Friday, October 30, 2026

10/30 Links Pt2: Douglas Murray: the Left’s Palestine 'fetish' – and why the West can still be saved; Pelosi calls Mamdani, El-Sayed's past comments on Israel 'concerning' and 'wrong'

From Ian:

Maxim Shrayer: Up (and Down) In Michigan
I would submit that the phenomenon of Jewish support for El-Sayed and other openly anti-Israel candidates or elected officials in the Democratic party does not logically or rationally stem from issues affecting Israel or the Jewish diaspora. Rather, it exemplifies the phenomenon I would like to call the “Jewish nostalgia for an American political home” in the Democratic party. Fueling this nostalgia is the anxiety that Jews no longer influence mainstream American politics. Various “Jewish cases” for the election of El-Sayed lay hopelessly bare a longing for the time when Jewish in America rhymed with progressive if not socialist, when Jews were civil libertarians if they weren’t gangsters (sometimes both), and when the Democratic party was a political home for the vast majority of America’s Jews.

This nostalgia also stems from a chronic reluctance to recognize that the Democratic party is becoming more and more a party of phantoms of socialism who either refuse to learn from twentieth-century history (especially Soviet history) or are too ignorant to do so. This Jewish Democratic nostalgia, like most other forms of nostalgia, does not address issues or remedy the present. It is a coping mechanism for the ones who have experienced political and social bereavement. Countless are the Jewish losses in America of the first quarter of the 21st century, and the biggest political loss is the Democratic party’s support of Israel. (That a Dominican-American congressman from the Bronx and a maverick Pennsylvania senator—rather than the Jews in the house or senate Democratic leadership—are the staunchest Democratic supporters of Israel speaks volumes about the predicament.)

Calls for the creation of an anti-MAGA Jewish coalition feel like an eleventh-hour performance of Jewish nostalgia for political influence. Such nostalgia has its deeper origins in the late 1960s, when Jewish activism ceased to be inherently Jewish as American Jews had achieved the status quo and overcome de facto discrimination while the still young Israel enjoyed national popularity and antisemitism was becoming marginal or subterranean.

You may wonder why the one writing these lines—a former refusenik, a Bostonian, an author and college professor—is so taken with this year’s Michigan Senate election. The answer is that through the lens of the Michigan Senate race I see a story of the impending Jewish divorce from the Democratic party and thus a refraction of my own political journey in America.

Shedding illusions is hard, and its even harder to do so when nostalgia performs a siren’s song. I speak from the experience of my family members in the former USSR, Israel, and America. When I reference the pain and pleasure of shedding of one’s political illusions, I also speak of the nearly forty years it’s taken to dispel my own. I’ve never once voted Republican, but over the past two years I have realized I can no longer vote Democratic. I detest Trump and will not vote for him or his menials, but I cannot give my vote to those who refuse to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and those who actively seek Israel’s undoing. This acknowledgment of political homelessness, a particularly difficult predicament for a Jewish immigrant in America, brings me to three closing reflections on the subject of the Senate election in Michigan.

One: Learn from the legacy of Jewish refuseniks. I have previously argued that refuseniks were the last great Jewish political movement in Diaspora. The purpose of the refusenik movement was to free Jews from the Soviet bondage. Ours was an activism on behalf of Jews that also made the world a better place, not the other way around. There is a direct lesson for today’s Jewish voters torn between their past allegiance to the Democratic party and the growing threat of its left wing. American Jews tend to celebrate their participation in American progressive politics while failing to see a powerful alternative in the activism of Jewish refuseniks. Would that today’s American Jews abandon the idea of political activism for the sake of others—including those who, like El-Sayed, openly articulate their opposition to Israel and Zionism.

Two: Putting an enemy of Jewish selfhood in the U.S. Congress can never be a Jewish goal. El-Sayed as a Democratic contender who exploits the climate of Trumpian America to empower himself is less troubling than the very idea of a candidate running against Israel. In this sense, El-Sayed is also a cipher for the radicalized left of the Democratic party: a younger, less Soviet (and more Baathist) muscular version of Senator Bernie Sanders. Explaining why he recently gave one million dollars to El-Sayed’s campaign (following the party lead of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), Senator Sanders stated: “I was outraged … that AIPAC … dumped 9 million dollars in support of Mike Rogers. … And what AIPAC wants is continued US financial support for the Netanyahu government in Israel, which, in my view, is a genocidal government … and a continuation of the war in Iran … . AIPAC and Netanyahu want to continue that war with Trump [sic], and I think we’ve got to end that war. Abdul believes we’ve got to end that war.”

Make no mistake: a vote for El-Sayed is a vote against Israel, not a vote against the Netanyahu government. Saying this during the Israeli elections that may well see Netanyahu defeated is especially revealing.

Three: A vote is not a matzevah—whatever else it says besides the pei-nun and one’s name in the past (political) life. A vote is not to be made out of nostalgia for a bygone political era. Do not vote to unearth your political past or your ancestral memories of Jewish activism on behalf of civil libertarianism. Those memories had been put to their final rest in the 1970s. Rather than submitting empty ballots of Jewish dignity, perhaps we should pour what remains of Jewish activism, Jewish influence and Jewish resources into a third party, moderate, centrist, founded on traditional liberal values? Or, perhaps instead America Jews should look beyond these shores toward a new great aliyah—the 21st century American aliyah.

