Thursday, March 28, 2024

03/28 Links Pt1: Israel’s Orwellian nightmare; How much evidence do you need of Hamas sexual abuse?; How Is the Palestinian Authority's Agenda Not Genocide?

From Ian:

Andrew Roberts: The West’s shameful betrayal of Israel gives Hamas the chance to kill again
Have we forgotten? Have we really forgotten so quickly the monstrous events of October 7 last year that we genuinely want an immediate ceasefire in Gaza before Hamas has been utterly destroyed as a military force and potential government there?

As we watched the British ambassador to the UN raise her hand at the Security Council meeting this week to vote for a ceasefire, alongside the Chinese and Russians, leaving our ally the US in the cold as the only member abstaining, do we not feel embarrassed, even ashamed? I know I do.

How proud I would have felt if we had actually had the guts to veto a resolution that is designed to prevent Israel from genuinely exercising her right to self-defence, which Britain and America were so quick to declare they believed in back in October – however, hypocritically, as it turns out. For Israel’s “right to self-defence” is utterly worthless if its forces are stopped from entering Rafah and annihilating the Hamas leadership there.

Hamas has already stated – and in this, at least, one can’t fault the group for its honesty – that it is committed to repeating October 7-style massacres as soon as it gets another chance.

As its spokesman Abu Obeida has stated, Hamas intends to make Israel “taste new ways of death”. The international community has clearly shown that it is happy to let Hamas have the opportunity, because the immediate ceasefire in the UN resolution is intended to be followed by “a lasting sustainable ceasefire”, in which Hamas would surely survive.

It will be hard even for Hamas to think up new ways of making Jews taste death considering what the terrorists did on October 7. Having dehumanised Jews after decades of officially-organised anti-Semitic propaganda to children as young as four, it visited death upon them in more vile, sadistic and depraved ways than can possibly be imagined. “Men, women, and children are shot, blown up, hunted, tortured, burned, and generally murdered,” wrote Graeme Wood in The Atlantic, “in any horrible manner you could predict, and some that you might not.”

Yet a mere five months later, we have shifted our position enough to give Hamas a lifeline, and have joined China and Russia in calling for a ceasefire before the terrorists are destroyed. In military doctrine, the word destruction means: “To render the enemy incapable of accomplishing his mission without reconstitution.”

Hamas’s stated mission is to destroy both Israel and Jews. Preventing any such reconstitution means forcing it into a Berlin 1945 moment in Rafah. As Benny Gantz, former Israeli deputy prime minister and Israel Defence Forces (IDF) chief of the general staff, has pointed out: “You don’t send the fire brigade to put out 80 per cent of the fire.”
Melanie Phillips: Israel’s Orwellian nightmare
President Joe Biden has conditioned military aid to Israel on the requirement that it submits a report within 45 days proving compliance with international law. Britain’s Foreign Secretary, Lord Cameron, has threatened to stop arms sales to Israel unless it allows the Red Cross access to Hamas detainees.

Seeking to explain this vicious treatment by Israel’s treacherous allies, commentators cite the need to appease American Muslims and radical Democrats in the U.S. presidential election; the anti-Israel Obama-era retreads in the Biden administration; and in Britain, the outsourcing of foreign policy by the inexperienced Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to Cameron, who shares the poisonous disdain for Israel that’s been entrenched in the Foreign Office for decades.

Plausible as those reasons are, there’s also a deeper issue. Israel’s current Orwellian treatment at Western hands should be no surprise because this treatment has been Orwellian for decades.

Under existential attack since its rebirth in 1948, Israel has repeatedly been forced by America and the West into making lethal concessions to its would-be destroyers that have left it in a state of permanent siege and under repeated attack.

America and the West have feted Palestinian leaders as statesmen even while those leaders brainwash generations into believing it’s their highest duty to kill every Jew. The Americans have armed and trained Palestinian police officers who have subsequently mounted terrorist attacks on Israelis.

The “two-state solution” is being insisted upon by the U.S. and Britain, even though it has been repeatedly offered to the Palestinians who have rejected it because their aim is to wipe Israel off the map.

The reason America and Britain have left Israel to swing in the wind is that they think the genocidal Palestinians have a legitimate case. The shocking treatment of Israel today by its so-called allies is merely a continuation of that decades-old Orwellian nightmare.
The President’s War Against the Jews
Biden owns this war imposed on Israel. The president inherited a Middle East marked by a bankrupt Iran and amicable relations between Israel and Arab countries with more in the works, thanks to President Trump’s historic Abraham Accords. Biden reversed course, enriched Tehran, funded terrorists and destabilized the Middle East—setting the stage for Oct. 7.

Biden shows no sign of reversing even one of his deadly failures. Instead of taking responsibility for his policy mistakes, he blames Israel for not going further and providing Iran with a launching pad on its border by establishing a Palestinian state. Perversely, the attacks of Oct. 7 have only led Biden to kick his effort to establish a Palestinian state into high gear.

Biden claims Hamas is different from the Palestinians. But an overwhelming majority of Palestinians, whether in Gaza or Judea and Samaria, cheered the Oct. 7 atrocities. Videos show Palestinians handing out candy in celebration, and a November 2023 research poll conducted by the Arab World for Research and Development (AWRAD) found, “[a]n overwhelming percentage of Palestinians support the October 7 massacre (75%), reject coexistence with Israel (85.9%), are committed to creation of a Palestinian state ‘from the river to the sea’ (74.7%) as the end of the Israeli Palestinian conflict … there is more support for the 10/7 massacre from the Palestinians resident in Judea and Samaria (83.1%) than those residing in the Gaza Strip (63.6%).”

Regardless of Biden’s wishes, the “river to the sea” crowd isn’t interested in living in peace next to a Jewish state: They don’t believe Israel should exist at all. While Israel’s cabinet overwhelmingly rejected Biden’s push for a so-called Palestinian state, with strong backing from 99 of the 120 members of Knesset also voicing their rejection, Biden and his administration continue to push their animus against the Jewish state while fueling rampant antisemitism in America. Biden’s silence, at his State of the Union, about the alarming rise of antisemitism throughout the United States, including the glorification of Hamas terrorism and intimidation and physical violence perpetrated against Jews in America’s towns and cities, was deafening. That’s because his party’s loyal foot soldiers among college and university administrators and professors or their K-12 equivalents, the media, Democratic politicians, or leftist NGOs, include a large number of antisemites, who live openly and happily in the Democratic Party. As Ryan Mauro, Capitol Research Center national security analyst explained, “the disturbing reality is that Hamas’s allies in the U.S. have a significant foothold in the non-profit sector. Major left-wing organizations are funding Hamas’s sympathizers and those who indirectly help Hamas by waging a political war against Israel.”

It was 50 years ago in 1973, when then Sen. Biden was in Israel, sitting with PM Meir. Biden recalled her saying to him that he “look[ed] so worried.” She assured him not to worry, sharing “we have a secret weapon in our conflict with the Arabs. You see, we have no place else to go.” Perhaps it took these 50 years for Biden to figure out how to exploit Meir’s words about Israel’s “secret weapon” to effectuate the ouster of the Jewish people from their ancestral homeland.

