Archive | March 2025

Trump admin still can’t deport anti-Israel, recent Columbia graduate yet, judge decides

Mar13
Trump admin still can’t deport anti-Israel, recent Columbia graduate yet, judge decides

Vita Fellig

One of Mahmoud Khalil’s lawyers said outside of the courthouse that his detention “should outrage anybody who believes that speech should be free in the United States of America.”

Ramzi Kassem, attorney for Mahmoud Khalil and founding director of Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility Project, speaks after a hearing in Manhattan, March 12, 2025. Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images.

Jesse Furman, a U.S. district judge in Manhattan, said on Wednesday that the government must allow Mahmoud Khalil’s lawyers to speak to him privately on the phone and gave prosecutors and lawyers for the anti-Israel former Columbia University graduates until Friday to tell him in writing when they plan to file written arguments, the Associated Press reported.

The initial hearing, which lasted about 30 minutes, centered on the government’s efforts to move the trial from New York to either New Jersey or Louisiana, where Khalil has been held. He is currently at the LaSalle Detention Facility in Jena, La., per the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement website.

Federal agents arrested Khalil, who was born in Syria and has ties to Algeria, on Saturday. The recent Columbia graduate holds a green card and is reportedly married to a U.S. citizen. The Trump administration has said that he led anti-Israel protests on Columbia’s campus, and the White House said that he has supported Hamas, which would be grounds for his deportation.

Hundreds of protesters gathered across the street from the federal courthouse at Foley Square in lower Manhattan, where anti-Israel demonstrators, clad in masks and keffiyehs, chanted “we will win” and “free Palestine.”

One of Khalil’s lawyers, Ramzi Kassem, told reporters and protesters gathered outside the courthouse that “what happened to Mahmoud Khalil is nothing short of extraordinary and shocking and outrageous,” per the Associated Press.

“It should outrage anybody who believes that speech should be free in the United States of America,” he said.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson told JNS that under section 237 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, “an alien is deportable from the United States if the secretary of state determines the alien’s presence or activities in the United States would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”

“In such cases, the secretary of state notifies the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, who has the authority to initiate removal charges,” the Foggy Bottom spokesperson said.

Police officers stand in front of a federal courthouse in lower Manhattan after an initial hearing in the case of anti-Israel, recent Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil, March 12, 2025. Photo by Vita Fellig.

“When you come to the United States as a visitor—which is what a visa is, which is how this individual entered this country,” Marco Rubio, the U.S. secretary of state, told reporters on Wednesday in Shannon, Ireland. “We can deny you that, if you tell us when you apply, ‘Hi, I’m trying to get into the United States on a student visa. I am a big supporter of Hamas, a murderous, barbaric group that kidnaps children, that rapes teenage girls, that takes hostages, that allows them to die in captivity, that returns more bodies than live hostages.’”

“If you tell us that you are in favor of a group like this, and if you tell us when you apply for your visa, ‘and by the way, I intend to come to your country as a student and rile up all kinds of anti-Jewish student, antisemitic activities, I intend to shut down your universities,’” he said. “If you told us all these things when you applied for a visa, we would deny your visa. I hope we would.”

“This is about people that don’t have a right to be in the United States to begin with,” Rubio said. “No one has a right to a student visa and no one has a right to a green card.”

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ran’s Growing Military Ties With China, Russia Present a ‘Danger’ to US and Israeli Security, Experts Warn

Mar13
ran’s Growing Military Ties With China, Russia Present a ‘Danger’ to US and Israeli Security, Experts Warn

Ailin Vilches Arguello

A Chinese warship sails during the joint navy exercise of Iran, China, and Russia in the Gulf of Oman, Iran, March 12, 2025. Photo: Iranian Army/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS

Expanding military cooperation between Iran, China, and Russia presents a rising threat to the US and its allies in the Middle East, especially Israel, according to experts who spoke with The Algemeiner.

