Saturday, February 22, 2025

02/22 Links: Six hostages released by Hamas including two held for a decade; Hamas forced 2 other hostages to watch fellow hostages freed

From Ian:

Sickened, Yes. But Shocked? By Abe Greenwald
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Some of those liberals are employed in media, government, and international nonprofit organizations, and they worked to make the slaughtering of babies on October 7 a contested issue. They didn’t entirely succeed, but they managed to distract attention away from Hamas’s infanticides and child-killings by raising doubts about various details. And when anti-Israel journalists had nothing else to use, the phrase “Israeli authorities claim” got the job done. Because on the left, the specter of the Jewish lie outshines the reality of the terrorist atrocity.

On social media, of course, the defense of Hamas has been more straightforward. Go to X at any hour and you’ll find someone with thousands of followers who just posted that the IDF itself is responsible for October 7. Those who aren’t conspiracy theorists or outright Jew-haters adopt what they believe is a more reasonable-sounding elision, something to the effect of “Hamas’s attack was bad enough. We don’t have to exaggerate it with tales of baby murder.”

That brings us to the larger reason that so many have resisted the truth of Hamas’s degeneracy. There’s a line from Cormac McCarthy’s The Crossing that I return to almost daily: “The wicked know that if the ill they do be of sufficient horror that men will not speak against it. That men have just enough stomach for small evils and only these will they oppose.” Hamas had the timorous world of “global opinion” beat from the start.

What’s more interesting about McCarthy’s line is that, like so many other axioms, it applies to almost everyone—except the Jews. In fact, for Jews, the inverse applies. While men don’t have “enough stomach” to oppose Hamas’s murdering children, in the second century B.C.E., men invented the Jewish blood libel for the very purpose of opposing the Jews. And it’s never stopped. It’s why the Gaza Ministry of Health exists—to amplify the blood libel and perpetuate Jew-hatred. So Jews are falsely accused of killing gentile babies and anti-Semites are falsely cleared of killing Jewish babies.

Given the millennia of persistent and murderous anti-Semitism, it should be hard to shock the Jews. Given the facts of October 7, it should be impossible for Hamas to do so. And I confess that, while infanticide should always be shocking, I wasn’t shocked by the killing of Ariel and Kfir Bibas. Disgusted and enraged, but not shocked. What shocks me is that Hamas and its supporters in Gaza are still alive. And it shocks me because, for Jews, the other implication of McCarthy’s formula should also be inverted. Unlike other men, Jews must oppose those evils of “sufficient horror.” I am more certain than ever that we will.
Daniel Greenfield: Fake Quotes by Saudi and UAE Imams Condemning Hamas Go Viral
Fake quotes by Saudi Grand Mufti Abdulaziz bin Abdullah Al-Sheikh and the Grand Mufti of Dubai Ahmed al-Haddad condemning the Hamas treatment of the bodies of the Bibas children have gone viral.

People are promoting these quotes with the best of intentions but there is no Arabic source for them.

“What we say today in Gaza is a disgrace to Islam, an act of blasphemy against Allah,” Saudi Grand Mufti Abdulaziz bin Abdullah Al-Sheikh reportedly said.

The social media posts claiming this racked up millions of likes. They were even quoted by a few papers which failed to do their research.

The quote has been disavowed.

The quote by Grand Mufti of Dubai Ahmed al-Haddad reportedly stated that, “Hamas has brought shame to Islam on a level never seen before.”

The quote has not been officially disavowed, but an Emirati journalist stated that he had never heard of it.

The only place the quote appears in Arabic is on a Christian Arab pro-Israel woman’s Facebook page. It should be assumed to be fake until proven otherwise.

People insisted on making up and then tweeting these fake quotes out of some hope that Islam was more merciful and decent than it is.
Gaza captor told hostages that Hamas collaborates with US campus protesters, lawsuit alleges
A Hamas member who held Israelis hostage in Gaza told the captives that the terror group was coordinating with “allies” on college campuses and in the media, according to a lawsuit filed in US court on Friday.

The lawsuit was filed by former hostages Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv. All three were taken from the Nova music festival in southern Israel during Hamas’s October 7, 2023, invasion of Israel.

They were held in Gaza by Abdallah Aljamal, according to the lawsuit and the IDF. Aljamal was a writer for the Palestine Chronicle, a news outlet run by the People Media Project, a US-based, tax-exempt nonprofit that is the focus of the lawsuit.

The hostages were rescued after 246 days in captivity in an IDF operation in June that also extracted hostage Noa Argamani, who was held separately nearby. Aljamal, his wife Fatima and his father Ahmad Aljamal were all killed during the hostage rescue mission. The family’s children survived.

Jan initially filed the lawsuit last year. The judge in the case granted a motion to dismiss the case last month, saying there was insufficient evidence to prove the defendants were aware that Aljamal was a Hamas operative. The judge allowed Jan to refile an amended complaint, however.

The new complaint was filed on Friday, adding Kozlov and Ziv as plaintiffs. The lawsuit, backed by the National Jewish Advocacy Center, was filed in a federal court in Washington State, where the People Media Project is based.

The case argues that the Palestine Chronicle provided Aljamal with a platform to “disseminate Hamas propaganda,” providing material support to a US-designated terrorist organization, in violation of international law.

According to the amended complaint, Ziv said Aljamal “repeatedly expressed his hatred for the State of Israel and the United States,” and told the hostages that “Hamas was in contact and actively coordinating with its affiliates in the media and on college campuses.”

Aljamal told the hostages that “Hamas was going to ensure that the United States, as well as Jews and Israelis, are hated everywhere and that Hamas in Gaza was coordinating with its allies, including its allies in the media and on college campuses, to foment hatred against Israel and Jews,” the complaint said.


