RSS
Liberal parents, far-left teens: When Jewish families fight over Israel
(JTA) — Most of my friends in Jewish circles are parents of teens or college students. We are liberal, tolerant, open-hearted folks, who jokingly call ourselves “NPR Jews.” We have Israeli friends, and we are watching in horror at a world in which it is once again fashionable, in liberal circles and on college campuses, to justify the murder and kidnapping of Jewish children — this time, because they were born in Israel. This new wave joins the rise of Jew-hate/Israel-hate in MAGA circles and the white supremacist anti-Jewish tropes parroted by celebrities like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Elon Musk.
While we lament the bloodshed of all people, we sympathize instinctually with our fellow Jews in Israel. We continue to advocate for a peaceful, long-term solution for both Israelis and Palestinians, but we know that Israel sometimes has to fight for its security. And while we ourselves have been critical of the Israeli government, at times deeply, we see too many others crossing the line from harsh criticism to double standards to outright demonization and antisemitism.
Our kids, meanwhile, are absorbing other messages. Yes, they see bad actors spreading misinformation and influencers fawning over the words of Osama bin Laden. But they also see images that activate the very values we helped instill in them: tolerance, inclusion and compassion. Daily footage of Palestinians, often children, who are caught in the crossfire of this war, demands their compassion. Clips of Israeli leaders who speak about Palestinians as “animals” or “Amalekites” provoke their outrage. Their parents’ laments about Jewish vulnerability are hard to square with hourly evidence of Israeli military power.
So, these last weeks have brought new questions:
When a teen tells us that we should stop worrying about antisemitism, how should we react? Should we push back and criticize them for not taking this seriously, or let them blissfully pretend that we are not living during a surge of hate?
What if teens are actively promoting, from a place of compassion and solidarity, only arguments that are anti-Israel or pro-Palestinian? How do we make sure that they are hearing Israeli voices on these issues and that they balance their critique with some clarity about the challenge of taking sides with those who wish to destroy us?
And what if our teens are justifying the terror of Hamas as a righteous form of armed resistance, as some Jewish students are doing on college campuses?
Just as the Passover seder calls on us to differentiate how we are to answer four types of children, these questions present us with a multi-layered pedagogic challenge.
I had the opportunity last week to speak with a New York-based therapist and parent coach, Dr. Julie Hirschfeld, about these questions in preparation for a webinar we hosted for parents of teens at Moving Traditions. Here are five of her insights (in bold) and my own reflections on why these insights are important right now for parents of teens.
1. “Be aware of how the war is putting a strain on your relationships.”
This may seem obvious, but as a parent, I know that it is easy to overlook how stress outside of the home manifests as stress in the home. The more time I take reading and watching coverage of the war and the antisemitism perpetrated in its wake, the less present I am to my family. If your teen resists talking with you about the war, it may be because they feel that the crisis is a threat to your ability to care for, nurture and protect them. To counter this, parents can pay attention to their teen’s well-being and find time to do things that they enjoy doing together. Hirschfeld talked about “finding time for normalcy” and connecting through Shabbat rituals or other ways that you can slow down together. Even if this is an obvious point, it is worth repeating.
2. “Don’t assume that your teen understands your connection to Israel.”
This is something that I am learning every day. When I think of my own connection to Israel, I recall the personal stories of those who found refuge in Israel after the displacement of millions of Jews after World War II and after the rise of Arab nationalist movements. I remember my first trip to Israel as a teen, connecting with my extended family there, and studying and living there during my college years. I met incredible Israelis and Palestinians working side by side to build a future based on coexistence and respect. And I remember former Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres and their visions of peace. Indeed, many of the hostages being held in Hamas tunnels are people who devoted their lives to those visions.
But our teens and young adults have come of age at a very different time. Israel has been labeled by their peers as a colonizer and white-supremacist oppressor. And since Rabin’s assassination, openly racist political and religious leaders within Israel have energized a Jewish supremacist vision, one that has a platform within the current government.
Since we cannot assume that our teens understand our connection to Israel, this crisis is a good moment to make time for you and your teen to share a walk, a meal or a drive — a time when you can give your teen some context that will help them understand why you care. Note: This is not the same as telling them why they should care. But it is important to share why you care, and what it means to you right now as you absorb the news and think about your connection to it. Even if your teen has a different set of feelings than you right now about Israel, you can ask your teen to have empathy for the emotions that you are feeling.
