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For one group of friends separated by geography, a single Israel experience builds lifelong bonds
When Ashley Inbar of Portland, Maine, got married in a traditional Jewish ceremony at the Jamaican beach resort of Ocho Rios in early January, there were five very special names on the guest list.
Just half a decade earlier, they were all complete strangers.
But then they met in Israel on an unusual Birthright trip geared toward “older participants” — those ages 27 to 32 — and forged bonds that have only grown over the years. When that 2018 trip drew to a close, six of them resolved to hold annual in-person reunions, despite the vast geographical distances that separate them.
“Pretty much right when we got home, we started planning to meet up somewhere,” said Inbar, who heads fundraising for the Jewish Community Alliance of Southern Maine. “Our first trip was to Denver, then we traveled north to Redstone, Colorado, and stayed for the weekend. As soon as we end one trip, we start planning the next one. We see each other as often as we can, and we talk every day through group chats on Instagram.”
The tight bonds established by the six friends — Inbar, Tim Campbell, Max Staplin, Carly Herbst, Simon Muller and Jared Glassman — are part of the goal of Birthright Israel, which seeks to offer participants a “life-changing experience.”
While forging bonds between Diaspora Jews and Israel is the main purpose of the trips, which are given to participants at no cost to them, the 10-day Birthright experience also aims to strengthen both participants’ Jewish identity and their connection to fellow Jews (including Israelis). Countless long-lasting friendships and romances that started on Birthright have blossomed into marriages and Jewish families.
From Inbar’s group five years ago, the vast majority of participants are still in touch, she said.
“There were 38 of us, and our entire group got along really well,” Inbar said. “We were all at similar places in life, and all of us already had careers. Even today, 95% of us are still connected through social media.”
During the pandemic, when the six couldn’t meet up in person, they held biweekly Zoom chats where they’d talk for hours on end, playing games and discussing the ups and downs of their lives — including engagements, illnesses, deaths of family members and job promotions — as well as their shared memories of their Israel experience.
Ashley Inbar, third from right, with her Birthright friends celebrates her January 6, 2023, wedding on the beach in Ocho Rios, Jamaica. (Courtesy of Ashley Inbar)
The group also stayed in touch with the Israeli security guard, Gal, who escorted them on the trip. Gal video-chats with the group at times of conflict in Israel to share his experiences on the ground — and at other times to practice his English. “He just became an integral part of our collective experience, and I think it was as impactful for him as it was for us,” Inbar said.
Staplin, 36, a franchise attorney in Philadelphia, says the 2018 Birthright trip was one of the best experiences of his life. While the tours to the Dead Sea and Masada were amazing and the vibrancy of Tel Aviv unforgettable, he said, what remains with him most are the friendships he formed during those 10 days.
“We’d stay up till 1 a.m. every night talking. We knew then that we’d be friends for the rest of our lives,” Staplin said. “We decided to have a reunion every year. The first was in New Orleans, then the next year we visited Ashley in Maine. As we were figuring out where to do the next reunion, Ashley got engaged.”
Since 1999, more than 800,000 young Jews from 68 countries have visited Israel on free 10-day trips offered through Birthright, known in Hebrew as Taglit (Discovery). The vast majority were 18 to 26, but from mid-2018 until recently some 13,000 Jews in the 27 to 32 age bracket got to visit Israel as well, according to Noa Bauer, Birthright’s vice president of global marketing.
Now that the pandemic has ended and trips to Israel are back in full force, the organization is seeing its highest demand ever and can’t accommodate all would-be participants without raising additional funds.
“Given the limited spots, we went back to the original age group of 18 to 26,” Bauer said, “though we did allow those who missed out during Covid to participate this past summer as a last chance even if they aged out during the pandemic.”
On Inbar’s trip, the cohort of older Birthright participants included two married couples and several people with children, including her.
Visiting Israel at an older age made all the difference to Glassman, a 36-year-old firefighter in New Orleans. He cited “a much higher maturity level” as one of the advantages of doing Birthright when he did.
“At 18 or 19, I wouldn’t have appreciated it as much,” Glassman said. “Everyone on our group really wanted to be there. In my case, as a young adult, I became much closer to my local Jewish community. I’m a pretty active member of my temple, Touro Synagogue, so when Birthright opened that slot for my age group, it was almost like it was meant to be.”
Staplin said that what really stood out from his experience was the 360-degree view of Israeli life and history that the Birthright trip gave him – not something he could have gotten on a typical vacation.