Whether Biden and his party are blinded by ideology, lack moral clarity, or both, the fact remains that the battle that Israel is fighting has existential stakes, not only for the Jewish state but for all Western civilization—regardless of party affiliation. Those who understand what is at stake in this fight must stand with Israel in her battle to achieve total victory—not only against Hamas and its barbaric ideology, but also against those in high places in our own country who support them.
Saving Israel from Itself?
The Israelis, according to some Americans, just don't understand their real interests and pursue policies that could lead to the ruin of the Jewish state. The role of Washington, as a friend, is to press Jerusalem to change its diplomatic direction.

American State Department official George Ball in 1977 published an article in Foreign Affairs titled: "How to Save Israel in Spite of Herself" - which soon became part of the American diplomatic lexicon.

The notion that the U.S. had to save Israel from itself to pursue Arab-Israeli peace is a meaningless intellectual exercise. Two years later (1979), Israel signed the peace agreement with Egypt that responded to its national security needs.

Moreover, the Oslo peace process with the Palestinians resulted from an Israeli initiative with very little involvement by the Americans, proving that Israel is an independent diplomatic player that is driven by its interests and can make peace with the Arabs without an American "savior."

In principle, the American president is elected to steward and secure U.S. interests rather than those of foreign countries like Israel. Israel's citizens didn't elect him, which suggests that he doesn't have an obligation to save them and certainly not to make decisions about war and peace in their name. The government elected by Israeli citizens has that responsibility.

Politicians and pundits have to understand that if they fail to convince the majority of Israelis that an independent Palestinian state would pose no threat to Israel, such a state will not be established.


JPost Editorial: How much evidence do you need of Hamas sexual abuse?
On October 7, we saw Israelis join the list of victims of wartime sexual violence. We already knew about it, not from the testimonies given on the Israeli side, but because of the blatant pride that Hamas flaunted as the terrorist organization broadly shared its horrific exploits.

Slowly but surely, more and more stories came to light. Women and men alike were raped at gunpoint, gang-raped, with their genitalia brutalized beyond recognition and, in some cases, even set aflame. The footage of many of these attacks was paraded proudly online.

Still, somehow, many around the world did not believe the Israeli victims. The leading voices of the #MeToo movement – the very movement outspoken in calling for the broad and all-encompassing belief that, first and foremost, victims of sexual violence must be believed – were among those who turned a blind eye to the horrors experienced by these Israelis. They claimed there was no evidence, that Israel was the oppressor, and that the more powerful body in a two-sided conflict could not fall victim to such things. Well, clearly, it did.

Of course, they ignored the fact that the very group committing these terrible acts was sharing them openly. They looked away. They insisted that evidence needed to be presented from the Israeli side. Still, for that to happen, it is the survivors – traumatized, terrorized, and victimized – who must make the enormous personal sacrifice and come forward at the expense of their mental well-being just for some rape deniers to have the proof they demand.

A United Nations delegation toured Israel for two weeks, collected evidence, and presented a report saying there was definitive proof of sexual violence used against the Israeli victims. The UN, an organization that has not been particularly friendly towards Israel since the start of the war, admitted that Israeli women were raped and tortured.

Slowly but surely, however, women are coming forward – not just to present their testimonies to the support systems in place or to the relevant authorities, but publicly.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist admits to raping woman during Oct 7 attack
A terrorist from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) admitted to raping an Israeli woman and murdering civilians during the Hamas-led October 7 attack, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) disclosed on Thursday with a video of the interrogation.

"The devil took over me, I laid her down, started undressing her and did what I did,” Manar Mahmoud Muhammad Kasem, a PIJ operative in its naval forces, told the intelligence officer from the IDF’s Unit 504.

Kasem was caught during an IDF operation at Shifa hospital in Gaza, along with hundreds of other PIJ and Hamas terrorists who had retaken the compound and its surrounding believing the Israeli forces were no longer fighting in the area.

During the investigation by the IDF’s Intelligence Directorate, Kasem first described his role in PIJ as well as how he was called to take part in the October 7 attack, from where he breached the fence into Israel, as well as how he was armed with a gun and two grenades, and described in precise detail the atrocities committed.

After another terrorist on his jeep was hit in the head, Kasem said out of fear he entered the Kibbutz and the first house he found, describing how a woman was frightened when she saw him, and while she was calling out for help he threw her on to a sofa and that’s when he said, "The devil took over me.”

When asked what exactly he did, Kasem replied, “I slept with her.” And the IDF intelligence officer asked for a clarification on what he meant, since they did not “sleep.”

“I raped her,” Kasem admitted, saying the woman tried to push him away.

Toward the end of the interrogation, Kasem heard gunshots and attempted to leave the Kibbutz but ran into men on the way that were not in army uniforms and shot at them, hitting at least one who fell to the ground, then he threw one of his grenades.


Sen. Graham: U.S. Won't Support Gaza War Pause without Hostage Release
The U.S. will only support a pause to the Gaza war that includes the release of hostages, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) said in Israel on Wednesday as he warned Hamas not to misunderstand Washington's abstention on the recent UN Security Council ceasefire resolution. "Hamas can't believe for a second that Israel would pause the fighting without the return of the hostages," Graham said.

"The resolution debacle, for lack of a better word...will soon be behind us. The one thing that Israel cannot afford is mixed signals." He noted that the wording of the UN resolution "created doubt" and that confusion has to be erased. Israel has a "moral obligation to its people to destroy Hamas," backed by international law, and that Washington would in the end support an IDF Rafah operation. "I do know this administration agrees [that] to ask Israel not to destroy these [Hamas] battalions [in Rafah] is just off the table."

"Israel has to destroy Hamas militarily. There is no hope for peace until you do that. The idea that Israel is somehow doing less than this [or] that Israel is violating international law. I don't buy that." He also dismissed claims that Israel was deliberately starving Palestinians, explaining that no other army in modern-day history has done as much as Israel to provide for enemy civilians during wartime.

Graham also stressed that Congress does not support slowing down weapons sales to Israel. "There would be a violent reaction in Congress if there was a whiff of any suggestion that we're slowing down armaments to Israel, which is fighting for its very existence. So I think there will be a bipartisan pushback."

"UNRWA as an organization is dead to the United States and the people of Israel. It must be replaced in terms of health care, basic necessities like food, as well as education....Somebody needs to pull the Palestinian school system up by its roots and destroy it.
" The lonely Democrats opposing Biden’s U.N. vote abstention
Few Democratic lawmakers, even staunch supporters of Israel, have thus far publicly criticized the Biden administration’s decision to abstain from a United Nations Security Council vote earlier this week calling for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.

So far, there have been just a few notable exceptions — some of whom have blasted the administration in strident terms.

“It’s appalling the U.S. allowed passage of a resolution that fails to condemn Hamas,” Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) said on X after Monday’s vote. “The UN has always been unwilling to condemn this group of terrorists, cowards and rapists. We must stand with Israel and stop pandering to the political fringe or Hamas apologists.”

The day after the vote, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) expressed similar concerns.

“I fear that yesterday’s abstention will only embolden Hamas and delay the safe return of the hostages — including the Americans,” he said in a statement. “I’m shocked that the Administration allowed the biased-UN to pass a resolution that failed to criticize Hamas, a designated foreign terrorist organization, that five months ago, brutally killed, raped, burned alive, and kidnapped more than 1,200 civilians. The resolution also called for an unconditional ceasefire without requiring the release of the hostages.”

