One of the most quoted verses in this week’s parashah, Eikev, is also one of its most misunderstood.
“He humbled you, made you hungry, and fed you with the manna… to teach you that man does not live by bread alone, but by everything that proceeds from the mouth of God.” (Deuteronomy 8:3)
Of course we live by bread. Without food, we die. So what was Moses teaching?
Perhaps the answer begins with a forgotten detail. When the Israelites left Egypt, they did not leave destitute. The Torah says they departed with gold, silver—and large flocks and herds.
Flock in the area known as “E1” just east of Jerusalem (photo: First One Through
If they already possessed wealth, why were they hungry? They had plenty of cattle to satisfy their needs.
Perhaps God was interrupting a dangerous transition.
In Egypt, Israel depended on Pharaoh. After the Exodus, they could have concluded, Now we provide for ourselves. We have the means, we are self-sufficient. But alas, God “made you hungry.”
For what purpose?
Had Israel been sated with eating meat for their entire sojourn in the desert, they might have entered the Promised Land having consumed much of its productive wealth. Instead, God preserved those assets by first making them less appealing, and then supplying a substitute for their daily needs.
Read this way, the manna was both sustenance and strategy.
That sheds new light on Moses’ warning just a few verses later:
“Beware lest you say, ‘My power and the might of my hand have made me this wealth.'” (Deuteronomy 8:7)
That wealth would had been long decimated without the daily manna.
The point of the manna was both the immediate sustenance and the vehicle with which to preserve future sustenance (the cattle). And it was God who gave the manna to not just keep people alive, but to position the nation to succeed in the future in the Promised Land.
The same is true today.
We need jobs, businesses, investments, and income. Eikev asks us to appreciate the means of our immediate livelihood, future savings and the source for both.
God was not preparing Israel for perpetual dependence. He was preparing them for covenantal partnership. Today and tomorrow.
Consider the lesser known phrase of “He made you hungry” rather than “man does not live by bread alone,” to appreciate the gifts of today and what it enables tomorrow.
For nearly three years, Spain positioned itself as one of Israel’s sharpest critics in Europe.
Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez repeatedly condemned Israel’s conduct in Gaza, recognized a Palestinian state, pressed for European measures against Israel, and framed the conflict primarily through the language of humanitarian obligation. Israeli officials responded that Spain had become increasingly detached from the security realities Israel faces and was rewarding Hamas diplomatically after October 7.
Then Spain found itself confronting a border crisis of its own.
An estimated 49,000 migrants surged into Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta in a single day, overwhelming local authorities and forcing Spain to deploy troops to restore order. Overnight, the country’s political conversation shifted from humanitarian ideals to border control, sovereignty, and national security.
Israel noticed immediately.
Israeli officials pointed to Ceuta as evidence of something they had argued for years: it is easy to lecture another democracy about borders until your own border collapses.
Israeli ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon took aim at Spain for why it maintains a colony in Africa
There was an unmistakable sense of schadenfreude in parts of the Israeli reaction. The same government that had spent months criticizing Israel for emphasizing security suddenly found itself insisting that no sovereign nation can simply allow tens of thousands of people to cross its frontier without control.
Every democracy must balance compassion with sovereignty. Every democracy must decide whether humanitarian obligations can coexist with meaningful border enforcement. Israel has argued for years that they must. Spain is now discovering how difficult that balance becomes when events unfold on its own frontier.
There is another irony.
Spain’s immediate security now depends heavily on Morocco’s cooperation. Rabat’s willingness to police its side of the border has become essential to Spain’s stability. Yet Morocco chose a dramatically different path from Spain in its relationship with Israel. It joined the Abraham Accords, expanded security, intelligence, and economic cooperation with Israel, and demonstrated that pragmatic regional partnerships can coexist with support for Palestinian aspirations.
Spain and Morocco have moved in opposite diplomatic directions with Israel. Yet today Spain needs Morocco more than ever.
Israel’s ambassador to Spain declined to say whether its government supports Morroco taking over the Spanish enclaves in Africa.
Israel, however, should resist celebrating too loudly.
