After President Donald Trump wrapped up a signing ceremony inaugurating his new Board of Peace in Davos, Switzerland, on Thursday, several of the highest-profile attendees of the event hustled to a private lunch where they spoke hopefully about the future of the Abraham Accords.

Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. Princess Reema Bandar Al Saud and Israeli President Isaac Herzog both shared optimistic remarks about the region’s future, according to one guest. Also in the room were Bahraini Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa and Khaldoon Al Mubarak, the CEO and managing director of the Mubadala Investment Company, an Emirati sovereign wealth fund.

Hosted and moderated by new Meta President Dina Powell McCormick and philanthropist David Rubenstein, the event honored Lally Weymouth, a former longtime Washington Post journalist who died in 2025. Her daughter, Katherine Weymouth, and brother, Don Graham, both former publishers of the Post, invited a long list of World Economic Forum dignitaries who had known Weymouth. She was described at the lunch as a “force of nature,” the attendee told Jewish Insider.

Participants also toasted Lutnick’s wife, Allison Lutnick, who was a leading advocate within the Trump administration for the release of the Israeli hostages held in Gaza. 

Other guests included Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, CNN host Fareed Zakaria, Post columnist David Ignatius, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell, Bridgewater CEO Nir Bar Dea, International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva and Israeli entrepreneur Yossi Vardi.

A vote to remove sixth Israeli President Chaim Herzog’s name from a public park was taken off of Dublin City Council’s agenda, after sparking an uproar in the Irish Jewish community, Jerusalem and Washington over the weekend. 

Herzog, father of current Israeli President Isaac Herzog, was born in Belfast and grew up in Dublin, and was the son of Ireland’s Chief Rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, who later became Israel’s first chief rabbi. Chaim Herzog fought in the British Army in World War II, taking part in the liberation of Bergen-Belsen, and was the head of IDF intelligence and Israeli ambassador to the U.N. — famously tearing up its “Zionism is racism” resolution — before serving as president in 1983-1993.

The park in Dublin was named after Herzog in 1995, to coincide with the 3,000th anniversary of Jerusalem’s establishment. It is adjacent to Ireland’s only Jewish school and close to major Orthodox and Progressive synagogues.

The plan to remove Herzog’s name came after a campaign to replace it with the name of Hind Rajab, a Palestinian girl killed during the Gaza war. Another reported proposal was to name the park “Free Palestine.” 

One member of the Dublin City Council Commemorations and Naming committee, Conor Reddy, wrote a post on X on Oct. 7, 2023 sharing a photo of a bulldozer from Gaza tearing down a barrier with Israel and added the text: “Tear down the fences, demolish the walls.” In another post that day, he said, “Resistance is heroic.” The following day, he wrote on X that the massive Hamas terrorist attacks “should be celebrated and supported … [and] should be embraced by everyone who values justice … It is beautiful.” 

The entire naming committee, except for one member, voted last week in favor of excising Herzog’s name, and to initiate a consultation process to select a new name. 

The next step would have been for the full Dublin City Council to vote on the name removal, which was scheduled for Monday. However, Dublin City Council Chief Executive Richard Shakespeare announced on Sunday that the vote would be withdrawn because the council’s naming committee did not follow the proper procedure. In addition, Dublin Mayor Ray McAdam said the committee had not provided the council with a sufficiently detailed report to make an informed decision. 

The change to the council’s agenda came after leading figures in the Irish government, as well as in Jerusalem and Washington, expressed opposition to renaming the park.

Though Ireland’s national government has taken the most anti-Israel stance in Europe since the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks, Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin called on Sunday for the motion to rename Herzog Park to be withdrawn. 

“The proposal would erase the distinctive and rich contribution to Irish life of the Jewish community over many decades … The proposal is a denial of our history and will, without any doubt, be seen as antisemitic,” he said in a statement. 

Irish Foreign Minister Helen McEntee noted that Herzog “is an important figure for many people, particularly for members of Ireland’s Jewish community. The government has been openly critical of the policies and actions of the government of Israel in Gaza and the West Bank … Renaming a Dublin park in this way — to remove the name of an Irish Jewish man — has nothing to do with this and has no place in our inclusive republic. … I urge Dublin City Councillors to vote against it.”

