IDF soldier who shot dead civilian during Hamas attack arrested
Intro
Yuval Doron Castleman was killed by a reservist soldier after helping stop a shooting attack in Jerusalem.
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Israeli Military Police on Sunday night arrested the soldier who shot and killed an Israeli civilian during a terror attack in Jerusalem last week, the army said.
Three Israelis were killed and six others wounded on the morning of Nov. 30 in a terrorist shooting on Weizman Boulevard at the main entrance to Jerusalem.
Yuval Doron Castleman, 37, was driving on the other side of the road from the bus stop where the attack took place. He exited his vehicle, walked across the street and engaged the two Hamas terrorists, who had already killed three people.
The two off-duty soldiers and Castleman managed to kill the Hamas gunmen, but Castleman was then mistaken for an additional assailant and fired upon.
Surveillance video footage shows that Castleman was shot after putting his weapon down and his hands in the air. He reportedly yelled, “Look at my ID, I’m Jewish.”
The IDF said that the soldier's detention was "preliminary" and that he will continue to be interrogated on Monday.
The arrest comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday called for a “thorough inquiry” into the killing.
“Yuval Doron Castleman is a hero of Israel. In a supreme act of bravery, Yuval saved many lives. However, unfortunately, a terrible tragedy occurred there and the man who had saved others was killed. There must be a thorough inquiry,” Netanyahu said after speaking on the phone with Castleman’s father.
“I spoke today with Yuval’s father Moshe, the salt of the earth, a Zionist family, an exemplary family. I and the entire nation mourn with them over the death of a hero of Israel,” said Netanyahu.
Moshe Castleman earlier on Sunday said that the soldier had “carried out an execution” of his son and demanded an investigation, saying that no officials had reached out to the family since the incident.
Yuval “did everything he needed to do so they [the soldiers] could identify him. He went down on his knees, opened his jacket to show he didn’t have any explosives on him, yelled at them, ‘Don’t shoot, I’m Jewish, I’m Israeli,’ and they continued to shoot him,” said Moshe.
“How is it possible to think he was a terrorist? It’s inconceivable,” he added.
Moshe said that Yuval had served in the Border Police and Israel Police before becoming a lawyer.
In response to a question during a Saturday night press briefing regarding his government's policy of relaxing conditions for civilians to acquire firearms licenses, Netanyahu said the policy would be continued.
"The reality of armed civilians is that many times it saves lives and prevents a great disaster. In the current situation, the policy should be continued. We may pay a price for it, that’s life,” he said.
War Cabinet Minister Benny Gantz tweeted on Sunday that “the case of Yuval the hero is not ‘life,’ but a warning sign that requires learning lessons that will save lives in the future. May his memory be for a blessing.”
I agree with those who consider U.S. President Joe Biden a failure to speak up about the American citizens held hostage in the Gaza Strip by Hamas since Oct. 7, 2023. As pointed out in The Wall Street Journal, “he rarely mentions them, and when he does, it’s usually to criticize Israel’s government for not agreeing to a ceasefire with Hamas that would cause the terrorists to release them.”
Along comes Donald Trump, promising on Truth Social that he’ll take a different course. “Everybody is talking about the hostages who are being held so violently, inhumanely and against the will of the entire World, in the Middle East. But it’s all talk and no action!”
“Please let this TRUTH serve to represent that if the hostages are not released prior to” his inauguration, “there will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity,” he added. “Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW!”
Some may call that “bombastic” but to his credit, at least Trump’s demanding that Hamas release the hostages it kidnapped, unlike the Biden administration, which prefers to threaten Israel over “humanitarian aid” that the world seems to know (but not Biden) is being stolen by Hamas when it enters Gaza.
As the father of an American terror victim—my 20-year-old daughter Alisa was murdered in a 1995 bus bombing when she was a student in Israel—I have some experience with America’s position regarding U.S. victims of Palestinian Arab terrorism. Let’s look at that position.
In 1995, President Bill Clinton signed the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act that gave American victims the ability to sue state sponsors of terrorism. I used that law to sue the Islamic Republic of Iran for its role as the funder of the terrorists who murdered Alisa. Getting a judgment of almost $250 million was easy; nevertheless, the Clinton administration put up roadblock after roadblock against my efforts to collect on the judgment. I was even accused by a member of the administration of trying to reset American foreign policy against Iran.
