Uncategorized
From Texas to Tel Aviv, invitations go out to Jews fleeing ‘Mamdani’s New York’
(JTA) — Just hours after New York City’s mayor election was called for Zohran Mamdani, a top Israeli official issued an invitation.
“New York will never be the same again, especially not for its Jewish community,” Diaspora Minister Amichai Chikli tweeted. “I invite the Jews of New York to seriously consider making their new home in the Land of Israel.”
Chikli’s call dovetailed with another appeal to Jewish New Yorkers made by a spokesman for the Jewish settlement in Hebron, Yishai Fleisher.
“Indeed, it was a great run, and you were a blessing to NYC. But Jews will feel less and less comfortable in the Big Apple,” tweeted Fleisher. “So do yourself a favor, buy real estate in the Land of Israel.”
The outreach from Israel sought to reach the majority of New York Jews who voted against Mamdani, many of whom saw his criticism of Israel as a warning sign for the safety of the city’s Jewish communities under his leadership.
While Mamdani has frequently reiterated a commitment to protecting Jewish New Yorkers, the impulse to flee the city following his win loomed large over Jews attending Andrew Cuomo’s event on election night, when the former governor came in second.
“One-hundred percent people are going to be leaving New York City under this mayorship,” said Joshua Friedman, a 32-year-old Orthodox Jew from the Upper East Side, in an interview. “There’s no reason to stay. Someone that hates you in your own backyard, why would you want to be here?”
After the election was called, Victoria Zurkiev, an Orthodox Queens resident and social media influencer at the event, said she predicted that “people who are successful will leave New York because they wouldn’t want to put their life in danger.”
“I believe that there is no life with Jewish people in New York going forward,” Zurkiev said. “I’m a New Yorker, this is my town, and to now sit there and think, where are we going next? It’s pretty sad.”
Vowing to move after a disappointing election result is almost a cliche, and not just for Jews in New York — exit talk is high among the wealthy in the city, whom Mamdani hopes to tax at a higher rate.
But actually leaving — and uprooting homes, careers and family life in the process — is much rarer. Still, while it remains unclear how many Jewish New Yorkers will finalize plans to leave the city, some communities have begun pitching themselves as destinations.
In Annapolis, Maryland, which currently has a Jewish candidate leading its mayoral race, plans for a new Jewish federation to serve the state’s capital and Chesapeake region were quickly shored up to coincide with New York City’s election outcome, according to Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, a co-founder of the new federation.
“We do expect that we’ll be making an appeal to new Jewish New Yorkers,” Laszlo Mizrahi, who is active in Democratic politics, said in an interview. “We feel that we are uniquely well positioned for people who want to have a warm and wonderful Jewish life that is without drama.”
Rabbi Marc Schneier, a prominent rabbi of the Hampton Synagogue and friend of Cuomo, announced that he was planning to build the first Jewish day school in the Hamptons.
“This is in anticipation of the thousands of Jewish families that will flock to the Hamptons and greater Suffolk County to escape the antisemitic climate of Mamdani’s New York City,” Schneier wrote in a post on Facebook.
Les Schachter, the board president of Congregation Nishmat Am, a Conservative synagogue in Plano, Texas, issued an “open invitation” to New York’s Jews to settle in North Texas.
“With the recent changes in New York City’s political leadership, I’ve heard from many Jewish families and business owners who are weighing their options,” said Schachter in an email. “If you’re considering a new start, I invite you to look closely at Plano and the greater North Texas region — where Jewish life is thriving, community is strong, and you’ll be genuinely, unmistakably welcome.”
Michael Benmeleh, a real estate agent in Miami, a city with a sizable, and growing, Jewish population, also emailed an appeal to Jewish New Yorkers on Thursday, writing “Tired of traffic, taxes, and Mamdani? Stop kvetching, start packing.”
Perhaps the most intense response has come from Israel, a country built in large part by Jews who left places that had gone from hospitable to hostile. While Chikli and Fleisher are right-wing figures, the assumption that New York Jews would want to leave was so widespread that it was the subject of a skit on the satirical show “Eretz Nehederet.”
In the skit, a New Yorker and an Israeli fleeing their home countries cross paths at Ben Gurion Airport. The New Yorker making aliyah says, “Trust me, it’s just not safe for Jews,” to which the Israeli, on his way to New York, replies, “You literally came to the most dangerous place for Jews on the planet.”
A poll of 501 Israelis published Thursday found that nearly half said they would avoid traveling to New York while Mamdani is mayor. The Jerusalem Post dedicated its front page on Thursday to an image of a disintegrating Statue of Liberty under the headline “Jews at risk in New York City.” And a satirical image shouting out Mamdani as the employee of the month at Nefesh B’Nefesh, an agency that supports Jews in claiming Israeli citizenship, went viral on social media.
