WASHINGTON — The United States abstained on a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war, allowing it to pass — marking the first time that the council has succeeded in issuing a formal call for a pause in the war.

The U.S. abstention drew a scathing response from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who accused the Biden administration of “harming” Israel’s war efforts and its efforts to free hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. He has canceled a delegation of top Israeli officials who were set to visit Washington, D.C. to discuss their war strategy.

The Biden administration had vetoed all Security Council resolutions calling for a cease-fire in the war until last week, when Russia and China vetoed a measure sponsored by the United States that attached the ceasefire call to a hostage deal.

The decision to abstain and clear the way for Monday’s resolution to pass — in addition to Netanyahu’s response — reflected a dramatic acceleration of worsening ties between the Biden and Netanyahu governments after months of U.S. support for Israel in the war.

The war began nearly six months ago on Oct. 7 with Hamas’ invasion of Israel, in which the terror group killed some 1,200 people and took approximately 250 hostage. Since then, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 32,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war. More than 250 Israeli soldiers have also been killed in the Israeli invasion of Gaza.  Global health officials also say the enclave is on the verge of famine.

The resolution, whose lead sponsor was Algeria, demands an “immediate cease-fire” during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which began two weeks ago. It also demands “the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages,” and stresses the “urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian assistance to and reinforce the protection of civilians in the entire Gaza Strip.”

The United States, which has been backing indirect negotiations for a temporary ceasefire and hostage release, denied that its abstention was a change in policy. The U.S. decision to abstain was made at the last minute, according to the United Nations news service, after the United States sought, and achieved, the replacement of the phrase “permanent ceasefire” with the phrase “immediate cease-fire.”

John Kirby, the spokesman for the Nationals Security Council, said in a call with reporters immediately following the vote that the United States abstained, rather than vetoing, because the resolution included a call for a release of Israeli hostages.

“Our vote does not represent a shift in our policy,” Kirby said. “We have been clear and consistent in our support for a hostage release as part of a cease-fire.”

Netanyahu portrayed the vote differently in a statement from his office. Noting that the resolution does not condition a cease-fire on a release of hostages, the statement said the United States “has abandoned its policy in the UN today.” The resolution sponsored last week by the U.S. mission had linked a cease-fire with a hostage release.

“This constitutes a clear departure from the consistent US position in the Security Council since the beginning of the war,” the statement said. “Today’s resolution gives Hamas hope that international pressure will force Israel to accept a ceasefire without the release of our hostages, thus harming both the war effort and the effort to release the hostages.”

The Hebrew-language version of the statement was even more critical of the United States: It said the U.S. abstention — rather than the resolution — “gives Hamas hope.”

The cancellation of the Israeli delegation comes as Biden and Netanyahu have been at odds publicly over whether Israel should invade Rafah, a city on Gaza’s border with Egypt that has been crowded with more than 1 million displaced Palestinians. Netanyahu’s government says an invasion is necessary in order to defeat Hamas, which has battalions there. Biden opposes the invasion because of the threat to civilian life.

In a statement on Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who is currently in Washington to seek U.S. military aid, suggested that he also supported entering Rafah, in part because of the potential impact on hostilities with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“We have no moral right to stop the war while there are still hostages held in Gaza,” Gallant said. “The lack of a decisive victory in Gaza may bring us closer to a war in the north.”

Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said he was disappointed with the decision to cancel the visit, speaking to reporters.

“It’s disappointing, we’re very disappointed that they won’t be coming to Washington D.C. to allow us to have a fulsome conversation on the viable alternatives to going in on the ground in Rafah,” he said. “We don’t believe a ground offensive in Rafah is the right course of action.”

But Kirby said that he expected the conversations about Rafah to continue.

“It certainly is not ideal that they won’t be coming to D.C., apparently, to have this discussion, but that doesn’t mean our ability to talk with them and have conversations have been eliminated,” Kirby said.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for immediate implementation of the resolution.

“This resolution must be implemented,” he said on X, formerly Twitter. “Failure would be unforgivable.”

It’s not clear whether or how the Security Council would enforce the resolution: Its tools include sending troops in, sanctions and arms embargoes. Military interventions are rare, however, especially with armies as formidable as Israel’s.

