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Author Whose Talk Was Canceled Over ‘Zionist’ Panelist Sees Sales Surge, Packed Crowds
Illustrative: Pro-Hamas protesters outside the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago, Illinois on Tuesday, May 21, 2024. Photo: Ron Sachs via Reuters Connect
The author of a book on Jewish American identity enjoyed a sellout crowd at a rescheduled event after the original discussion was canceled over the presence of a Zionist panelist.
Joshua Leifer, author of Tablets Shattered: The End of an American Jewish Century and the Future of Jewish Life, spoke alongside Rabbi Andy Bachman at the Center for New Jewish Culture in Brooklyn on Monday. The original discussion, which was scheduled at Powerhouse Books in Brooklyn last Tuesday, was canceled at the last minute by an employee who did not want the bookstore to platform a “Zionist” rabbi.
During Monday’s discussion, Leifer lambasted the store’s decision as both “wrong and antisemitic” as well as “the dumbest strategic thing you can do.”
The bookstore’s owner, Daniel Power, later clarified in an interview that Powerhouse Books does not maintain an official ban on Zionist authors and that the employee acted on her own. He revealed that the employee responsible for canceling the event quit on her own accord before he could fire her.
The bookstore issued an apology soon after the incident, writing, “litmus tests as a precondition for participation in public life are wrong. Rejections of dialogue, debate, and nuance are wrong.”
Despite the inconvenience, the backlash over the viral incident seems to have benefited Leifer. Roughly 300 people attended the rescheduled discussion, as opposed to the estimated two dozen that showed up for the original event. Leifer’s book currently holds the number one spot in the “History of Judaism” section on Amazon.
“In large part, this sanctuary is filled because of what happened,” Bachman stated at the event.
Leifer, a political progressive and writer, has issued blistering criticisms of Israel’s ongoing war in Gaza. He has called for a change in the “status quo” of Israeli policy and has encouraged the American Jewish community to reexamine its relationship with Israel.
In an essay published in The Atlantic, Leifer reflected on the bookstore’s decision to snub Bachman for being a Zionist, saying that it “exemplified the bind that many progressive American Jews face.”
“We are caught between parts of an activist left demanding that we disavow our communities, even our families, as an entrance ticket, and a mainstream Jewish institutional world that has long marginalized critics of Israeli policy. Indeed, Jews who are committed to the flourishing of Jewish life in Israel and the Diaspora, and who are also outraged by Israel’s brutal war in Gaza, feel like we have little room to maneuver,” Leifer wrote.
“My experience last week was so demoralizing in part because such episodes make moving the mainstream Jewish community much harder,” Leifer added. Every time a left-wing activist insists that the only way to truly participate in the fight for peace and justice is to support the dissolution of Israel, it reinforces the zero-sum (and morally repulsive) idea that opposing the status quo requires Israel’s destruction.”
The post Author Whose Talk Was Canceled Over ‘Zionist’ Panelist Sees Sales Surge, Packed Crowds first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Trump’s Travel Ban on 12 Countries Goes Into Effect Early Monday
US President Donald Trump attends the Saudi-US Investment Forum, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
US President Donald Trump’s order banning citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States goes into effect at 12:01 am ET (0401 GMT) on Monday, a move the president promulgated to protect the country from “foreign terrorists.”
The countries affected by the latest travel ban are Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
The entry of people from seven other countries – Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela – will be partially restricted.
Trump, a Republican, said the countries subject to the most severe restrictions were determined to harbor a “large-scale presence of terrorists,” fail to cooperate on visa security, have an inability to verify travelers’ identities, as well as inadequate record-keeping of criminal histories and high rates of visa overstays in the United States.
He cited last Sunday’s incident in Boulder, Colorado, in which an Egyptian national tossed a gasoline bomb into a crowd of pro-Israel demonstrators as an example of why the new curbs are needed. But Egypt is not part of the travel ban.
The travel ban forms part of Trump’s policy to restrict immigration into the United States and is reminiscent of a similar move in his first term when he barred travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations.
