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Visiting Jerusalem, Ron DeSantis tries out his Jewish stump speech
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Ron DeSantis may not have declared that he’s running for president yet, but his incipient campaign was on full display Thursday at a conference in Jerusalem, where he ran down a laundry list of issues relevant to Israel and American Jews.
Most of the Florida governor’s remarks reflected what has become Republican orthodoxy in the post-Donald Trump era: He supports Israeli West Bank settlements as well as keeping Jerusalem under full Israeli control. He wants the United States to be more aggressive toward Iran’s nuclear program. He vehemently opposes the movement to boycott Israel.
And he declined to take a position on the Israeli government’s effort to sap the Israeli Supreme Court of much of its power — which President Joe Biden has repeatedly criticized as a danger to Israeli democracy.
“We must also, in America, respect Israel’s right to make its own decisions about its own governance,” he said. “You’re a smart country. You figure it out. It shouldn’t be for us to butt into these important issues.”.
He also pushed back at claims that his legislation has led to the banning of Holocaust books in his state, calling them “fake narratives” (though multiple Holocaust books have been banned). And, at a press conference, he signed a bill that aims to penalize antisemitic harassment. He also touted a new bill that gives vouchers worth thousands of dollars to parents who send their children to private schools.
“We’ve really seen a historic migration of American Jews and Israeli Americans moving to southern Florida,” he said. “It’s really, really boomed, and I think Florida’s policies have really reinforced that.”
DeSantis, who landed in Israel yesterday, was the keynote speaker at a conference on Thursday hosted by the Jerusalem Post at the Museum of Tolerance here. He received multiple standing ovations and cheers throughout the morning. At a press conference after his speech, some of his supporters sat among the journalists and clapped at his responses.
Israel is the latest on a four-stop international trip by DeSantis, who is expected to announce later this year that he will challenge former President Donald Trump for the Republican presidential nomination. On the trip, he is meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog and other officials. His trip also includes stops in Japan, South Korea and the United Kingdom.
“If there’s any announcements, those will come at the appropriate time,” he said in response to a question about his potential candidacy.
In his speech, DeSantis described his past support for Israel, advocating for the 2018 move of the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and, in 2019, holding a Florida cabinet meeting in Jerusalem. He also told the crowd that he baptized his children with water from the Sea of Galilee and said he put a note in the Western Wall asking God to protect Florida from hurricane season.
An affinity for the Bible also played a role in DeSantis’ position on the West Bank, which he called “disputed” rather than “occupied.” He referred to the territory by the term “Judea and Samaria,” which is the Israeli government’s standard term for the area and also emphasizes its place in the Bible. He spoke of visits to the northern West Bank settlement of Ariel, as well as to the City of David, a Jewish neighborhood and archaeological site in eastern Jerusalem.
“We visited the Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria,” he said during his speech regarding a previous trip. Later, at the press conference, he said, “Those are the most historic Jewish lands there are, going back thousands and thousands of years.”
He also came out staunchly in favor of continued Israeli control of eastern Jerusalem, claiming that it is the best way to ensure religious freedom in the city. Palestinians aspire for the city’s eastern area to be the capital of a future Palestinian state.
“With Israeli sovereignty over the city of Jerusalem, people have the ability to practice their religion freely,” he said. “They have the ability to visit their sites freely. That would just actually not be true if that were in other hands.”
Although his Israel policies dovetail with those of Trump, and even though Trump’s Israel ambassador, David Friedman, was at the conference, DeSantis avoided saying the former president’s name in his speech, instead referring to “the previous administration.” He did say Trump’s name once during the press conference.
Following his speech, DeSantis announced partnerships with Israeli firms to develop tech products, and portrayed his state as an inviting home for Jews. He said the state had invested millions of dollars into synagogue security as well as Holocaust education. And he signed a bill that bans projecting threatening images on buildings without permission, as well as littering with the intent to intimidate.
