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Blinken: US will judge Israeli government on its policies, not its politicians
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Biden administration will base its relationship to Israel’s incoming government on the actions it takes, not the people installed in positions of power, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a speech Sunday.
Blinken’s speech, to the conference of the liberal Jewish Middle East policy group J Street, was notable because it offered the first official response to deepening questions about how the White House would work with a Israeli government that includes far-right parties. Until now, sources close to the administration had suggested that the White House could decline to meet with those parties’ leaders.
Blinken said the Biden administration would “continue to unequivocally oppose any acts that undermine the prospects of a two-state solution, including, but not limited to, settlement expansion; moves toward annexation of the West Bank; disruption to the historic status quo at holy sites; demolitions and evictions; and incitement to violence.”
The speech drew criticism from some J Street followers for stopping short of dealing firmly with an incoming Israeli government that they feel is taking aim at some of Israel’s core democratic principles.
“I had zero expectations for Blinken’s speech. And he couldn’t even meet those,” said Richard Goldwasser, a former J Street board member from Chicago, on Twitter. “Pablum on Xanax.”
The theme of J Street’s conference this year was battling anti-democratic forces in Israel and in the United States. Jeremy Ben-Ami, in his opening speech Saturday night, unveiled the group’s new motto, “Pro Israel, pro-peace, pro democracy”; the “pro-democracy” element was new. Ben-Ami drew a contrast with J Street’s main rival, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
AIPAC drew liberal Jewish criticism after its launch last year of political action committees that back an array of candidates, ranging from progressive to far right. It has also declined to comment on the likely inclusion in Netanyahu’s government of far right extremists, including Itamar Ben-Gvir, a disciple of the late racist rabbi Meir Kahane.
“So rather than focusing on defeating the white nationalists and the election deniers, with whom most of Jewish America has nothing in common, they instead are spending tens of millions of dollars to defeat liberal and progressive candidates who may or may not have once in their lives uttered a critical word about Israeli policy,” Ben-Ami said. “Organizations that failed to call out the Ben-Gvirs and the [Bezalel] Smotriches of Israel while endorsing the Jim Jordans, the Andy Biggs, the Scott Perrys here in the U.S. do not speak for us.”
Perry of Pennsylvania, Biggs of Arizona and Jordan of Ohio have all to varying degrees endorsed the election lies by President Donald Trump that spurred the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
J Street’s conference was focused on democracy in the United States at times to the exclusion of the issue that founded the organization in 2008, Israeli-Palestinian peace. In a 30-minute keynote speech Saturday night, Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Jewish Democratic congressman from Maryland known for his constitutional expertise, barely mentioned Israel.
“I know that you know what it means to be pro-Israel and pro-peace,” Raskin said. “And I want to just discuss for my time with you tonight what it means to be a pro-democracy American in 2022 in a rather frightful world where so many people have turned to propaganda and conspiracy theory and disinformation and fanaticism and authoritarianism.” He was interrupted multiple times by applause.
AIPAC mocked J Street for its absence of conventional pro-Israel content. “Not a word of praise for Israel,” the organization said in a tweet attached to a photo of Ben-Ami speaking at the conference. “Not a single recognition of Israel’s achievements or value. Not a single embrace of the Israeli people.”
Noa, the Israeli singer-songwriter, also appeared on Saturday night, singing songs that had been penned by Palestinian-Israelis. She likened the relationship of the Jewish Diaspora to Israel to that of a mother to a daughter, saying that mothers need to look out for the children, whatever tensions may arise.
“The Jewish people needs to help the maturing child,” she said, reflecting a theme that it repeated itself throughout the conference: that a voice like J Street was especially needed at a time of crisis in its democracy. “The worst thing we could do is walk away,” said Rabbi Jill Jacobs, the director of T’ruah, a rabbinic human rights group.
Blinken did speak about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, reflecting the pessimistic mood in the room but saying that he believed progress could still be achieved.
“I know that many people are disillusioned,” he said. “Many people are frustrated. We’ve been trying to get to a two-state solution for decades, and yet it seems that we’ve only gotten further away from that goal. But we cannot afford to give up hope. We cannot succumb to cynicism. We cannot give in to apathy. It’s precisely when times are difficult — when peace seems even further from reach — that we’ve simply got to work harder, that we must continue to pursue whatever openings we can to show that progress is still possible.”
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‘A collapse’: Number of Israelis who believe Trump prioritizes Israel’s security falls to new low, poll finds
(JTA) — The share of Israelis who believe that Israel’s security is a central consideration of President Donald Trump fell to a record low as Democratic support for Israel in the U.S. continued to decline, according to two new polls Tuesday.
A new poll from the Israel Democracy Institute found that, amid widening disagreements in Israel over U.S. efforts to broker a new nuclear deal with Iran, the share of Israelis who believe Trump prioritizes Israel’s security had seen a “collapse” from 44% in May to 28% in June, pollsters said.
