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Jewish Council for Public Affairs names Amy Spitalnick, who sued Charlottesville rally organizers, as its CEO
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The Jewish Council for Public Affairs has tapped Amy Spitalnick, who spearheaded a successful multimillion-dollar lawsuit against neo-Nazis, as its next CEO.
The decision is a sign that the group, called the JCPA, is pursuing a more assertively liberal approach. For nearly 80 years, it was an umbrella for local Jewish community relations groups, and was affiliated with the Jewish Federations of North America, which has historically been driven by consensus across local Jewish communities. But in December, it split from the federation system and rebranded as a more explicitly progressive group.
The statement Monday announcing Spitalnick’s hire highlighted her work at the helm of Integrity First for America, the nonprofit that underwrote a successful lawsuit against the organizers of the deadly neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017. The statement emphasized fighting for democracy against hate as priorities, and called Spitalnick “a powerful national voice on issues of democracy, antisemitism, extremism, and hate.”
Spitalnick, 37, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that she would focus on building relationships with other communities that are vulnerable to hatred and erosions in democracy.
“There needs to be an organization that wholeheartedly recognizes how deeply intertwined Jewish safety is with other communities’ safety and how bound up that all is in a broader fight for democracy at this moment, and builds the sorts of coalitions within and across communities that are essential to moving the needle,” she said.
The organization will remain nonpartisan, Spitalnick said, but she made no secret that she especially opposed many of the tropes peddled by Republicans including former President Donald Trump, who is a leading contender for the 2024 Republican nomination.
“We are grappling with a wave of anti democratic extremism that is deeply tied to rising bigotry and hate,” Spitalnick said. “And we see this in many forms — we see this with the attacks on immigrants and how so many of the conspiracy theories that underpin, for example, election lies, happen to utilize anti-immigrant and antisemitic conspiracy theories. We see this with the attacks on the trans community and on drag shows, where for example, neo-Nazis are using those attacks and those flashpoints to actively recruit for their violent antisemitic hate.”
Spitalnick was a communications official at J Street, the liberal Israel lobby, before transitioning into the rough-and-tumble of New York politics as the communications director for Mayor Bill DeBlasio and then in the state attorney general’s office. Last year, she was named director of another progressive Jewish group, Bend the Arc, but ultimately declined the position.
She earned a reputation for giving as good as she would get from her bosses’ critics and rivals. An email exchange she had with Tucker Carlson in 2015 made headlines when Carlson and his colleagues lambasted her with misogynist and vulgar language.
She was characteristically blunt last week after Carlson’s firing from Fox News after a history of using racially charged language. “When reporters write the story of Tucker Carlson, do not gloss over who he is,” she wrote on Twitter . “He is a raging white supremacist, misogynist, and bigot who has done more to normalize violent extremism and hate over the last few years than nearly anyone else.”
Spitalnick’s style is a sharp departure from the tone that the 79-year old organization had taken until December, when it announced an amicable divorce from the Jewish federations structure and its emphasis on consensus. It also means the group will be led by a millennial woman, a rarity among large national Jewish organizations.
“This now makes two millennial women at the helm of legacy Jewish organizations,” said Sheila Katz, CEO of the National Council of Jewish Women. “I’m looking forward to getting in good trouble together as we push Jewish organizations and leaders toward justice.”
Founded in 1944 as the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council — it changed its name in 1997 — the storied group was at the forefront of Jewish community advocacy for decades, from rescuing Europe’s Jews and opening up immigration to allow refugees to enter the United States to the Black-Jewish civil rights coalition, pro-Israel advocacy and advocacy for Jews in the Soviet Union. It received funding from dues paid by scores of local Jewish Community Relations Councils and from 16 national Jewish groups.
In recent years, as the American — and American Jewish — populations became more politically polarized, JCPA’s consensus-driven structure made it increasingly difficult for the group to take noteworthy stands on the issues of the day.
A turning point was the group’s decision in 2020 to sign a statement recognizing Black Lives Matter as a leading civil rights body. Officials in the Jewish federations system, which underwrote much of JCPA’s funding at the time, thought it was reckless to endorse a movement despised by most Republicans, and which has been accused of vehement opposition to Israel.
That spurred an effort to roll the JCPA directly into the Jewish Federations of North America, a shift that JCPA defenders said would place Jewish community relations under the purview of major donors, who tend to be more conservative than the grassroots.
Instead, the current chairman, David Bohm, led a split from the Jewish federations that would guarantee JCPA’s independence. Bohm and one of his predecessors, Lois Frank, joined UJA-Federation of New York in providing a substantial cash influx that would allow JCPA to function for three years.
That led to the divorce from the Jewish federations, and the end of dues that had come into the organization from the local and national groups. A JCPA official said Spitalnick would be expected to diversify the funding base, and did not count out a return to the dues-paying format.
Freed of the fear of alienating a multitude of stakeholders, the announcement in December laid out two prongs that located JCPA robustly in the liberal camp: One would focus on “voting rights, election integrity, disinformation, extremism as a threat to democracy, and civics education.” The other would focus on “racial justice, criminal justice reform and gun violence, LGBTQ rights, immigration rights, reproductive rights, and fighting hate violence.”
