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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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Netherlands reverses course, will sit out Eurovision again over Israel’s participation
(JTA) — The Netherlands is withdrawing from the Eurovision Song Contest, reversing an announcement that it would join the event and citing “sensitivity” over Israel’s participation.
The Dutch organization that oversees public broadcasting, the Nederlandse Publieke Omroep, or NPO, said on Tuesday that it failed to find sufficient support from broadcasters to ensure a Dutch artist could go to Eurovision.
“We have known for some time that Israel’s participation elicits various reactions in society and causes discussion and division,” said Jurre Bosman, NPO’s media director. “This is also the case among broadcasters and staff, and we understand that sensitivity.”
NPO said last month that the Netherlands would reenter Eurovision in 2027, when the world’s largest music competition will take place in Burgas, Bulgaria. The Netherlands boycotted the contest in May 2026, alongside Spain, Ireland, Iceland and Slovenia, because of Israel’s inclusion.
NPO’s pledge to rejoin Eurovision overrode a decision by the Dutch network Avrotros, which usually oversees the Dutch entry. Avrotros withdrew from Eurovision in August, saying the event “can no longer be considered neutral” with Israel taking part amid “the severe humanitarian suffering in Gaza and the ongoing restrictions on press freedom.”
Initially, NPO believed there was “sufficient support” among public broadcasters to allow the Netherlands to return, said Jet de Ranitz, the chair of NPO’s executive board. But the decision sparked backlash. Earlier this month, about 400 public broadcasting employees signed a letter titled “#NotMyEurovision” to NPO’s management and board, urging the organization to reconsider returning to the contest.
“We only want to send an artist or artists and staff to the festival if they can count on the full support of one or more broadcasters,” Bosman said.
The contest will still be broadcast in the Netherlands by the network NOS, as it was this year.
Eurovision director Martin Green said he was “deeply sorry” that the Netherlands would not participate, adding that the organizers understood the decision and “respect the strength of feeling behind it in the Netherlands.”
Ireland will also remain absent from Eurovision next year. The country’s broadcaster RTÉ said in September that “Ireland’s participation cannot be justified given the appalling and ongoing loss of lives in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis there.” In Spain, the head of broadcaster RTVE also said he favored a continued boycott.
Czechia pulled out of the event this month, but its public broadcaster cited budget cuts as the reason.
The controversy over Israel’s inclusion in Eurovision has prompted mass protests. The 2026 contest drew 131 million viewers, down 35 million from the previous year.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
The post Netherlands reverses course, will sit out Eurovision again over Israel’s participation appeared first on The Forward.
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This time, some American Jews really do face a choice between ‘American’ and ‘Jewish’
At a United Synagogue Youth program many decades ago, I remember being asked the following question: “Are you an American Jew, or a Jewish American?” Where, in other words, do your primary loyalties lie?
Then and now, American Jews have tried to dodge this question. There is no choice to be made, we insist; our Jewish values (including, for many, our emotional ties to Israel) and our American values are aligned.
But this year, for many Jews, there is a choice.
On the one hand, the United States as we know it is under unprecedented threat from a presidential administration that, aided by a politicized Supreme Court and a rubber-stamp Republican congress, has undermined its basic foundations. This is not a matter of political ideology; it’s not about tax cuts, restrictions on abortion, or environmental regulations, subjects about which reasonable people can disagree. It is about overt efforts to undermine the 2026 election, about blatantly authoritarian actions (ICE, DOGE, the ballroom, the Kennedy Center), and about a level of vulgarity, corruption, and venality never before seen in American history.
And on top of all of that, America’s standing in the world has precipitously declined; we have simply abdicated our role as leaders, and even members, of the international community. We are not only mocked around the world, but mistrusted; we have strengthened Russia and China. Trump’s deranged tariffs and pointless war have devastated the economy, causing millions to wonder how they will pay for fuel this winter.
Again, one may prefer Republican policies to Democratic ones, but all of this is beyond the realm of ideology. America faces an existential crisis.
On the other hand, there are “our” interests — chiefly the safety of American Jews and the security of Israel.
As I have written many times, I see the threats to each of these as primarily coming from the Right. Yes, there is anti-Zionism and antisemitism on the Left, but they pale in comparison to right-wing Christian Nationalism. Numerous Republican candidates have staffers who have knowingly promoted neo-Nazi propaganda. That same genre of propaganda (e.g. “Which way, American man?”) has been used in official statements of the Trump administration. Nothing on the Left compares to this level of institutionalization and power.
Nor do I see a blank check for Israel’s farthest-right extremists as beneficial to Israel’s security. When actions as modest as conditioning military aid or opposing settler violence in the West Bank are condemned as apostasy and antisemitism, Israel is not strengthened; it is weakened.
