Plus, Michigan's debate and switch
NATHAN HOWARD/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman looks on during his meeting with the US Secretary of State in Riyadh on October 23, 2024.
Add JewishInsider on GoogleGood Monday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we look at the challenges facing Saudi Arabia amid escalating tensions with the Houthis, talk to Jewish communal leaders in Michigan who say Abdul El-Sayed’s debate performance last week was the “final straw” for some Jewish Democrats in the state, and do a deep dive into the most recent polling in Israel ahead of the election later this month. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Gov. Kathy Hochul, Sen. Jon Ossoff and Rep. Mike Lawler.
Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by JI Executive Editor Melissa Weiss, with assists from Danielle Cohen-Kanik and Tamara Zieve.
Today’s Agenda
Former Israeli hostage Eliya Cohen and his wife, Nova music festival survivor Ziv Abud Cohen, are slated to speak at tonight’s UJA Young Leaders’ Oct. 7 commemoration in New York.
The Jewish Federation of Detroit, in partnership with the local Anti-Defamation League and American Jewish Committee chapters, is hosting “Call Me Back” host Dan Senor for a conversation focused on Judaism and Zionism in public life.
As Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed aims to court Jewish voters in Michigan in the final weeks of the campaign — and amid efforts by Republicans to woo Jewish Michiganders to vote for Republican Mike Rogers — Israel critics Brad Lander, the Democratic nominee in NY-10, and former Rep. Andy Levin (D-MI) are speaking at a private event in Ann Arbor for undecided Jewish voters today in support of El-Sayed.
In Stamford, Conn., the Zionist Rabbinic Coalition is hosting a conversation with Elisha Wiesel for rabbis in the greater Connecticut area.
One Thing To Know
analysis
By Melissa Weiss
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has spent years — and billions of dollars — seeking to transform his country into a global economic powerhouse. But the recent escalation in tensions with the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen — including the deadly weekend strikes on Riyadh’s main airport — is putting into question whether such a strategy is compatible with the changing geopolitical reality and continued threats posed by Iran and its terror proxies.
Thirteen people were killed and hundreds injured in a strike on a passenger terminal at the airport on Saturday. Another individual was killed in a separate attack when a projectile struck the airport again on Sunday. One American was among those killed in Saturday’s attack, prompting questions over whether Washington will enter the fight.
The Saudi playbook for years has been to lean on diplomacy and deescalation in an effort to prioritize its own economic ambitions. It’s a strategy that has done little to address the threats posed by the Houthis, leaving Riyadh vulnerable to the kind of situation it had hoped to avoid.
The Big Reads
BREAKING POINT
Last Thursday’s Michigan Senate debate, where Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed described Israel as a threat to the United States comparable to Iran and said he would not vote to send defensive aid to Israel even if it were under fire, proved to be a breaking point for some Jewish Democrats who were holding out hope that the Democratic nominee would moderate his views in the general election, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. Community leaders said that they’re hearing from some previously undecided Jewish Democrats that, after they debate, they now plan to back Republican Mike Rogers.
Accusation aftermath: El-Sayed on Sunday denied that he or any of his family members have ties to the Muslim Brotherhood — accusations Rogers raised last week during the debate, JI’s Danielle Cohen-Kanik reports. El-Sayed’s mother worked for the Islamic American Relief Agency, which was designated as a terrorist organization for supporting al-Qaida, and his sister-in-law sued to be removed from a federal terrorism watchlist, according to recent reports.”
Money moves: AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project, entered the Michigan Senate general election on Friday to oppose El-Sayed, after reported tensions with Rogers over its role in the race. The group spent nearly $100,000 on direct-mail advertisements to 130,000 Jewish voters highlighting El-Sayed’s response to the terrorist attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield, Mich., saying of the shooter, “Hurt people do hurt people.”
BIBI BOOST
The bloc of political parties backing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had its best showing of the campaign ahead of the Oct. 27 Knesset election, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports. In eight polls published by Israeli media outlets in the last week, the pro-Netanyahu bloc led in four and tied in two, while the opposition bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party, won in two. In all polls, the bloc sizes are very close, except for two polls in which Netanyahu’s bloc leads by 12 and 18 seats, respectively. The average of the eight polls puts Netanyahu’s bloc at 55 seats and the Eisenkot bloc at 51. Without the outlier polls, the average for Netanyahu’s bloc drops to 52 and the opposition bloc leads with 53 seats.
EMPIRE STATE EDUCATION
Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Friday that she will opt New York into the new federal scholarship tax credit program, making her the second Democratic governor to do so since the administration published formal regulations for the program, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. Hochul’s decision bucks intense opposition from teachers’ unions, but has won her support from the Jewish community, which has been urging governors to opt in.“I’ve been clear from the start that New York would participate in the federal scholarship tax credit program if, and only if, all schools and students, including those in our public schools, could benefit,” Hochul said.
The Rundown
TWO JEWS, THREE OPINIONS
peach state politics
scoop
On Our Radar
● The Live Briefing. Word on the street, clips, podcasts and quick updates — the items we’re tracking all day in our Live Briefing on the app (on Apple and Android) and website.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas postponed the PA’s upcoming elections, slated for late November, to Sept. 11, 2027; Abbas has repeatedly postponed Palestinian legislative elections, which were last held in 2006…
The French Foreign Ministry, which has led a renewed push for a two-state solution and recognition of Palestinian statehood, criticized the postponement of the elections, which it said “once again deprives the Palestinian people of the right to democratic expression at the ballot box”…
The White House is reportedly opposing all of the current candidates to succeed U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres when his term ends later this year, with a State Department official telling Politico the Trump administration is “looking for a little bit of a disruptor”…
The Trump administration announced sanctions against the International Criminal Court, hours after the Nobel Prize committee named former ICC judge Navi Pillay as the winner of this year’s Peace Prize…
The Pentagon quietly raised the number of servicemembers killed during this year’s hostilities with Iran from 18 to 21, with 865 wounded…
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) has thus far refused to release his remarks from the keynote address he gave at a gala hosted at the National Press Club last week by the anti-Israel activist group Democracy for the Arab World Now — the organization founded by Jamal Khashoggi that prioritizes transparency and accountability…
A group of 74 House Democrats led by Reps. Jason Crow (D-CO), Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ) and Sara Jacobs (D-CA) are calling on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the Pentagon to provide a report on civilian casualties in the war with Iran…
The Wall Street Journal does a deep dive into the “virtually unknown” donors backing left-wing candidates and causes this cycle, including failed House candidate Saikat Chakrabarti, real estate investor Deborah Simon and Bay Area tech executive Omer Hasan…
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul visited the Ohel in Queens, the grave of the Lubavitcher rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson; Hochul also paid respects at the graves of the rebbe’s wife, Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, and Ari Halberstam, who was killed in a terror attack targeting a van of Jewish students on the Brooklyn Bridge in 1994…
New York GOP gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman met with Allure Group founder and philanthropist Yoeli Landau at Landau’s home in Williamsburg, Brooklyn…
Amazon is in talks to acquire Decart, founded by Israelis Dean Leitersdorf, Orian Leitersdorf and Moshe Shalev, in a deal that could value the company at around $7 billion…
Private equity firm CVC sought to play down its purchase of a 40% stake in camouflage maker Fibrotex over concerns of potential blowback for investing in an Israeli company, opting instead to only inform investors in the fund rather than make a public announcement…
The United Arab Emirates’ WAM news service reports that Hamam al-Hammami, the FlyDubai co-pilot who attempted to hijack the plane, had previously flown the Dubai-Tel Aviv route at least twice to familiarize himself with it.
The UAE’s attorney general said that investigators are looking into al-Hammami’s shift toward extremism, focused on the two years he spent studying in Australia, during which time he is believed to have been radicalized at a Melbourne mosque…
A new report from the Council for a Secure America found that Kuwait is the Arab state with no current relations with Israel that is most likely to be the next country to join the Abraham Accords…
The Wall Street Journal speaks with intelligence agencies, cybersecurity experts, military officials and hackers about the hijacking of civilian video cameras to gather intelligence for attacks in conflict zones…
Worthy Reads
Find more Worthy Reads in our Live Briefing via our app (on Apple and Android) and website.
Blood Libels, Old and New: In Tablet, former refusenik Natan Sharansky considers the staying power of centuries-old blood libels against the backdrop of genocide accusations against Israel. “Our goal should not be to convince the rest of the world that we are right. Our existence does not depend on a vote in the United Nations. It depends on our own belief in the righteousness of Jewish civilization. Of course, we are not above criticism, and we must acknowledge and correct course when we deviate from our own standards. But remaining vigilant about our shortcomings is not the same as accepting guilt we don’t deserve.” [Tablet]
Targeted in Tucson: The New York Times spotlights Arizona state lawmaker Alma Hernandez, who is Jewish, and the ongoing threats she faces from both the far left and far right in part over her support for Israel. “She put iron bars on her windows and a blinding floodlight on her front porch. She cut down two trees in her yard after the police told her they could aid an intruder, and her brother moved in to protect her when the death threats intensified. … She said her vocal support for the Jewish state has drawn more violent messages in the last three years than any other time in her career.” [NYTimes]
Peace Prize Betrayal: In The Free Press, Elisha Wiesel accuses the Norwegian Nobel Committee of betraying the legacy of his father, Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, with its decision last week to award the Nobel Peace Prize to South African jurist Navi Pillay. “On December 10, 1986, I was 14 years old, sitting in Oslo City Hall as my father, Elie Wiesel, accepted the Nobel Peace Prize. I will never forget the look of hope on his face that day. … My father was honored because he had turned the memory of genocide into a moral duty to the living. This morning, the same committee awarded the same prize to Navi Pillay, who chaired the UN commission of inquiry that, on September 16 of last year, betrayed the meaning of the word genocide and weaponized it against Israel.” [FreePress]
Picture of the Day
A memorial dedicated to the victims of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre at the Nova music festival was inaugurated in Argentina over the weekend, in an initiative established by KKL Argentina in partnership with the city of Mendoza. More than 400 trees were planted in the Bosque KKL Nova (KKL Nova Forest) in Mendoza, one for each person murdered at the festival, at a ceremony attended by a delegation of bereaved families, representatives of the Nova Tribe Community Association and KKL Argentina representatives. Marcelo Álvarez
Birthdays
Tony Ressler, co-founder of both Apollo Global Management and Ares Management, he is the owner of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks, turns 66
Marjorie Berg Ancowitz, founder of Medical Reports Service, turns 101
Murray Chass, longtime baseball reporter for The New York Times, he is enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame, turns 88
Lewis M. Eisenberg, U.S. ambassador to Italy during the Trump 45 administration, he is a co-founder of private equity firm Granite Capital International, turns 84
Chris Wallace, longtime Fox News anchor, more recently at CNN, turns 79
Linda Gerstle, retired CEO of Wakefield, Mass.-based CAST, a nonprofit whose mission is to transform education for students with disabilities
John D. Lantos, pediatrician and medical ethicist, turns 72
Lamar A. Nelson, dermatologist in Los Angeles
Amy Eilberg, first female rabbi ordained in Conservative Judaism, turns 72
Richard B. Ancowitz, secretary to the New York State Tax Appeals Tribunal, turns 68
Seth D. Harris, deputy director of the National Economic Council during the Biden administration, now a distinguished professor at Northeastern University, turns 64
Wendy Singer, former executive director of Start-Up Nation Central until 2022, now a strategic advisor to select Israeli start-ups including Remilk
Gary Rosen, former editor of The Wall Street Journal‘s Weekend Review section, now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute
Raanan Agus, longtime managing director at Goldman Sachs, now chairman of the David Group
Babak “Bobby” Samini, Los Angeles-based trial attorney for many high-profile clients, turns 56
Alexandra Smothers, producer, actor and screenwriter
Yael Cohen Paran, former member of the Knesset, she now serves as the co-chair of the Green Movement of Israel, turns 53
Bram Cohen, computer programmer, creator of the BitTorrent protocol and founder of Chia cryptocurrency, turns 51
Rabbi Aharon Mordechai Rokeach, only son and heir apparent of the current rebbe of the Belz chasidic dynasty, turns 51
Miri Bohadana, Israeli actor, model and television anchor, turns 49
Michael Barbaro, reporter and co-host of “The Daily,” a podcast at The New York Times
Lauren Book, former member of the Florida Senate, turns 42
Rosie Gray, freelance journalist, formerly the politics and media reporter for BuzzFeed News, turns 37
Naomi Preizler, Argentine fashion model and artist, turns 36
Alex Katz, pitcher for Team Israel in the 2020 Olympics and 2023 World Baseball Classic, he is the founder of Stadium Custom Kicks, turns 32
Noa Argamani, Oct. 7 hostage, she is a platform manager at Vine Ventures, turns 29
Plus, Mamdani misses the mark on Oct. 7
Screenshot
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel and Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed appear on the "“For the Sake of the Argument with Lori Goldman” podcast.
Good Wednesday afternoon.
This P.M. briefing is reserved for our premium subscribers like you — offering a forward-focused read on what we’re tracking now and what’s coming next.
Today’s Daily Overtime was curated by JI U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
📡On Our Radar
Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking
President Donald Trump said he spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today to wish him and the Israeli people well on the third anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks. Trump called the attacks “a horrible tragedy” and said “the other side is paying a very big price for what they did on Oct. 7”…
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani observed the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks with a statement that opened with a denunciation of Hamas and the “horrific war crimes” it committed that day, but spent most of its length excoriating the Israeli response — drawing fierce criticism from mainstream Jewish organizations, Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman reports.
“Many New Yorkers are reckoning with this unbearable grief, and we mourn alongside them — all while knowing that our tax dollars fund these war crimes,” Mamdani’s statement said. “Three years later, we must refuse to accept a world in which occupation and apartheid continue, where war crimes are met with impunity, and our federal government continues its complicity with every arms shipment.”
UJA-Federation of New York accused Mamdani of choosing “to respond to the grief of Jewish New Yorkers by advancing false and inflammatory attacks against Israel — not only inappropriately shifting the focus away from Hamas’s cruelty, but also placing Jewish New Yorkers at risk”…
Metropolitan Police in the U.K. arrested 11 individuals today at anti-Israel marches, including five at a “spontaneous protest” outside the Camden headquarters of the Board of Deputies — the representative body of British Jews — for “inciting racial hatred, involving allegedly shouting or chanting slogans calling for intifada,” according to a police statement…
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot visited Hostages Square in Tel Aviv and Kibbutz Be’eri today, saying in a statement that France “will never forget” the victims of the Oct. 7 attacks — “Nothing will erase their faces or their names,” he added. A French official told The Times of Israel that Barrot has no plans to meet with Israeli officials during his visit, as Jerusalem and Paris continue to be at odds over issues including settlements in the West Bank and the war in Gaza…
The White House has asked the Pentagon to prepare potential options for strikes in Iran to be executed before the midterm elections, The Atlantic reports, as the president considers avenues to signal strength before voters head to the polls…
Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed recently called far-left influencer Hasan Piker to warn him that his extreme rhetoric was costing the candidate votes and asking him to stop, CNN reports…
In a lengthy profile on El-Sayed, CNN revealed that Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel avoided attending religious services for the High Holy Days after she endorsed El-Sayed, knowing her position was controversial among the Jewish community. Speaking to the outlet, she credited El-Sayed with largely having stopped attacking AIPAC in his public statements, which she said she asked him to do.