“To ensure the parties feel bound by an imposed cease-fire, the imposing entities usually need to exert leverage over them or constitute a credible deterrent to stop them from violating it,” a recent U.N. guidance on the mediation of cease-fires says. “Unless an imposed ceasefire is based on a realistic assessment of the context and an ability to follow up on the state of compliance by parties, it can become unstable and damage the credibility of those seeking to impose it.”

A number of Democrats in Congress have been calling for a suspension of military assistance to Israel as long as it impedes the delivery of aid. Biden has consistently said suspending military assistance is not on the table, but Vice President Kamala Harris over the weekend said she was not counting anything out if Israel goes ahead with its Rafah operation.

“We have been clear in multiple conversations and in every way that any major military operation in Rafah would be a huge mistake,” Harris said on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “Let me tell you something: I have studied the maps. There’s nowhere for those folks to go.”

Pressed as to whether there would be consequences for Israel should it go ahead with the Rafah operation, Harris said, “I am ruling out nothing.”

The post US Allows Gaza Cease-fire Resolution at the UN to Pass, Prompting Anger From Netanyahu appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

Philissa Cramer

In Jerusalem, a service omitted the loud noise-making associated with the holiday to accommodate soldiers traumatized by months of war. In Tel Aviv, bakeries peddled a triangular treat renamed for a contemporary villain, the leader of Hamas. And in Jewish communities around the world, costumes and holiday gifts paid homage to the more than 130 Israeli captives who remain in Gaza.

Those adjustments marked some of the many ways that Purim, a generally whimsical Jewish holiday that celebrates an ancient victory over a threatened genocide, took a different shape this year because of ongoing war and hostage crisis looming over Israel and Jewish communities around the world.

Many communities went ahead with the merrymaking expected of the holiday, with synagogues holding Purim carnivals for children and, in some cases, debauched parties for adults. Spiels, or festive plays retelling the Purim story, drew from a wide range of of-the-moment themes, including Barbie and Taylor Swift. In Israel, the streets filled as usual with costumed children.

But there were signs that it was not a typical Purim, starting with the hamantaschen sold in Israel this year. The Hebrew name for the cookies is “Oznei Haman” or Haman’s ears, named for the villain in the Purim story. This year, some bakeries renamed them “Oznei Sinwar,” a reference to Yahya Sinwar, the (notably large-eared) Hamas leader credited with masterminding the Oct. 7 attack on Israel that triggered the current war.

In the days leading up to and including the holiday, the war made itself felt in other ways. Some wrestled with how to celebrate at a time of such sadness. Some grappled with the contemporary implications of a chapter of the Purim story that suggests that the Jews, once saved in ancient Persia, exacted steep revenge. And some incorporated the themes, and trauma, of the war into their Purim costumes and practices.

After a returned soldier posted on the local Facebook group Secret Jerusalem that he was looking for a subdued Purim service — ”Enough time in battle and I just need a quiet one” — Chabad of Rehavia added a noise-free service to its plans. Because of a verse in the Scroll of Esther about “walled cities,” Purim is celebrated a day later in Jerusalem than in the rest of the world; the city went ahead Monday with its first official Purim Parade for the first time in more than four decades, though its attendance was reportedly lower than expected.

In posts on social media displaying Purim costumes, an unusual number of soldiers could be spotted among the pirates, Queen Esthers and astronauts in children’s parades. Rachel Edri, who became famous after offering cookies to her Hamas captors in October, shared pictures of a number of people of all ages who had dressed as her.

Others aimed to use the holiday to galvanize support for releasing the hostages. Celebrating in Texas, the influencers dubbed That Jewish Family on Instagram dressed in all yellow in a nod to the yellow ribbons that have come to represent the hostages. Many people posted pictures on social media of Kfir and Ariel Bibas, the young brothers who are the only children who remain in Gaza, in their Batman costumes from last year; a rally in New York City saw participants dress up as Batman in honor of the Bibas family. And Melinda Strauss, an Orthodox influencer in the New York City area, posted pictures of mishloach manot, the traditional food gifts given on the holiday, that came with names of hostages to keep in mind; she herself had made a maple cake beloved by a mother murdered on Oct. 7 to give to her own friends.

