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Netanyahu to face a divided and aggrieved American Jewish community when he meets with its leaders
(JTA) — The first time Benjamin Netanyahu meets with American Jewish leaders in the United States this year, he will be sitting in a room with at least two people who have demonstrated outside his hotel.
One of those rallies is being staged to welcome the Israeli prime minister. The other will be protesting him.
The meeting on Friday in New York City, following Netanyahu’s address to the United Nations General Assembly, will reflect the internal tensions of an American Jewish community riven by his efforts to weaken the Israeli judiciary and by other policies of his government, which includes far-right partners in senior roles.
The differences between American Jewish groups burst into the open this week, as two Orthodox Jewish groups rebuked those who have joined anti-Netanyahu protests.
“Criticism of the prime minister and his ruling coalition must be addressed in the right time and place,” the Orthodox Union said in a statement it posted to social media. Am Echad, an arm of Aguadath Israel that promotes Israel-Diaspora relations, expressed in a statement its “dismay at the reckless and inciteful rhetoric adopted by the Israeli protest movement during Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s visit to the United States.”
That sentiment runs counter to the positions of a wide range of centrist and left-leaning Jewish organizations and rabbis who have, to one extent or another, voiced criticism of the judicial overhaul legislation since it was introduced in January. Major Jewish groups such as the Jewish Federations of North America, the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League have urged compromise and lamented the passage of the first piece of the overhaul in July.
Some of those American Jewish critics have spoken at anti-overhaul rallies in the United States and Israel, including those taking place in New York City this week. At least one of the Jewish leaders, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, has been invited to attend the Friday meeting with Netanyahu. One day earlier, he is slated to speak at a major rally protesting the prime minister.
“We demonstrate our love and support for Israel, including celebrating its 75th anniversary, while also expressing our criticism of policies that we believe are contrary to Israel’s stated democratic and pluralistic values expressed in Israel’s Declaration of Independence and affirmed throughout the decades since,” Jacobs’ office said in a statement announcing his plans to speak at the protest.
The judicial overhaul, as initially proposed, would have sapped the Israeli Supreme Court of its power and independence as a way, its advocates say, to curb an elitist, activist judiciary. Following months of mass protests that have decried the legislation as a mortal danger to Israel’s democratic system, much of the legislation was temporarily shelved, though some of it may return to the table when Israel’s lawmakers come back from their summer recess. The legislation that passed in July restricted the court’s ability to strike down government decisions.
The debate surrounding the overhaul and the protests against it has sparked apprehension among those attending the Jewish leaders’ meeting — and those left off of the invitation list — about how the meeting will go. Participants were hesitant to confirm their attendance on the record.
A couple of the Jewish organizational executives said they had made last-minute changes so they could go to the meeting.
One of those invited noted that the consulate’s invitation called the event a “briefing,” leaving the recipient wondering whether Netanyahu will even brook questions or argument.
Despite the differences over Netanyahu’s policies and record, a who’s who of large Jewish organizations will be represented at the meeting. JTA has confirmed that, in addition to the URJ, the O.U. and Agudath Israel, the meeting will include representatives from the Zionist Organization of America, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee, the National Council of Jewish Women, Hadassah, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Jewish Federations of North America and the Conservative movement.
Off the invite list are left-leaning groups that have been more vociferously critical of Netanyahu’s policies toward the Palestinians, including J Street, Americans for Peace Now, the Israel Policy Forum and the Reconstructionist movement. (JTA has learned that other groups advocated for inclusion of the Reconstructionist movement.)
It is unclear whether the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, an umbrella community relations group that has recently taken a more explicitly progressive turn, will be invited to the meeting. The group’s new CEO, Amy Spitalnick, criticized Netanyahu for meeting earlier this week with Elon Musk, the tech mogul who has been slammed by Jewish groups for engaging with antisemites on X, the social media platform he owns and renamed from Twitter, and for attacking the ADL in a series of posts.
The prime minister’s office referred questions about the meeting to the Israeli consulate, which did not respond to a request for comment.
A majority of the groups that are attending have spoken out against the changes to the court system, or at least the speed with which Netanyahu and his deputies are advancing them.
Rabbi Jacob Blumenthal, the CEO of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism and the movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, said that if he is able to pose a question to the prime minister, he will tell Netanyahu not to “demonize Jewish protesters” and ask about the impact of the judicial overhaul on threats to Israel’s security.
