompatible with party leadership.”

“If elevated to chair,” the letter warned, “this record will not remain local or contained.”

Arnoldi, who in November ran an unsuccessful campaign for state delegate as an independent, is challenging the incumbent GOP chair, Katie Gorka, who declined to comment on the race when reached by JI on Tuesday.

Even if Republicans face long odds of winning elected office in Fairfax County — increasingly a Democratic stronghold — Arnoldi’s insurgent campaign still carries implications for the future direction of GOP politics in one of the largest jurisdictions in the D.C. area, some party observers cautioned.

Gary Aiken, a former Republican candidate for Fairfax supervisor, expressed alarm at Arnoldi’s campaign on Tuesday. “If these are the kinds of people running for chairman, I may have to get more involved again,” he told JI.

Still, Mike Ginsberg, a member of the Fairfax County Republican Party who also serves as its general counsel, downplayed such concerns — even as he acknowledged that Arnoldi’s messaging would likely resonate with a minority faction of committee members whom he noted are “perpetually disaffected and constantly complaining.”

“People of a certain age would analogize her to Statler and Waldorf in ‘The Muppet Show’ from the 1970s — criticizing from the peanut gallery without making any constructive contributions,” Ginsberg, who is Jewish, told JI. “Statler and Waldorf at least had the benefit of being entertaining — Shelly does not.”  

“Put bluntly, Shelly Arnoldi is a crank,” he added. “Every party has them. She is ours.”

Several leading Jewish and pro-Israel advocacy groups are expressing concerns about the impact of the recent rise in antisemitic and Islamist messaging out of Saudi Arabia, as the Gulf kingdom’s rhetoric is increasingly raising questions about its standing as a reliable U.S. ally in the region.

In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia has ratcheted up its anti-Israel rhetoric through state-sanctioned media and other regime mouthpieces, amid a widening rift with the United Arab Emirates and closer alignment with Islamist-oriented forces that are hostile toward Israel, such as Turkey and Qatar. 

The new posturing, part of a broader pivot from what national security experts had seen as Saudi Arabia’s moderating influence in the region, has fueled surprise and frustration among Jewish American advocacy organizations that have pushed for the kingdom to normalize relations with Israel, an objective now regarded in some circles as unlikely for the foreseeable future.

Last week, the Anti-Defamation League said in a sharply worded social media statement that it was “alarmed by the increasing frequency and volume of prominent Saudi voices — analysts, journalists and preachers — using openly antisemitic dog whistles and aggressively pushing anti-Abraham Accords rhetoric, often while peddling conspiracy theories about ‘Zionist plots.’”

“This is harmful on many levels, diminishing the prospect of peaceful coexistence in the region and weakening regional initiatives promoting tolerance, understanding and prosperity,” the ADL added.

The pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC, for its part, amplified a recent X post by Barak Ravid, a global affairs correspondent for Axios, who flagged what he called Saudi Arabia’s “information war against the UAE” and said “the Saudi press is full of articles that include anti-Israeli conspiracies, anti-Abraham Accords rhetoric and even antisemitic language.”

In a statement to Jewish Insider on Monday, Deryn Sousa, a spokesperson for AIPAC, emphasized that “America would be stronger and our interests would be better served if more nations, including Saudi Arabia, joined the Abraham Accords and worked together with our democratic ally Israel to promote regional peace, security and prosperity.”

Brian Romick, the president and CEO of Democratic Majority for Israel, echoed that sentiment, calling the Abraham Accords “a landmark diplomatic achievement” whose expansion, “especially through Saudi-Israeli normalization, should be a bipartisan pillar of U.S. policy.”

“A breakthrough between Israel and Saudi Arabia would be the most consequential step the region can take toward lasting peace, security, and prosperity, and the Trump administration should pursue it relentlessly while linking any upgrade in the relationship to measurable progress toward Saudi-Israeli normalization,” Romick said in a statement to JI. “Despite recent political frictions and unhelpful rhetoric, deep mutual interests in security, economic integration and technology make normalization an enduring strategic imperative.”

The American Jewish Committee, which has also promoted Saudi participation in the Accords, said it is “keeping a close eye on any developments” tied to the kingdom’s shift, but declined further comment.

While experts have linked Saudi Arabia’s recent animus toward Israel to such issues as the war in Gaza, Israeli recognition of Somaliland and unrest in Iran, Michael Makovsky, the president and CEO of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, suggested that one unexplored motivating factor may be the Trump administration’s friendly relations with Islamist leaders in Turkey, Qatar and Syria.

“It sends a signal to the Saudis that you could take more Islamist positions, and it won’t hurt you with the United States,” Makovsky said in an interview with JI on Monday, arguing the administration will need to “reorient” its engagement in the region if it wants to help shape Saudi policies to align more closely with American interests.

But Makovsky said he has not seen interest among Trump officials in pursuing that path — even as the administration has long encouraged Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords.

“I think the administration needs to step back and reflect on the fact that, if the Saudis are acting like this now, and they’ve been more of a moderating influence,” he said, “it should lead to a rethink of how they’re approaching all these other countries.”

Political leaders in North Carolina are condemning the Nazi symbols and antisemitic graffiti discovered earlier this week at a hub of Jewish life in Charlotte.

Shalom Park, where the vandalism took place, is a manicured 54-acre campus that is home to a Jewish Community Center, Jewish federation, community foundation, two synagogues, a preschool, a school, a library and a day camp, among other Jewish services, including a dedicated multi-car security detail. Signs were posted around the park featuring a swastika and a noose with language encouraging people to join the Nazi party.

The incident was met with widespread condemnation from current and prospective statewide leaders. 

“These ugly, hate-filled images left in Charlotte’s Shalom Park are unacceptable. My heart goes out to the Jewish North Carolinians who had to bear witness to this hateful ignorance,” Democratic Gov. Josh Stein, who is Jewish, told Jewish Insider. “Every person, regardless of religious background, deserves to live and worship without fear or intimidation. I am dedicated to doing everything I can to root out antisemitism in North Carolina.” 

Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC) said in a statement to JI, “Antisemitism has no place in our state. The vandalism at the Charlotte JCC was a clear act of hate, but it will not silence our commitment to standing with the Jewish community. I am grateful to those who swiftly restored Shalom Park to its purpose as a place of peace and respect.”

On Thursday afternoon, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) posted on X, “It’s deeply disturbing to see hateful imagery like this in Charlotte. Antisemitism is unacceptable and has no place in North Carolina or anywhere in America. I stand with our Jewish neighbors in condemning this hatred wherever it appears.”

The two leading candidates in the race to replace Tillis, who is retiring, echoed his condemnation of the Nazi imagery.

“This was a deplorable act of hate meant to intimidate and scare our Jewish neighbors — it’s unacceptable and those responsible should be held accountable. My thoughts are with the families and children of the Charlotte Jewish community,” former Gov. Roy Cooper, the expected Democratic nominee in the state’s high-profile Senate race, told JI.