Some attendees wore costumes to the weekly Saturday night rally in Tel Aviv to raise attention to the hostages. One woman turned the iconic hostage poster into a costume for herself, aiming to extend the posters’ effort to raise awareness about the remaining captives at a time when Israel is negotiating for the release of more of them. During the holiday, the news leaked that Israel has offered to release 800 prisoners to secure the safety of 40 hostages during a potential ceasefire. Officials reportedly believe the odds of an eventual deal are just even.

Despite the adjustments to the holiday, the celebrations elicited tensions from those whose grief remains raw.

“I’m not doing Purim this year. That’s it. I am not moving on. It feels too cruel,” Elana Sztokman, an Israeli anthropologist, educator and activist, wrote in her Substack newsletter. She said the holiday had made her even more conscious of the fact that Israel’s leadership has not acted as aggressively as she and many others would like to secure the hostages’ release.

“Does Jewish peoplehood even exist if some people are kind of expendable? Sacrificable? Or are peoplehood and community just fictions we keep telling ourselves? So that we can have fun moments like Purim parties?”

While one family member of a current hostage read psalms at a Purim service, others wrestled openly with how much to take part in the holiday.

“Every [Instagram] story of mine is of parties, of people who are happy and celebrating life. On the one hand deserves to celebrate life and be happy,” Maya Regev, who was held hostage until November, said in a statement posted to the social media account dedicated to her best friend Omer Shem-Tov, who remains in captivity. “On the other hand, I’m angry. I’m angry when I think of Omer and how much he would have loved to be here celebrating with us.”

The post In Israel and Beyond, Purim Celebrations Are Tempered by Trauma and Thoughts of the Hostages appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

Shira Li Bartov

Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s assertion earlier this month that Turkey “firmly backs” Hamas was the culmination of months in which the Turkish president has lambasted Israel’s war in Gaza.

The feud between the two countries did not end there. Last week, Israel’s Foreign Ministry summoned the Turkish envoy for a reprimand after Erdogan berated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and said God would “make him miserable and curse him.”

Israel’s foreign minister shot back on social media, “There is no God who will listen to those who support the atrocities and crimes against humanity committed by your barbaric Hamas friends. Be quiet and shame on you!”

Those public comments paint a picture of an acrimonious relationship between Israel and Turkey, but scholars say the reality is more complicated. Erdogan has spoken warmly about Hamas for decades and engaged in several high-profile diplomatic spats with Israel since coming to power more than 20 years ago. But at the same time, trade between the two countries is booming and their relations were warming up before Oct. 7.

“We know from the past, Erdogan always calls Israel a ‘terrorist state’ and a ‘genocidal state,’ yet business goes on with the state of Israel,” M. Hakan Yavuz, a professor of political science at the University of Utah and the author of 2021’s “Erdogan: The Making of an Autocrat,” told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Weeks after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack launched the war, killing some 1,200 and taking 250 hostages, Erdogan called Hamas a “liberation group.” Turkey has hosted senior Hamas figures before and after the attack, including leader Ismail Haniyeh, who Erdogan’s chief security adviser said “might have been” in Turkey on Oct. 7. During his speech earlier this month in Istanbul, Erdogan also said Netanyahu and his government “are writing their names next to Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin, like today’s Nazis.”

But last month, Turkey’s exports to Israel increased more than 20% to $422 million, surpassing the pre-Oct. 7 figure of $408.3 million, according to local reports. Israel ranked 13th on Turkey’s export list in 2023.

According to Yavuz, Erdogan is ramping up his pro-Hamas rhetoric ahead of Turkey’s local elections on March 31. Erdogan’s Islamic conservative Justice and Development Party is attempting to win back offices in Istanbul and Ankara, where the secular opposition Republican People’s Party took control in 2019, penetrating the president’s near-total grip on power.

Yavuz believes that Erdogan is making a play for votes with the Turkish public, which broadly sympathizes with the Palestinians and has been incensed by the bloodshed and reports of starvation in Gaza. More than 32,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive, according to the health ministry of the Hamas-run enclave.

