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American rabbis, wrestling with Israel’s behavior, weigh different approaches from the pulpit
(JTA) — Rabbi Sharon Brous began a sermon at her Los Angeles synagogue last month with a content warning. “I have to say some things today that I know will upset some of you,” she began.
That same morning, across the country in New York City, Rabbi Angela Buchdahl was confessing something to her congregants, too: The sermon they were about to hear “kept me up at night.”
Both women — among the most prominent and influential Jewish clergy in the United States — went on to sharply criticize Israel’s new right-wing government, which includes far-right parties that aim to curb the rights of LGBTQ Israelis, Arabs and non-Orthodox Jews.
In taking aim at Israel’s government from the pulpit, the rabbis were veering close to what many in their field consider a third rail. “You have a wonderful community and you love them and they love you, until the moment you stand up and you give your Israel sermon,” Brous told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The phenomenon even has an informal name, she said: “Death by Israel sermon.”
Brous would know: A decade ago, she was the target of sharp criticism after she encouraged her congregants at IKAR, a nondenominational congregation, to pray for Palestinians as well as Jews during a period of conflict in Israel. The incident didn’t end her pulpit, but she has come to understand why many rabbis choose what she called “the path of silence” when it comes to Israel.
Now, she said, American Jews must depart from that path. “I want you to hear me,” she said in her sermon. “There is a revolution that is happening, and this moment demands an awakening on both sides of the sea, an honest reckoning.”
All over the country, non-Orthodox rabbis are making similar calculations in response to Israel’s new governing coalition, which has drawn widespread protests over its policy moves. (Orthodox communities, including their rabbis, tend to be more politically conservative and skew to the right of non-Orthodox communities on Israel issues.) Israel’s government is advancing an overhaul of the legal system that would sap the power of the Supreme Court, and is also contending with an escalating wave of violence.
Some rabbis feel more emboldened to speak aloud what they have long believed. Others are finding themselves reconsidering their own relationship to Israel — and bringing their congregants along on their journey. A few still feel that criticizing Israel from the pulpit is a misguided and even dangerous venture, one that could splinter American Jewish communities.
What cuts across the spectrum is a belief that Israel has been discussed too little from the synagogue pulpit. Brous said the tendency of liberal rabbis not to talk about Israel lest they anger their more conservative congregants has resulted in a painful reality: “American Jews have not developed the muscle that we now need to respond to this regime.”
Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch of the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York City launched a new program called Amplify Israel, which he hopes will encourage Reform movement leaders to embrace Zionism even as they navigate a “deeply problematic and even offensive” new Israeli government. (Shahar Azran/Stephen Wise Free Synagogue)
Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, meanwhile, believes today’s rabbis must be vocal in fending off the influence of “competing values” about Zionism from “various organizations that are either cool on Israel or don’t like Israel or just downright anti-Zionist.”
Last year, angered by a letter signed by dozens of rabbinical students denouncing Israel’s actions during its 2021 conflict with Hamas in Gaza, Hirsch launched an initiative based at his New York City Reform synagogue to equip rabbis with tools to counter what he said was “the growing influence of an anti-Zionist element” in the next generation of Jewish clergy.
The initiative, Amplify Israel, is housed at his Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, and employs another rabbi, Tracy Kaplowitz, to work full-time to galvanize leaders from across the Reform movement to support Israel. Kaplowitz jokes that her new job won’t be complete “until every Reform Jew is a Zionist.”
Hirsch knows the new coalition is complicating his task. “The new government is going to make our promotion of Israel more difficult in the United States,” he said, noting that the government “has elements in it that are deeply problematic and even offensive to most American Jews.”
He and Kaplowitz contend that it is possible, in their view, for rabbis to criticize aspects of the Israeli government from the pulpit while still remaining broadly supportive of the Jewish state and encouraging their congregants to be the same. They also say the need to build Zionist sentiment within the American rabbinate transcends any particular moment, including this one.
