• We’ll be keeping an eye out in the coming days on how yesterday’s attack on a Michigan synagogue is playing out on the national stage, from Jewish communal conversations to debates in Washington and in state capitals about antisemitism, security funding and safety measures.
• We’ll also be monitoring the ongoing military operations in the Middle East. Overnight, dozens were injured in an Iranian strike on the northern Israeli Arab town of Zarzir. Earlier this morning, CENTCOM confirmed that four of the six crew members of a U.S. KC-135 that crashed during a refueling mission in western Iraq on Thursday were killed, with an investigation underway.
• In Iran, a large explosion was reported this afternoon local time at a Quds Day demonstration in Tehran. The IDF had previously warned against congregating in the area.
• SXSW continues today, with Tech Tribe hosting its annual Shabbat dinner this evening.
• On Sunday, Jewish philanthropists are convening in San Diego for the three-day annual Jewish Funders Network conference. eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher and Rachel Kohn will be on the ground at JFN — sign up for eJP’s Your Daily Phil for the latest on the conference, and say hello if you see Jay and Rachel in San Diego.
• The Zionist Organization of America is hosting a gala in South Florida on Sunday night, where the group will honor Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), Rep. Randy Fine (R-FL) and the Justice Department’s Leo Terrell.
• In New York on Sunday, HaZamir: The International Jewish Teen Choir, is slated to perform at Lincoln Center.
• And across the country, the Oscars are taking place Sunday night in Los Angeles.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S JOSH KRAUSHAAR

It’s a testament to the level of security, staff preparation and good fortune that a potential terrorist attack against Temple Israel in suburban Detroit was foiled yesterday. The fact that no one other than the heavily armed perpetrator was killed after driving a vehicle filled with explosives into a synagogue filled with preschoolers, counts as something of a miracle.

It’s also a reminder of the consequences of what can happen when antisemitism is allowed to become normalized in our society, moving unchecked through our social media feeds and political discourse, all amid the record levels of hate crimes committed against Jews simply for their identity.

Even as politicians are reflexively speaking out against antisemitism in the aftermath of the attack, it’s hard to forget the poisonous rhetoric many on the extremes have advanced that could easily activate a lone-wolf extremist to commit an unspeakable crime. 

On the hard left, opposition to Israel’s war in Gaza has morphed into accusations of genocide, attacks against AIPAC as a uniquely sinister organization, conspiracy theories that Israel tricked the U.S. into war with Iran and euphemizing the support of terrorism as merely being “pro-Palestinian.”

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), who has emerged as one of his party’s leading anti-Israel voices as he mulls a presidential campaign, had the audacity to say he “stands with” antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker — along with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who has refused to condemn “globalize the intifada” rhetoric and anti-Israel Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner — during the Michigan synagogue terror attack.

Former Obama deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes and his “Pod Save America” colleagues are now declaring that anyone who supports the Iran war — a group that may well include some Jewish Democrats in Congress who are sympathetic to the operation’s aims, even if they have reservations — should be primaried, and have no place within the Democratic Party. 

On the hard right, extremist podcasters are broadcasting the most undiluted antisemitism in media since the days of Father Coughlin in the 1930s. Tucker Carlson has devoted much of his show to promoting conspiracy theories about Jews, while other social media influencers have found that attacking Israel and questioning Jewish influence is a ticket to building a niche audience in online spaces. Gatherings of young right-wingers have all too often become cesspools of anti-Jewish hate. 

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

A Bridge Too Far: Puck’s Julia Ioffe looks at the catch-22 facing Elbridge Colby, the Trump administration’s under secretary of war for policy, as the U.S. engages militarily with Iran — a strategy that Colby has long personally opposed. “Colby isn’t the first to strike this kind of Faustian — or simply Washingtonian — bargain over the past decade. But for him, as for everyone else, the MAGAfication cuts both ways. On one hand, he has political power and the kind of job that NatSec types dream of. On the other, that power is entirely subject to Trump’s whims. ‘He’s an ideological actor in an administration that has no ideology,’ a Democratic member of Congress told me.” [Puck]

Van Hollen’s Venom: In the Jewish News Syndicate, Betsy Berns Korn, chair of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, raises concerns about Sen. Chris Van Hollen’s (D-MD) allegation that AIPAC is “neither” a pro-American nor a pro-Israel organization. “Citizens advocate for stronger alliances with NATO partners, support Taiwan’s democracy, promote human-rights abroad, defend labor interests, protect the environment and work to expand trade relationships. That tradition of civic participation is a hallmark of American democracy. Advocacy for a strong relationship between the United States and Israel belongs squarely within that tradition. … Support for this partnership does not make Americans less loyal to their country. On the contrary, it reflects their judgment about what best serves American security, democratic values and global stability.” [JNS]

Regime Unchanged: The Washington Post’s David Ignatius warns that the U.S.’ strategy in Iran runs the risk of allowing the regime to stay in place. “If the conflict ends tomorrow, Iran will have lost nearly all its nuclear facilities and scientists, most of its missiles and missile launchers, most of its weapons factories, most of its navy, and much of the command and control for its military, intelligence and security forces. But the regime survives. It has taken America’s best punch, and it’s still standing. Tiers of senior military, intelligence and political leaders are dead, but they have been replaced by others. There’s no sign of a popular uprising. The cadres of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps hide among piles of rubble, but they haven’t been eliminated.” [WashPost]

Kurds Force: In New Lines Magazine, Laurent Perpigna Iban spotlights the Kurdish factions that had until recent days been under consideration by the U.S. to lead a ground incursion into Iran. “For the first time in their history, the various Iranian Kurdish factions have found common ground and established a platform for cooperation. … The project is more political than military, laying the groundwork for the protection of Iran’s Kurdish population. According to converging sources, discussions about a potential ground incursion do exist, even if such a scenario has not formally been placed on the table.” [NewLines]

Mind Meld on Iran: The Financial Times’ Neri Zilber reports on the close coordination between Washington and Jerusalem on the joint attack on Iran. “The speed and ferocity of the aerial campaign has required extraordinary levels of coordination — from the initial war plan that was put together to the thousands of phone conversations every day between the two militaries. ‘It’s a mind meld,’ said Dan Shapiro, a former senior US defence official and ambassador to Israel. … The close coordination, across the entire chain of command, has involved some 4,000 to 5,000 calls per day — from the chief of staff level down to the hundreds of pilots in the air at any given time, according to the senior Israeli military official.” [FT]

Politico reports on Vice President JD Vance’s skepticism ahead of U.S. strikes on Iran; Vance reportedly privately conveyed his opposition to military action to senior administration officials…

President Donald Trump officially removed Carrie Prejean Boller from the Religious Liberties Commission, weeks after Prejean Boller vociferously defended antisemitic conspiracy theorist Candace Owens at a commission hearing… 

Religious Liberties Commissionadvisory board member Sameerah Munshi, who had allied herself with Prejean Boller, announced her resignation from the board…

Trump nominated Sarah Rogers, the State Department’s undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media, days after a federal judge voided the actions undertaken at the agency under Kari Lake, who was serving as acting CEO; Rogers will maintain her State Department role in addition to leading USAGM…  

The president also nominated United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Governing Council member Jeff Miller to serve as the body’s chair; Miller, who also serves on the board of the Republican Jewish Coalition, was first appointed to the USHMM’s governing council by Trump in 2021…

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) on Thursday introduced legislation, co-sponsored by Sens. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Tom Cotton (R-AR), designating the Polisario Front, the terrorist group that claims sovereignty over parts of the Western Sahara, as a foreign terrorist organization; “This bill will ensure that America’s most powerful anti-terrorism sanctions can be used to counter those threats and, once a designation is secured, the Polisario Front and its leaders will be cut off from access to the global financial system, international travel, and the resources they rely upon to conduct their terrorism,” Cruz told JI…

Following the Michigan synagogue attack, Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) shared on X an antisemitic death threat that he received, saying that they are a daily occurrence for him and other Jewish members of Congress…

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) raised concerns about the status of Kamran Hekmati, an Iranian-American Jewish constituent in Suozzi’s district who has been jailed in Iran for nearly a year after being arrested for having visited Israel more than a decade ago for his son’s bar mitzvah…

Reps. Sara Jacobs (D-CA), Jason Crow (D-CO) and Yassamin Anasari (D-AZ) led 121 House Democrats in a letter questioning the administration over a strike on an Iranian girls’ school reportedly executed by the U.S….

Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), who is 85, announced that he will seek an 18th House term, two years after the South Carolina Democrat stepped down from his Democratic leadership role…

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg endorsed New York state Assemblymember Micah Lasher, who had served as a mayoral aide to Bloombergin the Democratic primary to succeed Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY); Bloomberg is preparing to spend up to $5 million on an ad campaign boosting Lasher in the crowded 12th Congressional District primary…

The Treasury Department announced on Thursday that it was imposing sanctions on four “sham charity” groups in Turkey and Indonesia that it said are funnelling money and resources to Hamas, JI’s Marc Rod reports…

The Trump administration is temporarily lifting sanctions on Russian oil that is already at sea in an effort to lower prices as Iran maintains control over the Strait of Hormuz; Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Thursday that it was “unfortunate” that Moscow would benefit in the short term from the conflict with Iran… 

The White House intervened to water down a broadly bipartisan sanctions bill targeting Iran’s oil exports to China, sources told Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod…

Turkish elites have reportedly begun circulating claims that Israel could turn its military attention toward Ankara should Iran emerge from the war depleted — a belief analysts say reflects growing mistrust and conspiratorial thinking in Turkey rather than any actual Israeli intent, JI’s Matthew Shea reports…

The Wall Street Journal gives a play-by-play accounting of the defection of six members of the Iranian women’s national soccer team, who sought asylum in Australia while playing in a tournament in the country…

Palestinian scholar Walid Khalidi, a co-founder of Beirut’s Institute for Palestine Studies, died at 100…

Amb. Michael Mann, the head of the European Union delegation to Israel, donated blood yesterday during a visit to Magen David Adom headquarters in the mixed central Israeli city of Ramla.

