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White House says it will not meet with Israel’s Bezalel Smotrich when he visits the US
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Biden administration officials will not meet with Bezalel Smotrich, the Israeli finance minister who called for a Palestinian village to be “wiped out,” then backtracked, and who is visiting the U.S. next week to meet with leaders of Israel Bonds.
At least five liberal Jewish groups want the U.S. government to consider barring Smotrich from coming here. Ned Price, the department’s spokesman, said at Thursday’s daily briefing that questions on Israeli ministers’ travel should be referred to Israel, and that he does not comment on the eligibility of individuals to enter the United States.
The trip comes as Smotrich and his far-right allies in Israel’s governing coalition have upended traditions of comity between establishment U.S. Jewish groups and Israel. Those relationships have become even more strained in recent days, after Israeli West Bank settlers rioted in a Palestinian village. They also come amid raucous protests of the Israeli government’s plan to sap the power of the judiciary, which critics say endanger minority rights.
William Daroff, the CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said Smotrich’s remarks were “disgusting,” and a spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the powerful pro-Israel lobby, said the group would not be meeting with him.
Asked by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency whether the minister will meet with the White House, a National Security Council spokeswoman said, “No U.S. government meetings are planned for this trip.” That includes officials in the U.S. Treasury, the counterpart to Smotrich’s ministry, she said.
Smotrich is also responsible for civilian affairs in much of the West Bank. His call to “wipe out” the West Bank village of Huwara came after a settler rampage through the village following a shooting there that killed two Israeli brothers. At least one Palestinian in another village died amid the riots.
“I think the village of Huwara should be wiped out, I think that the state of Israel should do it,” he said in an interview on Wednesday. A few hours later, he walked back his statement: “To remove any doubt, in my words I did not mean wiping out the village of Huwara, but rather acting in a targeted way against terrorists and supporters of terror, and exacting a heavy price from them in order to return security to local residents.”
This week, the State Department’s annual report on terrorism recorded a “substantial rise” in settler attacks on Palestinian in 2021, the first time it had made such an assessment. On Wednesday, Price called Smotrich’s remarks about wiping out the village “disgusting” and “incitement to violence.”
“Just as we condemn Palestinian incitement to violence, we condemn these provocative remarks that also amount to incitement to violence,” Price said in his briefing that day. “We call on Prime Minister Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials to publicly and clearly reject and disavow these comments.”
Netanyahu has yet to do so, and with Smotrich just days away from a visit stateside to give a speech to Israel Bonds in Washington D.C., five Jewish groups are saying the Biden administration should at least consider keeping him out and others will not sit down with him. AIPAC’s declining to meet with Smotrich is particularly noteworthy. It routinely meets with senior Israeli ministers.
“The administration should make clear that comments promoting grave violations of human rights, such as those made by Smotrich, are grounds for re-examination of a visa for entry to the United States,” J Street, the liberal Jewish Israel policy group, said in a statement.
Four other Jewish groups are saying outright that the Biden administration should keep Smotrich out, among them Americans for Peace Now, an affiliate off the Israeli left-wing group; the Israel Policy Forum, a group that advocates for an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel; T’ruah, a liberal rabbinic human rights group; and Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Zionist group.
The T’ruah statement referred to U.S. immigration law, which bans entry to those who have “incited terrorist activity with intent to cause serious bodily harm or death.” It said the threat Smotrich poses is especially acute since he assumed responsibility for administering civilian life in parts of the West Bank.
“Smotrich’s comments are even more dangerous now that Israel’s de jure annexation of the West Bank has made him effectively the governor of the territory, with broad oversight over most areas of civil administration,” the T’ruah statement said.
IPF, a group led by former lay leaders of mainstream pro-Israel organizations, also joined the calls. its policy director, Michael Koplow, told JTA, “We believe that there are sufficient grounds to deny Smotrich a visa.”
The Americans for Peace Now petition, addressed to Biden, garnered more than 1,100 signatures less than a day after it was posted.
“Smotrich wants to bring his hatred to US soil. He has plans to travel to the United States later this month. We’re here to say that he is not welcome,” the petition says. “We have seen how incitement in Israel-Palestine has led to devastating violence and we urge your administration to deny entry to Smotrich and his hateful rhetoric.”
A sixth U.S.-based liberal group, the New Israel Fund, which raises money for social justice organizations in Israel, said Jewish groups should make clear Smnotrich is unwanted here. “Our responsibility right now as American Jews is to say ‘take your hateful racism, your homophobia your plans for an apartheid Israel and get out. We do not want you here’,” it said in a statement. Smnotrich has called himself a “proud homophobe.”
