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Tuesday, July 21, 2026

07/20 Links Pt2: Ireland’s hypocritical anti-Israel law is a win for Hamas — and a challenge to Trump; Rare burnt First Temple-era beams unearthed in Jerusalem after 2,600 years

From Ian:

Eugene Kontorovich: Ireland’s hypocritical anti-Israel law is a win for Hamas — and a challenge to Trump
In 1977, Congress prohibited US companies from participating in boycotts of countries with which the United States maintains friendly relations.

Decades later the Trade Promotion Authority law, passed during the Obama administration, specifically condemned “state-sponsored unsanctioned foreign boycotts of Israel.”

That’s exactly what Ireland’s law is.

US laws ban American companies from complying in any way with an impermissibly discriminatory boycott like Ireland’s.

That puts American companies operating there in a legal bind.

Moreover, the law requires the Treasury Department to maintain a “current list of countries which require or may require participation in or cooperation with an international boycott.”

American companies doing business in countries listed as boycotters face tax and other penalties if they abide by their requirements.

Until now, Treasury’s list was made up solely of Arab states like Syria and Iraq — and it’s gotten steadily shorter, as more Arab countries have made peace with Israel and started normal trading relationships.

Now Treasury must promptly add Ireland to its official list of boycotting countries: If Dublin wants to act like Damascus, it must be treated as such.

Irish legislators seek to pressure Israel to completely withdraw from Judea and Samaria, and to dismantle all Jewish communities there.

But Israel did exactly that with Gaza in the 2005 Disengagement — and Hamas turned it into a terror base.

Ireland claims its move upholds international law, but its hypocrisy is glaring.

It has imposed no similar rules on goods from other disputed territories — or on China, despite Beijing’s massive and ongoing human rights abuses.

Ireland isn’t about to shutter its movie theaters showing “The Odyssey,” even though parts of it were filmed in Western Sahara, which the United Nations regards as occupied territory.

Its ban applies only to Jewish towns.

President Donald Trump’s first administration clearly stated its opposition to Ireland’s law — heck, even the Biden administration warned Dublin of “consequences” if it moved forward.

But animosity to Israel runs so deep in Ireland — the only criticism the law got from opponents was that it doesn’t go far enough — that its legislators decided passing a symbolic Israel-bashing bill is more important than good relations with Washington.

Perhaps they think America is bluffing?

Regardless, imposing trade restrictions on a US ally as it fights alongside us in a hot war is deeply disrespectful.

But Britain’s new Prime Minister Andy Burnham is reportedly considering a similar measure — so Trump must nip this trend in the bud.

The United States must make it crystal clear that no matter which countries choose to impose sanctions on an ally, they will face the consequences of US law.
Ireland's Antizionism
In the sports world, opposition to Israel has grown significantly in the past few weeks and months. Nowhere has this been truer than in the ongoing campaign to cancel the upcoming Ireland-Israel football match scheduled for October. Left-wing politicians and the establishment media took the lead in advocating for a complete cancellation of the game, even if it would hurt Irish football in the long run. The media ran with the story every day, all with the same ideological bent.

When the game was moved from Dublin to a yet to be determined neutral venue, the very same people who complained about Israeli football players and fans visiting Ireland’s largest city argued that moving the game deprived them of the right to protest the Israeli team in person. The country’s largest trade union has even called on the national broadcaster not to air the game. This demonstrates that these activist groups were not interested so much in the outcome as in the process, for it allowed them to keep the issue alive in public discourse, with the establishment media eagerly amplifying the most extreme antizionist voices.

This gets to the heart of antizionism, for it doesn’t purport to offer constructive solutions to deeply entrenched problems, so much as to provide an ongoing justification for a constant campaign of vilification directed against Israel and the majority of the world’s Jews who support its right to exist in peace and security. Quite a few of those who agitated against the game being played in Dublin, who have been silent on the Islamic Republic’s massacre of their own people, couched their opposition as being borne of out of a commitment to being “anti-genocide.”

This implies that Israel’s war against Hamas was a deliberate act of genocide rather than the result of having to fight a war in a densely populated area, in which the enemy deliberately used civilian infrastructure to wage battle. This is a key component of antizionist discourse, which has employed “genocide” as a rhetorical weapon and as a libel. Nothing exemplifies the degree to which antizionism has taken over the Irish public sphere quite like the degree to which sundry politicians and journalists have used this term as a factual representation of what has occurred in Gaza over the last three years, with little regard to international jurisprudence. Those Irish antizionists who employ the term “genocide” do so not to highlight civilian suffering in Gaza — which is indeed very real — but to whip up hatred against Israel’s very existence and to downplay the Holocaust’s place in western collective memory. This is especially alarming, considering the lack of historical knowledge about the Holocaust among many in Ireland, particularly young people.

Antizionism, once institutionalized, limits the spaces in which Jews, if they identify with Israel in any manner, can freely operate. One recent incident which showcases the depth to which antizionist thinking has taken root in Ireland is the cancellation of a Dublin fundraiser for Magen David Adom, the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross. The Dublin National Concert Hall, which was meant to host the event, which was to include the performance of a play about October 7, decided to cancel the event following an antizionist campaign by local activists who accused MDA of being “complicit in genocide.” Significantly, no other venue has stepped up to offer to host the event.

