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Sicily’s Jews have their first rabbi in 500 years. Italy’s Jewish establishment won’t accept them.
CATANIA, Italy (JTA) — Rabbi Gilberto Ventura believes his synagogue has the most beautiful view in the world. Located in the tower of a century-old castle on the slopes of Mt. Etna in the eastern Sicilian city of Catania, the synagogue is wedged between a snow-capped volcano and the sun-kissed Mediterranean sea.
The 49-year-old Brazil-born rabbi also thinks his congregation is one of the most unique in the world. It’s made up mainly of Bnei Anusim — descendants of Jews forced to hide their religious practice and convert to Catholicism after the Spanish Inquisition of 1492. Before that infamous decree, Sicily was home to tens of thousands of Jews.
The synagogue, which was first inaugurated last fall, is the result of decades of grassroots efforts by those descendants in Catania to find each other and forge a sense of community that had been lacking for centuries.
Hiring a full-time rabbi was the last piece of the puzzle, and Ventura, who has a long history of working with communities of Bnei Anusim in Brazil, was a natural candidate. He arrived in Catania in January.
“I really believe that the future Judaism in the world, especially in some places like Italy and, of course, Brazil, is connected to the Bnei Anusim, and the need to embrace the Bnei Anusim,” Ventura said.
But in an ongoing point of frustration, the formal organization representing Italian Jewry, the Union of Italian Jewish Communities (UCEI), does not recognize them as Jews.
“In the case of Catania, this strange Jewish community hasn’t passed all the steps the law requires,” said Giulio Di Segni, the vice president of UCEI.
He was referring to the fact that the community did not seek UCEI’s permission before establishing themselves under the name “Jewish community of Catania.” Per Italian law, UCEI has a monopoly on acknowledging and establishing Jewish communal life in Italy — including authority over who can use the term “Jewish community of” in formal ways.
“UCEI can’t accept this because it is too easy,” he added. “We are not against their synagogue or their way of prayer, but they cannot use the name ‘Jewish community of Catania.’”
The rooftop of the Castello Leucatia, where the community meets, has a large menorah and a view of the Mediterranean. (David I. Klein)
Catania’s Jewish community members told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency a variety of stories about their Jewish backgrounds. Some came from families that always outwardly identified as Jewish. Others identified the source of family traditions practiced by parents and grandparents who — as descendants of Jews who faced persecution for practicing Judaism — still felt the need to hide aspects of their Jewishness from the public eye.
In the midst of questions about their ancestry, the majority of the Jewish community members have undergone Orthodox conversions. But that hasn’t led to their acceptance.
Benito Triolo, president of the Catania Jewish community, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that he first came to Judaism at the age of 40, thanks to the insight of a Jewish friend in Palermo, Sicily’s capital and most populous city. Working together, they established a Charter of Sicilian Jewry, which aimed to identify and highlight the Jewish heritage of neighborhoods across the island.
While working on that project, Triolo came closer to his own Jewish heritage, and after years of study, he completed an Orthodox conversion through a rabbi in Miami 25 years ago.
Another community member, who was born Alessandro Scuderi but today goes by the name of Yoram Nathan, first felt drawn to Judaism as a child watching news of the Six-Day War in 1967. At first, he was laughed at by other members of his family — except his grandmother, who happened to have a tradition of lighting eight candles in early winter and baking flat unleavened bread around Easter time.
Decades of study later, Scuderi also completed a formal conversion to Judaism before an Orthodox rabbinic court, or beit din.
Others had more straightforward backgrounds.
“I was born in a Jewish family,” said David Scibilia, the community’s secretary. “Frankly speaking, we were not hiding or deep in the shadows in this part of the country.”
Scibilia said that his father explained to him that he was a Jew as early as the age of four. Within their own home, they observed holidays and kept Shabbat — no easy task since Italian schools at the time of his childhood in the 1970s had class on Saturdays. He did not eat meat until he was an adult and was able to acquire kosher meat.
He said that his family had maintained their Jewish identity since the days of the Inquisition and married amongst a small group of other similar families.
“I was a Jew, but not part of any community,” Scibilia said. “Just my family was my community.”