“This is an opportunist leader,” said Yavuz. “I don’t think he cares about Palestinians. He has been instrumentalizing the Palestinian cause for a long time.”

Before Erdogan came to power in 2003, Israel and Turkey had close diplomatic relations. Turkey was the first country in the region to recognize Israel’s sovereignty in 1949. For decades, the two states shared counterterrorism and intelligence efforts and built strong economic ties, including in trade and tourism. Even after Erdogan became prime minister, before later becoming president, he hosted then-Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in 2007. However, a year earlier, he signaled that Turkey was warming to Hamas by inviting then-leader Khaled Meshaal to visit.

The relationship between Israel and Turkey began to deteriorate after 2008, when Israel launched a military campaign against Hamas in Gaza in response to rocket fire. In January 2009, Erdogan stormed out of the World Economic Forum after clashing with Peres and vowed never to return to Davos. A year later, the relationship imploded when a Turkish ship led a flotilla of boats carrying volunteers and humanitarian aid to Gaza, challenging Israel’s naval blockade of the enclave. Israeli troops raided the ship and, amid clashes, killed nine Turks on board.

Netanyahu apologized for the incident in 2013, but tensions between the countries continued to fester during rounds of conflict between Israel and Gaza. In 2018, Israel killed more than 100 Palestinians during protests on the Gaza border. In retaliation, Turkey expelled its Israeli ambassador and Israel in turn ordered the Turkish consul general in Jerusalem to leave.

The two countries again recalled their ambassadors following Oct. 7. Meanwhile, Turkish Jewish leaders have not publicly opined about the sparring between Netanyahu and Erdogan. The community’s organized leadership did not respond to a JTA request for comment.

“I think they are all in hiding,” said Yavuz. “No one in today’s dominant political culture would go and say, ‘As a Jew, this is what I think.’ I think that’s out of the question in Turkey. The political environment is very anti-Jewish in Turkey today.”

Over the course of his decades in office, Erdogan has worked to legitimize the public’s perception of Hamas as a viable form of Palestinian leadership, according to Asli Aydintasbas, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution and journalist from Turkey. Erdogan has openly supported the group and never categorized it as a terrorist organization, unlike the United States and the European Union. Many Turkish voters have followed his lead: A survey found that only 30% of respondents believe Hamas is a terrorist organization.

Unlike Yavuz, Aydintasbas argued in an interview with Brookings that the president’s pro-Palestinian position is driven more by personal convictions than by opportunism.

“There is no pragmatism there,” said Aydintasbas. “Erdogan sees it as his calling to take a position against what Israel is doing, even if the price is isolation. It is clearly personal, ideological, and near and dear to his heart.”

The Palestinian issue is also an important part of Erdogan’s ideology of neo-Ottomanism, said Aydintasbas. The president has built his political platform on the idea of reviving a Turkish empire in the Middle East akin to the one that existed prior to 1917. Key to that effort is representing dispossessed Muslim populations in the region, including the Palestinians, and standing opposed to the West and Israel.

But prior to Oct. 7, Erdogan had shown more openness to normalizing relations with Israel in recent years, as Turkey has struggled with economic difficulties and diplomatic isolation. The countries announced a full renewal of diplomatic ties in 2022. In Sept. 2023, weeks before the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7, Erdogan and Netanyahu met for the first time in New York and agreed to visit each other’s countries soon. That’s unlikely to happen now, according to Yavuz.

“I think Turkish public opinion moved further against Israel during this war,” said Yavuz. “I think the trade and business relations will continue, but with the current public opinion, those relations are in danger as well.”

The post What’s Behind Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ‘Firm’ Support for Hamas? appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

The U.N. Relief and Works Agency has enough money to continue its operations in the Levant until the end of May after several donor countries resumed financial support, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini announced in remarks to the Swiss press on Tuesday.

While UNRWA’s financial situation “is less dramatic” than a month ago and it will be able to pay salaries in March and April, Lazzarini told reporters the agency still operates “from one month to the next.”

He claimed that the freeze in U.S. funding, which will continue until at least March 2025, poses an “existential” threat to UNRWA, adding that the organization is trying to “mobilize even more countries” to compensate for the $300 million-$400 million annual loss.

