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In today’s Daily Kickoff, we interview New Jersey Assembly candidate Tamar Warburg, who would be the first Orthodox woman in the New Jersey legislature, and look at how a dispute over the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism is playing a role in the state’s elections. We report on Rep. Ritchie Torres’ call for New York’s City Parks Foundation to cancel its upcoming concert featuring Kehlani following the singer’s antisemitic and anti-Israel comments, and cover a bipartisan push from House members making the highest-ever request for nonprofit security funding for the upcoming fiscal year. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Yuval Raphael, Santa Ono and Robert Kraft.

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For the third day in a row, air raid sirens blared throughout central Israel on Sunday morning after the Iran-backed Houthis launched a missile from Yemen. This time, the IDF was unable to shoot the missile down before it reached Israel, and while no one was killed, it landed in a strategically damaging location: Ben Gurion Airport. Several airlines canceled flights for the coming days.

While Israel dealt with threats to its north and south, the IDF began calling up tens of thousands of reservists ahead of a return to more intensive warfare in Gaza, unanimously approved by the security cabinet on Sunday night and likely to begin after President Donald Trump’s visit to the Middle East next week.

Amid U.N. pressure, the cabinet also approved a plan to allow humanitarian aid in again — once the food currently in Gaza runs out — with a new distribution mechanism meant to prevent Hamas from pocketing the goods and using it as leverage to stay in power.

Since the last ceasefire in Gaza ended on March 18, Israel has been slowly intensifying the war with the aim of ramping up pressure on Hamas, first by stopping humanitarian aid, and then by evacuating the civilian population from more and more areas of the coastal enclave, and continuing airstrikes throughout.

After Hamas rejected the ceasefire and hostage release deal that Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, attempted to negotiate last month, and the terrorist group’s counter-offer excluded disarmament – a red line for Israel – plus a spike in IDF casualties in Gaza, Israel's patience began to run out.

The open decision to escalate and the mobilization of reservists to that end is its own form of pressure, another warning shot at Hamas aimed at pushing it to enter a hostage release deal, but Jerusalem views the intensification of fighting as the only way to reach the war’s other goal, “total victory” over Hamas, as Netanyahu said in a video posted to social media on Sunday.

An Israeli official told media that the plan includes occupying Gaza and retaining the territory, moving the Gazan civilian population south, and conducting “powerful attacks” against Hamas.

The mission, the prime minister said, remains to bring back the hostages and defeat Hamas: "There will be no Hamas [in Gaza] … We will not give up on defeating them. Wars must end decisively. We will win." 

At the same time, many hostage families and their supporters continued to speak out against intensifying the war, with the Hostages and Missing Families Forum saying, "The expansion of military operations puts every hostage at grave risk.” The group also noted that “the vast majority of the Israeli public views the return of the hostages as the nation's highest moral priority." Recent polls back up that statement, indicating that most Israelis would be willing to end the war in exchange for all the hostages.

IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir warned ministers in recent days that “in a plan for a full-scale maneuver, we won’t necessarily reach the hostages. Keep in mind that we could lose them,” according to Israel's Channel 13. The channel also quoted Zamir as saying that the goals of defeating Hamas and returning the hostages “are problematic in relation to each other.”

Netanyahu, however, continued to argue that the choice between defeating Hamas and the hostages is not binary. "Military pressure is what worked and it is what will work now," he said. "If we are victorious, we will free the hostages, and we are in the stages of victory … Victory will bring the hostages.”

The prime minister also waved off accusations that he was continuing the war for his own political longevity as "the propaganda line of the propaganda channels and the left," saying: "Should we leave Hamas inside [Gaza] so they will be at the [border] fences again? Should Hezbollah be at the fences? That's political?"

PARK & WARBURG FOR NJ ASSEMBLY

Tamar Warburg is hoping to be the first Orthodox woman in the New Jersey legislature, running for office in the June 10 Democratic primary to represent New Jersey’s 37th Assembly district, which includes Teaneck, Englewood and most of Bergen County. She didn’t plan for this: Last year, she was approached by Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop, a leading candidate for governor, who asked her to run on an unofficial slate affiliated with his campaign. She’s taking on two incumbent Democrats, arguing that they have not been attentive enough to the needs of the district’s large Jewish community. “I realized this was not an offer to Tamar Warburg. This was an offer to my Jewish community, and unless I had a really compelling reason not to do it, I didn't really have the authority to say no,” Warburg told Jewish Insider’s Gabby Deutch in an interview.