An aerial view of the city of Catania shows the Mt. Etna volcano in the background, Jan. 28, 28, 2022. (Fabrizio Villa/Getty Images)
Scibilia explained that once he had a child of his own, he realized he did not want her to have the same lonely Jewish experience. But when he reached out to UCEI, he said he found the proverbial door to organized Jewish life shut. Earning membership in Jewish community organizations across Western Europe involves a strict vetting process, and many groups require applicants to prove their mothers’ Jewishness according to varying standards.
Scibilia’s experience was echoed by Jews outside of the community in Catania and across Italy’s south who talked to JTA — a feeling of neglect or rejection by UCEI for those who fall outside of the norms of Italian Judaism.
UCEI currently recognizes 19 Jewish communities across northern Italy and just one in the south, in Naples, which has jurisdiction over the rest of the southern half of the peninsula and the island of Sicily. The organization recognizes around 28,000 Jews in total across the country.
Scibilia noted that despite his Jewish upbringing, he has multiple certificates of conversion from Orthodox rabbis. The first came from a beit din of American rabbis from who traveled to Syracuse, Sicily, to assess Scibilia and others like him in Sicily. His second comes from the conversion court of the Israeli Chief Rabbinate, which is known for its exacting Orthodox standards.
Both were rejected by Italy’s own Orthodox rabbinate, and he was forced to stand before another rabbinic court in Italy.
“I have at this moment — don’t start to laugh — three documents that prove that I am a Jew, two Ketubah [marriage contracts] for my wedding, and so on, again and again and again,” Scibilia said.
Others’ experiences in the region have been even more fraught, he said.
“The problem in Italy, that if you try to study with any rabbi here, you can study for 20 years, maybe you can die even before you reach the end of the tunnel,” he said. “From my point of view, they are playing with the spirituality of these people.”
In a statement last year, UCEI called the the Catanians “a phantom ‘Jewish community’” and accused them of “misleading the local institutions and deluding believers and sympathizers into adhering to traditional religious rites, never actually recognized or authorized by the Italian rabbinical authority.”
“Between UCEI and the Italian republic is an agreement signed in ‘87,” Di Segni said. “This law means everything about Jewish communities in Italy is through the Union Jewish community in Italy (UCEI).”
Noemi Di Segni, shown in Rome in 2017, is president of the Union of Jewish Communities in Italy. (Stefano Montesi/Corbis via Getty Images)
Triolo said he isn’t too concerned about UCEI’s recognition.
“Ours is a process of refounding old communities that existed as early as 200 and up to 1492,” Triolo said. “Our recognition is already in our history. At that time the UCEI did not exist. We were there and we simply returned!”
No one knows when Jews first arrived in Sicily, but the Talmud tells a story that claims Rabbi Akiva, a well-known early rabbinic sage, visited the island in the early second century and told of a small Jewish community in Syracuse. Some historians believe the Roman writer Caecilius Calactinus — who was born in a town near Messina in the first century B.C.E — to have been of Jewish origin.
All agree that over the course of history, Sicily’s Jews watched as the island was traded between Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, Arabs, Normans and half a dozen other empires. The narrative has also long been that Jewish life there ended five centuries ago, under Spanish rule.
The Spanish empire’s Jews suffered the same fate as Jews from the Iberian peninsula, who would become known to the world as Sephardim when they were expelled in 1492.
The descendents of Spain — and Sicily — spread throughout the world, establishing communities in North Africa, throughout the Ottoman empire, in the Netherlands and ultimately the British Isles and North America, as it was believed that Judaism faded away in their homelands.
Catania’s Jews disagree, arguing that many Jews practiced their religion over the centuries, in secret.
Triolo and others in the community formally inaugurated their synagogue in October. It was furnished with Torah scrolls donated by the Ohev Sholom synagogue in Washington, D.C.
The synagogue is situated in the tower of the Castello Luecatia, an early 20th-century structure built by a merchant believed to be of Jewish origin. The building was granted to the community by the city’s municipality.
“So they had the people, they had a synagogue, but they needed somebody to teach,” Ventura said.
The community meets in the Castello Luecatia, an early 20th-century structure built by a merchant believed to be of Jewish origin. (David I. Klein)
Ventura, who is Orthodox, may be the island’s first permanent working rabbi in over 500 years, but it’s not his first time working with Bnei Anusim.
Back in his native Brazil, Ventura was the leader of the Synagogue Without Borders, an organization through which he served 15 communities in Brazil’s north that were made up of descendants of Jews who came with the first Portuguese colonists to South America and who ultimately had to hide their identity as the Inquisition spread to the New World.
