Friday, May 02, 2025

05/02 Links Pt2: The Passion Play of Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders; How American Liberals came to hate Israel and love Hamas; The Hitler sympathiser on the BBC

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The fatal flaw in memorializing the Holocaust
They didn’t realize that the West had a visceral aversion to hearing about the Holocaust. Since this had taken place at the very epicenter of high Western civilization, even nations not directly involved felt an inescapable and unbearable guilt by association.

The way the guilty West dealt with this was effectively to sanitize Nazism. If it could say everyone could be a Nazi, including the Jews themselves, this would let the West off the guilty hook.

Darker still, the genocide of the Jews challenged the narrative of Jew-hatred that was embedded in Western culture. Although the Holocaust drove this underground, people still widely believed the paranoid, antisemitic tropes of covert Jewish power and malign intent.

They resented the fact that the Holocaust prevented them from expressing these views. Calling Israelis “Nazis”—the demonization lie perpetrated by those who wanted Israel destroyed—enabled antisemites to resume hating Jews once again, sanitized and camouflaged as anti-Zionism so that they couldn’t be accused of the very thing that had produced the Nazi Holocaust.

In her article, Wisse noted the perversity of teaching about hate to prevent hate. Societies that concentrate on their self-improvement, she observed, generally rely on positive instruction and reinforcement. “A pedagogical fixation on hate, by contrast, has been associated with societies like fascist Germany and Soviet Russia that wish to direct blame and hate against designated alien or undesirable groups,” she wrote.

The focus of post-Holocaust education should be not on hatred but on admiration. Most people have never met a Jew, whose numbers make them statistically insignificant.

Rather than confront the wider community with the almost inconceivable horror of the attempt to destroy a people about which they know nothing and care less, the focus should be on educating them about Judaism, the Jewish people and the State of Israel.

People should be taught about the key precepts of Judaism that have been absolutely essential to the development of civilized values in the West, including political freedom, the rule of law and respect for human life.

They should be taught that the Jews are an ancient people whose religion is centered upon the land of Israel; that they are the only people for whom it was ever their national kingdom; and that this is why the U.N.’s forerunner gave them alone the right to settle what is now Israel, the disputed territories of the “West Bank” and Gaza.

So many in the West think wrongly that Judaism is only a religious faith, which therefore shouldn’t have a land. So many think wrongly that the Jews are latter-day interlopers into that land from where they displaced its indigenous inhabitants. So many think wrongly that Israel is in illegal occupation of the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria.

They think this because they only hear Palestinian propaganda to this effect and are never told that these are wall-to-wall lies. As a result, they think that Israel is on the wrong side of fairness, justice and the rule of law, while the truth is the very opposite.

Antisemitism will always be with us. The best that can be hoped for is that it’s shoved firmly back beneath its stone. If there’s any chance of doing so, memorializing dead Jews should give way to celebrating the culture of the living ones.
How “The Brutalist” Tries to Rewrite American Jewish History
Normally this newsletter wouldn’t link to two separate articles reviewing the same movie, but a writer like Edward Rothstein reviewing a much-praised film like The Brutalist is something that demands attention. Rothstein praises the acting and the score of this film about the career of a Hungarian Holocaust survivor, Laszlo Toth, as an architect in America, and praises the director for the film’s ambition and scope. Yet he finds the film marred by its muddled understanding of its subject—modern architecture—as well as its ideological agenda, which “reinforces so many contemporary mythologies that caricature the American dream as a nightmare.”

One of the surprises of The Brutalist is that Tóth is depicted as a committed Jew, and the film takes his religious commitment seriously, though it is under siege by nearly every American he encounters. . . . When Tóth takes refuge in a Catholic homeless shelter, he is pressed to attend church. Later on, at a public meeting, his design of a chapel . . . is challenged partly because he’s a Jew. A mediocre Protestant architect is brought in to modify his designs. As Tóth says to his wife, “They don’t want us here!”

But this assertion seems more influenced by contemporary political talking points than by the Jewish experience in mid-century America; the opportunities that émigré Jewish professionals had from the 1930s through the 1950s transformed nearly every aspect of American culture. And the intense demand for immigration to the United States by all peoples, despite real prejudice and discrimination that often greeted their arrival, has persisted through the decades because more important liberties were being realized.

Despite all of this heavy-handed polemicizing, [the film] treats the Jewish aspects of Tóth’s life soberly, without condescension or irony or sentimentality. In fact, they are insisted upon. We see Tóth in a traditional synagogue on Yom Kippur, chanting the ancient litany of communal sins and beating his breast with each one mentioned—“We have trespassed, we have betrayed; we have stolen; we have slandered”—and we feel that we are in the presence of genuine and ardent religious feeling. In a development that has inspired palpable discomfort among some progressive critics, even Zionism is taken seriously.

Too bad a film willing to convey such a message insists on drawing incoherent parallels between capitalist America and Nazi-ruled Europe, and ignores the circumstances that drew real European Jews, like the fictional Toth, to America’s shores.
Seth Mandel: The Passion Play of Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders
The Anti-Semitism Awareness Act—a measure before the Senate that, inter alia, would grant legal status to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism—has for some time been caught in the legislative switches. Now, as its supporters try to move it forward, four amendments have been introduced that will serve as poison pills. Leading the charge to undermine the bill are Senators Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul, who have both claimed, falsely, that the bill criminalizes speech. It does no such thing. Seth Mandel explains:
Sanders . . . has taken criticism of the bill to new levels by doing more than just lying about what the bill actually does. The text of his amendment . . . includes literal Hamas propaganda in demanding the right (already protected under the bill) to “oppose the Netanyahu-led war effort, which has killed more than 50,000 and wounded more than 113,000, 60 percent of whom are women and children.”

These numbers have been repeatedly debunked, most recently by Hamas itself. . . . Obviously Congress cannot and will not enshrine in its legislation proven falsehoods designed to aid the enemy force currently keeping Americans hostage after massacring U.S. citizens. Sanders knows this. He just wants to demand anti-Israel propaganda be put on the congressional record.

Rand Paul’s attempt at scaremongering this legislation out of contention took a different form: . . . “This bill would subject to punishment speech claiming that Jews killed Jesus,” Paul said, repeating a popular white-nationalist talking point. He explained that the Gospels blame Jews for killing Jesus and therefore—and here he offered a solid candidate for the craziest thing ever said in Congress—“you’re no longer allowed to read John 18 and 19.”

He then . . . “entered into the record a list of the names of 400 Jewish American comedians who he said have referred to Jews in stereotypical language, and who he says may be targeted by the bill.”

Most informed readers would consider Paul’s interpretation of the Gospel of John misleading if not tendentious, and even if it were not, the bill proposes no punishment for speech of any kind. The Orthodox Union’s policy director, Nathan Diament, put it thus to Jewish Insider:
Let’s be clear: these amendments are a disgrace. They don’t just weaken the Antisemitism Awareness Act—they mock it. . . . Some lawmakers in Washington are abdicating their responsibility to ensure that this country’s civil-rights laws are used to protect American Jews as much as they protect any other community targeted with discrimination and harassment.


