Wednesday, February 04, 2026

02/04 Links Pt2: The Anti-Zionism Exception; A Hamas Hostage’s Secret Ordeal; Britain’s shameful tolerance for terrorism; The Woman Who Refused to Give Flowers to Hitler

From Ian:

The Anti-Zionism Exception
Civil rights law has an anti-Zionism problem. In cases alleging discrimination, courts typically allow civil rights plaintiffs to use a contextual test—assessing what the U.S. Supreme Court has called the “totality of the relevant facts”—to prove that discrimination in fact occurred. And when key facts are disputed, courts rely on juries to resolve them. Juries are quintessential finders of fact, and discrimination is a quintessential fact question.

But now, for Jews and Israelis, there is an emerging exception to the customary contextual test. Under this exception, behaviors styled as “anti-Zionism”—opposition to Israel’s continued existence—are deemed inherently not discriminatory. Although this anti-Zionism exception started with progressive activists, it has recently jumped to the pages of a published decision by a federal appeals court, which seemed to imply that anti-Zionism, once draped over someone’s speech, generally disproves allegations of discrimination.

This anti-Zionism exception is wrong. It obscures that, in context, anti-Zionism can involve discrimination based on both national origin and race. If it stands, the civil rights of Jews and Israelis will be profoundly unequal to those of other groups that experience discrimination. And, for those who discriminate against Jews and Israelis, anti-Zionist arguments and rhetoric will function as a sort of “get out of jail free” card, enabling them to skirt legal accountability.

As a civil rights lawyer, I have had a front-row seat to the emerging anti-Zionism exception in civil rights law. For years, I’ve stood shoulder to shoulder with other advocates to oppose discrimination of one kind or another, from racially disparate policing to President Donald Trump’s anti-Muslim travel ban. Sometimes we win. Sometimes we lose. But through it all, there has been one constant: a broad, contextual approach to diagnosing discrimination. In no area of civil rights law is there a magic word that defendants can utter to automatically defeat the charge of discrimination.

Instead of following the typical path in discrimination cases, the court seemed to do something different just for anti-Zionism and just for Jews.

That’s because discrimination can be subtle, especially in an age when being seen as a bigot is often socially undesirable and legally risky. As a result, even the most serious cases of discrimination often manifest through tacit double standards rather than explicit bigotry. Consider a police officer who allegedly deems it suspicious when a Black man, but not a white man, puts his hands in his pockets. Or an employer who, as one court put it, deems a man “assertive” but a woman “pushy.” Normally, a jury or other fact finder would be asked to decide whether, in context, these situations reflect discriminatory double standards or instead something more benign.

So it should be with anti-Zionism.

For starters, when deployed as a reason to target “Zionists,” such as by excluding them from school buildings, anti-Zionism is at least arguably, as Harvard Law Professor Stephen Sachs has explained, “a form of national-origin discrimination.” The reason is simple: Discriminating based on national origin includes insisting that people disavow a specific nation, especially their own nation of origin. Just imagine how easily laws prohibiting national-origin discrimination could be defeated if courts were to indulge wordplay such as “Oh, I’m not refusing to hire Italians and Haitians; I’m refusing to hire Italianists and Hatianists.”

Yet activists have resisted that logic for people they deem “Zionists.” And it’s easy to see why.

Particularly since the Hamas massacre of Oct. 7, 2023, anti-Zionism has become a pillar of progressive movements. Sometimes it is bare opposition to Israel’s existence. But sometimes it is more extreme. Indeed, I have witnessed people who consider themselves civil rights supporters—people I know—express support for Hamas. But unlike their right-wing counterparts, who openly revel in Jew hatred, progressives want to believe that they oppose explicit discriminatory postures. Instead, they insist that there is something unique about “anti-Zionism,” which they view as a response to a “Zionist” political ideology, that exempts their statements and actions from standard antidiscrimination analyses.
The Weaponization of the Word “Ethnostate” Against Israel
Israel is, by its own description, an ethnostate, and saying otherwise would be a “ludicrous lie.” At least, that’s according to Tucker Carlson in a recent conversation with white nationalist Peter Brimelow.

Because Jewish identity is matrilineal, meaning a person is considered Jewish if their mother is Jewish, Brimelow and Carlson argue that the Jewish religion is racially based and therefore a “racial component” is inherent in the State of Israel. Being that the state was founded by atheists who “identified as Jewish racially,” Carlson suggests that Israel can only be described as such.

However, Israel, by its own description, is not an ethnostate in the way that Carlson and his guest describe. It is not a ludicrous lie to say this, but rather a simple understanding of the state’s laws and what an ethnostate actually is. This term, nevertheless, has become increasingly popular amongst anti-Israel influencers and journalists to negatively single out the only Jewish state for being just that – a Jewish state.

An ethnostate, at its basic understanding, is a state dominated by a certain ethnic group. But anti-Israel influencers have taken this term to mean something drastically different when applied to Israel, because, being a Jewish-majority state, would naturally make Israel an ethnostate in the same way that other ethnic or cultural majority states, such as Japan or Greece, would also fall under this category.

But when applied to Israel specifically, the entire understanding of the term changes to be one of racial discrimination based on fundamental misinterpretations of Israeli and Jewish laws.

Israel’s establishment as a Jewish state grants every Jew in the world the right to live in Israel, under the Law of Return. Under this law, anyone with one Jewish grandparent is eligible to become a citizen of the state. This is not a racial hierarchy as Carlson and Brimelow allude to, but rather a policy rooted in peoplehood, history, and refuge. The Law of Return exists because Jews are a nation with a shared identity that predates modern racial categories and has survived thousands of years, despite much of that time being in exile from the land of Israel.

