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How Jewish leaders tried — and failed — to keep a Farrakhan follower off a Florida city council
(JTA) – When Brother John Muhammad emerged this fall as the leading candidate for a vacant city council seat in St. Petersburg, Florida, local Jews were distressed.
Muhammad is well known in the city as the president of a local neighborhood association and as a frequent advocate for minority groups. But Jewish leaders learned that he was also a follower of Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam leader who has a long history of antisemitism, and that he had made comments dismissing concerns about Farrakhan’s record.
Jewish leaders tried to stave off Muhammad’s appointment, pushing for more extensive vetting of the seven candidates and, in the case of the local Holocaust museum, actively lobbying against him. But the council confirmed him in a 4-3 vote, leaving local Jews frustrated — before they considered ways to make the situation a learning experience for their city.
“When I see a situation like this, it screams ‘opportunity’ to me,” Michael Igel, chair of the Florida Holocaust Museum, located in St. Petersburg, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
The saga playing out in St. Petersburg, Florida’s fifth-largest city, unfolded during the same period that a handful of Black celebrities, including Kanye West and Kyrie Irving, first became enmeshed in controversy over their own antisemitic comments and social media posts. The coincidence meant a dicey environment for broaching a conversation about the antisemitism of the Nation of Islam, whose rhetoric disparaging Jews overlaps with that of Hebrew Israelites, the ideology that Irving promoted by sharing a link to an antisemitic film.
It also turned St. Petersburg into a window for understanding how ties forged between Jewish groups and others can be tested.
Local Jewish leaders initially sought to stop Muhammad from gaining the city council seat, which was vacated after its previous holder resigned following redistricting and accusations she no longer lived in her district. They learned about Muhammad’s city council application only a week before the council’s vote, leaving them with little time to mobilize. The information came from a political rival of Muhammad, former mayoral candidate Vince Nowicki, who shared information about Muhammad’s Nation of Islam affiliation with local Jewish groups.
Nowicki also shared a comment Muhammad had made about Jews in a 2016 video in which Muhammad interviewed local Black LGBTQ activists. In the video titled “A Conversation About Growing Up Black And LGBT,” which JTA viewed, Muhammad said, “Minister Farrakhan got accused of being antisemitic for a long time because he pointed out and made some corrections about the activity of Jews. And anybody who says anything critical of the Jewish community is labeled as being antisemitic. Good, bad, right or wrong, it doesn’t matter what you say. If you criticize them that’s what you are.”
He continued, saying, “And I’m finding that it happens when you are critical of the gay community, when you say anything critical or anything that doesn’t align with that ideology, now all of a sudden you’re homophobic.” Muhammad’s comments about gay people received some light but friendly pushback from his interview guests.
Muhammad did not reply to multiple requests for comment by JTA, including to questions emailed to him at his request. He said during a public meeting ahead of the council vote that he thought scrutiny of him by Jewish groups had been unfair.
To Jewish leaders, the comments in the video coupled with Muhammad’s Nation of Islam affiliation were clear signs that he should not be appointed to the city council.
“I would sure hope that being antisemitic would be a red line, that you could not be a candidate,” said Rabbi Philip Weintraub of Congregation B’nai Israel, a Conservative synagogue in the city.
Jewish leaders began to take action, issuing statements and launching a letter-writing campaign to the council. They felt so much urgency that some even conducted business on Simchat Torah, a Jewish holiday when Jewish organizations typically pause their activities in accordance with Jewish law.
As a nonprofit, the local federation was constrained in how it could weigh in. Since it could not endorse or oppose specific candidates, it instead pushed for every candidate to be “properly vetted” and informed council members about Muhammad’s affiliations and past comments, according to Maxine Kaufman, executive director of the Jewish Federation of Florida’s Gulf Coast. She said the efforts did not have their intended effect.
“I don’t think anybody said, ‘Well, who is this Farrakhan, what does he stand for?’” Kaufman said. “I don’t think enough was done, personally.”
