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Saturday, April 11, 2026

04/11 Links: What Would It Have Cost For Israel To Maintain Its Popularity?; How to Handle Your Out-of-Control Ivy; BBC calls terrorists resistance fighters in Iran coverage

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: What Would It Have Cost For Israel To Maintain Its Popularity?
So: What could Israel have done at this moment to prevent its continuing fall in U.S. public opinion? We have our answer: not hit back.

Well, sure, some people say, Israel could have carried out airstrikes without a ground invasion. But first of all, that wouldn’t have worked either, since the accusations of “genocide” began while Israel was still trying to capture or expel the remnants of the invading Palestinian forces. Israel carries out airstrikes in Lebanon and gets accused of genocide there, too. The accusation is held at the ready and fired at Israel the second it does something in response.

Second, the idea that Israel shouldn’t go in after the hostages is genuinely insane, not to mention the fact that Israel absolutely had to strike back hard and that Western leaders agreed from the outset that taking out Hamas was a legitimate goal.

But let’s go back to the hostages. Americans were among those taken by Hamas, and the American public was punishing Israel for going in to find them?

Now, it’s true that along the way, various media figures falsely reported claims of a famine in Gaza, of intentional starvation, of genocide, and whatever else they could think of. There’s no question this hurt Israel’s standing, but since Israel didn’t do those things, it is necessarily limited in what it could have done to prevent people lying about it.

Either way, the underlying point seems to be clear here: Israel could have stopped or slowed its popularity slide in the U.S. had it been willing to let Iran and its proxies get away with Nazi levels of violence against Jews.

Are there things Israel can do at the margins to improve its public image? Absolutely, and those will be enumerated and debated as this discussion continues. But I can’t shake the feeling that marginal effects have been the only ones on the table outside of Israel doing something suicidal.
How to Handle Your Out-of-Control Ivy
That video of congresswoman Elise Stefanik, Republican of New York, grilling college presidents about whether calling for the genocide of Jews violated their university policies—and the college presidents responding that it depended on the context—has been viewed more than a billion times, making it what the jacket copy of her new book calls "the most-watched congressional hearing in history."

The performance propelled Stefanik to new prominence but not yet into a different job. She was reportedly considered—how seriously is unclear—to be President Donald Trump's 2024 running mate. Trump eventually did nominate her to be the U.S. ambassador at the United Nations, a cabinet position, but then in March 2025 Trump pulled the nomination. Stefanik entered the 2026 race for governor of New York—and then announced she was suspending that campaign and also not running for reelection to Congress.

Making a success as a nonfiction writer may be even longer odds than winning election as governor of New York as a Trump Republican. Yet on the basis of her debut performance, Stefanik just might have a promising future ahead of her as an author. Poisoned Ivies is the best book yet on how the October 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack on Israel reverberated on American campuses.

The right-wing jeremiad against decadent universities is a genre with a long history. The conventional list starts with William F. Buckley Jr.'s 1951 God and Man at Yale and continues through Allan Bloom's 1987 The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today's Students, and Dinesh D'Souza's 1991 Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus. You could take it back even further, to Irving Babbitt's 1908 Literature and the American College: "The function of the college … should be to insist on the idea of quality."

Unlike Buckley and D'Souza, who came at it as students, or Bloom and Babbitt, who were professors, Stefanik brings the perspective of a politician. With that hearing questioning Harvard's Claudine Gay and Penn's Liz Magill, who both subsequently resigned, she "reset the course of American higher education" and changed the perception of Ivy League institutions. "Instead of bastions of knowledge and vibrant institutional life, they are considered hotbeds of radical ideology, groundless elitism, intellectual laziness, and anti-American hatred," she writes.
Antisemitism is returning – and the world is silent, again
At the center of this danger stands Iran, a regime built on extreme religious ideology and ambitions of regional hegemony. Like Germany in the 1930s, this represents a combination of a totalitarian worldview and a drive to obtain destructive power. Iran operates through regional proxies and promotes a long-term strategy to destabilize the Middle East and beyond. The threat is not only external. It advances gradually and at times almost imperceptibly.

The connection between radical ideologies within Europe and actors such as Iran is not always direct, but it exists at the level of influence and consciousness. When extreme ideas spread, they create an environment in which it becomes easier to undermine stability, weaken trust in institutions, and empower hostile forces.

