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Nikki Haley has emerged as a favorite for Jewish Republican donors looking for a credible alternative to Trump

WASHINGTON (JTA) — With just days to go until Republican voters begin casting their presidential primary ballots, Nikki Haley is hoping that she can pull off an unlikely win over Donald Trump.
One thing the former South Carolina governor has in her corner: a growing array of major Jewish donors.
Haley, who also served as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, is not yet leading in any poll. But she is creeping up steadily in national surveys, has reached a virtual tie for a distant second place and is hoping for an upset win in New Hampshire later this month, bolstered Wednesday when former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who had been focusing on the state, dropped out. Eventually, she hopes to unite the entire anti-Trump vote behind her.
That anti-Trump constituency, according to one person with knowledge of how Republican donors are making decisions, includes many of the party’s most prominent Jewish names, who soured on Trump after the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol and are tired of “the chaos and crazy” that accompanies the former president.
“The [Jewish Republican] establishment has been trying to figure out which horse is the best one to try and ride because they don’t want Trump as the nominee,” said the insider, who didn’t want to be named supporting a candidate. With Haley’s recent rise in the polls, he added, “they’re pulling their checkbooks out.”
According to Fred Zeidman, a Houston businessmen who is a leading fundraiser for Haley, Republican Jewish backers have gravitated to Haley because of her relatively moderate stance on abortion and her pro-Israel credentials.
“This woman absolutely, absolutely has been so staunchly pro-Israel,” Zeidman told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“She really understands the politics, she understands what it means for the United States, what it means for world peace,” he said. “The other thing is, one of the biggest issues in the Jewish community is women’s rights. And she has been the first one to address [abortion] appropriately among the Republicans.”
Haley raised $24 million in the most recent quarter, more than double her haul in the previous round. And according to a recent Forbes article, the coalition of billionaires backing her is a who’s who of Jewish pro-Israel money.
Organizers of an upcoming Jan. 30 New York fundraiser for Haley, the magazine reported, include Cliff Asness, the hedge fund manager who took the lead in pulling a donation from his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, for its administration’s equivocation in condemning Hamas’ Oct. 7 invasion of Israel; Stanley Druckenmiller, a former hedge funder-turned-full-time philanthropist; Henry Kravis, an investor who has donated extensively to Israeli cultural endeavors; and Leonard Stern, the real estate magnate who has given heavily to Yeshiva University.
The next day, Haley will fly to Miami for another fundraiser, this one organized by Barry Sternlicht, a real estate billionaire who launched a $50 million pro-Israel initiative after Oct. 7, and Dan Och, a major giver to Birthright and the UJA-Federation of New York.
Haaretz reported last summer that Haley had garnered more support from the leadership of the establishment Republican Jewish Coalition than any other candidate. In recent months, as Trump’s lead in the Republican polls has solidified, her support from Jewish donors has soared even more.
She has the support of Jan Koum, the WhatsApp founder who has given $5 million to a super PAC affiliated with the candidate. Koum consults closely with the Jewish pro-Israel donor and GOP kingmaker, Miriam Adelson, who has pledged to remain neutral during this year’s primary. Asness has given $1 million to the same super PAC, the SFA Fund, and Stern has given $175,000.
Also said to be closing in on a decision to back Haley, said the person with knowledge of donors’ thinking, is Paul Singer, the influential Jewish hedge fund manager.
Other top Jewish donors to Haley’s super PAC include Ronald Simon, a California home builder whose family foundation runs a scholarship program for children from low-income families, who gave at least $1 million; Terry Kassel, a Palm Beach philanthropist who promotes Israel’s high-tech sector, who gave at least $250,000; and Elliott Badzin, a Minnesota car supply magnate, who gave at least $100,000.
The donors, often voluble when it comes to Israel and other hot-button political issues, are quiet when it comes to why they’re backing Haley: Asness declined to comment for this story and Kravis, Singer and Druckenmiller did not return requests for comment. A phone number for Koum’s family foundation reaches a law firm where a staffer said they have no way to reach Koum.
Haley gained legions of Republican Jewish fans when she made defending Israel the centerpiece of her 18-month stint at the U.N. She persuaded Trump to cut U.S. funds for UNRWA, the U.N. agency that aids Palestinian refugees and their descendants; she vetoed the appointment of Palestinians to high-ranking jobs; and she snubbed diplomats from nations who voted against Israel.