If Ceuta marks the beginning of sustained migration pressure into Europe, the political consequences are unlikely to stop with Spain. Across the continent, immigration has already fueled the growth of nationalist parties and intensified debates over identity, sovereignty, and integration. Another large migration wave could accelerate those trends even further.
History offers a warning for Jews.
Periods of political instability and polarization have rarely benefited Jewish communities. When societies become more fractured, antisemitism often finds new expression—from parts of the far right, from extremist Islamist movements, and from other ideological currents. Europe has already experienced a sharp rise in antisemitic incidents since October 7, 2023. Additional social upheaval could place Jewish communities under even greater pressure.
Israel can fairly point out the irony of Spain’s predicament. It can argue that Ceuta demonstrates the complexity of governing borders that are easier to criticize than to defend.
If Europe enters another prolonged period of political instability, no one should assume European Jews will remain untouched by the consequences. Those victims will not be amused by Israel nor protected by smug Israeli diplomats saying I told you so.
Until this week, Europe’s migration crisis was largely a story about the Mediterranean Sea.
For more than a decade, desperate migrants boarded overcrowded boats in North Africa, hoping to survive the crossing into Europe. Thousands never made it. The sea itself was the barrier.
Then came Ceuta.
Ceuta and Melilla are tiny Spanish outposts in Africa
In one of the largest mass border breaches Europe has seen in modern times, Spain’s tiny enclave on the North African coast was overwhelmed as an estimated 49,000 migrants crossed from Morocco by land and sea in just 24 hours. Spain deployed its military, Morocco reinforced the frontier, at least 18 people died during the rush, and the crossing was largely halted the following day.
The numbers are staggering. Ceuta is home to only about 85,000 residents. In a single day, arrivals equaled well over half the city’s population. This was a demonstration that, if the border gives way, hundreds of thousands of people can enter European territory almost immediately.
For governments, the calculation is entirely different. No country can meaningfully screen tens of thousands of arrivals in real time. Authorities cannot determine identities, criminal histories, security concerns, or asylum claims after a border has already been overwhelmed.
And this is not merely Spain’s problem.
Spain guards one of the European Union’s external frontiers. The Schengen system depends on every member securing that frontier because what enters one country can ultimately affect them all. Spain’s border policy is therefore not just Spain’s policy—it affects Paris, Rome, Berlin, Amsterdam, and every other country that has entrusted its own internal borders to the Schengen system.
That is why Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and other European leaders reacted so sharply. Their concern is larger than Ceuta itself. It is whether Europe can preserve free movement inside the Union if member states adopt fundamentally different approaches to controlling who enters from outside.
“We are in the process of bringing together the competent bodies and, once these meetings are over, we are ready to act, including through exceptional measures… such as suspending the Schengen agreement with Spain.” – Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni
Since the Arab Spring, Europe has absorbed millions of refugees and migrants fleeing civil wars in Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Those movements reshaped European politics, accelerated the rise of nationalist parties, and transformed debates over sovereignty, identity, and integration.
Ceuta is different. It revealed a land route from Africa into the European Union capable of moving extraordinary numbers of people in an astonishingly short period. If this becomes an established migration corridor, Europe could face pressures unlike any it has experienced since the Arab Spring, and it will likely far surpass it in terms of numbers.
From here, several futures are possible.
Spain could conclude that maintaining Ceuta and Melilla is no longer worth the political and financial cost and eventually negotiate their return to Morocco.
Spain could dramatically strengthen its external border, making clear that humanitarian obligations do not require surrendering control over who enters the country.
Or Spain could continue on its current course, betting that Europe will absorb the consequences. If so, pressure from its European partners will intensify. Calls to suspend Spain from Schengen or restore permanent internal border controls will become louder. While a “Spexit” (Spain’s exit from the European Union) remains a remote possibility, the political strains that produce such conversations would only deepen.
Nearly 50,000 migrants from Africa are estimated to have crossed into Ceuta, Spain on July 30, 2026
There is another outcome that deserves more attention beyond the immediate decisions of the government of Spain.
If governments are seen as unable or unwilling to control migration, voters rarely abandon the issue. They abandon the governments. Nationalist and right-wing parties would likely continue to gain strength across Spain and Europe. The political backlash would not stop at the wave of immigration. It would spill over into wider suspicion of immigrant communities and minorities who had no role in creating the crisis, further polarizing European society.
