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Thursday, March 14, 2024

03/14 Links Pt1: Biden's Middle East Is a Fantasy World; Schumer urges elections in Israel, saying Netanyahu unfit to serve; Fmr Hostage: Nurses cheered at captured ‘prey’

From Ian:

Biden's Middle East Is a Fantasy World
According to the White House, the Palestinians aspire to peace, reject Hamas, and are ready to make painful concessions. In reality, according to a November survey by Arab World for Research and Development, affiliated with Birzeit University, 59% of Palestinians "extremely support" the Oct. 7 massacre, and another 16% "somewhat support" it.

When President Biden refers to the Palestinian Authority as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, he ignores that its president, Mahmoud Abbas, was last elected 19 years ago to a four-year term, and that the last time the Palestinians went to the polls, in 2006, they voted for Hamas.

Vice President Kamala Harris this week uttered a statement about Israel typically reserved for dictatorships: "It's important for us to distinguish or at least not conflate the Israeli government with the Israeli people." Yes, there is a significant disparity between Israel's leadership and its citizens - but it's the opposite of what people in Washington assume.

A February survey conducted for Channel 12 News found that 63% of the Israeli public strongly opposes a Palestinian state under any circumstances. The Israeli government has been providing humanitarian aid to Gaza, but a January survey found that 72% of the public opposes such aid until all hostages are released.

The Israel Mr. Biden knows - the one that supports deep withdrawals, settlement evacuations, and the two-state solution - ceased to exist two decades ago during the second intifada. Savage Palestinian violence at that time indiscriminately claimed the lives of more than 1,000 Israelis, including babies, women and the elderly.

It's time the administration recognizes reality: The Palestinians overwhelmingly support the murder of Jews, and the Israelis don't think the Palestinians deserve a state.

I'd like to remind my fellow Israelis that it's important for us to distinguish, or at least not conflate, the American government with the American people. According to a recent Harvard Caps-Harris poll, the American public supports Israel much more than the president does.
Dennis Ross: Building a New Security Reality for Israel in Gaza
Oct. 7 changed Israel, inflicting trauma and hardening Israelis' belief that they cannot live with Hamas in control of Gaza. Israel needs a strategy for ensuring that its military efforts and achievements in Gaza translate into a new political reality that means Israel will no longer be threatened from the strip.

Israel does not want to be responsible for the Palestinians living in Gaza. However, Israel should not leave Gaza before it knows that Hamas is not in a position to reconstitute itself, its military means, and its political control. This requires that Hamas' military infrastructure, weapons depots, military industrial base, systems of command and control, and organizational coherence are largely destroyed. Israel's objective - and that of the U.S. - needs to be a permanently demilitarized Gaza, which can never again be used as a platform for attacks against Israel.

As long as 91% of Palestinians believe that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas should resign and 80% are convinced that the PA is corrupt, it is pointless to talk about a political horizon or an endgame involving the PA.

Everyone knows that Hamas will seek to divert the assistance and to reconstitute itself and its military machine. No donor will invest in Gaza if Hamas is in control or siphoning away supplies. So a condition for reconstruction must be a genuinely different administration in Gaza.
There's No Such Thing as a "Ramadan Truce"
An aspect of Ramadan that has been a tradition through the ages is the holy month as a time for war.

There is a history of Muslim armies waging war during Ramadan.

This makes it ironic that some well-meaning non-Muslims are calling on Israel to suspend its military operations against the Islamist extremists of Hamas out of respect for Ramadan.

The 1973 Arab-Israeli war is widely known in the Arab world as the Ramadan War, when Anwar Sadat dispatched Egyptian forces to cross the Suez Canal.

The Saudi newspaper Arab News reported that "some of the greatest victories in Islam occurred during Ramadan."

The Washington Institute's Patrick Clawson noted: "Modern proposals for Ramadan ceasefires by secular governments - the Soviets in Afghanistan, Saddam Hussein when fighting the Islamic Republic of Iran - were uniformly rejected by the Islamist side, which usually intensified fighting during Ramadan."

For Hamas and their fellow travelers, waging war during Ramadan is as valid as in the other months of the year.

The American government should not fall for well-meaning calls to urge Israel to display one-sided military restraint out of deference to Ramadan.

We can be sure that Hamas (or what's left of it) won't be devoting the next month to introspection, service and worship.


There Will Be No Peace until Hamas Is Dismantled.
When most people call for a "ceasefire," what they mean is that Israel must end its military campaign - unilaterally. Blame is laid squarely on one side. Yet it was Hamas, after all, that broke the ceasefire five months ago. It was Hamas that killed more than 1,160 people on Oct. 7, deploying torture, sexual violence and sadistic terror. It is Hamas that still holds 134 hostages, some of whom are believed to already be dead.

The Oct. 7 attacks generated the certainty that no Israeli government could ever again do business with the terrorist group responsible for the slaughter. It is too seldom reported that Hamas remains utterly committed to the annihilation of Israel. Hamas deliberately constructed the warrens and public buildings of Gaza in such a way as to put as many civilians as possible in harm's way. The terrible death toll is a direct consequence of Hamas strategy.

Even if Netanyahu is replaced as prime minister, no Israeli government can countenance an enduring ceasefire until this Islamist death cult has been destroyed as a viable military force. It will take time. It is a bleak task, forced upon the Israelis by what happened to them on Oct. 7. There will be no peace until Hamas is indeed dismantled.
Hamas Has Been Shattered. Now It Is Fighting to Survive
In the Defense Minister's office at Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv, a large pyramid adorns the wall made up of images of Hamas' top ranks. The title: "Status of leadership assassinations." After five months of ferocious conflict in Gaza, those still alive greatly outnumber the mostly mid-ranking commanders whose fate is illustrated by an X across their faces. But the Xs on the pyramid are gradually spreading, just as Hamas' fighting options appear to be dwindling.

The quasi-state in Gaza that Hamas used to rule is wrecked, its forces are decimated and its population is enduring a deepening humanitarian catastrophe. For Hamas, an Islamist militant group founded to destroy the Jewish state, victory now has largely narrowed to one thing: survival. "Does Hamas still exist militarily? Yes," said one senior Israeli military official. "Is it organized? No. The path to completely dismantling them goes on."

