On Friday night, Aug. 14, a man allegedly hit a 63-year-old woman and spat upon and heat-butted a 65-year-old security guard at Central Synagogue, a Reform congregation in Manhattan. Two days later, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani began a weeklong “planned vacation with his family in upstate New York,” according to City Hall.

JNS asked Jewish leaders in the city whether they thought that the mayor, who has been widely accused of fanning the flames of Jew-hatred, ought to have canceled his vacation to stand with Jewish New Yorkers after the attack at the synagogue and less than a month after a visibly Jewish man was stabbed near an Upper West Side synagogue by a man who, witnesses say, yelled “Allahu akbar.”

Rabbi Yaakov Menken, founding executive vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values, told JNS that the question is not if Mamdani should be taking a weeklong vacation, but “how soon he will retire or be retired.”

“Hateful violence starts from hateful incitement, and he has been inciting violence against our community since long before he took office,” he said.

Read the full article at JNS

Photo: Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office.

Rabbi Yaakov Menken, executive vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values, warned that the growing influence of the Democratic Socialists of America within the Democratic Party endangers the American Dream and the nation’s future.

In a Fox News appearance on Monday, Menken described the DSA as a dangerous movement whose ideology and recent actions pose a serious threat to core American values and the country’s long-term stability.

Menken has previously labeled the DSA “objectively antisemitic.” He issued that characterization after DSA co-chair Megan Romer told The New Yorker that the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel were “largely inevitable,” remarks that drew widespread condemnation from pro-Israel organizations.

The Coalition for Jewish Values is the largest rabbinic public-policy organization in the United States. Menken’s comments come amid heightened concerns in Jewish communities about the DSA’s expanding political footprint and its positions on Israel and related issues.

Photo: Rabbi Yaakov Menken, courtesy of Coalition for Jewish Values

BALTIMORE (VINnews)— The Coalition for Jewish Values, which represents more than 2,500 traditional Orthodox rabbis in American public policy, announced Monday the appointment of former U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman and Irit Tratt to its Advisory Board, along with three new professional staff members.

Friedman, who served as ambassador during the Trump administration and worked to strengthen the U.S.-Israel alliance, said he was proud to join the board.

“CJV represents a unique voice in public policy, articulating Jewish values with clarity and authenticity,” Friedman said. “I believe what they are doing is critical for America’s future, and I am proud to join its Advisory Board.”

Also joining the Advisory Board is Irit Tratt, a national board member of the Republican Jewish Coalition and a board member of the Jerusalem News Syndicate and the Jewish Institute for National Security of America. She also serves on the steering committee of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs.

“At this pivotal moment for Jews in America and around the world, principled leadership is essential,” Tratt said. “I am proud to join the CJV Board and to help advance an agenda rooted in traditional Jewish values, moral clarity and an unwavering commitment to Israel.”

The organization also named Isabella Brannon as director of legal affairs, Shaya Gedz as director of federal affairs and Rabbi Meir Levin as director of external relations.

“These appointments represent an important step forward for CJV as we expand our national presence and strengthen our ability to advocate for Jewish values and the Jewish community,” said Rabbi Yaakov Menken, CJV’s executive vice president. “Our new staff bring valuable experience, energy and commitment to our work, while Ambassador Friedman and others are now offering their extraordinary insight and leadership to our Advisory Board. At a time of rising antisemitism and growing hostility toward both Israel and Jewish values, their voices and counsel will be invaluable.”

Photo: U.S. Department of State, public domain.

“CJV represents a unique voice in public policy, articulating Jewish values with clarity and authenticity,” said Ambassador Friedman, who played a key role advancing human rights and the cause of peace during his time as U.S. Ambassador to Israel, as well as deepening the U.S.-Israel alliance. “I believe what they are doing is critical for America’s future, and I am proud to join its Advisory Board.”

By joining the CJV Advisory Board, Amb. Friedman recognized CJV’s advancement as one of the leading voices for authentic Jewish values in the public policy sphere. This growth was cemented over the summer with three new staff entering key positions: Isabella Brannon as Director of Legal Affairs, Shaya Gedz as Director of Federal Affairs, and Rabbi Meir Levin as Director of External Relations.

