Representatives of Syria’s Druze, Christian and Alawite communities warned members of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom on Thursday about the systematic targeting, persecution and atrocities their communities have endured under the new Syrian government led by President Ahmad al-Sharaa.

They urged the U.S. to condition the removal of remaining sanctions on Syria and its evolving partnership with the Syrian government on the government’s efforts to protect religious minorities and prevent further atrocities. Members of the commission, an independent body created by Congress, likewise expressed alarm about the pattern of violations against Syria’s minorities.

The Trump administration is currently urging Congress to fully repeal the remaining sanctions on Syria under the Caesar Civilian Protection Act, but some key players on Capitol Hill remain reticent given the human rights situation for minorities and other concerns inside Syria. The Senate passed legislation repealing the sanctions in its version of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, and the provision could be included in the final bill.

Rita Khairbek, a Syrian Alawite therapist and activist, said that the Alawite community has faced discrimination in various aspects of public life, as well as disappearances, abductions, beatings, murder, rape and executions and frequent incitement to violence against them.

During an attack on Alawite communities earlier this year, Khairbek said that more than 5,000 people were killed in two days, including 300 children, a figure that could not be independently verified by Jewish Insider and is higher than other documented estimates that place the toll at around 1,500.

She described the attacks as a “genocide,” going on to describe a range of other violations —  “dehumanization, discrimination. … [We are] isolated … massacres, the long destruction of our community life. Women abducted, children orphaned and shrines destroyed.”

“As a therapist, I see the after image: chronic fear, sleepless children, maps where our presence is rubbed out,” she continued. “Genocide is not only by body, it’s by symbol and by the slow destruction of our name.”

Khairbek urged the United States to condition its future work with the Syrian government on its protection of minorities, support an independent investigation of the attack on the Alawite community, protect survivors and work to support Alawite civil society.

Nuri Kino, a Syriac Orthodox Christian investigative journalist, emphasized that the Syrian Christian community has shrunk dramatically since the start of the country’s civil war, a situation faced by other minority groups in Syria as well, and that the shrinking of minority communities has not stopped since the fall of the Assad regime.

Kino said that churches have been attacked and burned, families kidnapped, their homes destroyed and grave sites desecrated. And he said that the international community has responded with sympathy but no action.

“What is happening now is ethno-religious cleansing, a slow, systematic removal of indigenous minorities through fear, violence and dispossession,” Kino said. “Yet the international community has largely responded with silence. Sanctions were eased without guarantees for minority protection.”

He said that the U.S. must put pressure on the Syrian government, including conditioning aid and sanctions relief, on “clear measurable religious freedom benchmarks” to be verified by an independent international monitor, secure guarantees that the government will protect religious sites, fund Syrian aid and human rights groups led by minorities and establish a U.S. special envoy for religious freedom in Syria reporting directly to the secretary of state.

Jamil Ammar, a Druze activist, said that the campaign of violence against the Druze community in the southern Syrian city of Suweida was deliberate, planned and even rehearsed in a smaller Druze community. 

The attacks began, Ammar said, with a disinformation campaign to incite hatred against the Druze community, followed quickly by an assault by armed forces from both the government and Bedouin tribes. The massacres, he added, have come immediately after disarmament operations by state forces. And he accused al-Sharaa of publicly thanking and supporting those responsible for the massacres.

Ammar said that the attacks have included an ISIS-style campaign of psychological warfare, where fighters have raped and killed victims and left their bodies in public places to intimidate the Druze and attempt to chase them off the land.

He characterized the current U.S. approach to the Syrian government as “wishful thinking” that was ultimately “transactional” and would create a “security risk.”

He urged the U.S. to monitor the new school curricula in Syria — through which he accused the government of attempting to indoctrinate a new generation of extremists — to consult with the entire array of the Druze community and to work to empower moderate Syrian Sunnis at the expense of the Sunni extremists he said currently control the Syrian government.

The witnesses differed in their recommendations to the commission on whether the U.S. should support a program of decentralization in Syria, in which local sectarian groups would be empowered at the expense of the central government and would be armed to maintain their own security.

Some argued that would be the only way to ensure the safety and protection of the minority communities, while others said that decentralization is not a viable solution and might only further exacerbate the existing problems and create more conflict.

Commissioners Meir Soloveichik and Steven Schneck also expressed concerns about the situation for religious minorities in Syria.

Soloveichick said he was “alarmed” by the Syrian government’s “lack of will or ability” to stop the attacks against a range of religious minorities, and noted that reports indicate that the Syrian government authorities were involved in and exacerbated the violence.

He also highlighted that HTS, the rebel group which al-Sharaa formerly led, has long been a cause for concern for the commission given its violations of religious freedom in the territory it controlled.

Schneck said he was also concerned about the “pronounced deterioration” of conditions for religious minorities in Syria. He further noted that, as of 2024, the commission found that nonstate actors like HTS had been, prior to the Assad regime’s fall, worse violators of religious liberties than the regime itself.

Aaron Zelin, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who also testified before the commission, painted a more complex picture of the situation, arguing that some incidents should be seen as political or acts of vigilantism targeting those involved with the Assad regime rather than sectarian violence, though he also acknowledged there have been real and serious massacres and other incidents.

“This goes to a fundamental issue related to Syria’s transition thus far, the incomplete and slow transitional justice process,” Zelin said. “The biggest issue today now in Syria is a lack of trust amongst many communities, and therefore a lack of transparency is undermining all of this. It’s worth noting, because there is no process to deal with bringing people involved in war crimes during the war to justice.”

Zelin also said that al-Sharaa has expressed a commitment to the rule of law and its equal application to all groups and that the Syrian government has attempted to engage at some levels with minority communities. But he acknowledged al-Sharaa himself has not met with the Alawite community.

Zelin said the the U.S. should urge the Syrian government to limit access to weapons and decommission nonstate forces, be more transparent about transitional justice processes and implement a long-term national and local dialogue project among majority and minority communities — rather than the brief, one-time dialogue convened by the new government.

While Congress is working on a bill to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization in the U.S., and the Islamist group is banned from Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and beyond, the group’s status in Israel is much more complicated.

The matter drew renewed attention this week after Mansour Abbas, the leader of the Ra’am party in the Knesset, an ideological offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, declined to call for the eradication of Hamas on Israeli radio.

In an interview with Israeli public broadcaster KAN, Abbas mostly lamented the high rate of crime and gun violence in Israeli-Arab society, but when he mentioned Gaza, the interviewer, Asaf Liberman, asked whether he sees Hamas as part of the enclave’s future.

“Palestinian society needs to pick its leadership and go on a new path towards peace and reconciliation,” Abbas responded. 

Liberman twice repeated his question and sharpened it: “Does Hamas need to be destroyed?”

Abbas added that an international force must enter Gaza and after an interim period a security force of the Palestinian Authority would be trained, but after being pressed to make his position on Hamas clear, he said the interview was beginning to feel like an “interrogation,” and pointed out that he had gone on air to talk about domestic issues facing Arab Israelis. “If you want to talk about crime, fine, if not, bye,” he said, before hanging up. 

Abbas has previously condemned Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks, calling them unjustifiable and inhumane, and called for the release of the hostages. The other reporter who conducted the interview, Suleiman Maswadeh, later noted that Abbas and his family had recently received death threats, and hinted that was the reason the Knesset member avoided repeating his previously articulated position — which Maswadeh said does not include a future for Hamas in the governance of Gaza.

In 2021, the Ra’am party became the first Arab party in 50 years to join an Israeli governing coalition, which was celebrated by many in Israel and abroad as a milestone for coexistence, while the Israeli right criticized the 2021-2022 government for what it characterized as working with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Monday’s interview sparked headlines and analysis in right-leaning Israeli media and comments by politicians on the right about the viability of center and left-wing parties once again forming a coalition with Ra’am to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, when Ra’am’s leader would not say that he is for eradicating Hamas.

“The Muslim Brotherhood is a very generic term,” said Michael Milshtein, head of the Palestinian Studies Forum at the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University. “It’s not membership in an organization; it’s a denomination. Mansour Abbas is the Muslim Brotherhood. Raed Salah, his rival, is also the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood. [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan is the Muslim Brotherhood.”

The historic and recent connections between Hamas and Ra’am, both of which were founded by adherents of the Muslim Brotherhood, shed light on the nuances of the international Sunni Islamist movement and its status in Israel.

Michael Milshtein, head of the Palestinian Studies Forum at the Moshe Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University, emphasized, in an interview with Jewish Insider on Wednesday, that the Muslim Brotherhood is an ideology aiming to make Muslim societies more religious, and is not one centralized organization spanning the Muslim world.

“The Muslim Brotherhood is a very generic term,” Milshtein said. “It’s not membership in an organization; it’s a denomination. Mansour Abbas is the Muslim Brotherhood. Raed Salah, his rival, is also the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood. [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan is the Muslim Brotherhood.”

Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna’s brother, Abd al-Rahman al-Banna, founded the group’s branch in Mandatory Palestine in 1935; its leaders included Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who incited the deadly Hebron riots against Jews in 1929 and collaborated with Hitler, and Izz al-Din al-Qassam, leader of the 1935 Arab Revolt against the British and namesake of Hamas’ short-range Qassam rockets. 

Gaza-based Sheikh Ahmad Yasin formed the Muslim Brotherhood-inspired Hamas in the 1980s. Sheikh Abdullah Nimar Darwish founded the Islamic Movement in Israel in 1971, which also espoused Muslim Brotherhood ideology.

In 1979, Darwish founded an underground group in Israel called The Family of Jihad with a goal of establishing an Islamic state. However, after his arrest and conviction for involvement in killing an accused collaborator and membership of a terrorist organization, he renounced violence and decided to promote Islamism within the confines of Israeli law.

Fissures began in the Islamic Movement in Israel after the Oslo Accords, with the northern branch, led by Sheikh Raed Salah, opposing it, while the southern branch supported it. The two parts of the movement officially split when the southern branch ran for the Knesset in 1996 as Ra’am, and Salah advocated boycotting national elections. 

The leaders of the northern branch were arrested in 2003 for aiding Hamas and in 2015, the branch was banned, after the police and Shin Bet demonstrated that it had close ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, and received funds from groups affiliated with Hamas.

Darwish, however, continued to be the spiritual leader of the Islamic Movement’s southern branch and said he was committed to obeying the laws of Israel. He engaged in interfaith dialogue events, often with former Labor lawmaker Rabbi Michael Melchior, and spoke out against Holocaust denial. 

While Islamic Movement Southern Branch leaders have met with Hamas leaders and taken part in mediation efforts between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, in 2022, then-leader of Hamas Yahya Sinwar declared Mansour Abbas a traitor for joining the governing coalition and saying Israel is a Jewish state. Abbas has said that his decision to join the governing coalition in 2021 came from the values he “absorbed from the legacy of Sheikh Abdullah Nimr Darwish.” 

As such, the more radical of the two major offshoots of the Muslim Brotherhood is outlawed in Israel.

Yet, more recently, the Islamic Movement Southern Branch has come under scrutiny for its own possible ties to Hamas. 

In the decades since its establishment, the Islamic Movement has faced repeated crackdowns on its charities. The Islamic Relief Committee, founded in 1987 with the stated goal to help the needy in the West Bank and Gaza, was shut down by Israeli authorities in 1995 for aiding Hamas members’ families, the first in a series of such actions.

“Israel’s anti-terrorism law and the whole discipline has been to focus on specific organizations and declaring them as terrorist organizations because of their goals, because of the means that they use, rather than focusing on an idea, which the Muslim Brotherhood really is,” Lt.-Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch, the former director of the IDF Prosecution for Judea and Samaria, told JI.

In July, the Israeli Justice Ministry unit dealing with nonprofit organizations found grounds to shut down “Aid 48,” a charity affiliated with Ra’am, on suspicion of providing funding to terrorist organizations. “Aid 48” is the Islamic Movement Southern Branch’s main charity. According to an investigation by the ministry, in 2020-2021, the organization transferred NIS 2 million to a charity in Hebron that Israel had declared in 2012 to be part of a terrorist organization; in 2023, “Aid 48” worked with three such Palestinian charities; in 2020, the organization gave NIS 933,000 to a Turkish organization run by Hamas members, which funneled money to the terrorist organization.

Lt.-Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch, the former director of the IDF Prosecution for Judea and Samaria, currently the director of the Initiative for Palestinian Authority Accountability and Reform in the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, explained to JI that Israeli law makes it easier to crack down on smaller subgroups than an umbrella term like the Muslim Brotherhood.

“Israel’s anti-terrorism law and the whole discipline has been to focus on specific organizations and declaring them as terrorist organizations because of their goals, because of the means that they use, rather than focusing on an idea, which the Muslim Brotherhood really is,” he said on the sidelines of a JCFA conference last week.

In order to declare the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization, “you have to break it down into intelligence,” Hirsch said, adding that the authorities would have to determine who they are seeking to arrest and what money and possibly weapons need to be seized.

Hirsch recounted taking part in the Israeli Security Cabinet meeting in 2015 when the government decided to outlaw the Islamic Movement Northern Branch.

“Some of the questions that were asked were, what is the next step? Who do we operate against now? It was a bit clearer than the entire Muslim Brotherhood, but even then there was a question,” he said.

“I would be very careful because, at its core, the Muslim Brotherhood is a movement that aims to change society. They have a lot of social organizations. It’s very different from Islamic Jihad or ISIS, who are not interested in social activism,” said Milshtein, adding that the Muslim Brotherhood ideology is up for interpretation by its adherents.

When it comes to the southern branch, Hirsch, who has worked with the “Choosing Life” organization of relatives of victims of terror whose lawsuit led to the shuttering of “Aid 48,”  argued that “there is a clear connection between Ra’am and funding Hamas … That connection was there all along. It’s partly ideological and partly the idea of the Muslim Brotherhood in its different constellations, including in Israel.”

Milshtein acknowledged that there have been cases of leaders of “Aid 48” meeting with Hamas leaders and funding going to Hamas ahead of its invasion of Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, but said that Abbas “took care of” those responsible when he learned of the incidents.

“I would be very careful because, at its core, the Muslim Brotherhood is a movement that aims to change society. They have a lot of social organizations. It’s very different from Islamic Jihad or ISIS, who are not interested in social activism,” he said, adding that the Muslim Brotherhood ideology is up for interpretation by its adherents.

“If you ask Mansour Abbas, there is no problem with being part of the Muslim Brotherhood and part of the government in a state that defines itself as Jewish,” he said. “If you ask Hamas, they want jihad against Israel.”

Rabbi Yosef Hamra, the brother of the last chief rabbi of Syria, who now lives in Brooklyn, was invited to offer a blessing to Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa during a meeting between al-Sharaa and a variety of Syrian diaspora activists in Washington on Sunday.

The moment produced a striking visual — a handshake between a kippah-wearing rabbi and the new president of Syria, a former Islamist terrorist affiliated with Al-Qaida and ISIS.

“Syrian Jews coming up and sitting down with the president — this is really history,” Henry Hamra, who leads the Jewish Heritage in Syria Foundation with his father, told Jewish Insider. “A lot of people from over here, from our community, were very, very emotional about it. It’s a beautiful thing, and my father was so touched and it was a great moment.”

Hamra said that al-Sharaa had thanked his father for the blessing and said that he would “love to see you again in Syria. And I think it’s happening very soon.”

He said that al-Sharaa had also, during the meeting, expressed a commitment to religious inclusion and pluralism.

“The Jewish community in Syria is exactly the same thing as every community,” Hamra said. “That’s what the president said — there’s no difference between the Syrian Jewish and the Syrian Christian and the Syrian Muslim. We’re all in this together … that’s what he was emphasizing also. And he spoke about all the religions — that everything is the same, the Kurds, the Alawites, everybody is the same.”

Forces aligned with al-Sharaa’s government have carried out massacres targeting the Alawite, Druze and other minority communities.

“We should get ourselves together and try to rebuild again [in] Syria,” Hamra said.

He said the members of Jewish Heritage in Syria also had the opportunity to discuss with both Syrian leaders and U.S. Syria envoy Tom Barrack the work they are doing to support sanctions relief and restore Jewish antiquities and religious sites in Syria. The Jewish group was invited to the meeting by the Syrian Foreign Ministry.

Hamra said that he had invited Barrack to tour Jewish sites in Syria, and Barrack expressed an interest, sharing his personal phone number with Hamra.

“I think the government [is] very, very open for us to start the process of building up, and that’s a great thing,” Hamra said.

Mouaz Moustafa, a Syrian-American activist who leads the Syrian Emergency Task Force, which has been working with JHS in advocating for the repeal of sanctions on Syria under the Caesar Act, said it was “inspirational” and moving to see the meeting between al-Sharaa and Rabbi Hamra.

Henry Hamra, who fled Syria in 1992 at age 15, also recently ran for the Syrian parliament on a platform focused on advocating for sanctions relief, though he was not successful.

Hamra reiterated to JI his desire to see the repeal of the Caesar Act sanctions.

“My goal is to help the Syrian people who suffered a lot, and I think they should have another chance to live in freedom again,” he said. Moustafa, Hamra and Hamra’s father have argued that any restoration work on Syria’s ancient synagogues will be impossible until all sanctions are lifted.

Opponents of the sanctions relief effort say that keeping the sanctions in place is necessary to maintain U.S. leverage and ensure accountability on American priorities like protecting minority groups from further attacks.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL) told Jewish Insider that, after his meeting with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa earlier this week, he’s going to “think about” his skeptical stance on the repeal of sanctions on Syria under the Caesar Civilian Protection Act. 

Mast has previously expressed concerns about lifting the sanctions, a move which the Trump administration supports.

The Senate approved the repeal of the Caesar Act as part of its draft of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, but the House has not yet approved similar legislation. Mast would need to approve the Senate proposal for it to be included in the final defense bill. He told The Hill last week that “discussions on Caesar Repeal are ongoing but my concerns should be obvious to anyone following the situation in Syria.”

The House Financial Services Committee voted on a bipartisan basis in July for legislation conditioning the lifting of the sanctions on Syria meeting a series of human rights, anti-corruption and counterterrorism standards.

Asked if the meeting had changed his views on the issue, Mast said that he had read at length about al-Sharaa and his background — al-Sharaa is a former terrorist commander affiliated with ISIS and Al-Qaida — prior to the meeting. Mast is a military veteran who lost his legs to a terrorist bombing in Afghanistan.

“We had a lot of conversation, good conversation,” Mast said. “I asked him very pointedly [to] explain why we’re no longer his enemy. He gave a pretty good answer. Said he was hoping for a noble future for his people, one free of radicalism, fundamentalism … and ISIS. So it was a good answer.”

Opponents of the full repeal effort argue that sanctions should remain on the books to ensure Syrian compliance with U.S. priorities and human rights, particularly in light of the massacres of religious minority groups.

President Donald Trump indicated that he expects Syria to join the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State during his meeting with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on Monday at the White House. 

“Yes, you can expect an announcement on Syria,” Trump said to reporters in the Oval Office. “We want to see Syria become a country that’s very successful. And I think this leader can do it. I really do.”

By joining the agreement, Syria would follow 89 countries that have committed to the pact’s goal of “eliminating the threat posed by ISIS.” The group was established in 2014 as part of a response to territorial gains made by the Islamic State after the collapse of Iraqi security forces in Mosul.

Following the fall of Syria’s longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad last December, al-Sharaa has sought to establish control over the war-ravaged nation and assert the authority of his new transitional government. However, the emergence of ISIS cells that have regrouped across Syria over the past few years pose a threat to this task. 

In 2025, ISIS has grown into a “small, flexible network” that seeks to establish a presence in eastern Syria, according to the Middle East Institute (MEI). An MEI report indicated that local security forces estimate there are between 2,500 and 3,000 active ISIS fighters in the country, calling the group the “most dangerous post-war security challenge” for al-Sharaa’s government.

Reports have indicated that ISIS is aiming to reactivate cells and amp up recruitment efforts in Syria through prisons and displacement camps.

John Hannah, a senior fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, said that by joining the coalition, al-Sharaa’s forces can work “hand in hand under U.S. direction to systematically crush ISIS across the country and take full responsibility for the massive detention camps at places like Al Hol [refugee camp].”

Al-Sharaa’s efforts to join the coalition show a commitment by Damascus to ensure ISIS does not pose a further threat to stability and marks a significant step in the changing relationship between the U.S. and Syria. 