Yezid Sayigh, a Beirut-based fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Hamas' predicament stemmed from its catastrophic miscalculation over the real balance of military power. The bloody Oct. 7 attacks laid bare the group's "delusion" that the cross-border raid would trigger uprisings against Israel across the Middle East - and thereby limit the war or tip the balance.
"If I Were 25, I'd Be in Gaza with a Gun in the IDF"
Prof. Alan Dershowitz said in an interview: "I was a lawyer for many of the protesters during the 1960s and the 1970s, and many of them were very radical, but nothing comes close to this [recent mass protests against Israel]. This is essentially equivalent to Nazi youth. The protesters are mostly ignorant. They know nothing about Israel. They know nothing about Hamas."

"All they know is that they're joining a demonstration based on intersectionality between oppressors and oppressed, and Jews are the oppressors and Palestinians are the oppressed. These are not pro-Palestine demonstrations. These are anti-Israel, anti-American and anti-Jewish demonstrations. And they're getting worse and they're spreading beyond the campus."

"It's time for Israel to win the war. It's time for Israel to ignore world public opinion, to thumb its nose, and ignore the Red Cross and Physicians Without Borders and the UN. Israel has to make its own decisions. Tragically, Israel cannot completely ignore the U.S., but it cannot be dictated to by the U.S. We in the U.S. have to take responsibility for assuring American support."

"There cannot be a two-state solution that's based on Oct. 7....Oct. 7 requires a complete dismantling and destruction of Hamas. Once that's done, we can go back and talk about various possible solutions, but nothing will ever be the same. For example...it cannot be that Hamas can come right up to the border....There has to be security done only by Israel, because that's the only country you can trust to do security. The same thing is true in the West Bank, but the key point is Hamas cannot be rewarded right now."

"I'm 85 years old. If I were 25 years old, I wouldn't be talking to you today. I'd be in Gaza with a gun joining the IDF."
Netanyahu, Israeli right, Hamas, Abbas ‘the four obstacles to peace,’ Schumer says
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) identified Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and “radical right-wing Israelis,” alongside Hamas and Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, as “the four obstacles to peace” between Israelis and Palestinians.

In a Thursday speech on the Senate floor that Schumer described as a “major address” on the two-state solution, the senator labeled Israeli cabinet members “bigots” and “extremists” and called for new elections in Israel.

“Five months into this conflict, it is clear that Israelis need to take stock of the situation and ask, ‘Must we change course?’” Schumer said. “I believe a new election is the only way to allow for a healthy and open decision-making process about the future of Israel, at a time when so many Israelis have lost their confidence in the vision and direction of their government.”

Schumer cited as particular obstacles to peace the inclusion in the governing coalition of Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israeli finance and national security minister respectively, and both of religious Zionist parties.

“There’s a nastiness to what Ministers Smotrich and Ben-Gvir believe and how they use their positions of authority and influence, and eagerness to inflame and provoke, that is profoundly irresponsible and self-destructive,” Schumer said.

Schumer, who is Jewish, said he was speaking out both as a senator and on behalf of “mainstream Jewish Americans” to represent their views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He implied that Washington should condition or cut off aid to Israel unless a new government is formed.

“If Prime Minister Netanyahu’s current coalition remains in power after the war begins to wind down and continues to pursue dangerous and inflammatory policies that test existing U.S. standards for assistance, then the United States will have no choice but to play a more active role in shaping Israeli policy by using our leverage to change the present course,” he said.

“If extremists continue to unduly influence Israeli policy, then the administration should use the tools at its disposal to make sure our support for Israel is aligned with our broader goal of achieving long-term peace and stability in the region,” he added. “I believe this would make a lasting two two-state solution more likely.”
John Podhoretz: The Shame of Schumer
Simply put, the deposition or removal of Bibi Netanyahu would neither further the “cause” of the two-state solution, which is dead for now and probably for a long time, nor change the approach to the war in Gaza one bit.

So much for the policy implications of Schumer’s speech. Now for the geopolitical implications. Imagine Mike Mansfield, Senate Majority Leader in the 1970s, calling for the collapse of the parliamentary government in Great Britain; or Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole calling for a new government in Australia in the 1990s. You can’t. Because it would have been unthinkable to them. In our lifetimes, the only governments our public officials ever suggest should be replaced by their populaces are authoritarian and totalitarian ones.

Israel is neither, to put it mildly. But Israel is a problem—for Democrats, in 2024. Or at least they believe it is, and Biden has been trying to split the baby since October 7. The administration says and acts as though Israel has the right to defend itself, and has backed its stated policy of destroying Hamas. But the Bidenites don’t want their leftist and Arabist and progressive constituencies to get so mad they will stay home or vote for Trump.

Those of us who support the Israeli goal of destroying Hamas have to take seriously the fact that the Biden people believe they are endangering themselves politically and give them some running room in the way they’ve given Israel running room. The administration’s policy toward Israel since October 7 seems almost miraculous because he hasn’t bent backward, or changed course, or made concrete demands that Israel cease its efforts. No other American leader has given Israel the leeway or the runway he has. The war has been on for five months now.

Now look. I am a conservative and I’ve been around a long time, so believe me when I say I’ve had contempt for Joe Biden for nearly 40 years—since the first time I heard him speak, and speak, and speak, and speak, and speak, at a lunch at the Washington Times in 1986. A question was posed. He opened his mouth to answer it. He closed his mouth…45 minutes later.

But I’m still grateful for what he’s done—so far. And what he’s decided is that he wants people to think he supports Israel but just despises that monstrous Bibi. Everything bad is Bibi. Everything wrong is Bibi. Biden is Bibi’s enemy. Kamala Harris said last week that we have to draw a distinction between the government of Israel and its people. As I’ve shown above, this is ridiculous as a matter of fact. It’s even worse as a matter of political theory, since we do not draw such distinctions when we’re talking about a democratically elected government. But she’s a good soldier, and was playing her part, which is the demonization of Benjamin Netanyahu even as what Netanyahu does the Biden administration continues to support.

In this sense, Schumer was being a good soldier too. But a bad Jew.

For 25 years now, I’ve heard Schumer say at Jewish events that his name means “guard” in Hebrew. Schumer = shomer. “My people,” he would shout over a piece of rubber kosher chicken at the Marriott Marquis ballroom, “were the guardians at the gates of Jerusalem! And that is still the role that is most important to me!” When I first heard this spiel, after he was newly elected to the Senate, I found it discomfiting—shouldn’t his most important role be to represent the people of New York? Was he deliberately trying to create a dual-loyalties narrative? What on earth was he doing?

