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Thursday, April 23, 2026

04/22 Links Pt2: Asking the wrong questions about antisemitism; The ‘anti-extremism’ movement has always been a con; SPLC indicted for ‘manufacturing’ extremism

From Ian:

Jonathan Tobin: Asking the wrong questions about antisemitism
Dahl was also living proof that once you remove the thin veneer of justifiable concern about any misdeed that Israelis are supposed to have committed, the gap between anti-Zionism and antisemitism is revealed to be a distinction without a difference. And that is why so much of the commentary about this play and antisemitism in general is still asking the wrong questions about the subject.

Some 78 years after the birth of the modern-day State of Israel, we should no longer be trying to draw distinctions that will allow Israel-bashers to avoid being tagged as what they really are: antisemites. Instead, we should be noticing the painfully obvious similarities that unite all anti-Zionists, whether they are as uncivil as Dahl or not.

Those who cheer for or rationalize attacks and violence, including the largest mass slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust that took place on Oct. 7, as well as deny Israelis the right to defend themselves against those who pledge its repeat, are on the same level as Dahl.

Are students or college professors who chant for Jewish genocide (“From the river to the sea”) or terrorism against Jews wherever they live (“Globalize the intifada”) really idealists who should be accorded the respect that sophisticated theater-goers are forced to retrospectively deny to a nasty old man who thinks the Jews deserved the Holocaust?

Is the contemporary journalist or politician who traffics in blood libels about Israelis committing a mythical “genocide” someone to agree to disagree with? Is that akin to how we are expected to react to an open neo-Nazi who does so in a less dignified manner?

The real lesson to be drawn from “Giant” isn’t the answer to the age-old debate about what to think about good art created by bad people. Nor is it a guide about how to behave when a favorite childhood author turns out to be a rotten bigot.

It is this: Those who embrace the cause of Israel’s destruction and the genocide of half of the world’s Jewish population that goes with that belief don’t deserve the benefit of the doubt when it comes to evaluating their character. Some may act in a less repugnant manner than Dahl and pretend to oppose antisemitism even as they support it, as is the case with the mayor of New York. Others are less civil or arguably even crazier, as might be said of some anti-Israel podcasters. But they are all part of the same evil cause. And they all deserve the same opprobrium a decent society should accord to antisemites like Roald Dahl.
Brendan O'Neill: The ‘anti-extremism’ movement has always been a con
The SPLC denies the charges. It says it will ‘not be intimidated’ by the Trump administration. It’s worth noting that there’s little love lost between Trumpists and the SPLC. The centre started life as a civil-rights law practice in 1971 before morphing into a huge outfit that keeps tabs on extremism across America. Some on the right accuse it of targeting not only genuine loons but also normal groups, like Turning Point USA. It is ‘liberal’ intolerance made flesh, they say, with its tendency to treat everyone to the right of David French as an Adolf-in-waiting. It’s a ‘partisan smear machine’, says FBI director Kash Patel.

Hopefully the truth will out as the fraud case progresses. But I’m interested in what this simmering scandal tells us about bourgeois activism right now. The possibility that the SPLC is Jussie Smollett on steroids requires analysis. He’s the actor who falsely claimed to have been roughed up by a pair of racists yelling ‘This is MAGA country!’. Is the SPLC the institutional version of such vain self-delusion, blowing up the threat of extremism in order to fatten both its bank balance and its sense of virtue?

If it’s true the SPLC ‘funded extremism’, that would only be a monetary expression of what has for a long time been its core mission – namely, threat inflation. For years now, the centre has promiscuously expanded the definition of extremism, lumping in normies with Nazis. It maintains a ‘hate map’, showing all the nutters in America, which apparently includes not only Sieg Heiling ‘Aryan’ freaks but also Christians who aren’t fond of gay marriage.

