09/15 Links: The Falsehoods and Culpable Demonisation Office; Deradicalizing Gaza; How Hamas Uses Brutality to Maintain Power ~ Elder Of Ziyon

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From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The Falsehoods and Culpable Demonisation Office

The Foreign Secretary, David Lammy, intoned: “Israel’s actions in Gaza continue to lead to immense loss of civilian life, widespread destruction to civilian infrastructure, and immense suffering”.

An American diplomatic official complained to The Times about the “relentlessness and ferocity” of Israel’s war and said it was a “head-scratcher” why Israel thought “this scorched-earth policy” was the best way to fight its enemies.

This was all drivel. If Israel’s war had really been “ferocious” and “scorched- earth”, the population of Gaza would have been decimated. Instead, the IDF has been regularly moving the entire population out of harm’s way — while Hamas has been using those civilians as cannon fodder and human shields.

The only people claiming “immense loss of civilian life” are Hamas, its UN patsies and other fellow-travellers. The number of civilians killed in Gaza according to Hamas statistics is ludicrous, since not one terrorist is acknowledged among the total. Given the number of terrorists whom Israel says it has killed in this war, the ratio of civilians to combatants killed in Gaza is unprecedentedly low and a fraction of the proportion of civilians killed in British and American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Of course, this hallucinatory anti-Israel derangement is now widespread. But how does one explain its grip amongst officials in government departments that actually deal daily with foreign affairs?

The British foreign service has a history of vicious opposition to the Jewish homeland, going back to the Palestine Mandate in the 1920s. Foreign Office diplomats were entranced by an entirely romantic view of the Arab world combined with an entirely cynical estimation of its value to British interests.

This older “camel corps” has been superseded by a new breed of Israel-hating officials, the “progressive” leftists who subscribe to the brain-dead myth that Israel is a colonialist interloper that has oppressed the “indigenous” Palestinians and deprived them of a state of their own.

Precisely because they specialise in world affairs, western diplomats are the supreme worshippers at the shrine of universalism, the doctrine that fetishises transnational courts where international law has been turned into a weapon of Israel’s destruction.

In addition, the one-time intellectual powerhouse of the Foreign Office has become dismayingly dumbed down. In the London Review of Books in 2016, a despairing letter from a former Foreign Office official lamented that, from 2007 onwards, it had become a “hollowed-out shell”, with “a cult of managerialism that seemed to regard foreign policy as an inconvenient side-issue” — and was now known to the general public only for its travel advice.

It was bad enough under the (mostly) Israel-friendly Conservatives. Now that Israel-bashing Labour is in the government stables, Foreign Office bigotry is free to gallop out of control.

BHL: “I Cannot Let People Say that Israel Is Targeting Civilians, because That Is Wrong”

Bernard-Henri Levy interviewed by Celia Walden
French philosopher, war reporter and documentary-maker Bernard-Henri Levy described the scene at what was left of Kibbutz Kfar Aza in Israel on Oct. 10. “The bodies of the victims had been buried by that point, but there were still pieces of bodies that hadn’t been assigned yet. They were stacked in a corner of a vegetable shed that was being used to house unidentified body parts. And that image? There is not a day or a night when I do not see it in my head. It follows me around constantly.”

We’re speaking on Zoom. For the past year, he has been living in an undisclosed location under very heavy police protection, after intelligence officials discovered that the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had paid an Iranian drug dealer $150,000 to assassinate Levy, who has been critical of the country’s leadership.

He says that after Oct. 7, “there’s a realization not just that things will never be the same again, but that things were not what we thought they were before….Hours after the attack, there were…actual, veritable explosions of joy. Professors at U.S. universities with huge online followings recorded and broadcast messages of absolute joy. This, when the bodies of the dead had not even all been buried.” He points out that even many of those who did offer early support began to fall away within the ensuing weeks and months.

Asked if he still believes Israel’s response has been just, he doesn’t have to think about it for a second: “Yes. I still don’t think the response has been disproportionate.” When filming the liberation of Mosul in 2016, he says, “I saw what indiscriminate hits looked like, what the desire to destroy a place from top to toe looks like, and let me tell you: that is not what is happening in Gaza.”