Well, if being a shomer for Israel was his supposed birthright, he just traded it for a mess of political pottage. The highest-ranking Jewish elected official in American history just used his status and his standing to provide cover to Biden for his “trash Bibi while supporting Israel” plan. And in so doing, he has defamed the Jewish state, he has slandered its legitimately elected prime minister, he has made outrageous and unseemly demands of a democratic ally, and he has turned himself into Biden’s Luca Brasi—a designated political hit man in service of a disingenuous argument.

I’m willing to forgive Biden for his game-playing here, at least until he changes course. Schumer deserves no forgiveness, and American Jews who support Israel especially after 10/7 have every reason now to view him with open contempt—and close their hearts and, most important, their wallets to him.
JPost Editorial: The US and Israel should stay out of their respective elections
US attempts to influence Israeli politics
But Netanyahu did not invent the wheel here. For decades, the US has sought to tip the political scales in Israel.

In 1992, then-US president George H.W. Bush withheld loan guarantees badly needed by Israel knowing this would help Yitzhak Rabin defeat Yitzhak Shamir in that year’s election.

In 1996, Bill Clinton did everything short of handing out leaflets for Shimon Peres to get him elected over Netanyahu. In 2022, President Joe Biden tried to prop up then-prime minister Yair Lapid by visiting here in July, even though new elections were to be held four months later that would pit Lapid against Netanyahu.

The problem with trying to interfere in another country’s elections is not only that it is wrong and breeds resentment – trust the country’s citizens to know what is good for them – but, as has been the case when US presidents looked to unseat Netanyahu, it often backfires.

Clinton, Obama, and Biden all did what they could to turn the public against Netanyahu, but in each case, it had the opposite effect.

Following Netanyahu’s speech to Congress in 2015, Obama’s refusal to meet him in Washington just weeks before an Israeli election was designed to signal to the Israeli public the president’s displeasure with the prime minister. The administration believed that the Israeli public valued a good relationship with Obama more than they liked Netanyahu. They were proven wrong.

Israelis are mature enough and intelligent enough to know what is good for their country and do not need America’s help in choosing their leaders. Likewise, the American people do not require input from Jerusalem to determine who should be its president.

Here’s a rule the US and Israel would be wise to honor, especially with the US approaching its election in November and Israel likely facing its new election in the not-too-distant future: You stay out of my elections, and I’ll stay out of yours.
'Israel not a banana republic': Netanyahu slams Schumer's 'undermining' speech
Israel expects US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to "refrain from undermining the Israeli government," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud faction said in a statement on Thursday.

Reacting to Schumer's speech, in which he accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of holding up peace in the Middle East and calling for elections in Israel, the Likud wrote that "Israel is not a banana republic, but a democracy proud of its choice in PM Netanyahu."

Israeli Ambassador to the United States Michael Herzog posted on X his response to statements by US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

"Israel is a sovereign democracy. It is unhelpful, all the more so as Israel is at war against the genocidal terror organization Hamas, to comment on the domestic political scene of a democratic ally. It is counterproductive to our common goals," Herzog wrote.

Opposition head MK Yair Lapid wrote that Schumer's speech "is proof that, one by one, Netanyahu is losing the staunchest supporters of Israel.

"What's worse is, he is doing it on purpose," the former prime minister charged. "Netanyahu is causing serious damage to the national effort to win the war and maintain Israel's security.

Former PM Bennett: Israel not a banana republic
Fellow former prime minister Naftali Bennett also sent a statement on the Senate majority leader's speech, stating that he "strongly opposes external political intervention in Israel's internal affairs.

"We are an independent nation, not a banana republic," Bennett wrote.


Israel’s moderate right wakes up, with Sa’ar breaking off from Gantz’s party
As new polling reveals that Israel’s voters are increasingly seeking a more pragmatic center-right choice for prime minister, politicians on the right are jockeying for position.

In the boldest move yet, security cabinet Minister Gideon Sa’ar has broken off from war cabinet Minister Benny Gantz’s National Union faction and is making a bid to join the three-man war cabinet. The maneuvering suggests an ongoing debate over what it means to be “right wing” in Israel as the war in Gaza grinds on and domestic issues such as Haredi conscription in the IDF reemerge.

Sa’ar’s call to join Gantz, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in the war cabinet, which Sa’ar argued is insufficiently hawkish, immediately brought the same demand from National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, leader of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party.

Sa’ar, who has served in several cabinet posts, was once one of the most popular figures in Likud, viewed as Netanyahu’s likely successor. He left the Likud in 2020 to establish his own party, after losing a Likud leadership primary against Netanyahu. In light of lackluster polling, he merged his list with Gantz’s ahead of the 2022 election.

Sa’ar announced the split from Gantz after months of rumors of discord within the National Union and reports that he was in talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (This iteration of Sa’ar’s party is so new that it does not have an English name yet; its Hebrew name roughly translates to “the statesmanlike right,” but native English speakers working with Sa’ar are still using “New Hope,” the previous name, until an official name is determined.)
Daniel Greenfield: Biden’s ‘Trojan Pier’ for Gaza
The Trojan pier is not only about bypassing Israel, but also Egypt. The administration’s vision is that the new arrangement will allow it to directly move materials into Gaza without having to get permission from either Israel or Egypt. And that’s a major victory for the terrorists.

Currently, the Israeli military is saying that it will coordinate the construction and inspect the cargo being transferred into Gaza, but that is yet another mistake in a series of them. Once the system is in place and if Israel has been pressured into withdrawing, it gives the terrorists a direct connection to their allies on the outside. And that includes so-called humanitarian groups.

Biden’s actions are a violation of Israel’s sovereignty. After a decade and a half of trying to bottle up Hamas after the group seized power due to Condoleezza Rice’s push for elections, Biden has decided to uncork the bottle. And while that’s bad for Israel, it’s also bad for America.

The last quarter century has been a series of painful lessons in the cost of trying to win the hearts and minds of Islamic terrorists. Having learned nothing from Afghanistan and Iraq, Biden is bent on repeating the same lunatic experiment by “flooding” Gaza with aid and rebuilding it. If he’s hoping for gratitude, the locals throwing U.S. aid packages in the trash aren’t showing it.