Six hostages released by Hamas including two held for a decade
Six more Israeli hostages have been released by Hamas in Gaza – with the terror organisation again attempting to use the handovers as a propaganda opportunity.

Three hostages – Eliya Cohen, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert – were led onto a stage in Nuseirat in central Gaza, surrounded by armed terrorists, some of whom filmed the proceedings. Friends and family of Omer Shem Tov celebrate his release from Hamas captivity

Hamas displayed messages mocking Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on banners placed on a stage that is set to be used during Saturday’s hostage release in central Gaza.

One message quoted Netanyahu as saying “Military pressure alone will return the hostages,” with another message below mocking Netanyahu saying, “Bibi… Don’t press… relax.”

The three hostages were told to wave to the watching crowd as they were handed the now familiar certificates produced by Hamas for all of the staged hostage releases.

Two other hostages – Tal Shoham and Avera Mengistu – were handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross in Rafah, and driven away in their vehicles to be handed over to Israel’s Shin Bet.

Hostage Hisham al-Sayed, who entered Gaza in 2015 and has been held there since, was released separately in Gaza City.

The IDF shared the emotional scenes as Mengistu, who had spent a decade in Hamas captivity, was reunited with his family.

In Israel, the families of the freed hostages, along with thousands who gathered in Hostage Square looked jubilant at the sight of the five released men.
These are the 4 hostages set to be released on Thursday; all are believed to be dead
After the release of six living hostages on Saturday, only four of the 33 hostages set to be freed during the first phase of the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas remain in captivity in Gaza, with it being widely believed that they are dead.

The four are Ohad Yahalomi; Tsahi Idan; Itzik Elgarat; and Shlomo Mantzur, 85. All four were kidnapped during the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, onslaught on southern Israel.

The four are set to be released on Thursday, according to the agreement mediated between Israel and Hamas by Qatar and the US.

According to Hamas’s past statements, the six hostages released on Saturday were the last to be returned under the first phase of the ceasefire deal who are alive, leading to the conclusion that the remaining four are dead. Israel has indicted that its own information matches the Hamas claims.

Israeli authorities announced earlier this month that Mantzur was killed on October 7, 2023, and his body was taken to Gaza.


Hamas forced Evyatar David, Guy Gilboa-Dalal to watch fellow hostages freed
Hamas forced Evyatar David and Guy Gilboa-Dalal to watch as six other hostages were released from captivity on Saturday.

Tal Shoham, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, Eliya Cohen, Avera Mengistu, and Hisham Al-Sayed were freed from the Gaza Strip on Saturday.

In a video posted to its Telegram channel, the terrorist organization made the two hostages watch as the others were released.

The video shows the two in the back of a car very close to the stage where the release ceremony for Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, and Eliya Cohen.

They can be seen grasping their faces and exclaiming as the ceremony takes place. At one point, they turn to the camera and plead to be brought home.

The families of David and Gilboa-Dalal have approved the distribution of the video.

“In addition to the inhumane physical conditions in captivity, as evidenced by the testimonies of the returnees, the abductees experience severe and cruel psychological abuse,” the Hostage Families Forum said in a statement.

"They are running out of time! The Israeli government and its leader must accelerate the negotiations and bring about the immediate return of all the abductees, without delay and without any delays."

The terrorists asked the hostages "how they feel" while watching the release of their friends.


Ben Shapiro: The True Faces Of Evil
Hamas parades dead Jewish babies in Gaza, then detonates bus bombs in Tel Aviv; the Trump administration continues its unique Ukraine approach; and worries grow about the state of the economy.


Ruthie Blum and Shahar Azani are interviewed by Rita Cosby of Newsmax on hostages returned Saturday

Erin Molan: What did HAMAS do to the BIBAS BABIES and ERIN MOLAN exposes the ‘what about kids in Gaza’ LIE
Erin Molan responds to those who try to justify this with the ‘Israel killed kids in Gaza’ lie. Erin exposes the lies and disgraceful attempts at moral equivalence


Trump's Negotiation Tactics About Hamas and Israel as Latest Brutality Revealed, with Michael Waltz
Megyn Kelly is joined by National Security Advisor Michael Waltz to discuss the latest horrifying example of Hamas' despicable brutality, what Trump means about "taking over Gaza" and his negotiation tactics, and more.




Shiri Bibas was not killed by IDF airstrike, forensic evidence confirms
The forensics team that identified Shiri Bibas's body confirmed that she did not die in an Israeli airstrike as Hamas had previously claimed.

"We were met with depths of evil and malice that could not be conceived," Dr. Chen Kugel, a leading forensic scientist from the National Center for Forensic Medicine, said on Saturday. "Our examination showed no evidence of injury from the bomb."

"This is a difficult day for us and for all citizens of Israel," he concluded.

Shiri Bibas's body was returned to Israel from Gaza on Friday night. Hamas transferred her remains to the Red Cross, which transferred them to the IDF. The military brought then brought her body to the Institute of Forensic Medicine for confirmatory testing.

The testing team was composed of a variety of specialists, including the DNA laboratory team and the institute's director, Dr. Kugel.

The institute was also responsible for identifying the remains of her children, Kfir and Ariel Bibas.

Their bodies were identified using forensic analysis in an interdepartmental collaboration between the National Institute of Forensic Medicine and the Israel Police.


Yarden Bibas speaks out after harrowing captivity, mourns tragic loss of family
Yarden Bibas, who was recently released from captivity by Hamas, shared his first public message on Saturday.

"Thank you very much – to each and every one of you who cared, prayed, and helped my family and me," Bibas wrote. "I appreciate it very much, and it is not taken for granted."

Yarden Bibas, his wife Shiri, and their two children, Ariel and Kfir, were abducted from their home on October 7. He was freed as part of the hostage release deal at the end of 2024 when he still did not know what had happened to his family.

