Gwyneth Paltrow lighting a menorah to celebrate the first night of Hanukkah with Noa Tishby. Photo: YouTube screenshot

Jewish American Oscar-winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow joined author and activist Noa Tishby in celebrating the first night of Hanukkah on Wednesday, as part of the latter’s new Hanukkah-themed video series on YouTube called “#BringOnTheLight.”

Paltrow — whose late father Bruce Paltrow was Jewish while her mother, actress Blythe Danner, is Christian — also talked with Tishby about her Jewish faith and holiday tradition. When Tishby asked the “Iron Man” star and Goop founder and CEO about a childhood memory from Hanukkah that she holds dear, Paltrow recalled being at her grandparents’ house in Long Island, New York, and getting Hanukkah gelt.

“I have such a strong memory of the gold, round coins, and my brother and I just tearing into them,” she reminisced, talking about the coin-shaped chocolates that are typically given to children during Hanukkah.

The “Contagion” star also told Tishby that in her home now, she makes latkes for Hanukkah and lights the menorah with her family. “We always light the menorah, we always gather together after we light the candles; it’s very sweet actually. We all hug and we bring in the light,” she said. “And ever since [my kids] were little, they would sit on the floor, close their eyes, and then I would give them their present. We do eight presents. I’m a spoiler.”

Paltrow has two children — Apple, 20, and Moses, 18 – with her ex-husband, Coldplay frontman Chris Martin. She is now married to American television writer, producer, and director Brad Falchuk, both of whose parents are Jewish. His mother was previously the national president of the Hadassah Women’s Zionist Organization of America.

In 2011, Paltrow discovered that she comes from a long line of rabbis on her father’s side of the family and that her great-great-great grandfather was Rabbi Tsvi Paltrowitch, a Kabbalah master and the Gaon of Nitzy-Novgorod in southwest Russia. She told Tishby she comes from 17 generations of rabbis.

Paltrow also discussed what it was like growing up with a Jewish father and Christian mother. “I grew up in a time in the 70’s where I think interfaith marriage was a big deal, so it was really hard for both of my parents’ parents that they were marrying each other. So it was a big scandalous. Nobody was happy about it,” she said.

“They definitely grew to accept it later in life,” the actress added, talking about her grandparents.  “They kind of let go of all that. But I felt so fortunate because I got to grow up with these two very different worlds and very different faiths. I always felt an incredible pull to my Jewish family and I still do. And the traditions, and the warmth, the unconditional love, the food, the yelling, the family … I’m so close to everybody on that side of my family. We are all kind of interwoven and important to each other and just show up for each other again and again and again.”

Tishby’s eight-part video series “#BringOnTheLight,” which coincides with the eight days of Hanukkah, launched on YouTube on Wednesday and promotes Jewish pride and unity. A new video will be released each day of Hanukkah at 11 am ET.



The post Gwyneth Paltrow Talks Hanukkah Family Traditions, Jewish Heritage With Noa Tishby first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Illustrative: Supporters of Hamas gather for a rally in Melbourne, Australia. Photo: Reuters/Joel Carrett

An award-winning Australian writer has called for the destruction of Israel and the “death cult of Zionism” in what was apparently meant to be a message of hope and optimism for the new year.

“May 2025 be the end of Israel. May it be the end of the US-Israeli imperial scourge on humanity. May we see the abolishment of the death cult of Zionism and the end of US empire and finally a world where the slaughter, annihilation, and torture of Palestinians is no longer daily routine,” Randa Abdel-Fattah posted on X/Twitter on Wednesday evening.

“And to achieve that,” she continued, “is to snowball collective liberation because the tentacles of Western imperialism oppress and dehumanize us all. May every baby slaughtered in Zionism’s genocide haunt you who openly support or acquiesce through your gutless silence.”

Abdel-Fattah’s tweet came in response to a social media post by the Turkish public broadcaster TRT World saying that three newborn Palestinian babies died from extreme cold in Gaza, where Israel has been fighting Hamas since the Palestinian terrorist group invaded the Jewish state on Oct. 7, 2023.