And what foreign policy was that? The Clinton administration lifted sanctions on the importation of Iranian caviar, pistachio nuts and carpets into the United States. Well, we all know where that got us.
In November 1995, the FBI seized the computer and records of one Sami Al-Arian, a professor of computer science at the University of South Florida. Why? He was suspected of being a fundraiser for Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), the terror group that took credit for Alisa’s murder. He also provided cover for terrorists through a think tank he assembled at the university. Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, who surfaced in Damascus to take over as head of PIJ following the death of Fathi Shikaki in late 1995, was a member of that think tank. It took eight years before Washington decided to prosecute Al-Arian. He eventually pleaded guilty to supporting a terror organization and was deported to Turkey.
In 1996, Clinton promised that the United States would bring Mohammed Deif, the killer of a 19-year-old Israeli-American—Nachshon Wachsman—to justice. Deif finally met his end this summer at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces.
The terrorist bombing of the Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem on Aug. 9, 2001, which took the life of American Malki Roth, only 15, brought condemnation from President George W. Bush, who said: “I deplore and strongly condemn the terrorist bombing in downtown Jerusalem today.” Israel released Ahlam Tamimi, one of the masterminds of the attack, in 2011 to Jordan as part of a prisoner swap for IDF soldier Gilad Shalit. Since then, Washington has refused to request Tamimi’s extradition from Jordan.
Taylor Force was a native of Texas and a West Point graduate, and after several tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq, he became a student at Vanderbilt University. He was murdered in a March 2016 terror attack in Tel Aviv while he was visiting Israel as part of a graduate-school study group examining global entrepreneurship.
Because the killer died while committing an act of terrorism, his relatives are paid a monthly pension equal to several times the average monthly Palestinian wage from the Palestinian Authority Martyr’s Fund. The Palestinian Authority pays a monthly cash stipend to the families of Palestinians killed, injured or imprisoned for involvement in terrorism. The Taylor Force Act was signed into law in 2018 and required America to stop sending economic aid to the P.A. until it ceased paying the stipends as part of its pay-for-slay policy.
The Biden administration wasn’t thrilled with the Taylor Force Act and sought ways around it. For instance, U.S. aid has been dispensed to UNRWA; additional USAID funding was announced in September, bringing the total aid since October 2023 to more than $1 billion; $20.5 million has been directed towards COVID-19 recovery efforts, including health-care and emergency response; and, $45 million has been provided to support the security sector, including improvements to the rule of law and law-enforcement capabilities.
Doesn’t anyone at the White House understand that money is fungible and that when you put money into the P.A.’s pockets, it just frees up other money that can be used to pay the stipends that are the target of the Taylor Force Act?
So, forgive me if I don’t sound sanguine over President-elect Trump’s announcement. The parents of American victims of Palestinian Arab terrorism have been down this road before, and it has never been a good trip.
A new survey released by the Jewish Medical Association of Ontario found that almost one-third (31%) of the 500 respondents in Ontario are considering leaving Canada due to the rising rates of antisemitism in the country.
The full survey, released on Wednesday, received responses from more than 1,000 Jewish medical professionals across Canada.
While 1% reported experiencing “severe antisemitism” before the Hamas-led terror attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, 29% said they have now experienced some form of Jew-hatred in their communities, 39% in hospitals and 43% in academic settings.
“Discrimination doesn’t just impact doctors,” said Dr. Ayelet Kuper, chair of the Jewish Medical Association of Ontario. “It undermines the entire healthcare system, compromising patient care and eroding workplace integrity.”
Dr. Sam Silver, an associate professor at Queen’s University, told the National Post how the antisemitic bigotry has affected him and his students.
“I work with healthcare students and residents who are bright, compassionate, and committed to becoming the future of healthcare in Canada,” Silver said. “Yet they are navigating a hostile environment where their identity as Jews makes them targets of hate and exclusion. This cannot continue.”
What makes the spread of conspiracy theories so troubling is that unlike in the past, today they are being promoted by supposedly respected and reliable media outlets and public figures.
As JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin notes, rather than being confined to the fever swamps of the far right and far left, now some of the most pernicious myths about public life are being treated as legitimate. Most of it is the fault of liberals and Democrats rather than the conservatives that legacy media repeatedly labels as purveyors of “disinformation.”
This point is made by the new book BlueAnon: How the Democrats Became a Party of Conspiracy Theorists, whose author, is Washington Examiner columnist David Harsanyi.
According to Harsanyi, “conspiracy theories are packaged and then laundered through media, which calibrates it for maximum plausibility, uses so-called experts and it becomes more credible to a lot of people.” And unlike the shadowy and marginalized QAnon on the right, the left’s BlueAnon conspiracies—whether about Republican candidates, climate change, capitalism or Israel—are mainstreamed.
The left’s embrace of conspiracy theories such as those publicized in filmmaker Michael Moore’s documentaries is well-documented. But the most conspicuous example of this came with the Russia collusion hoax based on the debunked claim that Donald Trump colluded with Moscow to steal the 2016 election.
While the idea was hatched by the Hillary Clinton campaign, it was embraced by elements of the federal security establishment and then relentlessly promoted by the mainstream media, which has largely abandoned journalism in favor of liberal activism.
Integral to this is how so-called “progressives” have mainstreamed antisemitic conspiracy theories whose purpose is to delegitimize Israel and Jews. Democrats have tolerated the rise of their intersectional left-wing base and its willingness to spread myths about the Jewish state that are merely modern versions of traditional tropes of Jew-hatred.
Jewish teen group BBYO raised more than $1 million in donations during #Giving Tuesday, marking the first time the organization has hit this goal in its history.
As many as 1,200 teenagers worldwide participated in the fundraiser, calling on friends, family and community members to donate. The teen-led effort also saw an increase of nearly 1,000 more donors over last year's campaign.
“In a world where antisemitism impacts three out of four Jewish teens, this grassroots effort exemplifies their determination to strengthen their community and keep their peers connected,” the organization stated.
Alexandra Greenberg, a high school senior in Denver, told JNS the event “is incredibly important to me because it unites our entire movement, bringing together Jewish teens to ensure they have a space to express their Judaism in whatever way feels authentic to them.”
“This year, it was especially meaningful for me to see global communities that hadn’t previously engaged in fundraising come together, breaking down cultural barriers and contributing to this goal in ways that felt truly personal and impactful,” she said.
Natalie Hittelman, a junior from Fairfield, Conn., told JNS that she participated in BBYO’s #GivingTuesday fundraiser because she “had a chance to make a direct impact on teens” in her area.
“I am a firm believer that money should not stand in the way of you finding your place in BBYO, so being able to help spearhead such a powerful fundraiser was so empowering,” she said. “I am grateful for BBYO and proud that I got to be such a big part of Giving BBYO Day because of the opportunities it will give to others.”
The targeted killing of a peaceful religious leader is an exceptional and horrifying event whose adverse effects can ripple outward. That is all the truer when dealing with a situation as sensitive as that of the young Jewish presence in the United Arab Emirates.
This community blossomed and grew in the context of the Abraham Accords, the groundbreaking peace agreement in 2020 between Israel and four Arab and Muslim-majority countries, including the UAE, that led to a flowering in trade, travel and diplomacy between these nations. The recent murder of Chabad Rabbi Zvi Kogan there shows that none of this can be taken for granted. Peace, like a garden, is not a natural state but the result of careful tending and the aggressive weeding out of threats.
Kogan was one of just a handful of rabbis living and working in the UAE, tending to a flock of an estimated 4,000 Jewish residents, about half of whom are Israeli. Even in such select company, he stood out. Kogan managed and operated Rimon Market—a kosher supermarket in Dubai that opened in December 2022. He also served as an aide to Rabbi Levi Duchman, director of Chabad of the UAE, and an executive member and co-founder of the Alliance of Rabbis in Islamic Countries, through which Duchman works with Jewish communities across the region.
Community members had incredible stories to tell of his exceptional deeds and values: his hosting of open Shabbat dinners every Friday night, his lack of “office hours” and his constant availability to help community members in distress of every kind. Kogan leaves behind a grieving widow—New York native Rivky Spielman—whose aunt and uncle were Chabad emissaries to India and murdered by terrorists in 2008, along with four of their guests at Chabad of Mumbai.