History offers reminders.
More than thirteen centuries ago, Muslim armies crossed from North Africa into Iberia and established Al-Andalus, reshaping the peninsula for centuries. Eventually, Spain pushed out all of its Muslims in a forced expulsion which also included the Jews. The roughly 200,000 Jews of Spain were expelled on July 31, 1492, and Spain has been basically Jew-free since then.
More recently, in the 1930s and 1940s, the National Socialists of Germany marked for extermination millions of unwanted people, including Jews, Roma and those with disabilities. Fierce tribalism marked foreigners as enemies, regardless of the actions of the residents.
Today, the choice is not between compassion and security. A democratic society requires both.
The Strait of Gibraltar remains one of the shortest distances between Africa and Europe. Ceuta has reminded Europe that borders are not abstract lines on a map: they are political decisions. If Europe chooses not to control its external frontier, events like this will not remain exceptional. They will become the new normal. As will the ramifications.
Will Europe decide who enters its borders, or will it let events on the ground make that decision for it. Each is a deliberate political decision.
Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey will introduce a new generation to one of civilization’s oldest stories. Yet the tale of the Trojan Horse is not really about ancient Greece. It is about human nature.
For ten years, the Greeks could not breach the walls of Troy. So Odysseus abandoned force in favor of deception. The Greeks appeared to sail home, leaving behind a magnificent wooden horse as a peace offering. The Trojans admired it. They celebrated it. They pulled it through their own gates as a symbol of victory.
Only after nightfall did they discover what they had really accepted.
Clip from movie “Troy” on the Trojan horse
The lesson has survived for nearly three thousand years because it was never simply about a horse. It was about the danger of lowering one’s guard in the presence of an extraordinary gift.
Which brings us to a Boeing 747 from Qatar.
When Qatar offered President Donald Trump a 14-year old luxury aircraft for eventual use as Air Force One, the gesture was unlike almost anything in modern American history. The discussion quickly became political. Was it legal? Was it ethical? Should the United States accept such an expensive gift from a foreign government?
Those are important questions. But the first question national security professionals must ask is Can we trust it?
Air Force One is not merely an airplane. It is the President’s office, military command center, intelligence platform, and secure communications hub. Every inch of the aircraft—from its wiring and electronics to its communications systems and defensive capabilities—must be assumed vulnerable until proven otherwise.
Recent reporting highlighted the practical reality behind that principle. Secret service advised the president from flying on the Qatari aircraft as he left a NATO summit in Turkey. Heightened threats from the Islamic Republic of Iran on the president’s life, while he flew on a gifted plane from Qatar, another leading state sponsor of terrorism, as he departed from Turkey, an increasing radical Islamic country, demanded precaution.
None of this requires believing Qatar intended harm. In fact, that misses the point entirely.
The Trojan Horse was not a warning about any particular adversary. It was a warning about the responsibilities of those charged with protecting a nation. Their job is not to assume good intentions. Their job is to imagine every possibility before someone else does.
When a head of state opens a student conference, the message extends far beyond procedural remarks. It is a statement about the values and aspirations a society hopes to pass to its next generation.
That is why Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s patronage of the 11th General Conference of the General Union of Palestinian Students (GUPS) deserves careful attention. In its official announcement, the conference proudly celebrated the organization’s history by declaring that it produced leaders including Yasser Arafat, George Habash, Nayef Hawatmeh, Faisal Husseini, Hanan Ashrawi, and Walid Khalidi.
Three of those names stand apart.
George Habash founded and led the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), responsible for airline hijackings, bombings, and attacks on civilians. Nayef Hawatmeh founded the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), whose history likewise includes attacks targeting civilians. Yasser Arafat led Fatah during decades in which its armed wing carried out numerous attacks against civilians before the Oslo era.
No one reading the official announcement could miss the point. This was not merely a history lesson. It was an effort to present these figures as part of the proud lineage of Palestinian student leadership.
That should concern anyone who hopes for a future of coexistence.
