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Jewish Groups Organize ‘J Pride’ Celebrations After San Diego Pride Refuses to Drop Anti-Israel Singer Kehlani
Kehlani arrives at the BET Awards 2025 at Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, California, United States. Photo: Image Press Agency via Reuters Connect
Local Jewish organizations in San Diego, California, have together organized a weekend of LGBTQ+ celebrations the same weekend as the San Diego Pride Festival after festival organizers ignored their requests to drop R&B singer Kehlani as the headlining performer due to safety concerns surrounding her anti-Israel comments.
The J Pride weekend of events is being hosted by the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center (LFJCC) Jacobs Family Campus and is open to everyone.
“At a time when hate and hostility feel louder than ever, we are choosing something different,” LFJCC said on its website. “We are choosing to lead with PRIDE, with compassion, and with unity. Rather than be defined by exclusion or division, our Jewish community across San Diego is coming together to create something new. A space that uplifts LGBTQ+ Jews and our allies. A space filled with joy, celebration, and connection. A space where everyone can feel seen, safe, and proud. This is not just a reaction — it’s a declaration.”
Kehlani has been a vocal supporter of a “free Palestine” and highly critical of Israel’s military actions in the Gaza Strip during the Israel-Hamas war. In May, the Grammy-nominated singer from Oakland, Calif., said, “F— Israel, f— Zionism.” Last year, she released a music video that opens with the phrase “Long live the intifada,” referencing violent Palestinian uprisings against Israel and the Jewish community. She has accused Israel of genocide, and in one Instagram post, she wrote: “Dismantle Israel. Eradicate Zionism.” She also posted an image online that called for Israel to be removed from the map and replaced with “Palestine.”
The premier sponsor of J Pride is Jamul Casino and Resort, which donated $10,000 to support the event and withdraw participation in San Diego Pride due to the Kehlani controversy, according to East County Magazine. The casino and resort said in a statement that it will honor its financial commitments to the San Diego Pride Festival but will not have a physical presence at the annual event.
“Given the complexity and sensitivity of this situation involving free expression, political symbolism and community inclusion, Jamul Casino Resort’s position is one that prioritizes its firm commitment to core values such as artistic freedom, equality, diversity and genuine respect for community concerns,” resort spokesperson Kirvin Doak said in a statement cited by the magazine. “As an organization rooted in LGBTQ2S+ advocacy, we do not condone hate speech or violence of any kind. Further, we will not be participating in the Pride Parade and those funds will be distributed to the J Pride Festival.”
The San Diego Pride Festival is set to take place July 19-20 at Marston Point in Balboa Park. Eight San Diego-based Jewish groups and synagogues have already withdrawn participation from the festival because of Kehlani’s inclusion.
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria will limit his participation in the festival in light of Kehlani’s involvement. He made the decision due to “regrettable and controversial rhetoric on social media about the Jewish community,” he explained in a letter to San Diego Pride leaders that was obtained by the San Diego Union-Tribune. Gloria will attend and walk in the parade on July 19 but not participate in the rest of the festival, according to his office.
The festival’s volunteer director of medical operations and assistant director of medical operations, both of whom are Jewish, said they were also stepping away from participating in the event. Others who have pulled their support for the festival include UC San Diego, UC San Diego Health, Meals on Wheels and Mamas Kitchen San Diego, among many others.
In May, nearly three dozen Jewish organizations released a statement urging festival organizers to reconsider having Kehlani perform at the event.
In late June, the Antisemitism Task Force of San Diego at StandWithUs launched a campaign called “Pride, not Prejudice” to pressure San Diego Pride organizers to remove Kehlani from the lineup of performers. Kehlani’s “hateful rhetoric” against Israel and Zionism “glorifies violence against Jews, and alienates Jewish LGBTQ+ participants, directly contradicting the values of inclusivity, respect, and safety that Pride events are meant to uphold,” the task force argued.
“When progressive spaces tolerate antisemitism or excuse it under the guise of anti-Zionism, they send a clear message that Jews are only welcome if they deny their identity,” Task Force Director Liat Cohen-Reeis said in a statement shared with The Algemeiner. “By booking Kehlani, Pride organizers are sending a clear message that Jews can join the festival if they leave their identity at home.”
San Diego Human Relations Commission Chair Nicole Murray Ramirez, who helped cofound San Diego Pride in 1974, told the Bay Area Reporter she will not attend the festival this year and is extremely upset with festival organizers for inviting Kehlani to perform.
“The Pride board is out of touch,” she told the local publication. “I am absolutely shocked, dismayed, and so disappointed. The Jewish community has always had our backs. I’m a Latino Catholic, but when this came out and [Kehlani] was booked, I wasn’t the only one shocked at the rhetoric she gave and her statements. This is about hate speech.”
“This is not about the Middle East,” she added. “This is about an entertainer who espouses hate, and calls for the end of a people.”
Kehlani insisted she is not antisemitic in an Instagram video uploaded in late April. “I am not antisemitic nor anti-Jew, I am anti-genocide,” she claimed. “I am anti the actions of the Israeli government, I am anti-an extermination of an entire people. I am anti the bombing of innocent children, men, women — that’s what I’m anti.”