His work there put him in conflict with Brazil’s Jewish establishment, too. But Ventura is unfazed.
In Brazil, he founded synagogues and summer camps and built mikvahs and yeshivas across the country’s north. Since 2015, he has facilitated the conversion of hundreds of Bnei Anusim, bringing them back into the fold of mainstream Orthodox Judaism.
“I am a teacher since I was 21 years old,” he said. “Now I am 49, along with my wife. It’s one of the things we love to do, and know how to do. To teach Jewish philosophy, to teach Torah, to teach Tanakh, to teach the story of the Jews in Brazil, and now we are starting to teach the story of the Jews in Italy, the story of the Inquisition etcetera.”
In Castello Leucatia, he leads Shabbat services with the energy of a gospel preacher, pausing between prayers to explain a verse, teach a new tune, welcome latecomers, or simply to allow the congregation to talk.
Catania community members are shown at a recent gathering. (David I. Klein)
“This is what’s most important,” he remarked during one such lull on a recent Friday night. “That they get to talk and be a community.”
Ventura had organized a Shabbat event for other Jews across Italy — from Naples to Turin — who shared his belief that the future of Judaism was in communities like the one in Catania.
“Our point of view of Judaism is that we have to be a part of society, we don’t have to insulate ourselves, we believe that Judaism has a lot to contribute to society,” Ventura said. “In Brazil, we have a lot of connections with people from the periphery, in the favela and other communities, immigrants, Indians, etcetera. So that is something we want to establish here, to teach the people a Judaism that brings good things to the wider society.”
Ventura isn’t the only one working with such communities in southern Italy. Across the Strait of Messina, Jewish life has also been on the rise in Calabria — the toe of Italy’s boot — thanks to an American-born rabbi named Barbara Aiello.
Aiello, though raised in Pittsburgh, is of Calabrian descent. She returned to the land of her ancestors in the early 2000s and began working with the Bnei Anusim there, ultimately establishing a synagogue called Ner Tamid del Sud, meaning “eternal light of the south.”
“Until now, nobody took care of Judaism in the south of Italy,” Scibilia said while looking out at the Mediterranean from the terrace of Castello Leucatia.
—
The post Sicily’s Jews have their first rabbi in 500 years. Italy’s Jewish establishment won’t accept them. appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Even Adam and Eve weren’t satisfied
האָסטו אַמאָל געטראַכט: „ווען איך וואָלט נאָר געהאַט דאָס אָדער יענץ, אָדער ווען מײַן מצבֿ וואָלט נאָר געווען אַנדערש, וואָלט איך געווען גליקלעך…“?
עס איז זייער אַנטמוטיקנדיק צו גלייבן אַז עס פֿעלט אונדז דאָס וואָס מיר דאַרפֿן כּדי צו דערגרייכן אונדזערע צילן און צו זײַן גליקלעך. און נאָך מער: ווען מען קומט צו אַזאַ מסקנה, פֿילט מען זיך ווי אַ קרבן פֿון די אומשטענדן, אוממעכטיק צו בײַטן די מציאות צום גוטן.
אָבער איז עס טאַקע אַזוי?
אין טיפֿן איז דאָס אַ פֿאַלשער חשבון. פֿרייד איז ניט אָפּהענגיק פֿון דעם וואָס מיר האָבן אָדער האָבן ניט, נאָר פֿון דעם ווי מיר קוקן אויף וואָס מיר האָבן און אויף וואָס עס פֿעלט אונדז.
אין דער וואָכעדיקער סדרה, בראשית, לייענען מיר וועגן בריאת־העולם און איר שפּיץ — די באַשאַפֿונג פֿון אָדם און חוה.
וואָס קען זײַן אַ בעסערער בײַשפּיל, אַז גליק איז ניט אָפּהענגיק פֿון אויסערלעכע אומשטענדן, ווי אָדם און חוה אין גן־עדן?
האָט זיי עפּעס געפֿעלט? ניין.
און דאָך האָבן זיי אַליין באַוויזן צו פֿאַרפּלאָנטערן דעם מצבֿ.
עס איז געווען בלויז איין בוים, פֿון וועמענס פֿרוכטן ג־ט האָט זיי פֿאַרווערט צו עסן, און זיי האָבן זיך ניט געקענט אײַנהאַלטן פֿון עסן דווקא פֿון יענעם בוים!
