Uncategorized
Biden plan to combat antisemitism demands reforms across the executive branch and beyond
WASHINGTON (JTA) — President Joe Biden unveiled a multifaceted and broad strategy to combat antisemitism in the United States that reaches from basketball courts to farming communities, from college campuses to police departments.
“We must say clearly and forcefully that antisemitism and all forms of hate and violence have no place in America,” Biden said in a prerecorded video. “Silence is complicity.”
The 60-page document and its list of more than 100 recommendations stretches across the government, requiring reforms in virtually every sector of the executive branch within a year. It was formulated after consultations with over a thousand experts, and covers a range of tactics, from increased security funding to a range of educational efforts.
The plan has been in the works since December, and the White House has consulted with large Jewish organizations throughout the process. The finished document embraces proposals that large Jewish organizations have long advocated, as well as initiatives that pleasantly surprised Jewish organizational leaders, most of whom praised it upon its release.
Among the proposals that Jewish leaders have called for were recommendations to streamline reporting of hate crimes across local, state and federal law enforcement agencies, which will enable the government to accurately assess the breadth of hate crimes. The proposal also recommends that Congress double the funds available to nonprofits for security measures, from $180 million to $360 million.
One proposal that, if enacted, could be particularly far-reaching — and controversial — is a call for Congress to pass “fundamental reforms” to a provision that shields social media platforms from liability for the content users post on their sites. The plan says social media companies should have a “zero tolerance policy for hate speech on their platforms.”
In addition, the plan calls for action in partnership with a range of government agencies and private entities. It says the government will work with professional sports leagues to educate fans about antisemitism and hold athletes accountable for it, following instances of antisemitic speech by figures such as NBA star Kyrie Irving or NFL player DeSean Jackson.
The government will also partner with rural museums and libraries to educate their visitors about Jewish heritage and antisemitism. And the plan includes actions to be taken by a number of cabinet departments, from the Department of Veterans Affairs to the USDA.
“It’s really producing a whole-of-government approach that stretches from what you might consider the obvious things like more [security] grants and more resources for the Justice Department and the FBI,” said Nathan Diament, the Washington director of the Orthodox Union. “But it stretches all the way across things that the Department of Labor and the Small Business Administration can do with regard to educating about antisemitism, that the National Endowment of the Humanities and the President’s Council on Sports and Fitness can do with regard to the institutions that they deal with.”
An array of Jewish organizations from the left to the center-right echoed those sentiments in welcoming the plan with enthusiasm, marking a change from recent weeks in which they had been split over how the plan should define antisemitism. Still, a handful of right-wing groups blasted the strategy, saying that its chosen definition of antisemitism diluted the term.
Despite the relatively united front, there are elements of the strategy that may stoke broader controversy: Among a broad array of partner groups named in the plan is the Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose harsh criticism of Israel has led to relations with centrist Jewish organizations that are fraught at best. The call to place limits on social media platforms may also upset free speech advocates.
Biden recalled, as he often does, that he decided to run for president after President Donald Trump equivocated while condemning the neo-Nazis who organized a deadly march in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.
“Repeated episodes of hate — including numerous attacks on Jewish Americans — have since followed Charlottesville, shaking our moral conscience as Americans and challenging the values for which we stand as a Nation,” Biden wrote in an introduction to the report.
The administration launched the initiative last December, after years during which Jewish groups and the FBI reported sharp spikes in antisemitic incidents. The strategy was originally planned for release at its Jewish American Heritage Month celebration last week, but was delayed, in part because of last minute internal squabbling over whether it would accept a definition of antisemitism that some on the left said chilled free speech on Israel. Some right-wing groups were deeply critical of the new strategy for not accepting that definition to the exclusion of others.
Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the executive vice president of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad) praised the breadth of the plan, and said the delay seemed to produce results.
“The White House has taken this very seriously. The phrase that something is still being worked on can often be a euphemism for a lack of concern,” he said. “In this case, it seems to have resulted in an even more comprehensive and hopefully more effective result.”