IHRA ire: But to win, she first faces an uphill battle within her own Jewish community. A messy political dispute playing out in the New Jersey gubernatorial election has trickled down to this Assembly race, pitting Warburg against another Orthodox candidate, Yitz Stern — and threatening to split the Jewish vote and deal a win to the incumbents. It all started with what was intended to be a straightforward piece of legislation that would’ve codified the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism, affording law enforcement officers and other state employees a tool to understand and respond to hate crimes and formulate anti-discrimination policies. It passed out of committee in the State Senate in February, but it was never brought to a vote on the floor. Of the two incumbent assembly members from District 37, one — Ellen Park — signed on as a sponsor of the bill, while the other — Shama Haider — did not, earning criticism from many in the Bergen County Jewish community. 

Read the full story here.

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President Donald Trump said the goal of U.S. negotiations with Iran is “total dismantlement” of its nuclear program, contradicting comments made by others in his administration that Iran may be allowed to retain some enrichment capabilities. Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday, the president said total dismantlement is “all I’d accept” out of the negotiations and downplayed the suggestion that the U.S. is open to Iran maintaining a civilian enrichment program, Jewish Insider’s Danielle Cohen reports. 

Civil enrichment: “Now, there’s a new theory going out there that Iran would be allowed to have civilian — meaning to make electricity and to — but I say, you know, they have so much oil, what do they need it for?” Trump said. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has indicated otherwise as recently as last month, when he told The Free Press, “If Iran wants a civil nuclear program, they can have one just like many other countries in the world have one.” Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff has made similar comments suggesting Iran could be permitted to continue enrichment up to 3.67% as part of a civilian program, though he backtracked after receiving pushback from GOP lawmakers.

Read the full story here.

GILBERT FLORES/VARIETY VIA GETTY IMAGES

Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) is calling on New York City officials to cancel a Central Park performance at a city-sponsored event by Kehlani, a performer who has called for the destruction of Israel and Zionism, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.

Back and forth: Kehlani is set to perform in June at an event for Pride month sponsored by the City Parks Foundation, an independent nonprofit which receives city funding to promote arts, sports, education and other programming in city parks. But Mayor Eric Adams has disputed whether the mayor’s office has any ability to cancel the performance or withhold funds. Torres highlighted Kehlani’s anti-Israel rhetoric  in a letter to Mayor Eric Adams, City Parks Foundation Executive Director Heather Lubov and Live Nation Entertainment CEO Michael Rapino and said that “Our public institutions have a duty to ensure that taxpayer dollars are never misspent on subsidizing or sanitizing antisemitism.”

Read the full story here.

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A bipartisan group of more than 130 House members put forward their highest-ever request for funding for the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, asking for an appropriation of $500 million, nearly doubling the current funding level, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.

Path ahead: Despite the substantial bipartisan support, the request could face strong headwinds as the appropriations process moves forward, with the Trump administration proposing significant cuts to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s non-emergency grants — a category that includes NSGP — and not, as of Friday, offering a specific budget line-item for the NSGP. “We respectfully ask that $500 million in funding be allocated to NSGP. The program provides critical security resources to at-risk faith-based and nonprofit institutions located in urban, suburban, and rural communities,” a group of 133 House members led by Reps. Gabe Amo (D-RI) and Michael McCaul (R-TX) said.

Read the full story here.

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The Trump administration’s budget request submitted to Congress on Friday calls for a $49 million cut to the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, the bureau responsible for investigating and adjudicating complaints of campus antisemitism, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.

Going deeper: The budget proposal, which slashes a total of $163 billion in spending, also includes what Republican defense hawks are condemning as an effective cut in defense spending and cuts to Federal Emergency Management Agency grant programs, Department of Justice hate crime prevention grants and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The budget request sent to congressional appropriators says that the OCR cut, which amounts to 35% of the department’s 2025 budget, seeks “to refocus away from DEI and Title IX transgender cases” and states that the office has cleared “a massive backlog in 2025.”

Read the full story here.

Bucking Boulos: Politico’s Felicia Schwartz and Robbie Gramer look at the relationship between the White House and Massad Boulos, Tiffany Trump's father-in-law and the Trump administration’s Africa advisor and senior advisor of Arab and Middle Eastern affairs, whose role has become “diminished” amid reported tensions with the White House. “Trump named Boulos as a senior adviser on the Middle East during the transition last year and he began taking informal meetings with Lebanese officials and other diplomats. But some in the administration say he was overstepping. ‘The job was more symbolic, but he didn’t know that,’ said an administration official. ‘Everyone knew it but him.’ … Boulos was weakened by a spate of early media interviews asserting himself as a dominant voice on Lebanon policy, irking Trump’s inner circle in the process, as well as a New York Times story that exposed he had for years misled the public about the source of his wealth. Two of the people familiar with Boulos’ interactions said he had developed an unfavorable reputation for talking too much. His move away from Middle East work stemmed also from concerns within the administration about some of his political and social connections in the region.” [Politico]

