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In: Israel, Lobbyists, Pete Hegseth, Politics, POTUS, Warfare

As the richest men in the US (all multi-billionaires) buy up media and technology companies at a dizzying pace, it’s logical to assume America is a wealthy nation. In reality, the US is broke, tasked with funding an escalating, costly war that lacks an exit strategy while simultaneously funding massive tax cuts for corporations and the wealthiest 5 percent of U.S. citizens.

According to the Institution on Taxation and Economic Policy, a combination of President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), termination of the Enhanced Premium Tax Credit and tariffs have resulted in increased taxes for all but the top wealthiest five percent of Americans. OBBBA alone is expected to provide $1 trillion in tax cuts for the richest one percent of Americans over the next decade, while cutting Medicaid by almost as much during the same time period.

The US is spending an estimated half a billion dollars each day to fight Israel’s holy war against Iran. And the Pentagon is now asking Congress to approve potentially $200 billion more. The funds would reportedly be used to increase production of munitions that the U.S. and Israel have used to strike thousands of targets since the conflict began.

“It takes money to kill bad guys,” Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said at a press briefing today about the request. “Today, will be the largest strike package yet, just like yesterday was. Our capabilities continue to build, Iran’s continue to degrade. We’re hunting and striking. Death and destruction from above.”

A chief economist warned this week that a U.S. recession is a “serious threat,” while gas prices have risen by close to $1 a gallon since the war began. Hegseth’s request will now force the U.S. Congress to decide whether they should continue to represent the interests of their Israeli donors or their constituents.

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In: Israel, Orit Strock, Politics
Israeli Minister Orit Strock

The daughter of Israeli Minister of Settlements and National Missions Orit Strock was found dead this week, less than a year after she filed a compliant against Strock, her father and her brother complaining of ritualistic sexual abuse beginning at a young age.

Shoshana Strock, 34, filed a complaint with Israeli police last April alleging sexual abuse by her parents and brother. A publication ban was immediately imposed on the case, disallowing Israeli media to publish anything else about it. In January, Strock elaborated on the allegations on Facebook.

She alleged that her father and someone named Rabbi Tao began forcing her to participate in sadistic sex cult rituals as a child as a form of “conversion therapy” to erase her identity as a lesbian. “Starting from age two and a half, my parents took me to pedophile ceremonies in which I was programmed and trained using drugs, hypnosis, and sexual abuse,” said Strock in a video posted last month.

“They pimped me out starting at the age of 13 in Tel Aviv,” wrote Strock. “And in essence, they completely erased my ability to experience healthy sexuality with a woman and made me hate my sexual identity and myself at the most severe levels possible.” Strock wrote that she was threatened if she told anyone the truth.

Israeli journalist Sefi Rachlevsky said he spoke to a friend of Strock’s who claims she was not suicidal but had been very afraid someone might kill her after going public with her claims. Strock was found dead in her home in northern Israel. Police have said an investigation is ongoing, but no official cause of death has been announced yet.

Orit Strock is a member of the far-right Religious Zionist party and has 11 children and 12 grandchildren. In 2007 her son Zviki was convicted of kidnapping and torturing a Palestinian boy who was found unconscious, naked, handcuffed and severely injured. Strock was sentenced to 30 months in prison.

In the wake of Shoshana Strock’s death, Israeli women’s organizations have called for a more expansive investigation into her abuse claims and death. “We cannot give up on her demand; the duty of the state is now clear: to investigate, examine, and uncover the truth,” said women’s organization Bono Alternativa. “How is it possible that the horrifying accounts of severe ritual abuse did not shake the system and the entire country?!”

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In: Israel, Pete Hegseth, Politics, Warfare
March 2025: 90,000 Muslim worshippers ascended Temple Mount for Ramadan prayers

“There’s no reason why the miracle of the re-establishment of the temple on the Temple Mount is not possible,” U.S. Secretary of Defense (then a Fox News host) Pete Hegseth said during a 2018 speech at the Arutz Sheva conference in Jerusalem. “I don’t know how it would happen. You don’t know how it would happen, but I know that it could happen.” 

The construction of a rebuilt “Third Temple” in Jerusalem is deeply rooted in Jewish and even some evangelical Christian eschatology. Derived from visions in the Book of Ezekiel and other texts, it describes a final, permanent house of worship whose construction is essential to ushering in the Messianic era, a time of peace when the Messiah is expected to return to earth.

The Temple has been suggested as one of the main drivers behind the US-Israeli war with Iran and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson last week argued during his podcast that the Iran War is a “religious war designed to rebuild the Third Temple on the ashes of Al-Aqsa.” “If you’re a Christian preacher calling for the rebuilding of the Third Temple, you kind of missed the whole point,” said Carlson. “That is not Christianity. It’s not even a close facsimile of Christianity. It’s clearly evil.”

The problem with building a Third Temple on the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, is that it is home to the Al-Aqsa mosque compound and the Dome of the Rock, an Islamic shrine. Located in the Old City of Jerusalem, the mosque compound dates back to nearly 700 CE and is the second oldest mosque in Islam. It was built to replace the Second Jewish Temple, which was destroyed by the Romans and replaced Solomon’s Temple, the First Temple, which existed between the 10th and 6th centuries BCE.

