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How many Hebrew Israelites are there, and how worried should Jews be?
(JTA) — Dressed in matching purple hoodies and shirts, with gold fringes attached to the bottom in observance of Deuteronomy 22:12, hundreds of members of a controversial Hebrew Israelite group marched through the streets of Brooklyn on Sunday.
“Hey Jacob, it’s time to wake up,” they chanted, using a term for people of color who have yet to embrace their “true” identity as descendants of the Biblical Jacob, later called Israel. “We got good news for you: YOU are the real Jews.”
The march and a demonstration that followed at the Barclays Center were organized by Israel United in Christ in solidarity with Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving, who was suspended for eight games after he posted a link to an antisemitic film on social media last month and then was slow to apologize. But IUIC has also used the controversy to promote its incendiary ideology and recruit new followers into what it calls “God’s army.”
After the demonstration — the second held by IUIC outside of the Brooklyn arena this month — the group’s founder posted a message on his Twitter account. “We are not here for violence,” Bishop Nathanyel Ben Israel wrote, “we are here for the spiritual war.”
Before 2019, those American Jews who were even aware of the once-obscure Black Hebrew Israelite spiritual movement likely associated it with the loud but non-violent street preachers who would harangue pedestrians in city centers. In December of that year, however, extremists professing Israelite beliefs attacked a kosher grocery store in Jersey City, New Jersey and a Hanukkah party in Monsey, New York. Two Jews were killed in Jersey City, and a 72-year-old rabbi who was stabbed in the head in Monsey died from his injuries three months later.
With the memory of those attacks still fresh, and against the backdrop of a surge this fall in public expressions of antisemitism combined with threats of violence against Jewish communities emanating from other extremist corners, the militant posturing of IUIC has alarmed many Jews already on edge.
Rabbi Mordechai Lightstone of Crown Heights observed on Twitter that the Israelites who regularly preach near his home on Shabbat have been “particularly aggressive” of late, heaping verbal abuse on both him and his children. On Sunday afternoon, Lightstone posted a video of IUIC members assembling for their march and rehearsing their chants in Grand Army Plaza.
“Terrifying,” commented Elisheva Rishon, a Black and Jewish fashion designer who blames Hebrew Israelites for inflaming tensions between the two communities to which she belongs. A few Twitter users compared the march to the 2017 far-right rally in Charlottesville, at which participants chanted “Jews will not replace us.”
The recent IUIC rallies give the impression that the radical wing of the Hebrew Israelite movement is large and riled up. Meanwhile, recent comments by Kanye West, the rapper who now goes by Ye, and Irving that align with elements of Hebrew Israelite doctrine suggest the movement has broad support among powerful Black celebrities.
But how big is the movement in reality? What percentage are extremists who assail Jews as impostors who stole their heritage from them? And if Black Israelism has entered the marketplace of mainstream religions in the United States, should Jews be concerned?
The numbers
The only available statistics on Israelite identification in the United States were collected as part of a small national survey conducted by an evangelical Christian research firm in 2019. For that survey, which sought to capture African-American attitudes toward the state of Israel, Lifeway Research asked 1,019 African Americans, “Which of the following best describes your opinion of Black Hebrew Israelite teachings?”
Most respondents (62%) said they are not familiar with the teachings, but 19% said they agree with “most of the core ideas taught by Black Hebrew Israelites,” and 4% said they consider themselves Hebrew Israelites. The remaining 15% said they either “firmly oppose” the teachings or disagree with most of them. (The survey did not specify what those teachings are.)
The 2020 U.S. Census put the Black population at 41.1 million, so extrapolating from the Lifeway data, there are approximately 1.6 million Hebrew Israelites in the U.S. — not counting the small numbers of Latinos and Native Americans who also belong to Israelite groups — and 7.8 million people who may not identify as Israelites but who agree with the spiritual movement’s main teachings.
For lots of these people, the attention that West and Irving have brought to their belief system has been validating.
“Israelism is becoming part of the plausibility structure of Black America,” Christian activist and author Vocab Malone told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, referring to a social context in which certain ideas are considered credible. “The suspicions that a lot of folks have toward the Jewish community, they think they’re vindicated now.”
