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Yahoo
5 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Argentina's rabbi-ambassador to Israel says El Al will launch direct flights to Buenos Aires
El Al will begin flying between Argentina and Israel, in both a powerful symbol of the countries' alliance and a practical boon for travelers like Rabbi Axel Wahnish. A canceled flight on his way to assume his new job might well have added urgency around one of Rabbi Axel Wahnish's first big breakthroughs asArgentina's ambassador to Israel: direct flights between Tel Aviv and Buenos Aires. Wahnish, the personal rabbi of Argentine President Javier Milei, was originally scheduled to depart from Buenos Aires on Aug. 14, 2024, to begin his tenure in Israel. But his Air Europa flight — which included a connection in Europe — was canceled due to a surge in tensions between Iran and Israel. As most commercial airlines scrapped their Tel Aviv routes amid the turmoil, only El Al, Israel's national carrier, and its subsidiaries reliably stayed in the air. Now, Wahnish has announced that El Al will begin flying between Argentina and Israel, in both a powerful symbol of the countries' alliance and a practical boon for travelers like him. El Al has not yet confirmed the flight, which Wahnish said on X would be formally announced next week, when Milei, a noted philosemite and Zionist, visits Israel for the second time. But Wahnish — the first rabbi ever to be appointed an ambassador to Israel — told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency back in August, when he was waiting to leave Buenos Aires, that he saw a direct flight as both a cause and a result of improved relations. 'It's a question similar to the debate about which came first, the chicken or the egg,' he said. 'As an ambassador, I plan to work on both fronts — collaborating with airlines to make the route, while also fostering commercial, cultural, artistic, sporting and educational exchanges.' Milei's three-day state visit is set to start on June 9 and to include meetings with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a speech before the Knesset, the acceptance ceremony for the Genesis Prize, a visit to the Western Wall and a meeting with relatives of the hostages taken during the October 7 attacks. Milei is the first non-Jew to be awarded the Genesis Prize. As part of the trip, Milei and Netanyahu will sign a 'Memorandum of Freedom and Democracy Against Terrorism, Antisemitism, and Discrimination.' The memorandum formalizes a major shift in Argentina's foreign policy following the election of Milei, a self-proclaimed 'anarcho-capitalist,' in 2023 after years of left-wing leadership. In 2013, Argentina signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran, and for much of the past two decades, the country maintained close ties with Iran and frequently criticized Israeli military actions. Under Milei, Argentina has pivoted toward a stronger alliance with Israel, openly supporting its right to self-defense and its war in Gaza. At times, Argentina has stood nearly alone among nations in supporting Israel, and Milei has not joined in as other allies of Israel, including with right-leaning leaders, have urged Netanyahu to end the war. 'It is a deep honor and a historic privilege to express our strong alliance against terror, standing close to the Israeli democracy that is defending itself from terrorists,' Wahnish said in the August interview. Wahnish told JTA that his rabbinic background is a bonus in his work as the ambassador — but not his main qualification. 'First and foremost, I'm an Argentine citizen, a human being. If someone has expertise in a particular area, whether as a physicist, engineer or any other skill, can that be a disadvantage? … No,' he said. 'The same applies to being a rabbi. I think it is a plus. I have an ethical and moral background, a philosophical knowledge, it is like an extra skill.' But he added, 'The strong alliance between our country and Israel is not rooted in religion. It's based on values of democracy and freedom.' At the time, he declined to say when Milei planned to fulfill his stated intention to relocate the Argentine embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move the United States made during President Donald Trump's first term in 2018. The embassy move has not been formalized, with conventional wisdom in Argentina being that Milei may be waiting until after midterm elections in October to follow through on his promise. But Wahnish appears to have succeeded in pressing forward on the direct flights, which he said on X in February were a 'dream of my administration.' At the time, he said he had advocated for the flights in a direct conversation with Netanyahu, in which they also discussed Milei's visit, the memorandum and the Israeli hostages still being held in Gaza, who include Argentine dual citizens. A direct flight between the two countries was previously announced in 2016, but it was never implemented. If the new El Al route becomes a reality, there is only one precedent — and it hardly offered a model of strong diplomatic relations. It was also not nonstop, on a route that is estimated to require 16 hours of flight time from Tel Aviv. On May 19, 1960, a special Israeli delegation arrived in Buenos Aires on an El Al flight to attend the 150th anniversary of Argentine independence. Their visit had a secondary purpose: The following day, the Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, whom Mossad agents had apprehended in Argentina, was disguised as a crew member and returned to Israel on the same plane. The aircraft stopped to refuel in Dakar, Senegal, and landed in Israel on May 22, where Eichmann was arrested. He was later convicted of crimes against humanity and hanged in 1962.
