Chief Rabbi of South Africa Warren Goldstein. Photo: Screenshot

South African Chief Rabbi Warren Goldstein has lambasted the government for defending Iran and downplaying threats to Israel — part of what the country’s Jewish community has long denounced as an increasingly hostile stance toward the Jewish state.

“It’s disgraceful … but, not unexpected, that the South African government came to Iran’s defense, stating there was no imminent threat to Israel or the West from Iran,” Goldstein said in a video posted on X on Monday.

“Iran fights back by launching missiles at Israel’s civilian centers, condemnation for which is, as expected, muted in the international media and community of nations,” the Jewish leader continued.

Israel’s strike on Iran was a 1-minute-to midnight action to head off the annihilation of the Jewish state, and prevent another Holocaust. pic.twitter.com/kYj7Tw9bDs

— Chief Rabbi Dr Warren Goldstein (@ChiefRabbiSA) June 16, 2025

Last week, Israel launched a broad preemptive attack on Iran, targeting military installations and nuclear sites across the country in what officials described as an effort to neutralize an imminent nuclear threat.

The ongoing Israeli strikes killed several of Iran’s top military commanders and nuclear scientists and dealt a major blow to the country’s retaliatory capabilities, destroying not only much of its ballistic missile stockpiles but also crippling its launch platforms.

On Friday, South African authorities expressed “profound concern” over Israel’s military campaign against Iran and extended their “sincere condolences to the Iranian government and the families of all victims.”

“These actions raise serious concerns under international law, including the principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity, and the protection of civilians enshrined in the UN Charter and international humanitarian law,” Chrispin Phiri, spokesperson for South Africa’s Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, said in a statement.

“We reiterate our unwavering commitment to the peaceful resolution of disputes. South Africa urges maximum restraint by all parties and calls for the urgent intensification of diplomatic efforts to de-escalate tensions and promote stability in the Middle East,” Phiri continued.

In his video posted to social media, Goldstein said there is ample evidence that Iran was just weeks away from acquiring nuclear weapons, noting that the Israeli strike came on day 62 of the 60-day window US President Donald Trump had given Tehran to reach a nuclear deal.

“Israel’s strike on Iran was a 1-minute-to midnight action to head off the annihilation of the Jewish state, and prevent another Holocaust,” Goldstein said.

After five rounds of talks between the US and Iran, diplomatic efforts stalled as the two adversaries clashed over Tehran’s insistence on maintaining its domestic uranium enrichment program — a demand that Trump had publicly rejected.

“For Israel this war against Iran is a fight for survival. To stop its annihilation. To stop another Holocaust,” the Jewish leader said in his video statement.

“Had Iran been able to develop a nuclear bomb and announce it via a successful test, it would have been too late to launch a preemptive strike. The stakes would have been too high, and Iran would have gained the leverage to completely shift the balance of power, both in the Middle East and globally,” Goldstein continued.

Iranian leaders regularly declare their intention of destroying Israel and have for decades supplied internationally designated terrorist groups, such as Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, with weapons and funding to attack the Jewish state. Nonetheless, South Africa’s Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources Gwede Mantashe said earlier this year that his country would consider partnering with Iran for expanding its civilian nuclear power capacity.

Amid the ongoing diplomatic deadlock between Tehran and Washington, Israel had previously declared it would never allow the Islamist regime to acquire nuclear weapons, as the country views Iran’s nuclear program — which Tehran insists is solely for civilian purposes — as an existential threat.

“Everyone knows that Iran must be disarmed but none has Israel’s courage to do what must be done,” Goldstein said. “But if they won’t help, they should at least express their gratitude to the brave government, soldiers, pilots, and people of Israel for what they are doing to make this world safe.”

Since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, the South African government has been one of the most vocal critics of the Jewish state on the international stage, repeatedly targeting Jerusalem through diplomatic actions.

Since December 2023, South Africa has been pursuing its case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) accusing Israel of committing “state-led genocide” in its defensive war against the Palestinian terrorist group in Gaza.