The U.S. aid suspension came after Israel said that at least a dozen UNRWA staffers participated in Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre and amid the revelation of the agency’s ties to terrorist groups, including its employment of 450 terrorists belonging to Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip.

Seventeen other countries also paused funding to the agency after Oct. 7, pending the results of investigations. The United Nations launched an internal probe into the matter and former French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna is leading an independent review.

However, several countries, voicing concern over the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip amid the Israel Defense Forces offensive against Hamas, have since resumed their donations.

On Tuesday, exactly two months after Germany pulled its funding, Lazzarini announced that Berlin pledged €45 million ($49 million) to support UNRWA’s work in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Judea and Samaria.

“Additional support by Germany to UNRWA, namely for its operations in the Gaza Strip, will depend on the progress of an ongoing investigation by the U.N. Office of Internal Oversight Services,” the U.N. agency said.

“With these new contributions, Germany is now our top donor [replacing the U.S.], something I am deeply grateful for,” said Lazzarini.

It was not clear what safeguards would be put in place to prevent German funds from being misappropriated for use in the Hamas-controlled Strip.

Ronen Bar, head of the Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet), has said that Hamas diverts at least 60% of the aid to Gaza for its own purposes.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a visiting delegation of United Nations ambassadors early last month that “UNRWA is totally infiltrated with Hamas.” The premier has ordered the IDF to come up with alternatives for the distribution of humanitarian aid to Gaza.

Asked for comment by JNS, the Prime Minister’s Office and Foreign Ministry did not comment on UNRWA’s announcement that it would continue to provide services to Palestinians until the end of the spring.

The post UNRWA Says it Has Enough Funding to Operate Through Spring appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

Ron Kampeas

WASHINGTON  — President Joe Biden said the United States would continue to “impose costs” on Russia for its imprisonment of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was arrested one year ago.

The Journal marked the March 29 anniversary by leaving most of its front page empty below a headline reading, “HIS STORY SHOULD BE HERE.” Every other article and headline on the front page involved Gershkovich.

“Today we mark a painful anniversary: one year of American journalist Evan Gershkovich’s wrongful detention in Russia,” Biden said in a statement.

“As I have told Evan’s parents, I will never give up hope either,” he said. “We will continue working every day to secure his release. We will continue to denounce and impose costs for Russia’s appalling attempts to use Americans as bargaining chips.”

Gershkovich, the 32-year-old American son of Jewish immigrants from the Soviet Union, has been held on espionage charges since March 29, 2023, when he was arrested by Russian agents while on a reporting trip in the city of Yekaterinburg. Gershkovich, the United States government, and the Wall Street Journal deny the allegations, for which the Russian government has not provided evidence. His arrest came amid an ongoing crackdown on the press in Russia during its war on Ukraine.

On Jan. 30, a Moscow court extended his detention through Saturday. Gershkovich has yet to be tried. If he is convicted, he could face up to 20 years in a penal colony.

Biden imposed sanctions on Russia’s internal security service, the FSB, about a month after Gershkovich was detained and has imposed multiple sanctions since then related to the Ukraine war and other malfeasance by the Putin regime. Both Russia and the United States have floated the possibility of a prisoner exchange, though a deal has yet to materialize.

Jewish organizations and activists have taken up Gershkovich’s cause, at times employing Jewish ritual to call for his release in ways that echo the Soviet Jewry movement of decades ago. Last Passover, seder tables around the world included an empty seat to symbolize his imprisonment, and Jewish federations spearheaded a campaign last year to send him letters ahead of Rosh Hashanah.

In the Journal, A four page section was dedicated entirely to Gershkovich, as were in-house advertisements elsewhere in the newspaper. “This story cannot be written,” said an ad taking up a quarter of page A7.

Also calling for Gershkovich’s release was a rare bipartisan statement from Democratic and Republican leaders in the Senate and House of Representatives.

“Forty-five years ago, Evan’s parents, Ella and Mikhail Gershkovich, found refuge in the United States after fleeing the Soviet Union,” said the statement issued in the name of House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a New York Democrat, Senate Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat who is Jewish, and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican. “Today, Putin is restoring Soviet-style control through repression at home and aggression abroad.”

