As Americans across the country marked the nation’s 250th anniversary over the July 4 weekend, New York City First Lady Rama Duwaji spent the holiday at an Islamic “spiritual wellness” retreat on the Spanish island of Mallorca, drawing sharp criticism from elected officials and renewing attention on the political views of New York City’s first family.
According to the New York Post, Duwaji departed for Spain ahead of the Independence Day celebrations and was photographed waiting at a United Airlines gate before boarding her flight.
The trip quickly became a flashpoint. Queens Councilwoman Joann Ariola told the Post, “Nothing says ‘America 250’ quite like skipping the celebration for a Mediterranean vacation. I am not surprised because she has made her hatred for America very evident.”
Staten Island Councilman Frank Morano also criticized the timing of the trip.
“It’s disappointing that the first lady chose to be overseas instead of taking part in one of the biggest civic events our city and country will mark this year,” Morano said.
Conservative commentator Arynne Wexler, who published the airport photos on X, mocked the contrast between the mayor’s public messaging and his wife’s travel plans.
Mamdani denounces pro-Israel lobby group as 'monsters'
“Funny how when Zohran Mamdani was telling New Yorkers to lower their AC his wife Rama Duwaji was boarding a flight to party in Mallorca,” Wexler wrote. She added, “Reminder that I can’t tag her because she deleted her account after her insanely offensive tweets were discovered. Champagne socialists.”
Duwaji has faced repeated scrutiny over her online activity and activism. Earlier this year, reports resurfaced showing she had “liked” a number of pro-Palestinian social media posts following the October 7 Hamas massacre.
She also illustrated a literary work included in a collection edited by Palestinian activist Susan Abulhawa, who has made inflammatory statements about Jews and Israel. After years-old social media posts containing racial, homophobic, and other offensive remarks resurfaced, Duwaji deleted her X account.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani has consistently defended his wife as a private citizen with no role in his administration, noting that some of her social media activity predated both their marriage and his mayoral campaign.
Mamdani himself has remained at the center of controversy over his positions on Israel and the Jewish community.
He has refused to condemn the slogan “globalize the intifada,” arguing that it should not automatically be interpreted as a call for violence, while continuing to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement and repeatedly accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza.
Shortly before the July 4 holiday, Mamdani also came under fire after referring to members of the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC as “monsters” while discussing the influence of money in politics, comments that drew condemnation from Jewish leaders and elected officials.
The first lady’s absence from America’s 250th birthday celebration, combined with the mayor’s recent rhetoric and the couple’s record on Israel-related issues, added another chapter to the ongoing debate surrounding New York City’s new first family.
Good.
Let’s have this conversation clearly.
Israel is a sovereign state. Not a project of Washington consultants. Not a branch office of the Democratic Party. Not a client state waiting for Obama-era officials to fly in and lecture us about our own survival.
Israelis already tested the fantasy they are trying to revive.
We gave land. We left Gaza. We empowered “moderates.” We were told peace was around the corner.
Then came rockets, tunnels, terror armies, and October 7.
The Israeli public has moved on because reality forced us to move on. The far-left diplomatic worldview Rahm Emanuel is bringing with him barely exists here anymore, because Israelis are the ones who paid the price for it in blood.
America is a great ally. But Jewish sovereignty is not conditional. Israel does not need lectures from former officials who helped build the foreign policy illusions that collapsed in our faces. We need allies who understand the Middle East as it is, not as they wish it still was in a 1990s peace-process seminar.
Israel will decide Israel’s future. Not Rahm Emanuel. Not Obama nostalgia. Not anyone who thinks the Jewish state must trade security for applause.
Yes. Democrats are trying to stop a Republican President from further arming the Muslim Brotherhood.
— Dumisani Washington (@DumisaniTemsgen) July 6, 2026
Republicans acting like this isn’t happening is COVID-era-level gaslighting. https://t.co/YSc9Q6T2xo
DIN:On June 26, Rabbi Yair Hoffman published a column titled "Entebbe — Fifty Years Later – Some New Perspectives". In that column he finds some story that he says caused Idi Amin to turn on Israel and then he jumps through halachic hoops to justify the rescue, he ultimately arrives at the obvious conclusion that "the rescuers were true heroes!!" But first, instead of just sticking to the miraculous amazing rescue, he needs to dig up a story to bad mouth the Generals of the IDF! Unbelievable!