Scott McConnell, Lifeway’s executive director, told JTA that the survey’s sponsor, the Christian Zionist organization Philos Project, supplied the question about Hebrew Israelite teachings. Asked if there are plans to include similar questions in future surveys, he replied, “I know there are some pastors at African-American churches that have concerns about some of their parishioners being led astray by the teachings of the Hebrew Israelites, so we’ll keep it on our radar.”
Malone, who uses an alias in keeping with hip-hop culture, is a close observer of the Israelite world. The Phoenix resident frequently engages in debates on the street and online with members of groups described as hateful by the Southern Poverty Law Center — including IUIC, Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge, Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ, and The Sicarii — in hopes of convincing them to follow what he considers to be the true path of Christianity.
Founded in 2003, IUIC has proven the most adept at creating public spectacles and garnering media coverage. The group operates 71 U.S. chapters and 20 international ones, according to the Anti-Defamation League, and it holds men’s conferences each year that culminate in choreographed marches on city streets, like the one on Sunday in Brooklyn. Based on the size of those marches, Malone estimated that national membership has grown from around 5,000 in 2015 to around 10,000 today. Other radical groups likely have much smaller memberships but don’t share any figures, preferring to “play their cards close to their chest,” Malone said.
These estimates suggest that the extremists comprise a very small percentage of the 1.6 Hebrew Israelites living in the United States.
Ultimately, IUIC has a goal of recruiting 144,000 Black, Latino and Native American people who will be spared by God during the end time, as foretold in the book of Revelation. In order to achieve this goal, the group sends representatives to proselytize overseas, including in parts of Africa and the Caribbean. (IUIC did not respond to requests for comment from JTA.)
Both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the ADL monitor the activities of IUIC and other radical camps, as Israelites call their groups. However, spokespeople for both organizations told JTA they do not know how many people belong to these camps.
An online movement
What is clear is that the camps have greatly expanded their reach in recent years, taking their message from street corners to the entire globe thanks to the internet and social media. IUIC members run dozens of YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts where they post a constant stream of videos and memes, many containing antisemitic tropes. One recent Instagram post shows a startled-looking Hasidic Jewish man holding his hat above the words “The Synagogue of Satan.” (Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, uses similar language about Jews. A video he recorded this month defending West and Irving has been viewed millions of times.)
The main IUIC YouTube channel, @IUICintheClassRoom, has 126,000 subscribers and 29.4 million video views. A series of videos posted three years ago on the channels of local chapters provide some insight into how members hear about IUIC and why they join.
The most common way these members say they found their way to the camp was via videos they watched online. “Prior to actually coming to IUIC, I did do some Israelite window shopping,” recounts Officer Joshua of IUIC Tallahassee. “I always questioned myself, why is it that our people are at the bottom? How come we get the worst jobs and so forth? I knew Christianity wasn’t answering my questions, so what I did was I just started soul searching.”
As part of his quest, Joshua says he stumbled upon a video of Bishop Nathanyel and other IUIC leaders preaching on the street. “I was like man, these brothers really know what they’re doing, they really have our history,” he says. “That’s what actually made me do more research on IUIC and the truth.”
Sar (“Minister”) Ahmadiel Ben Yehuda speaks at the African Hebrew Israelites’ annual New World Passover celebration in Dimona, Israel, May 2013. (Andrew Esensten)
In another video, Sister Ezriella from the Concord, North Carolina, branch explains that as a young adult, she felt uncertain about her life’s purpose. Then her mother shared information with her about IUIC. “She was so happy it changed her life, I had to take notice and I had to come check it out for myself,” she says. “I fell in love with it. I fell in love with finding out who I am.”
A number of Black, male celebrities have also been drawn into the wider Israelite orbit in recent years, including rappers Kendrick Lamar and Kodak Black, TV host Nick Cannon, boxer Floyd Mayweather and retired NBA player Amar’e Stoudemire.
