A chorus of senior Trump administration officials, including White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sought to offer a decisive rebuttal on Tuesday to what they deemed to be a false narrative, which had spread like wildfire a day before. 

They were all responding to the political tumult and online furor that erupted after Rubio briefed congressional leaders about the U.S. military operation in Iran on Monday afternoon. 

A narrative quickly formed — based in large part on a viral post on X from the White House clipping an excerpt of Rubio’s comments — that Trump decided to strike Iran because Israel was already planning an attack, which would then prompt Iranian retaliation, thus putting American troops at risk. 

“The president made the very wise decision — we knew that there was going to be an Israeli action, we knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties,” Rubio told reporters. 

The White House shared that sound bite in a post on X that was viewed more than 13 million times in less than a day. Rubio’s Monday messaging about Israel was echoed by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) after he and other congressional leaders received Rubio’s briefing. 

The question that was then posed dozens of times by reporters to policymakers: Had Israel forced America’s hand and dragged the U.S. into war? 

Never mind that Rubio also said in those same remarks the U.S. was not “forced” to strike because of an impending Israeli action. “No matter what, ultimately, this operation needed to happen,” Rubio said. The White House shared that sound bite on X Tuesday morning, drawing 500,000 views, a fraction of the visibility of the earlier post. “No, Marco Rubio Didn’t Claim That Israel Dragged Trump into War with Iran,” was the headline Leavitt posted on X. But the damage had already been done.

Fox News host Sean Hannity asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the same question in a Monday night interview. “You don’t have to drag him into anything,” Netanyahu said of Trump. “He does what he thinks is right for America.” 

Another reporter then posed the question to Trump directly on Tuesday during an Oval Office meeting between the president and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

“No,” Trump said decisively. “I might have forced their hand.” Hegseth then chimed in on X boosting Trump’s message: “This is 100% correct.” 

Rubio similarly refuted a reporter who said the U.S. needed to get involved because Israel was going to strike Iran.

“Your statement is false,” he said Tuesday during another visit to Capitol Hill for all-member briefings in the House and Senate. “Somebody asked me the question yesterday, did we go in because of Israel … I told you this had to happen anyway. The president made a decision, and the decision he made was that Iran was not going to be allowed to hide behind its ballistic missile program, that Iran was not going to be allowed to hide behind its ability to conduct these attacks. That decision had been made.”

The question, he said, was “a question of timing, of why this had to happen as a joint operation. Not the question of the intent.” 

Some questions remain unanswered. Trump told reporters alongside Merz that Iran was going to attack first, but it was not clear whom he expected Iran to attack, the Israelis or the Americans. A White House spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment.

“We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first,” Trump said. “Based on the way the negotiation was going, I think they were going to attack first, and I didn’t want that to happen. So if anything, I might have forced Israel’s hand, but Israel was ready, and we were ready, and we’ve had a very, very powerful impact.” 

Even as the White House refuted the narrative that Israel had pulled the U.S. into war and put American servicemembers at risk, Democratic lawmakers and right-wing podcasters turned it into an online rallying cry. 

“So Netanyahu now decides when we go to war? So much for America First,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) said in a post on X on Monday. Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security advisor to President Barack Obama, argued Trump could not bring himself to say no to Netanyahu: “Donald Trump is so weak that he couldn’t tell Bibi Netanyahu no, so now we are at war,” he said in response to the Rubio clip. 

Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), who was in Monday’s briefing by Rubio, afterward described the strikes as “dictated by Israel’s goals and timelines” and said he opposed them. 

On the right, Matt Walsh of The Daily Wire sharply criticized Rubio. “So he’s flat out telling us that we’re in a war with Iran because Israel forced our hand. This is basically the worst possible thing he could have said,” Walsh wrote. 

The conservative pundit Megyn Kelly said that the American servicemembers who have so far died in the campaign did not give their lives for the United States. “No one should have to die for a foreign country. I don’t think those four service members died for the United States. I think they died for Iran or for Israel,” she said on Monday. 

Now progressive Jewish groups are attacking the White House, saying that pinning the war on Israel feeds into antisemitic conspiracy theories.

“Shifting blame for American military decisions to Netanyahu is an abdication of responsibility and comes with the dangerous side effect of fueling antisemitic sentiment in the United States,” J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami said Tuesday.

The Jewish Democratic Council of America called Rubio’s language “unprecedented, dangerous and deeply irresponsible.”

“As Jewish Americans, we’re deeply concerned about the consequences of the White House effectively blaming Israel for its decision to launch a war against Iran, which has now spread to the entire Middle East,” JDCA said in a Tuesday statement. 

The Republican Jewish Coalition, meanwhile, spent Tuesday reposting messages from the White House, the Senate Republican Caucus and the Pentagon that Israel had not, in fact, dragged the U.S. into war. 

Rubio attempted to offer a final rebuttal of the narrative about Israel driving the war when he was back on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. He acknowledged how his comments the day before had spread — although he did not mention that the White House played a role in amplifying them.

“If you’re going to play the statements, you need to play the whole statement, and not clip it to reach a narrative,” said Rubio.

White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff addressed the AIPAC Congressional Summit taking place in Washington on Tuesday, two sources with knowledge of the event told Jewish Insider, as he prepares for the third round of negotiations with Iran later this week.

AIPAC led lobbying efforts against the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal with Iran, including creating a new lobbying group called Citizens for a Nuclear Free Iran that spent upwards of $20 million opposing the agreement. Witkoff has led the Trump administration’s negotiations with Tehran during the president’s second term, alongside Jared Kushner, and is set to hold discussions with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Geneva on Thursday.

The summit, which ran from Sunday to Tuesday and brought together more than 1,000 of the group’s top donors, featured virtual addresses from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Opposition Leader Yair Lapid. Others expected to address the event included House Speaker Mike Johnson (R‑LA), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D‑NY) and Sens. Tom Cotton (R‑AR) and Ted Cruz (R‑TX).

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz also addressed the summit on Monday about “the absurd nature of the U.N. and its institutions and how they are horribly anti-Israel,” one attendee told JI, while wearing a hat that read “Make the U.N. Great Again.”

On Monday evening, former Israeli hostage and pianist Alon Ohel performed on the main stage alongside John Ondrasik, the singer-songwriter known as “Five for Fighting” who has been deeply involved in Israel advocacy during the Israel-Hamas war. Ondrasik rereleased his song “Superman” in April 2025 dedicated to the Israeli hostages and Ohel in particular.

The conference’s speakers were “well balanced” with bipartisan members of Congress and senior level administration officials, the attendee told JI.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), one of the leading foreign policy voices in the Democratic Party’s moderate wing, expressed concern over the weekend that any White House decision to move ahead with military action against Iran would deeply alienate leading European allies of the United States. 

“There are pretty stark early warning signs of some challenges where core allies do not share our priorities,” Coons told Jewish Insider following a weeklong trip to Europe, which included stops at the Munich Security Conference, along with meetings in Ukraine and Moldova with top European diplomats. 

“It leaves me genuinely concerned that if Trump goes ahead with a strike against Iran, it is not going to enjoy support from any of our core allies,” he continued. “That will make it harder, and it may deepen this growing challenge for us.”

Asked how he would like to see the Trump administration address the Iranian regime’s violent crackdown on protesters and its nuclear program, Coons urged the president to work with close allies to “ramp up pressure” on Tehran and explain his approach to the public. The Delaware senator also encouraged Trump to include Congress in his deliberations. 

“A) Consult Congress. B) Make a case to the American people about why this is in our national security interest,” Coons said. “C) Clarify what on earth he’s planning with this Board of Peace, which just launched with a massive pledge from the United States that none of us had heard of before he announced it,” he said, ostensibly referring to the $10 billion financial commitment Trump made to Gaza’s reconstruction. “And D) If he’s going to work with close allies to ramp up pressure to try and achieve something at the negotiating table, he should work with close allies.”

“He shouldn’t just fire off a bunch of missiles and assume that that’s going to be enough to achieve the result he wants,” he added.

Coons also highlighted growing transatlantic tensions over potential U.S. military action against Iran during discussions with European officials, who expressed worries about a brewing U.S.-U.K. dispute tied to the Chagos Islands.

The remote British Indian Ocean Territory is at the center of a 2025 agreement in which the U.K. agreed to transfer sovereignty of the island chain to Mauritius while securing a 99- or 100-year lease for the strategic Diego Garcia military base, a joint U.S.-U.K. facility long used by American forces.

The Trump administration initially signaled support for the deal, with the State Department affirming it last Tuesday. But one day later, President Donald Trump publicly urged Prime Minister Keir Starmer to scrap the arrangement and retain full control of the “strategically located” base, warning it could be needed if diplomacy with Iran fails.

The Times of London reported Thursday that the British government had informed Washington that week it would not permit U.S. strikes on Iran from Diego Garcia or the Royal Air Force’s Fairford station, which houses U.S. Air Force troops, in England.

Coons called the U.K.’s stance “striking.” 

Coons plays a unique role in today’s Democratic Party. He sits in the Senate seat held by former President Joe Biden for 36 years, and the two Delaware Democrats have a relationship that dates back four decades. 

In addition to being the ranking member on Defense Appropriations, the panel responsible for Pentagon funding, Coons is next in line to succeed retiring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) as the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a role Biden held in the early 2000s. The Delaware senator remains Biden’s most ardent defender in politics following his exit from public life, and continues to advocate in his role as a senior Democrat in Congress for the traditional foreign policy views the two men have long shared. 

He does so against the backdrop of the ongoing debate among Democrats about the future direction of the party, on foreign policy and otherwise, in the post-Biden era.

Alongside Coons in Munich were a handful of prominent Democrats believed to be considering presidential runs in 2028, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Sens. Chris Murphy (D-CT), Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Elissa Slotkin (D-MI). Govs. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan and Gavin Newsom of California and former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. 