Four-time Israeli national champion in the skeleton event and pilot of Israel’s first-ever Olympic bobsled team in Milan, Adam “AJ” Edelman turns 35 on Saturday…

FRIDAY: Editor of Avotaynu Magazine, a journal of Jewish genealogy and scholarship, Sallyann Amdur Sack-Pikus turns 90… Former mayor of Miami Beach, Fla., and author of Destiny: From Shoeshine Boy to Mayor, Norman Ciment turns 90… Israeli singer, he won the 1978 Eurovision Song Contest, Izhar Cohen turns 75… Psychotherapist in private practice in Manhattan and Teaneck, N.J., Shana Yocheved Schacter… U.S. Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) turns 69… Founder of the Drug Policy Alliance, a NYC-based organization working to end the war on drugs, Ethan Nadelmann turns 69… Professor of applied mathematics at Imperial College London, he is also a chess grandmaster, Jonathan Mestel turns 69… Former Florida congressman, Alan Grayson turns 68… Teacher of rabbinic literature and author of The Jewish Family Ethics Textbook, Rabbi Neal S. Scheindlin turns 66… Founder and CEO of MediaBistro which she sold in 2007, now managing director of Supernode Ventures, Laurel Touby turns 63… Heavy metal songwriter, vocalist for the band Disturbed as well as for the band Device, he is a former yeshiva student, David Draiman turns 53… Member of the California state Senate since 2014, Benjamin Allen turns 48… Former member of Knesset for the Jewish Home party and decorated IDF reservist, Yonatan “Yoni” Chetboun turns 47… Deputy campaign manager on Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) 2020 presidential campaign, now host of radio show “The Agenda,” Ari Rabin-Havt… Television and film actor, Emile Hirsch turns 41… President and CEO of Nefco, a distributor of construction and industrial supplies, Matthew Gelles… Television and film actor, Emory Isaac Cohen 36… Senior director of social marketing at NBC Universal, Jessie Hannah Rubin… Former Formula 3 racing driver, his mother is Houda Nonoo, the first Jewish woman to serve as an ambassador of Bahrain, Menasheh Idafar turns 35… Gabriel Romano…

SATURDAY: Professor emeritus of chemistry at Tel Aviv University, winner of the 1982 Israel Prize, Joshua Jortner turns 93… Founder and retired president of Los Angeles-based Skirball Cultural Center, Rabbi Dr. Uri Herscher turns 85… Dean of Yeshiva Toras Moshe in Jerusalem, Rabbi Moshe Meiselman turns 84… Senior lecturer at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, Marshall Ganz turns 83… Canadian criminal defense attorney, Brian Greenspan turns 79… Actor, writer, producer, director and comedian, Billy Crystal turns 78… Former member of the Maryland House of Delegates for 28 years, Shane Elizabeth Pendergrass turns 76… One-half of the eponymous Ben & Jerry’s ice cream (Ben is four days younger), Jerry Greenfield turns 75… Retired Hebrew teacher, Eliezer Cohen Barak… Co-founder of the Adam and Gila Milstein Family Foundation, she is the president of Stand By Me, an organization that supports cancer patients, Gila Milstein… Partner at Hefter, Leshem, Margolis Capital Management Group of Wells Fargo Advisors in Highland Park, Ill., Steven Hefter… Founder and leader of ChangeCommunications, Jo-Ann Mort… NYC-based restaurateur and CEO of Union Square Hospitality Group, Danny Meyer turns 68… Professor in the department of Jewish philosophy at Tel Aviv University, Menachem Lorberbaum turns 68… Minneapolis-based attorney, Jonathan S. Parritz… Past president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Denise L. Eger turns 66… Owner of Baltimore’s Tov Pizza, which he founded in 1984, Ronnie Rosenbluth… Owner and COO of EJM Development Company, he also heads its lending division, New Frontier Capital, Jon Monkarsh… Microgrid architect at Urban Ingenuity and lecturer at Georgetown University, Shalom Flank, Ph.D… Film and television actress, she is best known for her title role in the 1985 film “The Journey of Natty Gann,” Meredith Salenger turns 56… Entrepreneur, musician, songwriter and record company executive, Josh Gruss turns 52… Screenwriter and film director, Etan Cohen turns 52… Canadian fashion stylist, publicist and close friend of Meghan Markle (her children were in the royal wedding as page boys and flower girl), Jessica Brownstein Mulroney turns 46… Heiress, together with her brother and cousins, to the Hyatt Hotels fortune, philanthropist, former child actress, Liesel Pritzker Simmons turns 42… Oldest of three sisters who are members of the rock band Haim, Este Arielle Haim turns 40… Former NASCAR driver, he is the sole inductee into the National Jewish Sports Hall of Fame and Museum in the “Auto Racing” category, Jon Denning turns 39… Former point guard at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was the Ivy League player of the year in 2012, Zack Rosen turns 37… Director, screenwriter and actor, known for his work on “The Intern,” “Big Time Adolescence” and “I Want You Back,” Jason Orley turns 37… Product quality specialist at The Topps Company, Philip Liebman… Coach for first-time founders, Sophie Galant… CEO of Prizmah, Paul Bernstein…

SUNDAY: Emmy, Golden Globe and Tony Award-winning actor, active in film, television and on the stage, Judd Hirsch turns 91… UCLA professor, biochemist and biophysicist, David S. Eisenberg turns 87… First-ever NYC Public Advocate starting in 1994, he is an author of 23 books, Mark J. Green turns 81… British billionaire and philanthropist, former chairman of retail conglomerate Arcadia Group, Sir Philip Nigel Ross Green turns 74… Former managing member at Buena Vista Fund Management in San Francisco, now owner of a homemade bread business, Robert Mendel Rosner… Animator and director of numerous episodes of “The Simpsons,” David Silverman turns 69… Real estate agent at Signature Realty Associates in the Tampa and Florida Gulf Coast market, Ze’ev “Wolf” Bar-El… White House special envoy leading diplomatic efforts around the world, Steve Witkoff turns 69… Freelance writer and consultant, Bathsheva Gladstone… Executive director of the Jewish Culture Center at Indiana University Bloomington, Debra Barton Grant… Member of the Knesset for the Likud party, currently serving as speaker of the Knesset, Amir Ohana turns 50… Retired MLB infielder, he now owns Loma Brewing, a brew pub in Los Gatos, Calif., he was Team Israel’s batting coach in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, Kevin Youkilis turns 47… Global business editor for Defense One, where he writes about the intersection of business and national security, Marcus Weisgerber… Psychotherapist based in Raleigh, N.C., Mindy Beth Reinstein Brodsky… Born in Jerusalem, she is a member of the New York state Assembly for the northeast portions of Queens, Nily Rozic turns 40… Rapper, comedian and actor, better known by his stage name Lil Dicky, David Andrew Burd turns 38… Board chair at the African Middle Eastern Leadership (AMEL) Project and executive director of the 30 Birds Foundation, Justin Hefter… Co-founder of Punchbowl News, Rachel Schindler… and Rachel’s twin brother, college admissions consultant and SAT/ACT tutor, Max J. Schindler… Zach Shartiag… Professional wrestler, Maxwell Jacob Friedman turns 30…

Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

President Donald Trump praised Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for assisting the members of Iran’s women’s soccer team, who are in Australia competing in the Women’s Asian Cup, amid fears for their persecution should they be forced to return home.

The president had called for Albanese to grant the athletes political asylum, saying they would “most likely be killed” if they were repatriated to Iran, and later commended him for “doing a very good job having to do with this rather delicate situation,” with five athletes “already taken care of, and the rest are on their way”… 

Trump disputed reports that the U.S. is preparing to deploy ground troops to secure nuclear material at the Isfahan enrichment site in Iran, telling the New York Post, “We haven’t made any decision on that. We’re nowhere near it.” He also told CBS News that “the war is very complete, pretty much,” and the U.S. is “very far” ahead of his initial four-to-five-week timeline…

Trump has communicated to aides that he would support the assassination of Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran’s new supreme leader, if Khamenei does not acquiesce to U.S. demands, including ending Iran’s nuclear program, U.S. officials told The Wall Street Journal…

The Lebanese government has requested direct negotiations with Israel, sending the message through U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, Axios reports. Washington and Jerusalem were reportedly skeptical about the idea, with Beirut thus far failing to disarm or rein in Hezbollah activities as the terror group continues to launch missiles into Israel…

NATO missile defense systems intercepted another Iranian missile heading for Turkey, a spokesperson announced today, the second time Iran has attempted to strike the NATO country’s territory…

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) threatened to impose “consequences” on Saudi Arabia for its unwillingness to join the U.S. campaign against Iran, as the U.S. evacuates its embassy in Riyadh and the kingdom continues to endure Iranian attacks, which have so far resulted in the deaths of two civilians and one U.S. servicemember. “Question — why should America do a defense agreement with a country like the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that is unwilling to join a fight of mutual interest?” Graham wrote on X…

Talks to advance Trump’s 20-point peace plan in Gaza, including the issue of Hamas’ disarmament, have been at a standstill during the campaign against Iran, Reuters reports, as Gulf countries that pledged funds to help rebuild the enclave have come under fire and flight disruptions have prevented mediators from traveling…

The criminal complaint filed in the Southern District of New York today against the two Pennsylvania men who allegedly hurled improvised explosive devices toward a protest against New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Saturday stated that both men explicitly identified ISIS as their inspiration, Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman reports.

“This isn’t a religion that just stands when people talk about the blessed name of the Prophet [Muhammad],” Emir Balat, 18, told police, according to the charging documents. He also said he had hoped to pull off something “even bigger” than the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, which he noted had caused “only three deaths”…

The White House moved today to designate the Sudanese Muslim Brotherhood as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity and announced plans to impose a Foreign Terrorist Organization designation on March 16, JI’s Matthew Shea reports, in the Trump administration’s latest crackdown against Muslim Brotherhood affiliates…

A new poll from the campaign of Rushern Baker, former executive of Maryland’s Prince George’s County, found him leading the crowded Democratic field seeking to succeed retiring Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD). Though a plurality of likely primary voters (28%) said they’re still undecided, Baker polled at 22% compared to former U.S. Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn’s 15% and Hoyer-endorsed state Del. Adrian Boafo’s 3%…

Rep. Kevin Kiley of California officially switched his party affiliation from Republican to independent — he had filed for reelection as an independent, but said today he would leave the party for the rest of his term as well. The move narrows the GOP majority even further, 217-214, but Kiley said he’ll continue to caucus with Republicans, blunting the impact…

Politico looks at the flurry of independent candidates seeking to unseat congressional Republicans in GOP-leaning districts, clashing with local Democratic establishments in the process…

An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead

Keep an eye out in Jewish Insider — we’ll have a profile of Dario Amodei, the Jewish CEO of Anthropic, which sued the Pentagon today over its decision to label the AI company a “supply chain risk.”

The Senate Armed Services Committee is expected to receive a classified briefing on the status of the U.S. and Israeli campaign against Iran.

The Republican Jewish Coalition and conservative magazine National Review will hold a daylong symposium on antisemitism, with remarks from Sens. Jim Banks (R-IN), Tom Cotton (R-AR) and Ted Cruz (R-TX); Noah Pollak, senior advisor at the Department of Education; Kenneth Marcus, founder of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law; Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the State Department’s antisemitism envoy; Leo Terrell, senior counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights; and Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.

Georgia’s 14th Congressional District will hold its special election to fill the seat vacated by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), with more than a dozen candidates on the all-party ballot. The district leans strongly Republican but the GOP field is split among nine candidates, raising the possibility that the Democratic front-runner — retired Army Brig. Gen. Shawn Harris — could slip into the April runoff.

• President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth are expected to meet this afternoon at the White House.
  
• Team Israel takes the field tomorrow night against Venezuela at the World Baseball Classic in Miami.
  
• On Sunday, New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, former Biden administration official Anne Neuberger and former Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg will give the keynote addresses at Birthright’s Excelerate26 summit taking place in Manhattan.
  
• Elsewhere in New York on Sunday, Israeli Olympic bobsledder AJ Edelman will sit in conversation with Neil Goldman at Chabad West Village.
  
• Cardozo Law School’s two-day Law and Antisemitism Conference kicks off on Sunday.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S JOSH KRAUSHAAR

The rapid turn within the Democratic Party against Israel — especially from several of its prospective presidential candidates — is awfully reminiscent of right-wing Republicans’ growing agitation against Ukraine several years ago when the Biden administration provided support to Kyiv as it defended itself from Russian aggression.

Both situations involved an activist faction of the party out of the White House speaking out against a longtime ally, fueled by conspiracy theories and memes floating online. It was propelled by a growing isolationist vibe within both parties that the country should focus on domestic concerns instead of dealing with national security challenges abroad. And it led many politically ambitious elected officials who knew better to spout some of the most poisonous slander against close partners who are (literally) under fire from enemies. 