The post South African Chief Rabbi Slams Government’s Support for Iran as Middle East Conflict Escalates first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Protesters march against the ICE detention of Palestinian activist and Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil, during a protest near Arizona State University (ASU) in Phoenix, Arizona, US, March 15, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Rebecca Noble

On June 14, National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) posted the following on Instagram:

National SJP condemns the Zionist, US-backed attacks on Iran. The Zionist entity has been attempting to ignite a regional war since the day the genocide began […]. Israel’s actions are those of a colonial project that knows its time has come to a close—the world wants Israel to be dismantled, and for Palestine to be free.

This is not fringe rhetoric. NSJP is one of the most prominent anti-Israel student organizations in the United States, and groups like it — some with documented links to extremist and even terrorist organizations — are not just influencing but organizing a growing share of anti-Israel activism on US campuses. As our recent research shows, these networks are coordinated, ideological, and increasingly radical.

In our Anti-Israel Campus Groups: Online Networks and Narratives report, my research team and I analyzed 76,000 Instagram posts, reviewed nearly 10,000 antisemitic incidents, and mapped more than 1,000 anti-Israel campus groups.

What we found was sobering: pro-Hamas and pro-Iranian rhetoric has become normalized in some campus protest spaces. These are not simply students speaking out against a government — they’re echoing propaganda from internationally recognized terrorist organizations.

How did we get here? How did so many students adopt such extreme views so quickly? The answer lies partly in social media — and partly in the silence of campus leadership.

Back in early 2024 — months before campus encampments against Israel dominated national headlines — students in my Social Media & Hate Research Lab flagged several troubling posts from pro-Palestinian student groups. These weren’t calls for peace or for a two-state solution. They were open endorsements of Hamas, a group responsible for mass murder, rape, and kidnapping.

I was skeptical at first. I had spoken with some of these activists a few weeks and months earlier; they seemed reasonable — even critical of Hamas in private. But the posts were public and unambiguous: “Glory to Hamas.” “Hamas is morally superior to Israel.”

These posts were not buried in the dark corners of the internet. They were posted by prominent student leaders, easily accessible on platforms like X and Instagram. When a compilation of these posts was circulated publicly, the response from university officials was telling: silence.

I attempted to engage students directly. Some couldn’t explain the slogans on their own signs. One read, “IUPD, KKK, IOF, all the same.” The students holding it had no idea what “IOF” meant — a derogatory term for the Israeli Defense Forces. Others shut down any conversation altogether. “We don’t talk to Zionists,” one organizer told me.

So I did what professors do: I started researching.

We found that some of the most radical posts by anti-Israel groups on social media had become also some of the most popular ones.

The most widely shared post we found was published on October 8, 2023 — one day after the Hamas attacks in Israel. It came from a group called SUPER at the University of Washington. While Hamas militants were still actively killing civilians, SUPER posted a statement endorsing “the right of Palestinians to resist,” without qualification. SUPER has since doubled down and become more extremist. In May, they helped lead the occupation of the Interdisciplinary Engineering Building at the University of Washington in Seattle. Their June 6 “Right to Resist Teach-In” featured a promotional image depicting a Hamas-seized IDF tank flying the Palestinian flag — the same image used on the cover of the Hamas propaganda booklet Our Narrative…

This pattern isn’t limited to one group. NSJP, the same group that posted the call to dismantle Israel and siding with Iran, acts as a strategic and narrative hub. On October 8, 2023, NSJP published a toolkit celebrating the Hamas attacks as a “historic win for the Palestinian resistance,” along with templates and talking points for organizing campus protests.

Off-campus groups like the Palestinian Youth Movement, which has documented ties to the PFLP, also play a key role. So do radical left-wing organizations and foreign actors aligned with Iran. The rhetoric often avoids explicitly calling for violence against Jews. Instead, it adopts the language of resistance and decolonization — terms that mask the underlying glorification of armed struggle.

And yet, many Jewish students know exactly what it means. After the murder of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., the Tariq El-Tahrir Youth and Student Network called the killings “a legitimate act of resistance.” The rhetoric is escalating and can lead to violence, even if it’s only a fringe part of the students who are protesting.

The data supports what many Jewish students have long felt: antisemitism rises alongside anti-Israel activism.

Universities with more anti-Israel groups report significantly higher numbers of antisemitic incidents. The correlation is strong, and it’s growing with the number of anti-Israel groups that can establish an anti-Zionist climate on campus that effectively targets Jews.