“If we have to transform how we connect to Israel each time there’s an election, we’ll be driving ourselves a little bit batty,” Kaplowitz said.
Rabbi Tracy Kaplowitz is a full-time Israel Fellow at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York City. She jokes that her job won’t be finished “until every Reform Jew is a Zionist.” (Ryen Greiss/Stephen Wise Free Synagogue)
Hirsch sits on the advisory board of another new pro-Israel initiative, the Zionist Rabbinic Coalition. Helmed by Stuart Weinblatt, senior rabbi at Conservative Congregation B’nai Tzedek in Potomac, Maryland, the group is an interdenominational network of more than 200 rabbis who advocate to ”strengthen the ties between American Jewry and the State of Israel.”
Weinblatt hews to an early generation’s view of how rabbis should approach Israel from the pulpit. He told JTA that he believes his colleagues should always be supportive of Israel in public, even if they choose to pressure the Israeli government and advocate against certain policies in private — which, he says, is “the appropriate vehicle” for voicing concerns. “My position has always been that support for Israel should be unconditional,” he said.
“If we as rabbis are sharply critical of Israel, the result can often lead to a distancing from Israel, which ultimately may diminish the connection people feel to Judaism and the Jewish people,” he added. “People do not always distinguish and differentiate between opposition to a particular policy and broader criticisms of Israel which can do lasting damage.”
Asked whether the Israeli government could ever conceivably take a step that would necessitate a public response from American rabbis, Weinblatt ruminated for days. He ultimately told JTA that the current debate around proposed changes to the Law of Return, the Israeli policy that allows anyone with at least one Jewish grandparent to claim citizenship, would be such an example, as that is a policy that would have a direct effect on Diaspora Jews.
Tightening who is eligible under the Law of Return is in fact a goal of some elements of Israel’s governing coalition, although the Diaspora minister assured an audience in the United States that, unlike with the proposed changes to the government’s judicial system — which have earned criticism across the political spectrum — there would be an effort to build consensus and no changes would happen overnight.
Still, the prospect of such a change so alarmed Rabbi Hillel Skolnick of Congregation Tifereth Israel in Columbus, Ohio, that he traveled to Jerusalem to address the Knesset, Israel’s lawmaking body.
“The members of my congregation and my movement have a spiritual connection with Judaism and also a political connection because we live in a democracy, so they see a Jewish democracy as an ideal that they can look to as a light unto the nations,” he said, in a speech he delivered as a representative of the Conservative/Masorti movement.
“By even questioning the idea of the Law of Return,” he went on, Israel “takes away from both the Jewish connection and the democratic connection they have with this country.”
Skolnick suggested that he was unsure of how to speak to his congregation about the new government and its agenda. “My question to you is, what message can I go home with?” he asked.
Rabbi Stuart Weinblatt, founder and chair of the Zionist Rabbinic Coalition, shown with Israeli President Isaac Herzog. Weinblatt believes American rabbis’ “support for Israel should be unconditional,” and that disagreements with its government should be hashed out in private. (Courtesy of Stuart Weinblatt)
This week, hundreds of American rabbis will be returning to their congregations with messages honed by a week in Israel. The Reform movement just concluded its biennial convention, which was held there for the first time since before the pandemic. Their visit coincided with major developments in the country’s twin crises: The Knesset advanced the judicial reform legislation, and three people were killed in a Palestinian shooting and subsequent settler riot in the West Bank.
In a sign of the balancing act that American rabbis are navigating, the Reform movement’s leader, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, who has been among the earliest and most outspoken critics of the new Israeli government, will also be a featured speaker at Amplify Israel’s conference this May aiming to encourage Zionist sentiment among Reform Jews.
At the convention, the leader of the Central Conference of American Rabbis called for Reform clergy to move away from defining Israel in stark black-and-white terms — an apparent reference to Jews who speak of “pro-Israel” and “anti-Israel” forces.