Some of the initiatives in the plan focus less on directly confronting antisemitism and more on promoting tolerance of and education about Jews.The Biden Administration will seek to ensure accommodations for Jewish religious observance, the accompanying fact sheet said, and “the Department of Agriculture will work to ensure equal access to all USDA feeding programs for USDA customers with religious dietary needs, including kosher and halal dietary needs.”
Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League CEO who was closely consulted on the strategy, said promoting inclusion was as critical as fighting antisemitism. “Is FEMA giving kosher provisions after disasters going to solve antisemitism?” he said in an interview. “No, but… it’s an acknowledgement of the plurality of communities and the need to treat Jewish people like you would any other minority community, and I think I’m very pleased to see that.”
In the months since Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, who is Jewish, convened a roundtable to launch the initiative, the Biden administration has pivoted from focusing on the threat of antisemitism from the far-right to also highlighting its manifestation in other spheres — including amid anti-Israel activism on campuses and the targeting of visibly religious Jews in the northeast. Those factors were evident in the strategy.
“Some traditionally observant Jews, especially traditional Orthodox Jews, are victimized while walking down the street,” the strategy said in its introduction. “Jewish students and educators are targeted for derision and exclusion on college campuses, often because of their real or perceived views about the State of Israel.”
The proposal that may provoke controversy beyond American Jewry is the Biden Administration’s calls to reform the tech sector, which echo bipartisan recommendations to change Section 230, a provision of U.S. law that grants platforms immunity from being liable for the content users post. Free speech advocates and the companies themselves say that if the government were to police online speech, it would veer into censorship.
“Tech companies have a critical role to play and for that reason the strategy contains 10 separate calls to tech companies to establish a zero tolerance policy for hate speech on their platforms, to ensure that their algorithms do not pass along hate speech and extreme content to users and to listen more closely to Jewish groups to better understand how antisemitism manifests itself on their platforms,” Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, Biden’s top Homeland Security adviser, said during a 30-minute briefing on the strategy on Thursday. “The president has also called on Congress to remove the special immunity for online platforms and to impose stronger transparency requirements in order to ensure that tech companies are removing content that violates their terms of service.”
Neo-Nazis and white supremacists encircle counterprotesters at the base of a statue of Thomas Jefferson after marching through the University of Virginia campus with torches in Charlottesville, Va., Aug. 11, 2017. (Shay Horse/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
In the weeks before the rollout, a debate raged online and behind the scenes amid Jewish organizations and activists about how the plan would define antisemitism. Centrist and right-wing groups pushed for the plan to embrace the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition. Among its examples of anti-Jewish bigotry are those focusing on when Israel criticism is antisemitic, including when “double standards” applied to Israel are antisemitic.
Advocates on the left say those clauses turn legitimate criticism of Israel into hate speech; instead, they pushed to include references to the Nexus Document, a definition authored by academics that recognizes IHRA but seeks to complement it by further elucidating how anti-Israel expression may be antisemitic in some instances, and not in others. Others sought to include the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism, which rejects IHRA’s Israel-related examples.
In the end, the strategy said the U.S. government recognizes the IHRA definition as the “most prominent” and “appreciates the Nexus Document and notes other such efforts.”
A number of the centrist groups pressed for exclusive reference to IHRA, including the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. Those groups praised the strategy and focused only on its embrace of IHRA. So did the Israeli ambassador to Washington, Michael Herzog.
“I would like to congratulate the Biden administration for publishing the first ever national strategy to combat antisemitism,” Herzog wrote on Twitter. “Thank you, @POTUS, for prioritizing the need to confront antisemitism in all its forms. We welcome the re-embracing of @TheIHRA definition which is the gold standard definition of antisemitism.”
Some center-right groups like B’nai Brith International, StandWithUs and the World Jewish Congress, praised the strategy while expressing regret at the inclusion of Nexus. Right-wing groups, such as the Republican Jewish Coalition and Christians United for Israel condemned the rollout.
