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‘The Butcher of Tehran’: Diaspora Iranian Jews Celebrate Death of Raisi, Iran’s Hardline President
Former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi addresses a Hamas solidarity rally in Tehran. Photo: Reuters/Sobhan Farajvan
Iranian Jews in the diaspora this week have been celebrating the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, whose long record of human rights abuses, Holocaust denial, and calls for Israel’s destruction have earned him infamy among Jewish communities worldwide.
Raisi, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, and several others died on Sunday in a helicopter crash in the mountainous forested region of northern Iran amid heavy fog that impeded rescue efforts.
News of Raisi’s death was quickly accompanied by reports of celebrations among diaspora Iranians of all backgrounds. For Jews, their reactions were set against a backdrop of anger directed at the Iranian regime, which drove the vast majority of Iran’s ancient and thriving Jewish community into the diaspora during and immediately after the 1979 Islamic Revolution — reducing a community that had previously numbered over 100,000 to a few thousand within a few years.
Dr. Sheila Nazarian, a celebrity plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, California, published that she “would shed no tears for Ebrahim Raisi, the ‘butcher of Tehran.’”
“As a woman born in Iran, I feel not just a sense of celebration at the death of this evil man, but of relief,” she wrote. “It is a feeling I share with a great many of my countrymen, and — in particular — countrywomen.”
Nazarian pointed to Raisi’s stint as deputy prosecutor of Tehran, where he sentenced thousands of political prisoners to death in “sham trials that lasted mere minutes” during Iran’s 1988 political purge.
Nazarian further mentioned Iran’s extensive support — including money, weapons, and training — for terrorist organizations across the Middle East during Raisi’s presidency. Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Shi’a militias in Iraq, and the Houthis in Yemen are among the armed groups backed by Tehran.
Along with blatant Holocaust denial and violent repression of women and popular dissent in the 2022 anti-government “Women, Life, Freedom” demonstrations, Raisi has been widely criticized by human rights organizations.
The deceased Iranian president has also consistently called for the elimination of Israel, saying he would “celebrate its end.”
“From his early days, Raisi epitomized the worst of Iran’s theocratic regime,” Nazarian wrote.
Others expressed hope that the death of Raisi could ultimately foster positive change in Iran.
“We hope that the death of President Raisi will usher in an era of freedom for the Iranian people and a quieter and more peaceful Middle East,” Elie Alyeshmerni, president of the Iranian American Jewish Federation, told The Algemeiner.
Meanwhile, comedian Menachem Kashanian released a video on Instagram highlighting the connections between Raisi’s death and the trial of Arvin Netanel Ghahremani, the 20-year-old Iranian Jewish man who was sentenced to death after reportedly killing an assailant in self-defense. On Sunday, Ghahremani’s execution was postponed until next month.
Kashanian compared the events to those of Purim, the Jewish holiday that commemorates the saving of the Jewish people from annihilation at the hands of the Persian emperor’s antisemitic minister Haman, an official in ancient Achaemenid Iran. Haman was ultimately hanged.
Elsewhere on social media, youth activists and commentators chimed in with comedy in the wake of Raisi’s death.
They especially pounced on a message on a Telegram channel affiliated with the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, which said Raisi had been assassinated by Mossad agent “Eli Copter.”
It is unclear whether the original post was intended to be humorous, trolling, or fake news. Either way, the post went viral, and social media users posted slews of memes parodying and lauding the fictitious Mossad agent allegedly responsible for the demise of Raisi. Other memes included edits lampooning Raisi set to the song “Helikopter” by Bosnian singer Fazlija.
Raisi’s funeral was held on Wednesday and attended by leaders of some of Iran’s terrorist proxies, including Hamas and Hezbollah. The Iranian president will be buried in his home city of Mashhad on Thursday.
The post ‘The Butcher of Tehran’: Diaspora Iranian Jews Celebrate Death of Raisi, Iran’s Hardline President first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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New York City Jews Targeted for Most Hate Crimes in March, NYPD Stats Show

Orthodox Jewish man waiting for the train in the New York City subway. Photo: Hans Lucas via Reuters Connect.
