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White House says it will not meet with Israel’s Bezalel Smotrich when he visits the US
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Biden administration officials will not meet with Bezalel Smotrich, the Israeli finance minister who called for a Palestinian village to be “wiped out,” then backtracked, and who is visiting the U.S. next week to meet with leaders of Israel Bonds.
At least five liberal Jewish groups want the U.S. government to consider barring Smotrich from coming here. Ned Price, the department’s spokesman, said at Thursday’s daily briefing that questions on Israeli ministers’ travel should be referred to Israel, and that he does not comment on the eligibility of individuals to enter the United States.
The trip comes as Smotrich and his far-right allies in Israel’s governing coalition have upended traditions of comity between establishment U.S. Jewish groups and Israel. Those relationships have become even more strained in recent days, after Israeli West Bank settlers rioted in a Palestinian village. They also come amid raucous protests of the Israeli government’s plan to sap the power of the judiciary, which critics say endanger minority rights.
William Daroff, the CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said Smotrich’s remarks were “disgusting,” and a spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the powerful pro-Israel lobby, said the group would not be meeting with him.
Asked by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency whether the minister will meet with the White House, a National Security Council spokeswoman said, “No U.S. government meetings are planned for this trip.” That includes officials in the U.S. Treasury, the counterpart to Smotrich’s ministry, she said.
Smotrich is also responsible for civilian affairs in much of the West Bank. His call to “wipe out” the West Bank village of Huwara came after a settler rampage through the village following a shooting there that killed two Israeli brothers. At least one Palestinian in another village died amid the riots.
“I think the village of Huwara should be wiped out, I think that the state of Israel should do it,” he said in an interview on Wednesday. A few hours later, he walked back his statement: “To remove any doubt, in my words I did not mean wiping out the village of Huwara, but rather acting in a targeted way against terrorists and supporters of terror, and exacting a heavy price from them in order to return security to local residents.”
This week, the State Department’s annual report on terrorism recorded a “substantial rise” in settler attacks on Palestinian in 2021, the first time it had made such an assessment. On Wednesday, Price called Smotrich’s remarks about wiping out the village “disgusting” and “incitement to violence.”
“Just as we condemn Palestinian incitement to violence, we condemn these provocative remarks that also amount to incitement to violence,” Price said in his briefing that day. “We call on Prime Minister Netanyahu and other senior Israeli officials to publicly and clearly reject and disavow these comments.”
Netanyahu has yet to do so, and with Smotrich just days away from a visit stateside to give a speech to Israel Bonds in Washington D.C., five Jewish groups are saying the Biden administration should at least consider keeping him out and others will not sit down with him. AIPAC’s declining to meet with Smotrich is particularly noteworthy. It routinely meets with senior Israeli ministers.
“The administration should make clear that comments promoting grave violations of human rights, such as those made by Smotrich, are grounds for re-examination of a visa for entry to the United States,” J Street, the liberal Jewish Israel policy group, said in a statement.
Four other Jewish groups are saying outright that the Biden administration should keep Smotrich out, among them Americans for Peace Now, an affiliate off the Israeli left-wing group; the Israel Policy Forum, a group that advocates for an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel; T’ruah, a liberal rabbinic human rights group; and Jewish Voice for Peace, an anti-Zionist group.
The T’ruah statement referred to U.S. immigration law, which bans entry to those who have “incited terrorist activity with intent to cause serious bodily harm or death.” It said the threat Smotrich poses is especially acute since he assumed responsibility for administering civilian life in parts of the West Bank.
“Smotrich’s comments are even more dangerous now that Israel’s de jure annexation of the West Bank has made him effectively the governor of the territory, with broad oversight over most areas of civil administration,” the T’ruah statement said.
IPF, a group led by former lay leaders of mainstream pro-Israel organizations, also joined the calls. its policy director, Michael Koplow, told JTA, “We believe that there are sufficient grounds to deny Smotrich a visa.”