“It’s obviously an important step,” said Hannah. “What’s intriguing in this case, however, is that al-Sharaa, the one-time fanboy of former ISIS leader Abu Omar Al Baghdadi and Al-Qaida franchise commander, is joining an anti-jihadist posse led and directed by the United States — the poster-child of the decadent, colonial and infidel West that also happens to be the primary patron of the world’s only Jewish state. That kind of sweeping ideological reversal is just not something you see every day. It certainly merits notice and should be welcomed.”

Ahmad Sharawai, a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said it would be a “significant milestone” should Syria join the anti-ISIS coalition and help Damascus’ new government “domestically and internationally.” 

“Externally, such a move would align Syria with the U.S.-led bloc in the region and help end its international isolation by presenting it as a credible counterterrorism partner,” said Sharawi. “Over the past year, we’ve already seen indications of this alignment, with reports of Syrian forces assisting coalition operations. A formal decision to join would only reinforce this new trajectory.” 

In 2019, the coalition was able to eliminate ISIS’ quasi-state in Syria with help from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) — Washington’s main counterterrorism partner in the country since 2015. By signaling an openness to enter the coalition, experts told Jewish Insider that al-Sharaa’s government is hoping to position itself as the primary partner to counter ISIS rather than the SDF. 

“The new Syrian government has consistently demanded the SDF’s integration into national forces but has faced U.S. resistance that preserved the SDF’s leverage,” said Sharawi. “By entering the coalition, Damascus can argue that it, and not the SDF, would serve as Washington’s sole counterterrorism partner, thereby diminishing the SDF’s bargaining power in integration talks.”

Al-Sharaa has cooperated with the U.S. against the terrorist group for nearly a decade, sharing intelligence with officials regarding the whereabouts of key ISIS and Al-Qaida leaders, according to experts. 

“[Al-Sharaa] has had a long history of throwing former jihadist allies under the bus whenever they’ve gotten in the way of his own single-minded focus on acquiring and holding onto power to build his vision of a new Sunni-dominated Syria,” said Hannah. “He’s been cooperating with CENTCOM on anti-ISIS missions under the radar for some time, quietly allowing it to do the dirty work of bumping off those who might serve as an alternative magnet for disgruntled Sunnis, former jihadists and foreign fighters who form the backbone of al-Sharaa’s support.”

But despite this, some have expressed concerns stemming from al-Sharaa’s past connection to Al-Qaida’s Syrian affiliate, which he broke from in 2016 and rebranded to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). Al-Sharaa formerly had a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head due to these past ties. 

“People said he’s had a rough past,” said Trump at the Oval Office meeting. “We all have rough pasts, but he has had a rough past. And I think, frankly, if you didn’t have a rough past, you wouldn’t have a chance.”

The move for now remains largely symbolic, with the exact terms of Syria’s role in the coalition likely to formalize “eventually,” according to The Wall Street Journal. 

Syria’s ambassador to the U.N., Ibrahim Olabi, said the meeting between Trump and al-Sharaa also addressed a potential security agreement between Syria and Israel, something Washington has worked on mediating this year. 

Trump has worked throughout his second term to integrate Syria’s new government into the international order; temporarily lifting U.S. all sanctions in May and again on Monday, easing export controls in August and removing al-Sharaa from a terrorist watchlist in November. 

The White House is seeking the help of Congress to take another step, arguing for the complete removal of the Caesar Act sanctions, which Trump can only temporarily suspend, named after an Assad government whistleblower and enacted in 2019 in order to financially suffocate the former regime. With al-Sharaa’s government now in power, the sanctions are seen by some as a roadblock towards further normalization and investment in Syria’s rebuilding. 

The Senate has moved to repeal the law as part of its version of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, but the House version does not have the same provision. Some lawmakers are holding out, saying that al-Sharaa must take steps to protect religious minorities and improve relations with Israel. 

But others argue that the lack of investment due to the sanctions remaining in place could stymie the fledgling government and potentially allow for a further ISIS resurgence, according to the Middle East Institute.  

Hannah said this moment may be the “tipping point” in getting the sanctions removed, adding that it is al-Sharaa’s “highest priority.” 

“[Joining the anti-ISIS coalition] offers President al-Sharaa an avenue to strengthen his case for further U.S. support on sanctions relief and delisting efforts,” said Sharawi. “Syria remains designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism, a status it has held since 1979, and participation in the coalition could give Washington the political cover to reconsider that designation.”

Good Monday morning!

In today’s Daily Kickoff, we preview today’s long-anticipated meeting between Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and President Donald Trump and spotlight an influencer couple from Daytona Beach, Fla., who has been advocating for closer U.S.-Syria ties on Capitol Hill and garnering high-level access. We report on the return of the remains of Lt. Hadar Goldin, over 11 years after he was killed and kidnapped to Gaza, and talk to Jewish leaders at the annual Somos conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico, about their approach to the incoming Mamdani administration. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Judge Amul Thapar, Sen. Ted Cruz and Ruby and Hagit Chen.

Today’s Daily Kickoff was curated by Jewish Insider Israel Editor Tamara Zieve and U.S. Editor Danielle Cohen-Kanik. Have a tip? Email us here.

What We’re Watching

• Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa will visit the White House today, becoming the first Syrian head of state to do so. More below.
• White House advisor Jared Kushner met today in Jerusalem with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer and Aryeh Lightstone, senior advisor to White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff.
• Columbia University’s School of International and Political Affairs is hosting a discussion on the slain Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s legacy, 30 years after his assassination. Speakers include former President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Columbia’s acting President Claire Shipman and SIPA’s Dean Keren Yarhi-Milo.
• The Anti-Defamation League’s annual Concert Against Hate is taking place this evening and will honor Marion Ein Lewin, Holocaust survivor, health policy leader, advocate and educator; Michael Lomax, president and CEO of the United Negro College Fund; Wesley Seidner, a senior at Oakton High School in Fairfax County, Va.; and Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt.

What You Should Know

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S Emily jacobs and marc rod

The firebombing of a hostage-release march in Boulder, Colo., this summer triggered a wave of calls from lawmakers — particularly Republicans — for action to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs and Marc Rod report.

Legislation to that effect was introduced in both the Senate and House in July, taking a new approach to designating the group as compared to previous legislative efforts that had stalled over the course of the last decade.

The legislation would require the imposition of sanctions on the Muslim Brotherhood, making it illegal to provide support to the group, making its members and affiliates inadmissible to the United States and blocking transactions involving assets held by Muslim Brotherhood members in U.S. financial institutions.

There were also calls from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle for the Trump administration to investigate the group and take action to designate it through executive authorities. The secretary of state has the authority to designate a group as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), and the White House could issue an executive order on the subject.

But so far, none of those efforts have come to fruition. The Senate bill currently sits at 11 co-sponsors, having recently picked up Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) as its first Democratic supporter, while the House bill has 19 co-sponsors from both parties — below the levels of support previous iterations of the bill had amassed.

Fetterman’s co-sponsorship could help the bill receive consideration by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, as the panel often only considers legislation with bipartisan support. A source familiar with the matter tells JI that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), the bill’s co-sponsor in the Senate and a member of the committee, is pushing for the panel to mark up the bill at their next business meeting. 

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

PEACE PROSPECT

Trump to host President al-Sharaa in historic visit as U.S. eyes Israel-Syria security deal

When Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa visits the White House on Monday, he will be the first Syrian head of state to do so, a long-anticipated meeting that could advance U.S. efforts to broker a potential security agreement between Syria and Israel. The U.S. has worked on mediating a security deal between the two nations this year following the fall of the Iran-aligned Assad regime and Israel’s decisive military action against Hezbollah in Lebanon, something that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said made the talks “possible,” Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports.

Issues of concern: After the fall of Assad, the IDF entered a U.N. buffer zone inside Syria in order to protect its own borders as the country’s military and government were in flux. Reports indicate that Damascus is seeking an end to the Israeli presence there, while Israel is calling for the demilitarization of southwest Syria and for al-Sharaa’s government to take more responsibility for the security of the Druze minority in the region. “Israel’s main concerns center on the deployment of Syrian forces in the south and the protection of the Druze minority, while Syria remains wary of leaving large parts of southern territory outside its control,” said Ahmad Sharawi, a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Trump administration officials have said in recent months that the security deal is “99% done,” though it has yet to be finalized. 

Read the full story here.

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DAYTONA X DAMASCUS DIPLOMACY

The influencer couple selling Syria on Capitol Hill

Alongside Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa’s rise in Damascus has been a flurry of activity in Washington, as lawmakers tried to make sense of a country that one day was considered a rogue nation locked in protracted civil war and the next was viewed as a free state on the path to stability. Two people in particular have become fixtures on Capitol Hill, pushing the message that Washington should lift sanctions on Damascus and build stronger ties with Syria: Jasmine Naamou and Tarek Naemo, a married couple who live in Daytona Beach, Fla., with a knack for social media self-promotion and a willingness to strike up a conversation with anyone, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.

High hopes: Naamou spoke to JI on Friday to preview what she hopes the Syrian leader will discuss with Trump, with normalization with Israel high on the list. “We want regional stability. Israel’s a neighbor. They’re a friend of America. We want them to be friends of Syria. We want to normalize relations,” said Naamou, who was driving to the airport, bound for Washington to be there for al-Sharaa’s visit. She also expressed hope for a U.S. security presence in Syria: “I believe they’re moving in the right direction of getting that security agreement in place. From what I’ve heard, they are in discussions of having a U.S. air base in Damascus to help with those security discussions between Syria and Israel. So I really do see the steps moving in the right direction.” 

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ISRAEL CONFIRMS IDENTIFICATION

Hamas returns Hadar Goldin’s remains after 11 years

Hamas returned the remains of Lt. Hadar Goldin on Sunday, over 11 years after he was killed in battle in Gaza. Israel confirmed the body was Goldin’s through DNA testing, four hours after it was returned, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports. Goldin was 23 when he fought in Operation Protective Edge in Gaza and took part in a mission to destroy a Hamas tunnel in Rafah on Aug. 1, 2014, during a 72-hour ceasefire. Hamas terrorists killed two Israeli soldiers, taking Goldin’s body with them.

Parents’ statement: Goldin’s parents, Leah and Simcha, publicly advocated for his return, but did not support the release of living terrorists in exchange for their son’s remains. After Goldin’s remains were returned, Leah Goldin said her family “took for granted that the State of Israel would not leave soldiers behind. It took us 11 years to bring him home through the IDF and security forces. … We faced many disappointments. We cannot give up on who we are, and we will prevail through our values. … Thank you for walking with us all the way.” Simcha Goldin credited IDF “soldiers [who] fought to bring warriors back from the battlefield. The IDF brought Hadar back to his homeland — no one else. … What this war has proven is that when we fight for our soldiers, we succeed. Victory means bringing home the hostages and bringing home our soldiers to Israel.”

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SCENE AT SOMOS

Jewish leaders begin outreach to incoming Mamdani administration, sensitively

The humid air was swelling with anticipation as thousands of New York politicos descended on Puerto Rico’s capital last week to attend the annual Somos conference, a multiday marathon of post-election elbow-rubbing where receptions and panels occur alongside covert negotiations and late-night schmoozing at local bars and hotels, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Kassel reports from the summit in San Juan. The extended Democratic gathering, which kicked off on Wednesday and continued into the weekend, was adjusting to the ascendant political order led by Zohran Mamdani, whose victory in New York City’s mayoral election earlier that week had upended the Democratic establishment and led to new alliances that until recently would have seemed improbable.

Mamdani moment: Attendees swarmed Mamdani’s arrival Thursday at the Caribe Hilton, where the incoming mayor was later fêted by some of the state’s top elected officials at a crowded beachside reception. For many Jewish leaders who joined the Caribbean confab, however, the feeling was far more subdued, as they openly grappled with the sensitive question of how to work with a mayor-elect whose stridently anti-Israel views conflict with their own core values. Still, some Jewish community leaders who spoke with JI over the course of the retreat suggested they were willing to give Mamdani the latitude to follow through on areas where they are aligned, pointing to a sort of provisional detente in the aftermath of a bruising and emotionally fraught election.

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CALL TO ARMS

Cruz tells GOP: It’s time to stand up to Tucker Carlson

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) called on his Republican colleagues to speak out against Tucker Carlson, arguing in a fiery Friday morning speech that they need to rise above their fear of alienating the popular conservative podcaster to denounce his platforming of antisemitism, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.

What he said: “It’s easy right now to denounce Nick Fuentes. That’s kind of safe. Are you willing to say Tucker’s name?” Cruz said in a speech at the Washington National Lawyers Convention of the Federalist Society, the conservative legal group. “Now I can tell you, my colleagues, almost to a person, think what is happening is horrifying. But a great many of them are frightened, because he has one hell of a big megaphone.” Cruz’s speech escalates a feud within the Republican Party about antisemitism on the party’s rightward fringes, after Carlson, the former Fox News host, held a friendly interview with Fuentes, a neo-Nazi agitator and commentator.

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LAYING DOWN THE LAW

Judge Amul Thapar, short-listed for Supreme Court, pushes back on Israel genocide charges

Judge Amul Thapar, a member of the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals and a member of President Donald Trump’s short-list for a Supreme Court nomination in his first term, pushed back on accusations of genocide against Israel at a Federalist Society conference on antisemitism on Friday, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports. The conference, at which a series of judges from the high-profile conservative legal group offered forceful rejections of antisemitism, is particularly notable given the discussions over antisemitism roiling the conservative movement in the wake of Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts’ video last week defending Tucker Carlson and rejecting the cancellation of neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes.

Judge’s findings: Thapar, who traveled to Israel after Oct. 7, 2023, with the Federalist Society, said on a panel about religious freedom and antisemitism that he had extensively researched the charges of genocide against Israel prior to the trip, and aimed to ask hard questions of Israeli officials during his visit. “What I found is, if that accusation was the one they were trying to prove, Israel was historically bad at accomplishing that task,” Thapar said. “For it to be genocide, it has to be a specific and deliberate aim to bring about destruction of the group. If that’s your goal, why would you drop leaflets and tell people to leave? Why would you set up safe zones? Why would you send texts and warn people? That’s some of the things Israel does that no other country has done before.”

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Worthy Reads

What Mamdani Could Do: Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt and Ari Hoffnung, ADL’s senior advisor on corporate advocacy who served as deputy comptroller of New York City, lay out how Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani could “weaponize” city funds to “carry out his anti-Zionist agenda,” in the New York Post. “His most consequential lever is the city’s $300 billion pension system: The mayor appoints trustees across each of the five pension boards. Mamdani or his appointees could pressure the boards to divest from companies linked to Israel, including major firms like Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Lockheed Martin, all long targeted by BDS activists. … Procurement represents another powerful lever. Many of the companies targeted by the BDS movement — Dell, Microsoft, Motorola and others — are deeply embedded in the infrastructure that keeps New York running. The city holds contracts worth about $400 million with Dell, $300 million with Motorola and $100 million with Microsoft — covering everything from laptops in the schools to police and emergency communications. Walking away from those partnerships under the banner of ‘human rights’ might make for good headlines but would dramatically punish our nation’s largest city: disrupting services, inflating costs and compromising public safety.” [NYPost]

The New New Antisemitism: In Tablet, David Reaboi examines how speakers and attendees at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s 40th anniversary leadership summit grappled with the issue of growing antisemitism on the right. “The confusion on display wasn’t unique to the RJC; it reflects a broader failure of imagination across Jewish institutional life. For decades, antisemitism was something safely external: a pathology of the far left, the campus fringe, or hostile regimes abroad. What’s emerging now is different. The new antisemitism speaks the language of patriotism, faith, and anti-elitism; it arrives disguised as cultural critique. It’s a theory of how the world works. To an audience conditioned by cable news, it sounds insightful rather than bigoted. Inside the ballroom, there was no framework for understanding this shift. Politicians could condemn hate, but they couldn’t recognize it when it wore their party’s colors.” [Tablet]

The Right’s Heritage: In his “Commonplace” Substack, Oren Cass warns that the infamous video by Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, defending Tucker Carlson’s interview with neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes is a symptom of a larger problem endangering the conservative movement. “What’s a little monarchism, race science, and misogyny among friends? In theory, to quote Roberts, ‘when we disagree with a person’s thoughts and opinions, we challenge those ideas and debate.’ But in practice, as his next sentence clarifies, ‘we have seen success in this approach as we continue to dismantle the vile ideas of the Left.’ And only the Left. Vile ideas on the Right see little challenge — wouldn’t want to ‘sow division,’ after all, like the Jews, sorry, like that venomous coalition of globalists serving another country’s agenda. When you spend enough time in the fever swamp, even if you think you’re just hanging out on the bank, that is how you find yourself talking.” [Commonplace]

Word on the Street

Cornell University agreed to conduct “annual surveys to evaluate the campus climate for students, including the climate for students with shared Jewish ancestry” as part of an agreement it reached with the Trump administration on Friday, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports… 

Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, the new executive chairman of Israeli spyware company NSO Group, hopes to use his ties to the Trump administration to help rebuild the company’s U.S. business, he told The Wall Street Journal, after the Biden administration placed the company on an export-prohibition list in 2021…

Michael Blake, the New York assemblyman mounting a primary challenge against Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY), scrubbed posts showing his support for AIPAC and participation at the group’s events from his social media accounts. Blake’s campaign has been attacking Torres for the congressman’s support of Israel and ties to AIPAC despite his own prior support and ties…

Mexican security agencies foiled a plot last summer by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to assassinate Israel’s ambassador to Mexico, Einat Kranz Neiger, U.S. and Israeli security officials revealed…

The Wall Street Journal chronicles the rise and fall of Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts, through his redirecting of the organization’s policy priorities and current controversy over his defense of Tucker Carlson. The story noted that Roberts encouraged employees working on Ukraine policy to watch Carlson’s monologues, which were rife with conspiracy theories about the war, to delete past tweets in support of Ukraine aid and to write papers reflecting the new, more isolationist policy that he had embraced…

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) asked the Justice Department to open an investigation into the anti-Israel activist group Code Pink for acting as an unregistered foreign agent of the Chinese government and providing “material support to foreign terrorist organizations,” the Washington Free Beacon reports…

The Free Press publishes an excerpt from Sen. John Fetterman’s (D-PA) memoir, Unfettered, which will be released tomorrow, in which he reflects on the deep depression he fell into following his stroke… 

The Wall Street Journal introduces key players in New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s inner circle, some of whom are “in line for key roles in his administration”…

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani says he’s seeking to distance his country from both Iranian and U.S. influence, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal ahead of Iraq’s Tuesday election where he’s seeking a second term…

Reporting from the Future Investment Initiative conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Politico‘s Sam Sutton explores the “cross-pollination between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia’s political and commercial enterprises,” and the rise of top-down capitalism in both countries…

Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, and Deborah Turness, head of BBC News, resigned on the heels of the publication of an internal report accusing the British national broadcaster of bias, including in its coverage of the war in Gaza and the way it edited a speech by President Donald Trump…

The New York Times spotlights the continuing isolation of Israeli academics even after the ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel…

The head of Germany’s Jewish community has warned about potential risks to the Jewish community due to rising support for the far-right party Alternative for Germany in the country’s eastern states…

Pic of the Day

Ruby and Hagit Chen salute their son Itay’s grave at the Kiryat Shaul military cemetery in Tel Aviv at his funeral on Sunday. Itay Chen, an American Israeli IDF soldier who was 19, served in the 7th Armored Brigade’s 75th Battalion and was killed in battle with terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023, and kidnapped to Gaza. His body was returned to Israel last Tuesday.

