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Egyptian president falsely claims Jews and Egyptians have always gotten along, raising a fraught and ancient history
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In a meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi mentioned Blinken’s Jewish identity, and made a false and curious claim.
“Mr. Secretary, you spoke about the crisis and you spoke as a Jewish person, and let me tell you that I am an Egyptian citizen, and I was born and brought up in a neighborhood where we had Jewish neighbors,” Sisi told Blinken, who was in Cairo Sunday to drum up support for Israel’s war against Hamas. “And Jews who used to live here in Egypt [had] not ever suffered from oppression and persecution… As a matter of fact, the Jews were never targeted … throughout the whole history. ”
Sisi, who is an ally of the United States and is friendly with Israel, has nurtured what’s left of the Jewish community in his country. But Egypt’s treatment of its Jewish population in modern times is replete with repression, discrimination and at times bloody violence — especially during and after Israel’s establishment. From a community of 80,000 in 1947, Egypt’s Jewish population now counts in the single digits.
Anyone familiar with the Bible and the Passover story, of course, can point to a far more ancient history of Jews being oppressed in Egypt — and that’s what Sisi may have been referencing in his comment. Modern Egyptians take umbrage at the tale of the Exodus, which recounts the tribulations of Jews as slaves in Egypt.
There is no archaeological or historical record of Israelites being in Egypt, as slaves or otherwise. Historians have said that the biblical story of Joseph and his brothers building an Israelite presence in Egypt may have origins in the reign of the Hyksos, a group of Canaanite tribes.
It’s a sensitive issue for Egyptians: In 1977, as the leaders of Israel and Egypt launched the history-changing talks that led to the Camp David Accords, which have endured decades later, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin joked that he looked forward to seeing the pyramids because “after all, we helped to build them.”
A top aide had pleaded with Begin not to make any reference to the pyramids, and his warning proved prescient: there was a flurry of aggrieved articles in the Egyptian press.
The pyramid myth has its modern origins in the hugely popular 1956 film “The Ten Commandments”, which depicts the Hebrew slaves laboring on the pyramids until they are redeemed by Moses, played by Charlton Heston.
Exodus describes the Hebrew slaves as working in construction, but does not mention the pyramids. As Rabbi Mordechai Becher pointed out last year on the website of the Orthodox organization Aish, the pyramids were built long before the children of Israel were purported to have been in Egypt. “Sorry to disappoint, but it was indeed aliens,” Becher joked in an account of his visit to Cairo.
Still, the myth continues to sting: As recently as 2010, Egyptian archaeologists were at pains to point out that discoveries showed that the people who built the pyramids were paid for their efforts.
More recently, the Jews of Egypt have had a painful, and documented, history: In its first stages of modernization, under the Muhammad Ali Dynasty in the 19th century, Egyptian authorities introduced laws discriminating against Jews. A sequence of laws in the 20th century disenfranchised the vast majority of Jews in the country.
Those laws and a series of bloody and deadly pogroms drove the Egyptian Jewish community to flee, depleting it to its current tiny size.
Blinken, who has noted his Jewish roots and the persecutions of his extended family to explain his commitment to Israel and to human rights, did not take Sisi’s bait. Hamas’ savage murder of more than a thousand people is what was moving him in this instance, Blinken said.
“I come first and foremost as a human being,” he said. “A human being like so many others appalled at the atrocities committed by Hamas.”
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Antisemitic Incidents at Argentina Local Soccer Match Spark Official Investigations, Condemnations
Fans of Argentinian soccer club All Boys marched through the streets before their match against Atlanta soccer club, carrying a coffin draped with an Israeli flag alongside Iranian and Palestinian flags. Photo: Screenshot
Argentinian authorities and soccer officials have launched investigations following antisemitic incidents by Club Atlético All Boys fans during Sunday’s local match against Atlanta.
Atlanta, a soccer team based in the Villa Crespo neighborhood of Buenos Aires, has deep historical ties to Argentina’s Jewish community, which has long been a significant presence in the area.
This latest antisemitic incident took place outside the stadium before the game had even started.
All Boys fans were seen waving Palestinian and Iranian flags, carrying a coffin draped with an Israeli flag, and handing out flyers bearing messages like “Free Palestine” and “Israel and Atlanta are the same crap.”
Before a football match today against the Argentine sports club Atlanta, which is closely associated with the Jewish community, fans of the opposing team, All Boys, waved Islamic Republic and Palestinian flags while parading a coffin draped in an Israeli flag through the streets.… pic.twitter.com/IQs4v6eoFz
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) June 29, 2025
Then, during the match — which ended in a 0-0 draw — a drone carrying a Palestinian flag flew over the stadium, while some fans reportedly chanted anti-Israel slogans.
Local police confirmed they have issued citations to individuals accused of inciting public disorder and related offenses.
On Monday, the Argentine Football Association (AFA) condemned the incidents as “abhorrent” and confirmed the organization has opened a formal inquiry into the events.
“This is not folklore. This is discrimination,” the statement reads.
Argentina’s Security Minister Patricia Bullrich also announced that a criminal complaint has been filed, citing “acts of violence, expressions of racial and religious hatred, and public intimidation.”
In a post on X, the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, condemned the incidents and called on both local authorities and the soccer officials to “take firm action against these acts of hatred.”
