Two weeks after Oct. 7, before the IDF had entered Gaza, El-Sayed said there was a ‘genocide being perpetrated against innocent Palestinians’
Emily Elconin/Getty Images
Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Abdul El-Sayed answers questions from attendees during a town hall event on September 3, 2026 at the Oakland Expo Center in Waterford, Michigan.
Add JewishInsider on GoogleDemocratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza as early as two weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel, before Israel’s ground invasion began nearly a week later and well before any other mainstream political leaders used the term.
“At the heart of the genocide being perpetrated against innocent Palestinians today is the Islamophobic trope that *all* Palestinians must be aligned with Hamas,” El-Sayed said on X on Oct. 21, 2023. “It’s the most murderous form of the post-9/11 lie our country told to take civil liberties from Arabs & Muslims then.”
Israel began conducting airstrikes in Gaza within hours of the Oct. 7 attacks and launched a sustained air campaign the next day, but IDF did not begin its ground invasion until Oct. 27.
El-Sayed’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on what he understood as of Oct. 21 that led him to believe a genocide was occurring.
Asked by a student to ‘stand unequivocally against the IRGC,’ El-Sayed criticized the U.S. for trying to be the ‘world’s policeman’
Emily Elconin/Getty Images
Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Abdul El-Sayed answers questions from attendees during a town hall event on September 3, 2026 at the Oakland Expo Center in Waterford, Michigan.
Pressed during an event on Wednesday to condemn the Iranian regime’s massacre of tens of thousands of protesters earlier this year, Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed sidestepped the question, focusing his answer on criticizing the U.S. war in Iran.
A Persian American student — who said that his cousin had been “hunted in the streets” by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for wearing her hijab improperly and that his uncle was “sentenced to die [and] received 50 lashings” — pressed El-Sayed to “renounce” those who supported assassinated Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The student, speaking at a town hall held at the University of Michigan, additionally called on El-Sayed to “stand unequivocally against the IRGC, against the Islamic Republic of Iran” and make some statement in support of the protesters.
El-Sayed responded by criticizing the U.S. for taking the role of the “world’s policeman.”
Asked by a Persian American student at a town hall held at the University of Michigan to "stand unequivocally against the IRGC," Abdul El-Sayed sidestepped the question and criticized the U.S. for trying to be the "world’s policeman."
— Jewish Insider (@jewishinsider) September 24, 2026
Read more: https://t.co/N2r8xS6tyt pic.twitter.com/pPTL86EtDc
“Here’s my point: one can disagree with the governance of a foreign country. One can stand in solidarity with freedom and democracy movements, but my worry is when one decides that we are going to go in and take out the leadership of a foreign government,” El-Sayed said. “Because here’s what happens: a lot of times that frustration gets used to justify corporate interests that have a real stake in the natural resources in a particular country.”
El-Sayed went on to say that he “will always stand for and with democratic movements, always” but added, “I also don’t believe that we were in the right to go to war to topple the government of Iran,” and said that it is the “responsibility of the people of Iran to decide what their leadership should look like.”
Pressed again by the student to express solidarity with the protesters who were murdered, El-Sayed repeated that he will “always stand with movements for freedom and democracy.”
The Michigan Senate candidate previously faced criticism over leaked comments in which he said he did not want to speak out publicly on Khamenei’s killing by the U.S. and Israel at the start of the Iran war because he did not want to alienate voters in Dearborn, Mich., who were upset about the ayatollah’s death.
“Abdul El-Sayed is looking a young man in the eyes and can’t even condemn a terrorist dictator murdering thousands of his own people. Pathetic,” former GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, El-Sayed’s Republican opponent, said on X in response to the exchange.
Plus, former Bernie bro bashes old boss
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a primary-night watch party for NYC congressional candidate Claire Valdez on June 23, 2026.
Good Tuesday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we report on a fundraiser for Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed that is being cohosted by a Democratic Party operative who praised her grandfather’s Nazi service, and spotlight Ed Miliband, who was announced as the U.K.’s foreign secretary on Monday. We talk to Jewish Democrats in Washington state who feel increasingly isolated in their own party, and interview Joel Rubin, a former Jewish liaison for Sen. Bernie Sanders, about his concerns that his one-time boss is promoting antisemitic candidates. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Micah Lasher, Ron Dermer and Khalil Al-Hayya.
We have also launched a new on-demand Live Briefing that you can access throughout the day via our new app (on Apple and Android) and on our website.
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
- President Donald Trump is slated to meet today with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun at 11 a.m. ET. The meeting comes as Israel moves forward with its plan to withdraw from “pilot zones” in southern Lebanon where the Lebanese Armed Forces will move in and administer the area in accordance with the framework agreement established last month between Beirut and Jerusalem.
- The White House is reportedly mulling a proposal from Middle East mediators including Qatar, Egypt and Pakistan for a 10-day ceasefire to halt fighting between the U.S. and Iran. Earlier today, officials in Bahrain confirmed that sirens sounded in the Gulf state ahead of what was believed to have been another Iranian attack.
- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine are slated to appear before the Senate Appropriations Committee this morning to testify about the Trump administration’s $88 billion supplemental funding request for the Pentagon.
- The House Intelligence Committee is convening a hearing today on the next generation of terror threats, with former National Security Advisor H. R. McMaster set to testify.
- Arizona is holding its primaries today, with the GOP’s gubernatorial race between Reps. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Dave Schweikert (R-AZ) taking center billing. The winner will face Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs in November.
- We’re also closely watching the primary results in Arizona’s 1st District, a swing district based in Scottsdale with a sizable Jewish population, which Schweikert is vacating to run for governor. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is backing former TV news anchor Marlene Galan-Woods over former state Rep. Amish Shah, who was the party’s 2024 nominee. The GOP front-runner is former NFL kicker and CBS Sports sideline reporter Jay Feely.
- In New York, Jewish Women International is hosting a day-long workshop series focused on Jewish women in the workplace.
- More than a dozen Jewish and pro-Israel groups, including the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the Israeli-American Council, the Jewish Federations of North America and Christians United for Israel, are hosting a virtual tribute to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) tonight ahead of his funeral next week.
- The three-day Gulf Research Meeting kicks off today in Cambridge, U.K. Speakers include Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud; Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesperson Majed al-Ansari; Mohammed Ibrahim Al Dhaheri, the deputy director of the United Arab Emirates’ Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy; and Arab World Institute President Anne-Claire Legendre.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MELISSA WEISS
In recent weeks, following the collapse of the memorandum of understanding between Washington and Tehran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, Iran has fired dozens of times on Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
At the same time, it has sustained fire from the U.S., whose military bases across the region have been targeted by the Islamic Republic, with several service members killed. And all the while, Tehran has targeted commercial ships transiting through the strait.
But as focus on the conflict with Iran has shifted from addressing the Islamic Republic’s nuclear ambitions to the Strait of Hormuz, Israel has stayed out of the fighting — despite Iranian threats earlier this month to target the Jewish state if the U.S. attacks did not cease.
There is no upside for Israel to reenter the fight, especially when the issue of the Strait of Hormuz falls outside of the objectives set by Israel at the start of the war earlier this year. (This, despite the widespread sentiment among Israelis that this year’s war did not improve Israel’s security situation, according to polling last month from the Israel Democracy Institute.)
Key among the goals laid out by Israel was degrading Iran’s ballistic missile program and setting back elements of its nuclear program. Reopening Hormuz is an American objective, not an Israeli one. With Israel having made the calculus that the most immediate Iranian threats have been blunted — at least in the short term — the current mission has become an American one.
“Israel’s best move is to not move — yet,” Mark Dubowitz, the CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Jewish Insider this morning. “Washington does the striking. Israel keeps its fire and its threats in reserve, waiting for one of two triggers: a U.S. request to join, or an Iranian regime foolish enough to hit Israel and invite the reprisal that has been promised.”
Despite Iran’s threats to target Israel, such a move would likely be a strategic misstep for the Islamic Republic. Iran’s blockade of the strait and its attacks on Arab and Gulf states are an attempt to reassert its dominance over the region and demonstrate its ability to impact the global energy market. Tehran also appears to be betting that sustained attacks across the region will push Arab states to pressure the U.S. to accept an agreement to reopen the strait, handing the Islamic Republic a win.