Bibas also expressed his gratitude to the supportive online community, stating:
"There is no doubt that this group is more than just another ordinary Facebook group! It is a group of good, supportive people, who are willing to help in any way possible!"

His post comes a day after Hamas failed to uphold an agreement to return his wife’s body, instead delivering the remains of an unidentified person.

Shiri Bibas's body was returned to Israel late Friday night. The Hostage and Missing Families Forum confirmed that the second set of remains that Hamas returned were hers.

"It is with great pain that we received the news of the identification of the late Shiri Bibas, who was murdered in captivity by the sons of injustice and was returned to Israel yesterday for eternal rest," the forum said in a statement. "The return of the late Shiri ends 505 agonizing days of uncertainty and deep pain. We share in the great sorrow of the Bibas family and will continue to accompany and embrace them."


Argentina debates renaming 'Palestine Street' to 'Bibas Family Street'
Within the Argentine political scene, politicians are debating a bill proposed by Buenos Aires City lawmaker Yamil Santoro, who seeks to rename "Palestine Street" to "Bibas Family Street."

The proposed plans to rename the street come after it was announced that Shiri Bibas and her two young sons Kfir and Ariel Bibas were murdered in Gaza captivity.

On X, he wrote: "We are presenting a bill to rename ‘Palestine Street’ as ‘Bibas Family Street.’ It is essential to remember and honor the victims of terrorism."

Argentine media reports suggest that Milei supports this initiative, but the decision lies with the Buenos Aires Legislature, where there are differing views.

Some argue that "Palestine Street" is unrelated to Hamas and that the street should not be renamed, instead recommending that a park or public space should be dedicated to remembering the Bibas children.

A blossoming relationship with Israel
Argentina's President Javier Milei's relationship with Israel has allowed for rapid policy decisions, including the national designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. The nation has also allegedly ceased recognizing Palestine as an independent state in United Nations votes, Argentine media reported.

Argentine ambassadors in neighboring nations, including Argentine Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Facundo Vila, have received criticism and complaints on Argentina’s position, including the proposed relocation of the Argentine embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, where Ambassador Wahnish is already based.


Landmarks, monuments worldwide light up in orange in memory of Bibas family
Buildings in major cities around the world were illuminated in orange light on Friday night and Saturday, in memory of slain hostages Shiri, Ariel and Kfir Bibas, who were murdered in captivity in Gaza after being taken hostage during the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, invasion and massacre.

The initiative was organized by the Foreign Ministry after their bodies were returned to Israel in recent days, and in total, 108 missions around the world worked to have their host countries participate.

Shiri and her two young sons, Ariel aged 4, and Kfir, just 9 months old, were abducted from their home in Kibbutz Nir Oz. The family’s father Yarden was snatched and held separately and was released on February 1 as part of the ceasefire and hostage release deal.

Hamas returned the bodies of Ariel and Kfir on Thursday but only handed over Shiri’s remains on Friday night, after first sending the body of an unknown Palestinian woman from Gaza.

While Hamas has insisted that the boys and their mother were killed in an Israeli strike in November 2023, Israel said that forensic examinations showed that the three were “brutally murdered” by their terrorist captors, who had killed Ariel and Kfir “with their bare hands.”

The color orange was chosen by the Foreign Ministry for the project as it has come to symbolize the plight of the young family over the past 16 months, due to the memorable bright orange hair of Ariel and Kfir.

Many buildings were lit up in Buenos Aires, Argentina, including the famous Obelisco, which featured an image of the entire family, which held Argentine citizenship.

Argentina’s President Javier Milei had previously declared two days of national mourning for Ariel and Kfir before Shiri’s fate was confirmed.


Freed hostages starved underground, forced into humiliating rituals, one disguised as Muslim woman
Released hostage Omer Shem Tov was forced to disguise himself as a Muslim woman and lowered into an underground tunnel in a bucket. He was spit on, cursed, and compelled to kiss his Hamas captors in a staged ceremony.

Other hostages were shackled for months, starved, and left in complete darkness, their bodies wasting away.

According to testimonies published by Israeli media, the six freed hostages endured months of isolation, abuse, and deprivation in Hamas’s underground tunnel network.

Eliya Cohen, one of the released hostages, recounted being shackled for extended periods, suffering deep cuts from the restraints. He and his fellow captives were primarily held in sealed tunnels with limited access to light. Hamas operatives would occasionally shine flashlights into their eyes, a form of psychological manipulation.

They would also deliberately eat in front of the hostages, tormenting them with food deprivation. Cohen also learned only upon his release that his partner had survived the attack.

Hamas disguised hostages as Muslim women
Shem Tov described being forced to disguise himself as a Muslim woman when being moved between locations. At one point, he was lowered into a tunnel in a bucket. He recalled being spit on and cursed by his captors.

Although he lost 17 kilograms during captivity, he remained committed to his Jewish faith and performed kiddush despite the near total lack of resources. Hamas terrorists also forced him to kiss them as part of a humiliating ritual. According to KAN News, his father, Malachi Shem Tov, revealed that Hamas fighters forced his son to wave and kiss one of the guards during a “ceremony” staged by the terror group.

Channel 13 News further reported that upon his release, Shem Tov wrote on a board while being transported in a helicopter: “I want a hamburger,” a moment his family described as a symbol of his resilience and return to normalcy.

Life in the tunnels: months of darkness and starvation
Shem Tov, Tal Shoham, and Omer Wenkert were held together for the last eight months in the tunnels. The conditions were unbearable: high humidity, extreme weight loss, and being completely disconnected from the outside world.

The three described an environment where time lost all meaning; the absence of seasons made it impossible to gauge how long they had been in captivity. Before their release, Hamas guards deliberately overfed them to make them appear healthier. The three formed a deep bond, likening it to that of brothers.