The warning came as Iran, China, and Russia on Wednesday concluded three days of joint naval drills in Iranian territorial waters in the Gulf of Oman, located in the northern Indian Ocean, bolstering defense cooperation as tensions in the Middle East mount over Tehran’s expanding nuclear program and terrorist proxies across the region.

The joint drills — called the Maritime Security Belt 2025 — also took place near the strategic Strait of Hormuz off southeast Iran, a critical passageway for global energy supplies through which a fifth of all crude oil traded worldwide passes. Iran has previously threatened to close the waterway if conflict breaks out with the US and Israel.

According to Jack Burnham, a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a Washington, DC-based think tank, such joint drills will allow the three authoritarian regimes to become more interoperable with each other while gaining valuable experience operating in a strategically sensitive environment.

This week’s joint naval exercise was the fifth conducted by Iranian, Chinese, and Russian military forces since 2019.

“The most recent iteration of these naval drills between Iran, China, and Russia highlights these capitals’ growing ties during a period of international turmoil,” Burnham told The Algemeiner. “In recent months, Russia and Iran have cemented closer defense ties, China has allegedly shipped missile components to Iran and its proxies, and China and Russia celebrated the anniversary of the Ukraine war by reaffirming their ‘no limits’ partnership.”

He also explained that such cooperation will allow the Iranian, Chinese, and Russian militaries to feel more comfortable operating together if a regional crisis emerges, adding that joint exercises may eventually lead to other forms of defense cooperation, “such as transferring cutting-edge military technologies between authoritarian states bent on challenging the West.”

“For Israel and for the region, the possibility of Iran and its proxies strengthening their already-comprehensive arsenals via access to Chinese and Russian weapons components presents a clear danger to its security,” Burnham said.

According to Iranian state media, this week’s joint drills featured warships and combat and support vessels from the Chinese and Russian navies, as well as warships from Iran’s naval forces, including both the regular military and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, an internationally designated terrorist organization.

The Iranian Navy’s deputy head of operations, Rear Admiral Mostafa Tajeddini, said these exercises aimed to “strengthen security in the region and expand multilateral cooperation between participating countries,” with the main goal of enhancing maritime security in the northern Indian Ocean, the Iranian state news agency IRNA reported.

The naval drills were monitored by observers from Azerbaijan, South Africa, Oman, Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Qatar, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, and Sri Lanka who traveled to Tehran.

In a statement, the Chinese Defense Ministry said the drills aimed at “enhancing military trust and strengthening practical cooperation,” including simulated strikes on maritime targets, visit-board-search-seizure operations, and search and rescue missions.

Both China and Russia have had deep interests in Iran as a partner in the Middle East. Beijing has continued to purchase Iranian crude oil despite Western sanctions and remains one of the top markets for Iranian imports. Meanwhile, Russia has relied on Iran for the supply of bomb-carrying drones used in its war on Ukraine.

According to John Lee, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a Washington, DC-based think tank, cooperation between China, Russia, and Iran has evolved from primarily political, diplomatic, and economic coordination to increasingly include military elements over the past half decade.

“Such exercises indicate that these three countries are preparing to work together across multiple potential conflict zones from the Middle East and Persian Gulf to Eastern Europe to Northeast Asia,” Lee told The Algemeiner.

“That they are practicing tactical strikes against sea-based targets as well as search and seizure operations is a simulation of what would be needed during a hot war with the US and its allies,” he continued.

Lee also explained that these three countries are united by their goal of undermining American power, with Iran trying to weaken Israel and disrupt stability in the Persian Gulf, Russia aiming to challenge NATO and expand into Eastern Europe, and China focused on integrating Taiwan and controlling the South China Sea.

With Iran seeking to coerce and gain leverage by disrupting shipping in the Persian Gulf, Lee argued that US hard power and influence are the key factors preventing these objectives from being realized.

“In a war scenario, the Persian Gulf and other choke points such as the Gulf of Aden become of immense strategic and tactical importance,” Lee said. “Deeper cooperation with Russia and China could allow Iran to exert its presence and influence in these bodies of water.”