Lansing, Mich., Mayor Andy Schor, a Jewish Democrat, also told CNN that he won’t endorse El-Sayed without having spoken to him, and his campaign has not yet made contact. El-Sayed also seems aware of his shortcomings: “I’m not the Democrat the Democrats want, but I am the Democrat that Democrats have,” he told the outlet…
As of this afternoon, El-Sayed still had not issued a public statement about the Oct. 7 anniversary, unlike many other candidates and elected officials across the country…
Meanwhile, the Republican Jewish Coalition announced today a $2 million ad campaign targeting Jewish voters in Michigan, highlighting Jewish Democrats who refuse to support El-Sayed, JI’s Marc Rod reports.
Ads from the group call out El-Sayed’s response to the terrorist attack earlier this year on Temple Israel, featuring several self-described lifelong Democrats saying they will not vote for El-Sayed, including a woman who says in the ad that her grandson attended preschool at the synagogue…
New YouGov polls of key midterm Senate elections found Democrats ahead in Kansas, Michigan, New Hampshire, Ohio as well as Texas, where state Rep. James Talarico is leading his GOP opponent, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, by six points (50%-44%)…
In an address today at the Acropolis in Athens, Greece, Secretary of State Marco Rubio hailed Western civilization, drawing a contrast between the Iranian regime, which he cast as a “cult of death” that glorifies martyrdom, and the West’s tradition of loyalty and sacrifice.
Rubio warned that the West has lost its will to fight and its drive to excel, saying that “the ideal of many ideologies in our time has, frankly, become a world of perfect safety, a world devoid of risk or failure” — one in which “we hold the most exceptional things among us hostage to the average, the ordinary, the mediocre”…
Former Boca Raton, Fla., Mayor Scott Singer, the Republican candidate running against Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) in South Florida, traveled to Qatar in 2024 where he met and was photographed with Qatar’s minister of municipality, Abdullah bin Hamad Al Attiyah, during a visit to the Qatar Economic Forum with other mayors from around the U.S., JI’s Marc Rod reports.
Singer and Moskowitz have been battling over which one of them is the stronger and more reliable supporter of Israel, in a district with a substantial Jewish population that could be up for grabs in the midterm election…
The authors of a play about the Oct. 7 attacks are calling for a police investigation after a fire alarm disrupted a showing of the play at Northwestern University yesterday. Alleging that someone intentionally pulled the alarm, playwright Phelim McAleer told Jerusalem News Syndicate, “These people are demonic.” Rep. Brad Schneider (D-IL) similarly called for an investigation into the incident, calling it “unacceptable”…
⏩ Tomorrow’s Agenda, Today
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a look at GOP concerns with a provision regarding cooperation with Israel in the 2027 National Defense Authorization Act.
El-Sayed and his GOP opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), will participate in a debate tomorrow evening airing on a local Detroit TV station.
Israel is expected to close the British consulate in east Jerusalem tomorrow in retaliation for London placing sanctions on Israeli settlements; reports indicate the U.K. intends to expel dozens of Israeli diplomats if the closure is enacted.
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LIFE AFTER CAPTIVITY
The former hostages talk with JI about survivor’s guilt and rebuilding their lives far from their Kibbutz Kfar Aza home
CAMPUS CHRONICLES
Three students who arrived on campus weeks before the attacks describe how the past three years reshaped their Jewish identities, through religious observance, community and activism
Plus, Smotrich urges Israeli self-reliance
Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images
Anti-Israel demonstrators protest against 'Great Israel Real Estate' event at the Park East Synagogue in Manhattan on Tuesday, May 05, 2026, in New York City.
Good Tuesday afternoon.
This P.M. briefing is reserved for our premium subscribers like you — offering a forward-focused read on what we’re tracking now and what’s coming next.
Today’s Daily Overtime was curated by JI U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
📡On Our Radar
Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking
Speaking at the National Conservatism Conference in Jerusalem today, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said that Israel “can and must bear a growing responsibility for its own security, develop military and economic independence and stand up for its own interests,” and that Jerusalem “respect[s] the right and the duty of the United States to put the American people at the top of its policy priorities”…
Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said similarly at the conference that, “if Americans put America first, like Israelis put Israel first … we can stand up to this new threat and, bound firmly together, toss red-green leftism into the ash heap of history”…
Roberts told The New Yorker in an exposé on the right-wing think tank released yesterday that he now believes far-right commentator Tucker Carlson is “exacerbating antisemitism in America,” after having previously released a video defending Carlson amid backlash over his friendly interview with white nationalist Nick Fuentes — a move that fractured the organization…
The Telegraph reports that the Green Party member who proposed the “Zionism is racism” motion recently adopted at the party’s conference is a self-described close friend of an al-Qaida terrorist jailed for a foiled 2011 plot to bomb travelers arriving at Heathrow from Israel.
Lubna Speitan had offered to testify in defense of Minh Quang Pham — now serving a 44-year sentence for the plot — and confirmed to the outlet that the two remain friends, suggesting he had been wrongly “targeted” by “the system”…
Meanwhile, the European Green Party said the British Green Party’s “Zionism is racism” policy runs counter to its support for a two-state solution and that it would immediately seek clarification from the British party’s leadership. German Greens co-leader Felix Banaszak separately called the policy “intolerable and unacceptable”…
British counterterrorism police arrested a seventh suspect today in connection with the alleged plot targeting the U.S.-run RAF Fairford air base, detaining a 22-year-old British man in London on suspicion of preparing terrorist acts. The other six suspects have been released on bail as the investigation continues…
The Cook Political Report changed its ratings of three key Senate races further in favor of Democrats: Kansas switched from “Lean Republican” to “Toss Up,” New Hampshire changed from “Toss Up” to “Lean Democratic” and North Carolina shifted from “Lean Democratic” to “Likely Democratic.” The three races will be critical to deciding which party takes control of the upper chamber…
Democratic Maryland Gov. Wes Moore would not commit to serving out a full second term if reelected in November, amid speculation that he plans to run for president in 2028: Asked at a gubernatorial debate today if he would serve the entirety of his next term, Moore said, “I would not be running for reelection if I was not committed to the people of Maryland,” and declined to comment further when pressed for a yes or no answer…
Member of Knesset Zeev Elkin met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky today as part of an Israeli delegation to Ukraine marking the 85th anniversary of the widespread extermination of Jews by the Nazis at Babyn Yar. Zelensky said the two discussed Iran’s cooperation with Russia as well as regional issues, and stated, “Strong relations between Ukraine and Israel could certainly contribute to our shared security”…
⏩ Tomorrow’s Agenda, Today
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a special edition of the Daily Kickoffhighlighting stories from former hostages, college students and the security sector marking the third anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel.
Others around the world will be marking the anniversary by protesting against the Jewish state, including on several college campuses and at New York City Hall, where anti-Israel groups including PAL-Awda, Within Our Lifetime and the youth chapter of the New York City Democratic Socialists of America are promoting a rally with a flyer that features the phrase, “Glory to the martyrs, victory to the resistance.”
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch vowed today at a press conference alongside New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani that “Jewish institutions will not be left to protect themselves without a strong partner in the NYPD” amid the demonstrations.
Elsewhere in New York, Jaser AbuMousa, a father from Gaza who lost several family members to Israeli airstrikes during the Israel-Hamas war, and Jonathan Dekel-Chen, the father of former Israeli hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen, will sit in conversation at the 92nd Street Y.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and her Democratic challenger Troy Jackson will face off tonight in their first debate, one of four to be held in the next two weeks, after Jackson was selected to replace Graham Platner as the state’s Democratic Senate nominee in July.
The National Conservatism Conference continues tomorrow in Jerusalem with speakers including former Polish President Andrzej Duda; Israeli Minister of Diaspora Affairs Amichai Chikli; former Israeli National Security Advisor Meir Ben-Shabbat; and Sebastian Gorka, senior director for counterterrorism at the U.S. National Security Council.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore will speak at an event tomorrow hosted by the Jewish Federation of Annapolis & the Chesapeake about the third anniversary of Oct. 7 and his commitment to combating antisemitism. The event will also feature a screening of the documentary “Torn: The Israel-Palestine Poster War on NYC Streets,” about the clashes in New York City as pro- and anti-Israel activists put up and tore down the “kidnapped” posters raising awareness about those taken hostage by Hamas.
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GAZA GRIFT?
The ringleader of the alleged conspiracy is Gaza-based Hamas official Saleem Alzaq, a member of Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades and one of its propaganda offices
IN THE CROSSHAIRS
The Jewish Federation of Greater Portland urged the University of Oregon to take action after antisemitic flyers called for ‘Hillel off campus’
Plus, Turkey and Pakistan send troops to Saudi Arabia
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on March 18, 2026 in Washington.
Good Monday afternoon.
This P.M. briefing is reserved for our premium subscribers like you — offering a forward-focused read on what we’re tracking now and what’s coming next.
Today’s Daily Overtime was curated by JI U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
📡On Our Radar
Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) argued during her first joint campaign appearance with Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed that the Jewish vote is not a monolith and that some Jewish voters are prioritizing issues other than Israel and antisemitism in the state’s upcoming competitive Senate race, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
“There’s no such thing as the Jewish voters, just like there’s no such thing as the Muslim voters or the Black voters. People have their own views and the things that they prioritize are going to drive their vote,” she said during a joint appearance on MS NOW, after participating in a town hall with El-Sayed over the weekend. “But I think frankly … people want to see a Jewish woman and a Muslim man being able to get along, debate, push and pull each other, and move the state forward”…
Appearing on Fox News this afternoon, El-Sayed declined to answer directly when asked if he supports U.S. terror designations for Muslim Brotherhood chapters in Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan. “I will support a terrorist designation for any organization that is engaged in or committed to political violence,” he said.
He also praised the Israelis who thwarted the attack on the FlyDubai flight last week, calling terrorism “awful and terrible”…
Also lending a hand to El-Sayed on the campaign trail is former President Barack Obama, who is set to campaign with the Senate candidate, as well as Michigan Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jocelyn Benson, in Detroit on Oct. 24…
Turkey and Pakistan will deploy troops to Saudi Arabia, the three countries said in a joint statement today, as the Kingdom continues to battle the Iran-backed Houthi militia in Yemen. The activation of the countries’ trilateral mutual defense pact “demonstrates the credibility of the commitment to collective defense” and “strengthens the effectiveness of deterrence,” the statement said…
Speaking today at a memorial in Jerusalem for those killed in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “settle accounts” with the remaining “human beasts” who planned and carried out the attacks; Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement that 4,000 of the terrorists who entered Israel on Oct. 7 have already been killed, while 2,000 remain at large…
Asked if he thinks Iran was responsible for the attack on FlyDubai FZ1073, President Donald Trump told reporters today, “I personally do,” even as investigators have not officially determined Iranian involvement…
Trump also said that the U.S. moved its B-1 bombers out of the RAF Fairford air base in the U.K. due to “some threats, and rather than tempting the enemy, we’ll capture the enemy and beat the enemy.” Vice President JD Vance said similarly today that the planes were moved “out of an abundance of caution, trying to protect our guys” from an unspecified threat from Iran…
Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with Netanyahu while en route to Iceland today, according to a State Department spokesperson…
British National Security Advisor Jonathan Powell reportedly visited Israel last week in an effort to prevent the closure of the British consulate in east Jerusalem; Israel ordered the consulate closed in response to British sanctions on West Bank settlements, and an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesperson said it will shut Thursday as planned…
A Kuwaiti national who attempted to attack the Israeli Embassy in London last year was sentenced today to life in prison with a minimum term of 20 years after being convicted of preparing a terrorist act. Abdullah Sabah Albadri, 34, was arrested outside the embassy armed with two knives and carrying a note indicating he was prepared to die as a “martyr”…
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) is continuing his travels in the Middle East in Saudi Arabia, where he met today with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, of whom he’s been a vocal critic. In a video update, Murphy said he pressed MBS about Gulf investments with the Trump family and freedom of political speech and discussed the Iran war and Palestinian statehood.
Murphy also visited the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh, which was struck by Iranian drones early in the Iran war. He claimed, based on the damage, that the strikes would have caused a “mass casualty event” if they had occurred while the building was occupied…
Ambassador Yehuda Kaploun, the State Department’s antisemitism envoy, said at a press conference today that countries including the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Guatemala, Paraguay, Costa Rica and Chile are considering adopting or have already decided to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism, as several Latin American countries have recently shifted more favorably towards Israel and prioritized combating antisemitism…
⏩ Tomorrow’s Agenda, Today
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a dispatch from the Israeli Embassy in Washington’s Oct. 7 memorial event taking place this evening.
The National Conservatism conference kicks off tomorrow in Jerusalem with speakers including Israeli scholar Yoram Hazony; Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts; writer Rod Dreher; Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich; and Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar.
National security veteran Brett McGurk’s new book, Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages, about his experience negotiating for the release of Israeli hostages held by Hamas during the Biden administration, will hit bookshelves tomorrow.
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PASTOR’S POSITION
Adam Hamilton called Israel’s war in Gaza ‘irresponsible and unjust’ but said he does not believe Israel’s intent ‘is to wipe out a group of people’
HATE MAIL
Far-right Maryland Republican Dan Cox’s son and ‘bodyguard’ sent an antisemitic rant to a consultant
Plus, UT Jewish groups host hostage counter-event to Piker
Samuel Corum/Getty Images
President Donald Trump speaks with reporters while aboard Air Force One on June 5, 2026 en route to Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin.
Good Thursday afternoon.
This P.M. briefing is reserved for our premium subscribers like you — offering a forward-focused read on what we’re tracking now and what’s coming next.
Today’s Daily Overtime was curated by JI U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
📡On Our Radar
Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking
The co-pilot who attacked his captain yesterday during a FlyDubai flight from the United Arab Emirates to Israel “underwent Islamist radical indoctrination,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed on Fox News this morning based on initial findings from the investigation, and had asked his crewmates after being captured to “kill me.”
Netanyahu acknowledged concerns about how the assailant was able to serve as a co-pilot on a flight to Ben Gurion Airport as an Omani national, given that the Abraham Accords bar pilots from countries that do not have diplomatic relations with Jerusalem from flying into Israel…
While Netanyahu cautioned that investigators have not yet determined whether the attacker had ties to Iran or other foreign actors, President Donald Trump told reporters today that, “based on what I’m hearing,” the pilot was in fact linked to Tehran and “could have been” associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps…
Netanyahu also said on CBS yesterday that Israel provided the U.K. with intelligence about an “Iranian-sponsored attack” on British soil, “and pretty much the next day they slapped sanctions on us,” referring to the new British sanctions regime targeting Israeli settlements.
Meanwhile, British counterterror officials arrested a 27-year-old dual British-Iranian national in London today on suspicion of plotting a terror attack in connection with the security incident at the U.S.-run RAF Fairford air base over the weekend. Five British men who were initially arrested near the base on suspected explosives and terror offenses have since been released on bail…
Trump told Time magazine in an interview published this morning that he “can’t imagine” Netanyahu ignored warnings from both the UAE and Egypt in weeks ahead of the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks, after reports emerged that the prime minister had been notified of the threats ahead of time.