Crucially, Israeli citizenship is not limited to the Jewish people. Arab Israelis account for 21% of the total population and hold the same rights as Jewish Israelis, including holding positions of government and law.

Yet this has not stopped journalists such as Briahna Joy Gray from incorrectly and continuously repeating that as an ethnostate, Israel denies Arabs equal rights.
Seth Mandel: The American Jewish Novel After October 7
One of the more interesting questions about Jewish culture after October 7 is: What will the future of American Jewish fiction look like? It will be particularly interesting to see how Israel is portrayed in the imaginations of Jewish writers of the Diaspora.

Conveniently, two recent books, both just named finalists at next month’s National Jewish Book Awards, can shed some light on the topic. The best way to describe Israel in American fiction before October 7 is by conjuring the film trope of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Coined by Nathan Rabin in 2007, the term refers to the female character who “exists solely… to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures.”

American Jewish novelists have just gone through a period in which Israel appears as the national version of this archetype: Call it the Manic Pixie Dream Country. In the books, American Jews are assimilated and spiritually adrift, while their Israeli counterparts are tan and fearless. The Americans are outwardly dismissive of the Israeli machismo but inwardly captivated by it. The Diaspora Jew and the New Sabra look at each other the way one imagines the Flintstones and the Jetsons might, as if their co-presence represents some kind of tear in the fabric of the universe. And if the American characters end up in Israel, it is at the end of a redemption arc, a moment of salvation and fulfillment.

In the most extreme versions, the plot involves Israel’s literal destruction, as if a non-Israeli Jewish future can only be imagined if there is no Israel, so strong is the Jewish state’s gravitational pull. As the novelist David Bezmozgis once said: “The Jewish future is to be found in Israel. The Jewish past in Europe. Where in this equation is North America?”

The apotheosis of this genre is, unfortunately, Jonathan Safran Foer’s 2016 novel Here I Am, an absolute chore of a book. In it, an earthquake hits the Middle East, devastates Israel and leads to a mass invasion of it by regional powers. Even with Israel on the edge of the abyss, the U.S.-based Jewish family remains unable to find its own identity. (Like many of the books in this genre, it owes something of a debt to Philip Roth’s The Counterlife.)

A much better version of the disaster storyline plays out in 2024’s Next Stop, by Benjamin Resnick, in which a supernatural phenomenon that makes people disappear also makes Israel disappear. The Jews are blamed for the anomaly and in the U.S. they are herded into ghettos.


A Hamas Hostage’s Secret Ordeal
After months of captivity in the fetid tunnels of Gaza, a hostage quickly learned that a pause in the fighting that offered respite for his captors meant only new horrors for him.

Emboldened by a temporary cease-fire in January 2025, the Hamas militants who had been standing guard over four Israel hostages decided it was safe to emerge into the sunlight and leave just one of them at a time in charge in the tunnel.

That left the hostages at the mercy of a temperamental captor they had nicknamed Amon, said one of the Israelis, Guy Gilboa-Dalal.

One day, Mr. Gilboa-Dalal said, Amon led him blindfolded to the captors’ room, saying that Hamas had information about an Israeli spy who resembled him. The spy, he claimed, had a tattoo on his leg. Amon removed Mr. Gilboa-Dalal’s pants, ostensibly to check.

There was no tattoo.

Then Amon went onto his computer, complaining that he had not seen a woman in a long time, according to Mr. Gilboa-Dalal. “He asked if I wanted to watch a porn movie,” he said.

Amon moved closer.

“He came up behind me and began touching me, kissing the back of my neck, putting a hand on my chest,” Mr. Gilboa-Dalal said. “I froze.”

When it was over, Amon warned his captive to say nothing about what had happened or else he would be killed.

Mr. Gilboa-Dalal was one of about 250 people taken hostage on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas led the assault on southern Israel that set off the war in the Gaza Strip. The hostages were released periodically in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned in Israel. The final 20 still alive, who included Mr. Gilboa-Dalal, were released last October, when the cease-fire now in effect began.

Hamas officials, who have denied accusations of sexual violence and sexual abuse in the past, did not respond to requests for comment for this article.

But several former female hostages and at least one other male captive have reported being sexually abused in Gaza. The United Nations reported in March 2024 that it had found “clear and convincing information” of “rape and sexualized torture” committed against some of the hostages. Amnesty International, too, has documented evidence that some captives were subjected to physical and sexual violence.

In a December interview with Israel’s Channel 12 Uvda program, a former hostage, Romi Gonen, recounted being sexually assaulted by four captors on separate occasions. The most grievous assault, she said, took place in a bathroom and lasted about half an hour.

Mr. Gilboa-Dalal gave his account to The New York Times at his home in Alfei Menashe, a settlement in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, several weeks after his release on Oct. 13. He decided to speak out, he said, because he wanted to support other victims of sexual abuse and to show them that they were not alone and had nothing to be ashamed of.

He said he also wanted to debunk Hamas’s claims that it had treated its captives well and had adhered to Islamic principles.


Melania Trump meets with freed hostages Aviva and Keith Siegel at White House
Freed hostage Aviva Siegel first met with first lady Melania Trump in January 2025. The two met again at the White House on Wednesday, but this time Siegel’s husband, Keith, joined them.

The Siegels flanked the U.S. first lady at the White House as they thanked her.

“I am eternally grateful to you and President Trump for bringing me home and for bringing all of the hostages back to their families,” Keith told the first lady.