Gottheimer linked the U.N. vote to Hamas’ decision to walk away from hostage talks. He said the vote is consistent with a long record of anti-Israel bias at the U.N.

“We must continue to stand with our key ally, Israel, and work to bring all of the hostages home, crush the terrorists, and provide humanitarian aid to innocent Palestinians being used as human shields by Hamas terrorists,” Gottheimer said.

Rep. Tomv Suozzi (D-NY) followed him later on Tuesday.

“To allow for a UN resolution calling for a ceasefire without requiring the release of hostages is wrong, and has emboldened the Hamas terrorists,” Suozzi said in a statement. “Hamas has again walked away from the negotiations, which has again delayed the release of hostages.”

He added, “the international community must recognize that Israel is in a war against Iranian-proxies and terrorists, whose goal is to destroy Israel and kill Jews.”


Hamas and Iran Celebrate Israel’s Isolation at UN
Expert Analysis
“The administration’s sustained political warfare against Israel doesn’t just hurt our democratic ally; it hurts the United States by emboldening our enemies. The administration should be sending signals that Hamas’s days are numbered. Between the Security Council vote and recent sanctions relief for Iran, the White House is signaling the exact opposite.” — Richard Goldberg, FDD Senior Advisor

“Hamas continues to coordinate and deepen cooperation with its most important state patron, the Islamic Republic of Iran, in plain sight. Conversely, any gap, however marginal, between Israel and America will only redound to the benefit of Tehran and its proxies. Iran’s entire post-October 7 gameplan has been to find a way to create enough regional chaos to prevent Israel from successfully defeating and defanging Hamas.” — Behnam Ben Taleblu, FDD Senior Fellow

“Hamas is carrying out suicide attacks against Israel on the battlefield and in the political arena. The terrorist group is more than happy to receive the Security Council resolution’s slap on the wrist in exchange for the added political pressure directed at Israel and the friction in the U.S.-Israel relationship.” — David May, FDD Research Manager and Senior Research Analyst

Haniyeh and Khamenei Met in November
Haniyeh’s meetings marked his second visit to Tehran since the start of the Gaza war in October. Haniyeh had previously traveled from his home in Qatar to Iran in early November. During that visit, Khamenei expressed his support for Hamas but denied Iran’s direct involvement in the terrorist group’s October 7 massacre. Iran’s state-affiliated Tasnim News Agency reported that Khamenei “emphasized Tehran’s consistent policy of supporting the Palestinian resistance forces against the Zionist occupiers.”

UN Resolution Fails to Require Hamas to Free Hostages
On March 25, the United States abstained from a resolution that the Security Council adopted demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. In total, 14 out of 15 Security Council members voted in favor of the resolution, which also demanded “the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. Yet the measure neither acknowledges Hamas’s October 7 massacre nor explicitly ties a ceasefire to the release of hostages. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the U.S. failure to veto the resolution “regrettable” and canceled an interagency Israeli delegation’s trip to Washington to discuss alternatives to a full-scale operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. The White House is reportedly working with the Israelis to get the visit back on the calendar.
How Is the Palestinian Authority's Agenda Not Genocide?
As the accusation against Israel of genocide persists, the White House willfully ignores the Palestinian Authority's incentive program for killing Israelis: the infamous "pay-for-slay." Enshrined in Palestinian law, the program authorizes the eradication of Israel and the Jewish people. How is this not genocide? It is time for the White House to demand as a condition for peace that the PA finally end the "pay-for-slay" program.

The PA's ruling Fatah Party's charter explicitly calls for the "eradication of Zionist economic, political, military and cultural existence." This is clearly genocide. The PA pays the families of "martyrs" a lifetime salary and monthly salaries to terrorist prisoners. The payments are larger the more people the terrorist kills and the length of his prison sentence. Prisoners are offered government jobs upon release. All of this costs more than $350 million per year.

Yet the Biden administration has decided that the PA should govern Gaza when the current war ends. The PA is party to Hamas' genocidal agenda. By endorsing the PA without considering other options for a post-war Gaza government and without publicly condemning "pay-for-slay," U.S. officials are handing power to the wrong people. They are supporting ideologies and actions hostile to peace and condoning crimes against humanity.
World Court unanimously orders Israel to ensure Gaza humanitarian aid
The World Court of Justice unanimously ordered Israel, accused by South Africa of genocide in Gaza, to take all necessary and effective action to ensure basic food supplies to the enclave's Palestinian population and halt the spreading famine.

The order came as Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters battled in close combat around Gaza's Al Shifa Hospital, where the armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they attacked Israeli soldiers and tanks with rockets and mortar fire.

Judges at the World Court, also known as the International Court of Justice, said the Palestinians in Gaza face worsening conditions and famine and starvation were spreading.

"The court observes that Palestinians in Gaza are no longer facing only a risk of famine (...) but that famine is setting in," the judges said in their order. South Africa requested the new measures as part of its ongoing case that accuses Israel of state-led genocide in Gaza.

There was no immediate comment from Israel's Foreign Ministry on the ruling. Israel has said it was making efforts to expand access from humanitarian to Gaza overland, through airdrops and by ship to the enclave's Mediterranean coast.

The Israeli army said it continued to operate around the Al Shifa Hospital complex in Gaza City after storming it more than a week ago. Its forces had killed around 200 gunmen since the start of the operation "while preventing harm to civilians, patients, medical teams, and medical equipment," it said.


Manuel Vallis: Israel on the Front Lines
The former prime minister of France explains that Israel fights in Gaza not only to defend itself, but to protect the values and security of a civilization under siege by an army of cowards and negationists

So, dear Bernard-Henri Lévy, you write of the solitude of Israel: Are Jews alone? Yes, you are right: “There is no land, on this planet, that is a haven for Jews, that’s what Oct. 7 made clear.”

To not understand that is to not understand anything about what we are living through, or what the Israelis feel, what the Jewish world feels.

It is our imperative duty to respect without fail the history of Jews in our country, and their past suffering.

I will not tire of repeating:

Without France’s Jews, France is no longer France.

That duty ties us, through our fraternal bond, to Israel.

Tonight, I want to say to the Israeli people, to my Jewish compatriots, that thanks to this magnificent assembly, to our engagement, and mine, as with a majority of French people, you are not alone!

Over there, our future, our destiny is also in play.

Oct. 7 reveals the drift on one part of the left—the famous “irreconcilable” left—of the ravages of Islamo-leftism, of wokism in our universities, of relativism, of social media, of conspiratorial theories that converge in their hate of universal values and therefore of Jews.

Yes, it’s all the same front line.

To be a patriot and republican is to understand that.

Oct. 7 is therefore a revealing event that forces us into a startling realization.

Only republicanism and an uncompromising defense of our universal values, of secularism, of our schools, our language, the uniqueness of France will make it possible.

It’s another story?

No, it’s the same one.

And we will meet again to speak of it, and act together.

So, let us take the offensive!

That’s the pact that we seal this beautiful night!

Thank you.
Israelis, Jews in terrorists’ sights at Eurovision and Olympics, Israeli official warns
Israelis and Jews attending the Eurovision competition and the Summer Olympics are in terrorists’ “crosshairs,” a diplomatic source who deals with foreign terrorism threats warned on Thursday.

