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World Zionist Congress roiled by left- and right-wing protests, in sign of Independence Day tensions
(JTA) — Tensions over Israel’s future have roiled a convening of the World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem, in a harbinger of a season of Diaspora Jewish participation in Israel’s fierce political fights.
First, left-wing and centrist delegates to the group, which determines policy for an arm of the Jewish Agency for Israel, rallied in front of Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday to protest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sweeping proposal to weaken the judiciary. Then, delegates from right-wing groups sought to block voting on resolutions critical of the Israeli government, in a gambit that generated tense scenes from within a body whose deliberations rarely attract public attention.
The tensions spilled over into Friday when the right-wing Knesset member who leads the committee focusing on the judiciary legislation, Simcha Rothman, was briefly cornered by protesters before being whisked away by police.
The incidents offered a sign of how the coming days and weeks might play out in Israel, as thousands of Diaspora Jews make their way to the country for events tied to Israel’s 75th birthday. The birthday comes soon before the days during which Israel’s right-wing government is expected to resume the judiciary legislation, which both proponents and critics say has the potential to change Israel forever. Protests are expected to be fierce.
The World Zionist Congress is the periodic assembly that determines policy for the World Zionist Organization, the arm of the Jewish Agency that aims to act as a bridge to the Diaspora. Among its functions is providing materials for Jewish schools across the globe and influencing the priorities of large, international Jewish organizations with substantial budgets. It also votes on symbolic resolutions about Israel’s character and future.
About 100 delegates in the World Zionist Congress took part in what participants said was a spontaneous march opposing the judiciary legislation on Thursday. They wore T-shirts provided by UnXeptable, a protest movement organized by Israeli expatriates.
“We are out here today because the current efforts of the Israeli government to undermine democracy and promote division threatens to tear us apart and not only cause divisions within Israel; it attacks the Diaspora as well,” said John Furstenberg, the vice president for Australasia for Mercaz, the Zionist arm of the Conservative/Masorti movement, who was a one of a number of speakers at the rally outside the Supreme Court. “We cannot stand idly by and say nothing whilst we see our enemies worldwide taking joy from our distress.”
Delegates to the World Zionist Congress protest against the Netanyahu government’s proposed changes to the courts, at the Supreme Court in Jerusalem, April 20, 2023. (Josh Drill)
Sheila Katz, the CEO of the National Council of Jewish Women, said delegates from 10 countries participated in the rally. She said she expected more in the coming days, particularly around the General Assembly being held by the Jewish Federations of North America, which is already being assailed by critics of the government for featuring Netanyahu and which is expected to draw 3,000 attendees. Katz is scheduled to be a featured speaker at a massive demonstration planned for Saturday night, which will mark 17 weeks of anti-government protests that have drawn hundreds of thousands of participants.
“All of us who are here believe in the original Zionist vision for this country, and we feel like the current government is losing its way,” Katz said. “And so how do you counter that? You counter it by sharing what the vision really is.”
A second confrontation took place during the congress itself, when a bloc of centrist and left-leaning groups advanced a number of resolutions that would have enshrined the Israeli Declaration of Independence as policy, protected LGBTQ rights and backed those who oppose Netanyahu’s court reforms.
Anticipating that the symbolic resolutions would pass, right-wing groups at the Congress successfully used parliamentary maneuvers to delay voting, though they did not succeed in pressing for individual votes that would have taken many hours and forced delegates to reveal their positions. The votes will now take place online, preventing a repeat of the shouting matches that took place on Thursday, and are expected to result in criticism of Israel’s government.
“This is a victory for the center-left-liberal bloc that will result in the passage of resolutions against the government’s policy, without concessions,” WZO Vice Chairman Yizhar Hess said in a statement about the decision to hold the votes online. “The right tried from the very beginning to prevent there being votes at this Congress. They failed at the beginning. They failed again today.”
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US Officials Tell i24NEWS Israeli Concerns About Gaza Board of Peace Are ‘Unfounded’
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump is interviewed by Reuters White House correspondent Steve Holland (not pictured) during an exclusive interview in the Oval Office in the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., January 14, 2026. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo
i24 News – Amid the criticism in Israel over the composition of the “Board of Peace” and the bodies set to govern the Gaza Strip, as well as concerns that Hamas could continue to threaten Israel under the new plan, officials in Washington suggest these concerns are unfounded, i24NEWS understands.
A Senior US official tells i24NEWS: “Turkey, Qatar, and Egypt were instrumental in achieving the ceasefire, securing the return of the living hostages, and bringing back the deceased. They have co-signed commitments that Hamas will follow through on its part of the plan, and the Board of Peace will work with them to ensure compliance.”
The underlying message is clear: President Trump will make the calls, and the US will ensure full implementation of all objectives of the plan, first and foremost the demilitarization of Gaza, regardless of the positions or hostile statements towards Israel coming from Turkey and Qatar.
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One Person Killed, 14 Hurt in Blast in Iranian Port of Bandar Abbas, Iranian Media Reports
FILE PHOTO: An aerial view of the Iranian shores and Port of Bandar Abbas in the strait of Hormuz, December 10, 2023. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo
At least one person was killed and 14 injured in an explosion in the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas on Saturday, a local official told Iranian news agencies, but the cause of the blast was not known.
The semi-official Tasnim news agency said that social media reports alleging that a Revolutionary Guard navy commander had been targeted in the explosion were “completely false.”
Iranian media said the blast was under investigation but provided no further information. Iranian authorities could not immediately be contacted for comment.
