GHF head Johnnie Moore said the world is turning a blind eye to Hamas violence against aid workers

Reverend Dr. Johnnie Moore, President of the Congress of Christian Leaders attends the Museum Of Tolerance Commemoration of the one-year anniversary of the October 7 attacks at Museum Of Tolerance on October 06, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.
Rev. Johnnie Moore, a member of President Donald Trump’s evangelical advisory committee, has years of experience with complex situations in the Middle East. He helped evacuate Christian refugees under threat from ISIS and has advocated for religious freedom and tolerance for minorities in the region.
But the challenges Moore faces as executive chairman of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the U.S. group, supported by Israel, that began distributing food and humanitarian aid in Gaza in May, have been unique.
Since its inception, GHF has faced a pervasive negative narrative in the international media and among aid organizations. More recent statements from U.N. and other aid groups in effect accuse the GHF of being an IDF front luring Gaza residents to one place so they can be attacked, while largely ignoring Hamas violence against Palestinians working with the GHF.
In a wide-ranging interview this week with the Misgav Institute for National Security’s “Mideast Horizons” podcast, co-hosted by Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov, Moore pushed back against what he says are false narratives about the group’s work and accused aid organizations of “sabotage” and spreading disinformation, while acknowledging the challenges of aid distribution in an active war zone.
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GHF is addressing “a problem that everyone knew and admitted existed … and now everyone has amnesia,” Moore said. “The vast majority of humanitarian assistance that has gone into the Gaza Strip over many, many, many years, was almost immediately diverted into the hands of Hamas, and then used for various nefarious purposes. And I’m not talking about some of the aid — I’m talking about almost all of the aid.”
As such, the mission of GHF is to equally and directly distribute aid to Gazans without having it be “used to prolong a conflict or hoarded,” he said.
Since the beginning of GHF’s operations on May 26, the organization has opened four distribution sites in southern Gaza, from which it said it has provided Gazans with over 958,000 boxes of food. Moore said the GHF calculates meals with a greater caloric value than what the U.N. aid organizations distribute, and by the GHF’s count, it has distributed over 54.8 million meals.
“In an objective world, this would be viewed as an incredible success,” Moore said. “To my great surprise, we poked a number of bears that I wasn’t anticipating, and not all of them are Hamas threatening our local aid workers and the Americans helping these people. A lot of [the antagonists] wear suits and are in places like Geneva and New York City.”
Moore quipped that he has faced “lots of trouble” in his career advocating for religious freedom for Christian minorities around the world, including death threats and sanctions from the Chinese Communist Party, but that the negative response to GHF is unique.
“Respectable — I don’t even call them respectable anymore — elite organizations that we would assume [have] good intent have just attacked us again and again. The whole time, we’re like ‘cooperate with us … teach us, let’s find ways of solving problems together,’” to no avail, he said.
Moore said he would have liked to collaborate with major humanitarian organizations, such as the World Food Program, but that the U.N. has “been trying to sabotage us from the very beginning.”
“We’d really like the people whose job it has been to do this for many years to decide to help us,” he added. “Instead, they spread lies that originate in Hamas and try to shut us down, and I can’t think of anything more immoral than trying to shut down an operation that’s … feeding millions and millions of meals every day.”
Moore said details his staff on the ground in Gaza have heard from residents have been “a shock to us,” and revealing about other humanitarian aid groups’ conduct.
“Early on, we had a number of people who wanted to confirm that the aid was free, because in every other circumstance, their experience was that the aid that was coming in from the United Nations and other organizations was being taken and sold to them. It was unbelievable to them that we were giving this stuff away for free,” Moore said.
Moore pushed back against news stories associating death and killing in Gaza with the GHF and its distribution sites, slamming them as “lies.”
“We didn’t wait for a ceasefire to start our aid distribution. We’re distributing aid in the middle of a hot war,” he said. “There have been incidents in the Gaza Strip of civilians being killed. But what’s clear is that there is this very intentional disinformation campaign that is trying to say that … the GHF is a death trap, that we exist not to feed people 50 million meals, but to lure people. This is the lie that they keep telling.”
Hamas has dedicated extensive efforts to delegitimizing GHF in the eyes of the world and trying to threaten and scare Gaza residents seeking food from GHF, Moore said.
“They release these statistics every single day and they say that all these people are being killed at our aid sites or in close proximity to our aid sites,” Moore said. “This is their primary way of both trying to scare Gazans [from] getting our aid, trying to force us to shut down, trying to force European governments not to fund us, for the United Nations to continue opposing us.”
Moore has been actively pushing back on social media against false claims about GHF, and called on the media and international organizations to scrutinize claims from the terrorist organization in Gaza, “but no one is asking hard questions,” he lamented.
“What about the prolific evidence that we do have of Hamas intentionally killing people and then attributing their murder to the GHF or others?” he added.
Moore said that “sometimes you read all these crazy headlines and you’re like, ‘Am I deceiving myself here?’ but we’re actually talking to the people [of Gaza] every day, and it seems [reality] really is in many cases the exact opposite.”
On the ground in Gaza, Moore says people are adapting to GHF’s mode of distribution, with families often getting together to trade if one needs more of one product than another. GHF also tries to be flexible under the circumstances, having morning and evening distribution times when needed to keep the process more orderly.