Every society chooses whom to celebrate before its young people. Some elevate scientists, entrepreneurs, doctors, artists, and peacemakers. Others elevate military heroes. But when organizations whose leaders orchestrated attacks on civilians are held up as exemplars at a student conference, the lesson is unmistakable: these are people worthy of admiration and emulation.
PA President Mamoud Abbas continued that the program is “a school for developing future leaders, and a bridge connecting generations of Palestinian students in the homeland and the diaspora,” and the hope that Palestinian Arabs who “invest in the education and awareness of their youth cannot be defeated by occupation or have their cause extinguished.”
Defenders may argue that these figures are important because they shaped the Palestinian national movement. History should indeed be taught honestly. But there is an important distinction between teaching history and celebrating it. Germany teaches students about Adolf Hitler without holding him up as a model. The United States studies the Ku Klux Klan without celebrating its founders. Context matters. So does moral judgment.
A student organization launching a new generation of leaders has every opportunity to highlight Palestinians who built universities, hospitals, businesses, charities, diplomatic institutions, or scientific achievements. Instead, its official narrative deliberately included men whose names are inseparable from campaigns of terrorism.
If Palestinian leaders genuinely seek to prepare young people for peace, they should be encouraging students to surpass the generation that embraced violence—not to walk in its footsteps.
Peace requires more than negotiations. It requires choosing different heroes.
Listen to many of today’s most prominent progressive Jewish organizations—T’ruah, Bend the Arc, Jewish Voice for Peace, and many rabbis who speak in similar terms—and a pattern quickly emerges. Their Judaism is explained through a familiar vocabulary.
Justice.
Human dignity.
Welcoming the stranger.
Repairing the world (Tikkun Olam).
Compassion.
These are presented not simply as Jewish values, but as the defining Jewish values.
It is an appealing message. It is also one the modern Western world already overwhelmingly believes.
Nearly every university, corporation, NGO, church, and democratic government affirms human dignity, equality, compassion, caring for refugees, and social justice. Whether one agrees with every application of those ideals is beside the point. They are no longer uniquely Jewish insights. They have become the common moral language of much of the modern world.
The progressive Jewish rabbis and organizations often remind audiences that many of those ideals trace their roots to the Hebrew Bible. That observation is true. Judaism profoundly shaped Western moral thought. Therefore the comment of them being Jewish values is seemingly to educate the western world that they only have their own universal values because of Jews. Also perhaps true, but to what end is the observation? Is it to inform those listening that Jews alone carry the essence of justice, with a transmission extending back thousands of years? That they alone are the actual guardians of values?
Or that they are all on the same page – that the values the West holds dear and the progressive rabbis are one and the same? That one or the other may take the lead on a subject – say condemning genocide, for example – and the other will echo the sentiment?
That approach deliberately strips anything uniquely Jewish from values. It makes the adjective superfluous. Redundant.
Many non-progressive rabbis and the mainstream Jewish organizations have a different view, one that affirms the Jewish component of values. Those are values that are woven into the covenant between God and the Jewish people, as laid out in the Bible and holy books, and debated for thousands of years.
In such telling, justice is not equity as progressive rabbis champion, but based on fairness and balance.
Charity is not generosity. It is tzedakah – an obligation, and one in which helping someone get a paying job and being able to care for themselves is viewed as much greater than making them addicted to welfare.
Rest is not work-life balance. It is Shabbat, a holy day that interrupts commerce, technology, and ordinary life every seventh day because God commanded it. The notion of people adding holiness to something inanimate – like an idol – is actually prohibited in Judaism, while it is encouraged for something specified and incorporeal like the seventh day.
Environmental stewardship is not merely “sustainability.” It includes shmita, allowing the Land of Israel itself to rest every seventh year, because it is a special gift to the Jewish people, much like Shabbat.
Family is not simply important. Marriage, children, circumcision, honoring parents, and transmitting Torah from one generation to the next are sacred obligations.
The list goes on. Some Jewish values are absent from the umbrella of tikkun olam, while others stand in direct contrast to the T’ruah placards.
Recovering the definition matters. Otherwise, “Jewish values” risks becoming little more than progressive ethics wrapped in Hebrew vocabulary—a faith whose unique contribution is remembered mainly as history, while its living covenant is quietly left behind.