Bohm, in restructuring JCPA, brought in the heads of two local community relations councils — Jeremy Burton of Boston and Maharat Rori Picker Neiss of St. Louis, who had previously said the old structure — and its inhibitions — made it increasingly irrelevant. The JCPA announcement this week came with quotes from Neiss and Burton lavishing praise on Spitalnick.
“Through her unwavering commitment to social justice and her demonstrated leadership in public policy advocacy, Amy is poised to usher in a new era of progress and impact for the Jewish Council for Public Affairs,” Neiss said.
The release said JCPA would continue “to support a democratic, Jewish, and secure state of Israel” but otherwise did not address the divisions over democracy and the judiciary currently roiling the country and its supporters abroad. It also didn’t address the erosion of support for Israel on the American left in an era when Israel’s governments have trended increasingly to the right.
Asked about differences between the Jewish community and other communities over Israel, Spitalnick said it was important not to cut out other communities. “It means working across those differences where possible, and building those relationships, and sometimes that means staying at the table even if we have fundamental disagreements,” she said.
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UK Police Investigate Security Incident Near London’s Israeli Embassy
A Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) car. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
British police said on Friday they were investigating a security incident near the Israeli embassy in London after a group reported online that it had targeted the premises with drones carrying “dangerous substances.”
Matt Jukes, the head of counterterrorism at London police, said there were no signs the embassy had been attacked, but officers in protective clothing were assessing “discarded items” found near the building.
The embassy said in a statement all its staff were safe.
COUNTERTERRORISM POLICE INVESTIGATE
“Counter Terrorism Policing London are aware of a video shared online overnight in which a group claim to have targeted the nearby embassy of Israel with drones carrying dangerous substances,” Jukes said in a televised statement.
“And whilst we can confirm that the embassy has not been attacked, we’re carrying out urgent inquiries to determine the authenticity of the video and to identify any potential link between it and the items discarded in Kensington Gardens.”
The pro-Iranian group Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya, or Movement of the Companions of the Right Hand of Islam, had posted a video which included footage of drones along with two figures dressed in protective clothing and a message that the Israeli embassy was being targeted.
The group has claimed responsibility for a spate of attacks across Europe on US, Israeli, and Jewish targets, including an arson attack which destroyed several ambulances belonging to the Jewish volunteer emergency service Hatzola which were parked near a synagogue in the Golders Green area of north London.
Jukes said the police presence had been stepped up and cordons had been put in place, meaning there was no public access to Kensington Gardens and the surrounding area.
“We do not believe there to be any increased public safety risk at this time, and we would urge people, nonetheless, to avoid the area while officers carry out their work,” Jukes said.
The Israeli embassy said in a statement that a suspected security incident was being investigated in an adjacent park.
“We wish to clarify that all embassy staff are safe and that the embassy was not attacked,” it said. “As always we remain in close and continuous contact with the local authorities.”
It was the latest in a number of incidents involving the embassy and Jewish sites in the British capital since the ambulances were torched last month.
Earlier this week, two suspects were arrested over an attempted arson attack on a synagogue in north London.
In March, two men were charged with being tasked by Iran to carry out hostile surveillance on the Israeli embassy and other Jewish targets, while earlier this week a man from Kuwait went on trial accused of planning a terrorist attack on the embassy.
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Kanye West Concert in Poland Will Be Canceled, Venue Says
Kanye West walking on the red carpet during the 67th Grammy Awards held at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, CA on Feb. 2, 2025. Photo: Elyse Jankowski/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
A Polish stadium said on Friday that it will cancel a concert by US rapper Kanye West days after he postponed a show in France amid a furor over his past antisemitic comments and celebration of Nazism.
“We would like to inform you that the Ye [Kanye West] concert planned for 19 June 2026 at the … Slaski stadium will not take place due to formal and legal reasons,” stadium director Adam Strzyzewski said in a statement posted on Facebook.
The decision by the Slaski stadium in the western city of Chorzow, first reported by Wyborcza newspaper on its website, comes just over a week after Britain blocked the 48-year-old from traveling there to headline a festival.
There was no immediate comment from the rapper, now known as Ye, who in January apologized for his behavior, which he attributed to untreated bipolar disorder, and renounced past expressions of admiration for Adolf Hitler.
Authorities in Poland had already signaled they would seek to ban the planned June 19 concert.
“In a country scarred by the history of the Holocaust, we cannot pretend that this is just entertainment,” Polish Culture Minister Marta Cienkowska said on Thursday.
More than 1.1 million people, most of them Jews, were murdered at the Auschwitz death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. Nazi Germany killed more than 3 million of Poland‘s 3.2 million Jewish population.
Ye was barred from Australia last year after releasing a song promoting Nazism and advertising swastika T-shirts on his website.
He has performed in the United States and Mexico City this year, with further concerts planned in Europe and Asia.