Iran’s growing ties with China and Russia come at a time when Tehran is facing increasing sanctions by the United States, particularly on its oil industry, as part of the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign aimed at cutting the country’s crude exports to zero and preventing it from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Even though Tehran has denied wanting to develop a nuclear weapon, the UN nuclear watchdog – the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) – has warned that Iran is “dramatically” accelerating uranium enrichment to up to 60 percent purity, close to the roughly 90 percent weapons-grade level.

On Wednesday, the UN Security Council met behind closed doors to discuss Tehran’s nuclear program and its obligation to provide the IAEA with “the information necessary to clarify outstanding issues related to undeclared nuclear material detected at multiple locations in Iran,” diplomat told Reuters.

Tehran has repeatedly claimed that its nuclear program is for civilian purposes rather than weapon development.

However, Western states have said there is no “credible civilian justification” for the country’s recent nuclear activity, arguing it “gives Iran the capability to rapidly produce sufficient fissile material for multiple nuclear weapons.”

Last week, Iran’s so-called “supreme leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Tehran will not be bullied into negotiations after US President Donald Trump revealed he had sent a letter to the country’s top authority to negotiate a nuclear deal.

Last month, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi rejected the possibility of nuclear talks with Washington.

“There will be no possibility of direct talks between us and the United States on the nuclear issue as long as the maximum pressure is applied in this way,” Araghchi said during a joint press conference with his visiting Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.

China will hold a meeting on Friday in Beijing with Russia and Iran on the Iranian “nuclear issue”, its foreign ministry said at a press conference, further highlighting the growing cooperation between the three powers.

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Amerykański wysłannik do Hamasu: Nie testujcie Donalda Trumpa

Mar12

Protestujący domagający się natychmiastowego zwolnienia zakładników przez Hamas, Tel Awiw Izrael, 6 marca 2025 r. (Fot. REUTERS/Shir Torem)

Amerykański wysłannik do Hamasu: Nie testujcie Donalda Trumpa

Marta Urzędowska

Steve Witkoff żąda, by Hamas natychmiast zwolnił zakładników i wyniósł się z Gazy. Grozi, że Ameryka “fizycznie i emocjonalnie wesprze Izrael” w walce z Hamasem.

– Nie jest jasne, co dokładnie się stanie. Ale będzie podjęte jakieś działanie. Być może razem z Izraelczykami – mówił Steve Witkoff w czwartek dziennikarzom zebranym pod Białym Domem.

Dopytywany przez reporterów wysłannik administracji USA ds. Bliskiego Wschodu nie powiedział jednak nic, co mogłyby świadczyć, że Ameryka planuje zbrojne działania w Gazie. – Jesteśmy gwarantem całego procesu, ale to Izraelczycy kontrolują dziś Gazę, a strona przeciwna to Hamas – podkreślał. – Jakiekolwiek działanie będzie głównie pochodziło od Izraelczyków, jednak słyszeliście, co powiedział wczoraj prezydent – da Izraelczykom wszystko, czego potrzebują. To oni będą działać, jednak z bardzo, bardzo silnym fizycznym i emocjonalnym wsparciem Stanów Zjednoczonych – dodał.

Wysłannik studzi nastroje po ultimatum Trumpa

Amerykanin musiał się tłumaczyć, bo dzień wcześniej prezydent Donald Trump opublikował w mediach społecznościowych serię pogróżek pod adresem Hamasu, brzmiących jak ultimatum i zapowiedź amerykańskich działań w regionie.

Steve Witkoff Fot. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

„Natychmiast uwolnijcie wszystkich zakładników i natychmiast oddajcie wszystkie ciała ludzi, których zamordowaliście, albo to będzie wasz koniec! Tylko chorzy i pokręceni ludzie przetrzymują ciała, a wy jesteście chorzy i pokręceni” – wygrażał, dodając, że „wysyła Izraelowi  wszystko, czego potrzebuje, by dokończyć robotę”.