און נאָך מער: לויט דעם תּנא רבי מאיר איז דער בוים געווען אַ ווײַנשטאָק. זיי האָבן זיך געדאַרפֿט אָפּהאַלטן פֿון זײַנע פֿרוכטן בלויז עטלעכע שעה, ביז שבת וואָלט זיך אָנגעהויבן; דאַן וואָלטן זיי געקענט מאַכן קידוש אויפֿן ווײַן און אַזוי אײַנפֿירן אַן אייביקן שבת.
פֿאַר וואָס האָבן זיי ניט געקענט זיך אײַנהאַלטן?
עס איז אַ טייל פֿון אונדזער נאַטור צו וועלן דווקא דאָס וואָס מיר קענען ניט האָבן, און ניט אָפּצושאַצן ווי געהעריג דאָס וואָס מיר האָבן יאָ.
עס קלינגט כּמעט אומגלייבלעך — כאָטש דאָס געשעט צו אָפֿט — אָבער ווען ג־ט קומט צו אָדם און פֿאָדערט בײַ אים אַן ענטפֿער פֿאַר וואָס ער האָט געגעסן פֿון בוים, באַשולדיקט ער „די פֿרוי וואָס דו האָסט מיר געגעבן צו זײַן מיט מיר“, ווײַל זי האָט אים געגעבן צו עסן פֿון בוים.
וואָס פֿאַר אַן אומדאַנקבאַרקייט!
ג־ט האָט אים געגעבן אַ פֿרוי, ווײַל ער האָט געזען ווי שטאַרק אָדם לײַדט פֿון זײַן איינזאַמקייט. און אַנשטאָט אָפּצושאַצן דעם אוצר וואָס ער האָט באַקומען, קריטיקירט ער זי און באַשולדיקט זי.
אין אַ בריוו צו איינעם וואָס פֿלעגט זיך אָפֿט באַקלאָגן וועגן זײַן לעבן, שרײַבט דער ליובאַוויטשער רבי — זכותו יגן עלינו:
„אין דער וועלט אין וועלכער מיר לעבן, געפֿינט זיך אין אַלע זאַכן אַ געמיש פֿון גוטס און שלעכטס. דער מענטש דאַרף אויסקלײַבן אויף וועלכן פֿון די צוויי צדדים ער וויל לייגן דעם טראָפּ, אויף וועלכן ער וויל טראַכטן, און וועלכן ער וויל נאָכגיין…
„ווי באַלערנדיק איז דאָס וואָס אונדזערע חכמים זאָגן וועגן דעם וואָס אָדם איז געווען אַן אומדאַנקבאַרער: נאָך איידער ער איז פֿאַרטריבן געוואָרן פֿון גן־עדן — ווען ער האָט זיך נאָך געפֿונען אין אַ ממשותדיקן גן־עדן — האָט ער זיך שוין באַקלאָגט וועגן זײַן מצבֿ.
„פֿון דער אַנדערער זײַט זענען געווען ייִדן, מענער און פֿרויען, וואָס האָבן געדאַנקט און געבענטשט דעם באַשעפֿער, און געזאָגט די ברכות השחר יעדן אינדערפֿרי, בשעת זיי האָבן געלעבט אונטער די שרעקלעכסטע באַדינגונגען אין די דײַטשישע קאָנצענטראַציע־לאַגערן.
„אין דער ווירקלעכקייט וועט דער מצבֿ פֿון יעדן מענטש זיך געפֿינען ערגעץ צווישן די צוויי עקסטרעמען.
„מײַן כּוונה איז ניט אײַך צו מוסרן, נאָר אונטערצושטרײַכן אַ מציאות: וואָס פֿאַר אַ לעבן מיר לעבן — אַ לעבן פֿול מיט צופֿרידנקייט און באַדײַט, אָדער פֿאַרקערט — איז אין אַ גרויסער מאָס אָפּהענגיק פֿון אונדזער ווילנסקראַפֿט, וואָס באַשטימט צי מיר וועלן לייגן דעם טראָפּ אויף דעם פּאָזיטיוון אָדער אויף דעם נעגאַטיוון.“
מיר זײַנען מסוגל זיך צו באַקלאָגן אויף די באַדינגונגען אין גן־עדן און צו פֿילן הכּרת־הטובֿ, דאַנקשאַפֿט, אַפֿילו אין די אוממענטשלעכסטע באַדינגונגען פֿון אַ קאָנצענטראַציע־לאַגער.