The entrance to the Florida Holocaust Museum in St. Petersburg, Nov. 27, 2016. (Jeffrey Greenberg/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
The Florida Holocaust Museum took another approach, circulating information about Muhammad to the wider community, along with a statement opposing the candidacy of anyone who would support Farrakhan’s antisemitism. Their goal, Igel said, was to educate the community about the severity of these views.
“There’s nothing else to talk about when somebody is supporting Louis Farrakhan,” Igel told JTA. “Particularly when you are seeking a position representative of a city, particularly one like St. Petersburg that is so known for its inclusivity and its openness.”
Igel praised some members of the city council who asked Muhammad pointed questions about his views at the vote, giving him the opportunity to refute Farrakhan’s comments about Jews. One council member who voted against Muhammad, Lisset Hanewicz, said her stepfather is Jewish and read Farrakhan’s past antisemitic statements into the record, saying, “I think people need to understand why a certain part of this community is upset.”
Igel acknowledged that getting involved in a city council appointment was an unusual move for a Holocaust museum. He said museum leaders had held a meeting beforehand to determine how to proceed but made a decision fairly quickly to weigh in.
“In this case, we don’t consider this to be a matter of politics,” Igel said. “This is a matter of morality. And this is what we teach.” If the candidate had been a white supremacist, Igel said, “that person would have been disqualified out of the gate.”
The Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center, two hate watchdogs, define the Nation of Islam as a group that propagates antisemitism and other forms of bigotry, not a religion. Founded in 1930 by Wallace Fard Muhammad, the Black nationalist group is not the same as traditional Islam and is rejected by most Muslim clerics; it entered mainstream prominence in the 1960s after civil rights leader Malcolm X and boxer Muhammad Ali publicly joined the movement. (Both later left the group, with Malcolm X publicly denouncing its leadership; he was assassinated shortly after, and two Nation of Islam members who were wrongfully convicted of his murder recently received a large settlement from New York City.)
The Nation of Islam entered its current era after Farrakhan took over the group in 1977. Now 89, he has used his platform to issue a steady stream of antisemitism, including calling Jews “wicked” and the “synagogue of Satan,” saying they have “wrapped your tentacles around the U.S. government,” and calling Hitler “a very great man.” Only a few years ago, the Women’s March progressive activist collective was nearly derailed over some of its founders’ associations with Farrakhan.
It is rare, but not unheard of, for public officials to have current or former associations with the Nation of Islam. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a practicing Muslim, was dogged by accusations that he had formerly been a member of the group when he first ran for Congress in 2006; he apologized for his past associations with the group. Trayon White, a Washington, D.C. council member and onetime mayoral candidate who has spread antisemitic conspiracy theories, has donated to the group in the past. Former President George W. Bush once praised the group, and a photograph showing Barack Obama in the same room as Farrakhan was fodder for Obama’s critics during his presidential run.
Muhammad, who is referred to on the city council website as John Muhammad and whose legal name is John C. Malone, declined to condemn Farrakhan at the city council meeting.
“I am not willing to denounce the leader of my faith no more than a Catholic would be willing to denounce their pope,” he said.
Muhammad’s reaction to questions about Farrakhan particularly concerned the federation and other local Jewish groups. Kaufman told JTA she didn’t know whether Muhammad himself is antisemitic, but she said his refusal to disavow Farrakhan was alarming.
“I do have issue with his reverence of someone who is blatantly antisemitic, and he won’t disavow him, he won’t reject him,” she said, echoing the the federation’s official statement on the vote.
At the meeting, Muhammad did say that he had reached out to the Florida Holocaust Museum but had not heard back — and that he thought the museum’s criticism of him was unfair.
“What I found when we reached out to have dialogue with the Holocaust Museum director, they did not want to talk to me,” he said. “They wanted to evaluate and disqualify me based on the association that I have as an individual. I don’t think that that’s just.”
Muhammad also defended his record with Jews by claiming that they were among the “diversity of those who support me.” He added, “And if you look at those who oppose me, they’re coming from one particular group.”