RJC said Biden “blew it” by not exclusively using the IHRA definition. The Brandeis Center, which defends pro-Israel groups and students on campus, said the “substance doesn’t measure up.”
Groups on the left, however, broadly praised the strategy. “We call on our Jewish communities to seize this historic moment and build on this new strategy to ensure that the fight for Jewish safety is a fight for a better and safer America for all,” said a statement from six left-leaning groups spearheaded by Jews For Racial & Economic Justice.
Greenblatt said it was predictable that groups on the left would take the win and that groups on the right would grumble — but that it was also beside the point. IHRA, he said, was now U.S. policy.
“This document elevates and advances IHRA as the way that U.S. policy will be formulated going forward and across all of the agencies,” Greenblatt said. “That is a win.”
—
The post Biden plan to combat antisemitism demands reforms across the executive branch and beyond appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Trump has no vision for what comes next in the Middle East
Buried within the long, maudlin, combative, occasionally moving and never modest verbiage of President Donald Trump’s Tuesday State of the Union address was this uncomfortable truth: Trump has no idea what comes next in the Middle East.
In discussing two conflicts that have drawn intense attention over the past year — those in Gaza and Iran — he offered a downright confusing picture of what the future has to offer.
When the president finally touched on foreign policy, after he had already been speaking for nearly an hour and a half, he credited himself with ending eight wars — a figure that’s worth questioning.
“The war in Gaza, which proceeds at a very low level, it’s just about there,” he said.
The Gaza war is over, maybe
There is no doubt Gaza is closer to peace than it was when Trump took office. The deal he forged between Israel and Hamas is so far the greatest foreign policy accomplishment of his second term.
But “just about there?”
Israel has killed about 600 Palestinians, including many civilians, since the ceasefire. Meanwhile, Hamas has not disarmed, and in fact, according to the Times of Israel, has begun inserting itself in new Trump-backed governing bodies in Gaza.
More than 80% of the structures in the Strip were destroyed in the conflict that began when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Rebuilding will take many years, and billions of dollars. Of the 200,000 temporary housing units humanitarian agencies estimate the enclave needs, only 4,000 have been delivered or on their way.
The much-heralded Trump peace plan, in other words, is on shaky ground.
That explains why Trump thanked Hamas, as he has done in previous speeches this month, for helping to find the bodies of dead hostages.
“Believe it or not, Hamas worked along with Israel,” Trump said, “and they dug and they dug and they dug. It’s a tough, tough thing to do, going through bodies all over, passing up 100 bodies, sometimes for each one that they found.”
Why not mention that Hamas wouldn’t have had to do such hard, noble work if it hadn’t attacked and killed Israelis in the first place? Because the odd compliment — thanking murderers for returning their victims’ bodies — was Trump playing to reality. If his signature diplomatic initiative is to succeed, he needs Hamas and its patrons to go along. So far, the group is stalling when it comes to disarmament. If he can’t persuade them to take that step, his signature peace effort is done for.
An awareness of just how treacherous this situation is explains why Trump’s Gaza comments focused largely on his success at negotiating the return of Israel’s hostages, both living and dead.
“And those parents who had a dead son,” Trump said, “they always told me that boy, they wanted him as much as though he were living.”
Trump didn’t offer a vision, as he has in the past, of a prosperous Gaza; of Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords; and of Israel at peace with its neighbors. He didn’t even mention his pet initiative, the Board of Peace — surprising, given that the body met for the first time just last week. The Middle East has a way of lowering expectations, and in the State of the Union, Trump wasn’t selling anything but the successful return of the dead.
The Iran war that isn’t, yet
On Iran, Trump was, if possible, even more confusing.
The United States has sent its largest military force in decades to the Middle East, which means we are once again — maybe — on the verge of a Middle East war. But Trump’s case for conflict — and explanation of how things got to this point — was lackluster.