Birthdays

Actress and producer, Zoey Francis Chaya Thompson Deutch turns 31…

Manager of the Decatur, Ga.-based Connect Hearing, Murray Kurtzberg… One of the four deans of Beth Medrash Govoha in Lakewood, N.J., Rabbi Yerucham Olshin turns 82… Professor emeritus at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, he is a co-founder of Nebraska Jewish Historical Society, Oliver B. Pollak, Ph.D. turns 82… Energy consultant, president and CEO of K Street Alternative Energy Strategies, LLC, Howard Marks turns 81… Former executive director of the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at California State University, Los Angeles, now the executive director of the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation, Raphael J. Sonenshein, Ph.D. turns 76… Israeli journalist, Elli Wohlgelernter turns 72… Chief administrative officer at the Legacy Heritage Fund, Elaine Weitzman… ESPN’s longest-tenured “SportsCenter” anchor, Linda Cohn turns 66… Rabbi at Temple Beth Kodesh in Boynton Beach, Fla., Michael C. Simon… Professor at Bar-Ilan University, Adam Ferziger turns 61… Senior rabbi of Leo Baeck Temple in Los Angeles, Ken Chasen turns 60… Former MLB right-fielder for 14 seasons, he founded Greenfly, a software firm for sports and entertainment organizations, Shawn Green turns 53… National security editor at The Washington Post, Benjamin Pauker… President of Democratic Majority for Israel, Brian Paul Romick turns 49… Co-founder in 2004 of Yelp, where he remains the CEO, Jeremy Stoppelman turns 48… Executive director of the Ruderman Family Foundation, Shira Menashe Ruderman… Chief investigative reporter at ABC News, Josh Margolin turns 46… Senior advisor on the public health team at Bloomberg Philanthropies, Jean B. Weinberg… YouTube personality, he came to fame as a child actor on Nickelodeon, Josh Peck turns 39… 

Editor’s note: Daniel Naroditsky, whom we featured in the “Birthdays” section of Friday’s Daily Kickoff, died on Oct. 20. We apologize for the error. 

The fall of Bashar al-Assad’s brutal regime in Syria last December happened slowly, and then all at once — leaving a region reeling from whiplash and a country digging itself out from the rubble, now under the leadership of a former militia head who cut his teeth as an Al-Qaida terrorist. 

This week, that leader, Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa, is coming to Washington, the first time a Syrian president has ever been invited to the White House. 

Alongside al-Sharaa’s rise in Damascus has been a flurry of activity in Washington, as lawmakers tried to make sense of a country that one day was considered a rogue nation locked in protracted civil war and the next was viewed as a free state on the path to stability. 

Two people in particular have become fixtures on Capitol Hill, pushing the message that Washington should lift sanctions on Damascus and build stronger ties with Syria: Jasmine Naamou and Tarek Naemo, a married couple who live in Daytona Beach, Fla., with a knack for social media self-promotion and a willingness to strike up a conversation with anyone. 

On the eve of al-Sharaa’s meeting with President Donald Trump, the couple arranged a meeting with the Syrian leader and Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Naamou and Naemo first came to Capitol Hill this year as activists with the Syrian American Alliance for Peace and Prosperity, a nonprofit that emerged early this year to advocate for closer ties between the U.S. and Syria, though Naamou said she doesn’t work directly with them anymore. The organization arranged meetings for Syria’s foreign minister in New York this year, and in April it brought two members of Congress — Reps. Cory Mills (R-FL) and Marlin Stutzman (R-IN) — to Syria for the first visit by U.S. officials in years. Naamou and Naemo were on the trip with them. 

Mills and Stutzman’s visit preceded a more senior delegation, with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), who has held several senior foreign policy roles, visiting the country together. 

All of those lawmakers have met with either Naamou or Naemo this year, documented with slick photos shared on the couple’s Instagram accounts. Naamou has 319,000 followers, and a pinned photo with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA); Naemo has 2.2 million followers and flaunts photos with the Saudi investment minister and Turkey’s ambassador to Syria — plus an image of him holding a rifle and sitting on a golf cart with Wilson. He refers to Wilson as “my dearest friend.” 

Naamou spoke to Jewish Insider on Friday ahead of al-Sharaa’s visit to preview what she hopes the Syrian leader will discuss with Trump, with normalization with Israel high on the list.

“We want regional stability. Israel’s a neighbor. They’re a friend of America. We want them to be friends of Syria. We want to normalize relations,” said Naamou, who was driving to the airport, bound for Washington to be there for al-Sharaa’s visit. She also expressed hope for a U.S. security presence in Syria: “I believe they’re moving in the right direction of getting that security agreement in place. From what I’ve heard, they are in discussions of having a U.S. air base in Damascus to help with those security discussions between Syria and Israel. So I really do see the steps moving in the right direction.” 

Ahead of his visit, the United Nations lifted sanctions on al-Sharaa, a move that followed a similar executive order by Trump in June. “President Trump is committed to supporting a Syria that is stable, unified and at peace with itself and its neighbors,” the White House said at the time.  

Naamou and her husband both work in real estate in central Florida, though they also have ties to a Saudi sovereign wealth fund, according to Intelligence Online, a publication focused on diplomacy. Naamou said investment is a focus of their advocacy to American officials. 

“They’re also going to have discussions on reintegrating investments in Syria because President Trump, when he went over to Saudi Arabia on his Middle East trip, he had announced the whole cessation of sanctions,” said Naamou. 

Florida oceanside city become such fixtures on Capitol Hill? Naamou, who is 30, dates her own advocacy to her college days at the University of Florida, where she studied international relations and political science because of what was happening in Syria. She said the political relationships started back home in Florida, too.

“I live in Volusia County, and it’s a relatively small county, and everyone kind of knows each other,” she said. “You just go to events, and you meet people, and things happen, and you discuss things, and then you find things in common.”

They’ve also met with Reps. Byron Donalds (R-FL), who is running for governor of Florida; Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL); Maxine Waters (D-CA) and Abe Hamadeh (R-AZ), who is the child of Syrian immigrants. 

“I see huge bipartisan support now,” Naamou said. “We like to term Syria as a swing state. Syria is multi-layered. Syria is one of the only countries in the Middle East that is so complex. You have all three Abrahamic religions present in Syria. You have all different types of ethnicities present. And so Syria is very key in the region, because it can be swung either way.”

“Either way,” in this case, means West or East — bringing Syria into the U.S.-led Western world, or into the Russia-Iran-China orbit. 

“They want the U.S., and they want to acclimate here with our values,” said Naamou, who was born in Michigan to a Syrian father. She described the rapid changes in Syria as a “snowball effect.” 

“I’ve never seen, when a regime has fallen, such a fast paced amount of change happen in such a short period of time,” said Naamou. She wants to see it continue: all sanctions lifted, American investment, closer ties. 

“I’m hoping that we see a larger acceptance of Syria in general,” she said. “I’m hoping that we’re able to somehow, in any way, reshape the narrative into a positive light.”

When Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa visits the White House on Monday, he will be the first Syrian head of state to do so, a long-anticipated meeting that could advance U.S. efforts to broker a potential security agreement between Syria and Israel. 

The U.S. has worked on mediating a security deal between the two nations this year following the fall of the Iran-aligned Assad regime and Israel’s decisive military action against Hezbollah in Lebanon, something that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said made the talks “possible.” 

After the fall of Assad, the IDF entered a U.N. buffer zone inside Syria in order to protect its own borders as the country’s military and government were in flux. Reports indicate that Damascus is seeking an end to the Israeli presence there, while Israel is calling for the demilitarization of southwest Syria and for al-Sharaa’s government to take more responsibility for the security of the Druze minority in the region.

“Israel’s main concerns center on the deployment of Syrian forces in the south and the protection of the Druze minority, while Syria remains wary of leaving large parts of southern territory outside its control,” said Ahmad Sharawi, a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. 

Trump administration officials have said in recent months that the security deal is “99% done,” though it has yet to be finalized. 

Experts told Jewish Insider the visit could allow the parties to work out the details of the agreement and push the long-awaited security deal to completion — a development that would further cement Damascus’ strategic realignment with Washington and Israel and foster reduced dependence on Iran. 

“Regrettably, a much-discussed Syria-Israel security agreement is evidently not ready to be announced, but it is hoped that the visit will help push the agreement over the finish line,” said Robert Satloff, executive director of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who called the visit a “landmark event.”

“Al-Sharaa’s visit to the White House is significant because it marks the first time Washington has treated Damascus not as an adversary, but as a potential partner,” said Sharawi. “There is a real possibility that this meeting could move both sides closer to signing such an agreement.”

To bolster a potential agreement, the U.S. is also preparing to deploy forces to an airbase near Damascus, according to Reuters. The move would mark the first direct American military presence in the Syrian capital, even as President Donald Trump has advocated for reduced or nonexistent military involvement in the region.  

Shawari says a potential U.S. military presence at an airbase near Damascus would represent a “turning point” in the talks.

“For Israel, a limited U.S. presence would provide Israel with a guarantor to keep the Syrians in check; for Damascus, it would signal goodwill toward Washington and a willingness to align with U.S. strategic interests in promoting regional stability,” said Shawari. 

Trump has worked on normalizing U.S. relations with the new Syrian government during his second term. During his Middle East visit in May, Trump became the first American president in 25 years to meet with a Syrian leader and announced an end to U.S. sanctions on Syria for the first time in more than a decade. 

The U.S. requested that the United Nations lift sanctions on al-Sharaa ahead of the visit — a move the Security Council approved on Thursday. The decision allows the U.S. to legally remove al-Sharaa from the Specially Designated Global Terrorist list and follows the State Department’s July 2025 decision to delist his faction, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as a Foreign Terrorist Organization. The Trump administration has also expressed support for repealing the congressionally mandated Caesar Act sanctions on Syria, a move the Senate is considering. 

“I’m glad that the @UN Security Council lifted its sanctions on Syria,” wrote Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman, on X on Friday. “This will benefit the Syrian economy and its people. Along with @potus, my colleagues and I are working to repeal Caesar sanctions so Syria can become a safe and prosperous partner for the U.S. in the Middle East.”

The Oval Office meeting also comes on the heels of an announcement Thursday that Kazakhstan will be joining the Abraham Accords, a move that Trump  administration officials said they hoped would help build momentum for the Accords ahead of the meeting and a later visit by the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Nov. 18. 

“President Trump has advocated for Syria’s inclusion in the Abraham Accords since lifting sanctions in May,” said Sharawi. “But, al-Sharaa himself has described that step as unrealistic for now, while signaling that he’s open to a security agreement modeled on the 1974 disengagement accord.”

The 1974 Separation of Forces Agreement — a resolution that was passed by the U.N — established a zone of separation between Israel and Syria and called for the disengagement of forces following the 1973 Yom Kippur War. 

In a webinar hosted by The Washington Institute for Near East Policy on Friday, former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Herzog — who said an “active U.S. role” is essential for the deal — questioned the effectiveness of using the previous agreement as a template.

“There is still the framework of the 1974 disengagement agreement between Israel and Syria following the 1973 war, but that is outdated,” said Herzog. “We need a new framework and new structure.”

Sharawi noted a new framework for cooperation between Syria and Israel could be based on “shared security threats” such as Iran and Hezbollah — a point Herzog also emphasized.

“Both Israel and al-Sharaa would take action [under a security agreement] to prevent Hezbollah from reasserting itself in Syria or Iranians smuggling weapons and munitions to Hezbollah in Lebanon through Syria,” said Herzog. “So this is a very big deal, but there are also risks.”

“The biggest opportunity is the fact that both al-Sharaa and Israel regard Iran and the Iranian axis as an enemy,” Herzog added. “Syria was a vital link in the Iranian axis and this is no longer the case — an indirect outcome of Israel turning the tables on Hezbollah and later on Iran.”

Satloff said there are steps al-Sharaa could take — whether as part of the emerging agreement or through independent gestures — to further strengthen regional security and demonstrate Damascus’ commitment to peace.

“One area where President al-Sharaa could make a singular contribution to broader Middle East peace is to publicly clarify an issue that has provided Lebanon’s Hezbollah with fodder for its ‘resistance’ against Israel — that is, for Syria to state that the disputed Shebaa Farms and divided town of Ghajar were Syrian territory when taken by Israel, not Lebanese,” said Satloff, referring to a disputed area along the Lebanon-Syria-Israel border that has been under Israeli control since 1967 but is claimed by Lebanon with Syrian backing. “This would pull the rug from under Hezbollah and undermine much of its rationale for continuing the fight against Israel.”

The Senate approved the repeal of strict sanctions legislation targeting the now-deposed Assad regime in Syria, as part of its version of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have been working to repeal or roll back the sanctions, known as the Caesar Act, for several months, though the effort is not without some opponents.

The chamber also passed, as part of a bipartisan package of amendments, an amendment led by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) — opposed by some Syrian-American activists — that requires regular reports to Congress certifying Syria’s compliance with a variety of U.S. priorities and urges the administration to reimpose sanctions if such verification cannot be completed.

The House version of the NDAA does not include a similar provision, so whether the sanctions repeal is included in the final bill, and in what form, will be subject to negotiations between the two chambers. Legislation placing a variety of conditions on the suspension of the Caesar Act, rather than repealing the sanctions, has gained momentum in the House.

The Senate also approved, by voice vote, an amendment that would repeal the Authorizations for Use of Military Force that allowed for the Iraq and Gulf wars. With similar provisions included in the House version of the bill, the repeal of those war authorizations, a long-term goal of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, looks increasingly likely this year.

Opponents have argued that the process has moved too quickly and with too little deliberation and consultation with the administration, and that repealing the authorities could jeopardize counterterrorism operations.

The upper chamber rejected an amendment that would have barred the modification of a Qatari-donated jumbo jet to serve as Air Force One, by a party-line vote of 50 to 46.

Other provisions added to the legislation in bipartisan amendment packages include programs aimed at countering foreign information manipulation and interference by adversaries like Iran; a study of the potential security conditions for reopening the U.S. embassy in Damascus, Syria; and legislation aimed at countering the wrongful detentions of U.S. citizens by adversaries like Iran by creating a new designation and penalties for countries engaging in such activity.

The legislation also expands and modifies various U.S.-Israel cooperative military programs.

Stability in Syria could help ease tensions between Israel and Turkey — two countries with competing interests in the region — and the U.S. has a key role to play in shaping the security agreements needed to get there, experts from the Middle East Institute said Thursday during a panel titled “Can Turkey and Israel Find Common Ground in Syria?”

“A lot depends on what the United States decides to do, how they treat the Kurdish question in the northeast of Syria, and what they ask the Israelis and the Kurds to do,” said Natan Sachs, a senior fellow at MEI who focuses primarily on Israel. 

“It’s not that [President Donald] Trump can decide what happens, because these interests, certainly for the Israelis but also for the Turks, are seen as vital domestic interests. It’s not just the question of the peace process in Turkey. For Israelis, it’s seen as vital threats on the Israeli border. But nonetheless, there is enormous room, I think, for [U.S.] diplomacy here with some chance of success.” 

The webinar, moderated by MEI’s vice president for policy, Ken Pollack, also featured Gonul Tol, a senior fellow at MEI who focuses primarily on Turkish politics. It comes against the backdrop of the collapse of the Assad regime last December and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa’s assumption of power in January. Al-Sharaa addressed the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday, the first time a Syrian president has done so in almost 60 years, presenting a vision of a “new Syria” after decades of civil war and dictatorship under the Assad family. 

But questions remain about Syria’s future and the influence of its two most powerful neighbors — Israel and Turkey. Sachs and Tol addressed how Syria has become a focal point for Turkish-Israeli rivalry, what role the U.S. could play in softening the hostilities between its two allies and how the situation impacts stability in the region. 

The Assad family “has been a long foe of Israel, but it was a known foe. It was a devil that they knew,” said Sachs, expressing concern that al-Sharaa, who was once a leader in Al-Qaida, could be a “pragmatist, but not someone who’s changed fundamentally.” 

Tol said that “it’s always been Syria that kept the two countries together, historically, from Turkey’s point of view, overlapping interests with Israel in Syria and on some level Iran too.”

“That was the glue that kept the relationship, no matter what was happening on the Palestine question, right? So now we are at a moment where that glue is not there,” Tol continued. “Syria and clashing interests are driving these two countries apart. What is worse is what kept that relationship in the golden years of the 1990s was the fact that Israel really needed Turkey, and it was the main factor behind this bilateral partnership. But in the last several years, Israel has taken many steps that makes Israel a lot less dependent on Turkey. I mean partnership with Ankara granted Israel this legitimacy.”

“So we’ve got a point where there is a dominant Israel that is militarily very powerful … Israel does not need Turkey anymore, and Turkey does not have leverage,” she continued. 

Tol called the Kurdish angle “important” to the situation. “Kurds now want autonomy,” she said. “They are somewhat emboldened by the Israeli presence there [in northern Syria] and as long as Syria remains unstable they won’t be able to send back those refugees.”

She went on to say that the presence of U.S. troops in the country complicates the situation of stabilizing Syria. A potential solution, Tol suggested, is “maybe both sides should just accept different spheres of influence,” similar to Israel and Turkey’s understanding in Azerbaijan. 

“The parties helped there in order to establish a non-conflict mechanism. So you control Turkey’s tens of thousands of troops in northern Syria. So the understanding was going to be, okay, you remain there. We are here. We do our business. So we don’t conflict with each other. Can that be done? I think that would be an ideal scenario for [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, because Erdogan wants Israel out of Syria. But he understands that it’s not realistic,” she said, adding that the two countries would like good relations. “Erdogan is not interested in military conflict with Israel. That is, I know that’s a negative that some have been pushing, but I just don’t think so. And I don’t think Israel has any interest in confronting Turkey’s military either. Turkey is a NATO country at the end of the day, and the stakes are just too high.”

Asked whether Israel can accept a Turkey-Syria agreement, and under what conditions, Tol pointed to recent reports from Israeli media that said one of the asks from the Israeli side in an agreement with Damascus is that it stops cooperating with Ankara on defense.

“We know that Turkey wants to have access to spaces in Syria and Israelis were saying they weren’t going to accept this … but Damascus is slow on that and in a difficult spot, too. So I think the defense angle, if Israelis are pushing that, forcing Damascus to stop having that defense partnership with Ankrara, that would be difficult to follow,” Tol said. 

Sachs said a red line for Israel in a Turkey-Syria agreement would be “Turkish access to [air] bases, and in particular flexibility for aerial defense.”  

“The Israeli assumption here is that Turkey’s influence is almost a given,” said Sachs. “The question is more the confines of that limit, not whether [the countries] come to an accommodation. From the Israeli perspective, the current trend is extremely worrying, with the rise of a regime it is very skeptical of — and with good reason.”

A debate is quietly simmering in Washington over the prospect of repealing congressionally mandated sanctions on Syria, an effort that has bipartisan support — but is not without its opponents.

As part of the Senate’s ongoing consideration of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, a provision was included in a bipartisan consensus package of amendments that would fully repeal the Caesar Act, a strict sanctions framework imposed in response to the Assad regime’s human rights violations. Should the NDAA move forward on the Senate floor, the amendment is almost certain to pass. 

The sanctions are currently being waived by the Trump administration, but can only be permanently repealed, before their 2029 expiration date, by Congress.

Some on Capitol Hill are pushing for a more cautious approach, keeping the sanctions on the books, at least in the short term, while pushing for the Syrian government, led by former Al-Qaida commander Ahmad al-Sharaa, to abide by a series of conditions in exchange for continued waiving of the sanctions.

Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) introduced a series of amendments to the Senate NDAA taking such an approach. The first would suspend the sanctions but keep them sanctions on the books indefinitely, past 2029, and require compliance with a series of conditions to keep the sanctions paused. 

A second, updated amendment would keep the sanctions on the books for the next four years and would recommend but not require the reimposition of sanctions if the conditions in question are not met.

The Graham-Van Hollen amendment is unlikely to have sufficient support to pass the Senate. 

A similar debate is playing out in the House, where the Financial Services Committee voted to advance a bill, led by Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), that would condition the lifting of sanctions, over the objections of lawmakers who have called for immediate and unconditional relief.

Activists in the Syrian-American diaspora community, including Rabbi Yosef Hamra, the brother of the last chief rabbi of Syria, who now resides in Brooklyn, are calling for Congress to reject efforts to condition sanctions relief, and want lawmakers to fully repeal the Caesar Act as quickly as possible.

Hamra, in a letter to congressional offices on behalf of the Jewish Heritage in Syria Foundation that was shared with Jewish Insider, expressed “grave concern” about the original Graham proposal, saying it would endanger Syrian Jews and prevent their ability to rebuild their community.

“This measure would put in place snapback provisions which would extend the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act indefinitely, including provisions harsher than those applied during the Assad regime’s worst atrocities,” Hamra wrote. “Lifting the Caesar sanctions is essential to restore synagogues and cemeteries, safeguard irreplaceable Jewish heritage and re-establish a mutli-faith community in Syria after more than 30 years in exile. Simply put, this amendment would be devastating to the Jewish community in Syria.”