Since the vote, a local Black newspaper condemned the scrutiny on Muhammad, calling it a “perusal into his faith practice.”
Igel said the museum had no record that Muhammad had reached out but encouraged him to come and learn more about the Holocaust and the nature of antisemitism. Stuart Berger, head of the local Jewish Community Relations Council, acknowledged at the city council meeting that Muhammad “has made himself available to us” at the federation, but that none of the federation staff “had been in direct contact with him.”
The federation’s involvement in Muhammad’s case became its own issue at the council vote, when the candidate referenced an email Berger had written to the county commissioner. In the email, Berger wrote that Muhammad’s vetting process had been “good enough for me!”
While Muhammad took the email as proof that the federation believed him to be fit for office, Berger and Kaufman maintain that it meant nothing of the sort. Berger had not been speaking on behalf of the federation, they say, and had not intended for his email to be shared publicly.
Now that Muhammad is on the council, attention has turned to building relationships with him. Kaufman has been meeting with individual city council members, and hopes to eventually meet with Muhammad himself. She also aims to have the federation make a presentation to the council about the dangers of antisemitism and push them to make a statement about it.
She doesn’t think it’s complicated. “I think hate’s hate,” she said. “Many different colors.”
Weintraub’s congregation is celebrating its 100th anniversary in March, and one of its congregants, Eric Lynn, is also involved in politics: he was the Democratic nominee for Florida’s 13th Congressional district in the midterms but lost his race to Republican Anna Paulina Luna, who said she was raised as a Messianic Jew and campaigned with far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Weintraub himself is a member of an interfaith ministerial dialogue group with Black churches and says he’s “a professional optimist” when it comes to managing conflict between different communities. He sent JTA an episode of the public radio podcast “Hidden Brain” about how to keep conflict from spiraling, saying it “describes what I’ve tried to do.”
Since Muhammad was appointed, Weintraub has met with him; the pair had what Weintraub described as “a pleasant conversation.” The two talked about parenting and “shared traumas,” he said. They did not discuss Muhammad’s comments supporting Farrakhan, but the rabbi couldn’t help but think about him.
“I thought I was a termite, according to Farrakhan,” Weintraub said. In contrast, Muhammad “said I was a person, so that was nice.”
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Trump is poised to reinforce Iran’s regime — despite Netanyahu’s pressure
President Donald Trump’s Wednesday meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took place with an air of urgency around Iran. Yet the men left their three-hour conclave without resolving a fundamental divergence: Israel is deeply suspicious of any agreement with the Islamic Republic, and Trump has a visible preference for keeping diplomacy alive.
So visible, in fact, that Trump announced on Truth Social after the meeting that negotiations with Iran will continue. Where does that leave Israel, which is deeply concerned that Trump, in search of a quick win, will go for a deal that eases sanctions — strengthening the Iranian regime at precisely the time when it seems brittle enough to fall? And what about Iranian critics of the regime, who have good reason to feel betrayed by an American president who encouraged them to protest, and now seems poised to pursue accommodation with the authorities who had protesters killed en masse?
Of course, nothing in the Trump era can be analyzed with absolute certainty. Strategic misdirection is a recognized feature of even normal statecraft, and Trump has elevated unpredictability into something close to doctrine. Yet even allowing for that ambiguity, the meeting made clear that Israel and the United States are not aligned on an absolutely key issue — a potentially perilous state of affairs.
What does Israel want?
Israel does not trust the Iranian regime, for myriad reasons. The Islamic Republic’s missile programs, its sponsorship of proxy militias, and its long record of hostility toward Israel are viewed as elements of a single strategic problem.
Because of that deep and deeply justified mistrust, Israel is wary of any deal that might stabilize or legitimize the regime — a risk raised by Trump’s interest in a new nuclear deal. Israeli leaders are concerned about long-term risk. A renewed agreement focused narrowly on nuclear restrictions would almost inevitably entail sanctions relief or broader economic normalization. Such measures, from Jerusalem’s perspective, would strengthen the very Iranian system that has spent decades spreading havoc across the region.