I will stop here—out of nostalgia for the illusion of Jewish unity. In closing, I turn to Isaac Babel, that great poet of Jewish upheaval. Babel has a short story from 1913 titled “Childhood. At Grandmother’s.” This early gem features a Jewish boy’s weekly Shabbat visits with his grandmother. She feeds him abundant meals with gefilte fish and fruit compote and teaches him about life in her imperfect Russian with an admixture of Yiddish and Polish. I used to think that American Jews were done loving their children and grandchildren so much that they would break their hearts with harsh and cynical wisdom. Perhaps I was wrong. What this Odessan grandmother says to her grandson in the 1900s applies to the socio-political illusions of today’s Jewish voters who find themselves at the crossroads:
“’Learn,’ she suddenly speaks with power. ‘Learn, you will achieve everything—wealth and fame. You must know everything. All of them will fall and prostrate themselves before you. All must envy you. Do not have friends. Do not give them money. Do not give them your heart.’”
Month after thwarted flydubai attack, Israel issues stringent new rules for all airlines
A month after the attempted terrorist crashing of a flydubai flight bound for Tel Aviv from Dubai, Israeli authorities issued new, stringent directives on Thursday to both foreign and Israeli airlines, requiring them to submit crew information 48 hours prior to departure, amid other steps to bolster security.

The new directives require that any further updates regarding crew members are submitted during the check-in period and no later than two hours before takeoff, and that a final list be issued at takeoff. Bloomberg reported that the measures were ordered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after a security review, and are intended to allow adequate time for background checks.

The directives come after a near-disaster on September 30 as flydubai Flight FZ1073 was en route from Dubai to Tel Aviv, when the copilot, Omani national Hamam al-Hammami, attacked the captain, Smit Machchhar, and attempted to crash the aircraft. The plane plunged thousands of feet before several Israeli passengers burst into the cockpit, whose door Machchhar had managed to open, immobilized the terrorist copilot and initially stabilized the plane.

Two off-duty pilots aboard the flight then took over the controls and made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia before a replacement aircraft returned passengers to Tel Aviv.

Machchhar was seriously injured in the attack by Hammami, who struck him in the back of the head with an emergency axe.

The security requirements were issued by the National Center for Passenger Information Data Analysis, also known as Malan, a division within the Israel Tax Authority. The directives apply to all incoming and outgoing flights to and from Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport operated by all airlines, foreign and Israeli.

Non-Israeli carriers and Israeli airlines operating foreign aircraft flying in and out of Israel will henceforth be required to complete an online form with full details about pilots, cabin crew and passengers 48 hours before entering Israel, for review by the Israel Population and Immigration Authority.

The Immigration Authority will approve or reject requests to board passengers and crew members on flights entering Israel, departing from it, or passing through its territory.

The National Center for Passenger Information Data Analysis emphasized that the advance-notice period will give Israeli authorities more time to prepare than international practices generally allow and strengthen their ability to address potential security concerns.
Heroic flydubai captain and crew honored by UAE president
The captain and crew of the flydubai flight to Tel Aviv, which was attacked last month, were honored Tuesday by the president of the United Arab Emirates.

UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan awarded Indian pilot Smit Machchhar and the rest of the crew the First Class Order of Zayed II, one of the Gulf country’s top civilian honors, “in recognition of their courageous efforts to ensure the safety of passengers,” his office said.

The president praised the crew’s bravery and professionalism in protecting passengers during the attempted hijacking on September 30.

The Indian pilot, who has been recovering in an Abu Dhabi hospital after being attacked with a cockpit axe by his Omani co-pilot, attended the ceremony, with scars from his injuries still visible on his head and his arm in a cast.

Despite his severe injuries in the cockpit attack, he managed to open the door, allowing passengers to enter, tackle the assailant and take control of the aircraft.

He has been widely praised as a hero.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has invited him to light a torch at Israel’s Independence Day next year.


Douglas Murray: Will we always have Paris?
Naturally, France is still able to produce home-grown idiots too. I like to keep up with French writers because France is still a country in which philosophy and thought matter, though there is a perfectly good argument that this is part of the problem. You have to have thought and read an awful lot to be as wicked as some of France’s philosophers and writers can be.

Édouard Louis is one writer I always read. Louis, a disciple and friend of the memoirist and cast-iron shit Didier Eribon, has, like Eribon, made a career of writing in unsparing detail about the left-behind French working class and specifically the horrific lives of his immediate family. I can’t say his books are fun reading, but they are honest – and honesty is one of the things I like most in a writer.

Being the sort of person who is the toast of the French, and to some degree international, literary world, Louis is also a political ignoramus. Whenever he veers away from writing about what he knows and tries to talk about politics, he pours out the recycled pabulum you would expect from any other Saint-Germain-des-Prés philosophe who has read more about life than he has seen.

Interviewed on the radio recently, he came out with a full-throated defence of the rioting in the city which has made him rich and famous. Indeed, he declared that he was in favour of setting the streets of Paris alight and of going out and breaking things. According to him, the business of politics is a matter of deciding whether to have or not to have blood on your hands. He even came up with that predictable and banal phrase ‘there is no great revolution without excesses’.

Whenever I hear a writer, artist or philosopher speaking in these terms I think deeply un-Christian thoughts. They include the hope that this time one of the excesses might involve a precious young novelist being punched in the face and his own doubtless perfectly ordered apartment set on fire. All so the rest of us can sigh sympathetically and say that sadly this time it is his turn to feel the excesses of the revolution.

Knowingly, I suppose, Louis enters a distinguished line of foul French intellectuals, the most obvious being Jean-Paul Sartre, whose writings have to be read if you want to understand one way in which extreme violence can be normalised. In his introduction to Frantz Fanon’s execrable The Wretched of the Earth (a classic of ‘post-colonial literature’) you can read Sartre positively salivating about the prospect of blood being spilt. He does not abhor violent revolution; he desires it. He doesn’t mind the spilling of blood on the streets; he wants it. The close reader might notice, however, that it’s not Sartre’s blood that is on the menu for spilling – it’s always the blood of other people that will magically rejuvenate society.

