Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

As the White House continues to promote the memorandum of understanding that will end the war with Iran and start negotiations between Washington and Tehran, Vice President JD Vance is out with a message that sounds strikingly familiar — at least to anyone who followed former President Barack Obama’s pitch on the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports.

“If you think this is a bad deal, what is your alternative?” Vance said in an interview this week with New York Times columnist Ross Douthat. 

Obama used nearly identical phrasing at a 2015 White House press conference: “I’m hearing a lot of talking points being repeated about ‘this is a bad deal,’” he said. “What I haven’t heard is, what is your preferred alternative?”

Watch a side-by-side look at Vance and Obama here…

Vance also delivered a tough message to Israeli officials who have criticized the MOU, telling reporters on Thursday that Israel’s government should be careful not to alienate the only friend it has left: President Donald Trump, JI’s Emily Jacobs reports.

“Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time and he happens to be the head of state of the world’s superpower. If I was in the Cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world,” said Vance…

Trump also had a word of caution for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, two days after he said Netanyahu was too “vicious” in his approach to fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon. Asked by a reporter for Israel’s Kan News if he will support Netanyahu in this year’s Israeli elections, Trump said he most likely would, but did not commit.

“I’ll have to look at who’s running, but I like Bibi very much. I would be most likely to endorse him,” said Trump. “He’s doing a very good job, he’s got to be a little bit more rational”…

United Against Nuclear Iran, an advocacy group that rallied opposition to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, said on Thursday that it “cannot endorse the MoU in its current form”…

AIPAC released a policy memo on Thursday that said the MOU “raises significant questions,” and called on Congress to “play a critical role in ensuring a final deal meets President Trump’s stated objectives for the war”…

In a Thursday speech at the FII Priority summit in Rome, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama blamed Iran for “ruthless” cyberattacks against the country, claiming that Tehran has sought to sow unrest about a preliminarily approved luxury development project in the country from Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, Trump’s daughter and son-in-law, JI’s Matthew Shea reports…

Janeese Lewis George defeated Kenyan McDuffie in the Democratic primary for mayor of Washington, D.C., with the Associated Press calling the race on Thursday afternoon. Democratic socialist Lewis George leads McDuffie 53% to 36%…

American Priorities, a super PAC created as a progressive counterweight to AIPAC, has received $250,000 from a tech executive whose firm is developing AI data centers in New York State — while boosting two democratic socialist House candidates who oppose efforts to expand data centers, JI’s Matthew Kassel reports…

Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-NJ), who has been absent from Congress since March due to an unexplained personal health issue, plans to return to Washington on June 30…

Israel and Syria are expected to resume direct talks soon due to pressure from the U.S., the Israeli network Kan reports…

The FBI announced that it charged San Diego resident Reda Mazen Rida Sabassi with conspiring to provide material support to Hamas after he allegedly raised approximately $600,000 through fraudulent charitable campaigns and funneled a portion to the terrorist organization…

Former Presidents Joe Biden, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton attended the grand opening of the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago on Thursday afternoon.

Guests included a litany of ex-Obama administration staffers, including former White House liaison to the Jewish community Matt Nosanchuk and former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro, who was spotted chatting with Obama…

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

Keep an eye on Jewish Insider for a look at how Jewish Republicans are feeling about the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding that was signed this week. 

Vice President JD Vance plans to travel to Switzerland this weekend for talks with Iran, though the plans are not yet finalized, he told reporters on Thursday. 

Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, will become the acting director of national intelligence on Friday after the confirmation of DNI nominee Jay Clayton was delayed this week at President Donald Trump’s request. 

We’ll be monitoring the final days of the heated congressional primary campaigns in New York, where Israel and Gaza remain hot topics for progressive candidates. 

We’ll be back in your inbox with the Daily Overtime on Monday. Shabbat Shalom!

Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

After days in which President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and other senior officials boosted the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding — and amid calls from Capitol Hill and beyond to make public the agreement’s details — the White House on Wednesday shared the text of the document that the Trump administration said will end the war against Tehran. Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs obtained the text of the MOU, which was read aloud to reporters during a call with a senior administration official.

The MOU states that the two nations “and their respective allies in the current war” will permanently end military operations — including against Lebanon, a stipulation that suggests the deal is meant to suspend Israel’s retaliatory strikes against Hezbollah, a provision for which Israel has not yet expressed approval. Iran “reaffirms” in the MOU that it will not “procure or develop nuclear weapons”…

The MOU text also reveals that the U.S. plans to issue a sanctions waiver to Iran so that it can sell oil, a major policy shift away from Trump’s use of sanctions against Iran. If a final deal is reached, the U.S. committed to ending all sanctions on Iran. Trump said earlier in the day at the G7 summit in France that the U.S. will not invest in Iran but would not stop other countries from doing so, JI’s Matthew Shea reports.

One new piece of information Trump shared on Wednesday that was not directly addressed in the MOU: a nuclear deal between Washington and Tehran would not prohibit the Iranians from possessing ballistic missiles, JI’s Matthew Shea reports. “I mean, they have to have some, because other people have some … It doesn’t work that way. And missiles aren’t the problem,” Trump said at the G7.

The agreement does not address Iran’s ballistic missiles or support for terrorist proxies. At the beginning of the war, the Trump administration said eliminating the ballistic missile threat from Iran was a key war aim…

The MOU asserts that a final deal will be negotiated within 60 days, unless both countries agree to extend the deadline. Iran’s naval blockade on the Strait of Hormuz must be lifted within 30 days. 

When talking to reporters after landing in Paris this afternoon, Trump said he does not view the 60-day deadline as a hard deadline. “Just as long as they’re behaving, I really don’t care that much,” Trump said.

Vance, not Trump, will be signing the MOU in Switzerland on Friday. “This way if it works out, I’m going to take the credit. If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD,” Trump said during the G7…

Some Republican senators criticized the MOU, with retiring Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) calling it “the worst foreign policy blunder in decades,” JI’s Marc Rod reports…

Dario Amodei and Sam Altman, the CEOs, respectively, of Anthropic and OpenAI, joined Trump and the other G7 leaders for lunch on Wednesday, along with Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff and Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis… 

The planned Senate confirmation hearing for Jay Clayton, Trump’s nominee to serve as director of national intelligence, was scuttled on Wednesday morning after a last-minute Truth Social post from the president saying that the hearing would be canceled, prompting frustration from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers, JI’s Marc Rod reports…

As a major shareholder in Volkswagen, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund is complicating talks between the German automaker and the Israeli state-owned defense company Rafael over Rafael’s intention to buy a plant from Volkswagen to manufacture components for Israel’s Iron Dome missile-defense systems…

The anti-Israel advocacy group TrackAIPAC, which attacks lawmakers who have received support from pro-Israel groups and donors who have supported Israel-related causes, endorsed Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), who once was targeted by TrackAIPAC before moving sharply to the left on Israel in recent months…

After eight people were indicted last week for allegedly threatening University of Michigan leaders and their families as part of an anti-Israel pressure campaign, former Michigan Democratic Party Chair Lon Johnson called on the party’s current leadership to review the actions of five of the suspects who were members of the Michigan Democratic Party…

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights announced on Wednesday that it is opening an antisemitism investigation into the American Psychological Association, the nation’s largest professional organization for mental health professionals. JI’s Gabby Deutch reported on the APA’s handling of antisemitism last summer…

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

Keep an eye out in Jewish Insider for a look at how some of the country’s most prominent Jewish communal leaders are marking America’s 250th birthday this July Fourth.

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) will be speaking in the morning at a fireside chat at the Hudson Institute focused on “diplomacy, defense and debt.”

We’ll be monitoring the results of Tuesday’s mayoral primary election in Washington, D.C., which still has not been called, even as Janeese Lewis George leads Kenyan McDuffie 53% to 37%, with 68% of the vote counted. 

Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

Amid reports of tensions between Washington and Jerusalem over the U.S.’ memorandum of understanding with Iran, President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Israel’s tactics in Lebanon and suggested Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa might be better positioned to take on Hezbollah, Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports.

“Bibi has to be more responsible with respect to Lebanon,” Trump said during a meeting with Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani on the sidelines of the G7 summit in France. “If Israel can’t do the job without killing everyone else, he [al-Sharaa] will do the job. Syria will do the job”…

The text of the deal between the U.S. and Iran has still not been released, but Trump on Tuesday pledged to do so after the Friday signing ceremony — though he did not offer specifics.

Trump also said during the meeting with the Qatari emir on Tuesday that the U.S. is “not investing any money in Iran,” even as The Wall Street Journal reports that the U.S. plans to allow Iran to begin selling oil as soon as the deal is signed…

Later, during a meeting with United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Trump said he was hopeful that a full deal would come soon after the MOU because, he asserted, U.S.-Iranian ties had improved.

