Worth reading from Haaretz: The backlash against J Street from Amb. Leiter says less about J Street than it does about the current fault lines in Israeli politics and its relationship with American Jewish life. 1/2

J Street mourns the passing of Congressman Barney Frank. He shaped landmark reforms and never stopped engaging honestly with difficult questions, including in his final weeks when he spoke candidly about US policy toward Israel. May his memory be a blessing.

This video is horrifying – and it can’t be explained away by saying Itamar Ben-Gvir is “just one minister.” Netanyahu can claim that Ben-Gvir doesn’t represent his government. But he is a minister in their cabinet – empowered, unrestrained, and shaping a culture where abuse is normalized.

“J Street is a cancer” isn’t the language of diplomacy. It’s the language of an extremist who refuses to acknowledge why so many American Jews are horrified by what this Israeli government is doing. 1/2 blogs.timesofisrael.com/from-ambassa...

Calling for “prisons for Zionists” and pushing conspiracies about Zionism and pedophilia is not principled progressivism. It’s antisemitism. The Republicans helping boost Maureen Galindo for their own political gain should be ashamed. 1/2

In a painful new column on Word on the Street, @jeremybenami.bsky.social reflects on sexual violence, settler violence, Jerusalem Day and the growing extremism reshaping Israeli politics – and asks whether we are losing the Jewish moral compass that has guided our people for generations.

When Jewish members of Congress are flooded with messages praising Hitler, threatening violence, telling them to “go back to Israel” or calling them subhuman, it sends a message to Jewish Americans everywhere. 1/2

When the law catches up to Bezalel Smotrich, his response is threatening more dispossession, more settlement expansion and more suffering for Palestinians. Using Khan al-Ahmar as a political pawn is cruel, extremist and dangerous.

A father of eight who spent years protecting his community was killed at his mosque. Families are grieving. Children fled for their lives. Answering Islamophobic violence with calls for mass deportation fuels exactly the kind of hate that led to this attack.

More and more American Jews look at the destruction in Gaza, the settler terror in the West Bank and the abandonment of any path to peace and believe this Israeli government is taking the country somewhere dangerous. 1/2 www.haaretz.com/us-news/2026...

We mourn with the San Diego Muslim community after a deadly shooting at the Islamic Center today. Our hearts break for the loved ones of the victims and at the images of children being led to safety. We must confront Islamophobia clearly, urgently and without hesitation.

Fighting antisemitism means protecting Jewish communities – not using our fear to score political points or advance anti-democratic agendas. The Antisemitism Response and Prevention Act offers a real path forward.

A clinic in northern Gaza is treating up to 500 patients a day – without antibiotics, basic supplies or even enough chairs for patients. All because Israeli authorities imposed new restrictions on international NGOs and continue to restrict humanitarian access.

Jewish students absolutely deserve campuses free from antisemitism. But equating a student wearing a keffiyeh with a threat to Jewish safety is not a serious definition of antisemitism. It collapses the distinction between true bigotry and expressions of Palestinian identity.

Ordinary Palestinians in Gaza are being squeezed from all sides. As families struggle to afford basic food, Hamas continues to exploit the chaos while Israeli policies restricting and concentrating aid and goods allow a small group of brokers and middlemen to make enormous profits.

We were deeply disappointed when the Sarah Lawrence Student Senate rejected the launch of a J Street U chapter on campus. 1/3

NEW from Jo-Ann Mort (@ChangeCommNYC) for the J Street Policy Shop: Marwan Barghouti has been in prison for 24 years, yet remains one of the most popular Palestinian political figures. What might Barghouti mean for solving the Israeli-Palestinian impasse?

NEW from Jo-Ann Mort for the J Street Policy Shop: Marwan Barghouti has been in prison for 24 years, yet remains one of the most popular Palestinian political figures. What might Barghouti mean for solving the Israeli-Palestinian impasse?

As Palestinians in Jerusalem’s Old City are met with extremist chants of “death to Arabs,” Ben-Gvir can be found cheering it on from above. This is what it looks like when state power doesn’t just tolerate extremism – it breeds it and encourages it.

This is antisemitism, plain and simple. The swastika is the symbol of the systematic extermination of Jews. Flying it alongside a Star of David is not protest, and anyone who believes it advances the cause of Palestinian freedom is deeply mistaken.

There can be no future for Gaza built around Hamas’ violent authoritarian rule – and no sustainable future built around permanent Israeli military control either. Any serious postwar plan must prioritize long-term security for both Israelis and Palestinians. www.axios.com/2026/05/13/g...

Sending strength to our friend and partner, @lioramihai.bsky.social, who was beaten by violent settlers today while accompanying a @peacenowisrael.bsky.social tour in the West Bank. Palestinians know this reality all too well. 1/3

Believing people when they speak about the darkest moments of their lives cannot depend on politics or ideology. Join thousands of J Street supporters, and sign our petition to Amb. Yechiel Leiter calling for an independent investigation into allegations of sexual abuse of Palestinian detainees.

Imagine hearing chants calling for your death echo through your own neighborhood while you lock yourself inside your home. That is the reality for many Palestinians in Jerusalem during the Flag March. [video credit: Charlie Summers, TOI] 1/2

Palestinians in Gaza deserve leadership that fights for their safety, freedom and future – not a violent dictatorship that brutalizes its own people. The courage of Palestinians protesting Hamas, even under threat, should matter to anyone who cares about Palestinian dignity.