While it is certainly true that antizionism has infiltrated the public sphere in numerous western democracies, there simply is no equivalent to the degree to which it has taken root in Ireland and in the Irish media, which focuses disproportionately on Israel in its news coverage. This is not meant to be a slight on everyday Irish people, many of whom have expressed alarm at the speed at which antizionism has become normalized in myriad aspects of Irish society. Rather, it should be seen as a warning sign for all those interested in promoting pluralism and tolerance and the viability of a peaceful, long-term settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most of all, it is a reminder that antizionism remains a distinct manifestation of Jew hatred, one that continues to threaten both the viability of Diaspora Jewish communities and the classical liberal underpinnings of western democracy.
David Collier: How an Antisemitic Conspiracy Theory Became a Community Note on X
The risk of long-term reputational damage needed to be addressed. I went back to the site where the graffiti had been drawn. Several days had passed, and I had no idea what I would find. The graffiti itself had gone, but two freshly painted patches on the pavement were immediately visible. Someone had covered it over. It was a relief. I may have been fighting a nonsensical conspiracy claim, but the approved Community Note had given the allegation the appearance of official endorsement.

I posted footage of the covered-up graffiti on X and requested a review of the Community Note. Thankfully, that was enough for the note to lose its approved status. It wasn’t, however, enough to stop the abuse or silence the conspiracy theorists.

There was one more thing I could do to close this case completely.

The FOI Request That Closes the Case
If park staff had painted over the graffiti, there should be a record of it. Because Trent Park is managed by Enfield Council, that record would be obtainable under the Freedom of Information Act.

On Saturday 27 June, attaching the photographs in my possession, I submitted the request.

I have now received the response.

As the brilliant fictional detective Adrian Monk would say at this point in the investigation: “Here’s what happened.”

On 24 June at 19:08, just over two hours before members of my family walked through the park, a concerned citizen sent an email to Councillor Alessandro Georgiou, the Conservative councillor of Cockfosters ward and leader of Enfield Council. The email is explicit in its detail, mentioning both the swastika and the Star of David.

To his credit, at 22:42 that night, Cllr Georgiou sent a response, thanking the sender, and copying in an official council account, asking for the graffiti to be cleared “ASAP.”

At 10:35 on 25 June, Lisa Smart, Head of Urban Green Spaces at Enfield Council, responded that the council aims to remove offensive graffiti within 24 hours and that she would instruct officers to deal with it.

I was also provided with timestamped images, showing that the council workers had arrived to deal with the graffiti within that 24-hour window, at just after 8:00 on the morning of 26 June.

The timestamps show the graffiti thirty-five hours after my photograph had been taken. Both the swastika and the crossed-out Star of David remain clearly visible, along with the stain in the centre of the pavement. So much for the claim that the markings had simply been drawn in water. According to the council’s account, the combination of the heat and the way the graffiti had embedded itself into the surface meant officers eventually had to paint over it, as the photographs show:

By 11:44 on 26 June, the graffiti had been covered over.

The following day, I returned to the site and filmed the footage I posted on X.

Case closed.

The Bigger Lesson
The disturbing aspect of this story is that a system intended to combat misinformation elevated a conspiracy theory into an apparently authoritative statement with real-world consequences.

The burden was then reversed. Those making the accusation produced no evidence. The Jewish target had to spend weeks obtaining official records simply to restore the presumption of innocence.

This time, documentary evidence happened to exist. Had the graffiti been removed some other way, the Community Note would likely still be there today, giving permanent credibility to a baseless accusation.

Systems that determine “truth” are vulnerable to organised falsehoods, popular prejudice and institutional bias. When the subject is Jews or Israel – where hostile narratives already circulate widely – that vulnerability becomes especially dangerous.


‘I started cursing him in Arabic’: Ex-hostage reveals words to Hamas captor upon release
In her first long-form interviews more than two years after her release from captivity, freed hostage Rimon Buchshtab-Kirscht shared this week what she told her Hamas captor as she was handed off to Red Cross personnel in Gaza.

Buchshtab-Kirscht was 36 when she was abducted by the Hamas terror group during its October 7, 2023, onslaught, and then returned to Israel as part of a hostage-prisoner exchange and ceasefire deal that November. Footage showing Buchshtab-Kirscht visibly talking back to the terror operative went viral.

“The whole ride [to the Red Cross hand-off] he was teasing me about Yagev,” she told the Ynet news site, in an interview released on Sunday. She was referring to her husband Yagev Buchshtab, who was kidnapped alongside her from their home in Kibbutz Nirim and then killed in captivity.

“‘Yagev will be here in two days,’” she recalled the terrorist – named Mustafa – saying to her. “‘Yagev will be here four days from now.’ And when he started talking about Yagev, he was pressing all my buttons, and it didn’t sit well with me.”

She added, “And then the terrorists in the car gave me a speech about going out.” She recounted that they told her, in English: “Smile and wave.” She continued: “And when you go out to that audience, who are barking and raging and screaming at you, they start telling you, ‘Don’t be afraid.’”

“At that point, you’re already so hungry and exhausted that nothing moves you or frightens you, and I started cursing him in Arabic, so that everyone would understand. It wasn’t some super special confrontation.”

“I just spoke to him the way they deserve, like the sons of bitches they are,” she said.

“I shouted at him, ‘Just because you’re masked doesn’t mean I can’t see you, and just because your eyes are covered doesn’t mean I don’t recognize your voice, or remember what you did to me, and kul kalb biji yomo,” she said. The Arabic expression refers to every “dog” eventually getting what it deserves.
Call me Back: Tisha b'Av: The Bottom of the Calendar - with Rachel Goldberg-Polin
Tisha B'Av is the saddest date on the Jewish calendar, but Rachel Goldberg-Polin argues it also offers hope and opportunity. In a conversation shaped by the personal and collective trauma of October 7, she explains why Jewish tradition gathers centuries of loss onto a single day, why it compels us to look inward, and how mourning is meant to become the first step toward repair.

