The Trump administration’s pick for deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East brings a record on Iran, the Houthis and the region that is alarming pro-Israel conservatives, having described Iran’s missile attack on Israel as “fairly moderate” and urged the U.S. against bombing the Houthis, instead calling for American pressure on Israel.

Michael DiMino, who was a military analyst at the CIA and an official at the Defense Department during the first Trump administration, has been a fellow at Defense Priorities, a Koch-funded isolationist think tank founded by allies of libertarian Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY). He has called for a reduced U.S. presence in the Middle East and argued that the U.S. does not have any critical interests in the region.

Columbia University students learning about the history of Israel found their first day of class thrown into chaos Tuesday after four masked demonstrators barged into the classroom, banged on drums, chanted “free Palestine” and distributed posters to students that read “CRUSH ZIONISM” with a boot over the Star of David.  

The masked demonstrators also held up, and tried to plaster the walls of the classroom, a sign featuring an illustration of Hamas terrorists pointing guns titled “THE ENEMY WILL NOT SEE TOMORROW.”

“They started throwing fliers at us all and talking about how terrible it is that this class is even happening and that we have an Israeli professor,” Lishi Baker, a junior studying Middle East history and a student in the History of Modern Israel course, told Jewish Insider. Baker praised the professor, Avi Shilon, a visiting professor from Israel, for responding “calmly.” 

A stabbing attack in Tel Aviv in which four people were wounded on Tuesday night was carried out by a man carrying an American green card, according to documents publicized by a Kann news reporter that were said to have been found on his body after he was shot and killed.

The U.S. permanent resident card belonged to  Abdelaziz Kaddi, a 29-year-old born in Morocco, and indicates his residency in the U.S. started in September 2022. An Israeli tourist visa indicating that he entered the country on Jan. 18 was also reportedly located on the attacker’s body. 

Israeli President Isaac Herzog will travel to the United States in the coming days, where he is slated to speak at the United Nations’ memorial service for International Holocaust Remembrance Day next Monday, his office confirmed.

Herzog — currently in Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum — will return to Israel before heading to New York City. 

Israeli President Isaac Herzog, long a supporter of a two-state solution, described the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks as a “wake-up call” for his outlook on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, telling attendees at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday that his view of peace in the Middle East had shifted. 

He described a bleaker view than he has previously espoused about Israel’s Palestinian neighbors, shaped irrevocably by the trauma of the terror attacks that killed more than 1,200 people. While he acknowledged “there must be a political move forward on the Palestinian front,” he did not commit to a Palestinian state as the end point of that process. 

Harvard University has agreed to implement the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism as part of a resolution to two Title VI lawsuits that it settled in federal court in Boston.

One of the lawsuits, filed in May by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Jewish Americans for Fairness in Education, alleged that since the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in Israel, students and faculty on campus have called for violence against Jews and celebrated Hamas’ terrorism as the university ignored harassment — including a physical assault — of Jewish students. 

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Herzi Halevi announced his resignation, effective March 6, citing his “responsibility for the failure of the IDF on October 7” in a letter tendered to Defense Minister Israel Katz on Tuesday.

Halevi’s resignation came at a time of increased political pressure from the governing coalition for him to leave his position.

Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and John Fetterman (D-PA) will reintroduce their bill requiring universities to make students aware of their right to file Title VI complaints if they experience discrimination or harassment on campus, Jewish Insider has learned.

The Protecting Students on Campus Act, to be reintroduced on Tuesday morning, would require the Department of Education to have a prominently displayed link on its homepage to the Office for Civil Rights’ webpage where individuals can directly submit civil rights complaints. The OCR, a part of the DOE, is legally obligated to respond to complaints of discrimination based on national origin under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.