“You know, I think if he would have known, he would have done something about it. Certainly, he would have had people at least alert,” Trump said…
Democratic Majority for Israel released a proposal today for a “modernized U.S.-Israel relationship,” with a focus on reimagined ties between the countries following the end of the current memorandum of understanding on military aid, set to expire in 2028, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
The group urged focusing on “more joint development and production in missile defense, cybersecurity, and emerging technologies” but did not fully rule out the potential for “some” continued military aid and missile-defense funding past 2028 — though the group suggested that such aid would likely be phased out “over time, and by mutual agreement”…
Roughly 20 empty Iranian oil tankers have been stranded off Sri Lanka’s coast — drifting with idled engines as food, fuel and water run low — since July, when the U.S. reimposed its blockade on the Strait of Hormuz. Washington has since pressured Sri Lanka into barring local ships from resupplying the vessels and their crews, according to The Wall Street Journal…
The Pentagon is reportedly sending a third aircraft-carrier strike group and additional Marine Corps ships to the Middle East — adding roughly 9,000 to 10,000 troops — which are set to arrive in the region in November, as Trump publicly weighs renewing strikes on Iran after the midterms. The buildup could bring the U.S. to three carrier-strike groups in the Middle East for the first time since April…
Secretary of State Marco Rubio waived human rights conditions on $320 million in U.S. military aid to Egypt, citing national security interests and Cairo’s “helpful role” following the start of the war with Iran, according to a State Department memo…
A CNN investigation found that Jared Kushner‘s private equity firm, Affinity Partners, is the largest shareholder in an Israeli financial group, Phoenix Financial, that holds stakes in Elbit Systems and at least eight other companies supplying the Israeli military — even as Kushner has served as a lead U.S. negotiator in the Gaza war.
Critics say his envoy status — which lets him avoid financial-disclosure requirements — blurs the line between his public role and private profit, though CNN found no sign that Kushner’s diplomacy affected the investments and his attorney said he has never directed Phoenix’s decisions…
While hundreds of students gathered at the University of Texas at Austin last night to hear far-left streamer Hasan Piker speak about the future of progressive politics, former Israeli hostage Maya Regev was across campus recounting her 50 days in Hamas captivity at a counter-event organized by campus pro-Israel groups in response to Piker’s appearance, JI’s Haley Cohen reports…
The superintendent of Montgomery County Public Schools acknowledged today that the district needs to do more to combat antisemitism, responding to a letter earlier this week from more than 40 local rabbis and cantors who warned that school leaders have failed to adequately address a rise in antisemitic incidents, JI’s Haley Cohen reports.
In his reply, Thomas Taylor called the school district’s response after a swastika was drawn on a student’s desk last month at Walter Johnson High School a “misstep,” and pledged to address concerns about staff training, student education and harmful social media behavior…
⏩ Tomorrow’s Agenda, Today
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a look at how Jewish voters in Texas are viewing the state’s hotly contested race for U.S. Senate between state Attorney General Ken Paxton and state Rep. James Talarico, as community leaders say neither candidate has made a meaningful effort to engage with the local Jewish community.
Israeli carriers El Al, Israir and Arkia will begin repatriation flights tomorrow to bring Israelis stranded in the United Arab Emirates back to Tel Aviv after FlyDubai suspended its 8-10 daily flights to the Jewish state. Meanwhile, we’ll be watching developments in the investigation into the attack as authorities work to officially determine whether the assailant had ties to Iran or other actors.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) will appear on Saturday with Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed at a town hall in Macomb County, Mich.
We’ll be back in your inbox with the Daily Overtime on Monday. Shabbat shalom and chag sameach!
Stories You May Have Missed
MUSEUM MOMENT
Wiesel, the son of Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, pointed to the museum’s past work documenting atrocities in Sudan and against the Yazidis and Rohingya
PLANNING FOR POWER
Sen. Mark Kelly told JI Democrats could withhold funds for White House operations to put pressure on the president
Plus, Nithya Raman's rocky relationship with LA Jews
30 September 2026, Israel, Lod: Yaniv Hayoun (C), one of the men who helped incapacitate the attacker on the flydubai aircraft bound for Israel from the United Arab Emirates, which was diverted to Saudi Arabia following an emergency signal, is welcomed after arriving at the Ben Gurion International Airport. Photo by: Jamal Awad/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images
Good Thursday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we have the latest on yesterday’s midair attack on a FlyDubai flight to Israel, look at tensions between Los Angeles City Councilmember Nithya Raman and the city’s Jewish community as the democratic socialist mounts a bid for mayor, and report on new federal data indicating that fewer than one-quarter of Nonprofit Security Grant Program applications were fulfilled this year. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Elisha Wiesel, Ivy Wolk and Ynon Kreiz.
Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by JI Executive Editor Melissa Weiss, with an assist from Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
Today’s Agenda
The United Arab Emirates has opened an investigation into yesterday’s attack on a FlyDubai flight from the UAE to Israel in which an Indian pilot was stabbed by his co-pilot, prompting the plane to plummet 17,000 feet before Israeli passengers on the flight, assisted by two off-duty pilots, regained control of the aircraft and safely landed it in Saudi Arabia.
The UAE’s attorney general said in a statement that investigators would “collect information and evidence, to determine the truth of the incident, its circumstances, details, and motives, and to verify the extent of its connection to any terrorist activity or purpose, or the existence of prior planning or direction for it.”
Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s office said this morning that he planned to recommend five of the plane’s passengers for the Presidential Award for Civilian Heroism, whom Herzog said in a statement “acted with extraordinary heroism” in alerting passengers and crew to the attack in the cockpit and overpowering the assailant co-pilot.
In Washington, the two-day Nixon Foundation Grand Strategy Summit wraps up today. Speakers include the White House’s Seb Gorka, Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT), former Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO), Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Riley Moore (R-WV), Rich Goldberg and Walter Russell Mead.
The Senate Judiciary Committee’s markup of the bipartisan, bicameral Right to Worship Act — which would create buffer zones outside of religious institutions during services — was canceled after the Senate ended its work week early, sending legislators home until after the midterms. Read more from JI’s Marc Rod here.
One Thing To Know
L.A. rift
By Matthew Kassel
Nithya Raman, a democratic socialist mounting a formidable bid to unseat Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass next month, faced a particularly hostile crowd on Tuesday night at a Jewish community candidate forum, where the city councilwoman fielded several tough questions about Israel.
Her answers drew audible groans from the audience members at the Skirball Cultural Center as she reiterated her view that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza and defended her decision to sit for an interview with the Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, who regularly espouses antisemitic rhetoric.
The event illustrated how Raman has continued to gain momentum in the final stretch of the race even as she has doubled down on her anti-Israel stances while courting voters in a city that is home to the second-largest Jewish population in the country. Her harsh positions on Israel — coupled with recent efforts to distance herself from some former allies in the Jewish community — suggest Raman has made a strategic calculation she can win without meaningful Jewish support.
The Big Reads
museum moment
Elisha Wiesel urged the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday to speak up against what he called the false accusation that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, arguing that the institution his father helped create has a “unique responsibility” to address the issue, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports. Wiesel, the son of Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel, made the appeal while delivering special remarks at an event honoring his late father on what would have been his 98th birthday. “You made your own findings for Darfur, the Yazidis, Rohingya,” he said in remarks directed at the institution. “You have the scholars, the credibility and the mandate to do the same hearing to explain with the rigor you applied to Burma why the genocide label does not fit Gaza and what the misuse of Holocaust language does to Jews around the world.”
planning for power
Senate Democrats say that they’d plan to use federal funding authorities to force the Trump administration to negotiate with the Iranian regime and end the Iran war if their party regains the majority in the next Congress, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod and Emily Jacobs report. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) told JI, with President Donald Trump continuing to ignore war powers votes from Congress that have attempted to force an end to the conflict, “we would use approp[riations] levers — either to put guardrails, not allowing funds unless or until there was an authorization [for use of military force passed by Congress].” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), meanwhile, said that he thinks lawmakers would be more likely to withhold funds for White House operations, while noting that the administration has asked for a $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget for 2027.
On the other side of Capitol Hill: A group of more than 40 House Democrats introduced the Stop the Settlements Act on Wednesday, which would place sanctions on anyone involved in further settlement expansion in the West Bank or Gaza and ban imports from Israeli settlements, JI’s Marc Rod reports.
security shortfall
In a year when the Jewish community was rocked by a terror attack at a Detroit-area synagogue alongside other antisemitic threats, the Nonprofit Security Grant Program fulfilled less than 23% of applications submitted for funding in 2026, according to new data obtained by Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod. The majority of the funding will be provided to houses of worship from various denominations, according to a source familiar with the situation, but other recipients include schools, medical facilities, senior centers, camps, museums, shelters and community centers. Application numbers and total funding requested seem to be down somewhat from 2025, when the program received in excess of 8,000 applications, with an acceptance rate of just 20%. Even so, the amount of funding requested was higher and the acceptance rate was lower than in any year in documented program history other than 2025.
The Rundown
busy in beirut
mile-high miracle
playing defense
bookshelf showdown
party outreach
On Our Radar
● The Live Briefing. Word on the street, clips, podcasts and quick updates — the items we’re tracking all day in our Live Briefing on the app (on Apple and Android) and website.
Iran said it received a formal response from the U.S. regarding its proposal to end the ongoing war, but did not elaborate on the contents of the response; President Donald Trump, who publicly rejected Tehran’s proposal earlier this week, said on Wednesday that a decision on Iran — either to “blow them up” or “make a deal” — was coming “very soon”…
Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered the immediate removal of Iran’s delegation to the U.N. General Assembly, including Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, from the U.S. earlier this week after Qatar-mediated talks again reached an impasse…
U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham said London believes that Iran “played a part” in a weekend incident in which five men were arrested on suspicion of explosives violations and terrorism near the RAF Fairford base, which was used by the U.S. to conduct strikes on Iran during the height of hostilities earlier this year…
Politico looks at the efforts of Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang to pitch the White House on a voluntary but binding “AI accords,” the basis for which originated at last week’s state dinner for Chinese President Xi Jinping, during which Zuckerberg pitched House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and then Huang on the idea…
Maine Democratic Senate candidate Troy Jackson apologized for comments made earlier this week in which he suggested that it was “unfortunate” that Jewish residents in the state were uncomfortable using the term genocide to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza and that they “don’t like to use that term only because they’re Jewish”…
A former bodyguard for former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), with whom the former lawmaker was romantically involved, said that he caused $200,000 worth of damage to Sinema’s home and tried to force the former senator to post a decades-old video from one of his deployments to Iraq because he was angry about her post-Senate work with companies he believed contributed to the wars in Gaza and Iran…
The head of the University of Oregon’s Hillel said that a sukkah that had been constructed in front of the building was taken from the property earlier this week, adding that he was unsure if the incident was “common theft” or something “more hostile and antisemitic in nature”…
Mattel CEO Ynon Kreiz was named co-CEO of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, serving alongside CEO David Ellison, after a judge on Wednesday issued an order allowing Paramount’s acquisition of WBD to proceed…
The Wall Street Journal spotlights efforts by Nathan Kirsh, the 94-year-old philanthropist and businessman, to build out what is likely to be one of the largest family offices established in recent years, following the sale earlier this year of Kirsh’s Jetro Restaurant Depot to Sysco for $29 billion…
The New York Times profiles actress and comedian Ivy Wolk, whose provocative social media videos have elicited negative responses that have propelled her to stardom…
Authorities in Texas said they foiled an imminent terror plot targeting the Texas State Capitol in Austin; a friend of the individual arrested in connection with the threat said Benny Caldera Jr. had told the friend he was angry with AIPAC and that “these people have to be exterminated”…
Israel’s Supreme Court cleared for publication the name of the senior Israeli intelligence official believed to be involved in the army’s intelligence failures leading up to the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks; Lt. Col. Aryeh Amidror, the son of former National Security Advisor Yaakov Amidror, was identified as the Gaza Division’s intelligence officer during and before the attacks…
British broadcaster and philanthropist Dame Esther Rantzen, the longtime host of “That’s Life!” — one of the most popular episodes of which featured Sir Nicholas Winton and several dozen of the adults he saved when they were children during the Holocaust — died at 86…
Worthy Reads
Find more Worthy Reads in our Live Briefing via our app (on Apple and Android) and website.
Midair Melee: The Atlantic’s Graeme Wood considers the political implications of yesterday’s attack on a FlyDubai flight to Israel. “The next step will involve determining whether the pilot acted alone — not a good look for Flydubai, to have suicidal or terrorist pilots — or at someone’s behest. The latter possibility could, if confirmed, have serious implications, depending on who directed the attack. Many have a motive: Sunni jihadists (al-Qaeda or the Islamic State), Hamas, and of course Iran and its proxies.” [TheAtlantic]
Strait Man: Bloomberg’s Alex Dooler, Dinesh Nair and Laura Gardner Cuesta spotlight Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed Al Nahyan as the Emirati official, who helms a $300 billion sovereign Abu Dhabi wealth fund, looks to find alternatives to the Strait of Hormuz amid tensions with Iran. “He is known to lean heavily on a small group of Emirati officials, some childhood friends and others who have steered Abu Dhabi’s economy for decades. … According to one former teacher, a young Sheikh Khaled was at ease even in a class of students who went on to become top political scholars in Middle Eastern geopolitics. He’s known to prefer to observe before offering careful interventions.” [Bloomberg]
Picture of the Day
Yaniv Hayoun (center), one of the passengers who helped incapacitate the attacker on the FlyDubai aircraft bound for Israel from the United Arab Emirates, was welcomed after arriving at the Ben Gurion International Airport on Wednesday night, still wearing the blood-stained shirt from the attack. Jamal Awad/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images
Birthdays
Rod Carew, former MLB second baseman and Hall of Famer who appeared in 18 straight All-Star Games, he is immortalized as Jewish in Adam Sandler’s “Chanukah Song,” turns 81
Lynn Steven Adelman, U.S. District Court judge for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, turns 87
Andrew David Hurwitz, senior judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, turns 79
Aaron Ciechanover, professor at the Technion, he won the 2004 Nobel Prize in chemistry, turns 79
Lynn Ahrens, Tony Award-winning writer and lyricist for the musical theater, television and film, turns 78
Bruce Levenson, former co-owner of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks and founding board member of the publicly traded TechTarget, turns 77
Israel Jacob Yuval, professor emeritus of Jewish history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, turns 77
Andrew Goodwin, copy editor at Politico since 2009
Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, a native of Scranton, Pa., turns 67
Steven C. González, the first-ever Jewish chief justice of the Washington State Supreme Court, now serving as an associate justice, turns 63
Cynthia Dawn “Cindy” Margolis, reality television personality, model and actor, turns 61
Adam Bennett Frisch, member of the Aspen City Council from 2011 to 2019, turns 59
Robert A. Rosen, founder of Peak Impact Advisors after 17 years at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Stacie Passon, film director, screenwriter and producer, turns 57
Rob Seidman, partner at FGS Global, specializing in telecommunications, technology, consumer protection and privacy for companies in regulated industries
Michael J. Koplow, chief policy officer at Israel Policy Forum
Rebecca L. Taibleson, former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, now a judge on the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, turns 43
Samantha J. Weinberg, director of investor relations and strategic engagement at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Yossi Raskas, account manager at Fiserv
Scott Rosenthal
Wiesel, the son of Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, pointed to the museum’s past work documenting atrocities in Sudan and against the Yazidis and Rohingya
Aurora Rose/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
Elisha Wiesel Attends The Blue Card Annual Benefit Dinner 2019 on April 8, 2019 in New York City.