Rachel’s suggested reading: This Is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation by Rabbi Alan Lew

In this episode:
Why Tisha B'Av became Judaism's day of mourning
The original national failure: The spies and the Promised Land,
The centrality and importance of the Temples we can’t comprehend
Sinat chinam and the danger of baseless hatred
Why Jewish tradition looks inward after catastrophe
How Tisha B'Av is observed and why the rituals matter
Rav Kook's answer: from baseless hatred to baseless love
Finding hope, repair, and "yet" after grief




Hamas names Khalil al-Hayya, former wartime negotiator, as new head of political bureau
Hamas on Monday named Khalil al-Hayya to head its political bureau.

Hayya served as chief negotiator for the terrorist organization during the Israel-Hamas War. He is the first person appointed to the position since Yahya Sinwar was killed in October 2024.

Hamas’s exiled Gaza chief and top negotiator has become an increasingly central figure in its leadership since the deaths of Sinwar in Gaza and Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed on a visit to Iran in July 2024.

Hayya has become increasingly influential as other senior Hamas officials have been killed in Israeli strikes. He left Gaza several years ago and was based in Qatar. Hayya established himself in Qatar several years ago

Hayya served as a Hamas point person for ties with Arab and Islamic states. He accompanied Haniyeh on his visit to Tehran in July 2024, during which the latter was assassinated.

The October 7 massacre was supposed to be a limited operation by Hamas to capture “a number of soldiers” and swap them for jailed Palestinians, Hayya reportedly said.

“But the Zionist army unit completely collapsed,” the Hamas-linked Palestinian Information Center quoted him as saying, referring to the IDF.

The terrorist attack had succeeded in bringing the Palestinian issue back into international focus, Hayya said.


Israel pans draft of Australia’s ruling Labor party’s platform ahead of debate
Israel took the unusual step on Monday of speaking out against a draft of the platform of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor Party, criticizing it as being one-sided and not giving enough attention to the responsibility of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In what media reports framed as highly unconventional involvement by a foreign power in the internal activities of a political party, the Israeli Embassy in Canberra issued a lengthy statement detailing its issues with the draft, which is to be debated at a Labor Party national conference later this week.

It said, “the embassy respectfully submits that several elements of the draft platform risk placing responsibility for the conflict on one party while giving insufficient attention to the decisions, conduct and continuing obligations of the Palestinian leadership and terrorist organizations such as Hamas.”

Israel “remains committed to a future in which Israelis and Palestinians live alongside one another in peace and security,” the statement continued. “That future, however, cannot be built through unilateral political declarations or international pressure directed at only one side.”

The embassy said it “notes these policy motions are still in draft form, and will continue to engage constructively with the Australian Labor Party through the usual diplomatic channels.”

Foreign Minister Penny Wong did not comment to media on the Israeli Embassy’s statement.

Minister for International Development and Multicultural Affairs Anne Aly said: “The Israeli embassy can put out what they want to say.”

In an interview with ABC Radio National, Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth said the matter is up to the party to debate internally, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

“We have unequivocally condemned Hamas, including for the atrocities of the 7th of October and its ongoing acts of terror,” the minister said. “We want to see a two-state solution in which Israelis and Palestinians can live in secure borders, and I think our prime minister and our government’s been pretty clear about that.”

The draft up for consideration has more to say about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict than the previous platform document from 2023. That had just a few lines which dealt with recognition of a Palestinian state, something the Australian government followed through with in September 2025.
ABC called out for dismissing AJA antisemitism warning
Sky New host Chris Kenny interviewed ABC chair Kim Williams and brought up an interview Chris had done with AJA CEO Robert Gregory on the topic of antisemitism.

The ABC's Media Watch had then mocked the discussion of antisemitism.

This was just a few months before the Bondi Massacre.


'Myopic': Former AFP detective questions Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's response to Islamophobia report
A former Australian Federal Police detective superintendent has questioned provisions in the government's response to the Islamophobia Envoy's landmark report.

Anthony Albanese on the weekend said his government would accept 35 of Envoy Aftab Malik's 54 recommendations while others remained under further review.

Under broader categories the government will direct $41.9 million to improve Islamic faith locations, and further funding for organisations helping communities affected by hate.

Further multicultural grants will look to support sports and cross-cultural events, alongside improved Islamophobia reporting systems with responses and community supports to be "improved".

But former AFP detective superintendent David Craig said the announcement left much to be desired.

He took aim at further "training" for AFP officers and parliamentarians, disputing the need.

"Having been in the AFP for a substantial period of time, there is already a lot of cross-cultural training done," he told Sky News host Peta Credlin on Monday.

"The last thing the AFP needs now, the last thing the Australian community needs now, is pulling more frontline officers off to tick some box for some additional training which they've had in depth anyway.

"Where are the AFP showing that they're Islamophobic?"

He said he was disappointed with the report and ensuing response at large.

"I thought that [Mr] Malik was going to put together a fairly astute report and not just a pro-Muslim report. I mean, I'm very disappointed. He could have done a lot better," he said.

"I mean $15 million for a Muslim community centre. Now what's a Muslim sports centre, I mean? How is that going to help Islamophobia? Every other religion or atheist that goes past the $15 million Muslim-only sports centre, how is that helping social cohesion?"

He questioned lifting faith-based security funding from $25 million by $42 million, saying the majority of religious attacks were happening elsewhere.

"They're happening in synagogues. They're in churches more often than they're happening in mosques," he said.

"They're also asking to rewrite the school curriculum and to educate people about Islamophobia, et cetera. But that's only for the state-based schools ... that doesn't apply to Islamic schools. They're not meant to be taught about social cohesion. It's only all the other schools.

