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In Israel’s political turmoil, the Biden administration eyes a threat to US security interests
WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Joe Biden has not hidden his disdain of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned rehaul of Israel’s courts.
But bubbling beneath the surface of Israel’s political crisis is another concern: shared U.S.-Israel security interests.
As Israeli reservists pledge to boycott call-ups in protest of the controversial judicial reform legislation, experts say Israel’s enemies could see opportunity — and that the Biden administration is worried. Gen. Mark Milley, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is headed to Israel next week to check in on the Israeli military, reports claimed on Wednesday.
“The United States has lots of partners in the Middle East, but Israel is by far its closest and strongest partner in the Middle East,” said Shira Efron, the senior director of policy research at the Israel Policy Forum, a group that advocates for a two-state outcome to the conflict. “If Israel’s capabilities and its readiness is affected, the United States loses capabilities in the Middle East.”
Biden has cast his concerns about Netanyahu’s planned judicial overhaul by emphasizing the democratic values the countries share and that he has extolled for his entire political life. “They cannot continue down this road,” Biden said on March 28.
But just two days earlier, on March 26, a White House communications glitch revealed that military readiness was also front of mind. That was the day Neyanyahu fired his defense minister, Yoav Gallant, for calling for a suspension of the legislation, in part because of the harm the political tensions were causing the military.
The Biden administration said it was “deeply concerned” by the firing. An early version of the National Security Council statement, released to the Times of Israel, read: “We are deeply concerned by the ongoing developments in Israel, including the potential impact on military readiness raised by Minister Gallant.”
The NSC removed the phrase about military readiness from later versions of the statement — NSC spokesmen never answered questions as to why — and Netanyahu rescinded his firing of Gallant.
But even as Gallant remains in place, deep questions remain about the degree to which Israel’s searing political divide have weakened its vaunted military and intelligence apparatuses. Netanyahu — and even his son Yair, on social media — has clashed with top military brass, and reports claim the prime minister aims to shake up parts of the army’s chain of command.
Netanyahu has batted down concerns, saying that the changes to the courts that have passed are minor and that he is no longer committed to other parts of the proposed rehaul his government rolled out in January. His opponents don’t believe him and continue to flood the streets at least once a week in massive protests.
He also remains bullish on U.S.-Israel relations, talking up cybersecurity cooperation and artificial intelligence research this month to a delegation of U.S. congressional Democrats who toured Israel on a mission sponsored by an affiliate of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
“The future belongs to those who innovate but the future also belongs to the free societies who cooperate with each other to assure that our people, our citizens, get the benefits of AI and not its curses,” he said. “I think in this regard, and in many other regards, Israel has no better ally than the United States and the United States has no better ally than Israel.”
Security cooperation very much underpins the U.S.-Israel relationship, said Mark Dubowitz, the CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, an influential think tank that has as its main focus the threat posed by Iran.
“The bilateral relationship on the military and security level is as strong as ever,” Dubowitz said in an interview. “I think the concern is what” the political turmoil will do “specifically to Israeli military preparedness and security with Iran on the cusp of nuclear weapons.”
U.N. inspectors say Iran is closer than ever to enriching uranium at a weaponization level. But even absent a nuclear weapon, Iran poses multiple threats to U.S. interests in the region, ranging from its arming of Hezbollah in Lebanon to its upholding the Assad regime in Syria.
Israel has been key to keeping Iran off balance while the United States deals with other regional threats, Efron said. She cited U.S.-Israel coordination in Syria in the late 2010s, when the country was wracked by civil war, as an example.
“You have a partner with mutual goals,” Efron said. “If one of the partners, the IDF, can’t do one of the tasks, it’s suboptimal.”
The threat to IDF readiness stems from thousands of military reservists who have sworn to stop volunteering if Netanyahu advances his overhaul of the courts, which opponents say would sap the judiciary of much of its independence.
Israelis protest against the Israeli government’s planned judicial overhaul, near the prime minister’s official residence in Jerusalem, March 23, 2023. (Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90)
Most reserve duty in Israel is mandatory, but a subset of volunteers for elite service in commando units, the air force and intelligence are exempt. Reservists in each of those disciplines are prominent among the dissenters.
The greatest threat is to the airforce, where reserve pilots take weekly training flights in order to qualify as ready for combat.
“You know, 60% to 70% of missions by the Israeli Air Force are done by reservists and some of them are going on strike,” said David Makovsky, a distinguished fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank with ties to the U.S. and Israeli governments. “If you don’t train, you can’t fly.”