“My question will be, ‘In the face of all the dangers Israel currently faces from Iran and Iran-supported terrorism, why is he choosing this moment to divide Israeli society through his judicial reforms?’” Blumenthal wrote in an email to JTA. “Both the government and opposition leaders I have spoken with have agreed that Israeli democracy is not perfect. Why not bring the country together around a process to examine the issues and propose reforms that are acceptable to a broad part of Israeli society?’”
Protests against the overhaul have been occurring regularly across the United States this year, and have been staged throughout the week in New York City on the occasion of Netanyahu’s visit. The expatriate arm of the Israeli protest movement, UnXeptable, has organized rallies at his hotel and, on the evening before his arrival in New York, projected onto the U.N. headquarters a plea not to welcome the “Crime Minister” — a reference to Netanyahu’s ongoing trial on corruption charges. Before his trip, the prime minister accused the demonstrators of partnering with Iran’s regime and the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The dueling messages from American Jews, supporting and opposing him, complicate the image Netanyahu has sought for decades to project in his appearances at the United Nations, speaking not just for Israel but as the leader of a unified Jewish community.
Now, he is facing sustained public criticism both from leading American Jews and from close allies. President Joe Biden has publicly opposed the judicial legislation, and raised the topic in his meeting this week with Netanyahu on the U.N. sidelines. Biden has said he believes he has the backing of the U.S. Jewish community in making his case.
“The President also reiterated his concern about any fundamental changes to Israel’s democratic system, absent the broadest possible consensus,” said the White House readout of the Netanyahu-Biden meeting.
Netanyahu is not expected to focus on the judicial overhaul in his speech to the General Assembly on Friday. Instead, he is expected to emphasize threats to Israel from Iran, and to celebrate the progress his government has made toward mutual recognition with Saudi Arabia.
Meanwhile, another meeting on the U.N. sidelines between a Middle Eastern leader and Jewish community leaders seems to have gone smoothly. Jewish leaders sounded optimistic notes after meeting Wednesday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who in recent months has sought to repair ties with Israel that had frayed significantly.
“We had a warm and engaging meeting with President Erdogan,” William Daroff, the CEO of the Conference of Presidents, wrote in a text message. “The president reaffirmed his commitment to a stable and fruitful relationship with the State of Israel, as well as his resolve to combat antisemitism, which he referred to as a ‘crime against humanity.’”
Netanyahu has not heard such a positive message thus far from many U.S. Jewish groups. But he might be able to make it out Thursday evening when he exits his hotel, as some American Jews plan to rally in the street on his behalf.
Morton Klein, the president of the right-leaning Zionist Organization of America, told JTA by email that he hopes to attend a “Stand with Israel” gathering in support of Netanyahu on Thursday evening outside the hotel, as a counterpoint to the major demonstration planned by Netanyahu’s critics. Klein, an outspoken supporter of the judicial overhaul, will also be at the meeting with Jewish leaders.
“It is important to show our support for Israel and its democratically-elected government and prime minister,” said an action alert from ZOA calling on people to attend. The ZOA appeal said the anti-Netanyahu protests were the work of “billionaire-funded far-left groups that seek to undermine the results of Israel’s democratic elections (while falsely claiming to be for democracy).” Like Netanyahu, the action alert lumped Israeli protesters in with “Palestine/Arab hate groups that seek Israel’s annihilation.”
Klein added in a text message that he would also take Netanyahu to task — for not going far enough in the judicial overhaul.
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The post Netanyahu to face a divided and aggrieved American Jewish community when he meets with its leaders appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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‘The View’ Co-Host Sunny Hostin Compares Jan. 6 US Capitol Riot to the Holocaust
“The View” co-host Sunny Hostin. Photo: Screenshot
Sunny Hostin, co-host of the long-running ABC talk show “The View,” on Monday compared the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol to the Holocaust perpetrated by the Nazis during World War II, prompting widespread backlash for making the comparison.
While discussing the significance of the Jan. 6 anniversary, Hostin argued that Americans need to “find moral clarity,” asserting that they should “never forget” the breach of the US Capitol and claiming that the riot should be remembered as a keystone moment in world history, akin to chattel slavery and the Holocaust.