The Americans for Peace Now petition, addressed to Biden, garnered more than 1,100 signatures less than a day after it was posted.
“Smotrich wants to bring his hatred to US soil. He has plans to travel to the United States later this month. We’re here to say that he is not welcome,” the petition says. “We have seen how incitement in Israel-Palestine has led to devastating violence and we urge your administration to deny entry to Smotrich and his hateful rhetoric.”
A sixth U.S.-based liberal group, the New Israel Fund, which raises money for social justice organizations in Israel, said Jewish groups should make clear Smnotrich is unwanted here. “Our responsibility right now as American Jews is to say ‘take your hateful racism, your homophobia your plans for an apartheid Israel and get out. We do not want you here’,” it said in a statement. Smnotrich has called himself a “proud homophobe.”
Daroff, of the Conference of Presidents, declined to comment to JTA on whether he would meet with Smotrich.But he tweeted his agreement with Price. “I agree. His statement seeking to ‘wipe out’ Huwara was, as Ned Price said, ‘irresponsible, repugnant and disgusting’,” he wrote.
Israel Bonds, which promotes investment in Israeli government bonds, said in a statement that because it works closely with the Finance Ministry, welcoming the sitting finance minister to its events was a matter of routine. Smotrich will speak to the group’s Washington, D.C. leadership meeting.
“As part of their long-established responsibilities, Israel’s finance ministers from across the political spectrum have historically, over Israel Bonds’ 72-year history, attended our events,” a spokesman said, replying to a JTA query. “One of the organization’s most unique and paramount attributes is that it remains unbiased with regard to any political party or affiliation.”
Hundreds of rabbis have said they would not welcome Smotrich or his allies into their synagogues and would encourage their communities to boycott him. The Presidents’ Conference did not invite ministers from Smotrich’s Religious Zionism party to address its annual colloquy in Israel last month, although they were invited to a luncheon for all Knesset members.
One group that backs settlements, the Zionist Organization of America, said not meeting with Religious Zionism leaders was a mistake.
‘Nobody has to agree with them or disagree with them,” Klein said. “But they should speak and whoever wants to challenge them, challenge them, criticize them, disagree with them.”
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Hillary Clinton Warns Youth Being Misled by ‘Totally Made Up’ Narratives About Gaza, Israel
Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks on the first day of the 2024 Clinton Global Initiative Meeting at the Hilton Hotel in New York City, US, Sepy. 23, 2024. Photo: MediaPunch/INSTARimages via Reuters Connect
Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued a stark warning this week, arguing that young Americans are increasingly turning against Israel because they are consuming misleading and often fabricated social-media content about the Gaza war.
Speaking at an Israel Hayom summit in New York, Clinton said that young people were being influenced by “totally made up” videos depicting alleged Israeli actions in Gaza, many of which she claimed were nothing more than stylized pro-Hamas propaganda.
Clinton noted that more than half of young Americans now receive their news primarily from platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, where short, highly sensationalized clips often spread faster than verified information. She warned that these platforms prioritize emotion over context, leaving users vulnerable to narratives that ignore decades of Israeli security dilemmas, Hamas terrorism, and the broader regional picture.
Clinton lamented that her attempts to have conversations with young people over the Gaza War have been fruitless, noting that students “did not know history, they had very little context, and what they were being told on social media was not just one-sided, it was pure propaganda.”
Her remarks reflect growing concern among pro-Israel advocates and politicians about the generational shift in US public opinion. Recent polling show that younger Americans, across political lines and even within the Jewish community, are significantly less supportive of Israel than older generations. Clinton suggested that this shift is less a product of thoughtful engagement with the conflict than of a digital information culture in which Hamas and its sympathizers have gained enormous influence.
”It’s not just the usual suspects. It’s a lot of young Jewish Americans who don’t know the history and don’t understand. A lot of the challenge is with younger people. More than 50 percent of young people in America get their news from social media,” Clinton said.