Their statement singled out press freedoms.

“On the anniversary of Evan Gershkovich’s captivity, we reaffirm the importance of his work,” it said. “Journalism is not a crime, and reporters are not bargaining chips. The Kremlin’s attempts to silence Evan and intimidate other Western reporters will not impede the pursuit of truth.”

The post On the First Anniversary of Evan Gershkovich’s Arrest, Biden Says His Detention Will ‘Cost’ Russia appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

Philissa Cramer

Amsterdam’s public tram company, GVB, will place memorials at three central locations where it transported Dutch Jews into the clutches of the Nazis during the Holocaust.

The city of Amsterdam is also donating 100,000 Euros — and potentially more in the future — to local Jewish groups to divest itself of its revenue from collaborating with the Nazis.

The announcement, from the office of Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema, comes shortly after researchers revealed that the company had not only collaborated with the Nazis to transport Jews to their deaths but sought repayment for its services even after the war.

“GVB would now like to express its generous and sincere regret for the role that the Municipal Tram and the Municipal Transport Company played in the Second World War,” Halsema’s office said in a statement issued Friday. “GVB calls it horrible and cruel that the Municipal Transport Company has sent invoices for carrying out the journeys to transport Jewish Amsterdammers to Central Station and Muiderpoort Station. The municipality and GVB therefore want to part with the money earned by participating in these deportations.”

This week, officials from the city of Amsterdam, GVB and Centraal Joods Overleg, the main Dutch Jewish organization, met to discuss the research in the book and documentary “The Lost City,” which concluded that GVB had transported 48,000 Jews from the city into the hands of the Nazis.

The announcement of the memorials and donation is a first step in responding to the research, which the mayor’s office says is ongoing and will result in a broader response next year.

According to the announcement, GVB will rename one stop to reflect the new National Holocaust Museum, which opened this month. Halsema also indicated that she would consider a proposal by Itay Garmy, a Jewish City Council member, to make the museum free for all Amsterdam secondary school students. And the mayor signaled that the donation — the equivalent to what it received from the Nazis, adjusted for inflation and rounded up significantly — could end being only the first step in restitution for the city’s role in persecuting its Jews, of whom the vast majority were murdered.

“The mayor has expressly informed the CJO that this amount is not intended as compensation, but is merely the return of money that the municipality should never have received,” the announcement said. “After the publication of the [forthcoming] report, the council will consider the financial consequences of the total findings.”

Gideon Taylor, president of the World Jewish Restitution Organization, which seeks the recovery of Jewish assets lost during the Holocaust, said in a statement that Amsterdam’s announcement represented a meaningful step.

“We acknowledge these important measures taken today. We look forward to continuing steps to address the past,” Taylor said. “Acknowledging history helps shape a better future.”

The post Amsterdam, Atoning for Role in Delivering Jews to the Nazis, Pledges Donation, Memorials at Tram Stops appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

The Palestinian Authority submitted a request on Tuesday for the United Nations Security Council to vote this month on accepting the entity as a full member.

In a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, P.A. U.N. envoy Riyad Mansour asked that an application submitted in 2011 be reconsidered. Another supporting letter was sent to Maltese diplomat Vanessa Frazier, who is currently serving as president of the 15-member council. That letter included the names of 140 countries that have recognized a Palestinian state.

However, the United States is expected to block the bid due to Washington’s long-standing policy that U.N. membership will only come as a result of a negotiated bilateral agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.

“Our position has not changed,” U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood told reporters Tuesday, as quoted by the Associated Press.

It was reported in February, however, that the Biden administration was considering unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state, which if true would mark a major foreign policy shift.

Mansour said on Monday that he hoped the U.N. Security Council will make a decision at an April 18 meeting on the Middle East, and Frazier told reporters on Monday that the council’s standing committee for new members, which includes all 15 UNSC members, is expected to meet privately to consider the application.

In his letter, Mansour claimed Ramallah’s 2011 membership application was still pending because the Security Council never made a formal decision on the matter. The P.A. currently holds U.N. observer status.

