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Herb Kohl, former Jewish senator from Wisconsin and Milwaukee Bucks owner, dies at 88
(JTA) — Herb Kohl, the longtime Jewish senator from Wisconsin who loved his Milwaukee hometown so much he bought its basketball team to keep it there, has died at 88.
Kohl was known for his soft-spoken, unobtrusive approach as a philanthropist, a retail mogul and a senator, an outlook he said he learned from his Jewish immigrant parents.
Kohl died Wednesday after a short illness, his namesake foundation said.
Elected to the first of four terms in the Senate in 1988, he became an influential member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, where he was a must-meet for pro-Israel lobbyists advocating for defense assistance for Israel. He was a leader on advocacy for children and the elderly, chairing the Senate Aging committee and authoring bills that expanded funding for school lunches and mandated child-safety locks on guns.
“There was always one constituency that everyone in the office knew was more important to Herb than anyone else, and that was children,” Brad Fitch, a one time spokesman for Kohl, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in 2011, after Kohl said his fourth term would be his last. “He would say, ‘They don’t contribute to campaigns, they don’t have a lobbyist.’ ”
He was also a leader in the Jewish community, helming a campaign that raised millions for Israel in a relatively small community in an emergency campaign after the 1967 Six-Day War.
Yet he abjured attention until his middle age, buying the NBA Milwaukee Bucks franchise in 1985, when he was 50, in order to keep them in the city, and then running for the Senate when he was 53.
“He loved sports, he loved Milwaukee and Wisconsin,” Bud Selig, the Jewish former Major League Baseball commissioner and a childhood friend of Kohl’s, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “I think his career is so really unusual in this day and age.”
Kohl was born and raised in Milwaukee. His parents, Max and Mary, had immigrated to Milwaukee from Poland and Russia, respectively, in the early 20th century. Max Kohl opened a grocery store before Herb was born; by the time he reached adulthood, Herb Kohl, one of four siblings, had helped build an extensive chain of grocery and department stores. Kohl left the management in 1979 of a company that now has over 1,000 stores nationwide.
Kohl said his father instilled in his children a strong work ethic — Herb Kohl started work in the chain as a bag boy. He said he also learned from his father to keep his emotions in check.
“My father was a person who had a very strong control over his ego and his needs,” USA Today, in its obituary, quoted Kohl as once saying. “He was a very driven man, but he was not a person who had the need to belittle people or fight with people or reduce them. He learned to control those impulses, which we all have, I think. He was a very controlled, disciplined person, and he was very influential on me in that respect.”
In 2016, speaking to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Kohl said his father taught him to give back to a community that had welcomed them.
“My father once said, ‘Money is like manure. It’s not good unless you spread it around,’” he told the newspaper. “Maybe the day I die all the money will be gone. Whatever. I’ve had a productive life. A happy life. A healthy life. And I never forget it. I’m very grateful for all the good luck I’ve had in my lifetime.”
His Jewish expression was low-key but had significant effect. Kohl asked Ray Allen, a star player with the Bucks, to accompany him in 1998 on a tour of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and it changed the player forever. He was soon urging fellow players to join him on tours whenever they were in Washington to play the Wizards. Allen joined the museum’s council in 2016.
Kohl was for a period in the 1990s and 2000s part of an anomalous group of Jewish senators elected from northern midwestern states with small Jewish populations. Russ Feingold served as the junior Wisconsin senator from 1993-2011, and there was a rotation of Jewish senators in neighboring Minnesota in the same period.
Sen. Herb Kohl meets with then Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan, May 12, 2010. (Office of Senator Herb Kohl)
In the Senate, the Democratic politician’s focus was on oversight and keeping spending within budgets. “I’m running as a businessman,” the Journal Sentinel quoted him as saying in its obituary. “I’m a person who hasn’t spent a nickel until he made a nickel.”
Kohl self-funded his campaigns so he wouldn’t be beholden to others, and he did not take kindly to the super-rich.
“The one thing I’ve never appreciated is when I meet people who are successful and some of them think it’s all about them, that they’re the ones who made the success and they deserve all the credit,” he told the Sentinel Journal in his 2016 interview. “Big egos. Dominating personalities. That’s a bad way to be. I don’t like people who are overweening in their self-esteem because they’re wrong and it doesn’t bode well for people around them. Too often, they’re also selfish and greedy. It’s a bad characteristic and I’ve always worked as hard as I can not to be suffused in that kind of thinking.”
President Joe Biden said his former Senate colleague, one of the richest men in Wisconsin, did not keep easy company with fellow multimillionaires.
“Throughout his career, Herb was unafraid to stand up to the business community that he’d come from, seeking to level the playing field for workers and make our economy more efficient and fair,” Biden said in a statement Thursday.