Just as many in Europe in the 1940s did not believe that the destruction of Jews on such a massive scale was possible, there are those today who struggle to believe that open threats against Israel and the West could be realized. Yet history has already proven that when declared evil is not stopped in time, it becomes reality.

The conclusion is clear. The West must wake up and distinguish between pluralism and indifference, between tolerance and surrender to ideologies that seek to exploit freedom in order to undermine it. The world once again faces a test. Will it choose to learn from the past, or repeat the mistake and hope for a different outcome?

Chamberlain believed he was buying time. In reality, he was buying an illusion.

That illusion came at a heavy cost to the world.

This time, everything is visible, everything is documented, and everything is being said openly. Iran declares its intention to destroy Israel, while leaders in France, the United Kingdom, and Spain roll their eyes and claim it is not their war.

Those who choose to close their eyes today will not be able to claim tomorrow that they did not know. The choice is not between war and peace, but between clarity and illusion, between responsibility and indifference.

The question is no longer what will happen, but who will bear responsibility when it does.


NYPost Editorial: Jew-hate will keep rising in NYC until Mamdani stops enabling it
The tide of Jew-hate in New York climbs ever higher — and will continue to rise until Mayor Mamdani and his fellow Democrats stop enabling it.

The latest ugly high-profile incident: A nurse, Jennifer Koonings, launched an antisemitic tirade against a group of Israeli tourists in Times Square, accusing them of slaughtering children and saying, “We don’t want you here, terrorists.”

This reflects, first, the left’s standard moral inversion on Israel: The people defending themselves from genocidal Islamists are somehow terrorists.

And, second, progressive entitlement: Kooning believes she has the right to scream filth at any Israeli she meets.

She also invoked the classic trope of the Jewish child-killer, one used to justify pogroms for centuries.

But it’s perhaps worst of all that she posted her monstrous insanity on Instagram, clearly expecting approval — and got almost 140,000 likes.
Joshua Namm: Two Years Later: Jews STILL Deserve Better
I can’t believe it, but it has already been two years since my article titled “We Deserve Better. Much Better” came out. It addressed some of the many issues with American secular Jewish organizations, as well as the tendency of large segments of our community, conducting “business as usual” in a post-October 7 world, when we should have finally learned that the way we had been doing things doesn’t work.

In it, I used the so-called “Jewish heritage night” sponsored by the Jewish Federation of San Diego County as the perfect example of the common “head in the sand,” delusional, attitude toward the ongoing war in Israel and rising antisemitism, in addition to an ongoing lack of pride in anything authentically Jewish (and the ability to openly express Jewish pride in any meaningful way).

In the two years since that article many things have changed. Israel experienced miraculous victories like the “beeper operation” against Hezbollah. The war with Hamas is in some kind of stasis that no one can seem to realistically define.

Unfortunately, it is equally stunning that two years and five months after 10/7, Hamas still exists and functions as a fighting force.

Every hostage either came home or was returned to us.

More recently, the United States and Israel have gone to war with Iran. Twice.

In February a massive lawsuit was filed against the state of California alleging “pervasive harassment of Jewish and Israeli students in its public education system.”

New York City, one of the most Jewish cities in the world, elected a Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who has refused to denounce terrorists, and has a wife who liked that thousands of Jews were murdered, injured, and traumatized on October 7, 2023.

He also invited Mahmoud Khalil, a loud and enthusiastic supporter of October 7, and fellow lowlife “guest” Abdullah Akl (who called on Hamas to bomb Tel Aviv), to have dinner with him and his family at Gracie Mansion (the Mayor’s residence).

He also lied about yet another Islamist (inspired by ISIS) attack on Americans, framing it as violence caused by peaceful protestors – protesting Mamdani.
Netanyahu says campaign against Iran ‘not over,’ touts ‘historic achievements’
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu contended in a video statement Saturday evening that the campaign against Iran “is not over,” in a video statement that repeated many of his previously stated arguments about the achievements in the recent US-Israeli war.

The statement drew criticism from the opposition, whose leaders said the war had failed to achieve its stated objectives.

Netanyahu claimed in his video that Iranian propaganda minimizing Israel’s achievements “is echoed in our media, and the propaganda of our political rivals is echoed in Iran.”

Highlighting Israel’s “historic achievements” thus far and using a map of the Middle East with the Iranian axis highlighted in red as a prop, Netanyahu said that “they wanted to strangle us, and we are strangling them.”

“We hit them, we still have more to do,” he said.

Netanyahu said that Israel “broke the barrier of fear” by striking Iran last June.