He also stands by the assertion that Israel “has done everything to avoid civilian casualties….I’ve been covering wars for 40 years, and it’s the first time in my life that I’ve ever seen an army open up a corridor every day between 6 a.m. and noon in order to warn civilians that they are going to hit an area where they are. The Israeli army is the first army in the world that I have seen say: ‘We’re going to hit here – please move’.”

“I cannot let people say that the hits are indiscriminate and targeting civilians, because that is wrong. And I cannot allow it to be said that there has been a genocide, because that is wrong.”

Deradicalizing Gaza

After World War II, there was no postwar insurgency. After the Nazis and imperial Japanese surrendered, groups of disaffected soldiers did not lead violent campaigns to restore the defeated regimes. The occupations of Germany and Japan were peaceful. Both countries became reliable American allies. Hundreds of thousands of the defeated regimes’ supporters – including senior officials, including war criminals – escaped serious punishment, rejoined society, and sometimes gained political influence. And still the peace was kept. How did the populations that had supported and fought for the Axis regimes get moderated?

Politically speaking, ideas can certainly be destroyed, just as they can be weakened, or die peacefully, or be resurrected. Imperialism was destroyed in Japan. Baathism was destroyed in Iraq. Communism died (without war) in Russia. Nazism was destroyed in Germany. Hamas’s bellicose Islamism might be destroyed in Gaza, not necessarily because Gazans stop believing, deep down, that Hamas has noble ideals. Rather, because Hamas’s ideals are deprived of the instruments of political power – armed militants.

Military losses and urban destruction can improve political cultures. Populations can abandon the aims that motivated them very recently to support aggressive wars and the regimes that start them. Deradicalization begins as civilians are persuaded of the futility and costliness of the aims of those who rule them. The German and Japanese peoples lost their homes, their streets, and their comfort, brought on by their regimes’ failed wars. Military defeats showed the Axis projects to be futile. In great measure, the German and Japanese peoples were deradicalized by the war itself.

Since Oct. 7, Israel has undertaken a war of Palestinian regime change and is doing a remarkable job given its political constraints. Hamas’s Gaza leadership is hiding or dead. The majority of Hamas battalions have disintegrated into gangs. More than 17,000 fighters have been killed. Israel’s current campaign makes a moderate Gaza more likely, not less. Destroying Hamas not only deprives Islamists of the ability to rule – it proves the futility of armed resistance to Israel, a condition for peace.

A noteworthy obstacle to moderate Palestinian governance is the lack of much precedent for it. For a hundred years, Palestinians have been led either by out-and-out Islamists like Hajj Amin al-Husseini – a wartime guest of the Third Reich – and like Hamas, or by better-marketed militants like Palestinian Authority chiefs Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas. Palestinian leaders have shared certain broad commitments: to brutalizing their domestic opponents and to terrorizing Jews.

A long-term Israeli military presence will be needed to protect non-Hamas Palestinian leaders after main hostilities calm down. The Palestinians are now suffering as never before for their leaders’ viciousness. The leaders themselves are in dire condition, with more killed every week. The Hamas movement looks like a losing, destructive, and pathetic cause. Palestinians know it, more or more each day.

Peace Requires Genuine Partners

Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is again negotiating with the Palestinians. His partner is former PA foreign minister Nasser al-Kidwa, Arafat’s nephew, who, in 2004, launched the campaign against Israel in the International Court of Justice for building the security fence as a means of tackling terrorism.

The plan is similar to the one drawn up between Abbas and Olmert in 2008, with 4% of the total territory of the West Bank annexed by Israel, with Israeli territory being swapped in its place, including a corridor linking Gaza and the West Bank. Having a Palestinian corridor cutting across Israel will not improve its security.

The plans for Jerusalem would make all Arab neighborhoods that were not part of Israel before 1967 part of Palestinian Jerusalem. The plan also calls for the involvement of five countries in control of the redivided Israeli capital. The idea is to push Israelis tired of the war, and the West enmeshed in its own socio-economic and political problems, to agree to something – anything – that would theoretically make the century-old problem disappear.