He claimed that Operation Midnight Hammer, the June 2025 U.S. strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, “obliterated Iran’s nuclear weapons program.”
But evidently, a program that was “obliterated” is somehow, less than a year later, an imminent threat. In the very next sentence, Trump said Tehran is now trying to rebuild its nuclear facilities and develop missiles that could reach the United States. (The simpler and more factual explanation: actually, nothing got obliterated in the first place.)
While claiming that the Iranian regime recently killed 32,000 of its own people during nationwide protests — an exact death toll is still elusive — he offered the country a path to survival: give up nuclear weapons.
But what sounds like a clear demand really isn’t. Nuclear diplomacy takes a long time and great delicacy. Trump, who favors swift resolutions, has backed himself into a corner: The military is already there, and the world is waiting with baited breath.
Plus, Americans don’t want to go to war. Some 49% of Americans oppose an attack on Iran, with just 27% in support of one, according to a YouGov poll this month. Independents oppose the idea by 54%, and Republicans support it by only 58%.
What’s a president who has staked his second-term reputation on his ability to win big and make peace supposed to do?
For now, the lack of specificity gives Trump room to waffle on whether or not to go to war — and try to make a case for what specific, achievable aims he would have in doing so.
In a clear sign that he doesn’t yet have answers for those questions, Trump’s language on Tuesday sounded awfully familiar. “I will never allow the world’s number one sponsor of terror to have a nuclear weapon,“ he said. “My preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy.”
Compare that to former President Barack Obama’s 2012 State of the Union.
“Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon,” Obama said, “and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal. But a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible, and far better.”
Maybe Trump has a clear idea of what comes next for Gaza and Iran. Or maybe we’ve just gone back to the future.
The post Trump has no vision for what comes next in the Middle East appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Memories of a subway passenger
דערצויגן געוואָרן אין דער שטאָט ניו־יאָרק, בײַ אַ משפּחה וואָס האָט נישט פֿאַרמאָגט קיין אויטאָ, האָב איך אַ גרויסן חלק פֿון מײַן לעבן „אויסגעלעבט“ אויף דער אונטערבאַן („סאָבוויי“). הגם הײַנט פֿאָר איך בדרך־כּלל מיט מיט דער מחוץ־שטאָטישער באַן „מעטראָ־נאָרט“, מוז איך מודה זײַן, אַז מײַנע יאָרן אויף דער אונטערבאַן האָבן זיכער געהאָלפֿן צו אַנטוויקלען בײַ מיר דאָס געפֿיל פֿון אַן עכטן ניו־יאָרקער.
אין עלטער פֿון 11 יאָר, למשל, זענען איך און מײַן 10־יאָריקע שוועסטער, גיטל, יעדע וואָך, נאָך די קלאַסן, געפֿאָרן מיט דער אונטערבאַן פֿינף סטאַנציעס צו אונדזער פּיאַנע־לעקציע. וואָס איז דער חידוש, פֿרעגט איר? איר קענט זיך אויסמאָלן, אַז צוויי אומשולדיקע מיידלעך, טראָגנדיק קליידלעך און צעפּלעך, זאָלן הײַנט פֿאָרן, אָן שום באַגלייטונג פֿון אַ דערוואַקסענעם — אויף דער אונטערבאַן? איך — נישט. פֿונדעסטוועגן, מיין איך, אַז דאָס האָט אונדז געגעבן אַ געוויסן נישט־באַוווּסטזיניקן קוראַזש, וואָס פֿעלט הײַנט די קינדער, וואָס זייערע עלטערן מוזן זיי פֿירן אינעם אויטאָ פֿון איין אָרט צום צווייטן.