“U.S. Jews do not have a single, uniform answer to what being Jewish means…. Many American Jews prioritize cultural components of Judaism over religious ones…. Orthodox Jews are a striking exception…. A plurality of Orthodox Jews say that being Jewish is mainly about religion alone (40%), and they are the only subgroup in the survey who overwhelmingly feel that observing halakha is essential to their Jewishness (83%)… The vast majority of Jews of no religion say that for them, being Jewish is mainly a matter of ancestry (41%), culture (25%) or both (15%).” – Pew Research May 2021
At this moment in time, the distinction is not theoretical or esoteric. Many progressive left Jewish organizations have adopted stridently anti-Israel positions, some arguing that the Jewish State should be destroyed. They knowingly lock arms with antisemites to advance such future vision.
And should it be a surprise? If the essence of Jewish values for the non-Orthodox far-left is that there is nothing particular about Jews, and that both the noun and adjective “Jew” and “Jewish” are simply historic words without meaning, why should Jews have self-determination any more than left-handed people?
“Supporting Israel is not a battle of political orientation between liberal and conservative Jews. It is a philosophical break in the Jewish community with a fault line regarding the uniqueness of Jews and the Jewish State. The non-Orthodox denominations’ religious philosophy will only let it embrace an Israel that is: about people, not God; about rights not rituals; more secular than religious; more democratic than Jewish; and more universal than particular.” – The Non-Orthodox Jewish Denominations Fight Israel, January 2018
The broader Jewish community should be clear and confident to say that this simply untrue. Judaism and Jewish values are not ancient rock carvings on a cave from which sprang forth the Judeo-Christian values of today. Jews are a living people with a belief in an ongoing covenant which have particular Jewish values that extend beyond universal morality. We should not accept self-erasure in the current environment of cancelling Jews.
More, everyone should fight this approach. Not only Jews but every people who care about their own unique culture and perspective. The lure of the “melting pot” is great but needn’t be absolute. Appreciate the universal AND the particular for Jews and every neighbor.
Judaism helped shape the modern vocabulary of universal values. But Judaism’s enduring contribution is not simply to teach those ideals but show how they are woven into a sacred way of living. One that sanctifies time through Shabbat, family through covenant, body through mitzvot, land through shmita and pilgimmage, and elevates communal responsibilities to a daily obligation.
Jewish values are not simply universal values. And we should not be ashamed to state it clearly.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as frozen. It isn’t.
Both Israelis and Palestinians appear to believe that now is NOT the moment for a final peace agreement. Instead of negotiating, each side is using this period to improve its position for whatever comes next.
They have adopted two very different strategies.
Israel’s strategy is physical.
The settlement movement is racing to create new facts on the ground – approving settlements, establishing outposts, extending infrastructure, and expanding the Israeli presence in disputed territory of Judea and Samaria. The calculation is straightforward: when negotiations eventually resume, the map itself will have changed.
The pace has been striking.
ACTION
2025
2026 (through April)
What it Measures
Official settlements approved
54
34 additional approvals (bringing the current government’s total to 102 since January 2023)
Government approval of new settlements or legalization of existing communities.
Rather than altering the geography, Palestinian leaders have concentrated on shifting international opinion. They have sought additional recognition from foreign governments, expanded support within international organizations, pursued legal and diplomatic campaigns against Israel, and strengthened ties with constituencies – particularly within the U.S. Democratic Party – that may wield greater influence under a future American administration. Their calculation is equally straightforward: when negotiations eventually resume, the political environment will have changed.
Expanded formal recognition beyond the Global South.
Major Western powers (2025)
France, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia
First major Western/G7 countries to recognize Palestine, signaling a shift among traditional allies of Israel.
International legal initiatives
Expanded
Increased reliance on the UN, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court to advance Palestinian objectives.
Political support
Increased
Growing support in parts of Europe and among segments of the U.S. Democratic Party.
Measured by their own objectives, both sides can point to progress. Israel has expanded its physical footprint while the Palestinians have expanded their diplomatic footprint. One strategy seeks to change the map while the other seeks to change the politics surrounding the map.
What is striking is what neither side is emphasizing.
