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Israeli Leaders Congratulate Trump, Strike Optimistic Tone as New US President Hails Hostage Deal

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with US President Donald Trump during a meeting in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, Sept. 15, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Tom Brenner
Israeli leaders congratulated Donald Trump as he took the oath of office on Monday to become the next president of the United States, praising his support for Israel and efforts to secure the return of the remaining hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza.
“Your first term as president was filled with groundbreaking moments in the history of the great alliance between our two countries,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement addressing Trump’s inauguration.
The Israeli premier then listed some of the policies that the US implemented when Trump served as president from 2017-2021.
“You withdrew from the dangerous Iran nuclear deal, you recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, you moved the American embassy to Jerusalem, and you recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights. You brokered the historic Abraham Accords in which Israel made peace with four Arab countries,” he continued.
Netanyahu also expressed optimism about the future of the US-Israel alliance and thanked Trump for his push to reach a ceasefire to halt fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and secure the release of some of the Israeli hostages still being held by the Palestinian terrorist group.
“I believe that working together again we will raise the US-Israel alliance to even greater heights. I’m confident that we will complete the defeat of Iran’s terror axis and usher in a new era of peace and prosperity for our region,” Netanyahu said. “On behalf of the people of Israel, I also want to thank you for your efforts in helping free Israeli hostages. I look forward to working with you to return the remaining hostages, to destroy Hamas’s military capabilities and end its political rule in Gaza, and to ensure that Gaza never again poses a threat to Israel. I am sure, Mr. President, that under your leadership, the best days of our alliance are yet to come.”
Israeli President Isaac Herzog also congratulated Trump in a post on social media, thanking the new US president for supporting the Jewish state and helping to secure the Gaza ceasefire and hostage-release deal.
“On behalf of the people of Israel, I send my heartfelt congratulations to you, President @realDonaldTrump on your inauguration as the 47th @POTUS. You are a true friend of Israel. Thank you for your unwavering commitment to Israel’s security and to building a better future for our region. A special thank you for your commitment to bringing all our hostages home,” he posted. “We wish you and your administration great success in your service to the American people. Good luck!”
Many observers have argued that Trump’s pressure on Hamas in public and on Israel behind closed doors to reach a ceasefire helped to bring both sides across the finish line.
Last week, both sides agreed to a three-phase deal that halts fighting in Gaza, and if fully implemented, would stop the war entirely. Under the first phase, Hamas is set to release 33 hostages — women, children, and elderly men — over the next six weeks in exchange for Israel releasing nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, who were largely detained for involvement in terrorist activity. Top officials in the new Trump administration have said in recent weeks that the US will support Israel renewing military operations in Gaza if Hamas launches more attacks against the Jewish state and violates the agreement.
The ceasefire began on Sunday, when Hamas released three female Israeli civilian hostages.
“I’m pleased to say that, as of yesterday, one day before I assumed office, the hostages in the Middle East are coming back home to their families,” Trump said during his inaugural address on Monday, prompting a standing ovation from the audience.
Trump also said that, while he intends to “again build the strongest military the world has ever seen,” his “proudest legacy will be that of a peacemaker and unifier.”
“We will measure our success not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars that we end, and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into,” Trump said. “Our power will stop all wars and bring a new spirit of unity to a world that has been angry, violent, and totally unpredictable.”
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Anti-Israel Singer Kehlani’s NYC Concert Gets Cancelled After Mayor Faces Pressure

Kehlani walking on the red carpet during the 67th Grammy Awards held at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, CA on Feb. 2, 2025. Photo: Elyse Jankowski/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
An upcoming New York City concert featuring Israel-hating, American singer Kehlani was canceled late Monday after organizers faced mounting pressure from New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
The webpage for the “Pride With Kehlani” benefit concert has also removed from the website of the City Parks Foundation. The privately-funded non-profit organization was hosting the performance, set for June 26 in Central Park, as part of its SummerStage festival series and in celebration of June being Pride Month. The concert was being produced and presented by Live Nation, which reportedly selected Kehlani for the performance.