Kehlani was scheduled to perform at a concert in New York City in June, but it was canceled after organizers faced pressure from Israel supporters, including New York City Mayor Eric Adams. Cornell University also canceled a performance by Kehlani, and the singer was set to headline San Francisco’s SoSF Pride festival in late June, but she pulled out of the lineup.
San Diego Pride organizers have rejected demands to have Kehlani removed from the event and released a statement in response.
“San Diego Pride identified headliners who are Grammy-level, queer artists to come into a space dedicated to centering and celebrating queer voices, queer identities, and queer joy,” said a spokesperson. “The organization has a zero-tolerance policy for hate speech. At the same time, San Diego Pride is committed to ensuring a space for dissenting voices — particularly queer voices of color — at a time when the federal government is actively silencing those same voices.”
The post Jewish Groups Organize ‘J Pride’ Celebrations After San Diego Pride Refuses to Drop Anti-Israel Singer Kehlani first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Says Eight Arrested for Suspected Links to Israel’s Mossad Spy Agency
The Mossad recruitment ad. Photo: Screenshot.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Saturday they had arrested eight people suspected of trying to transmit the coordinates of sensitive sites and details about senior military figures to Israel’s Mossad, Iranian state media reported.
They are accused of having provided the information to the Mossad spy agency during Israel’s air war on Iran in June, when it attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and killed top military commanders as well as civilians in the worst blow to the Islamic Republic since the 1980s war with Iraq.
Iran retaliated with barrages of missiles on Israeli military sites, infrastructure and cities. The United States entered the war on June 22 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
A Guards statement alleged that the suspects had received specialized training from Mossad via online platforms. It said they were apprehended in northeastern Iran before carrying out their plans, and that materials for making launchers, bombs, explosives and booby traps had been seized.
State media reported earlier this month that Iranian police had arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the 12-day war with Israel, though they did not say what these people had been suspected of doing.
Security forces conducted a campaign of widespread arrests and also stepped up their street presence during the brief war that ended in a US-brokered ceasefire.
Iran has executed at least eight people in recent months, including nuclear scientist Rouzbeh Vadi, hanged on August 9 for passing information to Israel about another scientist killed in Israeli airstrikes.
Human rights groups say Iran uses espionage charges and fast-tracked executions as tools for broader political repression.
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Body of Idan Shtivi, Murdered on Oct. 7, Retrieved from Gaza in Special IDF Operation
Idan Shtivi. Photo: Courtesy of the family
i24 News – The body of Idan Shtivi, a 28-year-old murdered by Palestinian jihadists at the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, was recovered in a joint operation by the IDF and Shin Bet in central Gaza, it was cleared for publication on Saturday.
Shtivi’s remains were returned to Israel alongside the body of Ilan Weiss, another hostage killed during the October 7 massacre.
“Idan Shtivi was abducted from the Tel Gama area and brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists after acting to rescue and evacuate others from the Nova music festival on October 7th, 2023. He was 28 years old at the time of his death,” read an IDF press release.
“Following an identification process conducted at the National Center for Forensic Medicine, along with the Israel Police and the Military Rabbinate, the Hostages and Missing Persons Headquarters notified his family.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Shviti “was a gifted student of sustainability and governance, and a courageous individual” who acted heroically on October 7, helping others flee.
“He was killed in the process and his body was abducted to Gaza by Hamas. My wife and I send our heartfelt condolences to the Shtivi family. So far, 207 hostages have been returned, 148 of them alive. We will continue to act tirelessly and decisively to bring back all our hostages—living and deceased.”
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Woman Stabbed at Ottawa Grocery Store in Latest Antisemitic Attack
A social media post by the alleged attacker, Joseph Rooke of Cornwall, Ontario. Photo: Screenshot via i24
i24 News – The stabbing of a Jewish woman at an Ottawa grocery by a man with a long history of antisemitic posts on social media, the latest antisemitic hate crime in Canada, sparked outrage and prompted condemnation from officials including the prime minister.
Both the victim and the attacker are in their 70s. The woman is reportedly in serious condition.
The suspect was identified as Joseph Rooke, who has authored a series of lengthy rambling screeds on social media, ranting against Israel and Jews.
“Judaism is the world’s oldest cult,” he writes in one post, going on to say “over time jews have become insidious in governments, businesses, media conglomerates, and educational institutions in order to do what they do better than anyone else. Jews are the world’s masters of propaganda, gaslighting, demonization, demagoguery, and outright lying. Using their collective wealth they have become masters of reprisal.”
“I am under no obligation whatsoever, legal, moral, or otherwise, to like jews and I do not. If that means I meet the jewish definition of an anti-semite, so be it.”
Canada has seen a steep spike in antisemitic attacks over the past two years, including a recent incident in Montreal where a Hasidic Jew was beaten in front on his children.
After Prime Minister Mark Carney condemned the incident, many, including former Israel’s ambassador the US Michael Oren, pointed out that Carney’s rhetoric and policies contribute to the increasing insecurity of Canada’s Jewish community through uncritical embrace of outrageous and easily disprovable allegations that Israel and its supporters were guilty of the worst crimes against humanity.