Six participants of a 2018 Birthright Israel trip gather for their annual reunion in 2022 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Courtesy of Ashley Inbar)
“The most meaningful part was gaining an understanding of what day-to-day life is like in a country with so much history but still in the middle of so much conflict in present times,” he said. “Watching the people of Tel Aviv just going about their regular work days despite the announcement of the largest rocket attacks in years. Taking a bus ride through the middle of nowhere to Masada and learning about what happened there centuries before America was discovered, and then seeing the daily struggles of the Bedouins the next day. Going from the Western Wall to the Mahane Yehuda Market. Eating schnitzel in a kibbutz and then eating fancy Thai-fusion food at a restaurant in Tel Aviv.”
Herbst was 32 when she went on Birthright. Until then, she said, her travel priorities were to visit countries other than Israel, even though her older brother had gone on Birthright and had a positive experience.
“I wasn’t that interested at the age when you’re supposed to go,” Herbst said. “But our group had a different perspective. We weren’t looking just to get a free trip. Even my Jewish identity was certainly different for me in my 30s than in my 20s.”
Now 37, Herbst works in business development at a New York City tech startup.
“For me, what’s special about Israel is the enduring history of religion, and not only of Judaism,” she said. “Even seeing how strong of a presence Islam and Christianity has there was really fascinating for me. There’s no other place in the world where you see that.”
Muller, 37, grew up outside Rochester, New York, and was supposed to go on Birthright in his mid-20s. But a month before his planned trip, Muller lost his job after the congressional office where he was working in Washington, D.C., suddenly closed. He never got around to rescheduling the Israel trip, and then he aged out.
Nearly six years later, he said, he got an email that Birthright was doing a pilot program for older Jews.
“It was just before my 32nd birthday, I didn’t know anybody else,” Muller recalled. “It was a shot in the dark. I had low expectations.”
The trip turned out to be one of the milestones in his life.
“I found people I really clicked with,” said Muller, now an international trade consultant in Seattle. “We all live in different places and have different interests, but Birthright really bonded us. It’s been a wonderful experience.”
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The post For one group of friends separated by geography, a single Israel experience builds lifelong bonds appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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What we know about the car crash at Chabad-Lubavitch Headquarters in Brooklyn
CROWN HEIGHTS — A driver crashed a car into an entrance of the Chabad-Lubavitch world headquarters in Brooklyn on Wednesday night, damaging the building on a night thousands had gathered there to celebrate.
Video circulating online and verified by eyewitnesses shows a vehicle repeatedly driving into the building’s doors at 770 Eastern Parkway in the Crown Heights neighborhood, the main synagogue of the Chabad movement and one of the most recognized Jewish institutions in the world. One witness said the driver had yelled at bystanders to move out of the way before he drove down a ramp leading to the doors.
Police arrested the driver at the scene and the synagogue was evacuated as a precaution.
The incident occurred on a festive evening in the Chabad world — Yud Shevat, the day that Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson took the movement’s reins in 1951. Chabad revelers from around the globe travel to Crown Heights each year to celebrate the occasion at farbrengens, or toasts, that are spread out in Chabad homes all over the neighborhood. The largest one is held at the movement’s iconic headquarters — Schneerson’s former home — with as many as 3,000 people in attendance.
Avrohom Pink, a 19-year-old Chabad yeshiva student, said the program at the headquarters had just concluded when the incident occurred.
He and a couple dozen others stood near the top of a ramp down to the pair of doors, a sedan turned into the driveway. Its driver, who Pink said was in his mid-twenties or early thirties with shoulder-length hair, yelled at people to get out of the way.
“He was trying to pull in, yelling at everyone to move out the way, interestingly — didn’t want to run people over, I guess,” Pink said. “Everyone moved out the way, and then he just drove down the ramp, rammed his car into those doors.”
While the car managed to push in the wooden doors, there was nobody in the anteroom they led to. The approximately 1,000 people Pink estimated were still in the building were behind another pair of doors on the other side of that room. Over the din of their celebration, they couldn’t hear what was going on, Pink said.
Rabbi Motti Seligson, a spokesperson for the movement, said on X that the ramming “seems intentional, but the motivations are unclear.”
The incident is being investigated as a hate crime by the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said.
During the election campaign and since taking office, Mayor Zohran Mamdani has repeatedly said he is committed to protecting Jewish New Yorkers and ensuring security around synagogues and other houses of worship.
The attack follows a rash of antisemitic incidents across the city. On Tuesday, a rabbi was verbally harassed and assaulted in Forest Hills, Queens, and last week, a playground frequented by Orthodox families in the Borough Park neighborhood in Brooklyn was graffitied with swastikas two days in a row. In both incidents, the suspects have been arrested. Antisemitic incidents accounted for 57% of reported hate crimes in 2025, according to the NYPD.
While the driver’s intent remained unclear, condemnation poured in from elected leaders.