In other words, it isn’t just France’s new culturally enriching population who believe burning things down can be good. Some of its home-grown best are up for it too. One French woman, Bettina Zourli, a sociology lecturer, was caught on camera last week arguing with a beautiful young Parisienne who had been threatened with rape by the rioters. Zourli appeared to have no sympathy for the victim, and explained to the younger woman that she was simply ‘collateral damage’. She has since apologised for her ‘clumsy’ words.

Like so many other French activists and thinkers, Zourli spoke her truth. France’s best include people who believe – to use the old cliché – that you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs. But they never do make their omelette. They just leave every-one else with a bloody, burned-out mess.
Douglas Murray: the Left’s Palestine 'fetish' – and why the West can still be saved | Quite right!
In the second part of Michael Gove’s conversation with Douglas Murray, they discuss the rise of antisemitism, the Left’s obsession with Palestine and the unlikely alliance between Islamists and the radical Left. What does the future hold for Israel – and would replacing Netanyahu really change anything?

They also turn to the things that make Western civilisation worth defending, from Britain's great cathedrals to classical music and literature. Despite the challenges facing the West, can it be saved even at the 13th hour?


Norman Finkelstein Claims Israel Hates Muslims, Then Goes SILENT When Asked This!

JewishUncensored: Dave Smith Tries To Humiliate Coleman Hughes. it Backfired



The soul of the Democratic Party is on the line in Michigan
Progressives believe themselves to be on the right side of history, soldiers fighting for a utopia that only suppressible bigotry and greed — rather than immutable human nature — could ever block.

That poisonous misimpression, paired with the ambition of self-serving conformists, is what’s empowered the antisemitic, anti-American, men-are-women-and-women-are-men wing of the Democratic Party.

The moderates don’t stand a chance — unless they’re able to teach their intra-party rivals a hard, irrefutable lesson about the consequences of their self-radicalization.

If there’s one thing that institutional Democrats care about, it’s power.

Pelosi despised Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez until she proved herself a national force, at which point the old hand became the upstart’s biggest fan.

Graham Platner retained the party’s support until it became clear he was going to get thrashed in a general election.

Bill Clinton, Ted Kennedy, Ilhan Omar; misogyny, manslaughter, and fraud — none of it mattered to the party because these knaves won elections.

Still, El-Sayed’s candidacy has haunted Democrats of conscience.

His primary opponent, Haley Stevens, is holding his feet to the fire and waffling on her support.

Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) has demanded that El-Sayed disavow an outside group’s ad repeating antisemitic talking points that echo the candidate’s own rhetoric.

Even Pelosi, the ruthless, hyperpartisan operator, conceded that El-Sayed’s failings are moral ones.

But without a galvanizing event to grant them the courage to take a real stand, these forces stand little chance of reversing their party’s precipitous decline.

El-Sayed’s defeat in a critical race amid an otherwise cresting Blue Wave would be just such an event.

As goes Michigan, so go the Democrats.

And that’s why every red-blooded American — and especially those invested in Team Donkey’s future — ought to be pulling for Michigan to reject El-Sayed on Tuesday.
Nancy Pelosi calls Mamdani, El-Sayed's past comments on Israel 'concerning' and 'wrong'
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., criticized New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed over their views on Israel Thursday, calling their positions "wrong" and saying they did not reflect congressional Democrats.

The two progressive Democrats were mentioned by "On Brand" podcast host Donny Deutsch, who asked Pelosi how he, as a Jewish man, could reconcile his support for the Democratic Party with politicians whose statements he considered antisemitic.

"When you say Israel doesn't have the right to be a Jewish state, that's antisemitic as far as I'm concerned with all that," Deutsch said.

When Pelosi asked for examples, Deutsch named Mamdani and El-Sayed, calling their comments "concerning."

"No, it's more than concerning," Pelosi responded. "It's wrong. It's wrong. And it isn't a reflection of the Democrats in the Congress of the United States. This new person in Michigan, we'll see if he gets elected to the Congress. But the mayor, bless his heart, I hope he succeeds as mayor, but I don't agree with some of the things he has said. But in terms of our people in the House of Representatives, if somebody says that, the other members disassociate themselves from it."

Before he was elected New York City mayor, Mamdani repeatedly dodged questions when asked if Israel should be a Jewish state. In a June 28 interview with ABC News, however, Mamdani said he supported Israel as a state with equal rights but declined to endorse it as a Jewish state.

"I think any state that privileges one religion over the other is one that I can’t tell you I support, whether it be Israel or Saudi Arabia or anywhere else," Mamdani said.

El-Sayed has repeatedly declined to affirm whether Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state. In a May appearance with Jewish supporters, the candidate said he "struggled" to answer this question and suggested the idea of a Jewish state wasn't consistent with the liberal values "we say we believe in here in the United States."

Earlier in the interview with Deutsch, Pelosi initially denied that anyone in the Democratic Party was antisemitic.

"The fact is that I really do not know of anybody there on our side who is engaged in antisemitism. That may be what it appears to be or what they're charged to be. But if they are, it's only a few. If there are, I think sometimes they say things that they shouldn't and can be interpreted that way," Pelosi said.

Despite her concerns about Mamdani and El-Sayed's comments, she dismissed their impact on the party as a whole.

"People represent their districts, and we have to respect that. The job description, job title is representative, but that doesn't mean it has an impact on the consensus of the Democratic Party, and [House Minority Leader] Hakeem Jeffries has been very clear on that," Pelosi said.


El-Sayed rejects Haley Stevens’ calls for apology over antisemitic ads
Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed on Friday rejected an appeal from Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) for him to publicly condemn an antisemitic ad in support of his campaign, which Stevens had made a condition of appearing at a joint event on Sunday.

Instead, El-Sayed attacked Stevens, his former Democratic primary opponent, days before the general election.

Stevens said in a statement Friday that she had been told that El-Sayed planned to condemn the Rebellion PAC ad, which blamed support of Israel on higher food prices. She also asked him to apologize for his own rhetoric on Israel and take down a campaign ad featuring Tucker Carlson, after having warned that he was alienating undecided Jewish and Black voters.