Some of these celebrities appear to have been exposed to Israelite teachings by relatives and other acquaintances. Lamar, who famously rapped “I’m a Israelite, don’t call me Black no mo’” on a 2017 song, learned about Israelism from a cousin who was involved with IUIC. Black began identifying as a Levite in 2017 after studying scripture with an Israelite priest while serving a jail sentence in Florida. Stoudemire has said his mother taught him he had “Hebraic roots.” (He officially converted to Judaism in 2020, a step most Israelites reject because it contradicts their claims of already being authentic Jews.)
Isabelle Williams, an analyst at ADL’s Center on Extremism who tracks radical Israelite camps, said celebrity endorsements of the ideology can have a big impact because they come from figures who are widely respected.
“If people came upon an extremist Black Hebrew Israelite group street preaching, it might be easier to dismiss it and recognize the extreme ideology behind it,” she said. “But when it’s being shared by these influential figures, people might be less likely to recognize the really insidious ideology and dangerous antisemitic conspiracy theories that are behind these statements.”
Williams added that a range of extremist groups have seized on comments made by West and Irving. “It’s not just BHI and NOI groups that are leveraging this moment,” Williams said. “We’ve seen white supremacists who are also using this recent attention and circulation of antisemitic conspiracy theories to promote their own agenda.”
Rabbi Capers Funnye is the most prominent Israelite leader in the U.S. He serves as chief rabbi of the International Israelite Board of Rabbis, an organization that provides spiritual guidance to about 2,500 people in the United States, along with tens of thousands of Israelites in southern and west Africa.
In an interview, Funnye condemned West, Irving and the radical Israelite camps that have rallied around them. “God is never about divisiveness,” Funnye said. “God is never about hatred. God is never about, ‘You ain’t.’ I don’t have to say what you aren’t to make me who I am.”
A member of the Chicago Board of Rabbis and the leader of a Chicago synagogue with a mixed membership of around 200 Jews and Israelites, Funnye was at pains to differentiate his community from IUIC and its ilk: His follows the Torah and supports the state of Israel, he said, while others follow both the Old and New Testaments, worship Jesus and reject Israel’s government as illegitimate.
“Whatever army that Kyrie is speaking about, we are not a part of his army,” he said, referring to a comment Irving made during an Oct. 29 press conference about how he has “a whole army” behind him.
But Funnye said another of Irving’s recent statements — “I cannot be antisemitic if I know where I come from” — resonated with him and his congregants.
“We are Semitic,” he said of Black people who identify as Israelites, “so now we really have to draw a line when antisemitism is only defined by one’s complexion or ethnicity. We were not the ones that racialized Judaism, and we will never racialize it because Jews are not a race.” (“Semitic” refers to people who speak Semitic languages, such as Hebrew and Arabic.)
Outside of the United States, the largest organized group of Hebrew Israelites is located in Israel. The African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem are a Dimona-based community of more than 3,000 African-American expatriates and their Israeli-born offspring.
African Hebrew Israelite youth serve in the army — not Kyrie Irving’s or IUIC’s army, but the Israel Defense Forces. After 53 years in Israel, the community has never been fully accepted, in part because they are not Jewish according to halacha, or Jewish law. Currently, some 100 community members are being threatened with deportation for living in the country illegally.
Ahmadiel Ben Yehuda, the African Hebrew Israelites’ minister of information, said he interpreted Irving’s remarks as a reference to “the global awakening of people of African ancestry to their Hebraic roots.” He said the backlash Irving has faced shows that the conversation around this awakening must involve qualified representatives of communities who can cite reputable sources — not documentaries such as the one Irving boosted — “Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America” — in support of their claims of Israelite ancestry.
“What is certain is that Israel and Judaism must figure out a way to better accommodate these communities,” Ben Yehuda said. “This is not going to fade away, and it shouldn’t. It will intensify as the awakening continues.”
How this awakening will affect Jews and established Jewish communities remains to be seen.
In September, George Washington University’s Program on Extremism released a report titled “Contemporary Violent Extremism and the Black Hebrew Israelite Movement.” The report noted that the “predominant threat” today comes not from Israelite groups themselves but from “individuals loosely affiliated with or inspired by the movement.”
Malone, the Christian activist, cautioned that as the extremist wing of the Israelite movement grows, more violent lone wolves may emerge.