“Antisemitism continues to rise across the country and it’s on all of us to root out antisemitism in all of its forms,” Cooper added. “I’ve fought against antisemitism and hate throughout my career and would continue working to keep all North Carolinians safe as U.S. senator.”

Michael Whatley, the likely GOP nominee in the race to succeed Tillis, told JI, “The antisemitic materials and Nazi imagery found at Shalom Park are vile and unacceptable. Antisemitism has no place in Charlotte or anywhere in America. We stand with the Jewish community and condemn this cowardly act in the strongest terms.”

Shalom Park has primarily been financed through the Leon Levine Foundation, whose president also spoke out following the incident.

“While this moment demonstrates that there are still pockets of hate in our community, it does not define who we are. In response, friends, neighbors, and allies have come together in a powerful show of solidarity,” Tom Lawrence, president and CEO of the foundation, said in a statement to JI. 

“We are deeply grateful to our many Jewish community partners who have met this moment with clarity of voice and action,” he added. “We are confident that our Jewish community is taking all appropriate measures to remain safe while continuing to engage joyfully and openly in Jewish life, learning, and celebration.”

A city council meeting in Richmond, Calif., ended with shouting and frustration after 11 p.m. on Tuesday evening when the body adjourned without considering a measure seeking to censure Mayor Eduardo Martinez, who is under fire from the local Jewish community after sharing antisemitic posts on his LinkedIn page last month. 

“This is a complete embarrassment as a city council,” Councilmember Jamelia Brown, one of the officials who sought to issue a formal censure of Martinez, said before walking away from the meeting room. “We will stand in solidarity and say that this was antisemitic conduct and behavior, yet we don’t want to formalize it and put it on record. It’s very coward [sic] behavior.”

Tuesday’s meeting was the first since Martinez shared multiple incendiary posts regarding the terrorist attack at a Hanukkah celebration in Bondi Beach, Australia, last month. He shared one post referring to the shooting as “Israel’s false flag attack.” Another post called the public celebration of Hanukkah “deeply provocative and very un-Jewish” and said it was meant to intimidate Muslims.

He has since fended off calls to resign from the Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council and several dozen local elected officials from nearby cities and towns.  

Martinez offered an apology at the start of the meeting, though he began with a jab at “people who are not ready to accept an apology.” 

“I failed to meet the responsibility that my position requires. I reposted content online that included antisemitic tropes and conspiracy theories, which have long been used to dehumanize Jewish people and justify violence against them. I was wrong to share them,” Martinez said. 

He offered another apology to “people who felt they had to choose between taking concerns of antisemitism seriously or continuing to support me and the larger vision of justice that we strive toward.”

“I regret that I compromised the integrity of the Palestinian solidarity movement here in Richmond,” Martinez said. “We must be clear that we will not allow antisemitism in our movements, nor will we allow antisemitism to be weaponized against progressive causes.”

The antisemitic rhetoric has struck a nerve with the city’s small Jewish community and Bay Area Jewish activists, givenMartinez’s history of sharing anti-Israel content. Richmond, a San Francisco suburb home to 115,000 people, was the first city in the country to adopt a resolution calling for a ceasefire after the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks in Israel, doing so weeks after the attacks. 

“We’re still angry. His apology did not feel genuine. It was sort of like a ‘sorry that my opponents are coming after me’ kind of apology, and so we’re maintaining the position that he should step down,” JCRC CEO Tyler Gregory told Jewish Insider on Thursday. 

The Richmond City Council voted to adopt a measure to begin a “restorative process” between the mayor and the city’s Jewish community, with Martinez undergoing antisemitism training and meeting at least twice with Rabbi Julie Saxe-Taller, the rabbi at Temple Beth Hillel in Richmond. Martinez said he met with Saxe-Taller and local Chabad Rabbi Yitzchok Wagner in recent days. 

“I appreciate our beginning a much-needed process to address antisemitism and to address the way it’s being increasingly and more baldly used to target Jews as well as to justify attacks on other vulnerable communities,” Saxe-Taller said in brief remarks at the council meeting. “The mayor and leadership of Temple Beth Hillel and others have begun a process of repair with the goal of making Richmond less vulnerable to antisemitism and therefore also to racism and division.”

Wagner and Martinez met for about two hours last week, Wagner told JI. He declined to speak publicly about the content of their meeting, but noted that frustration remains within the Jewish community.

“I think there is a large group that basically says, ‘Well, we have to do our part and just try to work with him. At the same time, the apology is not OK,’ and they’re not ready to accept the apology. They don’t feel it was sincere,” Wagner said. 

Attendees at the council meeting held up competing signs as city residents and activists from nearby communities spoke for a minute each. “Censure Mayor Martinez,” one sign read. “It was not just ‘one mistake,’” read another. The mayor’s supporters held signs reading, “Richmond Jews support our mayor” and “People power from Richmond to Palestine.” 

Vice Mayor Cesar Zepeda was one of two councilmembers, along with Brown, who introduced the formal censure resolution. He told JI that his goal was to show his colleagues that there should be consequences for harmful language. 

“What my colleagues might not realize is that by not voting to censure him, they voted to allow future councilmembers to pretty much get a Get Out of Jail Free card if you say bad stuff about our community, whether they’re antisemitic or racist or homophobic, whatever it may be,” Zepeda said. “You can post three or four things online, say a couple of things here and there, and just do a semi-apology, and you’re good to go.” (While the formal censure resolution was tabled, an amendment to a different resolution that would have censured Martinez was voted down.)

Martinez is up for reelection this year, and Gregory said the JCRC’s affiliated political arm is considering whether to support an opponent to the mayor.

“We’re looking carefully at the mayoral race and seeing if there might be an alternative that’s going to be less of a bomb thrower and less, just to be blunt, less antisemitic as mayor,” said Gregory. “We’re still waiting to see how the race shapes up, but there’s a strong possibility that we get involved in trying to see some change there.”

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) condemned as antisemitic an ad running in New York’s suburban 17th Congressional District that targets him for his support for Israel and for receiving support from pro-Israel donors.

“This ad is a disgrace,” Lawler said in a statement. “This kind of politics has no place in the Hudson Valley. I am calling on every candidate running in NY-17 to publicly and unequivocally denounce this ad immediately. Silence is an endorsement.”

The advertisement, paid for by the Institute for Middle East Understanding, attacks Lawler for supporting U.S. aid to Israel, claiming that such aid is depriving Americans of government-funded benefits programs.

“Israelis enjoy universal healthcare, while Americans go bankrupt from medical bills,” the ad’s narrator states. “Lawler’s reward? Giant campaign donations from AIPAC and the pro-Netanyahu lobby.”

It concludes, over an image of Lawler standing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “Who does Mike Lawler work for? It’s not you.”

Lawler said in his statement, “The IMEU attacks anyone who stands with Israel, opposes terrorism, refuses to bow to their radical agenda, and traffics antisemitic tropes.”

The 17th District, one of Democrats’ top targets in November, has a sizable Jewish population and many pro-Israel swing voters, which have been key to Lawler’s past victories.

