President Trump instituted the tariffs he had been threatening, 25% on products coming in from Canada and Mexico and 10% on products from China. Trump says that the purpose is to stop the flow of immigrants and fentanyl into the country. Canada and Mexico have announced the implementation of their own tariffs against the United States while China has said it will file a case against the United States at the World Trade Organization. It is expected that consumers will see increases in prices, and that there may be shortages of some products. As a result of The United States–Israel Free Trade Agreement signed in 1985, there are few tariffs or duties on goods traded between the United States and Israel. But there are still some tariffs in effect between the two countries. This includes United States tariffs on Israeli “meat of bovine animals,” and Israeli tariffs on live fish including tilapia, carp, and trout. What tariffs has Israel imposed on other countries?

Tariff - Anti-Tariff (4359337309) by Cornell University Library is in the public domain via Wikimedia Commons

A. Argentina - surgical tape, syringes, tampons, medical test kits.

B. Afghanistan - Edible offal of bovine animals, sheep carcasses, fresh camel meat.

C. Mexico - Liquified gas, glues, mortars.

D. Vietnam - whales, dolphins, porpoises, manatees, walruses.

E. The Vatican - tailors’ dummies, pocket lighters, artificial teeth, safety pins, rear-view mirrors, fire extinguishers, cranberry juice.

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Elon Musk is in the news because of an arm motion he made at President Trump’s inauguration. Many interpreted the motion as a Nazi salute and were very critical of Musk for this antisemitic gesture. However, the Anti-Defamation League (among others) dismissed this as “an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute.” Musk tweeted that “The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is soo tired.” Musk also posted a Nazi-pun-filled response which generated further criticism, including a statement by Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the ADL, who wrote “the Holocaust was a singularly evil event, and it is inappropriate and offensive to make light of it. @elonmusk, the Holocaust is not a joke.” This is not the first time that Musk was criticized for antisemitic statements. In 2023 an X user posted that “Jewish communities have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them.” Musk replied that the X user “said the actual truth,” though he later apologized, saying that “it might be literally the worst and dumbest post I’ve ever done.” Musk has also endorsed the German far-right AfD party, and at an AfD rally he offended many Jews, Germans and others when he said that “I think there’s, like, frankly, too much of a focus on past guilt.” What interaction did Elon Musk once have with a rabbi?

Elon Musk Royal Society crop (cropped) by Debbie Rowe is in the public domain via Wikimedia Commons

A. Musk posted on X that “Instead of teaching fear of pregnancy, we should teach fear of childlessness.” Rabbi Shlomo Litvin, a Kentucky Chabad shaliach, posted a picture of his wife and seven children and replied, “I’m working on it @elonmusk. Now please make a Tesla big enough for my family.” Musk responded “That’s great to see! Tesla Robovan is in development,” leading Rabbi Litvin to post, “Thank you, sir! My family would happily be the test family for the Tesla Robovan.”

B. After Elon Musk apologized for his support of an X user’s antisemitic post, he made a visit to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp site, where he was given a tour by Rabbi Menachem Margolin. At the end of the tour, he had only one question for Rabbi Margolin, “What can I do to help?” The Rabbi responded, saying, “Our message is always ‘Never Again.’ So for you personally, ‘never again’ give a platform to the antisemites,” to which Musk replied, “You have my promise.”

C. During the pandemic in 2022, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ordered banks to help cut funding to truckers who protested Trudeau’s health policies. In support of the truckers, Elon Musk posted a picture of Adolph Hitler with the caption, “Stop comparing me to Justin Trudeau.” Rabbi Aaron Gorman of the the Toronto Board of Rabbis issued a statement noting that “it is not our place to get involved in political discussions, but we will not stand idly by when the evils of Adolph Hitler and the Holocaust are diminished by petty comparisons such as this.” Musk then tweeted in response, “Okay, my bad, Trudeau is not like Hitler. Maybe just Mussolini.”

D. In 2023, Elon Musk was among the speakers at the Zeh Mizeh Satmar Business Expo at the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center. The topic was “Technology, Artificial Intelligence, and the 7th Day,” focusing on how technology can be used in ways which are consistent with the Shabbat. Rabbi Yitchok Jacobowitz asked Musk for his thoughts and Musk replied, “As you know, we are developing a Tesla car which will be completely driverless. I am told that there is a question as to whether this will meet your religious requirements. But I know you have Sabbath elevators. I promise that if you work with me, there will be a Sabbath Tesla in your future.”

E. Two Chassidic businessmen invited Musk to a meeting to discuss business issues. They also invited Chabad Rabbi Mordechai Lightstone, director of social media for Chabad.org and the founder of Tech Tribe to join them and answer any questions Musk might have about Judaism. After the business portion of the meeting ended, Musk noted that this was his first personal encounter with Chassidim. Rabbi Lightstone asked if Musk had any questions, and Musk said that he had one. Referencing the mens’ payos (side curls), Musk asked, “How do you curl your hair so nicely?”