איינער פֿון די פּערזענלעכע געהילפֿן בײַם רבין, הרבֿ בערל ע״ה יוניק, האָט דערציילט, אַז דער רבי האָט אים אַמאָל פּריוואַט געזאָגט:
„איך האָב געאַרבעט אויף זיך צו זען שטענדיק די זאַכן אין אַ פּאָזיטיוון ליכט; ווען ניט, וואָלט איך ניט געקענט איבערלעבן.“
ווען מען ווייסט וויפֿל פּערזענלעכע ליידן פֿון פֿאַרשידענע מינים דער רבי האָט אַליין דורכגעמאַכט, אין צוגאָב צו דעם ווייטיק פֿון די המונים מענטשן וואָס האָבן מיט אים געטיילט זייערע פּערזענלעכע צרות, קען מען פֿאַרשטיין, אַז אַזאַ בליק אויפֿן לעבן איז גאָר ניט קיין קליינע דערגרייכונג.
דערפֿאַר איז די „ווערקצײַג“ פֿון דער וואָך צו טראַכטן וועגן די פֿאָלגנדיקע פֿראַגעס:
זענען די אומשטענדן פֿון דײַן לעבן גוט אָדער שלעכט אומאָפּהענגיק פֿון דעם ווי דו קוקסט אויף זיי — אָדער ווערן זיי פֿאַר דיר גוט אָדער שלעכט דווקא צוליב דעם ווי דו קוקסט אויף זיי?
ס׳איז דאָ אַ וואָרט וואָס מען האָט געהערט אין נאָמען פֿון דעם דריטן חב״ד רבי, דעם צמח צדק זצ״ל: „אַזוי ווי מען שטעלט זיך אַוועק שבת בראשית, אַזוי גייט אַוועק אויף דעם גאַנצן יאָר“. דריק איך אויס די האָפֿענונג אַז מיר זאָלן אין דעם אַלע מצליח זײַן און האָבן אַ גוט געבענטשט יאָר.
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ADL makes a play for the arts with new reports suggesting anti-Jewish bias in culture spaces
(JTA) — The Anti-Defamation League is alleging “systemic exclusion of Jewish and Israeli artists” in a trio of reports released Thursday focusing on the publishing, museums and entertainment spaces.
The reports, which the ADL calls its “State of the Arts” initiative, were shared with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in advance of their publication and come as Jews have expressed alarm about their treatment in a post-Oct. 7 cultural landscape. They include:
- Grades for 40 museums on Jewish and Israeli representation that the ADL says “reveal a pattern of erasure by omission,” including comparatively few recognitions of Jewish American Heritage Month.
- A “trend report” based on interviews with more than 30 Jewish authors and publishing professionals alleging boycotts and exclusions from the publishing industry based on their identities.
- A survey of 65 incidents of “Jewish, Israeli and openly Zionist artists fac[ing] growing scrutiny, protest, disruption and cancellation” from performance venues or pressure from pro-Palestinian groups since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Israel.
- ADL-approved guidelines for how venues should host and engage with Jewish artists.
The reports will be accompanied by a launch event Thursday evening at the Jewish Museum in New York, to be attended by ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt as well as Jewish entertainers including actor Selma Blair and author and influencer Alyssa Rosenheck.
“We started to hear from patrons of the arts and artists and other people connected to museums that there was a real problem,” Shira Goodman, the ADL’s vice president of public affairs and special initiatives, told JTA in an interview about the genesis of the project.
As a result, the ADL started tracking Jewish and Israeli artists who had been targeted by protests. The group also heard from Jewish authors about the publishing industry, leading to an expansion of the project. Goodman said the team was motivated by the chance to leverage “boards of trustees and boards of directors, and donors, who might be able to have influence.”
“By shining a light on some of this, we might be able to have an effect and an impact,” she said.
The project follows the ADL’s campus antisemitism report cards, which launched in 2024 and assign letter grades to dozens of universities based on how well the group feels they have combated anti-Jewish sentiments. Criticized by many in higher education, and by some major Jewish groups including Hillel International, the report cards have nonetheless prompted several campuses to change or update their policies around Jewish issues.
