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Speaking to Israel’s Knesset, Kevin McCarthy demurs on judicial overhaul and warns against China
(JTA) — In a landmark speech to Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, on Monday, U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy didn’t mention the judicial reform legislation dividing Israel, instead focusing on what he said was the significant threat from business dealings with China.
McCarthy’s speech and comments took place on the opening day of the Knesset’s summer session, days after the country celebrated its 75th birthday and during considerable strife in the country over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-reaching proposals to weaken Israel’s court system. Netanyahu had suspended the advance of the reforms amid sweeping protests against them, in a pause that was due to end on Monday.
During a press conference after his speech, McCarthy offered a nod toward critics of the proposed legislation who seek to preserve the courts’ independence.
“Israel is their own nation. Israel can decide what they want to do,” McCarthy said. “But I mean, having democracy — you want to have a check and balance, you want to have separation of powers.”
The speech by McCarthy, a Republican, came as he leads a bipartisan delegation to the country days after it celebrated its 75th Independence Day. It also came amid tensions between Netanyahu and Biden, a Democrat, who has not yet invited Netanyahu to the White House.
In an interview with the Israeli newspaper Israel Hayom ahead of the speech, McCarthy chastised Biden for not inviting Netanyahu and said he would invite the prime minister to Washington if Biden did not.
But McCarthy was not at all partisan during his speech or afterwards, pointedly bringing the delegation of Democrats and Republicans into every photo-op. McCarthy spent more time discussing Chinese-Israeli relations, bringing tensions between Israel and the United States on the issue into public view.
“I strongly encourage Israel to further strengthen its oversight of foreign investment, particularly Chinese investment, building on the steps that you first took in 2019,” McCarthy said in his speech Monday, referring to an investment review board Israel launched that year under pressure from the Trump administration. “If we cooperate, then I’m confident we will meet the challenge and ensure a brighter future for both of our nations.”
McCarthy’s speech, the second ever by a U.S. House speaker to the Knesset, contained few surprises. He noted that Israeli pilots trained in his hometown of Bakersfield, California, before the country’s 1948 War of Independence. And he presented the Knesset with a copy of a House resolution passed overwhelmingly last week marking Israel’s 75th birthday. References to the establishment of a Palestinian state, which Netanyahu’s government opposes, were stripped out of the resolution, spurring criticism from Democrats who nonetheless voted for it.
The speaker also recommitted to fully funding current levels of defense assistance to Israel, assuaging concerns that across-the-board spending cuts passed by the House last week could affect the country.
“As long as I am speaker, America will continue to support full funding for security assistance in Israel,” he said.
And McCarthy also rejected attempts to isolate or boycott Israel, promoted peace with Israel’s Arab neighbors and called out shared rivals and enemies, especially Iran.
“We must always remain resolute in our commitment that Iran will never acquire a nuclear weapon,” McCarthy said.
Netanyahu, speaking before McCarthy, also noted the Iran threat and took care to say it was a concern shared by both Republicans and Democrats.
“The first and most urgent challenge is the joint effort by Israel and the U.S. to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons,” he said. Then, referring to the Israel Defense Forces, he added, “The IDF and the U.S. Armed Forces recently completed the largest military exercise in the history of Israel and for this I would like to thank the Biden administration.”
Another issue of bipartisan concern is Israel’s growing relationship to China. McCarthy inserted his warning about Israeli-Chinese ties into the portion of his speech praising U.S.-Israel technological cooperation, an endeavor that Israel considers critical to its security infrastructure.
Israel and Netanyahu particularly have cultivated ties with China and its massive market to advance sales of Israeli technology, and to invite Chinese investment in Israeli sectors. Netanyahu has in the past highlighted his efforts to bring China and Israel into each other’s orbit.
Those efforts have appalled leaders of both parties. One of the areas of consistency between the Trump and Biden administration has been a policy of constraining Chinese influence outside of Asia, as the country seeks inroads into Africa, the Middle East and Latin America. China concerns have been exacerbated in the United States in recent months by perceptions that China is cozying up to Russia in its war against Ukraine, and fears that China may be planning a similar action against Taiwan.
“We’ve seen successes of technological cooperation in so many areas,” McCarthy said. “Today, however, our innovation is at risk from a new threat: The Chinese Communist Party. While the CCP may disguise itself as promoters of innovation, in truth they act like thieves. We must not allow them to steal our technology.”
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University of Sydney Suspends Staff Member After Viral Video Shows Verbal Assault on Jewish Students During Sukkot
University of Sydney staff member verbally assaulting Jewish students during a Sukkot celebration on campus. Photo: Screenshot
The University of Sydney has suspended a staff member after a viral video showed her verbally assaulting Jewish students and teachers during an on-campus holiday celebration, sparking public outrage over one of Australia’s latest antisemitic incidents.