The Knesset in July passed a declaration – supported by members of the opposition – against establishing a Palestinian state, saying it would present an existential threat to Israel and, if created now, would be perceived as rewarding terrorism and would strengthen Hamas, encouraging further massacres like Oct. 7 and furthering Islamist jihadist control in the Middle East.

The Middle East doesn’t need another “peace process.” It needs peace. And that requires genuine partners, not people who continue to incite, pray for, and pay for the destruction of the sovereign Jewish state.

Caroline Glick: As Oslo turns 31, the left must abandon its hatred

Sure, Israelis want peace. But they don’t think they are the reason peace has eluded the Jewish state and people. They refuse to blame themselves for the aggression and hatred directed against their people and country.

The problem with politics of hate is that hate is a hard habit to break. If you have been conditioned to believe that your future is dependent on defeating the object of your hate, the only way your opinion is likely to change is if you stop hating. Since 1993, the PLO proved over and over that it is Israel’s enemy, not its peace partner. But accepting the truth meant accepting that the left had brought disaster on the country, and the objects of its hatred—the Jews who refused to renounce any aspect of their identity—had been right all along.

In other words, accepting failure required them to either redefine their class identity or abandon it. The left opted to reinvent itself. It embraced the concept of “Start-Up Nation” as a way to secure its economic and cultural power while maintaining its detachment from the rest of society. By seizing control over the new elixir of high-tech, the left joined the global elite, with its capitals in Davos and Silicon Valley.

But you have to pay to enter the realm of the new globalist elite. The overlords aspire to a post-nationalist, internationalist form of governance. Their ideological roots are not American capitalism. Rather, schooled in elite universities drenched in Soviet-rooted anti-Westernism, the leaders of the new global ruling class are post-nationalist and fully on board with the Soviet view that Zionism, the apotheosis of nationalist aspirations, is illegitimate. To join their club, Israel’s tech titans have been required to disavow their allegiance to their “violent settler” and “ultra-Orthodox” countrymen.

In other words, even when they tried to walk away from the PLO elixir that brought about the disaster of the Palestinian terror state in Israel’s heartland, they were faced with the same choice.

It worked, more or less, until Oct. 7. On that day, two things happened. First, Palestinian terrorists, with their paragliders, Toyota pick-up trucks, RPGs and sadistic blood lust exploded the myth that technology will free Israel of our need to defend ourselves with the brothers the left desperately hoped to abandon. All the military applications of the Start-Up Nation—the high-tech sensors, signals intelligence, the smart fence, the air force—failed completely on Oct. 7. The only thing that worked that day was the raw heroism and patriotism of the Jews—civilian and security forces who rushed to the south unbidden to save the families and communities being overrun.

The second thing that happened is that the international jet set, the global elite, dropped all distinction between “good” and “bad” Jews. The photos of the hostages from Be’eri and Kfar Azza were torn down with the same hatred that had long been directed toward “violent settlers” or “identifiable Jews” alone. The Jew haters on campuses no longer felt the need to pretend that some Israelis were acceptable.

For the past 11 months, members of the post-Zionist sector have been struggling to get their heads around the shattering of their delusions. Their leaders are trying to double down. But their insistence that the problems lay with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, or the haredim, or messianic settlers, or imbecile yokels who get teary-eyed at songs about Am Yisrael, has fewer and fewer takers. Every protest fizzles after a few days. The thrill is gone. With no “peace” or “Start Up Nation” fig leaves to hide behind, the hatred is all that is left.

Thirty-one years since the left embraced the PLO and hate, it must finally abandon it. Israel’s survival depends on it.

Bassam Tawil: The Only Deal Hamas Wants: Israel’s Surrender

Abandoning the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt would enable Hamas to carry on with its decades-long practice of smuggling weapons into the enclave. It would also allow the new head of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, to escape – along with many of the hostages with whom he is thought to be surrounding himself for protection — through the tunnels into Egypt’s Sinai Desert.

The most recent statement from Hamas makes it clear that the terror group wants Israel to leave the Gaza Strip before any hostages are freed.

