Jewish Insider

11/07/2025

As negotiations continue for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, in which half of the remaining 50 hostages are expected to return to Israel over 60 days, families of those still being held are waiting to learn if their loved ones will be among those coming home soon.

About 20 of the hostages are thought to be alive, but the families of the 30 others are also hoping to have a measure of closure, with their loved ones’ remains returned to be buried in Israel.

Rabbi Doron Perez described this period, in which there is constant discussion of a possible deal with hostages’ bodies returned to Israel, “is very nerve-wracking. … It aggravates the wound.”

His son Daniel was a 22-year-old officer in the IDF armored corps on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel. For five months, the family thought Daniel had been kidnapped, before learning that he had been killed on the day of the terrorist attacks and his body taken to Gaza.

Full story: https://ji.news/3n94svc

11/07/2025

The Senate Armed Services Committee’s draft of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, passed out of committee this week, includes provisions aimed at furthering coordinated air and missile defense efforts in the Middle East.

The amendment, led by Sen. Joni Ernst, highlights the ‘serious and growing’ missile threats from Iran and its proxies

11/07/2025

A top Senate lawmaker indicated that he’s open to resumed U.S. involvement in the campaign against the Houthis, amid a ramp-up of the group’s attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Israel that comes two months after the U.S. and the Houthis reached a ceasefire that ended the American bombing campaign against the group.

“The Houthis need to be totally eliminated,” Sen. Roger Wicker, the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told Jewish Insider.“They have no purpose other than to kill free people.”

Asked if the U.S. should become involved directly against the Houthis again, Wicker said, “I wouldn’t rule that out.”

Full story: https://ji.news/3n94iqb

11/07/2025

Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin declined to criticize New York City Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani’s refusal to condemn the “globalize the intifada” slogan.

The DNC chair, who was elected earlier this year, praised the party for being a “big tent” comprising different ideologies, including “leftists” such as Mamdani.

Asked during a “PBS NewsHour” interview about concerns from Jewish Democrats regarding Mamdani’s refusal to condemn the phrase, Martin replied, “There’s no candidate in this party that I agree 100 percent of the time with, to be honest with you. There’s things that I don’t agree with Mamdani that he said.”

Full story: https://ji.news/3n94fhf

11/07/2025

EXCLUSIVE | A group comprised largely of Democratic House lawmakers wrote to Elon Musk on Thursday condemning the antisemitic and violent screeds published by X’s AI chatbot Grok earlier this week, calling the posts “deeply alarming” and demanding answers about recent updates made to the bot that may have enabled the disturbing posts.

“We write to express our grave concern about the internal actions that led to this dark turn. X plays a significant role as a platform for public discourse, and as one of the largest AI companies, xAI’s work products carry serious implications for the public interest,” the letter reads. “Unfortunately, this isn’t a new phenomenon at X. Grok’s recent outputs are just the latest chapter in X’s long and troubling record of enabling antisemitism and incitement to spread unchecked, with real-world consequences.”

Full story: https://ji.news/3n949zq

11/07/2025

On the sidelines of the Sun Valley Conference this week, Jordanian King Abdullah II met with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

The Royal Hashemite Court said the two “discussed the positive economic relationship between the United States and Jordan.”

The Jordanian king is a rare foreign head of state who regularly attends the annual Allen & Co. summer gathering

11/07/2025

Rep. Mike Lawler has introduced bipartisan legislation that would expedite arms sales to U.S. partners that normalize relations with Israel and work with the U.S. in its efforts to counter Iran and its terrorist proxies.

Rep. Lawler: ‘I am committed to strengthening our relationships with regional partners and putting our ally Israel in the best position possible to do the same’

10/07/2025

Jeff Bartos, the Trump administration’s nominee for U.S. representative to the United Nations for U.N. management and reform, said at his confirmation hearing that Trump’s presidency provides unique opportunities to work to compel change and reform at the U.N., including in its alleged bias against Israel.

Bartos, a Jewish Republican, previously ran for U.S. Senate and lieutenant governor in Pennsylvania.