Just four months before Charlie Kirk was assassinated in September last year, the SPLC branded him and Turning Point USA as ‘hard-right’ promoters of ‘hate’. It has also designated the Alliance Defending Freedom a ‘hate group’. Anyone who has ever met those Christian folk will know how ludicrous this is. Even Moms for Liberty, which doesn’t want schoolkids to be taught ‘critical race theory’ or that there are 72 genders, has found itself on the SPLC’s map of hate. If it’s extremist to oppose telling seven-year-olds that people with dicks are women and people with white skin are privileged, I guess I’m an extremist.

The aim of such extremism-mongering is transparent. It’s about criminalising moral opinions that the credentialled classes find offensive. And it’s about keeping groups like the SPLC flushed with cash and busy with cases. It’s a job-creation scheme for the do-gooding classes. If the SPLC ‘funnelled millions’ into extremist groups, that would perversely be in keeping with its demented mission to keep the ‘hate’ bandwagon rolling.

Groups like the SPLC don’t only inflate the far-right threat. They also deflect from one of the true extremist scourges of our time – Islamism. The SPLC has long had a blind spot on Islamist extremism. Worse, it has branded those who oppose Islamism as ‘extremists’. A few years ago it drew up a ‘Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists’, which included the mighty Ayaan Hirsi Ali. This is a black immigrant woman who has stirringly made the case for liberal values against the despotism and misogyny of Islamism, and who has been threatened with death for doing so. Yet in the Kafkaesque hellscape that passes for ‘activism’, it is she who is a ‘propagandist’ whose ‘damaging misinformation’ is a menace to public life. This is moral inversion at its most despicable.

We have the same problem in the UK: ‘anti-extremists’ who are wilfully blind to Islamist extremism. On Saturday, as yet another Jew-hater was prepping a petrol bomb to hurl at a London synagogue, the Guardian published a long-read on the ‘return of fascism’ illustrated with white working-class men waving England flags. Islamists are firebombing synagogues. They killed Jews in Manchester on Yom Kippur. They’ve massacred children at a pop concert. They’re on our streets calling for more violence against the Jewish State. And yet ‘the virtuous’ myopically fret over the white far right. From the Guardian to the SPLC, the preening activist classes inflate fantasy threats and downplay real ones, to ensure that nothing as pesky as the truth will meddle with their narcissistic crusading. Now that’s dangerous.
Europe's Jew-Hate with a Vengeance
[M]any in the West who sympathize with Islamic terrorists were, within hours, trying to justify Hamas's atrocities by blaming Israel. The allegations against Israel were that it was denying supposed rights of an invented Palestinian people that "does not exist," as admitted by senior PLO official Zoheir Mohsen in 1977 in the Dutch daily newspaper Trouw. They nevertheless repeat spurious claims to the Jews' ancestral land, on which Jews have lived continuously for nearly 4,000 years, explicitly named "Judea," and to the failure by Israel to implement what -- according to the Palestinians themselves -- would be a "two-state solution" dedicated to taking whatever land they can get and using it as a base from which to conquer the rest.

There is invariably a grim consequence to constant vilification of minorities; the current slandering of Jews is no exception.

Israel may stand pretty much alone against the haters of this world. Depending on the political climate at the time, it can be expected that international leaders will remain absent, even silent, for the most part when Israel's enemies once again attack it – as they surely will. As historic events reveal, Israel and Jewry at large cannot fully rely for protection on the West.

"Many things will be forgiven," observed Israel's Prime Minister Golda Meir in 1973. "but one thing will not—weakness. The moment we are marked as weak—it is over."
Lawmakers from 15 Latin American nations unite to combat antisemitism
The First Congress of Latin American Legislators Against Antisemitism was held in Montevideo, Uruguay, last week, to develop a coordinated strategy to combat rising Jew-hatred across the continent.

The three-day forum culminated in a joint declaration formulated by the 35 participants from 15 countries, the association that organized the event, the Combat Antisemitism Movement, said in a statement on Sunday.

