Monday, October 16, 2023

10/16 Links Pt2: Hamas Uses Western Morality as a Weapon Against Israel; Hamas releases new footage of a hostage; Feminists for Palestine?

From Ian:

Haviv Rettig Gur: What Were the Palestinians Thinking?
The October 7 massacre seemed to many Palestinians as a rational step on the road to liberation rather than, as Israelis judge it, yet another in a long string of self-inflicted disasters for the Palestinian cause. The Palestinian strategy of terrorizing Israeli civilians, going back to 1920, follows the basic theory that the Jews are an artificial, rootless polity removable by sustained violence, so sustained violence must be deployed to remove them. This Palestinian vision of Israelis is taught to Palestinian children as the basic truth of the Palestinian struggle.

For Israelis, if the response of Palestinians to the Oslo peace process in the 1990s was the mass murder of Israeli civilians beginning in 2000 with a wave of 140 suicide bombings in Israeli cities and towns - killing grandmothers and infants in buses and pizzerias - and the response of Palestinians to the current stagnation of the peace process is the mass murder of Israeli civilians, then Israeli policy isn't the cause of Palestinian mass murder of Israeli civilians.

On October 7, for a moment, Israel's guard went down. Hamas was free to live out its intentions. It did so with blazing clarity and purpose. Israelis are now convinced that the massacre, in its enormity and astonishing cruelty, and especially in the joy with which it was carried out, wasn't a Palestinian miscalculation. The goal, as in 2000, was simply the complete removal of the Jews from this land.

With clarity comes closure. Israelis are unified as never before. No peace and no withdrawal will satisfy this impulse or grant Israeli Jews safety from this kind of wild, joyful hatred. And that brutality has now made itself too dangerous to be tolerated. In the Israeli mind, any brutality Hamas can commit it will commit. And so it cannot be allowed to ever commit any act ever again.
Hamas did it because we are Jews
Two days after the 9/11 attacks, French newspaper Le Monde captured the global mood. “In this tragic moment,” the paper wrote, “we are all Americans.” It gave voice to the upwelling of grief and sympathy as the Twin Towers lay smoldering and thousands of Americans lay under rubble.

As I write this piece, Israel is at war. On Saturday, terrorists launched a vicious and unprovoked attack, setting off thousands of rockets, slaughtering hundreds of innocent civilians, and taking dozens hostage. Men, women and children, young and old alike, were massacred on the streets, in their homes, and at a music festival. Their only crime: being Jewish.

And yet, in Israel’s tragic hour, no newspaper dares declare that they are now Israelis. Of course, this is sadly expected. Antisemitism finds its rawest and most sinister power in silence. For far too many around the world, Hamas’s actions were justified, even welcome.

Such is the antipathy toward the Jewish people and the Jewish state; even the most obvious and brutal terrorism can be excused and explained. Our enemies revel in Israel’s pain. The Jewish people must unite

Which is why Jewish people the world over must band together now. The hundreds of teenagers massacred by Hamas at the music festival likely did not support the ruling Likud party’s conservative politics. The scores of Kibbutz Be’eri residents killed in cold blood were not overtly religious. But that made no difference to their murderers. “They shot indiscriminately, abducted whomever they could, burned down people’s homes,” observed one survivor.

Secular or devout, young or old, liberal or conservative, kibbutznik or city dweller, pro-judicial reform or against it – our enemy made no distinctions during the slaughter. And so, neither should we make such distinctions among ourselves. This is a time for all who love the Jewish state to rally behind the banner of our shared identity, a time to put aside our internal squabbles and stare down the evil at our door. We must send a unified message: An attack on the Jewish state is an attack on all Jews. This extends the world over.

In the days following the attack, Americans – Democrats and Republicans alike – were quick to issue condemnations of Hamas. In the weeks to come, as Israel responds with military force to the threat in its midst, those political figures should keep the moral clarity of those statements in mind – particularly when armchair critics chastise Israel’s justified self-defense with the latest chorus of what-about-ism.
Hugh Hewitt: Why Hamas' Methodical Slaughter of Jews Carries a Special Horror
Evil people commit unspeakable crimes against humanity with horrifying regularity. But somehow Hamas' slaughter of Israelis feels different, in its intensity and immediacy, and not just because the terrorists grotesquely exploited social media to document their atrocities. The chilling and methodical depravity that stalked infants and the very old, as well as young people joyfully dancing at a music festival, was profoundly disturbing. An army of mass murders rampaged in search of victims targeted solely because they were Jews. No military objective, no strategic aim.

However much, over the past three-quarters of a century, we have seen crowds chant "Death to Israel" and "Death to America," many of us never imagined the existence of would-be Nazi hordes who, given the chance to kill Jews, would kill and kill and kill, and then celebrate the carnage. We clung to the ideas of deterrence and that the Islamist menace could be contained. We believed that the sort of irrational hatred that fueled Adolf Hitler's legions of killers was a thing of the past - or at least limited and incapable of producing mayhem on the scale that befell Israel.

We cannot allow ourselves the luxury of believing "Never again" actually meant "Never again." Israel will now wage the war it must, to shatter the very idea that the deep evil driving Hamas can be allowed to thrive. The U.S. and the civilized world - which of course includes many Muslim nations - must support this effort.
Alan Dershowitz: Hamas Uses Western Morality as a Weapon Against Israel
Israel has declared northern Gaza a war zone. They have given its civilians the opportunity to move several miles south in order to protect themselves from Israeli bombing of legitimate military targets. In giving civilians sufficient warning to leave, Israel has gone further than other Western nations at war. In World War II, the U.S. did not warn the civilians of Japanese cities (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) that were about to be nuclear targets. Great Britain did not give the civilians of Dresden the opportunity to leave.

Israel is generally held to a higher standard of morality by other governments, the media, and academia. Hamas knows this and exploits it as a weapon of war. When dead children are shown on TV, many viewers fail to distinguish between deliberate targeting of civilians and unintentional collateral deaths. Hamas has named this misuse of morality "the CNN strategy."

Israel must not permit itself to be limited in its preventive military actions by any double standard of morality. It is an all-out war against Hamas-controlled Gaza, and Israel is entitled, by any fair reading of international law, to do to Gaza City what the U.S. did to Berlin and Tokyo in 1945. It has warned civilians to leave. The collateral deaths of Palestinian civilians, caused directly by the Hamas decision to use them as human shields, would be the moral, political, and legal responsibility of Hamas.

Israeli reluctance to violate the double standards imposed on it by friends and foes alike allowed Hamas to re-arm and re-coordinate its military to facilitate the recent horrible massacres. These brutal attacks against Israeli civilians must change all that. Israel should apply its own very high standards of morality in deciding how to balance the collateral deaths of Palestinian civilians against the need to prevent the intended deaths of its own civilians at the hands of Hamas.


Hamas releases new footage of a hostage
Hamas released another video of a hostage on their Telegram channel on Monday. The video appears to show a young woman receiving medical attention from Hamas.

In the video, the girl says she was badly hurt and has been receiving medical treatment.

“Hi, I'm Mia Shem, 21 years old from Shoham. Currently, I'm in Gaza. I returned early Saturday morning from Sderot; I was at a party. I was seriously injured in my hand. I underwent surgery on my hand at the hospital [in Gaza] for 3 hours. They are taking care of me, giving me medicine, everything is fine. I only ask that they bring me home as soon as possible to my parents, to my siblings. Get me out of here as soon as possible. Please.”