Jews in New York City were victims of more hate crimes in March than any other group even as crime across the Five Boroughs fell to “historic” lows, according to statistics issued by the New York City Police Department (NYPD) on Thursday.
39 hate crimes targeted Jews last month, the Algemeiner reviewed data shows, outstripping the combined total of all other groups combined — 28 — and constituting 58 percent of all hate crimes reported to authorities. So far, there have born 85 antisemitic hate crimes in New York City through the first three months of 2025, with the month of February seeing a 100 percent increase in them over the previous year and March seeing no improvement at all.
The data continues a trend that has persisted for several years and concurred with a rise in antisemitic incidents across the US.
Jews represented a disproportionate share of hate crimes perpetrated in New York City in 2024 as well. Of the 641 total hate crimes tallied by the NYPD that year, Jews were victims of 345, which, in addition to being a 7 percent increase over the previous year, amounted to 54 percent of all hate crimes in the city.
As The Algemeiner has previously reported, antisemitic hate crimes have posed a major threat to the quality of life of New York City’s Orthodox Jewish community, which was the target in many of the incidents. In just eight days between the end of October and the beginning of November, three Hasidim, including children, were brutally assaulted in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. In one instance, an Orthodox man was accosted by two assailants, one masked, who “chased and beat him” after he refused to surrender his cellphone in compliance with what appeared to have been an attempted robbery.
In another incident, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily Jewish neighborhood. Less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face as he was walking in Brooklyn. Days after the week-long antisemitic hate crime spree, three men attempted to rob a Hasidic man after stalking him through the Crown Heights neighborhood.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post New York City Jews Targeted for Most Hate Crimes in March, NYPD Stats Show first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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NYC ‘Dyke March’ Bans Zionists From Participating in Annual Demonstration

(Source: Reuters)
NYC Dyke March, a public demonstration held by members of the lesbian community in New York City, has banned self-proclaimed “Zionists” from its annual event, citing a desire to stand against the so-called “genocide” occuring in Gaza.
The group revealed in a statement that their decision to ban Israel supporters from their ranks came after multiple members dropped out of the organization due to differences in “political beliefs and values.” After engaging in discussions with frustrated members, the NYC Dyke March committee agreed to adopt “an explicitly anti-Zionist position.” The organization claims that it will “strengthen our commitment” to fighting against Israel and advocating on behalf of Palestinians.
Last year, the NYC Dyke March previously came under scrutiny after organizers settled on “genocide” as the theme of its 2024 event. In a statement, decrying “ethnic cleansing, violence, and dehumanization,” the organization compared the ongoing war in Gaza, to the mass slaughters occurring in Ethiopia, Myanmar, and Sudan.
The organization plans on recycling the same theme for this year’s march, titling it “Dykes Against Genocide.” The group released a statement clarifying that Jews are allowed to attend and condemned the Oct. 7 slaughters as a “senseless loss of life.” After an apparent uproar from its members, the organization deleted the post and wrote that the group “unapologetically stands in support of Palestinian liberation.” In addition, the group affirmed that “anti-Zionism is not antisemitism and any language we put out which is not clearly opposed to a Zionist, imperialist agenda is harmful to us all.”
In the 17 months following the Hamas-led massacre of roughly 1200 people throughout Israel, the NYC Dyke March has produced numerous statements lambasting Israel and declaring “solidarity” with Palestinians amid their so-called “ongoing genocide.” The organization also accused Israel of engaging in supposed “pinkwashing” and “manipulative use of Jewish and queer identities,” with the aim of justifying its war efforts in Gaza.
Israel offers an expansive set of rights for members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transngender (LGBT) community, including recognition of same-sex marriages. Every year in June, Tel Aviv holds one of the largest LGBT Pride celebrations in the world. Meanwhile, members of the LGBT community are routinely imprisoned or murdered in other parts of the Middle East, including the Palestinian territories.