Hamra noted that members of the Syrian Jewish community have begun to return to the country and work to rebuild and restore Jewish sites and artifacts, which he said requires “a stable, predictable policy environment that encourages investment, cultural preservation, and the safe return of refugees.”

He argued that the sanctions “should be completely repealed with no risk of snapping back. Any attempt to prevent this law from being completely repealed without risk of snapback would be a disaster” by discouraging support for projects inside the country, which he said would halt efforts to rebuild.

Henry Hamra, the son of the rabbi, told JI he also rejects the updated Graham-Van Hollen amendment.

“A watered down amendment by Senator Graham has the same chilling effect and damage of any amendment that requires conditions and threatens snapback sanctions of any kind,” Henry Hamra said in a statement to JI. “That’s why the Jewish Syrian community in the United States supports a clean repeal of the Caesar Act with no conditions it is the right and moral thing to do.”

Henry Hamra told JI that extensive work is needed to restore old synagogues, Torah scrolls and other artifacts that have been long neglected and added, “We need all the sanctions to be lifted to help us out.”

A source supporting the repeal effort said Treasury officials told Congress that keeping the Caesar Act — which includes mandatory secondary sanctions provisions on individuals doing business with those sanctioned — on the books in any form, even if the sanctions are being waived, has created an environment of uncertainty that has made foreign countries and businesses unwilling to invest in long-term development and reconstruction efforts in Syria.

“This is more than a two-year or a short-term thing to rebuild the whole neighborhood, [it] would take years. American companies, too, by the way, are interested in working in Syria. As long as Caesar is an authority, and there’s snapback for it, people will be wary to do that,” Mouaz Moustafa, the executive director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force, told JI. “And the progress, including on some of the conditions that are being placed, itself, would be stifled if [the] Caesar Act remains in perpetuity.”

Moustafa’s group is also opposing any action short of full Caesar repeal, and argues that anything less would be a punishment to the Syrian people.

A spokesperson for AIPAC told JI that the organization “do[es] not oppose the lifting of the Caesar sanctions but believe[s] Congress should make clear its expectations for the new Syrian government and lay out the conditions under which sanctions could be reimposed.”

John Hannah, a senior fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America and a national security advisor to former Vice President Dick Cheney told JI he opposes the sanctions repeal, and that he favors a conditional approach like that outlined in the Lawler bill.

Hannah said that there is “some significant evidence” that Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa is willing to engage on U.S. security priorities which justifies some easing of sanctions, “but our big concern is that the administration has had kind of a blind spot on internal matters in Syria with regards to governance and particularly with the relationship of Damascus to the key minority groups, some of them quite well armed.”

He warned that Syria’s future is being “undermined” by internal governance issues, including what he described as an “Islamist, Sunni-supremacist” and “highly centralized, authoritarian” approach to statebuilding by al-Sharaa, and by the two high-profile massacres of religious minority groups in recent months.

“[Al-Sharaa] has shown himself to be a ruthless pragmatist and I think the U.S. has just got to use the significant leverage it does have and continues to have, which is primarily wrapped in Caesar — to apply that equally as effectively as we have on the security priority to a set of priorities about the process of internal governance in Syria,” Hannah said. He argued that the U.S. should not “just surrender that prematurely, particularly after these extraordinary levels of violence we’ve seen inside of Syria that are completely undermining the possibility of a stable, cooperative Syrian partner to the United States.”

He warned that al-Sharaa’s “particular vision of Syria” is the greatest risk and potential driver of another collapse and devolution back into civil war in Syria — more so than the potential impacts of sanctions, as argued by proponents of sanctions relief. “We can’t tolerate another 1,500-person massacre of some minority inside of Syria. I think it’ll break the country,” Hannah added.

He said the U.S. should condition sanctions relief on legitimate dialogue and efforts to include and protect minorities, including Druze and Alawites, Western involvement in training and professionalizing the Syrian military and the expulsion of foreign jihadists from the Syrian government. Under such conditions, he said he’d be supportive of repealing Caesar in two years, ahead of its current expiration in 2029.

Hannah said that by making clear the U.S. is “fully committed to continuing to issue waivers,” as long as “we see a sustained level of progress here,” it should provide “sufficient green lights” to wealthy Arab states and others to begin ramping up investments.

He also urged the U.S. to work with regional and European allies to develop a joint approach and outreach strategy for Syria, and said that the time is not right for the U.S. to remove its remaining military forces from the country and surrender the leverage those troops provide.

Correction: Rabbi Yosef Hamra is the brother of the last chief rabbi of Syria. A previous version of the story identified Hamra as his nephew.

Senate and House lawmakers met Thursday with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani, in the first trip by a Syrian government official to the Congress in decades.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) said that their meeting was “very encouraging and constructive.”

“I think we are on a path to eliminate sanctions in a way that safeguards interests of other nations in the region, and at the same time, provides for reconstruction in Syria, in a way that negates the influence of Iran and Russia,” Blumenthal said.

He said there was broad, but inconclusive, discussion about talks between the Syrian and Israeli governments.

Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ), who worked on Syria and Middle East issues at the State Department, called the trip “historic.” This was his first meeting with officials from the new Syrian government.

“He very much expressed a deep interest in being able to work as partners with us to stand up against ISIS, to stop Iranian reach and meddling throughout the Middle East, to push back on Russian interference,” Kim said. “There’s something really serious here that we need to engage with, and see how we can play a role. I worry that if we miss this opportunity, it could be a long time before we see a chance to be able to reshape the Middle East in a way for greater peace.”

He likewise said that al-Shaibani had said that the Syrian government has had extensive negotiations with Israel and suggested that they had been “positive conversations,” but that no agreements had been reached.

Regarding sanctions, Kim said that al-Shaibani had been “helpful in explaining how these restrictions are hurting” Syria’s reconstruction and recovery. “That’s important for us to hear and it’s important for us to think through what the effects are.”

“There’s a possibility and an opportunity here to reshape the Middle East in a way I could never have imagined,” Kim said.

Along with Kim and Blumenthal, Sens. Jim Risch (R-ID), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Roger Wicker (R-MS), Chris Coons (D-DE), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Reps. Joe Wilson (R-SC) and Abe Hamadeh (R-AZ) met with al-Shaibani.

“We discussed steps that are essential for Syria to ensure their full access to the international economy. Syria has an opportunity to build a stable democracy, something the region desperately needs right now, and I am hopeful they are on the right track,” Risch, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said in a statement.

Shaheen, the Foreign Relations Committee’s ranking member, emphasized in a statement the need to move quickly to repeal the Caesar Act sanctions on Syria.

“Syria’s economy is in crisis, and its authorities need financial resources to maintain basic functions of governance,” she said. “If we are too slow to act, we risk plunging Syrians back into conflict, which is in no one’s interest except for Russia and Iran. We have a small window of opportunity to put Syria on a path toward stability and prosperity. Members of our recent bipartisan congressional delegation to Syria as well as senior Administration officials … all agree: now is the time for the Senate to act by repealing the Caesar Act sanctions.” 

Wicker chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Wilson said, “President Trump’s leadership has ushered in a historic opportunity for a new chapter, benefitting ALL. Congress must now act: fully repeal the Caesar Act.”

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) said that she came away with optimism for the future of Syria from a meeting with Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa last month, while adding that she remains skeptical and emphasizing the need to “trust but verify.”

“This is an opportunity right now. Whereas before, we have been on opposing forces, now is the time when we can come together for the prosperity of the region and stability in Syria,” Ernst said at an American Jewish Committee event on Wednesday in Washington. “Yes, I’m skeptical, but I am optimistic.”

Ernst, a vocal supporter of Israel, joined a statement shortly after that meeting condemning Israel for carrying out strikes against Syrian government targets.

Ernst said that she’d had a striking exchange with al-Sharaa over their shared time in combat in Iraq — Ernst as a U.S. service member and al-Sharaa as a member of Al-Qaida.

“I told him I, as well, served in Iraq. He was kind of taken aback by that, but then we laughed,” Ernst said.

She said that she will give the new Syrian government the “benefit of the doubt, as long as they are earning that benefit.” But, she continued, “The minute things start going south, we no longer support and we made that very clear to the president while we were on that visit.”

She said that the best way to ensure that Syria turns toward the West and to prevent encroachment by Iran, Russia, China and Turkey is to maintain a presence and influence with Syria’s leadership.

Ernst — who has been among the most strident critics of Qatar in the Senate and argued on multiple occasions that it is not doing enough to pressure Hamas to free the hostages — offered a cautious response to the Israeli strike on Hamas leaders in Doha.

“We understand that Israel is in a place where they have said Hamas will be destroyed, end of story. We support them on that effort,” Ernst said. “The problem is when you are striking a partner nation who has been working so heavily on securing peace and stability in the Middle East, and that country on this particular strike happened to be Qatar, so the president was disappointed in that. I did not feel that it furthered our relationship” with Qatar.

She emphasized that, though Qatar is hosting Hamas leadership, it also hosts the largest U.S. Air Force base in the Middle East.

Addressing isolationist voices on both political sides, the retiring Ernst emphasized that relationships globally matter, and that the U.S. must maintain them.

“If you don’t have a seat at the table, you are not able to shape and influence the outcome,” Ernst said. “So it is very important that the United States remain engaged around the globe. Now I would also say presence is power.”

Former National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said on Wednesday that the “case for withholding weapons from Israel today is much stronger than it was one year ago,” adding that he now backs such efforts.

“The thing that we were grappling with throughout all of 2024, which is not the case today, is that Israel was under attack from multiple fronts,” Sullivan, who served under President Joe Biden, told The Bulwark’s Tim Miller. “It was under attack from Hezbollah, from the Houthis, from Syria, from Iraq, obviously from Hamas and from Iran itself. So the idea of saying, ‘Israel, we’re not going to give you a whole set of military tools’ in that context was challenging.”

“The case for withholding weapons from Israel today is much stronger than it was one year ago,” Sullivan added. “One, they don’t face the same regional threats. Two, there was a ceasefire hostage deal in place and the ability to have negotiations, and it was Israel who just walked away from it without negotiating seriously. Three, there is a full-blown famine in Gaza. And four, there are no more serious military objectives to achieve. It’s just bombing the rubble into rubble.”

Sullivan, who was tapped as the inaugural Kissinger Professor of the Practice of Statecraft and World Order at the Harvard Kennedy School, suggested that the political makeup of the Israeli government could affect the future of the U.S.-Israel relationship.

“If nothing changes in their government — if it continues to be a far-right government that pursues the same policies — then it won’t be the Israel we’ve known,” Sullivan said. “I think a lot of Israelis would say they wouldn’t recognize that Israel. And obviously, that should have an impact on the relationship.”

Since his arrival in Israel in April, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has made his mark as the first evangelical U.S. ambassador to Israel — and possibly the most effusive in his remarks about the Jewish state.

That may be why a leaked letter he wrote to Israeli Interior Minister Moshe Arbel last week, expressing “profound disappointment” that an issue delaying work visas for Christian organizations had gone unresolved and suggesting that Israelis may be treated in kind by the U.S., drew so much attention.

A day after the letter leaked, the ambassador visited Taybeh, a Palestinian village in the West Bank where there had been a fire in a field near a church, writing on X that “desecrating a church, mosque or synagogue is a crime against humanity and God,” and “I will demand those responsible be held accountable.” With Taybeh church leaders blaming settlers, Huckabee’s comments were interpreted in many media accounts as doing the same, though he later clarified that he was not attributing the fire to anyone. 

But with the visa issue resolved and the world’s attention on the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the latest round of collapsed negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage-release deal, Huckabee was back to standing firmly behind Israel in an interview with Jewish Insider in his office at the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem on Thursday. With an a guitar hanging on the wall behind him emblazoned with an American flag and President Donald Trump’s slogan “make America great again,” Huckabee pinned the humanitarian issues in Gaza on Hamas and the U.N and the failure of negotiations on Hamas, and was critical of other Western countries that have come out against Israel, accusing them of emboldening the Gazan terrorist group. 

The interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Jewish Insider: There’s a lot of pressure on Israel over humanitarian aid in Gaza and claims that residents of Gaza are starving. Israel says that they are letting more food in but no one is distributing it, while much of the world doesn’t believe that. I want to ask you: Do you think there is really starvation in Gaza? What is really happening?

Ambassador Mike Huckabee: This very morning, I had a visit from someone who returned yesterday from three days in Gaza. He firsthand went and saw the [Gaza Humanitarian Foundation] feeding sites, talked to people, not only from the staffing and the distribution, but he talked to people in Gaza … He came to the conclusion, first of all, that absolute lies that are being told, not only about GHF and what they’re doing, but are also being told about the deprivation. 

There are clearly people who need food and medicine. That’s not a doubt. But the biggest reason that people are not getting the food and medicine they need is that Hamas is doing its best to cause the people to suffer. They want to get the photos of the most disastrous consequences possible. 

The photos that I also saw, which were very disturbing but also revealing, [were of] hundreds and hundreds of pallets of food that are sitting out in the sun ready to be distributed, but the U.N. won’t move them. Hundreds of trucks filled with food and medicine, and the U.N. claims that they’re trying to help. No, they’re not. They are as much a part of the problem, if not the biggest part of the problem there is. And this food could be distributed right now, but the U.N. isn’t doing it. The NGOs aren’t doing it, and the World Food Program isn’t doing it, because they just drop it off. Then, basically, they’re waiting on Hamas to come and steal it so [the group] can turn around and sell it to the people that ought to be getting it for free. It is a scam. 

It is a disgrace and an outrage that the story that is being told is that GHF is killing people, and they’re not. They haven’t fired one round at anybody … It’s simply not true. It is sadly being reported sometimes because Hamas will release a news story and the Associated Press, CNN, The Washington Post, will gobble it up. They’ll print it without any verification … That’s what Israel is up against. It’s what the U.S. is up against every single day, with really, really horrible misinformation about what’s happening.

JI: Why do you think countries that purport to be friends of Israel and the U.S. — 26 countries signed a letter to Israel about the aid including the U.K., Canada, France — are believing Hamas?

MH: It’s hard for me to understand why they would do that without doing a little better job of verifying the information. If they would, they would have a totally different picture…

The other day there was the story of the 26 countries that came out and did this condemnation of Israel. If you read the news release, it’s all about Israel, all about what they haven’t done right, and a lot of the things in the story are just untrue. The biggest just shocker of it all, was that there was one brief mention of the fact that the war was started by Hamas on Oct. 7, as a passing reference, without really giving the qualifier that this war should have ended on Oct. the 8th, but Hamas doesn’t want it to, and they’re doing everything they can to make sure it doesn’t…

I’ve been shocked that very few other nations and even nonprofit organizations have been willing to stand up and help in the distribution of the food through the GHF, because the whole model was based on … No. 1, get food to people who are hungry, and No. 2, do it in a way that it doesn’t get stolen by Hamas. That’s been accomplished; over 85 million meals now have been served and continues to operate at almost 2 million meals a day.

It hasn’t been perfect. There have been hiccups, but [that happens] when you have that many people coming to a site and trying to get that much food out to people. Heck, you can go to Walmart on Christmas Eve … and it’s bedlam. Sometimes you stand in the long line and sometimes they ran out of what you wanted, but that’s true in the most efficient retailer on the planet. This is being done out in the middle of a desert for heaven’s sakes, and has really worked pretty doggone good. 

Well, we just want people to get the truth and to get the food, but we don’t want Hamas to steal it, which is what they have done through the U.N. model, which has been an absolute disaster. 

Maybe the U.N. is more interested in preserving the machinery of the U.N. than they are in feeding people. And I know that sounds harsh, but I absolutely am on the record for that, because when I see just thousands of pallets, thousands of tons of food sitting that could be consumed by people, it’s sitting there because the U.N. doesn’t really have any incentive to go out and actually get it to the people. They can just present that ‘We carried X number of trucks in.’ How many people got fed from that? Bigger question is, how many of those trucks or pallets are going to be looted by Hamas, who will then sell it to the people that are hungry?

JI: Do you think that there’s something that Israel needs to be doing differently at this point with regards to humanitarian aid? 

MH: Get their message out more strongly. You know, they have a good message about what they’re trying to do. They’re trying to protect the people who are delivering the food. Food isn’t being delivered by the IDF. That was one of the key points; they didn’t want the military giving the food, because there’s a distrust, and we understand that, so we brought our own contractors in. But you can’t give food away in a war zone without having the military who’s prosecuting the war involved, at least on the perimeter, so that they can make sure that there’s a secure route in and a secure route out … Israel has a much better story to tell than the world is hearing, and it’s very frustrating, especially when so-called allies are attacking Israel and not even really mentioning Hamas. 

JI: Hamas is degraded, but it’s still a force in Gaza and it’s still holding hostages. We’re talking a day after Hamas essentially rejected the temporary ceasefire and hostage deal being offered. But there was talk before that of turning the proposed 60-day ceasefire into a permanent one, even though Hamas has not been eliminated. How does the Trump administration see things going forward?

MH: The president has said repeatedly, without any equivocation, that Hamas can’t stay, and they can’t govern. … And frankly, it’s the right message. They can’t stay, they can’t govern. It would be like saying the Nazis can stay in Germany after World War II and have a hand in governing the future; nobody would have thought that was a good idea … Hamas built tunnels bigger than the London Underground so they could kill Jews. It’s a horrible, horrible story, and people need to put the blame where it falls, and that’s on Hamas and not on Israel.

JI: The negotiations seem to have reached a dead end. What more do you think that could be done to get the hostages home?

MH: If everyone in the world puts enough pressure on Hamas and says it won’t be just Israel and the U.S. coming to get you, it’ll be the whole world coming to get you. It’s like in the movie “Tombstone” and Wyatt Earp says, “I’m coming for you, and hell is coming with me.” That’s the kind of message that we need to say. The problem is Israel has made concession after concession. They have made offer after offer. The U.S. has intervened time and time and time again and gone to, I don’t know how many different talks, meetings and negotiations, but every time you will hear “we’re close,” we think we’re about there, and then Hamas changes all the conditions at the last minute, or just outright rejects them…

[On Wednesday, Hamas] went back to a position that [it] had abandoned in the past. So when there’s not a good faith negotiation going on, and then you have to ask: Whoever thought there was going to be? These are the people that murdered pregnant women in front of their families, and that raped women in front of their children. When people do things like that, these aren’t people you sit down and work out a negotiation to buy a home from or sell a car to. So, while everybody has hopes that this is going to end and soon, all the hostages returned and Hamas is gone, it’s up to Hamas whether or not that’s going to happen.

JI: Do you think the letter from the 26 countries emboldened Hamas to harden its position? 

MH: That’s the real tragedy. It’s not just that they’re condemning Israel, but by condemning Israel and barely mentioning Hamas, they’re empowering Hamas to just keep hanging on. 

There needs to be a collective across-the-whole-globe condemnation of Hamas with this clarity of message that what they’ve done is evil and holding hostages for nearly 700 days can’t be justified under any conditions … The families who have been put through a living hell over this deserve to be relieved. 

JI: What about the Qataris? Do you think that the U.S. is doing enough to put pressure on them? It seems that they are doing everything they can to try to stay on President Trump’s good side.

MH: One thing they could do — if that’s their goal, to be in the president’s good graces — would be to be key in bringing this to a resolve. And I hope they do. I hope they use every influence they have, and they truly have some. I mean, they’ve been housing some of the Hamas leaders since all of this started. And Al Jazeera, which is one of the most despicable propaganda machines in the world, is financed by them…

I’ll leave [the details] to the headquarters in Washington, but nobody would be disappointed if [Qatar] did more.

JI: There’s also President Trump’s plan to to turn Gaza into a ‘riviera.’ There has not been a lot of progress. Where do things stand? Is the U.S. asking any countries to accept Gazan refugees?

MH: I think it’s more of an Israeli mission to make that decision. What the president has said is U.S. policy is that people who are there who want to leave should be free to leave. They shouldn’t be forced to leave and face expulsion, but neither should people be forced to stay. It ought to be an individual, personal decision on the part of the people who are right now living in what is anything less than an ideal circumstance. 

JI: So you’re saying the U.S. is not involved in trying to find countries that will accept them?