Nor will they.

The United States spent American lives bailing out Iraqi Shiites and Syrian Sunnis only to have them kill Americans. Obama’s Arab Spring toppled Yemen’s government and turned the Red Sea into a terror zone for international shipping. The Iran Deal gave the terror regime in Tehran billions of dollars that it used to wage war across the region. And the Biden administration helped negotiate the deals to appease Hamas that led directly to the Oct 7 atrocities.

After all that, the Biden administration wants to open up Gaza to the rest of the world.

If this latest treasonous episode of nation building succeeds, the Israelis will pay the price, but so will all of us. The ‘trojan pier’ is not about delivering aid, it’s about giving the terrorists a gateway to the world. And when that gateway is in place, the world will burn even faster.
Pro-Israel Americans need to send Biden a message
Biden should know the Arab/Muslim community is not monolithic. Only about a quarter of American Muslims are of Arab descent, so not all are part of the anti-Israel lynch mob. The Lebanese, who are also concentrated in Dearborn, Mich., are mostly Christians who abhor the Palestinians because they made their lives hellish in Lebanon.

Israel’s detractors will most likely hold their noses and vote for Biden. They could sit out the election, but it’s hard to imagine them shifting to the Muslim-banning Trump. It would be typical, though, for the Palestinians and their supporters to cut off their noses to spite their faces. Just as Palestinians would rather live as they do than accept a Jewish state, their supporters here prefer throwing a tantrum and the election to Trump to accepting the defense of our ally against the people who would persecute them if they lived under their rule.

Now is the time for us to stand united in defense of Israel. We cannot afford to let a vocal minority drown out our voices. Let us remind Biden that the strength of our support for Israel far outweighs the influence of those who seek to undermine it.

By voting uncommitted, we can send a powerful message and ensure America’s commitment to Israel remains unwavering.


Blinken: Israel’s ‘job No. 1’ is protecting, aiding Gazans
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday that protecting and aiding residents of Gaza is Israel’s primary mission as it wages war against the Hamas terrorist group.

“We look to the government of Israel to make sure this is a priority. Protecting civilians, getting people the assistance they need—that has to be job No. 1, even as they do what is necessary to defend the country and to deal with the threat posed by Hamas,” the top American diplomat told reporters in Washington after a meeting with his international counterparts on Gaza.

The foreign ministers from Britain, Cyprus, the European Union, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates spoke with Blinken about the initiative underway to establish a temporary pier off the Gaza coast, announced by U.S. President Joe Biden during his State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress last week.

Hamas is still holding 134 of the 253 Israelis it abducted during its bloody Oct. 7 assault on the northwestern Negev. Their safe return is one of the three goals set forth by the Israeli War Cabinet—the other two being the destruction of Hamas and ensuring that Gaza can never again threaten Israel.


Qatar emir proposed expelling Hamas officials in meet with Blinken days after Oct. 7
Qatar’s Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani proposed expeling Hamas’s leaders from Doha during a meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken days after the terror group’s October 7 onslaught, two officials familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel on Wednesday.

The proposal was made in somewhat of a roundabout way during the emir’s opening remarks at an October 13 closed-door meeting in Doha with Blinken. Thani began by expressing his horror over Hamas’s attack in which some 1,200 people in Israel were slaughtered and another 253 were abducted into Gaza. He then asked whether it was time for the US to ask Qatar to expel the Hamas’s leaders, the two officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

When Blinken began his own remarks, he didn’t respond directly to the emir’s proposal but did go on to say that he thought it would be better for Qatar to use its contacts with Hamas — through the office it allowed the terror group to establish in Doha in 2012 at Washington’s behest — to mediate between the Gaza war parties to secure a hostage deal, the officials recalled. They added that the US secretary of state also clarified that it would not be “business as usual” for Hamas in Qatar once the conflict concludes.

Qatar has come under increasing pressure for what critics in the Israeli government — along with some US Republicans — say has been its refusal to lean hard enough on Hamas to agree to a hostage deal with Israel, including by threatening to oust the terror group’s leadership in Doha; and the back-and-forth in October 13 meeting revealed a more complex picture.

The US State Department declined to comment on the record, but an American source familiar with the matter said Blinken and Thani discussed the issue of Hamas’s presence in Doha and that the secretary told the emir to focus on securing the release of the hostages in the short term, adding that it wouldn’t be “business as usual with Hamas” in the long term.
US sanctions three Jewish men, two outposts in Judea, Samaria
Washington announced sanctions against three more Jewish men in Judea and Samaria who it accused of undermining “peace, security and stability in the West Bank.”

In the Thursday announcement, the Biden administration said the three “undermine the national security and foreign-policy objectives of the United States, including the viability of a two-state solution, ensuring Israelis and Palestinians can attain equal measures of security, prosperity and freedom, and reducing the risk of regional destabilization.”

Recent polling suggests that most Israelis reject a Palestinian state alongside a Jewish one in exchange for ending the war with Hamas and normalizing with Saudi Arabia.

Washington alleged that Zvi Bar Yosef “engaged in repeated violence and attempts to engage in violence against Palestinians in the West Bank” from a farm that he owns and “prevents local Palestinian farmers from accessing and using their lands.”

The Biden administration accused Moshe Sharvit, who also owns a farm, of having “repeatedly harassed, threatened and attacked Palestinian civilians and Israeli human-rights defender.”


US would support limited, pinpoint IDF op against high-value targets in Rafah — report
US officials have relayed to their Israeli counterparts that the Biden administration would support a limited operation in Gaza’s southernmost city, Rafah, that would prioritize “high-value” Hamas targets in and underneath the city instead of a large-scale offensive, the Politico site reported Wednesday, citing four US officials.

The US has opposed an Israeli offensive in Rafah — believed to be Hamas’s last stronghold and home to its last four battalions — without a plan to protect over a million displaced Gazans who have found refuge in the city from fighting in the northern and central parts of the Palestinian enclave. Other countries have also warned Israel against an invasion of Rafah.

Two Israeli officials told Politico that the Israel Defense Forces is still developing a plan for protecting the civilians.

But unnamed US officials told Politico that in private meetings, top administration officials have told the Israelis that the US would back a strategy for “counterterrorism operations” in Rafah rather than the full-scale war waged elsewhere in Gaza.