איך האָב ליב געהאַט צו לייענען די רעקלאַמעס אין וואַגאָן. איך געדענק, למשל, די מעלדונגען וועגן דעם יערלעכן שיינקייט־קאָנקורס, „מיס סאָבווייס“. עטלעכע וואָכן פֿאַרן קאָנקורס, איז אין יעדן וואַגאָן געהאָנגען אַ בילד פֿון די זעקס פֿינאַליסטקעס. פֿלעג איך מיט גיטלען איבערלייענען זייערע קליינע ביאָגראַפֿיעס — בדרך־כּלל, סטודענטקעס, סעקרעטאַרשעס, זינגערינס, און טענצערינס — און דיסקוטירן מיט איר, ווער ס׳וואָלט געדאַרפֿט געווינען די „אונטערערדישע קרוין“. איך פֿלעג זיך אָפֿט מאָל חידושן, ווי אַזוי איינע מיט אַ גרויסער נאָז אָדער געדיכטע ברעמען האָט דערגרייכט אַזאַ מדרגה, אַז איר פּנים זאָל באַצירן יעדן וואַגאָן פֿון דער ניו־יאָרקער באַן־סיסטעם.
איך האָב זיך אויך געלערנט מײַנע ערשטע שפּאַנישע זאַצן אויף דער אונטערבאַן. אין יעדן וואַגאָן איז געהאָנגען אַ וואָרענונג אויף ענגליש און אויף שפּאַניש: „די רעלסן פֿון דער אונטערבאַן זענען געפֿערלעך. אויב די באַן שטעלט זיך אָפּ צווישן די סטאַנציעס, בלײַבט אינעווייניק. גייט נישט אַרויס. וואַרט אויף די אינסטרוקציעס פֿון די קאָנדוקטאָרן אָדער דער פּאָליציי“. גיטל און איך האָבן זיך אויסגעלערנט אויף אויסנווייניק די שפּאַנישע שורות, און זיי איבערגעחזרט אַזוי פֿיל מאָל, ביז די ווערטער האָבן זיך בײַ אונדז אַראָפּגעקײַקלט פֿון דער צונג ווי בײַ אמתע פּוערטאָ־ריקאַנער. און ס׳איז אונדז צו ניץ געקומען: אַז מיר זענען געשטאַנען ערגעץ צווישן מענטשן, און געוואָלט אויסזען ווי אמתע שפּאַניש־רעדער, האָבן מיר אויסגעשאָסן די שפּאַנישע שורות מיט אַזאַ טראַסק, אַז אַ נישט־שפּאַניש רעדער וואָלט געקענט מיינען, מיר טיילן זיך מיט עפּעס אַ זאַפֿטיקער פּליאָטקע.
מײַנע דרײַ בנים האָבן שטאַרק ליב געהאַט צו פֿאָרן אויף דער אונטערבאַן. קינדווײַז פֿלעגן זיי צודריקן די פּנימלעך צו די פֿענצטער, סײַ ווען די באַן איז געפֿאָרן אין דרויסן, סײַ אינעם פֿינצטערן טונעל. מײַן עלטסטער, יאַנקל, האָט צוויי מאָל געפּרוּווט צו פֿאַרווירקלעכן זײַנס אַ חלום: צו פֿאָרן, במשך פֿון איין טאָג, אויף יעדער ליניע פֿון דער גאַנצער סיסטעם, פֿון דער #1 ביז דער #7; פֿון דער A־באַן ביז דער Z. (מע דאַרף האָבן אַ מאַטעמאַטישן קאָפּ דאָס אויסצופּלאָנטערן.) ביידע מאָל האָט יאַנקל באַוויזן צו פֿאָרן אויף אַלע ליניעס… אַחוץ איינער. נישט קיין חידוש, אַז בײַ אונדז אין דער היים איז יאָרן לאַנג געהאָנגען אינעם שפּריץ אַ פֿירהאַנג מיט אַ ריזיקע מאַפּע פֿון דער אונטערבאַן.