Abdel-Fattah, a lawyer and Future Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Macquarie University in Sydney, is one of Australia’s most prominent pro-Palestinian activists. She has also written 12 books, for which she has won multiple awards..

The Australian Jewish Association lambasted Abdel-Fattah for her comments, responding that “evil hate speech like this has no place in Australia.”

Australian writer Randa Abdel-Fattah. Photo: Screenshot

Wednesday was not the first time that Abdel-Fattah came under fire for her anti-Israel activity.

In October, the New South Wales Police Force posted on social media saying it would not tolerate flags of the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah or portraits of its leaders at anti-Israel protests. The message was displayed in blue and white, coincidentally the colors of the Israeli flag — a point noted by Abdel-Fattah.

“Brought to you in the colors of Israel’s flag,” the writer responded, appearing to insinuate without evidence that the Australian police force was acting on behalf of the Jewish state.

That same month, Abdel-Fattah penned an op-ed in which she accused Israel of “industrialized genocide, domicide, scholasticide, infanticide, femicide, medicide, and ecocide” in Gaza and described the Israeli state as “stolen land.” The writer also falsely accused Israel of seeking to expand its territory into Lebanon and Syria and posted messages from group chats that she was part of expressing excitement during Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7.

The academic, who reportedly receives an $802,000 taxpayer-funded grant for her research, in April led a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” for “all ages” at Sydney University to “inspire” children to “stand up for justice and solidarity.”

Footage showed Abdel-Fattah clapping and encouraging children as they chanted slogans including “intifada,” “Israel is a terrorist,” and “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” — a popular slogan among anti-Israel activists that has been widely interpreted as a call for the destruction of the Jewish state, which is located between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

Abdel-Fattah’s activism has come amid a surge in antisemitism across Australia since Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocities, amid the ensuing war in Gaza.

Earlier this month, for example, arsonists heavily damaged a synagogue in Melbourne in what the country’s prime minister called an antisemitic attack.

The attack followed the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) releasing a report showing that antisemitism in Australia quadrupled to record levels over the past year, with Australian Jews experiencing more than 2,000 antisemitic incidents between October 2023 and September 2024.

The data included dozens of assaults and hundreds of incidents of property destruction and hate speech. Physical assaults recorded by the group jumped from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024. The level of antisemitism for the past year was six times the average of the preceding 10 years.

In one notorious episode in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 attack, hundreds of pro-Hamas protesters gathered outside the Sydney Opera House chanting “gas the Jews,” “f—k the Jews,” and other epithets.

The explosion of hate also included vandalism and threats of gun violence, as well as incidents such as a brutal attack on a Jewish man in a park in Sydney.

Many of the antisemitic outrages documented by the ECAJ appeared to be connected to anti-Israel animus.

In June, the US consulate in Sydney was vandalized and defaced by a man carrying a sledgehammer who smashed the windows and graffitied inverted red triangles on the building. The inverted red triangle has become a common symbol at pro-Hamas rallies. The Palestinian terrorist group, which rules Gaza, has used inverted red triangles in its propaganda videos to indicate Israeli targets about to be attacked. According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), “the red triangle is now used to represent Hamas itself and glorify its use of violence.”

That same month, the office of Australian lawmaker Josh Burns was vandalized, with the perpetrators shattering windows, lighting fires, and graffitiing “Zionism is Fascism” on the building.

Weeks later, multiple memorials near the Australian War Memorial were defaced with anti-Israel graffiti. The messages included “Free Palestine,” “Free Gaza,” “Blood on your hands,” and “From the river to the sea.”

Around the same time in July, anti-Israel activists vandalized the oldest synagogue in Sydney, displaying a large banner outside the front entrance reading “Sanction Israel,” along with flags of the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in April that Canberra would consider recognizing a Palestinian state. The current government has also walked back the decision by the previous Liberal Party government to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Earlier this month, Australia voted in favor of a UN General Assembly resolution calling on Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza, breaking a two-decade pattern of opposing such a measure.