She debuted one of her trademark phrases, about how she wears heels as weapons, at an American Israel Public Affairs Conference in 2017.
“I wear high heels,” she said. “It’s not for a fashion statement, it’s because if I see something wrong I will kick it every single time.” (Years of deploying that phrase made her ready when another candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy, called her “Dick Cheney in heels” at a November debate. “They’re not for a fashion statement; they’re for ammunition,” Haley immediately rejoined.)
Israel has featured prominently in her campaign, especially since Hamas’ Oct. 7 invasion of Israel and the ensuing war. Before the war, she went after Ramaswamy’s proposal to cut defense assistance to Israel, saying at an August debate, “He wants to stop funding Israel. You don’t do that to your friends.”
She’s been hammering home the message on X, formerly Twitter. “Israel is a bright spot in a tough neighborhood,” she posted last week. “It has never [been] that Israel needs America. It has always been that America needs Israel.”
On abortion, Haley has tread a careful line: She has sought to embrace some of the most restrictive bans while not demonizing those on the other side of the issue. Unlike other candidates such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, her rival for second place, Haley has said she will not seek a federal ban, leaving it up to the states.
“As much as I’m pro-life, I don’t judge anyone for being pro-choice, and I don’t want them to judge me for being pro-life,” Haley said at the November debate. “So when we’re looking at this, there’re some states that are going more on the pro-life side. I welcome that. There are some states that are going more on the pro-choice side. I wish that wasn’t the case, but the people decided.”
That stance is probably not going to swing any Jewish Democrats, but it stands out for moderate Jewish Republicans who know the party isn’t moving left on abortion anytime soon, but who want a Republican leader who will tamp down what has been, for the Jewish community, a painful culture war.
“The fact is that the Republican Party is a pro-life party and if you’re somebody in the Jewish community who, that’s your top issue, you’re not voting Republican, and that hasn’t changed,” said the Jewish Republican insider. But the insider called Haley the “tip of the spear in terms of the party and where it needs to be to have a more nuanced argument and a nuanced case on dealing with the abortion issue.”
Haley could still stumble: At a town hall in New Hampshire, she recently declined to mention slavery as a cause of the Civil War, widely viewed as a gaffe and as a sharp contrast to her decision in 2015 to remove the Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina statehouse after a white supremacist mass shooting at a Black church in Charleston. (The next day she said slavery was a cause.) She has a reputation for equivocating on an array of critical issues, including Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 riot.
And while Haley stood out for defending Israel at the U.N., it was Trump who made the decisions that substantially shifted U.S. policy to be more aligned with the Israeli right — moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal and recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. Trump still boasts major pro-Israel backers, including his ambassador to Jerusalem, David Friedman.
But he also remains unpredictable, and the pro-Israel advisers who shaped his presidential policies, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, are no longer actively advising him.
For months, Trump’s preferred target was DeSantis. But he is turning his rhetorical guns on Haley, a sign that he views her as a threat. In a recent email, he used an epithet that has been a disparaging code for wealthy Jews.
“Nikki Haley Is Funded By Democrats, Wall Street, & Globalists,” his email said.
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The post Nikki Haley has emerged as a favorite for Jewish Republican donors looking for a credible alternative to Trump appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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As Gaza War Continues, Hamas Calls for Global Protests While Israel Marks Breakthroughs in Medical Innovation

A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
As the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas calls for global protests amid stalled Gaza ceasefire talks, Israel has broken new ground despite the ongoing conflict, achieving a major medical breakthrough in synthetic human kidney development.
The contrast illustrates a stark contrast between the priorities of Hamas, an international designated terrorist group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and Israel, the lone democracy in the Middle East that has long been a leader in tech and medical innovation.
On Wednesday, Hamas urged worldwide protests in support of Palestinians, calling on the international community “to denounce Israel’s genocidal war and starvation policy in Gaza.”
“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in all cities and squares on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday … through rallies, demonstrations and sit-ins outside the embassies of the Israeli regime and its allies, particularly in the US,” the statement read.
The Palestinian terrorist group also called to expose what it described as “the terrorism of the Zio-Nazi occupation against defenseless civilians.”
Hamas’s latest move against Israel comes amid stalled indirect negotiations over a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, which collapsed last month after the group vowed it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established — rejecting a key Israeli demand to end the war in Gaza.
In its statement, Hamas demanded the opening of all border crossings to allow immediate aid into the war-torn enclave and urged a global condemnation of “the international community’s inaction on the Israeli crimes.”