The declaration included a call to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism, show “solidarity with the State of Israel and firmly back its right to self-defense against the Iranian regime and its regional proxies,” demand “that Iran be held accountable for its global terrorist activities, both past and present, including in Latin America, reject “all attempts to isolate and boycott the State of Israel,” and the “bolstering of bilateral ties between Latin American countries and Israel in every relevant realm,” the statement read.

“From parliaments, and in coordination with the executive branches, we seek to build common public policies to confront this scourge [of antisemitism] with a regional and coordinated vision,” said Uruguayan Rep. Conrado Rodríguez, president of the regional legislators coalition.

Shay Salamon, the Combat Antisemitism Movement’s executive director of Latin American Affairs, described the gathering as a turning point in regional efforts.

“The Congress marks a decisive step toward the consolidation of a firm and coordinated regional commitment. The active participation of legislators from Latin America demonstrates that there is a real willingness to confront antisemitism by strengthening legal frameworks, promoting education and defending the democratic values that sustain our societies,” Salamon said.

In addition to policy discussions, participants took part in Uruguay’s national Yom Hashoah ceremony, commemorating the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust.


Former Gaza hostage Eli Sharabi reflects on Independence Day, family loss
Former Gaza hostage Eli Sharabi on Wednesday told Maariv that he particularly misses his family on Independence Day, as it was the family's collective holiday where they all gathered.

His wife, Lian, and daughters Noya and Yahel were murdered in their home during the October 7 massacre. His brother, Yossi, was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists and later murdered in captivity in the Gaza Strip.

"Independence Day was our holiday. Everyone used to gather at our lawn on the kibbutz," Sharabi said. "We would do a barbecue, laugh, and enjoy being together. The girls loved every moment of it."

"This year, like last year, we will probably gather at my sister's house, and there will be love and joy. We do not let ourselves be in constant sorrow, only at certain moments. We learn to embrace the happy moments just like the sad ones," he added.

"The meaning of Independence Day has changed for all of us after October 7. Everything is much more powerful. We are still fighting for our independence, for our home," he continued.

"In the last two years, people have felt more than ever that the ground is slipping from under their feet. People have experienced turmoil and loss of personal security. Today, I know how to appreciate much more freedom and other basic things. I know what real hunger feels like, and not how you feel when someone typically says 'I'm starving' after not eating for four or five hours. I know how to appreciate that I have toothpaste, hot water in the shower, that I do not have to eat moldy pita and beg to burn it on the gas so I do not taste the mold," he continued.

He told Maariv that he is "living a happy life," and enjoys the days when he is at home, starting his mornings with a walk on the beach, continuing with a workout, and preparing a small meal for himself, commemorating his murdered relatives, meeting childhood friends for a drink, and "cracking up laughing with them," before returning home to sleep.

He still finds himself thankful for the hot water and soap in every shower, for not having to ask permission to use the bathroom, for the ability to go to the supermarket and buy food for himself, and for the right to live.
Call me Back LIVE - with Rachel Goldberg-Polin
What does grief actually look like, and what does it mean to live with it?

In this live conversation recorded at Temple Emanu-El Streicker Center on the eve of Yom HaZikaron, Rachel Goldberg-Polin joins Dan Senor to reflect on love, loss, faith, and the story behind her new book, about the loss of her son, Hersh, who was taken hostage on October 7 and later killed in captivity.

This conversation explores how Rachel understands suffering, why she rejects the idea that grief “gets better,” and how she holds onto faith, love, and what she calls “tragic optimism.” It is a raw and deeply human discussion about what remains when everything changes, and what it means to keep going.

