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Tuesday, December 16, 2025

12/16 Links Pt2: Cash to Terror: How Humanitarian Aid Funds Extremism; 'Jew hate is brain rot': Erika Kirk vows to confront right-wing antisemitism, Holocaust denial

From Ian:

Lahav Harkov: Fight Larder Review of 'As a Jew' by Sarah Hurwitz
Sarah Hurwitz was treated like a celebrity at the Jewish Federations of North America’s General Assembly in Washington in November, and her remarks connected to her new book, As a Jew: Reclaiming Our Story from Those Who Blame, Shame, and Try to Erase Us, received enthusiastic applause. But it didn’t take long for hostiles—the same blamers, shamers, and erasers of her subtitle—to focus on one moment from her appearance and use it to vilify her. A speechwriter for President Barack Obama before taking on the same role for First Lady Michelle Obama, Hurwitz has since made a second career out of writing about how she has reconnected to her Judaism.

At the General Assembly, she made the point that young people are getting superficial, image-based information from social media about Israel and Gaza, and when she tries to present arguments based on data, they “are hear[d] through this wall of carnage” and they make her “sound obscene.” In remarks at a conference for young Zionists, she was also tagged for saying that pro-Israel arguments are being heard through “a wall of dead children.”

But it was her criticism of the way young Americans are taught about the Holocaust that really gave her critics their opening. Here was Hurwitz: “Holocaust education is absolutely essential, but I think it may be confusing some of our young people about antisemitism, because they learn about big, strong Nazis hurting weak, emaciated Jews, and they think, ‘Oh, antisemitism is like anti-black racism, right? Powerful white people against powerless black people.’ So when on TikTok, all day long, they see powerful Israelis hurting weak, skinny Palestinians, it’s not surprising that they think, ‘Oh, I know the lesson of the Holocaust is you fight Israel. You fight the big, powerful people hurting the weak people.’”

Professional libelers of Israel, such as the radical journalist Spencer Ackerman, claimed Hurwitz was confessing in these words that “Holocaust education has worked too well,” because the lessons it teaches make it harder for her to “rationalize Israel’s genocide.”

In so doing, Ackerman and others were actually validating one of the central themes of As A Jew. In this, her second book, she continues to tell the story of her own journey, which was the subject of her first, Here All Along (2019). Hurwitz explains here that her former identity, based on “cultural/ethnic/social justice/be a good person/Holocaust remembrance,” provided her little more than a superficial and largely unexamined Jewish persona—a persona that, polling indicates, she shares with most American Jews. Hurwitz ruefully describes her younger self’s lack of curiosity about Jewish history or Jewish observance and her rejection of anything that might have made her seem less cool to the non-Jews surrounding her. In this way, she has come to believe, she was internalizing the anti-Semitism that pervades Western culture.
Andrew Fox: Cash to Terror: How Humanitarian Aid Funds Extremism
Humanitarian aid is intended to save lives. But as Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) becomes one of the most widely used forms of relief globally, evidence is mounting that in certain conflict zones it is inadvertently fuelling the very forces it seeks to alleviate.

This report examines how CVA – the practice of giving money or vouchers to crisis-affected civilians in place of in-kind aid – operates in contexts where armed groups like Hamas, the Houthis, and Boko Haram exert significant control over markets, financial networks, and supply chains. By analysing documented case studies from Gaza, Yemen, northeast Nigeria and Sudan, we identify predictable mechanisms through which cash aid slides into extremist-linked economic systems.

Our findings are clear: when a marketplace, banking or money-changing system is under the control or influence of armed groups – even ones not designated as terrorist actors by the UN – cash transfers become predictable sources of revenue for those actors. In Gaza, money-changer “fees” of 20 – 40 per cent are common; in Yemen, at least $161 million in cash aid flowed into Houthi-held territory in 2024, and UN agencies have documented widespread diversion; in Nigeria, militants impose levies on traders and transport networks that capture value from aid transactions.

In response, this report outlines a set of policy recommendations designed to improve transparency, tighten oversight, and better mitigate the risk that humanitarian cash assistance will be co-opted by violent actors, while still preserving the capacity of aid agencies to deliver life-saving support.