Amid mounting international pressure to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel announced new measures to facilitate the delivery of aid, including temporary pauses in fighting in certain areas and the creation of protected routes for aid convoys.
Israeli officials have previously accused Hamas of diverting aid for terrorist activities and selling supplies at inflated prices to civilians, while also blaming the United Nations and other foreign organizations for enabling this diversion.
Hamas’s statement also emphasized that the “global resistance movement must continue until Israeli aggression on Gaza ends and the siege on the coastal strip is lifted.”
Meanwhile, as Israel faces escalating hostilities and the heavy toll of war, the Jewish state continues to push the boundaries of innovation and resilience, achieving new medical breakthroughs while confronting ongoing challenges.
In a major medical breakthrough, scientists at Sheba Medical Center and Tel Aviv University have successfully grown a synthetic 3D miniature human kidney in a lab using specialized stem cells derived from kidney tissue — one of the most promising advances in regenerative medicine.
Dr. Dror Harats, chairman of Sheba’s Research Authority, described this achievement as a reflection of Israel’s leading role in global medical innovation.
“Despite growing efforts to isolate Israel from international science, breakthroughs like this prove our impact is both lasting and essential,” he said.
In a landmark study, a team from Sheba’s Safra Children’s Hospital and Tel Aviv University’s Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine created synthetic kidney organs that matured and remained stable for 34 weeks — the longest-lasting and most refined kidney organoids developed to date.
Nearly a decade ago, the research team became the first to successfully isolate human kidney tissue stem cells — the cells responsible for the organ’s development and growth.
Previous attempts to grow kidneys in a lab using general-purpose stem cells were short-lived, typically lasting only a few weeks and often producing unwanted cell types that compromised research accuracy.
However, this Israeli research team used stem cells taken directly from kidney tissue — cells that naturally develop into kidney parts — allowing them to create a much purer and more stable model with key features found in real kidneys.
This medical breakthrough could have far-reaching implications, redefining the current understanding of kidney diseases and advancing the development of innovative treatments.
Researchers believe the model could help assess how medications impact fetal kidneys during pregnancy and move science closer to repairing or replacing damaged kidney tissue with lab-grown cells.
The discovery came days after researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and international partners discovered a way to boost the immune system’s cancer-fighting ability by reprogramming how T cells, which are white blood cells critical to the immune system, produce energy.
The researchers explained in a study published in the peer-reviewed Nature Communications that disabling a protein known as Ant2 in T cells greatly enhances their effectiveness against tumors.
“By disabling Ant2, we triggered a complete shift in how T cells produce and use energy,” Prof. Michael Berger of Hebrew University’s Faculty of Medicine, who co-led the study with doctorate student Omri Yosef, told the Tazpit Press Service. “This reprogramming made them significantly better at recognizing and killing cancer cells.”
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Netherlands to Push EU to Suspend Israel Trade Deal but Won’t Recognize Palestinian State ‘At This Time’

Netherlands Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp addresses a press conference, in New Delhi on April 1, 2025. Photo: ANI Photo/Sanjay Sharma via Reuters Connect
The Netherlands is spearheading efforts to suspend the European Union-Israel trade agreement amid rising EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, while simultaneously refusing to recognize a Palestinian state, contrasting with other member states as international pressure mounts.
On Thursday, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp announced that the Netherlands will push the EU to suspend the trade component of the EU-Israel Association Agreement — a pact governing the EU’s political and economic ties with the Jewish state.
This latest anti-Israel initiative follows a recent EU-commissioned report accusing Israel of committing “indiscriminate attacks … starvation … torture … [and] apartheid” against Palestinians in Gaza during its military campaign against Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist group.
Following calls from a majority of EU member states for a formal investigation, this report built on Belgium’s recent decision to review Israel’s compliance with the trade agreement, a process initiated by the Netherlands and led by EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas.
According to the report, “there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations” under the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.
While the document acknowledges the reality of violence by Hamas, it states that this issue lies outside its scope — failing to address the Palestinian terrorist group’s role in sparking the current war with its bloody rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli officials have slammed the report as factually incorrect and morally flawed, noting that Hamas embeds its military infrastructure within civilian targets and Israel’s army takes extensive precautions to try and avoid civilian casualties.
