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We spoke to the Jews advising Donald Trump, Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis
WASHINGTON (JTA) — In the middle of his victory speech on the night of the Iowa Caucuses, Donald Trump said he would end the Israel-Hamas war.
At a recent debate, Nikki Haley avowed that anti-Zionism is antisemitism.
At another debate, Ron DeSantis gave a shout-out to the director of the Republican Jewish coalition.
Jewish voters have historically voted overwhelmingly for Democrats. But that hasn’t stopped Republicans from focusing on American Jewry and Israel — both because the Jewish vote in swing states can help determine the election, and because of Israel’s importance to evangelical Christian voters.
This year, all three remaining Republican candidates take the Jewish community seriously enough that they have their own advisers on Jewish issues — trusted team members who possess deep knowledge both of the candidate and of the Jewish community. These Jewish whisperers fulfill a dual role, both steering the candidate on issues of Jewish concern and acting as a liaison to Jewish voters.
Ahead of next week’s New Hampshire primary, we spoke with top Jewish advisers to each of the campaigns. Each, predictably, said their candidate didn’t really need their advice — but each also plays a key role in their respective races for the White House.
David Friedman, lawyer-turned-ambassador for Donald Trump
David Friedman was Trump’s trusted bankruptcy lawyer until a snowbound day in February, 2005, when he said he realized he also was the real estate magnate’s close friend. He recalled that Trump traveled more than three hours through inclement weather to sit shiva with Friedman, who was mourning his father Morris, a prominent New York area rabbi.
In 2016, Friedman was one of a trio of close Jewish advisers to Trump, joining Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and another lawyer, Jason Greenblatt.
Trump named each of the three to roles in his administration, appointing Friedman as ambassador to Israel. Friedman’s past hardball rhetoric about the liberal Israel lobby J Street — he called them “worse than kapos” — almost sank his confirmation, but he was approved for the job on party lines.
On his watch, Trump enacted a series of policies celebrated by the Israeli government and its supporters. He moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognized an Israeli right to settle in the West Bank, recognized Israel’s claim to the Golan Heights, withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and brokered the Abraham Accords, normalizing relations between Israel and four Arab states. Trump has said Friedman played leading roles in moving the embassy and recognizing the Golan.
As ambassador, Friedman also pivoted from a Trumpian attack dog mode to a more avuncular persona, posting self-deprecating videos about coping with the frantic pace of getting ready for the Jewish holidays in Israel.
Three years after Trump left office amid a firestorm of controversy, Kushner and Greenblatt are no longer advising him. But Friedman endorsed his ex-boss last year. In an interview he said the endorsement — and his current advisory role on the 2024 campaign — were easy calls.
“The most powerful argument, obviously, is his record, and it’s a record not just with regard to Israel but with regard to fighting antisemitism domestically as well,” he said, referring to Trump’s 2019 executive order on federal investigations of universities for antisemitic discrimination.
What about Trump’s reputation for encouraging — or at least not condemning — far-right extremists? Friedman notably called out Trump in 2022 when the former president met with Kanye West, the rapper who made a stream of antisemitic comments, and Nick Fuentes, a Holocaust denier.
That was an outlier, said Freidman. Friedman spoke with Trump after he made his unhappiness known, but would not describe the phone call. “All I can tell you is that, to state the obvious, that hasn’t happened again,” he said.
How close are they? Trump has confessed to being unnerved when Friedman calls him “Mr. President,” wishing he would go back to Donald.
Fred Zeidman, fundraiser for Nikki Haley
Fred Zeidman has known Nikki Haley since 2010, when he was invited to support her first run for South Carolina governor that year.
“I absolutely just thought the world of her,” he said of Haley, then a state representative in her late 30s. “And so I sort of stayed close. She just seemed like she had it.”
Getting Zeidman on board was a catch for Haley, who was trailing better known South Carolinians at the time. Zeidman is a Texas businessman who was among the first to see presidential material in George W. Bush, and who organized, when Bush was governor, a life-changing tour of Israel for the future president.