3. “Keep in mind that this is an unsettling time for teens because they are seeing some of their peers sharing anti-Israel, and in some cases, anti-Jewish hate, and this is disrupting their social connections.”
Even well-educated, college-bound teens are more likely to read the political opinions of a select group of models, athletes, actors and cultural commentators than they are to follow journalists, political scientists or writers. Some people in your teens’ network are likely sharing propaganda and conspiracy theories posted by their favorite influencers. But while teens today are seeing vehemently anti-Israel posts and anti-Jewish posts, most do not want to make waves about them. Whether these posts are shared by someone in their class, on their sports team, or from their summer camp, most teens would rather not confront the person or comment on the post. Also, when teens see posts that call for peace, a ceasefire or humanitarian aid, they don’t necessarily view them as anti-Israel or antisemitic, but simply as “pro-peace.”
If your teen is willing to talk with you about what they are seeing on social media, you can help support their decision-making as they navigate what posts to ignore, when to reach out and when to speak up. You can help them find information about the crisis that they can trust, help them understand the continued threats that Hamas and Islamic Jihad pose in Gaza and in the region, and help them figure out what role they can play in challenging hate of any kind.
4. “If your teen is truly obsessed with the war, seeing everything through the lens of this crisis, and using this issue as a way to distance themselves from you, then you may need to speak with someone who can mediate the situation.”
There are times when a teen will latch on to an extreme political position because it sends a message to the parent that they seek independence or detachment. In more extreme cases, the teen can begin to see the world through the lens of a political battle and place the parents as the enemy. If that is your case right now, you may want to seek support from a friend, clergy person or therapist.
5. “It is natural for teens to differentiate their views from parents, and they often use their peers as a reference group.”
If your teens are in a school where peers are one-sided in their solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, and indifferent when it comes to the continued attacks on Israeli citizens by Hamas rockets, the welfare of the hostages being held by Hamas or acts of antisemitism here and around the world, then your teens may feel that fitting into their peer group requires that they express only pro-Palestinian sentiment or suppress their pro-Israel leanings. They might need to hear from parents the message that their hearts can have room for both the Palestinians suffering in Gaza and for the millions of Israelis who are in mourning, displaced, hiding in bomb shelters or awaiting news about the captives.
To help your teen expand their circle of empathy, you might share the various ways that Israelis are working with Palestinians to express solidarity, or tell them about joint efforts to provide humanitarian relief, like World Central Kitchen, which seek to help all non-combatants evacuees and families impacted by the escalating conflict in the region. Help your teens to see that there are dozens of ways to care for Israelis, for the Jewish people as a whole, and for Palestinians. Share the story of the late Vivian Silver, the Israeli peace activist murdered by Hamas. Give them hope that coexistence is still possible.
I deeply appreciated Hirschfeld’s insights, and since hearing them I, as a parent and a rabbi, have been trying my best to be in dialogue across the generations, which includes my children and their peers. I know that for some of my own peers, this has been one of the most challenging times in their parenting journey. The arguments that they are having with their teens are enormously difficult and require a great deal of patience.
I hope that in the coming months, we as a Jewish community can support all parents of teens as we navigate through this crisis and help bridge some of the generational and other divides that are tearing us apart.
—
The post Liberal parents, far-left teens: When Jewish families fight over Israel appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
RSS
Trump Denies US-Israel Plan to Strike Iran, Calls for ‘Nuclear Peace Agreement’ While Reviving ‘Maximum Pressure’
US President Donald Trump speaks during a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the East Room at the White House in Washington, US, Feb. 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Leah Millis
US President Donald Trump on Wednesday denied that the United States and Israel are planning to carry out a military strike on Iran, saying he instead wants to reach a “nuclear peace agreement” with Tehran as Iranian officials suggested differences over the Islamist regime’s nuclear program could be resolved.
“I want Iran to be a great and successful Country, but one that cannot have a Nuclear Weapon. Reports that the United States, working in conjunction with Israel, is going to blow Iran into smithereens, ARE GREATLY EXAGGERATED,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
It was unclear to which reports Trump was referring. In recent weeks, many analysts have raised questions over whether Trump would support an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, which both Washington and Jerusalem fear are meant to ultimately develop nuclear weapons.
“I would much prefer a Verified Nuclear Peace Agreement, which will let Iran peacefully grow and prosper,” he continued. “We should start working on it immediately, and have a big Middle East Celebration when it is signed and completed. God Bless the Middle East!”
