Uncategorized
Alarmed by their country’s political direction, more Israelis are seeking to move abroad
TEL AVIV (JTA) — When Daniel Schleider and his wife, Lior, leave Israel next month, it will be for good — and with a heavy heart.
“I have no doubt I will have tears in my eyes the whole flight.” said Schleider, who was born in Mexico and lived in Israel for a time as a child before returning on his own at 18. Describing himself as “deeply Zionist,” he served in a combat unit in the Israeli army, married an Israeli woman and built a career in an Israeli company.
Yet as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returned to power, assembled a coalition that includes far-right parties and started pushing changes that would erode hallmarks of Israeli democracy, Schleider found himself booking plane tickets and locating an apartment in Barcelona. Spain’s language and low cost of living made the city a good fit, he said, but the real attraction was living in a place where he wouldn’t constantly have to face down the ways that Israel is changing.
Israel’s strength over its 75 years, Schleider said, is “the economy we built by selling our brains.… And yet, in less than half a year, we’ve managed to destroy all that.”
Schleider has been joining the sweeping protests that have taken root across the country in response to the new right-wing government and its effort to strip the Israeli judiciary of much of its power and independence. But while he considered recommitting to his country and fighting the changes rather than fleeing over them, he also accepts the government’s argument that most Israelis voted for something he doesn’t believe in.
Daniel Schleider and his wife Lior are leaving Israel for Barcelona because of the political instability in their country. (Courtesy Schleider)
“I have a lot of internal conflict,” he said about the protests. “Who am I to fight against what the majority has accepted?”
Schleider is far from alone in seeking to leave Israel this year. While Israelis have always moved abroad for various reasons, including business opportunities or to gain experience in particular fields, the pace of planned departures appears to be picking up. No longer considered a form of social betrayal, emigration — known in Hebrew as yerida, meaning descent — is on the table for a wide swath of Israelis right now.
Many of the people weighing emigration were already thinking about it but were catalyzed by the new government, according to accounts from dozens of people in various stages of emigration and of organizations that seek to aid them.
“I’ve already been on the fence for a few years — not in terms of leaving Israel but in terms of relocating for something new,” said Schleider.
“But in the past year, with all the craziness and everything, I realized where the country was going. And after the recent elections, my wife — who had been unconvinced — was the one who took the step and said now she understood where the public is going and what life is going to be like in the country. You could call it the straw that broke the camel’s back,” he said.
“And then when the whole issue of the [judicial] revolution started, we just decided not to wait and to do it immediately.”
Ocean Relocation, which assists people with both immigration to and emigration from Israel, has received more than 100 inquiries a day from people looking to leave since Justice Minister Yariv Levin first presented his proposal for judicial reform back in January. That’s four times the rate of inquiries the organization received last year, according to senior manager Shay Obazanek.
“Never in history has there been this level of demand,” Obazanek said, citing the company’s 80 years’ experience as the “barometer” of movement in and out the country.
Shlomit Drenger, who leads Ocean Relocation’s business development, said those looking to leave come from all walks of life. They include families pushed to leave by the political situation; those investing in real estate abroad as a future shelter, if needed; and Israelis who can work remotely and are worried about the country’s upheaval. Economics are also a concern: With foreign investors issuing dire warnings about Israel’s economy if the judicial reforms go through, companies wary to invest in the country and the shekel already weakening, it could grow more expensive to leave in the future.
The most common destination for the new departures, Drenger said, is Europe, representing representing 70% of moves, compared to 40% in the recent past. Europe’s draws include its convenient time zones, quality-of-life indices, and chiefly, the relative ease in recent years of obtaining foreign passports in countries such as Portugal, Poland and even Morocco. Many Israelis have roots in those countries and are or have been entitled to citizenship today because their family members were forced to leave under duress during the Holocaust or the Spanish Inquisition.
Israelis protesting against the government’s controversial judicial reform bill block the main road leading to the departures area of Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv on March 9, 2023. (Ahmad Gharabli/AFP via Getty Images)
On the other hand, Drenger said, emigration to the United States, where the vast majority of the 1 million Israeli citizens abroad live, has declined significantly. The United States is known for its tough immigration laws and high cost of living in areas with large Israeli and Jewish communities, and even people who have no rights to a foreign passport have an easier time obtaining residency rights in Europe than the United States.