New reporting suggests that despite heavy bombing and repeated claims that Iran’s military had been “decimated,” Iran retains much of its missile capability and infrastructure. 1/2

A message from J Street President @JeremyBenAmi: There is a reflexive temptation, when confronted with reports of horrific abuses committed by Jews or by the State of Israel, to dismiss them. To blame the messenger or tell ourselves the world is just against us. 1/2

Israeli survivors who have spoken publicly and offered their voices to this report about sexual violence and abuse at the hands of Hamas terrorists and their allies showed extraordinary courage. The horror of what they endured is impossible to comprehend. www.cnn.com/2026/05/12/m...

After surviving 738 days of captivity, starvation, torture and sexual abuse in Gaza, former hostage Rom Braslavski is demanding accountability from Israel’s government. Israelis deserve leaders focused on the sanctity of life and building a future beyond endless war.

Come Thursday, extremists will inevitably march through Jerusalem’s Old City, chanting hate and trampling on Palestinian dignity and identity. Our hearts are with the brave Israelis from Om Dim Beyachad and the Palestinian community refusing to surrender to racism, fear and provocation.

Last month, Holocaust survivor, former Israeli diplomat and former Knesset member Colette Avital was shoved to the ground by police at an anti-war protest in Israel, sustaining a head injury. We spoke with her about protest, democracy, the occupation and the future of Israel.

Trump starts a reckless war behind closed doors, offers few answers to the public, then turns around and targets the people reporting on it and their sources. That’s what authoritarian leaders do when they know the facts won’t hold up.

Israel’s closest allies in American politics are sounding the alarm. As J Street’s Nadav Tamir writes: It’s not because they oppose Israel, but because they oppose Netanyahu’s endless wars, far-right extremism and devastation of Palestinians’ aspirations.

A generation of children across the region is growing up under the shadow of war. In Israel, Gaza, Lebanon and beyond, families displaced by war are waiting for the chance to simply live normally again. Endless war is failing everyone.

The response that “the world is against Israel” grows less credible every time allies impose consequences, like this move by the EU to sanction violent settlers and extremists. This is not about delegitimizing Israel. It’s about what the Netanyahu government is enabling in the West Bank. 1/2

Reports of sexual violence and abuse against Palestinians in Israeli detention and across the West Bank are horrifying and demand accountability. Every person’s humanity matters. That principle cannot disappear when the victims are Palestinian. 1/2

A better conversation among Democrats about Israel must include Palestine and Palestinians – not as an afterthought, but as central to any just and lasting future. New from J Street President @jeremybenami.bsky.social on Word on the Street: jstreetdotorg.substack.com/p/a-better-d...

Abe Foxman was a giant of the American Jewish community. A Holocaust survivor who dedicated his life to fighting antisemitism, he led the Anti-Defamation League for decades, serving as a clear moral voice and championing the rights of Jews and other minorities. May his memory be a blessing.

The Supreme Court just weakened key Voting Rights Act protections, making it easier to draw maps that disenfranchise Black and minority communities. 1/2

Eight years ago today, President Trump ripped up the Iran nuclear deal. At the time, Iran’s nuclear program was constrained and under the strictest inspections regime in the world. Today, Iran has enough Highly Enriched Uranium for 10 nuclear bombs. 1/4

MUST READ: The Israeli government is pushing the West Bank to the brink, withholding billions in funds from the Palestinian Authority and blocking Palestinian workers from entering Israel to work. Collective punishment will not make anyone, Israelis and Palestinians, any safer.

Too many Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim Americans in public service are attacked publicly and smeared simply because of who they are. @ilangoldenberg.bsky.social enberg flips the double standard on its head and calls out racist paradigms:

As Americans witness the devastation in Gaza, more are asking why groups like AIPAC continue defending blank-check support for Netanyahu’s government. The politics around Israel are changing because the status quo has failed everyone. More in @reuters.com: www.reuters.com/world/us/ten...

@hadyamr.bsky.social explains a reality too few Americans and Jewish Americans understand: Israel collects most Palestinian tax revenues – and has withheld billions from the Palestinian Authority, leaving workers unpaid and deepening instability in the West Bank. 1/2

If every terrorist group/regime leader killed is replaced by someone more extreme – and every strike pushes a fragile ceasefire closer to collapse – what exactly is the strategy? The people of Israel, Lebanon, Palestine + beyond deserve real security and peace, not an endless cycle of escalation.

🗞️ As J Street President @JeremyBenAmi put it to @WaPo: “Rest in peace to the old-fashioned ‘Israel right-or-wrong’ approach and blank checks. All of that is over.” Americans are asking harder questions – about values, accountability and what their taxpayer dollars are enabling.

After months of war, destruction, lost lives – and Americans paying the price at the pump and grocery store – we’re right back to where we always knew we should have started: Diplomacy. This war didn’t make anyone safer. It didn’t solve the problem – in fact, it actively made it worse.

Palestinian children in Gaza are being bitten by rats in their sleep. Families are taking shifts to stay awake and protect each other. Israel has an obligation to address the devastation. The U.S. has a responsibility to demand follow-through.

Two things can be true: Protests that glorify violence, wave Hezbollah flags and chant for the destruction of Israel are wrong. Using our synagogues to promote home sales in West Bank settlements is also wrong. 1/2

Can Washington finally treat Palestinians as partners? Hady Amr joins Ilan Goldenberg for a conversation on the future of the U.S.-Palestinian relationship today at 4pm Eastern on Word on the Street. 🔗 open.substack.com/live-stream/...