Yahoo
28-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Nike apologizes for using phrase associated with Holocaust in London Marathon ads
Nike's ad campaign for this month's London Marathon led to some major faith-related pushback. Spectators and social media users took issue with a billboard that said 'Never Again. Until Next Year,' arguing that Nike should have avoided the phrase 'Never Again,' which is generally associated with the Holocaust. 'Never Again is as iconic a phrase as Just Do It. Nike should know better,' wrote Bill Ackman, a prominent hedge fund manager, on X. In a follow-up post, Ackman said it's hard to imagine why no one at Nike raised concerns about the ad. 'I assume that this was unintentional, but it is hard to imagine that there was no one at Nike, on the marketing team, at their advertising firm, banner manufacture etc. who didn't know or who didn't think to Google the words 'Never again,'' he wrote. Similarly, Arsen Ostrovsky, a human rights lawyer, described the ad as 'in poor taste' in an X post. 'Seriously Nike? You posted this massive billboard in London for the Marathon. I don't believe for a second there was any ill malice, but please understand the concern with using the words 'Never Again', what they represent and why this was in poor taste,' he wrote. In a Monday statement to reporter Louis Keene of The Forward, Nike apologized for any harm it caused with the billboards. The company noted in its statement that the London Marathon ad campaign was built around phrases commonly used by runners. Another billboard in the series read 'Remember why you signed up for this.' 'The London billboards were part of a broader campaign titled 'Winning Isn't Comfortable,' built on runners' insights and designed to motivate runners to push past what they think is possible,' Nike's statement said. Although the Nike drama is unique, 'Never Again' has been used outside the context of the Holocaust before. For example, after the 2018 school shooting in Parkland, Florida, students used the hashtag #NeverAgain to promote protests in favor of gun control across the country, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The students, like Nike, faced pushback over their use of the phrase. 'For a second it felt like cultural appropriation, but I doubt the kids knew this or did it intentionally,' one Jewish woman observed on social media at the time, as the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported. The article noted that the phrase became associated with the Holocaust in the 1960s and 1970s. It was originally a call to armed resistance, but it's been transformed into a message of peace. The 'violent call for action was adapted by American Jewish establishment groups and Holocaust commemoration institutions as a call for peace, tolerance and heeding the warning signs of genocide,' per Jewish Telegraphic Agency. The London Marathon took place on Sunday. Sabastian Sawe of Kenya won the men's race in 2:02:27. according to The Associated Press. Tigst Assefa of Ethiopia won the women's race in 2:15:50.
