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Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Host Rally for Jamaal Bowman as He Ramps Up Anti-Israel Attacks
US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) are seen before a press conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on March 21, 2024. Photo: Craig Hudson/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Key anti-Israel lawmakers in the US Congress are set to headline a rally to support the reelection bid of Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) as the embattled congressman intensifies his verbal attacks on the Jewish state.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) will take the stage with Bowman on Saturday at St. Mary’s Park in the Bronx, New York. Sanders will also support Bowman at a rally on Friday at Maceachron Park in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York.
“Jamaal’s race will set the tone for progressive races across the country,” a sign-up form for the rally reads. “We’re going up against special interests who are using NY-16 [New York’s 16th Congressional District] as a test to see if they can win across the country. Our movement is strong, and we won’t let them win.”
The rallies mark the latest attempt by Bowman to rescue his flailing campaign. In a series of recent polls, Bowman has trailed his challenger in the Democratic primary, Westchester County executive George Latimer, by double digits.
Ocasio-Cortez, one of the most prominent critics of Israel in Congress, has expressed great anxiety over the state of Bowman’s struggling campaign.
“I cannot think of a single race that better exemplifies the battle, frankly for our democracy, between everyday people choosing their representation and big money coming in and choosing it for them,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a recent interview.
The prominent Democrat has previously denied that Israel is a democracy and accused the Jewish state of perpetrating “apartheid” and “genocide.”
Sanders, a progressive Jewish lawmaker who has launched similar accusations and accused Israel of inflicting “famine” on Palestinians, claimed that Bowman’s floundering reelection prospects are the result of an orchestrated attack by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the foremost pro-Israel lobbying organization in the US.
“Right-wing Super PACs like AIPAC are targeting Jamaal Bowman because he fights for the values of working class people in his district, whether it’s affordable housing, childcare and pre-K, public schools, or climate justice,” Sanders wrote on X/Twitter last month.
AIPAC’s stated mission is to seek to strengthen bipartisan support for the US-Israel relationship.
Bowman has also repeatedly attacked AIPAC, even accusing it of “racism,” along with some of the other most vocal critics of Israel in Congress.
Progressives fear that a loss for Bowman would diminish their leverage over the Democratic Party on key issues, including the Israel-Hamas war. Left-wing lawmakers believe that removing Bowman from office will embolden moderate forces to pull the Democrats to the political center.
Although Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders have criticized Israel’s military campaign against the Palestinian terror group Hamas in Gaza, Bowman has arguably issued the sharpest condemnations of Israel in recent months.
Bowman dismissed widely reported and corroborated claims of sexual assault of Israeli women by Hamas terrorists as “propaganda,” before walking back those comments earlier this year amid widespread scrutiny.
The congressman also hosted a fundraiser last month with Nihad Awad, who said in November that he was “happy” to witness Hamas’ rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, when the Palestinian terror group invaded the Jewish state from neighboring Gaza, murdered 1,200 people, and kidnapped over 250 others as hostages. The massacre launched the ongoing war in Gaza, where Israel has been waging a military campaign aimed at dismantling Hamas and freeing the hostages.
In an interview with left-wing pundit Olayemi Olurin earlier this month, Bowman argued that support for the Jewish state is rooted in “white supremacy” and “white nationalism.” He also suggested that Israel is responsible for the Oct. 7 atrocities, claiming that Israel’s alleged oppressive treatment of Palestinians might have spurred Hamas, which rules Gaza, to lash out.
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Israel to Issue 54,000 Call-Up Notices to Ultra-Orthodox Students
Haredi Jewish men look at the scene of an explosion at a bus stop in Jerusalem, Israel, on Nov. 23, 2022. Photo: Reuters/Ammar Awad
Israel’s military said it would issue 54,000 call-up notices to ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students following a Supreme Court ruling mandating their conscription and amid growing pressure from reservists stretched by extended deployments.
The Supreme Court ruling last year overturned a decades-old exemption for ultra-Orthodox students, a policy established when the community comprised a far smaller segment of the population than the 13 percent it represents today.
Military service is compulsory for most Israeli Jews from the age of 18, lasting 24-32 months, with additional reserve duty in subsequent years. Members of Israel’s 21 percent Arab population are mostly exempt, though some do serve.
A statement by the military spokesperson confirmed the orders on Sunday just as local media reported legislative efforts by two ultra-Orthodox parties in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition to craft a compromise.
The exemption issue has grown more contentious as Israel’s armed forces in recent years have faced strains from simultaneous engagements with Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Houthis in Yemen, and Iran.
Ultra-Orthodox leaders in Netanyahu’s brittle coalition have voiced concerns that integrating seminary students into military units alongside secular Israelis, including women, could jeopardize their religious identity.