He obliquely criticized Israel’s intelligence agencies — and again sought to absolve himself of blame — over the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack, stressing that in June 2025, “this time, precise intelligence reached me on time.”

The premier said he decided to go to the second war with Iran in February because the Islamic Republic “was very close to achieving a nuclear weapon” and to gaining the ability to produce thousands of missiles.

If Israel hadn’t attacked Tehran “would already have a nuclear weapon,” he claimed, citing intelligence last year that Iran was preparing to turn its enriched uranium into a nuclear weapon.

“The moment we received that intelligence, we went into action,” he said.


US-Iran talks extended into Sunday as Trump claims ‘no difference’ to him if deal reached
US President Donald Trump said Saturday he was not bothered about the outcome of US-Iran talks in Pakistan, insisting the United States had come out ahead from the war, even as Tehran said negotiations aimed at securing a deal to end the six-week war between the two countries before a two-week ceasefire expires were set to extend into Sunday.

The talks in Islamabad stretched into the early hours of Sunday morning following over 15 hours of marathon negotiations, even as Iran warned that Washington was making “excessive demands” over the Strait of Hormuz that could undermine Pakistan’s peacemaking efforts.

Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said after 3 a.m. local time that the third round had ended, saying “serious disagreements” still remained. State TV reported that negotiations would continue on Sunday, and Tehran’s government said the negotiations would continue despite the remaining differences.

However, a White House official briefed reporters around 5 a.m. Islamabad time that the talks were ongoing: “15 hours and counting.”

The trilateral direct negotiations were taking place with host Pakistan in Islamabad, a senior White House official said, a departure from recent practice where both sides held talks via a mediator while seated in separate rooms.

The US delegation was being led by Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, making it the highest level of American contact since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The Iranian delegation, composed of more than 70 members, was being led by parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, joined by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.


Beware Pakistan’s General Bearing Peace Talks
In August 1969, a secret diplomatic cable from the United States embassy in Islamabad reported on a conversation between Henry Kissinger, then National Security Advisor to President Richard Nixon, and the head of Pakistan’s air force, Air Marshal Nur Khan. According to the cable, both Kissinger and Nur Khan agreed that China’s then premier Zhou Enlai might be willing to negotiate with the United States, provided that Washington withdrew its military forces from Taiwan.

The cable gave rise to a flurry of secret diplomacy seeking to broker detente between two Cold War rivals, drawing in the White House and the highest levels of the Pakistani and Chinese governments.

The thrust of this old cable has a new relevance in the Iran conflict, with Pakistan again seeking to play a mediating role in talks involving America and an adversary. There is talk that US Vice President J.D. Vance might soon travel to Pakistan for a lead role in negotiations. He should be sure to read this history.

The stakes could hardly be higher. The United States and Israel have prosecuted a military campaign that decapitated Iran’s senior leadership, stymied its nuclear weapons program and degraded its ballistic missile capability. In response, Iran has pushed the global economy to the brink of recession by shuttering the Strait of Hormuz, sending global oil prices soaring.

That Pakistan has once again positioned itself at the centre of global politics demonstrates the country’s ambition to be a consequential actor. The idea that Pakistan can even be considered a viable location for hosting talks between the US and Iran shows its diplomatic convening power should not be underestimated.

Like in the 1960s, a powerful Pakistani military man acts as a driving force. Since assuming the role of Pakistan’s Chief of the Army Staff in November 2022, Asim Munir has consolidated power, sidelining rivals in the military and silencing democratic critics such as former prime minister Imran Khan. Munir serves as the country’s de facto ruler.
Iran’s supreme leader has disfiguring facial wounds and may have lost a leg, sources say
Iran’s new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is still recovering from severe facial and leg injuries suffered in the airstrike that killed his father at the beginning of the war, three people close to his inner circle told Reuters.

Khamenei’s face was disfigured in the attack on the supreme leader’s compound in central Tehran and he suffered a significant injury to one or both legs, all three sources said.

The 56-year-old is nonetheless recovering from his wounds and remains mentally sharp, according to the people, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. He is taking part in meetings with senior officials via audio conferencing and is engaged in decision-making on major issues including the war and negotiations with Washington, two of them said.

The question of whether Khamenei’s health allows him to run state affairs comes with high-stakes peace talks with the United States opening in the Pakistani capital Islamabad on Saturday.