Neither is devoting comparable energy to the difficult work of strengthening governance at home: confronting corruption, reforming institutions, addressing political dysfunction, or building the domestic political consensus that any lasting agreement would ultimately require.
Instead, each is attempting to improve its negotiating position by changing the external environment. It is a race between geography and diplomacy.
The next round of negotiations will not begin where the last one ended. It will begin with a new map and a new political landscape.
Worried about New York City Mayor Mamdani’s politics going statewide and national? You need to do a lot more than show up to a protest with placards.
New York is not simply a Democratic state. It is a Democratic supermajority state.
The governor, Governor Kathy Hochul is a Democrat. Democrats hold 41 of the State Senate’s 63 seats and 103 of the Assembly’s 150 seats—more than enough for a veto-proof supermajority in the Assembly and just one seat shy of one in the Senate. The practical result is that currently, Republicans have little ability to force negotiation or compromise. The state’s most important political debates now occur almost entirely within the Democratic Party.
That is critical at a moment like this.
When organizations such as the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) succeed in electing candidates or moving Democratic primaries to the far-left, the effects are no longer confined to activist circles. Ideas that gain traction within the Democratic caucus can become state policy without needing bipartisan support. Whether the issue is criminal justice, taxation, housing, energy, education, labor regulation, or Israel policy, the decisive battle is often the Democratic primary, not the general election.
This does not mean every progressive proposal becomes law. Democratic legislators disagree on many issues. But a supermajority means there are fewer institutional checks when one faction gains influence.
For New Yorkers who want a different direction than being advanced by the DSA and NYC Mayor Mamdani, the answer is not simply to oppose legislation after it is introduced. It is to change the composition of the Legislature itself.
That is why a relatively small number of competitive districts carry outsized importance this year.
Competitive legislative races do more than elect a senator or assemblymember. They build volunteer networks, raise money, increase turnout, and strengthen candidates throughout the ticket.
Congressman Mike Lawler’s race in the Hudson Valley is a prime example. His campaign in New York’s 17th Congressional District is again expected to be one of the nation’s most competitive House races. A strong Republican legislative effort in the region can reinforce his campaign, just as a strong Lawler campaign can help Republican candidates for the State Senate and Assembly. The same dynamic applies across Long Island, Staten Island, and other competitive suburban districts.
Congressman Mike Lawler (R-NY17)
Among the key legislative opportunities Republicans will target are suburban Senate districts on Long Island and in the Hudson Valley, along with competitive Assembly districts in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, Staten Island, Monroe County, Onondaga County, and the Capital Region.
Every election cycle, voters are told that one legislative seat cannot make much difference. In New York, the opposite is true.
A handful of seats in New York’s election can determine whether the Legislature remains a near-unchecked trifecta supermajority allowing radical far-left motions to become law or becomes a body where broader consensus is once again required. Those races will shape not only who governs in Albany, but how New York is governed.
The United Nations speaks constantly of justice, equality and freedom of worship in Jerusalem. Yet when confronted with the denial of the most basic religious freedom at Judaism’s holiest site, it demands that the discrimination continue.
This is not the position of one committee or one conference. It is the official position of the United Nations.
Following a recent visit by Israel’s National Security Minister to the Temple Mount, Secretary-General António Guterres declared that “the status quo at the Holy Sites must be upheld.” His spokesman, Stéphane Dujarric, went further on July 23, insisting that “there is a status quo regarding the holy sites of Judaism, Christianity and, of course, Islam in Jerusalem” and that “the faithful of all religions are able to interact with those sites… in a free manner.”
Those statements cannot both be true.
On the Temple Mount—the holiest site in Judaism—the “status quo” bars Jews from praying openly. Jews may visit during limited hours, but they are prohibited from conducting public prayer under the religious administration of the Islamic Waqf.
The United Nations therefore advocates preserving a system that denies Jews the freedom to pray at their holiest site while simultaneously claiming that people of all faiths are able to worship freely.
That is not religious equality. It is institutionalized religious discrimination.
Imagine the United Nations calling for the preservation of a system that prohibited Christians from praying at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre or Muslims from praying at the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Such a position would rightly be condemned around the world. Yet when the restriction applies to Jews, it is described as preserving the “status quo.”
