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JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT. |
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WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION |
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Today: New attack in Amsterdam, Jewish professor who sees genocide in Gaza set to teach Cornell course on it, Trump promises to return prayer to schools, interest in moving to Israel is up, and remembering the biblical Rachel on her yahrzeit. |
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Sen. Marco Rubio, a former Trump rival, joined the campaign trail in its final days. (Getty) |
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Mister Secretary
President-elect Donald Trump is expected to nominate Sen. Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, to be secretary of state in his second administration. The choice of Rubio, a foreign policy hawk, would likely reassure both Israel and traditional Republicans amid concerns about Trump’s inner circle pushing an isolationist approach.
But Rubio has moderated in recent years. He voted against emergency funding to Israel in April, arguing that the aid package should have included border enforcement measures. He also objected to its linkage with aid for Ukraine and Taiwan.
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Related: Another name bandied about for secretary of state was Vivek Ramaswamy, the biotech entrepreneur and former presidential candidate, who had suggested cutting aid to Israel. He is still a candidate for a top post, possibly Education Secretary. |
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Stephen Miller has attracted opposition from Jewish groups over his approach to immigration. (Getty) |
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Staffing up
Trump’s second-term team is starting to take shape. Stephen Miller, whose ancestors escaped anti-Jewish pogroms, is likely to be Trump’s new deputy chief of staff. He was the architect of the so-called Muslim ban and other tough border policies during Trump’s first term.
Trump nominated Lee Zeldin, a Jewish former congressman from New York, to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. The president-elect said Zeldin would enact “swift deregulatory decisions” to “unleash the power of American businesses.”
Trump chose Rep. Mike Waltz, a Florida congressman and former Green Beret, to serve as his national security adviser. His portfolio would include issues relating to the Middle East. (CNN)
Related: Every U.S. president since Jimmy Carter has had a liaison to the Jewish community — except for Donald Trump. Both Democrats and Republicans think he should hire one in his second term.
Plus… Trump was the first Republican presidential candidate since 2000 to win the majority-Arab city of Dearborn, Michigan. (AP)
In a video posted Monday, Trump promised to dismantle the Department of Education, and said “we will support bringing back prayer to our schools,” something the Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional in 1962. (ABC News)
Vice President-elect JD Vance quoted the wisdom of a serial killer from a Coen Brothers film. Our culture reporter, PJ Grisar, puts it in context.
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People examine a damaged streetcar in Amsterdam after it was set on fire Monday night. (Getty) |
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A second Amsterdam riot
Anti-Israel protesters started a fire inside a tram car in Amsterdam on Monday and riot police were called to disperse them. The ruckus erupted days after Israeli soccer fans visiting the Dutch capital were chased and beaten in what some described as an antisemitic pogrom. Several people were arrested. Read more ► Dutch Jews are coping with the fallout. Lievnath Faber, a local rabbinical student, said the community was “shaken” but added, “Once the dust has settled, we will be able to take our role as bridge builders, which is difficult at the moment.” (JTA)
A vandal defaced a monument in France honoring Holocaust victims. Officials are investigating the latest in a series of antisemitic incidents in the country in recent months. (Algemeiner)
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Natan Bahat, part of Kibbutz Nir Oz’s founding generation, fixes the lock on a door shot by terrorists on Oct. 7. Bahat moved back to Nir Oz as soon as possible after the attack. (Rina Castelnuovo) |
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The latest… A Hezbollah drone struck a kindergarten near Haifa Tuesday morning. The kids were in a shelter and unharmed. (Times of Israel)
The IDF reported that five of its soldiers were killed Monday in fighting in Gaza. Palestinian officials say 37 people in Gaza were killed by Israeli strikes Sunday and Monday. (Times of Israel, Reuters)
Nefesh B’Nefesh, a nonprofit that helps American Jews move to Israel, says there has been a surge of interest in the past year. “Jewish people are drawn to their nation when there are threats to it,” a spokeswoman for the group said. (Washington Post)
Residents of Kibbutz Nir Oz, which was decimated in the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, voted on Monday to rebuild instead of starting fresh somewhere else. Our Arno Rosenfeld chronicled their internal division over the future this fall.
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The famous deli scene in When Harry Met Sally, starring Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal. The film was written by Nora Ephron. (Castle Rock Entertainment) |
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‘I’ll have what she’s having’
A new book explores the films of Nora Ephron — including When Harry Met Sally with that infamous deli scene — but leaves out much of her Jewish identity. That’s because Judaism informed Ephron’s work in an understated way, said author Ilana Kaplan. To Ephron, Judaism was “completely part of her gestalt, her prism,” explained a friend, Abigail Pogrebin. Go deeper ►
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READERS LIKE YOU SHAPE EVERY PART OF OUR WORKWhile the Forward is now free to read, it isn’t free to produce. As a nonprofit, member-supported newsroom, we answer to our readers, not to institutions. |
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WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY |
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Cornell University is one of many schools where controversies continue to rage over the Israel-Hamas war. (Getty) |
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On campus…
🎒 A Jewish professor at Cornell, who has called Israel’s war with Hamas a genocide, is set to teach a course next semester titled “Gaza, Indigeneity, Resistance.” The university’s interim president is against the idea. (JTA)
🏫 The president of the University of Southern California is stepping down at the end of the school year. Among other things, critics accused her of mishandling the campus protests last spring. (NBC Los Angeles)
And elsewhere…
🎭 Demonstrators waving swastika flags gathered outside a performance of The Diary of Anne Frank on Saturday night in Howell, Michigan. “It was a scary moment,” said the president of the local theater behind the production. “But really, the show must go on.” (Detroit News)
🤷 A bipartisan House bill up for a vote today would target nonprofits accused of supporting terrorism. Jewish groups are divided on the issue. (JTA)
⛪ The Vatican teamed up with Microsoft to create a digital replica of St. Peter’s Basilica so people can visit virtually. It involved 400,000 high-res photos taken via drones and lasers. (AP, Religion News Service)
Shiva calls ► Jonathan Haze, an actor who starred in B-movies like 1960’s Little Shop of Horrors, died at 95 … Felice Gaer, who worked in human rights at the American Jewish Committee, died at 78. |
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On the Hebrew calendar, today is the 11th of Cheshvan, the yahrzeit of the biblical matriarch Rachel. For the occasion, Shulem Lemmer, a Hasidic singer, released his version of “Mama Rochel,” a popular Yiddish melody. |
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Thanks to Jacob Kornbluh, Lauren Markoe and Julie Moos for contributing to today’s newsletter, and to Jodi Rudoren for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected]. |
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