By LUIS ANDRES HENAO and MARIAM FAM, Associated Press

For the leaders of U.S. Jewish institutions, the recent attacks in Boulder, Colorado, and Washington, D.C., are stark reminders of their responsibility to remain vigilant despite years of hardening their security measures and trying to keep their people safe.

Now, they’re sounding the alarm for more help after a dozen people were injured in Boulder while demonstrating for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza on Sunday. And just over a week earlier, two Israeli Embassy staffers were fatally shot outside a Jewish museum in Washington.

After that shooting, 43 Jewish organizations issued a joint statement requesting more support from the U.S. government for enhanced security measures. Specifically, they asked Congress to increase funding to the Nonprofit Security Grant Program to $1 billion.

“Every Jewish organization has been serious about security for years. We have to be,” said Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism. “The grants are to harden the buildings, for things like cameras and glass, and some kind of blockage so they can’t drive a truck into the building.”

Vickie Gottlieb, left, of Greeley, Colo., joins her husband, Troy, in a prayer for victims of an attack outside of the Boulder County, Colo., courthouse Monday, June 2, 2025, in Boulder, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

“These are the everyday realities of Jewish life in the 21st century in America. It’s a sad reality, but it is an essential responsibility of leadership to make sure that people are first and foremost safe.”

Shira Hutt, executive vice president at The Jewish Federations of North America, said existing federal funds were inadequate, with only 43% of last year’s applicants to the grant program receiving funding.

Citing the attack in Boulder, she said increased funding for local law enforcement is also crucial.

“Thankfully, the attack was stopped before even further damage could have been done,” she said. “This is really now a full-blown crisis, and we need to make sure that we have all the support necessary.”

One of the Jewish Federation’s state-based affiliates, JEWISHcolorado, on Tuesday launched an emergency fund to raise $160,000 in support of the Boulder community. Its goals include enhancing safety and security measures for Jewish institutions and events.

Strengthening alliances and pushing for results

Leaders of Jewish Federation Los Angeles urged government, business and philanthropic groups to “supercharge an alliance so we can build mutual understanding, dispel conspiracy theories, and provide rapid response when any group is under threat.”

“Jews here in Los Angeles are terrified but determined,” said the federation’s president, Rabbi Noah Farkas. “We do not need more community meetings, we need results and we are counting on our local government and our law enforcement partners to do more.”

The security costs at 63 Jewish day schools have risen on average 84% since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct, 7, 2023, according to the Teach Coalition, the education advocacy arm of the Orthodox Union, an umbrella group for Orthodox Judaism.

The coalition is advocating for more state and federal security funding for Jewish schools and camps, as well as synagogues.

The attacks in Washington and Boulder only heighten the urgency, said its national director Sydney Altfield.

“Some people see this as an isolated instance, whether it is in Colorado, whether it’s in D.C.,” she said. “But we have to step up and realize that it could happen anywhere. … It is so important that our most vulnerable, our children, are secure to the highest extent.”

In Florida, Rabbi Jason Rosenberg of Congregation Beth Am said members of the Reform synagogue in the Tampa Bay area “are feeling very nervous right now and having some additional security might make people a little bit more comfortable.”

He said that “there’s a definite sense that these attacks are not isolated events, that these attacks are, in part, the result of a lot of the antisemitic rhetoric that we’ve been hearing in society for years now.”

However, he said part of his message as a faith leader in such a climate has been to encourage resilience.

“We can’t let this define us. … We can’t stop doing what we do; we can’t stop coming to synagogue; we can’t stop having our activities,” he said. “Our job is to add holiness to our lives and to the world, and we can’t let this stop us from focusing on sacred work.”

Security concerns inside and outside

Jacobs, the Reform Judaism leader, said the latest attacks in Washington and Boulder signaled that new security strategies were needed.

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“Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim were murdered outside of the event at the D.C. Jewish Museum,” he said.