“There’s a big funnel with any movement, and the bigger the funnel is, you get certain things down at the bottom,” he said. “This is not Buddhism. This is a different kind of thing with a different kind of rhetoric.”
—
The post How many Hebrew Israelites are there, and how worried should Jews be? appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Doxing Jewish and Pro-Israel Organizations Helps Antisemites Hunt Jews
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow speaks to reporters in Toronto, March 8, 2025. Photo: Christopher Katsarov/The Canadian Press via ZUMA Press via Reuters Connect
Lists of Jews and Jewish businesses have a grim history, particularly in Europe.
Following pressure from organizations combating antisemitism, last week, French-based mapping platform GoGoCarto removed a map cataloging more than 150 Jewish and Israeli-linked businesses in Catalonia, Spain.
Maps of Jews aren’t merely encyclopedic exercises; they are invitations to violence.
An anonymous group compiled what it called a “collaborative map of the Zionist economy in Barcelona.” The list featured kosher restaurants, a Jewish school, and multinational companies linked to Israel, such as Airbus, Microsoft, and Siemens.
Organizations fighting antisemitism warned GoGoCarto that the map violates French laws against incitement to hatred and discrimination.
Combat Antisemitism Movement’s director of European affairs argued that the map “echoes some of the darkest chapters in history, including the prelude to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany.” But one needn’t look to the Nazis to realize the danger of tracking Jews.
Just last month, ISIS supporters gunned down 15 people — including a 10-year-old girl — who were attending a large Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia. Organizers advertised the annual celebration publicly, including the event’s location. The Bondi terrorists used this information to kill Jews.
The threat of violence is why Jewish and pro-Israel events often refrain from publicly posting the location of their gatherings. It is also why most synagogues and Jewish schools have armed security to protect attendees. Wherever Jews gather, they are targets.
And the number of Jews that have been killed worldwide since Oct. 7, 2023, would be much higher if all the thwarted attacks had not been stopped.
For example, shortly after the Bondi massacre, Canadian authorities announced that they had arrested three individuals from Toronto for trying to kidnap women and Jews. Months earlier, in June, Canada extradited to the United States Pakistani citizen Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, after he “attempted to enter the United States to carry out a deadly terrorist attack on a Jewish center in New York City” using “semiautomatic weapons.”
But Khan didn’t have to cross the border to kill Jews and supporters of Israel. And he didn’t even have to compile a list of targets. Canadian editor of the online publication The Maple, Davide Mastracci, who has claimed that “Zionism has a stranglehold on our political system,” has already done that.
In March 2025, Mastracci created “Find IDF Soldiers,” a website dedicated to cataloging Canadians fighting in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In December, he released a follow-up, “GTA to IDF,” which lists seven schools, synagogues, and summer camps in the Greater Toronto Area that have had members serve in the IDF.
Mastracci explains that he is compiling this information because, “Canadians deserve to know who they [Canadians who have served in the IDF] are, the networks they’re a part of that may have influenced their decision to join the military and what they’ve done since returning to Canada.”
Mastracci claimed that the “information isn’t being collected and republished here to encourage any harassment of the institutions named.”
It seems that Mastracci doth protest too much.
A joint report from the Jewish Agency for Israel and the World Zionist Organization found a 340 percent increase in antisemitic incidents in 2024 compared to 2022. This has included violent attacks, overnight shootings at Jewish schools, vandalized synagogues, and discrimination.
Given the explosion of antisemitism in Canada since October 2023, publishing lists of Jews and Jewish organizations associated with alleged Israeli crimes is hardly an exercise in informing the public. It’s more like throwing a lighter to an arsonist.
Even the BDS Movement, the official organization spearheading the campaign to boycott and eliminate Israel, seemed to recognize this in 2022. When activists in the Boston area launched The Mapping Project to depict “local institutional support for the colonization of Palestine,” the BDS Movement disassociated itself with the endeavor, noting the devastating effect it had on the “Palestine solidarity movement.”