Kogan’s assassination was no random act of violence. Information in Israel’s possession indicates that he may have been under Iranian surveillance. Iran has been known to commit terrorist attacks against Jewish communities around the world, as when their operatives murdered 85 people, Jewish and non-Jewish, in the bombing at the AMIA (Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires in 1994. Just last year, Greek police narrowly thwarted an Iranian terrorist attack on a Chabad center in Athens.
Three people, all citizens of Uzbekistan, have been arrested for Kogan’s kidnapping and murder after apparently fleeing to Turkey before being turned over to the Emirati justice system by Turkish authorities.
Damage has undoubtedly already been done. Israel warned against all nonessential travel to the UAE, saying that “[t]here is concern that there is still a threat against Israelis and Jews in the area.” Sadly, the UAE’s state-run news agency, in announcing his killing, referred to Kogan merely as a “Moldovan citizen,” his other nationality, and deliberately avoided mentioning his Israeli citizenship or his role as a rabbi.
The ripples of the killing are reflected well beyond the Middle East. Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt, the U.S. special envoy for monitoring and combating antisemitism, wrote that she was “horrified” by “this heinous act” and that “the ongoing targeting of Jewish communities worldwide is abhorrent and must stop.” Sean Savett, the spokesperson for the White House National Security Council, stated: “This was a horrific crime against all those who stand for peace, tolerance and coexistence.” Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth in the United Kingdom, called the assault a “devastating blow" to peace. Jared Kushner, who helped negotiate the Abraham Accords, his brother Josh and their families have pledged $2 million to Chabad of the UAE in Kogan’s memory so that they can rebuild and further expand on his legacy.
Kogan left an incredible history of goodness, spiritual growth and community leadership that helped form and guide one of the most vibrant Jewish communities in the Islamic world in modern times. Through his life and actions, he showed that Jews and Muslims can live together in harmony, each free to worship God in their own way with constant respect and admiration for the other. The twisted souls who ended his life, like their commanders in Tehran, are too sunk in darkness to see the beauty of his compelling message. But the world sees it, and a brighter day will dawn—a day that looks with respect and admiration at the trailblazing leadership of Kogan and with repugnance on the cruel jihadi regime in Iran, whose violence and cruelty will bring about its own demise. May that day come soon!
New research reveals the extent of Jew-hatred in Australia since the Hamas-led terror attacks against southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) released a report on Dec. 1 tracking incidents from October 2023 through September 2024, which showed that in 2023 the total antisemitic incidents in the country reached 495. For 2024, that number rose to 2062, a 316% jump.
Broken down by types of incidents, physical assaults shot up even higher—going from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024, a 491% increase.
In response to the report, Australia’s Opposition leader Peter Dutton stated that “this is not just a Jewish issue—it is a national crisis, and it demands urgent action. Enough is enough.”
ECAJ research director Julie Nathan compiled the report.
“If anything, the raw numbers understate the seriousness of the surge in antisemitism that has occurred,” she said. “There have been many new forms and expressions of anti-Jewish racism that would once have been considered alien to Australia, but which have become commonplace.”
Nathan added that “if it was thought that anti-Jewish racism was a thing of the past and defeated, the last 12 months has shown that it has been cynically reactivated and stoked for political purposes.”
Chart on the number of antisemitic incidents in Australia from 2013-2024. Credit: Executive Council of Australian Jewry Report.
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Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) introduced legislation on Thursday that would ban the federal government from using the term “West Bank” and instead use Judea and Samaria, the terminology preferred by Israel.
Formally titled the “Retiring the Egregious Confusion Over the Genuine Name of Israel’s Zone of Influence by Necessitating Government-use of Judea and Samaria (RECOGNIZING Judea and Samaria) Act,” the bill would prohibit government funds from being used to describe “the land annexed by Israel from Jordan during the 1967 Six-Day War” as the “West Bank,” except in international treaties and agreements.
“The Jewish people’s legal and historic rights to Judea and Samaria goes back thousands of years,” Cotton said. “The U.S. should stop using the politically charged term West Bank to refer to the biblical heartland of Israel.”