“And that presented a whole additional sort of challenges for law enforcement and for each of our institutions doing security, which is: you can’t just worry about who comes in; you actually have to worry about who’s lurking outside, and so, that is part now of our protocols.”

The attack in Boulder, he said, took place during a “peaceful protest” where demonstrators were calling for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza.

“We have to worry about what happens inside our institutions. … We also have to be thinking and working with law enforcement about what happens outside.”

Jacobs recalled that when a Christian leader recently visited a Reform synagogue, he was “stunned by the security protocols,” which included procedures that Jacobs likened to passengers passing through airport security.

“I said, ‘Well, what do you do in your churches?’ and he said, ‘Well, we like to be welcoming.’ And I said: ‘We don’t have that luxury. We want to make sure our people feel safe, otherwise people will stop coming.’”

Associated Press reporter Tiffany Stanley contributed to this report.

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

by CATHERINE GASCHKA, SAM McNEIL and PAUL WISEMAN, Associated Press

PARIS (AP) — Europe and the United States are meeting in Paris to negotiate a settlement of a tense tariff spat with global economic ramifications between two global economic powerhouses.

The European Union’s top trade negotiator, Maroš Šefčovič, met Wednesday with his American counterpart, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, on the sidelines of a meeting of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

“We’re advancing in the right direction at pace,” Šefčovič said at a news conference. He said ongoing technical meetings between EU and U.S. negotiators in Washington would be soon followed by a video conference between himself and Greer to then “assess the progress and charter the way forward.”

European Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maros Sefcovic arrives for a meeting of EU trade ministers at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

Brussels and Washington are unlikely to reach a substantive trade agreement in Paris. The issues dividing them are too difficult to resolve quickly.

President Donald Trump regularly fumes about America’s persistent trade deficit with the European Union, which was a record $161 billion last year, according to the U.S. Commerce Department.

Trump blames the gap between what the U.S. sells and what it buys from Europe on unfair trade practices and often singles out for criticism the EU’s 10% tax on imported cars. America’s was 2.5% until Trump raised it to 25% in April. The EU has argued its purchases of U.S. services, especially in the technology sector, all but overcome the deficit.

After the Trump administration’s surprise tariffs last week on steel rattled global markets and complicated the ongoing, wider tariff negotiations between Brussels and Washington, the EU on Monday said it is preparing “countermeasures” against the U.S.

The EU has offered the U.S. a “zero for zero” deal in which both sides end tariffs on industrial goods, including autos. Trump has rejected that idea, but EU officials say it’s still on the table.

The EU could buy more liquefied natural gas and defense items from the U.S., and lower duties on cars, but it isn’t likely to budge on calls to scrap the value added tax, which is akin to a sales tax, or open up the EU to American beef.

“We still have a few weeks to have this discussion and negotiation,” French Trade Minister Laurent Saint-Martin said in Paris on Wednesday ahead of the OECD meeting. “If the discussion and negotiation do not succeed, Europe is capable of having countermeasures on American products and services as well.”

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Greta Peisch, who was general counsel for the U.S. trade representative in the Biden administration, said the zero-for-zero proposal could provide a way to make progress if the Trump administration “is looking for a reason not to impose tariffs on the EU.’’

But Peisch, now a partner at the Wiley Rein law firm, wondered: “How motivated is the U.S. to come to a deal with the EU?’’ Trump, after all, has longstanding grievances and complaints about EU trade practices.

One target of his ire is the value-added tax, similar to U.S. state sales taxes.

Trump and his advisers consider VATs unfair protectionism because they are levied on U.S. products. But VATs are set at a national level, not by the EU, and apply to domestic and imported products alike, so they have not traditionally been considered a trade barrier. There is little chance governments will overhaul their tax systems to appease Trump.

Likewise, the Europeans are likely to balk at U.S. demands to scrap food and safety regulations that Washington views as trade barriers. These include bans on hormone-raised beef, chlorinated chicken and genetically modified foods.