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Donald Trump was inaugurated as the 47th president of the United States. Among the speakers at the ceremony was Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University. Berman prayed that Trump and Vice President Vance “choose the right and the good, unite us around our foundational biblical values of life and liberty, service and sacrifice, and especially of faith and morality.” The first time that clergy offered prayers at a presidential inauguration was in 1937, when Franklin Roosevelt’s second inauguration included an invocation by Chaplain ZeBarney Thorne Phillips and a benediction by Father John A. Ryan. The first rabbi to participate was at Harry Truman’s inauguration in 1949, when Rabbi Samuel Thurman of the United Hebrew Congregation in St. Louis offered a prayer. Since then, most, but not all, presidential inaugurations have included a rabbi in the ceremony. What rabbi spoke at a presidential inauguration and then at a later time criticized that President?

President Roosevelt's Inauguration Address (15075354530) by SMU Central University Libraries is in the public domain via Wikimedia Commons

A. Rabbi Thurman, who had offered the prayer at Harry Truman’s inauguration. In 1950 he criticized Truman for remarks made at the Washington Hebrew Congregation commemorating the Holocaust, because Truman failed to mention Israel.

B. Rabbi Seymour Siegel, a professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary, offered a prayer at the second inauguration of Richard Nixon in 1973. Years later, when the Nixon tapes were released, Siegel heard the many antisemitic comments by Nixon (eg, “The Jews are just a very aggressive and abrasive and obnoxious personality”) and he stated that in hindsight he regretted having participated in the inauguration.

C. Rabbi Marvin Heir, Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, offered a benediction at Donald Trump’s first inauguration, in 2017. Heir criticized Trump later that month for offering remarks on International Holocaust Memorial Day that failed to specifically mention Jews.

D. Rabbi Abraham Rosenberg from Congregation Bnai Brith Jacob in Savannah, Georgia, offered the benediction at Jimmy Carter’s inauguration in 1977. In 2006, he criticized Carter upon the publication of Carter’s book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, noting that apartheid was not an appropriate description of the situation of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

E. Rabbi Amal E. Litella spoke at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy in 1961. He later criticized President Kennedy for what he called antisemitic remarks, when he heard Kennedy say the famous words, “Ask not what your country can do for Jew—ask what Jew can do for your country.” Told that Kennedy said, “you,” not “Jew,” Rabbi Litella replied, “Oh, that’s very different. Never mind!”

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Donald Trump has revived his plan, originally raised five years ago, to purchase (or militarily seize) Greenland from Denmark, ostensibly “for economic security.” There is no permanent Jewish population in Greenland, though it is believed that there may have been Jews in Greenland as early as the 16th and 17th centuries, among the Dutch whalers who fished in Greenland waters. Which of the following is true about Jews in Greenland?

Aerial view of Jakobshavn Glacier at Disko Bay (Greenland) by Giles Laurent is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

A. Fritz Loewe, a Jewish meteorologist, traveled to Greenland in 1929 to work with Alfred Wegener, the geologist who developed the hypothesis of how continental drift works. After their ground-breaking research Loewe returned to his native Germany. But in 1933 he lost his civil service job and was briefly incarcerated because of his religion, leading Loewe to flee Germany and resettle in Australia.

B. Fritz Loewe, a Jewish meteorologist, traveled to Greenland in 1929 to work with Alfred Wegener, the geologist who developed the hypothesis of how continental drift works. Unfortunately, on this trip to the frozen interior of Greenland, Loewe developed frostbite on his toes, leading to a crude amputation by scissors and a pen knife.

C. There are many ethnic communities around the world who claim to be Jewish or to have Jewish roots, including the Bene Israel and the Bene Ephraim of India, the Beta Israel of Ethiopia, and the Lemba people of southern Africa. There is a small community in Greenland called the B’nai Nordit (sons of Norway) who claim to descend from Jews who traveled to Norway (at the time of Jewish emigration to Russia in the 12th century), eventually then settling in Greenland. While they no longer live religiously as Jews, they do not eat the shellfish available in Greenland but thrive on the plentiful salmon, char and cod in the local waters.

D. Rita Sheftelovich, an Orthodox woman from Copenhagen, traveled to Greenland in the mid-1950’s to work as a nurse, caring for tuberculosis patients among others. Other than the many American Jews serving at the Thule Air Base, she may have been the only Jew in Greenland at that time. She kept kosher by eating canned goods and the plentiful fresh fish.

E. Rita Sheftelovich, an Orthodox woman from Copenhagen, traveled to Greenland in the mid-1950’s to work as a nurse, caring for tuberculosis patients among others. She kept kosher by eating canned goods and the plentiful penguins. (Her rabbi told her that turkeys aren’t listed in the Torah as kosher birds, but are called “tarnegol hodu,” or “Indian chickens” and are considered kosher like chickens. Similarly penguins are called “tarnegol eretz-yarok,” or “Greenland chickens,” and can therefore also be considered as kosher).

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