Elisha Wiesel urged the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday to speak up against what he called the false accusation that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, arguing that the institution his father helped create has a “unique responsibility” to address the issue.
Wiesel, the son of Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Elie Wiesel, made the appeal while delivering special remarks at “Honoring the Life, Lessons and Legacy of Elie Wiesel.” The event, held on what would have been his father’s 98th birthday, marked a decade since the elder Wiesel’s death. It was organized with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the State Department’s Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, the Embassy of Romania and Moment magazine.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum has not endorsed accusations of “genocide” regarding Israel’s military actions in Gaza, but neither has the organization issued formal institutional statements to address or quell the label. Instead, the museum has maintained its core organizational focus: educating the public about the Holocaust, condemning the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attacks and raising awareness about the subsequent rise in global antisemitism.
This neutral stance has not shielded the museum from intense political crossfire. Pro-Israel advocates and some Jewish community leaders argue that Holocaust institutions have a moral obligation to explicitly reject the “genocide” accusation, calling it a form of Holocaust inversion and a weaponization of Jewish history against Jewish people. Some have pointed to the Illinois Holocaust Museum, which distributed internal guides clarifying that the Gaza conflict lacks genocidal intent, as a model the national museum should follow.
“But on one question, this museum has a unique responsibility, and it is one we must face together,” Wiesel said. “Since October 7, the word genocide has been used as a weapon against Israel on campuses, at the United Nations, and even by a member of your own governing council. The charge is false.”
Wiesel pointed to the museum’s past work documenting atrocities in Darfur and against the Yazidis and Rohingya, arguing that the institution has the expertise and authority to properly address genocide accusations against Israel in a credible format.
“You made your own findings for Darfur, the Yazidis, Rohingya,” he said. “You have the scholars, the credibility and the mandate to do the same here to explain with the rigor you applied to Burma why the genocide label does not fit Gaza and what the misuse of Holocaust language does to Jews around the world.”
“Declining to join the accusation is not the same as dismantling it. You can do that. You have that power,” Wiesel added. “All of these other Holocaust and genocide museums around the country, I think, would respond to that leadership…That was my father’s vision: a place that remembers and then acts.”
Wiesel also referenced several voices within the museum’s broader community who have spoken out on the issue.
“Stu Eisenstadt, a dear friend of my parents, who helped birth this museum, has written about how the terms “genocide,” “Holocaust,” and “Nazi” are being weaponized to attack the legitimacy of the Jewish state,” Wiesel said. “In July, Chairman [Jeff] Miller invited [New York City] Mayor [Zohran] Mamdani here to learn what genocide actually looks like. These are brave voices, and they speak from within your family. I am grateful to them both. What I am asking for you to consider is that the institution itself find its voice alongside theirs.”
Wiesel also placed his appeal in the context of what he sees as a broader misuse of Holocaust terminology against Israel and Jews, something he says is fomenting global antisemitism.
“The genocide charge turns the Jewish state into the new Nazis. It turns the Jewish people back into a threat to be removed from the family of nations. It inverts the Holocaust,” he said. “Those who start the accusation know exactly what they are doing. They know that the uninformed will spread hatred like wildfire.”
Wiesel acknowledged that the museum faces constraints as a federal institution that private citizens do not, and expressed a deep admiration for its work and efforts in honoring his father’s legacy. He said his appeal was rooted in his deep connection to the institution through his father.
The elder Wiesel was appointed by President Jimmy Carter in 1978 to chair the President’s Commission on the Holocaust, and later served as founding chairman of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, helping drive the museum’s creation. The museum opened in Washington in 1993 after years of work by Wiesel and others.
“The [U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum] is an actual child of my father,” Wiesel said. “He had it in his mind before anybody else did. He convinced a president. He convinced a country. He fought through the bureaucracy, which is something he hated to do.”
Wiesel described the museum as a “little sibling” his father left him and said he remains “grateful to everyone who works here and to everyone who walks through these doors for carrying on this vision, for showing the truth every day.”
In an interview with Jewish Insider following the event, Wiesel said that special relationship made the appeal particularly difficult.
“It wasn’t easy to tell the [U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum] tonight that I think they’re missing an opportunity,” Wiesel told JI. “I had to really think hard on how do you do that diplomatically and with love, and with all of the good intentions, and make people feel it?”
“It’s not a criticism, it’s not an attack, it’s how can you have a Holocaust museum that bears my father’s etchings all over its place, all over its soul, and Israel is under attack?” he continued. “And one of the biggest lies affecting the Jewish people is that Israel is committing genocide. [The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum] has the expertise and the power and the standing to weigh in, and what a difference it would make!”
In making the case, Wiesel said he was inspired by what he learned from his father about speaking truthfully even when doing so could come at the expense of political access or personal relationships.
The younger Wiesel pointed to footage of his father urging President Ronald Reagan, as a friend, not to visit the Bitburg cemetery in 1985. The visit, planned during Reagan’s trip to West Germany with Chancellor Helmut Kohl, drew criticism because members of the Waffen-SS were buried there. Wiesel recalled his father sweating as he made his case.
He also referenced his father turning to President Bill Clinton at the museum’s 1993 dedication to plead for an end to the bloodshed in Bosnia. In both instances, Wiesel presented remembrance not as a reason to stay silent, but as an obligation to speak
“My father stood always with truth and the concept that you have to fight lies,” Wiesel said. “We have to fight the lies wherever we are, and with whatever platform we have. We can’t wait for somebody else to do it. We can’t hope some other leader is going to do it for us. Whatever our circle is, whatever our platform is, we have to use it.”
Still, Wiesel made clear that his remarks came from his own convictions.
“I felt the need that if I’m going to come here, I want to come and not say what my father would have said, but speak the words that I’m inspired by my father to say,” Wiesel said. “And tonight, that message was about what I think the museum can really do to make a difference in antisemitism: by being clear that Israel is not committing genocide.”
Plus, this rising Michigan Dem won't back El-Sayed
AFP via Getty Images
Departure hall of Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Airport in Tabuk on September 30, 2026 after a flydubai plane bound for Tel Aviv was forced to land in Saudi Arabia on September 30.
Good Wednesday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we report on a suspected terror attack on an Israel-bound flydubai flight earlier this morning, have the scoop on prominent Michigan Democratic state legislator Noah Arbit’s decision not to endorse Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed in the November election and cover New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s newly released plan to combat antisemitism, which received a mixed response from Jewish communal leaders. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Eric Cantor, Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri and Elaine Luria.
Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by JI Executive Editor Melissa Weiss, with an assist from Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
Today’s Agenda
U.S. forces completed their withdrawal from their last bases in Iraq earlier today, ending the more than two-decade-long American military presence in the country.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, State Department Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, Moment magazine and the Romanian Embassy are holding an event today honoring Elie Wiesel. The author’s son, Elisha Wiesel, is slated to speak at the event commemorating his father’s life and works.
Far-left streamer Hasan Piker is slated to speak at a University Democrats-sponsored event at the University of Texas at Austin. The event will take place in the location originally reserved by organizers, after administrators denied requests from University Democrats to move Piker’s talk to a larger venue.
One Thing To Know
BREAKING
A flydubai flight from the United Arab Emirates bound for Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia this morning in what Israeli security officials said may have been a terrorist incident following a violent altercation in which the plane’s captain, reportedly assisted by a passenger, wrested control from his co-pilot after the plane was thrown into a brief, rapid descent.
Images emerged in the hours following the incident of several passengers in bloody clothing. “We just heard screams, and then the cockpit door opened and we saw a huge amount of blood,” one passenger told Israeli media after landing in Saudi Arabia’s Tabuk Airport, near the Gulf state’s border with Jordan. Video also showed passengers tending to the pilot covered in blood on the floor, while the co-pilot appears tied up and possibly unconscious.
Israel’s i24News reported that the co-pilot who was subdued and restrained was of Omani origin, and that two additional pilots on board the aircraft, but not working the flight, were nationals of South Africa and New Zealand.
The Big Reads
DRAWING A LINE
Noah Arbit, a rising Jewish Democrat in Michigan’s state Legislature, has been a vocal critic of Abdul El-Sayed, a fellow Democrat whose Senate campaign in the key battleground state has exposed deep divisions within the Jewish community. But until now, Arbit had not yet publicly clarified if he is willing to set aside his differences and endorse El-Sayed, like some prominent Jewish Democrats in the state who have recently announced their support despite reservations with his hostile stances on Israel and approach to countering antisemitism. In an interview with Jewish Insider‘s Matthew Kassel on Monday, Arbit, 31, confirmed that he would not be endorsing El-Sayed, pointing to what he called the nominee’s promotion of antisemitic conspiracy theories and affiliations with extremist figures on the far left, among other issues he cast as deal-breakers in the closely contested race.
big apple blueprint
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration on Tuesday released what it calls the country’s first municipal strategy to combat antisemitism, a 30-page plan that provides $7.4 million for security and prevention grants, but declines to adopt a definition of antisemitism and does not address Israel-related hate, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports. Jewish leaders offered a mixed response to the mayor’s new strategy, with some welcoming increased security funding and other measures while also arguing that the plan fails to address what they see as a key driver of anti-Jewish hostility — rhetoric targeting Israel and its supporters. In a joint statement, UJA-Federation of New York, JCRC-NY, AJC New York and New York Board of Rabbis said that “any effort to confront antisemitism in New York City must fully address the realities Jewish New Yorkers face today.”
campus in focus
An independent federal commission on civil rights concluded, following a yearlong probe, that campus antisemitism is a “serious and growing civil rights concern,” but also suggested the Trump administration’s efforts to combat it went against both statute and established procedure, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. The report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights highlights that “recent federal enforcement has sometimes represented a departure from established practice” and that some of the administration’s punitive measures have been overturned in court. The report also called for greater staffing and better training for the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights — which the Trump administration slashed even as complaints grew significantly — to ensure adequate responses to campus antisemitism.
The Rundown
DEMOCRATIC SHIFT
high seas stakes
definition debate
virginia in view
friends on the trail
euro slip
On Our Radar
● The Live Briefing. Word on the street, clips, podcasts and quick updates — the items we’re tracking all day in our Live Briefing on the app (on Apple and Android) and website.
The Treasury and State Departments announced sanctions on 13 individuals and entities alleged to have assisted Iran in procuring weapons…
Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, SpaceX’s Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and former White House AI czar David Sachs were on hand at a press conference following a meeting on AI between President Donald Trump, White House officials and the tech leaders…
Organizers of a16z‘s upcoming Tech Week in San Francisco said that a hackathon event associated with the conference had been removed from its calendar for violating Tech Week’s terms of service after an Israeli applicant was told he could not participate by an organizer who cited Israel’s 2024 pager attack on Hezbollah, saying, “Hackathon participants carry pagers, smartphones and laptops … What happened in Lebanon shouldn’t happen in California”…
Immigration officials are moving to deport an anti-Zionist Israeli member of the Satmar Hasidic community who was present during an incident in which an Israeli flag was removed from a local government building in Rockland County, N.Y….
A new report from the U.K.’s Community Security Trust found that antisemitic incidents at universities in the country rose by 14% during the 2025-26 academic year, with 95 reported incidents compared to 83 the prior year…
Several dozen West Bank settlers clashed with Israeli security forces, several of whom were injured, as they were attempting to help a Palestinian family return to its home in the village of Jalud, from which the family had fled in July amid ongoing attacks by settlers…
eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher spotlights the Har Initiative, a post-Oct. 7 donor collective that plans to distribute $120 million in the coming months to groups fighting antisemitism; the initiave, which is made up of 12 funders including The Tepper Foundation, The Einhorn Collaborative, Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies and Maimonides Fund, is being led by Lindsey Spindle, president of the Samueli Foundation, and Fay Twersky, president of the Arthur Blank Family Foundation…
Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and former top Fatah official Mohammed Dahlan, an advisor to Emirati President Mohamed bin Zayed, have reportedly agreed to form a coalition in the Nov. 28 Palestinian election if Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas allows the election to move forward; Abbas has repeatedly postponed national elections, which have not happened in 20 years…
UAE Vice President Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh on Tuesday, marking the first high-level bilateral meeting since tensions between the two Gulf countries erupted publicly over Yemen last year…
Moroccan King Mohammed VI appointed Fatima Ezzahra El Mansouri as the country’s first female prime minister on Tuesday, after her Authenticity and Modernity Party won the most seats in last week’s parliamentary election…
Former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) is joining PhRMA as CEO after more than a decade at Moelis & Company…
Worthy Reads
Find more Worthy Reads in our Live Briefing via our app (on Apple and Android) and website.
The Missile Mess: The Atlantic’s Christopher Leonard spotlights the challenges associated with THAAD missile interceptors, which were frequently used by the U.S. and its allies during the height of tensions with Iran despite their high cost and dwindling stockpiles. “Munitions stockpiles have long been a neglected element of U.S. military strategy. Pentagon budget writers favor flashier line items, such as new fighter jets and naval destroyers. And munitions procurement relies on a fragile U.S. industrial base that is plagued by points of failure. They are produced by large U.S. defense contractors — such as Lockheed Martin, which makes the THAAD — whose business models constrain them from ramping up production even when a missile shortage is evident.” [TheAtlantic]
Mideast Misadventures: Wall Street Journal columnist William Galston considers the lessons learned over the course of the conflicts with Iran. “This is America’s third Middle Eastern misadventure in the past quarter-century, and likely the last. It signals the end of our effort to dominate the region, and it could set in motion a gradual drawdown of U.S. forces. … Our allies will have to choose between yielding to Iran’s regional dominance and creating a formal anti-Iranian alliance that could eventually include Israel.” [WSJ]
An Oct. 7 Reckoning: In the Jewish Review of Books, Matti Friedman reviews journalist Amos Harel’s 06:29: Anatomy of a Failure, a Hebrew-language account of the events of Oct. 7, 2023, and its aftermath. “Harel has no state budget, team of lawyers, or power of subpoena. But this book is the closest thing we have so far to a comprehensive and public reckoning with the failures that led to October 7. 06:29 is yet another example of a scenario that we in Israel have seen again and again since that fateful hour nearly three years ago, and that indeed can be said to have saved the country: The state fails, and a citizen rises to the occasion.” [JewishReviewofBooks]
Picture of the Day
Interviewed by The New Yorker‘s David Remnick (left) at New York’s Streicker Center on Tuesday night for the launch of his new memoir, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich (right), who was wrongfully detained in Russia for 16 months, reflected on the country he covered for six years — and on how dramatically life there has changed for Russian Jews since the start of the war in Ukraine. Read more from Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen here.