The NYC Dyke March’s announcement was met with widespread condemnation.
“You cannot exclude the majority of Jews and call yourself inclusive,” said the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) in a post on X/Twitter, adding that the group “essentially equates Zionism with racism” in their announcement.
The post NYC ‘Dyke March’ Bans Zionists From Participating in Annual Demonstration first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Trump Administration Planning $510 Million Cut to Brown University Budget, Report Says

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with journalists onboard Air Force One en route to Miami, Florida, U.S., April 3, 2025. REUTERS/Kent Nishimura
The Trump administration reportedly plans to terminate $510 million worth of federal contracts and grants awarded to Brown University, according to media reports.
Brown University’s failure to mount a satisfactory response to the campus antisemitism crisis, as well as its embrace of the diversity, equity, and, inclusion (DEI) movement — perceived by many across the political spectrum as an assault on merit-based upward mobility and causing incidents of anti-White and anti-Asian discrimination — prompted the alleged pending action by the federal government, according to the right-leaning outlet The Daily Caller.
The announcement comes as Brown scrambles to cover a $46 million budget shortfall and other universities across the country have faced similar funding cuts.
Brown University officials, however, denied that the university had received any directives from the Trump Administration.
“We have no information to substantiate these rumors,” Brown University provost Francis Doyle issued a statement. “We are closely monitoring notifications related to grants, but have nothing more we can share as of now.”
Meanwhile, Brown’s Jewish community rushed to the university’s defense, issuing a joint statement with the Brown Corporation which said that the campus is “peaceful and supportive campus for its Jewish community.”
The letter, signed by members of the local Hillel International chapter and Chabad on College Hill, continued: “Brown University is a place where Jewish life not only exists but thrives. While there is more work to be done, Brown, through the dedicated efforts of its administration, leadership, and resilient spirit of its Jewish community, continues to uphold the principles of inclusion, tolerance, and intellectual freedom that have been central to its identity since 1764.”
Brown Divest Coalition — an anti-Zionist group which recently saw its campaign for the university to adopt the boycott, divest, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel defeated by the Brown Corporation — weighed in too, denouncing the reported cut as “a means of suppressing all forms of popular dissent to the renewed violence of the US war machine abroad.” US Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) also criticized the move, accusing the administration “of a broader pattern of behavior…that will negatively impact communities across the country and lead to layoffs, restrict research, and more.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, the Trump administration is following through on its threats to inflict potentially catastrophic financial injuries on colleges and universities deemed as soft on antisemitism or excessively “woke.” The past six weeks has seen the policy imposed on elite universities including Harvard and Columbia, rattling a higher education establishment that has for better and worse operated for decades with little interference from the federal government even as it polarized the public and contributed to a growing sense that elites are contemptuous of Americans who live outside of their cultural enclaves.
In March, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon announced the cancellation of $400 million in federal contracts and grants for Columbia University, a measure that secured the school’s acceding to a slew of demands the administration put forth as preconditions for restoring the money. Later, the Trump administration disclosed its reviewing $9 billion worth of federal grants and contracts awarded to Harvard University, jeopardizing a substantial source of the school’s income over its alleged failure to quell antisemitic and pro-Hamas activity on campus following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. Princeton University saw $210 million of its federal grants and funding suspended too, prompting its president, Christopher Eisgruber to say the institution is “committed to fighting antisemitism and all forms of discrimination.”
Additionally, 60 universities are being investigated by the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights over their handling of campus antisemitism, a project that will serve as an early test of the administration’s ability to perform the essential functions of the agency after downsizing its workforce to increase its efficiency.
One of those universities, Northwestern University, on Monday touted its progress in addressing campus antisemitism, noting that it has adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, a reference tool which aids officials in determining what constitutes antisemitism, and begun holding “mandatory antisemitism training” sessions which “all students, faculty, and staff” must attend.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Trump Administration Planning $510 Million Cut to Brown University Budget, Report Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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