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Bari Weiss, crusader against antisemitism, takes leading role in Elon Musk’s push to limit Twitter moderation
(JTA) — Bari Weiss, a prominent commentator on antisemitism in the United States, is taking a leading role in Elon Musk’s efforts to reshape Twitter by criticizing the platform’s past efforts to combat bigotry and harassment.
Starting last Thursday, Weiss has been releasing Twitter threads with what she and another opinion journalist, former Rolling Stone writer Matt Taibbi, have deemed the “Twitter Files” — instances of how former Twitter moderators removed content they deemed as false or dangerous.
Making use of unusual access to Twitter’s internal records and systems, Weiss and Taibbi have made the case that Twitter has been subject to politically motivated decisions about what to remove by a “secret group” of high-level executives.
Those executives were tasked with executing Twitter’s moderation policies in sensitive cases, and the leaked communications show them doing so in politically neutral terms. But Weiss and Taibbi have argued that the suspensions doled out to conservative accounts, including former President Donald Trump, reflected a deep bias at the company.
Twitter shut down its Trust and Safety Council advisory group, which included 100 independent civil and human rights organizations, on Monday night. The group was formed in 2016 to address hate speech, child exploitation and other issues stemming from Twitter activity.
Musk’s supporters have been receptive, even forcing into hiding on Monday Yoel Roth, the Jewish former head of trust and safety at Twitter that Musk has falsely accused of stoking pedophilia and who has been targeted in Weiss’ tweets as well.
Weiss’ Twitter activism puts her at odds with a leading U.S. antisemitism watchdog, the Anti-Defamation League, which has long pushed for stricter moderation on Twitter and called for an advertiser boycott after Musk acquired the platform and expressions of hate spiked on it.
Weiss — who first vaulted into public view for calling out what she said was antisemitism on her college campus, and who quit a columnist job at The New York Times over what she described as bullying from colleagues — has worked with the ADL in the past. In conjunction with her 2019 book “How to Fight Antisemitism,” she has appeared at multiple events with the organization, as recently as November.
Now, she is a leading voice opposing what the ADL’s leadership says is one of the most pressing issues compromising American Jews’ safety.
The ADL declined to comment on Weiss’ involvement with Musk’s new moderation strategies. Weiss did not return requests for an interview.
Since Roth resigned from Twitter last month, he and Musk have exchanged criticisms on the platform. Over the weekend, Musk misrepresented a snippet from Roth’s graduate dissertation, writing: “Looks like Yoel is arguing in favor of children being able to access adult Internet services.”
On Monday night, Musk tweeted a phrase with a rabbit emoji that has become popular with followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory movement. He denied that he was referring to the movement or aiming a tweet at its followers, but QAnon communities across different platforms responded with excitement to his tweet, Vice News reported.
Accusations of pedophilia against public figures are commonplace in QAnon, which experts say also draws on antisemitic tropes.
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The post Bari Weiss, crusader against antisemitism, takes leading role in Elon Musk’s push to limit Twitter moderation appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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UK PM Starmer Says There Could Be New Powers to Ban Pro-Palestinian Marches
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer gives a media statement at Downing Street in London, Britain, April 30, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Jack Taylor/File photo
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the government could ban pro-Palestinian marches in some circumstances because of the “cumulative effect” the demonstrations had on the Jewish community after two Jewish men were stabbed in London on Wednesday.
Starmer told the BBC that he would always defend freedom of expression and peaceful protest, but chants like “Globalize the Intifada” during demonstrations were “completely off limits” and those voicing them should be prosecuted.
Pro-Palestinian marches have become a regular feature in London since the October 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel that triggered the Gaza war. Critics say the demonstrations have generated hostility and become a focus for antisemitism.
Protesters have argued they are exercising their democratic right to spotlight ongoing human rights and political issues related to the situation in Gaza.
Starmer said he was not denying there were “very strong legitimate views about the Middle East, about Gaza,” but many people in the Jewish community had told him they were concerned about the repeat nature of the marches.
Asked if the tougher response should focus on chants and banners, or whether the protests should be stopped altogether, Starmer said: “I think certainly the first, and I think there are instances for the latter.”
“I think it’s time to look across the board at protests and the cumulative effect,” he said, adding that the government needed to look at what further powers it could take.
Britain raised its terrorism threat level to “severe” on Thursday amid mounting security concerns that foreign states were helping fuel violence, including against the Jewish community.
“We are seeing an elevated threat to Jewish and Israeli individuals and institutions in the UK,” the head of counter-terrorism policing, Laurence Taylor, said in a statement, adding that police were also working “against an unpredictable global situation that has consequences closer to home, including physical threats by state-linked actors.”
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War Likely to Resume After Trump’s Rejection of Latest Proposal, Says IRGC General
Iranians carry a model of a missile during a celebration following an IRGC attack on Israel, in Tehran, Iran, April 15, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
i24 News – A senior Iranian military figure said that fighting with the US was “likely” to resume after President Donald Trump stated he was dissatisfied with Tehran’s latest proposal, regime media reported on Saturday.
The comments of General Mohammad Jafar Asadi, one of the top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders, were relayed by the Fars news agency, considered as a mouthpiece of the the powerful paramilitary body.
“Evidence has shown that the Americans do not not adhere to any commitments,” Asadi was quoted as saying.
He further added that Washington’s decision-making was “primarily media-driven aimed first at preventing a drop in oil prices and second at extricating themselves from the mess they have created.”
Iranian armed forces are ready “for any new adventures or foolishness from the Americans,” he said, going to assert that the Iran war would prove for the US a tragedy comparable with what was for Israel the October 7 massacre.
“Just as our martyred Leader said that the Zionist regime will never be the same as before the Al‑Aqsa Storm operation [the name chosen by Hamas leadership for the October 7, 2023 massacre in southern Israel], the United States will also never return to what it was before its attack on Iran,” he said. “The world has understood the true nature of America, and no matter how much malice it shows now, it is no longer the America that many once feared.”
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Trump Says US Navy Acting ‘Like Pirates’ to Carry Out Naval Blockade of Iranian Ports
A view of Iranian-flagged cargo ship M/V Touska as the US Navy Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyer USS Spruance conducts its interception in a location given as the north Arabian Sea, in this screen capture from a video released April 19, 2026. Photo: CENTCOM/Handout via REUTERS
President Donald Trump said on Friday the US Navy was acting “like pirates” in carrying out Washington’s naval blockade of Iranian ports during the US and Israel’s war against Iran.
Trump made the comments while describing the seizure by US forces of a ship a few days ago.
“We took over the ship, we took over the cargo, we took over the oil. It’s a very profitable business,” Trump said in remarks on Friday evening. “We’re like pirates. We’re sort of like pirates but we are not playing games.”
Some of Tehran’s vessels have been seized by the US after leaving Iranian ports, along with sanctioned container ships and Iranian tankers in Asian waters.
Iran has blocked nearly all ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz apart from its own since the start of the war. Trump has imposed a separate blockade of Iranian ports.
The US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28. Iran responded with its own strikes on Israel and Gulf states that host US bases. US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed thousands and displaced millions.
The war has raised oil prices and led to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for about 20 percent of global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments.
Trump, who has offered shifting timelines and goals for the war that remains unpopular in the US, has faced widespread condemnation over his comments on the conflict, including when he threatened to destroy Iran’s entire civilization last month.
Many US experts said last month that American strikes on Iran may amount to war crimes after Trump threatened to target civilian infrastructure.