In our polarized political landscape, support for Israel and Ukraine are now becoming partisan issues — Republican elected officials and voters are overwhelmingly supportive of Israel, while Democrats are standing by Ukraine.  

As The Atlantic’s David Frum put it: “The two most militarily capable US allies are Ukraine and Israel. Weird to have a political system where one of the two parties despises the first, and the other is deciding it hates and resents the second. America needs and benefits from both those friendships!” 

There were plenty of senior Republican figures who withstood political pressure to vote for military funding for Ukraine despite the tough internal politics, and now Democrats are facing that same type of pressure to abandon the Jewish state for short-term political gain. 

Given that California Gov. Gavin Newsom — one of the leading Democratic presidential candidates — is now saying the U.S. should reconsider its military support for Israel, and that it’s reasonable to consider Israel as an apartheid state, it’s clear that the party is facing a moment of choosing. 

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

• AIPAC’s annual Congressional Summit is taking place this week in Washington, with U.S. Ambassador to the U. N. Mike Waltz, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R‑LA), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D‑NY), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D‑NY) and Sens. Tom Cotton (R‑AR) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) slated to address the crowd. Read our curtain-raiser on the off-the-record confab here.
• We’re watching the continued influx of U.S. military assets to the Middle East as the White House prepares for a third round of talks with Iran, set to be brokered by Oman in Geneva, Switzerland, on Thursday.
• The Iran question could come up as soon as this morning, with President Donald Trump set to briefly address the media at a White House ceremony honoring individuals whose relatives have been killed by undocumented immigrants.
• We’re also monitoring how the winter storm hitting the East Coast today is disrupting everything from congressional votes to events and hearings up and down the Northeast corridor. To our readers from Washington to Boston: stay warm and safe!

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MELISSA WEISS

Tucker Carlson’s interview with U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee last week seemed to get off to a rough start before the commentator had even touched down in Israel, when it became known that Carlson would be conducting the interview from Ben Gurion Airport without plans to leave the complex to engage with the country — about which he spends significant airtime discussing — itself.

The troubles began before the interview aired, with Carlson alleging on social media that the passports belonging to his team members had been taken by Israeli security and that the group had been interrogated at the airport. But Carlson flew into Ben Gurion’s VIP Fattal Terminal, where passports are taken by airport officials to be expedited through a special processing service that avoids the immigration lines at Ben Gurion’s regular terminal. Questioning, as anyone who has flown into or out of Israel knows, is standard procedure and has been for decades.

But it was the release of the interview — nearly three hours long — that caused the most issue for Carlson. The initially released edition of the podcast included comments from Carlson to Huckabee alleging that Israeli President Isaac Herzog had ties to Jeffrey Epstein. “The current president of Israel, whom I know you know, apparently was at ‘Pedo Island,” Carlson claimed. “That’s what it says.”

That was, in fact, *not* what it — it being the Epstein files released earlier this month — said. Carlson appeared to be referencing an email in the trove of documents that referenced “Herzog,” despite no actual linkage between the Israeli president and the disgraced financier.

The outcry, as well as a letter from Herzog’s team and a statement from Huckabee, prompted a swift apology from Carlson, and a rerelease of the interview with that portion of the conversation removed. “They didn’t know each other, they never emailed with each other, never been in the same room. They had no relationship of any kind,” Carlson said. “So I just want to say clearly I’m sorry to imply that I knew something I didn’t know.”

But it was a conversation about the Bible that dominated headlines. The Tucker Carlson Network posted a partial clip on Saturday in which Carlson spoke at length about a passage in Genesis in which God tells Abraham, “to your descendants I will give this land, from the River of Egypt to the great river Euphrates,” and then asked Huckabee if he believed that the Jewish people therefore have the right to the land that includes modern-day Jordan and parts of Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

“It would be fine if they took it all,” Huckabee said before the video cuts off mid-sentence. The rest of the sentence that was omitted from the clip includes Huckabee saying, “But I don’t think that’s what we’re talking about here today,” adding “they” — meaning Israel — “don’t want to take it over; they’re not asking to take it over.” 

The cavalcade of stories framing Huckabee as supporting an imagined Israeli territorial conquest of the Middle East prompted a response from a group of Arab and Muslim states and multinational organizations, led by Saudi Arabia, condemning the comments. Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates — all of whom have peace agreements with Israel — signed onto the statement.

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

Risk Assessment: In The Wall Street Journal, former White House intelligence chief Marc Gustafson, who headed the Situation Room from 2022-2025, argues that the chances of U.S. strikes on Iran growing into an extended regional conflict are less than they were when he served in the White House. “For the Trump administration, the upside of acting at a moment of Iranian vulnerability is plainly alluring. It could further erode proxy networks, blunt the nuclear threat, and help tip the global balance of power in America’s favor. An attack on Iran would still entail risk. The regime’s identity is rooted in resistance to foreign interference. An external attack could trigger pockets of fierce backlash. U.S. personnel remain within range of thousands of Iran’s short-range missiles. Oil markets could convulse if Tehran disrupted Gulf shipping. The trauma of past Middle East wars has shaped Washington’s Iran policy for decades. But today Iran’s proxies are weakened, its economy is fragile, its population is restless and its leadership is superannuated.” [WSJ]

Help Should Be on Its Way: The New York Times’ Bret Stephens suggests that a strike on Iran is “crucial,” citing Tehran’s treatment of protesters in addition to the threats it poses to regional and global stability, and noting the recent student protests that have again broken out in the country. “But it’s not a stretch to assume those protests are also a signal to [President Donald] Trump that his promise last month to Iranians that ‘help is on its way’ hasn’t been forgotten, and that ordinary Iranians are prepared to join the fight for their own liberation. If so, then there is at least a reasonable chance that a sustained military operation that not only further degrades the regime’s nuclear, missile and military capabilities — a desirable outcome in its own right — but also targets its apparatus of domestic repression could embolden the type of sustained mass protests that could finally bring the regime down.” [NYTimes]

Leap of Faith: The Associated Press’ Steve Peoples looks at how Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro leans on his faith amid rising antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment. “Shapiro’s allies acknowledge the risks, but they ultimately believe his faith will help him connect with more Americans as he takes the next step in his political career. ‘He is intentionally choosing to go a different route and to be a different person, and it’s authentic to who he is and also what he believes,’ said Baptist Pastor Marshall Mitchell, a close friend and spiritual adviser to Shapiro. ‘Great elected officials, great Americans, great thinkers, never discount the influence and impact of faith.’” [AP]

Catholic Teaching: In The Washington Post, First Things Editor R.R. Reno, who identifies as a Catholic and a Zionist, counters recent anti-Israel rhetoric from Candace Owens and public figures associated with the Catholic Church who cite their faith in their opposition to Israel. “The Catholic Church urges me to bring my political judgments into accord with moral principles. In affairs of state, the most important norm is peace. This norm strongly favors support for established states. (This is why, for most of her existence, the Catholic Church rejected revolution and required obedience to existing governments.) The state of Israel exists. Undermining its legitimacy and aiding those who seek its destruction is far more likely to lead to widespread violence and inhumanity than its continued existence, whatever one thinks of the circumstances of the nation’s founding or its present policies.” [WashPost]

The White House notified Congress earlier this month that it intends to reopen the U.S. Embassy in Damascus, Syria, 14 years after it was shuttered amid the start of the country’s civil war…

A new super PAC that intends to counter pro-Israel PAC-supported candidates has spent more than $500,000 to boost far-left Democrat Nida Allam in her primary challenge to Rep. Valerie Foushee (D-NC), who lost support from AIPAC’s PAC this cycle after shifting left on Israel-related policy issues; the American Priorities PAC has also spent $72,000 backing Rev. Frederick Haynes III, a candidate for a Dallas-area House seat who preached about alleged “apartheid” in Israel in a sermon on the day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks…

The Elect Chicago Women super PAC, rumored to have ties to pro-Israel groups, began an ad campaign in the Chicago area on Saturday attacking Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss in Illinois’ 9th Congressional District, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports; the ads, which political experts said could boost anti-Israel activist Kat Abughazaleh in the crowded primary, come weeks after a similar effort in New Jersey by AIPAC’s super PAC to target former Rep. Tom Malinowski helped far-left activist Analilia Mejia to win the district’s special election primary…

Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy attended last night’s opening and ribbon-cutting at The Ohio State University’s Schottenstein Chabad Student Center…

The “Today” Show interviews Shira Kupperman Boehler, wife of Adam Boehler, the Trump administration’s special envoy for hostage response, about her early-stage diagnosis, at age 44, of lung cancer last year and subsequent treatment…

Jewish American hockey player Jack Hughes scored the winning goal in the Olympic finals of Team USA’s overtime win over Canada… 

Israel’s National Olympic Committee disqualified its four-man bobsled team after one of the team’s members lied about a medical injury in order to allow the team’s alternate a chance to compete; captain AJ Edelman said in a statement that “[g]iven that our placement going into the final run was all but predetermined, it was more important to us that our alternate could have the opportunity to compete in the Olympics”…

Australian officials charged a man who allegedly ran a car into a Brisbane synagogue with committing a hate crime…

At least eight Hezbollah members were killed in Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon over the weekend as the IDF scales up its activity targeting the Iranian terror proxy…

The New York Times reports on Iran’s succession plan and other contingency efforts should the U.S. strike the country; the Times reports that Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has entrusted Ali Larijani, the head of Iran’s National Security Council, with key decision-making powers since the rise of the country’s student protest movement in December…

The Washington Post looks at how Israelis are preparing for the possibility of a renewed war with Iran, less than a year after the 12-day war between the countries…

The Wall Street Journal talks to Iranian student protesters who took part in the wave of protests — and subsequently faced the forceful government crackdown on the demonstrations — and examines how neither Moscow nor Beijing, both traditional allies of Tehran, are expressing reticence in fully backing Iran amid deepening tensions with the U.S.…

U.S. and Western officials are warning that Iran could use its proxies to target American assets abroad should the White House move forward with a strike targeting the Islamic Republic…

The New York Times’ “Vows” section spotlights the Los Angeles nuptials of influencer Caroline Goldfarb and shofar player Michael Gropper, the latter of whom is the Western states development director of American Friends of Bar-Ilan University…

Former Deputy Israeli Foreign Minister Idan Roll is joining the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security as an expert on a range of issues including national security and public diplomacy; read our 2023 interview with Roll here…

Philadelphia artist Isaiah Zagar, who designed dreamscape mosaics around his hometown, died at 86…

NPR host Michael Silverblatt, whose “Bookworm” program ran for 33 years, died at 73…

Former Israeli hostages Matan Zangauker (left), Segev Kalfon and Ilana Gritzewsky led thousands of teenagers in the Shema prayer during Chabad’s CTeen annual Jewish Pride Takeover of Times Square on Saturday night in New York City.