"I think it's very one-eyed, it's myopic, and it won't help."
Ask Haviv Anything: 133: Mamdani and America’s new left, with Reihan Salam
The rise of Zohran Mamdani and the DSA are about far more than one politician or radical political moment. Manhattan Institute president Reihan Salam joins us to explain why highly educated, upwardly mobile young Americans are embracing radical socialist and "Third Worldist" politics. We decode explain the cultural and psychological shifts powering America’s new left: the search for identity among young Americans, including a rapidly changing Muslim community, how elite universities have become the "madrasas" of a new political identity, the surprising parallels between early 20th-century Jewish radicals and today's Muslim activists, and why a generation disconnected from traditional family structures is finding meaning in political radicalism.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Guest Credibility
00:29 The Phenomenon of Mamdani's Victory and DSA Successes
05:24 The Roots of Radical Movements and Generational Change
08:10 American Exceptionalism and Humility in Democracy
10:41 The Dislocation of American Identity and the Role of Media
13:50 The Radicalization of Youth and Media Influence
20:21 The Decline of American Immunity to Radical Ideas
25:40 The Role of Education and Universities in Radicalization
33:23 The Power of Narrative and Moral Stories
40:35 The Social and Cultural Changes in America
49:21 The American Muslim Community and Political Challenges
01:10:19 The Future of American Society and Political Movements
01:16:37 The Role of Identity, Authenticity, and Cultural Shifts
01:25:31 The Impact of Immigration and Education on Political Ideology
01:35:34 Conclusion and Reflection on Cultural and Political Shifts




Mamdani must ‘bear consequences’ for threatening to arrest Netanyahu, Jewish NY City Council member says
Inna Vernikov, a Jewish member of the New York City Council, urged U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio to determine whether New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani could face federal consequences if he attempts to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his planned visit to New York for the U.N. General Assembly.

In a letter sent to Rubio on Sunday, Vernikov, a Ukrainian-born Republican, accused Mamdani of threatening to carry out an “illegal order of arrest” and urged the U.S. State Department to issue a “stern” formal warning and assess whether such an action would violate U.S. law.

“This week, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has yet again threatened to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu upon his arrival in New York City for UNGA in September, citing the International Criminal Court, which the United States is not a signatory to,” Vernikov wrote.

“Not only does this political theater further fan the flames of antisemitism in New York City, but it is entirely baseless, as the mayor has no legal authority to arrest a sitting foreign diplomat,” she added.

On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump wrote that Netanyahu “will not be arrested, in any way, shape or form, while in the United States of America.”

Vernikov told JNS that she is grateful for Trump’s statement, saying it reaffirmed “what we already knew—Mamdani cannot and will not arrest Bibi.”

“To all the hopeful DSA puppets, Mamdani is about to break one of his core promises: to arrest the sitting prime minister of the only Jewish state,” she said. “Be angry.”

Vernikov also criticized what she described as Mamdani’s administration engaging with “the Islamic Republic of Iran, an enemy country the United States is currently at war with,” arguing that the mayor’s comments and actions amounted to a “threat of an illegal order of arrest” that “must bear consequences.”

She asked the State Department to determine whether an attempted arrest could expose Mamdani to federal prosecution or other criminal action.


Netanyahu ‘will not be arrested,’ Trump says
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not get arrested when he comes to New York City for the United Nations General Assembly in September.

Zohran Mamdani, mayor of New York City who promised on the campaign trail to have the Israeli leader arrested, has said that he’s exploring options with his legal advisers.

“Benjamin Netanyahu will not be arrested, in any way, shape or form, while in the United States of America,” Trump wrote.

The president stated that Netanyahu has been fighting against the Islamic Republican of Iran, “which recently killed 52,000 innocent protesters, and has spent the last 47 years killing American Soldiers and others.”

“The only ones that should be arrested are the people that led Iran into this unprecedented spiral of death and destruction, something that should have been dealt with years ago, by previous presidents,” Trump stated.


Michigan's Senate race tests pro-Israel Jews' loyalty to Democratic Party
Joel Tauber has been through many an election in his 92 years. And, with the exception of “one out of 100 times,” he’s always backed a Democrat, something even more important in the current midterm cycle, he believes.

“Winning the Senate and the House is the beginning of a way back to our democracy,” Tauber, a founding chair of Jewish Federations of North America who has hosted former President Bill Clinton and other Democratic leaders, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “It’s really, really important to me.”

But Tauber is a Michigan resident, and the state’s upcoming US Senate primary is making him deeply uneasy. Like many a Jew in the mitten state, he is pulling for pro-Israel centrist US Rep. Haley Stevens to win on Aug. 4.

Should her opponent, former county health official and staunch Israel critic Abdul El-Sayed, prevail instead, Tauber would take a step he’s said he’s never done before: leave the Senate ballot blank.

“I’d sit it out,” he said, of the general election. Of El-Sayed, he said, “There’s no way that I could vote for him.”

Traditionally Democrat fundraisers shift to planning for Republicans
Some Jewish Democratic leaders in the state are prepared to go even further. Several prominent Metro Detroit Jews who have traditionally fundraised for Democrats are also planning fundraisers for the presumptive GOP nominee, former US Rep. Mike Rogers, as a “hedge.” Others are planning to help him if El-Sayed wins the Democratic nomination, one Jew who is close to the Stevens campaign told JTA.

Others affirmed the idea that the Jewish Democratic donor class, feeling abandoned by the party, would back Rogers.

“There are leaders in our Jewish community who are longtime, lifelong Democrats and Democratic fundraisers, who are very concerned with where their party’s going,” said Dennis Bernard, national chair of government relations for the nonpartisan JFNA and a metro Detroit resident. “And if this is the case, they’ve made it clear, both financially and with their vote, that they would support Mike Rogers in the event El-Sayed wins the primary.”

