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‘Is that really her?’ Liberal Jews say Elise Stefanik, hailed as a hero of the House antisemitism hearings, has baggage of her own

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Over the weekend, one Jewish Democratic congressman joined with Elise Stefanik, the number-three Republican in the House of Representatives, to demand accountability for antisemitism.

Another took to cable TV to say she had no credibility on the issue.

The gap between the two Jewish Democrats — Florida’s Jared Moskowitz and Maryland’s Jamie Raskin — illustrates a broader dilemma for liberal Jews. Moskowitz joined with Stefanik to demand that three elite universities fire their leaders for failing to protect Jews on campus, while Raskin told MSNBC that Stefanik is a leading enabler of antisemitism because she has echoed a conspiracy theory that has fueled antisemitic violence.

The split on Stefanik stems from a congressional hearing last week in which she asked the presidents of Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania if “calling for the genocide of Jews” is against the universities’ codes of conduct. All three, weighing campus conduct codes against free speech imperatives, said the answer depended on the context. In the ensuing outrage, Penn President Liz Magill stepped down and pressure built on Harvard’s Claudine Gay to do the same.

For some, Stefanik emerged from the meeting as an unexpected champion of the fight against antisemitism. Moskowitz said in a Fox News interview that Stefanik “did a great job” questioning the university presidents and signed a letter demanding their resignations. 

In the past, however, the upstate New York Republican has drawn condemnation for comments echoing the white supremacist “great replacement theory,” which in its original form claims that Jews are orchestrating the mass immigration of people of color into Western nations in order to replace their white populations. In 2021, Stefanik’s campaign posted on social media that Democrats plan to “overthrow our current electorate” by allowing undocumented immigrants to enter the country.

That statement by Stefanik has placed some Jews in an ambivalent spot: surprised to find themselves cheering her on.

“I felt very strange, kind of like rooting her on when she was asking her questions,” recalled Jewish philanthropist Lisa Greer. “I just thought ‘this is really amazing.’ And then I kept thinking, well, it looks like Elise Stefanik, but is that really her? I couldn’t believe it was the same person.”

Betsy Sheerr, a Democratic donor and a philanthropist who has given to multiple Jewish and pro-Israel causes, said she appreciated Stefanik for getting results.

“I think that she said what a lot of us were thinking when we listened to the testimony, to be honest, and as harsh as she was — she was really grilling them — I think a lot of us watched that and said you know, that’s absolutely right, this is unacceptable, this is ridiculous, this is cowardice,” Sheerr said from Israel, where she was on a solidarity tour. “So you know in that way I would have to begrudgingly admit that she shone a light and there were results that might not have happened without the directness of her grilling people.”

Raskin, speaking Sunday on MSNBC, said that Stefanik’s enabling of antisemitism in her party disqualified her from any role in combating antisemitism on campus.

“Where does Elise Stefanik get off lecturing anybody about antisemitism, when she’s the hugest supporter of Donald Trump, who traffics in antisemitism all the time?” Raskin said, according to an account in The Hill. He added that she “didn’t utter a peep of protest” when Trump dined a year ago with Kanye West, the rapper who embraced antisemitism, and Nick Fuentes, a Holocaust denier.

Stefanik responded on X that Trump was “the best friend Jewish people have had in the White House in modern times.” She listed a number of Trump’s Israel policies, such as moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, as well as his 2019 executive order on antisemitism.

Stefanik’s past actions did not deter the country’s leading antisemitism watchdog from sharing video of the congressional hearing. In 2022, after a mass shooting in Buffalo inspired by the “great replacement” theory, the Anti-Defamation League criticized Stefanik as on of its propagators, saying her campaign’s posts “strategically play on extremist rhetoric to stoke growing fears that white Americans are under attack and minorities seek to eject them.”

Yet its CEO, Jonathan Greenblatt, posted a video the day of the hearing that starred Stefanik. “These leaders’ lack of moral clarity in response to this line of questioning is shameful,” he said on X, formerly Twitter.

Greenblatt and Stefanik did not return requests for comment.

Amy Spitalnick, the CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said Stefanik could not disentangle antisemitism from the left, which Stefanik repudiates, from antisemitism on the right, which Stefanik ignores.

“It’s important to understand how deeply connected all of this antisemitism is, they are all rooted in conspiracy theories around Jewish control and power,” said Spitalnick, who played a leading role in successfully suing the neo-Nazi organizers of the deadly Charlottesville march, who chanted “Jews will not replace us.” 

“By normalizing great replacement and related extremism, there’s this horseshoe effect where it inadvertently or intentionally fuels the idea that Jews have outsized power and control,” Spitalnick said. “And it all comes back in a way that is deeply dangerous not just for the Jewish community, but for everyone.”

What bothers Sheerr was her gut instinct that Stefanik would not walk back her own incendiary comments from 2021, or more robustly confront antisemitism in her own party. She noted that Stefanik started out as a moderate, and is now a loyalist of Trump — who also has peddled versions of the “great replacement” theory.

“She has really turned into one of the propagators of some of the vilest antisemitism,” Sheerr said. “She doesn’t call out anybody in her party, or anything, whether it’s for [peddling the] dual loyalty trope, or any of the other tropes, so I think she has done a service in a way but she’s a very dangerous member of Congress.”

Greer also wondered whether Stefanik would budge on her earlier views. “The best thing I can say about this is I wish in a perfect world she would have changed, she would say ‘I don’t believe that,’ and she would use that voice for good. That would be a wonderful thing,” she said. “But I have no sense that that’s going to happen.”

Others are more optimistic. Esther Panitch, a Democratic representative in the Georgia state legislature who has been outspoken in confronting anti-Israel sentiment in her own party, said she hoped that part of what spurred Stefanik to take the lead in confronting the university presidents was the lessons she learned from her flirtation with the great replacement theory.

“It seems she’s educated herself since the comments last year,” Panitch said in an interview. “I’m hopeful that’s what happened, and that she wasn’t trying to score a few points. I’m appreciative of what she did.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Kathy Manning, a Jewish North Carolina Democrat, accused Stefanik of acting in bad faith after she appeared to have copied sections of a letter written by Manning that criticized the college presidents. Manning posted two letters on Twitter, hers and the one Stefanik and Moskowitz authored.  The first three paragraphs were identical and Manning said Stefanik had plagiarized her. “Rep. Stefanik is trying to get a sound bite and media hits,” she said.

Stefanik replied on X, formerly Twitter, that she made changes to the letter and then circulated it to Republican members. She accused Manning of “trying to do a hit piece to help panicked Democrats who are clearly on the wrong side of history protecting these university presidents.”


The post ‘Is that really her?’ Liberal Jews say Elise Stefanik, hailed as a hero of the House antisemitism hearings, has baggage of her own appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.

Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.

“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”

GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’

Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.

“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.

“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.

“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.

After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”

RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL

Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”

Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.

“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”

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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco

Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.

People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.

“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”

Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.

On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.

Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.

On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.

“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.

Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.

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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas

Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.

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