The long, sad, saga of Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed
As the hostages Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed returned to Israel Saturday after a collective 20+ years in Hamas captivity – more than 7,000 days in Gaza between them – a great weight was lifted from their families.

Everyone knows their names now, and Israelis are celebrating their release, along with four hostages taken on October 7, 2023, who were also released Saturday.

But for years, their kidnappings were barely an issue, and had it not been for the October 7 attack, it seems unlikely they would have been released.

If you know anything about them, you know why that is: both are mentally ill, and both are from poor communities outside the Israeli mainstream. Mengistu is from an Ethiopian immigrant family, and al-Sayed is Bedouin.

Both young men, who have been diagnosed with schizophrenia, crossed into Gaza on their own, Mengistu in 2014 and al-Sayed in 2015.

Their decade-long captivity speaks volumes about the worst of human nature, of the depth of cruelty of which humans are capable. No one could seriously have believed that either young man was a soldier. Soldiers don’t wander on their own into Gaza, for one thing. And their schizophrenia would have become apparent quickly.

Learning of the hostages' plights
While attempts were made to get both men back, their plight received little publicity. After several years, Mengistu’s family demonstrated for his release, putting up a tent near the Prime Minister’s Residence, in the spot where the Saturday-night demonstrations in favor of releasing the hostages are now held. This was the first I heard about his kidnapping, and I learned of al-Sayed’s arrest in a news article about Mengistu.


Media Watch Dog: The ABC won’t admit the uncomfortable truth about anti-Semitism
ASIO DIRECTOR-GENERAL MIKE BURGESS TELLS ABC RADIO NATIONAL THAT, RIGHT NOW, ANTI-SEMITISM IS A MORE SERIOUS PROBLEM IN AUSTRALIA THAN ISLAMOPHOBIA

Sally Sara, presenter of ABC Radio National Breakfast, is one of the taxpayer funded public broadcaster’s staff who is most into equating anti-Semitism with Islamophobia.

However, when she interviewed Mike Burgess on Friday 21 February, the ASIO Director-General made it clear that, at the present time, anti-Semitism is a bigger problem in Australia than Islamophobia.

Let’s go to the transcript:
Sally Sara: You're listening to Radio National Breakfast. My guest in the studio this morning is Mike Burgess, who is the Director-General of ASIO. In 2024, you told Insiders that this shouldn't be a race between anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Is Islamophobia of equal concern to ASIO in your view?

Mike Burgess: Yeah, so every form of violence, and if it's come from a violent ideology, if it's politically motivated violence or it's done to promote criminal violence, then actually, ASIO will be on the case and looking at it. Both are wrong. I don't see it comfortable for me, with the debate about what's more important. They're both wrong. Think about the person on the receiving end of that act, whether it's anti-Semitic or Islamophobic. They're both incredibly wrong.

But it's clear that, actually right now, we are seeing way more anti-Semitism in terms of significant incidents my agency is investigating. My organisation is split on two parts of dealing with threats, threats to life [and] threats to way of life. On the threat to life, our number one priority now is investigating anti-Semitic acts in this country.

So that’s pretty clear then – even if it is not what many ABC journalists want to hear.

According to the ASIO Director-General, acts of Islamophobia and anti-Semitism are wrong.

However, right now, when it comes to “the threat to life” anti-Semitism is the most serious problem.
‘Send them straight back’: Hanson demands Gazans’ visas be revoked after Hamas’ ‘abhorrent’ act
One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson has called for the visas of Gazans fleeing the war in Palestine to be revoked after the recent "abhorrent" behaviour from Hamas.

Senator Hanson's comments follow Hamas’ return of deceased Israeli hostages on Thursday, with the terrorist group parading the coffins of four bodies, including a nine-month-old and four-year-old, before a cheering crowd of Palestinians as music blared.

The bodies were then displayed on a makeshift stage and surrounded by anti-Israel propaganda, including an image of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a vampire.

Adding to the cruelty, Hamas is accused of returning an unidentified body instead of that of Shiri Biba, the mother of the deceased children, as per the arrangement with Israel.

Senator Hanson and Liberal Senator Alex Antic joined Rowan Dean for Sky News Australia’s new program The World According to Rowan Dean. The fifth episode is available to watch now, and new episodes are out every Friday, for SkyNews.com.au subscribers.

Senator Hanson lashed out at the Albanese government over the thousands of Gazans who had been let in to the country, saying she hoped their visas would be cancelled if Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was elected into office.

In August last year it was revealed Australia had approved almost 3,000 visas from Palestinians fleeing Gaza since Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

“This is what I've said on the floor of Parliament. We should not allow these 3 ,000 into the country,” Senator Hanson said.

“I hope if Dutton becomes Prime Minister that he will revoke those visas and send them straight back where they're coming from.”

Senator Hanson argued other countries are reluctant to accept Palestinians fleeing the city and went on to label the behaviour of some Gazans “abhorrent” in the wake of the hostage handover.

“People must understand, these people are cheering, kids are out there, children out there cheering these coffins of these, you know, of these young children,” she said.


Egyptian NHS doctor who ‘glorified’ Hamas spared deportation
An Egyptian NHS doctor who mocked Israeli festival-goers for fleeing Hamas gunmen on Oct 7 has won a legal challenge against deportation.

An immigration tribunal judge backed Dr Mennah Elwan in her claim that James Cleverly, the home secretary at the time, was wrong to cancel her leave to remain in the UK after ruling that her presence was “not conducive to the public good”.

It followed what Stephen Davies, an upper tribunal judge, said were three “shocking and inexcusable” posts on X.

He agreed with Mr Cleverly that 34-year-old Dr Elwan had supported, justified and glorified the terrorist attacks by Hamas. He also accused her of “gloating” over the success of the attacks in which 364 Israelis were killed.