“So, just pause on that for a second. They are seeing short-form videos, some of them totally made up, some of them not at all representing what they claim to be showing, and that’s where they get their information,” continued Clinton, who previously served as a US senator from New York.
In today’s fragmented media environment, a single unverified video can reach millions of people within hours. Analysts have repeatedly documented how decontextualized or manipulated footage from Gaza circulates widely before fact-checkers can intervene. Meanwhile, footage that reveals Hamas’s extensive use of human shields, its embedding of military infrastructure inside hospitals, or its responsibility for repeated ceasefire collapses rarely achieves the same viral momentum. According to experts analyzing the flow of information, the asymmetry has allowed simplistic narratives portraying Israel as an aggressor to dominate the feeds of young users who lack the historical grounding needed to assess such content.
Clinton’s comments underscore a growing consensus that modern warfare is fought not only on the battlefield but also online in the domain of public relations. Israel, she suggested, faces an unprecedented challenge in countering digital propaganda that spreads farther and faster than any official briefing or nuanced reporting.
Clinton warned that the crisis extends beyond Israel to the United States and other democracies struggling to maintain informed public discourse. The result is an American youth culture increasingly swayed by unverified images and misleading narratives rather than history, context, or the realities of Israeli security, an information landscape that has reportedly been leveraged by foreign actors such as Iran, Qatar, and Russia to push disinformation.
Clinton’s remarks amounted to a call for a more robust response to online misinformation and for renewed efforts to inform young Americans about the complexities of the conflict.
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New York Governor Puts New Holocaust Memorial Project in Motion
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul. Photo: Reuters Connect
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Monday signed legislation to establish a new memorial honoring victims and survivors of the Holocaust that will be constructed inside the Rockefeller Empire State Plaza in Albany.
“With the first ever state-sponsored Holocaust Memorial, we are honoring the victims and survivors of the Holocaust while ensuring that all visitors have a place to remember and reflect on what the Jewish community has endured,” Hochul said in a statement announcing the action. “New York has zero tolerance for hate of any kind, and with this memorial, we reaffirm our commitment to rooting out antisemitism and ensuring a peaceful and thriving future for all.”
Per the legislation, Senate Bill 5784, the construction of the memorial, the first ever to be sponsored by the state government, will be managed by New York’s Office of General Services (OGS). Hochul’s office said its completion will give “visitors the opportunity to reflect on issues that touch the core of our society” and “serve as a reminder of the dangers of antisemitism, racism, and all manifestations of intolerance.”
Dan Dembling, president of the Capital District Jewish Holocaust Memorial, a nonprofit from upstate New York which promotes knowledge of the Holocaust, said his group is “deeply grateful” to Hochul.
“At this time when antisemitism is so high and rhetoric is reminiscent of the Nazi era, the need to remember the Holocaust is critically important,” Dembling said. “As envisioned, this memorial will have statewide impact by helping to educate people about the consequences of prejudice left unchecked and hopefully inspire New Yorkers to stand up against hate in all its forms.”
The approval of the Rockefeller Plaza Holocaust Memorial comes amid a rise in antisemitic incidents in New York, especially in New York City, where, according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), hundreds of anti-Jewish acts have been perpetrated in 2025 and a record 976 struck the city in 2024.
During the hate crime wave, the Jewish community in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn suffered a violent series of robberies and other attacks. In one instance, three masked men attempted to rob a Hasidic man after stalking him through the neighborhood. Before then, two men beat a middle-aged Hasidic man after he refused to surrender his cell phone in compliance with what appears to have been an attempted robbery. Additionally, an African American male smacked a 13-year-old Jewish boy who was commuting to school on his bike in the heavily Jewish neighborhood, and less than a week earlier, an assailant slashed a visibly Jewish man in the face.
Hochul’s handling of the problem has been criticized by Jewish civil rights activists and Republican lawmakers. Many lambasted, for example, her endorsement in September of the candidacy of New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, a self-described socialist who is allied with far-left anti-Zionist groups and has vowed to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should he visit the city. Mamdani has also supported boycotts targeting Israel and failed to denounce the slogan “globalize the intifada,” which has been widely interpreted as a call for terrorism against Jews and Israelis worldwide.