“These appointments represent an important step forward for CJV as we expand our national presence and strengthen our ability to advocate for Jewish values and the Jewish community,” said CJV Executive Vice President Rabbi Yaakov Menken. “Our new staff bring valuable experience, energy and commitment to our work, while Ambassador Friedman and others are now offering their extraordinary insight and leadership to our Advisory Board. At a time of rising antisemitism and growing hostility toward both Israel and Jewish values, their voices and counsel will be invaluable.”

Also joining the Advisory Board is Mrs. Irit Tratt, a National Board Member of the Republican Jewish Coalition, and a Board Member of Jerusalem News Syndicate and the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), who also serves on the Steering Committee of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs. “At this pivotal moment for Jews in America and around the world, principled leadership is essential,” said Mrs. Tratt. “I am proud to join the CJV Board and to help advance an agenda rooted in traditional Jewish values, moral clarity and an unwavering commitment to Israel.”

Photo: Amb. David Friedman, U.S. Department of State

The co-chair of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) group is receiving sharp backlash for saying on Friday that the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre in Israel was mostly “inevitable.”

During an interview with The New Yorker’s David Remnick, DSA co-chair Megan Romer was questioned about democratic socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier, who attended an anti-Israel, pro-Hamas rally the day after the Oct. 7 terrorist attack in 2023, and was pressed on whether she would have attended if she were in her position.

“I think that Oct. 7 was largely inevitable,” she replied. “If you put people in an open-air concentration camp and you deprive them of rights, of dignity, of food, of the ability to live in safety, you have to expect that they are going to not take that for that long. And that is not defending any harm of civilians or of non-combatants —”

Pro-Israel groups condemned her comments.

Executive Vice President for Coalition for Jewish Values, Rabbi Yaakov Menken, called the DSA “objectively antisemitic.”

“She used a mythological inversion of reality to justify both a murderous pogrom and an ongoing plan of starvation, torture, rape, and murder,” Menken said.

Read the full article at Fox News

Also published in Yahoo News.

Photo: Screenshot of Megan Romer interview.

Missouri primary voters will travel back two years when they head to the polls on Tuesday. There they’ll confront a rematch of two candidates whose previous face-off was largely defined by an influx of AIPAC cash that helped oust one of Israel’s most ardent critics in Congress.

In 2024, AIPAC “demonstrated its clout,” with a massive contribution that knocked out incumbent U.S. Rep. Cori Bush in favor of challenger Wesley Bell. In her concession speech, she promised revenge. On Tuesday, Bush is seeking to make good on the pledge. But while she is competing against the same candidate, the political landscape around them has changed dramatically.

Jewish leaders and activists in the state have followed the race closely. Rabbi Ze’ev Smason, president of the Coalition for Jewish Values – Missouri, told JTA in an email that his organization also doesn’t endorse candidates. But the difference between Bell and Bush, he said, was obvious to his regional chapter of a national Orthodox rabbinic group.

While Bell “supports Israel’s right to self-determination” and to exist as a Jewish nation, Bush has “established an adversarial relationship with Israel abroad, as well as with the overwhelming majority of her Missouri constituents,” according to Smason.

“At home in her district, Cori Bush was a ‘no-show’ for her Jewish constituents,” Smason stated. “She regularly refused requests for interviews from the local Jewish press, and was shockingly absent from the dedication ceremony of the Holocaust Museum and Learning Center, with no explanation.”

Read the full article at Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Also published in Times of Israel.

Rabbinic law operates on a principle that “a man may not make himself out to be evil,” but the Talmud also states that “silence is like agreement.” That means, two Orthodox rabbis told JNS, that it’s complicated what Jewish tradition has to say about Dr. Anthony Fauci declining to answer questions under the Fifth Amendment 111 times during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing last week.

Fauci is a former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to former U.S. President Joe Biden, who pardoned Fauci on Jan. 19, 2025. The doctor’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was the focus of the Senate panel hearing.

Rabbi Yaakov Menken, executive vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values, told JNS that he “was never as liable to believe conspiracy theories about what Dr. Fauci knew about the Wuhan Institute of Virology as I am after he refused to testify regarding the color of his tie.”

Menken, the group’s founding chief executive, noted the Talmudic statement that “a man may not make himself out to be evil.”

“That, however, refers to Jewish law exempting a person from bringing a fine, penalty or capital punishment upon himself through his own admission of guilt,” he said. “A person refusing to testify is quite different, as is the case here.”

“A person should be forthright and honest, and he made himself out to be someone with something to hide,” he told JNS.

Read the full article at JNS

Photo: C-SPAN Screenshot.