Trump’s social media post came one day after he signed a presidential memorandum restoring his “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran that includes efforts to drive its oil exports down to zero in order to stop Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
As he signed the memo, Trump expressed a willingness to talk to the Iranian leader but added Tehran was “too close” to a nuclear weapon and “cannot” have one.
Later on Tuesday, Trump said that he would “love” to make a deal with Iran to improve bilateral relations — but added that the regime should not develop a nuclear bomb.
“I say this to Iran, who’s listening very intently, ‘I would love to be able to make a great deal. A deal where you can get on with your lives,’” Trump told reporters in Washington, DC. “They cannot have one thing. They cannot have a nuclear weapon, and if I think that they will have a nuclear weapon … I think that’s going to be very unfortunate for them.”
Iran has claimed that its nuclear program is for civilian purposes rather than building weapons. However, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reported in December that Iran had greatly accelerated uranium enrichment to up to 60 percent purity, close to the roughly 90 percent weapons-grade level, at its Fordow site dug into a mountain.
The UK, France, and Germany said in a statement at the time that there is no “credible civilian justification” for Iran’s recent nuclear activity, arguing it “gives Iran the capability to rapidly produce sufficient fissile material for multiple nuclear weapons.”
During his first term in the White House from 2017-2021, Trump pulled out of a 2015 agreement negotiated between Iran, the US under the Obama administration, and several world powers which placed temporary restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions. The Trump administration also reimposed harsh sanctions on Iran, with the goal of imposing “maximum pressure” on the Islamist regime in Tehran, which US intelligence agencies have long considered the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Wednesday that the reimposition of a policy of heavy pressure against Iran will end in “failure” as it did during Trump’s first presidential term.
“I believe that maximum pressure is a failed experiment and trying it again will turn into another failure,” Araghchi told reporters.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian echoed that point in a televised ceremony, downplaying the impact of sanctions on Iran.
“America threatens new sanctions, but Iran is a powerful and resource-rich country that can navigate challenges by managing its resources,” Pezeshkian said.
Meanwhile, Araghchi again claimed that Tehran is not pursuing nuclear weapons.
“If the main concern is that Iran should not pursue nuclear weapons, this is achievable and not a complicated issue,” he added. “Iran’s position is clear: it is a member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and the Supreme Leader’s fatwa has already clarified our stance [against weapons of mass destruction].”
Iran’s nuclear agency chief Mohammad Eslami similarly insisted that his country remains committed to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, saying, “Iran does not have, and will not have, a nuclear weapons program.”
However, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, a leading coalition of Iranian dissident groups, revealed recently that the regime has covertly accelerated activities to construct nuclear weapons, including by ramping up efforts to construct nuclear warheads for solid-fuel missiles at two sites.
While it’s unclear whether Trump will be able to renegotiate a new nuclear deal, Iranian officials have expressed a willingness to engage in diplomacy.
“The clerical establishment’s will is to give diplomacy with Trump another chance, but Tehran is deeply concerned about Israel’s sabotage,” a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Wednesday. The official added that Iran wanted the US to “rein in Israel if Washington is seeking a deal” with the Islamic Republic.
Iranian officials, including top leaders, routinely declare their intention to destroy Israel. In recent months, however, the Israeli military has decimated two of Iran’s top terrorist proxies in the Middle East — Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon — and greatly compromised Iran’s air defenses in a military operation last year. Analysts have speculated that Iran’s current vulnerable position would make now an ideal time to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities.
The post Trump Denies US-Israel Plan to Strike Iran, Calls for ‘Nuclear Peace Agreement’ While Reviving ‘Maximum Pressure’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Oberlin College Course Uses Antisemitism as Sword and Shield
A memorial erected at Oberlin college by Oberlin Students for a Free Palestine. Photo: Oberlin Students for a Free Palestine / Facebook.
A description of a course beginning this week at Oberlin College, my alma mater, reads: “Popular conceptions of the relationship between Jews and power tend either to adopt (in the case of sympathetic accounts) a view of Jews as perennial victims or (in the case of hostile/antisemitic accounts) a view of Jews as overly or preternaturally powerful. This course attempts to complicate that bipolar framework by exploring a more diverse range of encounters between Jews and power from antiquity to the present.”
There’s nothing problematic about a take-down of the view that Jews are “overly or preternaturally powerful,” a trope popularized by the antisemitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The problem is with the other half of the course, which purports to “complicate” the “sympathetic account” of Jews “as perennial victims.”