Some Israeli politicians have maintained that providing aid for Gaza hinders the achievement of Israel’s war aims. Some on the right, who oppose letting any aid into Gaza, argue that if Hamas can pocket humanitarian aid and make money selling it, they will continue to control the enclave. And Hamas does still retain a significant measure of control over the area, despite more than 20 months of IDF operations.
Moore agreed with the argument that Hamas’ ability to take control of aid was “prolonging the conflict,” but said that GHF’s “mission is not related to the war.”
Still, he said that he thinks Hamas feels very threatened by GHF: “The fact is that Hamas continues to threaten Gazans and killed 12 of our local workers two weeks ago and nearly killed others and tortured others … Hamas took them to the Al Nasr Hospital and piled the dead and the injured outside … and wouldn’t let them get medical treatment, in order to send a message.”
“So I think it’s a hard argument to make that Hamas doesn’t oppose what we’re doing or isn’t somehow feeling threatened by what we’re doing,” Moore added. “Think of the fact that they issued bounties on the heads of Americans … They’re doing everything they can to shut [the GHF] down, which means that every time our aid workers, local or American, step into [Gaza], they are risking their lives in order to feed people.”
Moore noted that GHF does not operate in northern Gaza, where U.N. trucks continue to enter and are often taken by Hamas: “There was one day where 55 U.N. trucks went in and literally 52 were hijacked at gunpoint by Hamas or Hamas-linked militants,” he said. Another example he recalled was a time when “there was a [U.N.] truck that went in … Hamas wasn’t able to hijack the truck. So what does Hamas do? Hamas kills civilians around the truck to try to keep the civilians from getting what they can.”
“Amidst all of this, the U.N. literally told the BBC that none of their aid had been diverted. Zero. That was the official statement,” Moore said. “The U.N. is just lying through their teeth.”
Moore declined to share who funds GHF, but said that “the seed funding … principally came from a couple of countries, not Israel, that wanted to remain totally secret for political reasons.” Moore said he supports the decision of those countries not to reveal themselves, because of the negative narrative about the GHF, and expressed appreciation for the Trump administration for contributing to the foundation and encouraging others to do the same.
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Last month, Moore visited Syria with Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Foundation and a Syrian Muslim refugee who had fled the country. In Damascus, Moore met with al-Sharaa for nearly three hours.
Moore’s approach to al-Sharaa’s new government in Syria, he said, “comes down to two things. Number one … You’re saying nice things, but can we trust you? And number two, if we can trust you, are you actually capable of doing these things?”
Following the meeting, Moore said, “I absolutely believe there will be peace between Syria and Israel.”
“I think the first priority in Syria has to be the stabilization of Syria. But I definitely left that conversation with a very clear idea of what needed to be done, of how it could be done, and of the probability in the right time of it being done in order to see peace all across the region.”
There have been contradictory reports in recent days as to whether al-Sharaa is willing to acknowledge Israeli sovereignty in the Golan Heights. Moore suggested that peace between the countries may involve things that make both sides “uncomfortable.”
“I do think many of us, including many people in Israel, misread certain aspects of this new government, all for good reasons,” Moore added, referring to those who highlight al-Sharaa’s history as a leader of an Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. “Those of us who focus on the Middle East … have a tendency to be, we can be cynical, we can be conspiratorial, we can be a bit paranoid sometimes … But I always say the most valuable commodity in the Middle East is not oil or gas, it’s trust. If there’s no trust, nothing exists. And our visit was a trust-building exercise, and it was far more beneficial than I expected.”
Moore called al-Sharaa “a type of unicorn.”
“He comes from an Islamist orientation, no question whatsoever. But I’m not sure you can take this person and easily profile him,” Moore said. “This is the last gasp of a lot of extremists and when I met with Shahra, I viewed him as being more like [Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman] as almost any other of the leaders that I’ve that I’ve met with, in terms of his generation, and the way he talks about solving problems and all of these things. This is a younger generation of leaders in a region with a lot of older leaders who think only about the past. I think al-Sharaa, like MBS, and a few other leaders, are future-oriented.”
Moore called for the U.S. to help Syria rebuild, because the country’s economy and infrastructure are in shambles.
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Moore has also been a longstanding advocate for a strong U.S.-Israel relationship and evangelical support for Israel.
Asked about polls showing decreasing support for Israel among young evangelicals, and the rise of figures such as Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson who have used Christianity as an argument against such support, Moore said he thinks the decline is exaggerated as is the influence of the podcasters.
“For a long time, there was exaggerated concern about a rise of antisemitism on the right while we were watching this incredible surging of antisemitism on the left. Well, now, I’m sorry to say, but we’re seeing it on both sides,” Moore said. “Yet, it actually isn’t the right. OK, it’s a type of pseudo-libertarianism. You know that isn’t a part of the institutional right, but because of the internet, it’s much more influential.”
Still, he added, “I’m not seeing some of these actors becoming more influential among evangelicals. I’m seeing evangelicals reject these influencers as they start talking about things that evangelicals actually know quite well … like skepticism about, you know, the evangelical relationship with Israel.”
Moore said he summarizes the relationship between evangelicals worldwide with the Jewish community, and Israel in one sentence: “Your book is our book; your heroes are our heroes; and your values, while we interpret them differently, are our values.”