City Council Speaker Julie Menin called it a “horrifying incident” and a “deeply concerning situation.” New York State Attorney General Letitia James, who has close ties to the community, posted on X, “These acts of violence against our Jewish communities, and any of our communities, need to stop. Now.”
Mayor Zohran Mamdani arrived at the scene about two hours of the incident being reported and denounced the attack. “This is deeply alarming, especially given the deep meaning and history of the institution to so many in New York and around the world,” Mamdani said in a statement, standing alongside Police Tisch, who is Jewish. ”Any threat to a Jewish institution or place of worship must be taken seriously.” The mayor added that “antisemitism has no place in our city” and expressed solidarity with the Crown Heights Jewish community,
During the election campaign and since taking office, Mamdani has repeatedly said he is committed to protecting Jewish New Yorkers and ensuring security around synagogues and other houses of worship.
The incident came during a rash of antisemitic incidents across the city. On Tuesday, a rabbi was verbally harassed and assaulted in Forest Hills, Queens, and last week, a playground frequented by Orthodox families in the Borough Park neighborhood in Brooklyn was graffitied with swastikas two days in a row. In both incidents, the suspects have been arrested. Antisemitic incidents accounted for 57% of reported hate crimes in 2025, according to the NYPD.
The celebrations, which also mark the yahrtzeit of the Rebbe’s predecessor in 1950, continued at other locations in spite of the incident.
Pink described Yud Shevat as “Rosh Hashana for Chabad.”
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The post What we know about the car crash at Chabad-Lubavitch Headquarters in Brooklyn appeared first on The Forward.
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France, Spain Signal Support to Blacklist Iran’s IRGC as EU Moves Closer Toward Terrorist Designation
Commanders and members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps meet with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran, Iran, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
The European Union could soon label Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization, after France and Spain signaled a shift in support amid mounting international outrage over the Iranian regime’s violent crackdown on anti-government protests and shocking reports of widespread civilian deaths.
As two of the largest EU member states previously to oppose blacklisting the IRGC, France and Spain could tip the balance and pave the way for the designation, as the regime’s brutal suppression of dissent at home and support for terrorist operations abroad continues.
On Wednesday, a day before EU foreign ministers meet in Brussels to discuss the issue, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot announced that France will back the move to blacklist the IRGC, saying the repression of peaceful protesters must not go unanswered and praising their courage in the face of what he described as “blind violence.”
“France will support the designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the European Union’s list of terrorist organizations,” he posted on X.
After reversing its long-standing opposition to the move, France also urged Iran to free detained protesters, halt executions, restore digital access, and permit the UN Human Rights Council to investigate alleged abuses.
Multiple media outlets also reported that the Spanish government is expected to back the EU’s move to blacklist the IRGC, aligning with France in breaking its previous opposition.
The United States, Canada, and Australia have already designated the IRGC as a terrorist organization, while Germany and the Netherlands have repeatedly called on the EU to do the same.
Some European countries, however, have been more cautious, fearing such a move could lead to a complete break in ties with Iran, which could impact negotiations to release citizens held in Iranian prisons.
The EU has already sanctioned the IRGC for human rights abuses but not terrorism.
Labeling the IRGC as a terrorist organization would not only extend existing EU sanctions, including asset freezes, funding bans, and travel restrictions on its members, but also activate additional legal, financial, and diplomatic measures that would severely limit its operations across Europe.
Earlier this week, Italy also reversed its earlier hesitation and signaled support for the measure after new reports exposed the scale of Iran’s brutal crackdown on anti-government protests — a move that sparked diplomatic tensions, with the Iranian Foreign Ministry summoning the Italian ambassador.
According to local media, Iranian authorities warned of the “destructive consequences” of any labeling against the IRGC, calling upon Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani to “correct his ill-considered approaches toward Iran.”
Tajani said the Iranian regime’s bloody crackdown on anti-government protests this month that reportedly killed thousands of people could not be ignored.
“The losses suffered by the civilian population during the protests require a clear response,” Tajani wrote on X. “I will propose, coordinating with other partners, the inclusion of the Revolutionary Guards on the list of terrorist organizations, as well as individual sanctions against those responsible for these heinous acts.”
As international scrutiny over the regime grows, new estimates show that thousands have been killed by Iranian security forces during an unprecedented crackdown on nationwide protests earlier this month, far surpassing previous death tolls.
Two senior Iranian Ministry of Health officials told TIME that as many as 30,000 people could have been killed in the streets of Iran on Jan. 8 and 9 alone.
The Iranian regime has previously reported an official death toll of 3,117. But new evidence suggests the true number is far higher, raising fears among activists and world leaders of crimes against humanity.