I am baffled, how low have we sunk that this even needs to be debated?
I saw comments — now deleted — from several Yeshivishe guys claiming that the IDF “should not have done the rescue because al pi halacha you cannot endanger rescuers to save hostages.” Of course, had the hostage been their mother, sister, or child, they would have suddenly discovered a different halacha obligating the rescue. Funny how flexible some people’s “principles” become when the situation is personal.
The reason that Rabbi Hoffman had that column to begin with is because he caters to these Yeshivishe guys that couldn't in their wild imagination give Hakoras Hatoiv to the Zionists! If it were a bunch of Satmar Chassidim that had carried out that rescue then Rabbi Hoffman would never have even written that article! They refuse to acknowledge that it is in fact the Zionists that would do anything in the world to rescue a Jew in need! I had a classmate who was a hostage and when he returned he made a huge Seudas Hoidah with many prominent Gedoilim attending and he was of course praising the IDF and it wasn't an issue, but in today's world where hating Zionists is now the norm in the Yeshivishe bubble, they need to search for a heter and reluctantly say that the "Rescuers (Rav Hoffman couldn't bring himself to say IDF) were heroes"
Article below by Leo Pearlman
July 4th marked the fiftieth anniversary of one of the most extraordinary military operations in modern history.
On 4th July 1976, Israeli commandos flew more than 2,500 miles into Uganda, stormed Entebbe Airport and rescued more than one hundred hostages in an operation so audacious that it has become the benchmark against which every hostage rescue mission since has been measured.
The anniversary made me wonder something. Not whether Israel could still carry out such an operation, but whether the world would still celebrate it. Would newspapers celebrate Israel’s courage? Would governments praise its resolve? Would commentators still describe it as a triumph of good over evil?
Then I realised we don’t need to wonder, because almost fifty years later, Israel carried out another extraordinary hostage rescue operation. This time it wasn’t Entebbe, it was Nuseirat and in the difference between those two moments lies a story not only about Israel, but about us.
Before going any further, it’s worth acknowledging something that should not need saying.
Israel is not perfect, no democracy is. Like every democratic nation, it has elected governments that have made mistakes, pursued policies worthy of criticism and produced leaders whose words and actions many people. including many Israelis, have opposed. Recent years have provided no shortage of examples.
But that isn’t what this essay is about. If the difference between Entebbe and Nuseirat can simply be explained by disagreement with one Israeli government, then we learn nothing. Democracies change governments, but if our moral principles change every time they do, they were never principles at all.
What changed over those fifty years was something much deeper. It was the moral framework through which the Jewish state came to be judged.
The hijacking of Air France Flight 139 began like countless acts of terrorism before it. Armed terrorists seized a civilian aircraft and diverted it to Uganda, where they were welcomed by Idi Amin’s regime.
Once on the ground, something happened that sent a chill through Jewish communities around the world. The passengers were separated, the Jewish and Israeli hostages were kept, most of the others were released.
Barely three decades after the Holocaust, Jews once again found themselves being selected by armed men. Israel refused to accept it.
Marc Kasowitz’s firm had represented 43 Jewish and Israeli students who alleged Columbia failed to protect them during the violent anti-Israel protests and encampments that engulfed the Ivy League campus in Manhattan after the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks on Israel.
The plaintiffs said that at first, they were thrilled to be repped by Kasowitz, a veteran Manhattan litigator who was the legal face of a national campaign against campus antisemitism.
Attorney Marc Kasowitz’s law firm preyed on the Columbia University students it represented in the aftermath of antisemitic protests on campus, according to a lawsuit.
Magen David Adom (MDA) paramedics and EMTs provided her with medical treatment and evacuated her in critical condition to Shaare Zedek Medical Center, where doctors pronounced her dead.
According to testimonies, the baby’s older sister slept with her in the same bed and apparently unintentionally pressed on her. The circumstances of the incident are under investigation.
The police said that officers from the Beit Shemesh station who arrived at the scene opened an investigation and began collecting evidence to clarify the circumstances of the death.
MDA said that upon arrival at the scene, the infant was brought to the teams unconscious, without a pulse and not breathing. The teams began advanced resuscitation efforts, including chest compressions and ventilation.
MDA emergency medic Rafael Tolidano said: “When we arrived at the building, they brought us the baby who was unconscious, without a pulse and not breathing."
He added: “We began advanced resuscitation procedures, including compressions and ventilation, and evacuated her in an intensive care ambulance to the hospital, with her condition defined as critical."