The Eurovision Song Contest is set to take place in Malmö, Sweden, on May 7-11, and the Summer Games in Paris will kick off on July 26. The diplomatic source also highlighted the European Football Championship, known as the Euro games, set to take place in Germany in June. He briefed reporters in conjunction with a National Security Council travel warning issued to Israelis going abroad for Passover, which begins on the evening of April 22.

“Malmö is a city with many hostile areas,” the source said. “Whoever goes there should not display their Zionism. Don’t walk around with Israeli flags. That could cause problems — like street fights.”

At the same time, the source said he did not know of any specific terrorist threats against Israelis in Sweden.

With tens of thousands of Israelis expected to attend the Euro games and the Olympics, the source said “the major concern is about global jihadist factors who have Israelis and Jews in their crosshairs.”

More broadly, the Israeli official said, Israelis traveling abroad should try not to stand out.

”You can speak Hebrew to each other, but don’t shout to family members or friends on the other side of the street,” he said.

Dozens of terrorist attacks against Jews and Israelis have been thwarted since the start of the war in Gaza in October, the source said.

“At any given moment there are efforts around the world to attack Israelis and Jews. Along with local law enforcement, the Israeli defense establishment takes endless preventative actions…The parts made public are the tip of the iceberg,” he said.
Relatives of murdered Montrealers call on Ottawa to prosecute Hamas
The Montreal-based Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights held a press conference in Ottawa with family members of those killed and kidnapped by Hamas, calling on the Canadian government to have the RCMP investigate the terrorist group Hamas “for crimes against Canadian nationals.”

The group, which recently filed a massive brief with the International Criminal Court in the Hague accusing Hamas of war crimes against the hostages, also filed a Magnitsky sanctions submission on behalf of the Canadian families of those murdered and kidnapped during the Oct. 7 massacre in Israel.

The Magnitsky submission “provides evidence and legal analysis for the sanctioning of Hamas leaders and those aiding and abetting their crimes,” says a RWCHR statement. “The Canadian victim families are calling for Canada to act on this submission, and secure justice for Canadians targeted by Hamas, a designated terrorist organization.”

Former federal Justice Minister and Mount Royal MP Irwin Cotler, founder and international chair of the RWCHR, said that “this visit [by family members of the murdered and kidnapped] – underpinned by the recent findings of the UN of ongoing grave sexual and gender-based crimes — underscores the urgent need for Canada to ensure accountability and justice for Hamas crimes against Canadians, and to take a leadership role in securing the release of Hamas hostages.

“Every day that these hostages are in Hamas captivity is a standing crime against humanity.”

RWCHR Director of Policy and Projects Brandon Silver, who presided over the press conference, said of the Hamas atrocities, “make no mistake about it, these crimes, the murder and maiming of over 1,200 people and the taking of over 250 hostages, 134 of which remain in captivity and continue to suffer as we speak, that is motivated by antisemitism, not because I say so, but because the perpetrators say so.

“Hamas, in their Charter, has called for the murder and maiming of every Jew, wherever they may be found, including here in Canada, and the destruction of the State of Israel. They said they will carry Oct. 7 over and over again until they carry out their genocidal mission.”
New Poll: 79 Percent of Americans Support Israel, 66 Percent Say Israel Is Trying to Avoid Civilian Casualties
A Harvard CAPS/Harris poll conducted on March 20-21, 2024, found that by 56% to 44%, Americans agree that Congress should pass $14 billion in aid for Israel and for humanitarian aid for Gaza to help Israel defeat Hamas.

Supporters included 60% of Democrats and 54% of Republicans.

79% said they support Israel in the conflict, compared to 21% for Hamas. Israel supporters included 85% of Republicans, 74% of Democrats, and 79% of Independents.

66% agreed that Israel is trying to avoid civilian casualties in its war against Hamas, while 34% disagreed. Those who agreed included 75% of Republicans, and 62% of Democrats.

63% say a ceasefire should happen only after the release of all hostages and Hamas is removed from power. 77% said Hamas should be removed from running Gaza.


The Gaza Pier Makes Less Sense with Each Passing Day
But even if this pier is constructed at sea and successfully anchored to Gaza at some point (the project remains in the planning stages), the problem of distributing the aid it is meant to facilitate persists. That’s where the Israel Defense Forces come in, apparently. Politico reported on Wednesday that the IDF has agreed to create a “security bubble” around the pier to “protect the U.S. personnel building the pier as well as the individuals involved in offloading and distributing the aid.”

So much for the fiction that there would be “no U.S. boots on the ground” in Gaza. Additionally, the administration’s request for Israeli security to protect Americans would not be necessary if Israel had not experienced attacks on its troops amid efforts to disburse humanitarian assistance in Gaza, both from its besieged civilians and Hamas terrorists. And despite all this effort, Biden is unlikely to benefit from the gratitude of Israel’s critics.

“We can talk all we want about temporary piers and airdrops and more land crossings, but if there aren’t people on the inside who can safely deliver [aid],” said American Near East Refugee Aid president and CEO Sean Carroll before trailing off in his recent interview with the New Yorker’s Isaac Chotiner. “And that’s why the ceasefire is so important.” The Biden administration is committing U.S. troops and treasure to a risky mission that puts additional strain on the IDF, and he will get no credit for the effort from those he seeks to mollify. Maybe the administration believes the mission is self-justifying, but nothing will alleviate the suffering of Gazans faster than a speedy and victorious conclusion to Israel’s war. Anything that makes securing that objective harder runs counter to the White House’s interests.


Controversial group behind 2010 Gaza flotilla move closer to new provocation
Turkish aid agency Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), which in 2010 had sent an aid vessel to Gaza that was intercepted by Israeli authorities in a deadly raid that prompted a diplomatic crisis between the two countries, showcased two new vessels on Wednesday which were bound for Gaza.

IHH Chairman Bulent Yildirim inspected the ships, purchased for the Gaza aid project named "International Freedom Flotilla" and said in a written statement that one of the vessels, Anadolu (Anatolia), had a capacity of 5,500 tons.

IHH was also the organizer of the 2010 Mavi Marmara aid ship which was raided by Israeli forces and resulted in the death of nine pro-Palestinian activists. A tenth activist wounded in the incident died in 2014 after years in a coma.

The vessel was trying to breach Israel's security measures on the Gaza Strip, which were designed to prevent arms smuggling. The soldiers raided the ship leading a flotilla towards Gaza, prompting a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey.


White House Launches Campaign to Whitewash Marwan Barghouti
The Washington Post reported on Wednesday: “A lawyer who met with Barghouti this week said in a written report to the Barghouti family that he saw bruising over his right eye and that Barghouti showed him bruising on his back and right foot. The lawyer wrote that Barghouti told him that, on March 6, ‘I was beaten for long minutes all over my body, mainly on the face, back, and legs. The severity of the beating caused me to collapse to the ground, at which point they persisted in striking me until I lost consciousness.’”

Naturally, the arch-terrorist’s account included no references to what had instigated his rough treatment. A spokesperson for the Israeli Prison Service said the service “is a law-abiding organization. We have no knowledge of these claims.”

How did the legendary Gregory House MD put it? “Everybody lies.”

The State Dept. told the Post that Israel must “thoroughly and transparently investigate credible allegations of and ensure accountability for any abuses or violations.” Also, terrorists must be held in “dignified conditions and in accordance with international law.”