At his confirmation hearing, Jeff Bartos described the U.N. as ‘almost immune to reform’ but said that U.S. leadership from Trump as a ‘unique window of opportunity’ to force reform by leveraging U.S. funding.

10/07/2025

The goodwill gestures toward Israel from Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa began modestly. In a surprise move that came only months after he and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group toppled the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president gave Israel Syria’s archive of documents relating to captured Israeli spy Eli Cohen, who was captured and executed in Syria in 1965, and the remains of soldier Zvi Feldman, who was killed in battle in 1982.

Then, al-Sharaa pressured the terrorist groups Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to disarm, leading some of the groups’ leaders to flee the country.

And when Israel sent its bombers streaking toward Iran’s nuclear sites last month, Syria did not intervene with or publicly oppose Israel’s use of its airspace.

Taken together, these steps and others are leading to a warming of relations between Israel and its northern neighbor, a reality that seemed almost unthinkable just a few months ago.

A senior official in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s delegation to Washington emphasized this week that talk of peace between Israel and Syria is premature, saying that “agreements with Lebanon and Syria are not a matter of the short term, but they’re possible.”

Full story: https://ji.news/3n82hun

10/07/2025

An Israeli chemist who resigned from Stanford University is suing the school after he claims it was complicit in antisemitism that he faced at the school — including the alleged tampering with his lab results.

The Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and Los Angeles-based law firm Cohen Williams LLP filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Shay Laps, a Jewish Israeli postdoctoral researcher who was hired by Stanford in April 2024 after being recommended by a Nobel laureate. Laps’ research focused on synthetic and “smart” insulin, aiming to revolutionize diabetes treatment.

The allegations: According to the lawsuit, after arriving in professor Danny Chou’s Stanford lab, Laps was targeted by a lab staffer who knew that he was a Jewish scientist from Israel. At their first meeting, the suit alleges, the staffer told Laps, the only Israeli in the building, never to speak to her, and later excluded Laps from sitting with her and other staffers during lunch.

The complaint also names Chou, an associate professor of pediatrics and the lab’s leader and mentor, as a defendant. The discrimination escalated when, according to Laps, the lab staffer tampered with his research, producing fraudulent results without his knowledge.

Full story: https://ji.news/3n8293g

10/07/2025

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gathered with Senate leaders on Capitol Hill on Wednesday to discuss the ongoing efforts to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and expand the Abraham Accords.

Behind closed doors: Netanyahu spoke for around 30 to 40 minutes about the rationale for Israel’s actions in Iran and Gaza and his vision for the Middle East, including the normalization of ties with Saudi Arabia and Syria through an expanded Abraham Accords, before taking questions from the group, two senators in attendance told Jewish Insider.

On Gaza, Netanyahu said that he and the U.S. were trying to reach a ceasefire deal with Hamas and did not suggest he had any opposition to the push, something one of the senators described as a shift in tone for the Israeli prime minister.

Full story: https://ji.news/3n823ma

10/07/2025

Earlier this year at a symposium in New York City, Jewish scholars gathered to analyze the recent surge of antisemitism on college campuses and debate whether Jewish students still belong at the country’s elite bastions of higher education.

Over the next two months, college freshmen will embark on new chapters at universities around the country. Many Jewish students have found appeal in other top schools, such as Vanderbilt and Washington University, where administrators were quick to enforce university rules amid rising antisemitism in the aftermath of the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks, and therefore avoided much of the chaos that played out on other campuses. But some Jewish students are still seeking admission to the country’s most prestigious schools.

Leah Kreisler, a recent graduate of Winston Churchill High School in Potomac, Md., decided in ninth grade that she wanted to attend Columbia. Kreisler plans to enroll in Columbia’s dual-degree program with the Jewish Theological Seminary and will begin next year, following a gap year in Israel. Recent events have only reinforced Kreisler’s dream of attending the storied institution.

“Columbia has always had a politically charged environment and I honestly think that fits a part of who I am,” she told Jewish Insider. “I like having those kinds of discussions and engaging with people I disagree with. That spirit drew me to the school.”

Full story: https://ji.news/3n8zvtd