Irish Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Simon Harris said he agreed with McEntee and called the proposal “offensive.” Minister for European Affairs and Defense Thomas Byrne said that Herzog’s “story is an Irish story,” calling for the council to drop the proposal. 

Ireland is also pulling its “Occupied Territories Bill” to boycott Israeli products from the West Bank in light of a “changed political climate” as a result of the ceasefire in Gaza, the Irish Mail on Sunday reported. The legislation faced legal challenges due to its violation of European Union trade rules, and, as several members of Congress pointed out, could run afoul of U.S. states’ laws penalizing those who boycott Israel and damage relations between Washington and Dublin. 

Former Irish Justice Minister Alan Shatter told Jewish Insider that the government responses to the proposed Herzog Park name change, which came about 24 hours after the announcement from Dublin City Council, arose from concern in the government “about the bad international publicity. … I think they’re a little freaked by all the international condemnation,” much of which came from Jerusalem and Washington. 

The city council is independent and does not have to abide by the national government’s direction on naming matters, and parties to the left of the current government have a majority on the council. As such, removing Herzog’s name may have had majority support despite government party leaders’ opposition.

Reddy posted on X that the vote “is being pulled from the agenda after bad faith smears from Zionists [and] Americans. There is nothing antisemitic about removing the name [and] there was nothing wrong with the procedure that brought us to this point! Shocking.” 

Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s office released a statement on Saturday that the name change would “harm the legacy of the sixth President of the State of Israel, the late Chaim Herzog, as well as harming the unique expression of the historical connection between the Irish and Jewish peoples. … Removing the Herzog name, if it happens, would be a shameful and disgraceful move. We hope that the legacy of a figure at the forefront of establishing the relations between Israel and Ireland, and the fight against antisemitism and tyranny, will still get the respect it deserves today.

Former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Herzog, another one of Chaim Herzog’s sons, called the proposed name change “sad,” and said it was “painful to see how Ireland, once home to a proud, thriving Jewish community, has become the scene of raging antisemitism. Ireland is now one of the most virulent anti-Israel countries in Europe, blurring the line between criticizing Israeli policies and questioning Israel’s right to exist.” He called on Jewish organizations in the U.S. and worldwide to speak up in “denouncing this shame.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said that the proposed name change showed that “there is no decision more accurate and just than my decision to close our embassy in Dublin,” adding that the city “has become the capital of antisemitism in the world.”

“The Dublin Municipality has decided to remove the name of Chaim Herzog … What cannot be removed is the disgrace of the Irish antisemitic and anti-Israeli obsession,” Sa’ar added.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) posted on X: “When you think it couldn’t get worse in Ireland regarding animosity toward Israel and the Jewish people, it just did. … I don’t know what the people of Dublin are trying to say, but this is what I hear: A complete turning upside down of history when it comes to the Jewish people and the state of Israel. Modern Ireland … unfortunately has become a cesspool of antisemitism.”

Graham later wrote that he was “glad to hear efforts to rename Herzog Park in Dublin have been rejected.”

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee called the proposal “an incredible insult to the Herzog family whose roots are deep in Ireland. Let’s hope decent Irish people stop this madness!” 

After the motion was withdrawn, Huckabee wrote that “Ireland still has rational and thoughtful people … Hopefully this ends a very targeted form of  bigotry pushed by a few people who should be ashamed of themselves.” 

The Jewish Representative Council of Ireland stated that the motion “sends a hurtful and isolating message to a small minority community that has contributed to Ireland for centuries. We call on Dublin City Councillors to reject this motion. The removal of the Herzog name from this park would be widely understood as an attempt to erase our Irish Jewish history.” 

Shatter, a lifelong Dublin resident who had a 14-year national political career, lamented on X that “Ireland’s politics … has become systematically antisemitic.” 

Following the proposal’s withdrawal, Shatter said that “Dublin City Council’s Mayor should publicly apologize to the Jewish community for the stress [and] hurt caused [and] also apologize to the Herzog family.” 

“Until the government adopts a more balanced approach to the complexity of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, demands Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups end their violence and like [the Provisional Irish Republican Army] decommission their arms and abandons its inflammatory rhetoric, antisemitism in Ireland will continue to escalate and there will be further egregious, shameful examples,” Shatter wrote.

If Dublin eventually moves to change Herzog Park’s name, Shatter told JI that there may be legal recourse against it, should the council move to do so. 

