Ben Smith has worn many hats in his journey from young New York City Hall reporter to founder of a media company. But everywhere the veteran journalist goes — from The New York Sun to Politico to BuzzFeed to The New York Times — he has brought a signature scoop-focused intensity. As he prepares to launch his newest venture, Semafor, Smith joined Jewish Insider’s “Limited Liability Podcast” for a discussion on the state of journalism, cutting his teeth in New York’s infamous Room 9 and how he looks to build a new media company.

The House Appropriations subcommittee on homeland security approved a spending bill on Thursday containing $360 million for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program (NSGP), matching the funding level requested by Jewish nonprofits for several years.

The spending bill — with an $85.7 billion topline — is one of 12 appropriations bills before the House of Representatives and increases NSGP funding by $110 million over the 2022 funding level.

Tamara Cofman Wittes, the Biden administration’s nominee to be the assistant administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development for the Middle East, expressed support for the Abraham Accords under questioning on Thursday by Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about past comments critical of the normalization agreements.

Wittes testified on Thursday at a confirmation hearing alongside Michael Ratney, formerly the chargé d’affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Israel, who has been nominated to be the ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

CORINTHIA, Greece – As a child, Leon Avigad was sure he would be one of two things when he grew up: a spy or a hotelier. While a life undercover still hasn’t panned out, Avigad has fulfilled his other dream as a co-owner of Brown Hotels, one of Israel’s fastest-growing hotel groups.

Together with partners Nitzan Perry (his husband) and Israeli businessman Nir Waizman, Avigad appears to have hit on a winning formula: purchasing old, forgotten buildings in down-and-out locations and reimagining them as fun and funky travel destinations aimed at entertaining and pampering.

A classified briefing on Wednesday between Biden administration officials and members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee left many legislators pessimistic about the state of talks, which have been stalled for several months.

Committee Chair Bob Menendez (D-NJ), who has grown increasingly blunt in recent weeks in his calls for the administration to end the talks, said that he does not feel that the administration is coming around to his point of view, and called the administration’s efforts to address his concerns “a work in progress.”

A United Nations briefing on antisemitism became politically charged on Wednesday when a Palestinian representative to the world body criticized the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism for conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism.

Palestinian Deputy Permanent Representative to the U.N. Feda Abdelhady Nasser’s remarks occurred at the end of a three-hour U.N. Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) briefing on antisemitism, which featured a new proposal to tackle European antisemitism from the European Union’s coordinator on combating antisemitism, Katharina Von Schnurbein.

Legislation seeking to disband the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry investigating Israel has gained support in recent weeks, amassing 34 cosponsors since its introduction this spring.

The COI Elimination Act was introduced by Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL) in late March. It would designate that it is U.S. policy to “seek the abolition” of the COI and “combat systemic anti-Israel bias at the United Nations Human Rights Council and other international fora.”

Mick McGuire, a Republican Senate candidate in Arizona, said he does “not support” a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, arguing that Palestinian leadership “has repeatedly negotiated in bad faith” and “affirmed” its “commitment to the destruction of Israel.”

“I do not believe the Palestinian National Authority wants such a solution,” McGuire wrote in a questionnaire solicited by Jewish Insider. “There can be no two-state solution when one state remains committed to conflict.”