But, obviously, a large minority of American Jews see these matters differently. Domestically, they equate anti-Zionism and antisemitism, and feel themselves under personal threat from Muslim politicians like Zohran Mamdani or Abdul El-Sayed. They experience these threats differently from how I do — as worse than the threats from the Right. And they are dismayed by the support of the Palestinian cause among some progressive Democrats.
For these American Jews — again, a minority of the population, but probably a majority among Jewish institutional leaders and donors — there is indeed a choice. Which do we care about more: America’s survival, or Israel’s? Democracy or Jewish safety?
As I have said, I disagree with the premises of this dichotomy. But it is unquestionably one faced by over two million American Jews, according to polls. And so I want to offer three responses.
The first is to remind my community of how fortunate we are to be Americans. I don’t think I’ve ever felt as patriotic as I have in the last two years; the more Trump and MAGA attack the American Dream, the more I find myself appreciating it. The America I believe in is one with its best days ahead, not behind; it is a vision of a pluralistic, multicultural democracy where everyone ought to have a fair shake, regardless of class, religion, race, sex, gender, or ethnicity. That vision has never been fully realized. But it is one worth fighting for, and working to bring into reality.
And it is one that enabled my family — and probably yours — to thrive here. Like many American Jews, my grandparents fled violence (and, in part of my family, poverty) in Eastern Europe to the goldene medineh, the golden country. Of course, they faced antisemitism and exclusion here too, but nothing like what they left behind. My parents went to great universities, enjoyed the post-war economic boom, and gave me opportunities that no one in my family had a century ago.
Do we not see how all this is worth fighting for? And how endangered it currently is? Do we really think that the MAGA nationalists even want us here? Do we not see how attacks on immigrants and minorities are wrong, categorically, based on our own lived experience?
American Jews have prospered not by being an insular minority focused on our special interests, but by being engaged, patriotic Americans, fighting for the values in which we believe. That has been our ethical and political superpower. Yes, we take care of our own, but we are also part of the American experiment, motivated by Jewish values and the Jewish experience of marginalization. Let’s not abandon that now.
Second, I beg my fellow Jews to practice discernment rather than hysteria.
Ironically, I found an example of this where I did not expect to: in the “Non-Negotiable” campaign in Michigan, which sets out five non-negotiable positions for political leaders regarding Jewish safety and support for a Jewish state. Obviously, the subtext of the campaign is the senatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed, of whom I have written positively in these pages, and I do not agree with everything in its platform. That’s fine. The point is that by articulating positions, rather engaging in fear-mongering, hyperbole, and, let’s face it, Islamophobia, Nonnegotiable Michigan is doing something useful. They’re distinguishing between heated emotions and clear political positions.
And, by my reckoning, El-Sayed himself is on board with all five — actively supportive of three, and, he says, not opposed to two. (Many others on the Left are clearly not.) But whether he is or isn’t, the platform offers light rather than heat, in contrast with a lot of what I see on Jewish social media channels these days, which often traffics in hysteria. I would only quibble with the name; we can disagree with our politicians on some issues while supporting them on others.
Finally, and relatedly, I want to remind us all of some core political truths. Purity tests are political suicide; the perfect is the enemy of the good. The matzav (“Situation”) regarding Israelis and Palestinians is complicated; even if you think one side has acted worse than the other, both sides have done very bad things. (That is true if you’re on the Left or the Right.) Statements can feel hurtful without actually being hurtful; they may just be attacking something we care about.And when it comes to politics, emotional reactions often lead to bad results; it is far wiser to evaluate, consider, critique and reflect.
All of these facts point to the same conclusion: that oversimplifications and emotional reactivity are not our best allies when it comes to making political decisions. The Jewish tradition has bequeathed us two thousand years of legalistic parsing and multiple perspectives on even the most mundane of issues (I once spent three months learning about what makes an etrog permissible for use on Sukkot.). Let’s put those skills to use on something non-mundane: the survival of our country and our people. Consider all of what is at stake this year, yes, for our community, but also for the vibrant, flawed, but unprecedented nation that has allowed us to prosper. Both deserve better than this.
The post This time, some American Jews really do face a choice between ‘American’ and ‘Jewish’ appeared first on The Forward.
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Israel’s election deadlock: 3 scenarios for what comes next
(JTA) — JERUSALEM – As election results from Israel’s parliamentary vote on Tuesday continue to trickle in, what seems clearest is that no side in this political race will have enough votes to form a majority government, meaning the question of who Israel’s next prime minister will be remains uncertain.
According to the vote count so far, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party could have as many as 28 seats, yet his bloc of right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties will fall short of the 61 seats needed to form a majority government.
Yashar, the party led by Netanyahu’s main rival, former Israeli army chief Gadi Eisenkot, looks set to be the second-largest party, with around 22 seats. The so-called “change” bloc that Eisenkot leads will likely have around 47 seats, also far short of what is needed to form a government on its own.