This isn’t protest in the traditional sense. It’s propaganda, often shaped by off-campus entities and disseminated through social media with strategic precision. Faculty members and graduate student unions often lend moral cover. Dissent is increasingly treated not as dialogue but as betrayal. And pro-Hamas rhetoric is ignored and pretended to be non-existent on campus.

When I gave a talk in May entitled, “In the Mind of a Pro-Hamas Student,” backlash followed swiftly. Complaints were filed, letters written, and pressure applied — not to engage with the argument, but to silence it.

But we can’t afford to pretend. We can’t pretend that celebrating Hamas isn’t happening on our campuses. Or that slogans like “resistance by any means” are merely poetic. Or that calls to “globalize the Intifada” are harmless slogans.

Pretending comes at a cost. It threatens the safety of Jewish students. It erodes the academic values of open inquiry and honest debate. And it undermines our ability to distinguish justice from its dangerous imitations.

We don’t need to agree on everything about Israel and the Palestinians. But we should be able to agree on this: a campus culture that tolerates — or worse, celebrates — terrorism is not one that fosters justice. It is one that fails everyone.

Günther Jikeli holds the Erna B. Rosenfeld Professorship at the Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism in the Borns Jewish Studies Program at Indiana University. He heads the research lab “Social Media & Hate.”

The post Our Report Shows How Support for Palestinian Terrorism Has Spread on College Campuses first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

Television presenter Erin Molan at a press conference during a visit to Penshurst Girls School in Sydney, Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2021. Photo: AAPIMAGE via Reuters Connect

Australian broadcaster and journalist Erin Molan is in Israel during the country’s war against Iran and said she will remain in the Jewish state “to report the truth about what is happening here on the ground.”

“Let me make it very clear – despite media reports – I have not asked the Australian government – or ANYONE to on my behalf – to come to my rescue or evacuate me,” the former television presenter wrote in a social media post on Monday.

“There are a million other priorities for all involved in this conflict right now,” she added in part. “I desperately want to get home to my daughter – BUT – unlike so many people here — she is SAFE — many other children in Israel/Iran/Gaza are not. I am patiently waiting and thinking of all those who are in a far worse position than I am.”

Molan was scheduled to fly home to Australia on Friday but has been stranded in Israel since all airspace was closed following the start of Israel’s attack on nuclear and military targets in Iran, which started overnight on Friday. Since then, she has been reporting live from Israel about the war against Iran, sharing commentary on social media as well as videos of destruction in Israel caused by Iranian missiles launched at the Jewish state in retaliation for Israel’s airstrikes. During her extended stay in Israel, she has also interviewed Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and Israel’s President Isaac Herzog.

 

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A post shared by Erin Molan (@erin_molan)

On Friday morning, Molan filmed a video from Tel Aviv in which she expressed solidarity with Israel and the Israel Defense Forces amid its war against the regime in the Islamic Republic.

“A lot has changed in the Middle East over the past few hours,” she said. “Pray for the people of Israel, pray for the people of Iran – the vast majority of whom despise the regime in charge. I think the entire world should be incredibly grateful to Israel for carrying out these attacks on behalf of us all, because the enemy of terrorism and Iran’s Islamic regime is not just Israel, it is the entire Western world.”

In a video posted on Instagram on Monday, Molan called the Islamic regime in Iran a “satanic murderous, regime who hate peace and democracy.”

Molan is the daughter of the late Major General Jim Molan, an Australian senator who was an avid supporter of Israel and a strong advocate for Australia-Israel ties. Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war that began after the deadly terrorist attack on Oct. 7, 2023, Molan publicly expressed strong support for Israel’s military actions targeting the Iran-backed terrorist organization that orchestrated the deadly massacre.

On Thursday, Israel’s national airline El Al will start operating one-way flights to Tel Aviv to help bring home thousands of Israelis who are stranded abroad since the start of Israel’s war with Iran.

Former reality television star and transgender Olympic gold medalist Caitlyn Jenner was also in Israel when Israel launched its attacks on Iranian nuclear sites and military infrastructure but managed to escape by land to Jordan on Sunday. Jenner, 75, was in Israel as the guest of honor for the Tel Aviv Pride Parade, which was scheduled to take place on Friday but was canceled after Israel began a series of airstrikes on Iran.

The post Australian Journalist Erin Molan Refuses to Flee Israel Amid Iran War, Will Stay to ‘Report the Truth From the Ground’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.