El-Sayed rejected those requests, and sounded a defiant note against the Democratic lawmaker, who endorsed him immediately after the primary and maintained as of Wednesday that she still planned to vote for him.

“While Congresswoman Stevens seems intent on relitigating a primary that ended three months ago, let’s all focus on the task at hand: that’s beating Mike Rogers, holding Trump accountable, and getting money out of politics, putting money in pockets, and passing Medicare for All,” he said.

The campaign added that El-Sayed has “always been focused on addressing the most critical challenges Michiganders are facing” which is “why our people-powered campaign defeated a historic $70M in outside spending from big corporations and AIPAC on behalf of Congresswoman Stevens.”


Abdul El-Sayed Campaigns With Louis Farrakhan’s Antisemitic ‘Student Minister’ Who Recently Pushed Conspiracy Theory That Jews Ran the Slave Trade
Muhammad is an influential figure in the Nation of Islam and a staunch defender of Farrakhan, who has hailed Adolf Hitler as a "great man" and compared Jews to "termites."

Muhammad, who rose through the Nation of Islam's ranks in Chicago, has repeatedly amplified the Nation's and Farrakhan's antisemitic rantings, the Washington Free Beacon reported. In addition to promoting the conspiracy video about Jews controlling the slave trade, Muhammad has also promoted a 2023 Farrakhan speech in which Farrakhan rationalized Hitler's actions in Nazi Germany, stating that "Hitler went against usury and Hitler attacked pornography that the Jews had put on the Germans."

Muhammad has invoked antisemitic conspiracy theories of his own.

In an interview with Nation of Islam members in May, Muhammad referred repeatedly to "the enemy"—a term the Nation of Islam often uses to refer to Jews—while discussing The Israel Lobby, a book that alleges Jews malignantly shape American foreign policy. "They have the muscle, they have the money, they have power, they have influence," said Muhammad.

In 2020, Muhammad defended Farrakhan with a photo stating that, "Yet for fear of the Jews no one spoke openly of him."

In 2021, Muhammad wrote of "the ongoing Jewish and Gentile Kristallnacht against Black Muslim businesses," invoking the Holocaust-era Nazi pogrom against Jews. Muhammad has called the Nation of Islam's "Muslim Program," an influential treatise that calls for racial segregation and states that "intermarriage or race mixing should be prohibited," the "ultimate solution" to America's "race problem."

Farrakhan has had significant influence on Muhammad's political career and his views towards Israel. Muhammad has stated that Farrakhan pushed him to run for political office, and told him during a meeting that "I'm your cornerman." In 2019, Muhammad said Farrakhan advised him to reject an invitation to visit Israel as part of a "peace mission" due to "the great dangers and hatred that exist." He wrote that he declined the visit because of Israel's "vitriolic disposition toward Muslims."

Muhammad's rhetoric and ties to the Nation of Islam have also drawn scrutiny from organizations that combat antisemitism.

The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), a coalition of 700 groups that fight antisemitism, removed Muhammad from its mayoral advisory board earlier this year following a Free Beacon report about his remarks about Israel and Jews and his affiliation with the Nation of Islam.

"CAM was recently made aware of positions and affiliations held by Mayor Muhammad that are inconsistent with CAM's mission. As a result, CAM decided he will no longer serve on the board, and he was notified accordingly," a spokesperson said, citing the Nation's "notorious record of antisemitism."

CAM also called out El-Sayed for stoking vitriol against Jews.

"The conspiratorial rhetoric espoused by Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has placed a target on the backs of Jews across Michigan and beyond," the CAM spokesman said.

Other Nation of Islam leaders have rallied behind El-Sayed in the closing days of the campaign, though the Nation of Islam as a whole has not issued an endorsement in the race.

Troy X. Muhammad, the head of the Nation of Islam's mosque in Detroit, attended an event in Dearborn on Thursday hosted by the Unity & Justice Fund, a PAC linked to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, that is backing El-Sayed.

Troy Muhammad, who appeared with El-Sayed at an event last year, has threatened Jews for criticizing Farrakhan.

"Those like the Jews who, like Goliath, they think that they're big, but Farrakhan will bring them down," he said in a 2018 video recording unearthed by the Free Beacon.


Hasan Piker compares suburban Jewish voters to white supremacists in online rant
In a screaming rant on his livestream on Friday, antisemitic influencer Hasan Piker compared the heavily Jewish community of West Bloomfield in the Detroit suburbs to a Ku Klux Klan neighborhood, describing it as full of Jewish supremacists. Piker’s monologue led Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed to condemn Piker’s comments as “inappropriate” without speaking out against Piker himself.

Piker, while watching a news segment about West Bloomfield and a group of canvassers for El-Sayed in the district, said, “I don’t think this is insensitive to say — this is the equivalent of going to that like KKK neighborhood to stump for a Black candidate who’s running expressly … to abolish anti-miscegenation laws.”

He said that, while the Jewish community in West Bloomfield might be aesthetically different, “the supremacist attitude underlying their worldview is identical. … It’s racial supremacy. It’s Jewish supremacy.”

“Thank god they probably don’t own any guns,” he added.

Responding to a person interviewed in the news segment who said that maintaining Israel as a safe haven for Jews is important to the Jewish community, Piker began shouting.

“Look at how beautiful your neighborhood is. What are you talking about, having a safe haven? You would never live in Israel … Even the thought of it disgusts you,” he continued. “If it’s so dangerous, go live in Israel. Oh you won’t?”


Green Party crisis: Defections, splits and member exodus over Zionism stance
Zack Polanski’s Green Party has been rocked by a wave of councillor defections and a dramatic fall in membership numbers, as fallout continues from the controversial adoption of the party’s Zionism racism policy.