“When you start talking about chickens or GMOs or automobile safety standards, you’re talking about the ways countries choose to regulate their economies,” Peisch said. “We think that’s protectionist. They think it’s keeping their citizens healthy … It’s been a sore point for 60 years.’’

McNeil reported from Barcelona and Wiseman reported from Washington, D.C.

Former President Joe Biden’s metastatic cancer diagnosis brings together two controversial issues: PSA testing for prostate cancer and presidential politics.

To understand what is at stake Americans need basic information about PSA testing, and a frank discussion of the reasoning behind the prostate cancer screening decisions in the former president’s case. The dribble of information we’ve gotten only creates more uncomfortable questions for Biden and his family. The absence of adequate explanation also fails to contribute to public appreciation of these important medical issues.

The prostate, a walnut-shaped gland at the base of the bladder, produces “prostate specific antigen,” or PSA. Chemically classed as a glycoprotein, a sugar/protein aggregate, it leaks from the prostate into the blood, where its level can be measured with routine blood testing.

As men age, the prostate enlarges, increasing PSA levels. Screening tests take advantage of the fact that prostate cancer usually leaks more PSA than normal prostate tissue. And in the case of prostate cancer, the PSA typically rises relatively fast.

Beyond these basic facts, the PSA story becomes hazy. Although an elevated PSA may signal cancer, most men with an elevated PSA have benign prostate enlargement, not prostate cancer. Worse yet for screening, many men with prostate cancer have a mild and slow-moving disease that requires no treatment. They coexist with their disease rather than dying of it. This fact leads to the old adage that prostate cancer is the disease of long-lived popes and Supreme Court justices.

Medical advisory panels view PSA screening with skepticism partly due to the challenges of distinguishing benign PSA elevations from those related to cancer. Confirming a suspected cancer diagnosis requires prostate biopsies that can be painful and can produce side effects. Additionally, once a diagnosis is made, patients who might have coexisted with their disease may needlessly be subject to the harms of treatment, such as radiation and surgery. Finally, the benefits of early treatment of prostate cancer have been difficult to prove in clinical studies.

For all these reasons medical advisory panels have discouraged widespread testing or recommend a nuanced approach with careful discussion of risk and benefits between patients and their physicians.

Despite these concerns, the pendulum has swung toward more PSA testing in recent years. One reason is that improvements in radiographic imaging, such as MRI, allow for “active surveillance” that can track early lesions for signs of spread, allowing doctors to distinguish between relatively benign cases of prostate cancer and those likely to progress. Interventions can then be directed more specifically to those at high risk.

In my medical practice, I have generally been an advocate for prostate cancer screening despite the controversy surrounding the clinical benefits. My experience leads me to believe that early diagnosis improves prognosis. But even without improved medical outcomes, patients and their families still benefit from early diagnosis for the purposes of planning. No one wants to be sideswiped by a late-stage symptomatic disease that limits both clinical and life choices.

In Biden’s case, after some initial delay a spokesperson revealed on May 20 that there had been no PSA testing since 2014, during Biden’s vice presidency. The reasons were not revealed.

Such a decision might have been justified based on questions about the benefits and risks of PSA testing. However, given the importance of the health of a vice president and potential future president one might have expected doctors to err on the side of more information. The omission invites speculation that the political implications of a borderline or increasing PSA might have played a decisive role. More information regarding his last PSA and the basis for the decision not to continue screening might put such speculation to rest.

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In the past, the public has gained insight into important medical conditions from the unfortunate maladies affecting the first families. Colon cancer screening received increased attention after President Reagan’s diagnosis in 1985. Betty Ford’s public disclosure of her struggles with alcoholism and prescription drug dependency helped de-stigmatize treatment for substance use disorders.

Biden’s illness also offers an opportunity. Consider that prostate cancer poses the greatest cancer mortality risk faced by non-smoking American men. Transparency in dealing with the former president’s condition would serve the public interest by increasing awareness and understanding of the important, nuanced care decisions faced by so many men.