“In order to connect better with those in our communities around Israel in a nuanced and meaningful way, we must be able to move beyond the pro/con dichotomy which only serves to divide us in ways that are a distraction to the actual issues at hand,” Rabbi Hara Person told the attendees. During the conference, the rabbis attended and voiced support for Israeli protests against their government.
“We are seeing a shift for the better, in my opinion, about how Jews are feeling comfortable critiquing Israel’s policies,” Rabbi Sarah Brammer-Shlay told JTA last fall, before the Israeli elections. Brammer-Shlay was a signer of the 2021 rabbinical students’ letter who graduated from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and today is a rabbi and chaplain at Grinnell College.
That kind of shift has Weinblatt worried. “Sometimes, rabbis are actually out of sync and out of touch with their congregations, who do want to hear messages of support of Israel,” he said.
That may well be the case, particularly at synagogues with aging populations, but survey data suggests that American Jews are moving to the left on Israel at the same time that Israel itself has shifted to the right. The most recent Pew Research Center survey of American Jews, in 2021, found that most have a negative opinion of Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; only one-third think Israel is making a sincere effort to achieve peace with Palestinians; and 10% support the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement against Israel.
While rabbis typically consider what they think their congregants want to hear, they aren’t bound to say it. And some rabbis say this moment is a time to take a stand, even if there is blowback.
Rabbi Jeremy Kalmanofsky of Congregation Ansche Chesed, a Conservative congregation on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, announced in December that his congregation would no longer recite the Prayer for the State of Israel, part of most congregations’ Shabbat morning liturgy since 1948. He said the extremism of Israel’s leadership meant the words no longer applied, and replaced the prayer with the more generally worded Prayer for Peace in Jerusalem.
”I couldn’t just say, ‘God, please guide our leaders well,’” Kalmanofsky said, pointing specifically to the fact that extremist politicians Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich were now government ministers who would be the beneficiaries of such prayer. “The things that they’re saying cannot possibly represent the Israel that I want to support.”
Kalmanofsky had not previously been outspoken as a critic of Israeli policy. He said he has faced some tough feedback from some in his community, including from those who believe this is a moment that demands more, not less, prayer for Israel — “not an unreasonable response,” he said. But a month into the liturgy change, he said he is confident he has made the right decision.
“Something really meaningful had changed in the public life of the state of Israel,” he said. “That deserved real recognition, and a real response.”
Continuing to focus on preserving a Jewish connection with Israel without “dealing like grown-ups” with its “very serious problems” would render the rabbinical voice irrelevant, Kalmanofsky said. “At best, we’re kind of like, ‘blind love, blind loyalty.’ And at worst, we’re totally obtuse, and have nothing meaningful to say about the real world.”
“If you’re going to have a pulpit,” Kalmanofsky added, “you’re going to have to use it once in a while.”
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The post American rabbis, wrestling with Israel’s behavior, weigh different approaches from the pulpit appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Imam-led walkout over Jewish participant at CUNY interfaith event draws wide condemnation
(JTA) — Jewish groups and government officials are condemning an incident at a recent interfaith event held on the campus of the City College of New York, at which a Muslim leader reportedly led a student walkout against the Hillel director after saying he refused to be “sitting next to a Zionist.”
The incident took place last week and was first reported Wednesday by the Times of Israel, which obtained a recording of the event hosted by the college’s Office of Student Inclusion Initiatives.
The imam let loose a series of remarks about Shariah law and “the filthy rich” before stating, “I came here to this event not knowing that I would be sitting next to a Zionist and this is something I’m not going to accept. My people are being killed right now in Gaza.”
He then added, “If you’re a Muslim, out of strength and dignity, I ask you to exit this room immediately.” Roughly 100 Muslim students followed him out the door, according to the report, and the chaplain hosting the event expressed disbelief.