MH: It’s not something that has been shared with me as to being an immediate issue. I know that there is definitely talk that this would be a great opportunity for people to have a fresh start that has been discussed at both the U.S. and Israeli levels. And I think everybody thinks that would be a wonderful thing if people had that option, and if countries were willing to say, “Hey, we’d love to have people come and be part of our labor force and immigrate to our country.” But I don’t know that there’s any specific plans that the U.S. has made on that…

The U.S. took a position several months ago when the president said … ’We’ll just take [Gaza] over. Immediately, within 24 hours, you had four or five Gulf countries saying, “Oh no, no, we want a piece of it. We’ll help govern.” People who don’t understand the president and how he works probably didn’t get it that the whole point was to force people to pony up and get in the game, and that’s exactly what happened…

What he does want to do is to see that these people have a chance for a better life, economically, and just from a security standpoint, they’re never going to have it under Hamas … Who runs [Gaza in the future]? Good question. Maybe it comes to the place where there’s a number of Middle Eastern countries that come and really make a partnership and a coalition and invest the money to rebuild it and give people an opportunity to have a decent and deserved life.

JI: There have been terrible clashes and massacres of the Druze minority in Syria in recent weeks. It seems from U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, who’s also envoy to Syria, that the Trump administration still wants to give new Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa a chance. Is that causing friction with Israel, which tried to stop the violence against the Druze with airstrikes?

MH: Right now, the ceasefire has held for two days, which doesn’t seem like a lot of time, but in Syrian time, that’s a lot of time. There were some horrific things that have happened, especially to the Druze. The Israelis were very bold in standing up for the Druze and showing their support … literally going in and trying to help them with supplies and standing up assistance in every way they could. I thought it was an admirable thing, because the Druze have stood with Israel.

The head sheikh of the Druze community [Muwaffaq Tarif] was sitting right where you are on Tuesday afternoon. We had a very candid meeting about the situation they faced. They’re deeply grateful for Israel’s support. It did mean a lot to them that they weren’t just left hanging…

I’ve had several conversations with Ambassador Barrack over the course of the last week and before. It’s a fragile situation. Nobody’s going to deny that al-Sharaa is not exactly the person the U.S. would have picked … but he’s who we got.

What the president [Trump] did was, I think, bold, but also brilliant, at a time when al-Sharaa realized he doesn’t have the military or economic capacity to make Syria viable. He’s got to find a partner. He’s like the kid that goes to the prom and doesn’t have a date. Somebody’s going to go over there and say, “Would you dance with me?” Do we want it to be Iran, Russia, China? Absolutely not. President Trump comes in and says, “You can dance with me, but if you do, terrorism has to go away.” We can’t have these relationships with bad guys and remilitarize Syria and turn it into another nightmare like Assad. [Al-Sharaa] wisely decided that that was a better partnership than any offer he had. That’s where we are now. 

Everybody has anxieties about where this could go, but we also are in a place where it could turn the corner, go very well, and we could see normalization between Syria and Israel, and that would have looked really unthinkable two years ago.

JI: You don’t think that the last couple weeks have taken a Syria-Israel agreement off the table?

MH: No, I don’t at all. I think it showed some of the challenges that we face. A lot of things happened because of misunderstanding and lack of communication. When [the Syrian military] went south of Damascus with artillery and tanks, it looked like they were getting ready for a military operation. They should have better communicated to the Israelis [and said,] “This is not a threat to you. We’re not moving this equipment in there because we’re going to come across the border.” You know, everybody should have talked to each other better.

JI: But Israel wants that part of Syria, the south, entirely demilitarized. Do you think that’s something that Syria would agree to?

MH: Yes, I do. You want Syria to have some security forces, you’ve got to have that, but they don’t need a full-scale military with an air force and all the others. I think there are regional interests that would help provide a level of security for them that does not require the standing up of a navy and army … The ideal is to help them to become stable economically.

JI: There was reporting after the Israeli strikes in Syria that some people in the Trump administration called Netanyahu a madman and asked, “What country are they going to bomb next?” Does that ring true to you?

MH: I think that people who know don’t talk, and people who talk don’t know … I hate this kind of stuff where a person pretends that he knows something and blabs it out. The president has been very clear, again, without equivocation, that he and [Netanyahu] are very close friends. I saw with my own eyes and was in the room when there was an extraordinary level of camaraderie and cooperation … For all this talk about how there’s this terrible clash and all I would say, look at what is on the record, what is sourced with firsthand source, and dismiss the nonsense that people say … I discount it as somebody who’s trying to be important when they’re not that important.

JI: Still, it seems like there’s a kernel of truth to there being some sort of push and pull within the Trump administration, and even more so within the broader Republican Party, about foreign policy and how to relate to Israel. Do you think this is going to be a problem for Israel? 

MH: I really don’t see that. I mean, are there moments where Israel and the U.S. will disagree? Of course, [it] happens in partnerships, whether you’re in business or in marriage. I’ve been married 51 years. I guarantee you, my wife and I have had disagreements, sometimes, some pretty strong ones. She would tell you that she’s right and I’m always wrong. That’s part of the way we’ve stayed together 51 years. But it doesn’t mean that you don’t love each other and that you don’t stay together. 

It’s part of the process of being adults that you hash out your differences. So I don’t have any doubts that there are times they may have a conversation that they’re not on the same page …  I haven’t been privy to those, but that would be normal. 

JI: We’re coming out of a complicated week for Israel and Christians. There was an issue with work visas for people working in Christian organizations. How is that going to work going forward?

MH: It really wasn’t a big issue, except within that one area. And fortunately, we have it all resolved, and everybody’s happy … Really the new arrangement is the old arrangement, and that was that the process through which people would be granted visas coming to teach or to be a part of a Christian organization. It’s been handled the same exact way for decades, and we were very clear. We didn’t want anything new … Just do what you’ve been doing. It’s been working very well. There have been no problems with it. And then all of a sudden, in January, before I came, apparently there was a change in the way it was processed, and it was creating an enormous level of bureaucratic problems for the organizations, and they were frustrated, and it involved deep investigations and a lot of paperwork and cost…

So we had a meeting with a minister. Thought it went well and thought everything was resolved. The problem continued to happen. So if we would call with one specific case, it would get resolved, but then another one would come up, and then another … So I sent a letter. It was terse, but I felt it was an honest assessment of, look, we thought this was fixed. It isn’t. Here’s the problems it’s causing. We did not leak the letter, but it got leaked. I don’t know who sent it out, but that’s beyond the point. It resulted in immediate attention…

The point that I was making was that at a time when Israel needs all the friends it can get, and some of the best friends you have, the evangelical Christians in America, you really don’t want to tell them they’re not welcome, and that’s the message that’s being sent … We have to get it fixed. So we did, so everybody’s happy.

JI: By unfortunate coincidence, this was the same week where an IDF shell hit the church in Gaza, and then there was a fire near a church in Taybeh that Palestinians blamed on Israel.

MH: I think that it was unfortunate they were all happening at the same time, but they’re totally separate and not tied together in any way. The State of Israel didn’t do anything in Taybeh. And you know, [the shelling of] the Church of the Holy Family was a horrible thing, but to their credit, [the IDF] admitted that it was a terrible mistake and they apologized for it. It’s not something you would ever want to see happen. But Israel doesn’t get enough credit for owning up to a mistake when they make one and trying to make it right, and I appreciate that about them.

JI: You hear these voices of people saying Israel is going to lose Christian support. And there are polls that show young evangelical support for Israel in decline. Do you think that Israel needs to be doing something differently or reaching out more?

MH: I think there is some lessening of the support … There are several things at play. One is the advent of a lot of Middle Eastern studies on college and university campuses, highly funded by Gulf states that are pouring billions of dollars into these programs, and they’re somewhat indoctrinating influences … That’s part of it, and a lot of it is that maybe there’s just not a good historical context for some of the younger people that they don’t know. 

I’m convinced that one of the most important things people can do is to come to Israel and see for themselves. Don’t even take my word for it. You just come. That’s what I’ve been doing for 52 years. When I tell people my views of Israel, I tell them, look, it’s not something I read in a book or watched on a documentary or listened to some people give lectures. I’ve been coming here for 52 consecutive years. I’ve watched this country develop and grow and change … which I think had more credibility than just “I was at a march somewhere in Palo Alto [Calif.] and carried a sign for a few blocks. That’s something I hope happens more and more. The Jewish community has Birthright that brings a lot of young Jewish people here. There’s now an organization called Passages, and it’s bringing a lot of Christian kids here. I think that’s the most wonderful thing that can happen.

JI: Is the Trump administration still trying to negotiate with Iran? The Europeans said they will snap back sanctions if there isn’t an agreement by the end of August, and an Israeli official recently said the U.S. was hoping they would do it sooner. Is that true?

MH: I don’t know whether there’s any U.S. policy on hoping it would come sooner. Frankly, I’m just glad to hear the Europeans stand up for something that is right for a change. You know, they’ve been beating up Israel instead of Hamas for a while, and it’s kind of refreshing for them to realize that Iran’s playing games, and they’re still beating their chest and making threats that make no sense in light of what they’ve just been through.

In “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” King Arthur cuts off [the Black Knight’s] arm, then his other arm, and then his legs. And the guy says, “‘tis but a scratch.” I mean, that’s Iran. They got their arms and legs cut off, and they’re hollering, “Just a scratch, you didn’t get me’” … And you just want to say to them, “Did you not get the message? You just got your brains kicked out, and this would be a good time for you to experience a little humility and recognize you’re never going to have a nuclear weapon. Everybody’s telling you this, even Europe is telling you this. They’re about to put sanctions on you because of it, and this might be a good time to reassess your aspirations to be a nuclear-weapon country.” So I’m grateful that Europe is talking this way, and if they do it in August, wonderful. That’s better than not doing it at all. And maybe — probably not, but maybe — Iran comes to [its] senses.

JI: You recently made an appearance in the courtroom for [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s trial with a Bugs Bunny doll. Was that something that the president wanted you to do, or was that your idea? Some Israelis are concerned that the country or the judiciary could be penalized over Netanyahu’s trial the way President Trump threatened to raise tariffs on Brazil over the corruption trials against former President Jair Bolsonaro. Is that a possibility?

MH: I have not heard anything like that … [Trump] had two very significant, substantial statements about the trials here because he himself has been put through an extraordinary level of lawfare. It’s just been shocking as an American citizen, to watch this, where they try to file charges, both civil and criminal, anywhere they can find a court that’ll take him, New York, the District of Columbia, Georgia, Florida…

I think what he’s trying to say is that if you’re going to want to change the government, do it at the ballot box. You don’t do it in the courtroom. What he saw happening to the prime minister here, he saw as a mirror reflection of what was going on there [in the U.S.]. And it’s not so much that it’s an accusation about the courts or their integrity here, but the act of prosecuting and the tenacity of prosecution while a prime minister is going through the middle of two wars and trying to get hostages released. 

As far as my being there, I hadn’t seen a circus in a long time, so I decided to go.

Amid clashes between Druze residents of Syria, Bedouins, militias supporting Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Syrian government forces in recent weeks, videos and eyewitness testimony has emerged of brutal executions, torture and rape in Sweida, a Druze town in southern Syria. 

A group of Israelis has been working together to provide medical aid to Syrian Druze women who were allegedly sexually assaulted, an Israeli Druze source who is part of the initiative told Jewish Insider on Wednesday. There have been reports of rape of Druze girls and women, including the rape and murder of a five-year-old girl, though the number of victims is still unknown. 

Israel began transferring NIS 2 million (over $600,000) in humanitarian aid to the Sweida area in recent days, including food, first aid kits and other medical equipment. Hundreds of Israelis donated blood to be sent to Syria. On Sunday, four Israeli Air Force helicopters reportedly reached the hospital in Sweida, which was attacked in last week’s clashes.

In addition to the official aid packages, Druze Israeli women attempted to smuggle emergency contraception delaying or preventing ovulation, to minimize the likelihood of pregnancy among women reportedly raped in the clashes. However, those packages were intercepted.

The Druze Israeli women are continuing their effort to send other kinds of medical aid to victims of rape in the attacks, the source said.

Laila Khalife, an Israeli Druze activist, said that pro-government militias and Bedouin in the area have “targeted aid for the Druze community, whether it’s food or medicine, it’s been stolen. Even medical crews were killed so they can’t help.” 

The IDF declined to comment on the matter.

One widely circulated video showed a reporter from the Qatar-backed Al-Araby channel interviewing a Bedouin man who claimed to have kidnapped the Druze women and children in his car. A woman in the car confirmed that she was Druze and that she and her family had hid in their home for a week before being taken captive. Reports indicated that 97 Druze women were missing on Tuesday, though Druze sources in Israel put the number as high as 1,000. 

Khalife, a resident of Maghar in northern Israel, is part of a small group of Israelis — Druze and Jewish — who have been in constant contact with the Druze community in Syria and are working to provide them with aid.

She said that “almost 1,000 women were abducted and many more were murdered, some were raped before they were murdered and many were brutally violated. Their husbands and sons were murdered in front of them … There is no one left to fight for [the abducted women].”

Khalife expressed concern that the missing women would be “forced to convert to Islam, violated and used for sex trafficking.”

The women who remain in Sweida are “struggling with emotional and physical scars,” Khalife said.

Attacking Druze women is particularly painful for the community, Khalife added, because “in the Druze religion, [women] are sacred and protected. They are symbols of honor, of dignity.”

Khalife said that a fatwa, the Islamic religious ruling, calling to attack Sweida permitted the sexual violence: “It’s a vile war tactic that existed hundreds and thousands of years ago. It has no place in today’s world … The human conscience cannot comprehend it.”

Khalife called on women worldwide “to raise protests in every street, every city and every country. Women should not remain silent.”

“It’s like Oct. 7,” she added, referring to the 2023 Hamas attacks on southern Israel. “The world still doesn’t believe and doesn’t condemn all of the war crimes. The women’s organizations did not condemn the rape and violation of women on Oct. 7. And that was only one day — this has been more than a week [in Sweida].” 

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported earlier this week that 634 Druze were killed in the clashes in Sweida, about half of whom were combatants, and 194 of whom were executed, including a U.S. citizen, 35-year-old Hosam Saraya. In addition, 342 members of government-affiliated militias were killed, as well as 21 members of Bedouin tribes in the region.  

Though U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, who is also serving as the Trump administration’s Syria envoy, claimed that “these atrocities that are happening … are not by Syrian regime troops,” the Syrian Observatory said it documented the massacre of 12 members of one family by Syrian Defense Ministry forces.

Over 150,000 Israelis are members of the Druze religious and ethnic minority. The population is deeply integrated in Israel — most of the men serve in the IDF, including at very high ranks. Israel has committed to protecting the Druze in Syria, and the IDF launched airstrikes in Syria last week, aiming to stop the attacks in Sweida, some 25 miles from the border. As many as 1,000 Israeli Druze illegally crossed into Syria to try to defend their brethren. 

Khalife said that the attacks are “a horrifying act of ethnic cleansing, not just fighting in a war zone. We are witnessing hell on earth in real time, entire villages being invaded and crushed.”

She said that the names and photos of some Druze university students in Damascus have been published on social media with calls to rape, abduct and kill them.

Druze in Israel continue to be in contact with their Syrian counterparts to try to help.

“For the Druze community, it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, we are very connected,” Khalife said. “People don’t understand the bond we share. It’s like having a twin, and you can feel their pain.”

The House Financial Services Committee voted on Tuesday to advance a bill that would place a series of conditions on the lifting of U.S. human rights sanctions on Syria, after a debate over whether the U.S. should instead pursue complete sanctions relief for the new Syrian government.

The bill, led by Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), would require the Syrian government to comply with various human rights-related conditions, including protecting religious minorities, as a precondition for waiving under the Caesar Civilian Protection Act.

The bill presents an alternative to a parallel bipartisan effort in both chambers to fully repeal sanctions on the new Syrian government — underscoring continued tensions on the issue on Capitol Hill following the Trump administration’s efforts to release sanctions on the new Syrian government.

The bill advanced through the committee by a 31-23 vote, with Republican Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) voting with most Democrats against it, and Democratic Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Brad Sherman (D-CA) voting for the legislation.

“The objective here is to begin the process of lifting the sanctions,” Lawler said. “We have to recognize the fragility of the situation on the ground. We want Syria to be more stable. We want a more stable government. We want the Syrian people to be free from the oppression of the Assad regime. But in order to get there, we can’t just willy-nilly trust that everything is going to be A-OK. And so what we’re trying to do here is give the administration flexibility to begin the process of lifting sanctions. I think a wholesale repeal of the sanctions is premature.”

He said that it would be “foolish” to fully eliminate sanctions while there are still conflicts between the Syrian government and Israel, and amid ongoing attacks against Druze, Alawite and Christian minorities by Syrian government-aligned forces.

“What we are trying to accomplish here is to ensure that a sanctions regime is not completely eliminated, that there are conditions and benchmarks on the ground that have to be met, so that we do hold this new Syrian government accountable,” Lawler said, and “that they are in fact, making decisions and taking actions that create a much better and more stable situation in Syria.”

Lawler said the legislation “recognizes the fragility here and tak[es] a positive step forward so that this fledgling government actually potentially has a chance to succeed, but if you immediately lift the sanctions and there’s no accountability whatsoever, my fear is that [the tenuous stability in Syria] will collapse.”

Lawler added that it’s important for the sanctions infrastructure to remain in place in case the Syrian government falls.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), the committee’s ranking member, and other Democrats argued that the legislation did not go far enough in repealing the sanctions, and would set up the new Syrian government for failure. She introduced an amendment, which failed, to fully repeal the Caesar Act.

“Only full repeal will assist the Syrian interim government and [the] Syrian people,” Waters said. “We must help the Syrian people to rebuild Syria and to encourage investments in its future. As written, this bill blocks that goal.”

She said that “giving a little bit of money to the Syrian government is a throwaway. It does not accomplish what you think it will accomplish.”

“There will be great expectations of the government [that] they cannot fulfill with your little bitty partial removal of sanctions,” Waters continued.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) argued that the sanctions are hurting the Syrian people, and highlighted calls from Syrian-American organizations for full repeal of the sanctions.

Sherman argued that the U.S.’ voice is important particularly in speaking up for Syrian minorities, such as the Christians, Druze and Alawites who are under attack.

He worked during the committee meeting with Lawler and committee leadership on an amendment, which passed, that would modify the language in the legislation around the protection of religious minorities.

The new language states that the Syrian government must “take reasonable steps” to protect religious minorities, on top of the original legislative language requiring that the government not target or detain religious minorities.

Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), the lead Republican sponsor of the concurrent effort to fully repeal the Caesar Act, said on X that the bill “in its current form is not the right approach forward and does not align with President [Donald] Trump’s agenda for Syria. “

“I believe that a clean repeal of the Caesar Act is most in line with the President’s agenda to ‘give Syria a chance,’” Wilson said. “Keeping Caesar on the books for years will only deter long term reconstruction which could help ISIS resurgence.”

The House Financial Services Committee is set to consider legislation by Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) this week that aims to create oversight and set conditions for lifting sanctions on Syria, but stops short of full repeal of the 2019 Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act sanctions bill that other lawmakers are pushing on a bipartisan basis.

That the House is moving forward with Lawler’s legislation, which sets conditions for waiving Caesar Act sanctions, rather than the bipartisan Caesar Act repeal effort may indicate a level of continued skepticism from some House members about the prospect of full sanctions relief for the new Syrian government that has been pushed by the Trump administration.

“This bill modernizes the existing sanctions regime on Syria, requires assessments on existing sanctions relief provisions, and sets out goals for the Syrian government to meet anti-money laundering and anti-corruption standards,” Lawler said in a statement. “As the Trump Administration is already reviewing sanctions policy, we must ensure they have the tools to do so that reflect the current security environment.” 

“The al-Sharaa Administration certainly has a lot of work to do to reintegrate Syria with the U.S. and our allies. While this job should be difficult given the circumstances, it shouldn’t be impossible,” Lawler continued.

The Lawler bill would amend the Caesar Act to allow the president to waive the sanctions as long as the Syrian government meets a number of conditions, including that it not bomb its civilian population; allow humanitarian aid, medical access and freedom of travel; releases political prisoners detained by the Assad regime and allows international human rights groups to inspect prison facilities; does not target medical facilities, schools, residential areas, markets and community gatherings; combats production and proliferation of the illicit drug Captagon; and does not target or detain religious minorities.

The legislation also extends the waiver period for the sanctions from 180 days to two years. I would sunset the Caesar Act entirely when the administration verifies that Syria has been in compliance with those conditions for two years or at the end of 2029, whichever comes sooner.