Among the possible presidential hopefuls, Ocasio-Cortez and Whitmer were criticized for being unprepared for the conference after struggling to answer questions on U.S. policy toward China and Ukraine. Meanwhile, Murphy and Ocasio-Cortez separately accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza — appealing to a left-wing base that has made criticism of the Jewish state central to its foreign policy. 

Ocasio-Cortez later griped to The New York Times that her gaffes and perceived presidential ambitions overshadowed the message she was attempting to deliver on a major foreign policy stage. 

Asked about the large presence of potential Democratic presidential candidates in Munich,  Coons joked that he was “announcing my 2028 candidacy” before crediting his fellow Democrats for engaging closely on foreign policy issues.

“The reality is that over the last several cycles, I’ve been very encouraged to see governors, senators, former cabinet officials who are likely future presidential candidates invest the time in coming to Munich, coming to Davos, going to Halifax, going to Australia, because the threat environment for all of our countries has become more serious and more real,” Coons said. 

Coons also expressed concern about the hefty $850 billion budget for the Pentagon in the upcoming fiscal year,  noting the significantly increased funding is “a breathtaking amount of money, and there is a lot of skepticism on the part of Americans that it’s being well spent.”

“The average American needs to see good jobs and innovation coming out of this massive defense investment. If we focus only on buying American and only on American jobs, we will lose tactically, we will lose strategically, we will lose politically. To the extent we align together, there is a strong future for all of our countries as democracies to meet this moment and to deliver the innovation that this threat environment absolutely demands,” Coons said.

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.

Netanyahu said that his nearly three-hour meeting with Trump “mostly focused on the negotiations with Iran.”

“The president thinks the Iranians understand who they’re dealing with,” Netanyahu said. “He thinks the conditions he is setting, combined with their understanding that they made a mistake last time not reaching a deal, could bring them to agree to conditions that will allow a good deal to be reached.”

The prime minister’s view was more reserved: “I do not hide my general skepticism about the possibility of any deal with Iran.”

Netanyahu said he told Trump that if a deal is indeed reached, “it must include the components that are important to us, the State of Israel, and, I think, the entire international community: not just the nuclear matter, but also ballistic missiles and Iranian proxies in the region.”

After Wednesday’s White House meeting, the Prime Minister’s Office stated that the leaders discussed Iran and Gaza, and that Netanyahu “emphasized the security needs of the State of Israel in the context of the negotiations, and the two leaders agreed on continued coordination and the close contact between them.”

Trump posted on Truth Social that he “insisted that negotiations with Iran continue to see whether or not a Deal can be consummated. If it can, I let the Prime Minister know that will be a preference. If it cannot, we will just have to see what the outcome will be.”

The president warned that last time Tehran did not make a deal, the U.S. launched Operation Midnight Hammer, striking Iran’s nuclear sites.

The Prime Minister’s Office said Netanyahu will not be returning to Washington next week as he had been scheduled to, in order to speak at an AIPAC conference, and will instead appear virtually.

As he departed Washington a day after his meeting with Trump, Netanyahu voiced skepticism about the U.S.’ ability to reach an agreement with Iran.

“The president thinks the Iranians understand who they’re dealing with,” Netanyahu said from Joint Base Andrews. “He thinks the… pic.twitter.com/A1AsiDYZCe

— Jewish Insider (@J_Insider) February 12, 2026

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. 

According to a report by Barak Ravid for Israel’s Channel 12, the Trump administration’s views are very close to those on Netanyahu’s team, with a senior American official also believing the Iranians are unlikely to compromise. 

The meeting between the two leaders was “critical,” Ravid quoted the official as saying, because they “need to decide whether to conduct a joint strike if a deal is not reached.” Such a strike would be more likely to succeed if the militaries work together.

One indication of the Trump administration’s pessimism about the talks is the Pentagon’s order, as reported by The Wall Street Journal, for a second aircraft carrier strike group to deploy to the Middle East if negotiations fail, which came after Trump teased the idea earlier this week.

A source in Netanyahu’s delegation said that the prime minister also arrived in Washington with evidence, which he presented to Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner on Tuesday and Trump on Wednesday, that the Iranians lied to the Americans about their intentions in the talks, which they never planned to include ballistic missiles, as well as about stopping the slaughter of anti-regime protesters.

Meanwhile, the U.S. and Iran have yet to set a date for a second round of talks, and the first was under 90 minutes long — with some of that time dedicated to their Omani hosts passing messages back and forth in the indirect talks.

For the first hour and a half of the White House Religious Liberty Commission’s Monday hearing on antisemitism, the Jewish witnesses testifying about their experiences of antisemitism seemed to be in alignment with the commission’s members — all generally conservative and eager to see antisemitism stamped out. 

Then Commissioner Carrie Prejean Boller began questioning the witnesses with a sharply anti-Israel bent, in an adversarial tone. Following public backlash, she was removed from the commission two days later by the commission’s chair, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. (Prejean Boller insists Patrick does not have the authority to remove her.) 

Prejean Boller, who wore a Palestinian flag pin at the hearing, has used the criticism to deepen her line of attack against so-called “Zionist supremacy in America,” doubling down on her opposition to Israel. “I am a free American. Not a slave to a foreign nation,” she wrote on X on Tuesday. 

While Prejean Boller may have been removed from the body, she found an ally who has stood by her this week and who remains on the commission’s advisory board: Sameerah Munshi, a Muslim activist who first gained a public profile in the summer of 2023, when she testified at a Montgomery County, Md., school board hearing against the inclusion of LGBTQ-related material in elementary school classes. 

That moment thrust Munshi briefly into the national spotlight, where she worked alongside conservative Christians who also opposed the liberal Maryland county’s approach to educating about LGBTQ issues. Prejean Boller, too, first gained national attention for her opposition to gay marriage at a beauty pageant in 2009. 

The two women — both of whom were appointed by President Donald Trump — have now joined together as the anti-Israel wing of the commission. Both of them have publicly defended antisemitic commentator Candace Owens, who uses conspiracy-laden language to discuss Jews and Israel. In a shared Instagram post last week, Prejean Boller and Munshi pointed fingers at a shadowy cabal that they blame for both the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the alleged crimes of Jeffrey Epstein. 

“The politicians who refuse to condemn the Israeli government’s starvation and genocide on the Palestinians are the same ones unmoved by the Epstein crime files,” Prejean Boller and Munshi wrote. “Gaza was a precursor to the release of the Epstein files. Their goal: normalize and justify the torture and killing of innocent children … Arrest these monsters. Drain the evil swamp. End Palestinian genocide. Defund Israel.” 

Prejean Boller and Munshi said in another post that they had submitted an alternative list of “fair witnesses” to the commission whom they hoped would present at the antisemitism hearing. The list included Norman Finkelstein, a discredited Holocaust scholar who has publicly defended the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, as well as Miko Peled and Yaakov Shapiro, two anti-Zionist Jewish activists. 

“Antisemitism should never be conflated with anti-Zionism or pro-Palestinian advocacy,” the two women wrote. 

When former UCLA law student Yitzy Frankel spoke at the hearing about his experience of antisemitism on campus after Oct. 7, and described a statement he wrote condemning Hamas’ “rape, beheading of children and taking of hostages,” Munshi muttered under her breath that Hamas had not beheaded anyone, a member of the audience who was seated near her told Jewish Insider. 

What remains unclear is who at the White House appointed Prejean Boller and Munshi to their roles on the commission and its advisory board, of which Munshi serves as a lay leader. Several members of the advisory board who spoke to JI said they did not know how they had been selected. A White House spokesperson declined to comment. Munshi did not respond to a request for comment. 

Neither Munshi nor Prejean Boller had a history of posting anti-Israel content online prior to late last year. 

Prejean Boller’s X account was used only infrequently, mostly to share content about Trump, illegal immigration, Christianity and gender issues. In early 2024, Prejean Boller began to come to Owens’ defense when Owens left The Daily Wire amid concerns about her antisemitic views. Munshi was also an infrequent user of X, and very occasionally posted pro-Palestinian messages over the last two years. Following Monday’s hearing, both women have taken to posting often and highlighting their opposition to Zionism.

“We condemn Zionist supremacy and the demanding we deny our individual faith for the fear of being called an antisemite. Religious freedom lives on,” Prejean Boller posted on Tuesday alongside a photo of the two women. 

The U.S. will continue pursuing diplomacy with Iran, President Donald Trump said following his White House meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday.

“There was nothing definitive reached other than I insisted that negotiations with Iran continue, to see whether or not a deal can be consummated,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “If it can, I let the Prime Minister know that will be a preference.”

If negotiations do not lead to a deal, the president added, “we will just have to see what the outcome will be. Last time, Iran decided they were better off not making a deal, and they were hit with Midnight Hammer. That did not work out well for them. Hopefully, this time, they will be more reasonable and responsible.” 

In addition, Trump wrote, he and Netanyahu discussed “the tremendous progress being made in Gaza.” 

Trump characterized the summit as “a very good meeting, the tremendous relationship between our two countries continues.”

Netanyahu’s office said he and Trump discussed Iran, Gaza and regional developments. 

“The prime minister stood up for the State of Israel’s security needs in the context of the negotiations, and the two agreed to continue to coordinate closely,” the Prime Minister’s Office statement read. 

Netanyahu made a quiet entrance to the White House, and Trump was uncharacteristically camera-shy.

Trump and Netanyahu’s meetings — this was their seventh in the past year — have usually been accompanied by freewheeling press huddles, either in the Oval Office or East Room, in which Trump answered dozens of questions. On Wednesday, however, reporters were not allowed in the room before or after the meeting, which continued longer than scheduled and included lunch.

At the top of the meeting’s agenda were the details of the ongoing negotiations with Iran. The American team is led by White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, both of whom met with Netanyahu at Blair House on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, Trump said on Fox Business that the Iranians “want to make a deal. I think they’d be foolish if they didn’t. We took out their nuclear power last time, and we’ll have to see if we take out more this time.”