In a social-media post, he added that using the term “West Bank” is “a slap in the face to historical truth.”
“It’s time to call this region by its rightful name and stop playing into anti-Israel propaganda,” he said.
The Kingdom of Jordan promulgated the term after the 1948 Israeli War of Independence to describe the territory it controlled west of the Jordan River. Since the Six-Day War in June 1967, when Israel captured those territories, it has governed them as Judea and Samaria, and annexed the former eastern Jerusalem into the unified Jerusalem District.
The use of “West Bank” as opposed to Judea and Samaria is often viewed as a proxy for Palestinian and Israeli territorial claims and has also become a partisan issue in the United States, with many Republicans favoring Judea and Samaria while many Democrats using the phrase “West Bank.”
David Friedman, who served as U.S. ambassador to Israel in the first Trump administration, welcomed Cotton’s legislation on Thursday.
“Thank you, Tom Cotton, for standing with Israel, recognizing its biblical heritage and supporting one Jewish state,” he wrote.
The co-sponsors of the House companion version of the bill also touted Cotton introducing it in the Senate.
“Words matter,” wrote Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.). “It’s not ‘the West Bank.’ It’s ‘Judea and Samaria.’”
Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-N.Y.), who introduced the House version of the bill in February, said that it reaffirmed Israel’s “undeniable and indisputable historical and legal claim over Judea and Samaria.”
“This bill reaffirms Israel’s rightful claim to its territory,” she wrote. “I remain committed to defending the integrity of the Jewish state and fully supporting Israel’s sovereignty over Judea and Samaria.”
A trio of American Jewish leaders were honored on Tuesday by the Romanian government for decades of work in building the Eastern European country’s democracy, its incorporation into NATO and its reckoning with its antisemitic past.
This Sunday, all those efforts could be rolled back as Călin Georgescu—a little-known antisemitic, Holocaust-denying, pro-Russia candidate—is projected to win a runoff election for prime minister amid allegations of Russian meddling.
Facing an uncertain future back in Bucharest, Andrei Muraru—Romania’s ambassador to the United States—tied medals around the necks of Rabbi Andrew Baker, director of international Jewish affairs for the American Jewish Committee; Daniel S. Mariaschin, CEO of B’nai B’rith International; and Mark Levin, executive vice chairman and CEO of the National Coalition for Supporting Eurasian Jewry (NCSEJ).
Presenting them with the National Order of Merit in the rank of grand officer—the second-rarest civilian award—Muraru said the achievement was extraordinary. It was “not just regular achievement, but persistent, enduring, impactful and time tested leadership and achievement, the kind that deserves our highest recognition and praise,” he emphasized.
According to a declaration read at the ceremony, the awards were given “as a sign of high appreciation for their commitment to combating antisemitism and Holocaust denial, for their long-standing role in advancing Romania’s bilateral relations with the United States of America and with the State of Israel” and for their efforts to support Romania’s entry into the Schengen Area, allowing checkpoint-free travel for citizens of 29 European countries.
Baker was a member of the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania, known as the Wiesel Commission, led by Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel. It was established by former President Ion Iliescu, now 90, in 2003 to examine the history of the Holocaust in Romania and to make concrete recommendations on educating Romanians on the topic, following the uproar that Illiescu generated with his own Holocaust minimization.
“If you’re offered an award like this, you should take it. You never know when the time might come that you’ll need to give it back in protest.”
Rabbi Andrew Baker of the American Jewish Committee.
Baker had previously served on historical commissions in the Baltic states. He had known then-Romanian foreign minister Mircea Geoană from Geoană’s previous time as ambassador to the United States, and the two agreed that something needed to be done urgently in the wake of Iliescu’s comments.
Joined by Romanian Holocaust scholar Radu Ioanid, formerly of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and now Bucharest’s ambassador to Israel, Geoană thought a commission “would be good, and it would give it immediate credibility, and we recognized with Elie as chair, it would be very hard to discount any of the recommendations that would come out of this commission,” Baker told JNS.
“In the space of about 18 months, we had a clear and critical history prepared, agreed to, and other recommendations that I could promote together,” Baker recounted, including calling for the creation of a research center, a public memorial and an official commemoration day.