Doxing Jewish and Israel-related organizations will make Jews unsafe and will link pro-Palestinian activism to Nazi tactics of the 1930s. Mastracci’s projects may not meet the threshold for criminal incitement to violence in Canada, but they are certainly tools that will help antisemites hunt Jews.
David May is a research manager and senior research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). For more analysis from the author and FDD, please subscribe HERE. Follow David on X @DavidSamuelMay. Follow FDD on X @FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.
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The History of the Jews of South Florida: Antisemitism, Resilience, and Hope (PART TWO)
Congregants attend a service at Congregation B’Nai Israel in Boca Raton, Florida on October 10, 2023. Photo: GREG LOVETT/USA TODAY NETWORK via Reuters Connect
Part One of this article appeared here.
Miami Beach: Shtetl by the Sea
Despite its reputation for antisemitism in the early 1900s, Jews started coming to Miami Beach hoping to benefit from the prosperity the city had become known for.
In the 1930s, restrictive barriers to Jewish land ownership began to be removed. As a result, large numbers of Jews purchased properties from debt-ridden owners desperate to sell them. The Miami Beach Art Deco buildings of the 1930s and 1940s — many designed, built, and operated by Jews — are architectural treasures.
In 1949, the Florida Legislature passed a law ending discrimination in real estate and hotels, and the Jewish community’s development bloomed. By the 1970s, almost 80 percent of the population of Miami Beach was Jewish!
The Jewish influence on Miami Beach was tremendous. Jews were and are involved politically and in developing the tourist industry. Almost all the museums and arts organizations were started by Jews. Miami Beach has had at least 16 Jewish mayors, including the father and brother of the former Israeli Ambassador to the United States, Ron Dermer.
Thanks to its beautiful weather, Miami Beach became a popular Jewish winter vacation spot, earning it the nickname “Shtetl by the Sea.”
Yet, in 1980, Miami Beach began to change, with rising prices and changing demographics. This led many Jews to move north to Broward and Palm Beach counties, and in particular, Boca Raton.
Today, Miami Beach’s Jewish community has been bolstered by Jewish immigrants from Latin America, Russia, and Israel, as well as Orthodox Jews from the Northeast.
Surfside, which borders on Miami Beach, is currently the area’s most Jewish neighborhood. In fact, of its 6,000 residents, almost half are Orthodox Jews.
Miami in the 1930s.
Broward County: The Little-Known Story of Sam Horvitz
By 1910, five years before Broward became a county, a Jew named Louis Brown arrived in Dania, the county’s first city. By 1923, seven Jewish families were living in Fort Lauderdale, and after a few more families moved there, the first Jewish service in Broward County was held on September 17, 1926.
The building boom in the area went bust in 1926, but the small Jewish community remained. By the second half of the 1930s, the area began to recover. The Jewish community also grew, and by 1940, there were 1,000 Jews in Broward County. Today, the city of Hollywood, in Broward County, has a robust Jewish community.
Few know the fascinating background: a Jewish family is largely responsible for the city’s growth.
In the 1920s, Sam Horvitz, a high school dropout from Cleveland, entered a contract to build sidewalks and streets for Hollywood. In the building bust of the late 1920’s, Sam purchased and eventually owned more than half the vacant land in the city. As the owner of over 25,000 lots, Horvitz began building and selling single-family homes.
When Sam Horvitz died, his son William took the reins of Hollywood Inc. and continued to build on his father’s vision. The company began extending the city westward, with carefully controlled development adhering to the concept of quality communities. Hollywood Inc. built Orangebrook Golf Estates, Hollywood Hills, Emerald Hills, Lakes of Emerald Hills, Hollywood Mall (the first enclosed mall in Florida), the Bank of Hollywood Hills, the Post Haste Shopping Center, Sheridan Mall, and the Executive Plaza of Emerald Hills.
In 1966, Maynard Abrams became Broward’s first Jewish mayor for the City of Hollywood. He was followed by many dozens of Jewish mayors, state legislators, and US Congressional representatives in Broward County.
In the 1970s, Jewish retirees began choosing Broward as their new home, and moved to retirement communities in west Broward, such as Century Village in Pembroke Pines. The large Jewish population in Broward fostered a strong sense of community and Jewish identity. Multiple synagogues opened there. In 1970, there were 40,000 Jews, and in 1990, the Jewish community of Broward peaked at 275,000.