Natan Sachs, the director of the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, said reservist defections would have an effect at least in the short term.
“In the short term, there could be operational issues, especially if particular units are not up to up to Israeli standards, which are pretty high standards,” he said. “The numbers are considerable, especially in some of the squadrons.
That lack of readiness could undercut the high-profile joint exercises the United States and Israel periodically stage as a show of unity and force, and as a signal that the United States is ready to keep Iran’s ambitions contained. The most recent exercise was one called Juniper Oak, in January.
Dubowitz said the political tensions are distracting Israel from other pressing diplomatic and security matters, including intensifying Israeli-Palestinian violence in the West Bank, heightened tensions with Hezbollah on the Lebanese border and the normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which both Netanyahu and Biden see as a priority.
“There’s a growing possibility we’ll have war with Hezbollah, the West Bank is on fire,” he said. “Judicial reform has eclipsed all other compelling national security priorities, and then also opportunities, there’s a 50-50 possibility of a deal with the Saudis by the end of the year.”
Another reason Biden does not need Israeli instability is his focus on other regions. Like his two predecessors, Donald Trump and Barack Obama, Biden sees the preeminent long term threat in Chinese ambitions. Short term, he wants Ukraine to roust Russia from its invasion of the country.
Israel’s preoccupation with its domestic turmoil “could mean that the U.S. needs to do more in this region,” Efron said. “The U.S. doesn’t want to do more in this region. They want to focus on Russia. They want to focus on China.”
Sachs noted that Israel’s enemies, including leaders of Hezbollah and the Iranian regime, have indicated that they see an opportunity in Israel’s crisis, depicting it as accelerating Israel’s demise.
Israel’s enemies would be wise to be wary, Sachs said. Israel’s military remains formidable, and its reduced readiness poses a threat to its enemies: With fewer soldiers on duty, Israel would use blunter means of retaliation than the highly targeted systems usually available, causing greater damage.
Efron identified a longer-term concern in the presence in Netanyahu’s government of far right extremists. That could affect intelligence sharing, which has remained intensely close whatever other tensions have afflicted U.S.-Israel relations. Spies are less naturally inclined to share information with regimes that have radically different cultures, she said.
“You do this with partners you see eye to eye with,” she said of intelligence sharing. “The lack of shared values creates a challenge for the United States.”
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The post In Israel’s political turmoil, the Biden administration eyes a threat to US security interests appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Schumer Urges US Justice Department to Probe Arson Attack Against Shapiro as Possible Antisemitic Hate Crime
US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) holds a press conference in the US Capitol in Washington, DC, April 23, 2024. Photo: Annabelle Gordon / CNP/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
US Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (NY) on Thursday urged the Justice Department to launch a federal investigation into the recent arson attack against Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a fellow Democrat, as a possible hate crime motivated by antisemitism.
In a letter addressed to US Attorney General Pam Bondi, Schumer argued that the arson attack targeting Shapiro, who is Jewish, left the Pennsylvania governor’s family in “anguish” and warned that it could serve as an example of “rising antisemitic violence” within the United States. He stressed that a federal investigation and hate crime charges may be necessary to uphold the “fundamental values of religious freedom and public safety.”
“While the Shapiro family slept inside, the suspect allegedly set their home ablaze, causing extensive damage and leaving lasting anguish not only for the victims, but for Americans across the country,” wrote Schumer, who is also Jewish. “The suspect has since been charged with attempted homicide, terrorism, and aggravated arson.”
Additionally, Schumer cited search warrants signed by Pennsylvania police that said the suspect, 38-year-old Cody Balmer, targeted Shapiro’s official residence over the governor’s vocal support for Israel and “visible embrace” of Judaism. The senator argued that evidence surfaced by authorities might reveal an “antisemitic motivation” on behalf of the suspect, necessitating a vigorous federal response.
“These statements — in conjunction with the timing of the attack during Passover, Governor Shapiro’s visible embrace of his Jewish faith, and the context of rising antisemitism globally and across the country — raise serious concerns about antisemitic motivation,” Schumer added. “While the local district attorney has not yet filed hate-crime charges, he acknowledged that Governor Shapiro’s religion appears to have factored into the suspect’s decisions.”
Schumer called on Bondi to exercise “full weight of our civil-rights laws” in pursuing the investigation, underscoring the necessity of ensuring that no individual or public official “be targeted because of their faith.”