Daroff, of the Conference of Presidents, declined to comment to JTA on whether he would meet with Smotrich.But he tweeted his agreement with Price. “I agree. His statement seeking to ‘wipe out’ Huwara was, as Ned Price said, ‘irresponsible, repugnant and disgusting’,” he wrote.
Israel Bonds, which promotes investment in Israeli government bonds, said in a statement that because it works closely with the Finance Ministry, welcoming the sitting finance minister to its events was a matter of routine. Smotrich will speak to the group’s Washington, D.C. leadership meeting.
“As part of their long-established responsibilities, Israel’s finance ministers from across the political spectrum have historically, over Israel Bonds’ 72-year history, attended our events,” a spokesman said, replying to a JTA query. “One of the organization’s most unique and paramount attributes is that it remains unbiased with regard to any political party or affiliation.”
Hundreds of rabbis have said they would not welcome Smotrich or his allies into their synagogues and would encourage their communities to boycott him. The Presidents’ Conference did not invite ministers from Smotrich’s Religious Zionism party to address its annual colloquy in Israel last month, although they were invited to a luncheon for all Knesset members.
One group that backs settlements, the Zionist Organization of America, said not meeting with Religious Zionism leaders was a mistake.
‘Nobody has to agree with them or disagree with them,” Klein said. “But they should speak and whoever wants to challenge them, challenge them, criticize them, disagree with them.”
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Condemnation and Applause in Latin America after US Seizes Venezuela’s Maduro
Venezuelans gather to celebrate, after US President Donald Trump said that the US attacked Venezuela and deposed its President Nicolas Maduro, in Santiago, Chile January 3, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Pablo Sanhueza
Latin American leaders were divided between condemnation and jubilation in the wake of a surprise attack on Venezuela early on Saturday that US President Donald Trump said resulted in the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro.
While much of the region has long been wary of a return to US interventions throughout the 20th century that helped install authoritarian governments from Chile to Honduras, Maduro – who presided over his country’s social and economic collapse – was an increasingly unpopular and isolated leader.
Many Latin American countries have also experienced a shift in recent elections to more right-leaning governments, many of whose leaders view the US-backed military regimes of the last century as necessary bulwarks against socialism.
In a sign of the economic pain faced under Maduro, nearly 8 million Venezuelans have fled the country since 2018, with 85 percent of them migrating to neighbors in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration.
Many countries in the region have experienced surges in organized crime in recent years and the specter of Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua gang has loomed large over voters’ minds, leading to a rise in politicians vowing to crack down on crime and immigration.
While few leaders will shed serious tears about Maduro’s ousting, governments in the region will react along political lines, said Steven Levitsky, a professor and director of Harvard’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies.
“I think you’ll see right-wing governments applaud because that’s what they do. You’ll see left-wing governments criticize because how could they not?” Levitsky said.
REACTIONS SPLIT ALONG IDEOLOGY
The strongest condemnation of the attack came in a string of posts on X from neighboring Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro, a leftist who has frequently clashed with Trump and has also been threatened by the US president.
“The Colombian government rejects the aggression against the sovereignty of Venezuela and Latin America,” Petro said in one message, while calling for an immediate meeting of the United Nations Security Council, of which Colombia is a member.
His Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, echoed Petro’s comments.
“The bombings on Venezuela’s territory and the capture of its president cross an unacceptable line,” Lula said in a statement.
Chile’s outgoing President Gabriel Boric condemned the attack but President-elect Jose Antonio Kast, who rose to power by promising to crack down on migration and crime, said in a post on X that Maduro’s arrest was great news for the region.
“Now begins a greater task. The governments of Latin America must ensure that the entire apparatus of the regime abandons power and is held accountable,” said Kast, who will be sworn in on March 11.
In Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum also condemned the US intervention in Venezuela. Asked about comments Trump made on Saturday to Fox News, when he said the US has offered to “take out the cartels” in Mexico and that “we have to do something,” Sheinbaum replied that Mexico has a very good relationship with the US on security matters.
ARGENTINA, ECUADOR BACK ACTION
Argentina’s President Javier Milei, Trump’s closest ally in the region, has long criticized Maduro and posted videos and statements on X in favor of the attack.
In Ecuador, right-wing President Daniel Noboa said Venezuelans opposed to Maduro and his political godfather Hugo Chavez have an ally in Ecuador.
“All the criminal narco-Chavistas will have their moment,” Noboa said on X. “Their structure will finally collapse across the continent.”
Protests both in favor and against the strikes in Venezuela have been scheduled in Buenos Aires and other cities across the region.
The capture of Maduro by US forces “is one of the most momentous decisions in the history of US-Latin America relations,” said Brian Winter, editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly and vice president of policy at Americas Society/Council of the Americas.