“You had [former US Secretary of State] Condoleezza Rice, I believe, on this very show, saying, ‘You know, we need to move on from Jan. 6.’ I say, no. You don’t move on, because Jan. 6 was an atrocity. It was one of the worst moments in American history,” Hostin said. “And, when you think about the worst moments in American history, like World War II, like the Holocaust, chattel slavery, we need to never forget, because [the] past becomes prologue if you forget and erase.”
On Jan. 6, 2021, a mob of rioters, convinced that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen from Donald Trump, stormed the US Capitol building in an attempt to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power. The mob swarmed through the halls of the Capitol building, vandalizing and breaking into private offices. Trump was widely criticized for not doing more to condemn those who breached the Capitol and for fueling the false notion that he lost the election due to widespread fraud.
Hostin’s words set off a firestorm of criticism on social media, with many observers taking offense to her comparison of Jan. 6 to the systematic murder of 6 million Jews during the Holocaust.
“It is disgusting to compare Jan. 6 to the Holocaust,” wrote Samuel Stern, rabbi of Temple Beth Sholom in Topeka, Kansas.
“This Holocaust minimization by [Hostin] is so mind-blowingly offensive it’s hard to believe these fools still have a platform,” wrote Chaskel Bennett, a 9/11 first responder and grandchild of Holocaust survivors.
“Look how stupid everything has become,” tweeted Omri Ceren, national security adviser to US Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TEX).
“What an insult to every Jewish person on the planet, past and present. Breathtaking minimizing of one of the worst things to happen in human history,” wrote conservative CNN analyst Scott Jennings.
The post ‘The View’ Co-Host Sunny Hostin Compares Jan. 6 US Capitol Riot to the Holocaust first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Houthi Leader Warns Israelis: ‘Those Who Want to Sleep’ Comfortably Should Leave Country
Houthi policemen ride on the back of a patrol pick-up truck during the funeral of Houthi terrorists killed by recent US-led strikes, in Sanaa, Yemen, Feb. 10, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah
A senior leader of the Iran-backed Houthi terrorist group in Yemen has warned Israelis that they should flee to Cyprus or “return to their original country” if they want to sleep comfortably at night.
“Those who want to sleep should go to sleep in Cyprus or return to their original country,” Hazam al-Assad, a member of the Houthis’ political bureau, posted on X/Twitter on Sunday in a Hebrew-language message directed at Israelis.
The post came one day after al-Assad vowed that the Houthis will continue to attack Israel in support of the Palestinians in Gaza.
“We won’t stop … You must watch the sky, you must not sleep, you must not enjoy life as long as the children of Gaza die from bombs, hunger and cold. We will not abandon Gaza,” he posted.
On Monday, al-Assad celebrated after the Houthis claimed they arrested spies trained and equipped by British and Saudi intelligence services, arguing it was a victory in the Yemeni rebel group’s “holy jihad” and the alleged spies were supporting Israel.
“With the support of God Almighty, the Yemeni security services achieve a new victory in the battle of the holy jihad and the promised victory and in the path of support and victory for our people in Gaza, arresting the British spy cell affiliated with MI6 and Saudi Arabia supporting the Israeli enemy entity,” he wrote.
The Algemeiner could not immediately confirm the veracity of the Houthis’ claim about busting a foreign spy operation.
The Houthis have ramped up their military action against Israel in recent weeks, repeatedly firing missiles from Yemen at Israel. While Israel has intercepted many of the missiles, some have penetrated Israeli air defenses.
Last month, a ballistic missile launched by the Iran-backed group struck a playground in Tel Aviv, injuring at least 16 people and causing damage to nearby homes — the second attack in as many days — after several interception attempts by Israel’s air defense systems failed.
The strike came shortly after the Houthis launched another missile toward the center of Israel, and this time the projectile was only partially intercepted. The warhead crashed into a school in the city of Ramat Gan, outside Tel Aviv, causing one building to collapse and severe damage to another. Children were due to arrive at the school hours after the missile hit.
In response to the attack, the Israeli Air Force conducted retaliatory strikes targeting Houthi positions in Yemen, including strategic locations such as the port of Hodeidah and the capital city, Sana’a. US forces also conducted multiple airstrikes against Houthi positions with the aim of degrading the Houthis’ offensive capabilities and ensuring the security of vital maritime routes in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned at the time that Israel would take forceful action against the Houthis as it had done with Hezbollah, another Iran-backed terrorist organization, in Lebanon.