„Ani jeden członek Hamasu nie będzie bezpieczny, jeśli nie zrobicie, jak każę”

– grzmiał Amerykanin.

Tuż po opublikowaniu wojowniczych wpisów Trumpa, Biały Dom potwierdził doniesienia portalu Axios, że Amerykanie po raz pierwszy w historii prowadzą w Katarze bezpośrednie rozmowy z Hamasem. Wcześniej nigdy nie negocjowali z palestyńskimi terrorystami, rozmowy odbywały się przez pośredników.

Rzeczniczka Białego Domu Karoline Leavitt przyznała, że prezydent Trump kazał swoim wysłannikom „rozmawiać z każdym”. I przekonywała:

– Dialog i rozmawianie z ludźmi na całym świecie po to, by zrobić to, co najlepsze dla Amerykanów, to, zdaniem prezydenta, działanie w dobrej wierze.

Po stronie amerykańskiej w rozmowach z Hamasem uczestniczy specjalny wysłannik Waszyngtonu ds. negocjacji w kwestii zakładników Adam Boehler. Miało dojść już do kilku spotkań, podczas których rozmawiano głównie o zwalnianiu zakładników, w tym kilku Amerykanów, wśród których zapewne tylko jeden nadal żyje.

Koniec pierwszej fazy rozejmu w Gazie. Walki zostaną wznowione?

Trump grozi Hamasowi, a Witkoff studzi nastroje w czasie, gdy sytuacja w Strefie Gazy pozostaje mocno niejasna. W styczniu udało się podpisać rozejm po piętnastomiesięcznej wojnie rozpętanej przez Hamas atakiem na Izrael z 2023 r., w którym terroryści zabili 1,2 tys. osób, a 250 porwali do Gazy. W odpowiedzi Izrael prowadził na miejscu operację lądową i naloty, w których zginęło 48 tys. Palestyńczyków.

Pierwsza faza wypracowanego w styczniu zawieszenia broni, w ramach której ustały walki, a Hamas zwolnił 33 zakładników i wydał kilka ciał zabitych w zamian za zwolnienie z izraelskich więzień 2 tys. Palestyńczyków, przestała obowiązywać blisko tydzień temu. Póki co nie udało się dogadać w sprawie etapu drugiego, w ramach którego izraelscy żołnierze mieliby wyjść z Gazy, a terroryści wydaliby pozostałych zakładników. Na miejscu nadal przebywają najpewniej 24 żywe osoby i ok. 39 zabitych.

Ponieważ na razie nie udało się wypracować drugiej fazy rozejmu, Amerykanie zaproponowali przedłużenie pierwszej na sześć tygodni, jednak z zastrzeżeniem, że Hamas ma w tym czasie wypuścić zakładników. Terroryści odpowiadają, że nie zrobią tego bez gwarancji wycofania izraelskiej armii i tłumaczą, że jeśli oddadzą wszystkich porwanych, Izrael nie będzie miał powodów, by utrzymywać rozejm. W odpowiedzi Izraelczycy zablokowali dostęp pomocy humanitarnej dla dwóch milionów mieszkańców Gazy, zawieszenie broni zawisło na włosku, a obie strony na dobre szykują się do wznowienia wojny.

Witkoff: Czas na rozsądne działania Hamasu. Musi oddać zakładników i odejść

W czwartek dziennikarze pytali Witkoffa, co dalej z rozejmem i jak ultimatum Trumpa wobec Hamasu wpłynie na szanse dogadania się w kwestii fazy drugiej zawieszenia broni.

