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Israel’s outgoing Diaspora affairs minister: New government is ‘dangerous’ to ‘the very future of the state of Israel’
JERUSALEM (JTA) — With only a short time before he is expected to leave office when a new Israeli government forms, the man responsible for building ties between the world’s Jews and the state of Israel did not hold back Monday night about how hard that task could soon become.
Nachman Shai, Israel’s outgoing minister of diaspora affairs, was speaking to Jewish journalists from around the world who had gathered in Jerusalem for a conference. Shai, who has a background in journalism and previously served in the Knesset as part of Israel’s Labor party, said he finds “alarming” the approach that Benjamin Netanyahu, the incoming prime minister, is taking as he forms a right-wing government that includes extremist partners.
“Some of the elected officials lack sufficient experience and in any opinion, some of the coalition’s demands contradict and even contravene the democratic character of the state of Israel,” Shai said. “They have been given a playground of powers; they are high on zeal and euphoria. It is alarming, it is dangerous and it will potentially damage our relationship with the global Jewish world and the international entente and the very future of the state of Israel.”
Shai’s comments are in line with those he has made repeatedly about Netanyahu, who was prime minister for 12 years until 2021, since Netanyahu won Israel’s Nov. 1 election and proceeded to start building a coalition with the extremist politicians.
Netanyahu, Shai told the Times of Israel last month, “made some mistakes. [Former Israeli ambassador to the United States Ron] Dermer made some mistakes. Together they made a decision to get closer to the Evangelicals than to the Jewish population. I think that’s the wrong orientation.”
Among the issues he has criticized were Netanyahu’s approach to the “Western Wall compromise,” in which an egalitarian prayer section was supposed to be set up for Reform and Conservative Jews at the Western Wall. Its implementation has been stalled by Orthodox parties in Israel for years, and members of the incoming government have said they are not interested in catering to non-Orthodox Jews.
”I’m a political person, so I have to say that I blame the previous governments for neglecting the aspects of Jewish Diaspora in running their business in Israel,” Shai told the Jerusalem Post in an interview Monday morning, citing the Western Wall as a key site of inattention.
“First and foremost, I am concerned that the incoming government will damage the ties between the Jewish global community and Israel,” Shai said in a welcome address at the fifth annual Jewish Media Summit, which is run by Israel’s Government Press Office. “And not necessarily intentionally, but partly as a result of differences in ideology, partly as a result of political affiliation and partly because of ignorance and unwillingness to understand the situation on the ground.”
In warning about the potential breach between Israel and many Diaspora Jews, Shai joins a long list of people who have expressed concern. On Monday, that list grew to include hundreds of American rabbis who released an open letter in which they committed to take action against extremists in the Israeli government, including by not inviting politicians from far-right parties to their synagogues. They name Otzma Yehudit, the party headed by Itamar Ben-Gvir, as a particular target of their protest but said it would not be limited to just one party.
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Israel’s Netanyahu Hopes to ‘Taper’ Israel Off US Military Aid in Next Decade
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview published on Friday that he hopes to “taper off” Israeli dependence on US military aid in the next decade.
Netanyahu has said Israel should not be reliant on foreign military aid but has stopped short of declaring a firm timeline for when Israel would be fully independent from Washington.
“I want to taper off the military within the next 10 years,” Netanyahu told The Economist. Asked if that meant a tapering “down to zero,” he said: “Yes.”
Netanyahu said he told President Donald Trump during a recent visit that Israel “very deeply” appreciates “the military aid that America has given us over the years, but here too we’ve come of age and we’ve developed incredible capacities.”
In December, Netanyahu said Israel would spend 350 billion shekels ($110 billion) on developing an independent arms industry to reduce dependency on other countries.
In 2016, the US and Israeli governments signed a memorandum of understanding for the 10 years through September 2028 that provides $38 billion in military aid, $33 billion in grants to buy military equipment and $5 billion for missile defense systems.
Israeli defense exports rose 13 percent last year, with major contracts signed for Israeli defense technology including its advanced multi-layered aerial defense systems.
US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a staunch Israel supporter and close ally of Trump, said on X that “we need not wait ten years” to begin scaling back military aid to Israel.
“The billions in taxpayer dollars that would be saved by expediting the termination of military aid to Israel will and should be plowed back into the US military,” Graham said. “I will be presenting a proposal to Israel and the Trump administration to dramatically expedite the timetable.”
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In Rare Messages from Iran, Protesters ask West for Help, Speak of ‘Very High’ Death Toll
Protests in Tehran. Photo: Iran Photo from social media used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law, via i24 News
i24 News – Speaking to Western media from beyond the nationwide internet blackout imposed by the Islamic regime, Iranian protesters said they needed support amid a brutal crackdown.
“We’re standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed behind the Tajrish Arg area [a neighborhood in Tehran],” said a protester in Tehran speaking to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity. He added that “We saw hundreds of bodies.”
Another activist in Tehran spoke of witnessing security forces firing live ammunition at protesters resulting in a “very high” number killed.
On Friday, TIME magazine cited a Tehran doctor speaking on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital recorded at least 217 killed protesters, “most by live ammunition.”
Speaking to Reuters on Saturday, Setare Ghorbani, a French-Iranian national living in the suburbs of Paris, said that she became ill from worry for her friends inside Iran. She read out one of her friends’ last messages before losing contact: “I saw two government agents and they grabbed people, they fought so much, and I don’t know if they died or not.”
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Report: US Increasingly Regards Iran Protests as Having Potential to Overthrow Regime
United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – The assessment in Washington of the strength and scope of the Iran protests has shifted after Thursday’s turnout, with US officials now inclined to grant the possibility that this could be a game changer, Axios reported on Friday.
“The protests are serious, and we will continue to monitor them,” an unnamed senior US official was quoted as saying in the report.
Iran was largely cut off from the outside world on Friday after the Islamic regime blacked out the internet to curb growing unrest, as videos circulating on social media showed buildings ablaze in anti-government protests raging across the country.
US President Donald Trump warned the Ayatollahs of a strong response if security forces escalate violence against protesters.
“We’re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump told reporters when asked about the unrest in Iran.
The latest reported death toll is at 51 protesters, including nine children.