“Just as we acted forcefully against the terrorist arms of Iran’s axis of evil, so we will act against the Houthis,” he said. “We will act with strength, determination and sophistication. I tell you that even if it takes time, the result will be the same.”
Days later, on Dec. 26, the Israeli Air Force conducted additional strikes on the western coast of and deep inside Yemen, including at Sana’a International Airport in the Houthi-controlled capital.
“These military targets were used by the Houthi terrorist regime to smuggle Iranian weapons into the region and for the entry of senior Iranian officials. This is a further example of the Houthis’ exploitation of civilian infrastructure for military purposes,” the Israeli military said.
Netanyahu again vowed “to cut off this terrorist arm of Iran’s axis of evil” and to “persist in this until we complete the task.”
Amid the constant attacks, Israel has instructed its diplomatic missions in Europe to push for countries to designate the Houthi as a terrorist organization.
“The Houthis pose a threat not only to Israel but to the region and the entire world,” Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said in a statement. “The direct threat to freedom of navigation in one of the busiest maritime routes globally is a challenge to the international community and the world order. The most basic and fundamental step is to designate them as a terrorist organization.”
Several countries — including the United States, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and Israel — currently designate the Houthis as terrorists.
Sa’ar’s directive followed repeated attacks by the Houthis against Israel since October 2023, including the launch of over 200 missiles and 170 attack drones.
The Houthis have been waging an insurgency in Yemen for two decades in a bid to overthrow the Yemeni government. They have controlled a significant portion of the country’s land in the north and along the Red Sea since 2014, when they captured it in the midst of a civil war.
The Yemeni terrorist group began disrupting global trade in a major way with their attacks on shipping in the busy Red Sea corridor after the Iran-backed Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, arguing their aggression was a show of support for Palestinians in Gaza.
The Houthi rebels — whose slogan is “death to America, death to Israel, curse the Jews, and victory to Islam” — have said they will target all ships heading to Israeli ports, even if they do not pass through the Red Sea.
Since Hamas’s Oct. 7 onslaught, which launched the ongoing war in Gaza, Houthi terrorists in Yemen have also routinely launched missiles toward Israel.
The US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) released a report in July revealing how Iran has been “smuggling weapons and weapons components to the Houthis.” The report noted that the Houthis used Iranian-supplied ballistic and cruise missiles to conduct over 100 land attacks on Israel, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and within Yemen, as well as dozens of attacks on merchant shipping.
While the Houthis have increasingly targeted Israeli soil in recent months, they have primarily attacked ships in the Red Sea, a key trade route, raising the cost of shipping and insurance. Shipping firms have been forced in many cases to re-route to longer and more expensive journeys around southern Africa to avoid passing near Yemen, having a major global economic impact.
In September, the Houthis’ so-called “defense minister,” Mohamed al-Atifi, said that the Yemeni rebels were prepared for a “long war” against Israel and its allies.
“The Yemeni Army holds the key to victory, and is prepared for a long war of attrition against the usurping Zionist regime, its sponsors, and allies,” he was quoted as saying by Iranian state-owned media
“Our struggle against the Nazi Zionist entity is deeply rooted in our beliefs. We are well aware of the fact that this campaign is a sacred and religious duty that requires tremendous sacrifices,” added Atifi, who has been sanctioned by the US government.
Beyond Israeli targets, the Houthis have threatened and in some cases actually attacked US and British ships, leading the two Western allies to launch retaliatory strikes multiple times against Houthi targets in Yemen.
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‘I Grew Up Hating Israel, Jews’: Former Antisemite-Turned-Zionist Takes on World’s Oldest Hatred in New Doc
Norwegian student Marie Andersen carries an antisemitic sign at an Oct. 21, 2023, pro-Hamas demonstration in Warsaw, Poland. Photo: Screenshot
In a world grappling with a resurgence of antisemitism, a new documentary seeks to confront the issue head-on, positing an unsettling take on the motivations behind the world’s oldest hatred through the insights of Rawan Osman, a Syrian-Lebanese antisemite-turned-Zionist.
“Tragic Awakening: A New Look at the Oldest Hatred,” directed by Canadian-Israeli filmmaker Raphael Shore, interweaves historical analysis with contemporary events through the voices of clerics, historians, sociologists, and cultural commentators, including the late British Chief Rabbi Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, author Yossi Klein Halevi, Israel’s antisemitism envoy Michal Cotler-Wunsh, and journalists Bari Weiss and Douglas Murray. It argues that antisemitism stems not from a perception of Jewish inferiority, but rather from resentment of Jewish excellence and moral leadership.