That success led to the formation of a new ADL unit focused on ratings and assessments. Now, the watchdog’s attention is turning to the art world — at a moment when many eyes are trained on Jews and Israelis in those spaces.
Over the summer, a report from the literary free-speech group PEN America reached similar conclusions to the ADL on the exclusion felt by some Jewish and Israeli authors. The report led to deep internal divisions within PEN and the resignation of its president, who argued that the organization was not standing up for the free-speech rights of boycotters. New Jewish publishing initiatives aim to counteract what they say is the exclusion of Jewish voices in mainstream publishing.
Since Oct. 7, several pro-Israel Jewish artists, ranging from Jerry Seinfeld and Mayim Bialik to Matisyahu, have seen their events targeted by pro-Palestinian protesters. The ADL’s report catalogs all these incidents and more, including demonstrations staged by neo-Nazis against Jewish-themed theatrical shows, which the ADL’s staff said they see as equivalent to pro-Palestinian protests.
“They’re equally disruptive and exclusionary of Jewish voices,” Luda Isakharov, associate director of the ADL’s Ratings and Assessments Institute, told JTA. “We treat them the same in our grading.”
In recent weeks, two Israel-related arts controversies have further complicated the picture of how Jews in the cultural landscape orient themselves around the issue. Jewish mogul Robert Kraft pressured Ed Sheeran to drop Macklemore from his tour over the latter’s onstage rhetoric about Israel. And the Israeli documentary “NAZA” is being targeted by right-wing Israelis over the film’s detailing of the conduct of war in Gaza.
ADL researchers had no involvement in PEN’s publishing report, Goodman said; their own report argues that PEN didn’t go far enough. And while Greenblatt himself posted approvingly of Kraft’s role in the Macklemore dust-up, Goodman said the ADL has not yet thought through how it would record incidents like the Kraft controversy or the “NAZA” disputes, in which Jews or Israelis are the ones leading the protesting.
“We’re encouraging people to let speech go forward, to let concerts go forward,” she said. “Typically we have not been supportive of boycotts.” The report’s incident catalog, the ADL said, instead focuses on Jewish or Israeli artists targeted on the basis of their identities.
Goodman added, “We do speak out because we want celebrities to know how painful their language is, and the examples that they can set and what the impacts are.”
Both the Kraft and “NAZA” incidents occurred after the ADL had finalized its report. An earlier example of attempted cancellation directed at the “NAZA” filmmakers, when the mayor of Miami Beach briefly threatened to evict a theater showing the directors’ previous movie in 2025, failed to make the ADL’s catalog, although the directors are Jewish and Israeli.
One conclusion to draw from entertainment spaces’ relationship to Jews and Israelis, the ADL told JTA, is that many often cite heightened security concerns as a reason not to engage with the topic.
The museum report, similar to the campus report cards, assigns ratings to each of the 40 surveyed institutions, including major museums such as the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim. Grades range from “Gold Standard,” which the ADL assigned only to the Berkeley Art Museum, to “Critically Deficient,” which it gave to 12 museums, including the Whitney and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
The criteria include the number of Jewish and Israeli artists in each museum’s collection and whether or not they are presented with “Jewish framing.” Among those approvingly cited as representative of Jewish or Israeli art are left-wing Jewish artists such as Nan Goldin, as well as Arab-Israelis whose “art was very critical of Israel,” according to Isakharov. Goldin’s name does not appear in the early copy of the report shared by JTA, though other Israel-critical Jewish artists do.
The ADL also recorded whether a museum had been the site of a pro-Palestinian protest, and whether it had a process in place for identifying art that had been stolen by the Nazis from Jewish families.
Museum ratings also factor in an institution’s policies around anti-discrimination for Jews and Jewish programming — including for Jewish American Heritage Month, which ADL researchers said only one of the surveyed museums currently observes. Meanwhile, according to the ADL, 60% of the same museums observe other ethnic heritage months.
Some museums have already reached out to the ADL to say they would be sharing more of their policies related to anti-Jewish discrimination, Isakharov said.
Meanwhile, the ADL’s publishing report, similar to PEN’s, relies largely on anecdotal evidence about Jewish authors and subjects reportedly being passed over by agents, publishers or literary venues after Oct. 7.
“Much of what’s going on is happening below the surface,” Isakharov told JTA. “It’s oftentimes a last-minute drop, a gut feeling that authors have, and that makes it so hard to prove.”