Birthdays
Natan Levy, mixed martial artist who competed in the lightweight division in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, turns 35
Ehud Olmert, former prime minister of Israel, turns 81
Sanford Kadish, retired volunteer and tutor
Rochelle A. “Shelly” Kassen, past president of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, she is on the board of the Tikvah Fund
Adam Maximilian Aron, chairman and CEO of AMC Entertainment, he is a former co-owner of the Philadelphia 76ers, turns 72
Fran Drescher, actor and activist, she was president of the SAG-AFTRA labor union, turns 69
Ehud Hrushovski, professor of mathematical logic at Oxford, turns 67
Haim Taib, founder and president of the Menomadin Group and president of the Menomadin Foundation, turns 66
Allison Sommer, journalist for Haaretz since 2012
Jonathan Gruber, professor of healthcare economics at MIT and an architect of Romneycare and Obamacare, turns 61
Lisa K. Robbins
Gilad Menashe Erdan, Israel’s U.N. ambassador from 2020 to 2024, now global president of Magen David Adom, turns 56
Anastasia Goodstein, senior digital director at Inseparable
David Herszenhorn, international editor for The Washington Post
Jacques Stambouli, CEO of Via Trading Corporation, a liquidator of consumer merchandise
Rabbi Eliezer Kaunfer, president and CEO of Hadar Institute in Manhattan
Hildy Kuryk, founder and partner at Artemis Strategies, a boutique consultancy, turns 49
Ari Michael Shapiro, CNN contributor, former host of NPR’s “All Things Considered,” turns 48
Daniel Grossberg, member of the Kentucky House of Representatives since 2023, he lost his May 2026 Democratic primary, turns 48
Jonathan Peter Kasdan, screenwriter, director, producer and actor, turns 47
Yonatan Neril, founder of the Jerusalem-based Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, turns 46
Stephen Cohen, computer scientist and entrepreneur, he is best known as a co-founder and president of Palantir Technologies, turns 44
Steven Russolillo, chief news editor at Business Insider
Plus, Mamdani's antisemitism plan sidesteps Israel
Wisam Hashlamoun/Anadolu via Getty Images
Streaks of light from Iranian ballistic missiles are seen in the night sky above Hebron, West Bank, as Iran resumes its retaliatory strikes against Israel.
Good Tuesday afternoon.
This P.M. briefing is reserved for our premium subscribers like you — offering a forward-focused read on what we’re tracking now and what’s coming next.
Today’s Daily Overtime was curated by JI U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik.
📡On Our Radar
Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking
In a video address this morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Jerusalem has received “indications that, ahead of the [Israeli] elections, our enemies will try to attack us,” and warned such adversaries, “Don’t mess with us — not now, and not ever. Our long arm will reach you anywhere, at any time.”
Opposition Leader Yair Lapid said he had requested an “urgent security update” from Netanyahu’s office regarding his statement, which the PMO said it would provide…
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a separate video today that Hamas leaders living abroad are “also in [Israel’s] crosshairs,” after the IDF eliminated the commander of the terror group’s northern brigade in Gaza last night…
Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and former top Fatah official Mohammed Dahlan, who currently serves as an advisor to Emirati President Mohamed bin Zayed in Abu Dhabi, have agreed to run in a coalition in the upcoming Palestinian elections, a PIJ official confirmed to the Associated Press.
The coalition could challenge the dominance of Fatah, the party that governs the Palestinian Authority, if the Nov. 28 elections take place, which is far from certain — PA President Mahmoud Abbas has repeatedly delayed elections in the past…
President Donald Trump said in the Oval Office yesterday that he was “surprised” British authorities released on bail the five men who were arrested for a potential attempted terror attack at a U.K. air base housing U.S. military assets. “I wouldn’t have done that,” he said, adding that the incident “might be” linked to Iran but that he didn’t want to say definitively. “I know the answer, I could be very specific, but I’d rather not say. I would not have released them,” he added.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio similarly said yesterday that many people were “disturbed” the individuals had been released and that the “very serious situation” over the weekend “clearly involves the hands of a foreign actor,” without specifying further. Rubio indicated there’s “a lot more news that’ll come out on this in the days to come”…
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration today released its delayed municipal strategy to combat antisemitism, a 30-page plan that provides $7.4 million for security grants but declines to adopt a definition of antisemitism and does not address Israel-related hate, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.
Jewish leaders offered a mixed response to the strategy, with some welcoming increased security funding and other measures while also arguing that the plan fails to address what they see as a key driver of anti-Jewish hostility — rhetoric targeting Israel and its supporters, some of which they noted has been driven by Mamdani himself…
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights concluded, following a yearlong probe, that campus antisemitism is a “serious and growing civil rights concern,” but also suggested the Trump administration’s efforts to combat it “sometimes represented a departure from established practice” and went against statute, JI’s Marc Rod reports…
Democratic Majority for Israel’s PAC unveiled a nearly $1 million digital ad buy in Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District targeting Rep. Jen Kiggans (R-VA) over her support for Trump’s policies, in a bid to boost former Rep. Elaine Luria (D-VA)…
The State Department announced sanctions today on 13 individials and entities tied to Iran’s military procurement and proliferation, marking the one-year anniversary of the “snapback” provision that restored U.N. sanctions on Iran and calling on all U.N. member states to fully enforce those measures…
⏩ Tomorrow’s Agenda, Today
An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead
Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a look at the effectiveness of U.S. efforts to protect commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and how long Washington may be able to sustain them.
The Senate is expected to hold a vote this evening on a bill requiring the State Department to produce a report for Congress on violence by settlers and Israeli forces in the West Bank, including killings and detentions of Americans. If the resolution passes and the State Department does not produce a report in 30 days, most U.S. security assistance to Israel would be cut off. Any senator would also be able to force a vote on cutting off aid to Israel after such a report is delivered.
Far-left influencer Hasan Piker will speak at the University of Texas at Austin tomorrow, though in front of a smaller audience than planned; University Democrats, the group hosting Piker, said the university declined to provide them with a larger venue and other off-campus venues “pulled out” of discussions with the group. “We will not cancel because if we allow them to win, they will not stop until every semblance of left-wing speech is prohibited,” the Democratic Party-affiliated student organization said in a statement.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum — along with the State Department’s Office of the Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, the Romanian Embassy and Moment magazine — will host an event honoring the late Holocaust survivor and author Elie Wiesel, with remarks to be delivered by his son, Elisha Wiesel.
U.S. forces are set to withdraw from their last bases in Iraq by tomorrow, ending a military presence that has spanned more than two decades. The withdrawal, agreed to in 2024 under former President Joe Biden, comes as Iraqi security officials warn that the departure could allow Iran-backed militias to gain a stronger foothold in the country and ISIS cells to regroup.
Stories You May Have Missed
QUESTIONABLE COMPANY
One signatory has repeatedly referred to pro-Israel officials as neo-Nazis while others have been involved with Students for Justice in Palestine and campus anti-Israel advocacy
MARYLAND MATTERS
More than 40 clergy members called on Superintendent Thomas Taylor to require antisemitism-specific teacher training and consequences for hateful social media posts
Plus, in new memoir, Shapiro leans into his faith
Amber Arnold/Wisconsin State Journal via AP
UW-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin during an interview at Vilas Hall in Madison, Wis., Aug. 4, 2022.
👋 Good Tuesday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we look at the central role that Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s faith plays in his life, according to his new memoir, out today, and look at incoming Columbia President Jennifer Mnookin’s record as the University of Wisconsin chancellor prepares to become Columbia’s first Jewish president in decades. We break down the tensions between the University of Pennsylvania and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as the Trump administration seeks to get contact information for the school’s Jewish faculty, and report on concerns from leading Jewish organizations over Saudi Arabia’s recent Islamist turn. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Deni Avdija, Amer Ghalib and Edi Rama.
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
- Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Across the world, memorial events will be held commemorating the day, chosen to coincide with the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Over the weekend, the Claims Conference released the results of a new demographic study that found that fewer than 200,000 Holocaust survivors are still alive.
- In New York, Holocaust survivor Sara Weinstein will address the U.N. General Assembly at 11 a.m. ET today in a special session. Later in the day, Weinstein will join three other survivors in ringing the closing bell of the New York Stock Exchange.
- In Washington, the Counter Extremism Project’s ARCHER at House 88 is putting on a concert at the Kennedy Center titled “Enduring Music: Compositions from the Holocaust,” which will feature performances of works that were written in the ghettos and concentration camps of World War II Europe.
- Elsewhere in Washington, the Washington Wizards are celebrating Jewish Heritage Night during their game tonight against the Portland Trail Blazers. More below.
- In Israel, the Diaspora Ministry’s second annual conference on antisemitism wraps up today in Jerusalem.
- Israeli Economy Minister Nir Barkat is speaking today at the 17th annual WELT Economic Summit, being held this year at Axel Springer’s offices in Berlin.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S GABBY DEUTCH
Each time Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro gets on a plane to visit different communities as he begins his reelection campaign, he’ll silently recite Judaism’s foundational prayer, the Shema, before takeoff, according to his new memoir.
Shapiro has always kept his Jewish faith at the center of his public identity. But in Where We Keep the Light, which comes out today, the swing-state Democrat provides the most intimate look yet at the centrality of Judaism to his understanding of the world. Widely expected to be eyeing a bid for the White House in 2028, Shapiro makes clear in his new book that he will not back away from his Jewish identity as his national profile grows.
“My faith has never been something I thought about doing a whole lot. Not because it’s not important. The opposite, really. It’s elemental,” Shapiro writes. “It’s why I sometimes sound a little vague when I get asked about my religion in interviews or when I try to put it into words. Kind of like when you get asked to explain how you fall asleep or blink. You just know to do it. It’s part of you, without thinking. All essence and instinct.”
The book begins with the story of the arson attack on the governor’s residence in Harrisburg last year, hours after Shapiro hosted a Passover Seder there. It’s clear that the incident, in which the assailant said that he targeted the governor because of what Shapiro “did to the Palestinians,” impacted him deeply.
“No one will deter me or my family or any Pennsylvanian from celebrating their faith openly and proudly,” Shapiro writes.
The next night, his family began their Seder by reciting Birkat Hagomel, which he described as “a prayer expressing gratitude for surviving a dangerous situation.” Shapiro again sought comfort in those days in the Shema, and its straightforward declaration of faith in God.
Along with his deep identification with Judaism, Shapiro doesn’t shy away from his support for Israel in his memoir.
The Democratic Party has become more critical of Israel in recent years, and it is easy to imagine Shapiro deciding that the politically savvy move would be to talk less about his connection to the Jewish state.
Instead, Shapiro appears to have decided that the right move — a result, surely, of both political and moral calculations — is to reveal exactly what role Judaism and Israel have played in shaping him.
CAMPUS BEAT
Columbia University tapped University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin this week as the school’s fourth president in two years — and first Jewish leader in three decades. While the New York City campus, which was roiled by antisemitic turmoil for nearly two years following the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in Israel, has been quieter in recent months, Jewish student leaders who worked closely with Mnookin at Wisconsin expressed optimism that she could help Columbia repair its strained relationship with the federal government and ongoing division among students and manage the implementation of recent recommendations made by the school’s antisemitism task force, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.
But: Mnookin, a legal scholar who served as dean of the University of California, Los Angeles School of Law before moving to Wisconsin in 2022, faced some criticism over concessions she made with Students for Justice in Palestine protesters during an anti-Israel encampment on the Madison campus in April 2024. Mnookin initially sent law enforcement to shut down the student encampment — resulting in the arrest of roughly three dozen demonstrators — then negotiated with protesters after they established a new encampment.
Bonus: Jonathan Dekel-Chen, who gained international attention for his efforts to secure the release of his son, Sagui, who was taken hostage during the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks, is joining the faculty of Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, where he will teach classes on Jewish legacies in Europe and modern Israeli history.
CATALOGING CONCERNS
A burgeoning legal battle between the University of Pennsylvania and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission escalated last week when the Ivy League university called the agency’s methods of investigating whether the school permitted an antisemitic work environment “extraordinary and unconstitutional.” The EEOC subpoenaed the university to turn over lists of Jewish employees and members of Jewish organizations, along with detailed identifying and contact information, saying the information is needed for the agency to contact potential victims of antisemitic discrimination, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.
University’s response: The university’s president and trustees — with the support of Jewish campus organizations Hillel, Chabad and Meor, as well as the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia — refused to do so. Handing over those names would disregard “the frightening and well-documented history of governmental entities that undertook efforts to identify and assemble information regarding persons of Jewish ancestry,” the university asserted in a legal filing last Tuesday.
PROBLEMATIC POST
Kelly Neumann, a prominent Michigan Democratic fundraiser who is supporting several major Democratic candidates in the state, shared a social media post on Veterans Day in 2024 honoring her grandfather, who served in the Nazi regime’s army in World War II, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. The post includes multiple photos of Neumann’s grandfather in Nazi regalia, including what appears to be an officer’s uniform.
What she said: “Happy Veterans Day to all my family and friends who serve/served! Without you, America would not be here today,” the post, shared on Facebook and Instagram by Neumann, a local attorney, reads. “Interesting story, I do not talk much about but my Grandfather, Albert Neumann was on the German side in WWI & WWII. He escaped to Brazil with my Father after Germany lost in WWII.” Neumann is serving as a co-chair of the finance committees for state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, running for U.S. Senate, and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who is running for governor, and has also hosted fundraisers for Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI), prior to her Senate run, Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet (D-MI) and state Sen. Jeremy Moss, a House candidate.
NEBRASKA NOS
A majority of the Democratic candidates running in Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District, a key swing seat centered in Omaha that Democrats hope to flip in November, said at a candidate forum hosted by the Nebraska Young Democrats last week that they would reject support from pro-Israel groups, based on video of the event obtained by Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod.
What they said: Asked whether they would accept support from AIPAC or Democratic Majority for Israel, state Sen. John Cavanaugh committed to not taking any funding from either group, while activist Denise Powell said that she would not accept any funding from any special interest groups. Navy veteran Kishla Askins offered a less definitive answer, saying she is “right now … not taking” funding from J Street, AIPAC or DMFI, while also noting that she had been to Israel and served alongside the IDF while she was in the military and understands how dangerous the region is. James Leuschen, a longtime former senior staffer for Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) — a staunch Israel supporter — was the only candidate to definitively say he would not commit to turning down support from the groups.
ALARM BELLS
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. 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, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports.
ADL alarm: 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.’” The statement continued, “This is harmful on many levels, diminishing the prospect of peaceful coexistence in the region and weakening regional initiatives promoting tolerance, understanding and prosperity.”
Bonus: Saudi Arabia is suspending work on its Mukaab skyscraper project in Riyadh as the Gulf state faces mounting financial issues.
SABRA SLAM
On Tuesday night, the Washington Wizards will host the Portland Trail Blazers for Jewish Heritage Night in a game that carries significance beyond the standings. The matchup coincides with International Holocaust Remembrance Day, giving it added weight amid heightened antisemitic sentiment across the political spectrum. But despite that backdrop, the evening’s focal point for the local Jewish community may actually be what transpires on the court. Deni Avdija, the 6-foot-8 small forward from Beit Zera, Israel, returns to Capital One Arena, where his NBA career began, no longer as a developing young player, but as one of the NBA’s breakout sensations, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports.
Higher profile: Selected ninth overall by Washington in the 2020 NBA Draft, Avdija spent the first four seasons of his NBA career with the Wizards before being traded to Portland in July 2024. This season, he has found his footing in the league, making a dramatic leap that has drawn attention from fans and NBA stars alike. With that higher profile, however, has come online backlash — “hate,” he has called it — focusing on his Israeli roots.