His passion was Wisconsin, where he was familiar with the minutiae of its dairy farms, holding up the budget in 1999 for hours until he got through the state’s farmers’ desired dairy pricing reforms.
The best part of Kohl’s day was meeting constituents. Each day between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m. was coffee and muffins with Wisconsinites.
“Trying to drag Herb for a hearing away from those breakfasts was impossible,” Fitch said in 2011.
Kohl bought the Bucks in 1985 when it was rumored that their ailing owner was set to sell the team to buyers who would move the franchise. He dumped millions into the struggling team to keep it in Milwaukee, and when he sold it in 2014, he offered a discount in part to extract a promise that the new owners would keep the team in Wisconsin, and he pledged $100 million to build a new stadium to clinch the deal.
He also gave out $10 million to Bucks employees in bonuses.
“Every day I remind myself how fortunate I’ve been because so much of life is luck,” Kohl said told the Journal Sentinel in 2016. “I was born into a great family, had a great opportunity at Kohl’s, and on and on. I’ve had many, many great experiences and very few bad experiences. So what more can you ask for?”
Kohl, who never married, is survived by his siblings and their children. A nephew, Dan Kohl, helped found J Street, the liberal Jewish Middle East policy group, and ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2018.
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The post Herb Kohl, former Jewish senator from Wisconsin and Milwaukee Bucks owner, dies at 88 appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Supreme Court to Weigh Landmark Terrorism Case Targeting Palestinian Authority’s ‘Pay-for-Slay’ Program
PA President Mahmoud Abbas at the UN General Assembly in New York. Photo: Reuters/Caitlin Ochs
In a case that could redefine the legal landscape for victims of terrorism seeking justice, the US Supreme Court is set to hear arguments against the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) over their role in incentivizing violence against Americans abroad.
The high-profile brief — filed this week by a legal coalition and more than a dozen organizations in response to the 2018 murder of Israeli-American Ari Fuld by a Palestinian terrorist — calls on justices to hold Palestinian leadership accountable for its controversial “pay-for-slay” program.
The amicus brief, submitted on Tuesday by the International Legal Forum (ILF) and 16 other Jewish and pro-Israel organizations, argues that the PA and PLO have long been complicit in orchestrating and financially rewarding acts of terror.
“Since their founding, the PLO and the Palestinian Authority have been an instrumental element in inciting, funding, and rewarding terrorism, especially through the pay-for-slay program,” ILF CEO Arsen Ostrovsky told The Algemeiner. “They are not a powerless bystander but a leading driver of modern-day terrorism. Enough is enough.”
The so-called “pay-for-slay” scheme has been widely condemned by US lawmakers, with reports estimating that approximately 8 percent of the PA’s budget is allocated to paying stipends to convicted terrorists and their families. As outlined in the ILF’s legal filing, “the more deadly the attack and the longer the terrorist spends in prison, the greater the stipends they receive.”
The legal brief contends that the US Congress has clear constitutional authority to permit American victims of Palestinian terrorism to sue the PA and PLO in US courts, since these entities have maintained a presence on American soil and were previously warned that their activities could expose them to legal action. Palestinian leaders “had been on notice that their activities would subject them to jurisdiction, yet have continued to reward and sponsor terrorism regardless,” Ostrovsky said.
The lawsuit was initially filed under the US Anti-Terrorism Act by Fuld’s widow and other American victims of Palestinian terror, seeking damages from the PA and PLO. However, the case faced a major setback in 2023 when the Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that US federal courts lack jurisdiction over the Palestinian entities, citing concerns over the due process rights of foreign organizations.
Congress attempted to address this legal gap in 2019 with the passage of the Promoting Security and Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act (PSJVTA), which sought to ensure that the PA and PLO could be held accountable in American courts if they funded attacks against US citizens or conducted activities within the United States. The brief argues that the PA and PLO have done both, and therefore must face legal consequences.
“It is imperative to hold not only Hamas accountable, but the Palestinian leadership as well,” Ostrovsky said. “Acts of terror, such as the one that claimed the life of Ari Fuld, do not occur in a vacuum. They are the direct result of a pervasive Palestinian infrastructure that indoctrinates hate and incentivizes violence.”
The development coincides with an ongoing ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas, which included the release last month of Ari Fuld’s killer, Khalil Jabarin. Ari Fuld’s brother, Hillel Fuld, said the family’s “personal grievance and loss was currently amplified” by Jabarin’s release from prison.
Reflecting on the hostage deal that saw Jabarin walk free — financially secure by Palestinian standards due to the pay-for-slay stipends he received while in prison — Fuld acknowledged that the situation was “not black and white.”