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
She's Just the Tip of the Trump Administration's Racist Iceberg
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION has had more than its share of scandalous personnel picks, but Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson takes 'scandalous' to a whole new level—as in, Protocols of the Elders of Zion–level. Last week, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that in March 2023 and August 2024, Wilson made social-media posts attacking Leo Frank, the Jewish factory manager lynched in Georgia in 1915 after being convicted in the rape and murder of a 13-year-old girl in a trial widely regarded as an antisemitism-laden travesty. The posts also blasted the Anti-Defamation League, which fought for Frank's exoneration for decades and obtained a posthumous pardon in 1986. The Leo Frank libel is a popular cause among antisemites; shortly before Wilson's 2024 post, Candace Owens shared a video arguing that Frank was guilty of ritual murder. (She also asserted that the ADL was in cahoots with the Freemasons and the Ku Klux Klan to reverse the American Revolution.) Antisemites are nothing new on the far right, and their creep from the murky fringes of American conservatism toward something like center stage has been years in the making. But the presence of a right-wing antisemite like Wilson in an influential position in the federal government still raises eyebrows. Before Wilson became an official representative of the Department of Defense, she worked on Donald Trump's 2020 campaign and then took a job at the Center for Renewing America, the think tank founded by Project 2025 contributor and current Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought. Wilson had also defended Christian nationalism, promoted the antisemitism-inflected 'Replacement Theory,' and declared Confederate general Robert E. Lee to be 'one of the greatest Americans to ever live.' She's a big fan of the far-right Alternative for Deutschland party, shunned even by many other right-wing populist parties in Europe because of its flirtations with Nazi apologism. She even praised the party using the neo-Nazi-linked slogan Ausländer Raus! ('Foreigners out'). Departing from MAGA's general pro-Zionist stance, Wilson has also opposed U.S. aid to Israel (along with Taiwan and Ukraine). Last year, she mocked Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson for going to Columbia University to show solidarity with Jewish students who complained of a hostile environment created by pro-Palestinian protests. The campus protests, Wilson opined, were simply 'Sharia Supremacists vs. University Marxists' who should be left to fight each other. (Since actual university Marxists tended to side with the protesters, Wilson's use of 'Marxists' sure sounds like a code word for . . . another group.) While several prominent conservative pundits expressed dismay and urged Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to boot the 'blood libel apologist,' few congressional Republicans were willing to speak out. Sen. Lindsey Graham opined that 'if what you say about these posts are true, then she's completely off-script with President Trump'—obviously, the worst possible condemnation from Graham, for whom agreement with Trump is the only virtue. Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska warned about the importance of 'appropriate vetting.' The strongest comment came from Mick Mulroy, deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East in the first Trump administration: 'If she stays, then in many ways, it says those comments are acceptable.' Indeed. Let us help you see around corners as the road ahead gets more twisted and fraught. Sign up for a free or paid subscription today: THE SECOND TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S tacit acceptance of Wilson contrasts sharply with, for instance, the 2018 firing of Trump speechwriter Darren Beattie for ties to white supremacists. Of course, times have changed, and Beattie, too, is now back in a Trump administration post—this time as acting under secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs in the State Department. Given this climate, it is perhaps unsurprising that other troubling entanglements between the Trump administration and antisemitic figures have been reported in recent days—such as the administration's apparent intervention on behalf of 'manosphere' influencer Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan, who currently face rape and human trafficking charges in Romania. The Tates' supporters, among them Donald Trump Jr., dismiss the case as politically motivated. (Never mind that Andrew Tate bragged about his crimes on video.) In late February, the brothers returned to the United States after the Romanian government suddenly lifted restrictions on their travel. The extent of the Trump administration's involvement in getting the ban lifted is unknown, but the Financial Times has reported that several officials had brought up the case in phone conversations with the Romanians and that Trump Special Envoy Richard Grenell had talked about it in person to Romanian Foreign Minister Emil Hurezeanu. (Grenell downplayed his role but acknowledged his support for the Tates; meanwhile, Trumpworld insider Roger Stone has written on X that Grenell 'secured the release of the Tates.') It's also worth noting that Andrew Tate's former attorney, Paul Ingrassia—author of a cringeworthy 2023 post hailing his client as a model of 'human excellent among men,' persecuted because of the 'threat' he posed to 'global elites'—is now the White House liaison to the Department of Homeland Security. Andrew Tate is notorious mainly as an unabashed and self-proclaimed misogynist who says that women shouldn't vote because they're too emotional and boasts on video about punching, slapping, and choking women to keep them in line. But it's a good rule of thumb that someone with such hateful