Some Israelis aren’t picking anywhere in particular before leaving. Ofer Stern, 40, quit his job as a tech developer, left Israel and is now traveling around the world before deciding where to settle.
“We’re living in a democracy and that democracy is dependent on demography and I can’t fight it,” he said, alluding to the fact that Orthodox Jews, who tend to be right wing, are the fastest-growing segment of the Israeli population. “The country that I love and that I’ve always loved will not be here in 10 years. Instead, it will be a country that is suited to other people, but not for me.”
While others have already started their emigration process, American-born Marni Mandell, a mother of two living in Tel Aviv, is still on the fence. Her greatest fear is that judicial reforms could open the door to significant changes in civil rights protections — and in so doing break her contract with the country she chose.
“If this so-called ‘reform’ is enacted, which is really tantamount to a coup, it’s hard to imagine that I want my children to grow up to fight in an army whose particularism outweighs the basic human rights that are so fundamental to my values,” Mandell said.
Most people who look into emigrating for political reasons do not end up doing so. In the weeks leading up to the United States’ 2020 presidential election, inquiries to law firms specializing in helping Americans move abroad saw a sharp uptick in inquiries — many of them from Jews fearful about a second Trump administration after then-President Donald Trump declined to unequivocally condemn white supremacists. When President Joe Biden was elected, they largely called off the alarm.
The Trump scenario is not analogous with the Israeli one for several reasons, starting with the fact that the Israelis are responding to an elected government’s policy decisions, not just the prospect of an election result. What’s more, U.S. law contains safeguards designed to prevent any single party or leader from gaining absolute power. Israel has fewer of those safeguards, and many of those appear threatened if the government’s proposals go through.
Casandra Larenas had long courted the idea of moving overseas. “As a childfree person, Israel doesn’t have much to offer and is a really expensive country. I’ve traveled around so I know the quality of life I can reach abroad,” she said. But she said she had always batted away the idea: “I’m still Jewish and my family are still here.”
Clockwise from upper left: Benjamin-Michael Aronov, Casandra Larenas and Ofer Stern are all leaving Israel because of political unrest there. (All photos courtesy)
That all changed with the judicial overhaul, she said. While not against the idea of a reform per se, Laranes is firmly opposed to the way it is being carried out, saying it totally disregards the millions of people on the other side. Chilean-born, Laranes grew up under Augusto Pinochet’s military dictatorship.
“I still remember [it] and I don’t want something like that again,” said Larenas, who has purchased a plane ticket for later this spring and plans to take up residency abroad — though she said she would maintain her citizenship and hoped to return one day.
The departure of liberal and moderate Israelis could have implications on Israel’s political future. Israel does not permit its citizens to vote absentee, meaning that anyone who leaves the country must incur costly, potentially frequent travel to participate in elections — or cede political input altogether.
Benjamin-Michael Aronov, who grew up with Russian parents in the United States, said he was taken aback by how frequently Israelis express shock that he moved to Israel in the first place. “The No. 1 question I get from Israelis is, ‘Why would you move here from the U.S.? We’re all trying to get out of here. There’s no future here.’”
He said he had come to realize that they were right.
“I thought the warnings were something that would truly impact our children or grandchildren but that our lifetime would be spent in an Israeli high-tech, secular golden era. But I’m realizing the longevity of Tel Aviv’s bubble of beaches and parties and crazy-smart, secular people changing the world with technology is maybe even more a fantasy now than when Herzl dreamt it,” Aronov said. “I found my perfect home, a Jewish home, sadly being undone by Jews.”
Not everyone choosing to jump ship is ideologically aligned with the protest movement. Amir Cohen, who asked to use a pseudonym because he has not informed his employers of his plans yet, is a computer science lecturer at Ariel University in the West Bank who voted in the last election for the Otzma Yehudit party chaired by far-right provocateur Itamar Ben-Gvir. Cohen was willing to put aside his ideological differences with the hared Orthodox parties if it meant achieving political stability — but was soon disillusioned.
“None of it is working. And now we’re on our way to civil war, it’s that simple. I figured, ‘I don’t need this nonsense, there are plenty of places in the world for me to go,’” he said.
Thousands of Israeli protesters rally against the Israeli goverment’s judicial overhaul bills in Tel Aviv, March 4, 2023. (Gili Yaari Flash90)
Cohen stuck with the country after one of his brothers was killed in the 2014 Gaza War. Now, he said, his other brothers have recently followed his lead and applied for Hungarian passports in an effort to find a way to move abroad permanently.