“You have this massively dispersed religious movement around the world, 700 million people, and they all generally feel the same, 80-90% of them, about the Jewish community and Israel, because they get it from the Bible,” he said. “I’m not focused very much on politics these days, as we try to feed Gaza, but I think the evangelical community all around the world is a positive force and I don’t think the macro trends are changing at all.”
Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff appeared to confirm this week that the U.S. had already lifted some oil sanctions on Iran

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Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) speaks with press in the Hart Senate Office Building on April 07, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Two Senate Republicans are urging the administration against lifting any sanctions on Iran in absence of real concessions from the regime, following comments from Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff indicating the U.S. had already rolled back some sanctions.
Witkoff, speaking on CNBC on Wednesday, appeared to confirm that President Donald Trump had lifted some oil sanctions on Iran this week, as a signal of cooperation to China and Iran. Trump also said at the NATO summit that Iran would “need money to put that country back into shape. We want to see that happen,” adding, “If they’re going to sell oil, they’re going to sell oil.”
The comments came after Trump posted on Truth Social earlier this week, “China can continue to purchase Oil from Iran” — comments that a senior White House official said did not indicate any policy shift or sanctions relief.
Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) told Jewish Insider he had heard Trump and Witkoff’s comments and that he was not sure what they were referring to, but said no sanctions should be removed until Iran ends its support for terrorism and guarantees that International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors have access to facilities in Iran.
“We’re trying to get additional details, because we’re hearing the sanctions are still there, as well they should be. They still have acts of terrorism. Until we can actually verify that they’ve actually set aside planting terrorism around the region, we need to continue to be able to put pressure on them,” Lankford told JI.
He said the U.S. should not be removing any sanctions at this point, noting, “We can’t verify anything on the ground yet. … They’re literally trying to be able to block out the future [International Atomic Energy Agency] certification,” referring to an Iranian parliament effort to block IAEA inspectors from Iran going forward.
“We know they don’t have the power and the ability to be able to highly enrich uranium at this point, but we don’t have the ability, still, to be able to verify things on the ground,” Lankford continued. “And we have no shift in their policy, as far as we can tell — and certainly not in their charter — on what their stand is for terrorism in the region and to us.”
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said that sanctions relief should “[depend] on what we get for it. If we get complete denuclearization and a peace between Israel and Iran, that might be worth talking about.”
He said that the U.S. should not remove any sanctions preemptively.
“We should get something for it. Certainly, Iran is back on its heels now, and this is exactly the right time to negotiate some sort of long-standing arrangement,” Cornyn said. “I wouldn’t do anything preemptive.”
Reps. Schneider, Bacon, Panetta and Nunn traveled to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain last week

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Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan al-Saud seen during the 2nd ASEAN GCC Summit at Kuala Lumpur.
Three House members who traveled to the Middle East last week told Jewish Insider on Friday that Arab leaders expressed to them concern about a potential broadening of the conflict between Israel and Iran, even as they acknowledged the threat posed by Iran and its nuclear program.
The trip, sponsored by the Atlantic Council’s N7 Initiative and the Jeffrey M. Talpins Foundation, took Reps. Brad Schneider (D-IL), Don Bacon (R-NE), Jimmy Panetta (D-CA) and Zach Nunn (R-IA) to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain immediately following Israel’s initial attacks on Iran. A stop in Israel was initially planned, but ultimately became infeasible due to the evolving war between Israel and Iran.
The initial goal of the trip was to discuss the Abraham Accords and their potential expansion.
The lawmakers said that the Arab leaders they met with were concerned that the war between Iran and Israel would expand and escalate, and their countries would be caught in the crossfire — particularly the UAE and Bahrain, given the presence of American bases in their countries. The conversations took place before the U.S. struck Iranian nuclear facilities on Saturday night.
“We heard quite a bit about their concerns with respect to a nuclear-armed Iran that would be an existential threat to every one of those countries,” Schneider said, “but also a desire to deescalate what’s happening because they rightly see [that] every day the war goes on is another day for an unintended consequence or an inadvertent escalation that could directly involve any of the Gulf countries.”
Schneider noted that the countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, have publicly condemned Israel’s attacks, but he said that in private conversations, the lawmakers heard a more nuanced message and stronger opposition to Iran’s nuclear program.
“While they’re not going to celebrate what Israel is doing, certainly they are not going to cry over Israel’s success in handling Iran’s nuclear program,” he said.
Panetta said that the Arab leaders also clearly understood why Israel had taken the action that it had.
“The leadership of the countries we met with, they understand how disruptive, how much of a destabilizing force, the regime of Iran is to the region of the Middle East,” Panetta said, adding that the pushback they heard against the conflict was not as strong as he anticipated.
Bacon also said that the Emirati and Bahraini leaders were clear about the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, but preferred a diplomatic solution to the problem.
Bacon said the Saudis “held their cards much more tightly.”
“They were much more worried about Israel initiating this and they focused more on Gaza than anything else,” Bacon said. “In the end, if you pushed them, they would acknowledge Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, but their public face was much more critical of Israel than the other countries.”
Panetta said Saudi leaders did not discuss whether they’d be willing to use their own forces to intercept attacks from Iran on Israel, as they did during Iran’s April 2024 attack on Israel.
Privately, Bacon said, Arab leaders were in “awe of what Israel’s been able to do” in its operations inside Iran and knew “that only Israel could pull something off like this.” Bacon said he also sensed relief from those countries that Israel was addressing the threat from Iran.