Meanwhile, splits have emerged within the Green Group on Sheffield City Council over the incendiary motion passed at the Green Party conference earlier this month.

Leader Angela Argenzio has taken a hardline stance, supporting the equation of Zionism with racism in response to an ultimatum by Labour.

Labour Party chair Bridget Phillipson warned that local collaborations between the two parties would end unless the Greens reject the motion.

Jewish News understands that the future of the power-sharing agreement between the Greens and Labour in Sheffield will be decided next Wednesday. Some sources believe Labour will confirm a split from the Greens.

Labour’s Sheffield council leader Fran Belbin is understood to have relayed “messages of fear and anger” from within the city’s Jewish community to the Green Party leader, in an effort to change her mind over the impact of the Zionism motion.

Zack Polanski speaks at conference in Brighton
Belbin previously described the motion as “shameful and antisemitic.”

Three senior Sheffield Greens – Alexi Dimond , Maroof Raouf and Mustafa Ahmed — have publicly backed the motion, and are the driving force behind the attempt to defy Labour.

A wave of defections by Green councillors also continued over the past week.

On Wealden District Council in Sussex, led by Greens deputy co-leader Rachel Millward, Cllr Christina Coleman confirmed on Thursday that she had defected to the Liberal Democrats. Her decision, she said, was driven by concerns about “the party’s direction under Zack Polanski’s leadership and the recent conference motion on Zionism.”

Coleman’s defection was one of dozens of similar moves by Green councillors across the country. Some, including Cllr Drew Creek of Newquay, Cornwall, opted to leave the party for Labour specifically due to the Zionism motion.
France restricts Israeli arms displays at Paris naval defence exhibition
France has imposed fresh restrictions on Israeli defence companies participating in a major naval arms exhibition in Paris, while continuing to bar Israeli government representatives.

Israeli firms will be allowed to display air defence and missile interception technology at next week’s biennial Euronaval exhibition, but not offensive weapons. The measures affect major companies expected to attend, including Israel Aerospace Industries, Rafael, Elbit Systems and Israel Shipyards.

Since the outbreak of the war on October 7 2023, French authorities have repeatedly restricted Israeli companies’ participation in major arms exhibitions. At the Eurosatory defence exhibition in June, they ordered Israeli weapons classified as offensive to be concealed behind black walls.

At the previous Euronaval exhibition, Israeli companies were initially barred altogether, before successfully challenging the decision in a Paris court. However, the ruling came so close to the exhibition’s opening that the companies didn't have enough time to prepare their displays.

Euronaval’s general commissioner, Guillaume Merveilleux du Vignaux, said: “We were very recently informed of a decision by the French government to authorise Israeli exhibitors within a very clearly defined and restrictive framework, limited to the exhibition of equipment dedicated exclusively to anti-aircraft, anti-missile and anti-ballistic defence.”

He added: “The Israeli government or its representatives will not participate in the exhibition … There are a small half-dozen Israeli exhibitors who have registered.”

Israel’s defence industry has reported record exports and growing order books since the Hamas attacks of October 7 2023, amid heightened global demand for air defence, missile interception and battlefield technologies.
International dock workers strike to protest arms shipments, including to Israel
Dockworkers in Europe and beyond were staging strikes on Friday as part of an international campaign against arms shipments and to demand better working conditions, unions said.

Unions in France, Italy, Greece, Spain, Turkey and Morocco issued a joint call to demand an end to the wars in the Middle East, including the war in Gaza, and “an end to the militarization of ports.”

“Ports must not be used for the transport of weapons, ammunition, military equipment and troops,” the statement said. “Dockworkers do not work for war!”

Organizers say more than 100 ports across multiple countries joined the protest movement that could affect port operations in parts of Europe, the Mediterranean region and North America.

The Global Sumud Flotilla, a pro-Palestinian campaign group that repeatedly tried to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza, said it would execute “coordinated, strategic actions on the water” to support the strike.

In May 2026, dockworkers’ unions from over 35 European countries published the so-called Istanbul Declaration demanding that port facilities not be used to transport weapons destined for war zones.

Italian harbors, with Genoa at the forefront, have played a leading role in protests against arms shipments, frequently blocking cargo shipments bound for Israel and for US military bases. Passengers walk through the port of Piraeus during a 24-hour seafarers’ strike over pay, working conditions and safety, alongside protests by port workers against the transport of military equipment through ports, near Athens, Greece, October 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)

However, much of the arms that travel through ports is actually destined for Europe.

Over 2021-2025, Europe became the world’s biggest arms importer, data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute showed earlier this year.
Swedish climate activist barred from UK ahead of planned event with Palestine Action founder
The Swedish climate activist Andreas Malm has been barred from entering the UK ahead of a planned speaking engagement alongside the co-founder of the banned Palestine action group.

He was due to speak alongside Huda Ammori at an event next Wednesday, where he was expected to challenge the decision to proscribe the group and make claims about the ban’s impact on author Sally Rooney.

Malm – author of The Destruction of Palestine Is The Destruction of the Earth, and How to Blow Up a Pipeline – was reportedly informed by immigration officials that his presence in the UK “may not be considered to be conducive to the public good”.

His speaking engagement at the conference, put on by the Tribune organisation, and another planned appearance on BBC Radio 4’s Radical With Gabriel Gatehouse programme, were held at the same time as a challenge to the proscription of Palestine Action in the Supreme Court goes ahead next week.

Malm’s book The Destruction of Palestine begins with the words: “We have now clocked half a year of this genocide. Half a year has passed since the resistance launched Tufan al Aqsa…”

It continues: “The state of Israel is now committing the worst crime known to humanity…”

Tufan al Aqsa is the Arabic name for the large-scale terror operation launched by Hamas and the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades against Israel on October 7.

Published by Verso Books in January 2025, the book attempts to argue that Israel’s military actions in Gaza are deeply tied to an environmental catastrophe and fossil-fuelled capitalism.