READ THE FULL REPORT HERE.(PDF)
Oxfam chief criticised government for arming Ukraine and 'tried to rewrite charity's position on Gaza' before being ousted from £130k-a-year job amid 'bullying' claims
The £130,000-a-year ousted Oxfam boss criticised the Government for arming Ukraine and risked putting charity staff in danger in Gaza, an internal investigation said.

Dr Halima Begum's role as chief executive was declared 'untenable' by Oxfam's board of trustees over the weekend following an 'irretrievable breakdown in its trust and confidence' about her ability to do the job.

It came after 70 members of staff signed a letter calling for an investigation into her conduct which centred around allegations of bullying staff and creating a climate of fear.

But an extraordinary row has broken out at Oxfam over the treatment of its outgoing boss, with allies claiming she has been unfairly kicked out.

Last night, Dr Begum's lawyers confirmed she would be taking legal action against Oxfam for 'defamatory and unfounded criticism of her' that she described as 'hatemongering and stigmatisation'.

The report flagged public comments made by Dr Begum in which she accused the UK of 'taking sides' in the Ukraine war, which allegedly led to complaints and the withdrawal of donations.

During an appearance on BBC Radio 4 show Any Questions in November last year, she criticised the West for supplying Kyiv with long-range missiles and anti-personnel landmines, describing it as a 'retrograde step'.

'It definitely feels like a reincarnation of the Cold War - us taking sides as opposed to thinking what is necessary in order to build a just international security system that all nations could rely on,' she said. 'The stakes are so high not only for Ukrainian civilians dying but also Russian soldiers dying.'

Her remarks sparked a major backlash, with a surge in complaints and donor withdrawals, The Times reports.

The report also alleged that Dr Begum attempted to rewrite Oxfam's politically neutral public messaging on the war in Gaza. Staff claimed she was not careful enough in considering the safety of staff in Gaza when she publicly called for the UK to stop arming Israel, for example.

Staff are said to have complained that her changes exposed them to potential retaliation in an environment which was already volatile amid the Israel-Hamas war.


Cruz: American churches ‘asleep’ on antisemitism
The leaders of the mainstream Christian churches in the United States are asleep as antisemitism poisons the minds of young people from both the left and the right, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said on Thursday.

The words of warning from the Baptist lawmaker come as elements of both the Democratic and Republican parties are expressing increasingly open antisemitic views.

“We find ourselves facing echoes of the same hatred which fueled the Holocaust,” Cruz told a gathering organized by the Israel Allies Foundation in Washington, D.C. “The world’s response to the October 7 attacks made clear that the hatred of the Jewish people did not end in 1945. The hatred that fueled the Holocaust is still alive today and is not confined to geography.”

The senator, who has long condemned antisemitism on both sides of the ideological spectrum, said that he was frightened by what he is seeing America, which was facing an “existential crisis” of beliefs for the next generation.

“The poison is yielding results especially among young people,” Cruz said, attributing this worldview in part to the millions of dollars spread by Qatar in the United States. “The poison pouring into their ears is twisting their view of the world.”

He said that it was wrong to assume that “all is OK” because President Donald Trump is Israel’s strongest friend and the hostages are now home from Gaza.

“The Church is asleep, fueled by a heresy called replaced theology,” he said. “If we lose this battle, we lose our nation.”

The gala event by the faith-based organization, which was attended by hundreds of Christian supporters and lawmakers from scores of countries, honored Trump with its Lifetime Achievement Award for his unflinching support of the Jewish state.
'Jew hate is brain rot': Erika Kirk vows to confront right-wing antisemitism, Holocaust denial
Erika Kirk, the widow of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and the current CEO of Turning Point USA, said she would speak out against antisemitism on the right, including Holocaust denial, during a CBS News televised event moderated by CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss.

The event was recorded in New York City on Wednesday and aired Saturday night in prime time.

Kirk's statement came after being challenged by Bob Milgrim, the father of Sarah Lynn Milgrim, who was killed in an antisemitic attack in Washington earlier this year.

