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Elon Musk lays wreath at Auschwitz after private tour with Ben Shapiro and European rabbi
KRAKOW (JTA) — Elon Musk went on a private tour of Auschwitz ahead of a day of engagement with European Jewish leaders.
A delegation from the European Jewish Association conference in Krakow, where Musk is a featured speaker, is scheduled to visit the Nazi concentration camp on Tuesday. But the tech magnate — who has received criticism for allowing and abetting antisemitism on X, formerly Twitter, the social media platform he owns — instead visited on Monday “due to schedule concerns,” conference participants were told.
Musk traveled with Ben Shapiro, the Jewish right-wing pundit; EJA Chairman Rabbi Menachem Margolin, who is affiliated with the Chabad Hasidic movement; and Gidon Lev, an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor who was imprisoned at a different concentration camp as a child. Musk also brought along one of his young sons and carried him on his shoulders through the camp, including under the infamous “Arbeit Macht Frei” (“Work Makes One Free”) sign at the camp’s entrance, according to pictures distributed by EJA.
Musk laid a wreath and took part in a memorial ceremony, according to the Jewish group. He did not immediately elaborate on the visit on X, though he did share a picture of himself and Shapiro there.
The visit comes four months after Musk tentatively agreed to visit Auschwitz during a live chat on X with Margolin, who exhorted him “to walk there, to feel it, to understand it,” and other right-leaning Jewish leaders that was hosted by Shapiro, woh has a large following on X.
At first Musk rejected the invitation, saying, “I’m very well aware of the Holocaust and Auschwitz and Dachau and whatnot, and all the things that happened that were terrible. So this is not certainly new information for me. So I don’t need to visit Auschwitz to understand. I get it.”
But after Margolin pressed the issue, Musk responded, “I will seriously consider it,” before later adding that he could swing by after a visit to a factory he owns in Berlin. “Consider it a tentative yes,” he subsequently said.
That was before Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel and Israel’s resulting war in Gaza, which has triggered a new wave of anti-Israel and antisemitic sentiment on social media, including X. Musk visited a ravaged kibbutz in southern Israel with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in late November, saying that he found the experience “jarring” and left convinced that Israel should continue its war in Gaza. But he also drew fire — and the ire of more advertisers — for calling an antisemitic post “the actual truth.”
Musk is scheduled to take part in a live conversation about online antisemitism with Shapiro on Monday night at the conference, titled “NEVER AGAIN: Lip Service or Deep Commitment?”
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The post Elon Musk lays wreath at Auschwitz after private tour with Ben Shapiro and European rabbi appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Rights Group Files Lawsuit to Block Trump Deportations of Anti-Israel Protesters
Marco Rubio speaks after he is sworn in as Secretary of State by US Vice President JD Vance at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, DC, Jan. 21, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) filed a lawsuit challenging as unconstitutional the Trump administration’s actions to deport international students and scholars who protest or express support for Palestinian rights.
The lawsuit, filed on Saturday in the US District Court for the Northern District of New York, seeks a nationwide temporary restraining order to block enforcement of two executive orders signed by US President Donald Trump in the first month of his term.
The lawsuit comes after the detention of a Columbia University student, Mahmoud Khalil, a 30-year-old permanent US resident of Palestinian descent, whose arrest sparked protests this month.
Justice Department lawyers have argued that the US government is seeking Khalil’s removal because Secretary of State Marco Rubio has reasonable grounds to believe his activities or presence in the country could have “serious adverse foreign policy consequences.” Rubio on Friday said the United States will likely revoke visas of more students in the coming days.
Trump vowed to deport activists who took part in protests on US college campuses against Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza following the October 2023 attack by the Palestinian terrorists.
The ADC lawsuit was filed on behalf of two graduate students and a professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, who say their activism and support of the Palestinian people “has put them at serious risk of political persecution.”
“This lawsuit is a necessary step to preserve our most fundamental constitutional protections. The First Amendment guarantees the freedom of speech and expression to all persons within the United States, without exception,” said Abed Ayoub, national executive director of the ADC.
Chris Godshall-Bennett, the group’s legal director, said the litigation seeks immediate and long-term relief “to protect international students from any unconstitutional overreach that stifles free expression and deters them from fully engaging in academic and public discourse.”
The lawsuit centers on three Cornell University plaintiffs: a British-Gambian national and PhD student with a student visa; a US citizen PhD student working on plant science; and a US citizen novelist, poet, and professor in the Department of Literatures in English.
The post Rights Group Files Lawsuit to Block Trump Deportations of Anti-Israel Protesters first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Netanyahu Informs Shin Bet Chief to Vote on His Dismissal Next Week
Israel’s Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar speaks at Reichman University in Herzliya on Sunday, September 11, 2022. Photo: Screenshot
i24 News – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Ronen Bar, the head of the Shin Bet security agency, that he will bring a vote before his government to dismiss him next week.
The post Netanyahu Informs Shin Bet Chief to Vote on His Dismissal Next Week first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Houthis Claim to Attack US Aircraft Carrier, Retaliating for Strikes
Newly recruited fighters who joined a Houthi military force intended to be sent to fight in support of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, march during a parade in Sanaa, Yemen, Dec. 2, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah
i24 News – The Houthis claimed on Sunday that they targeted the aircraft carrier USS Harry Truman and other vessels in the northern Red Sea with 18 ballistic and cruise missiles and a drone. Military spokesperson Yahya Saree said that the US-led attacks against the Houthis on Saturday comprised of more than 47 airstrikes on seven governorates, with the death toll expected to rise.
“The Yemeni Armed Forces will not hesitate to target all American warships in the Red Sea and in the Arabian Sea in retaliation to the aggression against our country,” Saree said, vowing the Houthis “will continue to impose a naval blockade on the Israeli enemy and ban its ships in the declared zone of operations until aid and basic needs are delivered to the Gaza Strip.”
The post Houthis Claim to Attack US Aircraft Carrier, Retaliating for Strikes first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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