Four new defendants charged in plot targeting Jewish groups, University of Michigan leaders
Federal prosecutors in Detroit charged four more people in an alleged campaign of intimidation against Jewish organizations, University of Michigan leaders and businesses perceived to have ties to Israel, bringing the total number of defendants in the case to 12.

The latest defendants — Henry David MacKeen-Shapiro, 23; Aaron Hunter Vonbargen, 25; Joseph Mark Fisher, 23; and Srishti Tarana Sharma, 23 — are accused of participating in the campaign targeting the Jewish Federation of Detroit, university leadership, campus law enforcement personnel and several businesses. Two were arrested this week, while the other two remain at large.

“From Pharaoh to Hitler to Hamas, those who terrorize Jews have been the bad guys. As Americans, our job is to fight the bad guys,” U.S. Attorney Jerome Gorgon, the top federal prosecutor in Detroit, said.

The arrests follow the June indictment of eight other anti-Israel activists affiliated with the University of Michigan.

Following the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks in Israel, the defendants carried out a series of coordinated actions targeting university leaders or organizations with connections to Israel, according to the indictment. On the one-year anniversary of the attacks, they vandalized Detroit’s Jewish Federation building and two other businesses, spray-painting words including “intifada.”

They also forcibly entered and occupied university buildings, defaced property and disrupted campus events — and placed fake bloody corpses outside the homes of multiple university leaders, including then-University of Michigan President Santa Ono, over their perceived support for Israel.
When Jewish teachers fight back: American Jewish teachers push back against antisemitism
For the first time in the NEA’s 169-year history, religion and ethnicity were explicitly listed as protected categories against discrimination. Delegates were guaranteed the right to participate in meetings without harassment, intimidation, or exclusionary targeting.

New procedures also made it possible to enforce rules against harassment and intimidation, with electronic voting replacing the shouting that had accompanied contentious votes.

In addition, the NEA advanced a resolution supporting the recruitment of Jewish American teachers, training to address bullying and hate crimes against Jewish students and educators, and recognition of Jewish American Heritage Month.

Delegates also updated the union’s Holocaust resolution to name Jews specifically, recognizing the Holocaust as an attempt to annihilate the Jewish people.

Rather than resigning from their union posts in the face of a hostile environment, educators like Bloom and her colleagues in the Jewish Affairs Caucus decided to stay, organize, and successfully write new anti-discrimination protections into the governing documents of America’s largest teachers’ union.

“Fighting antisemitism right now can feel risky, exhausting, and never-ending,” Bloom said. “But this year, we know people finally listened.”

This is grassroots advocacy at its best.

Bloom recommends building relationships, particularly with the leadership, so that you can reach out for support. They need to know the Jewish story and our connection to our ancestral homeland, Israel.

“We also realized how important it is to know Robert’s Rules of Order very well and how these formal meetings work.”

Which made me think of my late father, who moderated the Colchester Town Meetings where town decisions were made. He conducted them according to Robert’s Rules of Order and knew every detail.

My parents would have relished this fight.


CNN Blurs the Lines Between Fact and Political Spin
CNN’s Chief Political Analyst David Axelrod suggested Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be blamed for Hamas’s massacre while labeling AIPAC “Israel’s lobby” in America on the network’s primetime show “Midterms 2026: Countdown to Election Night” on Oct. 18, 2026.

Both claims twisted basic facts: shifting blame for a terrorist massacre and maligning an American advocacy group as a foreign agent.

During the heated panel exchange, Axelrod faulted Netanyahu for doing “terrible damage” to the U.S.-Israeli relationship. When Senior Political Commentator Scott Jennings responded, asking why it was Netanyahu’s fault that his nation was attacked, Axelrod replied: “Actually, it may be. We don’t know.” Axelrod argued that Netanyahu’s refusal to authorize a customary official review of the intelligence failures preceding the attack linked him to the massacre itself.

Despite pushback from CNN’s Brian Todd, who noted that “negligence didn’t lead to a massacre,” Axelrod doubled down. When Jennings directly asked, “Who did the massacring?” Axelrod refused to answer. Contributor Lulu Garcia-Navarro then framed the exchange as a reflection of the ongoing debate among the Israeli electorate regarding the government’s accountability.

Garcia-Navarro is correct that Israelis are debating their government’s security failures. A state commission of inquiry – the kind of “official review” Axelrod referenced – would investigate the massive operational failures of October 7. Still, Jennings did not ask whether Netanyahu’s government failed to prevent the attack; he asked whether it was Netanyahu’s fault that Israel was attacked in the first place. Axelrod’s answer moved from the question of security negligence to the question of responsibility for the attack itself.

Regardless of Axelrod’s long-standing friction with Netanyahu, failing to stop an attack and committing one are fundamentally separate questions—a distinction Israel itself already makes.

Alongside the debate over the state commission of inquiry, Israel’s parliament in May 2026 approved the “Prosecution law for the October 7 Massacre,” which, according to CNN’s own reporting, creates a dedicated tribunal to prosecute roughly 400 Hamas Nukhba terrorists held in Israeli custody since the attack. One process asks how the attack was able to happen. The other holds accountable those who carried it out.

Whatever a commission ultimately finds about Israel’s security failures, those findings would not transfer responsibility for the torture, murder, and kidnapping of October 7 away from Hamas and the others who chose to commit them.

A commission investigating security failures serves a different purpose than an inquiry into perpetrators. Even if Israel’s border infrastructure had completely collapsed, responsibility for the torture, murder, and kidnapping of October 7 would still rest solely with Hamas and the civilians who chose to commit them. Blurring these lines allows terrorists to evade responsibility for the horrors they inflicted.

Axelrod’s willingness to obscure key facts (or have an intellectually honest conversation) was not isolated to the October 7 discussion; it was also evident when addressing American advocacy organizations.