Hamas claims to be administering medical attention
On Hamas's Arabic Telegram channel, the video is accompanied by the caption, "Mujahideen from the Al-Qassam Brigades provide medical care to a female prisoner in Gaza, who was captured on the first day of the Al-Aqsa Flood battle."


Eve Barlow: Feminists for Palestine?
See, it seems that Israel has been forgotten by the world’s feminists. And as a result, every woman who sets her heels inside Israel is also forgotten. Instead of having the support of the global women’s movement, we Zionists are instead gas-lit by other feminists who are aghast that we actually managed to escape our gendered dhimmitude. We achieved what so many didn’t. Self-actualization in our indigenous homeland.

Proud and celebrated feminists have spent the past week mocking Jewish people online. Our concerns are overblown, in our heads. We are attempting to victimize ourselves. We’re hysterical, right? We’re kerrrazy. And you know what the world does to crazy-ass bitches… Bring the stakes!

Feminists of the world, listen carefully: Gaza had eighteen years without Israeli presence. The Jewish people were driven out of Gaza in 2005. In those eighteen years, Gaza has failed to create an equal society for women. That has nothing to do with Israel. Gaza had eighteen years to allow all of its women to pursue higher education. The sky-high unemployment rates for women in Gaza don’t demonstrate a particularly girlboss-adjacent terrain. But did the feminists of the world ever voice concern about that? Are they doing it now? They’ve forgotten the basis for their identities to be pawns for Hamas terrorists.

My dear friend Dr Charlotte Proudman, a non-Jewish feminist barrister in the UK who has had her own experiences of trolling for the past decade, has relentlessly and courageously posted about the atrocities committed by Hamas, without any apology this past week. Like the rest of us who have risked our livelihoods to tell the truth about Israel/Palestine for years, Charlotte has been met with screeds of threats and insults by the usual brigade of woke sheep calling into question the very essence of her feminism. The hypocrisy of it all.

Please follow Charlotte and support her wonderful work.

The hard pill for these antizionist feminists to swallow is that Jewish women have fundamentally built feminism. We are the OG liberals, and they’re mad.

Golda Meir. Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Andrea Dworkin. Gertrude Stein. Naomi Klein. Adrienne Rich. Kathy Acker. Emma Lazarus. Susan Sontag. Gloria Steinem. Peaches. Einat Wilf. To name a few.

And lest we forget our Matriarchs: Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah.
Idan Raichel breaks down during interview about friend murdered by Hamas
Musician Idan Raichel was overcome with emotion during a live broadcast as he shared memories of his dear friend, Col. Roi Levy.

In an interview on Channel 12, Raichel recounted how Levy tragically lost his life in recent battles against infiltrators from the Gaza Strip.

Raichel passionately emphasized that if Levy could witness the extraordinary civilian response to helping those who were harmed in southern Israel, it would undoubtedly touch his heart.

Raichel broke down
"You see, this is why we fought for civilian leadership," Raichel imagined his late friend saying. Overwhelmed by grief, Raichel broke down during the interview and tearfully requested to leave the studio.

"We're live. I need to step away," he sorrowfully explained.

The hosts acknowledged Raichel's pain and bid him farewell as he left the studio, his emotions still raw.

Levy's loss deeply affected his family. Levy's wife expressed her profound love for him and her disbelief at the intensity of their bond. Levy's daughters also mourned him, recognizing him as their hero and vowing to uphold his cherished values.
A Developing Humanitarian Issue: Israeli Refugees from Hamas Terror
The recent Hamas massacres have created thousands of Israeli civilian refugees, displaced from their homes, places of work, schools, and communities.

Short-term support issues are being addressed by a wide citizen-based volunteer network.

Many of the refugees are survivors of the deadly attacks on their communities and were under direct threat of death for hours. Many have family members who have been killed or kidnapped by Hamas terrorists.

All of the refugees have experienced many years of aggression from Gaza, including thousands of missile attacks which had a significant psychological effect.

No international body is providing humanitarian assistance to Israel or to the refugees created by the Hamas massacre and threatened Hizbullah action.
More Than a Hot Meal
An unprecedented number of hotels, zimmers, and B&Bs in Israel have mobilized to cover another urgent need: shelter. Since the war’s inception, the media has been flooded with lists of guesthouses and hotels small and large offering to accommodate families for free. At the Brown Bobo hotel in Tel Aviv—the convention center that, until recently, hosted parties and conferences—is currently a “part recreation room, part emergency center,” according to the hotel chain’s spokesperson Shahaf Segal. As many had lost their homes and been forced to evacuate, Brown Bobo has been offering a free stay to groups from danger zones. The hotel is currently hosting at least 70 people, the majority of them from the southern kibbutz of Karmiya.

In close proximity to the less fortunate Netiv ha-Asara and Be’eri, the kibbutzim that were ground zero for the Hamas massacre, the majority of Karmiya’s residents, farther from the Gaza border, were warned by the neighbors and fled early. An organizer on the residents’ behalf had passed a spreadsheet with escape plans—and the hotel in Tel Aviv was one of the places they were told to go. “On Sunday I was the woman speeding down the road in a pink pajama, with three children,” said former Karmiya resident Adva Graziani, who’s currently staying at Brown Bobo.

There, she was welcomed not only with a room, but also a tight schedule packed with activities for adults and children, and services such as shiatsu massages and manicures, all by volunteers. “On one hand, we’re angry and disappointed in the government,” Graziani said, “but on the other hand, here, we’ve been wrapped in understanding and love.”

This duality is, partially, at the core of the initiatives: a shared sentiment of abandonment and an urge to take matters into one’s own hands, to compensate and rebuild. “There’s a distrust in the government and the leadership, an understanding that it’s just us, the civilians, and the army, and we’re in it together,” said Doktor. But on a very basic level, action also heals. When the war began, it was Akerman’s concern for Galily’s mental health, as a shell-shocked, ex-combat soldier, that prompted the joint project. “We’re broken, and it’s good to distract yourself,” said Doktor. “If I hear that someone’s in deep distress, I immediately tell them to come to the restaurant—we’ll find something for you to do!”
John-Paul Pagano: Macroaggression
When I began writing about Antisemitism 20 years ago, I set out to focus on “utopian and totalitarian ideas, mostly as they find expression in Antisemitic reaction to Israel and modernity.” That formulation was the embryo of what will likely be a lifelong inquiry. My original idea was freighted and abstract, but it felt precisely homed to a dark phenomenon cued by the Second Intifada: thought on the contemporary Left was algorithmically hostile to Israel out of all proportion to the policies and actions of the Jewish state.

Nevertheless, the way this thought was expressed at the time was generally respectable. It wasn’t hard to sense what was fermenting under the surface, but by and large, on campus and in politics, anti-Israel rhetoric attempted to marshal facts and arguments, however false or contextually bereft, and to avoid overt use of Antisemitism. There were steady exceptions of course, which kept writers like me lucubrating late at night, but the yeoman’s work of manufacturing hatred of Israel was done in polemics that would rely on sophisticated methods, like shell games of sympathy played through “root cause” analyses or foolish consistencies which ignored the nature of Palestinian rejectionism.

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I remember, for example, the useful idiots who brayed that Israel and the West needed to honor the democratic will of the people of Gaza, who had voted for Hamas in 2006. After all, didn’t the United States, the occupiers of Iraq, talk a big game about promoting democracy in the Middle East and vaunt Israel as an open society? It was this sort of sophistry, rather than hateful sloganeering, that predominated among partisans of the Palestinians, as well as critics of American foreign policy.