Residents of Kibbutz Aza, the Siegels were among more than 200 people whom Hamas took hostage on Oct. 7, 2023. She was released 51 days later during a short-lived ceasefire. He didn’t gain his freedom until last February, after 484 days in captivity.

“After Aviva was freed, she called me, wanted to see me, and we set up a meeting in New York in January 2025,” Melania Trump said about the meeting, which was included in a 2026 documentary just released about the first lady. “Aviva was a warrior. She is a warrior. She was fighting very hard for Keith, and I know he suffered a lot.”

Aviva Siegel had brought a handmade book about Oct. 7 and her husband. She gave it to the first lady later, who shared it with her husband, U.S. President Donald Trump.

In the movie, Aviva broke down crying, and the first lady comforted her and promised to pray for her husband. “I will always use my influence and power to fight for those in need,” the first lady said in the movie.


Isaac Herzog can do for Australian Jews what Albanese has failed to do
The visit of Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog, matters to Australia’s Jewish community because, painfully, Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese cannot help us heal.

Not because healing is impossible, but because Mr Albanese and his Government chose, for 28 months, not to hear us. Not to protect us. Not to stand with us. And not to confront the extremist Islamic ideology that ultimately spilled Jewish blood on Bondi Beach.

The Jewish community is grieving two losses.

The first is obvious and unbearable: the Bondi Chanukah massacre of 14 December 2025, where 15 people — including 10-year-old Matilda — were murdered and dozens more were shot while Jews gathered publicly, peacefully, to celebrate a festival of light.

The second loss is quieter, but just as devastating: the realisation that our own Government does not have our backs — and that many of our political leaders sided instead with voices that deny Jews the right to exist as a people at all.

I am an Australian-born Jew. Eighth generation. My maternal grandfather was a Rat of Tobruk. My paternal grandfather was a German Jew who survived the Holocaust, as did my father. I am not an Israeli citizen. I never served in the Israeli army. But Israel is central to who I am, as it is for Jews everywhere.

In every synagogue in Australia, prayers are directed toward Jerusalem — the site of the First and Second Jewish Temples — because the Jewish connection to the land of Israel is not political, not modern, not optional. It is more than 3000 years old, recognised in international law, and grounded in the universal right of self-determination.

That right has been openly rejected — loudly, repeatedly — by the very movements and figures this Government chose to appease.

Since October 7, 2023 — the largest massacre of Jews in a single day since the Holocaust — Australian Jews have lived under constant intimidation, hatred and fear. Yet we were never given permission to grieve.

On October 9, 2023, when the Sydney Opera House sails were lit in memory of the murdered, Jews were told to stay home. Pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel mobs had already claimed the streets. These crowds were not responding to Israeli military action in Gaza; they were reacting to (and in many cases celebrating) the massacre of Jews on October 7.

“Gas the Jews.”

“Fuck the Jews.”

“Where are the Jews.”

These chants were not about Israel. They were about us, Jews.

Some of the same voices had already been legitimised by the Government. Sheikh Ibrahim Dadoun, who praised the October 7 massacre as “a day of pride” and “victory,” had previously stood alongside Anthony Albanese at a National Iftar Dinner. In Greenacre, in Sydney’s West, fireworks were lit, sweets were handed out, all while Jewish blood was still wet.
Australia charges teenager over alleged death threats to Herzog
An Australian teenager has been charged for allegedly making online death threats against President Isaac Herzog, ahead of his upcoming visit to Australia.

The 19-year-old man allegedly made the threats on a social media platform last month "towards a foreign head of state and internationally protected person", the Australian Federal Police said in a statement.

The offence carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.

Police did not name the intended target of the alleged threats, but Australian media widely reported they were directed at Herzog. The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper also reported the teenager allegedly made threats against US President Donald Trump.

He was refused police bail and will appear before a court in Sydney on Thursday. Police said a mobile phone and equipment for making or using drugs were seized during a search at a home in Sydney on Wednesday.
Man charged after allegedly ‘mimicking’ Bondi Beach massacre on footbridge
A 23-year-old man has been charged with offensive behaviour and intimidation after allegedly pretending to shoot guns from the footbridge used in the Bondi Beach massacre.

Witnesses alleged they spotted two men on the pedestrian bridge at Bondi about 7pm last Saturday, one of whom allegedly “mimicked firing upon people” near to the bridge.

When challenged on his actions, police alleged the man verbally abused the bystanders, "causing them to feel fearful and intimidated".

Sky News host Sharri Markson on Wednesday revealed the men also allegedly ran down Campbell Parade yelling “f*** the Jews” and “kill the Jews”.

Police said they spoke with one 24-year-old man at the scene at the time.

The other, however, had already fled.

Following further investigations, police arrested a 23-year-old man in Coogee about 4.40pm on Wednesday.

On Thursday, police revealed they took the man to Surry Hills Police Station and charged him with two counts of stalk intimidate intend fear physical etc harm.

He also received charges for three counts of behave in offensive manner in or near a public place or school.

He was refused bail to appear at a bail court on Thursday.


Jonathan Sacerdoti: Britain’s shameful tolerance for terrorism
The fundamental problem is that terrorism cannot be defeated by terrorists, and neither can extremism be cured by extremists, whether they operate in Ramallah or Birmingham. The Palestinian Authority’s systematic celebration of violence, its financial incentivisation of murder, and its educational indoctrination of hatred make it structurally incapable of dismantling the very extremism it promotes and funds. Hamas will not disarm Hamas, but neither will an organisation that shares Hamas’s fundamental hostility to Jewish existence and celebrates the same ‘martyrs’ and ‘resistance operations.’ We need to stop pretending otherwise.