Purchase Rachel’s book: When We See You Again

In this episode:
Life before October 7 and the meaning of Shabbat in Rachel’s family
The morning of October 7 and the moment everything changed
What it was like to advocate for Hersh while he was in captivity
The discovery that Hersh knew his family was fighting for him
The night Rachel and her family learned he had been killed
Why Rachel rejects the idea that grief fades over time
“Toxic positivity” vs. “tragic optimism”
What grief really is, and what it reveals about love




The Strokes frontman says ‘privileged’ Zionists talk ‘like Black people during slavery’
In an interview on a popular web series posted Tuesday, US rock musician Julian Casablancas alleged that “American Zionists” are deeply privileged yet behave as if they are “Black people during slavery.”

The comment appeared in a 21-minute “uncut” edition of the web series “SubwayTakes,” in which host Kareem Rahma interviews both famous and up-and-coming New Yorkers about their most controversial opinions.

“Well, it’s been nice having a career,” Casablancas, the frontman for the band The Strokes, said before he dove into his hot take: “American Zionists get the benefits of white privileged people, but talk like they are Black people during slavery.”

Rahma, a comedian, responded immediately, as he always does, with his personal view on the opinion: “100% agree.”

The full-length video was posted to the “SubwayTakes” YouTube channel, which has nearly 1 million subscribers. An abridged version without the comments about American Zionists was shared to other “SubwayTakes” channels on Instagram and TikTok, where the project’s followings are larger.

Casablancas’ comments were not unprecedented for him: Earlier this week, his band used its final song at the Coachella music festival to condemn the US-Israeli war on Iran and Israel’s campaign in Gaza. The frontman previously signed onto a letter calling for a cultural boycott of Israel. Julian Casablancas of The Strokes performs during the first weekend of Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival on April 11, 2026, in Indio, California. (Photo by Amy Harris/Invision/AP)

But his discussion with Rahma pointed to how blanket criticism of “Zionists” has grown commonplace in youth-oriented and left-leaning American spaces. In the comments section, some viewers said Casablancas represented a model for how artists should take a stand against Israel and its supporters.

“Julian doubling down on criticising (american) zionists and zionism and american imperialism at large got me feeling hopeful and proud. smart, loud, and so f–king cool,” one commenter wrote on YouTube. “it truly is that easy @ everyone else in the industry.”


CUFI spends six figures on anti-Thomas Massie billboard campaign
President Donald Trump’s effort to unseat Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), a longtime thorn in his side, got another big-money boost as Christians United for Israel Action Fund, the advocacy arm of the Christian Zionist group, announced that it is spending six figures to blanket Massie’s congressional district with dozens of billboards hitting the congressman over his opposition to the Iran war.

“For one full month, CUFI Action Fund will dominate Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District outdoor advertising space by securing every available billboard in the district, creating a broad and highly visible message presence across the region,” CUFI Action Fund senior director Ari Morgenstern told Jewish Insider. “The buy spans key communities across the district, ensuring the message reaches voters in both local population centers and along major commuter and travel routes.”

Morgenstern said that the billboards are expected to reach “1.487 million adult impressions each week,” along major roadways across the district. The Kentucky primary election, where Massie is facing off against Trump-endorsed Navy veteran Ed Gallrein, is on May 19.

The billboard displays an image of President Donald Trump atop the American flag alongside Massie atop the Iranian flag, with the captions “Kentucky = Trump Country,” “Tell Massie: Support Peace Through Strength” and “No Support for Iranian Regime.”

The campaign banks on the notion that GOP primary voters in the deep-red district remain strongly supportive of the Iran war.
Mamdani administration won’t use a codified antisemitism definition, representative says
The head of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s antisemitism office on Wednesday said that City Hall will not replace a widely-used antisemitism definition that Mamdani scrapped on his first day in office.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism equates some forms of anti-Israel rhetoric with discrimination against Jews.

The definition is opposed by anti-Israel activists, who argue that the outline conflates political criticism of Israel with discrimination. Mamdani and members of his administration are harsh critics of Israel.

Former New York City mayor Eric Adams, Mamdani’s predecessor, adopted the definition for the city government last year by executive order. Mamdani revoked the order, along with other Adams executive orders, when he assumed office, sparking questions about how City Hall would recognize anti-Jewish discrimination.