Last week, Hamas burst into southern Israel and murdered some 1300 civilians, mowing down young peace ravers as in a video game, raping women, burning people alive, kidnapping toddlers and the elderly, parading children they had orphaned, and slaughtering babies, some of whom they decapitated in a triumphant quotation of ISIS. This was by far the worst single massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

The next day, 34 Harvard University student organizations released a joint statement declaring:
We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence.

And the gates were opened.


Caroline Glick: As Biden turns against Israel, Netanyahu must stand strong
On Sunday, U.S. President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan all announced that the United States expects Israel to permit “humanitarian aid” into Gaza.

The implications of this position are devastating for Israel. According to reports, there are “hundreds of trucks” lined up on the border in Egypt to enter the Gaza Strip carrying so-called “humanitarian aid.” These trucks, if permitted to enter, will not be inspected in any significant way. There is no reason to believe they are carrying baby formula and foodstuffs that will be delivered to the needy. There is every reason to believe they are carrying war materiel and jihadist fighters who have arrived to augment Hamas.

To the extent that there is food in the trucks, who will it feed? The hostages? The infirm? Who will the medicine be delivered to? The hostages? Will the fuel in the trucks be used in refrigerators to feed the captive Israelis?

Of course not.

Hamas is Gaza. All the “ministries” in Gaza are Hamas. All hospitals are Hamas. Hamas’s military headquarters is located under Shifa Hospital.

So whatever and whoever is in the trucks carrying “humanitarian aid,” all of it will be delivered to Hamas and will be distributed to benefit Hamas.

The idea that it could be otherwise is absurd. And the fact that the Biden administration is arguing this absurdity is an outrage.

Even if the “hundreds of trucks” are completely empty—and they manifestly are not—the trucks themselves are instruments of war. Their presence in Gaza will also advance Hamas’s military effort against Israel. They will augment Hamas’s capacity to kill and wound untold numbers of IDF soldiers now poised at the border waiting for the Netanyahu government to finally order them to enter Gaza.

Biden, Blinken and Sullivan—like their counterparts in Europe and the United Nations—insist that they want to give Hamas the trucks to avert a humanitarian disaster in Gaza. But their position is actually devastating for Gaza’s civilians.

By barring civilians from escaping Gaza to its territory, even for the purpose of transiting to third countries, Egypt is collaborating with Hamas’s war effort. By enabling Egypt to maintain its position, and demanding that Israel allow Hamas to resupply while calling that resupply “humanitarian aid,” the Biden administration is trapping the civilians of Gaza it claims to care about protecting. They will remain under Hamas’s jackboot. They will remain its human shields and cannon fodder.

Similarly, the United States is providing material support for Hamas’s propaganda campaign blaming Israel for the carnage of which Hamas is the sole author—in Israel and Gaza alike.


Ritchie Torres: Rep. Ritchie Torres: Democratic Socialists are ‘indoctrinating’ young Americans with anti-Israel hate in ‘moral monstrosity’
There is nothing accidental about the disregard for Israeli life that revealed itself in the wake of Oct. 7. The dehumanization of Israeli victims follows inevitably from the hyperbolic and systematic demonization of Israel itself.

Anti-Israel hate and hysteria have been allowed to fester freely in academia, social media, the political arena, and elsewhere. It has been propagated by Astroturf activists and academics, amplified by their enablers in elected office, and subsidized by government and civil society.

When people are made to believe the most dangerous lies about Israel — that Israel is the root of all evil on earth; that it is a “75-year occupation” that must be wiped off the map from the “river to the sea”; that Israelis are not civilians but settlers who can be fairly targeted for “resistance”; that Israelis are committing genocide and ethnic cleansing against the Palestinians and harvesting their organs and using the blood of their children; that Israel is always the aggressor and Hamas always the resister: when you tell so many lies and incite so much hate, what do you think will happen?

How do you think the believers internalizing these lies will respond to the savage slaughter of Israelis? This is a moral monstrosity made in America, and one that America must unmake.

The anti-Israel hate increasingly possessing the American mind is a demon that must be exorcised from our body politic. For America cannot long remain a decent society if the next generation of Americans are made to be indifferent to the barbaric butchering of Israeli civilians and children.

I, for one, stand with Israel as it seeks to defend itself. Despite the profound pain of the present, Israel will emerge from it all better and stronger than ever before.

It will outlive the pernicious lies and the dangerous demagogues who tell them. It will outlive the extremism of the DSA and BDS. It will outlive the terrorism of Iran and its proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah.

Israel will live on — for the next 75 years and beyond. Resilience is the DNA and destiny of the Jewish people and the Jewish State. It always has been and always will be. I am as certain of that as I am of anything. Am Yisrael Chai.
Daniel Greenfield: Ta Nehisi Coates Signs Letter Defending Hamas
You may remember Ta Nehisi Coates as America’s most prominent literary racist until Ibram X. Kendi came around.

He’s the guy who got a ton of awards for writing in “Between the World and Me” that the police officers and firefighters who died on September 11 “were not human to me. Black, white, or whatever, they were menaces of nature; they were the fire, the comet, the storm, which could — with no justification — shatter my body.”

Now he’s taking that moral triumph and signing on to a letter, alongside Richard Ford, Molly Crabapple, China Miéville and a whole bunch of writers you don’t know, attacking Israel for bombing Hamas.

After 400 or so words attacking Israel, the letter gets around to mentioning what started all this only at the end.

“On Saturday, after sixteen years of siege, Hamas militants broke out of Gaza. More than 1,300 Israelis were subsequently killed with over one hundred more taken hostage—some of them friends and family of signatories to this letter. We deplore the loss of all innocent life and now, as we write this letter, Israel is executing the largest expulsion of Palestinians since 1948 as it bombs Gazans without discrimination.”

After sixteen years of siege, Hamas militants broke out of Gaza. Note that opening. The letter doesn’t actually condemn Hamas, the way it repeatedly condemns Israel, it just “deplores the loss of all innocent life.”

The letter is helpful insofar as you know whose books not to buy. (But really, what are the odds you’re buying Richard Ford or China Miéville anyway and it only gets more obscure from there.)

The thing about Ta Nehisi Coates signing on to a letter defending Hamas is his history of exploiting the Holocaust. Coates’ original argument for reparations for slavery was based on Holocaust reparations. He was attacked for that by some on the Left. Earlier this year he visited parts of Israel occupied by Muslim settlers and blasted the Jewish State.
Daniel Greenfield: The Hamas ‘Inside Job’ Truthers Don’t Understand Israel or War
There have been two kinds of conspiracy theories circulated by ‘truthers’ after the Hamas massacre of Israelis.

The first kind essentially denies there was an attack or nitpicks the details. Those arguments are made in obvious bad faith by people who simply hate Israel and side with the terrorists. Any evidence presented to them is dismissed as fake.

The second kind of conspiracy theory is of the “inside job” variety most often involving a “stand down” order that allowed Hamas to massacre over 1,000 people without any military intervention. Some of the people pushing this stuff are the usual suspects, alt-righters and anti-semites, some of it’s coming from anti-war leftists and libertarians who treat every war as a vast conspiracy, and some from fringe figures in Israel.

The idea that Prime Minister Netanyahu or top generals would have issued a “stand down” (apart from being horrifying) makes no sense. Before this attack, he was the longest-serving prime minister in Israeli history. Now he’s been forced to join a unity government and polls show that most Israelis want him to resign. His political career may be over. Likewise that of the top generals. In Israel, they transition into politics. That is a whole lot less likely to happen now.

The Yom Kippur War disaster tanked Golda Meir and Moshe Dayan despite their heroic stature. There’s no political gain to letting the enemy murder over a thousand of your people in a preventable attack.

