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 ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏

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WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

Today: Heritage Foundation calls for an end to U.S. aid to Israel • Your guide to giving the perfect mishloach manot • Archaeologists find Europe’s oldest mikvah • and more

ON CAMPUS

The Education Department’s work force will now be about half the size it was when President Trump took office. (Getty)

Trump’s education purge — and the campus antisemitism fallout


The Department of Education announced Tuesday it will slash nearly half of its 4,100-person workforce, the first step in President Donald Trump’s broader plan to shut down the agency and shift oversight to states, local governments and other federal agencies.


🎒 Why it matters: The cuts could gut the department’s civil rights division, which handles cases concerning antisemitism on campuses. In 2024 alone, its 588 staffers handled more than 22,000 complaints.


🔄  Where do cases go? In February, the Justice Department launched an antisemitism task force, which has since notified 10 universities of campus visits and canceled $400 million in contracts with Columbia University. The joint task force includes representatives from the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services.


📌  The big picture: With antisemitic incidents on the rise, slashing the department’s civil rights arm could leave Jewish students with fewer avenues for federal protection.

Activist arrest…

  • Trump wants to deport Mahmoud Khalil, a pro-Palestinian activist. It’s led some Jews to ask: Is this the fight against antisemitism we signed up for? (JTA)


  • The American Jewish Committee said it was “appalled” by Khalil’s views, but did not praise his arrest, which has divided Jewish groups. (JTA)


  • Judge Jesse Furman, a Jewish federal judge who blocked Trump’s deportation order of Khalil, is now facing a wave of online attacks from far-right figures with massive followings — including against his wife, a prominent Jewish educator. (Forward)


  • Furman is expected today to examine the free speech issues in the case and could order Khalil released from detention. The conference could shed more light on other details in the case; an immigration judge will rule separately on Khalil’s immigration status. (New York Times)


Plus: Harvard cut ties with a librarian who tore down a Chabad poster of Israeli hostages, amid mounting scrutiny and funding threats from the Trump administration over campus antisemitism. (Harvard Crimson)

ON PURIM

(Midjourney)

🍬🎭👉 Our Louis Keene is praying you don’t get stuck with a sad box of raisins in your mishloach manot — the food baskets Jews give each other on Purim, which begins Thursday night. Instead, he’s got a foolproof guide to making gift baskets that actually spark joy—not disappointment. His recipe for success? Tasty treats, a fun theme, and a clever rhyme. Because let’s be honest: You deserve better. Dive in ►


Related: ‘Keeping up with the Cohens’ — how did Purim baskets get so stressful?


Plus…

ISRAEL AT WAR

Imad Muna, owner of a bookstore in East Jerusalem, shortly after being detained on Tuesday. (Getty)

The latest…

  • Steve Witkoff, Trump’s Middle East envoy, arrived in Qatar on Tuesday to take part in indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas, hoping to extend a ceasefire in Gaza. (Times of Israel)


  • Police raided a Palestinian bookstore in East Jerusalem for the second time in a month, detaining one of the owners for a short period and confiscating several books. The raid was prompted by a complaint from a caller who claimed to have seen books with “inciting content.” (Times of Israel)


  • The Heritage Foundation, the influential conservative think tank that has helped staff and implement strategy for the Trump administration, drafted a report calling for ending U.S. aid to Israel by 2047. (Jewish Insider)


  • An anti-Israel commentator has been tapped to be deputy director of national intelligence, a position that does not require Senate confirmation. (Jewish Insider)

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe at the Madison Square Garden rally in October for Donald Trump. (Getty)

🎤  Netflix ordered a comedy special from Tony Hinchcliffe, the comic who last fall made racist, sexist and antisemitic jokes at a Madison Square Garden Trump rally. This appears to be part of a larger push by Hollywood to reach Trump supporters. (CNN, Wall Street Journal)


✍️  Jewish groups are condemning a ruling by a Belgian court that acquitted a writer who wrote that he wanted to “ram a knife down Jews’ throats.” (Politico)


🛁  An archaeology professor and his students have discovered what they believe is an ancient Jewish ritual bath in Italy, potentially the oldest ever found in Europe. (New York Times)


On the food front…


🤔  Isaac’s Bagels in North Carolina pulled out of a Jewish food festival because of the organizer’s support for Israel. That prompted criticism — including from Jessica Seinfeld — and regret set in. (JTA)


💰 Burglars ransacked a kosher pizza shop in Los Angeles, rifling through the register and stealing a safe, and then broke into the pharmacy next door. “They hit the pharmacy every six months, looking for drugs and stuff like that,” said Mark Douek of Pizza Mark. (KTLA)


🍩  The owner of three Las Vegas Krispy Kreme locations has opted to no longer be under kosher supervision. (YeahThatsKosher)


🥚 Coming tomorrow: You think egg prices are high now? We’ll take a look back at how the Forward covered egg rations of the past.


Transitions ► Karen Dawkins, who launched the Jewish Press of Tampa Bay in 1986 with her late husband, Jim, is retiring from the newspaperRabbi Yosef Blau, who has been at Yeshiva University for 48 years (including during my one semester there in 1994), is making aliyah.


Shiva call ► Stanley Jaffe, a movie producer who brought us Kramer vs. Kramer, Fatal Attraction and The Bad News Bears, died at 84.

VIDEO OF THE DAY

Fans of Gal Gadot will watch her do anything. So while appearing this week on The Tonight Show to promote her new Snow White film, host Jimmy Fallon put that to the test. They played a game called “Will Gal Ga-Do-It?” in which, among other things, she reads from a phone book and eats an entire apple in 30 seconds. Pointing to the core, Fallon joked, “I’m putting that on eBay.”


Over on Live with Kelly and Mark, Gadot revealed the one director she wants to work with: Steven Spielberg. “He’s such a mensch,” she said.

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