“We urge the authorities to take all necessary actions and apply the full force of the law,” the statement reads. “Violence and discrimination must have no place in our society.”
Repudiamos enérgicamente las expresiones antisemitas ocurridas hoy en las inmediaciones del estadio Malvinas Argentinas.
Exigimos a las autoridades correspondientes, a la AFA y al Club All Boys que actúen con firmeza ante estos hechos de odio.
La violencia y la discriminación no… pic.twitter.com/3AmY7IQscY— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) June 29, 2025
Since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Argentina has experienced a surge in antisemitic incidents and anti-Jewish hate crimes.
According to a recent report by DAIA, Argentina experienced a 15 percent increase in antisemitic activity last year, with 687 anti-Jewish hate crimes recorded — up from 598 incidents in 2023 — marking a significant rise nationwide.
The study indicates that 66 percent of the antisemitic incidents originated in the digital realm, with a significant rise in Nazi symbols and conspiracy theories, but there was also a 34 percent increase in reported physical assaults, with such hate crimes rising in schools and neighborhoods.
The post Antisemitic Incidents at Argentina Local Soccer Match Spark Official Investigations, Condemnations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iranian nuclear program degraded by up to two years, Pentagon says
A satellite image of Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility. Photo: File.
The Pentagon said on Wednesday that US strikes 10 days ago had degraded Iran’s nuclear program by up to two years, suggesting the U.S. military operation likely achieved its goals despite a far more cautious initial assessment that leaked to the public.
Sean Parnell, a Pentagon spokesman, offered the figure at a briefing to reporters, adding that the official estimate was “probably closer to two years.” Parnell did not provide evidence to back up his assessment.
“We have degraded their program by one to two years, at least intel assessments inside the Department [of Defense] assess that,” Parnell told a news briefing.
U.S. military bombers carried out strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities on June 22 using more than a dozen 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs and more than two dozen Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles.
The evolving U.S. intelligence about the impact of the strikes is being closely watched, after President Donald Trump said almost immediately after they took place that Iran’s program had been obliterated, language echoed by Parnell at Wednesday’s briefing.
Such conclusions often take the U.S. intelligence community weeks or more to determine.
“All of the intelligence that we’ve seen [has] led us to believe that Iran’s — those facilities especially, have been completely obliterated,” Parnell said.
Over the weekend, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog, Rafael Grossi, said that Iran could be producing enriched uranium in a few months, raising doubts about how effective US strikes to destroy Tehran’s nuclear program have been.
Several experts have also cautioned that Iran likely moved a stockpile of near weapons-grade highly enriched uranium out of the deeply buried Fordow site before the strikes and could be hiding it.
But US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said last week he was unaware of intelligence suggesting Iran had moved its highly enriched uranium to shield it from US strikes.
A preliminary assessment last week from the Defense Intelligence Agency suggested that the strikes may have only set back Iran’s nuclear program by months. But Trump administration officials said that assessment was low confidence and had been overtaken by intelligence showing Iran’s nuclear program was severely damaged.
According to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, the strikes on the Fordow nuclear site caused severe damage.
“No one exactly knows what has transpired in Fordow. That being said, what we know so far is that the facilities have been seriously and heavily damaged,” Araqchi said in the interview broadcast by CBS News on Tuesday.
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Switzerland Moves to Close Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s Geneva Office Over Legal Irregularities
Palestinians carry aid supplies received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
Switzerland has moved to shut down the Geneva office of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US- and Israeli-backed aid group, citing legal irregularities in its establishment.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza in late May, implementing a new aid delivery model aimed at preventing the diversion of supplies by Hamas, as Israel continues its defensive military campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group.
The initiative has drawn criticism from the UN and international organizations, some of which have claimed that Jerusalem is causing starvation in the war-torn enclave.
Israel has vehemently denied such accusations, noting that, until its recently imposed blockade, it had provided significant humanitarian aid in the enclave throughout the war.
Israeli officials have also said much of the aid that flows into Gaza is stolen by Hamas, which uses it for terrorist operations and sells the rest at high prices to Gazan civilians.
With a subsidiary registered in Geneva, the GHF — headquartered in Delaware — reports having delivered over 56 million meals to Palestinians in just one month.
According to a regulatory announcement published Wednesday in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce, the Federal Supervisory Authority for Foundations (ESA) may order the dissolution of the GHF if no creditors come forward within the legal 30-day period.
The Trump administration did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the Swiss decision to shut down its Geneva office.
“The GHF confirmed to the ESA that it had never carried out activities in Switzerland … and that it intends to dissolve the Geneva-registered branch,” the ESA said in a statement.
Last week, Geneva authorities gave the GHF a 30-day deadline to address legal shortcomings or risk facing enforcement measures.
Under local laws and regulations, the foundation failed to meet several requirements: it did not appoint a board member authorized to sign documents domiciled in Switzerland, did not have the minimum three board members, lacked a Swiss bank account and valid address, and operated without an auditing body.
The GHF operates independently from UN-backed mechanisms, which Hamas has sought to reinstate, arguing that these vehicles are more neutral.
Israeli and American officials have rejected those calls, saying Hamas previously exploited UN-run systems to siphon aid for its war effort.
The UN has denied those allegations while expressing concerns that the GHF’s approach forces civilians to risk their safety by traveling long distances across active conflict zones to reach food distribution points.
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