The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), which tracks deaths by name and location, has confirmed 5,858 deaths, including 214 security personnel. Nearly 20,000 potential deaths are still under investigation, and tens of thousands of additional Iranians have been arrested amid the crackdown.
Established after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, the IRGC wields significant power in the country, controlling large sectors of the economy and armed forces, overseeing Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs, and coordinating closely with the regime’s terrorist proxies in the region.
Unlike the regular armed forces, the IRGC is a parallel military body charged with protecting Iran’s authoritarian regime, ensuring its so-called Islamist revolution is protected within the country and can be exported abroad.
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Petition Calls for US Investigation Into Immigration Status of Daughter of Former Iranian President
Former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, right, and his daughter, Leila Khatami. Photo: Screenshot
A petition circulating online that has garnered tens of thousands of signatures is calling on US authorities to investigate the immigration status of Leila Khatami, the daughter of former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, arguing that relatives of senior figures tied to Iran’s ruling establishment should not benefit from life in the United States while Iranians at home face repression.
The petition, launched by an anonymous activist identifying as an “Iranian Patriot,” urges the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement to review Khatami’s residency or visa status and to consider revocation and deportation if any legal grounds exist.
“This is not personal revenge. This is justice,” states the petition, which as of this writing has 84,919 verified signatures. “You cannot chant ‘Death to America’ through your political system while your own family enjoys safety, stability, and prosperity in America.”
Mohammad Khatami served as Iran’s president from 1997 to 2005 and has been described as a reformist figure within the Islamic Republic’s political system. Despite his reformist reputation, however, critics note that the Iranian state remained responsible for widespread human rights abuses at home and support for terrorist proxies abroad during his time in office.
Under Iran’s authoritarian, Islamist system, the Guardian Council, a 12-member body composed of clerics and jurists appointed either directly or indirectly by the supreme leader, bars any candidate from running for office not considered acceptable by the regime.
According to publicly available information cited in the petition, Leila Khatami, born in 1976, has pursued an academic career in the United States and has reportedly worked as a mathematics professor at Union College in New York. The petition argues that her presence in the US exemplifies a broader pattern of children of senior Iranian officials living in Western democracies while ordinary Iranians face repression at home.
Human rights activists have long documented abuses by the Islamic Republic, including the use of torture, suppression of protests, and severe restrictions on political freedoms.
Over the past few weeks, however, the Iranian regime has gone to unprecedented lengths to crush nationwide anti-government protests with a bloody crackdown. More than 30,000 people may have been killed by security forces earlier this month, according to new estimates that far exceed earlier death tolls.
Senior Iranian Ministry of Health officials told TIME that the scale of the killings and executions has overwhelmed the state’s capacity to dispose of the dead, saying that as many as 30,000 people could have been killed in the streets of Iran on Jan. 8 and 9 alone.
Aligned with the Ministry of Health’s new figures, Iran International reported that security forces killed over 36,500 Iranians during the Jan. 8–9 nationwide crackdown, marking the deadliest two-day massacre of protesters in modern history. The news outlet cited newly obtained classified documents, field reports, and accounts from medical staff, witnesses, and victims’ families.
The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), which tracks deaths by name and location, has confirmed 5,858 deaths, including 214 security personnel. Nearly 20,000 potential deaths are still under investigation, and tens of thousands of additional Iranians have been arrested amid the crackdown.
The Iranian regime has reported an official death toll of 3,117.
The nationwide protests, which began with a shopkeepers’ strike in Tehran on Dec. 28, initially reflected public anger over the soaring cost of living, a deepening economic crisis, and the rial — Iran’s currency — plummeting to record lows amid renewed economic sanctions, with annual inflation only getting worse.
However, the demonstrations quickly swelled into a broader anti-government movement calling for the fall of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and even a broader collapse of the country’s Islamist, authoritarian system.
The online petition does not allege that Leila Khatami herself has committed crimes in the United States. Instead, it argues that allowing family members of senior Iranian political figures to live in the US undermines accountability and sends the wrong message amid ongoing tensions between Washington and Tehran.
The campaign reflects growing anger within segments of the Iranian diaspora, particularly after the latest protests in Iran were met with deadly force. Activists argue that pressure should extend beyond sanctions on Iranian officials to include scrutiny of their family members living abroad.
The petition also comes on the heels of Emory University terminating Dr. Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, the daughter of Ali Larijani, the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran. The termination came after US Rep. Buddy Carter (R-GA) argued that her presence posed national security and patient trust concerns.
The US Department of the Treasury this month sanctioned her father for his role in coordinating the Iranian government’s violent crackdown on the protests throughout the country. According to the Treasury, Larijani publicly called on security forces to use force against demonstrators demanding basic rights, and his actions are tied to thousands of deaths and injuries.
The Algemeiner has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security for comment for this story.