Trump added that a “good deal” would mean “no nuclear weapons, no ballistic missiles, no this or that.” 

That statement checks off the most important items on Netanyahu’s priority list for an Iran deal, while leaving out the Islamic Republic’s sponsorship of terrorist proxies like Hezbollah and Hamas. It also does not include any aid to the Iranian protesters against the regime, whom Trump said late last year that he would help.

A source on Netanyahu’s delegation said that the prime minister is aware of the American political sensitivities around their meeting and was cautious to show deference to Trump, lest Netanyahu be seen as trying to push for war.  

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, however, said in an interview that his country’s ballistic missile program is “never negotiable.” 

Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani called Trump ahead of his meeting with Netanyahu to encourage him to reach a deal, according to Qatari media.

Netanyahu met with Secretary of State Marco Rubio ahead of the Trump meeting, for discussions focused on the administration’s plans for Gaza. 

Netanyahu presented Rubio with signed letters certifying his membership in the Board of Peace, which Trump founded to oversee reconstruction and demilitarization in Gaza and attempt to resolve other conflicts. 

The Board of Peace’s first meeting is next week, and Netanyahu’s office has yet to say whether he will attend. The prime minister was expected to come back to Washington from Feb. 18-22 for an AIPAC conference beginning that Sunday, and his office said the trip is still on schedule. 

Conservative activist Carrie Prejean Boller was removed from the White House’s Religious Liberty Commission, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the chair of the commission, announced on Wednesday. 

The news came two days after the commission held its first public hearing on antisemitism, which turned contentious when Prejean Boller minimized charges of antisemitism leveled against other public figures and pressed Jewish witnesses about whether they would consider her antisemitic for not being a Zionist and for believing Jews killed Jesus. 

“No member of the Commission has the right to hijack a hearing for their own personal and political agenda on any issue,” Patrick wrote in a post on X. “This is clearly, without question, what happened Monday in our hearing on antisemitism in America. This was my decision.”

Prejean Boller, who first entered the political fray in 2009 when she was stripped of her Miss California title following the release of a sex tape and controversial comments in which she said marriage should be between a man and a woman, reemerged as an activist in 2020. She was a member of Trump’s campaign advisory board that year, and gained a social media following for urging people to resist mask mandates and for speaking out against transgender women and girls participating in female sports. She converted to Catholicism last year. 

“Catholics do not embrace Zionism, just so you know. So are all Catholics antisemites?” she said at the Monday hearing to four Jewish witnesses who were testifying about their experiences of antisemitism after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks. Prejean Boller also came to the defense of right-wing podcaster Candace Owens, who regularly shares antisemitic conspiracy theories.

The White House, which appointed Prejan Boller to the commission last year, did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Prejean Boller’s removal, and has otherwise not commented on the incident this week.

The White House launched Phase 2 of President Donald Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan last month, intending to transition the enclave toward demilitarization, technocratic governance and reconstruction. But before those plans can move forward, the administration still needs to confront a central reality on the ground: Hamas remains armed and unwilling to cooperate.

During the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January, the Trump administration unveiled the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG), a committee of technocrats intended as a post-Hamas governing authority, alongside an outline for reconstructing the enclave. 

That vision, however, was quickly challenged by Hamas’ leadership. Speaking at the Al Jazeera Forum in Doha, Qatar, this past weekend, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, who is under U.S. indictment on terrorism-related charges, rejected the U.N. Security Council–backed plan for Gaza — a move that could complicate disarmament and Phase 2 efforts.

Experts told Jewish Insider that the administration’s expectation that Hamas can be persuaded to voluntarily hand over its weapons is detached from the group’s incentives and its perception of the war’s outcome.

“Without first disarming Hamas, progress on every other facet of Phase 2 will be minimal at best,” said Jonathan Ruhe, a fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America. “The U.S. needs to adapt its strategy, which remains stuck on convincing Hamas to hand over its weapons.”

Ruhe said Hamas believes it “won the war” and therefore “can’t be incentivized to give up” power. He added that, absent voluntary disarmament, the administration may need to consider using well-vetted and tightly overseen “private military contractors” to carry out the task, a suggestion also recently put forward by former special envoy for Iran and Venezuela Elliott Abrams and JINSA’s Eric Edelman and Rena Gabber.

Other experts were similarly skeptical that Hamas would relinquish control voluntarily. Michael Koplow, chief policy officer at the Israel Policy Forum, warned that Hamas is not going to “want to voluntarily give up their weapons without real guarantees,” adding that the group’s incentive to comply is “not very high.”

“If you’re going to get [Hamas to comply with the plan], it’s going to have to involve some sort of guarantees for the group and guarantees for the leadership, which are going to be very difficult for the Israelis to swallow,” said Koplow. 

Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Hamas is also unlikely “to surrender the actual administrative control of Gaza.” He outlined what he described as a narrow and unattractive set of options for disarmament.

“There are only two ways to fundamentally demilitarize Hamas,” Miller said. “There are only two forces capable of doing it. One would be the IDF, and you’ve seen how that has gone over the course of the last 2 ½ years. The second would be the deployment of thousands of American combat forces, which would take a while and result in a permanent occupation of Gaza by the U.S. military. Both of these strike me as not feasible from a military point of view and certainly not practical from a political point of view.”

Miller added that any disarmament process would likely need to be accompanied by an Israeli withdrawal from additional areas in Gaza. The IDF currently controls more than half of the territory, demarcated by what officials refer to as a “yellow line.” 

Until Hamas is disarmed, Miller said Israel is unlikely to permit large-scale reconstruction, given concerns that materials such as cement and metal tubing could be diverted for tunnel construction and weapons production.

Koplow also noted military means as an option for disarmament, but said the Trump administration appears to be leaning toward a “DDR” process — disarmament, demobilization and reintegration — an alternative to military force in which Hamas would give up heavy weapons first, transition away from armed activity and then reintegrate former fighters into civilian life.

“The idea is that you’re not going in and destroying the group,” Koplow said. “You’re first getting rid of their weapons, you’re then trying to transform the group itself into something different and then you’re reintegrating the group’s members back into society. Historically, that’s the way that terrorist groups like this are disarmed.”

Koplow cautioned that any such effort would be slow and contentious. “Hamas is going to make it difficult,” he said, adding that demilitarization will be “a long and drawn-out and very difficult process if it has any chance of working.”

“After all these months, the ISF still lacks a clear mandate,” Jonathan Ruhe, a fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, said. “If Hamas disarmed voluntarily, as Trump’s plan envisions, any number of countries would contribute troops for relatively safe peacekeeping duties like safeguarding humanitarian aid, police training and border patrol. But because Hamas won’t disarm peacefully, Arab and other Muslim countries consistently refuse to put their forces in harm’s way.”

Under Trump’s original 20-point plan, a U.S.-led International Stabilization Force (ISF) was envisioned as a “long-term internal security solution.” Last month, Trump appointed Maj. Gen. Jasper Jeffers as commander of the ISF, and Israeli media reported on Monday that thousands of Indonesian soldiers were expected to deploy to southern Gaza in the coming weeks as part of the first foreign contingent.

Despite those moves, experts say the ISF remains constrained. No other countries have formally joined the force, and efforts to assemble it have been complicated by reluctance among potential contributors and Israeli security concerns over which countries would be permitted to participate. Analysts also say the ISF still lacks a clearly defined mandate and could be limited to a supporting role rather than directly confronting Hamas.

“After all these months, the ISF still lacks a clear mandate,” Ruhe said. “If Hamas disarmed voluntarily, as Trump’s plan envisions, any number of countries would contribute troops for relatively safe peacekeeping duties like safeguarding humanitarian aid, police training and border patrol. But because Hamas won’t disarm peacefully, Arab and other Muslim countries consistently refuse to put their forces in harm’s way.”

Miller said the ISF would most likely deploy in areas already under Israeli control, rather than Hamas-held territory. “I see the stabilization force as exactly what its name implies,” he said. “It would be an after-the-fact deployment to monitor and stabilize. The heavy work of actually decommissioning weapons is going to take a very long time.”

Even if demilitarization were achieved, Miller said the question of whether and how Hamas members could be integrated into future governance remains unresolved. The group maintains an extensive bureaucratic apparatus in Gaza, including tens of thousands of civil servants and police officers, whose future role would need to be addressed.

“It’s probably going to involve making distinctions between Hamas fighters and Hamas bureaucrats, and making some very difficult choices about what level of reintegration, if any, you’re willing to allow for former Hamas members,” Michael Koplow, chief policy officer at the Israel Policy Forum, said.

“Hamas has 40,000 civil servants and 10,000 police,” Miller said. “Those people would be under the administration of whom?” 

Koplow suggested that the group be completely dismantled and barred from maintaining governing authority. 

“Hamas as a group, and certainly not as it’s currently constituted, can’t responsibly be given any role in future Gaza governance,” said Koplow. 

“It’s probably going to involve making distinctions between Hamas fighters and Hamas bureaucrats, and making some very difficult choices about what level of reintegration, if any, you’re willing to allow for former Hamas members,” Koplow added. “Then the question is, does anybody who’s ever had a Hamas affiliation have to be hunted down and eliminated over time, or is there a world in which they can, as individuals, be integrated into whatever future Gaza governance and society looks like?”

When the White House Religious Liberty Commission gathered in Washington on Monday for the body’s first public hearing focused on antisemitism, attendees expected an informative if subdued meeting, meant to gather testimony from Jewish Americans who have faced antisemitism. The commission’s members are tasked with drafting a report with recommendations for President Donald Trump about how to promote religious liberty.

The speakers were mostly conservative, like the 13 members of the commission, which was created by Trump last year. 

The conversation was largely friendly, barring one member of the commission, Catholic conservative activist and former Miss California Carrie Prejean Boller, who acted as more of an interrogator. She pushed back on witnesses’ testimony, arguing that they had defined antisemitism too broadly and questioning whether she would be considered an antisemite because she does not support Zionism and because she believes the Jews killed Jesus. 