Lee Smith: David Horowitz, 1939-2025
Radical Son is a narrative driven by crimes and lies. He’d helped his friend Betty Van Patter get an accounting job with the Panthers, and Newton had her murdered. That kept Horowitz out of politics for a while, as he wondered if the left could “take a really hard look at itself—the consequences of its failures, the credibility of its critiques, the viability of its goals.” He wrote, “I already knew the answers, although I wasn’t ready yet to draw the appropriate conclusions.”

His parents had not wanted to ask those questions, so when it became impossible to ignore or excuse Stalin’s crimes, they were crushed—they’d nurtured lies great and small for decades. In the Tablet article recounting my afternoon with David, I wrote that, with his parents’ failed political commitment in mind, he’d “resolved not to be played for a sucker.” Now I see that was a coarse formulation, and false. There was nothing calculated about his reevaluation of his place in the political realm. He lived by his sense of what was true and what was good, as he records in Radical Son. It’s a work of profound psychological acuity, whether he’s describing Newton, his parents, the character of an ex-wife, or his failure to see his own faults as clearly as he sees others’.

The fact is that throughout his career, first on the left and then on the right, Horowitz’s main theme wasn’t really politics; rather, it was family. Along with fellow former leftist turned conservative Peter Collier, he wrote several histories of great American families, including the Rockefellers and the Kennedys. Many consider A Cracking of the Heart, his memoir of his late daughter Sarah, to be his best book. Conservatives generally argue, with good reason, that leftist policies are designed to break the traditional family structure. But David believed that failures at home generate the psychological chaos at the heart of the leftist project to undo civilization and remake it in the image of barbarism.

“The perennial challenge,” he wrote in Radical Son, is “to teach our young the conditions of being human, of managing life’s tasks in a world that is (and must remain) forever imperfect. The refusal to come to come to terms with this reality is the heart of the radical impulse and accounts for its destructiveness, and thus for much of the bloody history of our age. My own life, which has often been painful and many times off course, is ultimately not discrete—a story to itself—but part of the narrative we all share.”

It’s true: Almost everything we love breaks. May we, too, earn the wisdom David Horowitz sought and found and shared with family, friends, colleagues, and readers.
How American Liberals came to hate Israel and love Hamas | Think Twice
Why do so many Americans side with Palestinian Arab terrorists against Israelis? JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin believes the answer to that question lies in an understanding of how progressive ideologues have largely taken over American education and culture. They have helped indoctrinate a generation with false ideas that cause them to view the conflict in the Middle East through the prism of American race relations. That led them to wrongly believe that Israelis and Jews are “white” oppressors rather than the objects of a Palestinian Arab obsession with destroying the Jewish state and the genocide of the Jews.

He’s joined in this week’s episode of Think Twice by Uri Kaufman, author of the new book, American Intifada: How the Progressive Left learned to hate Israel and love Hamas. According to Kaufman, the problem lies in the cognitive dissonance experienced by many Americans who are prepared to see the world through their distorted ideas about “privilege” and race even if it requires them to ignore the facts about Israel, the Palestinians and what happened on Oct. 7, 2023.

Kaufman asks us to imagine that the people of Gaza were Germans, white South Africans or white supremacists. “Do you really think that the Biden administration would have budgeted billions of dollars for the white supremacist ‘innocent civilians?’ And now hold the thought for a moment. Let's carry this all the way through. Let's assume again in this parallel universe, white supremacists, not Arab supremacists, but let's assume they murdered 1,200 black people and raped black women. And then they said, blacks are apes and pigs, as Arabs say of Jews. And they budgeted billions of dollars to those innocent white supremacist civilians who say blacks are apes and pigs. They'd be rioting in the streets. People would go crazy. So, the bottom line is what we have here is a classic textbook case of cognitive dissonance.”

Kaufman also believes the problem is caused by leading political figures like the late President Jimmy Carter, former President Barack Obama and opinion leaders like New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman and so-called human rights groups like Amnesty International, who, as Kaufman says, “ought to know better.” Their faith in their own failed ideas has led them to promote myths about Israel being responsible for the lack of peace when the real cause all along has been Palestinian intransigence and opposition to the existence of a Jewish state.

Kaufman is full of praise for the war leadership of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he describes as, “the most unfairly maligned politician on the face of the earth.” He also is optimistic about the future of the U.S.-Israel alliance, because of the basic fairness of the American people. Kaufman also thinks that, worries about negotiations with Iran notwithstanding, “I have a lot of faith in President Trump when it comes to Israel. He's proven himself. Whatever one thinks about his other policies, he's certainly proven himself on Israel.”


Nicole Lampert: The Hitler sympathiser on the BBC
BBC Arabic is the BBC’s most influential foreign-language service, reaching a weekly audience of 35million people. Ironically, taxpayers fund services such as BBC Arabic in order to flex the UK’s ‘soft power’ and spread our liberal values abroad – but this clearly is not what is actually happening here.

The jubilation expressed by some of BBC Arabic’s senior staff over 7 October reveals the extent of the problem. Sally Nabil, a bilingual correspondent based in Egypt and the Middle East, liked a tweet that described the massacre as ‘Palestinian resistance taking the initiative and surprising the Israeli occupier with an operation of quality’. She also liked a comment that described a photo of jeeps loaded with bodies and kidnapped civilians as ‘a proud scene’.

Then we have Salma Khattab, a correspondent for BBC Arabic based in Egypt. Her response to the greatest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust was to like a tweet describing the perpetrators as ‘freedom fighters’. Mahmoud Sheleib, a senior producer based in Cairo at the time of the 7 October pogrom, implied it was reasonable for Hamas to attack minors because Israel supposedly doesn’t ‘have any civilians among the youth’. ‘This is what the ignorant often don’t know’, he said on X. It tells us something important that none of these BBC employees seemed worried about their views becoming public, despite the Beeb’s clear rules on social-media use.

With ‘reporters’ like these, it’s unsurprising to learn that BBC Arabic’s coverage of the Israel-Hamas war has been riddled with inaccuracies. In fact, so staggeringly bad has its reporting been it had to make 80 corrections in the first five months of the conflict alone.

A comprehensive report by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA), published in March, reveals that this is not a new problem. In 2021, CAMERA notes, the BBC was forced to sack a West Bank-based reporter at its monitoring service when an old tweet that said ‘HitlerWasRight’ emerged. It found that BBC Arabic had also regularly hosted commentator Abdel Bari Atwan – a man who referred to a terrorist who killed Israelis as a ‘hero’ and expressed sympathy for Salman Rushdie’s attacker. He also said he would ‘dance with delight in Trafalgar Square’ if Iran attacked Israel. Where on Earth does the BBC find these people?

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has demanded ‘wholesale reform’ of BBC Arabic. In March, John Mann, the UK government’s independent adviser on anti-Semitism, said the BBC had repeatedly rejected his offers of anti-Semitism training. Yet none of this political pressure appears to have made the slightest difference at New Broadcasting House.

The BBC ought to be ashamed of BBC Arabic’s conduct. The fact that it isn’t speaks volumes.
Journalist who exposed Hamas link behind BBC Gaza documentary targeted by vandals
The Community Security Trust (CST), a charity which protects Jewish people in the UK, recorded 3,528 antisemitic incidents in the UK in 2024, the second-highest total ever reported to the organisation in a single calendar year.