According to some reports, Hamas has stated that it is willing to free the hostages in stages. It undoubtedly wants to hold on to as many hostages as possible as an “insurance policy” that Israel will not resume the war against the terror group and that the terrorist group will be able to have a free hand to attack Israel in the future. This implies that a large number of the hostages remain captive in the hands of the terror group for years. It is important to note that for the past 10 years, Hamas has been holding hostage two Israeli civilians who are believed to be still alive, as well as the remains of two IDF soldiers.

Hamas is willing to fight to the last Palestinian. The terror group does not care if tens of thousands of its own people lose their lives as a result of the war it began. Its No. 1 priority is to hold on to power after the war. Hamas is evidently hoping that a ceasefire-hostage deal will help it achieve its goal of retaining control over the Gaza Strip.

If the Biden-Harris administration wants to understand the real intentions and aims of Hamas, it just needs to look at what the terror group is saying in Arabic. Hamas and its allies are saying in Arabic that the only deal they would accept is one that results in Israel raising a white flag.

If Hamas is permitted to win the war, Iran and its other terror proxies, such as Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Houthis, will gain confidence and feel more empowered. In addition, this will convey to Muslim Jihadis worldwide that Israel and the West are too weak to protect their people and values against Islamist terror organizations. This weakness will lead to more terrorism not only against Israel, but also the US and most Western nations.

Instead of applying pressure on Israel to end the war, the Biden-Harris administration needs to demand firmly that the Hamas murderers and rapists totally surrender, disarm, cede control over the Gaza Strip, and release all the hostages unconditionally.

All this needs urgently needs to take place before Iran breaks out its nuclear weapons and sets about attacking its oil-rich neighbors, such as the UAE and Saudi Arabia, again.

Israel and the Coming Long War

From the outset, “the Gaza war” was a misnomer. In some ways, this wider regional war is already at hand. Ever since Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, Israel has faced not one but numerous antagonists in what is already one of the longest wars since its founding. The day after Hamas’s assault from Gaza, Hizbullah began attacking Israel from Lebanon. Shortly thereafter, the Houthis in Yemen also joined in.

Meanwhile, Shiite militias in Iraq, and sometimes Syria, have also menaced Israel with drones and rockets. And in mid-April, Iran launched 350 ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones at Israel, creating a new precedent for direct and open combat between the two countries. At the same time, Iran has been flooding the West Bank with funds and weapons to encourage terrorist attacks against Israel.

Just as it took several wars and many decades for Israel to vanquish the threat of Arab coalitions, victory over the Iranian axis will require a prolonged struggle. The current war must be seen in relation to Iran’s larger, long-term project to bleed out and destroy Israel.

Sooner or later, Israel will have to address the Hizbullah threat in Lebanon. Optimally, it would do this by means of a carefully planned, preventive attack at a time of its choosing. If it becomes clear that Hizbullah is preparing for a major attack on Israel, it would be wise for Israel to consider another preemptive strike, but this time with much stronger signaling, including lethal force against a broader range of targets.

To truly end the threat posed by the Houthis to international interests will require a collective approach that addresses the supply chain that is funneling Iranian support and weapons technology to the Houthis and by weakening the Houthis’ power in Yemen by reinforcing their competitors.

Situation in North can’t continue, Netanyahu says ahead of Hochstein visit

The cross-border violence between the IDF and Hezbollah in the North of the country “cannot continue,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said ahead of a meeting with US special envoy Amos Hochstein on Monday.

What is needed, Netanyahu said at the weekly government meeting, is “a change in the balance of forces on our northern border.” He also pledged to restore safety to that area so that the more than 60,000 residents of the border communities evacuated in October can return home.

“I am attentive to the residents of the North. I speak with them and with the heads of local authorities in the North. I see their distress. I hear their anguish,” he said.

“I am committed to this. The government is committed to this and we will not suffice with less than this,” he stated.

Hochstein, who is also expected to meet with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, is pushing to find a diplomatic solution to the contained IDF-Hezbollah war to prevent it from breaking out into a more wide-scale conflict.

Gallant has argued that Netanyahu has to prioritize the North over the South, making it the primary focal point of the IDF’s efforts rather than the South.
Prioritized fronts and potential new borders proposed

Netanyahu, however, has continued to invest in the southern front with Hamas as the main military objective.