That doesn’t mean Israel would prefer immediate military confrontation, or that it will speak out against any deal. An agreement that would dismantle Iran’s expanding missile range, including systems capable of reaching Europe, and cut funding from its network of allied armed groups — Hezbollah in Lebanon, Shiite militias in Iraq, the Houthis in Yemen, and the Palestinian factions Hamas and Islamic Jihad — would possibly be of interest. Trump has so far not publicly stressed those demands.
Israel is politically divided, but when it comes to Iran, a broad consensus cuts across political lines. The regime must fall or radically change, for the sake of human rights within Iran’s borders, and that of a healthy regional future outside them.
What does Trump want?
The American position is less straightforward, largely because it is filtered through Trump’s distinctive political style, and his limited regional knowledge. Trump often appears unbothered by expert and public opinion; he seeks drama, through visible wins, deals, and dramatic reversals. He will present any outcome as an amazing achievement that no predecessor could have hoped for — even if he ends up signing an agreement that looks quite a lot like former President Barack Obama’s 2015 nuclear deal, which he walked away from in 2018.
Trump’s broader worldview might provide insight. Unlike earlier American administrations that explicitly championed democracy promotion, with mixed results, Trump’s national security posture has consistently downplayed ideological missions. His rhetoric and policy frameworks have reflected skepticism toward efforts to reshape other societies’ political systems, instead emphasizing transactional relationships and the avoidance of prolonged entanglements.
This orientation is reinforced by his political base. A significant segment of MAGA-aligned voters wants a more isolationist foreign policy. Within that framework, negotiations that promise de-escalation and risk reduction are politically attractive. Military confrontation, by contrast, carries unpredictable costs.
Trump’s posture, oscillating between threats of force and enthusiasm for negotiation, reflects the strange truth that American political alignments on Iran defy traditional expectations, with hawkishness losing favor on the right. He has preserved the military option while simultaneously projecting optimism about a deal. Meanwhile, a huge and growing armada is parked in the waters near Iran.
What does Iran want?
Assessing Iranian intentions is notoriously difficult. The regime’s history of opaque decision-making, tactical deception, and disciplined negotiation complicates any definitive reading.
Yet certain baseline assumptions are reasonable. First, the regime seeks survival. Whatever ideological ambitions authorities may harbor, self-preservation remains paramount. Sanctions relief, economic stabilization, and reduced risk of direct confrontation with the U.S. all serve that objective.
Second, Iran is unlikely to accept a permanent prohibition on uranium enrichment, particularly at civilian levels. Tehran has consistently framed demands for “zero enrichment” as infringements on sovereignty — a defensible position under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Third, the regime has strong incentives to resist constraints on its missiles and militias, even though the militias are completely indefensible. But the regime exists, essentially, to export jihad, and those groups have been a central pillar of Iran’s project for decades.
Could the Iranian regime be brought down?
This question lurks behind every discussion of Iran, though policymakers rarely address it directly. Regime change, while rhetorically invoked at times, presents immense practical challenges. Many observers doubt that aerial strikes alone could produce political collapse. Modern regimes, particularly those with entrenched security apparatuses, rarely disintegrate solely under external bombardment. Iran’s leadership has demonstrated resilience under severe economic and military pressure, maintaining internal control despite periodic unrest.
That means meaningful regime destabilization would almost certainly require fractures within the state’s military, intelligence, and security forces, or coordinated ground dynamics that external actors can neither easily predict nor control. Such scenarios introduce enormous risks, including civil conflict, regional spillover and severe disruptions to global energy markets.
The regime’s brutality may reinforce its durability. A leadership willing to impose extreme domestic repression is less vulnerable to popular pressure than one constrained by public accountability. Last month Trump suggested the U.S. would support the protesters; that pledge appears to no longer be on his radar. The protesters were not seeking a better nuclear deal — which is now his apparent sole focus — but better lives.
So what happens now?
All of this suggests that Israel will be unhappy with any outcome to this period of tensions. It is much less likely that pressure from Trump will bring real reform to the Iranian regime is than that Trump will sign off on a deal that seems counter to Israel’s long-term interests.