Milgrim’s question carried unusual weight. His 26-year-old daughter, Sarah Lynn Milgrim, and her partner, Yaron Lischinsky, were shot and killed on May 21 as they left an American Jewish Committee event at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC, a case widely condemned as antisemitic.

Federal prosecutors later pursued hate-crime-related charges against the suspect, according to court filings and reporting at the time.

In the town hall, Milgrim asked whether Kirk would publicly confront antisemitism coming from the political right, including Holocaust denial. In response, Kirk became emotional, apologized to Milgrim, and said she would.

Losing loved ones to antisemitism
She told him, “You and I are a part of a very small club,” referring to the shared experience of losing a loved one in an antisemitic attack, before adding a phrase she said her late husband frequently used: “Jew hate is brain rot.”

Kirk went on to frame antisemitism as part of a broader moral crisis, saying, “Hate is hate. It’s evil,” while urging more dialogue across divides.


California Dems Silent on Radical Anti-Israel Group's Foiled Los Angeles Bomb Plot
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff, Los Angeles mayor Karen Bass, and more than a dozen House Democrats who represent parts of Los Angeles have remained silent on the coordinated bomb plot a radical anti-Israel group was planning before it was foiled by the federal government.

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Monday the Justice Department arrested four members of Turtle Island Liberation Front (TILF), an "anti-government, anti-capitalist" group that promotes anti-Israel ideologies. The group planned to detonate five bombs across Los Angeles on New Year’s Eve, painting Hamas triangles near their targets, according to a criminal complaint.

None of the elected Democrats who represent the city or state responded to requests for comment. That includes Reps. Pete Aguilar, Derek Tran, Maxine Waters, Ted Lieu, Luz Rivas, Linda Sรกnchez, Brad Sherman, Norma Torres, Sydney Kamlager-Dove, Laura Friedman, Jimmy Gomez, George Whitesides, Nanette Barragรกn, Julia Brownley, Judy Chu, and Gil Cisneros.
‘Politics in the guise of law’: Israel slams ICC ruling allowing Gaza probe to proceed
Israel on Monday slammed a ruling by the International Criminal Court upholding a decision to allow the investigation of alleged crimes in the war on Hamas in Gaza as part of its “Palestine” probe, opened in 2021.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said it rejected the Appeals Chamber’s decision to deny Jerusalem the right to formal notice of a new criminal probe, “as demanded by the principle of complementarity particularly with regard to a democratic state with an independent and robust judicial system.”

“This is yet another example of the ongoing politicization of the ICC and its blatant disregard for the sovereign rights of non-party States, as well as its own obligations under the Rome Statute,” the statement added.

“This is what politics in the guise of ‘International Law’ looks like,” the ministry concluded, noting that the decision of the Appeal Chamber was handed down by a narrow majority of three out of five justices.

The ruling states that the probe into the war launched following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre falls within the ICC prosecutor’s existing investigation into alleged crimes committed across Gaza, Judea and Samaria since 2014, which has been ongoing for some four years.

Judges upheld a ruling that there was no “new situation” or “substantial change” requiring Israel to be notified, as the alleged crimes involve the same territory, conflicts and parties already under the ICC’s scrutiny.

The two dissenting judges, Luz del Carmen Ibรกรฑez Carranza and Solomy Balungi Bossa, argued that the lower ruling contained procedural errors as it failed to properly address the Jewish state’s claim that post–Oct. 7 referrals by ICC state parties triggered a new, legally distinct situation.


Commentary Podcast: Who Are the 'Palestine Firsters'?
Eli Lake joins the podcast to discuss "The Palestine Firsters," his lead article in the January issue of COMMENTARY. Why do Ben Rhodes and a cast of others on the left and right want America to work against its core interests by breaking the U.S.-Israel alliance?
travelingisrael.com: An Islamic Crime on the Temple Mount — and the History They Tried to Erase
In this video, I reveal one of the greatest archaeological crimes in history—and one of the most extraordinary rescue projects ever created. In 1999, 9,000 tons of ancient soil were illegally removed from the Temple Mount and dumped like garbage. Out of that destruction was born the Temple Mount Sifting Project, which has since recovered over half a million artifacts from 3,000 years of Jerusalem’s history, including the time of the First and Second Temples and the time of Jesus.




