👋 Good Thursday morning!

Israeli Defense Secretary Benny Gantz isn’t slated to speak at the Aspen Security Forum until this afternoon, but Israel’s military was never far from the conversation on the forum’s dais.

During a session that looked at the military’s ability to adapt to a changing technological and geopolitical environment, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, who spoke alongside Rear Adm. Lorin Selby, the Navy’s chief of naval research, pointed to Israel’s elite 8200 unit — a highly skilled tech unit within the IDF’s intelligence corps — as an example of how the U.S. could upgrade its military capabilities.

“If I were focused on what we need, is we need like a digital ROTC, a West Point that's equivalent to [a] kind of digital and software,” Hoffman said. “We need that going into a service, whether it's modeled on, you know, Israeli 8200 unit or other kinds of things.”

“The training and education needs to change,” NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly, the session’s moderator, said. “Yes,” Hoffman responded. “The whole thing.”

“[Israel is] somewhat isolated. You're in a challenging neighborhood,” Selby told JI following the panel conversation. “And you guys have figured out how to kind of internally turn out an innovation ecosystem…[Israel has] also figured out how to do that in the military.”

Read our full dispatch from Aspen here.

Spread the word! Invite your friends to sign up.👇

Share with a friend

CIA Director William Burns said on Wednesday that President Joe Biden is hopeful that his trip to the Middle East last week “will help to reinforce what is clearly a positive trend line” and that Washington will “do everything we can” to promote increased ties between Israel and countries in the region, Jewish Insider’s Melissa Weiss reports from the Aspen Security Forum.

Positive trend lines: Burns told NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell that the Biden trip occurred against the backdrop of a “rare” moment in which “there are at least some modestly positive trend lines in a part of the world where I spend a lot of time and learned the hard way that modestly positive trend lines are exceedingly rare.”

Odd bedfellows: The CIA director also weighed in on the visit to Tehran this week by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, during which state-owned oil companies from each country inked a $40 billion agreement that will see the development of Iranian gas fields and new pipelines to export the gas. “Russians and Iranians need each other right now,” Burns said, noting that both nations are under sanctions and each face political isolation.

Drone deal: CNN reported earlier this week that Russian officials have visited Tehran at least twice in recent weeks to examine Iranian drones that are able to carry precision-guided missiles. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said last week that Moscow is seeking to purchase hundreds of drones from Iran to replenish its supply. “It's true that the Russians are reaching out to the Iranians to try to acquire drones, UAVs,” Burns said. “It's important, I think, for us to remember or to remind ourselves, when we look at that prospect, that the purpose of those drones is to kill Ukrainian civilians in a brutal and unprovoked war of aggression.”

Read more here.

A group of activists, led by a Yemeni human rights activist, were on Capitol Hill last week to deliver a message starkly at odds with the approach advocated by many in the human rights community: In order to aid the Yemeni people, the Biden administration should reinstate the Houthis’ terrorist designation and resume offensive weapons sales to the Saudi government, Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod reports.

Around town: The group was led by Wesam Basindowah, the president of the Yemeni Coalition of Independent Women, and included human rights and national security attorney and analyst Irina Tsukerman and Manel Msalmi, the president of the European Association for the Defense of Minorities, who also advises members of the European Parliament. The trip to Washington was timed to coincide with President Joe Biden’s trip to Israel and Saudi Arabia last week.

In response: The State Department said this week that its focus is on maintaining the current truce in Yemen. “Humanitarian considerations continue to be an important factor in any decision regarding a Foreign Terrorist Designation of [the Houthis]. We are currently focused on securing, extending, and building on the U.N. truce in Yemen, which is having a tangible impact on millions of Yemenis and provides a credible opportunity for peace in Yemen,” a State Department spokesperson told JI. “The parties need to continue to choose peace and move toward a permanent ceasefire and the launch of an inclusive, comprehensive political process under U.N. auspices.”

Read the full story here.

🇷🇺 Putin’s Problems: Bloomberg’s Bobby Ghosh suggests that the influence of Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose trip to Iran followed President Joe Biden’s trip to the region, in the Middle East is on the decline. “But the illusion that Putin’s travels are of equal import as Biden’s can’t be sustained by his meetings with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and his fellow guest, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. If anything, Putin’s war on Ukraine has diminished his country’s stature in the region. Rather than offer solutions to geopolitical, economic and security problems created by US disengagement, Russia is now a source of new crises. Mounting grain scarcities and food inflation in the poorer Arab nations are a direct consequence of Putin’s belligerence. His continued support for Iran despite its nuclear brinkmanship is cause for frustration for Israel and the Gulf Arab states menaced by the regime in Tehran. Not that the Iranians are feeling especially grateful at the moment: Russia is undercutting their oil exports to China.” [Bloomberg]