The lawmakers indicated that the normalization process between Saudi Arabia and Israel had been dealt setbacks by and since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. They said that the Saudis are demanding concrete progress toward a two-state solution before moving forward on normalization.
Schneider said that the Saudi deputy foreign minister indicated that “there has to be an irreversible path to a Palestinian state. It doesn’t have a timeline, it’s not saying a state tomorrow. I think there was recognition that that pathway and progress towards it must not be seen as a reward for Hamas and its actions on Oct. 7 and otherwise.”
“There needs to be hope and a pathway for the Palestinians for the Saudis to move forward,” Schneider continued.
Panetta noted that he had met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Oct. 6, 2023, and left with “great hope” for normalization, but that two subsequent meetings with Saudi leadership made clear that, “the Palestinian issue is definitely something that needs to be addressed prior to normalization.”
Bacon said he challenged Saudi leaders on the issue of who in the Palestinian Authority would be willing to live and coexist peacefully with Israel as the leaders of a Palestinian state, “and I didn’t hear a good answer back.”
Schneider said that there was “no love for Hamas in any of our conversations,” and that Arab leaders recognized the issues within the PA and the need for a true partner for peace with Israel.
Panetta argued that, if the Saudis want to see a two-state solution develop, “it’s incumbent upon them to be involved in these types of discussions. And what that entails is obviously something that’s going to continue to develop during the hopefully diplomatic negotiations that we must continue to have.”
Bacon added that his impression was that if Iran were “defeated significantly” by Israel, it would increase the opportunities in the longer term for the expansion of the Abraham Accords.
In spite of the regional tensions the war in Gaza has produced, the lawmakers said that Emirati and Bahraini leaders highlighted the benefits they have experienced from the Abraham Accords as they relate to Gaza, including regular access and communication to the senior levels of the Israeli government and, in the case of the UAE, easier access to provide aid to Gaza.
Bacon added that the leaders of those countries expressed “no weakening” of their commitments to the agreements, and instead focused on the benefits.
Schneider said that the Arab leaders are eager to pursue an economically prosperous future, and are focused on ensuring that Iran and other malign actors cannot disrupt that.
Bacon said that the group had hoped to continue on to Israel, the final stop on their original itinerary, by driving in from Jordan, but that plan was blocked by House Ethics Committee staff, who are responsible for oversight of privately sponsored congressional travel.
Panetta also noted that the State Department and Department of Defense did not support the prospect of the lawmakers traveling to Israel in the midst of the conflict.
Schneider said that there was “never any hesitation” from the group’s members about going forward with the trip, which left a day after Israel launched its attacks, before the scope and nature of Iran’s retaliation was clear.
“Over the course of the days, it became clear that Israel was vastly overperforming expectations and Iran was vastly underperforming expectations and so the dynamic changed every day, but what I can say is, we spent our last two days in UAE — life was normal,” Schneider said.
‘We are deeply concerned about a lack of preparation, strategy, and clearly defined objectives, and the enormous risk to Americans and civilians in the region’

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Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer speaks to the media during a weekly press conference in the Capitol Building in Washington DC, on Tuesday, March 12, 2024.
Asserting that President Donald Trump “owes Congress and the American people a strategy for U.S. engagement” in the Middle East, top Senate Democrats on Wednesday cautioned against potential U.S. strikes on Iran and argued that the president would need congressional authorization to conduct such an operation.
The signatories to the statement include Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sens. Chris Coons (D-DE), Patty Murray (D-WA), Jack Reed (D-RI) and Mark Warner (D-VA), the top Democrats on several key Senate committees and subcommittees. The statement suggests that a direct U.S. military intervention in Iran would see little support among Senate Democrats.
Trump has indicated that he is considering carrying out strikes inside Iran but has yet to make a final decision.
“Intensifying military actions between Israel and Iran represent a dangerous escalation that risks igniting a broader regional war,” the statement reads. “As President Trump reportedly considers expanding U.S. engagement in the war, we are deeply concerned about a lack of preparation, strategy, and clearly defined objectives, and the enormous risk to Americans and civilians in the region.”
The lawmakers said they are “alarmed by the Trump administration’s failure to provide answers to fundamental questions” and demanded that the president seek authorization from Congress “if he is considering taking the country to war.”
“Congress has not provided authorization for military action against Iran – we will not rubberstamp military intervention that puts the United States at risk,” the Democrats said. “Our foremost duty is to safeguard American citizens wherever they reside and to protect our troops serving on the front lines. The United States cannot sleepwalk into a third war in as many decades. Congress has a critical role to play in this moment.”
Legislation has been introduced in the Senate to bar military action against Iran, which could come up for a vote as soon as next week.
“[Trump] owes Congress and the American people a strategy for U.S. engagement in the region. We need a clear, detailed plan outlining the goals, risks, cost, and timeline for any proposed mission, as well as how he will ensure the safe evacuation of Americans in harm’s way all across the region,” they continued. “We demand immediate, detailed answers on these and other urgent matters to determine the way forward.
At the same time, the statement describes Iran as a threat to the U.S. and its allies that “must not be allowed to attain a nuclear weapon.”
“The United States stands firm in our support for the continued defense of Israel, our partner and ally,” they said. “Our commitment to Israel remains ironclad and we urge the administration to defend Israel against the barrage of Iranian airstrikes, including through the provision of additional air defense capabilities.”