Hochstein, according to KAN, is expected to propose a slight redrawing of the map along the border between Israel and Lebanon.

It had also been hoped that a Gaza hostage deal would open the door to a diplomatic resolution along Israel’s northern border, but no such agreement has been forthcoming.

Hezbollah increased its attacks against Israel on October 8, in support of Hamas’s October 7 invasion of Israel.

Ruthie Blum: Hochstein and Hezbollah

Public sentiment has come to alternate between “We’ll believe it when we see it” and “Don’t talk: shoot already.”

“I visited the north,” Netanyahu continued. “I am attentive to the residents of the north. I am talking to them and with local authorities in the north. I see the distress. I hear the cries. The current situation will not continue. It requires a change in the balance of power at our northern border. We will do whatever is necessary to safely return our residents to their homes. I am committed to this. The government is committed to this. And we will not settle for less.”

This will be achieved, he said, “thanks to the bravery of our fighters and from the unity within us, as a united people rising against our enemies to ensure our future.”

One encouraging sign was the report in the Lebanese media that the Israeli Air Force dropped leaflets over Wazani, near the border, urging villagers to evacuate the area by 4 p.m., because “Hezbollah is firing from your area.” Though the IDF subsequently stated that the fliers hadn’t been approved by the top brass—but were the initiative of Battalion 769—the move would suggest that Israel really is gearing up for the very conflict that Hochstein fears, certainly before the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election.

Indeed, if there’s one thing that Vice President (and Democratic candidate) Kamala Harris doesn’t want before voters go to the polls in seven weeks, it’s another full-fledged war against an Iranian proxy bent on Israel’s destruction—particularly on the fourth anniversary of the Abraham Accords, historic peace treaties between Israel and its anti-Islamic Republic Arab neighbors, brokered by Biden’s predecessor and possible successor.

Whether the uptick in rocket-and-drone fire from every direction will cause Hochstein to stay home remains to be seen. Even he ought to realize that his shuttling is an exercise in futility, since whatever he has to say about “de-escalation” can be conveyed over the phone.

NYTs: How Hamas Uses Brutality to Maintain Power

The bodies of six Israeli hostages recovered last month provided a visceral reminder of Hamas’s brutality. Each had been shot in the head. But Hamas also uses violence to maintain its control over Gaza’s population. In July, Amin Abed, a Palestinian activist who has spoken out publicly about Hamas, was attacked by Hamas security operatives, who covered his head and dragged him away before repeatedly striking him with hammers and metal bars. In a phone interview from his hospital bed, referring to Hamas, he said, “They almost killed me, those killers and criminals.”

In September, the Palestinian Journalists’ Syndicate blasted the “policy of intimidation and threat” facing some journalists in Gaza after a group of gunmen stormed the home of Ehab Fasfous, a reporter and social media activist. Fasfous, a well-known critic of Hamas, has long been targeted by the group’s general security service, a secret police force in Gaza that has conducted surveillance on everyday Palestinians.

On Wednesday, Abed left Gaza, one of dozens of wounded and ill people whom Israel permitted to travel to the UAE for treatment. “I feel safe for the first time in 17 years,” he said from his hospital bed in Abu Dhabi. “There’s no one that wants to kill, arrest or follow me.”

From ally to Hamas apologist: Australia has lost its moral compass

Aside from a few statements condemning antisemitism by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, the Labour government has remained largely silent, seemingly seeking to appease the Muslim community, which holds significant influence in some electorates and is threatening to field candidates to stand for election to Parliament on the single issue of Gaza.

The government, largely through its foreign minister, Penny Wong, has reinstated funding for UNWRA despite its history of employing and supporting Hamas terrorists. Wong has also been quick to criticize Israel for incidents reported by Hamas sources, often without retracting her statements when the facts later emerge.

Wong has consistently called for a cease-fire and Israeli restraint, which critics argue would allow Hamas to remain in control of Gaza. Most concerning was Australia’s recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations, signaling the Labour Party’s shift away from supporting Israel, likely to appease the Muslim vote.