“On the one hand this is a terrible, terrible deal from a strategic perspective, and there’s no sugarcoating the fact that letting go of thousands of monsters is just horrible,” he told The Algemeiner. “The flip side is that it’s the most beautiful thing there is to see those families reunited, and it’s a fundamental pillar of Judaism to free our prisoners, our people, and our soldiers need to know that we will do whatever it takes to bring them back if such a thing happens to them.”
Ostrovsky expressed his hope that the Supreme Court would hold Palestinian leaders accountable and prevent them from “rewarding and underwriting murderers of American nationals abroad, like Ari Fuld.”
The court’s decision to take up the case marks a pivotal moment in US counterterrorism law. If the justices rule in favor of the plaintiffs, it could set a precedent allowing American victims of international terrorism to pursue legal claims against foreign entities that support or enable such attacks. The brief was filed on behalf of ILF by the Holtzman Vogel law firm as well as the National Jewish Advocacy Center, with oral arguments expected later in the year.
The post US Supreme Court to Weigh Landmark Terrorism Case Targeting Palestinian Authority’s ‘Pay-for-Slay’ Program first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Lawmakers Reintroduce Antisemitism Awareness Act
US Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) at a press conference in Bergenfield, New Jersey, US on June 5, 2023. Photo: Kyle Mazza/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
A bipartisan group of US lawmakers on Wednesday reintroduced the Antisemitism Awareness Act, which would mandate the Department of Education to apply the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism when enforcing federal anti-discrimination laws.
The lawmakers — Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), Mike Lawler (R-NY), Max Miller (R-OH), and Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) — reintroduced the legislation after it passed the US House during the last Congress by a vote of 320-91. However, the Senate ultimately opted not to consider the bill in December.
Observers speculated that Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), the Senate leader, feared exposing potential fractures within the Democratic coalition regarding antisemitism and Israel. Following the onset of the Gaza war between Israel and Hamas in October 2023, Democrats have shown inconsistent support for the Jewish state, with some high-profile liberal lawmakers suggesting that Israel’s war against Hamas could be considered a “genocide.” Last November, 17 Democrats voted to implement a partial arms embargo against Israel.
IHRA — an intergovernmental organization comprising dozens of countries including the US — adopted the definition of antisemitism in 2016. Since then, the definition has been widely accepted by Jewish groups and lawmakers across the political spectrum, and it is now used by hundreds of governing institutions, including the US State Department, European Union, and United Nations. Dozens of US states have also formally adopted it through law or executive action.
According to the definition, antisemitism “is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.” It provides 11 specific, contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere. Beyond classic antisemitic behavior associated with the likes of the medieval period and Nazi Germany, the examples include denial of the Holocaust and newer forms of antisemitism targeting Israel such as demonizing the Jewish state, denying its right to exist, and holding it to standards not expected of any other democratic state.
In a statement, Gottenheimer said on Thursday that the “explosion of antisemitic violence” after the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023 massacre of 1,200 people in southern Israel inspired him to reintroduce the Antisemitism Awareness Act. He added that the legislation would provide state officials and law enforcement a “clear framework” on how to properly address antisemitic violence.
“Since the heinous Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, we have seen an explosion of antisemitic violence and intimidation on college campuses and in communities across New Jersey and the nation. Far too many in our community no longer feel safe in their own homes or classrooms,” Gottheimer said.
Lawler, a Jewish lawmaker and one of the most strident supporters of Israel in Congress, explained his decision to reintroduce the legislation, writing that “no person should feel unsafe, targeted, or ostracized because of their faith — and the Antisemitism Awareness Act will stop it from happening.”
The post US Lawmakers Reintroduce Antisemitism Awareness Act first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Hypocrisy Will Be Exposed’: Israeli Defense Chief Calls Out Spain, Ireland, Others Over Trump’s Gaza Plan
Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares (center), Norway’s Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide (right), and Ireland’s Foreign Minister Micheal Martin (left) gesture after a press conference in Brussels, Belgium, May 27, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Johanna Geron
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz on Thursday warned that the “hypocrisy” of Spain, Ireland, and other European countries hostile to the Jewish state will be exposed if they do not take in Palestinians who choose to leave Gaza, the war-torn enclave that US President Donald Trump has said he intends to rebuild after the population resettles elsewhere for a unknown period of time.
Katz called out several countries in Europe while announcing he had ordered the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to prepare a plan to allow Gaza residents who wish to leave to exit the enclave voluntarily.
“The people of Gaza should have the right to freedom of movement and migration, as is customary everywhere in the world,” Katz posted on X/Twitter. I welcome President Trump’s bold initiative, which can create extensive opportunities for those in Gaza who wish to leave, assist them in resettling in host countries, and support long-term reconstruction efforts in a demilitarized, threat-free Gaza after Hamas — an effort that will take many years.”
He said his plan would include exit options via land crossings, as well as special arrangements for departure by sea and air, noting that the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, which controlled Gaza before the current war and remains the strongest faction there absent the Israeli army, has used residents as “human shields” and and now “holds them hostage.”