Finally, Israel is a small country. A whole lot of people know each other and are related or friends with each other. This conspiracy theory requires you to believe that military personnel who had friends and family living in these communities decided to ignore calls for help and sit around playing cards while they were being butchered. Not to mention ignore attacks on their own bases and allow their fellow military personnel to be murdered, tortured, and taken hostage.
Muslim Federation Leader Posts Video Calling Jewish Bible ‘Ancient Book of Made-Up Stories’
When it comes to anything Jewish, South Florida Muslim Federation President Samir Kakli believes it is based on ‘fairy tales.’ That’s what he felt, when he recently posted on his Facebook page that Israel ‘is built on lies and fantasy.’ And that’s what he felt, when, in reaction to Hamas’s new crimes against humanity, he posted a video referring to the Jewish Bible, the Tanakh, as an “ancient text of made-up stories.” Given the anti-Semitic groups and individuals that constitute his Federation, it makes sense that he would hold these bigoted views. It also makes sense that the general public should be warned of his and his group’s actions.

In the morning of October 7th, close to 1000 Hamas terrorists entered Israel by land, sea and air, under the cover of thousands of rockets fired from Gaza, and massacred well over 1000 Israelis, mostly civilians. They raped women and ridiculed their bloodied bodies. They butchered elderly. Scores of babies were burned alive and beheaded by them. They killed house pets. They abducted around 150 Israelis and others, taking them into Gaza, threatening to execute them. The level of depravity, cruelty and violence has shocked many around the world, as videos and images of the carnage have been posted online and broadcast on the news.

Samir Kakli is the President of the South Florida Muslim Federation (SoFlo Muslims), an umbrella group for South Florida’s many radical Muslim institutions. Following the Hamas attacks, Kakli and the Federation immediately posted links on the group’s social media calling on its followers to donate money to Gaza through Islamic Relief (IR), an organization that Israel has banned and labeled a front for Hamas. One of the donate links to IR was attached to the Federation’s official statement about the present conflict, which, instead of condemning Hamas, condemned Israel for what it called “occupation and subjugation of the Palestinian people.”
NEW SHOW PREMIERE! The Quad : Israel at War
On Saturday, Hamas launched a barbaric attack against the Jewish state. As more horrors are discovered, and Israel goes to war, we are bogged down by the bare facts and unfolding events. But what is the human and family cost? What it is like to be a woman, a daughter, a mother, a wife watching these events unfold?

The Quad featuring Fleur Hassan-Nahoum (Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem), Emily Schrader (Activist and Journalist), Ashira Solomon (African American Jew and political Moderator) and Vivian Bercovici (Former Canadian Ambassador to Israel) will give a voice to everything Israel and Jewish from this unique perspective. Here - Everything is on the table.

In Episode 1, the Quad minus 1 (Vivian is in Canada running an emergency evacuation campaign) discusses where they were when the rockets and attacks on October 7th began, coping with national and personal tragedy, what forever changed in Israel, and how the international community has reacted both good and bad.


Eighty years ago we said ‘Never Again’ but we spoke too soon, writes KAREN POLLOCK chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust

STEPHEN GLOVER: As the evil of Hamas seeps on to British streets, you don't have to be Jewish to be afraid

Call Me Back Podcast: The October Massacre changes... Everything - with Elliott Abrams
In this episode with Elliott Abrams, we provide additional detail on the history of Israel-Gaza/Hamas — this time from a White House insider on U.S.-Middle East policy during a critical period in Hamas’s takeover of Gaza — what were leaders in Washington and Jerusalem thinking at the time?

Elliott takes us into the Situation Room: What did they get right and what did they get wrong? This part of the discussion is a good complement to our conversation last week with Jonathan Schanzer on this history of Hamas.

Elliott also considers all that has changed for Israel, the region (especially the Sunni Gulf and Iran), and the Diaspora-Israel relationship as a result of this war.

Elliott is senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He served as deputy national security advisor in the administration of President George W. Bush, where he supervised U.S. policy in the Middle East for the White House, and as Special Representative for Iran and Venezuela in the administration of Donald Trump.

Elliott was educated at Harvard College, the London School of Economics, and Harvard Law School. After serving on the staffs of Senators Henry M. Jackson and Daniel P. Moynihan, he was an assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration and received the secretary of state's Distinguished Service Award from Secretary George Shultz.

Elliott is the author of five books, including “Tested by Zion: The Bush Administration and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict”, which is most relevant to today’s discussion.
Call Me Back Podcast: The Gazan Battlefield — with Avi Issacharoff
Today, we consider to what to expect when the IDF enters Gaza. Avi Issacharoff has been an analyst and journalist for The Times of Israel, Walla, and Haaretz. In these roles, he reported extensively on the inner workings and leaders of Hamas and other Palestinian factions in Gaza and the West Bank — Avi has extensive networks in the Israeli security services and the Palestinian Territories.

He is also the co-creator and writer of the Netflix original series “Fauda”, and other television series for Netflix and Showtime.

A fluent Arabic speaker, Avi was also the Middle East Affairs correspondent for Israeli Public Radio, covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the war in Iraq, and the Arab world between the years 2003-2006. In 2004, together with Haaretz’s Amos Harel, he authored the book “The Seventh War – How we won and why we lost the war with the Palestinians.” In 2008, they co-wrote “34 Days – The Story of the Second Lebanon War”.

Born in Jerusalem, he graduated cum laude from Ben Gurion University with a B.A. in Middle Eastern studies. He then earned his M.A. from Tel Aviv University on the same subject, also cum laude.


Squad members face new vulnerability over anti-Israel activism



Supporters of Hamas' Barbaric Actions Must Be Shunned
Over the last week since Hamas began their horrific terrorist attacks in Israel, we've watched in dismay as elected officials marched in support of Hamas, union leaders expressed support for terrorist acts, and law professors at our supposedly best schools defended the Hamas attacks on social media.

On Friday, we saw people come out in Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, and even tiny Kamloops on a so-called "day of rage" because Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal called on them to do so. Let's be clear, if you were marching "in support of Palestine," you were actually marching in support of Hamas and endorsing the terrorism they inflicted upon Israel.

People think it's appropriate to march in rallies where the Hamas flag is flown, where chants of "from the river to the sea" ring out, and where organizers play recordings of the Israeli early warning air raid siren to warn of incoming missiles while the crowd chants "Zionists hide." All of these things happened in Toronto over the past week, on our major streets and with hundreds if not thousands cheering on.

You don't need to be on Israel's side to see how wrong this is, how sick and twisted the thinking of some people is to cheer on the slaughter of innocent civilians. Once you state that you support the barbaric acts of Hamas, you are no longer a member of civilized society, nor should you be treated as such.
Appeasing Hamas: why we need muscular liberalism



Can a Donor Revolt Save American Universities?
For years, even though the far left never had real political power, social and cultural power were all theirs. Fortune 500 CEOs bent the knee—literally, during the summer of 2020. NPR aired breathless segments with academics who defended looting, or argued for the destruction of the nuclear family. The more extreme you were, the more attention you got.

So when Hamas brutally murdered babies, raped women, and took the disabled as hostages, it was business as usual, at least on America’s college campuses. Silence from the universities; cruel and maximalist rhetoric from left-wing student groups.

But then something weird happened. People started to say no.

It began with Bill Ackman, the hedge fund billionaire, who had been doomscrolling since news of the attacks first broke. On Tuesday, he came across an open letter, signed by over thirty student groups from Harvard—his alma mater—which blamed Israelis for their own murders.