All the officials spoke to Politico on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matters.

An Israeli official told the outlet that some kind of offensive or operation in Rafah is inevitable.

“At the end of the day, we cannot win this war without defeating Hamas’s battalions in Rafah,” the official said.


FDD: How to Ensure Israel Has the Weapons It Needs
Since the October 7 Hamas terror attack, the United States has provided Israel with an enormous number and variety of weapons, which have played a vital role in helping Israel defend itself. Yet some in the United States have called for curtailing or stopping the flow of weapons to Israel, leaving Israelis concerned that the United States might not have its back in a future war.1 Accordingly, many Israelis are pushing to dramatically expand Israel’s defense industrial base (DIB) so it can meet its own needs for weapons and reduce its dependence on the United States.2

To ensure Israel has the weapons it needs in the future, it should pursue a hybrid strategy focused on quickly acquiring key munitions in large quantities from the United States when possible while making targeted investments to expand Israel’s domestic DIB. Israel is a technological superpower, not an industrial one, lacking the capacity to build many of the platforms, weapons, and munitions it needs. While Israel seeks “to defend itself, by itself,” its already outsized defense budget is not sufficient to meet current requirements, raising serious doubts as to its ability to afford a large, across-the-board DIB expansion. But at the same time, between the political realities of the American left and isolationist right and the increased pressure on America’s DIB, Israel needs to reduce its reliance on the United States, particularly for the munitions it most needs to fight enduring battles on multiple fronts.

By focusing on targeted DIB expansions for the munitions most likely to be in short supply from the United States in the future (whether for practical or political reasons), aligning American and Israeli DIB initiatives where possible, and establishing select manufacturing redundancies in both countries, Israel can effectively stockpile the weapons it needs for near-term conflicts, maintain investments in high-tech research and development, and still make its own DIB somewhat less dependent on Washington.

To explain why this is the best approach, this memo discusses the security assistance the United States has provided Israel since the October 7 terror attack, explains growing Israeli concerns about the future of such assistance, and recommends policies that Israel should pursue in the short- to medium-term to ensure it has the means to defend itself and its citizens in future conflicts. Admittedly, significant reform of Israel’s DIB will take decades, but this memo focuses on some initial steps that Israel should take to put it in a better position for a major war later this decade while jumpstarting necessary first steps in a process to enhance Israel’s DIB that will take a generation.
The target: Hamas' strategic brain
It isn't difficult to understand the considerable degree of caution being adopted by Israel with regard to the possibility that one of the most senior figures in Hamas, Marwan Issa, was killed in an IDF targeting operation on Saturday night. On numerous occasions in the past, Israel has bragged about targeting senior terrorists, only to later discover that they were in fact completely unharmed.

Mohammed Deif is a living example of this: Despite a number of attempts to target him and hopes that he had indeed been killed or at least severely wounded, photos and video clips captured by the IDF during the current war have clearly shown that he is in much better shape than anybody in Israel could have possibly imagined. Issa, better known in the Gaza Strip by his nom de guerre Abu al-Baraa, is the less well-known member of the Hamas 'triumvirate' that has ruled the Gaza Strip in recent years.

He does not enjoy the public aura surrounding Yahya Sinwar or the military reputation of Mohammed Deif, but his importance to the organization is no less critical than that of his two partners in the leadership structure. The reports describing him as a subordinate or "underling" of Deif do not do justice to the reality of the situation; Issa is the brilliant strategic brain among this threesome, he is also the individual who serves as the liaison between Deif and Sinwar – and there are those who even claim that he is the balancing factor who often 'irons out the creases' and calms things down in the complex relationship between these two top men.

Issa was born in 1965 in the Al-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. He is among the close group of confidants who surrounded Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the founder of Hamas, and in the past, he served a five-year prison sentence in Israel for his activity in the terrorist organization. Since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in 2007 he has amassed tremendous power and following the successful IDF targeting of Ahmed Ja'abari in 2012, he was appointed overall commander of the Hamas military force. He took pains to maintain a low public profile and refrained almost completely from any public appearances.

Issa paid a heavy price for his part in terrorist activity. His eldest son, Baraa, was wounded in 2008 and subsequently died several months later from his wounds, while his youngest son, Mohammed, was killed only last December. Issa himself has been on the terrorist wanted lists in the USA and Europe, and Israel has tried to assassinate him on several occasions in the past, including during IDF Operation Guardian of the Walls in 2021.
Strike on UNRWA facility in Rafah took out Hamas commander who stole aid, says IDF
The IDF said a strike Wednesday on an UNRWA facility in Rafah killed Muhammad Abu Hasna, a commander in Hamas' operations unit who was involved in seizing humanitarian aid entering Gaza and distributing it to Hamas operatives.

Abu Hasna was involved in "integrating extensive activity of the various Hamas units, was in contact with the field operatives of Hamas and directed them," the IDF said.

He was also tasked with a Hamas intelligence war room that collected information on IDF movements.

Abu Hasna's elimination "significantly harms the functioning of various Hamas units in Rafah."


Jaw dropping: How Hamas compromised security cameras in the runup to Oct. 7
In recent years, the IDF, Mossad, and Shin Bet security agency have noticed increased activity by Hamas when it comes to its intelligence-gathering efforts. As time passed, it seemed that the terror organization, which has always sought to obtain as much information as possible about Israel, was striving to step up its efforts in this field, in a dramatic way.

The central body in Hamas that dealt with this was the "Military Intelligence Department" – Moddatz, as it is called in Israel – which before the war had 2,100 operatives, which got their equipment and know-how from Iran and Hezbollah. The dominant figure in Hamas' intelligence array was Ayman Nofal, who was eliminated in the first days of the war. The IDF Military Intelligence Directorate, which closely monitored the department, was convinced that it had information on the entire range of Hamas' intelligence gathering apparatus.

But only after Oct. 7, when the IDF forces carried out a wide-scale operation into the Gaza Strip and raided the offices and retrieved the data on the server farms that Hamas had set up underground and the computers connected to them, did the true extent of Hamas' capabilities in intelligence become apparent. What was revealed there left Israeli intelligence officials speechless.