A CST spokesperson said: “We are aware of the incident and are providing David with support. We urge anyone who has any information to contact the police and CST.”

Mr Collier has said he would rather “leave the country” than stop researching and reporting on the conflict.

He added: “The UK’s been really nice to my family for quite an extended period of time now. We came 120 years ago and my grandfather fought in the army.”

He added: “I’m very attached to this country and yet honestly I am having every part of Britain kicked out of me.”

A Metropolitan Police spokesman confirmed it had received a report of criminal damage.

They said: “The victim’s car was vandalised outside his address. Officers launched an investigation and the report was treated as a racially aggravated criminal damage incident.

“Specialist hate crime officers reviewed CCTV from the area across a five day period.”

The spokesman added that the investigation has been filed with no arrests being made “due to a lack of positive lines of enquiry” but should further information be discovered, the case could be re-opened.
Truth lost the debate
If I were in Murray’s shoes, I would have asked Smith and the audience just two questions: What would you do to bring the hostages home, and what would you do to ensure that Oct. 7 never happens again? Because that is the moral and strategic challenge facing Israel.

Israel has gone to extraordinary lengths to avoid civilian casualties. Hamas, on the other hand, has done everything in its power to increase them—firing weapons from hospitals, hiding weapons in schools and using civilians as human shields. They built a vast terror tunnel empire beneath Gaza while failing to provide a single bomb shelter above ground for its people.

What about the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), the so-called “humanitarian” agency that employs Hamas operatives as teachers and aid workers, some of whom took part in the Oct. 7 massacre? The world continues to fund them.

Israel’s response is not genocide. It is restraint in the face of barbarism.

Murray had the truth on his side. Unfortunately, the truth alone doesn’t win hearts. It must be delivered with clarity, moral fire and emotional resonance.

This isn’t just about a war against Hamas. It’s a war against a global campaign of lies—a psychological war meant to delegitimize Israel and erode support for the Jewish state.

Smith’s ignorance is symptomatic of a much larger problem. While anti-Israel sentiment has long been entrenched on the far left, we are now witnessing its spread into the populist Trump-aligned right. That should alarm every American who values freedom and civilization.

Some on the right are now parroting the same “oppressor vs. oppressed” narrative being pushed by the radical left. They are buying into the propaganda of the green-red alliance, the Islamist-Marxist coalition that seeks to destroy the West. Israel is just their first target. America is next.

If American conservatives and libertarians truly believe in truth, freedom and Western civilization, they must stand with Israel. Not just because it’s morally right but because Israel’s battle is their battle, too.
Did the Pandemic Weaken the Taboo Against Antisemitism?
We know that the pandemic was the occasion for a great unraveling of social trust in our public health institutions, and in the medical field itself. Some of this was on the way, built into existing social trends. But I believe that the withdrawal from social life drained the authority and force not just out of institutions like health boards, schools, and churches (none of which have fully recovered), but also out of long-developed taboos and social expectations. The definitions of what’s crazy, what’s malicious, what’s polite, normal, and respectable all lost some of their force. Again, this built on an existing trend to shift socialization online. But considered this way, the rise of antisemitism would be connected to other trends the pandemic supercharged, like our low fertility, the sex recession, and the general surge of loneliness.

I cannot point to any special set of studies, or any formal chain of causation, but what Bill Buckley once called “the structure of prevailing taboos,” including the taboo against antisemitism, is obviously weaker now. It makes sense that the whole world of social authority lost power as we started socializing less than ever before. One early study during the pandemic said that antisemitic acts were being suppressed along with the general level of social activity during the pandemic, but that they were being replaced and replicated with a surge of online antisemitism.

The current vintage of antisemitism, particularly as it has been expressed alongside a left-wing critique of Zionism, has another peculiar quality: It is like a suicidal person’s envy of the vivacious. As targets of antisemitism, Jews tended to be blamed for contradictory crimes: They’re too clannish, they’re too cosmopolitan, they’re dedicated to a backward religion, they’re a force for secularization, etc., etc. Modern Israel stands out for not overprivileging a suicidal impulse in its rhetoric, and for in some ways excising it from its social life. Israel has an above-replacement birth rate. It defends its existence, surrounded by hostile powers, with zest and real self-belief. To perhaps dangle myself over the abyss of political incorrectness or risk romanticizing a foreign nation, it is as if the pandemic has turned many gentiles into Theodor Herzl’s caricature of self-hating Jews. The pandemic had us physically bent over our devices, scrolling neurotically, indulging in persecution fantasies, whereas Israelis — targets of real extinction-level violence — find themselves standing ramrod, facing their enemies with confidence, and wit. Maybe a civilization that let death and risk reign over it so abjectly is driven to disgrace and madness by an example of heroism and moral courage in the face of danger.
Harvard Law Review Awards $65k Fellowship to Student Charged in Assault of Israeli Classmate: Report
The Harvard Law Review is awarding a $65,000 fellowship meant to serve "the public interest" to Ibrahim Bharmal, the Harvard Law School student who faced criminal charges for assaulting an Israeli classmate, according to a new report.

Bharmal is one of this year's recipients of the Harvard Law Review Fellowship, Ira Stoll of The Editors reported. The program supports "recent Harvard Law School graduates"—Bharmal is set to graduate this month—with "a demonstrated interest in serving the public interest through their work and scholarship." It comes with a $65,000 stipend that funds each fellow's work "in a public-interest related role at a government agency or nonprofit organization." For Bharmal, that work will come at the Council on American-Islamic Relations's Los Angeles office, according to Stoll.

The move comes at a tumultuous time for both the Harvard Law Review and Harvard Law School. The Trump administration is probing both entities over internal documents, first reported in the Washington Free Beacon, that show editors at Harvard Law Review use race to select both editors and articles for publication. At least one private attorney, former Texas solicitor general Jonathan Mitchell, plans to sue the journal over the practice, ordering its editors on Friday to preserve documents that he plans to subpoena.

The law review claims to be separate from the law school, something a spokesman for Harvard, Jeff Neal, emphasized in a statement to the Free Beacon. The fellowship could undercut those claims. A Free Beacon review found that Harvard's database for grant and fellowship opportunities, known as CARAT, advertises the fellowship. That advertisement states that a "committee of Harvard Law School and Harvard Law Review alumni in public interest careers chooses finalists from the set of applicants, and a faculty committee interviews the finalists to select fellows," indicating Harvard faculty members signed off on Bharmal as a recipient.
Arsen Ostrovsky: Australia’s Election: A Defining Moment for the Jewish Community and Relations with Israel
At the center of this choice are two fundamentally different visions.

On one side, the @LiberalAus , led by @PeterDutton_MP, has shown unambiguous moral clarity. Dutton has consistently called out antisemitism, and pledged to adopt a detailed blueprint proposed by the Jewish community to tackling the hatred, including revoking visas for those involved in antisemitic attacks.