Inside the bizarre Nuremberg trial ‘witness house’ shared by Nazis and Holocaust survivors
It has to be history’s strangest — and potentially most discordant — lodging house. Opened by the Allies in the autumn of 1945, its guests had one thing in common: they had all been called as witnesses in the Nuremberg Trial. Beyond that, they shared little else.

The “extraordinary cast of characters” who were to stay over the coming months at 24 Novalistrasse ranged from “Hitler’s champions to his victims, from perpetrators of Nazi atrocities to survivors of concentration camps.” This motley crew is the focus of author Natalie Livingstone’s new book, “The Nuremberg Women: The Untold Story of the Eight Women Who Brought the Nazis to Justice,” which will be published in the United States on November 3.

As Wehrmacht generals, Nazi academics, and the wives of members of Hitler’s Cabinet rubbed shoulders with Polish Jews and French survivors of Auschwitz, the burden of soothing tensions and keeping the peace fell on Countess Ingeborg Kálnoky — a Prussian aristocrat handpicked by the Americans for the role of hostess.

A mother of four, Ingeborg was “brave, beautiful and fearless,” according to Livingstone, with looks compared to Hollywood star Jean Harlow. Her diary and subsequent book — one of the first about the Nuremberg trials by a woman — provides an invaluable account of the incredible story that unfolded at “the witness house.”

The house itself was in the Nuremberg suburb of Erlenstegen. Situated in a quiet cul-de-sac, the two-story property was rather more modest than the Gothic castle in Thuringia in which Ingeborg had been raised — or the three-story house on Budapest’s affluent Széher Street where she and her husband, Hugó, who came from a line of Hungarian nobility that stretched back six centuries, entertained the city’s social and cultural movers and shakers.

But the house on Novalistrasse offered a degree of safety, stability and security Kálnoky had not seen since the Nazi invasion of Hungary in March 1944.

Ingeborg and Hugó, who met at art school in Munich in the early 1930s, had been on the run from the Nazis for a number of years. They had left the Reich for Budapest in 1939 soon after the German invasion of the Sudetenland.

Hugó, a conservative monarchist and fierce anti-Nazi, became editor of a German-language newspaper, in which he attacked Hungary’s alliance with Hitler and praised Winston Churchill.
Montreal synagogue targeted for second time in six months
Police are investigating after several windows at a Montreal synagogue were damaged late on Thursday night in what Jewish groups described as possible pellet gun fire, the second violent incident at Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom in less than six months.

The Reform synagogue, founded in 1882, was the target of a firebombing in June. No injuries were reported.

“Enough is enough. This must stop,” the Federation CJA and Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs said jointly on Friday. “The Montreal Jewish community is tired of fearing for its safety and the safety of its children.”

CIJA is the advocacy arm of the Jewish Federations of Canada-UIA.

Montreal police and Federation CJA’s Community Security Network responded after being alerted to the incident.

“Based on the information we currently have, there is no active threat to the community at this time,” the Jewish groups stated. “Nevertheless, in a climate of rising antisemitism, we take this kind of incident extremely seriously.”

They urged community members to report suspicious activity.


Police probe Nazi swastika on Jewish NY candidate’s campaign sign as hate crime
Newburgh, N.Y., a town of about 31,825 located some 70 miles north of Manhattan, is probing a Nazi swastika on a campaign sign as a hate crime, its police chief told JNS.

A swastika was spray-painted on both sides of the sign for Scott Manley, a Jewish Republican running for town supervisor who currently serves as deputy supervisor, Manley told JNS.

“It is early in the investigation and no arrests have been made at this point,” Donald Bruce Campbell, chief of the town’s Police Department, told JNS on Thursday.

Newburgh is located in New York’s Hudson Valley, in Orange County, about 17 miles from the Chassidic enclave of Kiryas Joel.

Newburgh has an established Jewish community, including Kol Yisrael, a Jewish community center that houses Congregation Agudas Israel and Temple Beth Jacob, Manley told JNS.

He was in the middle of a radio interview on Wednesday morning when he received a text message alerting him to the swastika, he said. Less than two minutes later, another friend drove past the sign on Lakeside Road near Orange Lake, took a photograph and sent it to him.

“My stomach just turned,” Manley told JNS. “I missed a question on the radio interview.”

As soon as the interview ended, Manley drove to the sign and contacted the police chief, who dispatched an officer to the scene, he said.

“You always felt safe in your community,” Manley told JNS. “It was one thing to get the picture yesterday, but when I pulled up and saw it, you know, for the first time,” he became emotional.

“The first thing I thought of was my mom because her family went through a lot,” he said.

Manley said his nephew had researched their family genealogy and discovered that more than 200 relatives, mostly in the Netherlands, had been killed in the Holocaust.

“It really affected me,” he told JNS. “I was just in shock.”


From the NHS to Israel: Why British Jewish doctors are considering Aliyah
An NHS psychiatrist whose patient refused medication because she was Jewish. A dentist whose former manager allegedly suggested Jews had little reason to complain because they were not being sent to the gas chambers.

Both are considering leaving Britain for Israel, although neither sees antisemitism as the sole reason for moving.

They are among British Jewish medical professionals exploring opportunities in Israel, where hospitals are seeking overseas recruits to address staff shortages.

Around 150 British doctors attended MedEx UK at JW3 in north London on Sunday, according to organisers, meeting Israeli medical recruiters to discuss employment, licensing and the practicalities of making Aliyah.

For some, experiences of antisemitism and growing isolation in Britain have brought forward plans to move. Others have long wanted to live in Israel and hope to contribute their skills to its healthcare system.

The event came amid an increase in British Aliyah. Figures released by The Jewish Agency for Israel show that 890 people moved from the UK to Israel in 2025, compared with 704 in 2024 and 377 in 2023.