“The relationship is now normalized,” Trump said. He also said during the meeting with the Emirati leader that he would send the Iran agreement to Congress for review…

After a meeting between G7 leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he has a “certain degree of optimism” about the possibility of peace between Russia and Ukraine after Trump called on Russia to make a deal…

The FBI announced on Tuesday that it had foiled an attack planned targeting the UFC fight at the White House on Sunday, JI’s Marc Rod reports. One suspect allegedly told investigators that the attack was meant to target “capitalist elites,” “billionaires” and politicians linked to AIPAC, according to Fox News…

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) endorsed former Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) in her rematch campaign against incumbent Rep. Wesley Bell (D-MO), who unseated Bush, a member of the Squad, in 2024 in part with the support of AIPAC…

In his new book, Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith, Vice President JD Vance recounts a conversation with conservative activist Charlie Kirk two months before Kirk was killed last year, in which Kirk described young conservatives’ anger at “Israeli influence in American politics” and detailed how some were moving from criticism of Israel to antisemitism…

Toronto police warned that young people in Canada are being recruited and paid to carry out attacks against Jewish sites. “It is clear that some of the people hiring these criminals want to create a sense of fear in our communities, including in the Jewish community,” Toronto police chief Myron Demkiw said at a press conference…

Israeli journalist Amir Tibon was awarded the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature for his book The Gates of Gaza, a harrowing first-person account of how his family survived the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks and a deep dive into Israel’s policies in Gaza, Jewish Insider’s Christina Sher reports…

Democrats plan to take a tough line against the White House’s request for additional funding for the Defense Department, raising questions about whether the government will shut down again in October, Semafor reports…

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

Keep an eye out in Jewish Insider for a look at the Trump administration’s announcement earlier today that the Department of Justice will take over many of the responsibilities of the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, marking a major change to the federal office responsible for investigating antisemitic harassment and discrimination at American schools and universities. The move comes as the White House continues to seek to dismantle the Education Department… 

Cameron Hilton, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency, will testify at a confirmation hearing at the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee…

Comedian Amy Schumer and author Jessica Seinfeld will serve as the grand marshals of a kid-friendly New York Knicks ticker-tape parade outside the Children’s Museum of Manhattan at 4 p.m.… 

Notable developments and interesting tidbits we’re tracking

Details of the U.S. deal with Iran remain hazy, even after President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker, virtually signed a memorandum of understanding, as a senior U.S. official confirmed on Monday. Vance is slated to speak with CNN’s Jake Tapper at 5 p.m. today. 

The text of the MOU will likely not be released until “sometime after Friday,” Trump, who is in Evian-les-Bains, France, for the G7 summit, said earlier today during a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. According to a senior administration official, the MOU sets the stage for future negotiations; the official said that the most hot-button disputes between the two countries — including Iran’s nuclear program and U.S. sanctions — will be discussed only after the MOU is signed. Vance said earlier on Monday that Iran’s nuclear program is already destroyed, and the agreement “is about ensuring that they don’t rebuild it,” Jewish Insider’s Matthew Shea reports… 

Trump seemed bullish on the new direction in which U.S.-Iran ties may be headed. 

“We got along very well with Iran. It is a different set of leaders. As you know the first set is gone and the second set is gone. We found the third set to be very smart, strong, very smart,” Trump said during his meeting with Macron. “Hopefully it is going to be a good relationship, and we are going to get along. If we don’t, we go back to where we started, but I don’t think that is necessary”…

The Wall Street Journal reports that Israeli officials are “alarmed” by the murky deal, with many concerned that the MOU will provide Iran “with the financial relief it needs to rebuild its shattered economy but doesn’t include a commitment to turn over its enriched uranium”…  

In his first statement on the matter, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the recent U.S. and Israeli military campaign against Iran “saved Israel from a nuclear annihilation threat.” He vowed that Iran will never get nuclear weapons, “with or without an agreement”… 

Meanwhile, Netanyahu’s political opponents — and even some allies — blasted the premier after the deal was announced. 

Yair Lapid, the opposition leader from the centrist Yesh Atid party, said Netanyahu “lost the war.” Former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who is also challenging Netanyahu in this year’s elections, said the deal revealed that even after Israeli military successes against Iran, Netanyahu “is once again incapable of turning all of that into lasting security achievements.” Netanyahu also faced criticism from some members of his own coalition, with far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich calling the deal “bad for Israel and for the entire free world”… 

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said on Monday that he hasn’t yet formed an opinion on the Iran MOU, JI’s Marc Rod reports. “I don’t know enough about it to say” whether it’s a good deal, Thune said… 

Major Jewish groups appear to be approaching the deal with caution, JI’s Marc Rod reports. The American Jewish Committee said that as it “await[s] developments about the reported 60-day ceasefire agreement,” the group “remain[s] focused on the underlying threats posed by the Iranian regime that have destabilized the Middle East for decades.” AIPAC framed the MOU as the beginning of a 60-day window for talks. “We look forward to learning the full details of the framework for these negotiations, including whether the deal preserves the sovereign right of our democratic ally Israel to respond to the security threats it confronts,” AIPAC said in a statement.

The right-wing Zionist Organization of America said that the “little that we know is deeply problematic.” Democratic Majority for Israel and the Jewish Democratic Council of America both criticized the deal and Trump’s overall approach to Iran… 

Former George W. Bush administration official Joel Scanlon will take over as the new president and CEO of the Hudson Institute, the conservative think tank in Washington announced on Monday, JI’s Gabby Deutch reports…

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

Keep an eye out for coverage from Jewish Insider’s Will Bredderman from tonight’s PIX11 debate between Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) and Brad Lander ahead of the Democratic primary next week to represent New York’s 10th District.

Voters in Washington, D.C., will go to the polls tomorrow as Janeese Lewis George and Kenyan McDuffie face off in the Democratic primary for mayor. In deep-blue Washington, the primary winner is expected to sail to victory in November. Oklahoma congressional primaries also take place tomorrow, as well as a runoff to decide the Republican Senate candidate in Georgia.   

President Donald Trump is in Evian-les-Bains, France, through Wednesday for the annual G7 summit. On Tuesday, he’ll participate in several working sessions with the leaders of the G7 nations — Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom — on a range of issues including Ukraine, the Middle East and developing countries. He’ll also hold bilateral meetings with Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the United Arab Emirates.  

• The U.S. and Iran continued to trade strikes overnight, with the U.S. targeting Iranian military infrastructure, including air-defense systems, radars and drone command-and-control units, while Iran fired at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain. More below.
• Amid the ongoing exchanges of fire, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz is in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain this week, marking the first public visit by a senior U.S. official to the Middle East since the war with Iran began on Feb. 28, Jewish Insider’s Melissa Weiss reports.
• On Capitol Hill, the House Appropriations Committee’s Defense subcommittee is holding its markup of next fiscal year’s defense bill.
• Reps. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) and Don Beyer (D-VA) will speak this evening at a Progressive Policy Institute event billed as “Working Toward a New Era of Patriotism and Democratic Renewal” at the National Press Club in Washington.
• The Center for a New American Security is holding a daylong summit on Congress’ role in national security. Those slated to speak include Sens. Joni Ernst (R-IA) and Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), Reps. Adam Smith (D-WA), Don Bacon (R-NE) and Jason Crow (D-CO); former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. (ret.) CQ Brown and the Hudson Institute’s David Feith.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MELISSA WEISS

The Likud party’s statement on Wednesday confirming that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would stand on the ballot this fall put to bed long-swirling rumors that the prime minister was considering forgoing another run — potentially in exchange for the government dropping its legal case against him.

That speculation had deepened earlier in the week, when President Donald Trump publicly mused whether Netanyahu, whom Trump referred to as “a wartime prime minister,” might decide to exit politics. A survey released this week by the Israel Democracy Institute found that 61% of Israelis — including 57% of Jewish Israelis and 87% of Arab Israelis — think Netanyahu should refrain from seeking another term.

With Netanyahu ending speculation about his political future, the focus now turns to the candidates seeking to unseat him.

Gadi Eisenkot’s ascent — earlier this week, a Channel 12 poll found for the first time that more Israelis favored him over Netanyahu as prime minister — comes as the former IDF chief of staff, who lost a son and two nephews in the Hamas war, becomes increasingly critical of Netanyahu, in whose war cabinet Eisenkot sat. As Israeli journalist Nadav Eyal points out, Eisenkot “isn’t seen as aggressive toward anyone but Netanyahu.”

Meanwhile, former Prime Ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid have experienced little momentum after they announced their merger into the “Together” slate in April. 

The two made a risky bet in joining forces with many months to go before the election — one that can’t easily be undone. And while their broad coalition was successful in 2021, it’s unclear if Together’s tent is big enough for all the anti-Netanyahu voters — in a changed electorate post-Oct. 7 — whom Bennett and Lapid would need to pick up. 

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

Cootie Culture: In The Wall Street Journal, Joel Engel connects bullying he witnessed as a child to the modern-day rise in antisemitism. “Decades would pass before Charles R. again crossed my mind. Then came the grotesque violence of Oct. 7, 2023, and the firestorm of Jew hatred it ignited, which still shows no signs of containment. Now I can’t stop thinking about him. … Is there a more fitting metaphor — or more incisive explanation — for antisemitism than ‘Jews have the cooties’? None of the grandiloquent exegeses on antisemitism ever cuts to the heart of the matter the way ‘Jews have the cooties’ does. Some people in the ancient world decided Jews were infected, and their decree reached critical mass, then rolled over through the ages the way Charles’s cooties followed him to a new school.” [WSJ]

Whither Islam in America?: In Sapir, Reihan Salam observes the potential trajectories for Islam in America, amid the growing popularity of American Muslim activists who advocate for anti-Zionist and anti-American causes. “Together, the integration paradox and religious attrition explain something that might otherwise seem puzzling: why the most committed and articulate voices of Muslim anti-Americanism in the United States are not marginalized, dispossessed, under-assimilated newcomers. Rather, they are privileged, cosmopolitan, first- and second-generation insiders who lead largely secular lives. Consider [New York City Mayor Zohran] Mamdani and Hasan Piker, two hyper-assimilated American Muslims who have risen to prominence on the strength of their anti-Zionism, one through electoral politics, the other through a mass cultural platform that has made him one of the most followed political voices in the country.” [Sapir]

In an interview with CBS News, Vice President JD Vance said, when asked if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had gotten anything wrong, that the Israeli leader had “certainly gotten some things wrong,” but called Netanyahu “a good partner” who “aggressively asserts the interests of his country”… 

The Associated Press reports that the White House has held conversations with U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra about potentially serving as director of national intelligence, as Democratic senators stonewall the renewal of a key part of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act over the administration’s tapping of Bill Pulte as interim DNI and refusal to swiftly nominate a permanent replacement….