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Iran Says Hormuz Strait Open After Lebanon Truce, Trump Expects Iran Deal ‘Soon’
An Iranian flag lies amidst the rubble of a building of the Sharif University of Technology, which was damaged in a strike, amid the US-Israeli conflict with Iran, in Tehran, Iran, April 7, 2026. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said the Strait of Hormuz was open following a ceasefire agreement in Lebanon, while US President Donald Trump said talks could take place this weekend and he believed a deal to end the Iran war would come “soon.”
Araqchi said in a post on X the Strait was open for all commercial vessels for the remainder of the US-brokered 10-day truce agreed on Thursday between Israel and Lebanon to halt fighting between Israeli forces and Iran-backed Hezbollah.
Trump told Reuters on Friday that the US will work with Iran to recover its enriched uranium and bring it back to the United States as part of any deal.
US-Israeli strikes on Iran began on Feb. 28, triggering Iranian attacks on Gulf neighbors and reigniting the Israel-Hezbollah conflict in Lebanon.
Thousands have been killed and the conflict effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz – through which a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas usually transits – threatening the worst oil shock in history.
OIL PRICES TUMBLE, STOCKS JUMP
Oil prices fell more than 10%, extending earlier losses after Araqchi’s post. Global stocks, already trading near record highs, jumped further on the news.
Major shipping companies reacted more cautiously, signaling it may take more time for traffic through the chokepoint to return to normal levels – about 130 ships a day before the war.
Germany’s Hapag-Lloyd said it would refrain from passing through the strait while it assessed the announcement. The Norwegian Shipowners’ Association said several issues needed clarification, including the possible presence of sea mines.
The US Navy warned in an advisory to seafarers that the mine threat in parts of the waterway was not fully understood and avoidance of the area should be considered.
A senior Iranian official said ships could pass through the Strait only under coordination with Iran‘s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
After a video conference on Friday, more than a dozen countries said they were willing to join an international mission to protect shipping in the Strait when conditions permit, Britain said.
US BLOCKADE REMAINS IN PLACE
Shortly after Araqchi’s statement, Trump posted on Truth Social: “IRAN HAS JUST ANNOUNCED THAT THE STRAIT OF IRAN IS FULLY OPEN AND READY FOR PASSAGE.”
However, he said the US military blockade of ships sailing through the Strait to Iranian ports – announced after talks with Iran last weekend in Islamabad ended without agreement – would remain until “our transaction with Iran is 100% complete.”
An Iranian official later told Fars news agency Tehran would consider the Strait‘s continued blockade by US forces a violation of the ceasefire and would again close the waterway.
Trump told Reuters on Friday there could probably be more talks this weekend. Some diplomats said that was looking unlikely given the logistics of assembling officials in the Pakistani capital, where the talks are expected to take place.
DIPLOMACY PROGRESS
A Pakistani source involved in mediating between the US and Iran said there was progress in backdoor diplomacy and that an upcoming meeting could result in the signing of a memorandum of understanding, followed by a comprehensive deal within 60 days.
“Both sides are agreeing in principle. And technical bits come later,” the source said on condition of anonymity.
A senior Iranian official told Reuters there had been an agreement on unfreezing billions of dollars in Iranian assets, as part of the accord to reopen the Strait, without giving a timeline.
One key sticking point has been Tehran’s nuclear program. At last weekend’s talks, the US proposed a 20-year suspension of all Iranian nuclear activity, while Iran suggested a halt of three to five years, according to people familiar with the proposals.
Iran has demanded the lifting of international sanctions, while Washington has pressed for any highly enriched uranium to be removed from Iran. Two Iranian sources have said there were signs of a compromise on the HEU stockpile, with Tehran considering shipping part of it out of the country.
Trump told Reuters the US would bring Iran‘s enriched uranium back to the United States. “We’re going to go in with Iran, at a nice leisurely pace, and go down and start excavating with big machinery … We’ll bring it back to the United States,” he said during a phone interview.
He mentioned “nuclear dust,” a reference to what he believes remains after the United States and Israel bombed Iran‘s nuclear installations in June last year.
Despite Trump‘s optimism, Iranian sources told Reuters on Friday that “gaps remained to be resolved” before reaching a preliminary deal, while senior clerics struck a defiant tone during Friday prayers.
In Tehran, cleric Ahmad Khatami said: “Our people do not negotiate while being humiliated,” while in Isfahan, the imam said: “We did not accept the terms proposed by the other party.”
In Islamabad, troops were deployed along routes into the capital on Friday, though roads remained open and the government had not ordered business closures, as it did ahead of the previous meeting.
LEBANON CEASEFIRE GOES INTO EFFECT
The US-backed ceasefire agreed between Israel and Lebanon to end fighting between Israel and Hezbollah appeared to be largely holding on Friday, despite Lebanese Army reports of some Israeli violations. Paramedics said an Israeli drone strike killed one person in southern Lebanon.
The conflict was reignited on March 2 when Hezbollah opened fire on Israel in support of Tehran, prompting an Israeli offensive.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the reported ceasefire violations on Friday.