The issue is significant because discrimination against Jews is often not clear-cut, but sometimes associated with Israel or “Zionism,” and political rhetoric against Israel is protected speech, even though Jews often experience anti-Zionist activity as discrimination. Mamdani has shown himself ready to condemn “classic” forms of antisemitism, such as swastikas or tropes about Jewish greed, but unwilling to label anti-Zionist activities as discriminatory.

Phylisa Wisdom, the head of City Hall’s Office to Combat Antisemitism, testified before a City Council antisemitism task force on Wednesday, in one of her first public appearances since she took up the role last month.
NYC Council Speaker Julie Menin urges Mamdani not to veto buffer zone legislation
New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin warned Wednesday morning that if Mayor Zohran Mamdani vetoes the council’s legislation intended to regulate protests at religious and educational sites, the city will face “more divisiveness,” calling the decision a critical test for the mayor.

The bills, which include measures to create standard NYPD policy for deploying buffer zones during protests at educational and religious facilities, face a potential veto as Mamdani has repeatedly declined to take a stand on the issue. He has acknowledged concerns against the legislation from left-wing activists and civil rights groups who have targeted synagogues and yeshivas with anti-Israel demonstrations, and has until the end of this week to veto the bills or they become law automatically.

“We need less divisiveness. I really hope — and I’ve said this to the mayor — that there is not a veto of the package of bills. That’s necessary. It will create much more division,” Menin said during a panel discussion at 92NY on “the future of being Jewish in New York,” featuring the city’s most senior Jewish elected officials: Menin, who is the first Jewish council speaker, Comptroller Mark Levine and Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal.

The panel, moderated by 92NY CEO Seth Pinsky, comes as the city has experienced historic levels of antisemitism in the wake of the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks — and as Jews navigate a tense relationship with a mayor who has held hostile views towards several key communal issues. New York City has the largest population of Jews outside of Israel.

Asked by Pinsky what advice each would give to Mamdani to try to reassure the roughly 70% of the Jewish New York City electorate that did not vote for him, Hoylman-Sigal called on Mamdani to “follow the tradition of every mayor preceding him [since 1951] and visit Israel.”

He added that Mamdani already has some “really good Jewish advisors,” including Phylisa Wisdom, a progressive Jewish leader Mamdani tapped in February to run the Mayor’s Office to Combat Antisemitism. A range of Jewish Democratic politicians and advocates had lauded Wisdom’s selection, though she has alienated some Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish leaders over her work criticizing the secular education taught at yeshivas in the past.

Hoylman-Sigal’s assertion that the mayor’s heart “is in the right place” when it comes to the Jewish community was met with a chorus of “boos” from the audience.


SPLC's Offshore Assets Ballooned as Embattled Left-Wing Darling Secretly Funded KKK and Other ‘Violent Extremist Groups’—and Reported Owning Accounts in the Cayman Islands
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which claims to "dismantle white supremacy," saw its offshore assets balloon by as much as 430 percent over the last decade. The left-wing group allegedly defrauded donors by funneling millions of dollars to the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist organizations.

A federal grand jury on Tuesday indicted the SPLC, a self-described "catalyst for racial justice," for wire fraud, false statements to banks, and conspiracy to commit money laundering for allegedly funneling more than $3 million from 2014 to 2023 to members of the KKK, Aryan Nations, National Alliance, and other "violent extremist" groups. The SPLC routed the payments, which included a $1 million payment to a leader of the National Alliance, through a series of shell companies authorized by SPLC's chief financial officer and director of SPLC's "Intelligence Project," according to the Department of Justice's indictment.