BLUE STATE BLUES
The past few years of rising tensions in the Democratic Party over Israel and antisemitism have been marked for many Jewish Democrats in Washington — one of the country’s bluest states, which has a Jewish population of about 90,000 — by disappointment, anger and a growing sense of isolation within a party they have spent decades supporting. But the answer, they say, is not to walk away; rather, it’s to try to reclaim influence from within, Jewish Insider’s Danielle Cohen-Kanik reports.
Rebuilding: That effort begins with rebuilding the party’s own Jewish infrastructure. The Washington State Democratic Party’s Jewish caucus has gone “by the wayside, because it takes a lot of organizing and energy to keep it up,” said Linda Clifton, a longtime member of the caucus. “It’s all volunteer [work], and people had other jobs and other things they had to pay attention to. I think we need to revive it, and there’s been some effort to do that … but I think people are so disheartened that that becomes very difficult,” she continued.
FRIENDLY FIRE
Joel Rubin, a former State Department official who led Jewish outreach for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) 2020 presidential campaign, is now excoriating his former boss and the movement he has built for elevating stridently anti-Israel candidates — most notably former Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Notable quotable: “I think what Sanders and the Sanders operation have done is shove into our system the most categorically anti-Israel, antisemitic candidates that we’ve seen in a generation — if ever, certainly within the Democratic Party — and it’s by design,” Rubin said in an interview with JI last week at the Aspen Security Forum. “It’s not by accident, and it’s very disruptive intentionally. The goal is to undermine Democratic unity and even rationality on Israel at this stage.”
More Dem dynamics: Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) said in an interview with JI’s Emily Jacobs on Monday that the votes by more than 100 House Democrats last week in favor of an effort to end all U.S. aid to Israel indicate the party is “flirting with” making opposition to Israel the official party stance, something he said would lead him to leave the caucus.
NOT SO FUNNY MONEY
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is slated to appear at a campaign fundraiser this weekend that is co-hosted by Kelly Neumann, a controversial Democratic fundraiser in Michigan who faced scrutiny earlier this year for a 2024 Facebook post on Veterans Day that praised her grandfather, who fought for the Nazis in World War II, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.
Pulled out: Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who endorsed El-Sayed on Monday, was initially listed as a speaker at the Saturday event hosted by Neumann, though Neumann and the campaign removed Warren from their promotional materials after JI inquired about the senator’s role. Warren is speaking at a rally for El-Sayed later that day.
ACROSS THE POND
Ed Miliband’s appointment on Monday as U.K. foreign secretary is raising questions about how the former Labour chief will influence Israel and Middle East policy under Andy Burnham, the country’s new prime minister, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports. As the first Jewish leader of the Labour party, which he helmed from 2010-2015, Miliband has long balanced his commitment to Israel’s security with vocal criticism of the Jewish state that has fueled some tensions with British Jewish leaders.
Israel approach: During his past tenure as Labour leader, Miliband “certainly wasn’t an instinctive supporter of Israel, but he also wasn’t as hostile as some expected given his background,” Arieh Kovler, a political analyst in Jerusalem who previously served as the director of policy and research for Britain’s Jewish Leadership Council, told JI. “But that was a decade ago. Attitudes to Israel have hardened across British politics and the Labour Party with it.”
BACKTRACK
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani seemed to shy away on Monday from a campaign vow — referenced in an interview over the weekend — to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, even as he continued to lob rhetorical fusillades at the leader of the Jewish state, Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman reports.
What he said: Mamdani seemed to acknowledge on Monday that such a move might exceed his authority. “My administration will follow all applicable local laws, that is our commitment, that is something we will follow through on, when it comes to adherence to local laws,” the mayor told reporters after an unrelated event, stressing again when pressed: “We will follow our local laws.”
View from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.: President Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social site that Netanyahu would not be arrested “in any way, shape, or form” while in the U.S.
SHE’S RUNNING
Sen. Darline Graham (R-SC) said that she will run in next month’s special election to replace her brother, the late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), on the ballot as the GOP nominee for Senate in November, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs reports.
Mind made up: Graham, who was appointed last week to serve out the remainder of her brother’s term in the Senate, announced her decision to run for a full term in an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Monday. “I’ve made a decision,” Graham said. “I’m in.” Graham told Hannity, a friend of her late brother’s, that she had been “praying a lot” and “talking to my family” about the decision, which she acknowledged she needed to make at an expedited pace due to the week-long filing period for candidates beginning on Tuesday.
Worthy Reads
Eye on 2028: The Atlantic’s Mark Leibovich interviews Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and his wife, former Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-AZ), about Kelly’s presidential considerations, Giffords’ recovery after a 2011 shooting and Kelly’s shortlisting as former Vice President Kamala Harris vetted potential running mates. “Kelly told me that he’d only ‘read parts’ of Harris’s memoir. Presumably, these were the parts that corresponded to mentions of ‘Kelly, Mark.’ He smiled when I suggested this and did not deny it. When I brought up that Harris said she was concerned that he wasn’t tested as a national candidate, Kelly grew more openly annoyed than I might have expected, given how beside the point the topic is now. … He also noted, sarcastically, that some people apparently found it charming that Walz asked for Diet Mountain Dew to drink during his VP interview. ‘[Gov. Josh] Shapiro and I asked for water,’ he said, smirking.” [TheAtlantic]
Tehran’s Tactics: In The Wall Street Journal, Reuel Marc Gerecht and Ray Takeyh posit that Iran’s ability to withstand international economic pressure and U.S. strikes has given the Islamic Republic a “wartime advantage” over Washington. “Today’s conflict with the U.S. and Israel lets senior guard commanders, lowly IRGC foot soldiers and the rest of the theocracy’s security forces feel the fraternity of resistance against the regime’s enemies. For a dictatorship that lost most Iranians’ loyalty years ago, these wars were a boon. The zeal of the revolutionary faithful has baffled many Iranian expatriates and analysts, who see a morally, spiritually and financially bankrupt regime.” [WSJ]
Kuwait in the Crosshairs: The Financial Times’ Ahmed Al Omran looks at how the Iranian attacks across the Gulf have affected Kuwait, which has been targeted by more than 1,500 missiles and drones since the start of the war. “The sense of fear is particularly potent in Kuwait, which is still scarred by the trauma of the 1990 Iraqi invasion — a unique experience that sets it apart from other Gulf Arab states. Since the US-Israeli war against Iran started in February, Kuwait’s proximity to the Islamic republic and high concentration of American troops have made it an easy target for Tehran’s short-range missiles. … But the intensity and frequency of the attacks came as a surprise to some observers in Kuwait, which before the war enjoyed relatively cordial relations with Iran.” [FT]
A larger selection of Worthy Reads is available in our Live Briefing.
Word on the Street
Amid its escalating conflict with Iran, the White House’s social media feed posted a three-week-old poll on Monday from a right-wing polling firm indicating Americans support the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding established last month, JI’s Haley Cohen reports…
The Pentagon confirmed a New York Times report that nearly 100 American troops stationed in Jordan have been injured by Iranian attacks over the last two weeks as the Islamic Republic targets U.S. bases in the region; several of the strikes had not been made public prior to the Times’ reporting…
Israeli intelligence shared with the U.S. indicates that Iran moved thousands of centrifuges into its clandestine Pickaxe Mountain site last fall, following the 12-day war in June; read more about Pickaxe Mountain here…
The Wall Street Journal spotlights the “once-unthinkable” ideas being mulled by Washington, Beirut and Jerusalem to disarm Hezbollah in Lebanon…
The New Yorker‘s David Kirkpatrick talks to former Biden administration officials about the Biden White House’s policies toward Israel and Gaza at the height of the conflict between Israel and Hamas…
Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA), who is challenging Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA), removed from his campaign website family photos that featured his son-in-law, who was found to have promoted white nationalism and Nazi ideology online…
The Washington Post reports on the volatile temperament of Troy Jackson, who is expected to replace Graham Platner as the Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, during the time that Jackson served as the head of the state Senate…
Axios examines how Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY) rhetoric as she campaigns for Democrats around the country resembles former President Barack Obama’s own early campaign rhetoric following the launch of his 2008 presidential bid…
Politico looks at how New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has alienated portions of the city’s electorate — including the Black, Jewish and Latino communities — that have traditionally had close ties with City Hall…
The New York Times interviews New York state Assemblymember Micah Lasher about his childhood hobby of performing magic; the New York Democrat, who won last month’s Democratic primary to succeed Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), in 1996 published The Magic of Micah Lasher, and performed on national television as a child…
Adam Hamawy and Darializa Avila Chevalier, who won their respective Democratic congressional primaries against more moderate candidates in part by attacking Israel on the campaign trail, were announced as the keynote speakers at the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ annual gala in Washington…
Hungarian chess grandmaster Judit Polgar turned down Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s offer to serve as the country’s interim president, saying she felt she lacked “the strength to take on the historic responsibility of uniting a divided nation” in the post-Viktor Orbán era…
The president of the Australian Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants testified before the country’s royal commission investigating antisemitism that increasing antisemitism in the country has “disturbing parallels” to Nazi Germany, but that he did not believe that the country was “becoming another Germany in the 1930s,” owing to Australia’s “democratic institutions, legal system and civilian civil society”…
OpenAI is reportedly starting a business development operation in Israel, having hired a senior Israeli executive from Amazon Web Services to lead the effort to develop relationships in the Israeli high-tech sector…
Air France paused its flights to and from Dubai until next week; the airline is also temporarily suspending its routes to Saudi Arabia until later this week…
Hamas announced Khalil Al-Hayya, the terror group’s top negotiator in Qatar, as its new leader; Al-Hayya succeeds Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by the IDF in October 2024…
Former Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer is rejoining the Jewish Institute for National Security of America as a distinguished fellow, a position he previously held from 2021 to 2022…
Pic of the Day
Demonstrators from the Union of Jewish Students of France protested on Monday outside the Paris headquarters of French far-left party La France Insoumise following the interruption over the weekend of a Jewish DJ’s concert in Grenoble. La France Insoumise had for months been calling for a boycott of Barbara Butch’s show last Saturday, which was disrupted by anti-Israel activists.