“I disavow this ad and any outside meddling in our race here in NY-17,” Beth Davidson, one of the leading Democratic candidates in the race. 

“Democrats, Independents and Republicans alike can unite in opposition to Mike Lawler’s record of cutting healthcare, gutting food assistance and even cosponsoring legislation to allow Donald Trump to push his insane Greenland acquisition” Davidson continued. “We don’t need inflammatory rhetoric like this at a time when Jewish New Yorkers, my family included, already face a rise in antisemitism. This ad does nothing to make us safer or allow our community to heal. Let’s focus on what the Hudson Valley needs to thrive, which is housing, healthcare and economic opportunity.”

Mark Treyger, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, likewise characterized the ad as antisemitic.

“Expressing foreign policy disagreements alone is not antisemitic,” Treyger said. “However, advancing a shameful and hateful trope of Jews siphoning public resources for their own benefit is classic antisemitism. Disgraceful.”

Spain’s leading newspaper, El País, came under fire Tuesday for publishing an antisemitic comment about the Jewish background of the judge overseeing the case against deposed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

In a since-edited story, the left-leaning newspaper reported on Monday that federal Judge Alvin Hellerstein is a highly regarded jurist “despite being a recognized member of the Jewish community.” 

Hellerstein is a 92-year-old Orthodox judge with 27 years on the federal bench in Manhattan, including presiding over high-profile trials such as lawsuits brought in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and a suit against disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. 

“Hellerstein, who studied law at Columbia University (New York), began his career as a clerk in the court he now presides over. Throughout his career, he has issued well-reasoned rulings and strived to maintain impartiality, despite being a prominent member of the Jewish community,” the article stated in Spanish. The end of the last sentence was removed on Tuesday. 

Before it was edited, the story was reproduced by the Uruguayan El País, which also removed the line on Tuesday evening, following an inquiry from Jewish Insider. El País in Spain did not respond to multiple requests for comment from JI. (The two papers share no business connection other than syndication.) 

The European Jewish Congress condemned El País, writing that “Jewish identity is not a conflict of interest. Such language reinforces bias and has real consequences for how Jews are perceived in public life. Media have a responsibility to avoid words that legitimize prejudice and to correct them when they do.”

A new report by the Anti-Defamation League highlights several members of New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s transition team who have used antisemitic tropes and justified Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attacks, among other issues the group flags as “deeply troubling” and that raise further questions about his vetting process.

The document, published on Monday, comes days after the ADL uncovered antisemitic comments by  a top transition appointee, Catherine Almonte Da Costa, who had denigrated Jews in a series of past social media posts. Da Costa resigned shortly after the posts were publicized amid backlash from critics. 

Mamdani said last week that he was unaware of those comments and would hire an outside legal team to assist with the vetting process as he staffs his administration — noting “clear changes that need to be made” and are “underway.”

But the ADL writes in its new document that other appointees merit scrutiny as Mamdani prepares to assume office on Jan. 1. The ADL, which reviewed more than 400 transition appointees announced in November to help fill his administration, identified “many examples of individuals who have engaged in some type of antisemitic, anti-Zionist, or anti-Israel activities” and “have ties to” antisemitic groups and figures, according to the document. 

The organization, which has closely monitored Mamdani’s ongoing transition, says that it “has long distinguished between legitimate criticism of Israeli government policies and antisemitism.”

“The swift action taken in the Da Costa case demonstrates that when clear antisemitic statements are identified, Mayor-elect Mamdani’s team can and will respond appropriately,” the ADL says. “This makes it all the more important to understand how other appointments with concerning backgrounds were made and what this reveals about the vetting standards that will be applied to actual administration positions.”

Among the transition team members the ADL singles out is Zakiyah Shaakir-Ansari, co-executive director of Alliance for Quality Education who was named to the youth and education committee and is one of several appointees who expressed support for or participated in anti-Israel campus encampments. 

In one photo uncovered by the ADL, Shaakir-Ansari is pictured in front of a banner with an inverted red triangle — popularized by Hamas to identify targets — and the words “long live the resistance.” The ADL also flagged a cartoon that Shaakir-Ansari posted on social media that depicts “Israel as a dog pushing a person representing Palestine off a bed,” according to the document.

Meanwhile, a day after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks, Kazi Fouzia, director of organizing at DRUM Beats and a member of Mamdani’s committee on worker justice, defended the violence in a social media post claiming “Resistance are Justified when people are occupied” above footage of an anti-Israel demonstration in Manhattan, the document shows.

Youssef Mubaraz, director of public relations for of the Yemeni American Merchants Association who was appointed to serve on the committee on small businesses, also dismissed a Facebook video about Hamas’ widespread use of sexual violence on Oct. 7 as “propaganda,” according to the ADL.

The ADL writes that more than 20% of Mamdani’s appointees “have a documented history of making or sharing anti-Zionist or anti-Israel statements.” Mohammed Karim Chowdhury, also a member of the worker justice committee, previously shared a post claiming that “Zionists are worse than Haman of ancient times, the Inquisition, and the Nazis” and that “Zionists are never Jews,” the document notes.

“It’s all about the benjamins!” Rocky Bucano, who serves on the committee on arts and culture, wrote in a 2019 Facebook post that promoted antisemitic tropes “criticizing Israeli and American leaders,” the ADL says.  

At least four transition appointees have ties to Louis Farrakhan, the virulently antisemitic leader of the Nation of Islam, the ADL notes — citing Tamika Mallory, the former Women’s March organizer who was named to the community safety committee, and  Jacques Léandre, who is serving on the legal affairs team, among others. 

Other appointees have “connections to groups that openly promote terror and harass Jewish people,” the ADL says — including Within Our Lifetime, a radical anti-Israel organization that has engaged in antisemitic provocation.

In reviewing the transition team, the ADL writes in its document that many of Mamdani’s committee appointments “are inconsistent with his campaign commitments to prioritize the safety of New York’s Jewish community.”

“The composition of these transition committees will directly influence the administration’s policies and approach to Jewish community concerns,” the ADL states, “and the current appointments raise serious questions as to whether those concerns will not be adequately represented or addressed.”

A transition spokesperson, asked to comment on the report, referred Jewish Insider to Mamdani’s comments made during a press conference on Monday. 

“We must distinguish between antisemitism and criticism of the Israeli government,” he said of the findings, arguing that “the ADL’s report oftentimes ignores this distinction, and in doing so it draws attention away from the very real crisis of antisemitism we see.”

In recent weeks, James Fishback, a 30-year-old Republican investor who last month launched a long-shot campaign for governor of Florida, has drawn online attention for a series of incendiary social media posts attacking Israel and invoking antisemitic tropes.

In addition to praising followers of the neo-Nazi influencer Nick Fuentes, comments for which he has refused to apologize, Fishback has promoted a range of extreme anti-Israel positions, including in a recent campaign ad vowing to defend those who accuse the Jewish state of genocide. He has taken repeated aim at the pro-Israel organization AIPAC, which he calls a “foreign lobbying group,” saying its supporters are “slaves” and that his own “allegiance is to America.”