“This is not dialogue — it is harassment,” the Anti-Defamation League’s New York chapter wrote on the social network X. The chapter’s director Scott Richman called the incident “a truly disgusting display of raw antisemitism not only by the imam but by the huge crowd of people there for an interfaith event who followed him out the door because a Jew was present.”
“We unequivocally condemn this gross display of antisemitism at City College of New York,” the Nexus Project, a progressive-leaning antisemitism watchdog group, wrote on social media.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul blasted the walkout as “antisemitism, plain and simple,” adding, “No one should be singled out, targeted, or shamed because they are Jewish.” She urged the City University of New York, the public university system that includes the campus, “to act swiftly to ensure accountability and protect every student’s safety.”
Hochul’s Republican opponent in next year’s governor race, Rep. Elise Stefanik, called CUNY “a hotbed of antisemitism.”
The federal Department of Justice, which has used its authority to pressure universities to quash antisemitism, also has an eye on the situation. “This is deeply concerning,” tweeted Associate Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon. “@CivilRights has questions and will look into this!”
The Hillel at City College, in an email to members, wrote, “Our concern is with one individual’s extremist rhetoric—not with Islam, not with Muslim students, and not with interfaith engagement itself.” It added that it was confident that City College would “respond appropriately” to the incident.
CUNY said it was aware of the incident and was investigating.
Jewish Insider later identified the Muslim speaker, who had identified himself only as “Abdullah” on the recording, as Abdullah Mady, a recent psychology graduate of the school who stayed on to pursue a master’s degree in medical translation. In a biography published online by his department, accompanied by a photograph in which he is wearing a keffiyeh, Mady says he aims to become a doctor.
Ilya Bratman, who runs the Hillel that serves City College as well as several other local public and private schools, told the Times of Israel that he was in attendance but that there were not many other Jewish students present because the Hillel had been hosting a talk with a Holocaust survivor in another room in the same building.
One Jewish student who was in attendance told the moderator after the walkout, “You’re in shock? We’re not, we’re used to it.”
The post Imam-led walkout over Jewish participant at CUNY interfaith event draws wide condemnation appeared first on The Forward.
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Kaploun leans on personal story and Holocaust education in bid to become Trump’s antisemitism envoy
(JTA) — Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as U.S. antisemitism envoy, pledged to elevate Holocaust education and combat what he called a “global problem” of ignorance-driven antisemitism during a Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday, while sidestepping the more partisan controversies that prompted a rebuke from a group of House Democrats ahead of the session.
“Together with bipartisan support, we must educate the world to respect one another,” Kaploun told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in an opening statement that drew heavily on his personal encounters with antisemitism — from childhood taunts in Brooklyn to the Crown Heights riots and the deaths of family members on 9/11 and Oct. 7.
“I pledge to all of you here, I will not waver and I will not rest … to fight antisemitism everywhere and to make this world a better arena for God to dwell,” he said.
Kaploun, a Hasidic rabbi, Miami-based businessman and Trump ally, cast antisemitism as “a symbol of a larger hatred” and warned that societies that tolerate it invite broader violence.
He emphasized repeatedly that the core of the job must be education — of Holocaust history, of Jewish life in America and of the “Judeo-Christian values our country was founded on.”
But committee Democrats pressed him on political issues, including the administration’s muted response to a friendly interview that right-wing commentator Tucker Carlson recently conducted with Nick Fuentes, a antisemitic influencer. Asked whether Trump’s comments about Carlson — praising him while declining to denounce Fuentes — were appropriate, Kaploun responded by stressing freedom of speech while asserting that the administration is clear in condemning antisemitism.
“You have a right to hate, but we have a right to explain and stand up and abhor everything that you say,” he said, adding that he believes in condemning antisemitic remarks “whenever they need to be condemned” while maintaining free expression rights.