We gave him pizza and Tortit, didn’t we?

One of Israel’s arch-enemies on the Hill, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, insisted the US should warn Israel to leave Barghouti alone.

“The Biden administration should make it very clear to the Netanyahu government that if Barghouti is harmed or killed in prison, it would throw gas on a raging fire,” Van Hollen told The Post. “Barghouti is probably the most popular Palestinian leader. That’s true in the West Bank and in Gaza.”

And in certain parts of the Senate, where the Hamas atrocities and Israel’s fight for its life are weighed as equal, with some advantage to Hamas.


France to resume UNRWA funding with $30 million, Kuwait sends $2 million
UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) said on Tuesday it had sufficient funds to run its operations until the end of May after many donors paused their funding over Israeli accusations that some staff took part in Hamas' October 7 massacre, which triggered the war in Gaza.

Kuwait has handed its annual US dollar contribution of $2 million to UNRWA, Reuters reported on Thursday, based on the Kuwaiti state news agency KUNA. In addition, France has declared its intention to resume funding the agency under certain conditions.

France contributes to UNRWA funding
France intends to provide over 30 million euros ($32.41 million US dollars) to UNRWA this year to support its operations amid the ongoing war in Gaza, said the foreign ministry in Paris.

"We will make our contributions while ensuring that the conditions are met for UNRWA to fulfill its missions in a spirit devoid of incitement to hatred and violence," Foreign Ministry spokesman Christophe Lemoine told journalists.

He did not say when the next payment to the agency would be made. According to the usual quarterly schedule, the next tranche is due in April.


Seth Frantzman: Invading Rafah: The lessons IDF should take from northern Gaza
IT’S NOT always easy to understand the coded language of military speak. “Alternative to full-scale military operation” sound like precision raids by special forces and commandos. “Phasing” and “sequence” sounds like a slow maneuver, moving street by street with lots of time for civilians to move from one area to another, perhaps even moving civilians back and forth as parts of the city are taken.

It’s hard to know if any of this borrows from US experience in backing operations in Raqqa in 2017 or Mosul in 2016, or in battles for Fallujah in 2004 and Ramadi in 2006.

Are there positive lessons to be learned from all those battles? It would appear the levels of destruction in Raqqa and Mosul would not be accepted if Israel were to do the same in Rafah. Things were a bit easier for the Iraqis in Mosul because they had established IDP camps to move people to behind their lines. Israel does not want to do the same. This leaves more complex challenges regarding civilians in Rafah.

The overall issue in Rafah will be timing. The US is sending personnel and ships to build a temporary pier off the coast of Gaza. However, that will not be completed until mid- or late April. Concerns about humanitarian aid entering Gaza will overshadow the operation.

This is because most aid is now being delivered via Rafah, and thus Hamas is allowed to hijack the aid. Around 250 trucks enter Rafah day, with another 30 or so entering northern Gaza. The goal will be to shift this movement of trucks and aid in such a way that it meets the needs of the civilians who will need to be moved during any campaign in Rafah. Even a “phased” campaign would require phases of moving 50,000 civilians and meeting their aid needs.

The last challenge will be to make the Rafah battle worth it. Hamas will want to move out of Rafah as it moved out of northern Gaza, infiltrating the central camps area or other areas of Gaza, so that it can then return to Rafah. Hamas calculates that Israel does not have time on its side and that all Hamas has to do is “persevere” for another few months and it will win and Israel will not accomplish its objectives.

Toward that end, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh went to Iran this week and bragged about how Hamas is winning the war. Hamas calculated winning differently than Israel. It “wins” if there is more civilian suffering and if it can maintain its presence.

Israel talks about Hamas “battalions” but Hamas does not mind reducing its battalions and dispersing them into plain-clothes mafia-like groups of men who can control Gaza without needing to carry arms at all times. This is the Hamas model going back to its foundation in the 1980s.

Defeating this will require a lot more than just a phased precision operation going after the operatives that Hamas chooses to leave behind in Rafah.
One thing is stopping Israel from entering Rafah, and it's not Hamas
To satisfy the US, it is not enough to move the civilians without them getting shot; they also need to have food, shelter, and access to medicine once they are moved.

Rafah has been set up for such emergencies in the past and was ready for such an emergency now.

A tent city, food, and medical care were all waiting to some degree and relatively set up for erecting and adding to the existing infrastructure and areas, also helped by the proximity to the border with Egypt where much of the international aid is flown into.

But the three areas that the IDF would evacuate civilians to from Rafah are not.

Al-Mawasi is not as set up for absorbing civilians so that they can be kept fed and healthy for an extended period, and the infrastructure in Khan Yunis and central Gaza has been significantly destroyed by battles between the IDF and Hamas.

Based on this, military sources have admitted that if evacuating 1.2 million Palestinians from northern Gaza took one to two weeks depending on how one measures things, evacuating 1.4 million civilians from Rafah to much less hospitable and prepared areas will take many, many more (translate: one to two months.)

It is not even clear whether Israel and the international aid groups can set up minimally sufficient shelter and supplies in that time, which is partly why the US is still pressing Israel for more targeted and limited strikes and invasions into select parts of Rafah that do not destroy as much of the infrastructure as those that occurred in Gaza City and Khan Yunis, where whole neighborhoods simply no longer exist.

Israel’s problem with this is that Hamas would likely use any areas not being attacked to hide among the civilian population.

Also, Hamas can use the evacuation of 1.4 million civilians to sneak out many of its fighters back to areas which were previously viewed as cleared, just like many fighters used the evacuation of northern Gaza to flee south.

Of course, operationally making sure Palestinian do not flee into Egypt still has to be taken into account– a red line for Cairo which could lead it to fundamentally alter its relations with Jerusalem.

There may be no perfect answers and some of the benefit of spreading out the evacuation over a longer time may enable making more adjustments in real time as problems develop.

But certainly, as long as Hamas is not ready to cut another interim deal with Israel to release more hostages, there is no real option for Jerusalem other than to go into Rafah in some way, and US resistance – as long as the Jewish state gets more serious about planning for the issues of food, tents, and medical care – is likely to recede.

Whether the US will continue to back Israel as any Rafah operation plays out will then depend on the results: Do civilians make it out alive and are they able to continue to stay alive once moved, or not?
IDF's 'Hunter' system creates 'Google Maps' in Gaza battlefield
The IDF unveiled its new real-time terrorist threat section software - the 'Hunter' system, on its website on Tuesday.

Under each brigade, division, and command, soldiers sit in rooms full of computers, where they remotely locate and confirm attacks on terrorist infrastructure that endangers soldiers out in the field.

These "cells" are manned by IDF representatives from intelligence, fire control, and air force units. On each of their computers, a new system called the "Hunter" is activated. This system was developed at the start of the Swords of Iron War and has already saved multiple lives.

"Imagine Google Maps software—but for the battlefield in Gaza. The system gathers indications of threats and allows users to receive information about them," describes Lieutenant E.

Once the information is received, soldiers will decide if to respond to the threat.

The idea for the system was discussed before the war after the IDF realized that different terrorist cells didn't share just one comprehensive attack platform.
Mission Brief: The Official Podcast of the IDF: Operations Officer Takeover: How Do Combat Engineers Operate in the Field?
Tune in and take a step into Gaza’s underground and discover how combat engineering troops approach threats and any hostile surprises they might encounter—all through the eyes of CPT Simha, Operations Officer in the 98th Brigade.