It’s sadly become a generally accepted fact that antisemitism in the US has been making troubling inroads on both the left and the right of the political spectrum. On the right, antisemites are, at least, open, honest, unabashed — or even, at times — proud. This type of antisemitism is easy to spot and to diagnose.
The antisemitism encroaching from the left is more clever. It hides in plain sight, disguising itself frequently as pro-Palestinian or human rights activism. Other times, left-wing antisemitism poses virtuously as opposition to the antisemites of the right.
For example, the film Israelism complains, “American Jewish organizations have spent the last decade pouring millions of dollars into smearing and marginalizing human rights advocates … trying to brand Palestinian protest as antisemitic when there were neo-Nazis trying to kill us in our synagogues!” according to a review from StandWithUs. (Notably, the film was screened at Oberlin in November 2023, just a month and a half after the October 7 attack in which 1,200 Israelis were killed by Hamas.)
This attempt to promote the left-wing brand of antisemitism, even while using a critique of a different form of antisemitism as a shield, is what we see in the course.
The assertion that Jews, or those who “sympathize” with Jews, claim perennial victimhood in order to further malevolent ends forms the basis of a great deal of antisemitism; the “victimhood” canard is a straw man set up to demonize Jews. (For one example, see here.) Yet that is the very same assertion that is being made in the course description itself.
The Oberlin administration claims the course is designed to oppose antisemitism. That is partially correct, but it also serves to operate as a smokescreen. To understand this requires an acknowledgement that antisemitism can take different forms, and that antisemites of different stripes can at times come together (as when David Duke called Ilhan Omar “the most important Member of the US Congress”), and can at other times operate in opposition to each other, depending on what best suits their needs.
The pretense of opposing antisemitism, but only opposing antisemitism from the right, can serve to bolster the credentials of those who themselves promulgate a different flavor of antisemitism.
Even as the course, according to its description, knocks down one antisemitic trope, it promotes a different one: that Jews fallaciously claim victimhood for political gain.
Since the time when Oberlin made news because of a professor who, among other things, blamed Israel for the September 11 attack on the US, the new Oberlin administration, led by President Carmen Twillie Ambar, seemed to have made strides in combating antisemitism.
With a few of worst actors having departed the campus under various circumstances, President Ambar issued a decent statement regarding the October 7 attack on Israel, and recently blocked a terror-supporting speaker that a student group had attempted to bring to the campus. In the Spring of 2024, when antisemitic campus protests rocked the country, the protests at Oberlin were, in comparison, mild, and Oberlin stayed out of the news. But now, the Oberlin administration’s vision seems once again to be occluded when it comes to left-wing antisemitism, and this latest course offering threatens to bring the school back to an earlier era.
Karen Bekker is the Assistant Director in the Media Response Team at CAMERA, the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis.
The post Oberlin College Course Uses Antisemitism as Sword and Shield first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
World Largely Rejects Trump’s Relocation Plan for Gaza, Demands Two-State Solution
A general view shows destroyed buildings in northern Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, near the Israel-Gaza border, Nov. 11, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
JNS.org — Global reaction came swiftly on Wednesday to US President Donald Trump’s call for Gazans to be relocated out of the Strip, which he described as a “demolition site” — with most, if not all, countries panning the idea.
Trump proposed that ownership of the Strip be transferred to the United States, which would rebuild it.
“This was not a decision made lightly,” he said. “Everybody I’ve spoken to loves the idea of the United States owning that piece of land, developing and creating thousands of jobs with something that will be magnificent in a really magnificent area that nobody would know.”
Palestinians could be located to various locales. “It could be numerous sites or it could be one large site, but the people will be able to live in comfort and peace,” Trump said. “We’ll make sure something really spectacular is done.”
Most countries, which have embraced a two-state solution whereby a Palestinian state would be established adjoining the Jewish state in territories liberated by Israel in the 1967 Six Day War, expressed a mixture of incredulity and indignation.
“They [Palestinians] must be allowed home, they must be allowed to rebuild, and we should be with them in that rebuild on the way to a two-state solution,” said British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock released a statement insisting that a negotiated two-state solution is the only path forward, not only rejecting Trump’s relocation plan but calling for Israel’s capital to be divided.
“It is clear that Gaza — like the West Bank and East Jerusalem — belongs to the Palestinians. They form the starting point for a future state of Palestine,” Baerbock said.