Birthdays
Retired CEO of Sony/ATV, a large music publishing firm, he is a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, Martin Bandier turns 85…
President at Admar Group, Henry Dean Ostberg turns 98… Professor in the physics department at Bar-Ilan University, he won the Israel Prize in 2018, Shlomo Havlin turns 84… Director of the Center for the Political Future at USC, Robert Shrum turns 83… Criminal defense attorney, known for representing many politicians, celebrities and organized crime defendants, Benjamin Brafman turns 78… Former member of the U.K.’s House of Commons, now in the House of Lords, Baroness Susan Veronica Kramer turns 76… Senate majority whip (R-WY), John Barrasso turns 74… Chairman and CEO at Quantitative Financial Strategies, Sanford “Sandy” Jay Grossman turns 73… Endocrinologist and professor at Columbia University’s medical school, she is an honorary president of NYC’s Central Synagogue, Shonni Joy Silverberg, MD… Professor at Columbia Law School and daughter of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Jane Carol Ginsburg turns 71… Brooklyn resident, Irene Ostrovsky… Comedian and actor, best known for his five seasons on “Saturday Night Live” ending in 1990, Jon Lovitz turns 69… Former chief rabbi of Moscow, his opposition to the Ukraine war forced him to leave Russia, Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt turns 63… Literary agent at the William Morris Endeavor book department, Eric Matthew Simonoff turns 59… Actor and producer, Alysia Reiner turns 56… Professor of astronomy at MIT and winner of a 2013 MacArthur Genius Award, Sara Seager turns 55… Brazilian fashion designer best known for avant-garde designs and eclectic prints, Alexandre Herchcovitch turns 55… CEO of Fanatics, licensed sports merchandise and digital sports platform, Michael G. Rubin turns 54… Founder, president and CEO of Securing America’s Future Energy (SAFE) and the Electrification Coalition, Raphael “Robbie” Diamond… Rabbi of Congregation Bais Naftali in Los Angeles, his YouTube channel has over 4.6 million views, Rabbi Yoel Gold… Online media personality and director of product management at Electronic Arts (EA) in British Columbia, Veronica Belmont turns 44… CEO of Women of Reform Judaism since 2023, Rabbi Liz P.G. Hirsch… Clinical social worker, Aniko Gomory-Pink… Entrepreneur and political activist, she came to prominence as an African-American pro-Israel student activist at the U of New Orleans, Chloé Simone Valdary turns 33… Policy advisor at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Zachary A. Marshall… Senior recruiter at Tines, Rachel Elizabeth Nieves… Attorney in Madrid and secretary general of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain until 2021, Elias Cohen…
Elizabeth Warren, who is speaking at a rally for El-Sayed later that day, was originally billed as a speaker for the event but was since removed from event publicity
Sarah Rice/Getty Images
Abdul El-Sayed, candidate for US Senate in Michigan, speaks at Mumford High School on May 3, 2026 in Detroit, Michigan.
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is slated to appear at a campaign fundraiser this weekend that is co-hosted by Kelly Neumann, a controversial Democratic fundraiser in Michigan who faced scrutiny earlier this year for a 2024 Facebook post on Veterans Day that praised her grandfather, who fought for the Nazis in World War II.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who endorsed El-Sayed on Monday, was initially listed as a speaker at the Saturday event hosted by Neumann, though Neumann and the campaign removed Warren from their promotional materials after Jewish Insider inquired about the senator’s role. Warren is speaking at a rally for El-Sayed later that day.
A spokesperson for El-Sayed said Warren’s “inclusion on the flier was a clerical error by our campaign” and that she was never scheduled to speak at the fundraiser. A spokesperson for Warren declined to comment.
In Neumann’s November 2024 post, which was previously reported by JI, she said her grandfather, Albert Neumann, fought “on the German side in WWI & WWII.” She noted that he “was one of the first people in my life that accepted me as gay” and described him as “a true testament that people can change and love indeed can win.”
Neumann, a Michigan attorney, has since deleted the post after it resurfaced earlier this year. In a March 2026 Facebook post, she apologized “to anyone who was hurt by [my] post from years ago, as that was certainly never my intention,” but blamed Rep. Haley Stevens’ (D-MI) Senate campaign for unearthing the original post.
Neumann had endorsed state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, but after McMorrow dropped out early this month, Neumann backed El-Sayed. Neumann hosted a fundraiser for Stevens’ House reelection campaign last year.
A spokesperson for Stevens told JI in January that Stevens would not have invited Neumann to host the event if Stevens had “seen the post celebrating Ms. Neumann’s grandfather’s service to the SS.” (The Daily Mail reported later that Neumann’s grandfather was likely in the German Wehrmacht, or armed forces, rather than the Nazi SS.)
“The host in question has hosted or donated to several democratic senators, congresspeople, statewide elected officials and candidates, including Abdul’s opponent, Congresswoman Stevens,” a spokesperson for El-Sayed told JI. “All of us, including the host, condemn Nazi ideology.”
Neumann defended her grandfather even as she apologized for the original post. “To be clear, my grandfather was a german soldier, not a nazi,” Neumann wrote in March. In a phone call with JI on Monday, Neumann stood by this assertion and claimed that a representative from Germany’s Ministry of Defense told her the same thing.
“All I know is that I’ve been informed as a child, in growing up, and then recently again, is that they said he wasn’t a Nazi,” Neumann said. “I believe there is a distinction between a young German soldier and a Nazi in the actual regime close to Hitler.”
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum calls the idea that German soldiers were not part of the Nazi regime a “myth.”
“This belief is untrue. The German military participated in many aspects of the Holocaust: in supporting Hitler, in the use of forced labor, and in the mass murder of Jews and other groups targeted by the Nazis,” the museum states on its website.
Neumann’s political resume is lengthy. She served as a co-chair of the finance committee for McMorrow’s Senate campaign. She also previously worked to support gubernatorial candidate Jocelyn Benson, Michigan’s secretary of state, though Neumann has since endorsed Chris Swanson, a long-shot challenger to Benson.
Neumann told JI that she is “not antisemitic in any sort of way,” and that she regularly hosts events for Jewish politicians. Last year she hosted a fundraiser for Michigan state Sen. Jeremy Moss, a Jewish Democrat who is running for Congress.
“I’m not proud of my grandfather being in World War II as a young German soldier,” said Neumann. “What I am proud about is how he was so kind to me and accepted me as a minority in the ‘90s.”
The Senate candidate shared that her husband, who is Jewish, was verbally attacked in front of their 5-year-old daughter
MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images
Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow speaks on the first day of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, on August 19, 2024.
An activist at this month’s Michigan Democratic Party convention in Detroit screamed an antisemitic slur at the husband of Michigan Senate candidate Mallory McMorrow, in front of the couple’s 5-year-old daughter, McMorrow revealed in a radio interview airing Wednesday.