In the coming days, it may become clearer whether Netanyahu persuaded Trump to expand the scope of negotiations to include Iran’s missile program and its network of proxy militias. It is also possible that talks will collapse, and that military action will follow.
But this much is clear: If the regime survives intact and is strengthened in the process, that would be a profound tragedy. For 47 years, the Islamic Republic has oppressed its own people while exporting instability across the Middle East. That is roughly the same span of time that communism endured in Eastern Europe before popular unrest finally brought it down.
Only a month ago, there was a palpable sense that the Iranian people were courageously pressing for a similar reckoning. To reward a weakened and discredited regime at such a moment by helping it stabilize itself — in exchange for promises about uranium enrichment alone — would be a historic missed opportunity.
The post Trump is poised to reinforce Iran’s regime — despite Netanyahu’s pressure appeared first on The Forward.
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Jewish congresswoman storms out of Epstein hearing after Pam Bondi raises her record on antisemitism
(JTA) — Rep. Becca Balint stormed out of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s House Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday after Bondi deflected questions about the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and instead criticized Balint’s record on antisemitism.
Lawmakers called the hearing to press Bondi on a range of issues, including Epstein and the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement efforts.
Balint, a Vermont progressive, asked Bondi during her questioning whether Trump had been aware of billionaire financier Howard Lutnick’s ties to Epstein when he was appointed as commerce secretary. The most recent files released last month showed that Lutnick had visited Epstein’s private island and dined with him years after he said he had cut off ties — and after Epstein pled guilty to sex crimes.
After Bondi refused to answer Balint’s question, the congresswoman replied, “I’m going to conclude that the president, in fact, did know about his ties.”
At the end of Balint’s questioning, which devolved into shouting as Bondi consistently interrupted Balint, Bondi then raised Balint’s record on antisemitism.
“With this antisemitic culture right now, she voted against a resolution condemning ‘from the river to the sea,’” said Bondi, appearing to refer to Balint’s April 2024 vote against a House resolution condemning the common pro-Palestinian slogan. (At the time, Balint said the resolution was “yet another way to sow division and demonize Palestinians.”)
Balint quickly shot back at Bondi’s remarks.
“Oh, do you want to go there, attorney general? Do you want to go there? Are you serious? Talking about antisemitism to a woman who lost her grandfather in the Holocaust? Really? Really?” said Balint, before rising from her seat and exiting the chambers.
During her 2022 campaign for Vermont’s single seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, Balint, who describes her family as “Jew-ish,” frequently invoked the story of her Jewish grandfather’s murder during the Holocaust.
“My grandfather was murdered in the Holocaust,” Balint said in a campaign video at the time. “My whole life I’ve known that beating the forces set on dividing us takes showing up every chance you get.”
Balint’s grandfather, Leopold Bálint, was killed by the Nazis on a forced march from Mauthausen Concentration Camp in 1945 after he stopped to assist a prisoner.
The hearing Wednesday featured scathing criticism from Democratic lawmakers of Bondi’s handling of the Epstein case, with Maryland Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin accusing her of “siding with the perpetrators” and “ignoring the victims.”
“If AG Bondi claims to care about Epstein survivors, why did she reveal their identities but redact the names of the rich pedophiles and sex abusers who hurt them?” Balint wrote in a post on X Wednesday. “She must take accountability for this cover-up and finally deliver the justice these victims deserve.”
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What Carrie Prejean Boller tells us about Christian Zionism in the U.S.
Carrie Prejean Boller, a former Miss California and a recent Catholic convert, was removed Wednesday from the Religious Liberties Commission after she made some controversial remarks about Jews and Israel in a hearing on antisemitism.
“Catholics do not embrace Zionism,” she said. “So are all Catholics antisemites?”
Prejean Boller was responding to the idea, presented by a staunchly pro-Israel set of Jewish witnesses testifying at the hearing, that anti-Zionism is antisemitism.
