RSS
In Memoriam: The Man Who Fostered my Love of Israel
Edward Cohen. Credit: Courtesy.
JNS.org – I’ve been writing this column for more than a decade, but this week will, sadly, be very different for a few dozen of my readers.
I’m referring to a group of people—friends, family members, Israel advocates—who received my column every week courtesy of an email from my father, Edward Cohen, but who won’t be getting it from him this week. A fortnight ago, my Dad, who was 83, suffered from an overwhelming stroke at his apartment in Tel Aviv. Despite the best efforts of the doctors at Ichilov Hospital to revive him, he passed away about 12 hours later.
I traveled to Israel for his funeral—not an easy feat, given that most international airlines are not flying into Tel Aviv thanks to the war launched by Hamas with its pogrom in southern Israel on Oct. 7. If I’d flown directly from New York, I would likely have missed the funeral because of the lack of seat availability, so instead, I spent one night on a plane from JFK to London, where I met up with my brother, and the next night on an El Al flight from Heathrow Airport to Ben-Gurion Airport outside of Tel Aviv, where we landed, quickly showered and made our way to Jerusalem to bury our father at the cemetery in Givat Shaul. Then it was straight back to Tel Aviv for the shiva at the home he shared with his Israeli wife and their two daughters.
In truth, much of my trip is remembered as a blur. The combination of the awful news and the jet lag left me physically exhausted and not very communicative. But I do recall quite clearly several people coming up to me at the funeral, shaking my hand, wishing me a long life and then telling me, “You know, your Dad was very proud of you; he used to email me your JNS column every week.”
The point I want to emphasize, however, is that my Dad didn’t just passively shep nachas—admittedly, a very Ashkenazi phrase to use in remembering my proudly Sephardi father!—from my writings. He was an inspiration, and I learned an enormous amount from him, especially my Zionism, over the years.
As my brother memorably put it at the funeral, Dad loved Israel as if it were a person. His was an intense, joyous love, in which he garnered profound satisfaction from the mere act of waking up in a Jewish homeland, driving or walking along streets with Hebrew names, or buying nuts, baklava and other treats at the shuk. In both spiritual and material terms, he served our ancient homeland admirably, donating to numerous charities, sitting on the board of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA) from its inception under the tutelage of his late, dear friend, Dr. Dan Elazar, as well as spending two very busy years as the chairman of the Israel Free Loan Association (IFLA). He was, in Jewish parlance, a macher. It was a fact I gleaned during my teenage years when I spent summers with him in Israel, where he’d moved after his divorce from my mother, often accompanying him to meetings and social events where he would invariably receive an enthusiastic welcome.
As sons and fathers tend to do, we argued a lot. There were times, I know, when he was desperately worried about me; I think, in particular, of my flirtation with revolutionary Marxism during my university years and the anti-Zionism that came with it. But equally, I think my Dad knew how supremely uncomfortable I was, deep down, with having to be an enemy of the Jewish state, so when I recovered my senses, he was pleased but not really surprised.
He knew, I think, that I would come back, and he was one of the reasons that I did so. Not to ingratiate myself back into my Dad’s good books, but because I couldn’t cast aside all the things I learned before I started reading Leon Trotsky, Isaac Deutscher, Ralph Miliband and other Marxist revolutionaries and scholars, most of whom happened to be Jews. Nor could I ignore my own family history; my mother’s family in Bosnia, all of whom were youthful Zionists, was decimated during the Holocaust, while my father fled with his family from Iraq, where he was born, in 1941. Along with so many other immigrants, my relatives came to the teeming city of London, where they lived happy and productive lives, my father included. But unlike many other Jews there, my Dad was never truly at home in England. He yearned to be in Israel, and as soon as he got the opportunity to live there, he seized it.
The last few weeks of my Dad’s life were, as was the case for the rest of us, overshadowed by the Hamas pogrom. During the 1980s and 1990s, he’d engaged with members of the Israeli peace camp, particularly a small group of Israeli Sephardic intellectuals who hoped that they could forge a common cultural bond with the Palestinians, but those efforts, well-intentioned as they were, didn’t get anywhere, and eventually, he became disillusioned. Following the failure of the Oslo process and the outbreak of the 2001 Palestinian intifada, he reverted to being a security hawk. He was never a hater—never someone to lump all Palestinians into the same basket—but neither did he trust their integrity. When the Hamas terrorists penetrated the border on Oct. 7, he was grimly vindicated.
I miss my Dad, and every day that passes drives home his absence from my life. I miss the phone calls, the WhatsApp chats, even the annoying questions he’d email my way at the height of a busy day. I will miss landing in Israel and going straight to his apartment—a ritual that is as old as I am. But most of all, I feel a deep sadness at the fact that he left us in the middle of this ghastly trauma and won’t be here to see how it resolves.