The survey, which polled 603 Jewish respondents and 151 Arab respondents from June 28 to July 1, found that among Jewish respondents, the belief that Israel can fully rely on Trump has plummeted by 38 points between March and June 2026.
Just over one-third of Israelis said they believed Israel’s strategic security situation is better today than it was before the war with Iran. The margin of error was 3.57 percentage points.
Another survey released Tuesday, conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research from June 11 to 17, added to a growing number of polls showing waning support for Israel among U.S. adults.
The AP poll, which surveyed 3,040 people, including 1,022 Jewish adults, found that 40% of U.S. adults believe America is “too supportive” of Israelis, while 39% believe the U.S. is “not supportive enough” of Palestinians. While the survey included a large sampling of Jewish adults to allow for more reliable estimates of their opinions, the survey was weighted to ensure their views weren’t overrepresented in the findings, the pollsters said.
Among Democrats, the poll found that 58% now say the U.S. is “too supportive” of Israelis, up from 45% in an AP-NORC poll in January 2024.
The share dropped among Republicans, of which just 21% said they believed the U.S. was “too supportive” of Israelis. The share of Republicans who say the U.S. is “not supportive enough” of Israel has shrunk from 39% to 15% since 2024.
It also found that a third of American Jewish adults believe that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, while another 49% said that it has not.
Among U.S. adults overall, the poll found that about one-third believe Israel has committed genocide, including roughly half of Democrats.
The poll also found that the favorability of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani was split. It found that, among U.S. adults, 38% have an unfavorable view of Netanyahu, while just 28% of U.S. adults have an unfavorable opinion of Mamdani.
Among Jewish adults, about 6 in 10 view Netanyahu unfavorably, while just 39% view Mamdani negatively and 44% view the New York City mayor positively.
For the AP poll, the margin of error for adults overall was 2.8 percentage points, and the margin of error for Jewish adults was 5.0 percentage points.
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The iconic crest worn by Messi and Argentina’s soccer team was designed by a Jewish superfan 50 years ag
(JTA) — BUENOS AIRES — Soccer fans around the world are familiar with the crest worn by Argentina and its star Lionel Messi: a vertical shield with laurel branches symbolizing victory and glory at the bottom and three stars at the top representing the team’s three World Cup titles.
But few are aware that the crest has its roots in Argentina’s close-knit world of Jewish sports clubs, where its designer developed his affinity for soccer.
Norberto “Toto” Rud was in his late 20s and a member of Club Náutico Hacoaj, a Jewish club, when he proposed the crest in 1976, drawing on the branding acumen and graphic design skills he would use throughout his career as a businessman and soccer aficionado in Buenos Aires.
Rud has long been credited with developing the crest after observing that while many European soccer teams wore distinctive emblems, his own beloved Argentina’s jerseys were notable only for their sky blue-and-white colors.
Watching international soccer in the era of black-and-white television, Rud noticed that supporters could instantly recognize teams such as West Germany by its eagle or the Soviet Union by its CCCP lettering, but Argentina could easily be confused with clubs wearing similar striped shirts. He concluded that the national team needed a visual identity equal to its footballing tradition.
Rud prepared approximately 20 design proposals and submitted them to the Argentine Football Association, in a proposal that reached its president and executive committee. The crest made its debut on Nov. 28, 1976, just days after it was approved, in a 0-0 friendly against the Soviet Union in Buenos Aires.
Fifty years later, the crest is basically unchanged and is one of the most widely worn team logos in the world, as Messi jerseys are popular across the globe.
“As a son and a member of the Jewish community and as an Argentinean, it’s a source of pride,” Toto Rud’s son Oliver Rud told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He added, “Every time I see Argentina’s national team crest, it still amazes me.”
Toto Rud got to see Argentina wear his crest to two World Cup championships, in 1978 and 1986. But he did not live to see the third in 2022. He died in 2010 at age 61 and is buried in Buenos Aires’ La Tablada, Latin America’s largest Jewish cemetery.
Oliver Rud said his father’s mother came to Argentina from Ukraine, a common pathway for Jewish migrants in the first half of the 20th century. Toto Rud was born in March 1948 and was a longtime member of Hacoaj, where he played club soccer himself.
Founded in 1935 by Jewish immigrants to Buenos Aires, Club Náutico Hacoaj is a sports and cultural club with around 10,000 members and five facilities, one in Buenos Aires city and four in Tigre, a city in the north of the Buenos Aires province. Hacoaj, which means “strength” in Hebrew, has been the launch pad for a number of prominent Jewish athletes, including tennis star Diego Schwartzmann. Oliver Rud said a tree dedicated to his father is planted on Hacoaj’s sprawling campus.
“For Hacoaj, it is a tremendous source of pride that one of our members was the creator of the Argentine Football Association’s crest,” the club’s president, Osvaldo Ofman, told JTA. “His design not only represents the jersey of the Argentina national team, the reigning World Cup champions, but also gives us the feeling that a small part of Hacoaj and the Jewish community lives on in an emblem recognized around the world.”