The accounts of the people close to Khamenei’s inner circle provide the most detailed description of the leader’s condition for weeks. Reuters couldn’t independently verify their descriptions.

Khamenei’s whereabouts, condition and ability to rule still largely remain a mystery to the public, with no photo, video or audio recording of him published since the air attack and his subsequent appointment as his father’s replacement on March 8.

Iran’s United Nations mission did not respond to Reuters questions about the extent of Khamenei’s injuries or the reason he has not yet appeared in any images or recordings.
Five arrested as Syria says it foiled Hezbollah-linked plot to kill Damascus rabbi
Syria’s Interior Ministry said Saturday that five people were arrested over a plot to attack an unidentified religious figure in Damascus, alleging the cell was linked to the Iran-backed Hezbollah terror group.

Israel’s Kan public broadcaster and reports in Syria and Saudi Arabia named the figure as Rabbi Michael Khoury.

In a statement, the ministry said security forces observed a woman as she attempted to “plant an explosive device in front of the house of a religious figure” near a church in Damascus’s Bab Touma area.

Security forces intervened and dismantled the device, arresting all five members of the cell, the statement said.

“Preliminary investigations revealed the cell’s link to Lebanon’s Hezbollah, and that its members received specialized military training abroad,” including in handling explosives, the statement added.

The ministry added that investigations were still ongoing.

Kan cited an unnamed source within Syria’s leadership as saying the act attests to how Damascus is protecting the Jewish community, adding that Iran and Hezbollah are trying to undermine stability in Syria, including by encouraging pro-Palestinian protests.

There have been several plots to kill rabbis in the Middle East in recent years, most notably the kidnapping and killing of Chabad Rabbi Zvi Kogan in the United Arab Emirates in 2024.
US says Navy destroyers working to de-mine Strait of Hormuz
The US military said on Saturday that it had begun a mine-clearing operation in the Strait of Hormuz, with two US warships passing through the key waterway.

In a post on X, the US Central Command said two US Navy missile destroyers, USS Frank E. Peterson and USS Michael Murphy, “transited the Strait of Hormuz and operated in the Arabian Gulf as part of a broader mission to ensure the strait is fully clear of sea mines previously laid by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.”

Admiral Brad Cooper, the head of Central Command, said in a statement: “Today, we began the process of establishing a new passage and we will share this safe pathway with the maritime industry soon to encourage the free flow of commerce.”

CENTCOM said that additional US forces, “including underwater drones, will join the clearance effort in the coming days.”

Earlier on Saturday, US President Donald Trump posted on social media that the United States military has started to clear the strait, and that all of Iran’s minelaying ships had been sunk.

“We’re now starting the process of clearing out the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post, adding that “all 28” of Iran’s “mine dropper boats are also lying at the bottom of the sea.”

Trump’s comments were dismissed by Iran’s state-affiliated Nournews, which claimed that it was “fake news.”


Several Gazans said killed in IDF strikes; soldier seriously hurt in operational accident
At least 10 Palestinians were reported killed in Israeli strikes on Friday night and Saturday, with the Israel Defense Forces saying they included several terror operatives.

Meanwhile, an Israeli soldier was severely wounded in an “operational accident” in the central Gaza Strip on Saturday, the military announced. The incident occurred during bulldozing work in the area. The military said the soldier was taken to a hospital in serious condition and his family was notified.

In southern Gaza, the IDF killed Mahmoud Barim, a member of the Mujahideen Brigades terror group, who the military said had been carrying out surveillance on troops and “possessed a large amount of weaponry.

In northern Gaza, the IDF killed Ahmad Muhammad Saleh, a member of Hamas’s elite Nukhba Force, “who had advanced several terror attack plans against IDF troops,” the military said.

The strike targeting Saleh also killed several more Hamas operatives, it added, saying: “The terrorists posed a real threat to IDF troops and were eliminated in precise strikes.”

On Saturday, the IDF said troops stationed in northern Gaza killed a Palestinian terror operative who crossed the ceasefire line.

The operative approached reservists of the 205th “Iron Fist” Armored Brigade “in a manner that posed an immediate threat,” the military said, adding that the troops “eliminated the terrorist to remove the threat.”


travelingisrael.com: The War With Iran — It's Not The Missiles, It's The Children, Stupid



Turkey seeking nearly 5,000 years in prison for Netanyahu over October Gaza flotilla
Turkey indicted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday, as well as 35 other Israeli officials, for the naval interception of the October 2025 “Sumud” Gaza flotilla, seeking up to 4,596 years in prison as punishment, Turkish media reported.