Prezydent USA Donald Trump Fot. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

– Ludzie mówią o przedłużeniu fazy pierwszej albo o fazie drugiej, a mnie nie obchodzi, jak to będzie nazywane – przekonywał Amerykanin. – My mówimy o tym tak: „Czy będziemy mieli rozwiązanie? Czy będziemy mieli układ pokojowy? Czy sprowadzimy wszystkich zakładników do domu, co jest celem administracji Trumpa?” – wyliczał. I dodał:

– To wszystko wymaga porządnych, rozsądnych, humanitarnych działań ze strony Hamasu. Czas, by pokazali, że są w stanie to zrobić, mają dziś szansę zachować się sensownie, zrobić to, co trzeba i odejść.

Przecież nie będą częścią nowego rządu w Gazie.

Słowa Amerykanina raczej nie przekonają terrorystów do bardziej ugodowego podejścia. Hamas uparcie odrzuca żądanie Izraela, by nie tylko odsunął się po wojnie od cywilnego zarządzania Gazą, ale też całkowicie się rozbroił. Terroryści odpowiadają, że – o ile nie wykluczają oddania cywilnych rządów – o rozbrojeniu nie może być mowy.

Dopytywany przez dziennikarzy, jak konkretnie USA mogą zareagować na działania Hamasu, Witkoff uniknął odpowiedzi wprost, jednak sformułował zawoalowaną groźbę.

– Nie sądzę, że należy alarmować wszystkich, mówiąc, jak będziemy negocjować, czy jakie konkretnie podejmiemy działania – skwitował. I bez dalszego wdawania się w szczegóły dodał:

– Jednak nie testowałbym prezydenta Trumpa.

Zapytany, czy ultimatum Trumpa ma konkretny deadline, odpowiedział: „Sądzę, że na pewno jest taka data, ale nie jestem upoważniony, by o niej rozmawiać”.

Witkoff w przyszłym tygodniu wybiera się na Bliski Wschód, gdzie będzie próbował doprowadzić do przedłużenia rozejmu w Gazie.

Red. Alicja Lehmann

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Joe Rogan and the Jews

Mar12
Joe Rogan and the Jews

Park MacDougald

Ricky Carioti / The Washington Post via Getty Images

October 7 put Jewish blood in the water. What we’re watching now are the sharks.

It gives us no pleasure to report this, but we figured you should hear it from us. Jeffrey Epstein—the late New York financier—was a “Jewish organization of Jewish people working on behalf of Israel and other groups,” including organized crime and elements of the Central Intelligence Agency, to collect blackmail on American politicians and businessmen. This Jewish blackmail ring is so powerful that Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel, despite their promises of transparency, will never be able to produce any documents to prove its existence. Nor will President Donald Trump and his administration be able to cut U.S. support for Israel—the blackmail runs too deep.

Now, it may horrify ordinary people to learn that a substantial portion of Jews believe their existence depends on their ability to manipulate powerful Americans into compromising positions with sexually trafficked teenagers, but we should have some sympathy. It is not their fault that Israel was founded by organized crime syndicates, sinister transnational bankers, and terrorists, who brought the methods of the Jewish underworld into the present day. Perhaps they felt they had no choice. But in the modern day, these methods have grown “cancerous on the Jewish religion” and must be excised—for the good of Jews as well as Americans. Fortunately, thanks to Oct. 7, we can finally talk about this. America is waking up. That won’t stop surviving elements of the Jewish mafia from trying to smear us truth-tellers as lunatics, conspiracy theorists, and antisemites. But they are losing. Information wants to be free, and the arc of history bends toward justice.

There, we saved you 2 hours and 41 minutes. That was the run time of Joe Rogan’s interview with Ian Carroll, a TikTok influencer whose short rise from total obscurity to Rogan’s show—one of the most coveted slots in the entertainment business, which many a content creator would kill to appear on—would normally lead us to ask questions about foreign intelligence operations and shadowy behind-the-scenes influence networks, had Carroll not already helpfully answered our questions about such things (it’s Israel). On the other hand, we did not have the heart, or the patience, to sit through Candace Owens’ simultaneous appearance on Theo Von’s show, so you’ll have to dig through that one yourself. For those interested in further research, please consult Carroll’s videos about how Yale’s Skull and Bones society blackmails elites by making them do “gay stuff.” Or just wait for Rogan’s (real) forthcoming episode with Darryl Cooper, aka Martyr Made, who we hope will clear up any lingering misconceptions about World War II, like that the Allies were the good guys. 