A State Department directory lists Ortagus as a senior policy advisor at the mission to the U.N., according to a screenshot obtained by JI

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Morgan Ortagus speaks onstage during 2024 Concordia Annual Summit at Sheraton New York Times Square on September 25, 2024 in New York City.
Morgan Ortagus, who joined the Trump administration as Steve Witkoff’s deputy Middle East special envoy, has now moved to a position at the U.S. mission to the United Nations, a State Department source told Jewish Insider.
A State Department directory lists Ortagus as a senior policy advisor at the mission to the U.N., according to a screenshot obtained by JI.
Ortagus left Witkoff’s office after a widespread purge of Israel and Iran officials at the National Security Council. Ortagus is close with Mike Waltz, President Donald Trump’s former national security advisor who is now his pick to serve as ambassador to the UN.
Ortagus served as the State Department spokesperson during Trump’s first term, becoming a familiar face advocating for the president’s foreign policy priorities.
The last 24 hours have seen a sharp pivot from Trump to a more hard-line approach to Tehran

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U.S. President Donald Trump stops and talks to the media before he boards Marine One on the South Lawn at the White House on June 15, 2025 in Washington, DC.
While the last two months have been an exercise in diplomacy for Trump administration officials, who have crisscrossed the Middle East and Europe in an attempt to negotiate with Iran over its nuclear program, the last 24 hours have seen a sharp pivot from President Donald Trump to a more hard-line approach to Tehran.
“UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER,” the president posted on his Truth Social site on Tuesday afternoon, understood to be a message to Iran after more than five days of Israeli attacks meant to degrade Tehran’s military and nuclear infrastructure. Iranian reprisals have paralyzed Israel, but resulted in damage that has fallen far short of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s threats. Khamenei responded on Wednesday that “the Iranian nation will not surrender.”
The president’s post, made following his early departure from the G7 summit in Alberta, Canada, but before his Situation Room sit-down with senior advisors, signaled Trump’s new approach to the regional conflict.
Trump’s latest comments underscore his shift away from the isolationist elements of the GOP that have dominated his administration since a purge of more traditional foreign policy-minded Republicans, including former National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. As The New York Times’ Ross Douthat wrote on Tuesday, Trump’s isolationist supporters “imagined that personnel was policy, that the realists and would-be restrainers in Trump’s orbit would have a decisive influence. That was clearly a mistake, and the lesson here is that Trump decides and no one else.”
As the president’s position further crystalized — also Tuesday, he called Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei an “easy target,” but said the U.S. would not assassinate him, “at least not for now” — his post-G7 rhetoric trickled down to his inner circle.
Trump “may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment,” Vice President JD Vance posted on X yesterday. “That decision ultimately belongs to the president. And of course, people are right to be worried about foreign entanglement after the last 25 years of idiotic foreign policy. But I believe the president has earned some trust on this issue. … Whatever he does, that is his focus.”
It’s a notable shift from Vance, too, who has been one of the most prominent opponents of preemptive military action in the Middle East. (Vance opposed U.S. strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen earlier this year.)
Journalist Eli Lake noted on Tuesday that Trump’s “inner circle deliberating on Iran policy is very small and has been fairly tight-lipped,” adding that those advising him on Iran include Vance, Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and CIA Director John Ratcliffe. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Lake said, is “occasionally” part of the group, but was absent from recent Camp David conversations about Israel and Iran.
On Capitol Hill, while Republicans appear publicly split on the level of involvement that the U.S. should have in the conflict — from working with Israel to destroy the Fordow nuclear facility to forcing Iran’s hand in diplomatic talks — JI’s conversations with legislators indicate a different approach behind the scenes. One senior Republican senator who requested anonymity to discuss internal conference dynamics estimated that nearly the entire GOP conference is privately united on the issue of the U.S. supporting Israel in bombing the Fordow facility if Israel needs such support. Read more from JI’s Emily Jacobs and Marc Rod here.
“I think the president has struck the right position,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told JI earlier this week, “which is supportive of Israel’s right of self-defense, which is what this really is, and supporting them publicly while they defend themselves. I think that’s the right position to stick on.” Read more of Hawley’s comments here.
Trump has “handled this situation very deftly,” Hawley added. “I think his message has been pretty clear, which is that Iran is not going to get a nuke. So they can either surrender their nuclear program peaceably, and he’s willing to [have] the United States facilitate that, or the Israelis are going to blow their program to smithereens. Right now they’re choosing the smithereens route.”
Author Dan Senor offers a new frame of thinking in light of Gulf state investment deals

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Call Me Back podcast host Dan Senor moderates a session with WashU Chancellor Andrew D. Martin and University of Michigan President Santa Ono at the ADL Never is Now event at Javits Center on March 03, 2025 in New York City.
Midway through June, the Middle East looks very different than it did when President Donald Trump traveled to the region just last month.
Trump was feted by Gulf monarchs, as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates sought to make their mark on a business-savvy president by touting hundreds of billions of dollars in investments and trade deals.
Israel was an afterthought on the trip; Trump didn’t even visit. Iran nuclear talks were happening, but nonproliferation and geopolitics were secondary discussion topics to Trump’s checkbook diplomacy.