Katz’s order came two days after Trump said that the US would take over Gaza and develop it economically after Palestinians are safely resettled elsewhere.
I have instructed the IDF to prepare a plan that will allow any resident of Gaza who wishes to leave to do so, to any country willing to receive them.
Hamas has used the residents of Gaza as human shields, built its terror infrastructure in the heart of the civilian population,…
— ישראל כ”ץ Israel Katz (@Israel_katz) February 6, 2025
Global reaction to Trump’s plan was largely negative, with many countries expressing both incredulity and indignation.
Spain, for example, said that Palestinians must stay in Gaza.
“I want to be very clear on this: Gaza is the land of Gazan Palestinians and they must stay in Gaza,” Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares told reporters on Wednesday. “Gaza is part of the future Palestinian state Spain supports and has to coexist guaranteeing the Israeli state’s prosperity and safety.”
Katz took issue with countries that have been vocal critics of Israel and portrayed themselves as staunch defenders of the Palestinians taking such a stance.
“Countries such as Spain, Ireland, Norway, and others, which have falsely accused Israel over its actions in Gaza, are legally obligated to allow Gazans to enter their territory,” Katz said in his social media post. “Their hypocrisy will be exposed if they refuse. Meanwhile, countries like Canada, which has a structured immigration program, have previously expressed willingness to take in residents from Gaza.”
Albares rejected Katz’s suggestion that Spain should accept displaced Palestinians.
“Gazans’ land is Gaza and Gaza must be part of the future Palestinian state,” Albares said in an interview with Spanish radio station RNE.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Irish Foreign Ministry told the Turkish state-run Anadolu Agency on Thursday that Katz’s post was “unhelpful and a source of distraction,” adding, “The objective must be that the people of Palestine return safely to their home.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said during a press conference on Wednesday that Gaza under Hamas rule has been a “failed experiment, adding, “As long as immigration is voluntary and there is a country willing to accept them, can anyone really say it’s immoral or inhumane?”
“עזה זה ניסוי שנכשל” – שר החוץ גדעון סער נואם במליאה: “כל עוד הגירה מתבצעת מרצונו החופשי של אדם, וכל עוד יש מדינה שמוכנה לקלוט את אותו אדם, מישהו יכול להגיד שזה לא מוסרי ולא אנושי?” @gidonsaar pic.twitter.com/VxNy7jSdZC
— ערוץ כנסת (@KnessetT) February 5, 2025
Since Hamas started the Gaza war with its invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, both Spain and Ireland have been fierce critics of the Jewish state.
In the aftermath of the Oct. 7 atrocities, Spain launched a diplomatic campaign to curb Israel’s military response. At the same time, several Spanish ministers in the country’s left-wing coalition government issued pro-Hamas statements and called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, with some falsely accusing Israel of “genocide.”
More recently, Spanish officials said they would not allow ships carrying arms for Israel to stop at its ports. The US Federal Maritime Commission recently opened an investigation into whether Spain, a NATO ally, has been denying port entry to cargo vessels reportedly transporting US weapons to Israel.
Spain stopped its own defense companies from shipping arms to Israel in October 2023.
One year later, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez urged other members of the EU to suspend the bloc’s free trade agreement with Israel over its military campaigns against Hamas in Gaza and the terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Sanchez’s demand came three days after the Spanish premier urged other countries to stop supplying weapons to the Jewish state.
In Ireland, meanwhile, President Michael D. Higgins used his platform speaking at a Holocaust commemoration last month to launch a tirade against Israel’s military campaign targeting Hamas terrorists, appearing to draw parallels between Israel’s war in Gaza and the Nazi genocide of Jews during the Holocaust.
The speech came against a backdrop of strained Irish-Israeli relations, exacerbated by Ireland’s decision to join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and its support for redefining genocide in order to secure a conviction against Jerusalem.
In December, Israel announced it was shuttering its embassy in Dublin, accusing the Irish government of undermining Israel at international forums and promoting “extreme anti-Israel policies.”
Last month, Israel announced it was shuttering its embassy in Dublin, accusing the Irish government of undermining Israel at international forums and promoting “extreme anti-Israel policies.”
In October, Irish leaders called on the EU to “review its trade relations” with Israel after the Israeli parliament passed legislation banning the activities in the country of UNRWA, the United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian refugees, because of its ties to Hamas.
Spain and Ireland, along with Norway, officially recognized a Palestinian state in May, claiming the move was accelerated by the Israel-Hamas war and would help foster a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israeli officials described the decision as a “reward for terrorism.”
The post ‘Hypocrisy Will Be Exposed’: Israeli Defense Chief Calls Out Spain, Ireland, Others Over Trump’s Gaza Plan first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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