What has horrified me the most and demonstrated the Australian government’s disregard for the safety and well-being of the Jewish community and the fabric of tolerance in society was its decision to allow 3,000 Gazan refugees to migrate to Australia without the usual strict checks to ensure they are not connected to Hamas or pose a security risk.

Several weeks ago, the head of the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), Mike Burgess, stated that immigrants who express rhetorical support for Hamas should not be excluded unless they support violence. This elicited incredulous responses from the opposition Liberal Party and much of the mainstream media. The government responded by labeling critics of this decision as racists.

After being pilloried for his comments, the head of ASIO issued a retraction this week, clarifying that those who support Hamas are not acceptable.

Meanwhile, the government has maintained its position and has already allowed 750 Gazans to enter on tourist visas, knowing they will never leave.

The fact that no Arab country has accepted Gaza refugees and only a few other nations have, has exposed the Australian government’s lack of responsibility and accountability. While no one is advocating for a blanket refusal of Gaza refugees, proper and extensive screening has historically been conducted for refugees entering Australia.

As a further slap in the face for the Jewish community, it has been revealed that members of the fanatical Islamist movement Hizb ut-Tahrir, which advocates for a global Muslim caliphate, have participated in demonstrations and have been active on some university campuses. Despite being banned in the UK and Germany, calls to ban the group in Australia have gone unanswered by the government.

Following the execution of six hostages last Saturday, the Australian government stated on X that “every innocent life matters.” This mealy-mouthed response seemed to draw a moral equivalence between the barbarism of Hamas and the unintended deaths of innocent Gazans, who died after being used as human shields by Hamas. For me, this epitomized a deeper issue—the Australia that I loved and cherished has lost its moral compass.

Do Donald Trump and Kamala Harris identify as ‘Zionist’? Here’s what their campaigns told us.

For decades, President Joe Biden has called himself a “Zionist.” But in the waning days of his reelection campaign, he wondered aloud if anyone knew what the term means anymore.

Speedy Morman, a podcaster, had asked Biden in a July 12 whether he was a Zionist. Biden answered that yes, he was.

“Now, you’ll be able to make a lot out of that because people don’t know what a Zionist is,” Biden said.

Nine days later, Biden dropped out of the presidential race — and he may have been onto something in the interview with Morman, one of the last of his campaign. Neither of the people running to replace him — both avowed supporters of Israel — will say they are a Zionist.

Asked by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency if Vice President Kamala Harris considers herself a Zionist, a campaign aide replied:

“The Vice President and Governor (Tim) Walz have been strong and longstanding supporters of Israel as a secure, democratic homeland for the Jewish people. They will always ensure Israel can defend itself from threats, including from Iran and Iran-backed terrorists such as Hamas and Hezbollah.”

Told that the first sentence of that response would meet perhaps the most common definition of “Zionist,” the aide replied that beyond the statement she relayed, she had “nothing for you.”

Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s spokeswoman, also returned a lengthy reply without the Z-word:

“President Trump did more for Israel than any American President in history,” she said, and proceeded to enumerate Trump’s record on Israel as president, from brokering normalization deals between Israel and several of its neighbors to moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem and withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal.

“All of the progress made by President Trump in the region has been unraveled by Kamala Harris’s weakness and America Last policies,” Leavitt continued. “When President Trump is back in the Oval Office, Israel will once again be protected, Iran will go back to being broke, terrorists will be hunted down, and the bloodshed will end.”

Celebrating the 4th anniversary of the Abraham Accords
The Hamas invasion of Israel on October 7 was the product of an Islamist extremist ideology of hate and destruction, the same ideology that gave us the September 11, 2001, attacks. In both cases, terrorism on a vast scale triggered wars that continue to shake the international order. The extremist project aimed at radicalizing the region’s youth threatens peace and stability across the world.

The Abraham Accords represent the antithesis to this fanatical nihilism, an antithesis in which Israel is an accepted part of a Middle East. This is the vision in which Jews, Muslims, and Christians all contribute constructively to the phenomenal economic growth of a region that represents the world’s highest concentration of capital, energy, and transportation connections. Linking in India, as outlined in the India-Middle East Economic Corridor (IMEC) initiative, offers the further possibility of transportation, energy, shipping, and railroad connectivity stretching from India to the UAE and Saudi Arabia, on through Jordan and Israel, and finally Europe, to create a thriving commercial and logistical network that will benefit millions of people.