Today, Broward County has many thriving Jewish communities, including Fort Lauderdale, Hollywood, Cooper City, Deerfield Beach, Hallandale Beach, Pompano Beach, Tamarac, and Weston, with over 235,000 Jews.
Palm Beach County’s Boca Raton: From One Family to Half the Population
The first known Jewish residents of Boca Raton, Florence, and Harry Brown, arrived in 1931 from St. Louis.
Restrictive and antisemitic real estate practices kept the Jewish community small during the first decades of the 1900s. By the 1960s, the Jewish population began to grow, and in 1979, the Jewish population of Boca Raton, Highland Beach, and Delray Beach was estimated at 37,000.
The opening of Interstate 95 through Boca Raton in the 1970s eased the path for Jews from the Northeast to move to South Palm Beach County. Additionally, Jews from Miami and Broward County began moving to Boca Raton in the 1970’s, a trend that continued for the next thirty years.
Today, Boca Raton’s Jewish community, which started with a single family in 1931, has grown to almost half the city’s population. There are approximately 230,000 Jews in Palm Beach County, with very large communities in Boca Raton, Delray Beach, and Boynton Beach.
One of Miami’s distinctive communities is that of Cuban Jews. With the rise of Fidel Castro in 1959, approximately 10,000 Cuban Jews came to South Florida. The foundation they laid would help Jewish immigrants who followed them integrate into the South Florida Jewish community.
The Miami area currently has the highest proportion of foreign-born Jews of any area in the United States. Jews from Venezuela, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, and Brazil have settled in the Miami area. There are also almost 10,000 Israelis in the Miami and Hollywood areas.
The Growth of the Orthodox Community
Recently, there has been an explosive growth of South Florida’s Orthodox Jewish Community.
South Florida is blessed with hundreds of Orthodox shuls and Chabad centers, and dozens of Orthodox schools, and yeshivas. Over 8,000 children in Orthodox schools benefit from Florida’s school voucher system. There are advanced learning Kollels, Jewish outreach centers, and numerous kosher restaurants. In the winter, Chassidim from New York, including prominent rebbes and tens of thousands of Orthodox Jews from Brooklyn, Lakewood, and Chicago, visit South Florida for days or weeks.
Many residents and visitors take for granted the thriving Jewish communities and infrastructure already in place to benefit them.
The truth is that they owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Rabbi Alexander S. Gross (1917 – March 10, 1980), who played a central role in establishing Jewish life and Torah education in South Florida.
Rabbi Gross was an American Orthodox rabbi who established the Hebrew Academy of Greater Miami, the first Orthodox Jewish day school south of Baltimore, Maryland. He began the school in a storefront with just six students in 1947.
He was a graduate of Yeshiva Torah Vodaas and a close student of the great Rabbi Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz, the founder of Torah U’Mesorah. Rabbi Gross believed that by giving children a strong Jewish education, he would raise the level of observance and knowledge among adults as well, thereby building vibrant, knowledgeable Jewish communities.
Rabbi Gross’ devotion was legendary. He would drive all around South Florida to bring Jewish children to Hebrew Academy, literally driving carpool for multiple families, to help ensure they received the vital Jewish education.
In time, the results of his efforts would be clear, as the following vignette demonstrates.
In 1959, due to severe financial strain, the Hebrew Academy of Miami Board of Directors had to institute an austere tuition policy. If parents didn’t pay tuition, their child would no longer be able to attend the school. One of the affected families, which was in any case not overly enthusiastic about their son attending the Jewish school, told their son, Billy, that he would no longer be able to attend Hebrew Academy.
Billy was devastated. He loved the Torah studies and the school. Sadly but gratefully, he wrote a handwritten letter to Rabbi Alexander Gross, letting him know how much he appreciated what the Hebrew Academy did for him and that he had no hard feelings towards anyone at the school.