The State Department has reportedly launched an investigation into Trita Parsi, a co-founder of the Quincy Institute, as federal officials mull whether to revoke the Iran-born activist’s green card…

Federal prosecutors indicted eight anti-Israel activists affiliated with the University of Michigan on Wednesday, accusing them of conspiring to run a campaign intimidating university officials seen as pro-Israel and vandalizing local Jewish organizations, Jewish Insider’s Haley Cohen reports…

A Zionist Organization of America delegation met with the Justice Department’s Leo Terrell during the group’s mission to Washington this week…

Despite his brush with Knicks guard Jose Alvarado during Game 3 of the NBA Finals earlier this week, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg returned to Madison Square Garden for last night’s Knicks comeback win over the San Antonio Spurs; Alex Soros was spotted two seats down from Bloomberg, who was flanked on his other side by actor (and MOT) Timothée Chalamet and Kylie Jenner…

The British, Australian and Canadian governments jointly launched a $4 million fund aimed at supporting grassroots Israeli-Palestinian peace-building efforts…

The Czech Republic said it would block efforts in the EU to sanction Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, with Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka saying that sanctioning the far-right minister ahead of Israel’s elections later this year “would actually help” Ben-Gvir, whose actions and comments Macinka said “really goes beyond the pale,” among some voters…

Lily Cohen is departing her role as a press assistant at Third Way and joining the office of Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) as director of communications…

Tal Politis, Israel’s incoming defense attaché in Washington, who most recently served as Navy chief of staff, was promoted to vice admiral…

After the conclusion of Chabad-Lubavich’s Living Legacy Conference and Global Jewish Roundtable on Wednesday in Washington, a small delegation of attendees, which included shluchim and supporters of American Friends of Lubavitch-Chabad, met with Vice President JD Vance.

Hedge fund manager, he is the owner of MLB’s New York Mets, Steven A. Cohen turns 70…

Heir to the British supermarket chain Sainsbury’s, minister in two British governments under Prime Ministers Major and Thatcher, Sir Timothy Alan Davan Sainsbury turns 94… Former executive director of NYC-based government watchdog Citizens Union and former NYC public advocate, Elisabeth A. “Betsy” Gotbaum turns 88… Chief spokesperson for AIPAC from 2012 to 2025, Marshall Wittmann turns 73… Columbus, Ohio-based retail mogul, CEO of American Eagle Outfitters, Value City Department Stores, DSW and others, sponsor of ArtScroll’s translation of the Babylonian Talmud, Jay Schottenstein turns 72… Member of Knesset for the Agudat Yisrael faction of the United Torah Judaism party, Meir Porush turns 71… Past president and national board member of AIPAC, he is a senior advisor to Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, Lee “Rosy” Rosenberg… Former director of the Shin Bet, Yuval Diskin turns 70… Member of Knesset for the Shas party, Yoav Ben-Tzur turns 68… New Windsor, N.Y., attorney, Barry Wolf Friedman… Political and social justice activist, she served as Illinois state representative and as human rights commissioner, Lauren Beth Gash turns 66… Opinion columnist for The Washington Post until 2025, now writing on Substack, Jennifer Rubin turns 64… Partner in the D.C. office of worldwide consulting firm, Brunswick Group, Michael J. Schoenfeld… President of J Street, Jeremy Ben-Ami turns 64… Deputy director of the CIA in the Biden administration, he held the same role in the last two years of the Obama administration, David S. Cohen turns 63… U.S. attorney for Minnesota since October 2025, Daniel Noah Rosen turns 61… Associate dean and lecturer at George Washington University Law School, he previously served in the Biden administration, Matt Nosanchuk… Professor of Jewish thought at the University of Haifa, Josef Hillel “J.H.” Chajes turns 61… Founder of Shabbat[dot]com, he also serves as the national educational director for Olami Worldwide, Rabbi Benzion Zvi Klatzko… Dean of TheYeshiva[dot]net, he succeeded his father as editor-in-chief of the Yiddish weekly Algemeiner Journal, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak “YY” Jacobson turns 54… Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from 2017 to 2019, now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, Dr. Scott Gottlieb turns 54… Budget director at the City Council of the District of Columbia, Jennifer Budoff… Israeli businesswoman and philanthropist, she participated in two seasons of the Israeli reality show “Me’usharot,” Nicol Raidman turns 40… Director of communications and programming at Academic Engagement Network, Raeefa Shams… Actor, performance artist and filmmaker, Shia LaBeouf turns 40… Retired figure skater who competed for Israel in the team event at the 2018 Winter Olympics, Aimee Buchanan turns 33… Olympic medalist in canoe slalom in London (2012), Rio (2016), Tokyo (2020) and Paris (2024), Jessica Esther “Jess” Fox turns 32… Israeli attorney and CEO of Dualis Social Venture Fund, Dana Naor…

• Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will testify on Capitol Hill today for the first time since the start of the Iran war when they appear before the House Armed Services Committee for a Pentagon budget hearing.
• Hegseth’s appearance comes a day after Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee sent a letter to the defense secretary inquiring about the injuries and deaths of U.S. servicemembers in Kuwait in Iranian counterattacks in the early days of the war. According to prewritten remarks obtained by Punchbowl News, Hegseth is expected to accuse U.S. allies of not having done enough to back Washington in its fight against Iran, while Caine is expected to say that the Iranians “are weaker and less capable than they have been in decades.”
• President Donald Trump, meanwhile, has reportedly told aides to prepare for an extended blockade of Iran as talks with the Islamic Republic remain at an impasse.
• Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) is holding a closed-door roundtable meeting with members of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and Education Secretary Linda McMahon to discuss the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the department — and has taken the unusual step of inviting press to attend. McMahon, for her part, claimed yesterday at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing that she’s trying to rebuild and expand the department’s Office for Civil Rights. Read more here.
• The American Enterprise Institute’s Brett Schaefer and Advancing American Freedom’s Eugene Kontorovich are among the witnesses slated to testify at the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Oversight and Intelligence subcommittee hearing on U.S. accountability at the United Nations.
• The full House Appropriations Committee is meeting for its State Department markup today.
• The House Education & the Workforce’s subcommittee on higher education is holding a hearing on the First Amendment in higher education.
• In Philadelphia, public broadcaster WHYY is holding a debate this afternoon for the Democrats running in the open primary in Pennsylvania’s 3rd Congressional District to succeed retiring Rep. Dwight Evans (D-PA), where progressive heavyweights have in recent months thrown their support behind state Rep. Chris Rabb, a critic of Israel, over more moderate candidates including state Sen. Sharif Street and Dr. Ala Stanford. Read our deep dive into the race to represent the bluest district in the country.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S LAHAV HARKOV

The near-consensus among Israeli political pundits is that the merger of the parties led by former Prime Ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid is a huge moment in the campaign ahead of the next Knesset election, scheduled for Oct. 27. 

However, judging by polls published by six major Hebrew-language media outlets after the merger on Sunday, not much has changed since the announcement that Bennett and Lapid were joining forces. 

The newly formed “Together” opposition party polled around 24 seats — nearly the same number of seats as the two parties combined before the merger. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party is, according to the average of the latest polls, still the largest party at 29. 

According to the latest polling, it would be difficult for either side to build a governing coalition. The opposition Zionist parties did not get a 61-seat majority in any of the six polls. The most favorable poll for the opposition showed the anti-Netanyahu Zionist parties at 60 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, while the current coalition received over 61 seats in two polls (from those commissioned by Channel 14 and I24NEWS, which are more sympathetic to Netanyahu than the other media outlets).

To be sure, polls taken within 24 hours of an event are not the most reliable, and much can change in the six months until the election. 

The key question after the Bennett and Lapid merger is whether they are fighting other opposition candidates for dominance within their bloc – in which case, Bennett has likely solidified his status as Netanyahu’s main competition for the premiership – or to broaden the bloc’s appeal to win a majority in the Knesset.