“I’ll be the first to admit that I fell for the ‘Israel is our greatest ally’ scam and the lie that criticizing Israel is ‘antisemitic,’” he wrote in a social media post this week. “It wasn’t until I was offered a paid trip to Israel this summer (which I never took) that I realized how cringe and pathetic the propaganda was.”

In using such inflammatory rhetoric, Fishback, a political newcomer, is likely seeking to capitalize on the views of a younger audience of far-right voters increasingly fueling anti-Israel as well as antisemitic sentiment in the GOP, which has recently forced the party to confront a growing schism within its ranks over its ideological direction.

But while Fishback has sought to cast next year’s Republican primary as “very clearly a two-person race” between him and Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) — the pro-Israel GOP front-runner now dominating the polls while reporting a $40 million fundraising advantage — political operatives in both parties are skeptical his insurgent bid will ultimately amount to any sort of meaningful on-the-ground traction even as he continues to provoke controversy from behind the screen.

“Social media is the only reason anyone has heard of Fishback, and 20 years ago no one would even be talking about him,” Steve Schale, a Democratic strategist in Florida, told Jewish Insider. “Unless he stumbles into a pile of cash, it’s hard for me to see this being more than just an effort to get clicks.”

Fishback, the CEO of an anti-DEI investment firm called Azoria, is hardly the first candidate hoping to translate social media clout into votes or fame. A growing cohort of young influencers seeking office has emerged in recent years, so far with no success. 

Deja Foxx, a progressive TikTok activist who ran for Congress in Arizona this summer, had raised a lot of money and appeared to be gaining momentum near the end of the campaign. But despite the hype, Foxx fell short by nearly 40 points — losing out to a more established local lawmaker.

In the race to succeed outgoing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Donalds, a three-term congressman who is endorsed by President Donald Trump, is heavily favored to clinch the nomination over a handful of lesser-known primary rivals. Multiple surveys have shown him leading by double digits — with support from a range of state elected officials. Fishback, for his part, claimed just 2% of the vote in a recent poll.

“Although we’re still in the early stages of this race, it’s almost game, set, match,” said Ford O’Connell, a Republican strategist in Florida. “Byron Donalds is dominating the field, approaching 50% in the polls. Once voters realize he has Trump’s endorsement, he becomes the clear favorite. In GOP primary politics, Trump’s endorsement is the platinum standard.”

“If you look at any legitimate polling I would say Mr. Fishback has a very tall mountain to climb,” Will McKinley, a GOP lobbyist and government consultant in the state, echoed to JI.

Jim Cherry, a Republican pollster in Florida, said his “firm does political polling and as of this point, no client has requested that we include Fishback in any gubernatorial head-to-head questions.”

A college dropout and former hedge fund analyst, Fishback attracted some attention in conservative circles after he pitched DOGE “dividend checks” to a receptive Elon Musk, though the plan never took off. He later launched a super PAC to oppose Musk when the billionaire mogul fell out with Trump. He announced his gubernatorial bid in mid-November, pledging to “build on” DeSantis’ “historic record.”

Fishback has portrayed himself as a strong ally of DeSantis, who has so far declined to publicly back anyone in the race, while dismissing Donalds’ bid. But Fishback’s hostility to Israel puts him at odds with the governor, who has long touted his support for the Jewish state.

Meanwhile, Fishback’s recent comments on Israel are almost certain to alienate a sizable population of Jewish voters who live in Florida and can help tip the scales in close elections.

“In my opinion, he’s not a serious candidate and is simply trying to be incendiary to get attention,” said Gabriel Groisman, a Jewish Republican donor and a former mayor of Bal Harbour, Fla. 

He declined to comment further, saying that doing so would be “counterproductive.”

In a statement to JI Thursday, Sam Markstein, spokesperson for the Republican Jewish Coalition, dismissed Fishback as “a radical fringe candidate who has decided that the way to run his campaign is to attack the Jewish community and our ally Israel.” 

“It won’t work — and Republican Floridians will resoundingly reject him in the GOP primary,” he said.

Fishback, in response, said the “only poll that matters is on Election Day: August 18, 2026,” adding: “Until then, I am committed to earning Floridians’ votes by visiting all 67 counties to meet folks where they are, hear their concerns and share my vision for a more affordable Florida.”

“If elected, I’ll be a governor for all Floridians,” he continued in a statement to JI. “As a Christian, I have never ‘attacked’ anyone for their faith. I will protect religious freedom and ensure the safety of all Floridians.”

New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s newly tapped director of appointments, Catherine Almonte Da Costa, resigned on Thursday afternoon after her history of antisemitic online posts — including complaining about “money hungry Jews” — was exposed.

“Catherine expressed her deep remorse over her past statements and tendered her resignation, and [Mamdani] accepted,” Dora Pekec, the mayor-elect’s transition team spokesperson, said in a statement to Jewish Insider.

Da Costa, who previously served as executive assistant to former Mayor Bill DeBlasio and was appointed by Mamdani on Wednesday, posted a series of antisemitic comments in 2011 and 2012, which were shared by the Anti-Defamation League. Da Costa’s account — and the posts, which had remained online — was deleted once the antisemitism watchdog published her posts on Thursday. 

“Money hungry Jews smh,” Da Costa posted on X in January 2011, according to screenshots. 

“Woo! Promoted to the upstairs office today! Working alongside these rich Jewish peeps,” she posted in June 2011.

In June 2012, Da Costa wrote that the “Far Rockaway train is the Jew train,” a reference to the neighborhood’s sizable Jewish population. 

Da Costa resigned on Thursday, saying that she “spoke with the Mayor-elect this afternoon, apologized, and expressed my deep regret for my past statements. These statements are not indicative of who I am. As the mother of Jewish children, I feel a profound sense of sadness and remorse at the harm these words have caused. As this has become a distraction from the work at hand, I have offered my resignation.”

Sara Forman, executive director of the New York Solidarity Network, praised “cutting ties” with Da Costa as” the right thing to do,” but added that “had she said ‘Zionist’ instead of ‘Jew’ the response from the incoming Mamdani administration and the outcome we just witnessed would likely have been quite different.”

“This is why we have been telling Mr. Mamdani all along that all anti-Jewish rhetoric, including anti-Zionist dog whistles, cannot just be ‘discouraged,’ it must be rejected and condemned outright,” Forman said in a statement.

The Anti-Defamation League of New York and New Jersey condemned the posts on X before Da Costa’s resignation, writing that they “echo classic antisemitic tropes and otherwise demean Jewish people.” 

“We appreciate Da Costa has relationships with members of the Jewish community, but her posts require immediate explanation — not just from Ms. Da Costa, but also from the Mayor-Elect,” the ADL said in a statement. 

The recently unearthed posts come as several of Mamdani’s transition appointees have drawn scrutiny from Jewish leaders, who remain skeptical of the mayor-elect, who takes office on Jan. 1, and his commitment to fighting antisemitism. 