The attacks and their aftermath exposed that Jews cannot silence their opponents but in many cases are reduced to asking for pity, which only invites more sadism.

All kidding aside, Rogan—whatever his penchant for kooky theories about the moon landing or ancient aliens—never struck us as an antisemite, periodic hyperventilating from the Anti-Defamation League and other adjuncts of the Democratic Party notwithstanding. He is, or traditionally has been, an American everyman, and he doesn’t appear to be a resentful or damaged person, which is usually a prerequisite for going off the deep end regarding Jews. Which makes it all the more difficult to figure out what’s going on here. Does Rogan believe this stuff? Is he playing for relevance at a time when deranged talk about all-powerful “Zionist” and “neocon” influence, boosted by Elon Musk’s X algorithm, is all the rage on social media? Is there a network? Did someone—a booker, a friend, a tech baron, a political operative, a godfather—tell him that Carroll and Cooper are great guys and that he should help to get their message out?

Or maybe we’re looking at an op. The Joe Rogan Experience, after all, has 19.5 million subscribers on YouTube, and it became clear after last year’s election that many in the upper reaches of the Democratic Party saw Rogan and the wider podcast world as key to Trump’s victory. It’s obviously the sort of thing that would interest intelligence agencies, state and state-backed actors, and others with the resources to rival states. We have recent hard evidence of Chinese state actors boosting conservative-branded antisemitic content on X and of Russian state actors attempting to buy off right-wing social media influencers. Tucker Carlson, who appears to be the head (or at least the public-facing head) of the antisemitic power vertical on the American right, is financially backed by the fortune of the Iranian American businessman and (prior to 2020) lifelong Democrat Omeed Malik, who is also now Donald Trump Jr.’s business partner. In February, Carlson hosted on his show the Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, one of the largest media investors in the world and a major shareholder in X. Last Friday afternoon, he released an interview with the prime minister of Qatar, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani. 

The truth is we have no idea what the real story is. But as we’ve been trying to point out at Tablet for years now (see here and here), the sorts of questions we’re now forced to ask about Rogan are, in at least one sense, similar to the sorts of questions that guys like Carroll are posing about wealthy Jewish sex traffickers collecting blackmail on behalf of Mossad. That is to say, both are downstream of the hall-of-mirrors reality we now live in, in which the cumulative effect of two decades of official lies, secrecy, propaganda, and censorship has combined with the destabilizing impact of digital media on our collective psychic health. All of us know, just as Carroll and Cooper and Carlson and Rogan do, that we have been misled by people we cannot quite name, in ways we cannot quite understand, for reasons we can’t quite put our finger on. And good luck finding the truth in the pages of The New York Times, which everyone knows is for suckers. As Jacob Siegel wrote for Tablet in 2023, “Americans who want to join in their country’s civic life now find that the main way to participate is by following the trail of clues leaked by official sources while trying to solve elaborate, rigged puzzles about the nature of reality. It’s no surprise the country is going nuts.”

Carroll did manage to say one true thing, though, which is that Oct. 7 opened the door for “interest” in his favorite subject. But the reason is not that Americans are, all of a sudden, interested in pulling back the veil on the Jewish power that secretly controlled their lives. It was that the attacks and their aftermath exposed that Jews (including the mythical Israel lobby) are not nearly as powerful as they have been made out to be; that there is a huge, potentially lucrative audience for those who could explain that the murdered, kidnapped, and raped Israelis really had it coming; and that Jews cannot silence their opponents but in many cases are reduced to asking for pity, which, as anyone with a basic understanding of human psychology will tell you, only invites more sadism.