Osman — who founded “Arabs Ask,” a forum designed to challenge preconceived notions about Judaism and Israel among Arabs, and who describes herself as an Arab Zionist — narrates the movie.
Born in Damascus, Syria, she was raised in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley and later lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar before eventually settling in Germany. Her first encounter with a Jewish person was when she moved to Strasbourg, France in her twenties. In her words, the encounter prompted her “first and last panic attack.”
But a long process of exploration, including studying Modern Hebrew and Jewish history at a German university, led her to challenge the antisemitic beliefs she had absorbed growing up in the Middle East and ultimately change her perspective.
“Life is strange. I grew up hating Israel and the Jews, just like many Lebanese and Syrians,” Osman told The Algemeiner.
“Living in Europe, especially the decade I spent in Germany, made me one of the most vocal supporters of the Jewish state. Who would have thought?”
After reexamining her beliefs, Osman dedicated herself to soft diplomacy, educating the Arab world about Jewish history and the Holocaust. However, following the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel last Oct. 7, she adopted a more direct and assertive approach, despite the personal risks tied to openly supporting Israel. Reflecting on a conversation with her son, she recalled him asking, “Why are you doing this to me?” to which she responded, “I am doing this for you.”
Osman, who has expressed a desire to convert to Judaism and move to Jerusalem, teamed up with Shore and Rabbi Shalom Schwartz, the film’s executive producer and founder of Aseret, an organization dedicated to promoting the universal values of the Ten Commandments.
“I found myself on a quest to try and understand antisemitism. The Jews are blamed for all ills of the world. Why? Antisemitism requires a different type of explanation,” Osman says in the film.
Shore, who released the film alongside his new book Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Jew?, argued that while religious, social, and political reasons may trigger antisemitism, they fail to explain its deeper motives, leaving efforts to combat it ineffective.
“Today, more than ever before since the Nazis were defeated, we are forced to discover ways of finding greater tolerance in our world. We are completely delusional if we think that hatred of the Jews will end with the Jews. We are always the canary in the coal mine — a harbinger of what is to come for the entire civilized world,” Shore told The Algemeiner.
“If we are ever to effectively combat antisemitism, we need to better understand its roots with moral and spiritual courage, which demands unwavering pride in our common Jewish identities,” he continued. “Combating antisemitism requires pushing back at our enemies with clarity, unity, and an appreciation that our traditions and history are what have allowed us to overcome our enemies.”
Osman says at one point in the movie: “Hitler didn’t want to kill the Jews because they were bad; he wanted to kill them because they were good.”
Shore explains that for Hitler, the Jews represented “a spiritual and moral threat” because the ethical foundations of Western civilization — at their core, Jewish ideas — are the antithesis of his Darwinian outlook.
“Hitler believed that there was one great conflict that drives human history, and that was the idea of survival of the fittest,” Shore said. “Hitler believed that if the ideas of humanitarianism, love, equality, democracy were to succeed, that would be the end of humanity.”
After a screening of the movie in Tel Aviv last week, Osman shared her thoughts on the downfall of Iran’s regional axis of proxies, culminating with the recent fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Osman said that the reaction of some Israelis’ apprehension at Assad’s demise “literally broke my heart,” she said.
“I invited my Israeli friends to reach out to the Syrians and congratulate them” on the fall of Assad, who was the “monster of the century,” she said.
“Some of them misunderstood — they thought I’m endorsing Islamists,” she said, referencing the rebels led by a former member of ISIS and al Qaeda, Ahmed al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammad al-Julani.
Still, she noted, these groups achieved what the world, including the US and Israel, could not, emphasizing that the removal of Assad had to come from within Syria, as an external force taking him down would have turned him into a martyr.
Though Osman approached the recent changes with caution regarding their impact on Israel’s relations with its neighbors, she remained hopeful. “While I watch myself together with Rav Shalom Shwartz and Rav Shore on the big screen, I feel that peace between Israel, Lebanon, and Syria might come in my lifetime after all,” she told The Algemeiner.
The post ‘I Grew Up Hating Israel, Jews’: Former Antisemite-Turned-Zionist Takes on World’s Oldest Hatred in New Doc first appeared on Algemeiner.com.