הײַנט האָב איך אַ ספּעציעלע הנאה צו פֿאָרן אויף דער אונטערבאַן מיט מײַנע אייניקלעך. פּונקט ווי עס האָבן קינדווײַז געטאָן זייערע טאַטעס, קוקן זיי אויך אַרויס פֿון פֿענצטער און קאָמענטירן וועגן אַלץ וואָס פֿליט פֿאַרבײַ. ווער ווייסט? אפֿשר וועלן זיי אויך מיט דער צײַט זיך אויסלערנען די ציפֿערן און אותיות פֿון יעדער באַנליניע און דערבײַ אַליין פֿאַרוואַנדלט ווערן אין עכטע ניו־יאָרקער.
The post Memories of a subway passenger appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Trump administration files lawsuit against UCLA, saying it failed to protect Jewish and Israeli employees
(JTA) — The Department of Justice filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday accusing the leadership of UCLA of allowing an antisemitic work environment on campus, intensifying the Trump administration’s long-running scrutiny of the Los Angeles campus.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in the Central District of California, alleges UCLA failed to protect Jewish and Israeli faculty and staff from harassment following the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel and the protests that spread across American universities afterward.
The complaint was filed the same day President Donald Trump is scheduled to deliver the first State of the Union address of his second term, in which he is expected to cite the administration’s broader confrontations with higher education institutions as evidence of its successes. It also comes roughly three months after nine Justice Department attorneys resigned from the government’s University of California antisemitism investigation, telling the Los Angeles Times they believed the probe had become politicized.
The lawsuit says that antisemitic conduct at UCLA became widespread after Oct. 7 and persisted through the 2023-24 academic year. According to the lawsuit, Jewish and Israeli employees were subjected to threats, classroom disruptions, antisemitic graffiti and, at times, were blocked from parts of campus during protests.
The government places particular emphasis on the spring 2024 Royce Quad encampment, when pro-Palestinian demonstrators established a tent protest in the center of campus. The Justice Department alleges UCLA failed to enforce its own campus rules, allowing protests that disrupted university operations and contributed to what it describes as a hostile workplace.
“Based on our investigation, UCLA administrators allegedly allowed virulent anti-Semitism to flourish on campus,” Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a DOJ press release announcing the lawsuit. Harmeet K. Dhillon, who leads the department’s Civil Rights Division, described the alleged incidents as “a mark of shame” if proven true.
UCLA officials rejected the government’s characterization, pointing instead to changes made under Chancellor Julio Frenk.
“As Chancellor Frenk has made clear: Antisemitism is abhorrent and has no place at UCLA or anywhere,” vice chancellor of strategic communications Mary Osako said in a statement. She cited investments in campus safety, the launch of UCLA’s Initiative to Combat Antisemitism, the reorganization of the university’s civil rights office, the hiring of a dedicated Title VI and Title VII officer and strengthened protest policies.
“We stand firmly by the decisive actions we have taken to combat antisemitism in all its forms, and we will vigorously defend our efforts and our unwavering commitment to providing a safe, inclusive environment for all members of our community,” Osako said.
Frenk, who is Jewish, has spoken publicly about antisemitism in higher education. In an essay published by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last year, he invoked the history of German universities under Nazism, warning that those institutions “never recovered after driving Jews out” and urging American colleges to confront antisemitism while preserving academic freedom and open debate.
The new lawsuit follows earlier legal battles over campus protests at UCLA. In July 2025, the university agreed to pay $6.13 million to settle a lawsuit brought by Jewish students and a Jewish professor who said demonstrators had blocked access to parts of campus. Under that agreement, UCLA said it would ensure protesters could not restrict movement or access to university spaces.
Campus tensions over speech and security have continued more recently. Bari Weiss, the journalist and founder of The Free Press, withdrew this month from a scheduled appearance at UCLA as part of the Daniel Pearl Memorial Lecture series. Weiss had been invited to speak on “The Future of Journalism” but canceled the event, citing security concerns ahead of the lecture.
The post Trump administration files lawsuit against UCLA, saying it failed to protect Jewish and Israeli employees appeared first on The Forward.