Widespread social media comments suggest that some New York Jews at least thinking about moving to Israel, or making aliyah, in response to Mamdani’s election can be found widely.
“We need to take all our money, all our business, and ourselves and go back home to Israel,” one Jewish New Yorker who said she had already “updated my Aliyah paperwork” wrote in a Facebook comment. “Not because we are afraid ( even though many of us are) but because we need to SHOW the world why it looks like when we take away all we give and bring it to the only place we are safe- Israel.”
But even among those who see Mamdani’s win as a potent portent of antisemitic trouble, the idea of a Jewish exit from the biggest Jewish city in the world doesn’t always hold attraction.
“Don’t allow anyone to push you out,” Mayor Eric Adams told the Israeli journalist Neria Kraus in July, months before he dropped out of the election Mamdani won. “If I’m a Jewish person I’m not plotting out my plan to flee. You’re not going to run around the country every time someone does something antisemitic.”
Rabbi Tali Adler, a faculty member at Yeshivat Hadar who lives in New York City, wrote in a Facebook post the morning after the election that she understood why Jews in the city were scared about its result. But, she reminded them, thinking about or planning to flee was not the only traditional Jewish path ahead of them.
“We are the descendants of ancestors who not only knew when to leave, but so much more often, how to stay,” Adler wrote.
The post From Texas to Tel Aviv, invitations go out to Jews fleeing ‘Mamdani’s New York’ appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
Tidbits: Taiwan opens its first Jewish cemetery
Tidbits is a Forverts feature of easy news briefs in Yiddish that you can listen to or read, or both! If you read the article and don’t know a word, just click on it and the translation appears. Listen to the report here:
אויפֿן אינדזל טײַוואַן האָט מען לעצטנס פֿאַרלייגט דעם ערשטן בית־עולם אין לאַנד, דרײַ יאָר נאָך דעם ווי אַן אָרטיקער ייִד האָט, בײַם גוססן, אויסגעדריקט צער, וואָס מע וועט אים נישט קענען באַגראָבן אין טײַוואַן.
הרבֿ שלמה טאַביב, אַ מיטגרינדער פֿונעם חב״ד־הויז אין דער טײַוואַנער קרוינשטאָט טײַפּיי, האָט געזאָגט אַז דער ייִד האָט אים געבעטן בויען אַ בית־הקבֿרות אין טײַוואַן, כאָטש ער האָט געוווּסט אַז ער אַליין וועט נישט דערלעבן דאָרט באַגראָבן צו ווערן.
„זײַנע ווערטער זענען פֿאַר מיר געווען אַ קול־קורא,“ האָט טאַביב געזאָגט. „איך האָב פֿאַרשטאַנען, אַז אויב איך וועל זיך דאָס נישט אונטערנעמען, וועט קיינער עס נישט טאָן.“
מיט אַ חודש צוריק האָט מען פֿאַרלייגט דעם בית־עולם און באַלד נאָך דעם האָט טאַביב אָנגעפֿירט מיט דער ערשטער לוויה על־פּי־הלכה אין דער געשיכטע פֿון טײַוואַן. 95% פֿון די מתים אין טײַוואַן ווערן קרעמירט.
דער בית־עולם געפֿינט זיך אין אַ וואַלד, בערך 40 מינוט פֿונעם חב״ד־הויז. פֿאַר טאַביב איז דער בית־עולם געווען דאָס לעצטע רינגל אין אַ קייט פּראָיעקטן לטובֿת דער אָרטיקער ייִדישער קהילה. אין 2021 האָט מען געעפֿנט אַ ייִדישן קהילה־צענטער, אַ דאַנק אַ מתּנה פֿון 16 מיליאָן דאָלאַר פֿון אַן אָרטיקן ייִדישן געשעפֿטסמאַן, דזשעפֿרי שוואַרץ. אינעם צענטער געפֿינט זיך אַ שיל, אַ כּשרע קיך, אַ יודאַיִקאַ־מוזיי, אַ מיקווה און אַ זאַל פֿאַר 300 מענטשן.
הגם דער נײַער בית־עולם איז דער ערשטער אין טײַוואַן איז ער נישט דער ערשטער אין כינע. אין האָנג־קאָנג האָט מען געגרינדעט אַ בית־הקבֿרות נאָך אין 1855, און אין שאַנכײַ — אין 1862.
צו זען דעם אַרטיקל אויף ענגליש גיט אַ קוועטש דאָ.
To see this article in English, click here.