This principle applies with equal force to domestic policy. The notion that people convicted of terrorism can undergo meaningful transformation, or that the likes of Alaa Abd el-Fattah deserve state protection and resources, rests on the same dangerous delusion that has guided Britain’s Palestinian policy: the belief that support, accommodation, and financial incentives can somehow transmute hatred into moderation, even when the people in question are outspoken about their true beliefs.

The UK’s approach represents a catastrophic inversion of moral logic. Instead of treating terrorism and extremism with the cynicism, distrust, and caution they demand, British institutions have embraced a saccharine liberalism that sees taxpayer funds as therapeutic tools for ideological rehabilitation. We shower resources on those who would annihilate our values while expecting gratitude in return.

The hard truth is that extremists must be deprived of support, not rewarded with it. Where necessary, they must be forced to disarm, surrender, or leave. This is the real mark of moral and ethical robustness, not the wishful thinking that sees us splurge public money on every terrorist and extremist we can find, hoping against all evidence that financial incentives will somehow inspire their redemption.

From Birmingham to Gaza, the pattern is consistent: British institutions have developed a tolerance for terrorism and extremism that manifests in citizenship for extremists, electoral candidacies for convicted terrorists, and financial support for organisations that systematically reward mass murder. Each case is justified through narrow technicalities that ignore broader moral realities. The result is a system that simultaneously condemns terrorism in principle while funding it in practice – a contradiction that can only be sustained through wilful blindness to obvious truths.

The choice before Britain is stark: continue this descent into moral bankruptcy, or rediscover the capacity to distinguish between those who deserve our protection and those who seek our destruction. The current trajectory suggests the outcome is already decided.
Palestine Action activists in Elbit site break-in cleared of aggravated burglary
Six Palestine Action activists have been cleared of committing aggravated burglary over a break-in at an Israel-based defence firm’s UK site.

Charlotte Head, Samuel Corner, Leona Kamio, Fatema Rajwani, Zoe Rogers and Jordan Devlin faced trial at Woolwich Crown Court over allegations they used or threatened unlawful violence and used sledgehammers as weapons after a prison van was driven into Elbit Systems’ Bristol factory.

All six were acquitted of aggravated burglary and jurors found Ms Rajwani, Ms Rogers and Mr Devlin not guilty of violent disorder.

The jury deliberated for 36 hours and 34 minutes but could not reach verdicts for charges of criminal damage against all six defendants.

No verdict was reached in the allegation that Mr Corner, 23, inflicted grievous bodily harm on Police Sergeant Kate Evans, or on the charges of violent disorder against Ms Head, Mr Corner, and Ms Kamio.

The six activists hugged each other in the dock as a dozen of their supporters cheered from the public gallery above.

Before the verdicts were delivered, Mr Justice Johnson told jurors: “You said that you believe that you can go no further than you have got to already, and that no amount of time can make any material difference.”

The foreman agreed, and he said in that case: “I’m not going to ask you to deliberate any further.”

Footage played to jurors showed the six wearing red jumpsuits during the demonstration in the early hours of August 6, 2024.

Prosecutors said the six tried to “cause as much damage as possible and obtain information about the company”.

In body-worn footage from one of the security guards, shown to jurors, three of the defendants approached him and shouted at him to “f*** off”, with one holding a lighted flare and two others brandishing sledgehammers.


Birmingham venue says it cannot provide safe space for ‘Jewish supremacy’ conspiracists event
A venue due to hold an event featuring some of the country’s most notorious peddlers of “Jewish supremacy” conspiracy theories has said it can no longer host the meeting – because it cannot guarantee a “safe space” for participants.

The Old Print Works in Birmingham was due to hold the launch event for the “Anti-Zionist Movement” this coming Sunday, featuring individuals such as David Miller, Rahmeh Aladwan and Latifa Abouchakra, all of whom regularly post on social media about so-called “Jewish supremacy” in control of the UK.

Miller, who was sacked by the University of Bristol in 2021, has since become a producer for a show on Iranian regime-operated Press TV channel, which Abouchakra also works for. Aladwan was arrested by the police twice last year, including on suspicion of inciting racial hatred. In December, a medical tribunal voted to suspend her for 15 months while the General Medical Council conducted a full investigation into her conduct.

In a statement on Instagram to its five thousand followers, the venue said: “As a community charity The Old Print Works has limited resources available and under current circumstances cannot guarantee a safe space on the day for this event, its audience and our community.”

The venue adds that it is “committed to providing a safe civic space where topics of interest to our local community can be respectfully discussed. With the safety of our community in mind, we aim to put measures in place so that we can continue to host events, including those that provide a platform for under-represented voices.”

Responses to the post include criticisms of how the venue has “bowed down to the Zionist lobby” and accusations of the statement being “deliberately vague….maybe it would be better to be more transparent about your f**k up and about which under represented voices you are truly supporting.”

In a joint statement, grassroots advocacy groups Our Fight and Stop the Hate said they “welcome the announcement that The Old Print Works in Birmingham, that was due to host the launch event of the new hate campaign ‘The Anti-Zionist Movement’, has pulled out.”


PEN America withdraws support for Israeli comedian facing canceled shows
One of America’s leading free-speech groups has withdrawn its support for an Israeli comedian after previously describing the threatened cancellation of his shows as “a profound violation of free expression.”

PEN America issued a brief retraction on Tuesday, saying that “on further consideration,” it would no longer support Guy Hochman after venues in New York City and Los Angeles canceled his scheduled performances amid complaints from anti-Israel protest groups about his past comments regarding Gaza.