McMorrow, a state senator seeking the Democratic nomination for an open U.S. Senate seat, is not Jewish, but her husband is and their daughter attends a Jewish preschool. The incident occurred at a convention where far-left activists also booed one of her primary opponents, Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI), a moderate pro-Israel lawmaker.
The third candidate in the race is physician Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive who has a longstanding hostile record towards Israel.
“At the convention a few weeks ago, there was a mood,” McMorrow said in an interview with WHMI, a radio station in metro Detroit. “They booed Haley, but there was a man who walked up to my husband and my daughter — I was not there, just my husband and my daughter, and screamed an antisemitic slur at him in his face, in front of my 5-year-old.”
On the campaign trail, McMorrow has made a point of trying to cater to both the state’s sizable Jewish population and its large Arab population. She described herself in the interview as trying to be “the bridge,” while navigating conflicting views that she hears from voters.
“I got in an Uber the other day and unprompted, the man said to me, ‘Why is it that this country can afford to drop bombs on other countries, but we can’t feed our kids?’ There is a truth in that anger that we as a country have to figure out how we solve that,” McMorrow said.
But she cautioned that politicians and activists who are unhappy with American policy in the Middle East need to ensure their criticism does not veer into antisemitism.
“I will be the first to say, and I’ve taken a lot of heat for it — when it crosses the line into antisemitism, I will be the first to say so,” said McMorrow. “We have to make space for you to be angry and do so in a way that does not make people feel scared, truly scared, to just exist as a Jewish person in this country.”
McMorrow has been endorsed by J Street and pledged not to accept any funding from AIPAC. But she has also taken aim at El-Sayed for his approach to the Middle East. After he announced that he would hold campaign rallies with the far-left, antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker, McMorrow slammed El-Sayed in an interview with Jewish Insider last month.
She reiterated that position to WHMI, although she said she has “no problem” with people who appear on Piker’s show if they want to try to reach his audience and push back on his point of view.
“Bringing somebody in to campaign for you implies that you endorse that person’s point of view, and it tells your audience that this messaging is who I am,” said McMorrow, noting that the timing of Piker’s appearance in Michigan was particularly striking, just weeks after the attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield.
Asked whether she believes Piker to be antisemitic, McMorrow said no — but added that it almost doesn’t matter.
“I don’t think that he is. I think he gets dangerously close,” she said. “I think there is justifiable anger at the ongoing war. I think a lot of what he says is uninformed and hurtful. I can’t purport to speak for what he believes in his heart, but I can tell you, for my family, a lot of what he says is really hurtful.”
Plus, What to watch for during WHCD weekend
Win McNamee/Getty Images
President Donald Trump walks toward reporters before answering questions prior to boarding Air Force One on April 10, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland.
Good Friday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we preview the events around this weekend’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in Washington, and report on new FEC filings indicating that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed accepted donations from an antisemitic conspiracy theorist whose son was paid tens of thousands of dollars by the campaign for consulting services. We report on new legislation from Reps. Tom Suozzi and Max Miller that aims to create buffer zones around religious institutions, and cover efforts by NY-17 Democratic candidates Cait Conley and Beth Davidson to distance themselves from Senate Democrats’ legislation to block certain military sales to Israel. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: George Deek, Bob Iger and Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis.
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
- The ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon that was set to expire this weekend was extended for three weeks following yesterday’s White House meeting, facilitated by President Donald Trump, between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the U.S. Speaking to reporters following the meeting, Trump expressed hope that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun would meet at the White House during the ongoing ceasefire. Read more here.
- It’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner weekend in Washington. Trump is slated to make his first appearance as president at the annual dinner, which will take place tomorrow night at the Washington Hilton. Around Washington, the parties on the sidelines of tomorrow night’s so-called Nerd Prom have already begun. Last night, Trump attended a dinner hosted by Skydance Paramount CEO David Ellison honoring the president and CBS News correspondents at the U.S. Institute of Peace. Read more here.
- On Long Island today, Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) will hold a press conference with Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt to announce the introduction of a federal version of the buffer zone bills that have been put forward in a handful of cities and states. Read our interview with Suozzi below.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S EMILY JACOBS AND MARC ROD
A who’s who of the leading names in media, tech and global and domestic politics are flocking to the nation’s capital for the scores of exclusive parties surrounding the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner this Saturday — where President Donald Trump will make his first-ever appearance as president and deliver a roast of the political press corps.
The correspondents’ dinner, and the parties thrown in its honor, have always generated enough fanfare to maintain its status as the biggest weekend of the social calendar in Washington. This year, however, is being treated inside the Beltway as the most high-profile WHCD weekend in at least a decade, the result of Trump’s decision to participate in this year’s dinner after boycotting it for his entire presidency.
In addition to Trump’s roast, guests will be entertained by Oz Pearlman, a famed mentalist known for his mind-reading tricks. Pearlman, who is Jewish and was born in Israel, marks a shift from the traditional entertainment choice at the dinner, which is usually a monologue delivered by a comedian. Those comedians’ jokes about Trump were a factor in why the president has skipped previous dinners, and the White House Correspondents’ Association canceled its planned entertainer last year over backlash to her past comments.
The dinner could make for some awkward moments: one of the WHCA’s award winners this year is a team from The Wall Street Journal, for reporting on Trump’s ties to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein — an article that led Trump to sue the Journal. And that’s not to mention Trump’s routine hostility toward and criticisms of the media more broadly. It is unclear if the president will be present for the award ceremony.
Celebrities have historically flocked to Washington for WHCD weekend, though the number of famous names willing to appear for the dinner or other events dwindled during the first Trump administration. That trend began to reverse during the Biden administration, though it picked up again last year when Trump returned to office.
Nicki Minaj, the rap superstar who has become an advocate for the Trump administration, will be attending the dinner as a guest of the Washington Times. No other media organizations have announced celebrity guests for their respective tables at the dinner.
Regardless of a diminished turnout of famous faces, this weekend will be jam-packed with nonstop events, and it has already begun.
JI’s Emily Jacobs and Marc Rod will be out and about in the district this weekend, as well as at Saturday’s dinner. If you spot them at any of the events, take this as your invitation to say hello.
FOLLOW THE MONEY
Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has taken donations from a deep-pocketed activist whose group spearheaded the pro-Hamas protests that targeted a Queens synagogue in January — while the far-left candidate has at the same time paid tens of thousands in campaign funds to her son, Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman and Marc Rod report.
Paper trail: The latest Federal Election Commission filings show El-Sayed has received a total of $7,000 from Amani Barakat, the chair of Al-Awda-Palestinian Right of Return Coalition and a promoter of antisemitic conspiracy theories linking Jewish people to the Illuminati. It’s part of $33,550 that El-Sayed has taken in total from the Barakat family, a Palestinian-American real estate dynasty based in Southern California.
Slotkin says: Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) joined other Michigan Democrats in condemning Amir Makled, a Democratic nominee for regent of the University of Michigan, over Makled’s past comments on social media expressing antisemitic sentiments and support for terrorism, JI’s Marc Rod reports.
SACRED SPACES
Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY), joined by Rep. Max Miller (R-OH), introduced the SACRED Act this week, a new bill aimed at protecting attendees at religious institutions from harassment and threats by demonstrators — a phenomenon seen repeatedly outside synagogues that has spurred “buffer zone” legislation in New York and elsewhere, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
Details: The bill, which applies within 100 feet of a religious institution, would create criminal and civil penalties for individuals who attempt to intimidate or obstruct someone in a manner that causes reasonable fear for physical safety to prevent them from entering or exiting a place of worship. It also applies — within that 100-foot zone — to individuals who intentionally approach within eight feet of a person seeking to exercise their freedom to worship, for the purpose of intimidating or harassing them.
AID ARGUMENTS
Conley, Davidson distance themselves from Senate votes to block Israel aid in Jewish community forum
Cait Conley and Beth Davidson, two of the leading candidates in the Democratic primary in New York’s 17th Congressional District — among the most Jewish districts in the country — distanced themselves in a Thursday candidate forum from efforts by 40 Senate Democrats last week to block U.S. aid to Israel, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.