Among the most controversial of his appointments is Tamika Mallory, a former Women’s March leader who stepped down from its board amid allegations of antisemitism, to a newly established community safety committee.

President Donald Trump warned on Tuesday that Israel and the “Jewish lobby” have lost their influence in Washington and that Congress is “becoming antisemitic,” in a holiday message delivered to attendees at the White House’s annual Hanukkah party.

Trump expressed concern about the shift while delivering remarks from the East Room to a who’s who of lawmakers and prominent Jewish figures ahead of a ceremonial menorah lighting. The president repeatedly cautioned that the Jewish community and its allies “have to be very careful because bad things are happening” to Jewish people and to Israel’s global standing, citing the deadly attack on a Hanukkah event in Sydney, Australia, over the weekend and the denials of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. 

“You see what goes on in Australia. Or Oct. 7, how about Oct. 7? And then you have people that deny it ever happened. How about the people that deny, like they deny the Holocaust,” Trump said. 

In reference to a compilation of footage taken during the Oct. 7 attacks and shown to journalists, legislators and other officials, Trump said, “I saw tape that — I wish I never saw it. Actually, I wish I never saw it. … There’s no denying [what took place on Oct. 7], but then they’ll say, ‘Oh, the tape was a rigged tape. It was a tape that never existed. They made it up. It’s just propaganda.’ I don’t know if they believe it. I don’t think they believe it.”

“You have to be very, very careful. Bad things are happening and we’re not going to let that happen while I’m president,” he continued. “The DOJ and Harmeet [Dhillon, the assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Justice Department], we’re not going to let it happen, but please, please be vigilant and careful because you have some bad people that are now in Congress.” 

The president discussed the changes to Israel’s political standing in the U.S. and the growing number of Israel critics on Capitol Hill, noting his late father’s relationship with the Jewish community in New York, something he mentioned throughout the speech. Trump told the crowd how he and his siblings “grew up respecting and loving Jewish people. You know, you don’t even think about it in Brooklyn and Queens.”

“If you go back 10, 12, 15 years ago at the most, the strongest lobby in Washington was the Jewish lobby. It was Israel. That’s no longer true. You have to be very careful,” Trump said. “You have a Congress in particular which is becoming antisemitic. You have AOC [Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)] plus three, you have those people. [Democratic Rep.] Ilhan Omar, she hates Jewish people. You have to be very careful because there’s been a big change.”

“My father would tell me: The most powerful lobby that there is in this country is the Jewish lobby. It’s the Israeli lobby. It’s not that way anymore. You have a lot of people in your way,” he added. “You have a lot of people that don’t want to help Israel. You have a lot of people in Congress that don’t like Israel. You have a lot of people in Congress that in a way … they hate Israel. They hate Israel.”

Trump admitted that the realignment against Israel and the American Jewish community’s inclusion in domestic politics came as a surprise to him.

“If you would have told me 15 years ago that that was possible, I would have said, there’s no way, there’s no way that’s possible, but it’s happening, and obviously, it’s getting progressively worse,” he explained. “Less so in the Senate, but the Senate’s starting also. You get glimmers, you know? When I’m in the back rooms talking to people, you get glimmers of statements that you say, ‘Whoa, where did that come from?’ So we have to be, we have to be very careful, because bad things are happening.”

Among the members of Congress in the crowd as the president spoke were Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), Jared Moskowitz (D-NJ), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), David Kustoff (R-TN), Ronny Jackson (R-TX), Mike Lawler (R-NY), Max Miller (R-OH), Craig Goldman (R-TX) and Randy Fine (R-FL). Administration officials in attendance included Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick; White House Staff Secretary Will Scharf; Rabbi Yehouda Kaploun, the Trump administration’s nominee to be the State Department special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism; and Harmeet Dhillon.

GOP megadonor Miriam Adelson; Fox News host Mark Levin; Mort Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America; Norm Coleman, national chairman of the Republican Jewish Coalition; RJC CEO Matt Brooks; Israeli-American Council CEO Elan Carr; John Catsimatidis, a businessman and talk radio host from New York; far-right commentator Laura Loomer; constitutional scholar Alan Dershowitz; former White House Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt; Avi Berkowitz, a former White House adviser during the first Trump administration; American Jewish Committee CEO Ted Deutch; former Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel; journalist Douglas Murray; Chabad’s Yossi Farro; RNC spokeswoman Liz Pipko; talk radio host Sid Rosenberg; rapper Kosha Dillz; and Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer were spotted at the gathering.

Michael Bornstein and Jerry Wartski, two Holocaust survivors in attendance, watched Trump deliver his remarks from the front of the audience.

Trump invited several guests on stage to offer brief messages of their own, including Adelson, Levin, Rosenberg and Pipko. Adelson, who Trump noted was a top donor in the 2024 cycle, told the crowd she had spoken to Dershowitz during the event about the constitutional viability of Trump seeking a third term. “I said, ‘Alan, I agree with you. Four more years.’ So, we can do it. Think about it,” Adelson told Trump, prompting the room to erupt in applause.

The event, which took place in the East Room amid ongoing construction in the East Wing, came one night after Vice President JD Vance held a Hanukkah gathering at the vice president’s residence at the Naval Observatory. It also came hours after the White House held an afternoon reception for a smaller group of Jewish attendees. Conservative commentator Josh Hammer and former Auburn University men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl were among those spotted at that gathering.

The band at the evening reception played a mix of orchestra renditions of Hanukkah songs and smooth jazz as guests mingled and admired the blue and white Hanukkah ornaments on the four large Christmas trees in the East Room, two at each entrance. 

The menorah lighting was led by Trump, Lutnick, Scharf and Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the executive vice president of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad). Trump revealed that he did not realize Scharf was a practicing Jew until hearing him recite the prayer so easily on stage.

“I didn’t know he was that Jewish,” Trump said to Scharf with a smile. “You are seriously Jewish.”

Shemtov thanked Trump for showing “solidarity with the Jewish people and Israel,” telling the president as he stood just off stage, “You don’t just express solidarity. You practice solidarity with the Jewish people. And you practice solidarity with Israel, perhaps in a way we’ve never seen before.” 

Trump’s support for the Jewish community, Shemtov said, was “to the extent that many people say and many people believe that you may very well be — even among the friends of Israel and the Jewish people we’ve had — the most, the strongest, the deepest friend that Israel, and the Jewish people have ever had here in the White House.”

Republican consultant Arie Lipnick hosted an afterparty following the official White House reception. Attendees included Kaploun, Shemtov, Fine, Singer, Adam and Ellen Beren, Jewish Federations of North America CEO Eric Fingerhut, CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations William Daroff, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Rob Garson and Johnathan Burkan, former Deputy Special Envoys to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism Aaron Keyak and Ellie Cohanim, NORPAC NY Chair Trudy Stern, Commerce General Counsel Pierre Gentin and Michael Oved from the White House Council of Economic Advisors.

President Donald Trump and senior U.S. officials took a moment during the start of Hanukkah to reflect on the deadly antisemitic terrorist attack over the weekend at a holiday celebration in Sydney, Australia. 