She also defended right-wing influencer Candace Owens from accusations of antisemitism. 

“I listen to her daily,” said Prejean Boller, who appeared to be wearing a Palestinian flag pin. “I haven’t heard one thing out of her mouth that I would say is antisemitic.” In 2024, Owens was dropped from a Trump campaign event where she was slated to speak alongside Donald Trump Jr. after the campaign faced backlash for including Owens, who regularly shares antisemitic commentary in social media posts and on her podcast.

The first panel of speakers featured former UCLA law student Yitzy Frankel, who sued the university over its handling of antisemitism during the 2024 encampments; Yeshiva University President Ari Berman; Harvard alum Shabbos Kestenbaum; and former Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl. Each of them talked about their experiences of antisemitism — or combating it — in the United States after the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks in Israel. 

After nearly an hour and a half, Prejean Boller revealed that she had been counting each mention of Israel in the course of the discussion.

“Since we’ve mentioned Israel a total of 17 times, are you willing to condemn what Israel has done in Gaza?” said Prejean Boller. “You won’t condemn that? Just on the record.”

Prejean Boller insisted that she opposes Israel because of her Catholic faith.

“Catholics do not embrace Zionism, just so you know. So are all Catholics antisemites?” Prejean Boller asked the panel, earning some boos from the audience, a mix of Jewish professionals, Christian activists and members of the Washington Jewish community. “I want to be clear on what the definition of antisemitism is. If I don’t support the political state of Israel, am I an antisemite, yes or no?”

At the end of the first panel, the Religious Liberty Commission’s sole Jewish member, Rabbi Meir Soloveichik of Congregation Shearith Israel in New York, offered a pointed response to Prejean Boller’s commentary about Catholics.

“This is an incredibly diverse country, and the one thing we should be careful about is speaking on behalf of all members of a religious community, even if one is a member of that religious community. I certainly wouldn’t claim to speak for all Jews on all subjects,” said Soloveichik. “We’re not known for agreeing on everything, and that certainly should be said for speaking about Catholics in America.”

Soloveichik then quoted Secretary of State Marco Rubio, “who also happens to be a very devout Catholic,” and who spoke about the Jewish people’s connection to the land of Israel during a visit to Jerusalem last year. 

Prejean was a member of Trump’s campaign advisory board in 2020. The next year, she began using social media to rally against COVID-19 mask mandates. “You’re the next Rosa Parks. You’re the next Martin Luther King. This is so important that you stand,” she told a group of girls in 2021, urging them to go to school without masks, according to a video she posted on her Instagram. 

At the time, she had 11,000 followers. Now she has 124,000 followers. She is also an advocate against transgender women and girls participating in female sports, and an opponent of same-sex marriage. Recently, she began regularly posting videos from Owens and Tucker Carlson, along with sharp criticism towards Israel. Her biography on the commission’s website lists only her beauty pageant title and a book she authored about it. A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

“They mocked her. They censored her. They called her a ‘crazy conspiracy theorist’ simply for asking questions,” Prejean Boller wrote in a recent post about Owens. “I stand with Tucker,” she wrote in another post.

“I would really appreciate it if you would stop calling Candace Owens an antisemite,” Prejean Boller said at the hearing. “She’s not an antisemite. She just doesn’t support Zionism, and that really has to stop.” 

Other commission members include Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the former Archbishop of New York; Pastor Paula White, a senior advisor to the White House Faith Office; and Pastor Franklin Graham, president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and of Samaritan’s Purse. It is chaired by Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.

The rest of the Monday hearing proceeded as planned: bureaucratic, genial, straightforward. The commission’s membership is mostly Christian, and much of the discussion of antisemitism presented it as a problem for those who believe in Judeo-Christian values, and an issue for Jews and Christians to combat together — with an understanding that the government should be in the business of supporting Americans’ freedom of religion. The event took place at the Museum of the Bible, a private institution established by the evangelical founder of Hobby Lobby. 

“I want to thank everyone who is part of this fight,” Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner said at the start of the event. “It’s a battle that President Trump will continue to wage for Jewish Americans, for Christians, and for all Americans of all faiths whose First Amendment freedoms are under attack. I know it’s fitting that we’re here at the Museum of the Bible. The word of God is powerful, and it’s a powerful reminder of the importance of the First Amendment.”

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. 

In the meeting in early 2025, Aviva gave the first lady books that she had written about Keith, who grew up in North Carolina. Trump then passed those books to the president, the first lady shared on Wednesday. 

“I gave him the books, the books that Aviva gave me, and I explained the situation — where she thought that Keith was, how he was doing. She didn’t have much information, but she knew how much he was suffering, because she was with him for 50 days,” said Trump. “I explained to him everything, and I know how hard he was working.” 

The Siegel couple was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists from Kibbutz Kfar Aza on Oct. 7, 2023. Aviva was held hostage for 51 days before being released in the first ceasefire deal in November 2023, but Keith was not released until 2025, after 484 days of captivity. Over the course of the war, Aviva became one of the most visible activists advocating for the release of all the hostages. 

“Aviva is a warrior. She’s a warrior. She was fighting very hard for Keith, and I know he suffered a lot,” Trump said on Wednesday. “I’m happy to see you healthy at home with your children, with your grandchildren, with your family, and I know you’re giving back your time, your energy, to other people.”

Keith responded to the first lady’s remarks with emotional comments of his own, getting choked up at times. 

“I want to thank you for being a very compassionate person, for supporting and helping Aviva during those difficult days, and you helped her enormously in many ways,” Keith said to Trump. “I’m eternally grateful to you and President Trump for bringing me home and for bringing all of the hostages back to their families.”

The first lady said the meeting was planned to coincide with the Siegels’ travel schedule in Washington. But she also used the event to tout her new documentary, “Melania,” which the first lady said includes footage of her meeting with Aviva. 

According to the White House, text displayed at the end of the documentary lists Trump’s accomplishments as first lady, including: “Melania Trump played a key role in securing the release of Keith Siegel after 484 days as a hostage in Gaza, just 12 days after the inauguration.”

There are few things that Ha’aretz and the pro-Netanyahu Channel 14 agree on, but with American and Iranian officials set to meet for nuclear talks on Friday, there was near wall-to-wall agreement in Israel that the talks are unlikely to bring positive results.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff during his visit to Israel on Tuesday that “Iran proved time after time that its promises cannot be trusted,” according to a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office.

An Israeli military source told Channel 14 that Netanyahu also warned Witkoff that Iran wants to use the negotiations to “kill time … to transfer offensive weapons to hiding places.”

Witkoff, along with Jared Kushner, are set to represent the U.S. in the talks, which were originally set to be held in Turkey but have reportedly been moved to Oman, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is expected to lead his country’s negotiating team. Iran has also demanded that the negotiations be limited to its nuclear program, while the U.S. seeks to curb Tehran’s ballistic missile program and support for regional proxies. 

Hours after Witkoff met with Netanyahu on Tuesday, Iran launched a drone at the USS Abraham Lincoln, which the military shot down, and a U.S. ship escaped an Iranian attempt to stop it at sea. 

Jerusalem eyed the move toward negotiations with Iran with skepticism.

Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen, a member of the Security Cabinet, said on Wednesday, “Let’s admit the truth. There is no value to a diplomatic agreement with Iran.”

“Iran has never kept any of its commitments, and even if it agrees to something, it’ll be a hudna [Arabic for a temporary ceasefire] until Trump is out of office,” Cohen told Israel’s 103FM. 

Cohen said that “Trump is a businessman who wants the bottom line, and therefore he is taking his time to bring it. Our message to the U.S. is that negotiations with Iran are a waste of time.” 

Cohen argued that it is in the interest of the region to see the Islamic Republic fall: “Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the UAE and Azerbaijan told the U.S. ‘don’t attack Iran’ out of fear. It’s clearly lip service.” 

Ehud Ya’ari, the in-house Middle East analyst for Israel’s Channel 12, wrote in an article published Wednesday that the talks will try to reach “an interim arrangement that will relieve the tension without solving the problems.”  

“A move like this is not a good enough solution for Israel,” Ya’ari wrote. “An interim agreement means freezing problems, not solving them.”

At the same time, Ya’ari argued that a broader agreement that will satisfy both Trump and Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is impossible, though an interim agreement will also be challenging.

Tamir Hayman, director of the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University and former IDF intelligence chief, told Ha’aretz‘s Hebrew podcast “The Week” that “anything is better than an agreement with Iran. …Israel does not want an agreement.” 

“Israel does not want any nuclear program at all, zero enrichment,” Hayman said. “We’ll want limits to missile manufacturing and the export of terror to the Middle East export of arms. … My concern in light of past statements by Witkoff is that … he’s only dealing with nuclear and for him, any compromise on enrichment [is acceptable].” 

Hayman argued that “you can’t bring down a regime that you are negotiating with…Any agreement they reach is a lifeline for the regime.”

However, he added, “even without an attack, [the mullahs] will fall in the end,” citing the tens of thousands of protesters killed and Iranian leadership’s inability to save the country’s collapsing economy. 

Hayman said he used to be opposed to “managing the conflict,” but now he believes that the current situation, in which Iran there is a domestic political and economic crisis and no centrifuges are spinning in Iran, “could be good and increase the chances that it will awaken something inside [Iran].”

Meanwhile, Israelis continued to live under the shadow of threats from Iran’s regime, after over a month of concern that Iran may retaliate for an American strike by attacking Israel. The ad for the latest episode of Eretz Nehederet, Israel’s answer to SNL, opened with host Eyal Kitzis looking bored in the studio with ticking clocks behind him and the message: “So, we are still waiting for Iran to attack.” 

In her first week on the job last year, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that she planned to shake up the establishment-oriented press corps by creating a seat at White House press briefings reserved for new media outlets — a broad category that would include “independent journalists, podcasters, social media influencers and content creators,” she said. 