A further 445 made Aliyah between January and July this year, including 39 people working in medicine or other healthcare professions.
Israeli-American-made space vest on display at Smithsonian
A radiation protection vest, developed by an Israeli-American company and worn by astronauts aboard the International Space Station, went on display Friday morning at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

The AstroRad vest, developed by StemRad, was worn by four female U.S. astronauts and an Israeli private astronaut during routine daily activities aboard the space station.

“Having AstroRad displayed at the Smithsonian is a tremendous honor and a proud milestone for our team,” stated Oren Milstein, CEO and co-founder of StemRad.

StemRad was founded in 2011. In 2023, the company secured a $4.5 million agreement with the U.S. Department of Defense for its 360-degree gamma-shielding gear for use by the U.S. National Guard.

“Knowing that a technology we developed to help protect astronauts is now being recognized as part of the history of space exploration is incredibly rewarding,” Milstein stated.

“With AstroRad also on display at Kennedy Space Center following the groundbreaking Artemis I mission, we hope these exhibits will inspire future generations to tackle the challenges of human space exploration,” he said.

AstroRad was developed in collaboration with Lockheed Martin to address ionizing radiation in space.

Research findings published in Science Advances suggested that “AstroRad’s ability to dramatically reduce radiation exposure during potentially cancer-inducing solar radiation storms.”
Morocco opens first publicly funded museum dedicated to Jewish culture in Arab Muslim country
The Museum of Moroccan Jewish Culture opened earlier this month in the North African country, marking the first time an Arab Muslim country has allocated public funds to establish a museum dedicated to Jewish culture.

The move comes amid growing ties between the two nations, and a recent agreement to upgrade diplomatic relations, including opening embassies and appointing ‌ambassadors.

The museum in the northeastern Moroccan city of Fez, which opened its doors on Oct. 12, is located in the ancient Jewish quarter or Mellah, 100 meters from the Museum of Islamic Arts, in a move meant to highlight the country’s history of coexistence between Jews and Muslims.

The 1,700-square-meter (18,300 square-foot) site, donated by the local Jewish community, covers 2,500 years of Moroccan Jewish history.

The new Museum of Moroccan Jewish Culture in Fez pairs with the historic Museum of Moroccan Judaism in Casablanca to offer a fuller picture of the country’s Jewish history.

“The museum highlights the deep historical connections between Morocco’s Jewish and Muslim communities,” Serge Berdugo, president of the council of Moroccan Jewish Communities, told JNS on Thursday. “It represents an important step in preserving and transmitting Moroccan Jewish heritage to future generations.”

The museum’s facade has a brass inscription in four languages: Arabic, Amazigh, Hebrew and French; its exhibits showcase religious artifacts, rare manuscripts, historical archives and digital installations on synagogues, Hebrew schools and rabbinical courts.

Around 250,000 Jews lived in Morocco in 1948, which was once home to the largest Jewish community in North Africa, before waves of emigration to Israel, France and Canada.

About 2,000 Jews live in Morocco today, making it the largest Jewish community in the Arab world.


Looking back at Patrick Stewart's Israeli movie, 'Hunting Elephants'
Although Patrick Stewart, the acclaimed British actor who passed away on Thursday, was best known for his roles in the Star Trek and the X-Men movie franchises and his theatrical career, he also had an Israeli movie on his long list of credits: Reshef Levi’s 2013 Hunting Elephants.

The movie, which was the opening-night film of the Jerusalem Film Festival, was a caper comedy set in Jerusalem that featured Stewart alongside an all-star cast of Israeli actors. Stewart played the great-uncle of a young boy (Gil Blank) who spends time with his grandfather (Sasson Gabbai) and his grandfather’s friend (Moni Moshonov) at their assisted-living facility, who are former bank robbers. After the sudden death of his father, a bank guard (Zvika Hadar), the bank refuses to pay out the father’s pension over a technicality. Stewart comes to Israel to help the grandfather and his buddy rob the bank to get the money that is due to the boy’s family.

The movie explains Stewart's connection to the family by saying that the boy’s grandmother, who is now comatose, is British. In my review when the movie when it was first released, I praised Stewart as the best thing about Hunting Elephants: “[Stewart] injects the film with life and flamboyance. His role is a series of comic bits, one of the best of which is a flashback to him in England performing in a Star Wars-themed version of Hamlet… He plays a lord and failed actor who is broke and has even sold his title to pay the bills. Between the two old Israelis’ criminal background, Stewart’s talent for making an impression and deceiving people, and the boy’s knowledge of the bank’s security system, which his father was kind enough to explain to him in detail just before he died, it’s the perfect set-up for a caper movie.” One of the highlights of the movie was a music-hall performance by Stewart at the old people’s home.

In a press conference to promote the movie in Tel Aviv before filming started, Stewart said, “This movie is unlike anything else I’ve ever done, because every other character in the film, but Michael, my character, speaks Hebrew.” It turned out that he was a last-minute substitute for John Cleese, who was originally cast in the role but became ill before filming started. Stewart said he had visited Israel for the first time a year before making the movie, as a tourist, before performing in a stage production of The Merchant of Venice, a role which he had played five times. “In all the decades that had gone by, the one place I should have visited, to give this role verisimilitude, was Israel,” he said. On the earlier visit, he had had spent “four extraordinary days” in Israel and had not wanted to leave.

A few months later, he said, “I open a package and there is a script of an Israeli film and it’s set in Jerusalem. I couldn’t have been happier. And then I read the script and found out it was very funny and it had some very distinguished actors in it. So, I am delighted to be back, not as a tourist but as part of an Israeli film production.”


Hunting Elephants (2013) | Official Trailer - Patrick Stewart, Sasson Gabai
In Jerusalem, a bullied teen befriends his grandfather and long lost uncle and soon they decide to solve their financial problems by robbing a bank.



 



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