Dr Elwan, a neurology specialist, had reposted harrowing footage of Israelis running from gunmen at a music festival and written that “if it was your home, you would stay and fight”.

However, the judge quashed the expulsion decision on the basis that it was not “reasonable or proportionate” and breached her rights under both the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and common law.

He said Mr Cleverly should have had “proper regard” to the “short-lived and one-off nature” of the posts, which were quickly taken down, and her previous “blameless” record during her seven years in the UK.
Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong Dons Palestinian Flag in Malaysia
Green Day finally found its voice by supporting Palestinians following Israel’s furious counter-attack. All the while Hamas terrorists refused to give back hostages that we later learned were severely mistreated.

Several died in captivity.

On Wednesday, the band played in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and someone in the crowd threw a Palestinian flag onto the stage. Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong picked it up and draped it over his body as he played.

It’s hardly the first time the band sided with the Palestinian cause.

In their song “Peacemaker,” from the album “21st Century Breakdown,” Armstrong sings: “Well, call up the Gaza, hey, hey … Well, death to the ones at the end of the serenade.” In November 2024, Green Day was performing at the Corona Capital Festival in Mexico, and during their set Armstrong changed the lyrics of the song “Jesus of Suburbia” to show support for “Palestine.” The original lyrics are “From Anaheim to the Middle East,” but Amstrong instead sang, “From Palestine to the Middle East.”

What’s different now? Timing.

A day after their Malaysian concert, the Hamas government released the bodies of four Israeli hostages, including a four-year-old and a nine-month-old. Israeli sources claim the brothers had been strangled to death by their captors following a forensic exam of their remains.

Hamas officials farcically allege, without evidence, that the boys died from an Israeli attack.

It gets even worse.

Hamas created a ghoulish celebration to coincide with the hostage handover. Palestinians celebrated over the dead bodies as loud music played.


UKLFI: Currys reviews its badge policy after Jewish customers excluded from stores
Jewish customers have been forced to leave Currys stores after they objected to staff wearing Palestine flags on their name badges.

UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) wrote letters to Currys highlighting the incidents in its Cambridge and Hemel Hempstead branches, pointing out that Currys had breached Equality Law by creating a hostile and intimidating atmosphere for Jewish and Israeli customers.

As a result, Currys is reviewing its policy of kitting its staff out with Palestine flags on their badges to indicate they can speak Arabic.

An Israeli customer had visited Currys in Cambridge to purchase a TV on 8 February 2025. This was the day when three malnourished and mistreated hostages were released and forced to thank their captors, surrounded by gun-wielding Hamas terrorists. Palestinian flags were prominently displayed in media coverage of the event.

When approached by a staff member wearing a Palestinian flag on his name tag, the Israeli customer said: “I’m sorry, it’s not personal, but I’d like to continue on my own. It’s hard for me because of the flag.” Another employee offered assistance, but the manager intervened, telling her staff member not to serve him because “he was rude.” As a result he had to leave the store and purchase a £1500 television elsewhere.

The Israeli customer commented: “The incident has certainly left me feeling insecure and unwelcome. I felt that my right to professional and unbiased treatment was compromised.”

Another Jewish customer in Currys store in Hemel Hempstead was shocked at seeing the Palestine flag being worn by a staff member, and did not want to be served by him. The customer photographed the badge, and was strongly reprimanded by other staff for doing so. He was thrown out of the shop and followed out of the store by the staff member wearing the Palestinian badge, who took photos of the customer’s family, their car and its registration number.

This customer commented: “The badge made me uncomfortable because it was unnecessary and was clearly there to make a political statement. It was the treatment after that which shocked my children and I. We were effectively refused service because we were Jewish. I never expected to be treated that way in Britain.”


The BBC’s institutional arrogance is going to destroy it
The BBC increasingly appears to be enduring a slow-motion collapse under the weight of market forces and its own hubris. It’s been another rough week for the Corporation, in particular being forced to apologise for broadcasting a documentary from Gaza starring the young son of a senior member of Hamas.

When you add recurring accusations of bias to its irresistible urge to preach – rather than entertain or inform, as it should – plus a succession of avoidable scandals, sometimes it almost feels like the BBC actually wants you to hate it.

The BBC2 documentary Gaza: How To Survive A Warzone was broadcast on February 17, and featured the 14-year-old narrator Abdullah Al-Yazouri, who turned out to be the son of Ayman Alyazouri, a man described as being “Hamas royalty”. None of this was mentioned at the time.

The day after the BBC’s apology on Wednesday, the world witnessed the grotesque carnival of Hamas parading dead hostages in black coffins.

A BBC breaking news bulletin reported this with a headline “Hamas says it did ‘everything in its power’ to keep the hostages alive”. Everything, that is, except kidnapping them in the first place. That was supported by three Hamas statements “as context”.

The BBC is an organisation whose obsession with “balance” has mutated from the admittedly tricky position of trying to pander to no one to barely disguised legitimisation of Iranian-backed terrorists.

The documentary has since been removed from BBC iPlayer. But whatever the reason for the decision to broadcast Hamas propaganda – negligence or something more underhand – it reinforces all the worst suspicions about what is going on behind the scenes.
BBC accused of ‘whitewashing’ Hamas propaganda following Bibas body release
The BBC has been accused of "whitewashing" Hamas propaganda following an article by its Diplomatic Correspondent about the release of slain Israeli hostages on Thursday.

In an article published on the BBC News website about the return of the bodies of Oded Lifschitz, Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, Ariel and Kfir, veteran BBC correspondent Paul Adams wrote: “Once again, there was a stage, flanked by huge posters highlighting the catastrophic consequences of Israel's military campaign in Gaza and the Palestinian determination to stay put.”

The posters, which Adams referred to as "imagery of the consequences of Israel's campaign," featured depictions of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu as a vampire alongside slogans accusing him of being a Nazi war criminal who was responsible for the deaths of the Israeli hostages.