views of women probably also hates Jews—and (surprise, surprise!) the rule holds for Andrew Tate. He is, among other things, a vocal Hamas supporter: After October 7th, he not only pointedly refused to condemn the terror group but actually praised its 'masculine spirit of resistance.' He has also waxed poetic about the 'heroic' death of Yahya Sinwar, the architect and leader of the October 7th pogrom. In January 2024, Tate also speculated that since 'they' lied about Gaza and Israel, about Ukraine and about every other war, it stood to reason that everything we're told about World War II is probably a lie, as well. The war, he wrote, is 'still used to this day to psyop the populace' with the message that 'Bad guy = Nazi.' Upon his return to the United States, Tate quickly booked himself on the Full Send podcast, which boasts millions of followers, to complain that 'you can't criticize the Jews.' CONTROVERSIES ABOUT ANTISEMITISM in Trumpworld date back at least to the 2016 campaign, when Jewish journalists critical of Trump were often bombarded with antisemitic abuse from the pro-Trump 'alt-right.' Trump notably declined an invitation from CNN's Wolf Blitzer to rebuke his supporters who were directing such harassment at journalist Julia Ioffe because of her 'nasty' profile of Melania Trump. While Trump sought Jewish support by stressing his devotion to Israel, his flirtations with his antisemitic far-right supporters culminated in the debacle of Charlottesville, where marchers in August 2017 chanted such slogans as 'Jews will not replace us.' Trump then ostensibly condemned Nazis and white supremacists while commending the 'very fine people' who marched alongside them. At the same time, the administration presented itself as a stalwart protector of American Jews from the depredations of antisemitism on college campuses. Trump issues an executive order in 2019 directing colleges to consider an expanded definition of antisemitism, including some anti-Israel speech, when enforcing civil rights protections. Share The Bulwark Responding to the wave of pro-Palestinian protests that followed October 7th, the Trump administration has portrayed itself as leading the charge against left-wing antisemitism, taking new measures whose benefit so far are unclear and which, in some cases, arguably threaten protected speech. Most recently, the administration announced that it had canceled $400 million of federal grants to Columbia University because the school failed to protect Jewish students from harassment. What must Kingsley Wilson be thinking? WHILE THE ALT-RIGHT as a separate movement has largely faded from view, white nationalist and/or antisemitic views have infiltrated the right-wing mainstream—and with it, the government—to a degree unthinkable eight years ago. Tucker Carlson, who has coyly flirted with such views for a while, is now brazen about it, portraying pro-Israel conservative Jews like Ben Shapiro as rootless interlopers who care more about Israel than about America. Finally, last September, Carlson aired a long, fawning interview with 'popular historian' Darryl Cooper, a Hitler apologist who finds continued Nazi rule in France vastly preferable to drag queens at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony. Unscathed by the outrage among many conservatives, Carlson continued to play a prominent role in the Trump campaign. The 'vibe shift' is not necessarily that more people on the right are antisemites compared to eight years ago; it's that much of the right now appears to reject the basic notion that there should be any stigma against even the vilest bigotry. This was evident in the controversy over DOGE employee Marko Elez, briefly fired after his racist social media activity came to light but then rehired after a plea from JD Vance, who benignly described Elez's racial invective (e.g., 'Normalize Indian hate') as merely posts he 'disagree[s] with.' The 'antiwoke' backlash, which views the stigmatization of bigotry as a form of leftist speech-policing, is compounded by an anti-establishment backlash that valorizes norm-smashing—at least, smashing of liberal norms. And so we shouldn't be surprised when as prominent and influential a media figure as Joe Rogan, whose support was actively courted by Trump during the election, publishes an interview with antisemitic conspiracy theorist Ian Carroll, who claims that Jeffrey Epstein's child sex abuse ring was an Israeli intelligence operation to compromise Americans or that a group of 'dancing Israelis' had advance knowledge of the September 11th attacks. And that's not all: Among Rogan's upcoming guests is the same Darryl Cooper who discussed his World War II revisionism on Tucker Carlson's show last fall. Share
Yahoo
27-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
World's oldest Holocaust survivor dies at 113
(WJW) – A woman believed to be the world's oldest Holocaust survivor has died. Rose Girone died Monday morning, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, who spoke to her daughter. Rose lived in New York. Reports: Gene Hackman, wife found dead in New Mexico home The cause, according to her daughter, Reha Bennicasa, was old age. 'Everything that's out there is really who my mother was,' Bennicasa said, referring to the press coverage her mother received in recent years. 'She was a strong lady, resilient. She made the best of terrible situations. She was very level-headed, very commonsensical. There was nothing I couldn't bring to her to help me solve — ever — from childhood on. She was just a terrific lady… and I don't know, when God made her, they broke mold.' Social Security begin retroactive payments Click here for more on Holocaust survivors demographics. Girone was born in Poland in 1912. She had just celebrated a birthday last month. Rose said her secret to long life was to 'Live every day with a purpose, have amazing children, and eat lots of dark chocolate.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