What they said: Conley, a veteran who has worked in a variety of national security roles, said that she doesn’t believe that lawmakers should be trying to determine which specific systems should be provided to allies, but she also argued that the U.S. must continue to enforce global standards to ensure that all aid recipients are meeting U.S. standards. Davidson, a Rockland County legislator, said that she wants to see the U.S. use diplomatic tools and oversight to help bring about peace, rather than threatening aid to Israel. But she added that, “before voting for more funding, I would want to see a plan of how we bring this [Iran] conflict to a close, especially with a second conflict going on right next door.”
ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT
Young American adults increasingly view Israel as a burden to the United States, according to a new Harvard Youth Poll of 18- to 29-year-olds. The survey found that 46% of young Americans consider Israel to be mostly a burden to the U.S., compared to just 16% who say Israel is mostly a benefit to the U.S., Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.
Additional findings: Ukraine, which has also received U.S. support in its lengthy war with Russia, was also determined to be more of a burden by young Americans, though the numbers were less striking. Thirty-one percent of young Americans said Ukraine is mostly a burden, while 21% said it is mostly a benefit. Meanwhile, Washington’s relationships with Canada, Mexico and the European Union were mostly viewed as positive.
TERROR THWARTED
A young woman was charged Thursday in a conspiracy to “kill as many Jews as possible” by driving through a Houston synagogue. Angelina Han Hicks, 18, a resident of North Carolina, was arrested Wednesday and charged, according to the Davidson County Sheriff’s Office, with felony conspiracy to commit assault with a deadly weapon and felony conspiracy to commit murder for her plotted attack on Congregation Beth Israel, the oldest synagogue in Texas, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports.
Details: The FBI’s Charlotte Field Office received information on Tuesday that Hicks “was believed to be targeting members of the Jewish Community for a potential act of violence,” according to the sheriff’s office. Law enforcement found evidence in Hicks’ home that she and co-conspirators were planning a mass-casualty event, according to the Houston Chronicle.
School scrutiny: A new complaint filed with the Department of Education accuses a Florida Panhandle school district of violating Title VI of the Civil Rights Act by ignoring years of antisemitic harassment against a Jewish student, including Nazi salutes performed in the classroom.
NEW GIG
Israel’s first Christian ambassador, George Deek, has a new job after his return to Israel from his most recent posting as Israeli ambassador to Azerbaijan: special envoy to the Christian world. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar named Deek to the role on Thursday, with the ministry saying that the move was “intended to deepen Israel’s ties with Christian communities around the world,” Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports.
Background: Deek, who joined the Foreign Ministry in 2008 and has been posted to Norway and Nigeria, received the Foreign Ministry Director General’s Award for Excellence in 2021. He is part of the Arab Orthodox Christian community in Jaffa, and his father, Youssef Deek, was chairman of the community for many years.
Worthy Reads
Calling the Shots in Tehran: The New York Times’ Farnaz Fassihi does a deep dive into Iran’s new power structure following the deaths of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and dozens of top regime officials, finding that key decisions are now being made by senior generals affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “It was the Guards who came up with the strategy for Iran’s attacks on Israel and the Persian Gulf states, along with the closing of the strait to maritime traffic. They were the ones who agreed to a temporary cease-fire with the United States and approved back-channel diplomacy and direct negotiations with the United States. They tapped [Iranian parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher] Ghalibaf from among their own ranks to lead the talks with Vice President JD Vance in Islamabad.” [NYTimes]
Chronicle of a Kidnapping: In The Atlantic, American journalist Shelly Kittleson recounts her kidnapping — believed to have been conducted by the Iran-backed Iraqi militia Kataib Hezbollah — and subsequent week in captivity. “I was well aware of the risks inherent in being a journalist with the ‘wrong’ passport in places where the default assumption is that anyone asking questions is a ‘spy.’ I was also keenly aware of the creativity employed by those who write ‘intelligence’ reports, having been the victim of fabricated reports of that sort in the past.” [TheAtlantic]
The Jew-ish Paradox: In The Wall Street Journal, Joseph Epstein considers the cultural and religious distinctions among Jews while noting that the differences are unimportant to those who are antisemites. “Jew, Jewish, Jewish, Jew: The two sometimes seem to have little in common. But now, with the re-emergence and spread of antisemitism, not only in the U.S., but globally, they have the hatred aimed against them in common. Will the two join together to fight this menace? They damned well better.” [WSJ]
Word on the Street
President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that he had instructed the military to “shoot and kill any boat, small boats though they may be … putting mines in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz,” as Iran was reported this week to have been laying additional mines in the waterway…
The Wall Street Journal reports on concerns over the proliferation of Chinese satellite imagery that may be used to assist Iran and other American adversaries seeking to target U.S. installations and allies…
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that members of Iran’s national soccer team will be let into the U.S. to play in this summer’s World Cup, but that Iranians with ties to the country’s military would not be allowed entry…
Italian Sports Minister Andrea Abodi rejected the suggestion by Paolo Zampolli, the Trump administration’s special envoy for global partnerships, that Italy’s team replace Iran in the World Cup, saying that such a move was “firstly, not possible and secondly, not appropriate”…
The U.S. Department of Education opened an investigation into the New York City Department of Education, alleging that teachers associated with the group N.Y.C. Educators for Palestine had instructed students to support Hamas and referred to Zionists as “genocidal white supremacists”…
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not give advance notice to senior Republican senators before announcing on Wednesday that he was firing Navy Secretary John Phelan and had already tapped his replacement, causing surprise and confusion on Capitol Hill, JI’s Emily Jacobs and Marc Rod report…
The Wall Street Journal does a deep dive into Phelan’s efforts to convince Trump, a friend and neighbor, to buck Hegseth’s demand that Phelan resign from the Navy’s top job…
Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) added $1 million to his campaign coffers and said he would match any donation received ahead of his June primary against former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander; private polling for both camps indicates that Lander has a sizeable lead over Goldman, who first won his seat in 2022…
In a new ad, Goldman addresses the Iran war, saying, “Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu should have never started this war in Iran, and they must end it now,” adding, “I won’t vote for one more cent for this illegal and immoral war”…
Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee, in their draft 2027 funding bill for the State Department, are again aiming to leverage U.S. funding to the United Nations and other foreign programs to seek accountability for involvement by U.N. employees and others in the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel, JI’s Marc Rod reports…
Rachel Goldberg-Polin, whose book When We See You Again, about her life before and after the kidnapping and murder of her son, was released this week, was a featured speaker at the Time 100 Summit on Wednesday in New York…
Former Disney CEO Bob Iger is returning to Josh Kushner’s Thrive Capital — where he briefly worked in 2022 before returning to Disney after his successor, Bob Chapek, was ousted by the board — in an advisory role…
The Wall Street Journal interviewed folk-pop singer Noah Kahan ahead of the release of his new album, “The Great Divide,” out today…
Saudi Arabia, facing financial challenges associated with the Iran war, pulled out of an arrangement to give up to $200 million over the next eight years to the Metropolitan Opera in New York, itself under financial strain after years of decreased sales from the COVID-19 pandemic; the Met now faces a $30 million shortfall it must make up before the end of its fiscal year this summer…
The department within the U.K.’s Foreign Office tasked with tracking Israel’s potential breaches of law was closed due to budget cuts…
U.K. Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis met on Thursday with Prime Minister Keir Starmer at London’s Kenton United Synagogue, days after the synagogue was targeted in an arson attack…
An annual health report released today by the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office said that Benjamin Netanyahu was treated for early stage prostate cancer in late 2024…
Israir plans to launch daily flights this summer between Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport and New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport…
Police in the Israeli city of Modiin detained Hebrew University professor Alex Sinclair for wearing a yarmulke with the Israeli and Palestinian flags; when returned to Sinclair upon his release, the Palestinian flag had been cut from the yarmulke…
In response to rockets launched by Hezbollah toward Shtula in northern Israel on Thursday, the IDF said it struck Hezbollah military structures used to plan and carry out terror attacks in the areas of Kherbet Selem and Touline in southern Lebanon…
Retinal surgeon Kurt Gitter, an avid collector of art from Japan and the American South, died at 89…
Marquette University professor David Fantle, who helped bring the “Bronze Fonz” — a statue of the beloved “Happy Days” character Arthur Fonzarelli to Milwaukee’s downtown, died at 66…
Wine of the Week
JI wine columnist Yitz Applbaum reviews the 2025 Flam Blanc:
“I could not have orchestrated a more perfect evening if I had planned for a year. Last night, at Rendezvous, that impossibly charming jewel tucked away in the Neve Tzedek neighborhood of Tel Aviv, with a dear friend who happens to be a French-speaking cyber luminary, I was graced by a bottle of Flam Blanc, whose brilliantly beautiful semillon grape held the entire evening in its thrall.