Istanbul’s chief prosecutor accused those indicted of having been involved in a military operation against civilians in international waters, seeking a minimum sentence of 1,102 years.

The list of those charged also includes Defense Minister Israel Katz and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

Turkish Justice Minister Akın Gürlek referred to the indictment as a reflection of the country's commitment to international law.

Turkey previously issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu in November 2025, as well as for other senior Israeli officials.

The Global Sumud Flotilla set sail in late August, comprising dozens of vessels and hundreds of activists from multiple countries.

Israel detained over 400 of the flotilla's participants, including anti-Israel and climate activist Greta Thunberg, before deporting them shortly after.


BBC calls terrorists resistance fighters in Iran coverage
BBC Arabic has been forced to make repeated corrections to what critics have described as bias in its coverage of the war in Iran.

In one case, BBC Arabic referred to the banned terror group Hezbollah as “the Islamic resistance” after it launched a wave of attacks on northern Israel from Lebanon.

The broadcaster’s Arabic platform has been subjected to criticism since the conflict that followed the Oct 7 attacks on Israel, while its wider Middle East coverage is currently the subject of an official BBC bias review.

Claims of bias have continued since the start of the war involving Iran, the US and Israel.

A BBC Arabic reporter described Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, as “the Islamic resistance” last month, a day after the Lebanese government instructed its state-run media outlets to stop referring to the militia in those terms.

After complaints by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (Camera), the media monitoring group, the reference to “resistance” was removed.

BBC Arabic was forced to correct a description of Jerusalem’s Temple Mount and Noble Sanctuary as the “al-Aqsa Mosque” when the site contains several of the holiest sites in Judaism as well as Islam.

The same mistake has had to be corrected on several occasions by BBC Arabic since the Oct 7 attacks.

The service also made at least four incorrect references to Israel’s capital or government as being Tel Aviv, rather than Jerusalem, between Feb 25 and March 8 – bringing the number of similar cases since Oct 7 to 22.

Jerusalem is not recognised as the capital of Israel by Palestinians and their supporters, who claim East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state.

In one case last month, BBC Arabic referred to “the military operation carried out by Washington and Tel Aviv”. In another instance, it stated “the exchange of blows between Washington and Tel Aviv on the one side and Tehran on the other continues”.


Ask Haviv Anything: 105: Why don’t we talk about Jordan?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.

Our current question: why don’t we talk about Jordan?

Chapters
00:00 Jordan's Historical Role in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
08:02 Jordan's Current Position and Future Potential
14:15 The Complexity of Jordan's Identity and Politics


After AIPAC-backed primary loss, Malinowski endorses rival who accuses Israel of genocide
After Tom Malinowski narrowly lost a primary in which AIPAC spent $2.3 million against him, critics said AIPAC’s plan backfired as it had inadvertently boosted a candidate farther from its pro-Israel agenda.

Now, Malinowski has thrown his support behind that victor, the Bernie Sanders-backed progressive Analilia Mejia.

“A couple of months ago, Analilia and I were rivals for the Democratic nomination,” Malinowski said in a video posted on Thursday afternoon. “Together, we are here united as Democrats in common cause.”

The video, which featured a friendly Malinowski and Mejia seated next to each other, was released ahead of her special election next week, and emphasized the need for Democrats to “take back the House.” Neither politician mentioned Israel or AIPAC in the video, though both had slammed the lobbying group following their tight primary race.

After Mejia’s victory in February, AIPAC brushed off criticism that its attack ads against Malinowski — who describes himself as “pro-Israel” but crossed the group’s red line of supporting conditions on military aid — inadvertently contributed to Mejia’s win. Mejia has been harsher in her criticism of Israel and, unlike Malinowski, refers to its war in Gaza as a “genocide.”

But Mejia, an AIPAC spokesperson said, was only nominated for a special election that would fill the seat vacated by Gov. Mikie Sherrill, through the end of 2026. Analilia Mejia, the Democratic candidate running for New Jersey’s 11th congressional district, talks to a passerby in Morristown, New Jersey, March 24, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

“The real race for the full congressional term is in the June primary, and we’re going to take a close look at that,” said Patrick Dorton, spokesperson for AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project.

But if AIPAC had its sights set on supplanting Mejia come June, those plans may have been complicated by her newfound support from Malinowski, a popular politician in New Jersey’s 11th Congressional District.