“In my analysis, the city council has violated its legal obligations, both international and domestic,” he said. “They failed to engage in any consultative process with the Jewish community in Dublin, failed to communicate its intentions to the Herzog family and violated its own development plan.”

The plan in question requires the city to “consider cultural and minority sensitivities.”

In addition, as a member of the European Union, Ireland is meant to protect minority cultural rights, he noted.

In 2014, a plaque marking Chaim Herzog’s birthplace in Belfast was removed following multiple occurrences of vandalism and amid concern for the safety of the building’s staff and nearby residents.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday asked President Isaac Herzog to pardon him, six years after Netanyahu was indicted for fraud, breach of trust and bribery and as his yearslong trial continues to play out in Israeli court.

Among the reasons Netanyahu cited for requesting the pardon, in a concurrent video statement, was “the requests from President Trump to the president of Israel, so I can work together with him as quickly as possible to promote the necessary shared interests between the U.S. and Israel in a window of opportunity that I doubt will return.”

Earlier this month, Trump wrote a letter to Herzog calling on him “to fully pardon Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been a formidable and decisive War Time Prime Minister, and is now leading Israel into a time of peace, which includes my continued work with key Middle East leaders to add many additional countries to the world changing Abraham Accords. … While I absolutely respect the independence of the Israeli Justice System, and its requirements, I believe that this ‘case’ against Bibi, who has fought alongside me for a long time, including against the very tough adversary of Israel, Iran, is a political, unjustified prosecution.”

Netanyahu’s attorney, Amit Hadad, sent Herzog’s office a 111-page file of details of the trial, including a letter from the prime minister.

The proceedings involve three cases in which Netanyahu was indicted in 2020: for allegedly illegally advancing the interests of Israeli Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan while accepting gifts from Milchan and his friend, Australian billionaire James Packer; for allegedly engaging in negotiations with Yediot Aharonot publisher Arnon Mozes to advance positive media coverage of the prime minister in exchange for weakening the free rival newspaper Israel Hayom; and for allegedly accepting a bribe from Shaul Elovitch, the owner of Israeli telecom conglomerate Bezeq for positive media coverage on Elovitch’s news outlet at the time, Walla, in exchange for regulatory changes that benefited him. The judges overseeing the trial suggested in 2023 that the prosecution consider dropping the bribery charge because it would be difficult to prove, but the prosecution declined. 

“In recent years,” Netanyahu wrote, “the tensions and disputes between parts of the nation and the branches of government have increased. I am aware that the ongoing process on my matters have turned into a focal point of strong disputes. … As such, and despite my personal interest in continuing the trial and proving my innocence until my total exoneration, I think the public interest says otherwise. Out of public responsibility as the prime minister to try to bring reconciliation between parts of the nation, I have no doubt that ending the trial will help reduce the flames in the dispute around it.”

The prime minister also said that, in light of Israel’s “security challenges and diplomatic opportunities,” it is essential “to mend the tears, to reach unity in the nation and bring back the trust in government institutions.”

In his video statement, Netanyahu said that the judges on his case have ordered him to be present in court three times a week, which he called “an impossible demand that is not made on any other citizen in Israel.” 

In Israel, the president has the power to pardon and commute sentences of offenders, mostly those convicted of crimes. There is also a precedent of a president pardoning offenders who have yet to be convicted, such as in the Bus 300 Affair, in which Shin Bet agents who killed two Palestinian terrorists after they had been captured alive were pardoned before receiving a conviction by then-President Chaim Herzog.

However, there is no precedent of a mid-trial presidential pardon in Israel.

According to an analysis by Israel Democracy Institute research fellow Dana Blander, a pardon may be granted at any point, including in the middle of a trial, and does not require an admission of guilt or a statement of contrition. However, past opinions by Israel’s Supreme Court and attorney general after the Bus 300 Affair said that pardons before convictions may only be used in rare cases. 

Herzog’s office passed Netanyahu’s request to the Justice Ministry’s Pardons Department, which will send its opinions to the legal advisor of the Office of the President, who will then add her opinion before sending them to Herzog. A source in Herzog’s office told Jewish Insider that the process may take weeks and the president will rely heavily on the opinions he receives.

“The Office of the President is aware that this is an extraordinary request which carries with it significant implications. After receiving all of the relevant opinions, the President will responsibly and sincerely consider the request,” Herzog’s office stated.