For the P.A. to gain full U.N. member-state status, at least nine of the 15 council members must approve the application, and then two-thirds of the U.N. General Assembly would have to support it in a vote.

There is widespread opposition to the establishment of a Palestinian state in Israel, particularly after Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre.

Nearly two-thirds (66%) of Israeli Jews oppose the creation of a Palestinian state while 27% support it, according to this year’s “Peace Index” survey, released by Tel Aviv University.

On Feb. 21, the Israeli Knesset voted 99-11 to back the government’s decision to reject any unilateral recognition of “Palestine.” All coalition lawmakers and most members of the Zionist opposition parties voted in favor of supporting a Cabinet statement rejecting “international diktats regarding a permanent settlement with the Palestinians.”

Palestinian polls suggest that 89% of Palestinians support establishing a government that includes or is led by Hamas, which seeks to destroy Israel in its entirety and replace it with a Palestinian-Islamic state.

The post Palestinian Authority Submits Bid for Full UN Membership appeared first on Jewish Exponent.

Mike Wagenheim

The Palestinians’ revived application for full membership at the United Nations appears to be dead on arrival.

Before the U.N. Security Council even began its meeting on Monday morning to discuss the application, Washington poured cold water all over their hopes.

“Our position is that the issue of full Palestinian membership is a decision that should be negotiated between Israel and the Palestinians,” deputy U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Robert Wood told reporters. “It was a final-status issue under Oslo. They need to work out an agreement and that’s how full membership should come about.”

As one of the five permanent UNSC members, the United States holds veto power, which Wood signaled it was prepared to use in this case.

Nevertheless, the UNSC emerged from behind closed doors late Monday morning having decided to refer the petition to the Committee on the Admission of New Members, which, by long-standing practice, must agree by consensus to advance a membership application to a full UNSC vote.

Convening on Monday afternoon, the Committee, comprising one representative from each of the 15 UNSC members, failed to reach a consensus, however, thus stalling the process.

It is unclear whether members other than the United States also indicated they would reject the application, though when speaking with media, including JNS, diplomats requesting anonymity described Monday’s meetings as difficult.

The long-dormant application, filed in 2011, has been revived in recent days, as the Palestinians seek to push for full membership in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre. Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza has drawn harsh criticism from global diplomats, resulting in the Palestinians seeing an opening to upgrade their U.N. non-state observer status achieved in 2012.

Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s U.N. ambassador, told reporters that the Security Council intends to deal with the Palestinian application in a matter of “days, perhaps a week,” with the Palestinians previously announcing a target date of Apr. 18 for a full UNSC vote.

The UNSC announced that the Committee on the Admission of New Members will meet again on Thursday afternoon.

Even if it fails to advance the application, any Security Council member can individually introduce a resolution to bring it to a full UNSC vote, which would require at least nine votes of approval and no permanent member vetoes to succeed.

Algeria, which holds the de-facto Security Council seat representing the Arab and Muslim world, indicated it would pick up that mantle.

Amar Bendjama, Algeria’s U.N. envoy, when asked late Monday by media whether his country would be drafting a resolution, said, “Not yet. But soon.”

Should the application advance out of the Security Council, it would head to the 193-member U.N. General Assembly, where it would assuredly garner the two-thirds majority support necessary for final passage.

During a separate General Assembly session on the Israel-Hamas war on Monday morning, Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Gilad Erdan ripped member states for even considering the application

Erdan said the United Nations “has committed itself to reinforcing modern-day Nazi jihadists” by “rewarding terror” in seeking to grant Palestinian-statehood recognition in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre.

“If Hitler were alive today, he would be singing the U.N.’s praises,” Erdan said, adding that the Palestinians fail to meet several requirements of U.N. statehood recognition, including one stating that membership is open to all peace-loving states.

Noting the Palestinian Authority’s “pay-for-slay” policy, which grants salaries to terrorists who kill and maim Israelis, and scales the stipends to reward deadlier crimes and the longer prison sentences that go with them, Erdan said, “Internalize it…You murder more Jews, you get more money.”

Asked by JNS during a session with the press on Monday whether he believed reports of talks between Washington and Ramallah on reforming the pay-for-slay policy were substantive, Erdan demurred.