One example that illustrates the intelligence lapse is clearly illustrated in the security cameras that were compromised by Hamas. Although the IDF was aware of Hamas successfully hacking some civilian security cameras in Israeli communities to collect information, only after entering Gaza did the enormous scope of this Hamas endeavor become clear: The terrorist organization managed to get access to dozens of cameras, many of them inside kibbutzim on the Gaza border. The military now admits that the camera issue had been flagged but was not addressed with the necessary urgency.

Another area in which Hamas' real capabilities came to light after the war began is cyber warfare. In recent years, the IDF has noticed many attempts by Hamas' Moddatz elements to hack into soldiers' mobile phones. As was the case with the camera hacking, only after entering Gaza and seizing Hamas' servers in the tunnels did it become clear that this was just the tip of the iceberg. The IDF now understands that there were Hamas attacks that went undetected in real-time and that despite the organization's relatively limited cyber capabilities, the intelligence information it extracted from the phones it did manage to hack served it well on October 7.

In addition, Hamas succeeded in developing reconnaissance capabilities that included drones, which hovered over the Gaza Strip and carried out oblique photography of Israeli territory. Here too, Israel was aware of this activity taking place.


A Visit to the Qatari-Built Hamas Stronghold in Gaza
The Hamad neighborhood in Khan Yunis is comprised of luxury homes in multi-story buildings, built by Qatar, located just a few hundred feet from the sea, with a view of the ruins of the Israeli communities of Netzarim and Kfar Darom.

"We have been fighting for five months already, but this is the toughest combat zone we have been in so far. The terrorists here are suicidal, they fight for every square foot," IDF officers of the Commando Brigade said.

"This neighborhood looks nice, but it is actually one big battlefield," says Lt.-Col. M.

"There isn't a single location where we didn't encounter terrorists or ammunition. This is a very significant battle with very significant achievements. Unfortunately, two of our fighters were also killed right here."

"There isn't a day that we don't encounter the enemy here. There is a very large number of them here, an unusual amount compared to what we have experienced so far in Khan Yunis," explains Col. Y.

"There are a lot of terrorists who decided to retreat to this area in recent months from other areas."

Outside one of the buildings I met a physician for one of the units, a reservist who has been serving since Oct. 7. A psychiatrist by profession, he told me, "Morale is high, it's amazing. I wish everyone had the level of courage and the will to win like these fighters."

In one of the buildings, a terrorist used his family members as human shields. The fighters identified a woman and two children raising their hands, with the barrel of the terrorist's gun behind them. The forces managed to eliminate the terrorist, with the woman only lightly injured.


IDF troops in Khan Yunis find rocket launcher next to school
Soldiers from an elite Israel Defense Forces counter-terror unit found a missile and rocket launcher next to a school in the former Hamas stronghold of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza, the army said on Thursday.

During the targeted raids, troops also located missiles, explosives and other weapons under a bed in the home of a Hamas operative, according to the IDF.

The rocket launcher was destroyed.


Israeli wounded in Negev terror stabbing
One person was wounded on Thursday in a terrorist attack at a gas station near Beit Kama in the northern Negev, close to the Bedouin city of Rahat.

Magen David Adom emergency medical personnel treated the victim, a man in his 50s, at the scene before evacuating him to Soroka Medical Center in Beersheva in serious condition.

The terrorist was neutralized by the victim using his personal weapon, the Ynet news outlet reported.

“When we arrived, there was a lot of commotion and near one of the shops a man was lying unconscious and suffering from penetrating injuries to his body,” said senior MDA medic Kalman Ganzburg.

“We immediately put him in an intensive care vehicle and transported the victim to the hospital while CPR was being performed,” he added.

The Israel Security Agency later identified the terrorist as Fadi Abu Latif, 22, originally from the Gaza Strip.

Abu Latif’s mother is from Rahat and his father from Gaza, where his parents currently reside.

Abu Latif, a resident of Rahat, lived in the Strip until the age of 18. He was granted Israeli citizenship in 2019 after getting married.

Following an assessment at the attack site, Israel Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai called on the public to remain alert and report suspicious people or objects. The Merhavim Regional Council, which administers the area, instructed civilian security guards to increase vigilance.


Career soldier, 51, killed in stabbing in south; terrorist shot dead by victim
A senior non-commissioned officer in the Israel Defense Forces was fatally stabbed in a terror attack at a gas station in southern Israel on Thursday. The assailant, an Israeli citizen originally from the Gaza Strip, was shot dead by the victim.

Another three people were slightly wounded.

The attack took place inside a branch of the Aroma coffee chain at Beit Kama Junction, just north of Beersheba.

Surveillance camera footage from the attack showed the assailant approaching Chief Warrant Officer Uri Moyal from behind, pulling out a knife and stabbing him in the back. Amid a struggle, the terrorist was seen attempting to also stab Moyal in the neck. The pair then fell to the ground, as another man was seen trying to pull the knife from the terrorist’s hand.

Moyal was seen managing to get up, then opening fire at the terrorist with his handgun, before collapsing outside the cafe.

Moyal, 51 from the southern city of Dimona, served as a senior technology and maintenance NCO at the Nahal Infantry Brigade’s training base.

The Magen David Adom ambulance service said it took the victim to Soroka Hospital in Beersheba in critical condition, where he was pronounced dead shortly upon arrival.

The terrorist, a 22-year-old resident of the southern Bedouin city of Rahat, was killed.


Israel Intends to "Flood" Gaza with Humanitarian Aid
The Israel Defense Forces is planning to "flood" Gaza with supplies, spokesperson Rear-Adm. Daniel Hagari said Wednesday. The IDF is working on opening up multiple routes to Gaza by land, sea and air. Israel will provide the security for the floating pier that the U.S. will build and the supplies arriving at it, and will maintain a secure corridor for their distribution in northern Gaza.

Another sea route is already in operation. The World Central Kitchen has launched a barge-style ship from Cyprus carrying supplies meant for Gaza. According to Hagari, this is "a pilot" which has been "fully coordinated" with Israel.

A new land route, used for the first time on Tuesday, enabled a convoy of six trucks, carrying food bought by private contractors in Gaza, through a new road built by the IDF south of Gaza City. Hagari added that Israel will continue to coordinate airdrops of supplies to Gaza by the U.S., Jordan and other countries.


King of Gaza: Yahya Sinwar still holds large Palestinian support in Gaza
A special analysis conducted by the business intelligence company "Buzzilla" for Maariv shows that in the last three weeks, the general discourse on Arabic language social media in Gaza has been mainly positive towards the Hamas terrorist organization in general and towards its leader in the Gaza Strip, Yahya Sinwar, in particular.