This is a complex debate that has divided the Jewish community over the past several years, even before Oct. 7 shot the issue into the spotlight, with numerous debates over how antisemitism should be defined. But Prejean Boller was not, beyond a few mentions of Palestinian lives in Gaza, engaging with the usual questions that divide Jews on the question of whether anti-Zionism is antisemitism. Her issue was with whether or not Zionism is part of Christian biblical prophecy.
“As a Catholic, I don’t agree that the new, modern state of Israel has any biblical prophecy meaning at all,” she said in the hearing. Later, she doubled down on X. “I’m a proud Catholic. I, in no way will be forced to embrace Zionism as a fulfillment of biblical prophesy,” she wrote.
What she was referring to was the idea of Christian Zionism — the theological belief among some Christians that the Bible supports the existence of the modern state of Israel. Some forms of Christian Zionism support the Jewish state as a necessary, prophesied precursor to Jesus’ return; all Jews must return to Israel before the end of days. Others may simply support Israel because they believe it shares their “Judeo-Christian” biblical foundations. But whatever the reasons, there has historically been widespread political support for Israel among American Christians. And that support has been core to Israel’s relationship with the U.S.
The lobbying group Christians United for Israel boasts a membership of 10 million, not only larger than any Jewish pro-Israel group but larger than the population of Jews in the U.S.; its influence has been key to passing measures such as moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. The power of this support from evangelicals is perhaps why Dani Dayan, Israel’s former consul general in New York, said in 2021 that Israel “invested most of its energy in the relationship with conservatives, Republicans, evangelicals, and a certain type of Jews only.”
Prejean Boller’s comments are representative of a recent shift among American Christians, away from Christian Zionism.
“Where does my support for Israel come from? Number one, because biblically we are commanded to support Israel,” said Ted Cruz on Tucker Carlson’s show last year. “Hold on, hold on!” Carlson responded, acting as though he had never heard of this crazy idea that Christians support Israel based on the Bible.
That Carlson, an influential leader on the right and a devout Christian, would act as though Christian support for Israel was not only unbiblical but absurd, was a bellwether.
According to a survey commissioned by the University of North Carolina, support for Israel among young evangelicals, ages 18 to 29, fell from 75% to 34% between 2018 and 2021 — in fact, support for Israel dropped more precipitously among this evangelical group than it did in the general American population. And a 2024 version of the same survey found that Christians were less likely to consider their support for Israel on biblical grounds.
Prejean Boller, who converted to Catholicism from evangelical Christianity in April, called out these evangelical beliefs specifically in a post on X, saying that her conversion to Catholicism was predicated in part on repudiating evangelical Christian Zionism.
“My conversion to the fullness of the Catholic faith exposed what I was taught in American evangelicalism, a version of Christianity that fused Jesus with a political agenda and called it ‘God’s prophecy being fulfilled,’” she wrote. “It isn’t.”
Prejean Boller’s statements join those of Carlson, as well as more openly conspiratorial and antisemitic influencers like Nick Fuentes and Candace Owens — who Prejean Boller defended in the hearing as a Christian leader, saying she listens to the podcaster regularly and does not believe she is antisemitic.
These influencers and political leaders spread antisemitic conspiracy theories alongside sharp criticism of Israel, often on Christian grounds. All repudiate biblical justifications for Christian Zionism, and often frame antisemitic beliefs as core parts of Christianity.
Marjorie Taylor Greene, a right-wing congresswoman from Georgia and a devout Christian, voted against an antisemitism bill in Congress on the grounds that it would persecute Christians for their religious belief that Jews killed Jesus; she has also invoked her Christianity when rejecting U.S. support for Israel. Greene tweeted her support for Prejean after the hearing on antisemitism.
To be clear, the vast majority of American Christians and particularly American evangelicals continue to support Zionism as part of their religious beliefs. But other forms of Christianity are gaining visibility and political power, shifting the dominant Christian views on Israel. If the current trends continue, support for Christian Zionism may continue to decline, whether or not Prejean Boller is on the Religious Liberties Council.
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