“We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” the Harvard statement read. “The apartheid regime is the only one to blame.”

Ackman and his friends exchanged incredulous texts.

“I have been asked by a number of CEOs if @harvard would release a list of the members of each of the Harvard organizations that have issued the letter assigning sole responsibility for Hamas’ heinous acts to Israel, so as to insure that none of us inadvertently hire any of their members,” Ackman tweeted. “If, in fact, their members support the letter they have released, the names of the signatories should be made public so their views are publicly known.”

A dozen CEOs quickly joined Ackman.

A few hours later, Ryna Workman, the president of NYU’s Student Bar Association, learned that Winston & Strawn, the corporate law firm that had offered her a six-figure job, rescinded its offer. Not long after, the Bar Association removed her as president.

This was the new cost of publicly supporting Hamas, as Workman had done in an email sent to the entire law school: “Hi y’all,” Workman wrote, in a newsletter that should have been about study breaks and internship opportunities. “I want to express, first and foremost, my unwavering and absolute solidarity with Palestinians.” Workman went on to say that “Israel bears full responsibility for this tremendous loss of life.” This before the charred bodies were even in the ground.
TARTAK: Is Yalies4Palestine a hate group?
While the potential transformation of a once-anti-Semitic European political party into a pro-Israel one is both surprising and welcome, the reactions to the events of Simḥat Torah from American universities are depressingly predictable. This subject will receive more attention in Mosaic in the coming days. Today, I wish to point you to the reporting of Sahar Tartak, a Yale College sophomore, who comments on the declarations made since October 7 by a campus group called Yalies4Palestine (Y4P):

You can imagine my horror to find that Yalies4Palestine decided that the murderers are absolved of their responsibility in an Instagram post that holds “the Israeli Zionist regime responsible for the unfolding violence,” thereby justifying the use of unlawful violence against civilians (again: terror). An original Y4P post called on “the Yale community to celebrate the resistance’s success.”

The most recent post goes on to express “full support of the Palestinian people’s right to resist colonization and return to their land,” dismissing “nonviolent acts of resistance” as ineffective.

“Breaking out of a prison requires force. . . . We stand with all colonized people fighting for their liberation.” The statement is followed by an invitation to an October 9 rally “to uplift the calls of resistance.”

In short, it turns out this is not a group of students concerned about the wellbeing of Palestinian Arabs, but only about the success of Hamas in fulfilling its murderous goals.


Pro-Hamas protests show how higher education has finally crossed the line



The White House Says It Does 'Extensive' Work To Avoid Funding Terror Supporters. State Department Grants Say Otherwise.
The Biden State Department claims it conducts "extensive" due diligence to ensure recipients of taxpayer-funded grants do not support terrorism. But it recently gave $160,000 to a Palestinian university known as a hotbed of Hamas activity that praised Hamas terrorists as "martyrs" following their attack on Israel.

The State Department awarded Al-Quds University in the West Bank grants of $160,000 last year, according to records obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. The grants, which will fund programs for Palestinian entrepreneurs and "disadvantaged students" through 2024, are overseen by the State Department's Office of Palestinian Affairs. That office came under fire for calling on Israel to "refrain from … retaliatory attacks" after the Hamas assault.

Al-Quds University praised Hamas fighters in the wake of the terrorist group's recent attack on Israel, in which more than 1,000 Israelis have been slaughtered in the largest terrorist attack on the Jewish state. Al-Quds University said in a statement on social media that it "mourns the martyrs of the nation who died yesterday in the West Bank and Gaza as a result of this aggression."

Al-Quds has hosted numerous Hamas rallies over the years, leading the Israeli government and an American university to cut ties with the school. But that history has not deterred Foggy Bottom, which this week claimed to perform rigorous due diligence of all grant recipients. "All grantees sign terms of agreement agreeing not to support terrorism," a State Department spokesman told the Free Beacon.

It's the latest example of the State Department funding supporters of terrorist groups. Last month, the department awarded $100,000 to Al-Quds Open University, another West Bank school unaffiliated with Al-Quds University. Al-Quds Open University, which operates in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, canceled in-person classes in honor of the "righteous martyrs" who invaded Israel, the Free Beacon reported. The department gave $119,000 in grants earlier this year to two Gaza-based charities that have worked with Hamas. American taxpayers have funded more than $400 million in projects in the Gaza Strip since Hamas took over the area in 2009.

Al-Quds University's history can come as no surprise to the Biden administration. In a 2021 report, the State Department noted that an Al-Quds professor in an interview asked why the world "weeps" over the "so-called Holocaust." The professor in that interview also accused Israel of leading a "real, new Holocaust."


Madonna, Playboy Show More Backbone Than US Cultural Elites in Response to Hamas Atrocities
What happened: Hamas terrorists stormed into Israel and slaughtered more than 1,000 people.

What happened next: Some liberals in the United States took to the streets to celebrate the massacre of Jews. Others scrambled to blame former president Donald Trump for the terrorists' actions. America's elite universities responded as expected.

• Dozens of student organizations at Harvard, as well as the dean of the Graduate School of Education, released statements blaming Israel for the murder of innocent civilians at the hands of Hamas.

• Gillian Lester, dean of Columbia Law School, vaguely lamented the "violence that erupted in Israel and Gaza" while declining to mention Hamas or the terrorist group's unprovoked rampage against civilians.

• An anti-Israel student organization at Swarthmore College praised Hamas for having "valiantly confronted the imperial apparatus" and celebrated "the martyrs who have sacrificed their lives for liberation."

Why it matters: It is deplorable, for starters. The morally feckless response from America's elite cultural institutions was exacerbated by the formidable response from Playboy magazine and other unlikely sources of moral clarity.

Playboy
The men's entertainment magazine cut ties with Mia Khalifa, a former porn actress and OnlyFans model, in response to her "disgusting and reprehensible comments celebrating Hamas' attacks on Israel and the murder of innocent men, women and children." Khalifa had urged the Hamas "freedom fighters" posting videos of their atrocities against Israeli civilians to "flip their phones and film horizontal."
'How Dare You Slander the Names of Our Martyrs': Inside a George Washington Professor's Pro-Hamas Tirade

Top-Flight Law Firm Sidley Austin Hires Hamas Sympathizer From Harvard Law School. It’s Not the Only One.

Berkeley School District Hit For Slow Response to Hamas Terror Attacks, In Contrast To Quick Statement After George Floyd

Anti-Israel protesters and institutions are 'indoctrinating' young Americans in a 'moral monstrosity', Democrat Congressman says - as he asks: 'What kind of society are we becoming?

REVEALED: Billionaire Harvard donor Ken Griffin called leaders demanding college denounce letter from 35 student groups blaming Israel for Hamas attacks



Jon Huntsman Says Family Will No Longer Donate To University of Pennsylvania, Citing School’s Response To Hamas Attacks

Sky News host slams Lush store for sign telling customers to 'boycott Israel'
Sky News host Rowan Dean has slammed Lush after the cosmetics company weighed into the Israel-Gaza conflict, putting up a sign in one of their stores in Ireland telling customers to “boycott Israel”.

“I say to anyone in Australia, don’t go near those shops,” Mr Dean said.

“They are horrible, the stench, as I said, is enough to warn you and put you off.

“Shame on Lush, what a disgrace.”

Fighting in the Israel and Gaza war has intensified, with the death toll already climbing into the thousands.