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

Mitch’s Pitch on Ukraine: In The Washington Post, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) raises concerns about the status of U.S. aid to Ukraine that was approved by Congress months ago but has not moved beyond the Pentagon. “When Senate appropriators have sought an explanation from the department’s policy shop, led by Undersecretary Elbridge Colby, they’ve been stonewalled. … If we’re serious about ‘drone dominance,’ we shouldn’t sandbag a relationship with the world’s foremost drone experts. And if we’re keen on remaining the world’s preeminent superpower, we shouldn’t let unelected defense officials undermine U.S. leadership and obstruct deepening ties with Ukraine’s innovative military and industrial base.” [WashPost]

Manifesto Destiny: The New York Times’ Bret Stephens posits that the growing acceptance of violent political rhetoric across broad swaths of society is creating a breeding ground for extremism. “In short, it’s the philosophy of people who believe that democracy is actually despotism, provided they don’t like its results; that the laws of such a democracy are an oppressive sham that must be actively resisted; that the way to bring about change isn’t through political participation and elections but rather through multiple homicides. On the right, this is called fascism. On the left, communism. They are functionally almost interchangeable.” [NYTimes]

OPEC’s Obit: The Financial Times’ Verity Ratcliffe and Malcolm Moore look at the impact of the United Arab Emirates’ withdrawal from OPEC. “‘This is the beginning of the end of Opec,’ said Saul Kavonic, an energy analyst at MST Financial. ‘Saudi Arabia will struggle to keep the rest of Opec together. We could see other members follow suit, including Venezuela.’ … Meanwhile, markets have become increasingly attuned to statements from the U.S., including President Donald Trump’s social media accounts. ‘The Iran war has shown that the U.S. can have as much, if not more, influence over global oil flows than Opec,’ said Kavonic.” [FT]

Power to Wage War: The Wall Street Journal’s William Galston suggests that President Donald Trump is unlikely to be constrained by war powers resolutions, which have proven in recent decades to be ineffective. “Congress would gain leverage over Mr. Trump only when the Defense Department runs out of discretionary funds and the president is forced to request a supplementary appropriation to continue the war. Until that happens (and no one knows for sure when it will), the president holds the cards. The post-World War II emergence of the U.S. as a superpower with global reach and responsibilities has changed the constitutional balance between the executive and legislative branches, especially regarding the power to take the nation to war.” [WSJ]

Former Rep. Mark Walker (R-NC) departed his role as the State Department’s principal advisor for global religious freedom, three months after the position was created for him after he fell short of the Senate support necessary to be confirmed as ambassador-at-large for religious freedom, which he was initially nominated for last year…

The Treasury Department announced sanctions on nearly three dozen companies and individuals associated with Iran’s shadow banking system, which Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said “serves as a critical financial lifeline for its armed forces, enabling activities that disrupt global trade and fuel violence across the Middle East”…

The Financial Times reports on remarks made in February by U.K. Ambassador to the U.S. Christian Turner, who said he considered the term “special relationship” — a phrase commonly used to describe ties between London and Washington — to be outdated, adding, “I think there is probably one country that has a special relationship with the United States — and that is probably Israel”…

During a meeting on the 2027 funding bill for the State Department, several Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee pushed, ultimately unsuccessfully, for the committee to adopt new conditions on the $3.3 billion in U.S. military aid allocated for Israel annually in the bill, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports…

Former Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), who championed liberal causes during his decades-long tenure in the House, is releasing a book excoriating Democrats for having “embraced an agenda that goes beyond what’s politically acceptable” as he enters hospice care…

A Los Angeles megamansion built on property purchased in 2010 for $35 million by an entity tied to Qatar’s Al-Thani family was put on the market for $400 million, becoming the most expensive home listed for sale in the country; Colony Capital, which was previously led by now-U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, played a key role in the property’s development…

An active-duty soldier stationed at a Louisiana base was arrested after posting on Discord that his “goal in life” was to go to a synagogue armed with a weapon and “kill every single Jew I know”…

Duke University reinstated the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine after the group was suspended for having posted on social media an image of a pig holding a staff with the Star of David that had previously been used in Black Panthers imagery in the 1970s…

California’s secretary of state said the office is considering making changes to the state’s elections code after the statewide distribution of a voter guide that included antisemitic conspiracy theories from a fringe gubernatorial candidate…

The Wall Street Journal interviews B.J. Novak about his childhood and career trajectory ahead of the release of “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” which stars the former “The Office” actor… 

Israeli chef Eyal Shani opened his fourth South Florida restaurant, Naked Tomato, in the South Beach Moxy Hotel…

Israeli kosher burger chain Ruben is opening its first outpost in the U.S.; the restaurant is expected to open in Cooper City, Fla., next month…

The U.K.’s Foreign Office summoned Iran’s ambassador to London after a statement posted to the embassy’s social media that called on Iranians living in the U.K. to “all stand together, ready to sacrifice our lives, for it is better than surrendering our country to the enemy”…

Two Haredi men were reportedly stabbed outside a synagogue in the heavily Jewish London suburb of Golders Green…

The New York Times spotlights the British Navy’s Maritime Trade Operations Centre, an around-the-clock agency monitoring shipping routes in the Gulf and serving as an emergency service for vessels under attack…

Newly released correspondence between J.D. Salinger and his editor indicates that the Catcher in the Rye author wanted references to his Jewish-Irish background removed from the book’s jacket, saying he would “end up being expected to wear a Star of David and a Shamrock on the back of my sweatshirt”…

A Sydney, Australia, benefit concert meant to spotlight unity and benefit the Bondi Beach Jewish community following a deadly terror attack at a Hanukkah party in December was canceled after members of the Australian Hellenic Choir voted to withdraw from the event, where they were set to perform alongside the Sydney Jewish Choral Society…

The jury of the Venice Biennale said it will not consider submissions from “those countries whose leaders are currently charged with crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court,” putting both Israeli and Russian entrants out of contention; Israel’s Foreign Ministry said the move “transformed the Biennale from an open artistic space of free, boundless ideas into a spectacle of false, anti-Israeli political indoctrination”…

Former Washington Post reporter Rachel Siegel is joining CNN as a reporter for CNN Business, working out of the network’s Washington bureau…

Simon Amiel is joining Birthright Israel as executive vice president for North America…

Pennsylvania Gov. Shapiro spoke to a group of more than 200 Jewish day school students at the State Capitol in Harrisburg on Tuesday during Teach PA’s annual Advocacy Day.

Comedian, actor, writer, producer and director, he is best known for playing a semi-fictional version of himself in the sitcom “Seinfeld,” Jerry Seinfeld turns 72… Nobel Prize-winning economist, professor emeritus at MIT, known for his analysis of Social Security policy, Peter Diamond turns 86… Co-founder of the NYSE-traded homebuilding company Toll Brothers, Bruce E. Toll turns 83… Retired U.S. senator (D-MI), she completed her 24 years in the Senate in 2025, Debbie Stabenow turns 76… Marcy Smith… London-born actor with three Academy Awards for best actor, knighted at Buckingham Palace in 2014, Sir Daniel Day-Lewis turns 69… Sportscaster, best known as the radio and television play-by-play announcer for MLB’s New York Mets, Gary Cohen turns 68… Co-founder and first CEO of Netflix, Marc Bernays Randolph turns 68… Israeli diplomat, she was Israel’s ambassador to Latvia and then to Ireland, Lironne Bar Sadeh turns 67… Former NYC comptroller, he ran for mayor unsuccessfully in 2021 and 2025, Scott M. Stringer turns 66… CEO and chairman of 20th Century Fox until its acquisition by Disney, Stacey Snider turns 65… CEO of the United Democracy Project, Rob Bassin… Professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University, he is the author of many books including Predictably Irrational, Dan Ariely turns 59… NY-based award-winning artist who works with sound, kinetics, optics, magnetism and other materials to make sculptures and photographs, Julianne Swartz turns 59… Film and television actor, Paul Adelstein turns 57… Israeli-born, NYC resident, stand-up comedian, actor and sometimes chazzan, Modi Rosenfeld turns 56… Executive at a NYC-based investment management firm, Bennett J. Schachter turns 51… Former minister of environmental protection in Israel, Tamar “Tami” Zandberg turns 50… SVP of the Leon Levine Foundation and director of operations for the Levine family office, Justin Steinschriber… Israeli model and actress, she has appeared in many American movies, TV shows and advertisements, Bar Paly turns 44… Director of the office of government relations at the Smithsonian Institution, Anne Brachman… Commercial, industrial and residential real estate developer in the Mid-Atlantic region, Samuel A. Neuberger… Leader of public affairs for New York at Success Academy Charter Schools, Daniel Mitzner… Baseball pitcher for Team Israel at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Jonathan de Marte turns 33… Surfer, she represented Israel at the 2020 and 2024 Summer Olympics, Anat Lelior turns 26…

• King Charles III and Queen Camilla land in Washington today for their first state visit to the U.S. since assuming the throne. They’ll arrive to a city reeling from this weekend’s attempted attack on Trump administration officials at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. More below from JI’s Marc Rod, who was attending the event at the Washington Hilton on Saturday night.
• The king and queen will be welcomed by President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, and will have afternoon tea before attending a White House garden party.
• Trump is expected to convene a Situation Room meeting — sans King Charles — on Iran as the countries remain at an impasse amid stalled talks. The meeting comes days after plans for White House Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to go to Islamabad for a second round of talks were scrapped, with Trump telling Fox News on Sunday, “If they want to talk, they can come to us or they can call us.” Tehran has reportedly offered to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end the war without resolving its disputes with Washington over the future of the Iranian nuclear program.
• Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is in Moscow today, where he is slated to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
• Israeli President Isaac Herzog is in Kazakhstan today, where he is slated to meet with President Qasym-Jomart Toqayev.
• Israel Tech Week kicks off today in Miami. Speakers include Daniel Flesch, Phil Goldfeder and Gabe Groisman.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MARC ROD

The White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday night began normally enough — a bustle of reporters, administration officials and members of Congress among other A-listers streaming from the packed lobby of the Washington Hilton down into the basement ballroom.

White House Correspondents’ Association President Weija Jiang, a CBS News White House reporter, finished her introductory remarks, and the thousands of guests packed into the ballroom tucked into their salads.

Then, a loud, shattering bang rang out from the other side of the ballroom. Initially, I didn’t think anything of it — I thought someone had dropped a large tray of food (as President Donald Trump said later, he thought the same thing).

Videos and other accounts of the evening indicate that someone from the security staff shouted from the front of the room that guests should get down. I didn’t hear it. My first indication that something was wrong was when I started seeing other guests ducking under the tables and security officers drawing their guns.