The exchange came a day after 18 House Democrats urged the Senate to reject Kaploun’s nomination, citing his past comments about Democrats and his failure to publicly challenge Trump’s use of antisemitic tropes during the 2024 campaign. The letter also highlighted past litigation involving Kaploun in Miami, previously reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Kaploun pointed to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism when asked about distinguishing antisemitism from criticism of Israel. “Anyone has a right to criticize Israel,” but singling out the country while ignoring other global issues can cross the line, he said.
Outside groups were divided on Kaploun. In a letter to the committee, Orthodox Union Advocacy Center leaders Nathan Diament and Isaac Pretter did not explicitly endorse Kaploun but said he is “familiar with the issues facing Jews around the world” and has shown a willingness to work across the aisle, including by co-authoring a JTA op-ed earlier this year with the two previous antisemitism envoys. But another national Jewish group, the liberal Zionist New Jewish Network, came out in direct opposition and called on senators to reject the nomination. “The administration’s weaponization of antisemitism has been appalling. Confirmation of Rabbi Kaploun adds insult to injury,” wrote the group’s CEO, Hadar Susskind.
The committee has not yet scheduled a vote on the nomination.
The post Kaploun leans on personal story and Holocaust education in bid to become Trump’s antisemitism envoy appeared first on The Forward.
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Amid Push for Gaza Role, Palestinian Authority Continues Paying Terrorists, Teaching Antisemitic Hatred
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas looks on as he visits the Istishari Cancer Center in Ramallah, in the West Bank, May 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Torokman
As Western powers push for the Palestinian Authority to take a leading role in post-war Gaza, the government body has not delivered on promises of reform, continuing payments to terrorists and using school textbooks that glorify violence, demonize Israelis, and promote antisemitic themes.
On Wednesday, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar denounced the Palestinian Authority (PA) for nearly doubling its payments under its so-called “pay-for-slay” program — from $144 million in 2024 to $214 million so far in 2025 — despite the PA’s repeated promises of reform.
“The Palestinian Authority hasn’t stopped its payments of salaries to terrorists and their families. In fact, it is nearly doubling them,” the top Israeli diplomat said in a post on X.
“I call on Europe and the world to hold the PA accountable for funding terrorism. Stop Pay-for-Slay NOW!” he continued.
The Palestinian Authority hasn’t stopped its payments of salaries to terrorists and their families. In fact, it is nearly doubling them.
In 2024, it paid 144M dollars (€124M). In 2025, it has already committed 214M dollars (€185M) toward Pay-for-Slay, and the year isn’t even… pic.twitter.com/Iwyuy3le6y
— Gideon Sa’ar | גדעון סער (@gidonsaar) November 19, 2025
Even though PA President Mahmoud Abbas announced plans to reform the system earlier this year, new media reports reveal that Palestinian leadership has continued to issue payments.
The European Union (EU) is now demanding clarification on whether the “pay-for-slay” program is still operating through bypass channels, according to Euronews.
Western countries have been pushing for the PA to undergo internal reforms, aiming for the group to take control of Gaza after the war under the US-backed peace plan, despite strong Israeli objections.
The PA, which has long been riddled with accusations of corruption, has also maintained for years the “pay-for-slay” program, which rewards terrorists and their families for carrying out attacks against Israelis.
Under the policy, the Palestinian Authority Martyr’s Fund makes official payments to Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, the families of “martyrs” killed in attacks on Israelis, and injured Palestinian terrorists.
Reports estimate that approximately 8 percent of the PA’s budget is allocated to paying stipends to convicted terrorists and their families.
This week, Israeli officials visited Brussels to present evidence to the bloc that the old “pay-for-slay” program is still operating and may be using funds that EU member states had originally donated for other purposes.
“We understand that a recent payment has been made to the families of prisoners, based on a previous scheme. We profoundly regret this decision, as this seems to go against prior announcements,” the EU Commission told Euronews.
However, the European bloc rejected any suggestion that its funds were involved in the recent payments.