The phrase has become a euphemism for unequal rights. For sanctioned antisemitism.
The UN states that the “Palestinian people” have “inalienable rights” in Jerusalem, while insisting that Jews have none
Peace is not built by requiring one religion alone to surrender the right to pray at its holiest place.
The United Nations should stop demanding preservation of the Temple Mount status quo and instead demand its reform.
The UN Human Rights Council should establish a permanent agenda item asking a single question: Why are Jews still barred from praying openly at Judaism’s holiest site?
Every report by the Secretary-General on Jerusalem should state whether that prohibition remains in force.
Every General Assembly debate on Jerusalem should require Jordan and the Islamic Waqf to explain why the ban continues and what concrete steps are being taken to end it.
Every UNESCO discussion of the Temple Mount should address not only Jewish history at the site, but whether Jewish freedom of worship is being respected there today.
Every UN conference on Jerusalem should repeat the same demand until the answer changes:
End the prohibition on peaceful Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount.
The United Nations cannot credibly champion freedom of worship while defending a religious order that denies Jews that very freedom at Judaism’s holiest site.
One of the more curious developments in American politics is watching mainstream Democrats increasingly tailor their positions to satisfy activists who still refuse to support them.
The answer lies in understanding the difference between a coalition and an ideology.
A coalition exists to win elections. It is broad by design. People disagree on taxes, immigration, foreign policy, and the Middle East, yet work together because they share enough common ground to govern. Coalitions ask one question: Can we work together despite our differences?
An ideological movement asks a different question: Do you believe what we believe?
That distinction changes everything.
Purity tests are not an accident of ideological movements; they are their natural consequence. If your goal is to advance a comprehensive worldview, disagreement is no longer just a different opinion but evidence that someone has failed the test.
This helps explain the relationship between the Democratic Party and organizations such as the Democratic Socialists of America. The Democratic Party is trying to hold together one of the broadest electoral coalitions in America. The DSA is advancing an ideology. It has shown little hesitation about opposing Democratic incumbents who fail its litmus tests, whether on capitalism, Israel, policing, or other defining issues.
Israel illustrates the divide clearly. Within a coalition, someone can support Israel’s defensive war while criticizing particular government officials or military actions. Within an ideological movement, those distinctions may not be enough.
That is why the political response of some mainstream Democrats is so puzzling. They often behave as though they are negotiating with another coalition partner. They are not. They are seeking approval from a movement whose purpose is to distinguish believers from non-believers. Incremental concessions rarely earn lasting acceptance. They simply establish a new baseline for the next demand.
The DSA’s own long-term political vision underscores the point. It has argued that America’s two-party system should ultimately be replaced by a multi-party parliamentary democracy. That is an entirely coherent position for an ideological movement. But it also reveals why the tension is so persistent. A movement that seeks its own distinct ideological party will naturally find itself in conflict with a broad coalition whose purpose is to assemble majorities among people who disagree on fundamental questions. The friction is inevitable.
Perhaps the better response for mainstream Democrats is not to seek the DSA endorsement at all.
Every endorsement tells voters something about shared values. If an organization rejects your belief in a market economy, your support for the Jewish State’s continued existence, or your willingness to govern through compromise rather than ideological purity, why should the DSA’s endorsement be considered a prize? A politician should not be embarrassed to say, “We simply have different visions for the country.”
In fact, the willingness to disappoint ideological movements may be one of the clearest signs that a politician still understands the difference between governing and evangelizing.
There is a lesson here for the pro-Israel community as well.
Politics rewards participation, not nostalgia. Elected officials respond to the people who organize, communicate with their offices, volunteer, build local networks, and vote. If supporters of the U.S.-Israel relationship want their voices heard, they must become a consistently visible part of the political coalition—not merely assume their support will be taken for granted.
Building coalitions by attempting to contort to the demands of extremist ideologues will be a painful exercise to watch. And to live with. It has made many Democrats feel abandoned by their party as it chases the far-left which despises most of the coalition.
Coalitions are built by persuading people who disagree to work together. Ideologies are built by deciding who belongs. The Democratic Party will remain a relevant governing party only if it remembers which one it is.
First One Through 