“On Jan. 29, 2026, PEN America issued a statement on the abrupt cancellation of performances in New York and Los Angeles by an Israeli comedian, who has been accused by advocacy organizations of incitement to genocide in Gaza,” PEN wrote.

“PEN America has decided to withdraw this statement,” it said. “We remain committed to open and respectful dialogue about the divisions that arise in the course of defending free expression.”

Just days earlier, the foundation had rejected calls for Hochman to recant his alleged views as a condition to perform.

“It is a profound violation of free expression to demand artists, writers or comedians agree to ideological litmus tests as a condition to appear on a stage,” wrote Jonathan Friedman, PEN’s managing director for U.S. free expression programs.

“In this case, Hochman has a history of dehumanizing social-media posts about Palestinians that celebrate casualties and call for even more destruction in Gaza,” he said. “But shutting down cultural events is not the solution. Regardless of the accusations against him, Hochman has a right to perform without facing threats or litmus tests.”

Anti-Israel groups, including the Hind Rajab Foundation, have compiled social media posts from Hochman, a popular Israeli comedian, as part of legal efforts to bar him from performing in the United States and Canada.


Major Jewish orgs mum, as left-wing ones laud Phylisa Wisdom, named head of NYC Jew-hatred office
Mainstream Jewish organizations were silent, after Jewish media reported that Zohran Mamdani, mayor of New York City, named Phylisa Wisdom the new head of the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism.

Wisdom, executive director of the New York Jewish Agenda, a progressive group, has been critical of Chassidic schools, which she has said don’t provide adequate secular education. Many Chassidic leaders have accused her of being anti-Chassidic.

“Picking Phylisa Wisdom to run an office tasked with combating antisemitism is probably the biggest gaslighting Mamdani has done so far,” stated Yaakov Kaplan, vice-chair of Brooklyn Community Board 12.

“90% of all antisemitic attacks were against Orthodox Jews,” he wrote. “Picking someone for this office that Orthodox Jews see as an adversary is mind boggling.”

Jonathan Kopp, chair of the New York City chapter of J Street, which describes itself as “pro-Israel, pro-peace, pro-democracy,” stated that Wisom is a “smart, strategic and effective leader in New York City’s Jewish communal life” and “a great pick for this important position at this critical moment.”

The progressive group Bend the Arc: Jewish Action called Wisdom “a perfect choice.”

“Phylisa understands the threat of antisemitism and how to fight it in solidarity with our neighbors,” it said. “We’re thrilled to see her take on a position in the mayor’s office
Mamdani NYC health department staffers launch ‘Global Oppression Working Group’ accusing Israel of genocide
Employees of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s Department of Health have created a “working group” that accuses Israel of committing genocide, The Post has learned.

DOH staffers held the first “Global Oppression and Public Health Working Group” meeting Tuesday afternoon — in the middle of the workday — with members gathering at the department’s headquarters in Long Island City, as well as remotely.

“We really developed in response to the ongoing genocide in Palestine,” one presenter reading from the group’s mission statement said near the beginning of the meeting, according to video obtained by The Post.

“And the working group aims to address the growing interests among the health department staff to learn about current and ongoing global oppression in its many forms and how it influences the advancement of health equity,” the presenter said.

No mention of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that provoked the Jewish state’s retaliatory response and the brutal war in Gaza that followed was made during the more than one-hour presentation, according to a transcript of the meeting and a source who attended.

GOPH said its goals were to better understand the impact of global oppression on “the health and well-being of priority communities in NYC vis-à-vis trauma, violence and discrimination” as well as “supporting colleagues negatively impacted” by it, according to a slideshow presented at the meeting.

The flyer for the event was circulated near the elevator banks in the DOH building, a department employee said.

A former rep to ex-three term Mayor Mike Bloomberg was stunned that the DOH mission appeared to have veered suddenly from the public health of New Yorkers to foreign policy.

“This is shocking. If these NYC Health Department staffers truly believe Israel is committing genocide, will they now boycott the Israeli pharmaceutical companies that make lifesaving drugs New Yorkers depend on?” said Mark Botnick, who is Jewish.

“Or is this just performative politics that has no place in a taxpayer-funded public health agency?” said Botnick.
Mamdani health officials’ ‘oppression’ obsession: Attack Israel and Jews
And what does libeling another country have to do with the Health Department’s mandate to protect the health of New Yorkers from illness, from the flu to HIV?

Absolutely nothing.

Speakers, who seemed hand-picked for their hatred of Israel and contempt for the Jewish people were introduced by Sarah McKenney, a director of operations for the rapid response team at the DOHMH, and one of the organizers of the disgraceful event.

Mayor Mamdani is a longtime basher of Israel who’s surrounded himself with Jew haters and bandies about the term “genocide.’’ Lately, however, he’s vowed to protect Jewish New Yorkers from the often violent acts of antisemitism unleashed on streets, Jewish-owned businesses and synagogues throughout Gotham.

It’s time he put his money where his mouth is.

If Hizzoner wants to prove he represents all people of this city and cares if residents live or die, he’ll immediately disband this disgraceful working group and put its ringleaders on notice that their jobs are at risk if they refuse.
Jewish groups express concern after Canadian prime minister axes special envoy on Jew-hatred office
Jewish groups lamented an announcement by Mark Carney, the prime minister of Canada, that he is forming a “rights, equality and inclusion” council to replace the country’s offices of the special envoy on preserving Holocaust remembrance and combating antisemitism, and special envoy on Islamophobia.

Justin Trudeau, the former prime minister, named Deborah Lyons, a former Canadian ambassador to Israel, the special envoy in October 2023. Lyons said on July 17, 2025, that she was stepping down three months early “with a heavy heart.”