Israeli tech leaders at the time acknowledged that Israel cannot compete with the oil-rich Gulf states when it comes to investment dollars, and instead urged Israel to consider unique ways for the two countries to collaborate.
Now, with Israeli strikes on Iran entering their sixth day, the best way to get Trump’s attention in the region — at least for the moment — is no longer financial prowess. It’s firepower.
“I think what you saw over the last few days is Israel’s alternative model to checkbook diplomacy,” author and podcast host Dan Senor said in a Saturday episode of “The Prof G Pod,” hosted by NYU professor Scott Galloway.
“Israel has its own way of competing, because what Israel is demonstrating is, ‘Yeah, we’re not going to be the country that personally has sheikhs and emirs who can write checks for billions and trillions of dollars into the American economy,’” Senor said. “‘But we are the most capable ally in the world, and you, the United States, are going to get more out of this relationship than you give.’”
Trump amped up his rhetoric against Iran on Tuesday, a clear escalation after his more restrained posture in the early days of Israel’s strikes on the Islamic Republic.
“We now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran,” he wrote in a post on TruthSocial, blurring the lines between Israel and the U.S. “Our patience is wearing thin,” he wrote in another. “We know exactly where the so-called “Supreme Leader” is hiding. He is an easy target, but is safe there – We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now.” Trump rounded out his posting spree with a straightforward message: “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has staked everything — his legacy, his global standing, his relationships with world powers — on defending Israel against the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran

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Streaks of light from Iranian ballistic missiles are seen in the night sky above Hebron, West Bank, as Iran resumes its retaliatory strikes against Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has staked everything — his legacy, his global standing, his relationships with world powers — on defending Israel against the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.
The topic has dominated nearly every major address the prime minister has given, from U.N. General Assembly speeches to addresses to Congress, for the last 15 years. And over the last four days, Israel has been forced to put into action a plan that was years in the making — one that could profoundly reshape the Middle East in the days and months to come.
As Israeli journalist Amit Segal notes, “And so Netanyahu’s life mission became dismantling Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Over the years, in meetings with U.S. presidents, the incumbent president would raise the Palestinian issue, while Netanyahu would focus on the Iranian threat. Menachem Begin destroyed Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981, Ehud Olmert did the same to Syria’s reactor in 2007, and Netanyahu vowed to do likewise with Iran.”
The writer Douglas Murray forecasted exactly this situation 13 years ago, speaking at the Cambridge Union: “When Israel is pushed to the situation it will be pushed to of having to believe [Iran] mean[s] it, and when every bit of jiggery pokery behind the scenes runs out, and when the U.N. and distinguished figures have run out of time, and Iran is about to produce its first bomb,” Murray said at the time, “Israel will strike.”
Israel’s Friday morning strikes came as the Trump administration’s announced 60-day deadline for negotiations expired, and following intelligence reports indicating that Iran was weeks away from nuclear capabilities — as Murray predicted.
What has ensued is the deadliest and most destructive direct conflict between Israel and Iran in history. At least 24 Israelis have been confirmed killed since Friday night in strikes around the country.
For the last three nights, Israelis around the country have stumbled into safe rooms and public shelters as Iran bombarded the country with ballistic missiles.
And while the barrages, meant to overwhelm Israel’s defensive systems, have inflicted damage across the country, the vast majority of the roughly 350 missiles fired from Iran and Yemen over the last 72 hours have been intercepted by Israel’s missile-defense systems.
With Iran believed to still have nearly 2,000 ballistic missiles in its arsenal, the ongoing air raid sirens and attacks around the country could continue for weeks, stranding the more than 150,000 Israelis currently abroad as Israeli airspace remains closed. Israel’s Channel 12 reported today that repatriation flights may begin in the coming days, allowing stranded Israelis to return home.
In the last 72 hours, more than a decade of warnings have crystallized into reality, a culmination of years of diplomatic efforts, proxy battles and intelligence operations. What happens in the ensuing days and weeks will not only determine the strategic balance of the region — it has the potential to reset the global order.
Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate said he was ‘deeply concerned’ by Israel’s strikes on Iran

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, speaks during a debate at the CBS Broadcast Center on October 1, 2024 in New York City. This is expected to be the only vice presidential debate of the 2024 general election. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, criticizing Israel’s strikes on Iran and the Trump administration’s global posture, suggested that China might be better positioned than the United States to broker peace in the Middle East.
The 2024 Democratic vice presidential nominee was a favorite of Israel critics on the left during the vice presidential selection process and praised anti-Israel protesters during the campaign. He is seen as a potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidate.
“I truly worry now. I’m sure there’s some great strategic thinkers in the Trump administration that have now said, how is this going to — a tweet from the President today said, ‘I told them, I told them, they should have done something and here we are,’” Walz said at a Center for American Progress event, to chuckles from the audience. “Yeah, here we are with the Middle East back on fire in a way that has now expanded.
He said he is “deeply concerned” about the Israeli strikes on Iran.
“Iran has to retaliate in their mind, I’m sure,” Walz continued. “And now, who is the voice in the world that can negotiate some type of agreement in this, who holds the moral authority? Who holds the ability to do that? Because we are not seen as a neutral actor, and maybe we never were, I don’t want to tell anybody that … but I think there was at least an attempt to be somewhat of an arbitrator in this.”
“Consistently, over and over again, we’re going to have to face the reality, it might be the Chinese,” Walz said, “and that goes against everything [the Trump administration] say they’re trying to do in terms of the balance of power.”