I tried to duck under the tablecloth, but no luck — another occupant of the table was already underneath, and there was no room. My heart pounding, I was forced to do my best to stay low — but I was in the backmost row of tables, right by a door, sitting directly in the aisle.

If a shooter came into the ballroom from behind me, I was a sitting duck. I was completely helpless and exposed.

Two thoughts ran through my head. The main one: I’m getting married in six days. I can’t die now. The second: I can’t believe this is happening to me again. (For those readers who are newer to Jewish Insider — I was also on scene for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.)

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

Riyadh’s Reluctance: Foreign Policy’s Steven Cook considers why Saudi Arabia is not playing a more central role in the U.S. and Israeli conflict with Iran. “This is not to suggest that Saudi Arabia should get into the fight, but it is revealing that a country that billed itself as a rising power and the most important country in the Middle East is betwixt and between when its neighborhood is burning down. The Saudis clearly have interests at stake, but rather than taking action, they have been issuing strongly worded statements while others, including their adversaries, are shaping the region. It seems that Riyadh would be better off taking concrete steps to protect its interests. What is the saying about it’s better to be at the table than be the meal?” [FP]

Feeding Israel to the Left: In his Substack “The Abrahamic Metacritique,” Hussein Aboubakr Mansour raises concerns about the willingness of Democratic leaders to shift leftward on issues related to Israel amid pressure from the activist left. “The establishment’s reasoning is basic strategic calculation: the left will not relent on Israel; a civil war inside the party over the Jewish state would destroy the coalition; therefore, the rational move is to concede this issue, preserve party unity, and proceed with the moderate agenda on everything else: affordability, climate, migration, AI, etc. Feed this one thing to the beast, and the beast will be satisfied. It is an intelligent calculation, a genius one, really, but it is also a catastrophic one, because it rests on a complete misapprehension of what is being conceded and to whom.” [AbrahamicMetacritique]

Battle Royal: For Fox News, presidential historian Tevi Troy does a deep dive into the history of visits to the U.S. from U.K. royals. “When [Queen Elizabeth II] visited Eisenhower in 1957, she helped smooth over tensions that had emerged between Britain and the U.S. as a result of the Suez Crisis. … And now, as King Charles embarks on his first visit to the U.S. in President Donald Trump’s second term, the U.S. and Britain are in the midst of a disagreement over the war with Iran. Charles is not a political ruler, but perhaps his visit, like his mother’s in 1957, can smooth over tensions and help maintain the special relationship America has long had with the United Kingdom.” [FoxNews]

Axios reports that during the active conflict with Iran in March, Israel sent the United Arab Emirates an Iron Dome battery, interceptors and several dozen IDF troops to operate the missile-defense system; a senior Emirati official told Axios, “We are not going to forget it,” while a second official said, “It was a real eye-opening moment. To see who our real friends are”…

A new memo from the State Department acknowledges that the U.S.’ decision to launch Operation Epic Fury against Iran came — at least in part — at Israel’s request, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports… 

An 11-year-old Israeli girl who was critically wounded in an Iranian cluster bomb attack on her home in Bnei Brak earlier this month died of her injuries…

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Tucker Carlson suggested that he was given advance notice of the joint U.S.-Israel operation targeting Iran in late February, saying he received a text message at 10 p.m. ET on Feb. 27 — hours before the start of the operation — that read, “We’re going”; Carlson did not say who sent the message, acknowledging only that it was not President Donald Trump or Vice President JD Vance…

The WSJ notes that at the last meeting between Trump and Carlson, the president displayed a letter from evangelical leader Franklin Graham calling Carlson an antisemite…

The Treasury Department announced sanctions on a Chinese oil refinery and more than three dozen shipping firms and vessels tied to Iran’s oil export industry…

The New York Times examines the Trump administration’s “haphazard” approach to sanctions on Russia and Iran as Moscow and Tehran leverage their oil reserves amid a volatile market…

The Financial Times looks at the United Arab Emirates’ recent request that Pakistan repay $3.5 billion in loans, citing Islamabad’s deepening ties with Saudi Arabia and what the UAE “considers Pakistan’s meek response to Iranian attacks on the Gulf”…

UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed’s son-in-law Mohammed bin Hamad Al Nahyan and EDGE Group CEO Faisal Al Bannai — both of whom advise MBZ — visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., and made a swing through the U.S. to meet with SpaceX founder Elon Musk, Jared Kushner, investors Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz and defense firm Anduril, The Circuit’s Jonathan Ferziger reports…

Talks between the U.S. and Israel on the next 10-year memorandum of understanding are expected to begin next month, and will include Maj. Gen. (res.) Amir Baram, the director-general of Israel’s Defense Ministry, and Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Leiter representing Israel and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and State Department senior advisor Michael Needham…

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) dropped his opposition to Kevin Warsh’s nomination to be chairman of the Federal Reserve, clearing the way for Warsh to assume the role when Jerome Powell’s term ends next month…

A federal judge in Texas halted the deportations of six family members of an Egyptian man who firebombed demonstrators, killing an elderly woman, at a Boulder, Colo., march last year raising awareness about the Israeli hostages in captivity in Gaza…

Thrive Capital founder Joshua Kushner announced on Friday the launch of Thrive Eternal, a capital holding company that will acquire a minority, non-controlling stake in the San Francisco Giants as its first major partnership, Jewish Insider’s Melissa Weiss reports…

The New York Times interviews Hollywood agent Michael Glantz, who went viral after being filmed eating his burrata salad at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday as other guests around him ducked for cover…

Counterterrorism authorities investigating a string of antisemitic attacks in London arrested a 37-year-old man on suspicion of preparing to carry out terrorist acts; more than two dozen people have been arrested in connection with attacks against the country’s Jewish community since late March…

The Telegraph goes behind the scenes of the Met Police’s effort to track down arsonists targeting synagogues in the London area…

Israeli President Isaac Herzog is expected to push for a mediated resolution to reach a plea deal in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ongoing corruption trial, bucking pressure from the White House to pardon the prime minister…

Israel’s Cabinet signed off on the nomination of Michael Lotam to be the country’s first ambassador to Somaliland, four months after Jerusalem recognized the sovereignty of the East African nation…

The Cabinet also approved the appointment of former Israeli Ambassador to the U.K. Tzipi Hotovely to serve as the head of the National Public Diplomacy Directorate within the Prime Minister’s Office, which has been vacant for more than two years…

Israel launched a wide-scale, multimillion-dollar campaign – led by former Trump administration official Brad Parscale — to create pro-Israel web content that would be picked up by AI platforms…

Cardiologist Eugene Braunwald, who as a child fled Nazi Europe and went on to reshape how modern medicine approaches heart attacks, died at 96…

Diplomat Lionel Rosenblatt, whose experiences living in Haifa, Israel, as a child inspired him to join the U.S. Foreign Service and later lead Refugees International, died at 82…

Stars of the upcoming Keshet 12 series “Unconditional” attended the world premiere screening of the drama, about a mother-daughter pair stranded in Russia, ahead of its broadcast tonight, at the Cinematheque in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Showrunner, director, screenwriter and producer, Brian Koppelman turns 60…

Financial executive, he retired in 2014 as head of marketing for money manager Van Eck Global, Harvey Hirsch turns 85… Nonprofit executive who has managed the 92nd Street Y, the Robin Hood Foundation, the AT&T Foundation and Lincoln Center, Reynold Levy turns 81… U.S. senator (R-WV), Jim Justice turns 75… Physician and a former NASA astronaut, she is a veteran of three shuttle flights with more than 686 hours in space, Ellen Louise Shulman Baker, M.D., M.P.H. turns 73… Director-general of the Israel Antiquities Authority until 2020, he was previously a member of Knesset and deputy director of the Shin Bet, Yisrael Hasson turns 71… VP at Covington Fabric & Design, Donald Rifkin… Biologist and professor of pathology and genetics at Stanford University School of Medicine, he won the 2006 Nobel Prize in medicine, Andrew Zachary Fire turns 67… Co-founder of Casamigos Tequila and owner of restaurants, bars and lounges worldwide, Rande Gerber turns 64… Former member of the Knesset for the Shinui party, Yigal Yasinov turns 60… CEO of ZAM Asset Management, Elliot Mayerhoff… Founder and CEO of NYC-based Gotham Ghostwriters, he served as a senior advisor for Sen. Joseph Lieberman in his vice presidential and presidential campaigns, Daniel Gerstein turns 59… Israeli actor, entertainer and television host, Yitzhak “Aki” Avni turns 59… Attorney and journalist, she is a contributing editor at Newsweek and senior editor at Slate, Dahlia Lithwick turns 59… Author, political analyst and nationally syndicated op-ed columnist for The Washington Post, Dana Milbank turns 58… U.S. senator (D-NJ) since 2013, he was previously the mayor of Newark, Cory Booker turns 57… Israeli television and radio journalist and former member of the Knesset for the Jewish Home party, Yinon Magal turns 57… Professor of science writing at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Seth Mnookin turns 54… Cinematographer and director, Rachel Morrison turns 48… Identical twin brothers, between the two of them they won 11 Israeli championships in the triathlon between 2001 and 2012, Dan and Ran Alterman both turn 46… Israeli screenwriter and producer, she has written numerous advertisements and screenplays, Savion Einstein turns 44… VP of AIPAC’s mid-Atlantic region, Leah Berry… Television and film actress, Ariel Geltman “Ari” Graynor turns 43… Basketball coach, analyst and writer, Benjamin Falk turns 38… Senior creative director at Trilogy Interactive, Jessica Ruby… Head of climate data at Watershed, Jonathan H. Glidden… Research fellow at Emory University law school, David Jonathan Benger… Entrepreneurial investor, Noah Swartz turns 33… Medical resident at UCLA Health, Amir Kashfi… 