WATCH: Gen-Z for Change Chief Scolds U.S. for ‘Generations of Violence Across the World,’ Attacks ‘Occupier Israel’



Mossad joins call for closure of Al Jazeera bureau in Israel - report

Meta suspends page of ‘Quds News Network’
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has suspended the page of the Hamas-affiliated Quds News Network. On Saturday night, the publication’s Facebook page returned the error message: “This content isn’t available right now.”

“When this happens, it’s usually because the owner only shared it with a small group of people, changed who can see it or it’s been deleted,” per the page.

The organization continues to operate a page with 181,000 followers on Instagram (which Meta also owns) and a Twitter account with 185,500 followers.

Writing on Twitter on Saturday, the network condemned “Meta’s complete alignment with the Israeli occupation government and its continuous targeting and restriction of the Palestinian content.

“This has culminated in the removal of the English and Arabic pages of Quds News Network on Facebook, the largest Palestinian news page with over 10 million followers,” it claimed. “The network has been operating in both Arabic and English for over a decade across various social media platforms.”

Last year, the Australian Jewish Association referred to the network as “a notorious anti-Israel antisemitic propaganda platform affiliated with Hamas.”
Reuters Fact Check Suggests Israelis Unharmed at Music Festival. They're Meta's Major Fact-Checking Partner.
A Reuters fact check of an online video suggests Israeli concertgoers were unharmed by Hamas's terrorist attack—and is prompting Hamas sympathizers to argue that the attack didn't happen at all.

Reuters fact checks an online video taken from an Israeli concert—but not the music festival Hamas infiltrated last weekend—and goes on to debunk the claim that Israelis were "running for their lives." They weren’t—at the Oct. 4 concert depicted in the video—but Reuters makes no mention of the fact that hundreds of Israelis were actually slaughtered at a concert three days later.

The social media giant Meta employs Reuters as a fact-checking partner in six countries, including the United States and Israel. Inside Meta, Israeli employees have voiced alarm that one of the company’s major partners is whitewashing terror and itself spreading confusion about the facts on the ground.

"We saw today a massive campaign on our platform denying what has happened in Israel this week and saying Israel faked it," one Israeli employee wrote in an internal email reviewed by the Free Beacon, arguing that the tendentious fact checks are "putting not only our reputation globally and in Israel at major risk but it also puts our employees at risk as they are being blamed for this and harassed by people online and on the street."

The Reuters fact check examines an Oct. 7 tweet that purports to show Israelis "running for their lives" after Hamas terrorists infiltrated a music festival in southern Israel, but actually shows concertgoers running through the entrance of an Oct. 4 concert in Tel Aviv. But the Reuters video does not include footage from the actual Supernova Music Festival in southern Israel, where hundreds of Israelis were slaughtered by Hamas terrorists, who kidnapped some festival attendees and raped others, according to eyewitnesses. In fact, it only vaguely mentions the "desert attack."
TAKE ACTION NOW: Sign the Petition, Demand Accountability from the AP

Sky’s Kay Burley is a revolting person who should be ashamed of herself
I have seen loads of biased interviews from the UK broadcast media around the Israel-Gaza war on the BBC, Channel4 and Sky, but none so revolting and disgusting as the one this morning in which Sky New’s Kay Burley interviews Israeli Ambassador Tzipi Hotovely.

The line of questioning was so confrontational and devoid of any human compassion that one could scarcely believe that Israel had suffered the greatest loss of Jewish life since the Holocaust – in a single day – a little over a week ago.

I confess I paused and sat quite literally speechless after an exchange in which the ambassador reasonably and patiently pointed out that Israel has one of the best militaries in the world, doing all it can to minimise civilian deaths which Burley interrupted to sneer: “Better than any other army in the world? So where were they to defend your people last Saturday?”

Can you imagine saying this to the ambassador of any other country who had lost over a thousand people in a terrorist attack? Can you imagine anyone saying this to the US ambassador after 9/11? Can you imagine saying this to the French ambassador after the Bataclan massacre killed only a tenth of the number murdered in Israel ten days ago?

What a disgusting and revolting person. She is a stain on the British broadcasting media landscape. She should be drummed out of the industry on a metaphorical rail, tarred and feathered, by decent people, if indeed there are any decent people left in broadcasting.

But it got worse. I have to say, I rage-quit after Burly accused the ambassador – who had been patiently trying to explain that Israel’s first priority was the security of its own citizens – of therefore regarding the people of Gaza as “sub-human”.

I couldn’t watch any further. I will embed the video below. Perhaps you can get past the 5 minute mark. I’m afraid I could not.
CBC News Gives Platform To Unproven Allegations About Alleged Israeli Use Of White Phosphorous In Gaza
Since Hamas’ establishment more than 30 years ago, the Islamist terrorist group has made no secret of its quest to destroy Israel, and replace it with an Islamic State-style theocracy. For decades, the group has carried out suicide bombings in Israel, killing scores of innocent civilians, as well as firing thousands of rockets into Israeli populated centres, seeking to kill as many Israelis as possible.

And after the group’s October 7 mega terrorist attack in Israel, which killed more Jews than any other day since the Holocaust, Israel’s leadership is now announcing that it is preparing action to effectively neuter Hamas as a potent military force, and has begun air strikes to eliminate Hamas terrorist targets.

In anticipation of Israel’s widely-expected ground assault against Hamas in Gaza, CBC News published an article on October 12 entitled: “Israel is using white phosphorus in Gaza, human rights group says,” written by Senior Writer Brishti Basu.

In the article, Basu shared unproven allegations from Human Rights Watch (HRW) claiming that Israel has been using white phosphorous in its actions against Hamas. Human Rights Watch, long known for its one-sided anti-Israel bias, made headlines by falsely accusing the Jewish State of practicing apartheid.

Although white phosphorous is not banned in conflict, its usage is widely condemned, making CBC News’ platforming of the allegation against Israel significant.

Despite the explosive allegation leveled against Israel by Human Rights Watch – and given a platform by CBC News – Basu’s report acknowledged that “CBC News has not independently verified the rights group’s accounts of white phosphorus munitions being used by Israel,” a remarkable admission by our public broadcaster.

According to the article, the Israeli military denied knowledge that white phosphorous was being used in Gaza.
BBC News website reporting on the Hamas attack on Sderot police station
In an October 8th report credited to Yolande Knell, David Gritten and Rushdi Abualouf and titled ‘Israeli forces fight to drive out Hamas militants as death toll passes 600’ readers find the following:
“At least 10 militants who had taken over the police station in the town of Sderot were killed.”

An October 9th BBC Verify report titled ‘How Hamas staged Israel lightning assault no-one thought possible’ by Sean Seddon and Daniele Palumbo states:
“In Sderot, militants were seen standing on the back of a pick-up truck being driven through the town, which lies around 3km (1.8 miles) to the east of Gaza.”

As we see, none of those reports – which will remain online as what the BBC describes as “permanent public record” – mentions the eight members of the local police force killed during the attack on Sderot’s police station.

Items posted on the BBC News website’s live pages on October 7th and 8th likewise mention “militants”, “gunmen” and “armed fighters” but not the policemen and policewoman they killed.

To summarise, while the BBC News website “permanent public record” coverage relating to that attack on the police station in Sderot informs audiences that ten of the perpetrators were killed, it omits any mention whatsoever of the Israelis who lost their lives during that terror attack. That is not accurate and impartial news reporting.
Vox Answers ‘7 Big Questions’ About Israel-Hamas War With Lies, Half-truths & Manipulation
As Israel prepares for what is expected to be a ground operation in Gaza following the devastating attack by Hamas on October 7, Vox announced it had answered the “7 big questions about the Israel-Hamas war.”