Which is to say, the attacks put blood in the water. What we’re seeing now are the sharks.

This piece was originally published in Tablet’s daily afternoon newsletter, The Scroll. You can subscribe here to receive more commentary like this in your inbox every day.

Park MacDougald is senior writer of The Scroll, Tablet’s daily afternoon newsletter.

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Syrians Riot in Front of Jewish Museum in Munich Amid Rise in Antisemitic Incidents

Mar12
Syrians Riot in Front of Jewish Museum in Munich Amid Rise in Antisemitic Incidents

Ailin Vilches Arguello

Illustrative: Pro-Hamas demonstrators marching in Munich, Germany. Photo: Reuters/Alexander Pohl

Three young Syrian men rioted in front of the Jewish Museum in Munich this past weekend, spitting on photographs of Israeli hostages and deceased soldiers before one of the assailants threatened security personnel with a knife.

The incident, first reported by German media, was one of the latest antisemitic cases in a country that has experienced a surge in open hatred toward Jews since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

During the Gaza conflict, the Jewish Museum has displayed photographs of hostages taken by Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists during their Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel as well as deceased Israeli soldiers, along with candles, to honor and remember them.

On Saturday afternoon, three men — Syrian citizens living in Austria — vandalized the memorial by spitting on it while shouting antisemitic slogans, the German newspapers Süddeutsche Zeitung and Jüdische Allgemeine reported.

After witnessing the attack, two employees from the Jewish community’s security service tried to stop the assailants, who responded aggressively. One of the three men, a 19-year-old, allegedly kicked one of the employees before drawing a knife.

Several police officers assigned to protect the Jewish Center, located next to the museum, noticed the incident and intervened. Soon afterward, more than 30 officers arrived at the scene. Police and security guards had to threaten to use their firearms before the teenager dropped the knife.

According to local police, the man and his two accomplices, a 20-year-old and a 31-year-old, have all been arrested and are under investigation for threats, assault, defamation, and insulting the memory of the deceased.

The Munich Public Prosecutor’s Office has taken over the case, with senior prosecutor Andreas Franck, who also serves as the antisemitism commissioner of the Bavarian judiciary, overseeing the case.

Germany has experienced a sharp spike in antisemitism since Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza.

In just the first six months of 2024 alone, the number of antisemitic incidents in Berlin surpassed the total for all of the prior year and reached the highest annual count on record, according to Germany’s Federal Association of Departments for Research and Information on Antisemitism (RIAS).

The figures compiled by RIAS were the highest count for a single year since the federally-funded body began monitoring antisemitic incidents in 2015, showing the German capital averaged nearly eight anti-Jewish outrages a day from January to June last year.

According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), police registered 5,154 antisemitic incidents in Germany in 2023, a 95 percent increase compared to the previous year.

However, experts believe that the true number of incidents is much higher but not recorded because of reluctance on the part of the victims.

“Only 20 percent of the antisemitic crimes are reported, so the real number should be five times what we have,” Felix Klein, the German federal government’s chief official dealing with antisemitism, told The Algemeiner in an interview in 2023.

Earlier this year, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz condemned the ongoing discrimination faced by the Jewish community, calling it “outrageous and shameful.”

Last month, Germany’s federal parliament, the Bundestag, passed a motion to address antisemitism and hostility toward Israel in schools and universities, seeking to combat a surge in pro-Hamas demonstrations on campuses and antisemitic incidents across the country.

Jewish students at German universities widely expressed a growing sense of insecurity and uneasiness following Hamas’s Oct. 7 invasion of southern Israel, amid a slew of incidents purportedly meant to protest the war in Gaza.

The recently passed parliamentary motion stipulates that the federal government — in collaboration with the ministers of education and the German Rectors’ Conference, an association of state and state-recognized universities — must ensure that antisemitic behavior in educational institutions results in sanctions.

“This includes the consistent enforcement of house rules, temporary exclusion from classes or studies, and even … expulsion,” the motion reads.

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