“I’m not alone,” he said. “Most of my friends and family feel the same way.”
Others still, like Omer Mizrahi, view themselves as apolitical. A contractor from Jerusalem, Mizrahi, 27, headed to San Diego, California, a month ago as a result of the reform. Mizrahi, who eschewed casting a vote in the last election, expressed a less common impetus for leaving: actual fear for his life. Mizrahi described sitting in traffic jams in Jerusalem and realizing that if a terror attack were to unfold — “and let’s be honest, there are at least one or two every week” — he wouldn’t be able to escape in time because he was caught in a gridlock. “Our politicians can’t do anything about it because they’re too embroiled in a war of egos.”
Now 7,500 miles away, Mizrahi says he feels like he’s finally living life. “I sit in traffic now and I’m happy as a clam. Everything’s calm.”
Back in Israel, Schleider is making his final preparations for leaving, advertising his Tesla for sale on Facebook this week. He remains hopeful that the massive anti-government protests will make a difference. In the meantime, though, his one-way ticket is scheduled for April 14.
“I dream of coming back, but I don’t know that it will ever happen,” he said. “We made a decision that was self-serving, but that doesn’t mean we’re any less Zionist.”
—
The post Alarmed by their country’s political direction, more Israelis are seeking to move abroad appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Who can play a Jew — A debate in Germany
אױף דער בינע פֿון „דײַטשן טעאַטער“ אין בערלין טראָגט דער בלאָנדער שױשפּילער מאָריץ קינעמאַן אַ טלית. ס׳איז שװער צו זײַן אַ ייִד אין דײַטשלאַנד, גיט ער צו פֿאַרשטײן. שפּעטער שילט ער אין עולם אַרײַן מיט אױסגעשרײען פֿון „פּאַסקודנע גױים!“
מע װאָלט געקענט מײנען אַז קינעמאַן איז אַ ייִד, און אַז ער רעדט פֿאַר זיך אַלײן. ס׳איז אָבער נישט אַזוי פּשוט.
זײַן חבֿר דוד, דערציילט ער אין דער סאָלאָ־פֿאָרשטעלונג, איז אַן אַקטיאָר, נישט קיין ייִד, װאָס שפּילט גערן ייִדישע ראָלעס. ס׳איז אים אָבער שווער. „פּלוצעם װילן אַלע רעזשיסאָרן בלױז ׳עכטן׳ ייִדן!“ זאָגט ער. אײן מאָל האָט דוד אַפֿילו געבאָרגט בײַ מאָריצן זײַן יאַרמלקע כּדי צו פֿאַרבעסערן די שאַנסן צו קריגן אַזאַ ראָלע.
קינעמאַן שפּילט דאָ אַ פּאַרשױן וואָס, כאָטש ער טראָגט אַ טלית, איז נישט קײן ייִד. די פּיעסע הײסט טאַקע „פֿאַלשע ייִדן“ און זײַן פּאַרשױן איז באַשײַמפּערלעך באַזירט אױף אַ דײַטשן זשורנאַליסט אונטערן נאָמען פֿאַביאַן װאָלף.
יאָרנלאַנג האָט פֿאַביאַן װאָלף פּובליקירט פּראָװאָקאַטיװע פּאָליטישע עסײען פֿון אַ ייִדישן קוקװינקל אין אַ נאַציאָנאַלער צײַטונג – ביז זײַן לעצטן עסײ דאָרט אין 2023, װען ער האָט זיך מודה געװען אַז זײַנע מעשׂיות װעגן אַ ייִדישער באָבען זענען… פּוסטע באָבע־מעשׂיות. פֿאַביאַן װאָלף איז געװען אַזאַ מין „פֿאַלשער ייִד“, אַ װאָלף אין שאָפֿנפּעלץ, און פּונקט ווי וואָלף, האָט קינעמאַן דאָ אויך אָפּגענאַרט דעם עולם.
נאָך דער פֿאָרשטעלונג האָב איך בײַם שענק אין דער פֿאָיע פֿון טעאַטער געכאַפּט אַ שמועס מיט קינעמאַן און דעם דראַמאַטורג־רעזשיסאָר פֿון דער פּיעסע, נעם ברוזילאָװסקי. „קודם־כּל װיל איך װיסן, צי ביסטו טאַקע אַ ייִד?“ האָב איך געפֿרעגט בײַ קינעמאַן.