The propaganda sign said: “the war criminal Netanyahu and his Nazi army killed them with missiles from Zionist warplanes” and featured a ghoulish cartoon of the Israeli Prime Minister with blood dripping out of his mouth. The stage was flanked with images of white missiles spattered with red paint and the statement, “they were killed by USA bombs.”

Israeli officials have since stated that the bodies Kfir Bibas, aged ten months, and his older brother Ariel, aged four, were not the victims of an airstrike, but were instead murdered by Hamas terrorists’ “bare hands”.

A BBC newsroom source told the JC: “How a top BBC correspondent can turn huge horrifying posters of Netanyahu as a zombie Dracula peering over the hostages, and rows and rows of Israeli coffins into simply 'imagery of the consequences of Israel's campaign' is deeply worrying. Worse still, nobody batted an eyelid. Serious questions need to be answered."

Alex Hearn, Director of Labour Against Antisemitism (LAAS), criticised Adams for “whitewashing” Hamas’ antisemitic propaganda. "What was depicted wasn’t a failed military campaign but medieval blood libel," Hearn stated.

Meanwhile, Adams’ old posts on social media have resurfaced, prompting questions about his impartiality. In one post from October 7, 2023, he referred to the Hamas attack that day as a “mass breakout,” describing it as “audacious (and yes brutal).” The following day, he called the massacre “the day Gazans broke out of their dismal prison and exacted terrible revenge.”

On October 17, Adams suggested Israeli forces had bombed the al-Ahli hospital, a claim later contradicted by intelligence reports that linked the explosion to a failed rocket launch from within Gaza.


How Biden fueled a 200% surge in antisemitism In 2021, for example, Jay Greene, a fellow at the prestigious Heritage Foundation research institute, examined the social media accounts of 750 people holding key positions in DEI departments at 65 American universities, and found not only that almost all of them frequently shared content about Israel—despite the fact that the Jewish state, needless to say, is not supposed to play a significant role in the lives of those whose job definition is to ensure equality on campuses thousands of miles away from the Gaza Strip—but also that 96% of the content they shared about Israel was not only extremely critical but bordered on antisemitism.

A rare glimpse into the antisemitism of the DEI world was provided by Tabia Lee, a black non-Jewish woman who in 2021 was hired to lead the DEI efforts of De Anza College, near San Jose in Northern California.

In an article she wrote for the New York Post after her dismissal in 2023, Lee said that she was horrified, when she arrived at the college, to experience an atmosphere of antisemitic incitement and agitation. When she told her colleagues that Jewish students deserve treatment exactly like any other minority group, they replied that this was not true because Jews are Zionists, Zionism is racism and white supremacy, and therefore care should be taken, if Jewish events are allowed to take place at the college at all, that these events focus on Israeli injustices against Palestinians.

Lee was appalled and immediately demanded that the college officially condemn antisemitism. The college leadership refused, and after students and colleagues in the DEI department called her derogatory names such as “filthy Zionist,” Lee lost her job.

The picture she painted is painful and accurate. Before Biden’s election, systematic antisemitism on campus was rare. After the Democrats’ return to the White House, universities began establishing DEI departments at a dizzying pace, and staffed them with faculty members who saw hatred of Israel not only as a legitimate opinion but also as a moral duty of anyone who considers themselves a good progressive.

This is why so few universities lifted a finger after Oct. 7, when students raised Hamas and Hezbollah flags, set up tents in the heart of the campuses, and attacked their Jewish friends: Antisemitism in universities was the result of years of built-in policy, not a momentary and surprising outbreak.

Just as university presidents turned a blind eye to antisemitism—a blindness that cost some of them, including the presidents of the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard and Columbia, their jobs, not to mention vast sums in donations from Jewish supporters—so did the Democrats.

On Oct. 31, 2024, for example, Republican lawmakers on the House Education and Workforce Committee published a 325-page report on the state of antisemitism in universities. The report summarized a year of interviews with hundreds of people, as well as a thorough examination of 400,000 pages of internal documents at prestigious institutions such as those of the Ivy League.

One of the most incriminating findings published in the report was a transcript of a conversation between Minouche Shafik, former president of Columbia University, and David Greenwald and Claire Shipman, the co-chairs of the university’s board of trustees.

Shafik told Greenwald and Shipman about a conversation she had with then-Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

Shafik asked Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish politician in the U.S., what he thought the university should do with pro-Hamas students who disrupt studies on campus and harass Jews. And Schumer, as Shafik reported, said the university should do nothing, as antisemitism is a political issue that only interests Republicans.

Schumer, of course, denied the report, but it’s hard to imagine why an experienced leader such as Shafik would lie about such a matter in an internal conversation with her confidants. And even if the report is not accurate, it cannot be denied that the Biden administration did little, if anything, to ensure the safety of Jewish students on American campuses. She Was Fired for Antisemitism—Now She’s an Academic Gatekeeper
The first tenured professor to be fired for antisemitism, as I first reported here, has now secured a comfortable new role at one of anthropology’s most prestigious academic journals.

Maura Finkelstein, the subject of eight antisemitic incident reports at Muhlenberg University, was accused by students of pushing anti-Israel bias in class, mocking her school’s Hillel on Instagram, and even expressing that she was “heartbroken” over the Jewish organization’s presence on campus.

Hillel, founded in the late 1920s, was established to support Jewish students at a time when being Jewish was a liability on campus and Jews were seen as a threat to “white” students’ academic opportunities.

Since her firing in 2024, Finkelstein pledged to appeal her termination, but those efforts appear to have been unsuccessful. Instead, she has taken her anti-Zionist and anti-Israel sentiment to the American Anthropologist, the flagship journal of the American Anthropological Association (AAA), where she now serves as an Associate Editor, overseeing the publication of academic research.