The Liberal party has also reaffirmed Australia’s unwavering support for Israel on the international stage, including the right to defend itself against the barbarity of Hamas and Iran’s terror proxies, rejected the absurd and politicized attempt by the International Criminal Court to indict the Israeli Prime Minister and former Defense Minister, and vowed to cease funding to the Hamas-infested UNRWA.

Following his visit to Israel in August 2024, including to the sites of the October 7th massacre in the south of the country, which Foreign Minister Wong refused to do, when she came, Dutton wrote: “My trip to Israel has not only reinforced the importance of standing with our ally in its darkest hours. It has also reinforced the duty that democratic citizens have in turning the tide of anti-Semitism – wherever we find it and whatever form it takes.”

Contrast Dutton’s moral clarity with @AlboMP and the @AustralianLabor government, under whose watch there has been an unabated surge in antisemitism and systematic undermining of Australia’s relationship with Israel.

From the shameful reversal of the recognition of even west Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, to repeatedly voting against Israel at the United Nations, endorsing an arms embargo against the Jewish state, and re-upping the checkbook to UNRWA, it has been an utter sense of abandonment.

And now ahead of the elections, we find out that Labour is preferencing the virulently antisemitic, jihad-supporting Greens, and promising to recognize a Palestinian state, while Hamas is still holding hostages.

In short, Labor has sent a dangerous message: that political expediency trumps moral courage and support for your mates.

This election will offer a pivotal opportunity to change course — to say that Australia will not tolerate hatred, that it will not abandon its democratic allies, and to say unequivocally that antisemitism, in any form, has no place in Australian society.
Australian elections will not determine Israel's fate, but could divide Jewish community
Implications of a Labor victory for Australian Jews
If that forecast proves accurate, it could have serious implications for young Jews hoping to build their lives in Australia. Some may even consider Aliyah if the incoming government fails to act decisively to ensure their safety. Diplomatic relations with Israel may continue to cool under another Labor government — but for the IDF soldiers fighting an existential war thousands of kilometres away, that may be of little concern. Israel’s course in the current war won’t be determined in Canberra — and neither will its future.

Saturday’s election could, however, reshape the dynamics of Australia’s Jewish community. And that should matter to Israel, which has always defined itself as the homeland of the Jewish people. A fractured diaspora, unable to speak with a clear voice in support of Israel, is a real threat — one with long-term consequences.

Though small in size, Australia’s Jewish community has long been a vocal and vital ally. A major part of Israel’s strength, resilience, and global standing comes from the support of diaspora communities — through lobbying, aid, and moral solidarity. For everyday Israelis like me, it also means something less tangible but equally vital: knowing we are not alone.

Israel depends on its allies — sometimes literally — for survival. What would have happened if no coalition of states had come to Israel’s defence during Iran’s unprecedented missile attack in April last year? What if pro-Israel advocates hadn’t consistently urged foreign governments to maintain their support? I hope we never have to find out.

I took on this role with one goal in mind: to strengthen the bond between Israel and Australia — not just with its government, but with the Jewish community that has called it home since the end of World War II. A strong, lasting relationship requires a strong, united community. And if October 7 taught me anything, it’s that strength and unity are inseparable.

Australia’s Jewish community must protect its unity at all costs. It must also ensure that its younger generations feel they belong — and are encouraged to stay politically engaged. That can be achieved through leadership initiatives, open political discussions, and stronger education about Australia’s political system.
Australia’s Jewish Community Faces an Election — and an Unprecedented Threat
On December 6, 2024, the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne was firebombed in the early hours of the morning, with some worshipers narrowly escaping with their lives.

A December 2024 Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) report recorded a staggering 316% increase in antisemitic attacks since October 7, 2023 — a level not seen since the Holocaust. Those figures didn’t even include the firebombing attack.

Then, in January, Ice Hockey Australia canceled its hosting of a key international tournament — not to protect Jewish athletes, but, allegedly, to shield the Israeli team from anti-Israel protestors.

The current Labor government is not the cause of this antisemitism. But its failure to confront it robustly has contributed to its escalation. Since its election in May 2022, it has shattered the warm bipartisan relationship that existed between the two countries. It has voted for biased one-sided resolutions against Israel at the United Nations, while constantly criticizing Israel’s efforts to defend itself.

While it has in recent months appeared to finally take the threat of antisemitism more seriously — including setting up a special federal task force to crack down on antisemitism, as well as appointing a special a Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism — it does beg the question: What took so long? The damage has already been done.

Jews feel less secure now in Australia than they ever had, and the government bears a responsibility for that.

Just days ago, neo-Nazi flyers — adorned with Liberal Party logos — appeared in the mailboxes of Jewish homes in Caulfield, Melbourne, filled with antisemitic tropes about Jews and money. Members of the same hate group were seen outside voting booths dressed as Hasidic Jews, distributing flyers that read: “Giving the Jews everything they want.” Posters of both Jewish and non-Jewish candidates were defaced with red spray-painted Stars of David.

The image of Australia as a tolerant society for Jews has been severely strained, perhaps even shattered. Whether the ineffective Labor government remains in power, as it’s projected to do, or the more pro-Israel Liberal Party takes over, the road ahead for Australia’s Jews remains uncertain and dangerously perilous.

The antisemitic genie has been let out of the bottle — and putting it back in will not be easy.


NYC mayor orders oversight of public school communications after antisemitic newsletters
New York City Mayor Eric Adams ordered increased oversight of communications at the city’s education department on Thursday, after a second newsletter with antisemitic content was sent out this week to public school staff.

City Hall announced that all newsletters and citywide messages from the New York City Department of Education must now undergo an enhanced review process, including legal review and leadership sign-off, according to a memo the mayor’s office sent to JNS.

“Political speech, which has no place in official New York City Public Schools media, was inserted into divisional publications,” per the memo. “These incidents undermine our credibility and the trust our community places in us.”

Earlier this week, a Department of Education newsletter sent to hundreds of “master teachers” across the city’s 1,800 schools claimed that Israel is committing a “genocide in Gaza” and called for student voices to be centered in response to “global injustices,” wrote the New York Post.

On April 3, the city’s Office of Student Pathways Newsletter, a monthly publication distributed to students and parents in the city’s public school system, included a link to a “toolkit” that encouraged students to boycott pro-Israel organizations and advocate for “Palestine” on social media.

Rabbi Moshe Hauer, executive vice president of the Orthodox Union, told JNS that the newsletter sent out this week reflects a broader failure to protect Jewish students since Oct. 7.

“One tragic untold story since Oct. 7 is Jewish students feel abandoned and unprotected by those responsible for building a school community that is supposed to make those students feel safe and welcome,” he told JNS.

Adams told JNS on Thursday that the newly instituted protocols will ensure that “no politically one-sided rhetoric ever appears again in any official communication sent from our schools.”

“Let me be clear. Schools are where our children should feel safest, which is why neither antisemitism nor any other form of hate has any place in New York City Public Schools,” Adams said. “As the home of the largest Jewish community in the world outside of Israel, we must ensure our Jewish students, families and educators feel welcomed, not targeted.”


Teachers in chat group discuss ‘ZioNazis’ and showing anti-Israel videos to pupils
Teachers taking part in a WhatsApp group referred to “ZioNazis” and discussed showing videos to children on “what Israel is doing to Palestine”, the JC can reveal.