My Dad, you see, was confident that Israel would triumph in this latest installment of its battle to simply exist. I want to believe that he is right, and I think he is. And when victory does come, it will be a victory for him, too, as the Israel he loved so passionately will continue to flourish.
I have said my last farewell to my Dad, but his presence is with me. Every time I check the news from Israel, I think of him and am tempted to reach for my phone, call him and ask what he thinks … before remembering that I can’t. All that remains is his legacy, and it is one that I will treasure.
So, goodbye Dad, and thank you for shaping me into the proud Jew that I became. Thank you for being the person who introduced me to Israel, its land, its cultures, its food, its politics, its joie de vivre. Thank you for loving me, and know that I loved you.
May you rest in peace. And may your memory be a blessing.
The post In Memoriam: The Man Who Fostered my Love of Israel first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese
Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, attends a side event during the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, March 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Denis Balibouse
The Trump administration has imposed sweeping sanctions against Francesca Albanese, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, citing the UN official’s lengthy record of singling out Israel for condemnation.
In a post on X, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the sanctions under a February executive order targeting those who “prompt International Criminal Court (ICC) action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives.” He accused Albanese of waging “political and economic warfare” against both nations and asserted that “such efforts will no longer be tolerated.”
“Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against U.S. and Israeli officials, companies, and executives,” Rubio announced on X/Twitter.
“Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated,” declared the Trump administration’s top foreign affairs official. “We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”
Rubio concluded: “The United States will continue to take whatever actions we deem necessary to respond to lawfare and protect our sovereignty and that of our allies.”
The decision to impose sanctions on Albanese marks an escalation in the ongoing feud between the White House and the United Nations over Israel. The Trump administration has repeatedly accused the UN and Albanese of unfairly targeting Israel and mischaracterizing the Jewish state’s conduct in Gaza.
Albanese, an Italian lawyer and academic, has held the position of UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories since 2022. The position authorizes her to monitor and report on alleged “human rights violations” by Israel against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Last week, Albanese issued a scathing report accusing companies of helping Israel maintain a so-called “genocide economy.” She called on the companies to cut off economic ties with Israel and warned that they might be guilty of “complicity” in the so-called “genocide” in Gaza.
Critics of Albanese have long accused her of exhibiting an excessive anti-Israel bias, calling into question her fairness and neutrality.
Albanese has an extensive history of using her role at the UN to denigrate Israel and seemingly rationalize Hamas’ attacks on the Jewish state.
In the months following the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Albanese accused the Jewish state of perpetrating a “genocide” against the Palestinian people in revenge for the attacks and circulated a widely derided and heavily disputed report alleging that 186,000 people had been killed in the Gaza war as a result of Israeli actions.
The action comes as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits Washington, where he has received a warm reception from the Trump administration. Netanyahu has been meeting with US officials to discuss next steps in the ongoing Gaza military operation.
Gideon Sa’ar, Minister of Foreign Affairs for Israel, commended the Rubio announcement with his own post on X/Twitter, exclaiming: “A clear message. Time for the UN to pay attention!”
The post US Clamps Sanctions on Israel-bashing UN Rights Monitor Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations
US President Donald Trump speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
The Trump administration escalated its showdown against Harvard University on Wednesday, reporting the institution to its accreditor for alleged civil rights violations resulting from its weak response to reports of antisemitic bullying, discrimination, and harassment following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 massacre across southern Israel.
The US Department of Education (DOE) announced the action on Wednesday. Citing Harvard’s admitted failure to treat antisemitism as seriously as it treated others forms of hatred in the past, the DOE called on the New England Commission of Higher Education to review and, potentially, revoke its accreditation — a designation which qualifies Harvard for federal funding and attests to the quality of the educational services its provides.
“Accrediting bodies play a significant role in preserving academic integrity and a campus culture conducive to truth seeking and learning,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “Part of that is ensuring students are safe on campus and abiding by federal laws that guarantee educational opportunities to all students. By allowing anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination to persist unchecked on its campus, Harvard University has failed in its obligation to students, educators, and American taxpayers.”
The DOE, McMahon added, “expects the New England Commission of Higher Education to enforce its policies and practices, and to keep the Department fully informed of its efforts to ensure that Harvard is in compliance with federal law and accreditor standards.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Harvard’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism has acknowledged that the university administration’s handling of campus antisemitism fell well below its obligations under both Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its own nondiscrimination policies.
In a 300-plus-page report, the task force compiled a comprehensive record of antisemitic incidents on Harvard’s campus in recent years — from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee’s endorsement of the Oct. 7 terrorist atrocities to an anti-Zionist faculty group’s sharing an antisemitic cartoon depicting Jews as murderers of people of color. The report identified Harvard’s past refusal to afford Jews the same protections against discrimination enjoyed by other minority groups as a key source of its problem.
Coming several weeks after President Donald Trump ordered the freeze of $2.26 billion in federal research grants and contracts for Harvard, the task force report found it was “clear” that antisemitism and anti-Israel bias have been fomented, practiced, and tolerated not only at Harvard but also within academia more widely.”