The SPLC was able to afford such payments thanks in part to its offshore assets, which skyrocketed over that decade, growing from $44 million in non-U.S. equity holdings in its fiscal year ending October 2013 to a staggering $233 million in its fiscal year ending October 2021, a 430 percent increase. Since then, the SPLC's non-U.S. equity holdings have dropped to $130 million, according to its most recent financial audit covering the year ending October 2024. That's still a nearly 200 percent increase from the group's 2013 holdings.

While the practice of putting money in offshore accounts is not uncommon among major nonprofits, the SPLC has been criticized for years for bloated spending and financial opacity. The soaring amount of money in offshore accounts contributes to that, as does the indictment’s allegation regarding the use of shady bank accounts to pay hate group "informants."

The SPLC's massive endowment—the group controlled more than $800 million in assets at the end of 2024—relies heavily on foreign investments. The group's non-U.S. equity holdings exceeded its domestic holdings every year since 2016, according to the figures reported in its annual financial audits. Those holdings appear to be concentrated in the Caribbean. The SPLC reported owning accounts in the Cayman Islands and disclosed making a combined $57 million in "investments" in Central America and the Caribbean in its two most recent Form 990 tax filings.

Though the SPLC was founded in 1971 as a civil rights law firm seeking damages for KKK victims, its scope expanded over the years to include issues like immigration enforcement and gender ideology. Every year since 1990, the SPLC has published a "hate map" that is meant to identify groups that "attack or malign an entire class of people," but often includes run-of-the-mill conservative organizations like parental rights groups Moms for Liberty and Parents Defending Education.

As the SPLC's left-wing advocacy grew, so did its financial holdings, prompting criticism from former employees like Bob Moser, who described the group in 2019 as a "highly profitable scam" that was "ripping off donors."

"Its balance sheet long ago revealed the SPLC had ceased to be a charity and become a venture capital firm," Scott Walter, the president of the Capital Research Center, a conservative watchdog group, told the Washington Free Beacon. "The indictment reinforces that fact by revealing the SPLC operates like a centimillionaire who simultaneously invests in a drug to treat diabetes and a firm producing high fructose corn syrup."

According to the indictment, the SPLC funneled $270,000 to an organizer of the "Unite the Right" rally held in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017. The organizer "made racist postings under the supervision of the SPLC," the indictment says.


Pro-Palestine activist ‘believed she had lawful excuse’ to damage property
A Palestine Action activist has told a court she believed she had a “lawful excuse” to damage property belonging to an Israel-based defence firm during a raid.

Charlotte Head, Samuel Corner, Leona Kamio, Fatema Rajwani, Zoe Rogers and Jordan Devlin are charged with criminal damage after the incident at the Elbit Systems site near Bristol on August 6 2024.

The six defendants are accused of breaking into the factory before destroying property and clashing with security guards and police.

At Woolwich Crown Court on Tuesday, Head, 30, said the group targeted Elbit because they are Israel’s “largest weapon manufacturer”, adding that the action was not “a random act”.

Jurors heard that she picked up a prison van from Manchester in the days before the incident and on August 4 she drove it to Bristol, where she met the other participants.

Rajiv Menon KC, representing Head, asked the defendant what the main objective of the action was.

She replied: “To go in and destroy as many of the weapons as possible and to try and shut the site down.”

Asked if there were any other objectives, she said: “To try and get information on anybody that might be partnering with Elbit, like there are other companies that work with them and help them to function as the entity they are.”

Asked by Mr Menon KC if she had intentionally damaged property belonging to Elbit on the date of the incident, the defendant said: “Yes, but we believed we had a lawful excuse to do so.”

Jurors were shown footage of a security guard shouting at Head and another individual during the raid.


Williams College alum urges school to address Jewish student concerns before seeking donations
A Williams College alumnus is calling on the school to demonstrate a stronger commitment to Jewish students before seeking alumni donations, according to a recent opinion piece in The Williams Record, a student-run newspaper.