Israeli opposition figures came out against Netanyahu’s request, with Opposition Leader Yair Lapid saying that Herzog “cannot pardon Netanyahu without him admitting guilt, expressing regret and immediately leaving political life.”

Blue and White party Chairman Benny Gantz argued that Netanyahu’s request is “totally fake,” because it does not follow the usual process.

“Instead of fueling the flames, put out the fire that you created in Israeli society, stop the harm to democracy, call an election, and only then ask for a plea deal or pardon,” Gantz said.

Gantz and Israel Beiteinu leader Avigdor Liberman both speculated in public statements that Netanyahu sent the pardon request to distract from the controversial bill making its way to the Knesset that would allow most Haredim to remain exempt from IDF service.

“We cannot let him run the public conversation,” Liberman said. “Eyes on the goal.”

It’s a “morning of historic and momentous news,” as Israeli President Isaac Herzog put it on Thursday, when Israelis woke up to learn that a deal had been reached to free the remaining hostages in the coming days and halt the fighting in Gaza.

The sides are expected to officially sign the deal in Egypt today, and Israel’s Cabinet is set to vote at 11 a.m. ET on the exchange of the 48 hostages, 20 of whom are thought to be alive, for close to 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. The IDF said it began preparing to withdraw from parts of Gaza as part of the deal.

Hamas is expected to release the Israeli hostages first. Only when Israel is satisfied that the terrorist group has freed everyone it can find — including the remains of about 28 Israelis who were killed — will Palestinian prisoners be released. The swap comes with caveats: Hamas says it is unable to locate some of the bodies, and about 250 of the Palestinian prisoners set to be released are serving life sentences for terrorist offenses, though Israel insisted that high-profile detainees — such as Second Intifada mastermind Marwan Barghouti — will not be part of the deal. 

The deal is expected to pass easily in the Cabinet, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party holding the majority of the seats. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who expressed opposition earlier this week to President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war, was unusually quiet on Thursday morning, while Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said he would not vote in favor.

Trump said in an interview with Fox News that all of the hostages “will be coming back on Monday. … As we speak, so much is happening to get the hostages freed.” 

Israeli media reports have said that Hamas could begin freeing hostages as early as Saturday, without the mass propaganda events that marred previous hostage releases.

Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter made clear that only the first phase of the deal had been agreed on, and the end of the war can only come after it is implemented.

“We hope it leads to a complete cessation of hostilities and a rebuilding of Gaza for the sake of the Gazans and for the sake of Israel, but it’s the first stage, and we’ve got to see the first stage implemented completely,” Leiter told CNN. 

Trump is expected to fly to Israel over the weekend to celebrate the release of the hostages and address the Knesset, following an invitation from Netanyahu. The Hostages Families Forum invited Trump to meet with families and give an address in Tel Aviv’s Hostages Square during his trip. U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s former Middle East advisor, Jared Kushner, are expected to arrive in Israel later Thursday.

“We can finally breathe again, embrace those we feared we would never hold, and bring to dignified burial those we have lost. … We simply need the opportunity to look you in the eye and express what words alone cannot fully convey: that you gave us back our families, and with them, our hope,” the hostage families’ group wrote to Trump.

A delegation of released hostages and hostages’ relatives were in Washington, meeting with Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, when the deal was announced. With the president on Lutnick’s speakerphone, members of the group thanked the president for his efforts. 

The Tikvah Forum, made up of more hawkish hostage families, said that the news “gives us hope. We are full of hope that … we will merit to embrace our loved ones soon. Thank you to everyone who acted to bring them all back, especially our brave soldiers.” 

Opposition leader Yair Lapid called for Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, echoing a recent call from hostage families who nominated the president for the award.

Earlier in the week, senior figures from several of the countries involved in the talks headed to Egyptian resort town Sharm el-Sheikh to close the deal, including Witkoff, Kushner, Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani and Turkish Intelligence Minister Ibrahim Kalin.

Negotiators hammered out the details of the first phase of Trump’s 20-step deal — the hostage release — along with Israel’s initial lines of withdrawal. According to the plan Trump announced last month, Israel would only withdraw from Gaza City in the first stage, but subsequent Israeli media reports indicate that Jerusalem agreed to a withdrawal from parts of Khan Younis, as well.