Zohran Mamdani eyeing lawyer who defended al Qaeda terrorist for top City Hall job: source
Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani has tapped a controversial lawyer who defended an al Qaeda terrorist and a radical anti-Israel campus leader at Columbia for a “high-ranking” position at City Hall, The Post has learned.

Ramzi Kassem, who is also a law professor at City University of New York and a member of Mamdani’s transition team for legal affairs, is the top candidate for Chief Counsel, the most important advisory role in the mayor’s office, according to a source close to the transition team.

Kassem, 47, was one of the attorneys who defended Mahmoud Khalil, a Syrian-born leader of the pro-Palestinian encampment at Columbia who was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and earmarked for deportation. However, after 104 days in a detention camp judges ruled he should be released.

In addition to Khalil, Kassem helped to defend terrorist Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda member who was convicted in 2017 of bombing a French oil tanker, the Limburg, off the coast of Yemen in 2002.

“Kassem’s appointment to corp counsel wouldn’t sit well with the Jewish community,” said Ken Frydman, a Democratic political operative.

“Everyone’s entitled to legal representation…even Mahmoud Khalil. But that doesn’t mean Ramzi Kassem had to represent him,” he added to The Post.

Kassem, who was born in Syria, was also engaged in anti-Israel protests at Columbia, where he attended law school on a fellowship funded by members of leftwing activists the Soros family, records show.

In 1999, he wrote a letter to the editor of the Columbia Spectator newspaper criticizing the naming of a sandwich as an “Israeli wrap” because it was offensive to Muslims and Arabs, he said.

In other columns for the newspaper, he wrote that Israel’s behavior amounted to “a clear case of ethnic cleansing,” and in another article in 1998 he wrote that Jews had come to the Middle East “with the intention of conquering the land.” A two-state solution between Israel and Palestine “is not viable, nor is it desirable,” he claimed.


Israel blocks Canadian MPs at West Bank crossing: Delegation sponsored by ‘terror entity’
Six members of Canada’s parliament traveling from Jordan were denied entry to the West Bank on Tuesday by Israeli authorities who accused the delegation of being sponsored by “a terror entity.”

Ontario Member of Parliament Iqra Khalid, from Prime Minister Mark Carney’s ruling Liberal Party, said she was part of the delegation and was shoved several times by Israeli border officials.

She said she was pushed after trying to check on a member of the roughly 30-person delegation who was pulled aside for additional questioning after the group had been at the Allenby border crossing between Jordan and the Israeli-controlled West Bank.

Khalid said the border officials were able to see she was a lawmaker as they had taken her special passport, which looks different from a standard Canadian document.

The lawmakers were on a trip sponsored by Canadian-Muslim Vote, a charity group.

Israel’s embassy in Canada told AFP in a statement that the charity receives funding from Islamic Relief Canada, a subsidiary of Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW), which Jerusalem designates as a terror organization.
Eurovision host won’t ban Palestinian flags; won’t drown out boos as Israel performs
The Austrian broadcaster hosting the next Eurovision Song Contest will not ban the Palestinian flag from the audience or drown out booing during Israel’s performance, in a shift from the policy at previous shows, organizers said on Tuesday.

The 70th edition of the contest in May will have just 35 entries, the smallest number of participants since the contest was expanded in 2004, after five national broadcasters — those of Spain, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Iceland and Ireland — said they would boycott the show in protest of Israel’s participation.

What is usually a celebration of national diversity, pop music and high camp has become embroiled in diplomatic strife. Those boycotting say it would be unconscionable to take part given the number of civilians killed in Gaza amid Israel’s war with Hamas, which began with the terror group’s October 7, 2023, onslaught and was halted in a US-brokered ceasefire about two months ago. Israel has rejected those accusations, saying it has sought to minimize noncombatant casualties as it fought an enemy embedded in civilian infrastructure.