הפרגוד: מי שחשב שהענקנו גיבוי לאלימות. צריך להדגיש כי העימות המתמשך בחסידות סאדיגורה כבר מזמן חרג מגבולות מחלוקת פנימית. לאורך השנים ידעה החברה החרדית מאבקים על הנהגה וירושה בחצרות שונות, אך התיעודים מהתקופה האחרונה על עימותים, אלימות ואווירה מתוחה צריכים להטריד כל מי שעתידו של… pic.twitter.com/rgXZ8CHW3S
— הפרגוד (@moshepargod) July 5, 2026
To those who thought we provided backing for violence. It must be emphasized that the ongoing conflict in the Sadigura Hasidic community has long exceeded the boundaries of an internal dispute.
Over the years, the Haredi society has known struggles over leadership and inheritance in various courts, but the recent documentation of confrontations, violence, and a tense atmosphere should trouble anyone for whom the future of the Hasidic world is precious.
One can argue, debate in a rabbinical court, and even pursue legal proceedings, but it is forbidden for such a struggle to lead to threats, intimidation, or physical confrontations. The moment violence becomes a tool in the dispute, everyone loses, regardless of the question of who is right.
The responsibility lies first and foremost on the leaders and influential figures from both sides (the Admorim) to set a clear boundary and calm the spirits. If it is not stopped now, the damage will not be only to the Sadigura Hasidut.
Rav Tamir Granot, whose son was killed while serving in the IDF, says he spent months quietly meeting with leading gedolim after his loss, hoping to bridge the divide between the chareidi and religious Zionist communities over military service. In a wide-ranging interview, he claimed that while some senior rabbinic leaders privately agreed with aspects of his message, they were unwilling to express those views publicly.
The interview opened with interviewer Moshe Mansa recounting a conversation with a chareidi educator who described Rav Granot as one of the most influential—and, in his view, dangerous—figures in the current debate.
“The voice is the voice of Yaakov, but the hands are the hands of Esav. He looks like one of us. He speaks our language of Torah learning. We can’t simply dismiss him because he sacrificed the most precious thing in the world—his son. Instead of going through the rabbanim, he’s trying to reach our yeshiva bochurim directly and persuade them to enlist.”
Rav Granot said he understands why some perceive him as a threat but believes those fears stem from deep anxiety.
Watch a Charedie Thief take a Cement Mikva Dip
There is no question that this guy is "Pasul Le'Edis" and should he be a witness at a wedding there may be issues with that Chuppa!
Note: The Imrei Emes's anti Zionist position was only pre-WW2 and during the Holocaust when he hadn't found out yet how enormous the tragedy actually was. The Imrei Emes totally turned after the holocaust and after the State was actually established!
In 1943, Gur Hasidim beat Ben-Gurion’s brother — Moshe Nachmani — to death.
This is one of the most serious incidents in the history of relations between the Haredim and the Zionists in the State of Israel. Three Gur Hasidim severely beat Ben-Gurion’s brother, Rabbi Avraham Green. Shortly afterward, he died from his injuries.
Within a short time, the affair was swept under the rug and completely forgotten. Ben-Gurion did not make an issue of it, nor did the religious Zionists, and of course not the Gur Hasidim.
It is a painful story that teaches us how far violence can go, and how a heated argument can deteriorate into bloodshed. Above all, it teaches us that anyone who dares to criticize a revered Rebbe, admired by thousands of Hasidim, may end up in the grave.
President Donald Trump said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “knows who the boss is” ahead of their planned tete-a-tete in Washington, DC.
Trump told Axios Saturday that Netanyahu could visit as early as next week and said that the relationship between the two leaders is still strong.
“We get along very good,” the president noted.
U.S. President Trump points at Israeli PM Netanyahu as they shake hands.
Trump said Netanyahu “knows who the boss is.”
The pow wow could happen after Trump returns from the NATO summit in Turkey, which takes place July 7-8. Israeli officials, however, believe the two leaders won’t sit down face to face until the following week.
The pair spoke on the phone Friday and agreed to meet in “the near future,” according to a statement from the Israeli prime minister’s office.
“The Prime Minister said in the conversation that the US is a guarantor of global freedom, and Israel highly appreciates the close bond between the two nations,” the statement added.