In a video widely circulated on social media, a university staff member — reportedly of Palestinian Arab background — is seen approaching a group of Jewish students and teachers during a campus holiday celebration, shouting antisemitic insults at them.
The incident has sparked public condemnation and renewed calls for stronger action against rising antisemitism on college campuses, as the local Jewish community faces an increasingly hostile climate and a surge in targeted attacks across the country.
During a Sukkot celebration organized by the Australian Union of Jewish Students (AUJS) on campus, attendees — including students, teachers, and the university’s rabbi — were approached by a woman who asked them, “Are you Zionists?” while they gathered to participate in the annual Jewish festival.
“A Zionist is the lowest form of rubbish. Zionists are the most disgusting thing that has ever walked this earth,” the university staff member can be heard saying.
She then identifies as an “Indigenous Palestinian” and continues hurling antisemitic insults at the group, calling them “child killers.”
“You are a filthy Zionist,” she said. “You colonized us.”
This appalling video shows a Jewish academic and Jewish students at the University of Sydney being harassed by someone apparently of palestinian Arab extraction. The students were celebrating a Sukkot event organized by @AUJS, and there were no Israeli flags nor even hostage… pic.twitter.com/u7LJ2OxUCZ
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David Lange (@Israellycool) October 9, 2025
University security personnel tried to intervene as the incident escalated, but the staff member refused to leave and continued filming the group.
The woman is then seen in the video pointing at the group and shouting to a security officer: “Look at this rubbish, look at these parasites.”
University of Sydney Vice-Chancellor Mark Scott announced that the staff member had been suspended pending further investigation and offered a personal apology to the affected Jewish students and staff.
“We’re disturbed and appalled by the vision that depicts verbal abuse and harassment on campus,” Scott said in a statement. “Such conduct is utterly unacceptable, and we are taking immediate action under our codes of conduct, including suspending a staff member involved pending further assessment.”
“Hate speech, antisemitism, and verbal harassment have no place on campus, online, or in our wider community,” he continued. “We deeply apologize to any staff, students, or visitors who are distressed or impacted by this incident in any way.”
University officials referred the incident to New South Wales Police, who have opened an investigation into the matter.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) strongly condemned the incident, calling for swift action and prompt intervention by the authorities.
“This is the real face of antisemitism in Australia today. It hides behind an anti-Zionist mask,” the statement read. “This woman aimed to intimidate, threaten, offend, and humiliate a group of Jewish students just because they were Jewish.”
Antisemitism spiked to record levels in Australia — especially in Sydney and Melbourne, which are home to some 85 percent of the country’s Jewish population — following the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
According to a report from ECAJ, the country’s Jewish community experienced over 2,000 antisemitic incidents between October 2023 and September 2024, a significant increase from 495 in the prior 12 months.
The number of antisemitic physical assaults in Australia rose from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024. The level of antisemitism for the past year was six times the average of the preceding 10 years.
Since the Oct. 7 atrocities, the local Jewish community has faced a wave of targeted attacks, with several Jewish sites across Australia subjected to vandalism and even arson amid an increasingly hostile climate.
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Catholic University of America Confiscates Oct. 7 Memorial, Citing Flag Policy Infraction
Israeli flags bagged up after being confiscated by Catholic University of America staff. Photo: Provided by Students Supporting Israel (SSI)
The Catholic University of America allegedly used its bureaucracy to suppress Jewish grieving and commemoration of the children, women, and men whom Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered during the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre in southern Israel by canceling a memorial display approved in August, The Algemeiner has learned.
According to the school’s Students Supporting Israel (SSI) chapter, which faced a series of obstacles just after being established, university officials cited an arcane policy which proscribes flying the flag of any foreign nation, except for that of the Vatican, on campus. However, SSI maintains that it was selectively applied to Jews with malice, citing that anti-Israel organizations have flown the Palestinian flag on campus numerous times, with and without official permission, as have many other organizations.
The Algemeiner requested photographic evidence of SSI’s claims of selective enforcement, to which the group responded by sending several pictures showing dozens of foreign flags flying on the campus, including those representing the nations of Brazil, France, and Ukraine. The group added that after canceling SSI’s memorial for the second anniversary of the Oct. 7 atrocities, university staff marched toward the event spaces and dismantled everything SSI had set up and topped off the act by stuffing Israeli flags into a plastic bag and leaving it on a chair.