The endorsement prompted accusations that Hochul was contributing to the rising popularity and aggressiveness of political Islamism across the Five Boroughs. Days after Mamdani won his bid for mayor, anti-Israel protesters staged a riotous demonstration in which hundreds of people amassed outside a prominent New York City synagogue and clamored for violence against Jews.
Hochul’s political opponents blamed her leadership for the incident.
“This is [Gov.] Kathy Hochul’s New York,” US Rep. Elise Stefanik, a leading Republican candidate running to unseat Hochul in next year’s gubernatorial election, said on the X social media platform. “When New Yorkers were looking for strong leadership from our governor, instead of standing against antisemitic hate, Hochul chose to endorse a raging antisemite for mayor of NYC putting Jewish families at risk.”
Hochul’s office has maintained that her administration’s efforts to combat antisemitism lead the nation, pointing to its constituting a new Division of Human Rights, enacting a “first ever statewide plan to combat antisemitism,” and approving legislation which requires colleges in the state to hire a civil rights coordinator.
College campuses in the state continue to see shocking incidents of antisemitism, however.
In September, law enforcement agents filed hate crime charges against two Syracuse University students who they say forcefully gained entry into a Jewish fraternity’s off-campus house during Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and heaved a bag of pork at a wall, causing its contents to splatter across the floor. Just days earlier, someone graffitied antisemitic messages inside the Weinstein residence hall at New York University.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Guinness World Records Tells Israeli Charity It’s Currently Not Accepting Submissions From Israel
People stand next to flags on the day the bodies of deceased Israeli hostages, Oded Lifschitz, Shiri Bibas, and her two children Kfir and Ariel Bibas, who were kidnapped during the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack by Hamas, are handed over under the terms of a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Feb. 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
An Israeli nonprofit organization had its application to the Guinness World Records rejected recently because the latter has a current policy of not accepting submissions from Israel or the Palestinian territories.
The Matnat Chaim charity, which helps people make voluntary kidney donations, said on Wednesday it contacted Guinness World Records (GWR) to discuss an event it is planning next month at the International Convention Center in Jerusalem where 2,000 Israeli kidney donors will gather in one place, which would be a world record. The charity hoped the event would be entered into the next Guinness Book of World Records. However the nonprofit’s request was rejected by GWR, which claimed that it is currently not processing record applications from Israel or the Palestinian territories.
“We deeply regretted the decision to involve politics in a purely life-saving effort. Humanity should be above all boundaries or conflicts,” the charity, whose name means “Gift of Life” in Hebrew, wrote in a Facebook post. “But the truth is, no record book can truly contain the greatness of our donors. Our true record is not measured by certificates hanging on the wall, but by 2,000 men, women, and children who got up from their sickbeds and returned to life. It is measured by thousands of families who received their loved ones back.”
“Guinness may choose not to list us in their book, but our wonderful donors are listed in the book of lif. And this is the most important record there is,” the charity added. “Next month, we will meet in the name of God, the Matnat Chaim family, at the Nation Buildings and break a record. We continue with all our might in our activities, because there are still lives to save.”
Guinness World Records said in a statement on Wednesday that the policy has been place since November 2023, shortly after the war in Gaza started following Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel,
“We are aware of just how sensitive this is at the moment,” GWR explained. “We truly do believe in record breaking for everyone, everywhere but unfortunately in the current climate we are not generally processing record applications from the Palestinian Territories or Israel, or where either is given as the attempt location, with the exception of those done in cooperation with a UN humanitarian aid relief agency.”
GWR said it is “monitoring the situation carefully” and the record application policy is subject to a monthly review. “We hope to be in a position to receive new enquiries soon,” it added.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar called the policy “inexcusable” in a post on X. He said Israelis “expect and demand that this twisted decision be revoked immediately.”