Writing in the “NEU SUTR [Stand Up to Racism]” chat group, Farnborough teacher Nazia Abassi said: “I feel like Zionists look up to the Nazis and try their best to top their horrific crimes.”

She added: “These zioNazis have to be called out wherever they rear their ugly heads.”

The history teacher – who has also blamed “Zionist terrorists” for 9/11 on Facebook – said she had used videos to show children “what Israel is doing to Palestine”, adding that “they were shocked by what they saw and asked me why no one was stopping this”.

A Norfolk science teacher, Andrea Abeyesinghe, who is the chair of the local Palestine Solidarity Campaign branch that temporarily managed to get Israeli contestants banned from the World Bowls Tour, voiced her upset that the activist organisation Stand Up to Racism (SUTR) was not going far enough in condemning Zionism.

Abeyesinghe told the group she wanted the National Education Union (NEU) to do more to encourage teachers to “speak the truth” about Zionism. “I think the NEU needs to produce some approved resources so that teachers do not feel scared,” she wrote.

Last year, Alex Kenny, a former NEU executive, called in the publication Labour Outlook for trade unionists from across the UK to “continue to build pro-Palestine and anti-war initiatives in our unions and workplaces”.

And just before Passover, the former president of NEU Redbridge, Sajia Iqbal, filmed herself clearing the Israeli-made food section of Sainsbury’s in Ilford.

Palestine has long been a focus of the NEU, which sponsors trips to Israel and the West Bank. Four out of 14 executive members of the PSC are also high-ranking officials of the NEU.


Three anti-Israel Rutgers students arrested after protesting Gottheimer visit to Hillel, Chabad
Three Rutgers University students were arrested on Tuesday night and charged with rioting during appearances by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) at the Hillel and Chabad on the New Brunswick campus, and a fourth person, who is a teaching assistant at Cornell University, was charged with assaulting a police officer, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office.

“I always welcome a debate on the issues, even when I disagree,” Gottheimer told JNS. “But there’s absolutely no room for violence, especially against law enforcement, who are there to protect all of us.”

Gottheimer’s visit, during which his office said he discussed “the alarming rise in antisemitism on college campuses across the country” with students, came just over a year to the day after anti-Israel protesters pitched tents on campus.

“With so much hate and antisemitism across our country and our state, and even here on our college campuses, it’s more important than ever before that we remain united as one community to support each other,” stated the Jewish congressman, who is a candidate for N.J. governor.

“Let me be as clear as I can be: No student deserves to be targeted because of who they are or what they believe, here or anywhere,” the congressman added. “When the Jewish community at Rutgers is confronted by hate or intolerance, this is an attack on all of us, regardless of background, regardless of faith.”

The Rutgers Police Department had set up a protest zone, per the prosecutor’s office, but four protesters refused to clear the public sidewalk when the university’s police department asked them to do so.

When police officers formed a protective line, the four people tried to breach it. Police then declared the protest unlawful and attempted to disperse the demonstrators, but four of them—Thomas Whitehead (25), Lexi Tassone (21), Hanah Hassan (23) and Jasmine Rodriguez (24)—breached the line

The prosecutor’s office said that Whitehead, a doctoral student and teaching assistant at Cornell University, was charged with aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer, rioting and resisting arrest. Hassan and Rodriguez, both students, were charged with rioting, and Tassone, another student, was charged with rioting and resisting arrest.


Far-left activist who refused to denounce Hamas elected as local councillor in Preston
A Trotskyist candidate who said Hamas had the “right to resist” Israel in Gaza has been elected as a councillor in the Lancashire seat of Preston Central East.

Michael Lavalette, an academic and member of the Socialist Workers Party, had been asked at a hustings event last year ahead of the general election if he would “denounce Hamas as a terrorist organisation regardless of your views” on the war in Gaza.

He reportedly responded:”“No… I think when your land is occupied, and when it has been for 76 years, people have the right to resist.

“They had the right to resist in the Second World War, the French resistance, the Yugoslavian resistance, the Italian resistance, the Greek resistance. And the Palestinians have the right to fight against their own disposition.”

In an online video seen by Jewish News Lavalette said that while he did not support any one group himself “the Palestinians have always been heroic in their right to resist the colonialisation of the their lands.”

The Palestinians had the “right to resist” under international law, he said, saying it was up to them to choose what form of resistance they used.

He said being a “socialist activist” the “main enemy” was British and American colonialism.

Lavalette triumphed in Thursday’s local elections in Preston Central East, where he ran as part of a Preston Independents group in Lancashire with with 1782 votes.

Labour candidate Frank De Molfetta came second with 884 votes.
Green Party leaders pressed over decision to admit councillor who compared Zionism to Nazis
A Jewish Labour MP has written to the Green Party’s co-leaders over the “very concerning conduct” of a councillor in South London who compared Zionism to Nazism, and who backed a legal move arguing Hamas should be removed from the banned list of terror organisations.

In his letter to Carla Denyer and Adrian Ramsay, the MP Peter Prinsley noted how the Green’s deputy leader Zack Polanski had “rolled out the red carpet” to welcome Lewisham councillor HauYu Tam to the party.

Prinsley, a Jewish Labour Movement member, said he was “deeply concerned” to learn of Cllr Tam’s conduct, including a claim she was “extremely proud” of those working on a legal case to remove Hamas from the terror list.

The Labour MP noted JLM’s call for Cllr Tam to be expelled, and also a March 2023 letter warning the Greens have become a refuge for left-wing antisemites.

Directly addressing the Greens leadership, Prinsley writes: “Do you condemn the racist comments made by Councillor Tam?”.

He also calls for the party to “immediately suspend” her for her remarks.

The MP then asks in his letter for the Greens to review both its candidate selection processes and its training on antisemitism.

Jewish News was also alerted to a party-political broadcast released this month by the Green Party which featured a councillor who had previously denied Hamas’s atrocities on October 7.


Pro-Gaza candidate who backed segregated spaces for Muslims wins local election seat
A pro-Gaza independent candidate who called for segregated areas to end the mixing of Muslim men and women has triumphed in a local election in Burnley, Lancashire.

Maheen Kamran was elected as a councillor for Burnley Central East with 1,357 votes on Thursday taking the seat from Labourn the Burnley Central east seat.

Gavin Theaker representing Reform UK came second with 1,089 votes.

The 18 year-old medical student had previously told Politics Home she was motivated to enter politics by the war in Gaza, where she believes a “genocide” is taking place as a result of Israel’s war on Hamas.

She said she also wants to encourage public spaces to prevent “free mixing” between Muslim men and women.

“There’s a big aspect of free mixing,” she said ahead of the election. “Muslim women aren’t really comfortable with being involved with Muslim men. I’m sure we can have segregated areas, segregated gyms, where Muslim women don’t have to sacrifice their health.”

Meanwhile Azhar Ali, suspended by Labour for antisemitism last year during the Rochdale byelection, has been elected as an independent candidate as county councillor for the Nelson East ward with 1976 votes.