• President Donald Trump will attend a Kennedy Center board meeting this afternoon. The president confirmed on Friday that Richard Grenell was exiting his role as president of the arts center after just over a year in the position.
• New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is slated to briefly meet today with a group of largely local Orthodox Jewish leaders in the city, following a series of incidents in which Mamdani has had to address antisemitism in the context of his wife’s professional work and social media activity. Mainstream groups, including the Anti-Defamation League, the Jewish Community Relations Council-New York and the American Jewish Committee, were not invited to the meeting, which is expected to last between 15-20 minutes. Satmar leader Rabbi Moshe Indig and United Jewish Organization of Williamsburg’s Rabbi David Niederman are expected to attend.
• The Anti-Defamation League’s Never is Now conference begins today in New York. Speakers at today’s opening session include ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, GAP President and CEO Richard Dixon, actor Jerry O’Connell and Bravo stars Meredith Marks and Jackie Goldschneider.
• The Jewish Funders Network annual conference continues today in San Diego. Read more from eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher here.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S MARC ROD AND lahav harkov

The ongoing war in Iran is highlighting a widening gulf between center and center-left voters in Israel and Democrats in the United States. While Democrats in the United States are mostly opposed to the war, Israelis are overwhelmingly supportive of the effort.

Recent polling from Israel has shown that 92.5% of Jewish Israelis and 81% of Israelis overall support the war.

The divide was particularly evident in an exchange on X this week between Yair Zivan, a centrist and top advisor to Israeli Opposition Leader Yair Lapid, and Matt Duss, a foreign policy advisor to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and a former confidante of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), whose post prompted the exchange. 

Sanders, on X, condemned the Israeli operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon, saying, “The U.S. cannot continue to be complicit in Netanyahu’s wars.”

Zivan said in response that he was writing from a bomb shelter and that Israel “is under attack by fanatical terrorists who want to murder us,” arguing that Sanders’ “humanity never seems to extend to Israeli lives.”

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

• In New York, former Israeli hostage Emily Damari will sit in conversation this evening with Noa Tishby at Temple Emanu-El.
• The Jewish Institute for National Security of America’s U.S.-Israel national security summit begins today in Aventura, Fla.
• On the heels of last night’s election, New York Democrats are heading to Puerto Rico today for the 2025 Somos Conference. Will you be there? JI’s Matthew Kassel will be covering the conference — say hello if you see him.
• The two-day SALT conference kicks off today in London. Former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci are among the speakers at the fintech-focused summit.

A QUICK WORD WITH JI’S Josh Kraushaar

Democrats scored sweeping victories across the country yesterday, with moderate lawmakers comfortably winning governorships in New Jersey and Virginia, while a democratic socialist prevailed in the closely watched New York City mayoral contest. California overwhelmingly voted to redistrict its congressional maps, a response to efforts in some red states to reconfigure congressional maps to give the GOP an edge. 

The results underscore the widespread backlash to President Donald Trump’s polarizing governance in the first year of his second term in office, and indicate the likelihood that Democrats have momentum heading into next year’s midterm elections, where the party is looking to retake control of at least one branch of Congress.

In Virginia, former Rep. Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic nominee, easily defeated Republican Winsome Earle-Sears, the sitting lieutenant governor, by a double-digit margin (57-43%), bringing in a sizable Democratic majority in the state’s House of Delegates. Her victory was so sweeping that the Democrats’ scandal-plagued attorney general nominee Jay Jones, who was under fire for texts he sent several years ago wishing political violence against GOP colleagues, narrowly prevailed over the Attorney General Jason Miyares, a Republican.

In New Jersey, Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) comfortably prevailed over Republican Jack Ciattarelli, outperforming polls suggesting a close race. With most of the vote reporting, Sherrill leads by a whopping 13-point margin, 56-43%. In Bergen County, a bellwether county with a significant Jewish population, Sherrill won over 55% of the vote, a dominant performance illustrating the breadth of her support.

In New York City, DSA-aligned Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani prevailed over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who was running as an independent, though by a narrower margin than polling suggested. Mamdani leads Cuomo by eight points, 50-42%, with Republican Curtis Sliwa only winning 7% of the vote. The outcome suggested that many GOP voters ended up switching their support to Cuomo, who won a last-minute endorsement from Trump.

The Jewish vote in New York City went heavily for Cuomo, 60-31%, according to the exit polling, but Mamdani won nearly one-third support despite a long record of anti-Israel hostility and refusal to condemn “globalize the intifada” rhetoric, among other positions that alienated the mainstream Jewish community.

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

Mamdani and the Machers: The New York Times’ Nicholas Fandos reports on New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s meetings with high-profile figures, including New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg as he looked to shore up support in the weeks prior to his election. “The [NYPD chief] appointment would be one of the most significant he would make, and Mr. Mamdani needed to know he would have a partner to implement a series of progressive reforms he had pitched for the Police Department. Ultimately, both Ms. Hochul and Mr. Mamdani came around. … Mr. Bloomberg had privately told associates over the summer he was done with Mr. Cuomo after spending more than $8 million to back him in the primary. Mr. Mamdani left the meeting thinking he had done enough to keep it that way. He was wrong. Angry over Mr. Mamdani’s comments on Israel and worried about his inexperience, Mr. Bloomberg ultimately sent $5 million to two super PACs attacking Mr. Mamdani and re-upped his endorsement of Mr. Cuomo — but did so only six days before Election Day.” [NYTimes]

No to the Groypers: In The Wall Street Journal, Ben Shapiro argues that the conservative movement in the U.S. is “at a crossroads” amid an ideological split within the Republican Party over its embrace of Tucker Carlson and platforming of Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes. “The Republican Party, like the Democratic Party before it, is at risk of being eaten alive by fringe actors. To allow it is both morally unjustifiable and politically obtuse. Americans reject this garbage. If Republicans cower before Nazi apologists and their popularizers, the GOP will lose — and deserve to. Our answer must be no. No to the groypers and their publicists like Mr. Carlson. No to demoralization. No to bigotry and antimeritocratic nonsense. No to anti-Americanism. This is our country, our party and our conservative movement. We can’t stand by while it is fractured by those who betray our most fundamental principles. If we lose the right, then we will surely lose to the left — and either way, we will lose our country.” [WSJ]

If Rabin Were Alive…: In The Atlantic, Dennis Ross, who worked closely with former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin while serving as the White House’s chief Middle East negotiator during the mid-1990s, considers how Rabin might have approached some of the country’s current challenges. “Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack and Israel’s devastating campaign in Gaza have produced a mutual animosity that won’t soon disappear. But a more promising factor has also emerged: Arab states finally seem ready to assume some responsibility for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. … If Rabin were alive, he would spot this strategic opening and try to seize it. He would see in Trump’s 20-point peace plan an opportunity to rebuild a better Gaza and create a coalition with Arab states to oppose Iran and extremist forces in the region. Rabin would understand that Israel has to make some concessions to Palestinians in order to enhance the prospects of a regional coalition. But he would also require Palestinians to do their part by ensuring security and reforming the Palestinian Authority.” [TheAtlantic]

ABCs of Gaza Aid: In The Washington Post, Stony Brook University professor Todd Pittinsky calls for conditioning reconstruction aid to Gaza on education reforms in the enclave. “Every generation in Gaza grows up memorizing the language of martyrdom. Schools, summer camps, mosques and media channels work in concert to instill an uncompromising worldview: violence is virtuous, compromise is weakness and the annihilation of Israel is a sacred duty. Hamas’s rockets are the visible expression of decades of indoctrination of the next generation. Gaza’s children are the victims of this violent ideology. Few parents in London, Paris or Washington would tolerate their child being taught that violence is noble or that neighbors are subhuman. Yet the international community has subsidized precisely that curriculum for Palestinian children — and then has acted shocked when violence perpetuates itself. It’s time for that to end.” [WashPost]

President Donald Trump renominated Jared Isaacman to be NASA director, six months after pulling the Elon Musk ally’s initial nomination amid a spat with Musk…

The White House is seeking a full repeal of existing sanctions on Syria ahead of President Ahmad Al-Sharaa’s meeting with Trump in Washington on Monday…

The Pentagon is advancing its consideration of a request from Saudi Arabia to purchase up to four dozen F-35 fighter jets; at a Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs conference in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, Israeli Security Cabinet member Avi Dichter said Israel is having discussions in Washington in which it is “shedding light on the threats” of the potential sale…

Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) is mulling a challenge to Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA); if she enters the race, Pressley will also face Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA), who announced his bid for the seat last month…

The Justice Department ended its antitrust investigation into Assaf Rappaport’s Wiz, clearing a key hurdle in Google’s effort to purchase the cybersecurity company for $32 billion…

Millennium Management CEO Israel “Izzy” Englander sold roughly 15% — valued at $2 billion — of his stake in the company the 77-year-old founded in 1989…

The Telegraph reports on a leaked BBC memo regarding the findings of an internal investigation by Michael Prescott, who until June was an independent external advisor for the network; Prescott’s 19-page report found “systemic problems” in BBC Arabic’s coverage of the Israel-Hamas war, which he said “pushed Hamas lies” and “minimised Israeli suffering”…

The New York Times interviews Israeli-Russian researcher Elizabeth Tsurkov about the torture and solitary confinement she endured over the two and a half years she was a hostage of the Iran-backed Kataib Hezbollah group in Iraq…

The U.N. Security Council voted to approve a resolution backing Morocco’s claim to the Western Sahara; the U.S., which led the measure, and 10 other countries voted in favor, while Russia, China and Pakistan abstained and Algeria voted no…

Israel received the remains of Staff Sgt. Itay Chen, the last remaining American hostage, who was killed on Oct. 7, 2023, while stationed along the Gaza border…

The Knesset is moving forward with legislation that would increase government oversight of the country’s media outlets…

Iran freed two French nationals who had been imprisoned in the country for more than three years; the couple had faced decades in prison after being convicted of espionage…

International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi said that Iran must “seriously improve” its cooperation with nuclear inspectors, who have not been permitted to access the Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan facilities that were damaged during the 12-day war between Israel and Iran in June…

Stanley Chesley, a class-action lawyer and philanthropist who prioritized Jewish causes and projects in his hometown of Cincinnati, died at 89, eJewishPhilanthropy’s Jay Deitcher reports…

Julie Fishman Rayman (right), the American Jewish Committee’s senior vice president of policy and political affairs, interviewed the Department of Justice’s Harmeet Dhillon, who oversees the Civil Rights Division, on Tuesday at AJC’s National Leadership Council Advocacy Fly-In in Washington.