One recent pick for the daily new media seat in the rotation stood out: Drop Site News, a publication founded in the summer of 2024 to offer reporting explicitly hostile to Israel over the war in Gaza and the U.S. response to it. 

The far-left Drop Site’s inclusion among the outlets in Sunday’s press rotation — the group of TV, radio and print outlets selected to travel with and report on the president for the day — was a marked contrast to the mostly right-wing outlets like The Federalist and Gateway Pundit that are usually selected. Some newer, more centrist sites like Semafor and NOTUS have also been selected for the new media seat. 

Drop Site launched in July 2024 with an 8,000-word interview with two senior Hamas leaders in an article described as an “exclusive” conversation with officials from the terrorist group about “their motivations, political objectives and the human costs of their armed uprising against Israel.” Since then, the outlet has gained a reputation of credulously reporting on Hamas’ claims and repeating the group’s propaganda. 

Last April, Drop Site’s official X account, which has 273,000 followers, shared a message from Hamas calling for “days of rage in the face of the occupation and its supporters.” Drop Site has also vigorously argued that claims that Hamas terrorists raped anyone during the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel are false, despite widespread Israeli testimony to the contrary. A recent social media post from the site called it a “racist lie” to claim that rape occurred on Oct. 7. 

A national security reporter at Drop Site said in a post on X in January that Iran “should have fired every single missile on Oct. 8 while Israel was in disarray.” Amid anti-government protests in Iran that were violently suppressed by the regime last month, Drop Site shared a video that reportedly showed thousands of people marching “to express unity with the Islamic Republic’s leadership and reject what officials described as foreign-linked unrest and plots aimed at destabilizing the country.” 

Drop Site was founded by Jeremy Scahill, Ryan Grim and Nausicaa Renner, veterans of the far-left investigative outlet The Intercept and outspoken critics of Israel. Scahill described Drop Site as “a non-aligned, investigative news organization” that will take “big swings at powerful people and institutions.” Grim did not respond to a request for comment on Monday. 

The news outlet is a nonprofit, funded by reader contributions. It is fiscally sponsored by Social Security Works Education Fund, a Washington organization that educates about the importance of Social Security benefits. Open Society Foundations, George Soros’ philanthropic organization, donated $250,000 to Drop Site in 2024 to support its Middle East coverage, the Washington Free Beacon reported. 

In September 2025, Drop Site promoted a fundraiser to “help the journalists in Gaza City evacuate safely.”

Drop Site’s inclusion in the press pool occurred on a Sunday, when Leavitt did not host a press briefing, so its reporter did not get the opportunity to ask a question. Still, the outlet chosen to fill the new media slot is selected by the White House communications team, not by the independent White House Correspondents Association. 

A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. 

In December, Scahill went to Doha, Qatar, to interview Khaled Meshaal, who spent 20 years leading Hamas’ political bureau. Drop Site published the text of their interview in full, in which Meshaal offered a look at how Hamas views the publication: “I appreciate your keenness to conduct this interview and for providing this space and platform for me and for all those who represent the Palestinian cause,” Meshaal said. 

A week after President Donald Trump took office for the first time in 2017, the White House ignited a political and media firestorm by releasing a statement commemorating International Holocaust Remembrance Day that failed to mention Jews. 

The omission was covered in major media outlets like CNN and Politico; the Anti-Defamation League called it “puzzling and troubling.” 

Nearly a decade later, Trump released another Holocaust Remembrance Day post this week, with a far more specific message: “Today, we pay respect to the blessed memories of the millions of Jewish people, who were murdered at the hands of the Nazi Regime and its collaborators during the Holocaust,” the statement read, “as well as the Slavs and the Roma, people with disabilities, religious leaders, persons targeted based on their sexual orientation, and political prisoners who were also targeted for systematic slaughter.”

Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance’s post commemorating the day, which marks the anniversary of the 1945 liberation of Auschwitz by Allied Forces, did not mention Jews or antisemitism, leading political rivals on the left to pounce. (Democratic Majority for Israel called it “indefensible.”)

But despite the visibility of Vance’s tweet — which his defenders pointed out included pictures of him and his wife at Dachau, standing in front of a sign that said “Never again” in Yiddish — he was far from the only politician that failed to mention the fact that the Holocaust targeted Jews. Among them were: Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA), both of whom pledged to remember the victims of the Holocaust without referring to Nazis’ targeting of Jews. 

Multiple presenters at the U.K.’s BBC also failed to mention Jews in their coverage of Holocaust Remembrance Day — drawing backlash and a subsequent apology from the national broadcaster.

Does it matter that these politicians or media don’t reference Jews if they are still highlighting the significance of the Holocaust? It’s possible to argue that, definitionally, the Holocaust was about Jews, so one could assume that any reference to the Holocaust is itself a reference to the killing of Jews and the antisemitism that led to it. 

“If I talk about the potato famine, do I have to say Irish? How many other potato famines were there?” asked Deborah Lipstadt, a Holocaust historian who served as President Joe Biden’s antisemitism envoy. “But this is part of a greater whole in an age of rising antisemitism.” 

For years, Americans’ knowledge of basic facts about the Holocaust has been declining, particularly as fewer Holocaust survivors are alive each year to share their stories. A 2023 survey conducted by the Claims Conference found that 21% of Americans believed that 2 million Jews or fewer were killed. Eight percent of Americans, and 15% of 18- to 29-year-olds, said the number of Jews who were killed during the Holocaust has been greatly exaggerated. 

“Holocaust history has the power to teach vital, timeless lessons about why our choices matter — but only when it is approached with the precision, historical integrity and respect it rightfully deserves,” the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum said in a statement this week that called for an end to “the abuse and exploitation of Holocaust memory.” 

In the 81 years since the Holocaust, political leaders and movements have exploited the memory of the genocide to serve their own ends, particularly by shifting the focus of who its victims were. 

In the former Soviet Union, where more than 2 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust, memorials to those killed called them “peaceful Soviet citizens” — stripping them of their Jewish identity, as if their killers had targeted Russians rather than Jews. Some right-wing politicians in modern Poland have attempted to quash historical scholarship documenting that Poles were involved in Nazis’ killing of Jews, and that the Nazis targeted Jews, in particular, rather than just the Poles (though Poles were targeted, too). 

Norman Goda, a Holocaust historian at the University of Florida, said that modern remembrances of the Holocaust that fail to mention Jews are “a soft form of denial.” 

“The Nazis certainly knew who they were deporting. The Nazis certainly knew who they were gassing,” Goda told Jewish Insider on Wednesday. “The ignorance is such that you have to remind people that the Nazis called this Die Endlösung der Judenfrage, the final solution of the Jewish question. They weren’t just killing random people.” 

The politicians posting about the Holocaust almost surely know that, as do most of their constituents. But rising antisemitism coupled with declining knowledge about a genocide that targeted and killed 6 million Jews means that reminding people of the facts — the specifics — remains crucial. 

“Do we do this with any other mass catastrophe? Do we discuss the Armenian Genocide without mentioning the Armenians? Do we discuss slavery in the United States without mentioning who the slaves were?” Goda questioned. “We don’t do it, and anybody who would do that is engaged in an almost willful misunderstanding, either a profound historical ignorance, on the one hand, where you almost have to try to be that ignorant, or something that is simply more nefarious.”

The White House’s Religious Liberty Commission, which was formed by President Donald Trump last spring, plans to hold its first hearing focused specifically on antisemitism next month. 

The day-long public hearing will be held on Feb. 9 at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, and members of the public are able to testify. 

Rabbi Meir Soloveichik, an Orthodox rabbi from New York, is the only Jewish member of the commission, but its advisory board includes four other rabbis, all of whom are Orthodox: Tikvah Fund CEO Rabbi Mark Gottlieb; Rabbi Yaakov Menken, the Coalition for Jewish Values’ executive vice president; Princeton Chabad Rabbi Eitan Webb; and Rabbi Chaim Dovid Zwiebel, executive vice president of Agudath Israel. Alyza Lewin, president of U.S. affairs at the Combat Antisemitism Movement, is a legal advisor to the commission. 

The commission is chaired by Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. 

Key priorities of the Commission, according to the White House, are “parental rights in religious education, school choice, conscience protections, attacks on houses of worship, free speech for religious entities and institutional autonomy.” 

President Donald Trump issued a stark warning to Hamas on Wednesday, setting a timeline for the terror group’s disarmament and stating that it must deliver on its agreement to demilitarize or face potential military consequences. 

“Hamas has agreed to give up their weapons,” Trump said, speaking to a packed room at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “If they don’t do it, they’ll be blown away very quickly.” 

The president has made several statements following the initial adoption in October of the Gaza peace plan, insisting that the group disarm or face consequences. During his Davos address, Trump seemed to issue a more concrete timeline for when he expects the administration to determine if Hamas has chosen to comply with the agreement.

“They’ve got to do it, and we’re going to know over the next two or three days, certainly over the next two or three weeks, whether or not they’re going to do it,” said Trump, who noted that disarmament is “not an easy thing” for Hamas, adding that group members are “born with a weapon in their hands.” 

The administration is a week into the launch of Phase 2 of Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan, which moves from “ceasefire to demilitarization, technocratic governance, and reconstruction,” according to White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff. 

“We have 59 countries that are part of that whole peace deal, and some of those countries aren’t even near the Middle East, and they want to come in and take out Hamas,” said Trump. “They want to come in and they want to do whatever they can.”

Critics have remained skeptical over whether Hamas will comply and relinquish its weapons. The terrorist group has previously insisted that it would refuse to disarm until a Palestinian state is established. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who previously said Hamas is unlikely to disarm without Israeli confrontation, lauded Trump’s statement at Davos in a post on X on Wednesday.

“President Trump rightly put Hamas on a time clock for disarmament,” Graham wrote on X. “This is the right decision at the right time.” 