Campus Beat: In The Free Press, Rabbi David Wolpe, who served for a year as a visiting scholar at Harvard Divinity School, reflects on the school’s recently released report on antisemitism. “[The report] explains that anti-colonialism has become the ideological battering ram to mobilize a diverse cult of anti-Western sentiments. The challenge to Zionism becomes a first step in turning disillusion with the West into a wholesale indictment of it. The old antisemitism of the Soviet Union had this double purpose as well — destroy the Jews, and you’ve destroyed the root of Western civilization. Harvard is not just a host for this worldview. It is the dominant view on campus. But what no report can capture is the feeling that Jewishness was something to hide, and the stigma of being a Jew-hater was fading. One student in my class, after having walked through Harvard Yard and being screamed at by some of the protesters, said to me: ‘They don’t just hate what I believe. They hate me.’” [FreePress]

Weiner’s Way: In The Atlantic, Josh Tyrangiel interviews former Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY), who is attempting a return to politics in his bid for New York City Council. “Weiner’s a centrist Democrat — he thinks the neighborhood needs more cops and fewer pot shops. ‘If this election is about the most anti-Trump, crazy-making person on the left, you’re not going to pick a Cuomo or a Weiner,’ he said. ‘Now, I could be completely wrong, but there seems to be a disconnect with the brand that New York Democrats are selling and what people want to buy right now.’ I asked what evidence he had to support this. ‘I’m in New York with a head on my shoulders seeing what’s going on on 14th Street.’ … Most politicians know how to live on the surface in these moments. But Weiner uses conflict to make small things feel more urgent, to make local democracy into something worthy of passion. He’s not a beautiful speaker, but he challenges Democrats to hear the jagged melody blaring through his septum: Do we want to be polite, or do we want to solve this? If I’m willing to fight with you, imagine how hard I’ll fight for you.” [TheAtlantic]

Alarm in Africa: In the Jerusalem Post, Amjad Taha and Eitan Neishlos consider the threat posed to Israel by extremist elements in Sudan that are bolstered by support from Tehran. “Sudan is no longer just a battlefield. It is rapidly becoming a terror hub, strategically positioned near Israel’s southern flank and the vital shipping lanes of the Red Sea. The Baraa ibn Malik Brigade, operating under SAF, openly venerates Sayyid Qutb, the ideological architect of jihadism. Its leader, Al-Musbah Abu Zaid, often referred to as the Yahya Sinwar of Sudan, poses with figures like Mukhtar Badri, notorious for anti-Semitic incitement and global terror ties. ... Iran is also a central actor in this Islamist resurgence. Port Sudan has quietly transformed into a key node in Tehran’s regional weapons network. Through covert maritime shipments and military contracts, Iran has begun supplying drones to the Sudanese Armed Forces, the same types used by the Houthis to target Israeli-linked vessels in the Red Sea.” [JPost]

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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is slated to travel to Israel on May 12, before traveling on to Saudi Arabia, where he will join President Donald Trump, who also is slated to travel to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates… 

White House senior policy advisor Stephen Miller is reportedly a top candidate to succeed Mike Waltz as national security advisor, following Trump’s announcement last week that he planned to nominate Waltz to be U.S. ambassador to the U.N….

Politico looks at Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s standing in the Trump administration, noting that the former Florida senator, who was appointed interim national security advisor following Waltz’s ouster, “offers a lesson to others trying to survive under Trump”...

The House of Representatives postponed a vote on the IGO Anti-Boycott Act, which expands existing U.S. anti-boycott laws addressing compulsory boycotts of U.S. allies enforced by foreign nations, following outcry from the far-right, including Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) and influencer Charlie Kirk, online on Sunday; the legislation received near-unanimous support in committee last year…

Beth Davidson, a Democratic Rockland County legislator running against Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), shared with Jewish Insider her position paper on Israel and the Middle East, outlining her support for “the continuation and growth” of U.S. military aid to Israel, her plans for countering Iran’s nuclear ambitions and her support for the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism…

Harvard President Alan Garber said that the Trump administration’s threat — made by the president on Friday — to revoke the school’s tax-exempt status would, if carried out, be “highly illegal” and “destructive” to the university…

A Temple University student was suspended after an incident in which he and another individual ordered a sign with antisemitic text to his table at a bar owned by Barstool founder Dave Portnoy; in a social media post, Portnoy said he would, following a conversation with the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism’s Robert Kraft, cover the costs for the two individuals to travel to Auschwitz “to learn about the Holocaust”…