און איצט קלער איך, צי איז זײַן ענטפֿער װיכטיק?
ברוזילאָװסקי, װאָס איז יאָ אַ ייִד, האָט מיר דערקלערט׃ „ס׳איז מיר געװען װיכטיק צו טרעפֿן אַ בלאָנדן אַקטיאָר פֿאַר דער ראָלע. סוף־כּל־סוף האַנדלט זיך די פּיעסע נישט װעגן ייִדן, נאָר װעגן דײַטשן און זײערע נעװראָזן.“
די צוקוקערס פֿון דער פּיעסע האָבן נישט געוווּסט צי קינעמאַן איז אַ ייִד ביזן סוף. אַפֿילו דער קלאַנג־טעכניקער האָט הינטער די קוליסן געשטעלט די זעלבע פֿראַגע. קינעמאַן און ברוזילאָװסקי װילן דער עולם זאָל פֿאַרגעסן די סטערעאָטיפּן װעגן ייִדישן אױסזען און גלײבן, בשעת־מעשׂה, אַז קינעמאַן איז יאָ אַ ייִד.
צװישן זײַנע מאָנאָלאָגן האָט מען איבערגעשפּילט אױסצוגן פֿון רעקאָרדירטע אינטערװיוען װעגן די אַזױ גערופֿענע „קאָסטיום־ייִדן“. דאָס איז אַן אמתער פֿענאָמען׃ דײַטשע שאַרלאַטאַנען װאָס מאַכן זיך פֿאַר ייִדן און רעדן עפֿנטלעך װעגן דעם חורבן פֿון אַ ייִדישן קוקװינקל. פֿריִער האָבן זיי זיך געמאַכט פֿאַר לעבן געבליבענע פֿונעם חורבן, און הײַנט — װי זײערע קינדער און אײניקלעך. עטלעכע „קאָסטיום־ייִדן“ האָבן, אײדער מע האָט זײ אַנטפּלעקט, דערגרײכט גרױסע הצלחה. אײנער איז אַפֿילו געװאָרן דער ראָש פֿון אַ ייִדישער קהילה מיט הונדערט מיטגלידער.
אין אַן אינטערוויו האָט באַרבאַראַ שטײַנער, די מחברטע פֿונעם בוך„די אינסצענירונג פֿון ייִדישקײט“, געטענהט אַז קאָסטיום־ייִדן „דערגאַנצן אַ בלױז אין מאַרק“. אין אַ געזעלשאַפֿט מיט קאָלעקטיװער שולד לגבי אַ מינאָריטעט ציִען שאַרלאַטאַנען צו אַ היפּשן עולם. זײ פֿאַרשטײען גאַנץ גוט װעלכע רעפּליקן פֿאַרקױפֿן זיך.
ענלעכע פֿאַלן געפֿינט מען אין אַנדערע געזעלשאַפֿטן. אין קאַנאַדע, למשל, האָט מען אין די לעצטע יאָרן אַנטדעקט שרעקלעכע באַװײַזן פֿונעם אַמאָליקן גענאָציד אױף די אָרטיקע ערשטע אײַנגעבוירענע פֿעלקער. גלײַכצײַטיק האָט מען אַנטפּלעקט אַז דער פּרעמירטער קאַנאַדער שרײַבער טאָמאַס קינג, באַקאַנט פֿאַר זײַנע ביכער אָנגעשריבן פֿון אַ טשעראָקי־קוקװינקל, שטאַמט בכלל נישט פֿון די ערשטע פֿעלקער.
בסך־הכּל לעבן אין אַ לאַנד פֿון 83 מיליאָן מענטשן בלויז אַ 200 טױזנט ייִדן, לרובֿ אימיגראַנטן פֿון אַמאָליקן ראַטן־פֿאַרבאַנד אָדער מדינת־ישׂראל – ווי אויך אַ גרױסע צאָל גרים פֿון דײַטשן אָפּשטאַם. דער „צענטראַלער ראַט פֿון ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד“ פֿאַרטרעט בלױז אַרום אַ העלפֿט פֿון די ייִדן, װײַל נישט אַלע ייִדן פֿילן זיך צוגעבונדן צו דער אָפֿיציעלער ייִדישער קהילה אין זײער שטאָט. נישט געקוקט אױף דער קלײנער פּראָפּאָרץ ייִדן אין לאַנד – 0.24% – קומען זײ צו רײד בײַ כּלערלײ געזעלשאַפֿטלעכע דעבאַטעס: בפֿרט װעגן געשיכטע, װעלטפּאָליטיק און דער ראָלע פֿון אימיגראַנטן אין דײַטשלאַנד. מע קוקט אױף ייִדן װי די „גוטע, אַסימילירטע“ מינאָריטעט. להיפּוך — לױטן ראַסיסטישן נאַראַטיװ — אַסימילירן זיך קוים די מאַכמעדאַנער אימיגראַנטן און פּליטים און ברענגען מיט זיך אַן „אימפּאָרטירטן אַנטיסעמיטיזם“.