Bush had named Zeidman to chair the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Council, a thankless non-paying job that requires a dedication to the issue — coupled with fundraising chops. Zeidman, who says his mission is “the safety and security of the Jewish people and the state of Israel,” had plenty of both: He has become a sought-after fundraiser for Republican candidates over several election cycles.
In 2016, Zeidman could not stomach Trump’s approach and backed other candidates in the primary. Like some former Trump skeptics, he became a fan when Trump proved his pro- Israel bona fides (in part via Haley, who served as Trump’s first United Nations ambassador). At one point, Zeidman even tore up a t-shirt saying George W. Bush was the greatest ever president for Israel.
But this year, following Trump’s false claims of winning the 2020 election, and the subsequent Jan. 6 riot, he has again chosen Haley. Zeidman is a dedicated Republican, but also longs for healing. He has been outspoken in praising President Joe Biden’s backing for Israel in its war with Hamas.
He says he felt intense pride in being an early backer of Haley’s in 2015, after she brought about the removal of the Confederate flag outside the state capitol in the wake of the mass shooting at a Charleston Black church.
“When you look at the things that she did to demonstrate leadership to demonstrate moral clarity, when after the shooting — You know, she’s got it,” he told JTA this week. “She’s showing what she needs to do. She didn’t capitulate. She stood up of all places in the world at ground zero of the Confederacy.”
Zeidman says that Haley has also shown leadership on how Republicans can handle abortion — sticking to their conservative principles while not demonizing abortion rights advocates.
“She is the first Republican to break ranks on women’s rights, which is a key, key, key, key issue and ought to be a defining issue,” he said.
Zeidman’s son, Jay, also worked for George W. Bush as a liaison to the Jewish community. But he’s departed from his father — and is a leading fundraiser for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. His father describes with pride how they banter about their respective candidates.
Gabe Groisman, Jewish surrogate for Ron DeSantis
Gabe Groisman met Ron DeSantis about a decade ago, when the then-Florida congressman was visiting Israel.
“I immediately understood that he was one of these elected officials who really, really understands the region,” Groisman, a former mayor of Bal Harbour, told JTA. “It’s not just talking points.”
Groisman credits DeSantis’s time in the Navy, as an attorney at Guantanamo Bay and then on deployment to Iraq, for how he seems to get Israel. DeSantis’ faith, and his diplomas from Yale University and Harvard Law School, don’t hurt, Groisman added.
“It seems like it’s a mix between his military experience as a JAG officer in the Navy and his education and then also his religion — he definitely has a deep religious connection to the state of Israel,” he said. DeSantis has baptized his children with water from the Kinneret, or Sea of Galilee.
That made DeSantis the perfect candidate for Groisman, who feels a calling to persuade Florida’s Jews to vote Republican. Groisman, who accompanied DeSantis when the governor convened his first Cabinet meeting in Israel in 2019, is on the board of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
DeSantis, among the first governors to legislate against dealings with businesses that boycott Israel, is well known for his pro-Israel positions. Groisman wants people to learn more about DeSantis’s domestic Jewish initiatives, including expanding school choice — a potential boon to Jewish day school families — and toughening laws targeting hate crimes against Jews.
He says he’s frustrated by the press linking DeSantis with issues reviled by liberal Jews, including book bans and his targeting of the LGBTQ community.
“Despite lots of press to the contrary, the fact is, he’s with the Jewish community, time and time again,” Groisman said. “He’s helped pass legislation year in and year out to protect the Jewish community, expanding different laws to give police more power to protect the community.”
Groisman is the kind of Jewish leader Republicans hope will become more prominent: As Bal Harbour mayor from 2016-2022, he used his platform to speak out against Israel boycotts and has been an outspoken critic of campus antisemitism. A lawyer, a philanthropist and a consultant on government relations, he is active in the Israeli-American Council.
He gets an activist strain from his Israeli American mother, Judit, a longtime member of the Women’s International Zionist Organization.
“Even though she’s getting older, she spends her life as a community organizer,” he said. “Her attitude is, ‘get things done.’”