Finkelstein’s Controversial Views
In a recent post, Finkelstein urged fellow anthropologists to support the Palestinian cause, declaring that the AAA is taking the issue seriously.

Why Was Finkelstein Fired?
The Department of Education (DOE) intervened at Muhlenberg after eight students lodged formal complaints against Finkelstein, alleging anti-Israel bias and antisemitic behavior. She was reportedly seen photographing a fundraising table for Israel’s war effort inside the campus Hillel for unexplained reasons.

Finkelstein claims she was fired for retweeting a “poem,” but the complaints against her paint a more damning picture.

One student detailed Finkelstein’s classroom rhetoric:

“I have her for [class]… when the news broke about the Hamas invasion of Israel, Maura Finkelstein sent out an email to her classes saying that American news is biased and to read/watch the news sources she sent to us in order to understand the conflict going on in Israel.”

“As a Zionist and American Jew planning to move to Israel and become a citizen, I felt beyond uncomfortable and was too anxious to even go to class. We spent almost the whole class discussing the topic and almost no time on class material.”
Ex-NYU Student Bar Association prez that was axed for vile anti-Israel comments lands at woke nonprofit
The former head of NYU’s Student Bar Association axed for vile anti-Israel comments has been quietly working for an ultra-woke nonprofit itself accused of antisemitism that rakes in millions in taxpayer dough.

Ryna Workman began as a staff attorney for the Bronx Defenders last year, according to her LinkedIn bio, where she says, “I have focused my work on organizing students to be involved in liberation efforts.”

But Workman, is not listed on the group’s website and it’s unclear what her day-to-day responsibilities at the organization, which raked in more than $6 million last year from the City Council, with the overwhelming majority of those funds going to pay for legal services to illegal migrants, data show.

Workman made headlines after cheering the terrorists’ Oct. 7, 2023 slaughter of at least 1,200 Israelis — and blamed the Jewish state for the slaughter.

“I want to express, first and foremost, my unwavering and absolute solidarity with Palestinians in their resistance against oppression towards liberation and self-determination,” Workman, wrote in an email to the NYU Law student body three days after the attack.

The statement sparked outrage and led to Workmans’ removal as NYU student bar association president. A plum job at the law firm of Winston and Strawn was also rescinded.

Her current employer is also no stranger to controversy.

In 2021 a director there circulated an email blasting Israel with long recycled false allegations of “genocide.”

And two years later, the group was forced to issue an apology and a $170,000 settlement for alleged discrimination against a Jewish staffer.

“Ryna is a perfect case study of how the woke mind-virus poisons young minds at our elite institutions— she gets accepted to NYU, adopts they/them pronouns, begins supporting Hamas, and starts tearing down hostage posters,” said Jason Curtis Anderson, co-founder of One City Rising, a good government nonprofit.

“What are they learning at these schools that makes college students want society to collapse?”
George Washington University Retaliated Against Jewish Students Who Lodged Anti-Semitism Complaint, Federal Probe Finds
A federal civil rights investigation uncovered evidence that the George Washington University faculty retaliated against Jewish students based on "shared ancestry-related advocacy" by placing them in a remediation program after the students lodged an anti-Semitism complaint against an anti-Israel professor.

The Department of Education also ordered the school to conduct a review of former GW psychology professor Lara Sheehi’s social media posts—which included calls to "destroy Zionism" and described Israelis as "genocidal fucks"—to determine if the comments created a "hostile environment" for Jewish and Israeli students.

The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights raised the concerns in a confidential settlement letter with GW on Jan. 16, which followed a two-year investigation, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.

As part of the settlement, GW agreed to "review and revise" its anti-discrimination policies and train professors against "unlawful discrimination." The school also agreed to expunge any disciplinary action from the students’ records.

A group of Jewish and Israeli psychology students at GW filed the civil rights complaint in 2023, saying the school failed to protect them after they were "singled out for repeated and persistent harassment" by anti-Israel professors and classmates in the program and later subjected to retaliation when they complained.

In the letter, the civil rights office said it had "concern that the students may have been placed on remediation plans in retaliation for asserting their rights" under the Civil Rights Act’s Title VI anti-discrimination clause. It added that the decisions to place those students into a remediation program "appear to encompass [the students’] shared ancestry-related advocacy."

"Evidence provided to OCR indicated that the students made in-class statements during the course that constituted protected activity," the letter stated.


Why Did ABC News Present Terror-Linked Family as Innocent Palestinians?
ABC News wanted a good story on Israel’s anti-terror operation in Jenin last week.

But as usual, instead of doing some independent digging, foreign media rely on fixers to hook them up with the “best” interviewees — those who can speak about their suffering and displacement, while painting Israel as an aggressor.

And so the network’s Britt Clennett found herself talking to members of only one family in town — the Zubeidis. Did she know they were linked to various terrorists, including a very infamous one recently released as part of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal? Did she try to get other voices or challenge the choice of sources? If she did, she didn’t disclose it.

The result was that ABC News’s consumers were served Palestinian propaganda under the guise of authentic reporting.

The most ridiculous part of the multimedia piece is when Clennett interviews Jamal Zubeidi as “a displaced Palestinian,” without telling her viewers he is a close relative of none other than arch-terrorist Zakaria Zubeidi — a mass murderer who Israel recently released in return for Hamas hostages.

And despite the interviewee’s own admission of having ties to jailed relatives, ABC News just couldn’t — or wouldn’t — put two and two together.
Los Angeles Times Falsely Reports Most Remaining Hostages Are Soldiers
“The Palestinian is a civilian even if he takes up arms, and the Israeli is a colonizer even if he rests on the beach,” a pro-Hamas sentiment prevalent for years on Arabic social media marks all Israelis as legitimate military targets.