דער סאָציאָלאָג י. מיכל באָדעמאַן ז״ל און דער פּאָעט מאַקס טשאָלעק באַשרײַבן די עפֿנטלעכע דיסקוסיע װעגן ייִדן װי אַ מין מעטאַפֿאָרישן בלאָף, דעם אַזױ גערופֿענעם „אָנדענק־טעאַטער“: צו ערשט שרײַבט אַ נישט־ייִדישער דראַמאַטורג אָן דעם סצענאַר; דערנאָך קלײַבט ער אויס אַ ייִד װאָס זאָל רעדן פֿאַר אַלע ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד; אָט דער „רעפּרעזענטאַנט“ זאָגט אױס דעם דראַמאַטורגס רעפּליקן ווי געהעריק — און דער נישט־ייִדישער עולם אַפּלאָדירט. די מעטאַפֿאָרישע פּיעסע רעדט זיך װעגן די טױטע ייִדישע קדושים פֿון אַ מאָל, װעגן אַ נײַעם אױפֿבלי פֿון ייִדישקײט אין דײַטשלאַנד און מדינת־ישׂראל, װעגן אַנטיסעמיטיזם בײַ לינק־געשטימטע מענטשן און בײַ מאַכמעדאַנער, װעגן דײַטשן תּשובֿה טאָן און ייִדישן מוחל זײַן. אמתע ייִדן מיט אײגענע מעשׂיות אָדער מיט די „פֿאַלשע“ מײנונגען געהערן נישט אױף אַזאַ מעטאַפֿאָרישער בינע.
די שרײַבערין דבֿורה פֿעלדמאַן, באַקאַנט פֿאַר איר בוך „נישט־אָרטאָדאָקסיש“ און דער נעטפֿליקס־אַדאַפּטאַציע דערפֿון, האָט געשריבן אַ בוך אױף דײַטש מיטן טיטל „ייִדן־פֿעטיש“. לױט איר איז דער איצטיקער דײַטשער פֿילאָסעמיטיזם ענג פֿאַרבונדן מיטן אַלטן אַנטיסעמיטיזם. בײדע פֿאַרגרינגערן און פֿאַרשטומען די ייִדישע פֿילמיניקײט.
דאָס אויסטײלן ראָלעס אין טעאַטער קען זײַן פּריקרע, אַפֿילו ווען עס האָט גאָרנישט צו טאָן מיט אידענטיטעט. קינעמאַן האָט אפֿשר אַ מוסקוליעזן גוף אָבער ער זעט נישט אויס ווי קיין קינאָ־שטערן. די ראָלע־דירעקטאָרן (casting directors, בלע״ז) װײסן אָפֿט נישט װעלכע ראָלעס פּאַסן אים: איז ער אַ „נערד“ צי אַ „העלד“? „װי אַ שױשפּילער בין איך בײַ די ראָלע־אויסטײלער אין די הענט“, האָט קינעמאַן געזאָגט.
אין 2023 האָט דער אַמעריקאַנער נישט־ייִדישער אַקטיאָר־רעזשיסאָר ברעדלי קופּער, שפּילנדיק דעם דיריגענט און קאָמפּאָזיטאָר לענאַרד בערנשטײן אינעם פֿילם „מאַעסטראָ“, געטראָגן אַ פֿאַלשע „ייִדישע“ נאָז. דאָס האָט דערפֿירט צו אַ קלײנעם סקאַנדאַל, אָבער בערנשטײנס קינדער האָבן קופּערן פֿאַרטײדיקט.