“Two years after the deadliest day for Jews since the end of the Holocaust, Catholic University’s administration removed a memorial for the victims of the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre,” the group said in a statement shared exclusively with The Algemeiner. “Unfortunately, this isn’t an isolated event by the administration. It is the culmination of a clear pattern of censorship of antisemitic incidents. By removing a peaceful display for murdered Israelis, the administration sent a chilling message that makes pro-Israel students feel unwelcome on their own college campus.”
Responding to The Algemeiner‘s inquiry regarding the alleged incident, The Catholic University of America apologized for enforcing the flag policy on a day of meaning to its Jewish students. It did formally comment on cases in which the other groups violated it.
“Catholic University acknowledges the deep disappointment of the student organization ‘Students Supporting Israel’ who found their memorial removed the morning of Oct. 7. The memorial was removed because it violated our flags policy, which states that the only flags authorized to be displayed in spaces on campus accessible to the public at large are the flag of the United States of America, the flag of the Vatican City, and the flag of Washington, DC,” a university spokesperson said. “That said, the university regrets that the enforcement of the policy coincided with a deeply significant day of remembrance for those affected by the horrific Oct. 7 terrorist attack just two years ago.”
Foreign flags displayed in common space at The Catholic University of America.
It continued, “The enforcement of the flag policy on Oct. 7 is not a reflection in any way of the university’s views on and support of Israel. Following the terrorist attack waged against Israel, Catholic University President Peter Kilpatrick wrote to the campus community in which he strongly condemned the violence waged by Hamas and expressed sadness over the killing, kidnapping, and maiming of so many innocent people. He also addressed the rise in antisemitism, and violence against Muslim or Arabic students on other college campuses, and stated Catholic University’s zero tolerance for hate.”
US college campuses saw an alarming spike in antisemitic incidents — including demonstrations calling for Israel’s destruction and the intimidation and harassment of Jewish students — after the Hamas terrorist group’s Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel. In a two-month span following the atrocities, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) recorded 470 antisemitic incidents on college campuses alone. During that same period, antisemitic incidents across the US skyrocketed by 323 percent compared to the prior year.
To this day, Jewish students report feeling unsafe on the campus. According to a new survey conducted by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS), the vast majority of Jewish students around the world resort to hiding their Jewishness and support for Israel on university campuses to avoid becoming victims of antisemitism.
A striking 78 percent of Jewish students have opted to “conceal” their religious affiliation “at least once” over the past year, the study found, with Jewish women being more likely than men to do so. Meanwhile, 81 percent of those surveyed hid their support for Zionism, a movement which promotes Jewish self-determination and the existence of the State of Israel, at least once over the past year.
Among all students, Orthodox Jews reported the highest rates of “different treatment,” with 41 percent saying that their peers employ alternative social norms in dealing with them.
“This survey exposes a devastating reality: Jewish students across the globe are being forced to hide fundamental aspects of their identity just to feel safe on campus,” ADL senior vice president of international affairs Marina Rosenberg said in a statement. “When over three-quarters of Jewish students feel they must conceal their religious and Zionist identity for their own safety, the situation is nothing short of dire. As the academic year begins, the data provides essential insights to guide university leadership in addressing this campus crisis head on.”
The survey said additionally that 34 percent of Jewish students reported knowing a Jewish peer whom someone “physically threatened on campus,” while 29 percent reported difficulties in attaining religious accommodations from their professors, confirming months of reports that Jewish students face both social and institutional discrimination at universities.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Jewish man attacked in Montana by self-proclaimed Nazi on Oct. 7
A Jewish man in Missoula, Montana, was assaulted on Oct. 7 by a self-proclaimed “Nazi,” according to the Missoula Police Department.
On Tuesday, the suspect, Michael Cain, 29, got into an argument with the victim who had a visible tattoo of the Star of David on his forearm. Cain asked the victim about his tattoo and allegedly identified himself as a believer in the teachings of the Nazi party.
When the victim, who told Cain he was Jewish, then asked Cain to show him any Nazi-related tattoos on his body, Cain allegedly kicked and punched the victim, who was seated on the ground.
Missoula police then responded to the Poverello Center, a local homeless shelter where the assault took place, and later apprehended Cain who had fled the scene.
While en route to the local detention center, Cain disclosed to the arresting officer that he was a member of the “4th Reich” and said that while he did not attack the victim because of his Jewish identity, he would have if he had been more adamant about his beliefs, according to court documents obtained by local news outlet KGVO.
Cain was charged with felony malicious intimidation or harassment relating to civil or human rights and his bond was set at $50,000. Missoula police did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Montana is home to just under 1,500 Jews out of a general population of over 1.1 million. In 2023, the Anti-Defamation League recorded just 21 antisemitic incidents in the state.
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