After reading the letter, Rabbi Gross personally paid his tuition, and Billy stayed in the school. He thrived and graduated eighth grade as class valedictorian. He continued his studies in the renowned Telshe Yeshiva in Cleveland and became an accomplished Torah scholar. He returned to Florida as a rabbi and built up the North Miami Beach community. Rabbi Zev (Billy) Leff is today the rabbi of Moshav Mattisyahu in Israel and a renowned lecturer and author.
After Rabbi Gross passed away, his family was clearing out his desk and found a folder that had “my children” written outside in Yiddish. It was a list of children he personally paid tuition for, so they could stay in the Hebrew Academy and not attend public school.
After building the Hebrew Academy, Rabbi Gross looked to raise the level of Torah learning and scholarship in South Florida. Until that point, he had sent his best students out of town to study in the larger yeshivas of the Northeast. In 1974, the Talmudic College of Florida was started with the support of Miami Beach philanthropist Moshe Chaim Berkowitz. He brought Rabbi Yochanan Zweig to serve as the esteemed Rosh Yeshiva, and as a result of this step, other yeshivas, Bais Yaakovs, and Kollelim would come to be built in multiple South Florida communities.
Rabbi Alexander S. Gross, like Moses Elias Levy 130 years earlier, had a Jewish vision for Florida. Both of their visions have come true.
Rabbi Menachem Levine is the CEO of JDBY-YTT, the largest Jewish school in the Midwest. He served as Rabbi of Congregation Am Echad in San Jose, CA, from 2007 to 2020. He is a popular speaker and writes for numerous publications on Torah, Jewish History, and Contemporary Jewish Topics. Rabbi Levine’s personal website is https://thinktorah.org
A version of this article was originally published at Aish.
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Ceasefires in Name Only: How the Media Ignores Hamas and Hezbollah Violations
A Palestinian man points a weapon in the air after it was announced that Israel and Hamas agreed on the first phase of a Gaza ceasefire, in the central Gaza Strip, October 9. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Ceasefires are meant to bring relative quiet to the parties that have agreed to them. Unfortunately, Israel knows all too well that when dealing with terrorist organizations, quiet is rarely guaranteed, even after the signing of a ceasefire agreement.
It should be abundantly clear to the media that terrorist organizations are not interested in peace because this contradicts their very modus operandi. Yet the media has consistently omitted the ceasefire violations being committed by terrorist organizations, and instead has been shifting the responsibility for the lack of stability and peace onto Israel alone.
Israel has adhered to the agreements it signed with both Hamas and Hezbollah. Consistent violations by both of these terrorist organizations have resulted in Israel taking military action in Gaza and Lebanon to ensure the safety of its citizens and the security of the state. Only when the terrorist organizations have not upheld their end of the agreement as required has Israel taken action.
Graph based on data from The Long War Journal.
Graph based on data from The Long War Journal.
As of this time of writing, the body of one hostage, Ran Gvili, is still being held by terrorist organizations in Gaza. It is perhaps one of the most explicit violations of the agreement, which called for all hostages to be released within 72 hours of Israel’s withdrawal from certain areas in the Gaza Strip. While the media might be moving on to Stage 2 of the ceasefire agreement, Israel can only do so once Gvili’s body is returned.
Why not, “New blow to Gaza peace deal as Hamas still hasn’t returned the body of hostage Ran Gvili,” @IrishTimes?
Hamas hasn’t fulfilled its obligations under the ceasefire agreement. How about holding the terrorist org accountable instead of solely blaming Israel? pic.twitter.com/aHCCd666T6
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) January 7, 2026
Beyond the mishandling of hostages, Hamas has also violated the ceasefire by attacking the IDF 13 times, which involved sniper or RPG attacks, ambushes, detonations, storing weapons, and individual terrorist leaders advancing plots against the IDF in Gaza. Some of these violations have resulted in the deaths of IDF soldiers, underscoring that this is not a technical breach but a premeditated continuation of warfare. Terrorists have also breached the ceasefire using tunnels on five separate occasions, emerging from the underground system as an attempt to commit one of the above attacks.