Grammy Award-winning actor, comedian and singer, Josh Gad turns 45…

Retired senior counsel in the Baltimore office of DLA Piper, he served as president of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, Shale D. Stiller turns 91… EVP emeritus of the Orthodox Union and editor-in-chief of the Koren Talmud Bavli, Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb turns 86… Bethesda, Md., resident, Lois Copeland… Dean of a yeshiva high school in Israel, in 1967 he co-founded a popular band called The Rabbis’ Sons, Rabbi Baruch “Burry” Chait turns 80… Philosopher, novelist and public intellectual, she was a winner of a MacArthur Genius Fellowship in 1996, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein turns 76… Chairman of Agudath Israel of America and CEO of the OuterStuff sportswear line, Sol Werdiger turns 75… Film director, writer and producer, he is the president emeritus of the Producers Guild of America, Marshall Schreiber Herskovitz turns 74… 25-year veteran of USAID’s Foreign Service, she was the mission director for USAID in the West Bank and Gaza, Monica Stein-Olson turns 69… Strategic communications consultant, he was previously director of communications and PR for the Jewish Federations of North America, Joe Berkofsky… Political consultant and pollster, he is the founder of Luntz Global, Frank Luntz turns 64… Founder and CEO of Dell Technologies, he is the 10th richest person in the world according to Bloomberg, Michael Dell turns 61… U.S. senator (D-MD), Angela Alsobrooks turns 55… Best-selling author of young adult novels, Nova Ren Suma turns 51… CEO of film production firm Benaroya Pictures, Michael Benaroya turns 45… Founder of Tahrir Scarf, Johnathan Morpurgo… COO and director of research at The Lawfare Project, Benjamin Ryberg… Member of the Knesset for the Likud party, Dan Illouz turns 40… Former chief of staff at USAID, now a senior advisor at RF Catalytic Capital, Rebecca Chalif… Reporter at Bloomberg covering residential real estate with a focus on NYC’s housing market, Jennifer Epstein turns 40… Founder of an eponymous real estate brokerage in Tel Aviv, Barak Daon… AIPAC alum, now an engineering manager at Business Insider, Reuben A. Ingber… Senior strategy officer at Walton Enterprises, Mary Ann Weiss… Former national politics breaking news reporter at The Washington Post, Patrick Svitek… Director of policy and business development at Polymateria, Gidon Feen…

• The Munich Security Conference kicks off today in Germany. More below.
• The annual BBYO International Convention kicks off today in Philadelphia, with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro slated to speak tonight.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MELISSA WEISS

A who’s who of the world’s major political leaders, both past and present, are descending on Munich for the annual Munich Security Conference. After last year’s forum, in which Vice President JD Vance, who was leading the U.S. delegation, took an abrasive tone against Europe in his keynote address that rankled some attendees, Secretary of State Marco Rubio is expected to bring a softer tone when he leads this year’s delegation.

Unlike last year, when the Israel-Hamas war featured prominently on the agenda, this year’s MSC schedule has relatively little time dedicated to talking about the conflict, with just two sessions expected to touch on Gaza. And while last year’s attendee list included a number of Israelis, including President Isaac Herzog and Defense Minister Israel Katz, there are no current Israeli officials slated to speak. (Former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni will join one of the panels on Gaza reconstruction.)

Also absent this year is a Qatari presence. Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, who spoke last year about de-escalating tensions in the Middle East, is not on this year’s schedule, nor are any other Qatari officials.

Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) — back this year after skipping the 2025 MSC to travel to the U.S.-Mexico border — and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) will lead a bipartisan congressional delegation that includes Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Mark Warner (D-VA), Chris Coons (D-DE), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Steve Daines (R-MT), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), Peter Welch (D-VT), Andy Kim (D-NJ) and Elissa Slotkin (D-MI). 

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is slated to speak on two panels today, one on the “rise of populism,” and another on the “future of U.S. foreign policy,” the latter in conversation with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Matthew Whitaker, the U.S.’ representative to NATO. Matt Duss, a former foreign policy advisor to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) who has been critical of the U.S.-Israel relationship and is now advising the New York Democrat, said that she will use her perch in Munich to give the “working-class perspective” on the intersection of domestic politics and foreign policy.

AOC isn’t the only millennial member of Congress to be addressing the MSC this year. Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-AZ), the first Iranian American Democrat elected to Congress, will be speaking on Sunday on a panel titled “Under Reconstruction: A World Order for the Next Generation.”

A town hall session focused on Gaza rebuilding efforts will take place later this afternoon. Speakers include Nickolay Mladenov, the Bulgarian diplomat serving as the head of the Gaza Board of Peace, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), Livni and Palestinian Authority Foreign Affairs Minister Varsen Aghabekian. Concurrent to that panel is a session focused on maritime security, with Yemeni President Rashad al-Alimi, whose country has been used by the Iran-backed Houthis as a launching pad for attacks on ships transiting through the Gulf, set to speak.

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

Regional Row: The Washington Post’s David Ignatius spotlights the “epic feud” between the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia that is shifting regional dynamics. “The regional tension directly interfered with U.S. policy last March, when the Trump administration was assaulting Houthi rebels in Yemen who had been attacking Red Sea shipping. According to a senior former U.S. official, Trump called a top UAE official and asked him to help ‘mop up’ the Houthis. The UAE leader said he could send 2,000 troops immediately and 5,000 more soon — but he asked for a Saudi pledge that it wouldn’t support a Yemeni Islamist militia known as Islah. The Saudis didn’t deliver that promise, and the campaign never happened, the former U.S. official said.” [WashPost]

The Beauty Queen’s Blind Spot: The Atlantic’s Yair Rosenberg recounts his conversation with Carrie Prejean Boller, who was removed from the White House’s Religious Liberty Commission over her questioning of Jewish witnesses and defense of promulgators of antisemitism, including Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens, at a hearing earlier this week. “Indeed, as long as the subject was Israel, Boller was eager to engage. But when the conversation turned to other things that she had said at the commission hearing that pertained to anti-Semitism, not merely anti-Zionism, she suddenly became much more evasive. … Rather than reckon with anti-Semitic statements from those she had defended at a hearing intended to confront anti-Semitism, she repeatedly attempted to reroute our conversation back to the safer ground of criticizing Israel. She either did not realize that she was using anti-Zionism as a pretext to launder vulgar anti-Semitism and its purveyors into the public square, or she did not care.” [TheAtlantic]

Strike While it’s Hot: In The Wall Street Journal, ​​Bernard-Henri Lévy posits that the Trump administration should pursue military action to effect regime change in Iran. “Can one settle for ‘sanctions,’ ‘pressure’ and concessions wrung out and immediately circumvented, when one knows that Russia has long since found ways to flood Tehran and its proxies with the resources they need to continue their enterprise of destruction over the long term, given a sufficient respite? Is any compromise possible with fanatics who proclaim that they prefer the apocalypse to defeat and who, if there were an apocalypse, wouldn’t hesitate to drag their near and distant neighbors into it? I hope the American administration understands this. I hope it has grasped that the era of containment is over, that deterrence doesn’t work against a state that has made internal terror, regional destabilization and the end of the world both a mode of governance and a program.” [WSJ]

Give Diplomacy a Chance: In the Arab News, Jason Greenblatt, who served as the White House Middle East envoy during President Donald Trump’s first term, weighs in on Trump’s meeting this week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the decision to pursue diplomacy with Iran. “Many predicted he would strike quickly. I did not. Weeks ago, I wrote that he would first test whether diplomacy could work — real diplomacy, aimed at real results. Not another Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action-style agreement riddled with loopholes and excuses. Not another paper promise that looks good in headlines and collapses in practice. The last deal, among its many flaws, merely kicked the nuclear threat down the road and gave the Iranian regime space to cheat. And cheat they did. Trump wants something different.” [ArabNews]

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu again voiced skepticism about the U.S.’ ability to reach an agreement with Iran as he departed Joint Base Andrews on Thursday, a day after his White House meeting with President Donald Trump, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports…

The USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier group — the Navy’s most advanced carrier group — is moving from the Caribbean to the Middle East amid ongoing tensions between the U.S. and Iran…

The United Nations this week elevated an Iranian official to a senior leadership role and publicly congratulated Tehran on the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution — moves that former Trump administration officials and Middle East policy analysts say reflect a troublingly conciliatory posture by the international body toward a regime accused of violently repressing its own people, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports…

The U.S. smuggled approximately 6,000 Starlink internet connectivity kits into Iran last month as Tehran conducted a nationwide internet blackout…

A new analysis of satellite imagery by the Institute for Science and International Security found that Iran is fortifying its Isfahan nuclear complex…

The EU Aviation Safety Administration extended to March 31 an advisory urging airlines to avoid Iranian airspace…

The man arrested in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights neighborhood after allegedly stabbing a visibly Jewish man — to whom he had reportedly made antisemitic remarks prior to the attack — was released on bail…

Yeshiva University said that an incident in which a YU student was assaulted in Manhattan’s 181st Street subway station was an “unbiased attempted robbery”…

The U.K.’s Community Security Trust recorded a spike in antisemitic incidents the day of and the day following the terror attack at a Manchester synagogue on Yom Kippur last year in which two people were killed; with 40 incidents recorded each day, they marked the highest daily totals of the year…

The British High Court ruled that the government’s ban on the Palestine Action activist group was unlawful, despite group members’ participation in the vandalism and destruction of private property as part of their protests…

The new Israeli shekel hit a 30-year high, closing on Thursday at NIS 3.0680 to the dollar…

Israeli authorities arrested an IDF reservist and a civilian on charges of using classified information to place bets on the betting platform Polymarket…

The Football Association of Ireland said its national team will not forfeit any potential matches against Israel after the teams were drawn together, along with Austria and Kosovo; the announcement comes months after the FAI approved a motion calling on Israel to be banned from the Europa League…

The Atlantic interviews Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, whose Oscar-nominated “It Was All an Accident” was filmed in secret in the Islamic Republic and smuggled out of the country…

Team Israel bobsledders AJ Edelman and Ward Fawarseh, the first Druze Olympian, took practice runs on Thursday in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, ahead of the two-man Olympic bobsled race on Monday. Read our interview with Edelman here.

Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter, Melissa Manchester turns 75 on Sunday… 

FRIDAY: Rabbi and Talmudic scholar, also emeritus professor of economics at New York University, closely identified with the Austrian school of economic thought, Yisroel Mayer Kirzner turns 96… Israeli film and theater actor, Dalia Friedland turns 91… Former chair of the Toronto-based Mackenzie Institute think tank, he was a North York and Toronto City councillor, Norman “Norm” Gardner turns 88… Professor at American Jewish University in Los Angeles and scholar of biblical literature and Semitic languages, Ziony Zevit turns 84… Newsletter editor specializing in U.S. intelligence, military and foreign policy issues, Jeff Stein turns 82… U.S. senator (D-CT), Richard Blumenthal turns 80… Professor of anthropology at the University of Toronto, author of ‘I Didn’t Know You Were Jewish’ … and Other Things Not to Say When You Find Out, Ivan Kalmar turns 78… Former CEO of the Cleveland Browns and president of the Philadelphia Eagles, Joe Banner turns 73… Radio broadcaster for the New York Mets, Howard “Howie” Rose turns 72… Painter and photographer Ron Agam turns 68… Ukrainian businessman, previously president of the United Jewish Community of Ukraine, Ihor Kolomoyskyi turns 63… Casting director, Amy Sobo… Legal scholar, journalist and author, CEO emeritus of the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Jeffrey Rosen turns 62… Member of the Knesset for United Torah Judaism, Moshe Shimon Roth turns 62… Internet entrepreneur and co-founder of Zynga, Mark Pincus turns 60… Past chair of national women’s philanthropy of The Jewish Federations of North America, Rochelle “Shelly” Kupfer… Former senior speechwriter for Treasury secretaries Geithner and Lew during the Obama administration, Mark Cohen… Retired Israeli soccer player, he made 89 international appearances for Israel and won nine league championships, more than any other Israeli player, Alon Harazi turns 55… Founding member and partner of Drowos Wealth Management Group at Center Street Capital Advisors, Bryan M. Drowos… Publisher of Southern California’s Jewish Link, Dov Blauner… Investigative reporter at Reuters since 2018, following 12 years as a Wall Street Journal reporter, Mike Spector… Associate vice president for communications at Columbia University, Samantha Slater… Jonathan Neuman… Director of philanthropy at LPPE LLC, Daniel Sperling… Founder and owner at Miami’s Cadena Collective, Alejandra Aguirre turns 35…

SATURDAY: Civil and human rights activist, rabbi, radio host, television producer and public speaker, Allen Secher turns 91… Owner of Bloomberg LP, 2020 presidential candidate, former chairman of Johns Hopkins University and mayor of NYC, Michael Bloomberg turns 84… Award-winning investigative journalist for The Washington Post and author, who together with Bob Woodward did much of the original news reporting on the Watergate scandal, Carl Bernstein turns 82… Chairman and CEO of Reebok for 26 years until its 2005 sale to Adidas, Paul Fireman turns 82… British businessman and founder of WPP plc, Sir Martin Stuart Sorrell turns 81… Former borough president of Brooklyn for 12 years, following a 23-year stint as a New York state senator, Marty Markowitz turns 81… Chairman and CEO of the Blackstone Group, Stephen A. Schwarzman turns 79… Film producer and EVP of the NFL’s New York Giants, winner of a Golden Globe award, an Academy Award and two Super Bowl rings, Steven Elliot “Steve” Tisch turns 77… Retired chairman and CEO of Los Angeles-based City National Bank, Russell Goldsmith turns 76… Host of “Fresh Air,” an interview program distributed throughout the U.S. by NPR, Terry Gross turns 75… Sports executive and former All-Star basketball player, she served as president of the WNBA for six years and as SVP of the PGA Tour for 17 years, Donna Geils Orender turns 69… Former executive board member at the Holocaust Museum LA, Paulette Beckmann Nessim… Co-founder and CEO at 25Madison and executive chairman of Townsquare Media, he was previously deputy assistant secretary of defense, Steven Price turns 64… Volleyball and beach volleyball star, she is the only Brazilian (out of 455 athletes) in the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, Adriana Brandão Behar turns 57… Long-distance runner, she won the bronze medal in the women’s marathon at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Deena Drossin Kastor turns 53… Senior director for strategy, policy and government affairs for the National Insurance Crime Bureau, Howard Handler… Financial advisor in the Boca Raton office of San Blas Securities, Alan Feinberg Jr.… Activist and writer known by the pen name MaNishtana, Shais Rishon turns 44… Ice hockey player selected in the first round of the 2002 NHL draft, he then played on four NHL teams and was also a player on the U.S. national team, Eric Nystrom turns 43… Columnist for The Forward, Carly Pildis… Co-founder of Run for Something, a PAC dedicated to helping progressive young people run for office, Amanda Litman… Four-year basketball player for the University of California, Berkeley Golden Bears, then for Bnei Herzliya of the Israeli Premier League, now a real estate broker in Miami, Sam Singer turns 31… Actor best known for her role as Charlotte on the CMT comedy television series “Still the King,” Madison Iseman turns 29…

SUNDAY: British actress who has starred in nearly sixty films, her paternal grandfather shortened his name from Blumenthal, Claire Bloom turns 95… Professor of cognitive science at Indiana University, Pulitzer Prize winner, Douglas Hofstadter turns 81… Former Democratic member of the Texas House of Representatives for 26 years, Elliott Naishtat turns 81… Cartoonist, editor, former teacher at the School of Visual Arts in NYC and long-time contributing artist for The New Yorker, Art Spiegelman (born Itzhak Avraham ben Zeev) turns 78… Television and movie actor, he stars as the IRGC’s head of investigations in the Apple TV Israeli series “Tehran,” Shaun Toub turns 68… SVP of corporate development at Philip Morris International, Marian Salzman turns 67… Professor at Yale Law School and author of two best-selling novels, Jed Rubenfeld turns 67… Host of the radio program “Jewish Moments in the Morning” since 1983, Nachum Segal turns 63… Principal at Catalyzing Philanthropy, a boutique consulting firm, Karen Paul… Developer of the Miami Design District and many other properties in South Beach, Craig Lewis Robins turns 63…Self-employed writer, Elizabeth Ives “Beth” Solomon… Founder and editor-in-chief of popular progressive blog, “Talking Points Memo,” Josh Marshall turns 57… Investor, he founded and then sold the Rockstar energy drink, Russell Goldencloud Weiner turns 56… Founder and director of Areyvut, Daniel Rothner turns 54… Actress, writer, producer, and comedian, she won two Primetime Emmy Awards for playing Susie Myerson in “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” Alexandrea Borstein turns 53… Director of business development at Treetop Companies, Eric Distenfeld… Director of education at the Orthodox Union and host of the 18Forty podcast, David Bashevkin, Ph.D. turns 41… Deputy executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, Alex Siegel turns… Offensive lineman on three NFL teams, he is now an executive regional sales manager at Sirtex, Ben Gottschalk turns 34… Beauty pageant titleholder who represented Israel at the Miss Universe pageant in 2016, Yam Kaspers Anshel turns 28… Australian racewalker, she competed in the women’s 20 kilometer walk at the 2020 and 2024 Olympics, Jemima Montag turns 28… Actor and voice actor, Zachary Adam Gordon turns 28…

• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is heading back to Israel today following yesterday’s meeting with President Donald Trump. More below.
• The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is holding its confirmation hearing for Jeremy Carl to be assistant secretary of state for international organizations. Carl, who was born to a Jewish family and now identifies as Christian, has expressed a range of derogatory views about Jews, including in a 2024 interview in which he said that “Jews have often loved to play the victim rather than accept that they are participants in history.” Read Jewish Insider’s past reporting on Carl’s comments here.
• Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is meeting today with Zach Shemper, president of Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson, Miss., which suffered significant damage in an arson attack last month. The two are expected to discuss the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which provided the congregation with security cameras that helped catch the perpetrator, and the Pray Safe Act.
• In Los Angeles, Sinai Temple and Fabric are co-hosting a daylong summit focused on building bridges within the sports community. Lisa Leslie, Eddy Curry and Tamir Goodman are among those slated to appear at the gathering.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV HARKOV

At first glance, President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s nearly three-hour meeting at the White House on Wednesday appeared to end without any clear accomplishments.

Instead of the freewheeling question-and-answer sessions with media in the Oval Office and formal press conferences that followed most of Trump and Netanyahu’s previous six meetings since Trump returned to the White House, came a laconic statement from Netanyahu’s office about Israel’s security needs and a Truth Social post from Trump that was staid by the president’s standards. 

Trump wrote that he “insisted that negotiations with Iran continue to see whether or not a deal can be consummated. If I can, I let the Prime Minister know that will be a preference.” However, the president warned that last time Iran decided against making a deal, “that did not work out well for them,” and the U.S. struck the country’s nuclear sites.

However, Trump and Netanyahu were similarly silent about their meeting in April 2025 — their last in-person meeting before the joint strike in Iran two months later.

Behind the scenes, the main topic of conversation between the two leaders yesterday appeared to focus on options for action if Iran does not agree to a deal. 

The lack of press around the meeting was because Netanyahu wanted to keep a relatively low profile and show deference to Trump, since a strike on Iran — should one occur — would be led by the U.S., an Israeli source said.

The Israeli side is very skeptical that any deal can be reached between the U.S. and Iran, with Trump saying publicly that a good deal would mean “no nuclear weapons, no ballistic missiles,” and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi saying the ballistic missile issue is a nonstarter for Tehran. 

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

Open Season: In The Free Press, 92nd Street Y CEO Seth Pinsky, reflecting on protests last week targeting the venue’s State of World Jewry address, calls on officials in New York City and state to take additional steps to protect the Jewish community. “The protesters outside illustrated one of the challenges plainly: In today’s New York City, Jewish conversations — on any topic — are treated as legitimate targets for protest and disruption. More disturbing still, the hostility was not confined to the event’s attendees. Families arriving from birthday parties were harassed, as were New Yorkers simply using our gym. Even a neighboring store was targeted, with one protester explaining that it “had Zionists inside.” In other words, merely being present in and around a Jewish space was now enough to make someone fair game. … [W]hat we need from our progressive leaders is to demand the same clarity and consistency from their allies when it comes to Jews and Israel that they and their allies regularly demand of the MAGA right on a host of other topics.” [FreePress]

Bridge Over Troubled Water: In The Wall Street Journal, Henry Louis Gates Jr., who recently released a four-part docuseries on Black-Jewish relations, makes the case for strengthened ties between the two communities. “Two streams run beneath the floorboards of Western culture: antisemitism, our civilization’s oldest hatred, and antiblack racism. Whenever people search for a scapegoat, they lift up those floorboards and reach down. … Neither community speaks with a single voice. Each contains a range of convictions, anxieties, loyalties and values. Any durable partnership has to make room for that internal plurality. Coalitions fail when they demand unanimity, when they turn disagreement into disqualification. What sustains a shared project is the harder work of staying in relationship across difference, arguing without rupture, and protecting common interests even amid unresolved tensions. We often talk about community as if it were a mood. But it’s a practice. It means renouncing the cheap satisfactions of applause from your own side and the ease of a story with only heroes and villains.” [WSJ]

The Gaza Fantasy: In The Atlantic, Hussein Ibish reflects on what he calls the “profoundly unserious” proposal from the Trump administration to reconstruct Gaza. “It promises industrial parks, educational centers, residential zones, and beach resorts, likely inspired by cities such as Dubai and Singapore. But those cities evolved through decades of careful urban planning. Gaza is, at the moment, a rubbled wasteland. Approximately 80 percent of all structures have been badly damaged or destroyed, and Gazans have nowhere to live except in squalid tents or the ruins of former homes. … The fantasy is beguiling, and its realization would be a magnificent accomplishment — if it weren’t so unimaginably absurd. Trump’s master plan treats Gaza as if it were a greenfield site rather than a partitioned pile of wreckage populated by destitute, hungry, unsheltered people.” [TheAtlantic]

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formally joined the Trump administration’s Board of Peace during his meeting on Wednesday with Secretary of State Marco Rubio…

A group of Senate Democrats, including Sens. Tim Kaine (D-VA), Peter Welch (D-VT), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Mark Warner (D-VA), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Alex Padilla (D-CA), urged Secretary of State Marco Rubio to halt further deportations of asylum seekers to Iran…

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told the Financial Times that efforts to broaden U.S.-Iran talks beyond the nuclear issue would risk “nothing but another war”…

More Democratic lawmakers condemned the Israeli Cabinet’s recent moves to expand control over the West Bank, with Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) saying the move constituted a “green light for unilateral annexation of the West Bank” that violates the Oslo Accords and “threatens Israel’s security,” and House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Greg Meeks (D-NY) calling the decision “de facto annexation’ and “deeply troubling” and saying  it may “irreversibly erode” the possibility of a two-state solution…

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) introduced legislation to gain more transparency into the U.S.’ handling of hundreds of millions of dollars in Venezuelan oil proceeds, which are currently being held in an offshore account in Qatar…

Harlem’s Tsion Cafe, the only Ethiopian-Israeli restaurant in New York City, ended its regular dining service, with owner Beejhy Barhany citing a changed environment for Israeli restaurants in the city since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks and over the course of the ensuing war in Gaza among the reasons she’s switching to a cultural events-only model… 

Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square revealed a $2 billion stake in Meta, with the hedge fund manager reportedly being drawn to the tech company’s focus on AI…

The EU approved Google/Alphabet’s $32 billion acquisition of Israeli cloud-security startup Wiz, avoiding a lengthy inquiry as the companies seek to move forward on the sale…

France is calling on Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for the Palestinian territories, to resign over comments she made at the Al Jazeera Forum in Doha, Qatar, last week, in which she claimed that all of humanity “now has a common enemy” in Israel…

The Sydney Morning Herald reports on Hamas documents that allege that Mohammed al-Halabi, the former Gaza director of the World Vision, worked for Hamas while employed by the charity and used his role to obtain information about Israeli court proceedings…

Takamitsu Muraoka, an expert in Semitic languages and a former chair of Hebrew, Israelite Antiquities, and Ugaritic at Leiden University in the Netherlands, died at 88…

Israeli President Isaac Herzog (left) met on Wednesday with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in Canberra. Herzog will travel back to Israel today after a four-day visit, which also included stops in Melbourne and Sydney, that was marred by widescale protests targeting the president.