The data analysis showed that the general discourse towards Sinwar is positive—a surprising figure since discourse on social media tends to be critical.

The company's experts point out that it is possible to detect an increase in the positive discourse towards Sinwar personally when threats against him from the Israeli side come up in the media.

For example, after the IDF spokesman stated that "the fighters will get to Sinwar alive or dead," many reactions were seen on Gazan social media praising him as the one who surprised Israel, and despite all the intelligence in Israel's possession, he is still in hiding.

No conversation calling for the release of the abductees was found during the inspection.


Hamas executes Gaza clan ‘prince’ in message to potential ‘collaborators’
Hamas has executed a “prince” of the Doghmush clan in Gaza City, sources in Gaza said on Thursday. The killing was a message to those considering cooperating with Israel, which is looking for ways to bypass the terror group in the enclave, according to the sources.

Israel has floated the idea of Gaza clans acting as partners in running the internal affairs of the Strip after Hamas has been eliminated. In January, Israel’s National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi and Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer submitted a plan to the Security Cabinet that looked to the clans to form part of the backbone of a post-war civil administration.

Pro-Hezbollah Lebanese news station Al-Mayadeen reported that the clans have rejected the proposal.

“We will remain supporters of the resistance, and the management of the Strip is an internal matter,” they said, according to the report.

“Even if there are tribes that want to say yes to Israel and participate in the management of the Strip, they know that this is a danger to their lives because Hamas has not yet been completely destroyed,” said a Palestinian source, cited by Israel Hayom on Tuesday.


Mom kidnapped by Hamas: Nurses at Gaza hospital cheered at captured ‘prey’
A Chicago-area mom abducted by Hamas during its Oct. 7 attack on Israel said her captors were greeted as heroes when she and her daughter arrived as hostages at a Gaza hospital.

“The minute we came in, all the nurses were standing there and going like this [cheering]. They were all so happy that they came back with prey, with Israeli-Jewish prey,” Judith Raanan told NewsNation’s Elizabeth Vargas in her first TV interview since the ordeal.

Raanan and her now 18-year-old daughter Natalie were the first hostages to be released by Hamas after the Oct. 7 attack.

At the hospital, Raanan said she interacted with a man she believed to be a “very high-ranked” Hamas leader who spoke “brilliant Hebrew.”

Just hours earlier on that Saturday morning, Raanan and her daughter had been sleeping in the Nahal Oz kibbutz near the Gaza border when they received a phone call warning them not to go outside.

“I started walking towards the room of my daughter, and that was also the moment that a rocket hit the bedroom where I was,” Raanan said.

It was the start of a massive Hamas ambush that ultimately left 1,200 people, mostly civilians, dead.

Realizing an attack was underway, Raanan explained to her daughter what was happening.

“I simply said, ‘Honey, do you remember how you’ve seen the movies? Those guys that have all this military artillery and stuff that come with guns and all? That’s what’s going to come through the door, so don’t panic.'”

Raanan recalls armed men bursting into the room while she and Natalie were still in their pajamas.

“My girl was afraid. She said, ‘Mom, I’m afraid to be raped.’ I said nobody’s going to do nothing to you,” Raanan said.

The attackers held the two at gunpoint and ordered them to convince neighbors to leave the safe rooms where they were hiding, Raanan said.

“He’s telling me, ‘You tell them to get out, you tell them to get out, or I’m going to bomb the whole building,'” she described.

Fearing the Israeli Air Force could arrive at any moment, the Hamas attackers rounded up the hostages they’d managed to capture and marched them, zip-tied and at gunpoint, through the desert to the Gaza border, Raanan said.
EXCLUSIVE'I was their trophy': Man, 19, held hostage in Gaza after being captured at Nova music festival tells of harrowing ordeal at hands of Hamas terrorists - including operation by 'scared' doctor performed without anaesthetic
A 19-year-old former Israeli hostage - who was operated on by a Gazan doctor without anaesthetic - has urged the world not to forget about the brutality of the October 7 terror attacks.

Itay Regev - who was kidnapped from a peace music festival alongside his sister Maya Regev, 21, and their 21-year-old friend Omer Shem Tov - blasted the world for not doing more to rescue the remaining hostages.

On October 7, Itay, Maya and Omer were chased by nine terrorists who shot at them relentlessly while they were fleeing the Nova music festival.

After being shot in both his legs he was tied up, loaded onto a pickup truck and paraded around the Gaza strip while Gazans laughed and cheered at him.

He was then smuggled through the underground Hamas terror tunnels and taken into a hospital where he was operated on by a 'sweaty and scared' doctor without anaesthesia.

After the operation terrorists disguised Itay as a corpse and later in a burqa before transporting him to a safe house.

Speaking about his experiences as a hostage he said: 'Inside Gaza I was kept in a locked room and I couldn't see the sky.

'I was given cans with food and every so often some pita to eat.

'My captures would torture me by telling me that other hostages had been killed in IDF airstrikes and that the Israeli Government didn't care about me.

'And everyday and in every moment I would think about my family and my parents.'

Itay - who was held prisoner inside three different houses in Gaza until he was eventually released after 54 days - said he was filled with hatred towards Hamas and those that were keeping him captive.

He said: 'One family that kept me captive would let their children come and look at me and point at my wounds.

'I felt like I was their trophy and like no one in Gaza cared about me.

'No one that I met is innocent.'


Debunking Ivy League Myths About Israel | Yoseph Haddad
Dave Rubin of “The Rubin Report” talks to Yoseph Haddad about how media and higher education systems are being infiltrated by anti-Semitic sentiments; how Israel has successfully been a society for Jews and also Arab Israelis like himself; the surprising stats about diversity within Israel; ignored facts that prove that Israel is falsely portrayed as an apartheid state; how Hamas targeted both Jews and Arabs in the October 7 attacks; why Israel must take control of every inch of Gaza to defeat Hamas; and much more.


The Israel Guys: The Conflict With Lebanon Is ALMOST At the BREAKING POINT
An Israeli-American soldier who was believed to be kidnapped by Hamas on October 7th, was just revealed by the IDF to be dead. Massive rocket barrages from Lebanon continue to rain down on northern Israel everyday, and still Joe Biden is still worried about saving the Hamas terrorists trapped inside of Rafah.