“The 2025 Flam Blanc is an exquisite assemblage of sauvignon blanc, semillon, and the merest suggestion of chardonnay. The wine unveils itself with a disarming sweetness that lulls the uninitiated before delivering a magnificently brazen one-two punch of grapefruit peel zestiness across the mid-palate. The chardonnay finish, poised and unhurried, ushers one back to the noble terroir of the Judean Hills, lingering just long enough to leave you reaching for the bottle again. Pair this with handmade gnocchi and do acquire several cases. It is the kind of bottle that reminds even the most seasoned drinker why the Judean Hills deserve a permanent place in the conversation.”
Pic of the Day
Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe, a Republican, signed a bill on Thursday adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism into law.
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham, the board chair of the Missouri Alliance Network, which advocated for the bill, told JI, “Thanks to [this bill], our Jewish students will now be given the same protections of other minorities to combat the extreme rise in antisemitism we have seen the last few years. There is more work ahead to ensure school districts implement the IHRA definition and protect our Jewish students moving forward.”
Birthdays
Israeli designer, architect and artist, Ron Arad turns 75…
FRIDAY: Rabbi emeritus at Washington’s Adas Israel Congregation, he is a former president of the Rabbinic Assembly, Rabbi Jeffrey A. Wohlberg turns 85… Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony and Peabody Award-winning singer and actress, Barbra Streisand turns 84… Delray Beach, Fla., resident, Phyllis Dupret… Distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Maryland, College Park, Jeffrey C. Herf turns 79… Former president and publisher of USA Today, then chairman of theStreet, Lawrence S. Kramer turns 76… Chairman and CEO of Cincinnati-based Standard Textile, Gary Heiman… Former president of basketball operations for the Washington Wizards for 16 seasons, himself an NBA player for nine seasons, Ernest “Ernie” Grunfeld turns 71… Israeli singer descended from the Jewish diaspora in Kurdistan, Ilana Eliya turns 71… Columnist for Foreign Policy, Michael Hirsh turns 69…Author of books for children and teens, Deborah Heiligman turns 68… Founding partner and CEO of KSX Communications, Andrew Kirtzman turns 65… CEO and President of Wells Fargo since 2019, he was previously the CEO of Visa, Charles Scharf turns 61… Chief executive director of the Jewish Caring Network, Rabbi Carl S. “Chaim” Schwartz turns 56… Deputy chief of staff for Montgomery County, Md., Councilmember Sidney Katz, Laurie Mintzer Edberg… Emmy Award-winning television writer, producer and film screenwriter, known as the co-creator and showrunner of the television series “Lost,” Damon Lindelof turns 53… EVP of political operations at AIPAC, Mark H. Waldman… Israeli model, actress, entrepreneur, lecturer and activist, Maayan Keret turns 50… Film and television actor, Eric Salter Balfour turns 49… Brandon Hersh… Partner at Apollo Global Management, Reed Rayman… Special assistant to POTUS and senior speechwriter in the Biden administration, Aviva Feuerstein turns 39… Tech and innovation reporter at Automotive News, Molly Boigon…
SATURDAY: Retired attorney, he is a brother-in-law of former Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), Myron “Mike” Sponder… Social worker and former health spokesman of the Green Party of the U.K., he is the older brother of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Larry Sanders turns 91… Co-founder of Lender Bagels Bakery, he was the national chair of UJA, Marvin K. Lender turns 85… Hedge fund manager and founder of Omega Advisors, Leon G. “Lee” Cooperman turns 83… Former CEO of baker supply manufacturing companies, Joseph “Joe” Weber turns 81… Hedge fund manager and founder of CAM Capital, Bruce Stanley Kovner turns 80… Rosh yeshiva at Yeshiva University since 1973, rabbi of the Young Israel of Riverdale Synagogue since 1974, Rabbi Mordechai Willig turns 79… Former French finance minister and later managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn turns 77… David Handleman… Longtime chairman and CEO of Village Roadshow Pictures, now president of Through The Lens Entertainment, Bruce Berman turns 74… Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations from 2018 to 2021, he was previously president of Bed, Bath and Beyond, Arthur Stark turns 71… Administrative law judge at the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board, Beth A. Fox… Commissioner of the National Basketball Association since 2014, Adam Silver turns 64… Senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, focused on security issues in the Middle East, Michael Scott Doran turns 64… Partner at Quinn Emanuel, he served as U.S. ambassador to the Czech Republic in the Obama administration, Andrew H. Schapiro turns 63… Emmy Award-winning actor, voice actor, comedian and producer, he is descended from a Sephardic family rooted in Thessaloniki, Hank Azaria turns 62… Infomercial pitchman, better known as Vince Offer, Vince Shlomi or “The ShamWow Guy,” Offer Shlomi turns 62… Deputy director general at the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Benjamin Krasna turns 61… CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ, Meredith Dragon… New York Times-bestselling author and adjunct professor of neuroscience at Stanford University, David Eagleman turns 55… Deputy director of community health at the Utah Department of Human Services, David E. Litvack turns 54… Former professional baseball outfielder, Micah Franklin turns 54… Democratic Party strategist, she is a co-founder of Lift Our Voices, Julie Roginsky turns 53… President of the Alliance for Downtown New York, the nation’s largest business improvement district, Jessica S. Lappin turns 51… Opinion editor at the California Post, previously senior-editor-at-large for Breitbart News, Joel Barry Pollak turns 49… Attorney turned grocer and now professor, Danielle Brody Rosengarten Vogel… Co-founder of WeWork and now Flow, Adam Neumann turns 47… Executive director at Yaffed, Adina Mermelstein Konikoff… Managing director, head of social, content and influencer at Deloitte Digital, Kenneth R. Gold… Director of public affairs at FEMA during the Biden administration, now SVP at Avoq, Jaclyn Rothenberg… Film and television actress, model and singer, Sara Paxton turns 38… Staff writer at Daily Kos, Emily Cahn Singer… Former NHL ice hockey defenseman, now a color analyst for Westwood One and ESPN, Colby Shane Cohen turns 37… TikTok star, he runs the culinary website CookWithChefEitan, Eitan Bernath turns 24…
SUNDAY: Owner of the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers for 33 years until its forced sale in 2014, Donald Sterling (born Donald Tokowitz) turns 92… Retired Federation executive in Los Angeles, Oakland and Sacramento, Loren Basch… Investment banker best known as the chairman and CEO of Lehman Brothers through its bankruptcy filing in 2008, Richard S. Fuld Jr. turns 80… Professor of computer science and engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Hal Abelson turns 79… Immediate past chair of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, now a board member at Democratic Majority for Israel, Harriet P. Schleifer turns 73… President of Brandeis University from 2016-2024, Ronald D. Liebowitz turns 69… Moscow-born, conservative journalist and political activist in Israel, Avigdor Eskin turns 66… Senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and contributing writer at The Atlantic, Jonathan Rauch turns 66… London-based interfaith social activist, she founded and chaired Mitzvah Day International, Laura Marks turns 66… Journalist, biographer and the author of six books, Jonathan Eig turns 62… Former member of the Maryland House of Delegates and state Senate, Roger Manno turns 60… Former member of the California state Assembly where he served as chairman of the California Legislative Jewish Caucus, Marc Levine turns 52… Member of the NYC Council for six years and now a recently elected member of the NY State Assembly, Kalman Yeger turns 52… General partner of Coatue Management, Benjamin Schwerin… Senior global news editor at The New York Times, Russell Goldman turns 46… Senior director of federal government affairs at Jazz Pharmaceuticals, Karas Pattison Gross… Media relations manager at NPR, Benjamin Fishel… London-based reporter for The Wall Street Journal covering finance, he is the co-author of a book on WeWork, Eliot Brown… Male fashion model and actor, Brett Novek turns 42… Head coach of the UC Irvine Anteaters baseball program, he played for Team Israel in the 2012 World Baseball Classic, Ben Orloff turns 39… Communications director at the University of Florida College of Health and Human Performance, Alisha Katz… AI product manager at Apple, Kenneth Zauderer… Washington correspondent for The Epoch Times, Jackson Richman… Board liaison at American Jewish World Service, he is also a part-time matchmaker at Tribe 12, Ross Beroff… Ahron Singer…
The Michigan Senate contender accepted $7k from the chair of Al-Awda/PRRC — and hired her son
Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed speaks with customers and barbers at Blazin Wade Cuts in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026.
Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has taken donations from a deep-pocketed activist whose group spearheaded the pro-Hamas protests that targeted a Queens synagogue in January — while the far-left candidate has at the same time paid tens of thousands in campaign funds to her son, Jewish Insider has found.
The latest Federal Election Commission filings show El-Sayed has received a total of $7,000 from Amani Barakat, the chair of Al-Awda-Palestinian Right of Return Coalition and a promoter of antisemitic conspiracy theories linking Jewish people to the Illuminati.
It’s part of $33,550 that El-Sayed has taken in total from the Barakat family, a Palestinian-American real estate dynasty based in Southern California.
But records show the money has flowed both ways, as El-Sayed’s committee has given $10,000 a month since December to a newly formed consulting firm belonging to Barakat’s son, a philanthropy advisor with no apparent background in campaign work.
As Jewish Insider previously reported, Amani Barakat chairs the group Al-Awda, which also uses the names Palestinian Right of Return Coalition and Palestinian Assembly for Liberation.
The group greeted Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks with a statement sending “their highest salutations to the Palestinian Resistance, the Freedom Fighters and Defenders of the indigenous Palestinian people,” and it has collaborated with numerous radical groups, including the People’s Forum, CODEPINK and Samidoun — the latter of which the Treasury Department has identified as “a sham charity that serves as an international fundraiser for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist organization.”
Amani Barakat’s social media history is consistent with her organization’s extremism. She shared her organization’s Oct. 7 statement on her personal Facebook account, and made multiple celebratory posts on the day of the atrocities, including one in English reading, “When people are occupied, Resistance is justified” accompanied by the hashtags “#longlivetheresistance” and “#feepalestine” [sic].
Another in Arabic translates to “Hail, my people! My people, hail!” A third English language post declares, “This is a fight for freedom.”
Also on Oct. 7, Amani Barakat shared a video of since-killed Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh justifying the attack, and a drawing celebrating the assault as a battle between a Palestinian David and Israeli Goliath.
Amani Barakat also has an extensive history of social media posts amplifying or applauding terrorist leaders and activities: she has repeatedly shared videos by a Beirut-based TikTok user named Muhammad Kawtharani, who has served as a Hezbollah spokesman (though is distinct from the group’s commander of the same name); posted PFLP-branded content and celebrated its founders; and shared memes and material supportive of Hamas officials and fighters.
She has also repeatedly defended and applauded Khaled Barakat, the Canadian-based co-founder of Samidoun who was identified by both the U.S. and Canada as part of the leadership of the PFLP, which pioneered skyjacking in the 1970s and participated in the Oct. 7 assault, among other massacres. Amani Barakat and Khaled Barakat have exchanged greetings on Facebook, with Amani Barakat even suggesting they might meet up in the West Bank.
Since the start of the U.S.-Israeli military conflict with Iran, Amani Barakat has openly cheerleaded the regime in Tehran, posting an “I Stand with Iran” image, an image eulogizing assassinated Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei with a Quranic verse and news of a defiant statement from the Iranian foreign minister with emojis illustrating her support.
She has also lauded antisemitic podcaster Tucker Carlson for his “brave, principled journalism,” and signal-boosted antisemitic conspiracy theories claiming “Zionists” are responsible for wildfires in Argentina and naming “Illuminati and other secret Jewish and Zionist societies as the real powers running the world and fueling the ongoing war in Iran.”
The Al-Awda leader, who did not respond to requests for comment for this story, has also shared multiple posts from El-Sayed. Her $7,000 in contributions amounts to a small portion of the total funds the wealthy and sprawling Barakat family has mobilized for the Senate contender — a financial effort that also includes $4,300 from her son, Jamal.
But records suggest that the younger Barakat has received far more from the El-Sayed campaign than he or his mother have given. The disclosures show that El-Sayed has paid at least $40,000 since December for “political consulting” to The Commonwealth Project, a firm formed in late November 2025 in Wyoming.
State incorporation documents show that Jamal Barakat created this firm in conjunction with education technology entrepreneur John R. Hall, with whom he serves as an executive at Bayan Islamic Graduate School, a theological institution with campuses in Los Angeles and Chicago.
There is no record of any other campaign ever hiring the newly formed Commonwealth Project, and Jamal Barakat’s LinkedIn profile shows extensive background in the education and philanthropy sectors — but no experience in politics.
Jamal Barakat and Hall did not respond to emailed questions from Jewish Insider about how they came to work for the El-Sayed campaign. Hall also did not respond to any queries, while Jamal Barakat hastily said “no comment” and hung up when a JI reporter introduced himself.
El-Sayed, who has labeled both the Israeli government and Hamas as equally “evil,” did not respond to questions about his relationship with the Barakat family, or he came to hire their scion’s firm.
This contrasts with how El-Sayed reacted when JI notified him that a donor and self-identified fundraiser for his campaign posted antisemitic sentiments and shared tweets on X including denial of the Holocaust.
User @Niavaran555 described themselves as a fundraiser for El-Sayed and invited Jenin Younes, the national legal director for the Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, to join a fundraiser for El-Sayed in Washington in the coming weeks or months. Niavaran said separately that they gave the “max” to El-Sayed.
After JI inquired to El-Sayed’s campaign about the Niavaran account, the user made his posts private.
“Abdul’s campaign had no knowledge of this person’s anonymous online account. Abdul condemns any and all antisemitic or racist comments made, no matter who or where they come from,” spokesperson Sophie Pollock told JI, and said that the campaign refunded in full a donation from the apparent owner of the account.
They shared a post that appeared to question whether the Nazis used gas chambers to kill Jews during the Holocaust. “1944 Hitler introducing a ‘gas chamber’…. (Topic forbidden to question/debate)….” the post reads, in reference to Israel’s new death penalty law for Palestinian terrorists.
They reposted an X post saying that “Jewish n***** treating genocide like New Years Eve,” referencing a countdown on an Israeli television news channel for a deadline Trump provided to Iran.
Niavaran also reposted a meme urging now-deceased Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to “BUILD THE NUKE RETARD.”
Numerous biographical details shared by Niavaran online point to the account being owned by Sam Zia, a travel consultant based in Washington, D.C. Niavaran said they “ran a speaker series in oxford (OxSpeaks)” and Zia was a co-founder of the group in 2023. Zia is also based in Washington, D.C., based on his LinkedIn profile.
Niavaran also said he wrote his thesis on former Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh; Zia used a picture of Mossadegh as his Instagram profile picture. Zia had donated $2750, to El-Sayed’s campaign as of the most recent FEC filings.
The Michigan Senate candidate also said in the CNN interview that he supports Chris Van Hollen as Senate Democratic leader over Chuck Schumer
Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed speaks with customers and barbers at Blazin Wade Cuts in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026.
Far-left Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed said in an interview with CNN that aired Sunday that he believes the Israeli government is just as evil as Hamas.
Responding to a question from CNN anchor Manu Raju on that issue, El-Sayed answered in the affirmative, adding, “Killing tens of thousands of people makes you pretty damn evil. It’s not, ‘How evil is this one versus that one?’ Hamas — evil. Israeli government — evil. We can say both,” he said.
He also said that he believes Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal and responsible for a genocide.
El-Sayed also defended his decision to campaign with far-left streamer Hasan Piker, brushing off criticisms of Piker as “cancel culture.”
“My understanding of America is, it’s a place where we have freedom of speech. My understanding of America is, it’s a place where we’re willing to have conversations with folks with whom we disagree,” El-Sayed said. “I went on ‘Fox and Friends’ this morning. Is it un-American to go and speak on ‘Fox and Friends’? Or are we drawing certain kinds of lines? And it’s that penchant for cancel culture that I think people hate about Democrats.”
He said that Piker is “having a conversation with a number of folks who feel locked out.”
El-Sayed also said that Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) should replace Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) as the Democratic leader in the Senate, due to Schumer’s continued support for U.S. aid to Israel. Van Hollen is among the most vocal critics of Israel in the Senate.
Michigan has been a closely watched bellwether of the direction of the Democratic Party, and El-Sayed’s candidacy — defined by his virulent anti-Israel rhetoric — will test how hostile Democratic partisans have become toward Israel.