Florida has seen an uptick recently in white supremacist activity. The Goyim Defense League, a far-right antisemitic group, relocated there last year. In October, several public spaces in Jacksonville displayed messages promoting the antisemitic ideas of rapper Kanye West. Neo-Nazis intimidated attendees at an Orlando-area Chabad center in February, and last week, police arrested a man for a March attack on a different Florida Chabad center.
“This is going to be able to provide more tools to be able to combat antisemitic activity,” DeSantis said. ״If you have a synagogue and someone shines a swastika-like image on that, they have a right to do the image for themselves, but putting it on someone else’s property, they’re defining that in this bill as a trespass.”
The signing of that bill, and DeSantis’ contention that he supports Holocaust education, comes as legislation he signed has enabled parents in the state to pursue bans of Holocaust literature. A South Florida school district library removed a Holocaust-themed novel by Jodi Picoult in March, and this month, a high school in the state removed a graphic novel adaptation of Anne Frank’s diary from its shelves.
Despite those instances and other bans parents are seeking, DeSantis claimed that there was no significant campaign to ban Holocaust books. He called that allegation the “book ban hoax.”
“Those are all fake narratives,” he said. “We’ve provided curriculum transparency for parents, to make sure that the curriculum used in school is transparent and to make sure everything is age appropriate and is not conflicting with Florida standards. And so, what parents have identified unfortunately are pornographic images in books.”
The legislation, which has targeted books about sexuality and gender, is at the center of DeSantis’ campaign to limit or ban discussion of those topics in schools. The law, called the “Parental Rights in Education” bill and dubbed by critics as the “Don’t say gay” bill, also bans discussion of LGBTQ topics between kindergarten and third grade, among other measures. It is one of a series of recent state laws limiting transgender rights.
That law is also at the center of DeSantis’ feud with Disney, the state’s largest employer, which just sued the governor for allegedly punishing the company for its criticism of the law. At the press conference, DeSantis said the suit is about Disney wanting “to be able to control things without proper oversight.”
DeSantis did not refer specifically to the Anne Frank graphic novel in his remarks, and said Florida had “beefed up” Holocaust education in the state. But a Jewish ally of his who accompanied him on the trip, Republican state Rep. Randy Fine, defended banning the book, which he called the “Anne Frank pornography book.”
“I read the diary of Anne Frank many times as a kid and I don’t remember any of that stuff that they put in that graphic novel,” Fine told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “And frankly that graphic novel is antisemitic. To sexualize the diary of Anne Frank in that sort of inappropriate way, it is antisemitic.”
When told that the passages, which are authentic and relate to Frank’s attraction to another girl as well as a description of her own genitalia, have been included in the diary for decades, Fine said that the graphic novel was inappropriate regardless because it depicted the passages in an image.
“It wasn’t just that the passages were in the book,” he said. “It was how they were visualized.”
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The post Visiting Jerusalem, Ron DeSantis tries out his Jewish stump speech appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Candace Owens and the QAnonization of Anti-Israel Rhetoric
Right-wing political commentator Candace Owens speaks during an event held by national conservative political movement ‘Turning Point’, in Detroit, Michigan, US, June 14, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Rebecca Cook
Candace Owens’ recent viral post conflating Israel, ISIS, the Star of David, paganism, and the abuse of children is not merely wrong or provocative. It is something more revealing — and more dangerous.
Owens claims that “despite Israel’s best efforts to destroy the ancient world in the Middle East — relics still remain and reveal the truth.” She asserts that “the Kiddush cup is the symbol of Judaism,” that the Star of David has “ALWAYS been associated with Canaanite cults and Baal worship,” and that Aleister Crowley and his “occult friends who abuse children utilize this symbol in their ceremonial magic.” She pairs these claims with an image she falsely identifies as a “2nd-century temple in Baalbek, Lebanon,” adds that ISIS “has a knack for destroying ancient Canaanite temples,” and ends with the insinuation: “Who do you think controls ISIS?”