Lord Hayward, a pollster and respected Tory peer said:”“I don’t see Labour being able to resolve this issue with the Muslim community in places where there are large Muslim populations.”

Elsewhere in Lancanshire Sohail Asghar was elected for the Greens in the Accrington West and Oswaldtwistle Central seat.

Asghar had previously shared an image of an injured child on social media with the words “Israel equals ISIS”.


How the Palestinian Authority Teaches Young Girls to Celebrate a Terrorist
One of the Palestinian Authority (PA)’s greatest role models for girls and women is the terrorist murderer Dalal Mughrabi.

She led the attack that — until Oct. 7, 2023 — was the most lethal terror attack in Israel’s history, known as the Coastal Road Massacre. Together with other Fatah terrorists, Mughrabi hijacked a bus in 1978 and murdered 37 civilians, including 12 children.

Although 47 years have passed since the Coastal Road Massacre, the PA is still adamant about teaching girls and women to be like Mughrabi.

At a recent reading event in the PA Tulkarem Education Directorate (a branch of the PA Ministry of Education), high school girls read and discussed a novel about terrorist murderer Dalal Mughrabi:
Posted text: “As part of the reading challenge, the [Tulkarem] Education Directorate participated along with the Fir’aun High School for Girls in a wave activity aimed at discussing the novel ‘After the Last Shore’ by Dr. Adwan Nimr Adwan, as part of the reading challenge program.”

[PA Tulkarem Directorate of Education, Facebook page, Jan. 22, 2025]

Photos from the event show drawings, paintings, and decorations featuring Mughrabi that were made by the students:
A display at the activity had many images representing terrorist murderer Dalal Mughrabi.

The text on the image in the middle at the bottom above says: “Dalal Mughrabi, the legend that does not die.”

Hanging in the foreground is the PA map of “Palestine” — with the location of the Coastal Road Massacre marked on it.

Last year, Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) exposed that the Hebron Education Directorate used books to teach children that murderers of Israelis are role models. On National Reading Day, young schoolgirls were reading a children’s book about Islamic Jihad terrorist and female suicide bomber Hanadi Jaradat. She carried out a suicide attack at a restaurant in Haifa on Oct. 4, 2003, murdering 21 Israelis and wounding over 50.
Abbas blames Hamas, 'categorically rejects' aid lootings in Gaza
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas blamed Hamas for aid lootings in the Gaza Strip, WAFA reported on Friday.

The Palestinian outlet quoted a PA presidential statement saying that "it held Hamas-affiliated gangs primarily responsible."

He also emphasized that all of the looting gangs were "known to the Palestinian public and will top the blacklist to be held accountable and brought to justice in accordance with the law at the appropriate time."

Abbas calls on 'sons of dogs' to hand over hostages
This comes after Abbas called Hamas "sons of dogs" and told the terror group to "hand over the hostages" in a televised speech.

In the speech, he also stressed that "Hamas must end its control of the Gaza Strip and hand over its weapons to the Palestinian Authority."

He then called on Hamas to turn itself into a political party and demilitarize, and urged the terror group to "talk to us instead of the Americans."

Abbas also called for an end to the Israel-Hamas War. He stated that the PA's war goals include "Returning the hostages; lifting the Israeli blockade of Gaza; stopping the displacement of our people in coordination with Arab countries; defending the 'Palestinian cause.'"


Scammers use AI to rewrite and sell Holocaust survivor’s memoir
A 95-year-old Holocaust survivor has condemned fraudsters who used artificial intelligence to rewrite and republish her memoir under fake author names, some laced with anti-Semitic meaning.

Renee Salt, who endured the ghettos, Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, said she was “outraged” after discovering AI-generated copies of A Mother’s Promise, her recently published life story, were being sold online within days of its February release.

In a statement to Jewish News, Salt said, “They’ve stolen my life story. That is outrageous. I’m pleased and relieved that the counterfeit copies have now been taken down. I don’t understand how they can get away with this. It’s disgusting that this should happen.”

One fake version, titled Renee Salt memoir: A Mother’s Promise, appeared on Amazon, published under the name “Jude Williams”, a pseudonym her co-author, journalist Kate Thompson, told MailOnline had “a blatant anti-Semitic slant”.

“’Jude’ is German for Jew. Under the Nazi regime, Jewish people were forced to wear identifiers such as Star of David armbands or badges with the word ‘Jude’ on it”, Thompson said. One of the AI-generated fakes, published under the pseudonym “Jude Williams”, mimicked the real memoir’s title and cover. Photo Credit: MailOnline

After raising complaints, the fraudulent titles were taken down from Amazon but remained on Goodreads until later intervention. Thompson later spotted a second AI version, From Darkness to Light: The Remarkable Journey of Holocaust Survivor Renee Salt, published by “Penny Pincher”.

“It’s creative leeching,” Thompson said. “To take a Holocaust survivor’s testimony for your own profit is beyond reprehensible. It’s about as low as humanity can go.”

The authentic memoir took 18 months to write and was based on extensive interviews and research across Holocaust sites in Europe.

The Holocaust Educational Trust called the incident “an insidious form of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial”.
States, Cities, Schools Across US Declare #EndJewHatred Day in Solidarity With Jewish Community
State and local elected officials in the US, as well as public schools across the country, have pledged to recognize April 29 as #EndJewHatred Day in an effort to empower and show solidarity with Jewish communities in the US and Canada in their fight against antisemitism.

The international grassroots civil rights movement #EndJewHatred made the announcement on Tuesday, revealing that it has secured close to 100 proclamations, resolutions, and citations in support of #EndJewHatred Day from governors, senators, members of Congress, and state and local elected officials.

Some of the most recent proclamations have been issued by New Hampshire Gov. Kelly Ayotte and US Reps. Frederica Wilson (D-FL), Juan Ciscomani (R-AZ), and Tom Barrett (R-MI). In Canada, Melissa Lantsman (MP – Thornhill) issued the first Canadian #EndJewHatred Day proclamation, followed by MP Stan Cho and MP Dawn Gallagher of the Provincial Parliament in Ontario.

The Anti-Defamation League’s (ADL) latest Audit of Antisemitic Incidents, released earlier this month, revealed that antisemitism across the country last year broke “all previous annual records” since the ADL began tracking such data in 1979. The group recorded 9,354 antisemitic incidents in 2024, marking an average of 25.6 a day.

The new #EndJewHatred Day “serves as a unifying call to action to combat antisemitism in all its forms and to raise awareness of the ongoing challenges faced by Jewish communities,” as said in the proclamation signed by Ayotte. A proclamation signed by Colorado Gov. Jared Polis stated there is “an urgent need to act against antisemitism in Colorado and across the country.” Antisemitism in Colorado increased by 41 percent last year and by 373 percent over the past five years, according to the ADL’s latest audit.

Miami, Annapolis, and Beverly Hills are among the cities that have recently recognized #EndJewHatred Day. New York City first recognized #EndJewHatred Day in 2023.