🕍 Italian (Jewish) Renaissance: The Associated Press’ Frances D’Emilio spotlights Rabbi Barbara Aiello, an American rabbi who relocated to her father’s native southern Italy, from which he left prior to WWII, to revive the local Jewish community of Serrastretta. “When visitors arrive from abroad for ceremonies at her synagogue, Rabbi Aiello, who is 74, shows them the house in what had been the Jewish quarter in the nearby city of Lamezia Terme, where her father had been learning about his Jewish faith. She points out a plaque which reads: ‘In this quarter was active an industrious community’ of Jews from the 13th till the 16th centuries. One recent summer evening, as Aiello, who wears a yarmulke and necklace with a small Star of David, walked by en route to the ancient neighborhood, a local resident, Emilio Fulvo, 73, leaped up from a bench to greet her. When he was 15, Fulvo recounted, genealogical research discovered that his family has Jewish roots. Learning about his background ‘made me feel free,’ Fulvo said. ‘I knew something was missing’ while raised as a Catholic in southern Italy.” [AP]

🛍️ Wing and a Prayer: Vanity Fair’s Emily Jane Fox interviews The Wing founder Audrey Gelman, two years after Gelman left the company — and the public eye — amid controversy to focus on family and new ventures, including a homegoods store in Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill neighborhood. “Tucked into a real-life block of nondescript brokerage firms and dry cleaners is the charming fictional village of Barrow’s Green, which Gelman made up, and that is where the Six Bells — both real-life and fictional — is doing business as a ‘country store of homewares from a world far away,’ as the hand-painted sign out front says. A corporeal metaverse for the so-called grandmillennials. Gelman has populated Barrow’s Green with a cast of characters to whom she gave backstories. Inside the store, she’s hung oil portraits she’s collected over the years to serve as avatars for the townspeople, with brass name plaques underneath to identify the likes of the town gossip, the businessman, the rabbi.” [VanityFair]

New York Times bestselling author A.J. Jacobs and Tablet magazine's Armin Rosen spoke at the Williamsburg Hotel in Brooklyn last night at the launch of Tech Tribe’s Twelvex — a series of 10 events over the next 12 months exploring the intersection of tech, culture and the soul.

CEO of Fanatics, until last month he was a minority owner of the Philadelphia 76ers (NBA) and New Jersey Devils (NHL), Michael G. Rubin turns 50...

President at Admar Group, Henry Dean Ostberg turns 94... Chilean born classical music composer, professor emeritus at Tel Aviv University, Leon Schidlowsky turns 91... Escondido, Calif., resident, Leonard Simon Zoll... Retired CEO of Sony/ATV, Martin Bandier turns 81... Professor emeritus in the Department of Physics at Bar-Ilan University, Shlomo Havlin turns 80... Director of the Center for the Political Future at USC, Robert Shrum turns 79... Criminal defense attorney, Benjamin Brafman turns 74... Former member of the U.K. Parliament, now in the House of Lords, Baroness Susan Veronica Kramer turns 72... U.S. senator (R-WY), John Barrasso turns 70... Chairman and CEO at Quantitative Financial Strategies, Sanford "Sandy" Jay Grossman turns 69... Professor at Columbia University's medical school and the president of NYC's Central Synagogue, Shonni Silverberg, MD... Professor at Columbia Law School and daughter of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Jane Carol Ginsburg turns 67... Irene Ostrovsky... Comedian and actor, Jon Lovitz turns 65... Former chief rabbi of Moscow, Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt turns 59...

Literary agent and the co-head of at William Morris Endeavor book department, Eric Matthew Simonoff turns 55... Actress and producer, Alysia Reiner turns 52... Professor of astronomy at MIT and winner of a 2013 MacArthur genius award, Sara Seager turns 51... Brazilian fashion designer best known for avant-garde designs and eclectic prints, Alexandre Herchcovitch turns 51... Founder, president and CEO of Securing America's Future Energy (SAFE) and the Electrification Coalition, Raphael "Robbie" Diamond... Rabbi of Congregation Bais Naftali and teacher at Mesivta Birkas Yitzchok in Los Angeles, he is also a motivational speaker, Rabbi Yoel Gold... Online media personality and product manager on the Adobe Spark team, Veronica Belmont turns 40... Youth and teen engagement coordinator at Manhattan's B'nai Jeshurun, Aniko Gomory... Writer and political activist, Chloé Simone Valdary turns 29... Policy analyst at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Zachary A. Marshall... Talent acquisition partner at Drizly, Rachel Elizabeth Nieves... Attorney in Madrid and recent secretary general of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Spain, Elias Cohen...

Become a JI Ambassador! Invite your friends to sign up for the Daily Kickoff and be rewarded with exclusive Jewish Insider swag.

Share with a friend
Or simply share this link with your friends, family and colleagues: <<GrowSurf Share URL>>

Wondering how many referrals you have so far? Check your status on our website to see how close you are to your next reward.