The Iranian regime’s obsessive pursuit of Israel’s destruction is a threat to the achievement of this hopeful vision. In the past 20 years, Iran has steadily developed its network of proxies and clients throughout the region. Its goals are to tighten a “ring of fire” around Israel, to undermine the security and stability of key Arab neighbors, and to raise the pressure on the United States to withdraw from the Middle East. Iran’s pursuit of Israel’s annihilation is not rhetorical excess, as some claim, but a centerpiece of the regime’s ideology. Israel deserves the support and understanding of the international community as it fights to regain the security of its borders and its airspace. An encouraging development, the result of years of effort by the United States Central Command, is a new regional network of early warning, intelligence sharing, and counter-ballistic missile and counter-drone capabilities. This network, including several Arab countries, contributed significantly to the failure of Iran’s launch of a multi-pronged attack of more than 300 missiles and drones against Israel on the night of April 13 and into the early morning hours of April 14. As Iran moves ever closer to becoming a nuclear-armed power, it is essential that we further develop this regional network, while backing Israel’s efforts to push back the Iranian threat.

As we talk about this cooperation and this new vision for the region, we must also speak about Israeli-Palestinian peace. Before October 7, I believed that the Palestinians would gain a lot if they embraced the Abraham Accords and the regional peace and prosperity that they promised. Now, it will take time to rebuild that sense of hope and opportunity that existed one year ago, but with the support of the emerging networks of regional partners, this work must resume once the fighting ends, the hostages are released, and Hamas’s catastrophic reign of terror in Gaza has ended.

Netanyahu to address UN General Assembly

Israel to Respond Against PA If Palestinians Win at UN

Israel is girding for a diplomatic confrontation at the UN as the Palestinian Authority pushes for a General Assembly resolution calling for an international arms embargo and sanctions. Israeli officials say the PA’s moves violate the Oslo Accords and have crafted a series of countermoves, from halting fund transfers to severing security cooperation.

Israeli UN Ambassador Danny Danon blasted the move and urged democratic nations to reject a resolution that he says turns a blind eye to Palestinian terrorism. On Sep. 18, a vote on the Palestinian resolution is widely expected to pass by a comfortable margin.

“The Palestinians are waging diplomatic terror, and the UN is complicit – it’s a new moral low,” Danon told Israel Hayom. “It’s a blatant politicization and misuse of UN resources, dedicating an entire week to Palestinian issues while turning a blind eye to 101 hostages languishing in Gaza without Red Cross access, and hundreds of thousands of Israelis displaced by multi-front Iranian attacks. I urge UN member states to oppose these moves that effectively reward terrorism and the slaughter of innocent civilians.”

UN’s António Guterres only shows that he’s the Secretary-General of the Arab world

IDF: ‘UNRWA not telling full story’ about staffer killed in Samaria

Houthi missile explodes over central Israel

How did a Houthi missile evade Israeli and American hi-tech radar?

PM: Yemen’s Houthis to pay ‘heavy price’ for attacking Israel

Seth Frantzman: Five key challenges for Israel after latest Houthi missile attack

Seth Frantzman: Houthi missile attack on Israel: Iranian axis is not deterred

Houthi missile attack highlights what holds Abraham Accords together despite war

Special IDF Unit Handles Imprisoned Hamas Nukhba Terrorists

Force 100 is the IDF unit responsible for handling unusual incidents involving Hamas’s Nukhba terrorists imprisoned at the Sde Teiman base. The Nukhba led the attack on Israel on Oct. 7. Recently, some of the unit’s soldiers were investigated after a complaint by a Nukhba terrorist. Five other fighters of the unit have provided a rare glimpse into what they do inside the terrorist detention facility.

There are between 100 and 120 terrorists in each of the detention cells. Gideon (alias) said, “People don’t get it. If it wasn’t for us, the Nukhba terrorists would have surely raped soldiers – female and male – at Sde Teiman by now. Or the terrorists altogether would have risen up and hurt them, let alone kidnap and take them hostage for bargaining purposes.” Yossi (alias) said, “It is possible that without us being here, there would have been a mass escape of hundreds of Nukhba terrorists to the area that borders Gaza.”