“The expulsion of the Palestinian civilian population from Gaza would not only be unacceptable and contrary to international law. It would also lead to new suffering and new hatred,” she added.
France also rejected the proposal, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Christophe Lemoine saying, “France reiterates its opposition to any forced displacement of the Palestinian population of Gaza, which would constitute a serious violation of international law, an attack on the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians, but also a major obstacle to the two-state solution and a major destabilizing factor for our close partners Egypt and Jordan as well as for the entire region.”
Spain, which recognized a State of Palestine together with Norway and Ireland on May 28, 2024, also criticized the plan.
Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said, “I want to be very clear on this: Gaza is the land of Gazan Palestinians and they must stay in Gaza. Gaza is part of the future Palestinian state Spain supports and has to coexist guaranteeing the Israeli state’s prosperity and safety.”
Ireland, whose leadership’s allegedly antisemitic “actions and rhetoric” recently led Israel to close its Dublin embassy, also panned the idea.
Irish Foreign Minister Simon Harris said, “It’s very clear the direction of travel here: We need a two-state solution, and the people of Palestine and the people of Israel both have a right to live in states safely side by side, and that’s where the focus has to be.”
“Any idea of displacing the people of Gaza anywhere else would be in clear contradiction with UN Security Council resolutions,” he added.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said, “Australia’s position is the same as it was this morning, as it was last year. The Australian government supports on a bipartisan basis a two-state solution.”
Russia, which greeted a Hamas delegation in Moscow as recently as Monday, said a settlement is only possible in the framework of the two-state solution.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, “This is the thesis that is enshrined in the relevant UN Security Council resolution. This is the thesis that is shared by the overwhelming majority of countries involved in this problem. We proceed from it. We support it and believe that this is the only possible option.”
Beijing’s Foreign Ministry said, “China hopes all parties will take ceasefire and post-conflict governance as an opportunity to bring the Palestinian issue back on the right track of political settlement based on the two-state solution.”
Do what is necessary
During his 40-minute press conference on Tuesday night with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump said, “We’ll own it [Gaza] and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous, unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings.”
The US takeover of Gaza could involve the deployment of American troops, according to Trump. “We’ll do what is necessary,” he said. “If it’s necessary, we’ll do that.”
Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and the Palestinian Authority wrote to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday to reject the idea of resettling Palestinians outside of the Strip. But Trump said on Tuesday that “neighboring countries of great wealth” could pay for the relocation of Gazans.
Trump suggested that under US ownership and development, Palestinians could return to Gaza but that it would become an international zone.
“This is not for Israel,” Trump said. “This is for everybody in the Middle East — Arabs, Muslims, this is for everybody.
“I think you’ll make that into an international, unbelievable place,” he said. “Palestinians will live there. Many people will live there.”
Elements of what Trump described were redolent of the so-called “Trump Mideast peace plan” that he unveiled in 2020, which included developing Gaza’s waterfront into a tourism destination.
“I don’t want to be cute. I don’t want to be a wise guy, but the Riviera of the Middle East,” the hotel magnate and president said Tuesday. “This could be so magnificent.”
Trump said that his Gaza development plan did not rule out a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“It doesn’t mean anything about a two-state or one-state or any other state,” he said. “It means that we want to give people a chance at life. They have never had a chance at life because the Gaza Strip has been a hell hole.”
He added that he intends to visit the enclave, which Hamas has controlled, as part of a regional tour.
“I’ll visit Gaza,” the American leader said. “I’ll visit Saudi Arabia, and I’ll visit other places all over the Middle East. The Middle East is an incredible place.”
Netanyahu said Trump’s vision is in line with his war goal of ensuring that Gaza can never pose a threat to Israel again.
“President Trump is taking it to a much higher level,” Netanyahu said. “I think it’s worth paying attention to this. We’re talking about it. He’s exploring it with his people, with his staff. I think it’s something that could change history, and it’s worthwhile, really pursuing this avenue.”
Trump said that he had not yet made a decision about the United States recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, but that there will “probably” be a decision on the question “over the next four weeks.”
Netanyahu called Trump the “greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House.”
“Ladies and gentlemen, all this in just two weeks,” Netanyahu said of Trump’s executive actions since the start of his second term. “Can we imagine where we’ll be in four years? I can.”
The post World Largely Rejects Trump’s Relocation Plan for Gaza, Demands Two-State Solution first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login