One of the authors the ADL plans to spotlight prominently is Rosenheck, a photographer, influencer and author of the memoir “White. Blond. Jew.” She will be speaking at the ADL’s launch event Thursday. Rosenheck has a previous relationship with the ADL, having appeared at its “Never Is Now” summit last year, and has also spoken at the Republican Jewish Coalition.
Rosenheck’s book launch event in Nashville was cancelled by an independent bookseller earlier this year citing security concerns, an incident condemned by the local federation.
“This is what literary antisemitism looks like,” Rosenheck is quoted as saying in the ADL report, referring to her experience with the bookstore as well as negative posts about her book online.
Some Jewish scholars of publishing trends are critical of reports that suggest Jewish authors and subjects are facing discrimination. Such conclusions, they say, fail to make the case that Jews have been treated unfairly outside of industry norms.
Wellesley College professor Josh Lambert and Emory University professor Dan Sinykin, in a joint report also published Thursday, accuse the ADL’s study of being promoted by “political motivations.”
“The ADL’s report features quotes by a handful of right-wing activists (without acknowledging them as such), conflates Jews and Zionists, and opposes boycotts — all familiar strategies to suppress leftist Jewish and pro-Palestinian expression,” Lambert and Sinykin write in the left-wing magazine Jewish Currents.
The two present their own data suggesting that Jewish- and Israeli-themed fiction, after declining in 2024, actually entered an upswing in 2025. They also challenge some of the claims made by the PEN report’s key interview subjects, including the number of Jewish books one Jewish agent claimed to have signed since Oct. 7. Their story has prompted a correction on the PEN report.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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Netanyahu pledges new security measures in wake of FlyDubai attack
(JTA) — President Donald Trump spoke to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “at length” about the flydubai attack on Wednesday, while the United Arab Emirates said it was opening an investigation into the incident.
The UAE noted in a statement that the investigation included looking at “any and all possible connection to terrorist intent” after one pilot attacked another on a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv and appeared to try to down the plane.
Netanyahu also spoke to UAE leaders about the event, acknowledging as of Wednesday night that it couldn’t be ruled out that the attacker was acting out of mental illness rather than political motivations.
He told CBS News that the co-pilot allegedly behind the attack is being interrogated in Saudi Arabia, where the plane eventually landed. “He will be investigated, interrogated, we’ll join the investigation and find out.”
While Netanyahu pointed to Israel having received signs that Iran, particularly through its proxies, was looking to attack Israelis abroad, he told CBS that “It’s too early to say there was Iranian collusion here.”
He noted that Israel is “concerned” about the safety of other flights to Israel and that flydubai flights were suspended for the next few days. At the same time Israel is trying to put in place additional security checks and close the loopholes that had led to this incident. He pointed out that most screening protocols have until now been aimed at passengers rather than pilots.
“We’re going to have Israeli planes fly to Dubai and bring the thousands and thousands of Israelis” back home, he said.
He also referred to reports of terror attacks being planned by Iran before the Oct. 27 national elections, necessitating extra vigilance on the part of the government.
Both Trump and Netauand praised the heroism of Israel passenger Yaniv Hayun, who first entered the cockpit and saved the plane from near-certain disaster.
Trump told the media that Netanyahu had told him “an incredible story” about what happened, though he noted he hadn’t himself verified the details.
“An Israeli plumber, never flew a plane, was rarely in planes, very rarely flew,” Trump said referring to Hayun, “having never flown a plane, he took the stick, lifted the stick and leveled out the plane before it crashed.”
Trump noted that Hayun attributed his knowledge of what to do to being a regular watcher of the TV show “Air Disasters.”
“He happened to be a Jewish plumber,” Trump noted, apparently making the comment to a staffer nearby who is Jewish himself and whom Trump called “very proud” of the passenger.
Netanyahu himself told Fox News that Hayun’s “act of unbelievable courage” saved the plane from disaster.
“It’s incredible heroism. I don’t know how he did it.”
He continued, “He managed to enter the cockpit, he saw the attacker trying to jam the instruments. He grabbed him from behind, pulled the stick back,” and then two other people on the plane headed off the attacker while reserve pilots on the plane took over.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Netanyahu pledges new security measures in wake of FlyDubai attack appeared first on The Forward.
