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NY City Council speaker skips Israel trip, but says she is ‘proud’ of colleagues taking part
(New York Jewish Week) — The speaker of New York’s City Council said she supports her colleagues’ participation in an educational trip to Israel this week, one day after a Jewish news site asked why she was not taking part.
“I am proud that the Council’s Jewish Caucus has led a diverse delegation of members to Israel,” Council member Adrienne Adams said in a statement shared by the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, which is sponsoring the trip. “I look forward to holding a roundtable with the Council members on the trip, that includes members of my leadership team, upon their return.”
Twelve City Council members are currently on the week-long trip to Israel, which the JCRC has been conducting for over 30 years as a way to introduce politicians to Israel and cultivate their support. On Monday, an article in the Forward noted that Adams is the first leader of the council not to lead the trip since the speaker’s position was created in 1986.
The Forward also noted that the Democratic Socialists of America, which includes four affiliated members on the Council, has urged members not to attend the trip. A progressive Jewish group, Jews for Racial & Economic Justice, has also discouraged participation in the trip, telling the Forward that “the trip fails to be in any way evenhanded” and does not “show the reality of state and settler violence against Palestinians.”
The trip typically draws about a dozen Council members.
In its statement, the JCRC said the “itinerary is designed to introduce Israel in all its complexity while focusing on bridge-building and community partnerships. Participants will meet with leading Israeli and Palestinian scholars, NGO officials, representatives from civil society organizations, scholars, journalists, activists and high level public officials from a wide variety of backgrounds.”
The trip includes stops in largely Arab East Jerusalem and the Palestinian city of Ramallah in the West Bank.
Council member Eric Dinowitz, who heads the Jewish Caucus, is leading the trip, which concludes next Tuesday.
Adams did not indicate that she had any qualms about taking part in the trip. An unnamed council spokesperson told the Forward that Adams decided it was “prudent” to remain in New York to focus on budget and pandemic issues. Adams, who served as the co-chair of the Black, Latino and Asian Caucus, represents the Queens neighborhoods of Jamaica, Richmond Hill, Rochdale Village and South Ozone Park.
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Tucker’s Ideas About Jews Come from Darkest Corners of the Internet, Says Huckabee After Combative Interview
US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee looks on during the day he visits the Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest prayer site, in Jerusalem’s Old City, April 18, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – In a combative interview with US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, right-wing firebrand Tucker Carlson made a host of contentious and often demonstrably false claims that quickly went viral online. Huckabee, who repeatedly challenged the former Fox News star during the interview, subsequently made a long post on X, identifying a pattern of bad-faith arguments, distortions and conspiracies in Carlson’s rhetorical style.
Huckabee pointed out his words were not accorded by Carlson the same degree of attention and curiosity the anchor evinced toward such unsavory characters as “the little Nazi sympathizer Nick Fuentes or the guy who thought Hitler was the good guy and Churchill the bad guy.”
“What I wasn’t anticipating was a lengthy series of questions where he seemed to be insinuating that the Jews of today aren’t really same people as the Jews of the Bible,” Huckabee wrote, adding that Tucker’s obsession with conspiracies regarding the provenance of Ashkenazi Jews obscured the fact that most Israeli Jews were refugees from the Arab and Muslim world.
The idea that Ashkenazi Jews are an Asiatic tribe who invented a false ancestry “gained traction in the 80’s and 90’s with David Duke and other Klansmen and neo-Nazis,” Huckabee wrote. “It has really caught fire in recent years on the Internet and social media, mostly from some of the most overt antisemites and Jew haters you can find.”
Carlson branded Israel “probably the most violent country on earth” and cited the false claim that Israel President Isaac Herzog had visited the infamous island of the late, disgraced sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“The current president of Israel, whom I know you know, apparently was at ‘pedo island.’ That’s what it says,” Carlson said, citing a debunked claim made by The Times reporter Gabrielle Weiniger. “Still-living, high-level Israeli officials are directly implicated in Epstein’s life, if not his crimes, so I think you’d be following this.”
Another misleading claim made by Carlson was that there were more Christians in Qatar than in Israel.
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Pezeshkian Says Iran Will Not Bow to Pressure Amid US Nuclear Talks
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian attends the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit 2025, in Tianjin, China, September 1, 2025. Iran’s Presidential website/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Saturday that his country would not bow its head to pressure from world powers amid nuclear talks with the United States.
“World powers are lining up to force us to bow our heads… but we will not bow our heads despite all the problems that they are creating for us,” Pezeshkian said in a speech carried live by state TV.
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Italy’s RAI Apologizes after Latest Gaffe Targets Israeli Bobsleigh Team
Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics – Bobsleigh – 4-man Heat 1 – Cortina Sliding Centre, Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy – February 21, 2026. Adam Edelman of Israel, Menachem Chen of Israel, Uri Zisman of Israel, Omer Katz of Israel in action during Heat 1. Photo: REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha
Italy’s state broadcaster RAI was forced to apologize to the Jewish community on Saturday after an off‑air remark advising its producers to “avoid” the Israeli crew was broadcast before coverage of the Four-Man bobsleigh event at the Winter Olympics.
The head of RAI’s sports division had already resigned earlier in the week after his error-ridden commentary at the Milano Cortina 2026 opening ceremony two weeks ago triggered a revolt among its journalists.
On Saturday, viewers heard “Let’s avoid crew number 21, which is the Israeli one” and then “no, because …” before the sound was cut off.
RAI CEO Giampaolo Rossi said the incident represented a “serious” breach of the principles of impartiality, respect and inclusion that should guide the public broadcaster.
He added that RAI had opened an internal inquiry to swiftly determine any responsibility and any potential disciplinary procedures.
In a separate statement RAI’s board of directors condemned the remark as “unacceptable.”
The board apologized to the Jewish community, the athletes involved and all viewers who felt offended.
RAI is the country’s largest media organization and operates national television, radio and digital news services.
The union representing RAI journalists, Usigrai, had said Paolo Petrecca’s opening ceremony commentary had dealt “a serious blow” to the company’s credibility.
His missteps included misidentifying venues and public figures, and making comments about national teams that were widely criticized.