Detroit-area Jewish Democrats have asked Bernard, over golf outings, for introductions to Rogers, he said.

The reason: They see El-Sayed, who has questioned whether Israel should be a Jewish state and suggested that Democrats who support Israel only do so because of financial motives, as portending an existential threat to the national Jewish community. If he wins in a purple state, one in which pro-Israel Jews have for years butted heads with US Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the pro-Palestinian Democrat, some fear more candidates with similar views will follow, and lead to an unsafe environment for Jews in Michigan and beyond. They worry that increasingly hostile discourse creates an environment in which antisemitic harassment becomes more acceptable and Jewish political activism is considered suspect.

“This is a truly once-in-a-lifetime moment where you have to become a single-issue voter,” Bernard said. “And that issue is antisemitism, our Judaism and Israel. This is where you put party third: our people first, our country second.”
Michigan Dem who praised grandfather’s Nazi military service hosting fundraiser for Abdul El-Sayed
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is slated to appear at a campaign fundraiser this weekend that is co-hosted by Kelly Neumann, a controversial Democratic fundraiser in Michigan who faced scrutiny earlier this year for a 2024 Facebook post on Veterans Day that praised her grandfather, who fought for the Nazis in World War II.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who endorsed El-Sayed on Monday, was initially listed as a speaker at the Saturday event hosted by Neumann, though Neumann and the campaign removed Warren from their promotional materials after Jewish Insider inquired about the senator’s role. Warren is speaking at a rally for El-Sayed later that day.

A spokesperson for El-Sayed said Warren’s “inclusion on the flier was a clerical error by our campaign” and that she was never scheduled to speak at the fundraiser. A spokesperson for Warren declined to comment.

In Neumann’s November 2024 post, which was previously reported by JI, she said her grandfather, Albert Neumann, fought “on the German side in WWI & WWII.” She noted that he “was one of the first people in my life that accepted me as gay” and described him as “a true testament that people can change and love indeed can win.”

Neumann, a Michigan attorney, has since deleted the post after it resurfaced earlier this year. In a March 2026 Facebook post, she apologized “to anyone who was hurt by [my] post from years ago, as that was certainly never my intention,” but blamed Rep. Haley Stevens’ (D-MI) Senate campaign for unearthing the original post.


J Street defends College Democrats co-sponsorship amid backlash over Hasan Piker speech
J Street is defending its decision to co-sponsor the College Democrats of America convention after critics accused the liberal pro-Israel group of endorsing the anti-Zionist streamer Hasan Piker, who was a featured speaker at the event.

In a statement posted Monday, J Street said its campus arm, J Street U, spent “a couple thousand dollars for an exhibit table” and had “no role in choosing speakers, no approval over the program and no say in who was invited to address the conference.”

“J Street disagrees with much of what Hasan Piker says and with the way he says it. We won’t hesitate to say so,” the group wrote on social media in a statement first authored by its president, Jeremy Ben-Ami. “But we also reject the notion that the right answer to his invitation is to abandon the very spaces where the next generation of Democratic leaders is debating these issues.”

The convention, which was held in Washington, DC, from Thursday to Sunday, featured a host of speakers, including Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Jewish Democrat in Maryland; Randi Weingarten, the Jewish president of the American Federation of Teachers; and the democratic socialist Colorado congressional candidate Melat Kiros.

The statement followed blowback from several pro-Israel commentators, including author and podcaster Dan Senor, former Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl and Israel historian Sara Yael Hirschhorn, who all said it was inappropriate for a Jewish group to share a tent with an anti-Israel figurehead.


Washington Republican challenger targets ‘antisemitic’ socialist in primary
Doug Basler, the Republican seeking to unseat Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), said his immediate focus is not on defeating the longtime congressman but on preventing socialist Kshama Sawant from advancing past the Aug. 4 primary.

Basler told JNS on Monday that Sawant, a former Seattle City Council member, and Democratic challenger Melissa Chaudhry are “antisemitic.”

“They see Jews as oppressors. They see everything through their Marxist lens,” he said. “You’re either an oppressor or oppressed. They see Israel as an oppressor.”

“Marxists don’t like God,” Basler added. “Marxists want the state to be God, and anything that stands between the state and the people has to be eliminated. That’s why they don’t like Jewish people and they don’t like Christians.”

Basler, a former senior vice chairman of the King County Republican Party and current vice president of the Eastside Republican Club, has made opposition to socialism a central theme of his campaign. His campaign website includes a section titled “Socialism Revealed” that targets Sawant, who is running as an independent socialist.

“It’s actually shocking that Marxists are working with radical Muslims, because they are diametrically opposed to each other,” Basler told JNS. “They’re willing to work together to defeat America, which is odd, but I guess my enemy’s enemy is my friend.”

Basler also highlighted his support for Israel in a social media post on Monday, writing that “Hamas is a terrorist organization, if possible worse than the Nazis of World War II.”

“What they did on Oct. 7 was one of the most heinous acts since the Nazi death camps,” he wrote.


Ed Miliband made Foreign Secretary in PM Burnham’s cabinet shake-up
As a Jewish politician whose family survived the Holocaust, Miliband has often navigated a fine line between expressing a personal connection to Israel’s security and advocating for Palestinian statehood.

During his time as Leader of the Labour Party, he shifted the party’s traditional “New Labour” stance toward a more vocal critique of Israeli policy.

In the 2014 Gaza war Miliband broke with the Conservative government by explicitly calling Israel’s military incursions “wrong and unjustifiable.”

He also heavily criticised Prime Minister David Cameron for failing to condemn the scale of civilian casualties in Gaza.