The talks in Egypt began after Hamas stated last week that it was willing to exchange the hostages for Palestinian prisoners. The terrorist group rejected other components of the Trump plan, such as laying down its arms and the demilitarization and deradicalization of Gaza, yet Trump said he views Hamas as “ready for a lasting peace.”

Netanyahu said in a subsequent statement that this was a new concession from Hamas in that they agreed to free the hostages “while the IDF remains deep within the [Gaza] Strip.” The Trump plan would also have the IDF remain in a buffer zone along Gaza’s perimeter, including the Philadelphi Corridor between Gaza and Egypt.

Other issues under negotiation include who will be part of the temporary technocratic administration governing Gaza and the “Peace Board” led by Trump, with former British prime minister Tony Blair taking part, as well as, potentially, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan.

After an Iranian ballistic missile struck a home in the northern Israeli city of Tamra, killing a woman, her two daughters and her sister-in-law, news outlets faced an additional challenge beyond the sober responsibility of covering a tragic loss: choosing what language to use to describe these women and their ethnic identity. 

Tamra is an Arab town, with a history dating back hundreds of years. When Israeli President Isaac Herzog visited on Wednesday, he talked about the “shared society of Jews and Arabs” in Israel that “believe in our common life together,” and described the victims as “Muslim women.” Most news reports — in major international outlets including the Associated Press, Reuters, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal — referred to Tamra as either an “Arab-Israeli city” or an “Arab town in Israel.” 

CNN, however, chose a different word for Tamra, a city that is firmly inside Israel’s original 1948 borders: Palestinian. 

“Iranian strikes expose bomb shelter shortage for Palestinian towns inside Israel,” read one headline from this week. The accompanying article described Tamra’s residents as “Palestinian citizens of Israel.” Another story called Tamra a “Palestinian-Israeli town.” 

The descriptor is sure to confuse some readers. If advocates for a two-state solution talk about separate Israeli and Palestinian states, how can there be a Palestinian town within Israel? 

The use of the word is not a statement about the town being under Palestinian sovereignty or the jurisdiction of a Palestinian governing authority. The word is used to describe the national identity of the people who live there, similar to describing Americans of Chinese ancestry as Chinese Americans — only much more complicated, because of the recent politics of the war in Gaza and nearly eight decades of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 

Anwar Mhajne, a political science professor at Stonehill College in Massachusetts, who grew up in the Arab city of Umm al-Fahm in Israel, told Jewish Insider that using the term “Palestinian” to describe her identity and the place where she grew up can serve as an educational opportunity for people from outside the region who don’t know the history of her community, which dates back several hundred years.

“If I’m talking to outsiders who don’t understand the history of the region, I would say, ‘It’s a historically Palestinian town inside of Israel,’” Mhajne said. “Then I have to tell them the whole story of how that happened. The reason why I do this is because I have people ask me, ‘Wait, you’re not Jewish, so how are you in Israel?’” 

CNN’s use of the word “Palestinian” to describe the Arab-Israeli residents of Tamra reflects a broader linguistic shift that has been happening over the years among Israel’s Arab citizens, who account for about 20% of Israel’s population. A spokesperson for CNN did not respond to a question about whether the language reflected a change to the network’s style guide, but the recent language appears to be a shift for the news network, which even earlier this year used the term “Arab Israelis” in its reporting. 

“There’s a growing trend going on in the past, I want to say 10, maybe 20, years, of people who are saying, ‘We are going to reclaim our identity as Palestinians, and we’re not going to be ashamed to call ourselves Palestinians,’” said Yasmeen Abu Fraiha, a fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School who is completing a fellowship at Harvard Medical School. She counts herself among that trend: She didn’t use the term “Palestinian citizen of Israel” to describe herself until her late 20s, after she studied at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. 

Abu Fraiha grew up in a Jewish city in Israel and she trained at Israeli institutions. She was working at Soroka Hospital in Beersheba — the hospital that was hit by an Iranian missile on Thursday — during the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, when she helped treat hundreds of people injured that day. She likes the term “Palestinian citizen of Israel” because it encompasses two parts of her identity that are both important, although she is not a stickler about the language; she previously served as health policy director at the Task Force for Health Promotion and Equity in the Arab Society at the Israeli Ministry of Health, an official government entity.