The military statement promised to ensure conditions that respect the ultra-Orthodox way of life and to develop additional programs to support their integration into the military. It said the notices would go out this month.
The post Israel to Issue 54,000 Call-Up Notices to Ultra-Orthodox Students first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Influential Far-Right Minister Lashes out at Netanyahu Over Gaza War Policy
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich sharply criticized on Sunday a cabinet decision to allow some aid into Gaza as a “grave mistake” that he said would benefit the terrorist group Hamas.
Smotrich also accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of failing to ensure that Israel’s military is following government directives in prosecuting the war against Hamas in Gaza. He said he was considering his “next steps” but stopped short of explicitly threatening to quit the coalition.
Smotrich’s comments come a day before Netanyahu is due to hold talks in Washington with President Donald Trump on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day Gaza ceasefire.
“… the cabinet and the Prime Minister made a grave mistake yesterday in approving the entry of aid through a route that also benefits Hamas,” Smotrich said on X, arguing that the aid would ultimately reach the Islamist group and serve as “logistical support for the enemy during wartime”.
The Israeli government has not announced any changes to its aid policy in Gaza. Israeli media reported that the government had voted to allow additional aid to enter northern Gaza.
The prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The military declined to comment.
Israel accuses Hamas of stealing aid for its own fighters or to sell to finance its operations, an accusation Hamas denies. Gaza is in the grip of a humanitarian catastrophe, with conditions threatening to push nearly a half a million people into famine within months, according to U.N. estimates.
Israel in May partially lifted a nearly three-month blockade on aid. Two Israeli officials said on June 27 the government had temporarily stopped aid from entering north Gaza.
PRESSURE
Public pressure in Israel is mounting on Netanyahu to secure a permanent ceasefire, a move opposed by some hardline members of his right-wing coalition. An Israeli team left for Qatar on Sunday for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal.
Smotrich, who in January threatened to withdraw his Religious Zionism party from the government if Israel agreed to a complete end to the war before having achieved its objectives, did not mention the ceasefire in his criticism of Netanyahu.
The right-wing coalition holds a slim parliamentary majority, although some opposition lawmakers have offered to support the government from collapsing if a ceasefire is agreed.
The post Influential Far-Right Minister Lashes out at Netanyahu Over Gaza War Policy first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Australia Police Charge Man Over Alleged Arson on Melbourne Synagogue
Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks to the media during a press conference with New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon at the Australian Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, Aug. 16, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Tracey Nearmy
Australian police have charged a man in connection with an alleged arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue with worshippers in the building, the latest in a series of incidents targeting the nation’s Jewish community.
There were no injuries to the 20 people inside the East Melbourne Synagogue, who fled from the fire on Friday night. Firefighters extinguished the blaze in the capital of Victoria state.
Australia has experienced several antisemitic incidents since the start of the Israel-Gaza war in October 2023.
Counter-terrorism detectives late on Saturday arrested the 34-year-old resident of Sydney, capital of neighboring New South Wales, charging him with offenses including criminal damage by fire, police said.
“The man allegedly poured a flammable liquid on the front door of the building and set it on fire before fleeing the scene,” police said in a statement.
The suspect, whom the authorities declined to identify, was remanded in custody after his case was heard at Melbourne Magistrates Court on Sunday and no application was made for bail, the Australian Broadcasting Corp reported.
Authorities are investigating whether the synagogue fire was linked to a disturbance on Friday night at an Israeli restaurant in Melbourne, in which one person was arrested for hindering police.
The restaurant was extensively damaged, according to the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, an umbrella group for Australia’s Jews.
It said the fire at the synagogue, one of Melbourne’s oldest, was set as those inside sat down to Sabbath dinner.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog went on X to “condemn outright the vile arson attack targeting Jews in Melbourne’s historic and oldest synagogue on the Sabbath, and on an Israeli restaurant where people had come to enjoy a meal together”.
“This is not the first such attack in Australia in recent months. But it must be the last,” Herzog said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the incidents as “severe hate crimes” that he viewed “with utmost gravity.” “The State of Israel will continue to stand alongside the Australian Jewish community,” Netanyahu said on X.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese late on Saturday described the alleged arson, which comes seven months after another synagogue in Melbourne was targeted by arsonists, as shocking and said those responsible should face the law’s full force.
“My Government will provide all necessary support toward this effort,” Albanese posted on X.
Homes, schools, synagogues and vehicles in Australia have been targeted by antisemitic vandalism and arson. The incidents included a fake plan by organized crime to attack a Sydney synagogue using a caravan of explosives in order to divert police resources, police said in March.
The post Australia Police Charge Man Over Alleged Arson on Melbourne Synagogue first appeared on Algemeiner.com.