Schools that have vowed to recognize the date include Miami-Dade Public Schools, and districts in Florida, Michigan, Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York. Schools will commemorate this date by making sure it is marked on school calendars and observing it “through emails, morning announcements, or in other ways,” according to the #EndJewHatred movement.
After pressure from Trump admin, Croatia posts police at Chabad House
Rabbi Pinchas Zaklas, of the Chabad of Croatia in Zagreb, walked just steps behind Andrej Plenković, the Balkan state’s prime minister, at a Holocaust remembrance ceremony last week at the site of the former Jasenovac concentration camp site. The two being in lockstep is relatively new to Chabad’s relationship with the country and has the Trump administration to thank, per text messages that JNS reviewed.

Since April 15—during Passover—a marked police car has been posted around the clock outside the Chabad building. The Chabad rabbi told JNS that he had long sought such protection for this community from the state, but was stonewalled.

JNS viewed text messages, in which Pete Hegseth, the U.S. defense secretary, and Christopher Landau, the deputy U.S. secretary of state, responded to requests for help from the Croatian Chabad, as did Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. (JNS sought comment from the two Trump administration officials and from the congressman.)

“The United States government is a strong advocate for religious freedom for all,” the embassy’s public diplomacy section told JNS. “The U.S. embassy in Zagreb is aware of the Chabad community’s request for registration, and we have urged the government of Croatia to evaluate and respond to that request in line with Croatian law.”
Elderly Jewish Man Brutally Attacked, Called ‘Dirty Jew’ in Antisemitic Assault in Southern France
A Jewish man wearing a kippah was brutally attacked and called a “dirty Jew” in France this week, as the country continues to face a rise in antisemitic incidents since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in 2023.

This latest antisemitic attack took place on Wednesday night in Anduze, a small town in southern France, where the 70-year-old Jewish man was brutally beaten by an intoxicated individual, French media reported.

The elderly man — wearing a kippah and tzitzit, fringes on Jewish religious garments worn underneath a shirt, was feeding stray cats on the street when a 40-year-old drunk man approached him and demanded money.

According to eyewitness statements, when the victim refused to give him money, the attacker punched and kicked him repeatedly while calling him a “dirty Jew.”

The town’s prosecutor, Abdelkrim Grini, confirmed that the antisemitic nature of the attack was “proven” in light of the events that took place, according to the French publication Entrevue.

The suspect, who had previously been arrested for theft, was taken into custody on Thursday morning and is facing charges of “violence and insults based on religious affiliation or non-affiliation.”

However, due to his intoxication, he could not be interrogated immediately and will be questioned once his condition permits.

France is home to the largest Jewish population after Israel and the United States, as well as the largest Muslim community in the European Union.

Antisemitism skyrocketed in France following the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, amid the ensuing war in Gaza.

In March, Arie Engelberg, the rabbi of Orléans, was violently attacked while walking home with his nine-year-old son from the synagogue in the city, located south of Paris.

According to Engelberg, the attacker asked if he was Jewish, and when the rabbi replied yes, the assailant began hurling antisemitic insults, including “all Jews are sons of —,” and attempted to film him. The attacker then allegedly started punching Engelberg and bit him until several people stepped in to help.

French authorities arrested a 16-year-old teenager in connection with the antisemitic attack who was known under at least three identities – including one Moroccan and two Palestinian.
Illinois man sentenced to 53 years for hate crime that killed Palestinian child
A man from Illinois was sentenced on Friday to 53 years in prison after a jury convicted him of the murder of a 6-year-old Palestinian American boy and the severe wounding of his mother in an October 2023 hate crime stabbing, The Chicago Sun-Times reported.

Joseph Czuba, 73, stabbed and killed Wadee Alfayoumi and knifed Hanan Shaheen days after US ally Israel began its war on Gaza following Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel. v Prosecutors said the stabbing - one of the earliest and worst hate crime incidents in the US since the start of the war - was sparked by anti-Muslim hatred. US rights advocates have noted rising Islamophobia, anti-Arab hate and antisemitism.

Czuba killed a 6-year-old child
Czuba, who was the landlord for Shaheen and her son, stabbed the boy 26 times with a military-style knife with a 7-inch (18-cm) serrated blade, authorities said. Shaheen suffered multiple stab wounds in the attack that occurred in Plainfield Township, about 40 miles (64 km) southwest of Chicago.

Czuba was found guilty in late February. Shaheen testified during the trial that Czuba told her "you, as a Muslim, must die."
Jordanian sentenced to six years in US prison for anti-Israel attacks
A Jordanian national in Orlando, Florida, was sentenced to six years in US federal prison for threats against and attacks on businesses over their perceived support for Israel, the US Justice Department said on Thursday.

Hashem Younis Hashem Hnaihen, 44, described as “a Jordanian national residing illegally in Orlando,” broke into a solar power generation facility in Wedgefield, Florida, in June 2024, according to prosecutors.

He caused more than $450,000 in damage, the Justice Department said in a statement. He also broke doors and threatened other businesses.

Hnaihen was arrested in July 2024, charged in August and pleaded guilty in December.

“According to court documents, beginning around June 2024, Hnaihen targeted and attacked businesses in the Orlando area for their perceived support for Israel,” the Justice Department said.

“Wearing a mask, under the cover of night, Hnaihen smashed the glass front doors of businesses and left behind ‘warning letters.'”

Rights advocates have noted rising threats in the US against Jews and Israelis since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza, which began with the October 7, 2023 attack, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and abduct 251.

Antisemitic incidents in the US continued to rise to unprecedented levels for the fourth straight year in 2024, with 9,354 recorded cases of harassment, vandalism, and assault, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Communities around the world have seen sharp rises in antisemitic activity since October 7.
Germany’s AfD party is designated as far-right extremist
The far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD) has been designated an extremist organisation by the country’s spy agency over claims it poses a threat to democracy and the constitutional order.

The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution cited the AfD’s xenophobic stances on ethnicity as the reason for the decision, which it said was discriminatory towards non-ethnic Germans.

The spy agency said it decided to give the entire party the label as there were numerous instances of the AfD trying to “undermine the free, democratic” order in Germany.

The far-right AfD had already been placed under observation for suspected extremism in Germany, and the intelligence agency had also classed it as right-wing extremist in three states in the east, where its popularity is highest.

The agency, or Verfassungschutz, said specifically that the AfD did not consider citizens of a “migration background from predominantly Muslim countries” as equal members of the German people.

The party – which came second in the general election in February, winning more than 20 percent of the vote – has previously been dogged with allegations of antisemitism.

But it has more recently attempted to positioning itself as a defender of Jewish interests and argues that rising Muslim migration — rather than the far right itself – is the threat to the community there.

The party “aims to exclude certain population groups from equal participation in society”, said the BfV in a statement.

It has surged in popularity in recent years by capitalising on growing concern about migration at a time when Europe’s biggest economy has been mired in recession.

The AfD’s former leader, Alexander Gauland, sparked outrage in 2018 by downplaying the Nazi era, calling it “mere bird shit” in Germany’s thousand-year history.

Last year Björn Höcke, who led the AfD party in Thuringia, was tried for saying the words “Everything for Germany!” at a 2021 rally.

The slogan is associated with the SA stormtroopers, who played a key role in the Nazis’ rise to power.

Höcke – a former history teacher – denied knowing the phrase’s roots.