In a Dutch parliamentary debate on Gaza on Thursday, Veldkamp also announced that the government would not recognize a Palestinian state for now — a position that stands in sharp contrast to the recent moves by several other EU member states to extend recognition.
“The Netherlands is not planning to recognize a Palestinian state at this time,” the Dutch diplomat said.
“This war has ceased to be a just war and is now leading to the erosion of Israel’s own security and identity,” he continued.
This latest decision goes against the position of several EU member states, including France, which has committed to recognizing Palestinian statehood in September.
The United Kingdom has likewise indicated it will do so unless Israel acts to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and agrees to a ceasefire.
For its part, Germany said it was not planning to recognize a Palestinian state in the short term, and Italy argued that recognition must occur simultaneously with the recognition of Israel by the new entity.
Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Slovenia all recognized a Palestinian state last year.
Israel has been facing growing pressure from several EU member states seeking to undermine its defensive campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
On Thursday, European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera strongly condemned Israel’s actions in the war-torn enclave, describing the situation as a “grave violation of human dignity.”
“What we are seeing is a concrete population being targeted, killed and condemned to starve to death,” Ribera told Politico. “If it is not genocide, it looks very much like the definition used to express its meaning.”
Until now, the European Commission has refrained from accusing Israel of genocide, but Ribera’s comments mark one of the strongest European condemnations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
She also called on the EU to take decisive action by considering the suspension of its trade agreement with Israel and the implementation of sanctions, while emphasizing that such measures would require unanimous approval from all member states.
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Graduate Student Unions Promoting Antisemitism, Reform Group Says

Students listen to a speech at a protest encampment at Stanford University in Stanford, California US, on April 26, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect.
Higher-education-based unions controlled by United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) are rife with antisemitism and anti-Zionist discrimination, according to a new letter imploring the US Congress’s House Committee on Education and the Workforce to address the matter.
“Tracing its roots to communism in the 1930s, the UE is a radical, pro-Hamas labor union that has a long history of antisemitism,” the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW), one of the US’s leading labor reform groups, wrote on July 30 in a message obtained by The Algemeiner. “The UE openly supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which is designed to cripple and destroy Israel economically. Today, the UE furthers its antisemitic agenda by unionizing graduate students on college campuses and using its exclusive representation powers to create a hostile environment for Jewish students. The hostile environment includes demanding compulsory dues to fund the UE’s abhorrent activities.”
NRTW went on to describe a litany of alleged injustices to which UE members subject Jewish student-employees in the US’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to Cornell University. At MIT, the letter said, “union officers” aided a riotous group which illegally occupied a section of campus with a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” participating in the demonstration and even denying access to campus buildings. UE members at Stanford University, meanwhile, allegedly denied religious accommodations to Jewish students who requested exemption from union dues over that branch’s supporting the BDS movement. And Cornell University UE was accused of denying religious exemptions in several cases as well and followed up the rejection with an intrusive “questionnaire” which probed Jewish students for “legally-irrelevant information.”
The situation requires federal oversight and intervention, NRTW said, including Congress’s possibly clarifying that student-employees are not traditional employees and are therefore afforded protections under sections of the Civil Rights Act which apply to the campus.
“These continuing patterns of antisemitism are illegal, immoral, and must be stopped,” the letter continued. “We encourage you to do all that is in your power to investigate and help bring an end to the UE and its affiliates’ nonstop harassment and intimidation of Jewish students … The Trump administration can also use tools available to it under Title VI and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act against colleges who work with unions to create a hostile environment for Jewish students.”
July’s letter is not the first time NRTW has publicized alleged antisemitic abuse in unions representing higher education employees.
In 2024, it represented a group of six City University of New York (CUNY) professors, five of whom are Jewish, who sued to be “freed” from CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) over its passing a resolution during Israel’s May 2021 war with Hamas which declared solidarity with Palestinians and accused the Jewish state of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and crimes against humanity. The group contested New York State’s “Taylor Law,” which it said chained the professors to the union’s “bargaining unit” and denied their right to freedom of speech and association by forcing them to be represented in negotiations by an organization they claim holds antisemitic views.
That same year, NRTW prevailed in a discrimination suit filed to exempt another cohort of Jewish MIT students from paying dues to the Graduate Student Union (GSU). The students had attempted to resist financially supporting GSU’s anti-Zionism, but the union bosses attempted to coerce their compliance, telling them that “no principles, teachings, or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees” to the union.
“All Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason,” NRTW said at the time.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.