A joint effort between Vox writers, the piece reportedly explains the ins and outs of issues, including where the conflict currently stands, why Hamas launched its attack when it did, and how the Hamas assault sparked an outright war.

Unfortunately, among the answers were multiple big lies, distortions and omissions — here are the 7 most egregious:
1. Gaza is ‘Occupied’
Detailing what readers “need to understand about Gaza and Israel’s relationship to understand today,” Vox gives a brief history of the conflict that starts with Israel’s victory in the 1967 Six-Day War, noting that the Jewish state took control of the Strip from the Egyptians after its victory.

While Vox notes that Israel withdrew from the enclave in 2005, it goes on to claim that the “territory nevertheless has remained effectively under Israeli occupation.”

But the truth is that Gaza is not occupied and has not been since Israel withdrew every last military and civilian installation nearly 20 years ago. In fact, Hamas itself even admitted the enclave is not under occupation.

2. Questionable Expert Opinion
Delving into the painful reality that is daily life in the Gaza Strip, Vox ignores the role Hamas plays in compounding the misery, including by diverting humanitarian funds toward building its terrorist infrastructure.

Instead, the piece references the United Nations’ bleak assessment that the territory is in a “chronic humanitarian crisis,” which Vox solely linked to the Israeli-Egyptian blockade and Israel’s numerous military operations in response to Hamas rocket attacks.

Vox also quotes Columbia University historian Rashid Khalidi’s view that “pressure being put on Palestinians — it just assumes that they’re insignificant and they will tolerate any degree of humiliation, and that’s just not true.”

Any reputable publication should give enough information about an expert so that readers can decide how much weight to give their view. If Vox had done this with Khalidi, readers would know that he believes it is America’s fault that peace was not brokered when Hamas swept to power in 2006 — not the fact that it is impossible to make peace with a genocidal terror group sworn to Israel’s destruction.
‘As a Jew’: Sky News Falls For Professional Anti-Israel Activist

Reuters Journalist Who Questioned Difference Between Israeli Civilians and Combatants “Contextualizes” Terrorism

Media Echo Hamas’ ‘Israeli Airstrike’ Claim
What Could Have Caused the Explosion?
Although the media seems intent on following Hamas’ lead in ascribing all guilt to Israel for the deaths of those in the convoy, there are other possibilities for what could have caused the explosion.

Two days after the incident, it was reported that, according to the IDF, Hamas had planted IEDs along the escape route in order to deter Palestinian civilians from leaving northern Gaza for the relative safety of southern Gaza. This way, the terror group could continue to use the local population as human shields.

There is also the possibility that gas canisters that were being transported at the time ignited and exploded.

The day after this convoy explosion, there was a similar explosion within the convoy of Gazans moving along the Wadi Gaza bridge. According to video analysis of this second explosion, it was likely either a detonated Hamas IED or ignited gas canisters that caused the explosion.

While the role of the media is to report on all sides of a conflict, it is irresponsible to uncritically take at face value the claims of an internationally recognized terror organization, especially when reporting on such a sensitive topic as civilian deaths.


Political cartoonist Steve Bell 'sacked' by The Guardian after Netanyahu cartoon rejected
The Guardian has cut ties with one of its longstanding political cartoonists, Steve Bell, following accusations that his work was antisemitic.

A spokesman for the newspaper confirmed that the business had chosen not to renew Bell's contract following a string of posts the illustrator published online last week.

The Guardian spokesman said: “The decision has been made not to renew Steve Bell’s contract.

“Steve Bell’s cartoons have been an important part of the Guardian over the past 40 years – we thank him and wish him all the best.”

Last week, Bell tweeted about a cartoon related to the Hamas terror attack, which he alleged was rejected by Guardian editors.

The cartoon depicted Benjamin Netanyahu wearing boxing gloves and holding a scalpel over a map showing the Gaza Strip. The cartoon carried a quote reading, "Residents of Gaza, get out now."

Bell, who has worked for the paper for four decades, said he filed the cartoon on Monday morning to The Guardian. Four hours later, he claimed, it was rejected by senior editors.


Why is the WaPo still platforming a Hamas supporter?

OFCOM ONLINE SAFETY DIRECTOR IS VOCIFEROUSLY ANTI-ISRAEL
Ofcom’s Director of Online Safety Supervision has been posting anti-Israel content on her private Instagram this week. Fadzai Madzingira, who was hired by Ofcom in May, describes herself as “a Zimbabwean, a Black Feminist, a student of decolonization” and was previously Director of Ethical and Humane Use of Technology at Salesforce. BLM posts liked by Madzingira argue that the government’s support for Israel is a “vile colonial alliance” and that navy ships in the Middle East are participating in “ethnic cleansing and genocide of Palestinians“.

Guido is surprised Ofcom, responsible for broadcast impartiality, doesn’t check for extreme views like these before taking on new hires…

Madzingira is responsible for working “closely with tech platforms to make sure they follow new Government online safety rules“. Thank the Online Safety Bill for putting the internet in her hands…


Belgian MP buys a Hamas internet domain, directs it to IDF site
When Belgium’s only Jewish MP found out the the local Hamas internet domain in his country was vacant, he decided to buy it, and pull a little prank: If you search for Hamas.be on the internet, you will immediately be forwarded to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) official website in English.

“Having seen the many anti-Israel pro-Hamas protests in Europe, including unfortunately, in my country, I noticed that the site www.hamas.be was still available,” Michael Freilich told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. Adding that he “immediately went and bought the domain of the site, to make sure that no pro-Hamas activists in this country decides to get any insightful and wrong information,” he said.

“I registered the site, and the first thing I did was redirect it to the IDF site. So, at the moment, anyone who goes on this site, is directed to the IDF news site.” Hamas supporters, Israel is coming for you

He added that “the message is very clear. Anyone that wants to support Hamas should know ‘Israel is coming for you.’ The Israeli Defense Forces are coming for you, and will wipe you off the map.” Freilich explained that “I want the supporters of Hamas in this country also to know that Belgian politicians, especially those from my party, have been standing behind Israel and have said so in various statements.

“The head of my party, who is the mayor of the city of Antwerp, and head of the largest political faction in Belgium, Bart De Wever said very clearly at the beginning of the week: ‘In this fight between Israel and Hamas, there's only one side to choose and that is the side of Israel. We stand resolutely beside Israel.’”

On Saturday, the Post published that Freilich publicly commended the decision to shut down an online payment account previously connected to Gaza Now, a news platform and Telegram group tied to Hamas, boasting a membership of over 1.1 million.


Abbas’ advisor: The US is “occupying Palestine,” “through its colonialist branch Israel” Abbas’ advisor: The US “is thwarting peace… through its colonialist branch Israel”
PA Supreme Shari’ah Judge and Abbas’ advisor Mahmoud Al-Habbash: “We are being subjected to American aggression. [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas said this clearly: The one who is occupying Palestine is the US… It claims that it is sponsoring the peace process. This is a lie. The one who is thwarting peace in practice is the US through its colonialist branch, which is Israel.”
[PA Supreme Shari’ah Judge Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Facebook page, Oct. 9, 2023]

Posted text on Facebook page: “[Abbas’ advisor Mahmoud] Al-Habbash to [Egyptian TV] channel Al-Nile: The only solution is to end the occupation and establish an independent [Palestinian] state, and we are prepared to resist the occupation for another century.”

Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash also serves as PA Supreme Shari’ah Judge and Chairman of the Supreme Council for Shari'ah Justice and PA Chairman.