SummerStage released a statement on Monday explaining its decision to call off Kehlani’s performance. According to the statement, the mayor’s office contacted concert organizers and expressed concerns about “safety and security issues” at the event, especially in light of Cornell University’s recent decision to cancel a performance by Kehlani, “as well as security demands in Central Park and throughout the City for other Pride events during that same time period.”
“We strongly and emphatically believe in artistic expression of all kinds. However, the safety and security of our guests and artists is the utmost importance and in light of these concerns, the concert has been cancelled,” SummerStage said. “SummerStage is proud to be a platform for artists from around the world to perform and make arts accessible for all New Yorkers in their neighborhood parks. While artists may choose to express their own opinions, their views may not necessarily be representative of the festival. SummerStage events are intended to bring together all sectors of the New York City community and we look forward to welcoming more guests throughout the summer.”
Mayor Adams’ administration also threatened to pull the licenses for all SummerStage shows if Kehlani’s concert was not canceled, according to a letter sent to the City Parks Foundation that was obtained by New York Post.
Kehlani released a music video last year that opens with the message “Long live the Intifada,” a phrase that incites violence against Israel and the Jewish community. She has attended pro-Palestinian rallies, accused Israel of genocide, and shared numerous anti-Israel and anti-Zionist posts on social media. In one Instagram post, she wrote: “Dismantle Israel. Eradicate Zionism.” She also shared on social media a post that called for Israel to be removed off the map and replaced with “Palestine.” Kehlani recently claimed that she is not antisemitic.
“I am not antisemitic, nor anti-Jew. I am anti-genocide. I am anti-the-actions-of-the-Israeli-government,” she stated in a video posted on Instagram and TikTok.
Congressman Ritchie Torres, who pushed Mayor Adams to take action and have Kehlani’s Central Park concert canceled, applauded the move by SummerStage to call off the show. “Antisemitism becomes unacceptable only when we, as a society, have the courage to reject it—clearly, consistently, and without compromise,” he wrote on X.
SummerStage is the city’s largest free outdoor performing arts festival. It presents more than 80 free and benefit concerts each summer.
Kehlani has not publicly responded to the cancellation of her New York City concert.
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New Study Exposes Antisemitism in University Medical Centers

Illustrative Pro-Hamas protesters in Washington, DC, USA, on April 5, 2025. Photo: Robyn Stevens Brody/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect.
Antisemitism in academic medical centers located on college campuses is fostering noxious environments which deprive Jewish healthcare professionals of their civil right to work in spaces free from discrimination and hate, according to a new study by the StandWithUs Data & Analytics Department.
“Academia today is increasingly cultivating an environment which is hostile to Jews, as well as members of other religious and ethnic groups,” StandWithUs director of data and analytics and study co-author, Alexandra Fishman said on Monday in a press release. “Academic institutions should be upholding the integrity of scholarship, prioritizing civil discourse, rather than allowing bias or personal agendas to guide academic culture.”
Titled “Antisemitism in American Healthcare: The Role of Workplace Environment,” the study includes survey data showing that 62.8 percent of Jewish healthcare professionals employed by campus-based medical center reported experiencing antisemitism, a far higher rate than those working in private practice and community hospitals. Fueling the rise in hate, it added, were repeated failures of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) initiatives to educate workers about antisemitism, increasing, the report said, the likelihood of antisemitic activity.
“When administrators and colleagues understand what antisemitism looks like, it clearly correlates with less antisemitism in the workplace,” co-author and Yeshiva University professor Dr. Charles Auerbach said. “Recognition is a powerful tool — institutions that foster awareness create safer, more inclusive environments for everyone.”
Monday’s study is not StandWithUs first contribution to the study of antisemitism in medicine. In December, its Data & Analytics Department published a study which found that nearly 40 percent of Jewish American health-care professionals have encountered antisemitism in the workplace, either as witnesses or victims.
The study included a survey of 645 Jewish health workers, a substantial number of whom said they were subject to “social and professional isolation.” The problem left over one quarter of the survey cohort, 26.4 percent, “feeling unsafe or threatened.”
In some schools, Jewish faculty are speaking out.