ס׳איז שױן דורכױס פּסול, אַז אַ װײַסער אַקטיאָר זאָל זיך אױספֿאַרבן דאָס פּנים און שפּילן אַן אַפֿראָ־אַמעריקאַנער אױף דער בינע. אַזױ האָט געטאָן דער ייִדישער אַקטיאָר על דזשאָלסאָן (אַסאַ יאולסאָן) אין די פֿאַראײניקטע שטאַטן אין די 1910ער יאָרן אָן – און איז דעמאָלט געװאָרן אַ שטערן פֿון טעאַטער און קינאָ, דער „מלך פֿון ׳בלעקפֿײס׳“. מיט זײַנע קאָמישע פֿאָרשטעלונגען פֿון טראַדיציאָנעלע אַפֿראָ־אַמעריקאַנער לידער האָט דזשאָלסאָן, צװײ דורות נאָך דער שקלאַפֿערײַ, צעזײט און צעשפּרײט כּלערלײ ראַסיסטישע סטערעאָטיפּן.
אָבער װער מעג דען שפּילן אַ ייִד, און װער נישט? װײַטער׃ װער מעג רעדן פֿאַר די ייִדן אין דײַטשלאַנד 81 יאָר נאָכן חורבן?
אױף אָט די פֿראַגעס האָט קײנער אינעם שענק פֿון „דײַטשן טעאַטער“ געהאַט קײן קלאָרן ענטפֿער. סיר הענרי, אַ שױשפּילער בײַ דער בערלינער „פֿאָלקסבינע“, אַ געבױרענער אין קאַנאַדע, טענהט׃ „בעסער זאָלן דאָס די ייִדן דערצײלן די ייִדישע װיצן. אױף דער בינע, פֿונדעסטװעגן, װענדט זיך אַלץ אינעם קאָנטעקסט און די כּללים זענען נישט אַזױ פֿעסט.“
דער ייִדישער רעזשיסאָר ברוזילאָװסקי איז מסכּים׃ „מיר האָבן נישט קײן כּללים אין טעאַטער.“
The post Who can play a Jew — A debate in Germany appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Defining the Goals of the Iran War
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth holds a briefing with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine, amid the US-Israeli war on Iran, at the Pentagon in Washington, DC, US, March 19, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Evan Vucci
Going after the unacceptable threat Iran posed to American, Israeli, Gulf Arab States, European, and Asian military and political interests — and understanding the destructive hand of China behind the mullahs — was not a mistake. It was recognition of the stakes for the civilized world.
But the US and Israel, indispensable allies at many levels, have to take account of their differences in threat level and capabilities, and forge a political as well as military path together.
Two points to make in wartime:
First — achievable goals are essential to ending a war. Corollary 1: It is easier to start a war than end one Corollary 2: Every war must end
Second — there are things you don’t know and won’t know (although in some cases, people knew, but people weren’t listening.
President Donald Trump said in his State of the Union address: “They [the Iranians] have already developed missiles that can threaten Europe and our bases overseas, and they’re working to build missiles that will soon reach the United States of America.”
He was right, but dismissed with a collective snicker.
My husband, security analyst Dr. Stephen Bryen, ran the statement through Google Gemini and found disparaging references to the President in The Washington Post, The Guardian, American Progress, PBS NewsHour, PolitiFact, The New York Times and CNN, among others.
He found “experts” who told us that the range of Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal was about 2,000 km, which made Israel and the Gulf States potential targets, but allowed the Europeans to claim immunity. In 2025, a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) assessment posited that Iran was “years away” from possessing a viable ICBM.
They were wrong.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told NBC News in February, “We are not developing long-range missiles … we have limited the range below 2,000 kilometers.”
He lied.
Trump was right. The range is closer to 4,000 km, technically putting Paris in range (about 4,200 km from Tehran).
[Aside: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) said in a TV interview that Iran had enough uranium to make nuclear bombs, but there was no reason to do anything about it because Iran’s missiles couldn’t yet reach the US. Is he still sure?]
The unwillingness to see and understand threats is, in some ways, an admirable attempt to avoid war. War is terrible. No one wants war. War may kill the enemy, and surely it will also kill innocents. But the decades-old idea that one could negotiate with terrorists is a huge failing in the Western world.
The Oslo Accords were not peace. Temporary deals with Lebanon are not peace. Multiple Gaza ceasefires were not peace. Operations Rising Lion and Midnight Hammer were not peace. The return of the Israeli hostages was not peace.