Worthy Reads
Back the Protesters Now: In The New York Times, Iranian dissident and writer Masih Alinejad calls on the U.S. to take action in support of Iranian anti-government protesters. “Too often, the argument about the dangers of intervention is less about prudence than paralysis. It turns failures into a permanent permission slip for every dictator watching: Kill enough people and the world will be too afraid of past mistakes to stop you. The argument is dishonest because it pretends that intervention means invasion. Iranians are not asking for foreign tanks to roll down the streets of Tehran. They are asking for the world to stop acting as if the only options are occupation or indifference. Inaction gives a regime time to regroup, rebuild its machinery of repression and return with a cleaner narrative and a longer list of prisoners.” [NYTimes]
How to Disarm Hamas: In Foreign Affairs, Elliott Abrams, Eric Edelman and Rena Gabber suggest that private security contractors could serve as a stabilizing force in the Gaza Strip in the absence of countries willing to contribute troops to an international stabilization force. “Top-level security contractors are a viable but overlooked option for ridding postwar Gaza of Hamas. They are staffed by well-trained, highly capable military personnel with experience serving in elite units. They will not shy away from potential conflict with Hamas terrorists. In fact, they are perhaps the only force besides the IDF itself willing to directly confront Hamas and do the hard work of demilitarizing Gaza. A demilitarizing force composed of private contractors could also come together quickly, particularly compared to the ISF. That would allow it to push Hamas back before the group gains even more power.” [ForeignAffairs]
What Elie Wiesel Taught Me: In The Free Press, German-born physician Suzanne Lentzsch reflects on her time treating Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel in the final years of his life. “I thank fate that Wiesel’s and my own paths crossed for a time; that I, a German, could for even a brief time help the man who had been the voice of the German-murdered Jews of this world. I still feel the guilt of my home’s history like a weight on my shoulders. But Wiesel taught me there is a choice in how one carries that burden. I spent the first 25 years of my life trapped voiceless behind the wall of a dictatorship that surveilled and murdered its own citizens. Wiesel dedicated his life to testifying against the depravity that results when human decency collapses. As democracy again seems to teeter, his story and the history of my country ought not to be carried like a burden but as a covenant. They warn against the numbing indifference that allowed my neighbors to look on as starving children were marched past their houses from Sachsenhausen.” [FreePress]
Reform Holocaust Ed: In The Wall Street Journal, Casey Babb and Naya Lekht argue that existing Holocaust education must undergo reforms to more effectively address antisemitism. “In most school curricula, the Holocaust serves as the primary, often exclusive, lens through which the demonization of Jews is understood. Within this framework, Jews are recognized as victims only when their oppressors depict them as subhuman, racially inferior or treasonous. … Until Jewish institutions, schools and Holocaust educators update their curricula and language, meaningful progress in protecting Jewish students and families from antisemitism will remain limited. What’s needed is a pragmatic and courageous paradigm shift, one that begins with naming and recognizing the contemporary libels used to demonize Jews.” [WSJ]
Word on the Street
The IDF announced on Monday that it had uncovered the remains of deceased hostage Ran Gvili at a Muslim cemetery in eastern Gaza City and brought them back to Israel for burial — recovering the final hostage of the Gaza war and marking the first time since 2014 that no Israeli captive, alive or deceased, is being held in the enclave, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports…
Jewish groups welcomed the return of Gvili’s remains, offered their condolences, thanked political figures involved in hostage negotiations and expressed a sense of closure, eJewishPhilanthropy’s Nira Dayanim reports…
President Donald Trump said on Monday that the situation with Iran is “in flux” and that a “big armada” was headed to the Gulf, but that Tehran had expressed willingness to engage in talks; the president had reportedly received multiple intelligence reports indicating that the Iranian government’s position is at its weakest since the 1979 overthrow of the shah…
Trump’s comments come as the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group arrived in the Indian Ocean, positioning it to potentially assist in any military action in Iran…
Queen Rania of Jordan, who has downplayed the role of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks in the ensuing war in Gaza, attended the White House’s private screening of the new film “Melania” hosted by the president and First Lady Melania Trump…
The Trump administration deported roughly a dozen Iranians to the Islamic Republic as part of a broader illegal immigration in the U.S.; the deportation flight was the first to Iran since protests erupted across the country last month…
Hamtramck, Mich., Mayor Amer Ghalib, whose nomination to be U.S. ambassador to Kuwait had been stalled over concerns regarding his past promotion of antisemitic ideas, is joining AmeriCorps as the organization’s senior advisor for strategic partnerships…
The New York Times reports that the Department of Justice under the Biden administration began an investigation into Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-MN) finances and ties to an unnamed foreign citizen; the case stalled shortly after it was opened in 2024 for a lack of evidence…
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum warned against “making false equivalencies to [Anne Frank’s] experience for political purposes,” days after Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz invoked the young author and Holocaust victim as he compared the ICE raids in his state to Nazi actions during World War II…
Far-left operative Waleed Shahid announced on Monday morning he would assume a newly created role of deputy communications director of economic justice in New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s office, Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman reports…
Kanye West, now known as Ye, took out a full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal to apologize to the Jewish community for past antisemitic comments, including praise for Adolf Hitler, days before the release of his new album; the rapper said he suffered a brain injury in a car accident 25 years ago that damaged his frontal lobe, resulting in his erratic behavior…
Los Angeles’ Fine Arts Theatre in Beverly Hills apologized for the cancellation of a show by Guy Hochman after demanding the Israeli comic condemn Israel’s actions in Gaza; Hochman rejected the apology from Michael Hall, the theater’s president, saying it came only after pushback from the Jewish community…
The Washington Post reviews Alex Gibney’s new documentary “Knife,” about the attempted assassination in 2022 of writer Salman Rushdie, which premiered at Sundance earlier this week…
The Wiener Holocaust Library in London recently received a donation of artwork and writing from Czech Jewish artist Peter Kien, who passed on the works before he was transported to Auschwitz, where he died in 1944; the trove of artwork had been confiscated by Czech officials in the 1970s and recently recovered by the daughter of a friend of Kien’s….
Former U.K. Home Secretary Suella Braverman is joining Nigel Farage’s Reform party, saying she had felt “politically homeless for the best part of two years” as a member of the Conservative party, citing Conservatives’ stances on immigration and Brexit…
The Financial Times talks to Brig. Gen. Gil Pinchas, the outgoing chief financial advisor to the IDF and Israel’s Defense Ministry, about Israel’s plans to negotiate a new memorandum of understanding with Washington that will see less reliance on U.S. military aid…
Reuters reports on Iranian efforts to ship jet fuel to Myanmar’s military in violation of international sanctions for use against civilians in the Southeast Asian nation that has been mired in civil war for five years…
Iranian banking tycoon Ali Ansari, who is sanctioned by the U.K. for sending money to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has reportedly amassed a real estate portfolio worth more than 400 million Euros ($475 million) that includes properties across Europe, including multiple Hilton properties in Germany and a resort in Mallorca…
Calgary, Canada, philanthropist Al Osten died at 95…
Shelley Holt, who with her husband, Allan, the vice chair of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, was a major donor to the USHMM as well the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and a range of medical causes and institutions, died at 72…
Pic of the Day
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama delivered an address at Israel’s Knesset on Monday during a two-day visit to the country. In his speech, Rama blasted “well-meaning international public figures or associations who rightly described Gaza as an open air prison, but failed to identify the true jailer of the people of Gaza. They mistook the finger for what it was pointing at and, in doing so, failed to recognize that the jailer of Gaza is Hamas, no one else but Hamas: its ideology of terror against its own people and toward the Jewish nation, its totalitarian dogma that no Palestinian life is worth living until the State of Israel is annihilated and the last Jew is wiped out from the Holy Land.”
Birthdays
Television writer and producer best known as the creator of “Everybody Loves Raymond,” more recently he stars in the Netflix series “Somebody Feed Phil,” Philip Rosenthal turns 66…
Businessman and real estate investor, Paul Sislin turns 91… Winner of the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics, he is a professor emeritus at California Institute of Technology, Barry Clark Barish turns 90… Builder and operator of luxury casinos and hotels, Steve Wynn (born Stephen Alan Weinberg) turns 84… Corporate venture capitalist and scientist, he served as VP at Intel Corporation where he co-founded Intel Capital, Avram Miller turns 81… Topanga, Calif. resident, Joseph Helfer… Columbia, S.C., resident, Charles Geffen… VP at Elnat Equity Liquidity Providers, following 20 years as COO at the Orthodox Union, Eliezer Edelman… Professor of medieval Judaism and Islam at the Los Angeles campus of HUC-JIR, Reuven Firestone turns 74… Cookbook author and attorney, she is a co-founder of Foundation for Jewish Camp, Elisa Spungen Bildner… Chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, John Roberts turns 71… Member of the Missouri state Senate until 2023, Jill Schupp turns 71… President and CEO at MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger, Abby Jane Leibman… Founder, chairman and former CEO of Och-Ziff Capital, now investing through Willoughby Capital, Daniel Och turns 65… Communications director at C-SPAN and author in 2020 of When Rabbis Bless Congress, a history of rabbinical invocations in Congress, Howard Mortman… Founder and managing member of Liberty Peak Capital and co-founder and lead investor of Multiplier Capital, Ezra M. Friedberg… Chief growth officer at Coordinated Care Services after five years as CEO of the JCC of Greater Rochester, Josh Weinstein… Editor-in-chief of The Foreign Desk, Lisa Daftari… Jerusalem-born rapper and YouTuber with 502 million views, Rucka Rucka Ali turns 39… English fashion model, Daisy Rebecca Lowe turns 37… Former basketball point guard, including for the Israeli women’s national basketball team, she is now a coordinator at Herzl Camp in Wisconsin, Jacqui Kalin turns 37… Community engagement coordinator at the Raleigh-Cary (NC) JCC, Grace Fantle Kaplan… Managing partner of Netz Capital, Lia Michal Weiner Tsur… Manager at Deloitte, Joshua Henderson…
Plus, Israel joins the Board of Peace
JOINT BASE ANDREWS, MARYLAND - JANUARY 16: U.S. President Donald Trump boards Air Force One on January 16, 2026 in Joint Base Andrews, Maryland. Trump is traveling to Palm Beach, Florida where he will attend a dedication ceremony to rename part of the city's Southern Boulevard before remaining at his Mar-a-Lago property throughout the holiday weekend. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
👋 Good Wednesday morning!
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we preview President Donald Trump’s address at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, happening later today, and talk to Democrats on Capitol Hill about Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s allegation that the Harris presidential campaign asked him if he’d been an agent of Israel. We look at how J Street is navigating a political environment that is increasingly hostile to Israel, and spotlight Deep33 Ventures as the VC, launched this week, aims to counter China through U.S.-Israel tech collaboration. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Noam Bettan, Mark Carney and Rep. Mike Lawler.
Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by Jewish Insider 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
- President Donald Trump will speak at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this afternoon local time after a delayed arrival resulting from an electrical issue on Air Force One that forced the initial plane to return to Joint Base Andrews after an hour in flight to be swapped out.
- We expect Trump to speak at length about the Board of Peace he is assembling, a day after the president told reporters at the White House that the body could serve as an alternative to the U.N. Earlier today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that Israel would join the body, after previously criticizing the inclusion of Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on the board’s executive committee.
- The president’s address will be preceded by an interview with Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa, and followed by a session focused on the political realignment of the Middle East. Speakers in the latter session include Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, U.K. Foreign Minister Yvette Cooper and International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi.
- Later in the day, Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) is slated to speak at the WEF about the U.S.-China relationship.
- We’re continuing to monitor the situation in the Middle East, as the U.S. deploys an aircraft carrier and fighter jets to the region. Trump issued his harshest warning yet to Iran, vowing in an interview with NewsNation last night to “wipe them off the face of this Earth” if Tehran makes an assassination attempt against him. “Anything ever happens, the whole country is going to get blown up,” Trump said.
- In Washington, the House Foreign Affairs Committee is holding its markup of the Eastern Mediterranean Gateway Act.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV HARKOV
When President Donald Trump first raised the idea of establishing a Board of Peace in October, it was as part of his 20-step ceasefire plan for Gaza. The board was meant to oversee a committee of Palestinian technocrats — whose composition was announced last week — and “set the framework and handle the funding for the redevelopment of Gaza … [and] call on best international standards to create modern and efficient governance that serves the people of Gaza and is conducive to attracting investment.”
The following month, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution supporting the ceasefire plan and “welcom[ing] the establishment of the Board of Peace,” authorizing it to operate in Gaza until the end of 2027.
But the board’s charter describes a body concerned with peace worldwide, not with removing Hamas’ terror threat in Gaza, and in fact, it does not mention Hamas, Gaza or Israel at all. Its expansive, stated role is to “promote stability, restore dependable and lawful governance, and secure enduring peace in areas affected or threatened by conflict.”
Indeed, it appears to be an attempt to compete with the United Nations. Its preamble says: “Declaring that durable peace requires pragmatic judgment, common-sense solutions, and the courage to depart from approaches and institutions that have too often failed … Emphasizing the need for a more nimble and effective international peace-building body.” Asked at a press conference on Wednesday if he intends for the body to replace the U.N., Trump said it “might.” “I wish the United Nations could do more. I wish we didn’t need a Board of Peace,” he said.
QUESTION OF CONCERN
Several moderate House Democrats said they were concerned and frustrated by Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s account, which emerged over the weekend, of being questioned by Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, as part of his vetting as her potential running mate, about whether he had ever been an agent of Israel. Shapiro, who volunteered on a kibbutz and briefly on an Israeli army base while in high school, also said that the campaign had pressured him to walk back condemnations of antisemitism on college campuses, and emphasized that he took offense to the scope and persistence of the questioning he faced about Israel, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod and Emily Jacobs report.
Reactions: “Totally insane,” Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) told JI. “I don’t know how else to describe insanity. Literally insane.” Rep. Greg Landsman (D-OH) said the questioning was “concerning” and that he was “glad Josh had the courage to say what happened. Hopefully people will appreciate that you shouldn’t do that. … It’s a long-standing antisemitic trope that we’re all agents of the Israeli government, that we’re all working for this global Jewish cabal. And so that’s problematic,” Landsman, who is Jewish, continued.
Bonus: In Shapiro’s new memoir, which comes out next week, he recalls how his turbulent childhood — marked by his mother’s mental health challenges — shaped his approach to family and politics.
‘A new normal’
Three months after a ceasefire largely ended the fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, the battle over the future of U.S.-Israel relations still rages in Washington. Both the left and the right face an erosion of support for traditionally pro-Israel positions. Amid the upheaval, the progressive Israel advocacy group J Street sees an opportunity: a chance to solidify Democrats’ shift away from unconditional support for Israel and its security needs. At the start of an election year, interviews with J Street’s top political official and its policy chief make clear that the group is eager to create space for Democrats who have taken a more critical approach to Israel, reflecting and reinforcing a shift toward greater distance in the historically close U.S.-Israel alliance, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.
Shifting tide: “There’s going to be a new normal,” Ilan Goldenberg, J Street’s senior vice president and chief policy officer, told JI in an interview. “There were two years of trauma that, I think, with the return of the hostages and the end of the war, people can finally start processing, but things are not going back.”
SUCCESSION RACE
Essex County Commissioner Brendan Gill, one of the leading Democrats running for the vacant 11th Congressional District seat in New Jersey, told Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod he would be a strong supporter of Israel and the continued U.S.-Israel relationship, while also expressing concerns about the current Israeli government.
