JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

How Kamala Harris views antisemitism differently than Biden, major U.S. public school system accused of failing to protect Jewish students, Trump campaign nixes Holocaust denier from event, and Israeli athletes arrive at Paris Olympics.

MR. NETANYAHU GOES TO WASHINGTON

(Getty)

Welcome to Wednesday, and thank God it’s not Monday, which was the hottest day ever recorded on Earth. 🔥  Make sure to hydrate if you’re out and about in D.C. for the visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

• Today: At 10 a.m., Netanyahu will attend a long-in-the-works memorial service for Sen. Joe Lieberman, who died in March. And at 2 p.m., he’s scheduled to deliver an address to a joint session of Congress.

  
  

• Thursday: Netanyahu will meet separately with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in D.C.

  
  

• Friday: Netanyahu will travel to Florida to meet at Mar-a-Lago with former President Donald Trump.

  
  

• Saturday: The prime minister is expected to spend Shabbat in D.C. before returning to Israel Saturday night.

Setting the scene: Netanyahu, whose last trip to Washington was in September 2020 to sign the Abraham Accords during the Trump administration, is arriving now under very different circumstances.

• Netanyahu’s stock was in decline even before the war began, as he sought to consolidate his own power by limiting that of the country’s judiciary. And since Oct. 7, his popularity — both at home and abroad — has plummeted. International criticism of Netanyahu has increased as the death toll continues to grow in Gaza.

  
  

• Some families of hostages see his failure to successfully negotiate a deal to end the war and free their relatives as a political ploy to stay in power. Freed hostage Noa Argamani lashed into Netanyahu when she met with him on Monday in D.C. A recent poll found that 72% of Israelis think he should quit over his failures related to Oct. 7.

Boycotts and protests: Dozens of Democratic lawmakers say they will skip the speech, like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has called Netanyahu a “war criminal.” Congresspeople have a long history of snubbing invited guests — including the pope.

• Rep. Jerry Nadler, dean of the Jewish Caucus, says he’ll attend “out of respect for the State of Israel and the office of the prime minister.” But he called Netanyahu “the worst leader in Jewish history since the Maccabean king who invited the Romans into Jerusalem.”

  
  

• Hundreds of demonstrators wearing shirts that read “Jews say stop arming Israel” gathered Tuesday in the rotunda of a House office building. Multiple protests against Netanyahu are planned at the Capitol today.

  
  

• One group welcoming Netanyahu with open arms? Evangelical Christians.

Record breaker: With today’s speech, Netanyahu will become the world leader who has addressed Congress the most times. Prior to this week’s address, which will be his fourth, Netanyahu was tied with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, at three times each. We look back at why Netanyahu keeps getting invited, and what he’s said on previous occasions.

Opinions…

• As Netanyahu speaks to Congress, it’s never been more important — or lonely — to be a liberal Zionist

  
  

• ‘He should go and stay’: As Netanyahu visits Congress, Israelis at home are tired of the act

ISRAEL AT WAR

Clean water and reliable hospital care are harder to come by in Gaza, where garbage collection and other municipal services have come to a halt. This was the scene Sunday at a refugee camp. (Getty)

The latest (besides Netanyahu’s visit)…

• Israel’s military said it discovered evidence of the polio virus in sewage in Gaza, “a reminder that nine months of war have unleashed threats beyond bombs and bullets,” reports The Wall Street Journal.

  
  

• A survivor of the Hamas massacre at the Nova music festival said he was raped during the attack, the first time a male victim has publicly described such sexual crimes.

  
  

• “Several major labor unions on Tuesday called on President Joe Biden to halt all military aid to Israel,” reports Jewish Insider.

  
  

• Hamas has detailed dossiers on thousands of Israeli soldiers and their families — including phone numbers, social media profiles and bank details, according to a trove of documents leaked online this week.

  
  

• With Netanyahu away, his far-right security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, said he would allow Jews to pray on the Temple Mount, a holy Muslim site where it was agreed long ago to not allow Jewish prayer, where conflict could escalate. A fellow Knesset member called Ben-Gvir a “pyromaniac interested in igniting a Third Intifada.”

ALSO IN THE FORWARD

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at a campaign rally in May in Philadelphia. (Getty)

• Kamala Harris views antisemitism differently than Biden, my colleague Arno Rosenfeld writes in the latest edition of his antisemitism newsletter. Read it here, and subscribe here.

  
  

• An astronaut, a kosher Jew and a Southern gentleman walk into the vice presidential race: Our culture reporter PJ Grisar ranks the Jewishness of Harris’ prospects for a running mate.

  
  

• “What if God is a Republican?” asks Israeli novelist and agnostic Etgar Keret in a new opinion essay, lamenting on claims of divine intervention in the assassination attempt against Trump.

  
  

• We asked, you answered: We were a bit befuddled by a recent query to our Bintel Brief advice column from a woman at her wit’s end because her retired husband won’t do more household chores. So we turned to our readers, and you had some great ideas.

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

An elementary school in Philadelphia. (iStock)

On campus…

🎒 The school district of Philadelphia, among the largest public school systems in the U.S., failed to protect its Jewish students from antisemitism, according to a federal complaint filed Tuesday by the Anti-Defamation League. (Times of Israel)

🎓 Harvard handed out diplomas to 11 of the 13 students “who initially had their degrees withheld in May as they faced disciplinary action for participating in the pro-Palestine encampment.” (Harvard Crimson)

🖼️  Hamline University in Minnesota settled a religious discrimination lawsuit with a professor it fired after she showed a painting of the Prophet Muhammad and a Muslim student in the class complained to administrators. (AP)

And elsewhere…

🎤  A Trump campaign event scheduled for Friday in Nashville has disinvited Candace Owens, a far-right pundit “who traffics in antisemitic tropes and Holocaust denial.” (Jewish Insider)

⚖️  A judge sentenced a self-proclaimed Nazi to two years in prison for sending antisemitic, profanity-laced threats to Anti-Defamation League offices in Denver, Houston, Las Vegas and Manhattan. (Haaretz)

📚  Three Jews were attacked last month at an event about the Mideast conflict at a public library in Asheville, North Carolina. Police have now made an arrest, and charged two more people with “ethnic intimidation.” (Algemeiner)

What else we’re reading ➤  Andorra’s 73 Jews worship from a community center they are barred by law from calling a synagogue … The new Tel Aviv cafés looking to heal communities torn apart on Oct. 7 … A museum exhibit on Jewish food and humor puts the ‘borscht’ in Borscht Belt.

VIDEO OF THE DAY

Israel’s 88 Olympic athletes arrived this week in Paris amid heightened security threats. Israeli officials said they doubled the security budget since the Tokyo Games. “Aside from security concerns,” reports the Times of Israel, “many of the athletes are also bracing themselves for an angry reception, including protests outside games, boos inside stadiums, opponents’ refusing to shake their hands or other staged provocations.” Watch a news clip above for more details.

Related: Authorities also warned that Iran-backed terror groups may be seeking to attack Israeli civilians and other Jewish targets in Paris.  

Dept. of corrections: In Monday’s newsletter, we incorrectly stated that a Wednesday memorial service for the late Sen. Joe Lieberman would be held at D.C.’s Adas Israel Congregation. It will take place at the Washington Hebrew Congregation.

Thanks to Jacob Kornbluh, Lauren Markoe, Julie Moos and Talya Zax for contributing to today’s newsletter, and to Beth Harpaz for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at editorial@forward.com.

Support Independent Jewish Journalism

Without you, the Forward’s stories don’t just go unread — they go untold. Please support our nonprofit journalism today.