CPT Simha discusses everything from demolition scenarios to unique explosives developed in light of emerging threats in the field.
'Now Is the Time of the Sword': Israelis Brace for the Big War in the North
It's been more than six months since Hamas terrorists rampaged through southern Israel, but here in the north, Oct. 7 never really ended.

On Oct. 8, the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah picked up where its ally left off, launching an ongoing barrage of rockets, missiles, and artillery shells into northern Israel. The violence has so far killed 14 soldiers and eight civilians in Israel, along with dozens of civilians and hundreds of terrorists in Lebanon. While Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza has enabled most of the some 129,000 Israelis who were evacuated from the south to return to their homes, nearly all of the 48,000 or so evacuees from the northern border area have remained displaced, according to government data obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The Biden administration has increasingly sought to restrain the Israel Defense Forces response to Oct. 7, with the president describing the Gaza war effort as "over the top" and driven by rage. For Israelis, though, the crisis in the north is a constant reminder that they are the ones under attack, and Gaza is just one front in their much larger war of self-defense.

"We need to get used to the fact that we will have to wage war on several fronts simultaneously because this is the Iranian strategy," Orna Mizrahi, the former deputy head of Israel's National Security Council. "The Americans don't want a regional war. Nobody does. But for most of Israel's political and military leadership, the question is not if but when we will have to wage a full-scale war in the north."

Hezbollah and Hamas—two of the numerous Iran-backed terror groups that surround Israel in a "ring of fire"—have both refused to negotiate ceasefires with Israel unless the Jewish state effectively lays down its arms in Gaza. The Biden administration has held Israel back in the north and south, most recently warning the IDF against an invasion of Rafah, Hamas's last stronghold in Gaza.

In the meantime, Israel’s far north has been paralyzed. During a recent two-day trip across the length of the border with Lebanon, residents of the evacuated area spoke of widespread fear and frustration.
Hezbollah Offensive Would be ‘Oct. 7 on Steroids’
Award-winning director and producer Eli Katzoff explores the frightening and potentially imminent scenario of war between Hezbollah and Israel. This JNS production takes a look at Hezbollah plans uncovered by Israel, and a look at Hezbollah's immense arsenal of missiles. What damage could Hezbollah do to the Israeli homefront, and how would Israel respond to a Hezbollah attack?

Based on in-depth interviews with Lt. Col. (res.) Sarit Zehavi, founder of the Alma Research and Education Center and Lt. Col. (res.) Uri Ben Yaakov, senior researcher at Reichman University’s International Institute for Counterterrorism, 'WHAT IF: War in the North' offers a frightening warning of what will happen if a diplomatic solution is not reached to diffuse an already-simmering conflict.


IDF Preparing to Evacuate Civilians from Rafah
In order for the Israel Defense Forces to be able to operate freely in Rafah, the civilians there will have to evacuate - and Hamas will do everything in its power to prevent them from doing so for precisely this reason.

The IDF's Southern Command and its Population Evacuation Unit possess a state-of-the-art control center and real-time map of Gaza's civilian situation, enabling evacuation from specific areas and the tracking of those efforts.

By December, the IDF was able to evacuate over a million people from northern Gaza, setting a vital precedent.

During these past evacuation efforts, the IDF witnessed many attempts by Hamas to stop Palestinian civilians from leaving.

The difference this time will be that now, the IDF will need to set up checkpoints to filter out any terrorists attempting to move north with the civilians.


Gunman opens fire on school bus in West Bank
Three Israelis were wounded on Thursday morning in a terrorist attack in the Jordan Valley.

A Palestinian gunman opened fire on a school bus and several cars travelling along Route 90, near Al-Auja, which lies just north of Jericho.

The terrorist reportedly ambushed passing vehicles from the side of the road, firing at them from a standing position and then immediately fleeing the scene, according to eyewitnesses cited by local media.

The terrorist was reportedly masked and wearing clothing resembling an IDF uniform.

Israeli forces launched a manhunt for the perpetrator.

Magen David Adom emergency medics treated a 30-year-old man with moderate gunshot wounds and another man in his 20s who was lightly injured. A 13-year-old boy was also lightly injured by glass shards.


‘I’ll be the saddest happy person alive’: Inside the grief retreat helping bereaved Israelis
OneFamily, a charity for families affected by terror, is working with the parents of young people murdered by Hamas on October 7

For three days the grief-stricken visitors have a raft of sessions to choose from, all designed to help them acquire the psychological tools they need to rebuild their lives back home. They have the option of several therapy sessions a day, mainly on a group basis, as well as excursions in nature, designed for their therapeutic value. Psychotherapist Dr Shlomit Bresler, who specialises in trauma and loss, helped devise the therapeutic retreats for OneFamily. Before helping bereaved parents, the charity ran weekend programmes for “Nova” survivors, and Dr Bresler admits she was sceptical about extending the project.

“I was worried it was too early for any kind of group therapeutic work for the parents,” she says. “Usually for people in severe trauma or early state of loss, it is difficult to identify or to contain the pain of others, and I would not advise participating in group activities. But we decided to try a pilot programme and so many preconceptions fell away. The parents were so eager to share with each other. People connect through shared trauma when it’s the exact same atrocity.

“This October 7 attack is unique, and for parents it’s so important to meet others going through the same experience. People from the outside are so careful talking to them; people see them and cross the road because they don’t know what to say, or feel guilty because they didn’t lose what they lost. At the retreat everyone can be authentic. They understand each other.”

The weekend experience is not where it ends, explains Dr Bresler: “It’s where it starts.” The real power is in the network they create. The parents all join a WhatsApp group, along with the therapist. “I get all the messages between them and I see them making plans to meet. Before, they would have felt much more isolated. They form very close bonds.”

The families gather at breakfast, lunch and dinner time. Some talk matter-of-factly, reliving traumatic details of what Hamas did. They flick through their phones showing each other their children, the pendants or scarves with their child’s faces, and explain how they died. No conversation is off limits – who took their sleeping tablets, who managed to eat today – and they are often brutally and painfully open.

“I dreamt there were loads of bees everywhere – and that Hamas was here,” says one distraught mother over breakfast on day two. Grieving father, Shlomi Krief, 53, asks permission before sharing a final photo of his son Shahaf, 17. It shows a bloodied toilet cubicle and his son slumped on the floor in his beach flip-flops. Behind him is his sweetheart Alina, 17, also shot dead. The photo was taken by first responder volunteers from Zaka, the organisation tasked with collecting the bodies in the dignified manner required by Jewish law.

“I am relieved to see this photo because it shows me that Alina and Shahaf were not messed with in their final hours and they were together. He covered her, maybe he tried to save her,” he explains. Horse-mad teen Shahaf was at beach Zikim that morning when Hamas infiltrated from the sea and gunned down 19.

Five days later, the IDF came to the family’s house to inform them. The only word his mother Rita, 53, can find as she reflects on that morning is “horrific”. Since his death, she says, “I feel like I am disconnected from everything, just functioning automatically – no purpose… Shahaf was killed and we also died.” But meeting other bereaved parents in Cyprus has provided some relief. “These parents here can understand me, we speak the same language, we all lost beautiful children.”

