J Street works to promote an open, honest and rigorous conversation about Israel. The opinions reflected in articles posted in the News Roundup do not necessarily reflect J Street’s positions, and their posting does not constitute an endorsement from J Street.
October 7 Community Calls
Continuing the commemoration of this painful anniversary, J Street invites our supporters to join us and the Progressive Israel Network for a call today about the Gaza war and its devastating impact on Palestinians, Israelis and the wider Middle East.
Trump May Be Good for Netanyahu, but Not for Israel, The Jerusalem Post
J Street Israel’s Director Nadav Tamir shares, “Harris is committed to Israel’s security and has proven so throughout her long career as California’s attorney-general and senator and Biden’s vice president. She is expected to follow Biden’s foreign policy guidelines, meaning deep commitment to Israel’s security, but equally deep concern over the damage to Israel and the United States caused by the policies of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history.”
Biden, Netanyahu Speak, Israel Vows Lethal Retaliation Against Iran, Reuters
The 30-minute call was the first known chat for Biden and Netanyahu since August and coincides with a sharp escalation of Israel’s conflict with Iran and the Iran-backed Lebanese Hezbollah, but with no sign of an imminent ceasefire to end the conflict with Iran-backed Hamas in Gaza.
Iranian Official Heads to Saudi Arabia as Israel Postpones U.S. Meeting, The New York Times
As the Middle East remains on edge in anticipation of a possible retaliatory attack by Israel on Iran, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday as part of a diplomatic tour aimed at shoring up relations with Iran’s Arab neighbors.
US Calls Out Israel at UN for ‘Catastrophic Conditions’ in Gaza, Reuters
Israel needs to address urgently “catastrophic conditions” among Palestinian civilians in the besieged Gaza Strip and stop “intensifying suffering” by limiting aid deliveries, its ally the United States told the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday.
Israel Says Attack on Iran Will Be Precise and Lethal, Politico
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Wednesday that Israel’s eventual military response to Iran “will be lethal, precise and especially surprising.”
Israeli Strike On School-Turned-Shelter in Gaza Kills 27, AP
An Israeli strike on a school sheltering the displaced in the Gaza Strip killed at least 27 people on Thursday, Palestinian medical officials said. The Israeli military said it targeted militants hiding among civilians, without providing evidence.
Israeli Strike Kills 5 Emergency Workers in Southern Lebanon, The New York Times
Rescue teams searched through the rubble early on Thursday after an overnight Israeli strike in southern Lebanon killed at least five members of the country’s civil defense agency, according to Lebanon’s health ministry and state news media.
71% of US Jewish Voters in 7 Swing States Favor Harris, Democrat-Affiliated Poll Finds, The Times of Israel
A poll commissioned by a Jewish affiliate of the Democratic Party shows United States Vice President Kamala Harris garnering 71% of the Jewish vote in the seven swing states likely to decide the election.
Brown Says No to Pro-Palestinian Students’ Demands for Divestment, NPR
The university’s highest governing body, The Brown Corporation, says divesting “would signal that there are ‘approved’ points of views to which members of the community are expected to conform,” which would be “wholly inconsistent with the principles of academic freedom and free inquiry and would undermine our mission.”
On Israeli Apathy, The New York Times
Mairav Zonszein argues, “Israeli disregard for Palestinian suffering, whether conscious or not, has been one of the most palpable and disturbing features of life in Israel since Oct. 7. Of course it existed well before then, but it is all the more stark and consequential now. It is precisely this apathy that has enabled the far right — which is not at all apathetic in its approach toward the Palestinians — to dominate Israeli politics, unchallenged.”
Don’t Believe the Netanyahu Bashing. The U.S. Basically Agrees with Him., The Washington Post
Perry Bacon Jr. writes, “What Biden and his aides should have been constantly saying the past year is, ‘Israeli and Palestinian lives matter,’ not, ‘Israel has a right to defend itself.’”
65 Doctors, Nurses and Paramedics: What We Saw in Gaza, The New York Times
Dr. Feroze Sidhwa shares, “What American physicians and nurses saw firsthand in Gaza should inform the United States’ Gaza policy. The lethal combination of what Human Rights Watch describes as indiscriminate military violence, what Oxfam calls the deliberate restriction of food and humanitarian aid, near-universal displacement of the population, and destruction of the health care system is having the calamitous effect that many Holocaust and genocide scholars warned of nearly a year ago.”
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