Officials and residents in countries whose citizens will soon be banned expressed dismay and disbelief.
Chad President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said he had instructed his government to stop granting visas to US citizens in response to Trump’s action.
“Chad has neither planes to offer nor billions of dollars to give, but Chad has its dignity and its pride,” he said in a Facebook post, referring to countries such as Qatar, which gifted the U.S. a luxury airplane for Trump’s use and promised to invest billions of dollars in the U.S.
Afghans who worked for the US or US-funded projects and were hoping to resettle in the US expressed fear that the travel ban would force them to return to their country, where they could face reprisal from the Taliban.
Democratic US lawmakers also voiced concern about the policies.
“Trump’s travel ban on citizens from over 12 countries is draconian and unconstitutional,” said US Representative Ro Khanna on social media late on Thursday. “People have a right to seek asylum.”
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Israeli Military Says It Struck Hamas Member in Southern Syria
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, May 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Stephanie Lecocq/Pool
The Israeli military said on Sunday that it struck a member of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in southern Syria’s Mazraat Beit Jin, days after Israel carried out its first airstrikes in the country in nearly a month.
Hamas did not immediately comment on the strike.
Israel said on Tuesday it hit weapons belonging to the government in retaliation for the firing of two projectiles towards Israel for the first time under the country’s new leadership. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz held Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa accountable.
Damascus in response said reports of the shelling were unverified, reiterating that Syria does not pose a threat to any regional party.
A little known group named “Martyr Muhammad Deif Brigades,” an apparent reference to Hamas’ military leader who was killed in an Israeli strike in 2024, reportedly claimed responsibility for the shelling. Reuters, however, could not independently verify the claim.
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Israel Orders Military to Stop Gaza-Bound Yacht Carrying Greta Thunberg
FILE PHOTO: Activist Greta Thunberg sits aboard the aid ship Madleen, which left the Italian port of Catania on June 1 to travel to Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid, in this picture released on June 2, 2025 on social media. Photo: Freedom Flotilla Coalition/via REUTERS/File Photo
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz told the military on Sunday to stop a charity boat carrying activists including Sweden’s Greta Thunberg who are planning to defy an Israeli blockade and reach Gaza.
Operated by the pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), the British-flagged Madleen yacht set sail from Sicily on June 6 and is currently off the Egyptian coast, heading slowly towards the Gaza Strip, which is besieged by Israel.
“I instructed the IDF to act so that the Madleen .. does not reach Gaza,” Katz said in a statement.
“To the antisemitic Greta and her Hamas-propaganda-spouting friends, I say clearly: You’d better turn back, because you will not reach Gaza.”
Climate activist Thunberg said she joined the Madleen crew to “challenge Israel’s illegal siege and escalating war crimes” in Gaza and highlight the urgent need for humanitarian aid. She has rejected previous Israeli accusations of antisemitism.
Israel went to war with Hamas in October 2023 after the Islamist terrorists launched a surprise attack on southern Israel, killing more 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages back to the enclave.
Katz said the blockade was essential to Israel’s national security as it seeks to eliminate Hamas.
“The State of Israel will not allow anyone to break the naval blockade on Gaza, whose primary purpose is to prevent the transfer of weapons to Hamas,” he said.
The Madleen is carrying a symbolic quantity of aid, including rice and baby formula, the FFC has said.
FFC press officer Hay Sha Wiya said on Sunday the boat was currently some 160 nautical miles (296 km) from Gaza. “We are preparing for the possibility of interception,” she said.
Besides Thunberg, there are 11 other crew members aboard, including Rima Hassan, a French member of the European Parliament.
Israeli media have reported that the military plans to intercept the yacht before it reaches Gaza and escort it to the Israeli port of Ashdod. The crew would then be deported.
In 2010, Israeli commandos killed 10 people when they boarded a Turkish ship, the Mavi Marmara, that was leading a small flotilla towards Gaza.
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