This is not argument. It is an indictment assembled from fragments — misidentified images, decontextualized symbols, and recycled antisemitic tropes — designed to contaminate. The method is deliberate: connect enough charged elements and let the audience complete the accusation without ever having to state it openly.
Owens urges her audience to “wake up” to what she presents as a hidden truth: that Jewish symbols are not Jewish at all; that Judaism is secretly pagan or occult; that Jewish ritual objects are implicated in sinister practices; that Jews or Israel are responsible for the destruction of ancient history; and that shadowy forces tied to Jewish symbolism abuse children. The implications are unmistakable.
What is most striking is the absence of evidence. No archaeology. No primary sources. No theology. No peer-reviewed history. Just insinuation stacked on insinuation, sealed with the conspiratorial refrain to “wake up.”
This is not political criticism. It is ideological collapse.
In modern terms, this is the QAnonization of antisemitism.
There is a reason that Owens’ post contains no factual evidence: it doesn’t exist.
In its place appears the oldest components of conspiratorial antisemitism: secret knowledge reserved for the initiated; symbols stripped of historical context and recast as sinister codes; insinuations of ritual corruption; and the projection of vast, hidden power onto Jews.
This is not “thinking outside the box.” It is backwards thinking. Owens’ move is not modern. It is medieval.
The most revealing element of Owens’ post is not its historical illiteracy, but its moral destination: the insinuation of child abuse.
This is not incidental. It is the endpoint of the narrative. From medieval blood libels to modern conspiracy movements, antisemitism reliably converges on the same accusation. Jews are charged with violating what society holds most sacred because the charge is designed not to persuade, but to obliterate moral resistance.
Once Jews are framed as abusers of children, no counterargument matters. No evidence is sufficient. Debate becomes impossible.
Owens did not stumble into this trope. She arrived precisely where antisemitic narratives always arrive when they run unchecked.
Ancient Israel outlawed child sacrifice when it was widespread across the Near East. It denied divinity to kings, subordinated rulers to law, and insisted that power itself was morally accountable. Human beings were no longer fuel for the gods; every individual life was sacred. To accuse Jews of Baal worship is not confusion. It is inversion — the projection of pagan cruelty onto the civilization that dismantled it.
Furthermore, Owens’ claims about Jewish symbols collapse under even minimal scrutiny.
The Star of David is not an occult emblem. It appears as a Jewish symbol in late antiquity, with archaeological evidence from the synagogue at Capernaum dating to the second century CE, and it recurs throughout late antique and medieval Jewish life. Its adoption reflects Jewish continuity, not pagan borrowing.
The Kiddush cup is a sanctification vessel used to bless wine — on Shabbat and holidays — but it was never the “symbol of Judaism” as Owens’ claims. Its purpose is to mark sacred time, family gatherings, and restraint. There is no historical, textual, or anthropological evidence tying it to anything resembling Owens’ claims or insinuations.
The image Owens presents as a “2nd-century Canaanite temple” at Baalbek is fictitious. Baalbek’s monumental remains — the Temples of Jupiter, Bacchus, and Venus — are Roman imperial constructions from the first to third centuries CE. Baalbek was a Roman city, not a Canaanite cult center.
Owens’ follow-on post fares no better. She points to the historical appearance of a six-pointed star — often called the “Seal of Solomon” — in Moroccan iconography and on some flags and coins in the 19th and early 20th centuries as supposed proof that the symbol is not Jewish.
This is a classic example of conspiracy reasoning masquerading as historical insight.
Yes, the hexagram appeared in Moroccan art and occasionally on flags prior to 1915, when Sultan Yusef formally replaced it with a five-pointed star to distinguish the national flag and emphasize Islamic symbolism. But the hexagram’s presence there proves precisely nothing about Judaism. Geometric symbols migrate across cultures. Their use in Islamic or Christian contexts does not erase their meaning within Jewish civilization — just as the crescent’s appearance outside Islam does not make it non-Islamic.