In October 2014, Miliband whipped Labour MPs to vote in favour of a symbolic House of Commons motion to unilaterally recognise the State of Palestine.

The move was designed to kickstart momentum for a two-state solution but caused significant friction with some traditional Jewish donors and community organisations.

During a 2014 visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories, Miliband toured a Bedouin camp in the West Bank and publicly stated that the expansion of Israeli settlements was “wrong and illegal,” arguing it posed a mortal threat to the peace process.

Despite his willingness to break ranks over specific military actions and borders, Miliband has consistently tried to show pro-Israel foundational principles—especially after the October 7 Hamas attacks. In November 2023, he followed the party whip to abstain on an SNP-led amendment calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, voting instead for a Labour amendment focusing on humanitarian pauses and longer-term political steps.

Miliband has consistently classified Hamas as a terrorist organisation and has routinely condemned its rocket attacks on Israeli towns as “totally unjustified and appalling.”

He has also been a firm and vocal opponent of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. Speaking at a Labour Friends of Palestine dinner in late 2014, he asserted that isolation and boycotts are not the way forward, prioritising bilateral trade and diplomatic negotiation instead.

Miliband has visited Israel several times, both privately and in his political capacity.

During these visits, he met with Israeli officials, Palestinian leaders, and civil society representatives, touring towns affected by conflict and visiting sites of historical significance to his family.

His 2014 visit included meetings in Jerusalem and a tour of a Bedouin camp in the West Bank, where he again spoke out against settlement expansion. These experiences have informed his nuanced views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and reinforced his commitment to a two-state solution.

In 2013, as Labour leader, Miliband led his party to vote against UK military intervention in Syria following the Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons. This decision defeated then-Prime Minister David Cameron’s proposal and marked the first time in decades that Parliament blocked a government’s call for military action.

While supporters praised Miliband for demanding clear evidence and a defined strategy, critics—including some in the Jewish community and foreign policy circles—accused him of undermining the UK’s global standing and emboldening the Assad regime.

Miliband was born to Polish Jewish immigrants, Ralph Miliband and Marion Kozak, who arrived in the UK during World War II as refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe.

His father, a renowned Marxist academic, lost several relatives in the Holocaust, while his mother survived the war as a hidden child in Belgium. His mother, who died earlier this year, became a passionate campaigner for the Palestinian cause.


Burnham cannot allow Ali Milani near power
Andy Burnham’s pledge to be ‘for all of us’ may include hiring a man for his Downing Street staff who called 9/11 a ‘false flag’ that the US ‘knew of… in advance’, made jibes against Jews, defended an advocacy group that called Jihadi John a ‘beautiful young man’, and said that exposΓ©s of the child grooming scandals were a ‘racist campaign’.

Ali Milani, chair of the Labour Muslim Network, has been working closely with Burnham in the run-up to his election as Makerfield MP and Labour leader, helping with his social media, and has been repeatedly spoken of as an expected hire in No. 10’s digital communications team.

What hasn’t been reported in the coverage of Milani’s potential new job is his views. Writing in 2025 about the grooming scandals – years after multiple official reports had confirmed what happened – Milani claimed that ‘this conversation in Westminster has nothing to do with the actual victims or the crimes… I will call it out for what it is – a racist campaign.’ He also claimed that politicians were asserting that group-based sexual abuse is ‘an exclusively Pakistani and/or Muslim problem.’ The actual charge was that the crimes were disproportionately committed by Pakistani and/or Muslim men.

Earlier, Milani had turned his forensic crime-solving skills to the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington, which killed more than 3,000 people. He wrote: ‘3,000 deaths will not be at peace until the truth is revealed! #falseflag.’ He later added: ‘It is and will forever be, until a thorough independent investigation is done, my position that the US gov. Knew of the attack in advance.’ He later apologised for this, noting that he was a teenager at the time and later described the theories as ‘silly’.

Milani also apologised for a series of tweets from the same era where he demanded the destruction of Israel, insulted the former newspaper editor Piers Morgan as ‘a zionist’ and wrote in response: ‘Nah u won’t mate. It’ll cost you a pound #jew,’ a jibe at Jews’ supposed meanness.

In 2015, he signed a letter condemning the National Union of Students for boycotting the group Cage, whose head of research had that year described the Isis executioner Mohammed Emwazi (‘Jihadi John’) as a ‘beautiful young man’. (The head of research later said that ‘at the end of the day’, Emwazi’s actions were ‘absolutely horrific’.) Milani and his fellow signatories claimed that allegations of extremism against Cage were ‘baseless, Islamophobic smears’ and ‘cutting ties with Cage denies NUS a wealth of experience and information in tackling Prevent,’ the government counter-extremism programme


Young Greens elect antizionist leaders and drop IHRA antisemitism definition
The Young Greens have elected antizionist co-chairs and voted to drop the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.

Jo Dowbor, a founder of the controversial Greens for Palestine group, which proposed the controversial “Zionism is racism” motion at last year's Green Party conference, has been elected co-chair of the Young Greens alongside Cynthia (Cyn) Muthoni.

Both Muthoni and Dowbor shared an Instagram post from the Greens 4 Palestine account describing them as the youth wing's new “anti zionist co chairs” [sic].

The pair now hold influential positions within Zack Polanski's burgeoning ecopopulist party.

Members under 30 account for more than a quarter of the Green Party's membership, and the Young Greens have acted as a bellwether for future party policy, with previous anti-Israel motions first adopted by the youth wing before being taken up nationally.

Originally from Argentina, Dowbor – who unsuccessfully contested Arsenal ward in north London for the Greens at this year's local elections – is an antizionist activist who led a Young Greens motion in 2024 describing the war in Gaza as a genocide and helped secure support for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel. Both positions were later adopted by the national Green Party.