“EU support to the PA is linked to its efforts to pursue the reform agenda,” the EU Commission said.
For years, the EU has been the largest provider of external assistance to the group, allocating approximately $1.47 billion bilaterally between 2021 and 2024.
As the international community seeks to chart a path for Gaza’s reconstruction after the Israel-Hamas war, the PA is maneuvering to take a leading role in the war-torn enclave, despite Israeli objections and with the backing of Western powers — a move that experts say is unlikely to succeed given the PA’s lack of credibility and support for terrorism against Israel.
Along with pledging to reform the “pay-for-slay” program, Abbas has also repeatedly reaffirmed his commitment to long-promised administrative reforms, even saying he intends to hold presidential and general elections after the war under international supervision.
The PA leader was elected to a four-year term in 2005, and he has not held elections since then.
Beyond payments to terrorists, the PA has also repeatedly promised Western powers to reform its school textbooks, which for years have notoriously promoted antisemitism and hatred for Israel.
Despite the PA’s promises, its textbooks continue to glorify violence, demonize Israelis, propagate antisemitic themes, and promote an exclusivist nationalist narrative.
On Wednesday, the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), a nonprofit organization that analyzes schoolbooks and curricula around the world, released a new study analyzing 290 textbooks and 71 teachers’ guides used across multiple grades, finding that not a single reform has been made to address previous problematic content that promotes violence and incites hatred.
IMPACT-se’s report on the 2025–26 Palestinian Authority curriculum reveals a disturbing reality: Palestinian children are still being indoctrinated with the glorification of violence, antisemitism, promotion of martyrdom and the rejection of peace—embedded even in math and…
— IMPACT-SE (@IMPACT_SE) November 19, 2025
For years, PA-issued textbooks have been criticized for promoting extremism and undermining efforts to encourage peaceful coexistence with Israelis.
According to the newly released report, the textbooks’ content remains unchanged despite the PA’s explicit promises to reform the curriculum and public assurances from European officials that such reforms were underway.
IMPACT-se CEO Marcus Sheff said the findings “expose a stark and disturbing reality.”
“Virulent antisemitism, the glorification of jihad, and incitement to violence remain deeply embedded across all grades of Palestinian Authority textbooks,” Sheff said in a statement.
For example, Jews and Israelis continue to be portrayed as inherently evil, manipulative, corrupt, or as enemies of Islam, perpetuating deeply rooted antisemitic stereotypes, while the demonization of Israel remains a persistent and striking theme throughout the textbooks.
An 11th-grade history textbook features a cartoon with antisemitic imagery portraying Jews as controlling the world, including a black-and-white image labeled “cultural colonialism” showing two arms gripping a globe — one holding an American flag, the other an Israeli flag.
In a 10th-grade history textbook, it is claimed that after World War II, “the Zionists hoped the US would support the establishment of their national homeland in Palestine — by exploiting their political, media and financial influence in the United States.”
Another example comes from a 9th-grade civics textbook, which claims that Israel “deliberately releases herds of pigs” to damage Palestinian crops and undermine the Palestinian economy.
The newly released study also warns that the textbooks promote and justify violence against Jews and Israelis, fostering a culture of aggression and hostility.
In an 11th-grade history textbook, the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre — where 11 Israeli athletes and delegation members were killed — is depicted as a legitimate form of Palestinian resistance.
“The Palestinian resistance resorted to many methods in its struggle against the Zionist occupation. The fedayeen primarily used guerrilla warfare inside Palestinian territories, and also struck Zionist interests abroad — such as the Munich operation in 1972,” the book says.
According to the IMPACT-SE report, references to Jewish history and Israeli-Arab diplomatic efforts have been completely removed from the 2025–2026 textbooks, with any content promoting non-violence or compromise absent and the Holocaust entirely ignored.
The PA had committed to curriculum reforms earlier this year in order to secure over $462 million in economic support from the European Union, contingent on meeting specific education-related benchmarks.