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• Politico reports that President Joe Biden has decided to keep Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list. Removing that designation was the final Iranian demand in the negotiations toward a return to the Obama-Biden nuclear deal of 2015 (the JCPOA).

The RJC strongly opposes any return to the JCPOA.

• Rob Malley, US envoy for Iran and the chief US negotiator in the nuclear talks, testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee yesterday. The Jewish Insider reports:

Rob Malley, the US envoy for Iran, said on Wednesday that the prospects for reaching a new nuclear agreement with Iran "are tenuous at best" and pledged that, should the Biden administration reach a new deal with Tehran, it will submit such an agreement for congressional review.

"The odds of a successful deal are lower than the odds of failure," Malley told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in rare public testimony about the state of negotiations in Vienna. "If Iran maintains demands that go beyond the scope of the [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action], we will continue to reject them, and there will be no deal. It is not our preference. But we are fully prepared to live with and confront that reality, if that is Iran’s choice."

…Malley confirmed that the administration would submit any deal reached for congressional review under the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act (INARA), which had been a lingering question for many critics of the negotiations.

You can watch the committee hearing here.

• Iran used secret UN records to evade nuclear probes, according to the Wall Street Journal:

Iran secured access to secret United Nations atomic agency reports almost two decades ago and circulated the documents among top officials who prepared cover stories and falsified a record to conceal suspected past work on nuclear weapons, according to Middle East intelligence officials and documents reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.

• A senior member of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was shot dead in broad daylight outside his home in Tehran on Sunday. According to reports, Col. Hassan Sayyad Khodaei planned kidnapping and killings of Iran’s opponents, including recent failed plots to kill an Israeli diplomat and an American general. The New York Times ran a story alleging that Israel carried out the killing of Khodaei and told US officials about it, but Israeli sources denied that report.

Last week, we noted that Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and her anti-Israel friends introduced a House resolution calling for official US government recognition of the "Nakba," the "catastrophe," which is the Palestinian term for the creation of Israel.

Republican Jewish Coalition Chairman Norm Coleman condemned the resolution, saying that it “distorts history and international law in service to an anti-Israel agenda that has no place in the US Congress.”

On the topic of Tlaib’s "Nakba" resolution, Jonathan Tobin writes:

As an attempt at telling this history [of what happened in 1948], the resolution is a despicable farce that deserves little notice. But it’s important because it represents the way the left-wing of the Democratic Party led by the so-called "Squad"—of which Tlaib, who is of Palestinian descent, is a charter member—has fully embraced intersectional ideology. Other "Squad" members are co-sponsors, including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Cori Bush (D-MO), Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and Betty McCollum (D-MN). This attempt to treat the war on Israel’s existence as analogous to the struggle for civil rights in the United States and an integral part of the progressive political agenda represents a sea change in American politics.

…While Tlaib and the other Progressive Caucus members who co-sponsored the resolution want to frame their gesture as a matter of support for human rights and recognition of the suffering of Palestinians, it is actually nothing of the kind. Its purpose is to place on the record, congressional support for the elimination of Israel.

This change being pushed by the most leftwing members of the Democratic Party in Congress is also seen at the grassroots of the party. A new Pew report finds that Democrats now view the Palestinian people and the Palestinian government more favorably than they do Israelis and the Israeli government. Nate Hochman writes at National Review:

Democrats and Democrat-leaning respondents gave the Palestinian people a net favorability of 64, and the Palestinian government a net favorability of 37. Alternatively, they gave the Israeli people a net favorability of 60, and the Israeli government a net favorability of 34.

In contrast to Democrats, Republicans and Republican-leaning respondents gave Israeli people a net favorability of 78 over a net favorability of just 37 for the Palestinian people. They gave the Israeli government a net favorability of 66, versus just 18 for the Palestinian one.

… Notably, young Americans seem to be moving against Israel — and toward Palestine. An unsurprising development, given the atmosphere on American college campuses.

One more note on this topic. Earlier this month, Rep. Tlaib appeared at the "Nakba Day" rally in Dearborn, Michigan, where she told the crowd, "The American people are with us… They want to stop the apartheid" [meaning Israel]. Another speaker at that rally, Osama Siblani, the publisher of Arab American News, was more direct in his remarks, explicitly calling for violence. He said:

We are the Arabs that are going to lift Palestinians all the way to victory. Whether we are in Michigan, and whether we are in Jenin. Believe me. Everyone should fight within his means. They will fight with stones. Others will fight with guns. Others will fight with planes, drones. And others will fight with rockets. And others will fight in their voice, and the others will fight with their hands and say free, free Palestine! Video here.

•. In an example of RJC responding decisively to any instance of antisemitism on our side of the political aisle, the RJC spoke out this week against a candidate running as a Republican who made antisemitism comments. Collin Anderson reports at the Washington Free Beacon on antisemitic remarks made by Greg Raths, who is running a primary challenge against RJC PAC-endorsed Republican congresswoman Young Kim in California’s 40th Congressional District.

In remarks before the Orange County Islamic Foundation, Raths said:

Israeli PAC in Washington, they got money and they control a lot of these politicians… The Jewish community is very well organized in the United States and they control a lot of politicians. That’s why the foreign aid is so large going to Israel.

Anderson notes:

Raths's comments echo those of [Rep. Ilhan] Omar, who in 2019 said US support for Israel is "all about the Benjamins baby," a reference to $100 bills bearing Benjamin Franklin's face.

… Republican Jewish Coalition national political director Sam Markstein… rebuked Raths, calling his remarks "blatantly anti-Semitic."

"Both Mr. Raths and Ilhan Omar now share the distinct dishonor of suggesting that Jewish Americans buy political influence—a well-known, age-old anti-Semitic stereotype," Markstein told the Washington Free Beacon. "It is disgusting, appalling, and has absolutely no place in the GOP."

• RJC Political Director Sam Markstein appeared on the Ari Hoffman Show on Seattle’s 570 KVI radio station. He discussed the "Nakba" resolution, antisemitism in the Democratic Party, and the RJC’s efforts to support pro-Israel policies and candidates. His segment starts at 1:05:00 here.

Biden’s poor leadership putting US military on dangerous ground

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo writes that the Biden administration is seriously weakening America’s defensive capability through politically influenced decisions about the development, procurement, and maintenance of weapons systems.

Unpack your bags, Mr. President

Jewish Policy Center Senior Director Shoshana Bryen tells President Joe Biden to cancel his planned trip to Israel and Saudi Arabia unless he’s going to bring along some real changes to his Middle East policies. He should restore the prior administration’s policies on both Iran and the Palestinians, she asserts.

Why Ukraine matters

Jim Talent, the former US Senator from Missouri, lays out a thoughtful explanation of why Americans should care about what’s happening in Ukraine and why we should help the Ukrainians in this conflict.

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