Another section of the legislation instructs the administration to brief Congress on regulatory and enforcement relief provided to the Central Bank of Syria through the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, allowing the bank to re-integrate with the global financial system. 

It also asks the administration to assess whether the Export-Import Bank should be allowed to support exports to Syria; it is currently banned from doing so.

In addition, it instructs the administration to work to support policies to combat money laundering, weapons proliferation and corruption, as well as support financial connectivity and economic growth in Syria at the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

Israel struck the Syrian Defense Ministry’s headquarters in Damascus on Wednesday in response to violence against the country’s Druze minority, a week after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke in the White House of the “opportunity for stability, security and eventually peace” with Syria.

The strikes came after clashes between Druze and Bedouin groups that began on Sunday, leaving as many as 250 dead over four days in Sweida, some 25 miles from the border with Israel and in the area of Syria that Israel seeks to have demilitarized. 

Syrian government forces entered the fray on Tuesday, saying they aimed to stop the fighting and bring about a ceasefire, which they said they had reached on Wednesday. Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, formerly the head of the Syrian branch of Al Qaida, seeks to disarm Druze and other militias and have them integrate under the new government.

Israeli Druze called for Israel to intervene from the outset of the violence on Sunday, saying that their Syrian counterparts were being massacred, raped and tortured by forces aligned with al-Sharaa. In Israel, videos and images circulated of Druze religious figures’ mustaches being forcibly shaved off by men in military fatigues.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday afternoon that Washington has “engaged all the parties involved in the clashes in Syria. We have agreed on specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end tonight. This will require all parties to deliver on the commitments they have made and this is what we fully expect them to do.”

An Israeli official said that the U.S. had been in talks to stop the violence in Syria since Monday. 

Reda Mansour, a Middle Eastern Studies professor at Reichman University, former Israeli ambassador to Brazil and a member of Israel’s Druze community, told Jewish Insider that “there is not really one Syrian army; it’s different armed groups that do what they think. It will take time until everyone is convinced to hold their fire.” 

Mansour expressed hope that the Israeli strikes convinced al-Sharaa to “stop the rampage.” 

The former ambassador compared the violence against the Druze in Syria to the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel and said that the Druze in Syria had not faced such violence since the 1925 rebellion against the French Mandate.

“In the rebellion against the French, it was mostly between soldiers,” Mansour said. “This ISIS and Al Qaida-style attack is a massacre, rape, burning of holy sites, torture of the elderly and religious leaders.” 

Mansour also said the community has not had electricity in three days and is running out of food and medical supplies, after attacks on the city’s hospital and its medical staff.

Syrian Druze “are in distress and they are asking [Israel] for help all of the time,” Mansour said, and argued that “al-Sharaa wants to get rid of the Druze.” 

“If he wanted to stop the attack, it wouldn’t have happened,” Mansour said. “His people said they are coming to Sweida to defend the Druze from the Bedouin, and then they conquered Druze villages. The people murdering and torturing the elderly are wearing his military’s uniforms.” 

On Tuesday, dozens of Israeli Druze men began crossing into Syria, breaching a border fence near the town of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights. 

Netanyahu called on the Israeli Druze to remain in Israel: “You could be murdered, you could be taken hostage, and you are impeding the efforts of the IDF,” he said. 

Yet, on Wednesday, the number of Israeli Druze in Syria rose to at least 1,000. The IDF also used tear gas and other crowd control methods to stop Syrian Druze from crossing into Israel.

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir said that Israel is “acting with determination to prevent hostile elements from establishing a presence beyond the border, to protect the citizens of the State of Israel, and to prevent the harming of Druze civilians … We will not allow southern Syria to become a terror stronghold.”

Zamir called on Druze Israelis to “uphold the law and preserve your lives. We are committed to you and your security and are doing everything possible to support you. I have ordered a further reinforcement of intelligence and strike capabilities in order to increase the pace of strikes and halt the assaults against the Druze in Syria as needed.”

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, who has held a hard line on al-Sharaa since the fall of the Assad regime last year, called on the new Syrian government “to come to its senses and to restore order,” lest it lose control of the country and risk the economic engagement it has sought with the West. 

Sa’ar called on the international community to speak out against the violence against minorities in Syria, asking rhetorically, “What else needs to happen? What are they still waiting for?”

“We are seeing a recurring phenomenon of persecution of minorities to the point of murder and pogroms in Syria,” Sa’ar said in a briefing to reporters on Wednesday. “Sometimes it is the regime’s forces. Sometimes it is Jihadist militias that are the basis of the regime. And usually, it is both.”

Sa’ar pointed to violence against the Syrian Alawite community, the burning and bombing of churches in recent weeks and repeated waves of violence against Druze in Syria. 

The foreign minister said that Israel will act to keep regime forces out of southern Syria and protect its border, and to protect the Druze minority.

Sa’ar also took aim at Western leaders looking to engage with al-Sharaa. “This is not a democratically elected regime,” he said. “Because sometimes, when I am in political meetings [with foreign counterparts], people talk to me about the ‘transition.’ This is not an elected regime at all. This is a regime that … took control by force.”

Sa’ar later spoke to his counterparts in the EU, Germany and Greece, pointing out that the EU set the protection of minority rights as a condition for lifting sanctions on Syria. Sa’ar said there is a “consistent pattern of exploiting these riots [against minorities] for the regime’s interests.” He also called the Syrian government’s claim that there would be an independent investigation of the events a “farce,” noting that al-Sharaa made a similar statement about the massacre of Alawites in March, and no results have materialized.

However, IDF Lt.-Col. (res.) Sarit Zehavi, founder and president of the Alma Research and Education Center focusing on the security of Israel’s northern border, argued to JI that “Israel really had no choice.”

“It had to send a sharp and clear message of defense to the Druze in Syria because it committed to defending them, because the Druze in Israel are real partners,” she said.

In addition, Zehavi said that “whoever doesn’t protect minorities in Syria, especially those on the border [with Israel], will end up being attacked by the same jihadis.”

That being said, Zehavi doubted that the strike on the Syrian Defense Ministry would be effective and said that Israel should focus on targets that are relevant specifically to stopping the attacks on Syrian Druze.

Michael Doran, director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East at the Hudson Institute, questioned whether Israel was certain al-Sharaa was behind the violence in Sweida. Doran wrote that he is not convinced that al-Sharaa “traveled to Baku and met with Israelis there, [and] then chose to provoke a conflict with [Israel] over the Druze,” referring to a meeting between Syrian and Israeli officials over the weekend.

“A policy that holds al-Sharaa responsible for forces he doesn’t control won’t strengthen him—it will weaken him,” Doran wrote on X. “In practice, it becomes a tacit, perhaps unwitting, vote for a disintegrated Syria. But a disintegrated Syria serves Iran more than it serves Israel. And it won’t help with Turkey either.” 

Last week, Netanyahu praised President Donald Trump in the White House for having “opened up a channel” with the Syrian regime for negotiations. Talks were underway, with Israeli representatives reportedly meeting with al-Sharaa in the UAE and Azerbaijan last week, for a non-aggression pact between the countries, though not for normalization.

An Israeli official speaking about the future of Israel-Syria talks on condition of anonymity said on Wednesday that Israeli “policy is not based on illusions, but on reality. We want security first.” 

Recently, Israel was willing to engage more with the regime in Syria because “things stabilized a bit,” the official said, “but we are not deluding ourselves. They are talking nicely … but there is a difference between what they say and what they do. As their neighbors, we cannot ignore what they do. We send messages [to Western countries] that reflect these things.”

Mansour, who is an expert on modern Syrian history, was skeptical that negotiations between Israel and Syria can be fruitful, saying, “There is not much hope for a political culture that will create stability … There is an inability of the Sunnis, the majority, to understand and accept that there are many minorities, over 30% of the population.”

The former ambassador said that regime-affiliated forces have been harassing minorities on a daily basis. “They enter Christian areas and call on loudspeakers to convert to Islam,” he said. “They check couples to see if they’re married and if not they harass them. There is daily pressure on the Druze, Christians, Alawites and Kurds, and it cannot continue. When they are threatened, they will react.”

Al-Sharaa, Mansour said, “does not look like he’s capable or wants to change it. He wears a suit and tie, but he was in Al Qaida from age 16 … He hinted he’s willing to let Israel keep the Golan Heights and that he wants peace, but on the ground the signs are not encouraging. He speaks nicely, but on the ground he wants to get rid of the Druze — and if he succeeds, he’ll attack the Kurds next.” 

“The problem,” Mansour lamented, “is that the Americans believed his show.” 

Zehavi said that Israel is likely to return to talks but will be better informed about where the al-Sharaa regime is headed after recent events.

“The first question is whether [al-Sharaa] controls his forces so they won’t massacre minorities, whether he really controls Syria,” she said. 

This week also clarified Israel’s red lines for al-Sharaa, she said: “It’s clear why it is important for southern Syria to be demilitarized. You cannot mix Druze and jihadi militias.” 

The goodwill gestures toward Israel from Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa began modestly.

In a surprise move that came only months after he and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group toppled the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president — “a jihadi in a suit,” as Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar called him over past ties to Al-Qaida — gave Israel Syria’s archive of documents relating to captured Israeli spy Eli Cohen, who was captured and executed in Syria in 1965, and the remains of soldier Zvi Feldman, who was killed in battle in 1982.

Then, al-Sharaa pressured the terrorist groups Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to disarm, leading some of the groups’ leaders to flee the country.

And when Israel sent its bombers streaking toward Iran’s nuclear sites last month, Syria did not intervene with or publicly oppose Israel’s use of its airspace.

Taken together, these steps and others are leading to a warming of relations between Israel and its northern neighbor, a reality that seemed almost unthinkable just a few months ago. While officials and analysts are stopping short of calling the rapprochement peace talks, there is a new optimism — albeit cautious — following the strikes.

While at the White House on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke positively about an “opportunity for stability, security and eventually peace” with Syria. He said that prospect stems from “the fact that [President Trump] has opened up a channel … and the change of security situation brought about by the collapse of the Assad regime.”

Last week, Sa’ar said in a press conference that Israel “would like to have all our neighbors … in the camp of normalization and peace in the region. That includes Syria, as much as it includes Saudi Arabia … It is too early to prejudge what will happen in the future. We have certain security needs and interests, which we must take into account.”

A senior official in Netanyahu’s delegation to Washington emphasized this week that talk of peace between Israel and Syria is premature, saying that “agreements with Lebanon and Syria are not a matter of the short term, but they’re possible.” 

“There are a lot of challenges,” the official said. “It would be irresponsible to talk about Syria entering the Abraham Accords or normalization at this time. We aren’t there.”

Still, the official said that opportunities opened up after the successful Israeli and American strikes on Iran, among them an agreement with Syria. 

One way the 12-day Israeli operation against Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs may have contributed to Israel’s cautious optimism about reaching understandings with Syria is that its airspace played an important role in Israel’s strikes and defense during that time — and Damascus did not get in the way.

Carmit Valensi, head of the Syria program at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, told Jewish Insider that “there was intensive Israeli activity in Syria’s airspace on the way to attack Iran, and Israel shot down [Iranian] drones and missiles over Syrian territory.” 

While al-Sharaa’s view of Iran as a “strategic threat to the entire region” is not unique among leaders in the Middle East, Valensi pointed out, “unlike other Arab countries that condemned Israel [for the strikes on Iran], al-Sharaa was totally quiet.”

Israel and Syria “have a shared goal to weaken Iran and its influence,” Valensi said. “I think that gave another push for the interests to bring relations closer.”

Ronni Shaked, a research fellow at the Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace at Hebrew University, views Syria’s willingness to allow Israel use of its airspace to strike Iran as the most significant of a number of “goodwill gestures” from Damascus to Jerusalem that may be contributing to Israel’s shifting approach to Syria.

Letting Israel use Syrian airspace during its war with Iran “gave Israel unusual freedom of action to easily reach the Iraqi border and then Iran, which took a great weight off of Israel,” Shaked said.

“He [Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa] is showing signs that he knows he has to change to get help from the West and so the world will recognize him as the legitimate leader,” said IDF Maj.-Gen. (res.) Ya’acov Amidror, a former Israeli national security advisor. “It’s also clear that Arab leaders are not willing to live next to a Taliban state.” 

Other gestures in the months since al-Sharaa’s rise included giving Israel Syria’s archive of documents relating to Israeli spy Eli Cohen, who was captured and executed in Syria in 1965, and the remains of soldier Zvi Feldman, who was killed in battle in 1982. 

In addition, Shaked noted that al-Sharaa pressured the terror groups Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to disarm, leading some of the groups’ leaders to flee the country.

IDF Maj.-Gen. (res.) Ya’acov Amidror, a former Israeli national security advisor, told JI that the main reason for the shift was that “time passed, that’s all.”

“In the beginning, he was a mystery. No one knew who [al-Sharaa] was, only that he came from Al-Qaida, and we only saw Al-Qaida-type people around him,” Amidror said. 

Since assuming leadership of Syria in December, however, Israel has seen that al-Sharaa “is trying to build something else in Syria,” Amidror said. “He is showing signs that he knows he has to change to get help from the West and so the world will recognize him as the legitimate leader. It’s also clear that Arab leaders are not willing to live next to a Taliban state.” 

“Taking all of that together, Israel is willing to talk,” he added.

Trump’s May meeting with al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia also motivated Jerusalem and Damascus to enter talks. 

Shaked said that Syria “jumped on [the opportunity] … and said, ‘If Trump is willing to recognize us, then we can get rid of the sanctions and receive grants’” to help rebuild the country. 

The meeting between Trump and al-Shaara “was the breakthrough that set the path we are on,” he added.

Valensi concurred, saying that “the direct motivation for Israel to change its approach is the Americans’ embrace of al-Sharaa.”

After Assad’s fall in December, Israel struck Syria’s air defenses, missile stockpiles and other military capabilities, and moved into the buffer zone between the countries. Valensi said that the “hawkish approach to al-Sharaa came from … the trauma of Oct. 7 [2023 terror attacks]. Israel is much more determined to stop threats that may develop on its border. And paradoxically, Israel had a feeling of increased self-confidence, strength and power after its significant military achievements against the axis of resistance and Hezbollah, including the beeper operation and killing [Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah.”

Even before the May meeting in Riyadh, Valensi said, Israel had begun to soften its approach, with indirect talks between the countries, fewer military strikes and talks about deconfliction with Turkey, mediated by Azerbaijan.

“I think Israel started to understand that there were risks to its approach, and was starting to create a hostile dynamic to Israel” within Syria, Valensi said.

Amidror stopped short of describing the current situation as a shift in Israel’s approach: “There isn’t a change yet. We aren’t giving anything up, but we are in talks … We’re not withdrawing [from the Syrian Golan] so fast.” 

That could change in the future, however, Amidror added, saying that if al-Sharaa “really distances himself from where he came from and goes to a less extreme and more normal place, there is no reason for Israel to ignore it.”

Syrian media describes the talks as a “non-aggression pact,” Valensi said. Damascus has said it is looking to return to the 1974 ceasefire agreement that went into effect after the Yom Kippur War, which would entail Israel withdrawing from the Syrian side of the Golan Heights to where it was before the fall of former President Bashar al-Assad last year, and for there to be a buffer zone with U.N. forces between the countries. 

Valensi was skeptical that Israel would be willing to withdraw from the peak of Mount Hermon, a point in Syria which the IDF deployed troops to shortly after the fall of Assad, after so many senior Israeli security figures have called it a strategic achievement.

“Peace with Syria removes the entire threat from the eastern front, which is Israel’s longest front and a strategic one. We have peace with Jordan, and if we had peace with Syria, it would be the greatest gift to Israel,” said Ronni Shaked, a research fellow at the Harry S. Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace at Hebrew University.

“Israel may want a more gradual formula, a withdrawal in stages. I don’t know if al-Sharaa will accept that, and [withdrawal] is his basic condition,” she said. 

Shaked argued that “Israel has no need for the Syrian Golan. I don’t know what we’re doing there. It’s nonsense, it’s a symbol. If we want peace, we need to stop conquering territory.” 

“Peace with Syria removes the entire threat from the eastern front, which is Israel’s longest front and a strategic one. We have peace with Jordan, and if we had peace with Syria, it would be the greatest gift to Israel,” he said.

While talks are not focused on a comprehensive peace treaty yet, Shaked said anything is possible: “It was a great surprise when [former Egyptian President Anwar] Sadat came to Israel. We pinched ourselves and asked when we’re dreaming. New realities are created by brave leaders. If Netanyahu will be brave enough, he can give a little attention to this issue and make advances towards peace.” 

Valensi, however, argued that “the conversation about expanding the Abraham Accords or normalization is not relevant now.” She noted that al-Sharaa has said that public opinion in Syria would not support normalization with Israel, and it would be too drastic of a shift. “Al-Sharaa is a new leader with very limited legitimacy. It’s a fragile situation … It’s unclear that al-Sharaa would want to take on that political risk,” she said.

Johnnie Moore, an evangelical leader and director of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation who met with al-Sharaa last month, told the “Misgav Mideast Horizons” podcast last week that he “absolutely believe[s] that there will be peace between Syria and Israel. No question. It’s just a matter of time.”

As to an unconfirmed report that Netanyahu and al-Sharaa will meet in September before the U.N. General Assembly, Valensi said that “so many things can change in two months … Reality is so dynamic so I would not go that far. But if things continue on this trajectory, then it is possible.” 

Still, al-Sharaa would have to do a lot of work on Syrian public opinion before being photographed with Netanyahu, she added.

Johnnie Moore, an evangelical leader and director of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation who met with al-Sharaa last month, told the “Misgav Mideast Horizons” podcast last week that he “absolutely believe[s] that there will be peace between Syria and Israel. No question. It’s just a matter of time.” (The writer is a co-host of the podcast.) 

Al-Sharaa, Moore said, is part of a new generation of Middle Eastern leaders who are “future-oriented” and focused on solving problems, in contrast with “older leaders who think only about the past.”

To get there, however, Moore said “there are practical things that have to be done, and there are things that will make the Syrians uncomfortable and things that will make Israel uncomfortable. And yet, I think it will be done.” 

“I’m not sure it’s going to be done as quickly as everybody wants it, but I am certain it’s not going to take as long as people think it might,” he added.

U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Thomas Barrack, who is serving as special envoy to Syria, said on Monday that Hezbollah could have a future in Lebanese politics, despite the organization’s designation by the U.S. State Department as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.

“Hezbollah is a political party. It also has a militant aspect to it,” Barrack said at a press conference on Monday morning in Beirut, following a meeting with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun. “Hezbollah needs to see that there is a future for them, that the road is not not harnessed just solely against them, and that there’s an intersection of peace and prosperity for them also.”

Barrack said he was “unbelievably satisfied” with the Lebanese government’s response to the U.S.-proposed peace plan for the country, which includes the complete disarmament of Hezbollah and Israel ceasing airstrikes within the country. 

Looking forward, Barrack emphasized that Hezbollah’s role within a new governing structure would be decided by the Lebanese government alone, with the U.S. playing a supporting role.

“Nobody is better than the Lebanese in choosing opportunities,” Barrack said. “The region is changing, everything is moving at warp speed. All of the countries around us are changing, are morphing. You have a president of the United States who has committed to saying he has great respect for Lebanon, that he is behind it, and he wants to help in peace and prosperity.”

In May, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said 80 percent of the government’s objectives in disarming Hezbollah were met, reportedly with assistance from Israel, including intelligence and military support.

Bipartisan groups of House and Senate members have introduced legislation to repeal the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, sanctions legislation passed in 2019 targeting the former Syrian government led by Bashar al-Assad, a step that proponents say will help remove obstacles to reconstruction and stabilization efforts in post-Assad Syria.

The administration recently announced that it would be lifting all sanctions on Syria, but the Caesar Act sanctions can only be temporarily waived, for periods of 180 days, barring a full repeal by Congress. Administration officials have indicated that they’d support such a step, and sanctions relief, in principle, has broad support on both sides of the aisle.

The sanctions, named for a pseudonymous individual who documented the Assad regime’s torture of civilians, also targeted Syrian critical industries, individuals and businesses that supported or did business with the Syrian government and Iranian and Russian entities that supported the Syrian government. 

Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Rand Paul (R-KY) introduced legislation on Wednesday to repeal the sanctions. 

Reps. Joe Wilson (R-SC), Jimmy Panetta (D-CA), Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), Lou Correa (D-CA), Jack Bergman (R-MI), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) and Mike Levin (D-CA) introduced a similar bill in the House last week.