Receiving honors in Washington, D.C., on behalf of the Romanian government for their longtime work in building the Eastern European country’s democracy and combating antisemitism are (from left) Mark Levin, executive vice chairman and CEO of the National Coalition for Supporting Eurasian Jewry; Daniel S. Mariaschin, CEO of B’nai B’rith International; and Rabbi Andrew Baker, director of international Jewish affairs for the American Jewish Committee, assisted by Andrei Muraru, Romania’s ambassador to the United States, Dec. 2, 2024. Credit: LucyJo Photography.
‘It became a kind of litmus test’
Looking back over the last 20 years, Baker said that the work since then in Romania has gone “mostly forward, some steps back.”
Just this October, Baker was in Bucharest, helping the government to host a Holocaust conference focused on distortion and the education needed to address it, in conjunction with the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), on which Baker sits as a special envoy for combating antisemitism.
“We’re not really dealing with outright denial these days, but with the idea that, well, we don’t want to acknowledge the role of local collaborators from the Holocaust era and because they were also anti-Soviet fighters, they deserve to be honored, and we’ll ignore that they might have been murdering Jews anyway,” said Baker of a common issue that Romania faces.
The Wiesel Commission was also linked to Romania’s 2004 acceptance into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Romania has served as a key NATO ballistic-missile defense site.
Ion Iliescu. Credit: Agência Brasil via Wikimedia Commons.
Baker was part of a U.S. committee for NATO, addressing matters like Holocaust restitution and confronting Holocaust history.
“In a way, it became a kind of litmus test, because the argument for bringing these countries into NATO was not one that was sufficient to focus only on the military piece,” Levin told JNS, citing the relative insignificance of the strength of militaries like Romania and Lithuania.
With the end of the Cold War, questions were asked about the overall role of NATO and whether it “should be a community of values, and how are these countries dealing with issues of ethnic intolerance and so on,” said Baker.
He told JNS that every country might have had different issues with different ethnic minorities or neighbors, but they all had the same legacy in terms of having had Jewish community problems under communism and honestly confronting Holocaust history.
The awards given on Dec. 2, 2024. Credit: LucyJo Photography.
‘Taken a lead in the fight of antisemitism’
Mariaschin was also involved in Romania’s ascension to NATO after the country was rejected during the first round of post-Soviet additions in 1999.
He told JNS that B’nai B’rith, together with Baker’s AJC, became leading voices in the Jewish community in advocating for membership for Romania “and saying the window would not always be open.”
“This was an opportunity to ensure that the eastern flank of NATO and Eastern Europe would stay in the Democratic camp,” said Mariaschin, taking to Capitol Hill to push for the Senate’s ratification of Romania’s membership.
Andrei Muraru, Romania’s ambassador to the United States, Dec. 2, 2024. Credit: LucyJo Photography.
Levin’s ties to Romania go back even further before it shed communism during its 1989 revolution.
Under the Jackson-Vanik amendment to the U.S. Trade Act of 1974, a country’s immigration practices are linked to the granting of the economically valuable category of permanent normal trade relations. Levin helped to take part in Romania’s annual review concerning their acceptance of Jewish immigrants, ensuring that they were provided with dignified living conditions.
“To see what’s happened and to see how the Jewish community has grown and developed and has been integrated into Romanian society by successive governments—it’s remarkable to see how Romania has taken a lead in the fight of antisemitism,” Levin told JNS. “I’d like to think again that our organizations help build that bridge.”
But those bridges are showing signs of cracks. The rapid ascension of Georgescu, who has loudly glorified a pair of fiercely antisemitic Romanian fascists, has sent shockwaves through Europe and in Jewish communities in Romania.
From left: Mark Levin, executive vice chairman and CEO of the National Coalition for Supporting Eurasian Jewry; Daniel S. Mariaschin, CEO of B’nai B’rith International; Rabbi Andrew Baker, director of international Jewish affairs for the American Jewish Committee; and Andrei Muraru, Romania’s ambassador to the United States, Dec. 2, 2024. Credit: LucyJo Photography.