The post Tidbits: Taiwan opens its first Jewish cemetery appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
EU seeks to advance trade ban on Israeli settlements
(JTA) — The European Union could be leaning toward banning trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Foreign ministers debated various tactics to respond to the settlements on Monday at their monthly council meeting in Brussels, against the backdrop of rising violence by settlers and efforts by the Israeli government to expand settlements in Palestinian territories.
In a press conference following the meeting, the EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said one possibility had stood out.
“The option that got the most support was banning the trade with illegal settlements,” she said. All 27 member states consider Israeli settlements in the West Bank to violate international law.
Kallas added, “We tasked the ambassadors to take this work forward, and probably will also have an extraordinary meeting on this.”
No decisions have yet been made, and the path forward is uncertain. Some EU member nations favor aggressive action against the settlements, while others are unlikely to back any measures that take aim at Israel. A number are in the middle and have not decided whether they support trade bans.
The level of agreement between European governments needed to enact a partial or full trade ban on Israeli settlements remains an open question. Kallas said it was the European Council’s legal opinion that voting on trade issues called for a qualified majority, meaning that 15 out of 27 states would have to vote in favor, representing at least 65% of the EU population.
But she also acknowledged that legal experts disagreed about how much backing was needed for a trade ban. “You can always find different lawyers who come up with different ideas,” she said.
Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar accused Kallas of an “obsessive campaign against Israel” in a post on X. “There was no consensus. There was no qualified majority. In fact, there was no majority at all,” he wrote, adding, “Tricks like this do nothing to advance our shared interests.”
The EU has hotly debated measures against Israel as settlements in the West Bank have expanded and settler violence has sharply intensified over recent years. The Israeli NGOs Peace Now and Kerem Navot said in a report last week that “the current Israeli government has advanced de facto annexation of the West Bank at an unprecedented pace.”
The ministers considered measures including a stricter export licensing system, higher tariffs and a partial or outright ban on goods produced over the pre-1967 lines. The options were first presented in a paper last week by the European Commission, the EU’s executive branch, as pressure mounted from European governments.
Kallas said these potential moves were not “options against Israel,” but “options against the illegal settlements that undermined the two-state solution.” She told reporters before the meeting that member states had been pressing for a trade ban on Israeli settlements, saying, “Everyone agrees that the situation in the West Bank is really intolerable.”
In May, the EU sanctioned Israeli settlers over violence against Palestinians after Hungary’s new government, led by Peter Magyar, gave its approval and allowed the states to reach a consensus.
To protest the Gaza war, the commission last year proposed suspending the EU’s free trade agreement with Israel as set out under the EU-Israel Association Agreement, the cornerstone of economic and political cooperation between Europe and Israel. The proposal was not advanced because it lacked the majority support of 15 member states.
The EU is Israel’s largest trading partner, accounting for 33.1% of its imports and 29.4% of its exports in 2025, according to a summary on the European Commission website, which did not provide data on settler goods. The free trade agreement does not apply to goods originating from Israeli businesses located over the pre-1967 lines.
Revoking the association agreement requires unanimous approval from the EU’s 27 member states, while a partial suspension, such as freezing the free trade agreement, calls for a qualified majority. Germany, Italy, Hungary and Czechia have consistently opposed such suspensions.
Israel’s most vocal critics in Europe, including Ireland and Spain, have pushed for suspending the association agreement along with proposing their own import bans at the national level. Ireland now holds the rotating presidency of the European Council, a six-month term that ends in December 2026.
The legal basis of trade restrictions on Israel lies at the heart of debates in the EU. Support from a qualified majority is sufficient to enact a commercial policy, while changes in the common foreign and security policy — such as sanctions — require unanimity.
Some legal scholars have argued that an EU ban on imports from Israeli settlements should be imposed as a trade measure rather than a sanction, making it easier to pass.
A group of 40 scholars said in an open letter last month to Kallas, trade chief Maroš Šefčovič and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen that a blanket ban on settlement imports had a legal basis under the EU’s common commercial policy. Claims that unanimity was needed for the prohibition were “grounded in political rather than legal considerations,” they said.
The scholars also referenced an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice in 2024, which said that Israel’s military control of Palestinian territories in the West Bank constituted an illegal occupation.
“In that regard, it should be noted that the EU Court of Justice has ruled that, in its acts, the EU is ‘bound to observe international law in its entirety,’” they said.
Daniel Mariaschin, Honorary CEO of the pro-Israel Jewish advocacy organization B’nai Brith International, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that reducing trade “would only weaken one of Europe’s most important partnerships in the region.”
“There are those within the EU who are looking for any way to undercut Israel’s international standing, and this is yet another example,” Mariaschin said.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post EU seeks to advance trade ban on Israeli settlements appeared first on The Forward.