The attack, which occurred Sunday when two gunmen opened fire at a Hanukkah event on Sydney’s Bondi Beach, killed at least 15 people, including a Holocaust survivor. Over 40 others were injured.

Speaking at the White House Sunday night, Trump called the shooting a “purely antisemitic attack,” and praised Ahmed al Ahmed, a Muslim man and bystander who stepped in to disarm the gunman at Bondi Beach. Ahmed is undergoing surgery for gunshot wounds. 

“It’s a very brave person actually who went and attacked one of the shooters, and saved a lot of lives,” said Trump. “Great respect to that man that did that.”

Trump added that in the wake of the attack, Jews should celebrate Hanukkah “proudly.” The president has largely dismissed safety concerns in the U.S. and told reporters on Fox News on Sunday that Jewish Americans should “be proud of who you are.” 

Antisemitic incidents have been on the rise around the world, particularly since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 terror attack on Israel. On Friday night, a California home decorated for Hanukkah was the target of a drive-by shooting. In Amsterdam on Sunday, anti-Israel protesters gathered and set off smoke bombs near a venue that was scheduled to hold a Hanukkah concert performed by Israeli cantor Shai Abramson.  

During the National Hanukkah Menorah lighting ceremony in Washington on Sunday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick echoed Trump’s message about the attack and insisted that Jewish Americans “celebrate proudly.”

“Today we light the light of Hanukkah to bring light to much of this darkness,” said Lutnick. “It is a difficult and tough day for what we’ve lost, but we must always celebrate being Jews.”

On Sunday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio held a call with Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong to discuss the attack in Sydney. 

“The United States strongly condemns the heinous terrorist attack in Australia targeting a Hanukkah celebration hosted by Chabad-Lubavitch of Bondi,” said State Department deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott. “We stand in solidarity with the Jewish community and with the Australian people as we pray for the victims and their families. We are grateful to Australian first responders and bystanders for their heroic response.”

In his statement, Pigott called rising antisemitism a “scourge that must be confronted and defeated.”

“No community should have to fear publicly celebrating their faith and traditions due to the threat of extremist violence and terror,” said Pigott. “There can be no compromise with antisemitism.”

New Jersey’s largest teachers’ union, the New Jersey Education Association, cut ties with an editor of its magazine on Friday, following criticism from top state officials over her antisemitic and pro-Hamas posts on social media.

Ayat Oraby’s since-deleted posts on X, screenshots of which were viewed by JI, claimed Israel “killed many of its citizens” during the Oct. 7, 2023 terror attacks and voiced her support of Hamas, praising its actions on social media as “resistance,” among other views.  

Oraby, who started at the NJEA Review magazine in August, told the New Jersey Globe, the first outlet to report her termination, that her “intent has always been humanitarian: to stand against the killing of civilians and to advocate for peace. When compassion is politicized, even empathy can be misread.” 

Local Jewish elected officials voiced worry about Oraby’s appointment in October, sending a letter to NJEA with 24 signees, expressing “deep concern.” 

“We are disappointed that no corrective action has yet been taken despite clear evidence and mounting public concern. Words matter and silence in the face of hate speech is complicity,” the signatories wrote. “We strongly urge you to act immediately to remove Ms. Oraby from any editorial or leadership role within the NJEA and to reaffirm the Association’s commitment to ensuring that all educators, students, and families regardless of religion or background can feel safe, respected, and represented.”

The letter followed one sent by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) to the NJEA, also voicing concern.  

“Ms. Oraby has an extremely troubling public record of promoting divisive, violent, and hate-filled rhetoric that has no place in our great state, and that must be addressed immediately,” Gottheimer wrote on Oct. 6. “It is clear that Ms. Oraby should not be involved in any publication sent to New Jersey’s educators or, for that matter, have any role in educating our teachers or children.”

Oraby told the New Jersey Globe that Gottheimer was unfair to condemn her for a post she deleted that compared Israel to Nazi Germany, a claim she said “reflects public opinion and legitimate criticism, not hatred.”

Gottheimer also denounced NJEA earlier this month over its plans for an anti-Israel “Teaching Palestine” session scheduled during the union’s November conference. 

NJEA’s parent organization, the National Education Association, has also faced scrutiny for anti-Israel and antisemitic actions, including a vote, which was eventually overturned, to disassociate from the Anti-Defamation League. 

Pomona College opened an investigation on Thursday after an on-campus event held Wednesday commemorating the second anniversary of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks was disrupted by four masked and keffiyah-clad individuals who barged in chanting “Zionists not welcome here.”

“While we have not yet identified the individuals, we are examining video footage taken during the event, as well as security footage to determine how access could have been gained,” Gabrielle Starr, the college’s president, wrote in a campus-wide email. “We are also reviewing our security protocols for on-campus events.” 

“Antisemitic hate cannot be tolerated here,” Starr wrote. 

The memorial, sponsored by Hillel in a university building and scheduled on the Hebrew calendar anniversary of the attacks, featured a talk by Yoni Viloga, who survived the attack on his family’s home in Kibbutz Mefalsim. 

“The event was meant to be an opportunity for students to reflect on what happened two years ago. The disruption was very unsettling, I saw students with tears in their eyes,” Bethany Slater, director of Pomona Hillel, told Jewish Insider. The disruption, which also included chants of “Zionism is still a colonial ideology” and “You’re all complicit in genocide,” lasted about two minutes, until campus safety officers arrived. 

While the liberal arts college in Claremont, Calif., has faced several anti-Israel demonstrations since the Oct. 7 attacks, Wednesday evening’s protest was the first to occur in an expressly Jewish space on campus. It also came days after Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire and hostage-release deal. 

“This is the first time Hillel has been targeted. Demonstrations have always been directed at the [university] administration because they were calling for [Boycott, Divest and Sanctions measures],” said Slater. “This is the first time a Jewish event has been targeted at all, which is just shocking that it would happen now in the context of the ceasefire agreement.” 

Pomona College is among the dozens of universities currently under investigation by the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights for its alleged failure to address campus antisemitism.

Pomona administrators have responded quickly to a number of anti-Israel incidents that have occurred on campus in the aftermath of the Oct. 7 attacks and ensuing war in Gaza. In April 2024, police officers dressed in riot gear arrested at least 20 masked students after some 150 people stormed the university president’s office and refused to leave for more than three hours. Organized by the student-led group Pomona Divest Apartheid, the demonstrators from Pomona, as well as the affiliated Scripps and Pitzer Colleges, were protesting the removal of an anti-Israel “mock apartheid wall” on campus. 

The following October, when an on-campus demonstration — which involved anti-Israel students taking over and shutting off access to a campus building — took place on the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks, Pomona suspended 10 involved students through the end of the 2024-25 academic year. 

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) first became a household name for her embrace of a range of wild conspiracy theories — including antisemitic claims about the Rothschild family like the idea that space-based weapons controlled by the Jewish banking family were the cause of California wildfires.