Al-Aqsa is the third holiest site in Islam for Sunni and Shia Muslims alike. It is a main focal point in the ongoing war in Gaza. Holy sites in Jerusalem have been closed as the war with Iran ramps up, with the Israeli military alleging an Iranian warhead impacted just a few hundred meters from the Old City on February 28, the first day of the war.

“That’s why going and visiting Judea and Samaria and understanding that sovereignty — the very sovereignty of Israeli soil, Israeli cities, locations — is a critical next step to showing the world that this is the land for Jews and the Land of Israel,” said Hegseth during his 2018 speech. “If you walk the ground today, you understand there is no such thing as the outcome of a two-state solution.“

“Without investment of our partners, NATO is irrelevant,” said Hegseth. “The truth [is] that Europe, as Ken pointed out so aptly, is a museum soon to be drowned out by radical Islam and Islamism should they not address their lack of sovereignty, their demographic problems and their inability to defend their culture.”

Hegseth was referring to speaker Kenneth Abromowitz, co-founder and managing partner of NGN Capital, a global healthcare venture capital fund worth half a billion dollars. He was also managing director and a senior adviser of The Carlyle Group.

“I would submit to you, in light of the support you have in Washington, DC, the support you have amongst patriotic Americans, amongst evangelical Christians, amongst believers, amongst Republicans, even amongst some Democrats who can barely say it anymore in Washington…Do what needs to be done here in Israel, because I truly believe America will have your back.”

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In: Israel, Lobbyists, Politics, POTUS
Bernie Sanders’ 2020 national campaign director Analilia Mejia beat AIPAC-backed candidate Tom Malinowski in NJ’s recent special election

As mid-term season ramps up, important primary races are underway in Texas and Illinois. The midterm elections will potentially reshape the U.S. Congress, making it critical to understand how important the outcomes are for Israel and its powerful slate of U.S. lobbying groups.

“We expect to be involved in dozens of races both in primaries and general elections this cycle,” said Patrick Dorton, a spokesman for AIPAC’s affiliated super PAC, the United Democracy Project (UDP).

According to Track AIPAC, there are currently only 21 members of U.S. Congress who have never accepted money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC, the largest pro-Israel PAC in the US) or other pro-Israel lobby groups. The remaining 514 sitting members have all accepted varying amounts of fundraising money from pro-Israel lobbyists.

With the Illinois primary just two days away, AIPAC has spent more than $1.9 million on ads to replace retiring Rep. Danny Davis with Melissa Conyears-Ervin, the city treasurer of Chicago. She faces over a dozen other candidates in the upcoming primary. And IL Sen. Dick Durbin is retiring after more than 30 years in office, with three top Democratic candidates vying for his seat.

Durbin received more than $2.7 million in pro-Israel donations over his decades in office. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, who accepted more than $1.7 million in pro-Israel donations, is vying for his seat along with Rep. Robin Kelly, the recipient of just over $368,000 from Israeli lobbies and Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton, who has received just over $248,000.

U.S. Democratic Reps. Jan Schakowsky and Jesus “Chuy” Garcia are also retiring. Schakowsky has received more than $2.5 billion from Israeli lobbyists while Garcia hasn’t received any and rejects AIPAC. Dozens of Democrats are vying for those seats, with AIPAC playing an increasingly bigger role in candidates’ platforms.

Schakowsky, once a staunch supporter of Israel, has increasingly become critical of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the war in Gaza and recently withdrew her support of Cook County Commissioner Donna Miller to succeed her. Miller has pulled in more than $3.3 million in AIPAC-related donations. “Illinois deserves leaders who put voters first, not AIPAC or out-of-state Trump donors,” said Schakowsky. She endorsed Evanston Mayor Daniel Bliss instead, who has received just over $288,000 in pro-Israel funding.

The Texas Senate primaries have yielded tight races for Democrats and Republicans alike, with AIPAC once again playing a key role. James Talarico, who received just over $23,000 from pro-Israel interests, will face an as yet to be determined Republican challenger. Incumbent Sen. John Cornyn, who has accepted more than $2 million from AIPAC and other Israeli interests, is being challenged by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who received just over $53,000 from Israeli lobbyists.

The Republican primary was so close that the two candidates will face a runoff on May 26. Paxton’s success puts President Donald Trump in a sticky position. Trump himself has received more than $230 million from Israeli groups and it was expected he would endorse Israel’s candidate, Cornyn. But Paxton has gained traction within the MAGA movement, and Trump risks alienating his voters by endorsing Cornyn. Talarico’s popularity has been rising with some predicting he may turn one of Texas’s Senate seats blue for the first time in 33 years.

AIPAC and its offshoots began to ramp up spending during the 2022 midterms, shelling out more than $221 million between December of 2021 and January of 2026.

Their strategy has not always paid off though, as was the case in the recent Democratic primary special election in New Jersey. Israeli lobbyists spent more than $378,000 pushing former Rep. Tom Malinowski for a House seat. He was defeated by progressive candidate Analilia Mejia, who has been openly critical of Israel.

To learn if your U.S. representatives better reflect your interests or Israel’s, check Track AIPAC.

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