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The post We spoke to the Jews advising Donald Trump, Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Condemns UN for Extending Mandate of Anti-Israel Official Francesca 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 United States has “strongly denounced” the United Nations for extending the tenure of controversial UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, repudiating the decision as an example of “antisemitic hatred” within the international organization.
“The Human Rights Council’s (HRC) support for Ms. Albanese offers yet another example of why President Trump ordered the United States to cease all participation in the HRC,” the US Mission to the UN said in a statement on Tuesday. “Ms. Albanese’s actions also make clear the United Nations tolerates antisemitic hatred, bias against Israel, and the legitimization of terrorism.”
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” that Israel supposedly commits against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Earlier this month, the UN Human Rights Council renewed the mandate of Albanese, despite widespread calls from several countries and NGOs urging UN members to oppose her reappointment due to her controversial remarks and alleged pro-Hamas stance.
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 the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s attacks on the Jewish state.
In the months following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, atrocities across southern Israel, Albanese accused the Jewish state of enacting 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 United Nations launched a probe into Albanese last summer for allegedly accepting a trip to Australia funded by pro-Hamas organizations. She has also celebrated the anti-Israel protesters rampaging across US college campuses, saying they represent a “revolution” and give her “hope.”
While speaking at a Washington, DC bookstore in October, Albanese also accused Israel of weaponizing the fallout of the Oct. 7 slaughters to justify the continued “colonization” of Gaza.
“The 7th of October is a tragic date for the Israelis, but this is what also triggered the opportunity for Israel to complete and channel the project of colonial erasure. Israel seized the opportunity to complete that plan of realizing Jewish sovereignty only in the land of Palestine,” Albanese said at the time.
The UN official has also decried Israelis as “foreign” Jews who expelled “indigenous” Palestinians from their land for the purpose of creating an exclusionary ethnostate, erasing the millennia-long presence of Jewish people within the land of Israel. She has also repeatedly condemned Israel as a “colonial” enterprise, comparing the Jewish state to British India or French Algeria.
“They used to say, let us colonize Palestine as the Brits have colonized India, as the French have colonized Algeria, because up to 70 years ago, colonialism was totally acceptable. Today, it’s not and so the narrative has changed,” Albanese said.
The post US Condemns UN for Extending Mandate of Anti-Israel Official Francesca Albanese first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Award-Winning French Actress Mélanie Laurent Joins ‘Fauda’ Season 5 Cast in Lead Role
French actress Mélanie Laurent. Photo: yes Studios.
Multi-award-winning French actress Mélanie Laurent will take on a lead role in the fifth season of the popular Israeli television series “Fauda,” Israel’s yes Studios announced this week.
Laurent’s film credits include “Inglorious Basterds” (2009), “Now You See Me” (2013), and “Operation Finale” (2018). She has two César Awards and a Lumières Award. Her most recent work includes last year’s “The Flood,” a French-Italian film where she played Marie-Antionette, and the French-language film “Freedom,” which she wrote and directed.
Laurent will be featured in seven of the nine episodes in season five of “Fauda,” according to yes Studios. Details about her character and role in the Hebrew-language show have not been revealed, but she will star alongside “Fauda” co-creator and lead star Lior Raz, with whom she previously worked on the 2019 Netflix film “6 Underground.”
Season five of “Fauda” is expected to premiere on yes TV in Israel in early 2026 and will later stream worldwide on Netflix, where the first four seasons of the award-winning show are already streaming. Yes Studios announced in March that filming for “Fauda” season five will begin in late April.
The upcoming season will be filmed in Israel and overseas, following the “Fauda” team on a private mission. Details about the plot for the new season have been kept under wraps. The fifth season will mark 10 years of “Fauda” airing in Israel and around the world on Netflix.