“We can keep the new Syrian authorities accountable without decimating the economy,” Shaheen said in a statement. “Sustained diplomatic engagement can yield tremendous results.”

Paul argued against the Caesar Act sanctions in principle, saying they had been too broadly targeted.

“While the Caesar Act was intended to isolate the Assad regime, it has ended up punishing everyday Syrians — fueling poverty, crippling recovery, and blocking progress toward peace,” Paul said. “This repeal is about restoring a more targeted, principled approach that holds bad actors accountable without inflicting unnecessary suffering on the very people we claim to support.”

The timeline for the repeal effort is somewhat unclear: Secretary of State Marco Rubio testified in May that the administration’s ultimate goal would be to repeal the act, conditioned on the new Syrian government “mak[ing] enough progress” on U.S. priority issues. 

But U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, who also serves as U.S. envoy to Syria, indicated greater urgency, calling for Congress to repeal the sanctions within the first 180-day waiver period, which is renewable if the sanctions are not repealed before then.

“I promise you the one person who has less patience with these sanctions than all of you is President Trump,” Barrack said during a visit to Syria to meet with President Ahmad al-Sharaa last month.

The House lawmakers leading the repeal legislation represent a broad spectrum of the House,  ranging from a former chair of the House Progressive Caucus to a former House Freedom Caucus member, and including Israel hawks on both sides of the aisle.

“The Assad regime sanctioned by the Caesar Act no longer exists, and it is time to repeal the law to provide long-term certainty to those who would like to invest in the reconstruction and rebuilding of Syria,” Wilson said in a statement.

Panetta said that repealing the sanctions would help the U.S. “position itself as a partner for continued progress” as adversaries aim to gain a foothold in Syria.

“The repeal of these broad sanctions will give foreign partners the certainty they need to invest in the Syrian economy and give their new government a chance to succeed,” Jayapal said.

Morgan Ortagus, a key member of Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff’s team, is departing his office, Jewish Insider has learned. 

Ortagus, the deputy special envoy, has been removed from her portfolio in the special envoy’s office, two sources familiar with the matter confirmed to JI. Ortagus had been overseeing the Trump administration’s Lebanon policy and had wanted to take over the Syria file, but was unsuccessful in doing so. 

Israel’s Channel 14 reported over the weekend that Ortagus was expected to leave her position.

Ortagus, who supported Trump’s 2024 bid and campaigned for him, did not respond to JI’s request for comment on the move or if she plans to continue serving in the administration in another capacity. 

The White House did not respond to JI’s request for comment on Ortagus’ future in the administration. 

President Donald Trump appointed Ortagus as Witkoff’s deputy in January, which he announced in an unusual statement expressing reticence about her appointment.

“Early on Morgan fought me for three years, but hopefully has learned her lesson,” Trump said in the statement, referencing Ortagus’ tenure as spokesperson for former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “These things usually don’t work out, but she has strong Republican support, and I’m not doing this for me, I’m doing it for them. Let’s see what happens.” 

Ortagus’ departure comes less than two weeks after Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio oversaw a widespread purge of officials at the NSC, including those overseeing the Middle East and Israel and Iran portfolios. This followed Trump’s decision to pull former National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, another Iran hawk in the administration, from his role and instead nominate him to be his ambassador to the United Nations.

The staffing developments inside the administration are taking place against the backdrop of an effort by Witkoff and Trump to move ahead with nuclear talks with Iran and a continued push for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

Correction: An earlier version of this story said that Ortagus was leaving the National Security Council. Ortagus was not a member of the NSC.

With the Middle East in flux from Gaza to Lebanon, Syria and Iran, any week in the last 600 days would have been a busy one in Jerusalem. Still, Sen. Dave McCormick (R-PA) arrived in Israel on Monday at a particularly significant moment, with nuclear talks with Iran reaching a critical juncture and the U.S. and Israel moving forward with a plan to distribute humanitarian aid in Gaza.

Israel is one stop in McCormick’s first trip abroad after becoming chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism earlier this year. 

“There are so many issues that will be coming before the Senate … so it felt like it was appropriate to come and get the truth on the ground,” McCormick said in an interview with Jewish Insider in Jerusalem on Tuesday. “We wanted to come to Israel as a show of solidarity. It’s a very tough time now, in the aftermath of [Israeli Embassy staffers] Yaron [Lischinsky] and Sarah [Milgrim] killed in Washington, and all the polarization and the challenges with Gaza and Iran.”

In between a visit to the Western Wall and minutes before his meeting with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the group implementing the American-Israeli Gaza aid plan, which has come under fire from international aid groups on the ground, McCormick spoke with JI about the significant issues on his agenda. Tech investor Liran Tancman, one of the Israelis involved in arranging the aid distribution program, took part in the meeting with McCormick and GHF as well. 

The GHF began distributing aid on Monday, though it had to pause at one point on Tuesday, reportedly due to overcrowding. Additionally, Hamas members reportedly threatened Gazans who cooperated with the American-led effort.

“I certainly recognize … how complex a problem this is,” McCormick said. “On one hand, you want to give the humanitarian assistance that is needed to make sure innocents are able to have the support they need. But it’s also a tool that’s been hijacked by Hamas as a source of revenue, as a source of leverage and control. So, how do you balance?”

The senator noted positively that hundreds of trucks had already entered Gaza, and expressed hope that the GHF could distribute aid to families in need.

McCormick also pointed out that “this whole thing could end overnight if [Hamas] release[s] the hostages.”

His message for countries such as the U.K., France and others that have threatened action against Israel if it does not allow the U.N. to distribute aid is “to actually look at the complexity of the problem and the good faith efforts that are being taken to address it. I think that will hopefully be confidence-building for them.”

McCormick was also in Israel at a time in which the Trump administration appears increasingly concerned that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is not on board with the White House’s efforts to reach a diplomatic deal with the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program. Israel is reportedly preparing contingency plans to strike Iran. 

Tensions between Washington and Jerusalem led Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to tell Fox News on Monday that she was dispatched to Israel to tell Netanyahu to allow negotiations to run their course.

The day after meeting with Netanyahu, McCormick said, “Nobody shared any battle plans with me. Obviously, the administration is in close contact with the Israeli government … I think, ultimately, the defining point is Iran can’t have a nuclear program and can’t be on the path to having a nuclear program. That’s a defining goal.”

“I think there is an opportunity because I think Iran is at a weak moment due in part to incredible actions that Israel has taken against the terrorist proxies supported by Iran,” he added. “The political pressure on Iran is at an all-time high, and the capability of the Iranians is at an all-time low. So you’ve got a moment of opportunity, and I’m hoping that forces will come together to make the most of it.”

McCormick argued that Trump and Netanyahu’s remarks on Iran’s nuclear program are consistent with one another.

“I go to what President Trump said, which is full dismantlement of the nuclear program and no enrichment, those are his two red lines, and I listen to what Netanyahu said yesterday, which is, ‘I don’t trust them, but we need full dismantlement of the nuclear program and no enrichment,’” he said.

McCormick noted that former Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, Israel’s opposition leader, said the same thing as Netanyahu about Iran in their meeting. 

“If the deal would come together in line with what President Trump has said, that would be something that would be welcome,” McCormick added. “It would be a huge step forward for the region and a huge step forward for the world.” 

Asked if Republicans in the Senate would accept a deal that fell short of those lines, McCormick first said that while he is not privy to the details of the current negotiations with Iran, “I don’t necessarily believe any of what I read [in the media]. I’ll believe it when I hear the president … I’m not going to talk about something that doesn’t exist yet.” 

The senator pointed to a letter signed by nearly all Senate Republicans urging the president to reject any deal that does not include the full dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear program.

“I’ve been with the president when he’s talked about this, and I’ve heard him talk about dismantling [the Iranian nuclear program] … That’s the position that I think he’s taken and that I would take,” he stated.

When one negotiates with Iran, McCormick said, the first consideration must be to “take Iran at its word when it says it wants to destroy Israel and the United States,” and the second is that “there’s a history of untrustworthiness.”

“If you start with those two premises, then you have to get an outcome where the likelihood of a reconstitution of a nuclear Iran program is not something that is in the cards,” he said.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Congress last week that the current negotiations with Iran are only about its nuclear program and not its terror proxies or ballistic missile program, though related sanctions remain in place.

However, McCormick said, “that doesn’t mean U.S. policy is only going to deal with [the nuclear program], and my basic view is Iran has been a bad actor and any … reducing sanctions should also require the complete termination of any support for terrorist proxies.”

Asked if that doesn’t contradict an offer to lift sanctions in exchange for a nuclear-only deal, McCormick said, “I don’t know what the deal is, but any treaty would ultimately come before the Senate and those are the kinds of questions I’ve asked.”

McCormick expressed confidence that the Trump administration would not try to circumvent the Senate, saying that “for any agreement to last, it needs to come through the Senate.”

The senator rejected the framing that there are two dueling foreign policy camps in the Trump administration, the more traditional Republicans and the “restrainers,” saying that Trump has been “very consistent” and that he has “a realpolitik view of supporting American interests.”

“I’ve seen lots of administrations … There are always conflicting views. That’s how good policies are made. You have a policy process where people get to argue and the president gets to decide,” he said.

Trump, McCormick said, has “made it very clear that the Israelis are our closest ally in the Middle East. There is no one that’s done more to support Israel … He’s been very clear on his stance on antisemitism. So listen, these are complex problems … but I think the administration stance has been a very clear one, and the president keeps coming back to peace through strength, which I think is one of the defining pieces of this foreign policy.”

As for the relationship between the U.S. and Qatar, which hosts Hamas leaders in its capital and represents Hamas’ interests in hostage and ceasefire negotiations with Israel, McCormick said: “From a realpolitik perspective, Qatar is an important part of bringing together the possibilities of a peace deal, but I think any funding that’s supporting terrorist organizations or any historical support should be an important consideration in the relationship.”

The senator posited that “our relationship with Qatar is moving in the right direction, but ultimately it depends on changing behavior where it’s not supporting groups that aren’t in line with U.S. objectives or allies of the United States.”

When it comes to concerns that Qatar is spending large sums of money to try to gain favor and influence the U.S., McCormick drew a distinction between the $400 million plane Qatar is planning to gift Trump to be used as Air Force One and then donated to his library, and Qatar’s large contributions to American universities.

McCormick has “concerns about the plane from a security perspective and an intel perspective. Obviously, we want to make sure that … there’s no national security risk associated with it.”

However, he called the donation of the plane “a sort of transaction between the U.S. government in many countries that happens in all sorts of different forms … It’ll go through whatever ethics review.”

McCormick said that funding for universities, however, is a major concern, not only from Qatar but from China, “particularly if there are motivations tied to it.”

“No one has been a stronger voice on antisemitism on campus than me,” he said. “Any foreign money that can be tied to supporting groups that are leading this antisemitism, I’m very opposed to. I think President Trump cracking down on these universities for their antisemitism, looking at the sources of funding, making federal funding contingent on dealing with antisemitism and making sure universities are doing their role is necessary.”

In his second consecutive day of hearings on Capitol Hill, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that he expects that additional Arab countries will join the Abraham Accords by the end of the year, if not earlier.

“We do have an Abraham Accords office that is actively working to identify a number of countries who have lined up and already I think we may have good news, certainly before the end of this year, of a number of more countries that are willing to join that alliance,” Rubio said a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Wednesday.

The comments are consistent with other recent remarks by President Donald Trump and Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.

Rubio added that the administration is currently working on selecting an ambassador for the Abraham Accords, as required under law, to submit for congressional confirmation.

He said that there is “still a willingness” in Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel, but “certain conditions are impediments,” including the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel and the ensuing war.

Rubio’s testimony largely reinforced and added on his comments the day before, on issues including Iran and Syria.

He again insisted that all elements of the Trump administration, including Vice President JD Vance and Witkoff, are unified behind the position that Iran cannot be allowed to maintain its capacity to enrich uranium.

And he affirmed that U.S. law requires that any deal with Iran be submitted to Congress for review and approval, noting that he had been in Congress when that law was passed.

At an afternoon hearing with the House Appropriations Committee, Rubio again said that sanctions relating to Iranian proxy terrorism or other malign activities will not be impacted by a nuclear deal that does not address those subjects. Republicans in the past have questioned the distinction between nuclear and non-nuclear sanctions, particularly as part of the original 2015 nuclear deal, which took a similar approach. And they’ve argued that any sanctions relief would allow Iran to expand its support for regional terrorism.

Rubio said the administration is continuing to ramp up sanctions on Iran, and said that European parties to the deal are “on the verge” of implementing snapback sanctions on Iran. He said that the administration would support legislation to implement additional sanctions on Iran’s oil sector.

He denied knowledge of a Tuesday leak by administration officials that Israel was making plans to strike Iran’s nuclear program, adding, “I also don’t think it’s a mystery, though … that Israel has made clear that they retain the option of action to limit Iran from ever gaining a nuclear capability.”

Expanding on comments he made the day before, Rubio said that he favors moving the mission of U.S. security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian territories under the authority of the U.S. ambassador to Israel so that it can be a better-integrated part of the U.S.’ Israel policy. But he vowed that the core function of the office will continue.

Rubio denied reports of talks between the United States and Saudi Arabia about potential nuclear cooperation outside of a “gold standard” deal, which would include banning domestic enrichment.

The secretary of state reiterated comments about the critical necessity of providing sanctions relief to Syria to help contribute to stability, but he said that continued sanctions relief “does have to be conditioned on them continuing to live by the commitments” that the Syrian government has made verbally, including to combat extremism, prevent Syria from becoming a launchpad for attacks on Israel and form a government that represents, includes and protects ethnic and religious diversity.

He indicated that the U.S. is not actively working to shut down the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, but pledged that the United States will not be providing any further aid to or through that organization and will use its power and funding to look for alternatives.

He said it will be up to other countries whether they continue working with UNRWA, though he noted that the U.S. has been the agency’s largest donor.

Rubio said that he would be supportive, in concept, of legislation to expand current U.S. anti-boycott laws to include compulsory boycotts imposed by international organizations. That legislation was pulled from a House floor vote after right-wing lawmakers falsely claimed it would ban U.S. citizens from boycotting Israel.

Pushing back on calls for the U.S. to withhold weapons sales to the United Arab Emirates over its support for one of the parties involved in the Sudanese Civil War that the U.S. has found is committing genocide, Rubio said that the U.S. is not fully in alignment with the UAE but argued that it’s critical for the U.S. to continue engaging with and maintain a strong relationship with the UAE for its broader foreign policy goals in the Middle East.

He said that maintaining such a relationship and expanding the U.S.’ diplomatic and economic relationship with Abraham Accords countries is also important to ensuring that the Accords continue to be successful.

Rubio said that the State Department had approved restarting aid programs for Jordan that remained frozen — though he noted most were initially exempted from the administration’s blanket freeze. He acknowledged that the frozen programs had been “a source of frustration for [Jordan], and frankly for me.” He continued, “Ultimately, we’re going to get all those programs online, if they’re not online already.”

In a heated back-and-forth with Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), who was brandishing a pocket Constitution, Rubio again defended the administration’s policy of revoking student visas from individuals accused of involvement in anti-Israel activity on college campuses, saying that they are coming to the United States to “tear this country [apart]” and “stir up problems on our campuses.”

Addressing the case of Rümeysa Öztürk, a Tufts University graduate student that supporters have said was detained solely for writing an op-ed in a student newspaper criticizing Israel, Rubio claimed the situation is not as has been represented. “Those are her lawyers’ claims and your claims, those are not the facts,” Rubio said.

Asked by Jayapal about a comment — “Jews are untrustworthy and a dangerous group” — made by an Afrikaner refugee recently admitted to the United States from South Africa, Rubio said that he would “look forward to revoking the visas of any lunatics you can identify.”

But when presented with the fact that the individual in question was admitted as a refugee, not on a visa, Rubio said that refugee admissions are “a totally different process,” adding “student visas are a privilege.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in his first appearance on Capitol Hill since being confirmed as secretary of state that Iran’s support for regional terrorist proxies has not been part of the ongoing talks between the Iranian government and Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, which Rubio said have been focused wholly on Iran’s nuclear program and enrichment capabilities.

At the same time, Rubio insisted that any sanctions related to terrorist activity and weapons proliferation would remain in place if such issues are not part of the nuclear deal. 

Rubio’s comments indicate the deal might still be subject to what some critics in the United States and the region described as a key flaw of the original nuclear deal — that it failed to address other malign activity by the regime. One U.S. lawmaker who traveled to the Middle East recently said that U.S. partners in Israel and the Arab world had argued that any deal must include non-nuclear provocations.

Rubio added that sanctions will remain in place until a deal is reached, and that European partners are working separately on re-implementing snapback sanctions, potentially by October of this year, when such sanctions expire.

He also said that Iran cannot have any level of nuclear enrichment under a nuclear deal, as it would inevitably provide a pathway for Iran to enrich to weapons-grade levels.

“About 90% of the work of enrichment is getting to that 3.67% level [necessary for civilian nuclear power]. After that, the rest of it is just a matter of time,” Rubio said. “They [Iran] claim that enrichment is a matter of national pride. It is our view that they want enrichment as a deterrent. They believe that it makes them a threshold nuclear power, and as a result, [become] untouchable.”

Rubio said that reaching a nuclear deal will not be easy, but that it is the administration’s preference. He reiterated that Iran can be permitted to have nuclear energy for civilian use, but only if it imports nuclear material from elsewhere. He said at a second hearing later in the day that a so-called 123 Agreement for civilian nuclear cooperation with the United States or an equivalent deal would be possible if Iran dismantles its enrichment capacity.

Addressing the war in Gaza, Rubio said that the U.S. is ultimately hoping to end hostilities, adding that ending the war will require Hamas freeing the hostages and ensuring that Hamas and similar terrorist groups do not maintain power in Gaza. He placed blame on Hamas for failing to agree to a ceasefire.

Rubio said that regional partners are willing to step up to help support the reconstruction of Gaza, but said that the territory’s future governance will be the key question going forward. He said that a stable governing authority capable of providing peace and security will be necessary to keep Hamas out of power.

Rubio also denied any plans for forcible or permanent relocation of Palestinians in Gaza, but said that the administration had been engaged in discussions with other regional partners about allowing Gazans who want to temporarily relocate to do so. He said he was not aware of any such conversations with Libya, as a recent NBC News report suggested.

“You don’t want people trapped [in Gaza]. They may want to come back, they may want to live there in the future, but right now, they can’t,” Rubio said. “And if there’s some nation willing to accept them in the interim period, yes, we’ve asked countries preliminarily whether they would be open to accepting people, not as a permanent situation, but as a bridge towards reconstruction.”

He said that the U.S. was “pleased to see that aid is starting to flow” into Gaza, after Israel had blocked it for 11 weeks.

He rebutted accusations that Israel is seeking to destroy Gaza, saying that Israel has told the U.S. and the world that “they need to root out the remaining elements of Hamas — who, by the way, have been an impediment to multiple ceasefires.”

Later in the day, Rubio reiterated that the U.S. sees resuming humanitarian aid as a priority and has encouraged Israel to allow aid into Gaza — a divergence from some Israeli officials and congressional Republicans who have opposed allowing aid into Gaza. He appeared to acknowledge that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is dire.

“Many of you have noticed there’s been a growing number of anti-Hamas protests and demonstrations as well. So there are people there that understand that this is a root cause of it,” Rubio said. “That said, you have this, you have this acute, immediate challenge of food and aid not reaching people, and you have existing distribution systems that could get them there.”

He said that Israel can defeat Hamas and prevent diversion of aid while still permitting “sufficient quantities” of aid to move into the territory. He said that organizations like the World Food Program have the capacity to immediately begin distributing aid, reflecting the reticence of Israeli and U.S. officials to rely on the U.N. for distribution.

The secretary of state continued to embrace the administration’s policy of revoking student visas and residency permits from individuals alleged to be involved in anti-Israel activity on college campuses, adding that such revocations will continue.

“We’re going to do more. There are more coming. We’re going to continue to revoke the visas of people who are here as guests and are disrupting our higher education facilities,” Rubio said. “I want to do more, I hope we can find more.”

Rubio said later in the day that thousands of student visas have been revoked, but many for reasons unrelated to anti-Israel activity.