.@GovTimWalz on Israel's preemptive strikes: "Iran has to retaliate in their mind I'm sure and now, who is the voice in the world that can negotiate some kind type agreement in this? Who holds the moral authority…we are not seen as a natural actor…it might be the Chinese…" pic.twitter.com/pi4tpnc4lD
— CSPAN (@cspan) June 13, 2025
Walz also described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as “intolerable.”
“It became a central focus in the campaign — and I would say rightfully so,” Walz said. “Human rights issues, how we’re going to try and attempt to get a two state solution where we can allow folks to live peacefully and coexist and have their own self control, or self determination.”
In 'The Most American King,' author Aaron Magid argues that the Jordanian king’s staying power is what makes him interesting — and that the relative stability he has overseen demands attention in a region so often beset by chaos elsewhere

Thierry Monasse/Getty Images
King of Jordan Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein attends a signature of a Partnership Agreement in the Berlaymont, the EU Commission headquarter on January 29, 2025 in Brussels, Belgium. Today the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and the European Commission are poised to solidify a strategic partnership through an agreement.
American fascination with the Middle East and its colorful leaders — dictators and military generals and royals and Israeli premiers — dates back decades, from Saddam Hussein to Iran’s ayatollahs to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
One ruler has survived more or less unscathed over more than a quarter century, avoiding flashy headlines about power struggles or coups, all while keeping a tight grip on power and maintaining close, bipartisan ties with Washington.
That’s Jordan’s King Abdullah II, who has ruled the country since 1999, taking over from his father, King Hussein, who ruled for 47 years. In The Most American King, a new biography of King Abdullah, author Aaron Magid argues that the Jordanian king’s staying power is what makes him interesting — and that the relative stability he has overseen demands attention in a region so often beset by chaos elsewhere.
“Jordan is a critical U.S. strategic partner, both in terms of money and in terms of U.S. troops — there are thousands of U.S. troops based in Jordan,” Magid, a Middle East analyst and former Amman-based journalist, told Jewish Insider in an interview this week. “But unfortunately, journalists often chase violence and wars and conflicts, and the Hashemite Kingdom has been remarkably stable over the past 25 years … Jordan, because it has less violence, it gets a lower media profile.” (Magid was a reporter at JI from 2016 to 2018.)
The book charts King Abdullah’s journey from boarding school in the U.S. and studying at Georgetown University to ruling a country whose language he hardly spoke, given his many years spent living and learning abroad. But it’s that intimate knowledge of American culture that, Magid argues, has allowed King Abdullah to cultivate the kind of lasting, bipartisan relationships with lawmakers that many other nations covet. King Abdullah was the first Arab leader to meet with Presidents Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Donald Trump — in both terms — in the White House.
Magid drew a distinction between Washington’s longtime relationship with Amman and Trump’s efforts this year to build closer ties with Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, each of which he visited in May.
“Qatar, which President Trump visited recently, is the same country that Trump called for a blockade against in 2017 for supporting terrorism. And Saudi Arabia, of course, right now might be close with Trump, but when the Democrats were in power, President Biden called them a pariah, and there’s a lot of Democratic opposition to Saudi Arabia,” Magid explained. “What makes Jordan unique is its ability to be close with both presidents and then have those very strong security ties as well.”
Jordan receives roughly $1.45 billion a year from the U.S., making it one of the largest recipients of American foreign assistance dollars. That’s despite King Abdullah’s public criticism of Israel, America’s strongest ally in the Middle East — and even harsher language from his wife, Queen Rania, who is of Palestinian descent.
Still, despite taking a publicly hardline stance against Israel’s conduct in Gaza, King Abdullah has not seriously considered pulling Jordan out of its 1994 peace treaty with Israel, nor has he severed the crucial security ties between the two countries. Jordan also helped shoot down Iranian missiles fired at Israel last year.
“There were many disagreements with [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, personally … but at the same time, King Abdullah has ensured that even though many in the country support annulling the peace treaty, he’s refused to do that,” said Magid. “Part of the reason he does that is because he’s been getting about $1.5 billion a year from Congress, and if he were to sever the peace deal, it would be unlikely he would reach that number of aid, and that aid is critical for the country. But I think he does understand that having some sort of relationship with Israel is in his benefit and his national security interest.”
In his book, Magid reveals that King Abdullah’s public criticism of Israel was not a foregone conclusion.
“There was a honeymoon period in terms of King Abdullah’s relationship with Israel as king, and it lasted about a year, 1999 and 2000. He says in an interview, ‘I have many friends in the IDF.’ That’s not language you would ever hear from King Abdullah today,” Magid recounted. “He praised Ehud Barak as someone who is great to work with, not something you’d ever hear him say again about an Israeli prime minister. And then he even said that Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon raised Israel’s moral credibility. Once again, you’d never hear King Abdullah or any Jordanian official say anything positive about Israel’s morals in today’s day and age.”
King Abdullah has generally succeeded at balancing the concerns of Jordan’s population, the majority of whom are Palestinian, with the nation’s security needs, argues Magid. But he has “done a very poor job of providing jobs for his people,” Magid said.
“Part of the issue for King Abdullah is he doesn’t have a grand accomplishment, either on the domestic front or on the foreign policy one,” said Magid. “But unlike his father, who had these grand moves, he has been much more toned down.”