Her candidacy was backed by Green co-deputy leader Mothin Ali, who cited her work “as an anti-imperialist" among the reasons for his support.

Meanwhile, Muthoni is a director at UK Teach Anti Racism and Woodstock Town councillor in Oxfordshire.

At the same Young Greens convention this weekend, where delegates also heard from Green co-deputy, district councillor Rachel Millward, members voted in favour of a motion proposed by Dowbor to abandon the widely adopted IHRA definition of antisemitism.

Dowbor said she had written the motion "in collaboration with anti-Zionist Jewish Greens" [sic] and claimed that it provided "a framework that protects both Jewish members and those involved in the Palestine movement."

The new definition refers to antisemitism from "far-right and white nationalist movements" but makes no reference to Islamist antisemitism.


French LGBT Activist Forced Offstage by Gaza Zealots
French Jewish musician Barbara Butch was scheduled to perform at the Cabaret FrappΓ© festival in Grenoble—but an estimated 200 ‘free Palestine’ activists had other ideas.

Ultimately Butch was forced to leave the stage, after the activists began hurling insults and bottles at her. According to them, her ‘crimes’ include
- a performance in Tel Aviv in 2025 after the main Pride event there was cancelled;
- past support for proposed legislation, the ‘Yadan bill,’ aimed at restricting support for terror and Holocaust distortion/denial.

It remains unclear whether the campaigners object more to her Jewish family background or her opposition to modern forms of antisemitism, but under pressure from antisemites she cut short her cover version of the John Lennon dirge ‘Imagine’ and left the stage. The episode certainly points to the folly of any ‘Queers for Palestine’ activism.

Previously Butch was at the centre of a global controversy concerning alleged anti-Christian messaging during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics. Four men were subsequently convicted on November 21st, 2025 of “cyberbullying” her with threats and harassment. Later, she went to further anger Christians in her official role as the 2026 artistic director of the annual Nuit Blanche festival, also staged in Paris.


Teachers’ union passes resolution blaming Israel for teacher salary crisis in Palestinian-controlled areas
Delegates at the American Federation of Teachers’ 89th national convention approved resolutions on July 17 opposing U.S. and Israeli military operations in Iran and Lebanon, while also adopting a measure that blames Israel for a salary crisis affecting teachers in Palestinian-controlled areas.

The union, led by Randi Weingarten, who was re-elected to a 10th two-year term during the convention, adopted the measures as part of its 2026 policy resolutions.

One resolution calls for “an immediate end to the war with Iran,” urging the United States and Israel to cease military operations against the Islamic Republic and its blockade of Iranian ports, while calling on Tehran to end its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. It further states that any negotiated settlement must include verifiable guarantees that Iran will not develop nuclear weapons.

The same measure also demands “an end to Israel’s bombing and invasion of Lebanon, and to the forced evacuation of Shia Muslims from southern Lebanon.”

Delegates also approved a separate resolution asserting that Israel’s withholding of tax revenues collected on behalf of the Palestinian Authority has disrupted public-sector salaries, including those of teachers in Palestinian-controlled territories. It also accuses Israel of violating the International Labour Organization’s mandate on wage protection.

“In the Palestinian territories, because of Israel’s withholding of tax revenues, public sector workers, including teachers, receive only a portion of their salaries, leading to major disruptions affecting more than 50,000 teachers and hundreds of thousands of students,” the resolution states.
Trump admin’s new visa rule could squeeze out anti-Israel student activists, experts say
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s new rule limiting how long foreign students can stay on visas could make it more difficult for some anti-Israel activists to remain in the country indefinitely, experts told JNS.

Markwayne Mullin, the U.S. homeland security secretary, stated on Thursday that the “duration of status” system, which has existed for almost 50 years, has “compromised national security and created an environment ripe for immigration fraud.”

“Foreign students have been admitted into the U.S. indefinitely, allowing thousands to abuse our immigration system by perpetually enrolling in courses to avoid having to leave the U.S.,” he said.

According to the department, the rule limits foreign students and exchange visitors to four years in the country, after which they must apply for an extension. The rule also reduces the grace period for foreign students to leave the country, transfer schools or change their immigration status from 60 days to 30 days.

Mark Goldfeder, director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, told JNS that under the “duration of status” system, “a foreign student was vetted exactly once, and then never again, sometimes for a decade.”

“We have spent the last few years watching what unexamined, open-ended status can produce on a quad,” he said. “This rule restores the unremarkable principle that a guest’s visa gets reviewed by the government that issued it, on a schedule.”

“The overwhelming majority of international students are exactly what they say they are, and a student who comes here to study will graduate inside four years without ever noticing this rule exists,” Goldfeder added. “But the perpetual activist on his seventh year of loosely defined coursework will notice it, and that is rather the point.”


Online forms urged people to report presence of Israeli citizens, Italian Jews in tourist areas
The president of the Jewish Community of Milan (Mosaico), Walker Meghnagi, has gravely condemned online forms urging people to report the presence of Israeli citizens and Italian Jews staying in Italian hotels and other tourist accommodations.

"I think we're going back to the 1930s, to hunting Jews," Meghnagi said.

The forms were removed following intervention by General Pasquale Angelosanto, Italy's National Coordinator for the Fight Against Antisemitism.

The Google form that was circulated - before its removal - read: "This form is intended to record cases of Zionist tourism, property purchases, and, more generally, Zionist neo-colonization in Italy. The data collected will be received by the Global Sumud Movement and will remain protected and confidential. However, we ask you to provide a source so we can verify the information, coordinate possible initiatives, and support areas affected by the phenomenon."

It then said: "The sole purpose is to map the spread of the phenomenon and its various forms."