“First, yes, I’m Israeli. I was born and raised there. Hebrew is my first language. I love the Israeli culture,” Abu Fraiha explained. “I’m fully Israeli. And then at the same time, my history, my narrative, my national connection, is to the Palestinian people.” 

Mhajne, too, identifies with the Israeli part of her identity. It’s the passport she holds. She is the product of an Israeli education, and earned her bachelor’s degree at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. But that is not the full story of who she is. 

“I do hold both close, dearly, and I think they’re very important to hold onto. Historically, culturally, in a lot of ways, we are Palestinian, and we share that story. It’s our ancestors’ stories. These towns and us, we’ve been there for a long time, even before Israel was a state.”

Among Israel’s Jewish population, the language has not caught on widely, although it has growing cachet among Israeli Jews on the political left. Israel’s government formally uses the term “Arab-Israeli” to describe this part of the population, and that is the language generally used in English, too. 

Shayna Weiss, senior associate director of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis, said the rhetorical matter can be “quite confusing” for her undergraduate students, so she usually discusses it at the beginning of each course she teaches about Israeli society.

“I generally use the term ‘Israeli Palestinian’ ‘Palestinian citizens of Israel,’ but there are also instances where some people have said they see themselves as Israeli Arab, like certain pop stars, that sort of thing. And if I know that’s what they think about themselves, that’s the term I try and use,” Weiss told JI. 

The death of the women and girls in Tamra has brought to the surface a rhetorical debate that has been bubbling up for years. Ultimately, Mhajne argued, what matters is not the words used to describe them — but that they were human beings. 

“It bugs me, honestly, sometimes when people fight over ‘Arab’ and ‘Palestinian,’” she said. “They’re someone’s wife and daughters.”

Israeli President Isaac Herzog called Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro on Sunday, a week after an arsonist motivated by anti-Israel animus set the governor’s mansion on fire. 

Herzog expressed solidarity with Shapiro after the attack, which took place hours after the governor hosted a Passover Seder. 

Shapiro told Herzog he greatly appreciated the call, a spokesperson for the president told Jewish Insider.

The man who set fire to the governor’s mansion last weekend said in a 911 call that he “will not take part in [Shapiro’s] plans for what he wants to do to the Palestinian people.” 

While Shapiro quoted the Jewish priestly blessing following the attack, he stopped short of attributing the attack to antisemitism in an interview on Friday with ABC News and rebuffed a call by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to have Attorney General Pam Bondi investigate the attack as a hate crime.

Herzog was the first Israeli official to call Shapiro after the attack. 

Ofir Akunis, the Israeli consul general in New York, sent a letter to Shapiro last week, saying that he was “deeply shocked and saddened to learn of the arson attack.”

“This appalling act of violence, carried out during one of the most meaningful nights of the Jewish calendar, could have resulted in a far greater tragedy,” Akunis added. “We commend law enforcement for their swift and effective response, and we stand in full solidarity with you and your family.”

Behind the Scenes: Thirteen Jewish Prisoners in Iran – The Untold Story of a Negotiation That Worked: As the Israeli government and its most ardent backers in the United States continue to ramp up their criticism of the Obama administration’s pursuit of a nuclear deal with Iran, they might do well to heed the lessons from the last time they were involved in arms-length diplomacy with their arch-enemies in Tehran. Nearly a decade ago, the U.S. Jewish community and the United Nations played a key role in a series of secret negotiations to win the release of thirteen Jews imprisoned in Iran.

–In 1999, the story started almost predictably. Security agents arrested thirteen Jewish residents of the southeast Iranian city of Shiraz, including five merchants, a rabbi, two university professors, three teachers in private Hebrew schools, a kosher butcher and a 16-year-old boy, accusing them of spying for Israel. After an elaborate, partially televised show trial, 10 were sentenced to lengthy prison terms, while Israel organized a high-level pressure campaign globally to win their release. The prisoners were gradually freed in small groups, with the news kept under wraps until the barest of details were leaked in March 2003, a month after the last one left Iran for Israel. But the inside story, never told until now, appears to show that opposite sides can make a deal, no matter how limited the scope. In interviews, the two key players in the negotiations – U.S. Jewish leader Malcolm Hoenlein and Giandomenico Picco, then a UN diplomat – revealed a delicate diplomatic minuet in the shadows that finally coaxed Iran to release the prisoners. (more…)