Meanwhile, Israel’s Arab parties, which both blocs have said they wouldn’t include in a coalition, are on pace to get at least 17 seats collectively and could become key to helping the opposition oust Netanyahu.
The formal process whereby each party holds consultations with Israel’s President Isaac Herzog to recommend a candidate for prime minister will likely begin next week. Political analysts are already speculating on possible scenarios.
Their tentative takeaway: Reality may force political leaders to break their solemn promises to not work with certain other parties.
So what are the possible scenarios if the final results leave the political arena so starkly divided? Here are the three most likely outcomes.
1. The “change” bloc plus the Arab parties
All the parties in the change bloc bar the Democrats, led by Yair Golan, stated throughout their campaigns that they would not form a government with either of the Arab parties, even though Mansour Abbas, the leader of Ra’am, an Islamist faction, joined a centrist coalition from 2021-2022, breaking what had once been a taboo. Abbas is again offering to join forces with the change bloc.
“Clearly this is emerging as an option mathematically and politically,” Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israel Democracy Institute, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency on Wednesday. But he added, “It’s obviously not only a violation of campaign promises, but I think the Israeli public opinion is deeply unprepared for such an option.” Tolerance for working with an Islamist party has diminished since the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led raids.
Another variation on this option is for the change bloc — Eisenkot’s Yashar party, B’Yachad, led by former prime ministers Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid, and Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party, as well as the Democrats — to form a minority government.
While 61 seats are needed to form a majority government, there is nothing to prevent a government with fewer than 61 seats from being formed if it can gain support on key legislative decisions.
This could happen if Arab factions support the change bloc on key votes but otherwise don’t play a role in the government. This would give the change bloc up to 65 seats when Arab parties’ support from the sidelines is added in.
Even this step has been rejected by Lieberman, yet Professor Jonathan Rynhold, of the Department of Political Studies at Bar-Ilan University, said it was possible that Eisenkot could put pressure on him to accept.
“Even though Lieberman has said no to such an option, he might say yes if he’s the prime minister,” Rynhold said.
On the other hand, the Arab parties, especially the Joint List, might demand concessions for such an agreement that Eisenkot himself finds hard to stomach.
2. Formation of a unity government
A quick look at the political map following Tuesday’s vote shows that center-right parties ranging from Eisenkot’s Yashar party to Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu, with Likud and B’Yachad in between, gained a substantial share of the seats. One possible scenario is that some of these parties, even though they are avowed political foes, could join forces.
“I think it is perhaps more likely that there will be serious negotiations around a unity government,” Plesner said. “I would imagine that Netanyahu would prefer unity based on him forming a coalition with all of his bloc members, and then luring one of the ‘change bloc’ parties to his government.” That would mean including ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism and far-right parties led by Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.
However, Plesner said the change bloc parties would most likely push for a “real unity government,” whereby Netanyahu “gives up on one of the far-right parties that has caused a lot of challenges for Israel’s international image, or perhaps an ultra-Orthodox party that has refused to pass a military draft bill.” He was referring to a law that would force more haredi men to serve in the military, from which they’ve traditionally been exempted. This, he said, would create a “Zionist, more centrist-leaning option.”
“I think this is something that Israeli public opinion would be able to live with and perhaps even prefer, but I can’t say anything about the political viability of it,” Plesner said.
The change bloc ran on replacing Netanyahu, and no doubt many of its voters would feel betrayed by such an outcome.
3. Another round of elections
In his election night speech, Eisenkot declared that “after an election with such high voter turnout, it would be a mistake to hold another election.” Some 77.7% of voters cast ballots, the highest since 1999, according to election officials.
However, with no bloc reaching a majority and serious ideological disagreements among the parties, another round of elections might be the most likely possibility. For Netanyahu in particular, allowing the process to play out while he retains his position as interim prime minister until another election is held could well be the most favorable outcome for the long-serving leader, according to Plesner.
A similar scenario played out beginning in 2019, when Netanyahu’s bloc of supporters failed to achieve a majority. Israel then held a series of elections, culminating in the March 2021 vote, when Netanyahu’s bloc was ousted by a center-left alliance led by Bennett and Lapid. The November 2022 election returned Netanyahu to power.
“I don’t really know what the path forward is now,” said Gideon Rahat, a political scientist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
“If we were talking 10 years ago, I would say that something else might happen – a unity government or a different solution perhaps,” he said. But given the entrenched political camps at this point, another round of elections might be where the country is headed.
On the other hand, given the unpredictable nature of Israel’s political scene, Plesner noted that it could be a “time for politicians to get creative.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if all sorts of ideas that we haven’t thought of before come up in the upcoming few weeks,” he said, adding that he believed that, with so much uncertainty, it could “take weeks and perhaps months” before the next prime minister is determined.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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