After Oct. 7, thousands of terrorists were captured in Israel. The Israel Prison Service was not equipped to house the overwhelming number of detainees, so a detention facility was opened at Sde Teiman, as had been done in previous wars with Hamas. The guarding and treatment of terrorists in Sde Teiman falls mainly on Military Police soldiers, who are not trained to deal with dangerous terrorists.

The IDF feared – and rightly so – that extreme scenarios would develop in Sde Teiman, such as a mass escape, an uprising or the kidnapping of soldiers and taking them hostage. That is why it was necessary to establish a special force, trained for such scenarios.

Yossi explained, “We are all fighters coming from special units, we went through tests and sorting, then intensive training for a month.” Gideon said, “When we accept fighters into the unit, we instruct them to use reasonable force according to the regulations and laws, explaining what is allowed and what is not.”

Oren (alias) explains what they find while doing searches of prisoners: “We found steel, screws, pieces that they take apart from the showers, or pieces of thin plastic, which they sharpen to be used as weapons.” Moshe (alias) added: “We also find thin pipes that they make from the wire fence they dismantle, transforming them into weapons, or steel with which they cut their own (zip-tie) handcuffs or create some kind of spikes.”

Gideon said, “We fear that at the moment of truth, the terrorists will take advantage of our weaknesses and slaughter the Military Police officers and everyone who happens to be in the area. And if they have not done it until today, it is only thanks to Force 100 and our deterrence….Everyone there has blood on their hands, they are well-trained terrorists who have undergone grueling training in the terrorist organizations specifically to perform these kinds of missions.”

British expert: Tunnels key to understanding the Hamas war

IDF publicizes probe confirming it mistakenly killed three hostages in Gaza bombing

Israeli wounded in terror stabbing outside Jerusalem’s Old City

Israel’s scorched earth tactics aim to paralyze Hezbollah in Lebanon

Hezbollah fires 40 rockets, drone at northern Israel

BBC to air Nova music festival documentary ahead of one year anniversary of Israel-Hamas war

‘They are in the Holocaust’: Noa Tishby on the experience of Israeli hostages

Israeli author and activist Noa Tishby discusses the horrific conditions Israeli hostages face as they remain held in Gazan tunnels.

“These places are horrific – they are tiny, they are full of humidity, the people that have been there have reported dehydration, suffocation, it’s claustrophobic,” Ms Tishby said.

“I was at an event a few weeks ago and somebody asked me in the audience, where do I think the hostages are and I looked at him and said: I don’t know where they are but I can tell you that right now, they are in the Holocaust.”

THE LAWFARE PROJECT: PROTECTING JEWS IN COURTS

The woke classification of victimhood and oppression has put Jews on the wrong side of the divide, and so put many of them on the defensive. Not Brooke Goldstein, founder and executive director of the Lawfare Project. The project was created in order to fight against Jew hatred in courts, based on a solid civil rights agenda. It is a fight many more should be taking part in. Gadi spoke with Brooke about Qatari money that flows into American universities, campus antisemitism, and the growing risk to Jews of physical violence. Yes, there are things to do in order to fight back.

Man who set himself afire in Boston reportedly was anti-Israel protester

SDUSD Ethnic Studies Worsens Pain of Jewish Community After Hostage Murders

Controversial deal with anti-Israel protesters has big donors deserting University of Windsor

Jordan’s King Abdullah to appoint US-educated technocrat as new PM, sources say

Hamas official says despite war losses, terror group has recruited ‘new generations’

Over 8,000 Iranian-made kamikaze drones were launched by Russia into Ukraine since

Two years after Mahsa Amini protests, Iran restores order but not legitimacy

France: Antisemitic tag at memorial for killed Jewish women

Steady work: Comedy writers poke fun at antisemites on new X account

Jewish singer Matisyahu says ‘antisemitism and morons’ won’t stop him

Gal Gadot: The Jewish people ‘will prevail, (only) by being united’

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!

 

 


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