“We will allow all official flags that exist in the world, if they comply with the law and are in a certain form — size, security risks, etc.,” the show’s executive producer, Michael Kroen, told a news conference organized by the Austrian broadcaster, ORF.

Kroen added that ORF “will not sugarcoat anything or avoid showing what is happening, because our task is to show things as they are.”

The broadcaster will not drown out the sound of any booing from the crowd, as happened in 2025 during Israel’s performance, ORF’s director of programming Stefanie Groiss-Horowitz said.

“We won’t play artificial applause over it at any point,” she said.
Bin Laden ‘voice of freedom’, says Palestine Action activist
A pro-Palestine activist described Osama bin Laden as a “voice of freedom” just hours after news of the Bondi Beach terror attack started to emerge, The Telegraph can reveal.

Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, claimed The Guardian removed the former Al-Qaeda leader’s infamous manifesto from its website because young Westerners were beginning to “understand” the group’s motivation for the Sept 11 attacks.

The article, “A letter to the American people”, gained viral traction on TikTok in Nov 2023 amid Israel’s war in Gaza, more than 20 years after it was first published by the newspaper in 2002.

In the essay, Bin Laden argued that the United States was an imperial power hostile to the Muslim world and that American civilians were legitimate targets because they supported the state by paying taxes.

Praising Gen Z’s renewed interest in the article at a panel event in Glasgow on Sunday, Mr Begg said: “At the beginning, or not long after the genocide in 2023 had begun, there was a series of videos that went viral amongst young American girls [...] in their early 20s.

“[The videos] went so viral that the cause of [them] being viral had to be removed – and that was a letter written by Osama bin Laden to the people of America that was published in The Guardian and remained on their website for the past 20-plus years. It’s called Osama bin Laden’s ‘Letter to America’.”

He went on: “He mentions in that letter one place 20 times: Palestine and Israel. Not Afghanistan, not Iraq, not Somalia, though those were all places of conflict with the United States of America. He mentions Palestine.

“Agree with him, disagree with him, condemn him, praise him; he mentions it. And the girls on TikTok, you know what they started to say? Now I understand. Now I understand why 9/11 happened. And as if by magic, The Guardian removed that voice of freedom and opinion. Removed something that had been on their website for over two decades: ‘we don’t want anybody to think to make those connections’”.


“Put the Zios in the ground” student charged with stirring up racial hatred
A student videoed during a pro-Palestinian demonstration chanting a call to “put the Zios in the ground” has been charged by the police with stirring up racial hatred.

Samuel Williams was arrested on Wednesday 15 October after footage of a speech he had given the previous Saturday at an anti-Israel rally in London circulated widely on social media. The video showed Williams appearing to praise what he described as “an upright, a steadfast and a noble resistance in Palestine and in Gaza to look to, to be inspired by.”

In the video, Williams went on to say that he doesn’t want “to yap for too long”, and then refers to “a chant we’ve been workshopping in Oxford that maybe you guys want to join in, it goes ‘Gaza, Gaza, make us proud, put the Zios in the ground’.”

A statement from the Metropolitan police confirmed that on Tuesday 16 December “Detectives investigating allegations of antisemitic chanting at a demonstration in central London in October have charged a man.

“Samuel Williams, 20, of Oxford has been charged with stirring up racial hatred contrary to Section 18(1) of the Public Order Act 1986. He will appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday, 27 January.”

Williams was a Politics, Philosophy and Economics undergraduate at Balliol College at the time of the video. He had previously been pictured in videos shared by Oxford Students Palestine Society. Social media pictures showed Williams wearing a keffiyeh, while another featured the student brandishing a replica AK-47 assault rifle. He also featured on a language-tutors site in which he described himself as “native German” with “a passion for German culture both old and modern”. He described his family as coming “from northern Bavaria, the town of Bayreuth (Wagner’s home town).”

Oxford university suspended Williams on the same day as his original arrest, with the institution saying at the time that it was “unequivocal: there is no place for hatred, antisemitism or discrimination within our community, and we will always act to protect the safety and dignity of our students.”