Background: Gill — a longtime New Jersey political hand who has previously worked as a staffer for or on the campaigns of Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), former Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), who died in 2013, and former Reps. Steve Rothman (D-NJ) and Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) — said his time working with each of those lawmakers, all strong supporters of Israel, has served as his “North Star” for his policy toward the U.S.-Israel relationship. “I very much believe that we absolutely can respect the ability to disagree with decisions that are made by an elected government that we might not agree with, but still at the same time never waver on Israel’s right to exist, never waver on protecting the strategic partnership in that region of the world that the United States has enjoyed with the only democracy that exists, to continue to aid Israel in ways that are both important to its own protection and, by extension, the protection of our own national interests,” he said.
TAKING AIM
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, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. “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.”
What it says: 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.”
TEHRAN TALK
House Dems call for steps to restore communications access in Iran, but stay mum on military strikes
At a press conference outside the Capitol on Tuesday, House Democrats called for action by the U.S. government to ensure free internet access and telecommunications for Iranians amid a crackdown by the Iranian regime, but largely withheld comment on whether the administration should undertake military strikes on the regime in support of the protesters, as President Donald Trump has floated, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Reconnecting: “People cannot reach loved ones, plan and organize or reach unbiased information. They are literally being kept in the dark by their own government, and it could very well be permanent,” Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ), the daughter of Iranian immigrants and the first Iranian-American Democrat in Congress, said. “It’s why long-standing bipartisan efforts to ensure internet access in Iran cannot be left on the back burner. This access could save lives, and this is all very personal to me.” She thanked colleagues for signing on to a bipartisan resolution expressing support for the Iranian protesters and calling for steps to restore internet access.
Scoop: Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) will reintroduce legislation on Wednesday to address the threat of killer drone strikes by the Iranian regime and other foreign adversaries through increased cooperation between the U.S. and Israel, Jewish Insider has learned.
TECH TOGETHER
A new deep-tech investment firm seeking to help Israeli startups fundraise and collaborate with U.S. companies emerged from stealth mode on Tuesday, announcing the launch of its $150 million fund. Called Deep33 Ventures, the firm will be led by serial entrepreneurs and investors Lior Prosor, who has invested in companies including Via Transportation, Lemonade Insurance and Carbyne, and Michael Broukhim, the co-founder of FabFitFun, who has invested in companies such as SpaceX, Stripe and Hut8, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.
‘Allied infrastructure’: The fund, which already secured $100 million in capital commitments from its first group of investors, will focus on deep tech — which includes quantum computing, advanced energy and autonomous systems. “There isn’t a deep tech fund focused on Israel’s ecosystem. One of our biggest differentiators is the overlap of being deep tech and concentrated on Israel,” Broukhim told JI. With offices in Tel Aviv, New York and Los Angeles, the firm aims to create what it calls a U.S.-Israel “allied infrastructure corridor” combining the two countries’ technological strengths to counter China.
Worthy Reads
Pressing For Change: The Atlantic’s Arash Azizi talks to Iranians about potential U.S. military action against the Iranian government and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. “Ultimately, Iran’s next chapter will be the outcome not only of what America does or does not do but also of the interactions among regional actors, protesters, and the regime’s web of factions. How these will unfold is all but impossible to predict. But one thing is clear. Until a few years ago, millions of Iranians repeatedly voted in the country’s mostly unfree elections, hoping that regime insiders could pave a path for reform. They wouldn’t have dreamed of demanding change from American bombers or drones, or of asking the U.S. president to please kill the supreme leader for them. Khamenei’s obstinate refusal to effect any meaningful change and his bloody massacre of civilians in droves have brought Iranians to this point.” [TheAtlantic]
Government Without Jews?: In Tablet, former White House official Tevi Troy, looking at the history of Jewish participation in government since the U.S. was established, considers what that participation could look like in the future as both major political parties increasingly welcome antisemitic elements. “While the current attacks on Jews from both the left and the right are by no means unique in the context of Jewish history, they are alien to American political culture — which is what makes this moment frightening. The attempt to mainstream antisemitism on both the left and the right should be properly understood as an attack by extremists in both parties on the existing political culture and on the principles of the American founding. The American tradition is far more closely linked to the Jews and their many contributions to it than it is to the antisemites of the left or the right, whose hatred of the Jews reveals a rejection of that tradition — which they hope to reorder and replace with various European-born ideologies, from communism to fascism to theocracy, that have proven toxic to their political hosts.” [Tablet]
A Spin on Jewish Manhood: In The New York Times, Esther Zuckerman reflects on the Jewishness of the title character in director Josh Safdie’s “Marty Supreme,” a mid-century table tennis phenom whose religion is a critical component of his upbringing and shapes his decision-making as advances in the sport. “The brand of Jewish man who interests Safdie is not a model minority. The director is drawn to brash hustlers who make decisions that get themselves and the people around them into loads of trouble. And yet these characters are written with love and a deep understanding of the evolution of Jewish New York. … Marty Mauser may not achieve the greatness he longs for, but he is a representative of a generation of Jews whose dreams didn’t quite come true but who deserve recognition all the same. That’s the big-picture version of what Safdie and his cohorts are doing with ‘Marty Supreme.’ In the narrative, they dig deeper into the knotty reality of what it would have been like for a 23-year-old Jewish American man in 1952.” [NYTimes]
Word on the Street
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, speaking yesterday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, argued in his speech to attendees that there had been “breaking of the world order, the end of a pleasant fiction and the beginning of a brutal reality where the geopolitics of the great powers is not subject to any constraint”…
Elsewhere at Davos, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatar’s prime minister and foreign affairs minister, said on Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s proposed Board of Peace represents the only viable path forward for Gaza, confirming that Doha has been invited to join the initiative, Jewish Insider’s Mathew Shea reports…
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi defends Tehran’s violent crackdown on protests in the country and threatens that Iran will be “firing back with everything we have if we come under renewed attack” by the U.S.; in response, the WSJ’s editorial board, which called Araghchi the “soft face” of the regime, said the diplomat’s threat “betrays Iran’s harsh reality”…
Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT), Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) and more than 70 Senate and House colleagues wrote to President Donald Trump urging the U.S. to intervene to stop potential Israeli annexation of the West Bank, and to reimpose sanctions on violent settlers…
Goldman Sachs and the Qatar Investment Authority announced the expansion of their strategic partnership, with the QIA potentially committing up to $25 billion in Goldman Sachs’ asset management arm..
The Supreme Court declined to hear a case brought forth by Agudas Chasidei Chabad, a Brooklyn-based umbrella group representing the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, against Russia over the return of sacred Jewish texts that had been taken by the Nazis and are now held in Russia…
With worshippers at Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson, Miss., still reeling from a Jan. 10 arson attack that severely damaged the historic synagogue, Congress appears poised to provide $300 million for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program for 2026, a small boost from the funding provided in 2024 and 2025, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports…
Miami Beach, Fla., nightclub Vendôme apologized for a now-viral incident in which far-right influencers were seen inside the venue as it played a Kanye West song praising Adolf Hitler; Vendôme said that three staff members that had been involved in the incident were no longer employed there…
Following the Buffalo Bills’ latest postseason loss, Gary Ginsberg laments in The New York Times about his hometown team’s lifelong failure to win a Super Bowl while expressing hope that revitalization efforts in the city could boost the team to a history-making championship win…
Israeli singer Noam Bettan won the season finale of popular Israeli singing competition show “Rising Star,” becoming Israel’s entrant to the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest…
Israel began demolishing the east Jerusalem headquarters of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, following the passage of a law banning the agency, which works with Palestinians, over what Israel says is its support for terrorism and staffers’ ties to terror groups…
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces are facing pressure from Damascus and Washington to agree to integrate into the Syrian government, days after the implementation of a ceasefire between the two…
Jacob Reses, chief of staff for Vice President JD Vance, and the Foundation for American Innovation’s Rachel Altman, got married on Sunday in Rockville, Md….
Literary agent and Holocaust survivor Georges Borchardt, who found a publisher for Elie Wiesel’s Night and represented the estates of such writers as Tennessee Williams and Hannah Arendt, died at 97…
Philadelphia attorney and community activist Daniel Segal died at 79…
Pic of the Day
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar (left) and Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka spoke on Tuesday in Prague during an official visit by Sa’ar to the Czech Republic.
Birthdays
Actor, director and producer, he is the voice of Beast in Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast,” Robby Benson (born as Robin David Segal) turns 70…
Writer specializing in modern Judaism and women’s issues, Blu Greenberg (born Bluma Genauer) turns 90… Philanthropist, co-founder and chair emerita of the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies, Lynn Schusterman… Owner of the NHL’s Boston Bruins and chairman of Delaware North, a global food service and hospitality company, Jeremy Maurice Jacobs turns 86… Literary critic, feminist, writer on cultural and social issues, Elaine Showalter (born Elaine Cottler) turns 85… Retired Israeli ambassador to Cyprus, New Zealand, Turkmenistan and Estonia, Shemi Tzur turns 81… Israeli visual artist, he taught at Jerusalem’s Bezalel Academy of Arts for 30 years, Zvi Goldstein turns 79… Attorney general of the U.S. during the Obama administration, now a senior counsel at Covington & Burling, Eric H. Holder Jr. turns 75… Past chairman of the Zionist Organization of America and chair of the real estate group at the NY/NJ law firm of Sills Cummis & Gross, Mark Levenson turns 69… CEO of UJA-Federation of New York since 2014, he will retire in June, Eric S. Goldstein turns 66… U.S. senator (R-ND), Kevin Cramer turns 65… Chairman and CEO of Norfolk, Va.-based Harbor Group International, a $21 billion real estate investment firm, Jordan E. Slone turns 64… Executive editor digital at the Washington Monthly, Matthew Cooper… Chief operating officer of OneTable, Andrea Greenblatt… Senior fellow at the USC Annenberg School, she is the former editor-in-chief of both Glamour and Self magazines, Cindi Leive turns 59… CEO at C-SPAN, Sam Feist turns 57… President and CEO of The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, Rachel Garbow Monroe… Director, producer and screenwriter of films, best known as the producer or director of the eight films in the “Paranormal Activity” series, Oren Peli turns 56… Christian Zionist, television host and presenter of “The Watchman” sponsored by Christians United for Israel, Erick Stakelbeck turns 50… CEO at Shpait.AI, Shlomo Einhorn… Peruvian model and TV host, she represented her country in Miss Universe 2009, Karen Schwarz turns 45… D.C.-based staff writer for the Los Angeles Times, Jennifer Haberkorn… Israeli actress, screenwriter and filmmaker, Romi Aboulafia turns 42… Vice president, chief of staff and senior counsel at Children’s National Hospital, Jordan Grossman… Samuel Z. Eckstein…
Plus, Qatar’s prime minister says Hamas violated ceasefire
Stephen Lam/San Francisco Chronicle via AP
State Sen. Scott Wiener, center, speaks during an annual pumpkin carving event at Noe Valley Park in San Francisco, Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025.
Good Thursday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we talk to California state Sen. Scott Wiener about his bid for the congressional seat currently held by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and report on President Donald Trump’s continuing support for Amer Ghalib, his embattled nominee to be ambassador to Kuwait. We spotlight former Rep. Cori Bush’s recent extreme rhetoric as she mounts a comeback bid for her St. Louis-area congressional seat, and report on Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani’s comments yesterday blaming Hamas for violating the ceasefire with Israel. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Alon Ohel, Michael Bloomberg and Len Blavatnik.
Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by Jewish Insider Executive Editor Melissa Weiss and Israel Editor Tamara Zieve, with an assist from Danielle Cohen-Kanik. Have a tip? Email us here.
What We’re Watching
- Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav, CNN’s Dana Bash, Oct. 7 survivor Aya Meydan and former Israeli hostage Omer Shem Tov are being honored tonight at the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s annual tribute dinner in Los Angeles. Steven Spielberg will present Zaslav with this year’s Humanitarian Award, SWC’s highest honor.
- In Washington, Sony Pictures, the Motion Picture Association and the German Embassy are hosting a special screening of “Nuremberg.”
- Tikvah Ideas is hosting a conversation this afternoon between historian Jack Wertheimer and North American Values Institute founder David Bernstein about the challenges Jewish institutions face in combating antisemitism.
- The Future Investment Initiative wraps up today in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
- In Israel, we’re keeping an eye on the fallout from the announcement by the World Zionist Congress’ Likud delegation that it planned to appoint Yair Netanyahu, the son of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to a top World Zionist Organization post. The announcement collapsed the coalition agreement that had been reached earlier in the day, prompting the WZC to vote to reconvene in two weeks. Read more from eJewishPhilanthropy’s Judah Ari Gross here.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S JOSH KRAUSHAAR
A new Quinnipiac poll of the New York City mayoral race with less than a week until Election Day shows Zohran Mamdani on track to win, but with a narrow plurality that underscores the breadth and resilience of the political opposition against him. In short, he’s set to prevail thanks to a divided opposition and backing from an enthusiastic left-wing faction of the electorate — not because he’s winning over hearts and minds in Gotham.
If the polling is accurate, Mamdani would be the first New York City mayor to win without a majority of the vote since John Lindsay in 1969. Mamdani leads former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo 43-33% in the Quinnipiac poll, with Republican Curtis Sliwa tallying 14%. Mamdani, in a sign of his political ceiling, has lost several points of support since the pollster’s survey earlier this month.
Among Sliwa voters, 55% said that Cuomo was their second choice, while only 7% said the same of Mamdani. If New York City utilized a ranked-choice voting system as it did in the primary, this race would be neck-and-neck.
The Quinnipiac poll finds Mamdani building an unconventional coalition of secular progressives and Muslims in New York City politics, running up the score with voters of no religion (71% support) or of a religion other than Christianity and Judaism (50%). Mamdani struggles badly with Jewish voters, winning just 16% support, while only receiving 28% of the vote among Catholics and 36% among Protestants.
Mamdani is winning support from just 59% of Democrats, with 31% backing Cuomo — an unusually weak showing for a Democratic nominee. But Republicans are evenly divided between Cuomo and Sliwa, preventing the former governor from capitalizing on Mamdani’s deep unpopularity with GOP voters. Mamdani is tied with Cuomo among independents at 34% apiece.
CALIFORNIA CAMPAIGN TRAIL
Scott Wiener, a veteran California state senator from San Francisco, has long coupled his lifelong support for Israel with vocal opposition to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and far-right members of his governing coalition. Now, the 55-year-old Jewish Democrat finds himself navigating delicate political terrain as he balances those competing views while mounting a new campaign to replace Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in the Bay Area congressional seat that she has held for nearly four decades. With Pelosi rumored to soon announce she will retire at the end of her current term, Wiener has been fielding attacks from a far-left primary rival, Saikat Chakrabarti, as Israel and Gaza emerge as a source of division in the nascent race that is already shaping up to be among the more bitterly contested Democratic battles of the upcoming election cycle, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports.
Israel issues: Chakrabarti, 39, a former chief of staff to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), is a fierce critic of Israel who has called its war in Gaza a genocide and pushed for ending all military funding to the Jewish state. He has also backed a controversial House bill, called the Block the Bombs Act, that aims to impose severe restrictions on U.S. weapons sales to Israel — and is needling Wiener for so far declining to clarify his own position on the measure, which is not likely to pass. In an interview with JI earlier this week, Wiener continued to deflect when asked for his stance on the matter, saying only that, if elected next year, “there will be new bills introduced” when he serves in the House. Despite treading cautiously around the legislation, however, Wiener confirmed that he is broadly in favor of withholding offensive arms to the current Israeli government that, in his view, “is not committed to peace or democracy.”