Israeli singer and survivor of the Nova Music Festival, she won second place in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025, Yuval Raphael turns 25…

Singer, poet and actor, best known as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, Art Garfunkel turns 84… Co-founder and chairman of Rexford Industrial Realty, Richard Ziman turns 83… Television and film critic, Jeffrey Lyons turns 81… French public intellectual, media personality and author, Bernard-Henri Lévy turns 77… Economist and former director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University where he remains a University Professor, Jeffrey Sachs turns 71… Israeli ceramic artist and sculptor, Daniela Yaniv-Richter turns 69… Psychologist and wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Sara Netanyahu turns 67… Director at The Gottesman Fund, Diane Bennett Eidman… Music producer and entertainment attorney, Kevon Glickman… Former prime minister of Israel, now leader of the opposition, Yair Lapid turns 62… Former regional director of AJC New York, now CEO at Healthcare Foundation of NJ, Michael Schmidt… Research division director for JewishGen USA, Ellen Shindelman Kowitt turns 58… Senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, Benjamin Wittes turns 56… Host, anchor and correspondent for CBS News and CBS Sports, Dana Jacobson turns 54… General counsel of The Jewish Theological Seminary, Keath Blatt… Jerusalem-born pianist, she has performed with major orchestras worldwide, Orli Shaham turns 50… Director at the Domestic Policy Council in the first six months of the Trump 47 administration, now director  of federal education policy at America First Policy Institute, Max Eden turns 37… CEO and organizer of Los Angeles-based Aesthetics and Edits, Tara Khoshbin… Legal correspondent at Business Insider, Jacob Shamsian… Legislative assistant for Sen. Dave McCormick (R-PA), Talia Katz…

• Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is in Israel this week. More below.
• Also in Israel, but on separate visits, are Sens. David McCormick (R-PA) and Jacky Rosen (D-NV), as well as Reps. Mike Lawler (R-NY), Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-FL) and Michael McCaul (R-TX).
• The Israel Democracy Institute is hosting its annual Eli Hurvitz Conference in Jerusalem today and tomorrow.
• This evening, the Foreign Ministers’ Conference on Combating Antisemitism, hosted by Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, kicks off in Jerusalem. The conference will run through tomorrow evening. Earlier today, the Foreign Ministry welcomed Jewish leaders from around the world ahead of the start of the conference.

A QUICK WORD WITH LAHAV HARKOV

Amid persistent reports of a rift with President Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been seeking to reassure Israelis that everything is fine. But behind the scenes, there are continued signs that the relationship between the two leaders isn’t as close as it was during the president’s first term.

In a press conference last week, Netanyahu said Trump recently expressed his “total commitment” not only to Israel, but to Netanyahu, and that in a recent call with Vice President JD Vance, he told the prime minister, “Don’t pay attention to all the fake news spin about a rupture  between us.” U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee called the reports “nonsense,” Netanyahu pointed out, quoting him as saying people should “listen to what the president said and not some source who’s not up to date and pretends that he knows.”

Netanyahu took such pains to say the U.S. and Israel are in constant communication and coordination — at least on Iran and humanitarian aid to Gaza — such that one may get the idea that the prime minister is overcompensating at a time when there’s one headline after another claiming there is friction between Jerusalem and Washington.

Words like “rupture” and “break” may be too strong to describe the current dynamic between Trump and Netanyahu, though there are signs of deep disagreements on some of the most important policy issues for Israel’s national security. 

For example, on the issue of Iran’s nuclear program, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told Fox News from Jerusalem on Monday that “President Trump specifically sent me here to speak with the prime minister about how negotiations are going and how important it is that we stay united and let this process play out.” That conversation, she added, was “quite candid and direct.” 

The comments imply that Trump is concerned that Netanyahu is not on the same page as he is and does not plan to wait and see how nuclear talks with Iran unfold before Israel potentially launches a strike. Noem’s comments came days after a phone call between Netanyahu and Trump, which the Prime Minister’s Office readout said included discussion of Iran, and that Israel’s Channel 12 reported was heated. Trump reportedly signaled his confidence in striking what he considers a good deal, and has signaled optimism in public comments over the holiday break that he will have “good news” on the Iranian front.

Trump also publicly pushed for an end to the war in Gaza. On Sunday, the president said “Israel, we’ve been talking to them, and we want to see if we can stop that whole situation” – aka the war in Gaza – “as quickly as possible.” Trump has made clear he wants to be seen as someone who ends wars, but the fighting in Gaza is grinding on without any indication that Hamas is ready to meet Netanyahu’s conditions to end the war: freeing all the hostages, laying down its arms, exile for Hamas leaders, demilitarizing Gaza and implementing Trump’s relocation plan. Netanyahu, however, said that the war will continue and the IDF will occupy more of Gaza to try to eliminate Hamas and pressure it to free the hostages. 

Israel is also in a situation where it needs assistance from the U.S. and isn’t making any overtures of its own at this time — certainly, none that can compare to a $400 million presidential plane or a pledge to invest $600 million in the United States. With a president who often views the world through a transactional lens, that can make things more challenging for Israel, as Trump administration sources have noted to Jewish Insider in recent weeks.

In addition, Trump had several close confidantes who were very focused on Israel in his first term. Steve Witkoff and Jason Greenblatt may share similar titles as Trump’s current and former envoys to the region, but Witkoff lacked Greenblatt’s familiarity with Israel and its geopolitical position from the start, and is also responsible for leading nuclear diplomacy with Iran and pursuing a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

Huckabee has only been in Israel for a few weeks and he doesn’t have as close of a relationship with the president as David Friedman did when he was U.S. ambassador. And Jared Kushner’s role as a close family advisor has been filled in the second term by Donald Trump, Jr. 

This term, there are also the dueling foreign policy factions within the Trump administration, the so-called “restrainers” and the more traditional Republicans.  The Trump administration’s moves to centralize its foreign policy decision-making — diminishing the role of Congress and the National Security Council — has created a situation in which some Israeli officials are uncertain of where to turn to make their case.

The restrainers look like they have the upper hand — with Mike Waltz out as national security advisor and Trump railing against the “so-called nation-builders, neocons or liberal nonprofits” in his recent speech in Saudi Arabia — and some of them hold positions on Israel and the Iranian threat that have raised concerns in Jerusalem.

Battering Rahm: The Free Press’ Peter Savodnik interviews former U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel as the Democrat mulls a return to politics — and a 2028 presidential bid. “I asked him whether someone with his biography could win the Democratic nomination. It wasn’t just that he was part of the Democratic establishment. It was that he was a Jew with the middle name ‘Israel,’ and he was unequivocally supportive of the Jewish state’s right to exist. … He did not think of himself as enigmatic. ‘I’ve shown I’ve got the strength to say my views, and one of the key things about being a president is you got cojones, and you got strength,’ he told me. He added: ‘I’m not naive to antisemitism. I’m not naive to certain elements within the left.’ His point — about winning his House seat and being elected mayor — was that the people, the voters, mattered the most, and he believed that, in the end, they would be on his side. ‘There’s going to be people who try to bring up stereotypes or other types of things, and I’ve never hid my Judaism — not gonna — but I have confidence in the public.’” [FreePress]

The Future Sarah Saw: In The New York Times, Yasmina Asrarguis, a friend of Israeli Embassy staffer Sarah Lynn Milgrim, reflects on their friendship and the politicization of Milgrim’s death in the aftermath of the Capital Jewish Museum attack. “Sarah’s legacy must not be co-opted, not by the person who shot her, and not by those who now wish to brand her with their politics or make her a poster child for a cause. Sarah’s name should not become a pawn, nor a rallying cry, for those who seek to weaponize her death for political gain on either side of this conflict. … In his bullets, the killer could not have seen all that Sarah was, all that she believed in. Her Jewish identity was flattened into a target. In her murder he picked exactly the sort of person who might have altered the future. But just as the extremist misunderstood Sarah, so too do many of those who profess to weep for her loss. Those who mourn Sarah should reflect on her ideals, learn from her life’s work and aim as she did on creating the fragile groundwork for Middle East peace. It was a future she helped prepare for, one conversation, one relationship at a time.” [NYTimes]