Daniel J. Stone is an internist and geriatrician in Beverly Hills. He wrote this column for the Los Angeles Times.

American universities have long feared that the Chinese government will restrict its country’s students from attending institutions that cross Beijing’s sensitive political lines.

Universities still fear that consequence today, but the most immediate threat is no longer posed by the Chinese government. Now, as the latest punishment meted out to the Trump administration’s preeminent academic scapegoat shows, it’s our own government posing the threat.

In a May 22 letter, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced she revoked Harvard University’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, meaning the university’s thousands of international students must transfer immediately or lose their legal status. Harvard can no longer enroll future international students either.

Noem cited Harvard’s failure to hand over international student disciplinary records in response to a prior letter and, disturbingly, the Trump administration’s desire to “root out the evils of anti-Americanism” on campus. Among the most alarming demands in this latest missive was that Harvard supply all video of “any protest activity” by any international student within the last five years.

Harvard immediately sued Noem and her department and other agencies, rightfully calling the revocation “a blatant violation of the First Amendment,” and within hours a judge issued a temporary restraining order against the revocation.

“Let this serve as a warning to all universities and academic institutions across the country,” Noem wrote on X about the punishment. And on Tuesday, the administration halted interviews for all new student visas.

This is not how a free country treats its schools — or the international visitors who attend them.

Noem’s warning will, no doubt, be heard loud and clear. That’s because universities — which depend on international students’ tuition dollars — have already had reason to worry that they will lose access to international students for displeasing censorial government officials.

In 2010, Beijing revoked recognition of the University of Calgary’s accreditation in China, meaning Chinese students at the Canadian school suddenly risked paying for a degree worth little at home. The reason? The university’s granting of an honorary degree to the Dalai Lama the year before. “We have offended our Chinese partners by the very fact of bringing in the Dalai Lama, and we have work to resolve that issue,” a spokesperson said.

Beijing restored recognition over a year later, but many Chinese students had already left. Damage done.

Similarly, when UC San Diego hosted the Dalai Lama as commencement speaker in 2017, punishment followed. The China Scholarship Council suspended funding for academics intending to study at UCSD, and an article in the state media outlet Global Times recommended that Chinese authorities “not recognize diplomas or degree certificates issued by the university.”

This kind of direct punishment doesn’t happen very frequently. But the threat always exists, and it creates fear that administrators take into account when deciding how their universities operate.

American universities now must fear that they will suffer this penalty too, but at an even greater scale: revocation of access not just to students from China, but all international students. That’s a huge potential loss. At Harvard, for example, international students make up a whopping 27% of total enrollment.

Whether they publicly acknowledge it or not, university leaders probably are considering whether they need to adjust their behavior to avoid seeing international student tuition funds dry up.

Will our colleges and universities increase censorship and surveillance of international students? Avoid inviting commencement speakers disfavored by the Trump administration? Pressure academic departments against hiring any professors whose social media comments or areas of research will catch the eye of mercurial government officials?

And, equally disturbing, will they be willing to admit that they are now making these calculations at all? Unlike direct punishments by the Trump administration or Beijing, this chilling effect is likely to be largely invisible.

Harvard might be able to survive without international students’ tuition. But a vast number of other universities could not. The nation as a whole would feel their loss too: In the 2023-24 academic year, international students contributed a record-breaking $43.8 billion to the American economy.

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And these students — who have uprooted their lives for the promise of what American education offers — are the ones who will suffer the most, as they experience weeks or months of panic and upheaval while being used as pawns in this campaign to punish higher ed.

If the Trump administration is seeking to root out “anti-Americanism,” it can begin by surveying its own behavior in recent months. Freedom of expression is one of our country’s most cherished values. Censorship, surveillance and punishment of government critics do not belong here.

Sarah McLaughlin is senior scholar on global expression at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression and author of the forthcoming book “Authoritarians in the Academy: How the Internationalization of Higher Education and Borderless Censorship Threaten Free Speech.” She wrote this column for the Los Angeles Times.