Hamas war on Israel October 2023 - At least 1,300 Israelis were murdered and over 3,300 wounded, in addition to at least 199 Israelis who were abducted into the Gaza Strip, in a Hamas terror war that began when approximately 2,500 Hamas terrorists broke through Israel's security fence at the Gaza Strip border and launched a surprise attack, taking control of several Israeli towns and attacking a music festival on the Jewish holiday of Shemini Atzeret (Simchat Torah), which fell on the Sabbath, Oct. 7, 2023. Hamas terrorists also fired at least 5,000 rockets at Israeli population centers. In response, Israel launched Operation Iron Swords to counter the Hamas terror threat. Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon joined Hamas' terror war starting from the following day, attacking Israel from the north.


PA will pay $2,789,430 to families of 1,500 dead Hamas terrorists

EU Responds to Hamas Terror by Tripling Gaza Aid

Ignoring Hamas atrocities, Fatah official says Israel is worse than Nazis

Should We Help the Palestinians in Gaza?



Israel Enters the Gray Zone
The authors begin the book by describing the 2018 operation that exposed the existence of a secret warehouse outside of Tehran. The facility contained hundreds of thousands of documents with technical details about Iran's march toward a nuclear bomb. After two years of surveillance and planning, the Israelis broke in and spirited out many of those documents, only to reveal their contents and prove that the Iranian regime had been lying for years about the peaceful or civilian nature of their program. As the authors note, it was "perhaps the largest physical heist of intelligence materials from an enemy capital in the history of espionage."

Another chapter is devoted to the 2020 assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the "Robert Oppenheimer of Iran," who was cut down in the town of Absard, 40 miles east of Tehran, by a "remote-controlled, satellite-linked machine" that identified him using facial recognition technology, pumped him full of 13 bullets, and then self-destructed. Unfortunately for Israel and the West, the authors correctly note that Fakhrizadeh "created a network of scientists that will continue his work." This, of course, means that Israel's gray zone campaign must continue, as well.

Yet another chapter explores the "virtual battlefield." Both sides of this conflict have landed their punches in cyberspace. Iran has penetrated the phones of Israeli leaders, hacked Israel's water network, and infected Israeli companies with ransomware. But the Israelis have the edge in cyber, with multiple successful penetrations of the nuclear program, hacking operations that have thrown the Iranian economy for a loop, and psychological operations that have served to rally the Iranian people against their reviled regime. But the authors warn that "Israeli society is much more dependent on technology. Hence, they have … much more to lose." Cyber is therefore a realm to watch closely as the gray zone war drags on.

On balance, the authors appear rather sanguine (with some caveats) about Israel's efforts to "Target Tehran." It's not hard to understand why. But in this part of the world, there are no permanent victories—only permanent battles. The terrorist assault by Hamas last weekend only underscores this.

Even before the mass murder perpetrated by Hamas, a fascinating debate began to unfold in Israel's security establishment about whether the "Campaign Between the Wars" is a sufficient substitute for a major operation that delivers a crippling blow to the regime, its proxies, and its nuclear program. Expect that debate to heat up after Hamas is neutralized in Gaza. Israel will be looking further downrange.

Target Tehran: How Israel is Using Sabotage, Cyberwarfare, Assassination—and Secret Diplomacy—to Stop a Nuclear Iran and Create a New Middle East by Yonah Jeremy Bob and Ilan Evyatar Simon & Schuster, 368 pp., $28.99
How Iran, the 'Head of the Snake,' Directly Helped Hamas's Assault on Israel
"We coordinated with Hezbollah and with Iran and the Axis [of Resistance] before, during and after the battle at the highest level." — Hamas representative Ahmed Abdulhadi, revealing Hamas coordination before and during the massacre, Newsweek, October 11, 2023.

Another Hamas official, Ali Baraka, told Russia's state-run RT outlet that his group had secretly planned the assault for two years and did not inform any other factions or allies, including Iran and Hezbollah, of the "zero hour." Baraka confirmed that Iran "gives us money and weapons."

While many in the West chose to disregard Iran's role in arming, training and funding Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the same cannot be said about a large number of Arabs who have long been warning of Tehran's expansionist actions in the Middle East. Some of those Arabs have been openly talking about how Iran uses its proxies to wreak havoc not only on Israel, but on some Arab countries. Through its proxies, the Iranian regime now effectively occupies Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, in addition to the Gaza Strip. The Arabs, in short, see clearly what many Westerners apparently want to remain oblivious to.

"Hamas is an organization affiliated with the clerical regime in Iran, just like Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, and it is the same axis that threatens Saudi Arabia and Kuwait day and night. We differentiate between a just cause and a terrorist axis." — Mansour al-Malik, Saudi Arabian petroleum engineer, on X, October 8, 2023.

"Iranian Regime Mouthpiece Kayhan : Iran Is The Mind And Hands Behind Hamas; Operation 'Al-Aqsa Flood' [The Invasion of Israel] Was Planned By Qods Force Commander Qassem Soleimani Before he Was Killed; Khamenei Hinted in August 2022 at 'The Complete Conquest of Israel." — Report by the Middle East Media Research Institute, (MEMRI), October 12, 2023.

"Iranian Website Asr-e Calls On Iranians Not To Speak Out On Iranian Involvement In 'The Hamas-Israel Conflict' – For Fear Of Harming Iranian Interests...." — Report by MEMRI, October 13, 2023.

What will it take for the US and its allies to grasp that the appeasement of the Iranian regime is read by the mullahs and their proxies as weakness? If such appeasement continues, make no mistake: today, the carnage is Israel; tomorrow, it will be the US and Europe.


John Cusack Whitewashes Hamas Terror Attack as Self-Defense After Talking to Palestinian Protesters in Chicago

My Nazi High-School Principal

PreOccupiedTerritory: Polish Economy Dips On Reports Jews No Longer Need To Leave Israel To Visit Mass Slaughter Sites (satire)



Gal Gadot mobilizes for the families of the Israeli hostages
Hollywood star Gal Gadot has taken a stand for the families affected by the war in Israel. On Thursday, she shared a heartfelt post on her Instagram account, calling on her followers to help in sharing the stories of the missing and kidnapped individuals.

'The word needs to see them'
"Send me the details of the missing and abducted through the link in my bio and story," Gadot's message reads. "The world needs to see them."

Gadot emphasized her commitment to helping raise awareness about the tragedy of the Israeli hostages in the hands of Hamas. "I want to use my platform to shed light on the stories of those who have been abducted or gone missing," she wrote. "We must put faces and names to the unimaginable statistics that plague our world. The world must witness the faces of babies, children, mothers, fathers, and elderly individuals who have been taken captive or have mysteriously disappeared from their homes without a trace."


Floyd Mayweather Jr., NBA players to join L.A. march to Museum of Tolerance in support of Israel
World champion boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. will be among NBA players and elected officials taking part in a march to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles Sunday to show their support for Israel after last weekend’s surprise terrorist attack.

The march is scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. at Young Israel of Century City located at 9317 W. Pico Blvd. before ending about a half mile away at the museum located at 9786 W. Pico Blvd.

“Floyd Mayweather, world champion boxer is expected to march along with NBA players as well as influencer Montana Tucker, who will also speak during the program, a news release from the museum stated.

The program will take place at the Simon Wisenthal Center Museum of Tolerance after the march.

Lt. Governor Eleni Kounalakis; Congresswoman Sydney Kamlager-Dov; Jewish Federation’s Rabbi Noah Farkas; Omar Qudrat, Muslim Coalition of America; Pastor Greg Laurie and Founder and CEO Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Rabbi Marvin Hier are also scheduled to take part in the program.




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