World News
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Maine Democrats are poised to nominate Graham Platner, as Jewish Democrats withhold support
Maine Democrats are poised to nominate Graham Platner on Tuesday to challenge incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins in one of the most important Senate races this year. But a series of recent domestic violence allegations and controversies surrounding Platner could become a major political problem for the party in its effort to regain control of…
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Some Jewish Republicans say Tucker Carlson is no longer a threat. Others worry he’ll run for president.
(JTA) — At the Republican Jewish Coalition’s annual gala last November, much of the discussion centered around right-wing antisemitism. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz warned that there was “an existential crisis in our party” as figures such as Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens and Nick Fuentes built their online audiences, while right-wing firebrand Rep. Randy Fine of…
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Canada’s new council to tackle antisemitism divides Jewish groups
(JTA) — Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has announced a plan to fight antisemitism, but Canadian Jews are debating whether it’s enough. Carney said on Monday that the country was “failing Jewish Canadians” as antisemitic hate crimes rose to the highest levels seen in Canada since World War II. In a speech at Toronto’s Holy…
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Progressive Jews are trying out post-Zionism. There’s one big flaw in their approach
The data is clear: American Jews are feeling increasingly alienated from Zionism. But a new progressive coalition is failing to reckon with why the Zionist ideology their members mostly reject was so powerful in the first place. On May 18, more than 40 Jewish organizations launched the Jewish Diaspora Movement, which, in their words, rejects…
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It’s time for Jews who love Israel to give up on Zionism
Why have I, a longstanding democratic Zionist who lived in Israel for five years and loves the country passionately, abandoned my belief in a democratic Jewish state? My short response is that I did not abandon democratic Zionism. Democratic Zionism abandoned me. More than two-and-half years after Hamas slaughtered close to 1,200 people in the…
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Majority of House Democrats vote to defeat Lebanon war powers measure
(JTA) — A House resolution aimed at preventing U.S. involvement in hostilities in Lebanon failed Thursday. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Michigan Democrat and fierce critic of Israel, forced a vote on the House floor Thursday. It was defeated 324 to 92, with 91 Democrats voting in favor. The sole Republican vote came from Kentucky Rep.…
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After years of hostile relations with Israel, Slovenia’s new prime minister signals diplomatic reset
(JTA) — Less than an hour after Slovenia’s newly elected prime minister, Janez Janša, was sworn into office by the country’s parliament, he had the Palestinian flag lowered from a government building. The move marked the first step in a sharp reorientation of Slovenia’s posture towards Israel under Janša. The right-leaning prime minister, who previously…
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Israel gives in to the politics of debasement
A small episode this week crystallized the broader pathology of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu more clearly than any grand speech or ideological argument ever could: the Knesset vote for state comptroller, one of the most sensitive institutional positions in Israeli public life. In Israel, the 120 members of the Knesset elect the comptroller by…
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My irrational, possibly problematic obsession with an $85 yarmulke
Growing up, we had a rule of thumb about yarmulkes: the closer yours was to your forehead, the more strictly religious you were. The frum bochurim placed theirs practically on their noses; the boys from Conservative families bobby-pinned their kippahs on the back of their heads, like climbers gripping a rockface. The cool kids, of course, stuffed…
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How Iran is outsourcing terror plots against Jews
The prosecution of an Iraqi national in connection with thwarted alleged terror plots in the U.S. and Europe has put the behind-the-scenes role of Iran in the spotlight — part of what security experts say is a growing and hard-to-trace threat. Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, a 32-year-old Iraqi national accused of ties to an…