Nate E. Lebowitz, a member of the Class of 1986 and now a cardiologist in New Jersey, wrote that the routine fundraising appeal from the private liberal arts college in Williamstown, Mass., felt like “a knife plunged into my heart” amid a troubling campus climate since the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

He cited reports from Jewish students describing “hostility and isolation,” and said the administration’s responses have appeared “hesitant, bureaucratic or morally unclear.”

Lebowitz, who helped advocate for a Jewish campus center as a student, also pointed to reports that displaying an Israeli flag in the Jewish Religious Center required additional “community conversation,” which he said reflected “a profound misunderstanding of Jewish identity.”

His criticism comes amid a series of campus incidents over the past two academic years. During the spring 2024 semester, Students for Justice in Palestine and the anti-Zionist group Jews for Justice established an encampment on Sawyer Quad, calling on the college to divest from companies tied to Israel.

In November 2024, a table representing Jewish and Israeli heritage was vandalized with graffiti including “free Palestine,” “I love Hamas” and “colonizers.”
Police investigate anti-Israel graffiti at Catholic school in Canada
Police in the Peel region of Ontario are investigating the scene at St. Aloysius Gonzaga Catholic Secondary School after anti-Israel hate graffiti was discovered on the school building on Tuesday morning.

Various statements were spray-painted along the length of one of the buildings. Statements included: “Israel spit on Christians. They hate the world,” and “Israel kills kids.”



Bristol school that postponed visit by Jewish MP not antisemitic, review finds
An independent review of a Bristol school that postponed a visit from its local MP, who is Jewish, has concluded neither the school nor the trust that runs it are antisemitic.

Bristol Brunel Academy, run by the Cabot Learning Federation, was inspected by schools watchdog Ofsted after claims earlier this year that it may have been intimidated into cancelling a visit by local MP Damien Egan.

A review was commissioned by the Cabot Learning Federation after discussion with the Department for Education (DfE), and carried out by retired headteacher Dame Joan McVittie.

Dame Joan concluded that neither Bristol Brunel Academy nor Cabot Learning Federation are antisemitic. However, she did recommend the trust considers additional training on antisemitism, and seeks ways to repair the relationship with Mr Egan.

It was reported at the time that Mr Egan had been prevented from visiting after intervention from pro-Palestine activists.


PA accuses Israel of engineering ‘special rodents’ to attack Gaza children
Israel has developed a “special kind of rodent” that specifically “attacks children and the sick” in the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian Authority recently claimed in one of its more outlandish libels against the Jewish State.

Palestine Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) Director Rafat Al-Qudra made the claim about the genetically engineered rodents to Fatah-run Awdah TV on April 15, Jerusalem-based watchdog group Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) revealed.

“All indicators point to there being a type of rodent—rats and mice, to be precise ... These rodents… are of a special kind, they are large in size, and they particularly attack children and the sick ... It is believed that these rodents were developed and experimented on specifically by the Israeli occupation,” Al-Qudra said in an interview.

P.A. and Fatah officials are spreading the libel to divert blame from Hamas for the damage to Gaza’s health care services and general infrastructure, which was a direct result of the terror group’s invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, PMW said.

“The Palestinian Authority systematically uses libels that present Jews and Israelis as a mortal threat to Palestinians, to justify and encourage Palestinian terror and murder of Israelis as self-defense,” PMW founder and director Itamar Marcus told JNS.

The P.A. doubled down on its rat libel on April 18 when Jamal Obeid, member of the Supreme Leadership Body of Fatah in Gaza, told Awdah TV: “There are rodents in some areas of the Gaza Strip... that were not known here in the Strip. It seems that the Israeli occupation deliberately acted to introduce these rodents into the Gaza Strip; this is a fact and not just media propaganda. There is a visible fact.”

“This rat libel joins other recent libels—all from official PA sources,” Marcus said. “For example, that Israelis think Palestinians are heirs of the Amalekites, which the Bible tells them they must kill, and that Israeli educational texts teach that non-Jews are pigs which “God created in the form of humans to serve the Jews.”


