Wall Street Journal: Israeli Minister Calls It Unfair to Link Trump with Synagogue Shooting

October 31, 2018

By Felicia Schwartz

Israel’s minister for the Jewish diaspora defended President Trump from criticism related to the Pittsburgh shooting, calling it unfair and wrong to associate him with the weekend massacre.

The closeness between Israel’s conservative government and the Trump administration has exacerbated a rift between Israel and many American Jews, a majority of whom belong to liberal streams of Judaism, known as the Conservative and Reform movements.

Many American Jews have criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government for its policies and for their official exclusion by the Israeli Rabbinate, which controls issues such as the governing of holy places and religious conversion.

“Any attempt to blame President Trump for this horrific attack is simply wrong and unfair,” the diaspora minister, Naftali Bennett, told The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday. “President Trump has shown to be a great friend of Israel and the Jewish people.”

Mr. Bennett traveled to the U.S. to offer support and assistance to America’s Jewish community after the mass shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue on Saturday, in which 11 people were killed.

Mr. Trump has been blamed for emboldening extremists with his rhetoric, and Pittsburgh officials and some American Jews had urged him to cancel a trip to Pittsburgh on Tuesday , where he visited the temple and a hospital.

Marchers in a public protest during the visit carried signs reading “No place for hate” and “We do bridges not walls.”

Some critics say Mr. Trump’s comments while in office, including blaming both sides last year for violence during a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, have contributed to an atmosphere in which anti-Semitic attacks in the U.S. are on the rise.

Trump administration officials have pushed back on the notion that Mr. Trump has stoked extremism. His aides have noted that his daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren are Jewish.

Mr. Netanyahu encouraged unity among the Jewish community in the wake of the shooting.

“Jews were killed in a synagogue. They were killed because they are Jews. The location was chosen because it is a synagogue. We must never forget that. We are one,” he said.

Mr. Trump is overwhelmingly popular in Israel, owing to policy decisions including moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and declaring it Israel’s capital.

But such moves haven’t garnered similar favor with American Jews: 74% of American Jews plan to vote for Democrats in the coming midterm elections and 75% disapprove of Mr. Trump’s policies, according to a recent poll conducted by American polling firm the Mellman group on behalf of the nonpartisan Jewish Electorate Institute.

In an illustration of tensions between generally more liberal Jews in America and those in Israel, Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau on Sunday referred to the site of the Pittsburgh shooting as “a place of prominent Jewish character,” rather than a synagogue, in an interview with Mashor Rikon, a right-wing Israeli weekly.

Ahead of Mr. Trump’s visit, more than 35,000 people signed an open letter to Mr. Trump from leaders of a Pittsburgh-based progressive Jewish group, which said the president wouldn’t be welcome unless he denounced white nationalism and stopped targeting minorities.

Other members of Pittsburgh’s Jewish community welcomed Mr. Trump, telling him in a letter that “your support of Israel and American Jewry is appreciated, especially in the face of the virulent anti-Semitism our community suffered just days ago.”

U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman said in Tel Aviv on Wednesday that Jews must not be divided by the Pittsburgh massacre. “We can never allow ourselves to be divided over the pointless exercise of assigning blame to anyone but the killer himself,” he said.

Mr. Trump said on Twitter Wednesday that he and his wife were treated very nicely during their Tuesday visit and that they didn’t see any protesters.

—Dov Lieber contributed to this article.

POLITICO: The DNC is meeting — and Israel is at the forefront once again

April 10, 2026
Democrats’ internal feud over Israel is rearing its head on the party’s biggest stage — again.  Critics of Israel’s military actions and the pro-Israel lobby’s interference in recent Democratic primaries are setting up thorny test votes at the Democratic National Committee’s spring meeting in New Orleans on Thursday, where members will debate resolutions recognizing a Palestinian state, conditioning military aid to Israel and condemning the “growing influence” of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and other dark-money groups.

Survey Shows Most U.S. Jews Are Not Following Pro-Israel Spending In ’26 Primaries And Are Divided On Its Value

April 7, 2026
To: Jewish Electorate Institute From: The Mellman Group Re: Survey Shows Most U.S. Jews Are Not Following Pro-Israel Spending In ’26 Primaries And Are Divided On Its Value Date: April 6, 2026 

U.S. JEWS IDENTIFY AS BOTH PRO-ISRAEL & CRITICAL OF ITS GOV’T

April 7, 2026
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MEDIA CONTACT: info@jewishelectorateinstitute.org TUESDAY, APRIL 7, 2026 202-695-0531 U.S. JEWS IDENTIFY AS BOTH PRO-ISRAEL & CRITICAL OF ITS GOV’T Jewish Repub’s, Indi’s Support Pro-Israel Spending in Primaries; Dems Less So AIPAC popular among R’s, not as much among D’s; DMFI better liked by D’s WASHINGTON – As the Democratic National Committee sets to convene in New Orleans this week and consider resolutions on Israel and its AIPAC lobby, a new poll for the Jewish Electorate Institute (JEI) finds the majority of American Jews identifies as both pro-Israel and critical of the Israeli Government. There is limited awareness of the spending by pro-Israel groups in the 2026 primaries, with only one in ten saying they have heard a great deal about it. Attitudes split on partisan lines with majorities of independent and Republican Jews supporting this spending, while a plurality of Democrats is opposed. But still, the majority of Democrats are either not sure or supportive, the poll finds. These are among the top findings of a survey of registered Jews nationally for the JEI by The Mellman Group, several others of which were released last week before Passover. A fuller release of all its findings will come on Friday, after the holiday ends. Further, attitudes about AIPAC and DMFI, the pro-Israel groups spending the most in these primaries, are also split on partisan lines, with AIPAC slightly underwater among Democrats, and popular among Republicans. DMFI is less known but better liked among Democrats. J Street’s numbers are relatively even but measurably smaller. This analysis is based on the findings of a survey of 800 registered Jewish voters nationally. The survey was conducted for JEI by The Mellman Group using a high-quality online national panel from March 13-23, 2026. The margin of error for the sample as a whole is +/-3.5% at the 95% level of confidence (higher for subgroups). Majority of U.S. Jews Identifies as Both Pro-Israel and Critical of Israeli Policies An overwhelming 86% of American Jews describe themselves as generally pro-Israel. However, fewer than one-quarter (23%) say they are both pro-Israel and supportive of Israeli policies. A 63% majority identifies as pro-Israel and critical of the Israeli government policies – split roughly equally between those who are critical of some policies (32%) and those critical of many (31%). Just a combined 14% say they are not generally pro-Israel (9%) or do not hold a view (5%). This trend is not dissimilar to one in the JEI poll that shows Jews are also generally patriotic towards America but also critical of some government policies, numbers for which will be released Friday.  While pro-Israel sentiment extends across party (84% of Democrats, 90% of independents, 94% of Republicans), Democrats are considerably more likely to be critical of Israeli policies (73% critical) than independents (44%) and Republicans (39%).