Tucker Carlson made a pair of visits to the White House in the last two weeks, having lunch with President Donald Trump two Fridays in a row.

Reached by Jewish Insider, the White House did not say what the purpose of Carlson’s two visits were but confirmed that the far-right commentator and the president had lunch during the second visit. The meeting came one week after Carlson was spotted at a White House gathering for about a dozen oil executives for a discussion about how to best utilize Venezuela’s oil reserves following the U.S. operation that deposed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. 

Carlson was seen in pictures standing against a wall in the East Room during the event on social media later that day. 

Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were scheduled to have lunch with Trump on the day of Carlson’s first visit, according to the president’s public schedule on Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. Carlson also joined the lunch, which took place prior to the event with oil executives, despite his name not being included on the public calendar. 

Carlson told the National Review’s Audrey Fahlberg last Saturday that he “had no idea there was an oil event in progress — that’s not why I came — but he invited me to come with him after lunch, so I went.”

Asked what the agenda was for the first meeting, Carlson replied: “[Trump] asked me to lunch on a topic that had nothing to do with Venezuela or oil. It was happenstance that the oil meeting was in progress. I go up regularly to see him and always have the best time.”

Pictures of Carlson in the Oval Office with Trump, Rubio, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and other senior administration officials on Friday began circulating on social media shortly after his visit.

It is not clear who at the White House extended an invitation to Carlson for either of the trips, though the former Fox host has remained friendly with Trump and is close friends with Vance. 

Carlson has maintained access to the White House despite regularly pushing antisemitic conspiracy theories on his podcast, while hosting figures like neo-Nazi influencer Nick Fuentes and podcaster Darryl Cooper, a Holocaust denier who has made a name out of claiming Winston Churchill was the main villain of World War II, not Adolf Hitler. 

Asked who invited Carlson to the White House, a spokesperson for Vance only confirmed that Carlson was at the White House for a lunch on Friday. The spokesperson did not address JI’s inquiry whether the vice president had invited Carlson to the White House for either visit.

One of Washington’s few remaining bipartisan traditions is the annual clamoring for a ticket to the White House Hanukkah party — an affair that was smaller than usual this year after the Trump administration tore down the East Wing, prompting disappointment even from some Republican allies who did not score an invite. If you’re a member of the opposing political party, forget about it.  

But even as power changes hands in Washington, one person is a fixture at Republican and Democratic White House Hanukkah parties, as well as Hanukkah gatherings all across the Beltway, from the Pentagon to the Justice Department to the Capitol. That’s Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the executive vice president of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad), the Washington arm of the global Chabad movement, and Washington’s unofficial menorah-lighter-in-chief.

“I was raised during the Bicentennial, and I got a very patriotic education in our day school. I felt very American, and I thought this was a strong public expression of a deep Jewish pride that I was able to enjoy,” Shemtov said during Hanukkah last week. “I come from grandfathers on both sides of my family who were arrested and imprisoned, tortured and exiled for being Jews and for practicing Judaism and for leading Jewish communities. So I wasn’t going to let the freedom we are so fortunate to have here just pass without my active participation in it.”

In an interview with Jewish Insider, Shemtov reflected on the importance of spreading a Hanukkah message of light in a region where that’s often missing: the halls of power in Washington. 

During Hanukkah this year Shemtov attended as many as four events in a day, shuttling between government institutions and reciting the blessings in front of dignitaries including President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Attorney General Pam Bondi. He led a bipartisan menorah lighting on Capitol Hill with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). 

“The menorah itself is a symbol of bipartisanship, in my opinion, because you almost always have four branches on one side, four branches on the other, and a shamash in the middle,” Shemtov reflected. “In the time of the Temple, we are told that the flames used to point towards the center from either side, and the center flame used to point towards heaven. And that was the connection of divinity with this world.”

“When we point towards the center,” Shemtov continued, “we bring more sensibility and, therefore, divinity to our existence across the board. That’s why, especially when we do this with the two leaders, the speaker and the minority leader together, I think it sends a very powerful message to whoever sees it that there’s hope for togetherness, even in a time of divisiveness.” 

It was Shemtov’s father, Rabbi Abraham Shemtov, who is most responsible for bringing public observances of Hanukkah to Washington. In 1979, Abraham Shemtov participated in the first National Menorah Lighting with President Jimmy Carter, a tradition that his son now leads on the Ellipse, outside the White House, each year. 

But this year’s National Menorah Lighting would be different than the usual large, boisterous affair. Shemtov knew that as soon as he woke up. 

“I was able to tell that it was going to be a very cold day, but that was a small problem compared to what I saw was an unprecedented vicious terrorist attack on a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney, Australia. Sydney is very close to me,” Shemtov said. His wife Nechama is from Sydney and lived down the street from Bondi Beach, where 15 people were killed on the first day of the holiday by terrorists who reportedly pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. 

But the brutality of that day, which sent his wife’s family huddling together for safety, did not keep Shemtov from spreading the message of Hanukkah around Washington. “I think that it’s an important opportunity to bring a message of life, unity, warmth and positivity in a way which might otherwise not even be possible,” Shemtov said. 

It’s no longer a surprise to arrive at the White House or the Naval Observatory and find kosher brisket, freshly made latkes and sufganiyot in a variety of flavors. But the White House Hanukkah party is a relatively recent invention. The first one took place in 2001, hosted by President George W. Bush. It would be a few more years before the event was certified kosher — by Rabbi Shemtov, of course. It’s a responsibility he oversees regardless of who is president.

“They say about the White House, etc., that the moment you don’t feel it’s special to walk into these places — the White House, the Capitol, VPR [the vice president’s residence] — you should stop working there,” said Shemtov. “Access, acceptance and prominence within these hallowed and rarefied quarters of society is something our forebears can only have dreamed of in an ambitious fantasy, and here we are, able to live it. We just have to want to be proud enough to do so, and that’s why, of course, it’s always an honor to be invited, involved, participating and particularly in helping organize such respectable recognitions of our faith.” 

Shemtov’s job is to drive for hours around the Beltway, helping Jews in positions of power practice their faith proudly and publicly. This year, he made it a priority to also be home in time to light his own menorah. 

“I have to have a Jewish home as well, not just a Jewish expression to the outside world. And to do that takes effort because scheduling is so crazy,” said Shemtov. “We have to remember it’s like an airplane. You have to put your own oxygen mask on, or else you won’t be able to help anyone at all.”

The White House has told Republicans that President Donald Trump will not pull the nomination of Amer Ghalib, the mayor of Hamtramck, Mich., to be U.S. ambassador to Kuwait and wants the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to hold a vote on his candidacy, despite the growing bipartisan opposition to his nomination, Jewish Insider has learned. 

White House officials have communicated to committee Republicans in recent days that Trump would not withdraw Ghalib’s nomination because the president credits the Democratic Hamtramck mayor with helping him turn out Michigan’s Arab-American vote and win the state in last November’s presidential election, two sources familiar with the ongoing discussions told JI.

“We were told Trump believes he [Ghalib] helped him deliver Michigan. He doesn’t want to abandon him,” one GOP senator on the committee said of the White House’s characterization of the president’s thinking.

Pressed about the four committee Republicans who already committed to joining all Democrats in opposing Ghalib’s confirmation, the White House has told senators and senior committee staffers that Trump wants Ghalib’s nomination to receive a vote regardless of the outcome. 

“If Trump wants his friend to go down that way, that’s OK. He can go down that way,” another Republican on the committee said, expressing confidence that Ghalib had no path to advance out of committee. 

No Democratic senators on the committee will support advancing Ghalib’s nomination to the full Senate if and when it comes up for a vote, a source familiar with the Democratic whip count told JI. With all Democrats opposed, Ghalib could only afford to lose one Republican to be reported favorably out of committee. 

Four committee Republicans have already come out publicly against his nomination — Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), John Curtis (R-UT), Dave McCormick (R-PA) and John Cornyn (R-TX). At least two others confirmed to JI that they have voiced their reservations about Ghalib to the White House in the wake of his confirmation hearing last week, when Ghalib faced a bipartisan grilling over his long record of promoting antisemitic ideas and his embrace of anti-Israel positions as an elected official. Those senators have not yet made those concerns public. 

The White House did not respond to JI’s request for comment on Tuesday.

Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), the committee’s chairman, acknowledged to JI on Tuesday evening that he had not yet scheduled Ghalib’s nomination for a vote, but demurred when asked if he planned to do so. 

A committee spokesperson for Risch declined to comment.

“A lot of what Trump is doing is kind of testing whether these guys have a gag reflex,” one Democratic committee member said of the situation, surmising that the president’s actions were partially aimed at assessing how much Republicans were willing to push back on nominees and legislative proposals that they object to.

As the Trump administration ratchets up its efforts to influence higher education, the latest White House proposal for colleges and universities is being met with skepticism from academics — even as its authors say its implementation should be a no-brainer.

That’s in reference to a White House document called the “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” a 10-point plan that the federal government is asking universities to sign in order to get preferential treatment for the federal funds upon which many research universities rely. 

If the schools don’t agree to the terms in the compact — which include commitments to end race-based hiring and admissions, limits on foreign enrollment and a pledge to foster greater ideological diversity — they risk losing billions of dollars.

The compact reflects an evolution of a familiar Trump administration argument: that America’s preeminent educational institutions have strayed from their mission, letting politics interfere with their raison d’etre as centers of academic excellence. Combating antisemitism on college campuses — a cause the White House has prioritized this year — provided President Donald Trump a foray into greater oversight of higher education. But there appears to be no direct line from that fight against antisemitism to the broader ideological framework in this compact, which makes only a passing reference to antisemitism.

A White House official who worked on the compact called it a “basic, basic easy low hurdle,” telling Jewish Insider that the document is “a nonpartisan, neutral concept.” 

Many academics, including several who have spoken out against antisemitism and against universities’ handling of it in recent years, don’t agree. 

“Fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone,” Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Sally Kornbluth said last week, making MIT the first university to formally reject the compact. 

The White House wrote to MIT and eight other campuses this month, giving them early access. Brown University joined MIT in rejecting the compact on Wednesday, but the other seven universities haven’t yet responded ahead of the Oct. 20 deadline. 

With the compact, Trump is making the case that universities have a fiduciary responsibility to American citizens that they have not met, as academia has “lost its way,” according to the administration official. 

“It’s for the taxpayers,” said the official, who requested anonymity to speak openly about a negotiating process that is mostly taking place behind closed doors. “This administration is here to support research … but at the same time we also can’t abdicate our responsibility to you and myself. There are a lot of people who are cutting checks to the IRS because that’s what they have to do, and they don’t even go to college.” 

But where the Trump administration sees “good hygiene,” according to the official, many academics worry the compact’s far-reaching goals could amount to an overreach that impinges on free speech and academic freedom.

“It’s something that everybody’s talking about, and people are taking it very seriously,” said David Myers, a professor and the chair of Jewish history at the University of California, Los Angeles. “It really seems to touch upon one of the cardinal principles of university governance, which is autonomy and independence.” 

Menachem Rosensaft, an adjunct law professor who teaches about antisemitism and the Holocaust at Cornell University, called the compact “overkill, with a number of positive items in it, but overall problematic for any independent university of college.” 

Rosensaft questioned how the compact addresses antisemitism, if at all: Antisemitism is only mentioned in a section about foreign students, which accuses those who are “not properly vetted” with “saturating the campus with noxious values such as antisemitism and other anti-American values.”

Academics concerned about antisemitism told JI that the Trump administration is right to point out that severe problems exist in higher education. But many are unsure how this compact will address the issues Jewish students face. 

“I often wonder if a compact like this had come out of the Biden administration or a Harris administration, whether, from the faculty, there’d be that same kind of knee-jerk reaction [that] we have to oppose everything that comes out of the administration — when actually, when you read this line by line, there’s a lot of things we can agree with,” said Miriam Elman, a former political science professor at Syracuse University. 

“If you look at certain things individually, they’re OK. I don’t have any problem with freezing tuition, for example, or with arresting grade inflation. I don’t have any problem with teaching [Western civilization]. The problem is that, as a whole package, it’s kind of the antithesis of what universities are meant to do,” said Norman Goda, a historian and professor of Holocaust studies at the University of Florida. “And if the addressing of antisemitism is one of the aims of this, then I don’t know how that is done.”

Miriam Elman, a former political science professor at Syracuse University, said that some of the immediate skepticism of the compact is likely due to politics. But that doesn’t alleviate all of her concerns.

“I often wonder if a compact like this had come out of the Biden administration or a Harris administration, whether, from the faculty, there’d be that same kind of knee-jerk reaction [that] we have to oppose everything that comes out of the administration — when actually, when you read this line by line, there’s a lot of things we can agree with,” said Elman, who is the executive director of the Academic Engagement Network, which fights academic boycotts of Israel. 

“But we also are not naive. The Trump administration does have an agenda. It does have priorities, and it is wrapping those priorities into the fight against campus antisemitism. So there is a lot of concern.” 

The compact appears to be primarily directed at undergraduate programs. Dr. Philip Greenland, a professor of medicine at Northwestern University, said his colleagues at the medical school are generally not worried about the compact in the way many humanities professors are. “It could affect the medical school in a secondary way: If Northwestern is drawn into this and doesn’t comply, we may never get our federal funding back,” said Greenland. The Trump administration froze $790 million in federal funding for Northwestern in April. 

“Although the compact doesn’t seem to be talking about antisemitism, in the end, people will remember: How did the administration go after the universities?” said Pamela Nadell, the chair in women’s and gender history at American University and the author of a new book about antisemitism in America. “They said that they were promoting antisemitism.”

“I think it’s in some sense a good thing that it doesn’t call out, specifically, that this is about antisemitism,” Greenland continued. “What the compact seems to be more about is a claim, which is justifiable, that universities have become very, very ideological in one direction … People are claiming that the compact will deprive them of their free speech. But what that doesn’t recognize is that the current situation deprives other people of their free speech and their free expression.” 

The Trump administration official told JI that the compact is “all-encompassing,” and argued that its broad mandate includes antisemitism — but not only that.

“It overlaps, but the compact isn’t a compact to stop antisemitism. It’s a compact to return to lawful academic excellence and a marketplace of ideas, [and] that includes eradicating antisemitism,” said the official. 

Pamela Nadell, the chair in women’s and gender history at American University and the author of a new book about antisemitism in America, argued that the Trump administration’s earlier actions targeting antisemitism will come to be viewed as the pretext for what is now a much larger and more strategic rewriting of federal policy toward institutions of higher education. 

“Although the compact doesn’t seem to be talking about antisemitism, in the end, people will remember: How did the administration go after the universities?” said Nadell. “They said that they were promoting antisemitism.”

President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Monday that Israel had agreed to sign onto the White House’s 20-point peace plan to end the war in Gaza, with Trump calling the development “one of the great days ever in civilization.” 

Both leaders described the deal, which would release all of the remaining Israeli hostages in exchange for an immediate end of the war, as the starting point for greater regional integration, a goal that Trump described as “eternal peace in the Middle East.” 

Senior Trump administration officials first introduced the plan last week in a meeting with Arab and Muslim leaders in New York, and Trump said he had buy-in from the Qataris, who have been a go-between in negotiations with Israel and Hamas, and that he had discussed the matter with the leaders of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. 

But the deal is not yet final: Hamas has not yet agreed to it, though Trump expressed hope that the terror group will do so. Trump said he would allow Netanyahu to continue the war with his “full backing” if Hamas does not agree to it. 

“This can be done the easy way, or it can be done the hard way. But it has to be done,” Netanyahu said at the press conference. “All these goals must be achieved because we didn’t fight this horrible fight, sacrifice the finest of our young men, for Hamas to stay in Gaza.”

The plan would require the release of all the hostages still held by Hamas back to Israel within 72 hours, and an immediate end to the war, according to a copy of the plan published by the White House. In exchange, Israel would release 250 Palestinians serving life sentences in Israeli jails, along with nearly 2,000 Gazans detained since the Oct. 7 attacks in 2023.

The first principle of the plan is that Gaza would be deradicalized, with Hamas out of power and transitional mechanisms in place to take over governance of the beleaguered territory. Amnesty would be offered to Hamas members “who commit to peaceful co-existence and to decommission their weapons” once the hostages are returned. Hamas members who wish to leave would have safe passage to do so, although the plan does not explicitly state that they will be required to leave. The plan would also surge aid to Gaza through the United Nations and other international mechanisms as soon as the hostages are released.

An international transitional body, with Trump as chair and former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair heavily involved, would oversee the redevelopment of Gaza until the Palestinian Authority has been reformed and is able to take over leadership of the Gaza Strip. The U.S. and other Arab and international partners would develop a temporary stabilization force to deploy in Gaza, and Trump would oversee the creation of an economic development plan to facilitate investments in the seaside territory. 

“I believe that today we are taking a critical step towards both ending the war in Gaza and setting the stage for dramatically advancing peace in the Middle East, and I think beyond the Middle East, with very important Muslim countries,” Netanyahu said. “We’re giving everybody a chance to have this done peacefully, something that will achieve all our war objectives without any further bloodshed.” 

Several Muslim leaders announced their support for the deal, including the prime minister of Pakistan and the Emirati foreign minister. 

As Trump and Netanyahu stood side by side, each heaping praise upon the other, they were not entirely on the same page about all aspects of the deal — in particular the role of the Palestinian Authority in the future governance of Gaza, which Netanyahu has all but written off, despite that goal listed as an objective in the White House’s plan. 

“Gaza will have a peaceful civilian administration that is run neither by Hamas nor by the Palestinian Authority,” Netanyahu said, a contrast to the plan’s language that the PA — once it is reformed, an objective that could take years — will control Gaza. 

The White House deal also recognizes “Palestinian self-determination and statehood” as “the aspiration of the Palestinian people.” Netanyahu, however, has said repeatedly that a Palestinian state is out of the question. 

Trump did not refer to the plan’s language about Palestinian statehood in his remarks, instead offering leeway to Netanyahu. “Prime Minister Netanyahu is very clear about his opposition to a Palestinian state,” Trump said. “Several countries have foolishly recognized the Palestinian state.” 

The leaders’ comments followed a three-hour meeting between Trump and Netanyahu. During the meeting, Trump orchestrated a phone call between Netanyahu and the Qatari emir, which Trump said afterward was a “a heart-to-heart conversation” in which Netanyahu apologized for Israel’s attack on Doha last month that targeted Hamas leaders and killed a Qatari security guard. The three nations agreed to launch a “formal trilateral mechanism” to “enhance mutual security, correct misperceptions and avoid future misgivings.” 

The full text of the plan says that even if Hamas rejects the plan, the scaled-up humanitarian aid operation will continue, and terror-free areas will be handed over from the Israel Defense Forces to the international stabilization force. But Trump said that Israel will have the “full backing” of the U.S. to resume fighting in Gaza if Hamas does not accept the plan. 

“If Hamas rejects the deal — which is always possible, they’re the only one left. Everyone else has accepted it. But I have a feeling that we’re going to have a positive answer. But if not, as you know, Bibi, you’d have our full backing,” said Trump.  

The Israeli strike targeting Hamas leaders in Qatar is dividing the White House, which strongly criticized Israel for attacking Qatari territory, and Senate Republicans, who have been overwhelmingly supportive of the Israeli action.

President Donald Trump told reporters on Tuesday evening he was “not thrilled about the way that went down” and “very unhappy with every aspect,” his first direct public comments on the Israeli strike, after White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt made comments to the same effect earlier in the day.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), asked about the White House statement on the attack, told Jewish Insider, “I understand we have troops there, but my focus is Israel. Hamas has had every chance. … Lay down your weapons, release the hostages — you live. If you don’t — it keeps going.”

Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) told JI, “Israel has made this very clear, and the same as we’ve made it very clear, we’re going to go after terrorist organizations, no matter where you’re at. We have a good relationship with the Qataris. They didn’t target the Qataris. They were targeting Hamas, and they had the right to do that.”

Asked about the administration’s comments, he said, “I understand where they’re at. My opinion is the Qataris knew good and well that they were there and they were doing nothing about it.”

He said that he does not know the full context of the strike at this point, but that if Israel had asked Qatar to take action against the Hamas leaders sheltering inside the country and Qatar had refused, “then I don’t blame Israel for doing that. Now if they didn’t have a conversation beforehand, maybe it is a different story.”

When asked about the White House’s statement, which described the Israeli strike as “unfortunate,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) responded, “I think it’s unfortunate that Qatar kept the Hamas leaders in their country, that was the unfortunate part.”

He said that he was surprised that the strike didn’t come sooner.

“Why did it take them so long? As soon as Oct. 7 happened, I met with the Qatari ambassador and I said, ‘Why are you hosting these people?’ He said, ‘Well, Obama asked.’ I said, ‘He gave you a bad job. Stop doing it,’” Scott continued. “I’m glad [Israel] did it. I’m impressed with what [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s done, the political leaders, the military leaders, the IDF, whether destroying Hamas, or Hezbollah or Iran — you have to really admire what they’re doing.”

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS), the most outspoken supporter of Qatar among Senate Republicans, stood alone in offering a full-throated criticism of the Israeli strike and fully backing Trump’s position.

“I fully agree with President [Trump]. At the request of the U.S. and Israel, Qatar is mediating a peace agreement. The Israeli attack on allied soil, where approximately 10,000 American troops are stationed, is highly ill-advised,” Marshall said on X. “Grateful that [Secretary of State Marco Rubio] is finalizing a Defense Coordination Agreement with Qatar to prevent Israel from repeating this action.”

In a prepared statement on behalf of President Donald Trump, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Tuesday criticized the Israeli strike on Hamas leaders in Qatar and expressed regret that it had taken place in Doha, adding that the U.S. had warned Qatar about the strike when the U.S. itself became aware.

She said Trump had also vowed to Qatari leaders that such an attack would not be repeated in Qatari territory.

“This morning, the Trump administration was notified by the United States military … as Israel was attacking Hamas, which very unfortunately was located in a section of Doha, the capital of Qatar,” Leavitt said. “Unilaterally bombing inside Qatar, a sovereign nation and close ally of the United States that is working very hard and bravely taking risks with us to broker peace, does not advance Israel or America’s goals.”

Pressed repeatedly on whether Israel had notified the U.S. about the attack, as some reports indicated, or whether the U.S. military had detected it independently, Leavitt did not specify, repeating only that the U.S. military had notified the White House.

She said that Trump “immediately directed” Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff to notify Qatar about the upcoming attack when the administration learned about it.

“The president views Qatar as a strong ally and friend of the United States and feels very badly about the location of this attack,” Leavitt continued.

She did add, however, that the administration views eliminating Hamas as “a worthy goal.”

Asked whether Trump would impose “consequences” on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the strike or provide a “directive … to Netanyahu in terms of what’s allowed in the future,” Leavitt said that “that’s a decision only the president can make.”

Leavitt said that Trump had spoken to Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Netanyahu after the attack.

She said the president “assured [the Qatari leaders] that such a thing will not happen again on their soil” and thanked Qatar for “their support and friendship to our country.”

She said that both Trump and Netanyahu agreed that they want to make peace quickly and said Trump “believes this unfortunate incident could serve as an opportunity for peace,” and that Trump had conveyed his displeasure about the location of the strike to Netanyahu.

“He expects all of our friends and allies in the region — that includes both Qatar and Israel — to seek peace as well, and he wants to see that happen, and he’s working with all of our allies in the region to get that done,” Leavitt said.

Leavitt denied that Trump’s post on social media over the weekend offering a “last warning” to Hamas to accept a ceasefire deal was a reference to the impending Israeli attack.

The White House’s expressed concern about the location of the attack puts the administration at odds with many senior members of Trump’s own party in the Senate, who were quick to express support for the Israeli attack, and aligns more closely with top Senate Democrats who have been more critical of the attack and where it took place.

Asked about the White House’s opposition to the strike, multiple Senate Republicans who had earlier in the day expressed support for the Israeli attack declined to comment.

Meanwhile, Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) said, “I will actually agree with President Trump that it doesn’t advance our interests in terms of advancing negotiations for the release of hostages or the ceasefire that is urgently needed in Gaza.”

“I have not gotten any briefing on the details of how it was approved, whether or not the Trump administration was aware and supported it, but in the middle of a hostage negotiation that is urgently needed to free the hostages, to end the fighting, to deliver humanitarian relief and to address Hamas — to take a strike in Doha against Hamas leaders, I think puts at risk any peace process,” Coons said. He added that he wants to be briefed on further details.

Seb Gorka, the White House senior director for counterterrorism and a deputy assistant to the president, aired his grievances with the anti-Israel faction within the Republican Party on Tuesday, alleging that the wing of the GOP aligned with podcast host Tucker Carlson is  “basically Pat Buchanan in a new guise.”

Gorka made the comments in a conversation on counterterrorism and U.S. strategy at the Hudson Institute after being pressed on the foreign policy disputes within the MAGA movement and Carlson’s grievances with President Donald Trump’s decision to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities in June. 

Asked by moderator Michael Doran, a Hudson senior fellow and director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, if he was comfortable addressing the growth of anti-Israel, antisemitic sentiment on right-wing podcasts and social media, Gorka replied, “Yeah, I am, because it bothers me immensely, but I’ve come to a certain realization with regards to that, that this wing of isolationism is nothing new. We had this 100 years ago.”

“This is just a poor, substandard repackaging of neo-Buchananite isolationism,” Gorka said, referencing Buchanan, the former Nixon communications director who became an outspoken critic of Israel. “It’s actually a more shallow version. Pat is far smarter than this version of isolationism.”

Gorka said that he is “actually in a better place with” the onslaught of anti-Israel rhetoric from Carlson’s wing of the party than he was previously, explaining that he realized that most of the rhetoric was coming from “probably half a dozen very loud people on Twitter and Rumble,” the right-wing video platform. 

“You get out of the miasma, the cesspit that is social media, and you talk to representative MAGA voters, of the 80 million that put the president back in the White House, they don’t think that we should pull down the shutters on the Pacific and the Atlantic coast,” Gorka explained. “They don’t think that Israel is the reason for Oct. 7. They actually have a very special place in their heart for Israel, and they don’t think that hospitals being bombed in Ukraine is a good thing because somebody offered NATO membership to Ukraine, allegedly, a decade ago.”

“As an immigrant to this country, a legal immigrant to the United States, one of the most trenchant indicative characteristics for me of the American people is common sense. They understand who is responsible for Oct. 7. They understand who [Russian President] Vladimir Putin is. And as such, I was worried by this neo-Buchanan isolationism, but I look at President Trump’s actions, they have no hold on him,” he continued.  

Gorka then pointed to the early days of the first Trump administration, alleging that at the time, then-Defense Secretary James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson expressed hesitation about moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem out of fear that doing so would cause a third world war. 

Gorka said that Trump told concerned members of his Cabinet at the time that they were going through with the move because, “A) We promised the people of Israel 23 years ago, and we’ve broken that promise every six months of 23 years. B) I promised the American electorate in the campaign. We’re doing it. And C) It’s the right thing to do.” He argued that the “moral clarity” shown by Trump on issues impacting Israel highlighted the contrast between the president and his detractors on foreign policy matters. 

Earlier in the program, Gorka told Doran that the president’s approach to the Middle East was heavily focused on combating Iran.

“You need to understand one thing: When the president looks at the region, he doesn’t slice it down into cylinders of excellence. He doesn’t care if you’re the Syrian desk officer or the natural resources expert. He has one overlay for the whole AOR [Area of Responsibility], and that one metric, that one prism, is Iran, and he’s absolutely right,” Gorka said. “Iran is front and center in everything we do in the region, because they remain the greatest state sponsor terrorism, and the world would be a much safer place if that were not the case.”

Gorka noted that when Trump is asked by reporters about anything related to national security, “more than 50% of the time … the president will bring up Iran,” adding that this was “especially” the case “before [Operation] Midnight Hammer, because it really is on his mind that this is the threat. A nuclear Iran, an ideologically Islamo-fascist regime that wishes to acquire the most dangerous weapons in the world, is a threat to all decent peoples.”

Turning his attention to Israel, Gorka argued that the Jewish state’s “post-Oct. 7 operations have rewritten the map of the Middle East for the next 50 to 100 years.” He praised Israel’s military moves in Syria and Lebanon, crediting the IDF with taking down the Assad regime in Damascus and significantly weakening Hezbollah. 

As for whether the U.S. will undertake additional operations in the region to target Iranian proxies, Gorka said the “jury is still out on that,” but praised Trump’s strikes against the Houthis. 

“We had great success with our operation against the Houthis. Again, it wasn’t well understood by the so-called experts. For the president, the action against the Houthis was about one thing and one thing alone. When we told him there had been 150 attacks against U.S. vessels going through the Straits and that they’d actually fired on naval vessels as well, he said, ‘Well, that will not be allowed to stand.’ It’s not just about U.S. interests [but] about global freedom of maritime transport. So all of these things are connected,” Gorka said of Trump’s motivation to strike the Iran-backed Yemeni terror group. 

Gorka also disputed the notion that the president was tied down by ideological labels, but rather that he’s focused on achieving results and fixing problems: “Here’s the trouble for the Beltway with understanding the current commander in chief: there is no ideological taxonomy into which he will fall.”