Uncategorized
PEN America president, defending Israel’s critics, resigns after report warns of threats to Jewish authors
(JTA) — The president of PEN America resigned over the weekend in protest of a report on boycotts targeting Jewish and Israeli authors, part of yet another round of internal division over Israel at the literary free-speech institution.
Dinaw Mengestu, an Ethiopian-American novelist and Bard College professor, told The Atlantic he was stepping down because he believed the PEN report, “A Silent Moratorium,” failed to defend the free-speech rights of participants in the movement to boycott Israel.
“It’s the First Amendment that allows all of us to engage in boycotts, not PEN America,” Mengestu told the publication. “PEN America as a free expression organization is supposed to defend that right.”
The author did not respond to multiple Jewish Telegraphic Agency requests for comment, but in an Instagram post Monday alluded to an interest in creating a new organization to rival the prominent nonprofit, which defends the free expression rights other writers.
In response to an interview request, PEN sent a statement to JTA saying it was “grateful” for Mengestu’s leadership and would “respect” his decision. The statement also alluded to PEN’s own past turmoil: “We tell hard stories, in politically challenging moments, about writers from a range of perspectives, even when it’s uncomfortable for us given our own recent history.”
In its report, published on its blog, PEN described “Jewish and Israeli writers who feel that the mainstream literary world is increasingly shutting them out because of their identity, nationality, or views.” Interview subjects include several Israel critics, as well as literary agents who assert that they face more difficulties signing Jewish authors after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and amid the subsequent war in Gaza. The report also repeatedly cited a JTA report about a 2024 viral list of “Zionist” authors to boycott.
Among other details, PEN’s report revealed that Israeli novelist Etgar Keret and public radio host Ira Glass had cancelled a planned live event in Australia over fears of threats and protest.
“This silencing and exclusion of writers is a threat to what PEN America is fundamentally committed to defending: a culture of free expression for all,” according to the report.
In addition to the report, PEN also altered its institutional policy toward cultural boycotts, which the organization has long opposed. Although its report on Jewish authors asserted that boycotts “threaten the free expression rights” of their targets, the revised guidelines say that the group will also defend the right of writers to participate in boycotts.
Mengestu’s resignation comes at a perilous moment for Jews facing cultural boycotts, both within the standard-bearers of PEN and elsewhere. PEN’s Jewish former longtime CEO stepped down in 2024 following months of blowback from rank-and-file authors who felt the organization was insufficiently critical of Israel and caused PEN to cancel a festival for global authors.
Since the leadership change, PEN leadership has published and retracted a condemnation of a boycott effort trained at an Israeli comedian and also published a report cataloguing Israel’s “cultural destruction in Gaza.”
Mengestu had assumed the role of board president in 2025. But PEN’s report about Jewish and Israeli writers on Thursday, he wrote, “makes clear that [change] will not happen.”
The Anti-Defamation League said it was “deeply troubled” by Mengestu’s resignation Monday. “Freedom of expression means opposing efforts to boycott, silence, or exclude writers because of their identity or nationality,” the organization tweeted, saying that the author’s decision to leave PEN over his objections to the report on Jewish authors “sends a chilling message.” Jewish authors also objected.
“Imagine running a free expression org and resigning because it refuses to blacklist authors based on their nationality,” the author David Zweig wrote on X, musing whether Mengestu would object to boycotting authors from his birth country: “Ethiopia doesn’t exactly have a good human rights record.”
In response to The Atlantic’s story that quoted sources from inside PEN who were critical of his resignation, Mengestu wrote a lengthy Instagram post Monday in which he stated, “This piece is about trying to suppress constitutionally protected speech,” criticized past PEN reports critical of the BDS movement, and added, “What PEN America fails to understand is that boycott is a form of dialogue.”
He announced his intention to “help make something better,” receiving affirmative comments from notable authors including Viet Thanh Nguyen, Angela Flournoy, Jewish pro-Palestinian novelist Jess Row and Pulitzer Prize-winner Benjamin Moser, author of a forthcoming history of Jewish anti-Zionism.
Other Jewish authors on the left were among those defending Mengestu’s decision to step down.
“Dinaw is one hundred percent correct that this kind of fake victim propaganda can be used to support anti-Boycott legislation which violates the First Amendment and is everywhere as popular support for Palestinians grows,” author Sarah Schulman wrote on Facebook. Calling PEN’s blog about Jews “one of those fake anti-semitism pieces,” Schulman added, “If PEN wants to survive, they have to get out of the Israel/Zionism business.”
The post PEN America president, defending Israel’s critics, resigns after report warns of threats to Jewish authors appeared first on The Forward.