But he had previously called the Holocaust memorial in Berlin a “memorial of shame”, saying Germany should make a “180-degree turn” in its attitude to commemorating the genocide.


AJC, MAX create section of curated content for Jewish American Heritage Month
The American Jewish Committee’s Los Angeles chapter partnered with MAX, HBO’s streaming service, to create the first-ever menu bar dedicated to Jewish American Heritage Month, which began on May 1.



“Filled with storytellers, the Jewish community has contributed immeasurably to the film and television industry, with stories of joy, pain, challenge, family, love, and much more,” Richard Hirschhaut, director of AJC Los Angeles, told JNS. “We are excited to join with MAX in this unprecedented initiative and proud to have helped bring it to life for all Americans to enjoy.”

“Our community has faced tremendous challenges throughout history and experienced immense trauma in the 18 months since the October 7 Hamas terror attack,” he added. “And yet, with unending resilience, we celebrate the remarkable contributions the Jewish community has made to American society.”
Yeshiva University men’s basketball team nets a big win in ‘Rebound’
For this group of young men, basketball is much more than just a game.

In “Rebound: A Year of Triumph and Tragedy at Yeshiva University Basketball,” which FOX Nation premiered on April 9, we get a behind-the-scenes look at the challenges faced by the Yeshiva University men’s basketball team in the wake of the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks that shocked the State of Israel and Jews around the world.

Emmy award-winning filmmaker Pat Dimon does a masterful job conveying the conflicts the players felt after the horrific attack as they contemplated how to move forward with their basketball season, which suddenly felt insignificant after what transpired on that fateful day in October 2023, just two days before the start of practice for the team.

YU men’s basketball has experienced a resurgence in recent years, which began shortly after the arrival of Coach Elliot Steinmetz in 2014. Their 50-game win streak, which stretched from November 2019 until December 2021 and was the second-longest in NCAA Division III history, captivated the nation and catapulted the team to the top of the rankings. I was at the Dec. 30, 2021, game at the Max Stern Athletic Center when the Maccabees’ historic win streak came to an end against Illinois Wesleyan University, which was ranked fourth in the nation at the time. The energy and excitement in the gym that night was palpable, a keen reminder of how much the dedicated YU fan base and the greater Jewish community value this team.

“Rebound” begins by chronicling the struggles faced by the team’s Israeli players after Oct. 7, and it does an excellent job underscoring the shock and disbelief that they felt as they learned about what was happening. The film opens with YU guard Adi Markovich describing the experience of hearing about the events of Oct. 7, including discovering that one of his friends was murdered. As he’s talking, we see jarring footage from the Hamas attack that presents viewers with scenes from the destruction and devastation that ensued, which is followed by a scene in which Markovich walks onto the basketball court at YU holding a ball in his left hand. The juxtaposition of those images encapsulates the dichotomy that the filmmakers skillfully conveyed through “Rebound”: the inner turmoil the players were feeling and how to reconcile that with their passion for basketball, which seemed relatively trivial in light of the unimaginable suffering of their Israeli brethren.
BBC’s ‘We Will Dance Again’ wins International Emmy honour
A powerful BBC documentary about the 7 October massacre at the Nova Music Festival has won the International Emmys’ Honour Award for most impactful film to society, alongside two additional Emmy nominations.

We Will Dance Again tells the story of a music festival that became a killing field as Hamas terrorists stormed the site near Re’im, murdering over 360 people and abducting dozens more. The documentary weaves mobile phone footage recorded by victims with first-hand testimony from survivors of the Nova Music Festival massacre. Dashcam photo of a Hamas terrorist capturing a man at the Supernova music festival, held near Kibbutz Reim in Israel’s southern Negev desert on October 7 2023, where terrorists from Gaza killed hundreds of individuals. Wikipedia.

Leo Pearlman, producer and partner at Fulwell Entertainment, said, “Across all the horrors of 7 October, the massacre at the Nova Music Festival is the site where the juxtaposition between good and evil was most apparent. It is the reason why this film, that I had the privilege to produce, is both the most important project I have ever worked on and the one I most wish I never had to.

“In the 550 days since this crime against humanity, there have been 100s of music festivals around the world, not one of them has used it as an opportunity to pay tribute to the young innocent victims whose only crime was to be Jewish.

“Imagine such a tragedy occurring at Glastonbury or Coachella and the world remaining so deathly silent? Instead, at those same music festivals, we hear chants of ‘from the river to the sea’ and banners calling for the destruction of the only Jewish state and Kneecap given platforms to spread hate.

“The young, innocent victims of the Nova massacre stood for unity, love and inclusivity, we should be building solidarity across communities in their memory, using their tragic loss as the motivation to reject hate.”

He added: “It is an honour to receive two Emmy nominations and the Academy’s honorary award, not to our merit, but in tribute to those whose lives were taken, the survivors, for truth and for the 59 hostages who still remain in captivity in Gaza.”
Seth Mandel: Israel’s Unstoppable Bad Boys of Streaming
I was trying to figure out what it was that I liked so much about Bad Boy, the new Israeli TV series that premiers on Netflix today. The acting is excellent, the writing is solid—it’s a good show. But then it hit me: The fact that there is no larger significance to the show is what is so significant about it. It is “merely” a massively successful (in Israel, at least so far) Israeli artistic endeavor with an undercurrent of political normalcy.

And finding a home on Netflix means it has gone global. Israelis are people again—complex humans with their own problems and their own triumphs and their own quandaries and their own personal lives that have nothing to do with The Conflict. Israelis exist outside the simple character sketch drawn up by international media, and Bad Boy is a perfect example of why that’s so important.

Bad Boy’s pedigree is part of the story. It was created and written by Ron Leshem, who was behind the original, Israeli version of the MAX hit Euphoria, and Hagar Ben-Asher, producer of the Peacock series adaptation of the bestselling novel Long Bright River. And the story is based on the real-life experiences of Daniel Chen, who plays himself.

Chen’s protagonist is Dean Shaiman, a brilliant but volatile 13-year-old boy in and out of juvenile prison for increasingly serious crimes. Chen plays the grown-up Dean, who has changed his name to Daniel and tells his life story as part of a stand-up comedy set, while the bulk of the show consists of flashbacks. We watch as young Dean struggles growing up in a broken home, goes through the court system, the prison, and foster system, only to seemingly get sucked into a vicious cycle of recidivism. We know he comes out OK though from the start because of Daniel’s narration.

That stand-up routine mostly provides laughs but it does offer one source of tension. At some point in the set, Daniel realizes that an old juvi mate of his is in the audience. This is no ordinary juvi mate though: It’s the grownup Freddy Soosan, Daniel’s cellblock tormentor. Backstage, Daniel freaks out, a reminder that his comedy is covering some deeply baked-in trauma. It also makes the viewer question whether Daniel really got his life together.

Politics almost never intrudes, and when it does it’s fleeting. About halfway into the eight-episode series, young Daniel (still going by Dean back then) ends up back in jail, and this time the Jewish and Arab inmates fight over prayer space. Dean expresses his surprise to a guard, saying the two groups never had a problem before. The guard reminds Dean that the last time he was in prison was before the intifada.




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This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For 20 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

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