Iranian security bars ‘probably gay’ disfigured supreme leader from his father’s funeral — fearing Israel would strike again
Trump says Iran gets ‘week off’ for lengthy funeral for former supreme leader: ‘Isn’t that nice?’
This will be Netanyahu’s first meeting with Trump since he pressed for war with Iran in a Situation Room meeting in February.
Though Trump maintains that he and Netanyahu have “a very good relationship,” tensions have risen between the two in recent months over the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran and Israel’s conduct in its war against Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Trump called Netanyahu “f–king crazy” over his attacks in Lebanon on June 1.
”You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this,” Trump confirmed to The Post he grilled the Israeli PM over airstrikes in Beirut.
Israel and Lebanon signed a tripartite agreement with the US on June 26 which called for a phased Israeli withdrawal for Southern Lebanon with the Lebanese Armed Forces assuming control of areas currently occupied by the Israel Defense Forces, as well as a demilitarization of Hezbollah.
Vice President JD Vance also slammed members of Netanyahu’s coalition for criticizing the emerging Iran deal in a June 18 press conference.
“Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time, and he happens to be the head of state of the world’s superpower,” he said.
“The problem for Israel is not Donald J. Trump, and anybody in Israel who thinks their biggest problem is the president of the United States needs to wake up and smell the reality of the situation that country is in.”
In today’s climate of deep division and rising emotional intensity within the Jewish community, disagreements have not only sharpened-they have become corrosive. Lines are crossed in speech that would once have been unthinkable. When people are shocked or outraged by the actions of those on the other side of an ideological divide, language becomes a weapon.
Among the most severe expressions in the Hebrew language is the curse Yimach Shemo V’Zichro-“May his name and memory be blotted out."
For generations, these words were reserved for the enemies of Klal Yisrael-the Amaleks of history, the destroyers of our people. Today, tragically, they are sometimes directed at fellow Jews: political opponents, ideological rivals, or Jews who have strayed from Torah.
This is not a minor slip of language. It is a collapse of boundaries that the Torah itself draws with absolute clarity.
The Torah, Halakha, Chazal, and the conduct of our Gedolim all point in one direction with unmistakable force: no matter how sharp the disagreement, no matter how far another Jew may have fallen, this language does not belong anywhere near a fellow Jew.
The Torah draws a clear line: “You shall not curse the deaf" (Vayikra 19:14). Chazal explain in Sanhedrin 66a that the Torah is not speaking narrowly about a deaf person. It is setting the lowest possible threshold: even someone who will never hear the insult is protected. If that is true there, then all the more so when speaking about someone who hears, feels, and is wounded by every word.
The people in these caskets survived the Holocaust—only to be murdered by an antisemitic mob just over a year later.
by Yudel Shain
Regarding Bodek and B'gan Frozen Strawberries
It has been noted that both Bodek and B'gan—two separate companies—market frozen strawberries produced in Peru. Under existing arrangements, the primary certifying authorities including Rabbi Shmuel Teitelbaum, Minchas Chinuch Hashgocha and the OU rely entirely on the insect-free certification of Rabbi Aharon Teitelbaum (the Nirbater Rav), who oversees the initial production for B’Gan etc. in Peru. Consequently, no independent, secondary reinspection of these products is conducted before they are marketed.
Recently, independent kashrus individuals not affiliated with Bodek or B’gan have reportedly discovered insect infestations in these imported frozen strawberries from Peru. These findings have called into serious question the reliability of the current certifications, particularly because the specific authorities being relied upon are widely known not to be specialized experts in insect infestation or entomological kashrus inspection protocols. This raises severe concerns within the community regarding whether the oversight is sufficient to guarantee that the strawberries are entirely insect-free.
The Halachic Context
From a halachic standpoint, strawberries are widely recognized as much’zak be’tolaim (substantiated and presumed to be infested). Due to the nature of their textured surface, many halachic authorities maintain that it is virtually impossible to ensure they are insect-free through standard commercial washing alone.
As a result, a growing consensus of halachic experts advises that consumers should not rely on pre-washed frozen strawberries—even those bearing multiple prominent certifications. Instead, strawberries should only be used if they are completely peeled, as this is the only definitive way to ensure they are free of insects.
Current Actions and Lack of Public Alerts
Reports indicate that the certifying Rabbonim have quietly directed companies to remove affected stocks from retail store shelves. However, no public alerts have been issued to warn families who may already have these products stored in their home freezers, or who may have already used them in prepared foods.