The post ‘May 2025 Be the End of Israel’: Australian Writer Calls for Destruction of Jewish State to Mark New Year first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

An Israeli tank crosses the ceasefire line between Syria and the Israeli Golan Heights, Dec. 11, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Avi Ohayon

The collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, a turning point in the decades-long Syrian civil war, has set the stage for a drastically different Middle East. While many see Assad’s defeat as a blow to Iranian influence and a big win for Israel, the reality is far more complex and disheartening.

For years, Assad’s regime was a predictable enemy of Israel. While it engaged in occasional attacks and supported groups like Hezbollah, Assad carefully avoided provoking full-scale conflict with the Jewish State. His regime maintained a level of control over Syrian territory, limiting the ability of extremist groups such as Al-Qaeda to operate freely. This control allowed for relative stability on Israel’s northern border.

The rebel group now dominating Syria risks replacing the predictable relationships under Assad with widespread chaos. This shift introduces not just unpredictability but also direct security threats for Israel, undermining the assumption that Assad’s downfall is a victory for the Jewish State.

With Assad’s downfall, the country is no longer a singular nation but a fractured region with competing Islamist groups, many of which harbor deep animosity toward Israel. The most prominent group to emerge is Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), currently designated as a terrorist organization, rooted in Al-Qaeda’s ideology.

HTS, founded initially as Jabhat al-Nusra in 2012, became Al-Qaeda’s official partner in Syria before later distancing itself from the group to broaden its appeal. Many argue, however, that its leadership and ideology remain firmly tied to Al-Qaeda’s global jihadist movement.

By 2022, HTS had control over significant parts of Syria’s northwest, particularly in the Idlib province, with a fighting force estimated at over 30,000.

HTS has made no secret of its hostility toward Israel. Recently, its leadership has issued repeated threats, calling for the liberation of Jerusalem and vowing to target Israeli territory. While the group’s primary focus remains on consolidating power in Syria, its anti-Israel rhetoric raises concerns about future confrontations, significantly as the group expands its presence near the Golan Heights.

Under Assad, terrorist activity from Syria into Israel was minimal due to the regime’s tight border control. However, the current disorganization in Syria has opened opportunities for groups like Al-Qaeda to exploit the instability.

In 2023 alone, Israeli forces intercepted at least two smuggling attempts involving weapons and explosives along the Syrian border, underscoring the growing threat.

HTS’ takeover of Syria raises the likelihood of increased cross-border violence.

The Jordanian military, which has successfully conducted counterterrorism operations against ISIS and other extremist factions, now faces the challenge of monitoring an increasingly unstable border with Syria. A 2022 report by the Jordanian Armed Forces highlighted a surge in smuggling incidents along the Syrian border, many involving drugs and weapons trafficked by groups like the HTS.

For Israel, a destabilized Jordan is a matter of significant concern. Jordan remains one of Israel’s most cooperative neighbors, with both nations sharing a peace treaty since 1994. If HTS succeeds in undermining Jordan’s security, it could disrupt this vital alliance and force Israel to reallocate military resources, further straining its defense capabilities amid rising threats on other fronts.

The United States has adopted a cautious approach to Syria. The absence of the US has left Israel alone in managing the results of Syria’s collapse, forcing it to rely on military actions like airstrikes against military targets within Syria. These strikes, while effective in the short term, risk escalating tensions and drawing Israel into broader conflicts.

Despite the challenges, the fragmentation of Syria does offer some short-term advantages for Israel. Traditional adversaries, like Hezbollah, have been weakened. Yet, these gains are unlikely to last; the rise of extremist groups like HTS poses a long-term danger that could surpass the challenges presented by Assad’s regime.

The collapse of Assad’s regime marks the end of an era but does not guarantee stability or security for Israel. Instead, it brings in a period of heightened uncertainty, where new threats emerge. While Israel may not face immediate danger from the new Syrian regime, there is a serious potential for future conflict.

Israel’s challenge is to adapt swiftly to this new reality, reorganizing its military and diplomatic strategies to address both immediate risks and long-term threats. As the region reshapes itself, support for Israel will be crucial in ensuring its security and maintaining this pillar of democracy in an increasingly radicalized Middle East.

The post The Fall of Assad: Israel’s Fragile Advantage first appeared on Algemeiner.com.