‘It sends an awful message’
A sense of trepidation could be felt in the air during the awards ceremony on Dec. 3, amid the celebration of the accomplishments of the past 30 years.
“We celebrate democracy, integrity and humanity, and strongly reject hate, fear and deception,” Muraru told those gathered. “This, ladies and gentlemen, is our sacred responsibility today, tomorrow and always. And we say that with a literal sense of urgency, as we are approaching perhaps the most consequential elections of our time in Romania this coming weekend when democracy and integrity must win—they will win—and fear and deception must and will be defeated.”
Mariaschin told JNS that a win on Sunday by Georgescu would be “a regression.”
“There’s a comfort level, there are visits back and forth, all kinds of programs,” he said of the known climate in U.S.-Romanian relations.
“To have someone who venerates the Iron Guard, an abject antisemite,” said Mariaschin, pausing, seemingly processing what it could all mean for the work he and his partners were being honored for.
Călin Georgescu. Credit: Focus Creștin via Wikimedia Commons.
Baker, who wrote an open letter to Romanian President Klaus Iohannis on the subject, told JNS that everyone voting for Georgescu is not necessarily an antisemite or Holocaust denier.
“But he is those things,” Baker said of Georgescu. “If you elect someone who has those views, it sends an awful message, and I think it undermines the very basis for the good and warm relationships that we have had, that we see in the bilateral relation between Romania and the United States, but also the relationship between Romania and Israel.
Levin took a measured tone, telling JNS that even if Georgescu is elected, he will be working with a parliament that is unlikely to bend to his will.
“I wish I could give you a definitive answer,” said Levin. “The level of concern is higher, certainly.”
Baker, meanwhile, told those gathered on Tuesday of something Ioanid once imparted to him.
“If you’re offered an award like this, you should take it. You never know when the time might come that you’ll need to give it back in protest,” he said, half in jest. “Well, I very much hope, even as fraught as these times are, that won’t happen.”
“Please let this truth serve to represent,” U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said in his social media message this week, warning that if the hostages are not released, “[t]hose responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied history of the United States of America.”
This challenge represents not only a practical shift but also a conceptual one. Trump’s use of the word “truth” enforces this change in the dynamic.
Trump’s threat came after Hamas released a video of American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander in captivity. Trump puts the blame for the lives and deaths of the 100 human beings still held hostage by Hamas where it belongs—on the terrorists responsible for the Oct. 7 atrocities and aftermath.
As he said in his statement, Trump is astonished, and rightly so, that there has been so much talk and outrage, but no decisive action.
The word “truth,” in the antisemitic mire that has flooded the world since Oct. 7, has erased the distinction between murderers and victims. It has filled the world with historical and political filth and maddened crowds. The reversal of truth, in which a horde of thousands of murderers systematically tore apart innocent families, one by one, has transformed into hatred for Jews and a threat to the West.
Now, with Trump’s decisive stance, a flag has been raised. Meanwhile, a governing group appears to be forming to confront not only the violence of Hamas but also Iran’s proxies. Hamas is finally being recognized for what it is: the sole culprit. On one side, there is good, Israel and its hostages, and on the other side, evil—Hamas and its backers.
This perspective has been lost since Oct. 7, even within Israel. The slogan “Bring them home” is aimed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, often implying that the greater responsibility lies not with Hamas but with the Israeli leader. Street protests in Israel are muddled by political hatred that accuses Netanyahu of refusing a ceasefire to maintain his government, a notion that has been disproven by the truce with Lebanon.
These protests are manna for Hamas, which continually raised the stakes for an agreement—a negotiation the terror group never truly intended to finalize unless it meant the survival of its Gaza regime.
Hamas, as confirmed by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and President Joe Biden themselves, has rejected all agreements to which Israel was willing to agree. Instead, they have continued to brutally torment and execute the hostages. Throughout this last year, Hamas has never ceased to incite conflict and anguish across Israel.
Now, as Trump is saying, the time for empty words is over. The status quo must be changed and not with useless gifts or humanitarian aid that is hijacked by terrorists or slandering Israel or political attacks that strengthen the enemy while Israel fights an essential war as humanely as possible despite the use of human shields.
As of now, the slogan is no longer “Bring them home,” but rather, “Let my people go.”