Form asks if groups were 'manageing phenomenon' of Jewish visitors
According to Italian paper La Repubblica, subsequent pages of the form asked respondents to report on locations where Jewish or Israeli visitors were seen, whether local organizations or activist groups were already "managing the phenomenon," and other information.

The stated objective of the form was to map the phenomenon and coordinate unspecified future initiatives.

"What is happening today shows that there are unbalanced individuals out there, and if this kind of message spreads widely enough, you are certain to find someone willing to act on it," Meghnagi said.

"For this reason, mapping where Jews are is extremely serious."

The Jewish Community of Milan said it will not launch its own legal initiative but has already forwarded the questionnaire to the relevant authorities.

The Global Sumud Movement - infamous for coordinating flotillas to Gaza - denied any involvement with the forms when contacted by La Repubblica.

"Zionism is one of the issues we work on, but we do not hunt Jews, and we know nothing about this questionnaire," it said. "We did not commission it and had not even seen it before it was taken offline. We only learned about it through the newspapers, and we reserve the right to take appropriate action, including issuing an official statement."
Could Australia be Israel's secret gateway to global success?
Israeli companies looking to expand globally should consider Australia as a launchpad, according to Paul Israel, executive director of the Israel-Australia Chamber of Commerce.

With a population of 28 million and a reputation for being an early adopter of technology, Australia offers companies the opportunity to build credibility before entering larger markets such as the United States, Asia, and Europe. If a company succeeds in Australia, it gains valuable validation. If it does not, it has the chance to refine its product and strategy before expanding into even bigger markets.

The IACC hosts, supports, and represents well over 1,000 corporate members annually, according to its website. It works to build synergy between Israeli and Australian companies and helps Israeli businesses integrate into the Australian marketplace and vice versa.

This year, The Jerusalem Post, together with the Central Synagogue of Sydney, will convene senior business leaders, investors, entrepreneurs, policymakers, philanthropists, community leaders, and innovators from Australia, Israel, and the broader Asia-Pacific region for a high-level, business-focused gathering designed to deepen ties between Australia and Israel. The conference will take place on November 19.

The summit is expected to include keynote speeches, high-level panel discussions, one-on-one conversations, sector-focused sessions, networking opportunities, and curated business meetings. Participants can expect a full day of substantive programming that combines thought leadership, business development, community engagement, and strategic networking. The event will focus on sectors where Israel and Australia share strong commercial interests and significant growth potential.

Australia is the world's 12th largest economy by nominal gross domestic product (GDP), with an economy valued at approximately $2.12 trillion. Moreover, Israel noted that, when measured by GDP per capita, the country is the seventh richest in the world.

Much of Australia's wealth is generated by its abundant natural resources and mineral reserves.

"When it comes to buying technology, Australia can afford to buy best of breed, and the reputation Israeli technology has of being reliable, robust, and top tier is very respected by Australian corporates," Israel explained. He added that, for some of Israel's largest high-tech companies, Australia ranks among their top five destinations.

Just think about the cyber industry. Australia is one of the most targeted countries in the world, and because of its time zone, it is often among the first to experience new cyberattacks. Because of those vulnerabilities, the country is constantly looking for the right technologies to protect its marketplace.

Already, major cyber companies such as CyberArk, Sygnia, Armis, Check Point, and others operate in Australia.


Rare burnt First Temple-era beams unearthed in Jerusalem after 2,600 years
Archaeologists have uncovered rare charred wooden beams in Jerusalem believed to date to the Babylonian destruction of the First Temple in 586 BCE, in a discovery that researchers say could transform understanding of one of Jewish history’s defining moments.

The burnt timbers were unearthed during excavations by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) and Tel Aviv University in the City of David, within the Jerusalem Walls National Park. Researchers believe they formed part of the roof of a First Temple-period building that collapsed as the city was destroyed by Babylonian forces.

The discovery is considered highly unusual because well-preserved wood from the Iron Age is exceptionally rare in Israel. Archaeologists believe the beams survived for around 2,600 years after plaster from the building’s walls melted in the intense fire and sealed the burnt wood beneath it.

Excavation director Efrat Bocher said: “The beams appear to have served as the roof of an inner courtyard in a building from the First Temple period. During the destruction, they collapsed onto the floor. We believe that the plaster cladding of the building’s walls, melted by the fire, covered the charred wooden beams, and ultimately enabled their exceptional preservation.”

Scientists say the find could also provide the most precise dating yet for the destruction of ancient Jerusalem.

Dr Johanna Regev, of the Israel Antiquities Authority, explained that the unusually large number of growth rings preserved within the timber will allow researchers to date the wood with far greater accuracy than has previously been possible.

“It is very rare in Israel to find wood with such a large number of growth rings,” she said. “Here, in the City of David, we found thick beams with many rings, offering significant research potential – with more growth rings enabling higher dating resolution. Until now, we could date finds within a range of hundreds of years. Now we can attain much greater precision, narrowing the dating range down to as little as ten years.”

Researchers also believe Jerusalem’s returning inhabitants may have deliberately left the burnt remains untouched after the Babylonian exile as a permanent reminder of the city’s destruction. The growth rings of the wooden beams discovered in the City of David. Photo: Efrat Bocher

Dr Yiftah Shalev, who co-directs the excavation for the Israel Antiquities Authority alongside Professor Yuval Gadot of Tel Aviv University, said: “Preserving memory is a human need, seeking to preserve what once existed. Here we see it in its clearest form: a deliberate choice to leave ruins in place as a testament to the destruction and build the new layer over them.”

The discovery was announced ahead of Tisha B’Av, the annual fast commemorating the destruction of both the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem.





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