But as the congresswoman has emerged as an unlikely star in liberal circles and mainstream media after breaking with her party on the government shutdown, health care funding and the Jeffrey Epstein files, her erstwhile critics have all but ignored her increasingly frequent use of antisemitic tropes and embrace of conspiracy theories targeting Jews.

Earlier this week, the controversial Georgia congresswoman vowed on X, “No bar codes on me. I’ll never take 30 shekels. I’m America only! And Christ is King!”

Her rejection of “30 shekels” appears to be a reference to the pieces of silver paid to Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus, and the currency of Israel. Greene’s mention of “bar codes” refers to claims by former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) about AIPAC fundraising events, which AIPAC has denied.

She has also repeatedly boosted claims that Israel and Jewish people were involved in last month’s killing of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and are seeking to co-opt his organization.

“Do not allow a foreign country, foreign agents, and another religion tell you about Charlie Kirk,” Greene said on X. “And I hope a foreign country and foreign agents and another religion does not take over Christian Patriotic Turning Point USA.”

Last week, Greene reposted an X post by Holocaust denier Evan Kilgore, in which Kilgore shared a video of Candace Owens — a primary propagator of Israel-related conspiracy theories about Kirk’s death — claiming that Kirk had announced prior to his death that he was abandoning his support for Israel.

And she lauded a eulogy delivered by far-right commentator Tucker Carlson at Kirk’s funeral, in which Carlson compared Kirk’s killing to the death of Jesus.

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that no matter which party is in charge, the secular government of Israel always gets its way,” Greene wrote on X.

Greene has been one of the few Republican lawmakers to attack AIPAC and other pro-Israel advocacy groups, accusing them of exercising malign influence over the U.S. government and demanding they register as foreign agents. AIPAC is funded and led by American citizens, not the Israeli government.

She has accused Israel of “meddling in campaigns and elections” and of “meddling in government policy — government of the United States policy — as well as dictating what America does in foreign wars.”

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that no matter which party is in charge, the secular government of Israel always gets its way,” Greene added on X.

Regarding the war in Gaza, Greene has employed language sometimes indistinguishable from that of far-left Israel opponents, accusing Israel of committing genocide and of deliberately killing innocent people and children, particularly Christians. She led an effort in the House to cut off U.S. missile defense aid to Israel, which failed overwhelmingly.

She also shared posts suggesting that Israel had foreknowledge of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks and chose to delay its response, and claimed that “Most of America has Israel fatigue” because politicians ignore domestic problems in order to “talk about Israel all day” and that a GOP colleague is “fighting for his life to maintain his pro Israel money.”

“I am not suicidal and one of the happiest healthiest people you will meet. I have full faith in God and Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. As a sinner, I am only saved through His grace and mercy,” Greene said. “With that said, if something happens to me, I ask you all to find out which foreign government or powerful people would take heinous actions to stop the information from coming out.”

Greene described the Anti-Defamation League as a “dangerous hate group that targets Christians,” praising the FBI for recently cutting ties with the group.

Amid her escalating social media campaign against the pro-Israel world and her advocacy for the release of files related to the Epstein investigation, Greene suggested last month on X that a foreign government or other powerful individuals were planning to assassinate her.

“I am not suicidal and one of the happiest healthiest people you will meet. I have full faith in God and Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. As a sinner, I am only saved through His grace and mercy,” Greene said. “With that said, if something happens to me, I ask you all to find out which foreign government or powerful people would take heinous actions to stop the information from coming out.”

The post was widely interpreted — including by at least one fellow lawmaker — as a suggestion that Israel or Jewish people were targeting Greene.

“Why do crazy people keep thinking ‘the Jews’ are trying to kill them?” Rep. Ted Cruz (R-TX) replied.

Greene has also claimed Israel is operating a social media campaign targeting her.

Outside of Israel policy and the Jewish community, Greene has also continued to lean into other conspiracy theories, such as posting in August that it is “oddly consistent and strange” that several mass shooters have authored manifestos, asking, “who tells them to do that?” In the past, she has repeatedly spread conspiracy theories about mass shootings, speculating that demonic possession or military mind control may be responsible for school shootings.

Last month, she also shared a Carlson documentary claiming the truth of the 9/11 attacks had been covered up and convened a congressional hearing on weather modification that heavily featured conspiracy theories and false and misleading claims.

“The RJC has endorsed multiple GOP primary challengers to Marjorie Taylor Greene. She is out of step with the Republican Party, and with President Trump. The people of Georgia deserve better — and we are determined to do what we can to retire her,” RJC CEO Matt Brooks said.

“While the president and congressional Republicans back our ally, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene is aligned with Reps. Ilhan Omar and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to demonize Israel and weaken a partnership that makes America safer, strong and more prosperous,” AIPAC spokesperson Marshall Wittmann told Jewish Insider. “Our 5 million members will not be deterred by her rancid anti-Israel and unhinged raving.”

The Republican Jewish Coalition, which has repeatedly opposed Greene, said it continues to support efforts to defeat her.

“The RJC has endorsed multiple GOP primary challengers to Marjorie Taylor Greene. She is out of step with the Republican Party, and with President Trump. The people of Georgia deserve better — and we are determined to do what we can to retire her,” RJC CEO Matt Brooks said.

Greene did not respond to a request for comment.

Greene has recently been a thorn in the side of GOP leadership for a number of reasons, including criticizing the party’s approach to a health care tax credit central to the current government shutdown, critiquing the Trump administration’s mass deportation strategy and Middle East policy, backing an effort to force a House vote on the release of documents related to the Epstein investigation, accusing the party of blocking women from leadership roles and voting against other elements of the House Republican leadership’s agenda.

Her disputes with the Trump administration could create an opportunity for a Republican primary challenger to make a run against her — though Trump hasn’t personally spoken out against Greene as he has against Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), another anti-Israel House GOP colleague, and Greene has continued to profess her loyalty to Trump and his movement.

She does not yet face any serious primary competition.

Greene previously accumulated influence in the House as a close ally of Trump and former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) but has found herself increasingly sidelined. National Republican Party leaders did not back her as she considered a run for Georgia’s Senate seat against Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) or the state’s governorship.

Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. on Thursday compared congressional efforts to block U.S. weapons transfers to Israel to the antisemitic “blood libel,” the false accusation that medieval Jews used the blood of Christian children to cook Passover matzah — and he took aim at Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) for leading the charge.

Speaking at a Rosh Hashanah reception at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, Ambassador Yechiel Leiter said in a fiery speech that Democratic proposals in Congress to restrict military aid to Israel during its ongoing conflict amounted to “a modern-day blood libel,” and warned that the rhetoric could have deadly consequences.

“I was told that if we really wanted to, we would feed the Gazans appropriately,” Leiter said of a recent conversation with a lawmaker. “I said, ‘Do you put blood in the matzos that you eat on Passover?’ There is no distinction between the two. This is a blood libel. Blood libels cost lives.”

Leiter did not refer to Sanders by name, but the Jewish Independent from Vermont has been at the forefront of a series of recent Senate resolutions calling on Congress to block certain arms sales to Israel. The most recent, in August, did not pass, but 27 Democrats, the majority of the caucus, voted for it. 