At the state’s Democratic nominating convention on Sunday, which all three Senate candidates attended, Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) was booed by a contingent of left-wing activists hostile to her longstanding support for Israel.
Also receiving heckles from a loud contingent of Democratic delegates: a speaker supporting Jordan Acker, who is seeking reelection to the University of Michigan Board of Regents. Acker has been targeted by the university’s anti-Israel activists, facing harassment and vandalism of his home that Michigan leaders have called plainly antisemitic.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris spoke at a party event the day prior to the convention, where she said President Donald Trump “got pulled into” the war in Iran by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, adding that the war “has always been [Trump’s] feeble attempt to distract from the Epstein files.”
The Michigan Senate candidate held two rallies on college campuses with Piker Tuesday evening, despite growing Democratic concerns over the social media influencer
Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed speaks with customers and barbers at Blazin Wade Cuts in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026.
Far-left Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, leftist streamer Hasan Piker and Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Summer Lee (D-PA) dismissed criticism of Piker and his past antisemitic and anti-American comments at a rally at the University of Michigan on Tuesday — El-Sayed’s second event of the day with the controversial social media influencer.
The El-Sayed endorsers all brushed off the criticism of Piker’s record of antisemitic comments, support for terrorism and other controversial activity as a distraction from their message and other issues of the day, including the war in Iran.
“A lot of the people that are on the Republican side, the reactionary side, they, instead of talking about [the war in Gaza], decided to talk about me stumping for Abdul El-Sayed instead,” Piker said, dismissing criticism of him — which has come from Democrats as well — as a distraction.
Piker referred to the war in Iran as “Operation Epstein’s Fury” and the Trump administration as “a bunch of fascist monsters that got tuned up by Israel,” and closed out his remarks with “Free Palestine.”
“Every single dollar that is spent on a bomb is stolen from each and every one of you. That’s $1 that they spend blowing up a school overseas instead of building schools in your neighborhoods,” he continued, going on to blame support for Israel for the lack of universal healthcare in the United States, and to claim that U.S. taxpayers are paying for Israel’s healthcare system.
El Sayed said that he had heard that a pro-Israel group on campus planned to protest the rally — to boos from the crowd — but El-Sayed said that the group would be welcome in the room “because at the end of the day, we believe in the courage of our convictions and our ideals.”
During his remarks, El-Sayed took numerous swipes at AIPAC, accusing the pro-Israel advocacy group of “corrupting our entire politics.” He said he expects the pro-Israel organization will be the largest spender in the Senate primary — though it has not yet announced any plans to engage in the race and has never before spent money in a Senate campaign.
He called the war in Iran “genocidal, illegal, unjustifiable” and accused fellow Democrats of hypocrisy for saying that they view the war as illegal but declining to rule out voting for supplemental funding to support the war effort.
He also insisted — in spite of his promotion of Piker — that he would be a strong voice against antisemitism, pointing to his own background as a Muslim and his “love and reverence” for all people.
Tlaib said she’d told Piker backstage that he would always be welcome in Michigan.
“The fact that, literally, they’re all like, ‘Defend our democracy. Oh, shut up, cancel him’ — make up your damn mind,” Tlaib said, addressing critics of Piker. “Make up your godd*** mind. We’re for everybody in the room or not. Give me a break.”
Tlaib praised El-Sayed as someone closely aligned with her anti-Israel views, including support for blocking aid to the Jewish state.
“I’ve been there seven years, and I’m tired of having to beg my colleagues to do the right thing, to not take money from the people that hurt us, not to literally spend resources and funding like this for war and destruction and death,” Tlaib said. “If any member of Congress or Senate can support a genocide like that, what else are they supporting right here in our backyard at home.”
Lee, like Piker and El-Sayed, dismissed the controversy over the rally as an attempt by people “who don’t want us talking to people who might rock the boat” to silence and stop the rally.
Other speakers at the rally included UM regent candidate Amir Makled, an attorney who provided pro bono representation to anti-Israel protesters at the university who faced criminal charges for their role in the demonstration, Summit Louth, the newly elected president of UM’s student government and Yousef Rabhi, a county commissioner.
“It was right here on this campus that students were punished for speaking out at the Diag, and it was right here on this campus where that outrage, the irreprehensible conduct of our Board of Regents punished students for speaking out against the genocide that students were charged with felonies just for the words of ‘free Palestine,’” Makled claimed.
Among other issues, Louth praised El-Sayed for calling the war in Gaza a genocide and for condemning the war in Iran and the Israeli operations in Lebanon.
“As we all saw this morning, the deranged president of this country issued a genocidal ultimatum on an entire country. F*** him. F*** that. We need to take our country back,” Rabhi said. “Instead of putting forward money to pay for your tuition, they are bombing people halfway across the world. Instead of paying money to make sure that we have single payer universal health care in this country, they are murdering innocent people. “
The Michigan Senate candidate had condemned the attack but also placed blame for it on Israel’s operations in Lebanon
Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed poses for a portrait in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026.
Far-left Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is taking flak over comments in an internal campaign call that issuing a statement on the attempted terrorist attack on Temple Israel in the Detroit suburbs that placed blame on Israel for the attack was a “risk” he felt he had to take, Punchbowl News reported Tuesday.
In both the original statement and the internal comments, El-Sayed condemned the attack while also suggesting that it ultimately could be blamed on Israel’s operations in Lebanon. The alleged attacker was the brother of a Hezbollah commander killed in an Israeli airstrike, the IDF said.
The Punchbowl report linked to a minute-long unlisted YouTube video of El-Sayed, which appears to have been recorded on Zoom.
“I want us to understand that we have to work toward a world where none of this happens, no war, no bombing of apartment buildings, no antisemitism, no attacks on synagogues in schools, like we need to be opposed to all of it and and I think that that’s the kind of leadership that I’m hoping I can offer,” El-Sayed said in the video.
“We put out a much longer statement on this,” he continued. “I hope folks will check it out, and I hope it resonated. And, you know, it was a risk. All of our team was really worried about saying something, but leadership is being willing to say the thing, if you believe it to be true, that nobody else is going to say.”
El-Sayed clarified in an X post that the “risk” he was referring to “that these cowards will NEVER take is having the courage to call out an illegal and unjustified war that’s killing children, wasting our tax dollars, and spiking gas prices, too.”
While El-Sayed spoke, one person in the Zoom meeting, identified as “Mauricio” appeared to justify the attack, saying in a comment, “The synagogue raised funds for the IDF.”
In the initial statement, El-Sayed offered a condemnation of the attack, emphasizing that it would leave scars on the community and that it recalled “centuries of trauma,” while affirming his support for Jews’ right to practice their faith in safety.
But, while condemning the attacker and saying his actions could not be justified, El-Sayed also suggested that the perpetrator’s actions ultimately traced back to Israel and its reported killing of his family members.
“Hurt people hurt people. Violence is a cycle,” El-Sayed said. “Ayman Ghazali lost family, including two children in an airstrike in Lebanon last week. They were innocent people, and then, in an evil act of displaced rage, he tried to take it out on innocent children who had nothing to do with the loss of the innocent children he lost, except that they share a faith.”
“A week earlier, an airstrike killed his niece and nephew. Imagine if that had never happened. Imagine there was no war in Iran. Imagine if there were no air strikes in Lebanon. Imagine if his family had never died. Imagine there was never an attack on Temple Israel. That’s the world that we want to live in,” El-Sayed continued.
Spokespeople for El-Sayed’s Democratic opponents did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
But Republicans have pounced on the comments.
Mike Rogers, the likely GOP nominee for the Senate race, condemned El-Sayed over his remarks in the internal campaign call.
“If you’re having a moral crisis over whether to condemn terrorism, you’re unfit for office,” Rogers said in a statement. “There’s no justification for it, but here Abdul is sympathizing with the attacker. It’s an absolute slap in the face to the families of these kids, and to Michigan’s entire Jewish community — and only serves to inflame antisemitism.”
Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, called his comments “pathetic.
“The contrast couldn’t be more clear in Michigan: radical terrorist sympathizers like Abdul El-Sayed or America First heroes like Mike Rogers,” Scott said.
El-Sayed has shrugged off criticisms of his comments.
El-Sayed is also facing attacks from Republicans and the Democratic group Third Way over his participation in a pair of events with far-left influencer Hasan Piker, who has repeatedly made antisemitic comments and expressed support for terrorism.
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