Shapiro’s residence, the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion, was set ablaze on Sunday morning, hours after the governor hosted a gathering to celebrate the first night of the Jewish holiday of Passover. Shapiro said that he, his wife, and his children were awakened by state troopers knocking on their door at 2 am. The governor and his family immediately evacuated the premises and were unscathed.
Corporal Benjamin Forsythe of the Pennsylvania State Police said in a warrant to obtain the devices of the suspect, Balmer, that he set fire to Shapiro’s residence over the alleged ongoing “injustices to the people of Palestine” and his Jewish faith.
According to the warrant, Balmer called 911 prior to the attack and told emergency operators that Shapiro “will not take part in his plans for what he wants to do to the Palestinian people,” and demanded that the governor “stop having my friends killed.”
The suspect continued, telling operators, “Our people have been put through too much by that monster.”
Balmer later revealed to police that he planned to beat Shapiro with a sledgehammer if he encountered him after gaining access into his residence, according to authorities.
He was subsequently charged with eight crimes by authorities, including serious felonies such as attempted homicide, terrorism, and arson. The suspect faces potentially 100 years in jail. He has been denied bail.
Shapiro, a practicing Jew, has positioned himself as a staunch supporter of Israel. In the days following Hamas’s brutal slaughter of roughly 1,200 people across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Shapiro issued statements condemning the Palestinian terrorist group and gave a speech at a local synagogue. The governor also ordered the US and Pennsylvania Commonwealth flags to fly at half-mast outside the state capitol to honor the victims.
Shapiro’s strident support of the Jewish state in the wake of Oct. 7 also incensed many pro-Palestinian activists, resulting in the governor being dubbed “Genocide Josh” by far-left demonstrators.
Bondi condemned the attack targeting Shapiro. However, Bo she has not clarified whether she plans on opening a federal case against the suspect, saying that her office is doing “anything we can to help convict the person that did this and keep them behind bars as long as possible.”
The post Schumer Urges US Justice Department to Probe Arson Attack Against Shapiro as Possible Antisemitic Hate Crime first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Government Contractor, Virginia Resident Pleads Guilty to Iranian Spying Scheme
An Iranian protester waves an Iranian flag while participating in an anti-Israeli multinational rally at the holy mosque of Jamkaran near the holy city of Qom, 156 km (97 miles) south of Tehran, Iran, on April 15, 2025. Photo: Morteza Nikoubazl via Reuters Connect.
A resident of Great Falls, Virginia — Abouzar Rahmati, 42 — pleaded guilty on Wednesday to collecting intelligence on US infrastructure and providing it to the Islamic Republic of Iran, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced.
“From at least December 2017 through June 2024, Rahmati worked with Iranian government officials and intelligence operatives to act on their behalf in the United States, including by meeting with Iranian intelligence officers and government officials using a cover story to hide his conduct,” the DOJ said, noting that Rahmati even infiltrated a contractor for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that possesses “sensitive non-public information about the US aviation sector.”
Throughout the duration of his cover, Rahmati amassed “open-source and non-public materials about the US solar energy industry,” which he delivered to “Iranian intelligence officers.”
The government found that the operation began in August 2017, after Rahmati “offered his services” to a high-ranking Iranian government official who had once been employed by the country’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security, according to the DOJ. Months later, he traveled to Iran, where Iranian agents assigned to him the espionage activity to which he pleaded guilty to perpetrating on Wednesday.
“Rahmati sent additional material relating to solar energy, solar panels, the FAA, US airports, and US air traffic control towers to his brother, who lived in Iran, so that he would provide those files to Iranian intelligence on Rahmati’s behalf,” the DOJ continued. Rahmati also, it said, delivered 172 gigabytes worth of information related to the National Aerospace System (NAS) — which monitors US airspace, ensuring its safety for aircraft — and NAS Airport Surveillance to Iran during a trip he took there.
Rahmati faces up to 10 years in prison. He will be sentenced in August.
This is not the first Iranian plot on US soil to be revealed by US federal law enforcement in recent months.
In November, for example, three Iranian intelligence assets were charged with contriving a conspiracy to assassinate critics of the Islamic Republic of Iran, as well as then US President-elect Donald Trump.
According to the DOJ, Farhad Shakeri, 51; Carlisle Rivera, 49; and Jonathan Loadholt, 36, acted at the direction of and with help from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), an internationally designated terrorist organization, to plot to murder a US citizen of Iranian origin in New York. Shakeri, who remains at large and is believed to reside in Iran, was allegedly the principal agent who managed the two other men, both residents of New York City who appeared in court this week.