He denied reports that the administration is planning to eliminate the position of U.S. security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian territories, saying that there had instead been discussions about bringing the mission under the authority of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem.

Rubio also pushed back on accusations from Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) that the administration was “abandoning” a push for normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, saying instead that “the Saudis are the ones that have expressed their inability to move forward on it, so long as the conflict is happening in Gaza. But we would love to see normalization.”

The secretary of state spoke at length about the situation in Syria and the administration’s decision to remove sanctions on the country. He acknowledged that, even with U.S. engagement, the situation in Syria could still collapse, but argued that collapse would have been a certainty if the U.S. had not chosen to engage and lift sanctions.

“It is our assessment that, frankly, the transitional authority, given the challenges they’re facing, are maybe weeks, not many months, away from potential collapse and a full scale civil war of epic proportions, basically the country splitting up,” Rubio said.

Despite President Donald Trump’s announcement that the U.S. would remove “all” sanctions from Syria, Rubio said in the second hearing that the sanctions would be removed “incrementally.” He said that Syria’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism should be removed if Syria meets the conditions for such a move.

Rubio said that resolving internal divisions, restoring a unified Syrian national identity and creating a situation in which millions of displaced persons can return will be critical challenges going forward.

Rubio described the fall of the Assad regime and the possibility of a stable and peaceful Syria as an “opportunity for Israel,” despite the Israeli government’s deep concerns about the new Syrian government and its leader’s past jihadi loyalties. 

“They’re not viewing themselves as a launch pad for revolution. They’re not viewing themselves as a launch pad for attacks against Israel,” Rubio said. “So we think this is an extraordinary thing, if, in fact, you have in Syria a stable government that encompasses all the elements of their society and has no interest whatsoever in fighting wars with Israel over borders or anything else. I think that’s an extraordinary achievement for Israel’s security.” 

He said that the U.S. has been working to mediate conflicts between Turkey and Israel inside Syria, but added that Syrian government decisions in the medium term about whether to allow Turkey or Russia to maintain bases inside Syria will be a key issue going forward. 

He said Iran is still working to foment violence inside Syria, which he characterized as one of the most critical threats to the new government’s stability.

Rubio said Trump had moved more quickly than anticipated in meeting with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, but said that removing sanctions will allow regional partners to surge aid in, helping to build a more stable government and unify armed forces in the country.

But Rubio also said that action from Congress will be needed to repeal other sanctions legislation like the Caesar Act that can only be temporarily waived by the president, pending performance from the Syrian government.

He described the situation in Syria as the “first test” of what he characterized as a new approach to U.S. foreign aid and engagement driven more by local personnel and bureaus than Foggy Bottom.

Rubio said that the U.S. Embassy in Syria remains closed due to concerns about potential attacks from other armed groups in the country, explaining that the U.S. does not see the new government led by former jihadist fighters as a security threat.

He said that ISIS, with which al-Sharaa was previously affiliated, “hates the transitional authority, and they hate al-Sharaa, and they hate everybody in his government and I think pose a grave risk to them.”

He said that the Syrian government is willing to take over counter-ISIS operations but currently lacks the capacity to do so.

He added that stability in Syria would help bring stability in Lebanon, and if those two countries become stabilized, it “opens up incredible opportunities around the region for all kinds of peace and security and the end of conflicts and wars.”

Rubio denied any knowledge related to a potential gift of a Boeing 747 jet from Qatar to Trump or the U.S. government.

Asked about the situation, the secretary of state declined to speak publicly about conversations with the United Arab Emirates regarding its backing of one of the warring parties in Sudan that the U.S. has found is committing genocide, but said that it doesn’t “serve the interests” of international parties to back belligerents in the conflict “because instability there is going to create a breeding nest for radicalism.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), a close ally of President Donald Trump, called for a cautious and deliberate approach to removing sanctions on Syria and emphasized that Congress has a significant oversight role to play, hours after Trump announced he plans to lift “all” U.S. sanctions on Syria.

Graham’s statement on sanctions relief came as he touched down in Turkey for a trip aimed at evaluating the situation in Syria and appeared aimed at pumping the brakes on Trump’s sweeping declaration. Reactions from others on Capitol Hill to the news have been decidedly mixed across both parties.

Graham said that he’s “very inclined to support sanctions relief for Syria under the right conditions,” but also cautioned that the Syrian government took power through force.

“Waiving congressionally passed sanctions is a complicated process. While I would like to empower the new players in Syria, it has to be done in a coordinated fashion with our allies — especially our friends in Israel — so that numerous security concerns can be addressed,” Graham said in the statement.

“This newly formed government in Syria may be a good investment and could be the pathway to unifying Syria, making it a stable part of the region. However, there is a lot that must be learned before making that determination,” he continued. “A stable Syria would be a game changer for the region, but given its past, their progress must be evaluated closely.”

Graham highlighted that Congress has a role to play in any sanctions relief and noted that the administration must submit a report to Congress outlining substantive changes to the situation on the ground in Syria before its designation as a state sponsor of terrorism can be lifted.

“That report has not been received and Congress has the opportunity to review this action if it chooses,” Graham continued. “The designation of Syria as a state sponsor of terrorism has tremendous ramifications apart from the sanctions. I am certain that Congress would need to be informed of changes in conditions placed on Syria and how they have met those conditions before Congress can make an informed decision on whether or not it should approve the change in designation.”

Graham also noted that Israeli officials are “extremely concerned about the state of play in Syria,” and said that he plans to discuss those concerns and keep in close touch with Israeli officials during the trip, “so that we can fully understand the implications of sanctions waivers.”

He noted that attacks on Israel have been launched from Syria in the past. Israel has deployed troops to a buffer zone over the Syrian border and conducted strikes on military infrastructure in the country since the fall of the Assad regime.

Reactions from others on Capitol Hill have been mixed, across both parties.

Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, who had pushed for phased, conditional sanctions relief for Syria, said he deferred to Trump’s decision on the issue without strongly endorsing it. He said he’d discussed the subject with Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio prior to Trump’s conversation with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.

“It sounded as if they had some negotiations on it. He is the president of the United States and I respect his judgement,” Risch said.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who had joined with Risch in calling for conditional sanctions relief, praised Trump’s decision.

“I commend President Trump’s decision to lift all sanctions on Syria,” Shaheen said. “These sanctions succeeded in their original goal of aiding in the downfall of the brutal Assad regime. I welcome their removal now to give the new Syria a chance to develop into a free and prosperous state independent of the malign influence of Russia, Iran and China.”

She said the U.S. should “move expeditiously” to lift sanctions and “increase our engagement with the Syrian authorities” alongside allies and partners. 

“Stability and security in the heart of the Middle East will pay dividends for U.S. interests and along Syria’s borders, including for our friends in Israel, Lebanon, Türkiye, Iraq and Jordan,” Shaheen continued. “We must do all we can to ensure Syria continues to move in the direction of democracy, stability and security.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) fell closer to Graham’s view of the situation, emphasizing that Trump “has to come to Congress” and that sanctions relief should be conditional to achieve concessions from the Syrian government.

“He has no explanation for why he’s just unilaterally surrendering all of this leverage,” Blumenthal said. “For the guy who talks about the art of the deal, he’s gotten nothing for it in the way of any sort of guarantees about what the Syrian government’s going to do.”

He said that whether Congress would repeal the sanctions would depend on what the Syrian government commits to do.

“This regime is basically an unknown — a vast unknown — headed by someone who was regarded as a terrorist until just months ago,” Blumenthal said. “I want some more security guarantees and also other conditions.”

New Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa discussed last week his conditions for normalizing relations with Israel with Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), who was one of the first American lawmakers to visit the country since the overthrow of the Assad regime.

Al-Sharaa’s apparent openness to normalization is a striking step given his history as a fighter and leader in Al-Qaida and ISIS, and the campaign of Israeli military strikes against Syria, motivated by concerns about al-Sharaa and other new Syrian leaders’ jihadist pasts, among other issues.

During a meeting at the presidential palace in Damascus, al-Sharaa told Stutzman that his concerns regarding Syria’s relationship with Israel are keeping Syria as a unified country and not allowing regions to be divided off, Israel’s military encroachment into Syria around the Golan Heights and the Israeli bombing campaign targeting Syrian military assets. 

Al-Sharaa said any agreement with Israel would have to address those points, but Stutzman told Jewish Insider last week that “outside of those couple of items — and I’m sure there’s going to be other issues that he would bring to the table, but [al-Sharaa] was open to those conversations about normalizing relations with Israel.” Stutzman said he felt al-Sharaa was being honest and upfront about those conditions.

He said they did not specifically address the issue of whether al-Sharaa’s government is seeking to reclaim the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in the Six-Day War in 1967. Israel has floated the prospect of attempting to create and protect an autonomous zone for the Druze minority in southern Syria and strongly opposes any sanctions relief for the regime, as has been floated by lawmakers in the U.S.

The congressman noted that al-Sharaa used the word “Israel” on various occasions, rather than using euphemisms like “Zionist [entity]” preferred by Israel’s antagonists in the region, which Stutzman suggested was a positive sign.

The Indiana congressman said he believed al-Sharaa, who some in the United States and Israel — including members of the Trump administration — think still harbors jihadist aims, is sincere in his interest in reforming Syria and moving beyond Islamist extremism. 

“He sees the prosperity of the West, it seems to me like he may want to be a part of that, and I think that’s something we should be open to,” Stutzman explained. “His past is dubious. We can’t ignore it. But at the same time, it seems like he’s stretching a hand to the West to have a dialogue.”

Stutzman called for a “trust-but-verify approach” to the new regime. He said that he and al-Sharaa had discussed the issue of lifting U.S. sanctions, which Stutzman said would ultimately be a decision best left to President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. 

“He wanted to keep Syria unified. That was a really top priority for him,” Stutzman said. “And respecting all human rights, religious rights, he seemed agreeable to that. Actions speak louder than words, and that’s what we have to watch, but I truly believe that we should be engaging in a conversation with him.”

“He’s already pushing Hezbollah and the Iranians out of the region, and he has a good relationship with Turkey for the most part, and is reaching out to the countries in the Middle East,” Stutzman added, saying that welcoming members of Congress into the country for an unrestricted visit was another positive sign.

Stutzman said he believes al-Sharaa is currently committed to keeping Iran, Russia and China out of Syria, but said that if al-Sharaa cannot find friends in the West, he will likely turn to American adversaries.

He said that al-Sharaa is highly interested in building economic relationships with Gulf states and making Syria peaceful and prosperous.

“He was very thoughtful and measured, but you could tell a couple of times he got excited, he was getting excited when I asked him about his vision for Syria economically, and he started talking about trade and commerce and tourism and the relationship with Qatar and Saudi Arabia and UAE, and the fact that they could be an energy resource to the West as well as trade routes,” Stutzman said.

Al-Sharaa pitched to Stutzman plans to build rail lines and trucking routes through Syria to the Gulf and the West to cut down shipping times, as well as a gas line to Europe that could help undermine Russia’s energy dominance.

The Indiana lawmaker noted that he was particularly struck by the fact that a Christian woman, Hind Kabawat, is a member of al-Sharaa’s Cabinet. She met with Stutzman and Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL), who also traveled to Syria, and took them to meet with other Christian leaders.

He said that he was also impressed by al-Sharaa’s opening of the presidential palace to the Syrian people. 

Stutzman added that, in general, he saw a sense of optimism among the Syrian people, which “shows you how bad it was before.” He added, “their spirit is not broken,” drawing stark contrasts between his visit to Syria and the dejected people he saw on a visit to Russia in 1995 after the fall of the Soviet Union.

“There seemed to be a sense of hope and optimism,” he said. “The opportunities there are endless if President al-Sharaa takes advantage of it.”

He said that Christian leaders in Syria with whom he met were aware of but did not seem especially worried by al-Sharaa’s jihadist background. The Christian leaders noted that al-Sharaa’s father was an academic, that some of them had known al-Sharaa in their school days and that al-Sharaa, while a member of terrorist groups, had been fighting against the Assad regime.

The surprise trip came about through long relationships between Stutzman and members of the Syrian American community, including the leaders of the Syrian American advocacy group that organized the trip, who live in Indiana.

“I’ve learned a lot from them, and they asked me to be supportive of lifting sanctions,” Stutzman said. “I said, ‘It’s hard to just say that without knowing more and seeing what’s on the ground.’ And so the opportunity came to go over, and that’s why I went.”

Sens. Jim Risch (R-ID) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), the chair and ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, this week urged the Trump administration in a letter to consider expanded sanctions relief for Syria.

Their letter, addressed to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, marked a notable new push from two of Congress’ most senior foreign policy leaders for targeted and conditional sanctions relief for the new Syrian government, an effort that has seen broad bipartisan support in Washington, but which is opposed by the Israeli government.

Risch and Shaheen urged the administration to “remove barriers to expanded engagement with the Syrian interim government,” with an aim of balancing “opportunity and risk” and providing opportunities for U.S. partners to engage in Syria even if the U.S. takes a more cautious approach.

“We recommend a thorough review of existing U.S. regulations on Syria, to include the extension and expansion of existing general licenses and limited or short-term sanctions relief in the near term,” the lawmakers said.

They urged the Cabinet officials to offer sanctions relief for a wide range of critical fields including agriculture, energy and energy infrastructure, finance, telecommunications and education. 

The two said the U.S. should expand general license provisions to allow “more time and geographic flexibility to those on the ground” and consider “short-term sanctions relief” to increase liquidity and prevent instability, goals they believed are  “essential to achieving the conditions to advance U.S. interests.”

Risch and Shaheen said that the U.S. should also work to push the new government to intensify efforts to crack down on terrorism, prevent Iranian and Russian entrenchment, destroy remaining chemical weapons, eliminate narcotics and find missing U.S. citizens.

The senators argued that the administration should reward “irreversible” progress on these issues with “fulsome sanctions relief,” and pursue “deeper economic and diplomatic isolation” if such progress does not materialize.

They warned that some recent reports out of Syria “raise serious concerns” about backsliding on some of these issues. 

Risch and Shaheen further noted the “growing competition between Israel and Türkiye over Syria’s trajectory that may threaten American interests,” urging the administration “to move quickly to mediate between our allies.”

Jeffrey Togman wanted to make a documentary about the bloody civil war in Syria. He found his subject at a synagogue. 

In May 2016, the Seton Hall University political science professor saw that Congregation Shomrei Emunah, a Montclair, N.J., Conservative synagogue five blocks from his home, would be hosting a discussion on the Syrian war and refugee crisis. At the time, Togman was actively looking for a subject to profile in his film. “I was looking for Syrian Americans who could tell the story of Syria,” Togman told Jewish Insider last week.

After hearing Mohamed Khairullah — a Syrian American activist and the mayor of nearby Prospect Park, N.J., a town of nearly 6,000 — speak at the event, Togman knew he had found his documentary’s main subject. “He’s a real American, Jersey guy. I thought he’d be a great character, and a great person to bridge these two worlds, to let many Americans understand what was happening in Syria,” Togman said. 

After three years of filming Khairullah’s day-to-day life as mayor, including the Islamophobic hate mail that frequently lands in his inbox, Togman released “Mayor Mohamed” earlier this month at the Brooklyn Film Festival, with plans to bring the film to more audiences later this year. The goal of the film was twofold, Togman explained: to showcase the story of a long-serving Muslim elected official and the discrimination he faces, and to highlight Khairullah’s humanitarian work on behalf of Syrians trapped under Bashar al-Assad’s brutal rule.

“This basic notion that we’re all human beings, and that we have to stand by each other, is what people walk away with most strongly,” Togman said of the initial response he has received to the film. 

Khairullah, a Democrat, has long been vocal about his Syrian heritage and his criticism of the Assad regime. He also is not shy about describing the racism he faces as a Muslim public servant. “There’s a lot more people who don’t speak about it, who just take their punches and roll through life, through the pain and suffering, sometimes missing opportunities — or sometimes just having to take the pain, that humiliation,” Khairullah told JI. “It’s just not acceptable, so I don’t mind exposing it. That’s why I chose to share my story.”

The feature-length movie shows life for Khairullah and his family in northern New Jersey. “The town itself is just a microcosm of American diversity,” Togman said of Prospect Park, where more than half the residents are of Hispanic origin. But, Khairullah said, “just like any New Jersey community, everybody complains about property taxes. We pride ourselves [ourselves] on our community and our quality of life.” He has been mayor since 2006 and plans to run for another term next year. 

At the heart of the movie is Khairullah’s story of becoming an American. “There are all these barriers to integration for the Muslim American community,” said Togman. “It reminds me very strongly of the Jewish American experience. In fact, one of the characters in the film equates the two. And it’s really a story of this community that is often looked at in a suspect way, that’s often excluded.”

Khairullah left Syria in 1980 as a child. He was not officially a refugee, but his father was known to be a critic of Hafez al-Assad, the current leader’s father. The Khairullah family first went to Saudi Arabia, where they lived for 11 years, before coming to the U.S. when Khairullah was a teenager.

Compared to the conservative Saudi Arabia, America was a culture shock. “I had to get adjusted to the freedoms that we had,” said Khairullah. “I could never become a firefighter in Saudi Arabia — and that was a passion for me — because I’m not Saudi. But here, they told me, ‘Look, you couldn’t be a firefighter, but we could change the local ordinance.’” He was not used to seeing rules changed without the permission of a king. 

In most ways, Khairullah’s life is unremarkable: He spends time with his wife and kids, he goes to work as a teacher (his day job), he roots for the Giants. But he also deals with the discrimination that comes with being Muslim in America. 

“I wasn’t fully aware, certainly, at the type of hatred that Muslim Americans face,” said Togman. “The hate mail was atrocious: wishing them all dead, saying that all Muslims were animals. Things that many other groups, including Jewish Americans, are very familiar with.”

One sequence in the film shows different scenes of Khairullah with his wife and children — eating dinner, hanging out on the couch — while the text of hate mail he has received is overlaid on the screen. His wife holds their baby, smiling and laughing with their older children, as Khairullah looks down at his phone. The message, “I cannot wait till Trump takes this nation over and sticks his foot up your Syrian scumbag a**” appears on the screen.

Khairullah said he received anti-Muslim hate mail before former President Donald Trump was elected in 2016. But after Trump issued an executive order banning travel from seven predominantly Muslim nations a week into his presidency, Khairullah said the hate ratcheted up. “To my knowledge, it has become more common and people have become more daring. Those who had some kind of racist vein in them, they just expose themselves.” 

The hostility increased following his response to Trump’s policy. “We issued our executive order saying that everybody is welcome into town, and our municipal employees cannot ask for legal status while providing services. This is when we started receiving extra hateful messages,” Khairullah recalled. 

The documentary also features the story of a Republican challenger who drew accusations of Islamophobia. Khairullah had been speaking at a Board of Education meeting, and the woman spoke over him, saying, “This is not Sharia law, this is an orderly session.” 

“She refuses to apologize, and then she runs against him,” said Togman. 

The Syrian civil war that prompted Togman to make this documentary still rages on. “History is not going to look kindly upon us,” said Khairullah, arguing that neither former Presidents Barack Obama nor Trump took strong action on behalf of Syrians. “I hope that the Biden administration shows a little more leadership here and works more toward helping the Syrian people towards aspirations, towards freedom and self-determination. But I’m not very hopeful at this point.”

One scene in the movie shows a clip of Khairullah during a visit to Syria, one of several he took to the country as a relief worker. He stands in Aleppo amid the ruins of a bombing, ambulances speeding by all around him. ”Syrians are not radical. They’re not terrorists. All they want is their freedom, their democracy,” Khairullah says in speech at a protest back in New Jersey. 

Togman and Khairullah traveled together to Turkey in the course of making the film, where they visited Khairullah’s extended family and attempted to enter Syria together. They were barred, and Khairullah has not gone back since 2015.

Now, after a decade of trying to get Americans to pay attention to the brutal actions of the Assad regime, Khairullah has changed his tactics and lowered his expectations. “It’s more focused. You go and speak now to people who want to listen, rather than try to project it to the entire world,” said Khairullah. The same principle holds for the movie: “If someone goes to watch the movie, they know they’re going to watch something about Syria.”

But they will also learn something about their Muslim friends and neighbors here in the U.S. “It’s been something of an eye-opener. People have been shocked about the experience of the Muslim American community,” said Togman. Muslims who have watched the movie have taken something special from it: “I think that they really enjoy seeing a Muslim American as a hero in a film.”