Owens takes a very limited historical fact, strips it of context, and weaponizes it to imply occult continuity and Jewish corruption.That is not history. It is symbol scavenging in service of a predetermined conclusion.
Archaeology, linguistics, epigraphy, and historical memory all point in the same direction: Jewish civilization emerged in the land of Israel, maintained continuity there for millennia, preserved its language, law, and rituals through exile, and launched a moral revolution that shaped the ethical foundations of the Western and Islamic worlds alike.
When that evidence proves stubborn, opponents do not refine their claims. They abandon the field. Israel is no longer wrong — it is demonic. Jews are no longer mistaken — they are occult.
Antisemitism does not begin with expulsions, pogroms or gas chambers. It begins when lies are repackaged as insight, when conspiracy theories replace scholarship, and when hatred is disguised as revelation.
Candace Owens’ post is not mere controversy. Its popularity — over 1.4 million views as of this writing — is the symptom and proof of how far this intellectual rot has already spread.
And history is unforgiving to societies that mistake intellectual decay for courage — until the consequences arrive in forms no one can plausibly claim to have misunderstood.
Micha Danzig is an attorney, former IDF soldier, and former NYPD officer. He writes widely on Israel, Zionism, antisemitism, and Jewish history. He serves on the board of Herut North America.
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Middle East Needs Long-Term Solution, UAE Says Ahead of US-Iran Crisis Talks
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei attends a meeting with students in Tehran, Iran, Nov. 3, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Regional power United Arab Emirates urged Iran and the United States on Tuesday to use the resumption of nuclear talks this week to resolve a standoff that has led to mutual threats of air strikes, emphasizing that the Middle East does not need another war.
Iran and the United States will discuss Iran‘s nuclear program on Friday in Turkey, Iranian and US officials told Reuters on Monday. US President Donald Trump said that with big US warships heading to Iran, “bad things” would probably happen if a deal could not be reached.
A source familiar with the situation said on Tuesday that Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner would take part in the talks, along with US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Kushner’s plans. Ministers from other countries in the region are also expected to attend.
An Iranian diplomatic source said Tehran’s view of the talks is neither optimistic nor pessimistic, adding that the Islamic Republic’s defensive capabilities are non-negotiable and that it is ready for any scenario.
“It remains to be seen whether the United States also intends to conduct serious, result-oriented negotiations or not,” the source said.
Iranian sources have said Trump is also seeking to limit Iran‘s ballistic missile program, which Iranian officials say is an essential component of the country’s defense.
Earlier the UAE, a highly influential Gulf Arab oil producer and close US ally, said the region cannot afford another conflict.
“I think that the region has gone through various calamitous confrontations,” the UAE president’s adviser Anwar Gargash told a panel at the World Governments Summit in Dubai.
“I don’t think we need another one, but I would like to see direct Iranian-American negotiations leading to understandings so that we don’t have these issues every other day.”
Iran should rebuild its relationship with Washington to reach a wider geo-strategic deal which could help Tehran repair its economy ravaged by US sanctions, Gargash said.
IRAN FEARS US STRIKE MIGHT IMPERIL RULE, SOURCES SAY
Gulf Arab states are worried that Iran will carry out its threat to target US bases on their territory should Trump attack the Islamic Republic again.
In June, the United States struck Iranian nuclear targets, joining in at the close of a 12-day Israeli bombing campaign. Since then, Tehran has said its uranium enrichment work – which it says is for peaceful, not military purposes – has stopped.
Recent satellite imagery of two of the targeted sites, Isfahan and Natanz, appears to show new roofing over two destroyed buildings but no other signs of rebuilding, according to the imagery provided by Planet Labs and reviewed by Reuters.
The meeting in Istanbul aims to revive diplomacy over the long-running dispute about Iran‘s nuclear program and dispel fears of a new regional war.
The US naval buildup near Iran follows a violent crackdown against anti-government demonstrations last month.
Trump, who stopped short of carrying out threats to intervene, has since demanded nuclear concessions from Iran and sent a flotilla to its coast. He said last week Iran was “seriously talking,” while Tehran’s top security official Ali Larijani said arrangements for negotiations were under way.