Their broader purpose, prosecutors said, was to target nationals of the United States and its allies for attacks, including “assaults, kidnapping, and murder, both to repress and silence critical dissidents” and to exact revenge for the 2020 killing of then-IRGC Quds Force chief Qasem Soleimani in a US drone strike in Iraq. Trump was president of the US at the time of the operation.
The Quds Force is responsible for Iran’s proxies and terrorist operations abroad, and Soleimani was a revered figure among supporters of the Iranian regime.
The Justice Department added that Shakeri told law enforcement that he was ordered roughly a month before the 2024 US presidential election to develop a plan for murdering Trump, who has vocally criticized Iran’s efforts to obtain nuclear weapons, harass Israel, and overturn the regional order in the Middle East. It also said that Rivera and Loadholt’s activities in the US included “surveilling two Jewish American citizens living in New York City” and stalking another potential female victim, journalist Masih Alinejad, at her home and other locations. All the targets were to be murdered, jobs for which the agents stood to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars.
All three men are now charged with murder-for-hire, conspiracy, and money laundering. Shakeri faces additional charges, including violating sanctions against Iran, providing support to a terrorist organization, and conspiring to violate the International Emergency Powers Act, offenses for which he could serve up to six decades in federal prison.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post US Government Contractor, Virginia Resident Pleads Guilty to Iranian Spying Scheme first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Georgetown University Identifies Suspected Perpetrator of Antisemitic Graffiti
Students, faculty, and others at Georgetown University on March 23, 2025. Photo: ZUMA Press Wire via Reuters Connect.
Georgetown University has identified the person suspected of graffitiing an antisemitic message in a residence hall, an incident that has caused alarm at an institution that was recently scrutinized over its student government’s scheduling a referendum on the anti-Israel boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement to take place during the Jewish holiday of Passover.
“The Georgetown University Police Department has identified a suspect in this case and is investigating it as a bias incident and hate crime,” said a statement addressing the incident that was signed by four high-level university officials — excluding interim president Robert Groves. “We strongly condemn antisemitism in all its forms, and this act of hatred has no place in our community.”
It continued, “We stand together with our Jewish community. We recognize the effect that this deeply troubling incident has on our community, including the impacts on individual students and employees.”
The officials added that other incidents of vandalism have been perpetrated on campus in “recent days,” prompting investigations by the institution’s police department. They noted that political disagreement is causing students to devalue one another to the point that they are willing to commit “discriminatory actions” for which there is “never justification.” They encouraged students to refer to the university’s Speech and Expression Policy for guidance on how to engage in civil political expression.
On Thursday, Students Supporting Israel (SSI) Georgetown — a Jewish advocacy group that is fighting to normalize the pro-Israel movement on campus — implored the university to impose a disciplinary measure on the perpetrator of the graffiti that matches the severity of the offense.
“SSI Georgetown is deeply concerned by the antisemitic graffiti recently found on campus — an act of hate that threatens the safety and dignity of Jewish students,” the group said. “We call on the university to hold those responsible accountable and make clear that antisemitism has no place at Georgetown. SSI stands proudly with the Jewish community and all communities that are recipients of hate, and we remain committed to ensuring students can live and express their identity without fear.”
The antisemitic incident comes amid a moment of turbulence at Georgetown University.
Earlier this week, its Student Association (GUSA) rescheduled an anti-Israel referendum after numerous complaints that holding it during Passover would effectively disenfranchise Jewish students by depriving them of a chance to express opposition to the measure at the ballot box.
GUSA said on Monday that it moved the referendum date to acknowledge concerns raised by SSI, as well as Chabad Georgetown, Georgetown Israel Alliance, and the Jewish Student Association.
“We made this decision after hearing concerns about the placement of the election during a religious holiday,” the governing body said in a statement posted on Instagram. “Although the election has been rescheduled, formal campaigners may continue to campaign for the referendum until the end of the campaigning period. Individuals may continue to register as formal campaigners until the end of the campaigning period.”
The referendum must still be contested for other reasons, SSI told The Algemeiner on Tuesday.
“We commend the decision to move the vote past Passover but are still intent on combating the procedural irregularities surrounding the referendum,” the group said, referring to the fact that the resolution only passed because GUSA senators, the campus newspaper reported, “voted to break rules” which require referenda to be evaluated by the Policy and Advocacy Committee (PAC), a period of deliberation which establishes their merit, or lack thereof, for consideration by the senate.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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