Italy refuses to deport Palestinian suspect to Israel, fearing ‘degrading treatment’
An Italian appeals court refused on Wednesday to send a suspected Palestinian terrorist to Israel, saying he risked “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment” if he was extradited.

The man, named by the court as Anan Kamal Afif Yaeesh, 36, was one of three Palestinians arrested in central Italy on suspicion they were planning attacks in an unspecified country.

Israel applied for the extradition of Yaeesh, but his lawyer opposed the request, presenting reports by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch on prison conditions for Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.

In a written ruling, a panel of three judges in the central city of L’Aquila sided with the defense, saying Yaeesh would face “acts constituting a violation of human rights” if the extradition request was granted.

They ruled that he should be kept in prison in Italy because he is being investigated by the public prosecutor’s office for the same charges for which Israel had requested his extradition.

The substance of the allegation against him was not discussed in the hearing. Israel has repeatedly said detainees and prisoners are treated in accordance with international law.

Israel, which is at war with the terror group Hamas in the Gaza Strip, has accused Yaeesh of financing a terror group from the Tulkarem refugee camp in the West Bank, called the Tulkarem Brigade.

Italy said on Monday the three arrested Palestinians had set up a cell linked to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed offshoot of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s secular nationalist Fatah party. It is considered a terrorist group by Israel, the European Union, and the United States.


Jewish man attacked by anti-Israel protesters at October 7 documentary screening in Logan Square
As anti-Israel protesters tried to block people from entering a Monday night screening of "Nova," a documentary about the October 7 Hamas massacre at the Nova Music Festival that killed hundreds, a Jewish attendee was attacked. Chicago police are now investigating.

Using megaphones, wearing masks and carrying posters, dozens of anti-Israel protesters blocked the entry to Logan Theatre Monday night for the presentation hosted by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. The protest also spilled over inside the lobby.

The protesters yelled "shame on you" to people attending a Jewish-sponsored event screening a documentary about the Hamas massacre of more than 300 people at the Nova Music Festival in Israel on October 7, 2023.

One Jewish man, who did not want to be identified for fears for his safety, walked into the building carrying a small Israeli flag.

"I did not say anything to anyone, as we walked up I did not look at anyone, I did not give anyone the finger, I simply walked up holding an Israeli flag," he said.

The man, who is in his late 50s, said one protester tried to yank the flag from his hand. The next thing he knew, he was being attacked by several protesters.

"A group of them was swinging me around and threw me into a parked car," the victim said. "I was completely surrounded by maybe six or seven that started punching me in the head."

Fortunately he was not seriously injured, but the attack has left him shocked and worried for the future of his Jewish children.

"I think it is disgusting you cannot walk down the street Jewish in 2024," he said.


Michael Gove names groups as he unveils extremism definition
Michael Gove has named five groups he said would be assessed against a new government definition of extremism.

The communities secretary told MPs he had concerns about the "Islamist orientation" of three of the organisations.

He also named two groups he said promoted a "Neo-Nazi ideology".

The new extremism definition applies to, but does not criminalise, groups promoting an ideology based on "violence, hatred or intolerance".

Groups judged to meet the new definition - expected to be named in the coming weeks - will be blocked from receiving government funding and meeting officials.

The definition has been met with a backlash from civil liberty and community groups, with two of the groups mentioned by Mr Gove already threatening legal action if they end up on the list.

The unveiling of the new definition comes amid the backdrop of heightened community tensions over the Israel-Hamas war, and political rows over the policing of pro-Palestinian marches in London.

The community secretary has said a list of organisations meeting the new definition will be drawn up following "careful" reviews of evidence and consultation with civil servants.

But speaking in the Commons, he said the British National Socialist Movement and Patriotic Alternative would see their activities assessed against the new definition.

He said the groups "promote Neo-Nazi ideology" and were "precisely the type of groups about which we should be concerned".

He also named the Muslim Association of Britain, Cage and Muslim Engagement and Development (MEND) as organisations that "give rise to concern for their Islamist orientation and views".


London’s ‘little Palestine’ to remove flags from buildings, schools and lampposts
Palestinian flags will start coming down from council buildings in Tower Hamlets after lawyers threatened legal action, mayor Lutfur Rahman has said.

Local residents told the JC in January that the flags – which first appeared on council-owned property soon after October 7 and have been seen on bus stops, lampposts and buildings – were “intimidatory”.

Many of the flags were put up in clusters around schools.

Some Jewish residents have considered leaving the borough, which has been dubbed ‘Little Palestine’ because of the ubiquitous flags.

Legal advocacy group UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), who had threatened legal action against the council, said they were “delighted” with the decision.

The council sought independent legal advice which allegedly agreed with the UKFLI view that the flags broke the law.

A freedom of information (FOI) request sent to the council by the JC has revealed it received 290 complaints or enquiries regarding Palestinian flags from October 2023 until now. This figure differed from the 355 number quoted in a separate FOI, raising questions about the council’s monitoring of the situation.

The council refused to comment on the legal status of the flags.


Hundreds block San Francisco airport terminal calling for Gaza truce
Hundreds of anti-war protesters demanding a ceasefire in Gaza and calling for an end to US military assistance for Israel blocked the international terminal at the San Francisco International Airport on Wednesday.

Footage from the scene showed protesters carrying banners with messages such as “Permanent Ceasefire Now,” “Stop the World for Gaza” and “Stop Arming Israel.” An ABC News affiliate put the number of demonstrators at more than 300.

“We do not want to be here. We are forced to be here because we have lost count of the petitions we’ve sent, the emails we’ve sent, of the meetings we’ve had with our congresspeople, of the days we’ve marched through the streets begging our government to hear the millions of voices for ceasefire,” said a protester, in footage shared by AJ+ reporter Dena Takruri on X.

Protests demanding an end to the war in Gaza have occurred in many US cities in recent months, including near airports and bridges in New York City and Los Angeles, vigils outside the White House, and marches in Washington.

This month, large protests were seen ahead of US President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address and the Oscars. Demonstrators have regularly interrupted Biden’s campaign events and speeches.

Airport officials said the international terminal remained open, but passengers were re-routed around the activity. Activists blocked the roadway outside the airport, marched in circles, and chanted slogans.




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