Another 50 ceasefire violations come from terrorists crossing the yellow line into an area controlled by Israel, as agreed upon in stage 1. These incursions are not incidental, as many of the unauthorized crossings of the yellow line also involve terrorists seeking to ambush Israeli troops, plant explosive devices, or commit other hostile activities that pose an immediate threat to the IDF.
“Israeli fire kills three people in Gaza,” writes @Reuters.
Omitted: they were terrorists who crossed the yellow line, breaking the ceasefire.
Once again, Reuters hides the terrorism – but never misses a chance to blame Israel. pic.twitter.com/4n8oICokfm
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) November 4, 2025
When such violations are ignored or stripped of context, Israel’s defensive responses are falsely framed as escalations rather than obligations to protect its forces and population. Yet in reporting on the yellow line and Israel’s inevitable countermeasures, the media has more often than not omitted these critical facts and, in doing so, has distorted the reality of who is violating the ceasefire and at whose expense.
The breaking of the ceasefire is not only a danger to Israel, but also to Palestinians living in Gaza. Hamas has turned its violence inward, targeting Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel on at least two occasions. Additionally, Hamas has loaded or launched rockets on two different occasions. Most recently, the launch failed and fell inside Gaza near a hospital. These actions expose the central truth often missing from media coverage that Hamas’ refusal to disarm is not symbolic or political. It is an ongoing, tangible threat, and yet this continued militarization and the civilian danger it creates are routinely omitted from reporting.
Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire
Graph based on data from Doron Kadosh.
While there is less information about each specific violation by Hezbollah, it is evident that the terrorist organization has no intention of abiding by the agreement by disarming and remaining beyond the Litani River. From January 2 until January 11, the IDF X account has reported seven different responses to Hezbollah violations. This includes the targeting of terrorist infrastructure, including weapons facilities and training compounds currently being used by terrorists, launch sites, and terrorists working to advance attacks or rebuild infrastructure.
Despite the glaringly obvious violations, the media has still worked tirelessly to turn a blind eye to Hezbollah’s consistent violations – reported to average seven per day in July 2025 – and the terrorist organization’s persistence in its goal of rearming, rebuilding its infrastructure, and destroying Israel has not withered.
“Israel hasn’t upheld their end of the ceasefire agreement,” according to @SkyNews‘s @YousraElbagir.
No mention whatsoever of Hezbollah’s failure to disarm or its efforts to rebuild and reassert itself in southern Lebanon in breach of the ceasefire agreement. https://t.co/0htPoft5NB pic.twitter.com/Vk0A3Hvb62
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) December 29, 2025
The ceasefire agreement explicitly states that Israel is allowed to practice its “inherent right of self-defense” while adhering to international law. With Hezbollah’s refusal to disarm and move beyond the Litani River as required by this agreement, Israel has every right to exercise acts of self-defense to ensure there will no longer be a threat on the northern border.
Except Hezbollah hasn’t ceased, and that’s why Israel is firing.
Not firing rockets into Israel is only a small part of Hezbollah’s ceasefire obligations. Rebuilding its forces in southern Lebanon is a violation.@CNN‘s @bencnn won’t give you the full picture. pic.twitter.com/71hEHsJcQf
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) November 30, 2025
Because Hezbollah is a multifaceted hybrid, deeply embedded within Lebanese society, the media’s reporting frequently minimizes or obscures the extent to which it is classified as a terrorist organization. In doing so, Hezbollah is implicitly absolved of its requirement to uphold the agreement.
Terrorist groups, @AP.
That’s the term you’re looking for. pic.twitter.com/V1WxWZYWM2— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) January 8, 2026
Despite the ceasefires with Hezbollah and Hamas, the threat of both terrorist groups looms as they refuse to abide by the deal, most crucially by declining to give up their power and disarm. As a result, Israel has had to take action against both terrorist organizations to restrain them and ensure the security of the state.
For the past two and a half years of war, the Western media has found any excuse to shift the blame onto Israel, and the aftermath of the ceasefires is no different. The context of terrorist groups refusing to adhere to the agreement is frequently missing from reporting. Any article that mentions the fragility of the ceasefires must include the violations by the terrorist organizations or otherwise risk obscuring the truth on the ground and covering for terrorists.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.