Best-selling author, known for children’s and young adult fiction, Judy Sussman Blume turns 88…

Commercial director in the Inglewood and Beverly Hills offices of Keller Williams Realty, he is also a principal at Westside Realty Advisors, Gary Aminoff turns 89… Physician and public intellectual, he is a dean at Shalem College in Jerusalem and professor emeritus at the University of Chicago, Leon Richard Kass turns 87… Former prime minister of Israel, Ehud Barak turns 84… Periodontist in Newark, Del., Barry S. Kayne, DDS… Economist, physicist, legal scholar and libertarian theorist, his father was Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman, David D. Friedman turns 81… Computer genius, author, inventor and futurist, Ray Kurzweil turns 78… Grandmother of Aryeh, Gabby, Alex and Daniella, among others, Esther Dickman… Member of the Knesset for the Likud party, Eti Hava Atiya turns 66… Former president of Disney-ABC Television Group, Ben Sherwood turns 62… President of U.S. affairs at Combat Antisemitism Movement, Alyza Lewin… Associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, Brett M. Kavanaugh turns 61… Film director, producer and screenwriter, Darren Aronofsky turns 57… Comic book author and illustrator, Judd Winick turns 56… Actress known for her voice work in animation, websites and video games, Tara Lyn Charendoff Strong turns 53… Member of the board of directors for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics committee, Chad Tyler Brownstein turns 53… Comedian, actor, podcaster, writer and producer, Ari Shaffir turns 52…

Principal deputy national security advisor throughout the Biden administration, now a distinguished senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, Jonathan Finer turns 50… Deputy director for external affairs and communications at the Troy, Mich.-based Kresge Foundation, Christine M. Jacobs… Former MLB player, he is now the program director and owner of London, Ontario-based Centrefield Sports, Adam Stern turns 46… Former columnist for The Wall Street Journal for 17 years, Rachel Feintzeig… Deputy solicitor general of New Jersey, he previously clerked for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Michael Zuckerman… New York regional director for the American Jewish Committee, Joshua Kramer… Israeli actress, best known as ADA Samantha Maroun on “Law & Order,” Odelya Halevi turns 37… Syndicated political columnist and senior editor-at-large for Newsweek, Josh Hammer turns 37… Senior advisor in the Bureau of Global Public Affairs at the State Department during the Biden administration, Megan Apper… Counsel in the international trade group at Crowell & Moring, Jeremy Iloulian… PR and communications manager at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Anna Behar…

• White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner are wrapping up two days of meetings in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, focused on the Russia-Ukraine war, and will likely depart to Oman ahead of talks with Iran tomorrow. The White House had threatened to walk away from the meeting, initially planned for Turkey, over a series of last-minute Iranian demands, including the change of venue and limiting the scope to Tehran’s nuclear program. The talks, which are viewed in Israel with deep skepticism, are for now back on following the urging of some Arab states for Washington to remain at the table. More below.
• Israel’s Security Cabinet is convening today at 4 p.m. local time.
• It’s primary day in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District. Voters are heading to the polls today to cast their ballots to choose the successor to fill now-Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s House seat. AIPAC’s super PAC United Democracy Project has spent upwards of $2 million in the district on ads targeting former Rep. Tom Malinowski (D-NJ) following his leftward shift on foreign policy. More below.
• The Hudson Institute is hosting a sit-down this afternoon with State Department antisemitism envoy Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun.
• Civic Spirit and the The Jewish Education Project are hosting a daylong summit today in New York focused on civic education in Jewish day schools and American Jewish identity.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV HARKOV

It didn’t take long – just over two hours, to be precise – between the news of the apparent collapse of talks between the U.S. and Iran and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi’s announcement on X that they were back on: “Nuclear talks with the United States are scheduled to be held in Muscat on about 10 am Friday.” Anonymous American sources then confirmed to various media that negotiations were set to take place, after leaders of Arab and Muslim countries urged the Trump administration to give them a chance, despite Iran’s prevarications.

Still, Araghchi’s statement alludes to one of the major reasons that the talks were, briefly, called off: Are they only “nuclear talks” or are they about a range of malign behavior by the Islamic Republic? 

The Iranian answer to that question is clear, but the Trump administration sent mixed messages.

President Donald Trump’s interview yesterday with NBC provides few clues. The president expressed support for the protesters against the Iranian regime, saying “we’ve had their back.” 

Yet, in a bit of revisionist history, Trump portrayed his recent threats to Iran as being solely about the nuclear file: “They were thinking of starting a new [nuclear] site in a different part of the country. We found out about it and said, ‘you do that, we’re going to do very bad things to you,'” Trump said. He didn’t mention ballistic missiles in the interview.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, however, specified that “as far as the topics [of negotiations] and what the agenda needs to be, I think that in order for talks to actually lead to something meaningful, they will have to include certain things, and that includes the range of their ballistic missiles, that includes the sponsorship of terrorist organizations across the region, that includes the nuclear program and that includes the treatment of their own people.”

“Beyond that,” Rubio said, “the president retains a number of options as to how to respond to [the violent crackdown on protesters] and future events.”

Vice President JD Vance told Megyn Kelly that stopping Iran from getting a nuclear weapon was the main concern: “In a perfect world, would I love it if a bunch of freedom-loving Iranians… had a government that was much more friendly to the United States of America? Would that be a good thing? Absolutely.”

“But fundamentally,” he added, “the president has been focused …  on this question of ensuring that they don’t get a nuclear weapon. .. I feel 100% confident that even if the Iranians were rushing toward a nuclear weapon, they couldn’t get one during the Trump administration. But we’re not thinking about the next three years; we’re thinking about the next 30 years.”

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

Decision Time: The Washington Post’s Marc Thiessen weighs the risks of President Donald Trump backing away from action on Iran. “There are risks to military action in Iran, just as there were risks to the military action in Venezuela. We take the success of the Venezuelan operation for granted today, but it could easily have gone sideways: A helicopter could have crashed, Americans could have been killed, and U.S. forces could have failed to achieve their objective. Deposing the Maduro regime by force was a bold and courageous decision. And deposing the Iranian regime by force will require similar presidential courage. Though a weakened Iran cannot stop the U.S. military, it could inflict damage on both the United States and Israel. In Venezuela, Trump concluded that the risks of inaction outweighed the risks of action. That is doubly true for Iran.” [WashPost]

For Whom the Toll Tolls: In The New York Times, Scott Anderson considers what the range in death tolls from Iran’s recent crackdown says about Tehran’s treatment of protesters. “In conventional wars, combatants often minimize their own casualty figures while exaggerating those of their enemy to bolster morale and suggest victory is close. In internal insurrections like what we have witnessed in Iran, this formula tends to be reversed, with the state lowballing casualty numbers — no government wants to be seen as indiscriminately slaughtering its citizens — and dissidents raising them to provoke outrage. The current Iranian regime has the dubious distinction of having traveled both sides of the street. … Whatever the final number proves to be, it may have carried out one of the worst state-sanctioned massacres of unarmed civilians anywhere in nearly a half century in order to survive.” [NYTimes]

After Charlie Kirk: The Atlantic’s Yair Rosenberg reflects on how the death of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk has “destabilized the entire Trump coalition,” calling Kirk “a pivotal person” who had held the movement together. “In doing so, the killer helped unshackle dark forces — chief among them anti-Semitism — that now threaten to overtake the conservative movement. … On one level, this conflict is about Jews and Israel. But on another, this debate is downstream from something much bigger: a power struggle over who will define and control the MAGA movement once Trump is gone. By painting rivals as tools of the Jews, hard-right influencers such as Carlson and Bannon hope to delegitimize the competition not by besting their ideas, but by slurring their loyalties and identity.” [TheAtlantic]

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) announced on Tuesday that he had drafted legislation designating the Polisario Front, the militant group that claims sovereignty over parts of the Western Sahara, as a foreign terrorist organization and will formally introduce it “if there’s no change in their behavior,”Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs reports….

Reps. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) and Eric Swalwell (D-CA) introduced the Internet Reach and Access Now (IRAN) Act, requiring the administration to implement, and periodically update, a strategy to promote internet access for Iranian civilians…

A small group of lawmakers received a redacted copy of a classified whistleblower complaint made against Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard; an investigation into the complaint had for months been stalled over the DNI’s refusal to share the information with Congress…

Federal prosecutors filed four additional terrorism-related charges against the Chicago man accused of killing two Israeli Embassy staffers outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington last year…

The World Jewish Congress’ Menachem Rosensaft is calling on the Alliance for Downtown New York, which maintains hundreds of commemorative markers on the sidewalks of Manhattan’s Lower Broadway, not to replace the marker honoring former French Prime Minister and Nazi collaborator Pierre Laval, which had been damaged and become a tripping hazard before its temporary removal…

PEN America walked back its condemnation of protests targeting an Israeli comedian whose Los Angeles shows were canceled; PEN America had previously condemned the “profound violation of free expression” the protests had caused Guy Hochman, but said in a follow-up statement days later that it “decided to withdraw this statement” and “remain[s] committed to open and respectful dialogue about the divisions that arise in the course of defending free expression”…

Less than half of Israelis support joining an American strike on Iran if Israel is not directly attacked, a poll from the Israel Democracy Institute found this week, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports…

The Washington Post laid off a third of its newsroom staff, including its entire Middle East bureau, some staffers from which had faced criticism for repeated instances of biased, sloppy and inaccurate reporting…

The New York Times’ culture critic reflects on the state of “Jewish comedy” amid increasing antisemitism and a more polarized political climate, especially on issues related to Israel…

eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher spotlights the PRECEDE Foundation’s efforts to educate the Ashkenazi community about potentially lifesaving early detection for pancreatic cancer, which Ashkenazi Jews are significantly predisposed to… 

Jewish leaders in Manchester, England, are warning Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola to “focus on soccer” following comments he made about “the genocide in Palestine”; “We have repeatedly asked for prominent individuals to be mindful about the words they use given how Jewish people have had to endure attacks across the globe,” a statement by the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester read…

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is eliminating the federal positions of antisemitism envoy and Islamophobia envoy, replacing both roles with a newly created advisory council to combat hate…

Australia is preparing a system to “grade” universities on their handling of a range of issues relating to antisemitism as part of a broader plan from the office of Canberra’s antisemitism envoy that was fast-tracked following the terror attack at Sydney’s Bondi Beach in December… 

The brother of Shin Bet head David Zini and two others were indicted on charges of trafficking cigarettes into the Gaza Strip during Israel’s war against Hamas…

First Lady Melania Trump welcomed freed Israeli hostages Aviva and Keith Siegel to the White House on Wednesday, one year after Aviva met the first lady for the first time and pleaded for help securing her husband’s release, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.