“We are grateful to everything that the American administration has been doing to support peace and security in our region,” he began, going on to express skepticism that P.A. leader Mahmoud Abbas — who has repeatedly said he would use the P.A.’s “last penny” to provide for pay-for-slay salaries — would agree to the reported reforms. These would involve, among other things, a shift from rewarding lengthier prison sentences to a more general “welfare” program for prisoners.

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Philissa Cramer

Holocaust survivors in Israel relived their trauma on Oct. 7, when Hamas’ attack on their country was the deadliest day for Jews since the Nazis were defeated. Some were injured, hid for their lives and were displaced from their homes, in echoes of their experiences as children.

Now, they will get a lump-sum payment from the organization that negotiates reparations from Germany as a show of solidarity in the wake of the attack.

The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany announced on Tuesday that it is allocating 25 million Euros in a one-time payment for survivors in Israel. The “Solidarity Fund for Israel” will yield about 220 Euros ($238) for each of the roughly 120,000 survivors in the country.

The payment follows a different one-time stipend given in December to Israeli survivors who were evacuated from their homes following the Oct. 7 attack. It also comes on top of the total amount that Germany agreed to pay survivors and related organizations this year — more than $1.4 billion, the most ever — in a reflection of the high costs of caring for elderly survivors.

“Supporting Holocaust survivors is always our number one concern. Immediately following the horrific attacks of October 7, we began working to ensure every survivor was first safe, then secure in a location where they could be comfortable, and to ensure that they have financial support while the conflict continues,” Claims Conference President Gideon Taylor said in a statement. “This additional symbolic acknowledgment payment by Germany to Holocaust survivors in Israel is a message of solidarity.”

A spokesperson for the Claims Conference said it had announced the payment only in Israel to avoid creating confusion for survivors who live elsewhere. According to an analysis the organization released in January, the most detailed of its kind, half of all remaining survivors live in Israel, followed by 18% each in North America and Western Europe and 12% in the former Soviet Union.

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Juan Melamed

An Argentine court has ruled that Iran and Hezbollah were behind the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, a landmark development in the reckoning over the antisemitic attack that may open the door to international legal action.

In a nearly 800-page ruling, the country’s highest criminal court said on Thursday that Iran directed the 1994 bombing of AMIA, which killed 85 people, and defined the attack as “a crime against humanity” and Iran as “a terrorist state.” The bombing was, at the time, the deadliest single attack on Jews since the Holocaust. It came two years after a bombing at the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires killed 29.

Controversy over the bombing, and who is culpable for it, has roiled Argentina’s politics and legal system for decades.

In 2015, Alberto Nisman, a Jewish prosecutor, was found dead in his apartment shortly before he was to present evidence that the country’s then-president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, had covered up Iran’s role in the attack. In 2013, Kirchner had signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran that allowed Iran and Argentina to jointly investigate the attack.

An official report found in 2017 that Nisman was murdered. Kirchner later served as Argentina’s vice president from 2019 to 2023 and was convicted on separate corruption charges shortly before leaving office, which she was expected to appeal.

Argentina has South America’s largest Jewish population, at more than 200,000. Jorge Knoblovits, president of the Argentine Jewish umbrella organization DAIA, welcomed the ruling in a statement.

“We must applaud these judges, who have had courage and probity,” he said, noting that the ruling “opens the possibility of a lawsuit in the International Criminal Court.”

Argentina’s new president, Javier Milei, is a Catholic who has called Judaism a source of his values and embraced Israel, which is currently in hostilities with Iran and Hezbollah. In a statement, his office praised the ruling.

“The office of the president welcomes the ruling … that puts an end to decades of postponement and cover-up in the AMIA case,” Milei’s office said, adding that Milei has “asserted the absolute independence of the judiciary,” allowing the court “to exercise its function with total freedom, without political pressure, to deliver the justice that both victims and their families have been waiting for for decades.”

The ruling came months after the U.S. Justice Department charged a dual Colombian-Lebanese citizen with playing a key role in the bombing. According to the Justice Department, the suspect, Samuel Salman El Reda, 58, has been a Hezbollah operative since 1993. He was charged with providing material support to a designated terrorist organization.

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