The priority of the Istanbul talks is to avoid conflict and de-escalate tension, a regional official told Reuters. Regional powers including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates were also invited, he said.
Iran’s leadership is increasingly worried a US strike could break its grip on power by driving an already enraged public back onto the streets, according to six current and former officials.
Officials told Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that public anger over last month’s crackdown – the bloodiest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution– has reached a point where fear is no longer a deterrent, four current officials briefed on the discussions said.
Iranian sources told Reuters last week that Trump had demanded three conditions for resumption of talks: Zero enrichment of uranium in Iran, limits on Tehran’s ballistic missile program, and ending its support for regional proxies.
Iran has long said all three demands are unacceptable infringements of its sovereignty, but two Iranian officials told Reuters its clerical rulers saw the ballistic missile program, rather than uranium enrichment, as the bigger obstacle.
One Iranian official said: “Diplomacy is ongoing. For talks to resume, Iran says there should not be preconditions and that it is ready to show flexibility on uranium enrichment, including handing over 400 kg of highly enriched uranium (HEU), accepting zero enrichment under a consortium arrangement as a solution.”
Tehran’s regional sway has been weakened by Israel’s attacks on its proxies – from Hamas in Gaza to Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and militias in Iraq – as well as by the ousting of Iran‘s close ally, former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
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Somaliland Expects Israel Trade Deal, Has Minerals to Offer, Leader Says
Somaliland President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi speaks during the unveiling of the Somaliland Mission premises in Nairobi, Kenya, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Monicah Mwangi
Somaliland expects to reach a trade agreement soon with Israel, the first country to recognize its independence, and is willing to offer rights to valuable mineral deposits as part of a deal, its leader said in an interview with Reuters.
Israel in late December became the first country to recognize the Republic of Somaliland, which borders northern Somalia and has claimed independence for decades. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel would seek immediate cooperation in agriculture, health, technology, and the economy.
Speaking to Reuters via video link from Dubai where he was attending the World Government Summit, Somaliland President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi said no bilateral economic deal with Israel had yet been reached, but Somaliland expected to sign “a partnership agreement.”
“At the moment, there is no trade, and there is no investment from Israel. But we are hoping 100% [for] their investment, their trade, and hopefully we will engage with the business people and the government of Israel soon,” he said.
“Somaliland is a very rich country in resources – minerals, oil, gas, marine, in agriculture, energy, and other sectors … We have meat, we have fish, we have minerals and they [Israel] need them. So, trade can start from these main sectors,” he said. “The sky is the limit.”
He said in return Somaliland would seek access to Israeli technology.
Somaliland says its mineral resources include vast reserves of lithium, critical for batteries and electric vehicles. In 2024 the Saudi Mining Company Kilomass secured an exploration deal there for lithium and other critical minerals.
Abdullahi said he was grateful to Israel for being first to recognize Somaliland. While Somaliland also hopes for future military cooperation with Israel, he said establishing Israeli military bases had not been discussed.
He said he had accepted an invitation from Netanyahu and would visit Israel soon, but no date had yet been set. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar visited Somaliland a month ago.
Abdullahi said he expects all United Nations countries eventually to follow Israel‘s lead, including the United Arab Emirates and the United States, though he said it was normal for recognition to take time.
He said he had a good working relationship with the US and believes President Donald Trump will “someday” recognize Somaliland. Last month, he pitched investment deals at a dinner in Davos attended by Trump’s son Eric.
Israel‘s decision to recognize Somaliland has drawn an angry response from Somalia, and has also been criticized by China, Turkey, Egypt, and the African Union.
Somaliland also cooperates with the UAE, with DP World a big investor in the Berbera port. The UAE has “not decided officially yet but they are just one of the countries we expect to recognize Somaliland,” Abdullahi said.
“We also expect that the Saudi government will make the same investment in Somaliland,” he said.