In February, the Jewish Faculty Resilience Group (JFrg) at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) accused the institution in an open letter of “ignoring” antisemitism at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine (DGSOM),” charing that its indifference to the matter “continues to encourage more antisemitism.” JFrg added that discrimination at the Geffen medical school has caused demonstrable harm to Jewish students and faculty. Student clubs, it said, are denied recognition for arbitrary reasons; Jewish faculty whose ethnic backgrounds were previously unknown are purged from the payrolls upon being identified as Jews; and anyone who refuses to participate in anti-Zionist events is “intimidated” and pressured.
“DGSOM’s continued silence in the face of a sustained and deeply troubling rise in antisemitism within its own institution is not just complicity — it is a failure of responsibility,” the group said. “Without strong and principled leadership, this dangerous pattern will persist.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Dozens of Former Eurovision Contestants Pressure Organizers to Ban Israel From 2025 Song Contest

Israel’s representative to the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest, Yuval Raphael, holds an Israeli flag in this handout photo obtained by Reuters on Jan. 23, 2025. Photo: “The Rising Star,” Channel Keshet 12/Handout via REUTERS
More than 70 previous contestants of the Eurovision Song Contest on Monday demanded that Israel’s public broadcaster Kan should be banned from the international competition this year because of what they falsely claim is Israel’s “genocide” of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Singers, songwriters, musicians, lyricists and others from across Europe signed an open letter, published by Artists for Palestine UK, that was addressed to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which organizes the Eurovision Song Contest. In their letter, the anti-Israel creatives urged the EBU to ban Kan, claiming that it is “complicit in Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza and the decades-long regime of apartheid and military occupation against the entire Palestinian people.”
“We believe in the unifying power of music, which is why we refuse to allow music to be used as a tool to whitewash crimes against humanity,” the open letter stated. The signatories urged EBU to “act now and prevent further discredit and disruption to the festival.”
“Silence is not an option,” they added. “We therefore join together to state that the EBU’s complicity with Israel’s genocide must stop. By continuing to platform the representation of the Israeli state, the EBU is normalizing and whitewashing its crimes … Israel must be excluded from Eurovision.”
The former Eurovision contestants also said that they were “appalled” by the EBU’s decision last year to include Kan in the competition during the Israel-Hamas war.
“The result was disastrous,” they said about the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest. “Rather than acknowledging the widespread criticism and reflecting on its own failures, the EBU responded by doubling down — granting total impunity to the Israeli delegation while repressing other artists and delegations, making the 2024 edition the most politicized, chaotic and unpleasant in the competition’s history.”
During last year’s competition, Israeli singer Eden Golan was booed on stage by anti-Israel audience members, faced death threats, had a anti-Israel Eurovision jury member refuse to give her points, and was forced to conceal her identity outside of the competition for her own safety.
Those who signed Monday’s open letter also accused the EBU of a “double standard” in regards to Israel. They criticized the EBU for expelling Russia’s public broadcaster from the competition in 2022, because of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine that year, but still allowing Israel to participate in the song contest amid the Israel-Hamas war that started after the deadly Hamas terrorist attack on Oct. 7, 2023.
“[It] can’t be one rule for Russia and a completely different rule for Israel. You bomb, you’re out,” said former Eurovision contestant Thea Garrett, who represented Malta in 2010.
“I believe that the Israeli government has been and is inflicting genocide on the people of Palestine and for that reason Israel should be barred from competing in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest,” added Charlie McGettigan, who won the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest for Ireland.
The open letter was signed by creatives from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Finland, France, Iceland, Malta, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Turkey. The national broadcasters in Iceland, Slovenia and Spain have previously expressed opposition to Israel’s participation in the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest.
The open letter was published the same day that Israel’s Eurovision representative this year, singer Yuval Raphael, traveled to Basel, Switzerland, to compete in the song contest. Raphael, who is a survivor of the Nova Music Festival massacre on Oct. 7, 2023, will compete in the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest with the song “New Day Will Rise,” a ballad written by singer and songwriter Keren Peles. She will perform in the second semi-final on May 15 and, if she advances, will compete in the Eurovision Song Contest grand final on May 17.
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