The university is now suing the federal government over the funding halt.
President Trump has spoken scathingly of Harvard, calling it, for example, an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institute … with students being accepted from all over the world that want to rip our Country apart” in an April post to his Truth Social platform.
In recent weeks, however, both Trump and McMahon had commended Harvard’s constructive response in negotiations over reforms the administration has asked it to implement as a precondition for restoring federal funds. The requested reforms include hiring more conservative faculty, shuttering diversity, equity, and inclusion [DEI] programs, and slashing the size of administrative offices tangential to the university’s central educational mission.
The administration has since changed its tone in the wake of a report by The Harvard Crimson that interim Harvard President Alan Garber has said “behind closed doors” that he has no intention of doing anything that would make Harvard more palatable to conservatives.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration’s Joint Task Force to Combat Antisemitism issued Harvard a formal “notice of violation” of civil rights law. Charging that Harvard willfully exposed Jewish students to a flood of racist and antisemitic abuse both in and outside of the classroom, it threatened to strip whatever remains of Harvard’s federal funding.
“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” wrote the federal officials comprising the multiagency Task Force. “Harvard may of course continue to operate free of federal privileges, and perhaps such an opportunity will spur a commitment to excellence that will help Harvard thrive once again.”
In Wednesday’s announcement, US Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Harvard’s conduct “forfeits the legitimacy that accreditation is designed to uphold.”
“HHS and Department of Education will actively hold Harvard accountable through sustained oversight until it restores public trust and ensures a campus free of discrimination,” he said.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Hardball: Trump Administration Reports Harvard to Accreditor Over Antisemitism Allegations first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks
IDF operating in southern Lebanon. Photo: IDF Spokesperson
Israeli forces uncovered and destroyed Hezbollah weapons caches in southern Lebanon on Wednesday, as a new report indicated that despite ongoing U.S.-led efforts to secure a disarmament deal, the Iran-backed group is making repeated, largely concealed attempts to rebuild its military presence in the area.
Troops carried out several operations targeting Hezbollah infrastructure in southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning, destroying weapons depots, explosives and multibarrel launchers concealed in forested terrain, the IDF said, in violation of the November ceasefire, which requires Hezbollah to withdraw its forces 20 miles from the Israeli border.
A new report released this week by the Alma Research and Education Center found that Hezbollah is focused on rebuilding in three areas: operational deployment, weapons acquisition, and financial recovery.
“Hezbollah didn’t give up its resistance narrative and motivation,” Alma’s director, Lt. Col. (Res.) Sarit Zehavi, told The Algemeiner.
“It wants to rebuild its capabilities and infrastructures, whether it’s the villages that will be used as human shields or the military infrastructure in South Lebanon and in Lebanon in general.”
According to Zehavi, Hezbollah is attempting to return Radwan fighters to positions south of the Litani River as part of a wider plan to restore its elite forces to operational readiness. The IDF on Monday killed Radwan commander Ali Abd al-Hassan Haidar in a targeted strike. The action came hours after US Special Envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut to discuss a long-term deal that would include an Israeli withdrawal and complete disarmament of Hezbollah.
Barrack described the Lebanese response to the proposal as positive. Later, he issued a blunt warning to Hezbollah in response to a vow by the terror group’s leader, Naim Qassem, not to lay down its arms. “If they mess with us anywhere in the world, they will have a serious problem with us,” Barrack said in an interview with Lebanese news network LBCI. “They don’t want that.”
Zehavi said it was premature to predict the outcome of the diplomatic efforts. She warned that the challenge of disarming Hezbollah remains enormous and emphasized that the Lebanese Armed Forces have not demonstrated the capability or willingness to confront the group.
“It’s too soon to be optimistic or pessimistic,” she said, noting that no firm commitments have emerged from the Beirut talks.
Hezbollah’s efforts to smuggle and manufacture weapons have been complicated by both Israeli strikes and the regional realignment over recent months. While Israeli strikes have disrupted many supply routes, according to Zehavi, Syrian authorities have intercepted far more Hezbollah-bound weapons than the Lebanese Army, which claims to have uncovered 500 arms caches but has provided no evidence.
The financial front marks the third aspect of Hezbollah’s rebuilding effort. Last week, the group halted cash payments to Shiite civilians whose homes were damaged in the war, citing liquidity problems. Zehavi attributed the shortfall to disruptions in Iran’s funding networks — an outcome of the 12-day war against the regime in Tehran — and said the constraints would likely hamper Hezbollah’s ability to compensate its base and sustain operations.
“I hope they will continue to have problems with the cash flow, that way it will be very difficult for them to recover,” she said.
The post IDF Strikes Hezbollah Sites in South Lebanon as Terror Group Pushes to Rebuild Amid US Disarmament Talks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.