“A position that I loved dearly but brought forth so many challenges, some deep disappointments, but in the end, some real achievements which I know will sustain the Jewish community and Canada in years to come,” she said at the time.

On Wednesday, the Canadian government said that the new council “will be comprised of prominent Canadians from academia as well as experts and community leaders, with a mission to foster social cohesion, rally Canadians around shared identity, combat racism and hate in all their forms and help guide the efforts of the government of Canada.”

Among the council’s most important functions will be “consulting and partnering with communities from coast to coast to build bridges between communities and combat all forms of racism and hate, including antisemitism and Islamophobia,” it said.

Sacha Roytman, CEO of the Combat Antisemitism Movement, stated that the group had been “proud” to work with the special envoy’s office, “which played a critical role in fighting the recent rise of Jew-hatred in the country.”

“In the aftermath of the Oct. 7 massacre, Canadians woke up to the stark reality that antisemitism was surging uncontrollably, both across the globe and throughout Canada itself,” he said.

“It is bad enough that the last occupant of the office, Deborah Lyons, felt the moral obligation to resign last July,” Roytman said, “but Prime Minister Mark Carney’s disastrous decision today to eliminate the position altogether marked a shameful choice to double down on weak leadership, showing that Canada’s government is sadly not up to the task at this critical moment.”
Israeli Telecom Stock Crosses $800 a Share, Making Norway’s Pension Fund, Led by Scooter-Riding Wokester, Look Foolish for Divesting
Beyond all the moral and geopolitical reasons that divesting from Israel is a bad idea is the reality that even strictly on economic terms, the concept is a money-loser.

In early December 2024, the Norwegian government pension fund announced it would divest from Bezeq, Israel’s largest telecommunications company, "due to an unacceptable risk that the company contributes to serious violations of the rights of individuals in situations of war and conflict."

The Norwegian fund owned 0.76 percent of the company’s shares in June 2024, worth 252 million Norwegian krone (about $26.1 million at current exchange rates). On Dec. 3, 2024, when the Norges Bank Executive Board announced the divestment decision, BEZQ.TA closed at $538, according to Yahoo Finance. A little more than two months later, the stock closed at $601.60. I noted a year ago that "the Norwegians missed out on an 11.8 percent gain in about two months."

Fast forward another year, and yesterday, Feb. 3, 2026, BEZQ.TA closed at $809 a share, meaning it’s up more than 50 percent in the 14 months since the Norwegians decided to sell.

Nor is that the only dramatic gain that Norway has lost out on as a result of its anti-Israel investment policies. On Aug. 25, 2025, the Norges Bank Executive Board decided to dump its $2.1 billion worth of shares in Caterpillar Inc., the Texas-based construction giant. The ethics board reportedly declared that "bulldozers manufactured by Caterpillar are being used by Israeli authorities in the widespread unlawful destruction of Palestinian property." Caterpillar stock closed at $702.89 a share on Feb. 3, 2026, up from its $432.30 close on the day of the divestment announcement, according to Yahoo Finance. That’s a 62.6-percent gain, handily outperforming the 8.3-percent return of the S&P 500 index.

A New York Times profile last month described the $2.1 trillion Norwegian fund as "the world’s biggest" and depicts its chief executive, Nicolai Tangen, "riding an electric scooter to work after his morning sauna and swim." Another photo that ran with the piece shows Tangen, bare-shouldered, in the water for his "morning dip." Even the Times, which is not exactly an ardent defender of Israel, quoted a finance professor at NHH Norwegian School of Economics and the Wharton School, Karin S. Thorburn, who called the moves to divest from Caterpillar and the Israeli companies "a worrying precedent." Reported the Times, "Professor Thorburn said the controversy threatened to undercut the fund’s model as a nonpolitical investor." It could also damage the returns.
Seth Moulton Said He Would Return ‘Any’ AIPAC Donations. He’s Kept Tens of Thousands of Dollars From the Pro-Israel Group
Rep. Seth Moulton (D., Mass.), who is challenging Sen. Ed Markey in the Democratic primary, pledged in October to return "any AIPAC donations" to his campaign. But Moulton has held onto tens of thousands of dollars in AIPAC donations, refunding only around half of what the group has given him since 2024, a Washington Free Beacon analysis found.

Moulton's campaign now says he will return only donations received in the 2026 campaign cycle, shifting the goalposts of his original statement and allowing him to pocket most of the donations he has taken in from the pro-Israel group.

In November, Moulton's campaign returned $5,000 to AIPAC's political action committee and $37,800 from 18 individuals who made donations through AIPAC, a practice known as earmarking, campaign disclosures show. But Moulton's campaign has held onto more than $40,000 in AIPAC cash given to his campaign in 2024.

Moulton's campaign filings show no record of refunds for a $5,000 contribution from AIPAC's political arm on Aug. 29, 2024, and another $5,000 contribution on Oct. 16, 2024. And Moulton's campaign has kept nearly 30 earmarked donations given in 2024, which total $31,300, according to a Free Beacon analysis.
Anti-Israel Group That Stormed University of Minnesota Building Now Leads Illegal Anti-ICE Agitation
A University of Minnesota student group has emerged as a leader behind illegal—and sometimes violent—anti-ICE agitation gripping Minneapolis. It's a significant shift for the school's Students for a Democratic Society chapter, which roughly one year ago stormed a campus building in an anti-Israel raid, trapping employees inside and causing tens of thousands of dollars in property damage.