During the reign of King Hussein, Jordan had some major victories, both strategic and tactical, as well as some major setbacks — like losing control of Jerusalem and the West Bank in the 1967 war with Israel. Still, the stability that King Abdullah has maintained is coupled with a high unemployment rate and a move even further away from democracy, which does not help his image in the eyes of his countrymen.
“When you ask people, often behind closed doors, who is more popular, his father or him, most people will say his father. His father was loved,” said Magid. “But it’s difficult to know, exactly, given that you can go to jail — and many people have gone to jail in Jordan — for criticizing the king.”
Plus, U.S. pours cold water on Macron’s Palestinian summit

ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
State Department Sikorsky HH-60L Black Hawk helicopters as they fly over Baghdad towards the U.S. embassy headquarters on December 13, 2024.
Good Thursday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we talk to analysts about the significance of the evacuation of some State Department personnel and military families from the Middle East and the likelihood of a military strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. We report on the defeat of two resolutions in the Senate yesterday to stop weapon sales to Qatar and the UAE, and cover comments by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on the status of the Qatari luxury jet gift. We talk to GOP senators about French President Emmanuel Macron’s campaign for international recognition of a Palestinian state, examine the findings of a new Quinnipiac poll that illustrates deepening partisanship over Israel, and have the scoop on a push by the Orthodox Union calling on the Senate to pass the Educational Choice for Children Act. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Van Jones, Rev. Johnnie Moore and Rabbi Abraham Cooper.
What We’re Watching
- The House Appropriations Committee will conduct its full committee markup of the 2026 defense and homeland security funding bills.
- The House Armed Services Committee will hold a hearing on the Department of Defense’s 2026 budget request with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine.
- The Senate Committee on Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs will hold a hearing on the nomination of Sean Plankey to be director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
- The Zionist Organization of America is holding its annual legislative lobbying day at the Capitol.
- Argentine President Javier Milei is being presented with the Genesis Prize today at Jerusalem’s Museum of Tolerance.
What You Should Know
A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV HARKOV
Since the Israeli strike on Iran’s air defenses in October, Jerusalem has sought a green light, or something close to it, from Washington to strike the Islamic Republic’s nuclear sites. President Donald Trump, however, repeatedly told Israel to hold off as he pursued a diplomatic agreement with Tehran to stop its enrichment program.
Now, after the Iranian nuclear program has continued apace and Trump has voiced frustration over Tehran’s intransigence, it seems that Jerusalem’s patience for diplomacy is running out.
Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer and Mossad chief David Barnea will be meeting Trump’s top negotiator Steve Witkoff on Friday ahead of the sixth round of talks with Iran in Oman on Sunday “in an additional attempt to clarify Israel’s stance,” an official in Jerusalem said, amid persistent reports and strong indications that Israel is prepared to strike Iran.
After a call with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu last week, Trump said that if Tehran does not agree to give up uranium enrichment, the situation will get “very, very dire.” On Wednesday, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said that “there have been plenty of indications” that Iran is moving towards weaponization of its nuclear program, and Gen. Michael “Erik” Kurilla, the chief of CENTCOM, said that he presented Trump and Hegseth with numerous options to attack Iran if nuclear talks break down.
Hours later, the State Department began to move some personnel out of Iraq and the military suggested that servicemembers’ families depart the Middle East, while the U.K. warned about a potential “escalation of military activity” in the region. Such evacuations are often the first step to reduce risk ahead of a large-scale military operation.
Trump told reporters that the evacuations are happening because the Middle East “could be a dangerous place, and we’ll see what happens.” More on this from Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod here.
Kurilla postponed his testimony before the Senate planned for Thursday. Staff at U.S. embassies and consulates throughout the Middle East were told to take safety precautions, and those stationed in Israel were told not to leave the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, Jerusalem or Beersheva.
Multiple news outlets published reports citing anonymous American officials that Israel is ready to strike Iran without help from the U.S. One possible reason for the timing — moving forward even as Washington and Tehran are set to enter a sixth round of talks on Sunday — is that Iran has reportedly begun to rebuild the air defenses that Israel destroyed last year. Iranian Armed Forces Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri reportedly said last month: “We are witnessing a remarkable improvement in the capability and readiness of the country’s air defense.”
PARIS PUSHBACK
GOP senators criticize France’s Macron for defying U.S. with Palestinian statehood push

French President Emmanuel Macron’s campaign for international recognition of a Palestinian state and championing of an upcoming United Nations conference on the subject despite U.S. opposition has received a frosty reception from Senate Republicans, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs reports. France is set to co-chair “The High Level International Conference for the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution” with Saudi Arabia at the U.N. headquarters in New York next week. Several senators described it as a distraction from U.S. efforts to secure peace in the region while praising the Trump administration’s decision to urge U.N. member states against participating.
Republican reactions: “It certainly sounds like they take us for granted and think that they can act without consequence. France has a long history of doing this in foreign policy. They’re consistently a problem and have been forever, but I’d say it’s very unhelpful of them at this present moment,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told JI. “They’ve generally had a cozy relationship with Iran that is purely driven by economic ties, maybe some historic ties. It makes no sense to me. I don’t think it’s well received by our administration,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) said.
Read the full story here with additional comments from Sens. John Kennedy (R-LA), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Markwayne Mullin (R-OK).