“The operation confirms return of Washington as policeman in its ‘sphere of influence,’ an idea that defined much of 19th and 20th centuries but had faded since (the) end of the Cold War,” Winter said in a post on LinkedIn.
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Democratic US Lawmakers Say They Were Misled on Venezuela, Demand a Plan
US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) holds a press conference in the US Capitol in Washington, DC, April 23, 2024. Photo: Annabelle Gordon / CNP/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Democratic members of the US Congress said on Saturday that senior officials of President Donald Trump‘s administration had misled them during recent briefings about plans for Venezuela by insisting they were not planning regime change in Caracas.
The US attacked Venezuela and deposed its long-serving President Nicolas Maduro in an overnight operation, in Washington’s most direct intervention in Latin America since the 1989 invasion of Panama.
Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democrats’ leader in the Senate, said he had been told in three classified briefings that the administration was not pursuing regime change or planning to take military action in Venezuela.
“They assured me that they were not pursuing those things,” Schumer said on a call with reporters. “Clearly they’re not being straight with the American people.”
Schumer said he had not been briefed by Saturday afternoon and called for the administration to fill in not just congressional and intelligence committee leaders, but also all lawmakers by early next week.
“They’ve kept everyone in the total dark,” he said.
Lawmakers said they wanted more guidance on Trump‘s plans for Venezuela, after he told reporters he would put the country under US control, for now.
“No serious plan has been presented for how such an extraordinary undertaking would work or what it will cost the American people. History offers no shortage of warnings about the costs – human, strategic, and moral – of assuming we can govern another nation by force,” said Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The Senate is due to vote next week on whether to block further military action against Venezuela without congressional approval.
In briefings in November and December by officials including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, lawmakers said they were told repeatedly that there were no plans for a land invasion inside Venezuela and that the administration was not focused on regime change.
“Instead, the Administration consistently misled the American people and their elected representatives,” Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement.
The Pentagon, State Department and White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
SOME LAWMAKERS SAY ADMINISTRATION LIED
Several lawmakers said they felt they had been lied to.
“The Administration lied to Congress and launched an illegal war for regime change and oil,” Democratic Representative Don Beyer of Virginia said on X. Beyer’s district includes the Pentagon, just across the river from Washington.
At a news conference on Saturday, Trump said Congress had not been kept fully informed because of concerns that word about his plans would get out. “Congress does have a tendency to leak,” Trump told reporters.
Members of Congress, including some of Trump‘s fellow Republicans as well as Democrats, had been clamoring for more information about his strategy toward the oil-rich South American nation since September, when he began a military build-up in the Caribbean and ordered strikes on boats he said were carrying drugs.
“When we had briefings on Venezuela, we asked, ‘Are you going to invade the country?’ We were told no. ‘Do you plan to put troops on the ground?’ We were told no. ‘Do you intend regime change in Venezuela?’ We were told no,” Democratic Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts said on CNN. “So in a sense, we have been briefed, we’ve just been completely lied to.”
Lawmakers said they were not briefed before the operation, although Rubio called some members of Congress after it took place. There were no briefings for lawmakers scheduled by Saturday afternoon. Republican congressional leaders said they hoped to arrange some after lawmakers return to Washington on January 5 following their year-end recess.
Most Republicans praised Trump‘s action and have declined to discuss what has been said in classified briefings.
“President Trump‘s decisive action to disrupt the unacceptable status quo and apprehend Maduro, through the execution of a valid Department of Justice warrant, is an important first step to bring him to justice for the drug crimes for which he has been indicted in the United States,” said Senate Republican Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota.
Members of Congress have long accused presidents from both parties of seeking to sidestep the Constitution’s requirement that Congress, not the president, approve anything other than brief and limited military action needed to defend the United States.
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Israeli Leadership Hails Trump for ‘Brave, Brilliant’ Venezuela Operation
Photo of Maduro in U.S. custody shared by Trump. Photo: i24 illustration.
i24 News – Israel’s prime minister and foreign minister issued high praise to US President Donald Trump following the successful operation on Saturday to capture Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro.
“Israel commends the United States’ operation, led by President Trump, which acted as the leader of the free world,” Gideon Sa’ar, the Jewish state’s top diplomat, wrote on social media. “At this historic moment, Israel stands alongside the freedom-loving Venezuelan people, who have suffered under Maduro’s illegal tyranny.”
“Israel welcomes the removal of the dictator who led a network of drugs and terror and hopes for the return of democracy to the country and for friendly relations between the states,” he further added.
The statement came hours after Maduro and his wife were seized in an overnight operation.
“This was one of the most stunning, effective and powerful displays of American military might and competence in American history,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort.
Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, hailed Trump’s “bold and historic leadership on behalf of freedom and justice.”
“I salute your decisive resolve and the brilliant action of your brave soldiers,” the premier added.