CROSSING THE RUBICON
Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), who recently announced a primary challenge to Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), said this week that his break with AIPAC was “a long time coming.” A day after entering the Senate race, Moulton announced that he would reject any further donations from AIPAC and would return more than $30,000 from the group, a move that has continued to be a major talking point and feature of his early campaign. Coming from an outspoken moderate like Moulton, the move has also raised strategic questions in a race against a committed Israel critic like Markey, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Mouton’s move: In an online interview with a progressive commentator published on Tuesday, Moulton reiterated comments he made in his public announcement rejecting AIPAC. “Israel is our most important ally in the Middle East, but I have strong disagreements with the Bibi Netanyahu government, and I’ve been very public about those disagreements for a long time,” Moulton said. “The problem is that AIPAC is aligned with that government, so I’ve been pushing them privately to separate themselves, but they wouldn’t do that. And so ultimately, it was my decision to distance myself from the organization.” AIPAC has a history of supporting Israel and the U.S.-Israel relationship regardless of who is in power.
TURNING UP THE VOLUME
In her congressional comeback attempt against Rep. Wesley Bell (D-MO), former Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) is continuing to lean into extreme rhetoric and stances, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Recent rhetoric: Speaking at an anti-Trump “No Kings” rally in St. Louis shortly after launching her campaign, Bush dedicated extensive time to eulogizing murderer and escaped convict Assata Shakur, an activist who killed a police officer in 1977 and later escaped from prison. Shakur died in Cuba in September. Bush, in her remarks, described Shakur as “an activist that we recently lost” who “gave us a mantra that we live by. She said it is our duty to fight for our freedom.” During those remarks, Bush — who has faced repeated accusations of antisemitism — made passing reference to fighting antisemitism and other forms of bigotry. She finished other remarks about the Trump administration — seemingly unrelated to Israel policy — with a shout of “Free Palestine.” On X, Bush continues to attack Israel and its supporters as a central message of her campaign, including reposting unfounded claims accusing Israel of violating its ceasefire agreement with Hamas — a subject she has otherwise not addressed on her account, including when the agreement was initially announced.
sticking by his nom
The White House has told Republicans that President Donald Trump will not pull the nomination of Amer Ghalib, the mayor of Hamtramck, Mich., to be U.S. ambassador to Kuwait and wants the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to hold a vote on his candidacy, despite the growing bipartisan opposition to his nomination, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs has learned.
Staying loyal: White House officials have communicated to committee Republicans in recent days that Trump would not withdraw Ghalib’s nomination because the president credits the Democratic Hamtramck mayor with helping him turn out Michigan’s Arab American vote and win the state in last November’s presidential election, two sources familiar with the ongoing discussions told JI. “We were told Trump believes he [Ghalib] helped him deliver Michigan. He doesn’t want to abandon him,” one GOP senator on the committee said of the White House’s characterization of the president’s thinking.
DOHA DIARIES
Qatar’s prime minister acknowledged on Wednesday that Hamas violated the ceasefire with Israel the day prior by striking IDF troops in Gaza, calling the incident “disappointing and frustrating.” Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani said that, though Tuesday’s violation was highlighted by the media, “this is something that is expected throughout the ceasefire,” Jewish Insider’s Danielle Cohen-Kanik reports.
What he said: “I believe what happened yesterday was a violation, and then what we were expecting [was] that … there will be a response. But fortunately, I think the main parties, both of them, are acknowledging that the ceasefire should hold and they should stick to the agreement,” Al-Thani said. Israel did respond to Hamas’ attack with strikes in Gaza on Tuesday and said it was resuming its ceasefire commitments on Wednesday. Pressed by moderator and MSNBC host Ayman Mohyeldin on who exactly committed the violation, Al-Thani admitted, “Well, look, if we start to describe the violations, it will be an open-ended question. But what happened yesterday, the attack on the Israeli soldiers, that’s basically a violation by the Palestinian party.”
Bonus: The Wall Street Journal reports on frustrations in Israel over Hamas’ slow-walking of the return of the bodies of the remaining 13 hostages.
LEGAL SHIELD
Responding to historic levels of antisemitism in the U.S., the Anti-Defamation League and Gibson Dunn LLP announced on Wednesday a new joint network offering pro bono legal assistance to victims of antisemitic incidents. The new initiative joins an already crowded space of Jewish groups offering legal services, including the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, The Lawfare Project and StandWithUs, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.
Details: While leaders of those organizations told JI they welcome the ADL’s new venture — and some already have plans to collaborate — the network appears to overlap with existing Jewish nonprofit work, though none with the scale of lawyers and firms the ADL is engaging. Called the ADL Legal Action Network, the antisemitism watchdog’s latest initiative will involve more than 40 law firms across the U.S., with more than 39,000 attorneys offering support as co-counsel and referral counsel to people who have experienced discrimination, intimidation, harassment, vandalism or violence on the basis of their Jewish identity. Victims will be instructed to submit information about their case online to be evaluated by a professional litigation team, which will assess whether the situation warrants free representation.
Worthy Reads
Adams on Mamdani: In an interview with Molly Ball for Time, New York City Mayor Eric Adams raises concerns about New York City mayoral front-runner Zohran Mamdani. “Adams considers Mamdani’s promises unrealistic; he predicts buyer’s remorse when the frontrunner’s supporters realize he can’t actually freeze most people’s rent, make buses free, or bring down the cost of living. Adams is also concerned about the threat of Islamic extremism, with which he thinks Mamdani is too comfortable, and perplexed by polls that show Mamdani getting a large proportion of the Jewish vote. … In 2023, Adams hosted Mamdani and his father, a scholar of post-colonialism at Columbia University, for dinner. ‘The frightening thing is, he really believes this stuff!’ Adams tells me as he mixes the veggies. ‘Globalize the intifada, there’s nothing wrong with that! He believes, you know, I don’t have anything against Jews, I just don’t like Israel. Well, who’s in Israel, bro?’ At the dinner’s end, Adams says he told the Mamdanis, ‘Listen, I just don’t believe what you do.’” [Time]
Poisoned (Big) Apple: In The Wall Street Journal, Bernard-Henri Lévy warns of what a Mamdani victory in the mayoral election could portend for New York City and beyond. “It would be a black day for the Jews of New York. An insult to the memory of Saul Bellow, Elie Wiesel and Leonard Bernstein. A spit in the face of Emma Lazarus, the poet whose words of welcome to the humiliated, afflicted, nameless and stateless who arrived at Ellis Island are engraved on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. It would be a beginning of rupture of the age-old pact between the world’s most cosmopolitan city and the people of the Book. It would be an earthquake in the history of Judaism: At the hour when the threat of annihilation was everywhere, New York was the last place on the planet where Judaism and Jews could not only be saved, but reinvented. Beyond the Jews, it would be the entire Democratic Party turning its back on the legacy of Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton to rally to a faction that, under the cover of ‘intersectionality,’ confuses the green flag of Hamas with that of the workers.” [WSJ]
The Power of Prayer: In the Jewish Journal, Tevi Troy reflects on the prayers — by his estimate, in the billions — said over the course of the hostages’ captivity in Gaza. “Many of the hostages themselves prayed as well. Some of them were religious when they were taken hostage. Some became religious because of the experience. The sustaining of hope through prayer is often derided in Western liberal societies. But the hostages themselves have attested to the power of prayer in giving them not only hope, but agency. And that gave them a grasp on life itself. … Even as we prayed for the hostages, most people had little expectation that they would survive the horrors that Hamas had in store for them. I myself wondered whether these prayers would have any effectiveness, even as I dutifully said them, day in and day out, for two years. And while we mourn the 83 who did not make it, we must also celebrate the miracle that 168 of them have survived, an outcome no one would have imagined possible two years ago.” [JewishJournal]
Windows of the Soul: The Forward’s Benyamin Cohen spotlights the efforts of retired Illinois judge Jerry Orbach to salvage stained glass windows from shuttering synagogues. “‘I’ve heard many congregations describe their windows as the soul of their congregation,’ [Case Western Reserve University professor Alanna] Cooper said. She found in Orbach what her fieldwork had only theorized. ‘He’s creating an afterlife for these windows,’ she said at a dedication ceremony at Northbrook, where they both spoke [and where many of the windows are kept]. Standing before the crowd that day, Cooper described the scene she’d witnessed when windows were removed from Ahavath Israel in Kingston, New York, which Orbach also rescued and relocated to Northbrook. Cooper recalled workmen carrying the panels to their crates as the last members of the congregation looked on. ‘As they lowered the windows into the boxes,’ she said, ‘it felt like a burial.’ Now she gestured toward the sanctuary, the glass alive with color once more. ‘And this,’ she said, ‘is the afterlife.’” [TheForward]
Word on the Street
The FBI is pushing back on an effort by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to make DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s office the federal government’s primary counterintelligence agency, underscoring tensions between the two agencies days after they clashed over National Counterterrorism Center head Joe Kent’s attempted investigation into the killing of Charlie Kirk…
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave $1.5 million to the Fix the City super PAC backing former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, days before the city’s mayoral election…
CBS News conducted a fresh round of layoffs that included Johannesburg, South Africa-based foreign correspondent Deb Patta, whom Puck described as “one of the most prominent voices on Gaza”…
A federal judge sentenced the two men convicted of attempting to kill Iranian dissident and writer Masih Alinejad on behalf of Iran to 25 years in prison…
An inquest into the attack on a synagogue in Manchester, U.K., on Yom Kippur found that one of the attack’s two victims was mistakenly killed by a single police bullet as he attempted to hold the synagogue’s door closed, while another congregant died of multiple stab wounds after being attacked by Jihad Al-Shamie…
DAZN is teaming up with FIFA to relaunch FIFA+, a global soccer streaming service; DAZN founder and chair Len Blavatnik and FIFA President Gianni Infantino inked the deal in Riyadh on Wednesday, joined by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman…
The IDF said it conducted an overnight raid in the southern Lebanon village of Blida targeting Hezbollah infrastructure…
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is mulling the possibility of moving the country’s capital to the southern coastal city of Makran, citing the degree to which Tehran, with a population of 10 million, has become “expanded and overloaded”…
International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi said that inspectors have noticed movement around Iranian sites where enriched nuclear material is stored, but that the Islamic Republic does not appear to be actively enriching uranium…
Grossi’s comments come amid reports that Iran is working to rebuild its ballistic missile program following the 12-day war with Israel in June; European intelligence sources said that Iran has received thousands of tons of sodium perchlorate from China in the last month following the reimposition of snapback sanctions on Iran…
The New York Times looks at the mass displacement of hundreds of thousands of Syrians and sectarian violence around the country since the ouster of Bashar al-Assad last year…
Longtime NYPD Chief Chaplain Rabbi Alvin Kass, the oldest and longest-serving member of the department, died at 89…
Pic of the Day
The cast of Israeli satire show “Eretz Nehederet” performed David Broza’s song “Under the Sky,” accompanied by former hostage Alon Ohel on piano.
Birthdays
Winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for his biographies of Robert Moses and Lyndon B. Johnson, Robert Caro turns 90…
Former president of the University of Minnesota and chancellor of the University of Texas System and current president of the University of California, Mark Yudof turns 81… Actor, best known for his portrayal of Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli in the “Happy Days” sitcom, Henry Winkler turns 80… NBC anchor, reporter and commentator, she is married to former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan, Andrea Mitchell turns 79… South African-born rabbi, now leading Kehillat Bnei Aharon in Raanana, Israel, David Lapin turns 76… Professor of physics at Syracuse University, Peter Reed Saulson turns 71… Former basketball player for five seasons with the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, now a managing director at CBIZ, Joel Bruce Kramer turns 70… Israeli violinist, violist and conductor, Shlomo Mintz turns 68… President of New York University since July 2023, she is the first Jewish individual and first woman to serve in that role, Linda Gayle Mills turns 68… Meatpacking executive, sentenced to 27 years in prison in 2009 for fraud, his sentence was commuted by President Donald Trump in 2017 after serving eight years, Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin turns 66… Former CEO and later executive chairman of Qualcomm, now CEO of Globalstar, he is a co-owner of the NBA’s Sacramento Kings, Paul E. Jacobs turns 63… Partner in the D.C. office of Cadwalader, he previously served as the attorney general of Maryland, Douglas F. “Doug” Gansler turns 63… Partner and co-founder of the Irvine, Calif., law firm of Wolfe & Wyman, Stuart B. Wolfe… Global head of public policy at Apollo Global Management, David Krone… White House correspondent for The New York Times and a political analyst for CNN, Maggie Haberman turns 52… Principal in the D.C. office of Korn Ferry, Jeremy Seth Gold… Assistant secretary for investment security at the U.S. Treasury during the Biden administration, now a partner at Latham & Watkins, Paul M. Rosen turns 47… Public information officer of the City and County of Denver, Joshua Eric Rosenblum… Businesswoman, fashion designer, author and former White House advisor, Ivanka “Yael” Trump turns 44… Magician, author and lecturer, Joshua Jay turns 44… Founding director at Tech Tribe and director of social media for Chabad, Mordechai Lightstone… Bioinformatics scientist at Specifica, she earned a Ph.D in Genetics from Stanford and was on the 2010 U.S. Olympic Biathlon team, Laura Spector turns 38… Senior congressional reporter for Punchbowl News, Ally Mutnick… VP of public affairs at the American Petroleum Institute, Rebecca Schieber Brown… Senior spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee, Mia Ehrenberg…
Top Talker: Senators Menendez, Kirk and Schumer Circulate New Iran Sanctions Bill: “Three top senators, including two Democrats, have begun circulating a draft of a new Iran sanctions bill that critics say could violate the terms of an agreement struck between Iran and the United States in Geneva last month. The bill, set for introduction by the Democratic chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Robert Menendez of New Jersey, along with top sanctions hawks Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Mark Kirk (R-IL), defies the Obama administration’s repeated requests for Congress to hold off on any new legislation that could imperil last month’s interim nuclear pact with Iran while talks continue towards a comprehensive final deal. (more…)
Rundown – AIPAC breaks silence on Iran deal; White House reaches out to Jewish leaders; Haim Saban hosted President Obama at his house last night; Harry Reid stuck between Dem caucus and White House…
AP – A battered Israel resumes campaign against Iran: “Having lost its battle to stop the international deal reached this week on Iran’s nuclear program, Israeli officials are already picking up the pieces and planning a fight to shape a final agreement that negotiators hope to reach in six months.” [AssociatedPress]
AIPAC – U.S. Must Prevent a Nuclear-Capable Iran: “Now that the P5+1 has inked an initial agreement with Iran, America must not only ensure full Iranian compliance but also insist that any final deal deny Tehran a nuclear weapons capability. Tough sanctions legislation passed by Congress and vigorous diplomacy pursued by the administration have brought Iran to negotiations. However, the initial agreement raises many concerns—including implicit acceptance of Iranian enrichment. Congress has provided the leverage to spur Iran to seek talks; now it must press the administration to negotiate a verifiable agreement that will prevent Iran from ever building nuclear weapons. Congress must also legislate additional sanctions, so that Iran will face immediate consequences should it renege on its commitments or refuse to negotiate an acceptable final agreement.” [AIPAC] Analysis from @Yair_Rosenberg – AIPAC is not bucking the Obama administration by pushing sanctions IF Iran violates deal. That’s the admin’s stance! (more…)
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