Meanwhile, on Friday morning, Mejia was endorsed by J Street, the liberal pro-Israel group that supports a growing number of candidates who back conditions on military aid to Israel. J Street’s president, Jeremy Ben-Ami, blasted AIPAC in a Substack column following the February primary. He also wrote positively about Malinowski, but did not mention Mejia in the column.

“I look forward to working in partnership in our shared commitment against antisemitism, bigotry and hate,” Mejia wrote, accepting J Street’s endorsement.
Dan Bilzerian, who says Judaism is ‘terrible’ and wants to ‘kill Israelis,’ runs for Congress
Dan Bilzerian, the mega-influencer who’s spread conspiracy theories about Jews and said he wants to “kill Israelis,” is running for Congress.

Bilzerian registered this week to run in the Republican primary against the Jewish far-right firebrand Rep. Randy Fine in Florida’s sixth district. Bilzerian initially gained fame for his Instagram photos alongside bikini-clad women but has since become a vocal critic of Israel and Jews — and has repeatedly called Fine a “fat Jew” in the lead-up to his campaign launch.

In a TMZ interview after Bilzerian announced his candidacy, the outlet’s Jewish founder, Harvey Levin, questioned the influencer on whether his use of the phrase “fat Jew” was antisemitic.

“[Fine] literally talks about how Muslims are lower than dogs, so, is that Islamophobic?” Bilzerian shot back. Fine drew bipartisan criticism for his comments earlier this year.

“Yes,” TMZ’s Levin and Charles Latibeaudiere responded. (Bilzerian added that Fine “tweets that, and he’s a senator,” though Fine is actually a member of the US House of Representatives who was formerly a state senator.)

Bilzerian responded to a follow-up question by denying that he’s antisemitic — and questioning the term “antisemitism” altogether, saying it’s been “hijacked to only talk about Jews.”

“No, I’m not antisemitic. I think that that’s kind of a made-up term, I think the Palestinians are the real Semites,” Bilzerian said.

“Was Hitler antisemitic?” Levin asked.

Bilzerian did not say.

“Like I said, the term is focused solely on Jews, but actual Semites are the Arabs,” he answered. “And Palestinians are Semites as well. They actually have more DNA lineage to that region than any of the Eastern European Ashkenazi Jews that have taken it from them.”

The comments were nothing new for Bilzerian, who has 30 million followers on Instagram and 2 million on X. He regularly tweets opinions like “Jewish supremacy is the greatest threat to the world today,” questions the accuracy of the statistic that 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust, and reposts clips of avowed antisemite Nick Fuentes.
Sex, Nazism and rock ‘n’ roll: Why rockers love to goose step in the gaslights
From the swastika-emblazoned shirts of Sid Vicious half a century ago, to Kanye West’s lifelong admiration for Adolf Hitler, countless pop and rock stars have played in the Third Reich sandbox. Few suffered lasting career damage for fetishizing Nazism.

Published in February, “This Ain’t Rock ‘n’ Roll: Pop Music, the Swastika, and the Third Reich,” offers the first comprehensive history of the music industry’s obsession with Nazism. Alongside a parade of iconic goose-steppers, author Daniel Rachel interwove a “parallel narrative to explain the original meaning of Nazi symbolism, events and terminology,” he told The Times of Israel.

“The book doesn’t so much point the finger and accuse musicians of being antisemitic as lay out a history,” said Rachel. “The book says, here are the facts, this is what artists have said or done. The history is in plain sight,” said the award-winning British music historian.

Central to Rachel’s thesis is that rock and pop musicians get a “free pass” for appropriating the swastika and other fascist symbols. Whereas glorifying Nazism is typically punished in other art forms, said Rachel, “Rock ‘n’ roll has willingly reproduced the swastika and images of the Third Reich since its inception. Artists’ actions are sometimes challenged but mostly not,” he said.

Adopted by Adolf Hitler in 1919, the Hakenkreuz — or swastika — was explicitly intended to be antisemitic, according to the budding dictator in his memoir. Still, said Rachel, the swastika’s connection to antisemitism “is not widely associated with the symbol and helps to explain the ‘free pass,’” he said.

Fascination with the Third Reich’s design aesthetic was catalyzed by filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will,” released in 1935. An extended, high-tech commercial for Hitler and Germany’s reawakening, Riefenstahl made the party’s Nuremberg Rally look like the first rock ‘n’ roll concert, said Rachel.