Israel collected intelligence and built an extraordinary military force in cooperation with the United States, while the US built Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPS). But it also assumed that giving the people of Gaza a decent life, including work permits in Israel, would keep things calm.
It worked at some level until October 7, 2023.
After that, Israel’s determination to defend its citizens forced a reckoning. It would no longer ignore Iran. President Trump agreed. Last summer’s attack on Iranian assets was a masterpiece of coordination and cooperation.
But it wasn’t enough.
The attacks launched this year were designed not only to eliminate Iran’s weapons and weapons-producing capability, but to put in place a new strategic pattern for behavior.
Much of the Arab world has come to his thinking. UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq and even Qatar, seeing that they are targets for Iran, not allies, have stepped up. Azerbaijan, too. Syria is silent and Lebanon is trying to figure out how to get rid of Hezbollah. In Europe, the Czech Republic and Estonia defied the EU resolution on the war.
In the past few days, Japan and several European countries appear to have awakened to the fact that their future, their security, and their people are on the firing line.
The late Fred Iklé, a defense strategist and official in the Reagan administration, wrote a book entitled Every War Must End. He was writing primarily, but not only, about American wars. For Iklé, who passed away in 2011, the essential lesson was that it is much easier to start a war than to successfully conclude one. Having achievable aims — both military and political — and stopping when they have been met — is the key to success.
The alternative is to slog along with grinding casualties until the conflict peters out ignominiously when public opinion no longer supports the effort. The French, he pointed out, were the military victors in Algeria — as were the Americans in Vietnam — but in both cases, the Western power withdrew without a political victory, and public disillusionment hampered the government at home and abroad for years after.
The Russians left Afghanistan when it produced unacceptable grumbling at home. More recently, the US left Afghanistan and northern Syria.
In none of those cases was the war over; in each case, people continued to die on the ground when we went home.
But Israel is home. Israel needs victory to ensure peace — how you define that between allies is precisely the point. And America and Israel must find a definition of victory that works for each.
Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of the Jewish Policy Center and Editor of inFOCUS Quarterly magazine.
Uncategorized
When a Jewish Landmark Disappears, So Does Jewish Presence
The Contemporary Jewish Museum. Photo: screenshot.
Another major Jewish institution has collapsed – and the implications reach far beyond San Francisco.
The Contemporary Jewish Museum (CJM) has closed and is selling its building. What was once a bold, architecturally striking institution in the heart of downtown will soon be something else entirely. Another civic space repurposed. Another cultural anchor lost.
I loved seeing that building. Designed by Daniel Libeskind, it was bold, unmistakable, and confident – right off Yerba Buena Gardens in the heart of the city. It stood prominently, not tucked away or obscured, but fully visible. It sent a simple but powerful message: Jewish life belongs in the civic fabric. For me, it was a symbol of pride.
And now it is gone.
The explanations offered are familiar. Attendance declined by roughly 50 percent from 2019 to 2023–2024. Revenue fell. In the fiscal year ending June 2024, expenses outpaced revenue by more than $5.9 million. Leadership acknowledged that the building itself had become “beyond our capacity” to maintain.
All of that may be true. But it is not sufficient.
Institutions do not simply collapse because conditions change. They collapse because they fail to respond to changing conditions with clarity, discipline, and purpose. And when a flagship Jewish cultural institution disappears in one of the wealthiest and most philanthropic regions in the country, it is worth asking not only what happened, but what it says about us.
At one level, this is a story of institutional failure. The museum expanded into a large and expensive footprint – a 63,000-square-foot facility completed in 2008 at a cost of $47 million in a city already becoming more difficult to sustain. It relied on a fragile mix of philanthropy and foot traffic in a downtown that was hollowing out even before COVID accelerated the trend. The museum was still carrying roughly $27 million in outstanding construction debt. When those pressures intensified, there appears to have been no clear plan to right-size the institution, refocus its mission, or rethink its role in a changing cultural landscape.
Instead, the result was a slow drift toward insolvency – followed by closure.
But the deeper problem is not simply managerial. It is cultural. And it was visible in the year before the closure, when the museum found itself caught in an episode that illustrated just how far it had drifted from its core identity.
In spring 2024, the museum mounted its first major open-call exhibition of California Jewish artists. Seven of the accepted artists withdrew their work in a coordinated protest, demanding that the museum commit to BDS – the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement against Israel – and divest from all funding associated with the Jewish state. The museum rejected those demands. But rather than confidently reaffirming its identity as a Jewish cultural institution, it hesitated publicly, left blank spaces on its walls where the withdrawn works would have hung, and framed the episode as a “complicated moment.” It was a moment that revealed an institution uncertain of what it stood for.