Team USA ice dancer from 2014-2019, now a clinical research coordinator associate at Stanford Medicine, Eliana Gropman turns 25…

Former member of the Knesset for Agudat Yisrael and the United Torah Judaism alliance, Shmuel “Shmelka” Halpert turns 87… Former member of the Virginia Senate for 44 years, Richard Lawrence “Dick” Saslaw turns 86… Director, screenwriter and producer of movies and television, Michael Kenneth Mann turns 83… Outfielder from 1965-1974 for the Houston Astros and Atlanta Braves, later in his career he served in the Astros’ front office, Norm Miller turns 80… Israeli engineer, inventor and entrepreneur, he holds more than 800 patents and applications, and is a founding partner of Rainbow Medical, an operational investment company, Yossi Gross turns 79… Actor, singer, voice actor, puppeteer and comedian, best known as the voice of Jafar in Disney’s “Aladdin” franchise, Jonathan Freeman turns 76… Professor at Georgetown University Law Center, he wrote a 2015 essay entitled “The Making of a Libertarian, Contrarian, Nonobservant, but Self-Identified Jew,” Randy E. Barnett turns 74… Founder and CEO of a company representing 200 hotels globally, he is the owner of Luxe Hotels, Efrem Harkham turns 70… Board chair of Jewish leadership organization M2 and a member of the board of governors of The Jewish Agency for Israel, Linda Adler Hurwitz… Ellen Braun… Movie, television and stage actress, writer, producer and director, Jennifer Jason Leigh (family name was Morozoff) turns 64… Rabbi of Congregation Beth Shalom of Napa Valley, Niles Elliot Goldstein… Former member of the New York state Assembly, now a New York City Council member, Harvey David Epstein turns 59… Canadian environmental activist, Tzeporah Berman turns 57… Educator, writer, columnist, lecturer, public speaker and pro-Israel activist, Rabbi Pesach Wolicki… Baltimore-area sommelier, he curates kosher food and wine events and researches synagogue history, Dr. Kenneth S. Friedman turns 53… Member of the New York City Council from 2014-2021, now a NYC attorney, Benjamin Kallos turns 45… President and COO of American Signature, the parent company of Value City Furniture, Jonathan Schottenstein turns 44… Israeli swimmer, she competed in the 2000 Olympics, Adi Maia Bichman turns 43… CEO at the American Journalism Project, Sarabeth Berman… Partner for political and strategic communications at Number 10 Strategies, he was previously a senior advisor to Ambassador Ron Dermer, Joshua Hantman… Olympic sprinter, born in Los Angeles and now an Israeli citizen, specializing in the 400-meter dash, Donald Sanford turns 39… Actor and singer, best known for his work in musical theater, Alex Brightman turns 39… Director of communications and intergovernmental affairs at NYC’s Correctional Health Services, Nicole A. Levy… Israeli golfer who is an LPGA Tour member, Laetitia Beck turns 34… 

Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

Saudi Arabia’s shift away from its traditional alliances and towards Islamism is evoking more backlash: Asked about Riyadh’s growing rapprochement with Qatar and Turkey, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a press conference this afternoon that he’s following the developments and that Israel “expect[s] from anybody who wants normalization or peace with us that they not participate in efforts steered by forces or ideologies that want the opposite of peace”…

Netanyahu’s comments came shortly after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman held a phone call with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, where MBS conveyed that “the Kingdom considers any threat or tension against Iran unacceptable”…

That’s not stopping the U.S. from hinting at the continued possibility of strikes on Iran: U.S. Central Command announced it will be conducting a “multi-day readiness exercise” in order to “demonstrate the ability to deploy, disperse, and sustain combat airpower” across its area of responsibility, which includes Iran…

And Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) slammed Riyadh for other nefarious actions in the region, Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs reports, including its “attack” on the UAE and silence regarding the Syrian government’s campaign against the Kurds, demanding the kingdom use its influence to “keep the region from falling further into chaos.”

“Please understand that I am smart enough to know that Saudi Arabia has influence on the Syrian government, and I expect them to use it,” Graham said, adding that he is “trying to work with the administration and regional partners to prevent a bloodbath in Syria against our Kurdish allies”…

(President Donald Trump, meanwhile, had a markedly different take on Syria: He told reporters today that he had a “great conversation” with the “highly respected president of Syria” and that “all of the things having to do with Syria and that area are working out very, very well, so we’re very happy about it”…)

The U.S. Embassy in Riyadh also held its first-ever International Holocaust Remembrance Day event, writing that “Today’s modest but meaningful commemoration reflects a universal duty: protecting our shared humanity across cultures, faiths, and nations”…

With Graham eyeing Damascus and Riyadh, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) took aim elsewhere, calling for the U.S. to arm protesters in Iran “NOW.” “For the Iranian people to overthrow the Ayatollah — a tyrant who routinely chants ‘death to America’ — would make America much, much safer,” he said…

Authorities in Azerbaijan arrested three people allegedly preparing an attack on the Israeli Embassy in Baku today; the men were affiliated with ISIS-K, the Afghani branch of the terror group…

The Board of Peace is attempting to formalize its processes and responsibilities, according to a draft resolution from the board obtained by The New York Times, which bestows expansive powers to its chairman — Trump — including naming the commander of the International Stabilization Force, which still has yet to be established.

The document also names White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and attorney Martin Edelman as members of the board, the first time they have been identified as such…

After a doctor who is the daughter of a senior Iranian government official departed from Emory University’s medical school, the professor who serves as head of Emory’s faculty leadership council criticized the school for letting her go, JI’s Haley Cohen has learned.

Noelle McAfee, a professor in Emory’s philosophy department, sent a scathing email to the university expressing concern that the school’s dismissal of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, the daughter of the secretary of Iran’s Supreme Council for National Security, was a politically motivated firing. 

“It’s extremely disappointing to see that our leadership here at Emory are consistently caving to political pressure and never taking the side of faculty,” McAfee wrote, quoting an anonymous faculty member, expressing concern that Ardeshir-Larijani, whose father is responsible for the Islamic Republic’s national security, didn’t receive due process…

In the Garden State, Mussab Ali, the former Jersey City Board of Education president and champion of anti-Israel college encampments, officially launched his primary challenge to Rep. Rob Menendez (D-NJ) today, hitting Menendez on day one for supporting Israel and being endorsed by AIPAC.

“Democrats need to step up and become the party where we abandon corporate PACs, we won’t take money from groups like AIPAC, and we need to be accountable to everyday people,” Ali told the New Jersey Globe. He also enters the race with the endorsement of former Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), who was unseated in part due to his sharp criticisms of Israel…

Marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Chicago’s City Council voted unanimously to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism into its municipal code…

An early look at tomorrow’s storylines and schedule to keep you a step ahead

Keep an eye out in Jewish Insider for an interview with Republican Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer, who’s hoping for a conservative shift among Jewish voters in South Florida to help him unseat Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL).

“October 7: In Their Own Words,” a play drawn directly from testimonies of survivors of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks, will premiere at the Kennedy Center. Read JI’s interview with the show’s playwrights here.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio will be on the Hill, testifying at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on U.S. policy towards Venezuela in the aftermath of the ouster of former President Nicolás Maduro.

• It’s the first day of New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin’s term after yesterday’s unanimous council vote. Menin, a centrist Democrat representing the Upper East Side and Roosevelt Island, is expected to serve as an ideological counterweight to elements of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s agenda. More below.
• The Senate will vote today on a war powers resolution that would limit U.S. military action in Venezuela without congressional authorization.
• Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) will meet today with survivors of the Hanukkah terror attack in Sydney, Australia. More below.
• Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) will officially announce his plan to retire from Congress in a floor speech today. The 86-year-old Hoyer, who served as House majority leader from 2007-2011 and 2019-2023, told The Washington Post that he “did not want to be one of those members who clearly stayed, outstayed his or her ability to do the job.”
• Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro — who kicked off his 2026 reelection bid this morning — and Lt. Gov. Austin Davis are slated to speak today in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.
• The Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center in New York City is hosting a screening this evening of “The Road Between Us,” a documentary about the efforts of Maj. Gen. (res.) Noam Tibon to rescue his son, journalist Amir Tibon, and Amir’s family from Kibbutz Nahal Oz during the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attacks. Read our interview with Noam Tibon and director Barry Avrich, who will speak at the screening, here.
• In Beirut, Lebanese Armed Forces commander Rudolph Haikal is scheduled to brief Lebanese legislators on efforts to disarm Hezbollah in the southern region of the country, along Israel’s border. Lebanon’s army announced that it had completed the disarmament of Hezbollah in Southern Lebanon, with the exception of small areas under Israeli control. The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office called the efforts “an encouraging beginning, but they are far from sufficient, as evidenced by Hezbollah’s efforts to rearm and rebuild its terror infrastructure with Iranian support.”

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MATTHEW KASSEL

As New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani draws increased scrutiny for picking some top appointees whose past incendiary social media comments have provoked controversy and raised questions over his vetting process, Jewish community leaders are now watching closely for signs of how the administration will make staffing decisions on key issues connected to Israel and antisemitism.

One person to keep an eye on is Josh Binderman, who served as Mamdani’s Jewish outreach director during the campaign and transition. He has largely maintained a low profile in his time working for the candidate and now mayor, garnering just a small handful of mentions in the press, despite his critical position leading engagement with a community that in many ways remains deeply skeptical of Mamdani’s hostile stances on Israel and commitment to implementing a clear strategy to counter rising antisemitism.

Binderman, most recently a communications manager for New Deal Strategies, an influential progressive consulting firm, served until 2024 as a PAC manager and a senior associate for J Street, the progressive Israel advocacy group, according to his LinkedIn profile. 

While Mamdani notably refused to work with the organization when he led a chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine as an undergraduate student at Bowdoin College, the mayor has since developed a friendlier rapport with J Street, which has defended him amid charges that he tapped transition advisors who engaged in anti-Zionist activism that crossed a line into antisemitism.

Mamdani’s decision to employ a former top J Street staffer during the election suggests he could follow a similar approach to key Jewish community posts for his developing administration. If so, it could help to at least dampen some concerns from Jewish leaders who fear the mayor will end up hiring even harder-left members in his coalition such as activists associated with Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Israel advocacy group that aggressively promotes boycotts targeting the Jewish state.

It is still an open question, however, how Mamdani will move forward on such issues. His decision last week to revoke two executive orders linked to Israel and antisemitism was widely seen as a discouraging maneuver that eroded goodwill among mainstream Jewish leaders — even as Binderman had reportedly given some advance warning to leaders about the effort before the inauguration.