When Violence Is Rationalized: In The Atlantic, the Manhattan Institute’s Reihan Salam and Jesse Arm consider the underlying root of American political violence following the Capital Jewish Museum attack. “What we’re witnessing is an issue not with Israel, but with America. When violence aimed at Jews — or those seen as aligned with them — is dismissed, excused, or rationalized, it undermines the civic norms that hold our society together. Elite institutions that once upheld liberal pluralism now indulge a form of identity politics that prizes grievance over justice. Some of the ugliest reactions to the D.C. shooting treated the murders as incidental — or even deserved. That’s not just moral failure. It represents a worldview that treats violence as politics by other means. Such rationalizations have been used to justify the ideological murder of a health-care executive, coordinated arson attacks on Tesla dealerships by anti-capitalist extremists, and, now, executions outside a Jewish museum in the nation’s capital.” [TheAtlantic]

Kingsley Wilson, a deputy press secretary at the Department of Defense who has come under fire from Democratic and Republican lawmakers and Jewish communal organizations for promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories, has been promoted to serve as the department’s press secretary, the Pentagon announced on Friday, Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch reports…

President Donald Trump said he was “considering” taking $3 billion in grant funding to Harvard and redistributing the funds to trade schools across the country…

Trump also said on Sunday that he expected to have “good news” on the ongoing Iran nuclear talks later this week, ahead of a fifth round of talks slated for Friday in Rome…

Sens. Tim Scott (R-SC), Maggie Hassan (D-NH) and three bipartisan co-sponsors reintroduced legislation to repeal the sunset on energy sanctions on Iran first passed in 1996…

Sens. Chris Coons (D-DE) and David McCormick (R-PA) introduced legislation requiring a whole-of-government strategy to counter cooperation between Iran, Russia, China and North Korea…

A group of more than 50 House Republicans led by Rep. Addison McDowell (R-NC) introduced a resolution commemorating Israeli Embassy staffers Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim, who were killed in an attack outside the Capital Jewish Museum last week…

The Washington Post’s Mark Lasswell reflects on “an extreme week in antisemitism,” including the murders of two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington, the resignation of the BBC’s Gary Lineker following his posting of an antisemitic social media image and a widely reported but false statement by a U.N. official regarding infant deaths in Gaza…

Moldova extradited to the U.S. a Georgian national and Eastern European neo-Nazi group leader who had instructed an undercover federal agent to dress as Santa Claus and distribute poison-laced candy to Jewish children…

The New York Times reports on an extensive Russian spy operation with roots in Brazil; the spies were identified and in some cases apprehended using intelligence gathered from, among other countries, the U.S. and Israel…

Dozens of prominent Jewish philanthropists from the United States, U.K., Australia and Israel sent a letter to Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar decrying a proposed bill that would impose an 80% tax on foreign governments’ donations to Israeli nonprofits, ahead of a Knesset committee hearing on the legislation later this week, eJewishPhilanthropy’s Judah Ari Gross reports…

The Washington Post looks at the efforts by the mother of a U.S. Army soldier who was injured last year while working on the U.S.’ ill-fated humanitarian pier in Gaza and later died from his injuries to find answers to questions surrounding his death…

Israeli Opposition Leader Yair Lapid accused the Israeli government of setting up two shell companies, backed by taxpayer money, to fund the humanitarian aid effort in Gaza; the Prime Minister’s Office denied the claim…

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began operations on Monday, a day after its CEO, Jake Wood, resigned due to what he said was an inability to operate according to the “humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence”; the foundation’s chief operation officer also resigned… 

Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff slammed Hamas’ “disappointing and completely unacceptable” response to a U.S.-proposed ceasefire and hostage-release agreement that would secure the release of 10 of the remaining 21 hostages believed to be alive…

Former Israeli hostage Liri Albag was briefly detained at New York’s JFK International Airport over an outdated system note that still listed Albag as still being in captivity in Gaza… 

Far-right Israelis chanted anti-Arab slurs as tens of thousands marched through the Old City of Jerusalem to celebrate Jerusalem Day…

U.K. authorities said that an incident in which dozens of people in Liverpool were injured after a driver ploughed through a crowd of Liverpool FC supporters was not tied to terrorism…

The Financial Times reviews Uwe Wittstock’s Marseille 1940: The Flight of Literature, about the Emergency Rescue Committee’s formation and efforts to save German Jews, many of whom were writers and intellectuals, at the start of WWII…

Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi’s “Un Simple Accident” won the Palme d’Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival; the film was shot clandestinely inside Iran by Panahi, who was until recently barred from leaving the country…

Filmmaker Michael Roemer, who with his sister was rescued by the Kindertransport during WWII and whose work included “Nothing But a Man” and “The Plot Against Harry,” died at 97…

German-born documentarian Marcel Ophuls, whose film “The Sorrow and the Pity” debunked the myth of a widespread French resistance to the Nazis during WWII, died at 97…

Artist and children’s book author Judith Hope Blau, who made jewelry and other works out of bagels, died at 87…

Writer Leslie Epstein, whose “King of the Jews” received widespread acclaim, died at 87…

“Fauda” actor Idan Amedi, who was seriously injured during reserve duty in Gaza last year, spoke on Saturday evening in conversation with Rabbi Marc Schneier at the Hampton Synagogue in Westhampton Beach, N.Y.

Emmy Award-winning actor, comedian and director, Richard Schiff turns 70…

MONDAY: Public speaker, teacher and author, Richard Lederer turns 87… Journalist and educator, the mother of the late Susan (former CEO of YouTube), Janet (anthropologist and UCSF professor) and Anne (co-founder of 23andMe), Esther Hochman Wojcicki turns 84… Member of the U.S. House of Representatives (D-IL) since 1999, Janice Danoff “Jan” Schakowsky turns 81… Former SVP of News at NPR, after a lengthy career at the New York Daily News, The New York Times and the Associated Press, Michael Oreskes turns 71… Co-founder and CEO of Mobileye which he sold to Intel in 2017, he is also a professor at Hebrew University, Amnon Shashua turns 65… NYC real estate developer, board member of The Charles H. Revson Foundation and a former commissioner on the NYC Planning Commission, Cheryl Cohen Effron… Former brigadier general in the IDF, she has been a member of the Knesset for the Likud since 2009, currently serving as minister of transportation, Miriam “Miri” Regev turns 60… Counsel in the government affairs practice of Paul Hastings, Dina Ellis Rochkind… Photographer, her work has appeared in galleries and been published in books, Naomi Harris turns 52… South Florida entrepreneur, Sholom Zeines… Program officer for media and communications at Maimonides Fund, Rebecca Friedman… Former minor league baseball player, he has become one of the leading agents for NBA players, with five contracts of over $100 million each, Jason Glushon turns 40… Executive editor of Ark Media, she is the author of a book last year on the 1929 origins of the current Israeli-Arab conflict, Yardena Schwartz… CEO and director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, Mark Goldfeder… Co-founder of Stories Abroad Tours, Arielle Gingold… Assistant professor of law at Wayne State University Law School, Benjamin L. Cavataro… Toronto-born Israeli actress and singer, best known as the protagonist of the Israeli television series “Split,” Melissa Amit Farkash turns 36… Strategic partnerships and engagement manager at U.S. Pharmacopeia, Morgan A. Jacobs… Catcher in the Philadelphia Phillies organization, he played for Team Israel in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, Garrett Patrick Stubbs turns 32… Eytan Merkin…

TUESDAY: Retired professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, he is the author of 80 books, Philip Kotler turns 94… Founder of Val d’Or Apparel and Cannon County Knitting Mills, Martin “Marty” Granoff turns 89… CEO of British real estate firm Heron International, he was knighted in 2024, Sir Gerald Ronson turns 86… Senior U.S. district judge for the Central District of California, Christina A. Snyder turns 78… Retired in 2014 as school rabbi and director of Jewish studies at The Rashi School, a K-8 Reform Jewish school in Dedham, Mass., Ellen Weinstein Pildis… Partner in the D.C. office of ArentFox Schiff, he wrote a book about the struggle for Jewish civil rights during the French Revolution, Gerard Leval turns 75… Analytical psychotherapist, author, and Jewish Renewal rabbi, Tirzah Firestone turns 71… Former MLB pitcher (1978-1982) who played for the White Sox and Pirates, he is now a financial advisor at RBC Wealth Management, Ross Baumgarten turns 70… Owner of a 900-acre plant nursery in Kansas, he is a former MLB pitcher (1979-1990) and was an MLB All Star in 1979 and 1982, Mark Clear turns 69… Marriage counselor, therapist and author, Sherry Amatenstein… U.S. ambassador to Argentina during the Biden administration, he served for six years as chairman of the National Jewish Democratic Council, Marc R. Stanley turns 68… Beverly Hills-based immigration attorney, founder and chairman of the Los Angeles Sephardic Jewish Film Festival, Neil J. Sheff… General manager of Phibro Israel and co-founder of LaKita, a non-profit crowd-funding platform for Israeli public schools, Jonathan Bendheim… Workplace and labor reporter at The New York Times, Noam Scheiber… Stage, film and television actor and producer, Ben Feldman turns 45… Director of development at the Livingston, N.J.-based Joseph Kushner Hebrew Academy, Grant Silverstein… “Science of Success” columnist for The Wall Street Journal, Benjamin Zachary Cohen… Director of legislative affairs and policy at General Atomics, Katherina (Katya) Dimenstein… Assistant district attorney for Bronx County, Joshua A. Fitterman… Reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer since 2012, Andrew Seidman… Emily Cohen…