Now, Argentina will face off in the Round of 16 against Egypt, whose coach Hossam Hassan waved a Palestinian flag after defeating Australia in a 4-2 shootout on Friday. Footage of him walking across the field with the flag while chants of “Free, free Palestine” were heard quickly went viral. In a post-match interview, Hassan said his “heart and soul” were with the Palestinian people and dedicated the win to both Egyptians and Palestinians.
Tuesday’s match represents something of a de facto Israeli-Palestinian showdown in a tournament in which neither the Israelis nor the Palestinians are playing. In addition to the show of support for the Palestinians from Egypt, the Argentine government staunchly supports Israel, which Messi, a Catholic, has visited. And a recent poll by an Israeli magazine found that Argentina was the clear favorite among Israeli World Cup viewers, named by 38% of respondents as the team they hope wins the tournament.
The knockout game comes a decade after Messi ignited a backlash in Egypt after announcing on an Egyptian television program that he was donating his shoes to a charity in Cairo. Presenters on the TV show accused Messi of being Jewish and aligned with Israel, which he had visited three years earlier.
“I know he’s Jewish, he donated to Israel and visited the Wailing Wall and whatever,” then-Egyptian Football Federation spokesman Azmi Mogahed phoned in to say. “We don’t need his shoes and Egypt’s poor don’t need help from someone with Jewish or Zionist citizenship.” Mogahed died in 2020.
Messi, who plays for Inter Miami during the regular season, is 39 and is widely expected not to play in another World Cup after this one, meaning that an Argentina loss could be his last game in international competition.
For Oliver Rud, the game will be an opportunity to reflect not only on Messi’s contributions but on his father’s, as well.
“Every time I see Argentina’s national team crest, it still amazes me,” he said. “In fact, my brother Guido and I were just talking about it the other day — how incredible it is to think that Toto designed the crest for the national team some 50 years ago. It’s really extraordinary. Every time I see the crest, I feel a little piece of him in my heart. It’s a beautiful way to remember him.”
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Abdul El-Sayed has refused super PAC funding. An anti-AIPAC PAC says it will spend for him, anyway
(JTA) — A super PAC formed to counter the influence of pro-Israel political action committees confirmed that it will boost Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary, despite the candidate’s pledge to refuse all super PAC funding.
A spokesperson for American Priorities PAC, the anti-AIPAC PAC, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Tuesday that its vow two days earlier to “do whatever it takes” to help El-Sayed “means spending.”
The move would put El-Sayed, who has mounted an popular insurgent campaign for a seat viewed as a must-win for Democrats, in the company of other progressives this election cycle who specifically railed against pro-Israel super PACs when swearing off corporate funding — while also benefiting from spending by the newly created pro-Palestinian super PAC.
Super PACs have no limits on fundraising but by law are prohibited from directly coordinating with a campaign — so American Priorities could theoretically raise money to run ads and other get-out-the-vote operations to boost El-Sayed without his consent.
El-Sayed has yet to comment publicly on American Priorities’ plans.
A physician and former county health director, El-Sayed is scheduled to debate his opponent, U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens, on Tuesday night in Grand Rapids. A third candidate, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, dropped out of the race over the weekend, which American Priorities said motivated its pledge to help El-Sayed. The primary is set for Aug. 4.
El-Sayed has made refusing PAC money a key element of his platform. “Money out of politics” forms part of the slogan that brands many of his yard signs. A new ad released by his campaign on June 30 claimed he was “the only candidate for Senate” who has taken “No Corporate PAC Money.”
The American Priorities spokesperson did not immediately respond to a follow-up to clarify what El-Sayed’s anti-PAC pledge would mean for the group’s spending plans. Requests for comment to the El-Sayed and Stevens campaigns also were not immediately returned.
Stevens, a pro-Israel moderate who has welcomed PAC support, has so far had at least $10 million in AIPAC-affiliated funding directed to boost her campaign, according to Federal Election Commission data. AIPAC-affiliated ads for her have trumpeted policies, including proposed restrictions on immigration enforcement, that AIPAC-funded ads in different races this year have lambasted.
American Priorities has complicated the narrative for the progressive wave of the 2026 primary cycle, which has made pro-Palestinian causes and opposition to corporate funding twin priorities while treating AIPAC as a particular bogeyman.
American Priorities also spent to help democratic socialists Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier in their successful primary runs for New York congressional seats last month, even as Valdez pledged to “end Citizens United,” the 2010 Supreme Court decision that allowed unlimited political spending by corporations and unions, and Avila Chevalier called to “abolish Super PACs.”
The spending allowed the candidates’ opponents to accuse them of hypocrisy but failed to derail their success at the ballot box. American Priorities also spent heavily in favor of Adam Hamawy, a doctor who served in Gaza who won his crowded New Jersey congressional primary in June.
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