Separately, four people were killed after a gas explosion in the city of Ahvaz near the Iraqi border, according to state-run Tehran Times. No further information was immediately available.
Two Israeli officials told Reuters that Israel was not involved in Saturday’s blasts, which come amid heightened tensions between Tehran and Washington over Iran’s crackdown on nationwide protests and over the country’s nuclear program.
The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
US President Donald Trump said on January 22 an “armada” was heading toward Iran. Multiple sources said on Friday that Trump was weighing options against Iran that include targeted strikes on security forces.
Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian accused US, Israeli and European leaders of exploiting Iran’s economic problems, inciting unrest and providing people with the means to “tear the nation apart.”
Bandar Abbas, home to Iran’s most important container port, lies on the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway between Iran and Oman which handles about a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil.
The port suffered a major explosion last April that killed dozens and injured over 1,000 people. An investigative committee at the time blamed the blast on shortcomings in adherence to principles of civil defense and security.
Iran has been rocked by nationwide protests that erupted in December over economic hardship and have posed one of the toughest challenges to the country’s clerical rulers.
At least 5,000 people were killed in the protests, including 500 members of the security forces, an Iranian official told Reuters.
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How a law used to protect synagogues is now being deployed against ICE protesters and journalists
After a pro-Palestinian protest at a New Jersey synagogue turned violent in October, the Trump administration took an unusual step — using a federal law typically aimed at protecting abortion clinics to sue the demonstrators.
Now, federal authorities are attempting to deploy the same law against journalists as well as protesters against Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid the agency’s at times violent crackdown in Minneapolis.
Former CNN anchor Don Lemon, a local journalist, and two protesters were arrested after attending a Jan. 18 anti-ICE protest at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, Justice Department officials said Friday. Protesters alleged the pastor at Cities Church worked for ICE.
The federal law they are accused of violating, the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE, prohibits the use of force or intimidation to interfere with reproductive health care clinics and houses of worship.
But in the three decades since its passage in 1994, the law had almost entirely been deployed against anti-abortion protesters causing disruptions at clinics.
That changed in September of last year, when the Trump administration cited the FACE Act to sue pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Congregation Ohr Torah in West Orange, New Jersey.
It was the first time the Department of Justice had used the law against demonstrators outside a house of worship, Harmeet Dhillon, an assistant attorney general for the department’s civil rights division, said at the time.
The novel legal strategy — initially advanced by Jewish advocacy groups to fight antisemitism — is now front and center in what First Amendment advocates are describing as an attack on freedom of the press.
“I intend to identify and find every single person in that mob that interrupted that church service in that house of God and bring them to justice,” Dhillon told Newsmax last week. “And that includes so-called ‘journalists.’”
How the law has been used
The FACE Act has traditionally been used to prosecute protesters who interfere with patients entering abortion clinics. Conservative activists have long criticized the law as violating demonstrators’ First Amendment rights, and the Trump administration even issued a memo earlier this month saying the Justice Department should limit enforcement of the law.
But in September, the Trump administration applied the FACE Act in a new way: suing the New Jersey protesters at Congregation Ohr Torah.
They had disrupted an event at the Orthodox shul that promoted real estate sales in Israel and the West Bank, blowing plastic horns in people’s ears and chanting “globalize the intifada,” a complaint alleges.
Two pro-Israel demonstrators were charged by local law enforcement with aggravated assault, including a local dentist, Moshe Glick, who police said bashed a protester in the head with a metal flashlight, sending him to the hospital. Glick said he had acted in self defense, protecting a fellow congregant who had been tackled by a protester.
The event soon became a national flashpoint, with Glick’s lawyer alleging the prosecution had been “an attempt to criminalize Jewish self-defense.” Former New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy pardoned Glick earlier this month.
The Trump administration sued the pro-Palestinian protesters under the FACE Act, seeking to ban them from protesting outside houses of worship and asking that they each pay thousands of dollars in fines.
At the time, Nathan Diament, executive director of the Orthodox Union Advocacy Center, told JNS he applauded the Trump administration “for bringing this suit to protect the Jewish community and all people of faith, who have the constitutional right to worship without fear of harassment.”
Diament did not respond to the Forward’s email asking whether he supported the use of the FACE Act against the Minneapolis journalists and protesters.
Mark Goldfeder, CEO of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, a pro-Israel group that says it uses legal tools to counter antisemitism, did not express concern over the use of the FACE Act in the Minnesota arrests — and emphasized the necessity of protecting religious spaces from interference.
“The idea that ‘you can worship’ means nothing if a mob can make it unsafe or impossible,” Goldfeder wrote in a statement to the Forward. “So if you apply it consistently: to protect a church in Minnesota, a synagogue in New Jersey, a mosque in Detroit, what you are actually protecting is pluralism itself.”
Goldfeder has also attempted to use the FACE Act against protesters at a synagogue, citing the law in a July 2024 complaint against demonstrators who had converged on an event promoting Israel real estate at Adas Torah synagogue in Los Angeles. That clash descended into violence.
The Trump administration Justice Department subsequently filed a statement of interest supporting that case, arguing that what constituted “physical obstruction” at a house of worship under the FACE Act could be interpreted broadly.
Now, similar legal reasoning may apply to journalists covering the Sunday church protest in Minneapolis. Press freedom groups have expressed deep alarm over the arrests, arguing that the journalists were there to document, not disrupt.
The arrests are “the latest example of the administration coming up with far-fetched ‘gotcha’ legal theories to send a message to journalists to tread cautiously,” said Seth Stern, chief of advocacy for Freedom of the Press Foundation. “Because the government is looking for any way to target them.”
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