“Somebody claiming the mantle of Jewish pedigree actually leads the charge — an embargo on Israel, an embargo on weapons to Israel at a time of a seven-front war,” he said. “Where is the outrage? Where are we being called to order that this is no different than putting blood in the matzos on Passover?”

The ambassador’s speech, delivered to a group that included Democratic and Republican lawmakers, Trump administration officials and Jewish communal leaders, came hours after two Israeli soldiers were killed at the Allenby Crossing from Jordan into the West Bank by a Jordanian driving a Gaza-bound truck of humanitarian aid, and after four Israeli soldiers were killed by a bomb in Gaza. 

Leiter warned that Israel is “facing something now that we haven’t faced perhaps since the 1930s.”

“It’s a contagion of lies that we have to battle together, because if you don’t battle lies, you end up battling for your life,” said Leiter. “This era of Rosh Hashanah, please be aware: the Protocols of the Elders of Zion 2.0 are being written right now.”

He castigated European governments for moves toward recognizing a Palestinian state, calling it “an award for terrorism” and accusing France and Britain of “moral depravity.” He also directed his ire at the Jewish actress Hannah Einbinder, who in an Emmy acceptance speech last week said “F*** ICE, free Palestine.”

“Maybe you deserve an Emmy, but what you don’t deserve is a platform to libel your own people and to libel people standing opposed to moral depravity on the international stage,” said Leiter, who did not mention Einbinder by name. 

“Israel is standing alone in the world,” the ambassador said — except for “with our dearest friends in the Congress of the United States and the Senate of the United States and the administration of President [Donald] Trump, the best friend Israel ever had in the White House.”

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is holding firm in his choice not to label the arson attack that targeted the governor’s mansion on Passover as antisemitic or a hate crime, saying in a Friday interview on ABC News’ “Good Morning America” that he will leave that question to the prosecutors. 

“I think that’s a question for the prosecutors to determine. They’re going to determine motive,” Shapiro said. “I recognize when you’re in these positions of power, there are people out there that want to do you harm, but I try not to be captive to the fear, and I try not to worry or think about why people want to do that harm.”

ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos pressed Shapiro on the question, noting that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called on the Department of Justice to investigate the attack as a hate crime. Shapiro stood by his statement made on Thursday that Schumer’s letter was not “helpful.”

Stephanopoulos followed up with an opportunity for Shapiro to address antisemitism by connecting the attack on the governor’s mansion to the 2018 Tree of Life shooting. 

Shapiro’s job, Stephanopoulos argued, “is to combat the kind of conditions we’re seeing to create the opportunity for situations like this. Pennsylvania is no stranger to this,” he said. “We saw the attack in the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018. How do you combat this kind of hate?”

Shapiro pivoted away from the comparison. “By speaking and acting with moral clarity,” Shapiro responded.

Rather than mentioning antisemitism in his response, Shapiro instead spoke about political violence. He talked about the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in Butler, Pa., last summer and mentioned the arrest of Luigi Mangione, the man charged with murdering the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, in Altoona, Pa. 

“I think it’s also important when you’re not dealing with a traumatic event, in Butler, in Altoona or here in Harrisburg, to be leading every day in a way that brings people together and doesn’t just continually divide us,” said Shapiro. 

Congressional Democrats lambasted the Trump administration for hiring Kingsley Wilson, who has a lengthy history of posting antisemitic conspiracy theories, as a deputy press secretary at the Pentagon. Republicans have largely remained silent on the issue. 

“As antisemitism continues to surge around the world since October 7th: The Trump administration hired a top Pentagon official with a history of antisemitic conspiracy theories and extremism,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said in a statement. “It’s outrageous, and Secretary [Pete] Hegseth must fire her now.”

Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV), the co-chair of the Senate antisemitism task force, told Jewish Insider that Wilson’s “appalling comments and conspiracy theories paint a disturbing pattern of behavior.”

“No one who engages in this antisemitic rhetoric should ever hold a position in the U.S. government, and it is alarming that the Trump administration hired her in the first place,” Rosen continued.

Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), who previously served in the Pentagon, told JI, “Whether it’s her antisemitic comments, delegitimizing Kosovo or promoting conspiracy theories, this woman is unfit to serve alongside our men and women in uniform.”

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) also described Wilson’s hiring as characteristic of the Trump administration.

“Wilson has a long history of antisemitism and her comments are egregious and disqualifying,” Wasserman Schultz said. “But Trump has always surrounded himself with extremists, conspiracy theorists, and the far-right fringe, so I can’t say I’m surprised. She is not fit to serve in any role given her bigoted views.”

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), a co-chair of the House Jewish Caucus, described Wilson as the latest in a series of problematic hires.

“It is outrageous that someone with a history of promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories is now speaking for the Pentagon,” Nadler said in a statement. “Kingsley Wilson’s extremist views have no place in our government — yet under President Trump, they are not the exception, they are the rule. She is just the latest addition to a disgraceful roster of staffers who reflect this administration’s disturbing embrace of hate and bigotry. The American people deserve better.”

Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), the co-chair of the House antisemitism task force, said that Wilson “must be removed immediately.”

“To stomp out antisemitism, we must do it on the extreme left & right,” Goldman said. “No one who compares Hamas’ infanticide to abortion, promotes Great Replacement Theory, or celebrates the lynching of Jews should get an important DOD appointment.”

Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) wrote to Hegseth, calling Wilson’s hiring “an insult to the integrity of the Department of Defense” and that she is “unfit for any position of public trust,” and demanding she be fired immediately.

“If Kingsley Wilson is the type of person you believe should represent the Department of Defense, it raises serious questions about your judgement — and your commitment to the values that define this nation,” Torres wrote, adding that a failure to fire her would be “reasonably understood by the public as an endorsement on behalf of yourself and the Pentagon of her repugnant views.”

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA), who serves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate Armed Services Committee, said that he had not been briefed beyond the basic details about the situation, but expressed sadness at the notion of a young person being so bigoted.

The Virginia senator said that the “first thing” he asked himself upon learning of Wilson’s comments was, “I wonder how old this person is, because you should never see this from a young person.”

“How could a young person have their mind so poisoned by this? I mean, I don’t get it. There’s no excuse for antisemitism or bigotry, but I, sort of I guess naively, think that young people would be more immune to it,” Kaine told JI. “What has been your life experience that has led you to that belief?”

No congressional Republicans commented on the situation to JI on Thursday, with several  saying they weren’t familiar with the situation and saying they would look into the matter. Others did not respond to requests for comment.

On Wednesday, Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE) told Politico the comments were “horrible” and “not appropriate.” She was not the only member of her conference to speak out.

“I’m not gonna tell them who to hire, but I do know that [President Donald] Trump doesn’t believe any of the things she’s talking about, and I’ll leave it up to them to determine if they think she’s the right spokesperson,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told the outlet. “If what you say about these posts are true, then she’s completely off-script with President Trump.”