The group, known as UMN SDS, organized a Jan. 28 protest outside a hotel located on campus that was allegedly housing ICE agents. Dozens of agitators swarmed the Graduate by Hilton and rocked police barricades, pounded on drums and pans, set off noisemakers, and shouted "Fuck ICE" at local and state law enforcement. University police eventually declared it an unlawful assembly and arrested 67 protesters, including Jack Louis Nimz—a public school teacher, the president of SDS's national arm, and one of the radicals arrested for storming the campus building in October 2024.



It was the third time in as many weeks that UMN SDS rallied more than 100 radicals outside the hotel, encouraging supporters to confront the "homicidal kidnappers" it claimed were residing there. At a Jan. 13 protest it organized, three agitators were arrested after the crowd damaged property and created "hazardous conditions for the public and law enforcement," according to the University of Minnesota. The next week, while promoting a Jan. 21 protest on Instagram, the group wrote, "We're not done just because Minneapolis pigs tried to scare us away."
Should Western Tech Giants Partner With Pro-Hamas Network Al Jazeera?
A few weeks ago, Al Jazeera named Google Cloud as its primary technology provider for “The Core,” a sweeping program designed to integrate generative artificial intelligence (AI) throughout its production process. The move, which further deepened the relationship between the two companies, should sound alarm bells for policymakers and anyone concerned with the accuracy, credibility, and transparency of the news media and information space, which impacts nearly every aspect of society.

The Core enables more efficient reporting and even drafts scripts that humans generally would otherwise write. Reporters can pull archival material in seconds, generate compelling data visualizations — visual stories — and synthetic images at planetary scale, and automate story planning, all through AI platforms built by Google.

However, it’s not the innovation that’s the problem but rather its use to generate and amplify adversarial state-funded and directed news with no warning labels to its global audience.

The Qatari state funds and oversees Al Jazeera, shaping editorial output. Because of its shared ideology with the Muslim Brotherhood, Al Jazeera’s content often reflects the lens of the Muslim Brotherhood, three branches of which the United States just designated as a terrorist organization. The Qatari outlet also has a history of producing content that glorifies terrorism. Tech companies that help Al Jazeera amplify its content using algorithms, AI, or other methods, advance Qatari foreign policy rather than reflecting independent media assessments on a wide range of worldviews.

Part of the Al Jazeera-Google program is “AJ-LLM,” described as the editorial brain of the system that will be trained on Al Jazeera’s archives and connected to Gemini Enterprise, according to the companies. Al Jazeera is already very prominently cited in large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT and Claude in questions about the Gaza war, and Gemini could very well follow that trajectory with this expanded partnership.

While one reason Al Jazeera features prominently in LLM answers is because it has no paywall, new partnerships, including Google’s major expansion with Al Jazeera, may fuel its presence even more.

Al Jazeera assures there will be sufficient human oversight in the process. However, Al Jazeera’s current and historic content, with its anti-Western bias that amplifies the likes of Hamas, loaded into its LLM platform, will churn out faster, flashier versions of the same editorial product, in countless formats.


Washington Post fires one-third of staff, including all its Middle East journalists
The Washington Post laid off one-third of its staff Wednesday, eliminating its sports section, several foreign bureaus and its books coverage in a widespread purge that represented a brutal blow to journalism and one of its most legendary brands. All the paper’s Middle East correspondents and editors were among those fired.

The Post’s executive editor, Matt Murray, called the move painful but necessary to put the outlet on stronger footing and weather changes in technology and user habits. “We can’t be everything to everyone,” Murray said in a note to staff members.

He outlined the changes in a companywide online meeting, and staff members then began getting emails with one of two subject lines — telling them their role was or was not eliminated.

Rumors of layoffs had circulated for weeks, ever since word leaked that sports reporters who had expected to travel to Italy for the Winter Olympics would not be going. But when official word came down, the size and scale of the cuts were shocking, affecting virtually every department in the newsroom.

“It’s just devastating news for anyone who cares about journalism in America and, in fact, the world,” said Margaret Sullivan, a Columbia University journalism professor and former media columnist at the Post and The New York Times. “The Washington Post has been so important in so many ways, in news coverage, sports and cultural coverage.”

Martin Baron, the Post’s first editor under its current owner, billionaire Jeff Bezos, condemned his former boss and called what has happened at the newspaper “a case study in near-instant, self-inflicted brand destruction.”


PA TV reveals Gazans endangered children for terror stipends
The Israeli Foreign Ministry on Tuesday tweeted a video of Syrian journalist Mustafa al-Miqdad alleging that some Gazans send their children into dangerous situations in the hope they will be injured by Israeli forces so their families can collect compensation from the Palestinian Authority.

“Years ago, at the Gaza border there was friction with the Zionist enemy. There were those who would go out to protests and marches there. As families, some would go together with their children … so they would be injured or something would happen to them, so they could later receive the monthly aid or the monthly salary,” al-Miqdad said in a Feb. 1 interview with Palestine TV, the P.A.’s main television station.

The Foreign Ministry tweeted: “Jobs, not Jihad. Welfare, not warfare. While their citizens struggle, the Palestinian Authority’s budget tells a dark story. They aren’t investing in job creation; they’re subsidizing terror. Palestinian children deserve a future, not a price tag on violence. End pay-for-slay.”



Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), which translated the video to English, commented on its X account: “Kill your child. Collect your cash. That’s pay-for-slay.”

“PMW has been warning for years that pay-for-slay incentivizes terror. But we couldn’t even imagine that Palestinian parents would intentionally expose their children to injuries and even worse just to get a monthly salary. And now even this is exposed by PA TV itself,” PMW founder and director Itamar Marcus told JNS.