“That comes out of the mouths of David Bowie, Gene Simmons and Mick Jagger,” said Rachel. “Stars of that status saw the parallel, then began to adopt similar ideas in their dress and stage design. In the mid-1970s, Bowie requested his designer to make his set like Nuremberg rallies.”


More than 200 arrested at protest against Palestine Action ban in central London
Police arrested 212 people during a mass protest against the ban on Palestine Action in central London.

The Metropolitan Police confirmed all of the arrests made during the demonstration at Trafalgar Square are for showing support for a proscribed organisation.

Among those arrested was Massive Attack musician Robert Del Naja, who sat with an “I Support Palestine Action” sign and was later carried away by three police officers.

The ages of those arrested range from 27 to 82, the force said.

In a post on X, the Metropolitan Police said their officers continue to “make arrests where people are showing support for a proscribed organisation”.

Hundreds of protesters gathered in Trafalgar Square on Saturday afternoon with signs reading “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action”.

Many of the mostly elderly demonstrators sat on camping chairs and on the ground as they held up their placards.

At the top of the square, near the National Gallery, large banners were displayed reading “Jurors deserve to hear the whole truth” and “Israel starves kids”.


42 US Jewish authors slam Jewish Book Council’s bias toward ‘Israeli and Zionist voices’
Dozens of anti-Zionist and non-Zionist Jewish authors are criticizing the Jewish Book Council, a historic literary group, for what they said was a “bias toward centering Israeli and Zionist voices” and “narrowing its vision to a Zionist approach to Jewish culture.”

A new open letter signed by 42 authors argues that the council, which was founded in 1925, should commit itself more to spotlighting Jewish voices who disagree with traditional Zionism and should not have showcased Israeli and Zionist voices after the bloody Hamas-led invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023.

“Because the JBC is our most visible and longstanding Jewish literary institution, its focus on Zionist authors and books gives both Jewish and non-Jewish readers the false impression that Jewish books are inherently Zionist,” the open letter, published Thursday by “a Concerned Group of Jewish Writers,” argues.

Notable signatories include Israeli-Dutch novelist Yael van der Wouden, whose 2024 debut “The Safekeep,” a Jewish LGBTQ romance set in postwar Amsterdam, was shortlisted for a Booker Prize and won an award from the Jewish Book Council; memoirist Qian Julie Wang, whose book “Beautiful Country” was a New York Times bestseller, recommended by former President Barack Obama and winner of an award given by the council; novelist Adelle Waldman, author of “Help Wanted”; and Michael David Lukas, a professor at San Francisco State University and past winner of both the National Jewish Book Award and Jewish literature’s prestigious Sami Rohr prize for his 2018 novel “The Last Watchman of Old Cairo.”

The Jewish Book Council was founded to support and award Jewish authors and topics. In addition to handing out the annual National Jewish Book Awards, the council also connects authors with Jewish speaking engagements, publishes reviews of Jewish books and provides other forms of support. In 2024, after a list purporting to expose “Zionist” authors circulated online, the council launched a hotline to report antisemitism in the literary world.

The council’s CEO, Naomi Firestone-Teeter, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency the letter represented a “difference in expectations” about what the institution can stand for.

The authors said they initially contacted the council’s leadership in private last year, engaging in a dialogue over a list of specific concerns. Those included the council’s failure to define antisemitism in its reporting tool, as well as its stated support of Israel and Israeli authors in recent awards ceremonies.

The authors also urged the council to state that criticism of Israel “is not inherently antisemitic,” and to “create programs and content in the coming year that reflect a more genuine diversity of Jewish views on Israel/Palestine and create spaces for Jews and cultural workers engaged with Judaism to have these difficult conversations.”

When the council didn’t follow up on their requests, the authors claimed, they decided to take their letter public. “We were — and remain — concerned that the institution’s apparent bias toward centering Israeli and Zionist voices is not only exclusionary but harmful, contributing to the dehumanization of Palestinians and advancing a system of cultural apartheid,” they wrote.


German court upholds ban on protest against Israel’s ‘genocide’ at Buchenwald memorial
Anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian activists who planned a protest at the Buchenwald concentration camp memorial in Germany will instead rally in the nearby city of Weimar on Sunday after a court upheld a police ban on the demonstration.

The planned vigil, called by a campaign dubbed “Kufiyas in Buchenwald,” had provoked a sharp debate in Germany, with a number of politicians denouncing the protest as inappropriate.