University of Michigan President Santa Ono is departing the Ann Arbor school for the University of Florida, following the UF presidential search committee’s unanimous decision to recommend Ono as the sole finalist to succeed former President Ben Sasse, who stepped down last summer…

Officials in the U.K. arrested seven Iranian men in connection with two separate national security-related threats; police said four of the men were planning a terrorist attack on an unnamed site…

The Associated Press spotlights the “Violin of Hope,” which was recently discovered to have been made by a Jewish craftsman while imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp; the violin-maker, Franciszek “Franz” Kempa, survived the war and died in his native Poland in 1953…

The Wall Street Journal looks at the increase in online radicalization of European teenagers following the arrests of dozens of young people across the continent in connection with plots to conduct terror attacks…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that Qatar has “decisive influence” over Hamas “that is not always exercised but could be,” a day after the Prime Minister’s Office released a statement calling on Doha to “stop playing both sides with its double talk and decide if it's on the side of civilization or if it's on the side of Hamas”...

Hamas released a video of hostage Maxim Herkin, a month after releasing a video showing the first sign of life from the Russian-Israeli citizen who was kidnapped from the Nova music festival on Oct. 7, 2023…

The Israeli government decided not to establish a state commission of inquiry into the events surrounding the Oct. 7 attacks at this stage, citing the intensifying war in the Gaza Strip…

Tehran said it would strike Israel or the U.S. if either responded to the Sunday ballistic missile attack conducted by the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen…

Iran unveiled the new “Qassem Basir” ballistic missile that Iran’s defense minister said has a range of 745 miles…

Phil Gordon, who served as national security advisor to former Vice President Kamala Harris, is joining the Brookings Institution as the Sydney Stein, Jr. Scholar in the Brookings’ Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology…

Rabbi Sholom Lipskar, the longtime leader of The Shul of Bal Harbour, Fla., and founder of the Aleph Institute, died at 78…

Singer Jill Sobule, who was known for her hits “Supermodel” and “I Kissed a Girl,” died at 66…

Attorney Sybil Shainwald, who represented female clients whose health had been damaged by poorly tested devices and treatments, died at 96…

MA’AYAN TOAF/GPO

Singer and Nova music festival massacre survivor Yuval Rafael met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and First Lady Michal Herzog before departing for the Eurovision Song Contest in Switzerland, which takes place next week, where she will perform “New Day Will Rise” as Israel’s entrant in the annual competition.

MIKE KIREEV/NURPHOTO VIA GETTY IMAGES

Former Israeli national soccer team captain, he also played for Chelsea, West Ham United and Liverpool in the English Premier League, Yossi Benayoun turns 45...

Senior U.S. district judge for the Northern District of Illinois, Robert W. Gettleman turns 82... Best-selling author of 20 novels featuring fictional Manhattan prosecutor Alexandra Cooper, written by the former head of the sex crimes unit of the Manhattan District Attorney's office, Linda Fairstein turns 78... Retired chief judge on the Maryland Court of Special Appeals, he was once president of the Jewish Community Council of Washington, Peter B. Krauser turns 78... Docent at NYC's Metropolitan Museum of Art, Ruth Klein Schwalbe... Gayle Weiss Schochet... Member of the Knesset, almost continuously since 1988, for the Haredi parties of Degel HaTorah and United Torah Judaism, Moshe Gafni turns 73... South African-born president of American Jewish World Service, Robert Bank turns 66... David Shamir... Pulitzer Prize-winning author of three nonfiction books, historian and journalist, Tom Reiss turns 61... Senior managing director of the Jewish Funders Network, Yossi Prager... Emmy Award-winning television writer and producer, known for “The Simpsons,” Josh Weinstein turns 59... Special education consultant and nanny, Nancy Simcha Cook Kimsey... EVP of BerlinRosen, Nicole Rosen... Executive director of public relations at UJA-Federation of New York, Emily Kutner... Executive director of Micah Philanthropies, Deena Fuchs... Head coach of the football team at the University of Washington, Jedd Ari Fisch turns 49... President of Charleston, S.C.-based InterTech Group, Jonathan M. Zucker turns 47... Journalist, stage and film actress, Lara Berman Krinsky turns 45... Mayor of Bat Yam, Israel, Tzvika Brot turns 45... Member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives since 2013, Michael H. Schlossberg turns 42... Former professional golfer, now an orthopedic surgeon, David Bartos Merkow, MD turns 40... Partner at New Enterprise Associates, Andrew Adams Schoen... Maxine S. Fuchs... Blake E. Goodman... Basketball player for the Under 20 Team Israel in 2023 and the Michigan Wolverines in the Big Ten Conference, he recently declared for the NBA draft, Daniel Wolf turns 21...