Hell on wheels Video shows disturbing antisemitic attack on NYC subways: ‘F–k the Jews’
Two hateful attackers were caught on disturbing video threatening to kill a group of young Jewish men on the subway — and grabbing one of them by the collar — in Brooklyn this week.

The group of eight boys and young men was heading back to the Chabad Lubavitch headquarters in Brooklyn from a Hanukkah celebration in Union Square on Monday night when the antisemitic bigots began hurling slurs at them, one of the victims recalled.

“They yelled at me, and the son said, ‘I’ll kill you,'” Mendy Asraf, a 20-year-old yeshiva student visiting from Israel, told The Post, noting the attackers appeared to be a father and son.

The vile pair first confronted the group while they were transferring to the No. 3 train at the Franklin Avenue stop, yelling “F–k the Jews,” Asraf said.

The harassment ramped up once on the train, when one of the Jewish men began filming the heinous onslaught.

One of the aggressors grabbed one of the victims by the collar of his coat, as the other yelled “I’ll kill you” and pointed a finger gun at his head, social media footage of the incident shows.

“I was really afraid. When he made his fingers the sign of a gun towards me, I was really afraid. I didn’t know what he had in his pockets,” Asraf said.

He said the group stayed fearfully silent as other passengers around them tried to intervene.

“Chill!” one straphanger can be heard pleading in the video in a desperate attempt to squash the scuffle.

The group of Jewish men got off at the next stop at Nordstrom Avenue and ran to the nearest police precinct to file a report, Asraf said.

“I thought it could be a very dangerous situation,” he said, adding he and the others feared for their lives


Czech Republic expected to move embassy to Jerusalem in 2026
The Czech Republic is expected to move its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem next year, an official said Tuesday, further strengthening close bilateral ties dating back to the founding of the Jewish state.

The show of support from one of Israel’s closest European allies comes as Argentina plans to open its embassy in Jerusalem in the spring, and as Hungary is also weighing a similar move.

The Czech Republic’s new foreign minister publicly voiced support on Sunday for relocating the country’s embassy from Tel Aviv to the Israeli capital.

“I personally am very much looking forward… to be present when one of the symbols of solidarity becomes the fact that the Czech Republic finally moves its embassy to Jerusalem,” Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka said at a Chanukah event in central Prague organized by the Chabad movement. “It should have been there a long time ago.”

JNS has learned that Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiลก is expected to visit Israel early next year and could announce the embassy move during the trip.

Three days after the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre, the Czech Parliament unanimously adopted a resolution urging the government to move the country’s embassy to Jerusalem in a bipartisan show of support. The previous government, however, never implemented the move, even as it backed Israel in international legal forums and on the diplomatic stage during the war against Hamas in Gaza.

“We see the Czech Republic as one of our greatest friends in Europe and in the world, and as a natural partner,” Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar wrote on X Tuesday evening after a congratulatory phone call with his Czech counterpart upon assuming office. “We appreciate the Czech Republic’s close friendship and consistent support, especially throughout the war.”

The historic connection between the two small countries dates back to Israel’s 1948 War of Independence, when Czechoslovakia alone supplied vital arms to the fledgling Jewish state.


Buoyant stock market lifts Israel to 3rd in Economist ranking of 2025’s best economies
Israel moved up three spots and has been the third-best performing economy in 2025 out of a list of 36 countries, according to an annual ranking compiled by The Economist.

The British magazine cited the outperformance of Israel’s stock market and a strong recovery of the economy following the two-year Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, which was halted in October with a ceasefire. Israel’s economy trailed only those of Portugal, which scored the top spot, and Ireland, which came in second place.

“Israel has continued its strong recovery from the chaos of 2023,” The Economist said, adding that Israel has been among the best performers when it comes to its local stock market.

“In the past year, the share price of the country’s most valuable listed company, Bank Leumi, has risen by around 70%,” The Economist added.

The Economist’s ranking for the “economy of the year” is based on an overall score evaluating five economic and financial performance indicators in a given year – core inflation, inflation breadth, Gross Domestic Product (GDP), employment and stock market performance.

Israel is also one of the best-performing equity markets in local currency terms in the 2025 ranking after Slovenia, the Czech Republic and South Korea.




Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 

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