Reform UK EXPELS election candidate after Jewish News uncovers fascist BNP ties
Reform UK has expelled a local election candidate after he failed to declare his former membership in the extreme far-right British National Party (BNP), just one day after Nigel Farage addressed him and other candidates at a rally.

Jewish News raised concerns about David Robert Prior, the party’s candidate for the Saltwell seat in Gateshead, north-east England, after being alerted to his history with the antisemitic, far-right organisation.

Saltwell and Bensham is home to Britain’s third-largest Orthodox Jewish community, and is recognised as a major European centre for Jewish education.

Prior had actively sought support from the Charedi community in Saltwell, concealing his previous affiliation with the BNP, which was formerly led by the openly antisemitic Nick Griffin.

On Tuesday, Farage spoke to Prior and other activists at the Sunniside Club venue. Following the event, Prior posted on social media: “Who would have thought Nigel Farage would be in the Sunniside Club. What a bloke!”

However, sources contacted Jewish News to warn about Prior’s past as a supporter of the far-right, racist party, expressing concern about how he might treat Jewish voters if elected.

Jewish News was also shown a leaked BNP membership list, posted on Wikileaks in 2010, which included Prior’s name.
Estonian Holocaust memorial 'extensively damaged' by vandalism
An Estonian Holocaust memorial was discovered to have been destroyed on Friday, according to the Estonian Police and Border Guard Board and the Estonian Jewish Community.

The Ereda memorial in Ida-Viru County was “extensively damaged,” police told The Jerusalem Post, with the monument dented, several pieces broken off, and its fastenings bent.

Police currently do not have any suspects, as the memorial is reportedly in a remote forest area without surveillance cameras.

The Estonian Jewish Community organization did not immediately respond to requests for comment, but wrote on Facebook that such acts were “deeply concerning and offend both the memory of the victims and society as a whole.”

The Israeli Embassy in Estonia said on social media that the memorial’s destruction came as Jews around the world were commemorating [Israel’s] Holocaust Remembrance Day.


Lancashire school commissions statue to honour Kindertransport students
A Lancashire school that gave refuge to three Jewish children fleeing Nazi persecution is raising £30k for a commemorative sculpture and garden space in their honour.

In 1939, Church of England institution Rossall School welcomed three German-Austrian Kindertransport children, Gerd Haag, Robert Augenfeld and Karl Schneider.

Each had been brought over by the Quakers and at first housed at the Dovercourt Bay reception camp near Harwich before finding places at the school.

Eighty-seven years later, Rossall alumni, Juls Dawson, 52, from Epping Forest, who spent 14 years at the school, and cousin, Caroline Apfel, 49, from Finchley, are leading a project to create a memorial to the boys in the form of a sculpture by artist Ian Wolter, whose works include Safe Haven, the Harwich-based memorial to the Kindertransport, based in a garden of reflection. Juls Dawson, former Rossalls student.

Their efforts are supported by the school council. Descendants of the boys have been consulted on the process.

Dawson told Jewish News: “Rossall provided them with safety, support and a sense of belonging. I feel now more than ever, it is critical to educate the current students and future generations to the history of the Holocaust and this story of how many British Jews came to be in the UK especially in light of 50% of schools no longer having Holocaust Memorial Day in the school calendar anymore, not to mention the rise in anti-semitism that we are witnessing escalating every day.”

Sculptor Ian Wolter said: “In 2022 Dame Stephanie Shirley unveiled Safe Haven, my first memorial to the Kindertransport. I understand that the former headmaster of Rossall School was there that day so I was delighted to be approached to make a new memorial for the school. The new bronze sculpture will represent the three kindertransport boys that Rossall hosted. Though I’ll sculpt the statues from live models, I’ll model their faces from photographs of the actual boys.”

The sculpture, funded through a £30k campaign, will be unveiled in a dedicated open space in the school’s gardens in early 2027.




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