Too many institutions in recent years have confused relevance with purpose. In an effort to remain current, they have chased trends, embraced fashionable programming, and diluted the very identity that made them distinctive. In doing so, they have weakened the case for their own existence – both to the public and to their donors.
Jewish institutions are not immune to this drift. When they lose clarity about who they are and what they are meant to do, they risk becoming interchangeable with any number of other cultural organizations. And interchangeable institutions are far easier to abandon.
The museum’s collapse also raises uncomfortable questions about the direction of Jewish giving. The Jewish Federation Bay Area manages more than $2 billion in assets and provided millions in grants in fiscal year 2023 alone. The Bay Area is home to some of the most generous Jewish philanthropists in America. If a flagship institution like this cannot be sustained in that environment, the problem is not a lack of resources. It is a question of priorities.
Much contemporary giving is directed toward causes, programs, and initiatives – often important ones. But less attention is paid to sustaining the shared institutions that give Jewish life visibility, continuity, and public meaning. Museums, cultural centers, and communal spaces do not always produce immediate or measurable outcomes. But they create something more enduring: a sense of presence.
The board chair told reporters that the building “does not define the museum.” And perhaps he is right, technically. The executive director expressed optimism about a smaller, reimagined future. That deserves acknowledgment. But what has been lost in the interim – the physical presence, the civic statement, the visibility – cannot simply be reimagined back into existence. Presence is not just programmatic. It is architectural. It is spatial. It is the fact of a building that stands in the middle of a great city and says: we are here.
Places like the Contemporary Jewish Museum did something rare. They connected past and present, insiders and outsiders, tradition and creativity. They offered a space where Jewish life could be explored without precondition – neither purely religious nor purely academic, but deeply cultural and civic at once. They were not simply museums. They were part of the infrastructure of Jewish public life.
The disappearance of such institutions is especially troubling given what is happening in the broader culture. The ADL recorded 9,354 antisemitic incidents in 2024, the highest level since tracking began in 1979 – a staggering 893 percent increase over the past decade. The FBI simultaneously recorded the highest number of anti-Jewish hate crimes since it began reporting data in 1991. A majority of American Jewish college students report feeling uncomfortable or unsafe on campus because they are Jewish.
At a moment like this, the disappearance of visible Jewish institutions sends precisely the wrong signal. It suggests contraction when presence is needed. It risks normalizing a quieter, less visible Jewish public life.
It is also worth noting that the CJM’s collapse is part of a wider pattern in San Francisco’s struggling cultural sector – the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, California College of the Arts, and the nearby Mexican Museum have all faced severe financial distress in recent years. This context matters. The CJM did not fail in a vacuum. But it is not exculpatory, either. What distinguishes the institutions that endure is usually not better luck. It is clearer purpose and stronger accountability.
When an institution like this collapses in a wealthy and engaged community, it is rarely because no one cared. It is because no one felt ultimately responsible for ensuring that it endured. Not the board. Not the donors. Not the broader community.
Everyone assumes someone else will step in. And no one does.
That is the accountability failure. And it is correctable – if the community chooses to correct it.
The sale of the Contemporary Jewish Museum should not be treated as a local story or an isolated failure. It is a signal, one that should prompt concrete action.
Jewish philanthropists and federations should dedicate a meaningful portion of their giving specifically to sustaining cultural institutions – not just causes and programs, but the physical and civic infrastructure of Jewish life. Boards of Jewish institutions should be held to explicit accountability for institutional survival, not just programmatic innovation. And Jewish communities in every major city should ask, right now, whether their flagship cultural institutions are financially sound – and what they would do if they were not.
If the CJM survives in some smaller, reimagined form, that would be welcome. But the larger lesson stands regardless: Jewish presence in American public life is not self-sustaining. It requires deliberate investment, disciplined governance, and a community willing to prioritize endurance over the fashions of the moment.
Some institutions are easy to replace. Others are not.
The Contemporary Jewish Museum was more than a museum. It was a statement.
And its disappearance should force us to ask whether we are still willing to make such statements – or whether, slowly and quietly, we are allowing them to disappear.
Samuel J. Abrams is a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.