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

From Foggy Bottom to the Hill: Politico’s Jordain Carney spotlights Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s positioning on Capitol Hill, where he served as a senator for 14 years, as the point person for the Trump administration’s recent foreign policy moves. “Secretary of State Marco Rubio worked the phones in the wee hours of the morning and, in the days since, has played an outsize role in not only formulating the administration’s strategy in Venezuela but explaining it to skeptical lawmakers wary of a protracted military commitment. That outreach has been to his former Republican colleagues as well as Democrats, including those who see him as a rare Trump official with whom they can maintain a trusted and respectful relationship amid profound policy disputes. ‘Although I may disagree with him on a day-to-day or hour-to-hour basis … he has shown extraordinary competence,’ Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democratic leader, said in an interview. ‘I voted for him in this position; I still have confidence in his abilities.’” [Politico]

Silenced on Venezuela: The Atlantic’s David Graham considers the reticence of Vice President JD Vance and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, both of whom come from the isolationist camp, to give vocal backing to the White House’s arrest of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro. “What all of these figures understand is the importance of staying on Trump’s good side. [Steve] Bannon was exiled from the first Trump White House; he has since mastered the art of diverging just enough from the president that he sometimes takes flak but never gets banished from the fold entirely. Gabbard already saw the dangers of getting crosswise with the president when she implicitly warned against the bombing of Iran this past summer, before quickly falling back in line. One more break might get her sacked. No one has as much to lose as Vance, though. … Vance may not like what’s going on in Venezuela, though unless he says so, no one knows. Until then, his willingness to keep his mouth shut speaks loudly. For Vance, deeply held principles are fine, but staying in power is even more alluring.” [TheAtlantic]

States’ Rights: In The Wall Street Journal, Guy Goldstein and Daniel Arbess argue that Israel’s recognition of Somaliland is in line with the 1933 Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States that lays out the parameters for statehood — which the Palestinian Authority falls short of meeting. “[Somaliland] has a permanent population, a defined territory, effective government and the capacity to conduct foreign relations — the four tests of the 1933 Montevideo Convention. … Israel’s recognition of Somaliland affirms something deeply offensive to the professional virtue-signaling ‘peace’ industry. The entire regional narrative collapses once the Montevideo criteria are taken seriously. Somaliland passes. Kurdistan passes. South Yemen is close. Puntland isn’t far behind. The one project that dominates every United Nations agenda, every campus protest, every moral lecture, does not. Israel’s move isn’t a rejection of the two-state idea; it is a return of that idea to reality. It is what happens when you stop rewarding dysfunction and start recognizing good behavior.” [WSJ]

President Donald Trump is expected to announce the members of the newly created Board of Peace next week amid efforts to move into the second phase of the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas; Nikolay Mladenov, a former U.N. envoy to the Middle East, will serve as the board’s representative on the ground…

The White House announced its withdrawal from dozens of international organizations, including the Global Counterterrorism Forum, Global Forum on Cyber Expertise and more than 30 U.N.-affiliated groups…

The Senate passed, by unanimous consent, a resolution condemning the rise in ideologically motivated attacks against American Jews and condemning antisemitism…

FTA Administrator Marc Molinaro, who represented upstate New York in the House from 2023-2025, is mulling a run for the state’s 21st Congressional District, a seat being vacated by Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) at the end of this year…

Qatar is the top country donating foreign funds to American universities, and Cornell University is its leading recipient, according to a new dashboard from the Department of Education that displays foreign gifts and contracts provided to U.S. educational institutions, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports…

The board of Warner Bros. Discovery recommended that shareholders reject a hostile bid by David Ellison’s Skydance Paramount, which had amended a previous bid in an effort to sway Warner Bros. from moving forward with a deal with Netflix…

People interviews Tony Dokoupil about his new role anchoring “CBS Evening News”…

The Richmond, Calif., City Council refused to take up an emergency resolution censuring the city’s mayor, Eduardo Martinez, for sharing conspiracies about the terror attack at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney, Australia, on social media…

The foreign desk chief of Spanish daily El País apologized for the newspaper’s characterization of Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who is presiding over the trial of deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro; the paper described Hellerstein as having “made efforts to maintain an impartial stance despite being a well-known member of the Jewish community,” a clause that was later deleted from the online version…

Reform U.K. leader Nigel Farage called allegations from numerous former classmates that he engaged in antisemitic and racist bullying as a teenager “complete made-up fantasies”…

Iranian army chief Maj. Gen. Amir Hatami threatened preemptive military action, days after Trump cautioned that the U.S. could act in Iran if protesters in the country were killed…

Iran said it executed a man convicted of spying on behalf of the Mossad, as the Islamic Republic continues its crackdown on alleged spies following the 12-day war with Israel in June 2025…

Deqa Qasim, the director of the political department in Somaliland’s Foreign Ministry, told Israel’s N12 that Jerusalem and Hargeisa are discussing setting up an Israeli military base in the African territory, contradicting a previous denial that such an agreement was on the table… 

Likud lawmaker Dan Illouz, in a speech to the Knesset on Monday, warned the American right about the dangers of rising antisemitism within its ranks, Jewish Insider’s Lahav Harkov reports…

The New York Solidarity Networkannounced that Sara Forman, the group’s inaugural executive director since 2022, will step down at the end of the month…

Josh Hammer is joining the David Horowitz Freedom Center as a Shillman Fellow… 

Jay Stein, whose development of Universal Studios’ tram tour turned the company into an empire that competed with Disney, died at 88…

Swiss film producer Arthur Cohn, who won six Oscars for his films, including Best Documentary Feature for “One Day in September,” about the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, died at 98…

Rabbi Uri Lupolianski, the first Haredi mayor of Jerusalem and founder of Yad Sarah, died at 74…

Guillaume Cardy, the chief of the French National Police’s elite unit RAID (Research, Assistance, Intervention, Deterrence), paid his respects on Monday at Paris’ Hypercacher supermarket during a ceremony commemorating the 11th anniversary of the deadly Islamist attacks on the kosher market as well as the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical newspaper.

Member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as a guitarist and founding member of the Doors, Robby Krieger turns 80…  

Sociologist at the American Enterprise Institute, Charles Murray turns 83… Senior U.S. district judge for the Southern District of Florida, now on inactive status, Alan Stephen Gold turns 82… Moscow-born classical pianist, living in the U.S. since 1987, Vladimir Feltsman turns 74… Pulitzer Prize and Grammy Award-winning composer, he is a professor of music composition at Yale, David Lang turns 69… Founder and chief investment officer of Pzena Investment Management, Richard “Rich” Pzena turns 67… Israel’s ambassador to the Republic of Korea, Rafael Harpaz turns 64… Co-founder of Pizza Shuttle in Milwaukee, Mark Gold… Violinist and composer best known for her klezmer music, Alicia Svigals turns 63… VP of wealth services at the Alera Group, he was an NFL tight end for the Bears and Vikings, Brent Novoselsky turns 60… Founder and president of DC-based Professionals in the City, Michael Karlan turns 58… Lobbyist, attorney, patron of contemporary art and philanthropist, Heather Miller Podesta turns 56… Anthropologist and epidemiologist, she is a professor of pediatrics at UCSF, Janet Wojcicki turns 56… Former state senator in Maine (2008-2016), Justin Loring Alfond turns 51… Singer-songwriter, musician, and actress, she was the lead singer and rhythm guitarist for the indie rock band Rilo Kiley, Jenny Lewis turns 50… Former director of U.S. public policy programs for Meta / Facebook, now a partner in Lev Collective, Avra Siegel… Editor, investigative reporter and screenwriter, Ross M. Schneiderman… Actor, screenwriter and director, he is a son of film director Barry Levinson, Sam Levinson turns 41… Retired professional soccer player, he is now a partner in Columbus, Ohio-based Main + High Investments, Ross Benjamin Friedman turns 34… Principal dancer with the American Ballet Theatre, Skylar Paley Brandt turns 33…

• We’ll be reporting on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House, slated for next week. More below.
• New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani will be sworn in on Jan. 1. New York Attorney General Tish James will conduct the official swearing-in at midnight, while Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) will perform the ceremonial swearing-in during the day.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV’S HARKOV

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with President Donald Trump next week, the Iranian threat will be at the top of the agenda. That’s a sentence that could have been written countless times in the past – but this time, after the degradation of Iran’s nuclear program, was supposed to be different.

We’re six months out from Operation Midnight Hammer, when the U.S. and Israel worked together to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities, and the 11 days of Israeli airstrikes on Iran that preceded it.

But much of the public conversation following that 12-day war focused on the damage done to Iran’s nuclear program – which is likely significant, but still hard to measure precisely – and less on the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missiles and air defenses.

Israel destroyed hundreds of missiles, launchers and production sites, and boasted about its control of the airspace over Tehran a day into the war as testament to its military prowess. But Jerusalem is now deeply concerned that Tehran has managed to recoup, with help from China, much of its losses.

In that vein, Netanyahu and his team are preparing to brief Trump on Israel’s concerns that Iran is expanding its ballistic missile program.

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

• In Washington today, the Hudson Institute’s Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East is hosting a daylong seminar titled “Antisemitism as a National Security Threat.” Speakers include the White House’s Seb Gorka, former antisemitism envoy Deborah Lipstadt, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast (R-FL), CNN’s Scott Jennings, Walter Russell Mead and former State Department senior advisor Ludovic Hood.
  
• On Sunday, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is hosting a Hanukkah brunch reception at the Government House of Maryland.
  
• Later Sunday, the National Menorah lighting for the first night of Hanukkah, hosted by American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad), will take place on the Ellipse in Washington.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MELISSA WEISS

Last week, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore stood before a crowded room of Jewish attendees just outside the nation’s capital, and proclaimed: “Today, I want to be loud and clear, that Maryland stands with the Israeli people and we support their right to exist in the region with the same sense of safety and security that we all want,” Moore told attendees at the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington’s annual “Lox and Legislators” event.

The nuance in Moore’s statement was telling — an expression of support not for Israel specifically, but for the Israeli people. It’s a clear distinction — and a potential shift in messaging for mainstream Democrats seeking to put daylight between themselves and the Israeli government, while not, as they see it, throwing Israelis under the bus.

But it’s also the kind of language reserved for rogue and oppressive regimes. Few politicians mention “the South African people” when speaking about disagreements with Pretoria. Same with “the people of Brazil” or “the people of Poland” when disagreements between Washington and those countries arise.

Separating governments from their populaces is commonplace when talking about countries committing grave human rights violations. In their co-sponsorship of legislation introduced last week backing internet freedom in Iran, Sens. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) and Dave McCormick (R-PA), both referred to “the people of Iran.” Last month, Rep. Young Kim (R-CA) introduced legislation supporting “The North Korean people” who “face torture, imprisonment, starvation, and forced labor every single day.”

But Israel, a key U.S. ally, is a parliamentary democracy that holds regular (some would argue too regular) elections. And Moore, a savvy politician with potential White House ambitions, can read the political tea leaves within his party. 

A Gallup survey released over the summer found that a majority of Americans — 52% — viewed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unfavorably, while just 29% had a positive view of Israel’s longest-serving leader. The July poll reflected Netanyahu’s highest unfavorable numbers in nearly three decades. 

But perhaps most telling was that Netanyahu, in the Gallup poll, was viewed favorably by just 9% of Democrats — likely due to the convergence of a number of factors, among them Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gaza and Netanyahu’s close ties with the Trump administration.

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