Blue Square Alliance previews Super Bowl ad combating Jew-hatred
Robert Kraft’s Blue Square Alliance Against Hate previewed its 2026 Super Bowl ad on Feb. 3, slated to air on Feb. 8 during the game between the Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., home of the San Francisco 49ers.

The commercial features a Jewish student walking the halls of a school and discovering that a fellow student has placed a “dirty Jew” note on his backpack.

In the ad, a black student covers the note with a blue square. “Do not listen to that,” he says. “I know how it feels.”

“Two in three Jewish teens have experienced antisemitism,” the ad says. “Share the blue square and show you care.”

The BSA, founded in 2019 by Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots, introduced the blue square campaign in 2023, highlighting “that Jews are disproportionately the victims of 68% of all religious hate crimes,” according to the organization.

“BSA empowers people of all backgrounds to stand up to Jewish hate, whenever and wherever they see it,” the group states.

The ad is part of a larger $15 million campaign focusing on Jew-hatred, claiming that “Gen Z is three times more likely to witness antisemitism, yet nearly twice as likely to say it is not a problem.”


Teen arrested over antisemitic terror threat at NYC charter school
A 17-year-old male has been arrested for sending threatening antisemitic emails to fellow students at Renaissance Charter School in Jackson Heights, Queens, according to the New York City Police Department.

On Monday, the NYPD 115th Precinct responded to a 911 call of a “possible bias incident” inside the school, where officers were informed “of an individual that disseminated antisemitic emails,” according to a police report provided to JNS.

The email allegedly stated, “At 2 pm we will rise up and kill all the Jews in this school and the city. F**k the Jews,” local outlet QNS reported. The message was sent under the name of a student who attends the school.

The suspect, who has not been publicly identified, has been charged with making a terroristic threat and aggravated harassment as a hate crime. The investigation is being handled by the NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force.

“A teenager in New York was arrested for explicitly calling for the murder of Jews,” stated Hen Mazzig, senior fellow at the Tel Aviv Institute. “When hatred reaches students this young, antisemitism is not just alive, it is thriving and spreading to younger generations like a disease.”


The Woman Who Refused to Give Flowers to Hitler
Yocheved Gold, who recently died at the age of 102, lived a life that tracked the arc of modern Jewish history, its deepest horrors and its defiant triumphs.

As a teenager in Nazi Germany, she came face to face with Adolf Hitler and refused to honor him. As a young woman, she helped build the Jewish state. And at 99, she survived Hamas’ brutal October 7 attack, only to insist on returning to her home. This is the story of a woman who refused, again and again, to be moved.

Refusing to Give Flowers to Hitler
Yocheved was born in 1923 in Halberstadt, Germany, into a family whose roots in the country stretched back generations. Her mother, Sarah (née Bamberger), descended from a line of rabbis; her father, Rabbi Dr. Aharon Neuwirth, was known for his scholarship and deep piety. One of seven children, Yocheved grew up in a warm, proudly observant home that took Jewish life seriously.

In 1930, the family moved to Berlin. Three years later, Adolf Hitler became Chancellor, and the walls began closing in. Yocheved later remembered walking to synagogue with her mother past Jewish shops whose windows had been smashed, their facades scrawled with a single word: JUDEN.

The assault on Jewish life escalated quickly. In 1933, Jews were barred from working as professors, judges, lawyers, or civil servants. Jewish doctors were forbidden to treat non-Jews. By 1935, German Jews were stripped of their citizenship altogether. Schools, businesses, and public spaces displayed signs that said, “Jews not allowed.”

And yet, the world looked away. The International Olympic Committee saw no problem hosting the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. Jews were excluded from participating but 13-year-old Yocheved was determined to witness the opening ceremony. With her light hair and blue eyes, she could pass as Aryan. She slipped into the Olympic Stadium unnoticed.

Almost immediately, she was swept into a group of children selected to greet Hitler.

The children were handed flowers and instructed to line up. One by one, they would step forward, salute the Führer, and place the flowers in his hands. When Yocheved’s turn came, she froze.

“I saw him face to face,” she later recalled, “and I was a little afraid.” But fear gave way to resolve. “That I, as a Jew, would give Hitler flowers? I refused.”

She did not step forward to offer the flowers.

Somehow, her defiance went unnoticed. Her disguise held. Kater that day, the Jewish girl who had silently snubbed the most powerful man in Germany walked back home to her family, carrying with her a quiet act of resistance that would foreshadow a lifetime of courage.


Somaliland president says he expects to soon visit Israel, sign trade agreement
Somaliland expects to reach a trade agreement soon with Israel, the first country to recognize its independence, and is willing to offer rights to valuable mineral deposits as part of a deal, its leader said in an interview with Reuters, adding that he expected to soon pay a visit to the Jewish state.

Israel in late December became the first country to recognize the Republic of Somaliland, a northeastern part of Somalia that has claimed independence for decades. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel would seek immediate cooperation in agriculture, health, technology and the economy.

Speaking to Reuters via video link from Dubai where he was attending the World Government Summit, Somaliland President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi said no bilateral economic deal with Israel had yet been reached, but Somaliland expected to sign “a partnership agreement.”

“At the moment, there is no trade, and there is no investment from Israel. But we are hoping 100% [for] their investment, their trade, and hopefully we will engage with the business people and the government of Israel soon,” he said.

“Somaliland is a very rich country in resources — minerals, oil, gas, marine, in agriculture, energy and other sectors… We have meat, we have fish, we have minerals and they [Israel] need them. So trade can start from these main sectors,” he said. “The sky is the limit.”

He said in return Somaliland would seek access to Israeli technology.






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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Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون



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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