Maggy Solomon, 60, and her husband and childhood sweetheart Benny, 62, learned the details of their 26-year-old daughter Hilly’s death from a friend who survived the festival. They know Hilly ran into the woods from the Nova site and when she saw she had no chance of outrunning the terrorists’ grenades and bullets played dead under a car, but was eventually killed by a spray of bullets. Maggy says: “We consider ourselves ‘lucky’ because we know what happened to her, and because she was just shot and not mutilated or raped like so many of the others. I feel her fear all the time around me.” She breaks down. “I’m sorry. Today is Shabbat, Saturday, when it happened. Every Saturday at 9:30am is really hard for me.”
'Hamas treated us like animals': Rescued hostage speaks on Gaza captivity
Rescued Gaza hostage Luis Har was "treated like a dog" by the terrorist organization Hamas while being held hostage, he told the Daily Mail in a report released on Wednesday.

The rescue occurred at 2 a.m. where the Mail report described it as a "huge explosion which threw the 71-year-old accountant from his mattress and ripped off the door from his tiny cell-like room."

Har felt an arm grab his leg and someone told him "Luis, it's the IDF – we came to take you home" in Hebrew.

Har had been in Hamas captivity for 129 days by the time of his rescue, during which he would bond with the Hamas captors over Argentinian soccer star Lionel Messi, due to Har also being Argentinian.

The Mail report noted Har's belief that "his luck had finally run out," but after his rescue, he was in Israeli territory within the next hour. The report also noted that the helicopter that carried Har out of the Gaza Strip "dodged rocket fire to land at Sheba Medical Center."

"If that soldier had told me to jump up, I would have jumped up. We were completely in their hands. Really completely. There was a feeling of complete security," Har told the Mail.

Who else from Har's family had been taken hostage?

Har was taken alongside his partner and her brother as well as his sister Gabriela and her daughter Mia. All five returned back to Israel alive.


AP photographer co-wins for photo of terrorists taking Shani Louk's corpse into Gaza
A freelance photojournalist, Ali Mahmud, contributed to the Associated Press (AP) winning first place for the Team Picture Story of the Year last week for taking a photo of Shani Louk's half-naked corpse as Hamas terrorists were driving it away on October 7, alluding to the photographer's knowledge of the attack beforehand.

According to the Pictures of the Year program's website, the category "recognizes the collaborative effort of a photography staff covering a single topic or news story. It is a narrative picture story that consists of images taken as part of a team effort to cover a single issue or news story."

Other photos, mostly attributed to other photographers on behalf of the Associated Press, were snapped of destroyed or damaged buildings in Gaza, injured or dead Palestinians, Israelis mourning at funerals or fleeing from rocket attacks. However, many of these photos allude to photographer's previous knowledge and possible involvement of the massive attack launched on Israeli soil - in order to get the "shot of a lifetime."

The program posted news about the AP's victory, alongside Mahmoud's photo of Louk on Instagram, where they came under immense criticism from users. Louk's name is not mentioned anywhere in the program's Instagram post.

Social media reaction
"There is a dead body of a partially unclothed human being, a young woman who was brutally murdered and probably raped. This cannot be real. Please remove this photo," one user wrote, while another said "She has a name. Shani Louk. Her family specifically requested that we remember her laughing and living. Take this down and show some respect. If you want to post our Shani, find a photo she consented to."

Mahmud, who took the photo of Louk, had his name mentioned in an earlier report when parents of Louk and other Nova massacre victims sued AP and Reuters last month for their employment of photojournalists who accompanied the terrorists on their pogrom and contended that AP ignored close connections the photographers had to terrorist organizations, to which they said: "we have not seen any evidence – including in the lawsuit – that the freelance journalists who contributed to our coverage did."

On its website, Picture of the Year international did include Shani Louk's name in the caption. However, on its Instagram account, it did not mention her name in the caption accompanying her picture.


Colonialism, Racism, and the Arab Israeli War of 1948
In 1947, a two-thirds majority of the members of the United Nations, an organization which took its name from the term for the Allies fighting against Nazi Germany, voted to establish an Arab, and a Jewish state on what had been British Mandate Palestine. Supporters of the Jewish state, and the Zionists themselves, viewed that project as an anti-colonial, anti-racist, and as a continuation of the anti-fascist passions of World War II. The Arab opponents, at the time and since, denounced the establishment of Israel as precisely the opposite, that is, an example of colonialism, racism, and in Soviet era propaganda even a form of Nazism. Historian Benny Morris has written extensively about the causes and nature of the war of 1948, and the controversies that have surrounded it ever since. Historian Jeffrey Herf has examined the international politics surrounding Israel’s establishment. In conversation, Morris and Herf will explore these issues and the way they influence contemporary discussions.

Buy the books from this series: https://yivo-institute.myshopify.com/collections/the-origins-and-ideology-of-hamas

View the series bibliography: https://yivo.org/cimages/ideology_series_bibliography.pdf

Read the concluding chapter of Benny Morris’s 1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War: https://yivo.org/cimages/20240321133818293_web.pdf

Read Jeffrey Herf’s essay, “Israel is Anti-Colonialist, Anti-Racist, and Anti-Fascist (and was from the Start)": https://sapirjournal.org/israel-at-75/2023/04/israel-is-antiracist-anti-colonialist-anti-fascist-and-was-from-the-start/

About the Speakers

Jeffrey Herf studies the intersection of ideas and politics in modern European history, specializing in twentieth century Germany. He has published extensively on Germany during the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, the Holocaust, and on West and East Germany during the Cold War. His research interests now focus on the Nazi period and German and European history in post World War II decades up to the collapse of Communism and the end of the Cold War in 1989.

Benny Morris, a historian, was formerly a professor of history in the Middle East Studies Department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. He is the author of 1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War and most recently, with Dror Ze’evi, The Thirty-Year Genocide: Turkey’s Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894–1924.


Arab-Israeli perspective on the conflict with Hamas and the political situation in Israel
Muhammad Zoabi tells i24NEWS about the complex experience of arab-israelis since October 7th


‘Vast majority’ of Arabs inside Israel have condemned Hamas’ actions
Israeli Journalist Khaled Abu Toameh says “no one can identify with such atrocities” from the October 7 Hamas attack and the “vast majority” of Arabs inside Israel are opposed to Hamas.

“The question is not how we respond to Israel’s war on Hamas,” he said.

“It is how do we respond to the Hamas attack on Israel.

“The vast majority of us, the Arabs inside Israel are opposed to it.

“We have condemned it.”


‘All about politics’: US allows UN Gaza ceasefire resolution to pass
Former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer says the United States not vetoing a ceasefire vote was “all about politics”.

On Monday, the United Nations Security Council resolution for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza was passed after America abstained from voting.

The US has previously vetoed various draft resolutions put forward by the council since October last year regarding the war between Hamas and Israel.

Mr Downer claimed the move to not block Monday’s resolution marks was an effort from the Democrats to try and win back some of the Muslim voters ahead of the election in November.

“When you look back on the Michigan primaries there was a sort of whatever it was … a 20 per cent abstention by Democrats who were mainly Muslim Democrats,” Mr Downer told Sky News host Chris Kenny.

“The Biden team were stung by this and wanted to try and win back Muslim votes for the Democrats.”