The court in Weimar has now upheld an early decision by officials to ban the vigil and instead move protesters to a square in the city, according to a decision seen Friday by AFP.

The Nazi concentration camp memorial is located on a hill just outside the central German city.

The activists had called their demonstration to remember “the victims of genocide and fascism” and the struggle “against all genocides, particularly the genocide currently taking place in Palestine.” Israel has denied all accusations of genocide.

But judges ruled that the protest would likely “violate the dignity of victims” of the Nazi regime who suffered in the camp, according to a court statement.

Last year, the Buchenwald concentration camp memorial refused to allow a woman to attend the anniversary event because she was wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf, also spelled kufiya.

The woman took legal action to be allowed to return to the memorial for another event, but the court found that the memorial had been within its rights to deny her entry.

The court said the keffiyeh is a political symbol and could also “endanger the sense of security” for Jews visiting the site.


Israel reprimands Spain over burning in effigy of Prime Minister Netanyahu in Spanish town
Israel's Foreign Ministry summoned the Spanish chargé d’affaires to be reprimanded due to the burning in effigy of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the small town of El Burgo, Spain, on Sunday.

"The appalling antisemitic hatred on display here is a direct result of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's government's systemic incitement," the Foreign Ministry said in a Saturday post on X/Twitter.

"And even now, the Spanish government remains silent," concluded the post, which included an apparent video of the event.

The incident in question was part of an annual event going back decades, with previous events involving the burning in effigy of Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, El Burgo Mayor Maria Dolores Narvaez told local media.

According to Narvaez, the seven-meter-tall effigy of Netanyahu had been filled with 14 kilograms of gunpowder before being ignited.

Spain's own Foreign Ministry responded to Israel's X/Twitter post, with a source saying to Reuters that the Spanish government "is committed to fighting against antisemitism and any form of hate or discrimination," adding, "we totally reject any insidious allegation which suggests the contrary."

The relationship between Israel and Spain has been strained in recent years due to the Gaza war, with Spain accusing Israel of international law violations and barring from its airspace and ports all vessels carrying weapons bound for Israel, a move classified by Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar as antisemitic.


Romanian secret police trailed a Jewish photographer in the ’80s. Those files are now a film
He had wild hair and wore jeans. He was American — and Jewish. He had a camera.

That was enough to trigger surveillance by the notorious secret police of communist Romania, the Securitate.

Now, 41 years after photojournalist Edward Serotta boldly stepped behind the Iron Curtain, we can see just how obsessed the Romanians were with him, thanks to a short documentary by renowned Romanian director Radu Jude and historian Adrian Cioflâncă.

“Plan contraplan/Shot Reverse Shot,” which had its world premiere at the Berlinale international film festival last month, gives equal time to Serotta’s reminiscences about Romania in the 1980s, and to the Securitate’s observations of him.

And of course, to the photos: After his Romania adventure, Serotta put down new roots in Europe and has spent decades documenting the Jewish life that was nearly obliterated in the Holocaust. He has published several books of photographs documenting Jewish communities. He also documented the fall of the communist regimes in which he’d set foot as a young man.

Twenty-two minutes long, the film was one of several shown at the festival with themes related to Jewish life and history, or to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The obsessive spying of the communist regime, as documented here, appears absurd today. But it was fully serious at the time.
Matti Friedman and Abigail Pogrebin in Conversation: Out of the Sky
Join journalist Matti Friedman and Abigail Pogrebin for a conversation about heroism, Jewish memory, and one of the strangest stories of WWII — and Friedman’s new book, Out of the Sky: Heroism and Rebirth in Nazi Europe.

In 1944, a team of young women and men who had escaped the Holocaust made the inconceivable choice to parachute back into Nazi-occupied Europe under the cover of a British military operation. By the end of the mission, not a single Nazi was harmed and not a single Jew was saved, and many of the parachutists died in the process — yet their story would become one of Israel’s founding myths. What happened? And what made them heroes? Using thousands of original documents from once-secret files, manuscripts, memoirs, and unpublished letters, Matti Friedman follows four of the parachutists from the spring of 1944 to the operation’s dramatic end that winter — telling a gripping and surprising tale of a forgotten moment, demonstrating how storytelling itself can have a power even greater than warfare.

Hear Friedman discuss this strange and fascinating story: a conversation exploring the line between myth and reality, heroism and futility, and how it resonates in our own time.






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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