Israeli actor Idan Amedi said in February he will not return for the fifth season of “Fauda” because of his music career and ongoing rehabilitation from injuries he sustained while fighting with the Israel Defense Forces in the Gaza Strip during the Israel-Hamas war that began in 2023. Amedi starred in the show as undercover agent Sagi Tzur, who is the husband of intelligence officer Nurit (Rona-Lee Shimon), who will still be featured in the show’s next season. It remains unclear how “Fauda” will address the exit of Amedi’s character.
As Israel’s longest running action series, “Fauda” follows a team of elite Israeli undercover agents as they hunt down and apprehend terrorists. The show is based on the real-life experiences of its creators, Raz and journalist Avi Issacharoff. The new season is being led by season 4 director Omri Givon (“Hostages”) and written by Omri Shenhar (“Tehran”). “Fauda” is produced by yes TV and L. Benasuly Productions for yes TV.
“Fauda” crew member Matan Meir was killed in action in November 2023 while fighting in Gaza as an IDF reservist.
The post Award-Winning French Actress Mélanie Laurent Joins ‘Fauda’ Season 5 Cast in Lead Role first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Will Keep Gaza Buffer Zone, Minister Says, as Truce Bid Stalls
Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, April 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israeli troops will remain in the buffer zones they have created in Gaza even after any settlement to end the war, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Wednesday, as efforts to revive a ceasefire agreement faltered.
Since resuming military operations last month, Israeli forces have carved out a broad “security zone” extending deep into Gaza and squeezing some 2 million Palestinians into ever smaller areas in the south and along the coastline.
“Unlike in the past, the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] is not evacuating areas that have been cleared and seized,” Katz said in a statement following a meeting with military commanders.
“The IDF will remain in the security zones as a buffer between the enemy and the communities in any temporary or permanent situation in Gaza — as in Lebanon and Syria.”
In a summary of its operations over the past month, the Israeli military said it now controls 30 percent of the Palestinian enclave.
In southern Gaza alone, Israeli forces have seized the border city of Rafah and pushed inland up to the so-called “Morag corridor” that runs from the eastern edge of Gaza to the Mediterranean Sea, between Rafah and the city of Khan Younis.
It already held a wide corridor across the central Netzarim area and has extended a buffer zone all around the frontier hundreds of meters (yards) inland, including the Shejaia area just to the east of Gaza City in the north.
Israel says its forces have killed hundreds of Hamas fighters, including many senior commanders of the Palestinian terrorist group, since March 18 but the operation has alarmed the United Nations and European countries.
More than 400,000 Palestinians have been displaced since hostilities resumed on March 18 after two months of relative calm, according to UN humanitarian agency OCHA.
Katz said Israel, which has blocked the delivery of relief supplies into the territory since early March, was creating infrastructure to allow distribution through civilian companies at a later date, but the blockade on aid would remain in place. Israeli officials have noted that Hamas often seizes humanitarian aid heading into Gaza for its own use and will sell the rest to Gazan civilians at high prices, using the money to fund its terrorism operations.
He said Israel would pursue a plan to allow Gazans who wished to leave the enclave to do so, although it remains unclear which countries would be willing to accept large numbers of Palestinians.
RED LINES
The comments from Katz, repeating Israel‘s demand on Hamas to disarm, underscore how far away the two sides remain from any ceasefire agreement, despite efforts by Egyptian mediators to revive efforts to reach a deal.
Hamas has repeatedly described calls to disarm as a red line it will not cross and has said Israeli troops must withdraw from Gaza under any permanent ceasefire.
“Any truce lacking real guarantees for halting the war, achieving full withdrawal, lifting the blockade, and beginning reconstruction will be a political trap,” Hamas said in a statement on Wednesday.
Two Israeli officials said this week there had been no progress in the talks despite media reports of a possible truce to allow the exchange of some of the 59 hostages still held in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners.
Israeli officials have said the increased military pressure will force Hamas to release the hostages but the government has faced large demonstrations by Israeli protesters demanding a deal to stop the fighting and get them back.
Israel launched its war in Gaza in response to the October 2023 attack by Hamas on southern Israel that killed 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage.
The post Israel Will Keep Gaza Buffer Zone, Minister Says, as Truce Bid Stalls first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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