Arab-Israelis would 'much rather’ live in Israel than anywhere else
Filmmaker Ami Horowitz has slammed the global narrative which tries to “demonise” Israel and “lie” about its war with Hamas.

Mr Horowitz interviewed Arab-Israelis living in Israel who claim relations between the two states are calm and they don’t experience any racism.

“They are very clear – they would much rather live in Israel than any other Arab state,” Mr Horowitz told Sky News host Rita Panahi.

“They, more than any other person, understand what they have and what they would lose if they were part of Egypt or Iraq or a Palestinian state.

“In terms of economics, they have more money, they have more income ... they have more freedom, they get to vote; none of these things are available anywhere else in the Arab world.”


The Quad: "I Saw The Corruption of Palestinian Leaders & Aid Groups" The Truth About Aid To Gaza
The Quad interview the author and the founder of the Tel Aviv Institute Hen Mazzig about his first-hand witnessing of the corruption of Palestinian leadership and international aid groups. He served 5 years in The Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) in the West Bank and attests to how the Israeli authorities seem to care more about the Palestinian people than their own leaders. The same story is repeating itself currently in Hamas-run Gaza.

The Quad also discuss the claim that Israel is causing a famine by not delivering aid to Gaza. And Special Guest actor and filmmaker Yuval David join the show for Scumbags and Heroes!




Rep. Ritchie Torres: Supporting Israel Is Common Sense
The Second-Term Congressman from the Bronx spoke to The Jewish Press about the benefits of visiting Israel, facing far-left hate, and the future of Israel and Gaza

The Jewish Press: Hi, thank you so much for making time to speak to us. And I know the Jewish community does greatly appreciate your support. It’s been absolutely incredible.

Rep. Torres: Well, that’s too kind, but I appreciate it.

You’ve said that your positive stance toward Israel was heavily shaped by your visit there in 2015. You’ve called it one of the most transformative experiences of your life. Do you think things would be different if more opponents of Israel would actually visit, as you did? And does ignorance about what Israel is about lead to the hostility toward Israel that we are seeing? Or is it just the age-old deep-seated antisemitism rearing its ugly head?

My experience tells me that there’s no substitute for firsthand experience with Israel. It’s the best form of education. And I find that the most vociferous critics of the Jewish State have actually never gone to Israel, and have never seen the facts on the ground with their own eyes.

You know, were it not for my own engagement with Israel, I would have never become a Zionist. I grew up in a community that was almost exclusively Latino and African American; I had no engagement with the Jewish community. And then when I became a [City] Council member in 2014, I was invited by the Jewish Community Relations Council to go on a delegation to Israel. And as you point out, I’ve often described it as one of the most transformative experiences of my life – going to Yad Vashem, going to Masada, going to a place like Sderot. And I remember speaking to the local mayor of Sderot who said that the majority of his children struggle with post-traumatic stress, because families like his live under the threat of rocket fire.

I remember seeing bus stops doubling as bomb shelters. I thought to myself, imagine the sheer trauma of a five-year-old who’s seeking refuge in a bomb shelter while rockets are being fired and sirens are going off and adults are panicking. And there’s nothing but pandemonium. I come from the Bronx where families often live in fear of bullets, gun violence. But no one in the United States lives in fear of rockets; none of us as Americans worry that Mexico and Canada are going to fire rockets into American homes and communities. And so my first trip to Israel enabled me to realize early on that Israel faces a level of insecurity that has no equivalent in the American experience.

And I tell people, “Look, I’m not going to tell you what to think about Israel. But I will tell you how to think: Before you rush to judge Israel, you should actually go there and speak to both Israelis and Palestinians, speak to both Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs, you know, go to a place like Sderot and see the facts on the ground with your own eyes. And I guarantee you that if you have an open heart and an open mind, you’re going to adopt a view of Israel that is far more complicated than the cartoonish portrayal that percolates on social media platforms and on college campuses.


Standpoint with Gabe Groisman: Ep. 14. Ben Shapiro.
Host of The Ben Shapiro Show, Ben Shapiro joins Gabe for an interesting discussion about Trump's path to victory in November, Biden's "Divided States of America," how the US is losing ground around the world, Israel, antisemitism and Ben's rap career.




‘Child murderer’: Jewish woman accosted at Amsterdam home over daughter’s IDF service
Three women accosted a Jewish nurse on her doorstep in Amsterdam on Wednesday, calling her a “child murderer” because of her daughter’s service in the Israel Defense Forces, she said.

The incident in the heavily Jewish suburb of Amstelveen followed weeks of incitement in fliers and social media posts against the nurse over her daughter’s military service in Israel, De Telegraaf daily reported.

One of the women who allegedly accosted the nurse told her that she should be ashamed of herself, adding “I don’t understand why you are still here in the Netherlands,” the nurse said.

Speaking to De Telegraaf anonymously, the nurse added: “It feels like in World War II when the addresses of Jews were given out.”

The intimidation followed the surfacing online of a video of the nurse’s daughter in IDF uniform. Fliers advertising her address in Amstelveen and accusing her of complicity in “child murder” began appearing around her neighborhood in February, with online banners bearing the same message, she said.

People flying Palestinian flags came looking for the woman at her workplace, too, she added.

“Residents beware, a child murderer lives in the neighborhood. This genocidal maniac returned from her murderous activities in Israel and will be soon be tried,” the text of one flier reads, featuring pictures of the nurse’s daughter. “Her mother sent her bitch daughter to kill babies, she is also an accomplice,” read the text, which included the address, workplace, and names of the two women.

Naomi Mestrum, the director of the Center for Information and Documentation on Israel, the Dutch Jewish community’s watchdog on antisemitism, told De Telegraaf that the three women “specifically targeted” the nurse in an organized action.
Ryan McBeth: Are 20,000 UK Soldiers returning from the Israel / IDF
A recent TikTok / Twitter disinformation campaign claimed that 20,000 dual UK/Israeli citizens would return back to the UK “soon.” If true, this would mean that roughly 7% of the UK’s Jews returned to Israel to fight. This is far above the roughly 90-100 UK citizens per year who go to Israel to join the IDF.

This is likely disinformation. Uncensored on Substack (9:30min vs 5:45min) Are 20,000 IDF Soldiers Returning to the UK?


The Political U-Turn of Michael Rapaport | Israel-Hamas War
Visegrad24 presents an in-depth series covering the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict. This comprehensive series features on-the-ground interviews, bringing firsthand insights from a diverse range of voices, including politicians, professors, journalists, experts and influencers.

Our guest today: Michael Rapaport
Michael is an American comedian and actor, best known for his roles in movies such as True Romance (1993), Cop Land (1997), Deep Blue Sea (1999), Dr. Dolittle 2 (2001) and The Heat (2013).

He has also had roles in TV series such as Friends (1999), Boston Public (2001–2004), Prison Break (2008–2009) and My Name Is Earl (2007–2008).

He is also works as reporter for Fox Sports, covering the BIG3 basketball league formed by Ice Cube.

00:00 - Introduction
00:48 - Standing up for Israel
01:55 - Hollywood career
02:29 - Aggression on social media
04:02 - Hollywood silence on Oct. 7th
09:09 - Support for Hamas in the West
12:40 - Not voting for Biden
15:18 - Being white?
16:05 - Bearing witness to Oct. 7th
19:55 - Peace






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