In the journalistic equivalent of this wholesale delegitimization of Israel and its citizens regardless of the facts, a June 2021 letter signed by hundreds of Western journalists, including nine from the Los Angeles Times, exhorted that all coverage of Israeli-Palestinian issues should be filtered through the distorting prism of “Israel’s military occupation and its system of apartheid.”

This week, Los Angeles Times coverage seemingly embraced this approach, adopting without challenge Hamas’ baseless definition of all male hostages between the ages of 19 and 49 as soldiers.


Hezbollah supporters flock to Beirut for Nasrallah funeral
Thousands of supporters of slain Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah have flown into Beirut for his funeral, which will take place on Sunday nearly five months after he died in an Israeli airstrike.

The 64-year-old terror master was killed in an Israel Defense Forces strike on Hezbollah headquarters in south Beirut on Sept. 27.

The Israeli Air Force conducted a massive strike targeting the headquarters, built underground beneath residential buildings, in the heart of the Dahiyeh district of the Lebanese capital.

His death was a massive blow to the Iranian-backed Shi’ite terrorist group. Under his leadership beginning in 1992, it wreaked terror against the Jewish state and Sunni Muslims.

Israel also killed Nasrallah’s cousin and successor, Hashem Safieddine, slain in an IAF strike on a Beirut suburb six days later. Safieddine will be buried in his hometown in Southern Lebanon.

The two bodies had been temporarily buried in secret locations, according to the Associated Press.

Crowds are expected to assemble at Beirut’s main sports stadium for a funeral ceremony before Nasrallah’s interment, the report added.

An Iraqi Transport Ministry official was cited by AP as saying that up to 6,000 Iraqis have traveled to Beirut over the last several days. Iraq has a majority Shi’ite population with a big following of Hezbollah.

Among those who traveled to Beirut was the anti-Israeli American commentator Jackson Hinkle, who frequently spreads anti-Western propaganda via his social media accounts.

“I am honored to be attending the funeral,” Hinkle posted on X after arriving this past week in Beirut.


Third IRGC commander in a week threatens to destroy Israel, as Iran ramps up missile production
IRGC Maj.-Gen. Ebrahim Jabbari threatened to destroy Israel as part of Operation True Promise 3 in a speech to members of the Basij during a training exercise in Birjand on Friday.

"Operation True Promise 3 will be carried out at the right time, with precision, and on a scale sufficient to destroy Israel and raze Tel Aviv and Haifa to the ground," he said.

Jabbari's threat marks the third time in a week that an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) commander has threatened to destroy Israel in Operation True Promise 3.

Jabbari joined Brig.-Gen. Ali Fadavi, deputy commander of the IRGC, and Brig.-Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the IRGC's Aerospace Force, in their threats to destroy Israel in Operation True Promise 3.

Operation True Promise 3 is the name given to Iran's planned third attack against Israel, following the first and second attacks in April and October 2024.

IRGC threats to destroy Israel
The increase in IRGC threats has been linked to an increase in IRGC missile production over the past month.

Iran received a 1,000-ton shipment of rocket fuel precursor chemicals from China last week, while the IRGC revealed a new underground "missile city" a week before.

This was further bolstered by Hajizadeh's comments on Tuesday, where he lauded Iran's ability to strike Israel in "the world's largest ballistic missile operation."
Syrian arrested in stabbing at Berlin Shoah memorial wanted ‘to kill Jews’
German police apprehended a 19-year-old Syrian man on Friday evening in a stabbing at Berlin’s Holocaust memorial that left a Spanish tourist with life-threatening injuries to his neck.

The victim was placed in an induced coma but was no longer in critical condition, AFP reported on Saturday.

The suspect had a “plan to kill Jews,” police and prosecutors said.

The victim “was so seriously injured that he had to be taken by the fire brigade to hospital for emergency treatment,” Reuters quoted a police spokesperson as saying.

The victim is a 30-year-old man, the Associated Press reported.

The suspect was arrested with blood stains on his hands and carrying a Koran and a prayer rug, AFP reported, adding that initial investigations suggested “connections with the Middle East conflict.”

The Syrian came to Germany in 2023 as an unaccompanied minor, was granted asylum and lived in Leipzig, investigators said.

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe commemorates the 6 million Jews killed by Germans and their helpers during the time of the Third Reich.

Earlier on Friday, an 18-year-old ethnic Chechen was arrested on suspicion of plotting to attack the Israeli embassy in the German capital, the Bild newspaper reported.
Three arrested near Israeli embassy in Sweden on suspicion of attack plot
Swedish police on Friday confirmed the arrest of three men near the Israeli embassy in Stockholm on suspicion of planning an attack.

The arrests were made close to the embassy, but not inside the compound itself, spokesperson Susanna Rinaldo told Reuters.

“We are unable to comment on the potential motive,” she added.

The suspects are being held for interrogation, according to the report.

In October, Swedish authorities open a probe into an “unusual incident” after gunfire was heard in the vicinity of the embassy.

A firearm and an empty shell casing were found outside the legation, according to TV4 Nyheterna.

In January 2024, an apparent explosive device was found near the Israeli diplomatic mission in the Swedish capital.
One dead, several police wounded in ‘Islamist’ stabbing attack in France
One person was killed and two police officers were seriously injured Saturday in a knife attack in eastern France that President Emmanuel Macron said was an “Islamist terror act.”

Prosecutors said three more officers were lightly wounded in the attack in the city of Mulhouse, carried out by a 37-year-old suspect who is on a terror prevention watchlist, prosecutor Nicolas Heitz told AFP.

The suspect was in custody.

France’s national anti-terror prosecutors unit (PNAT), which has taken charge of the investigation, said the suspect first attacked the municipal police officers, shouting “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest).

Witnesses confirmed to AFP that the suspect had several times shouted the words in Arabic that are used by Muslims as an exclamation of their faith.

A civilian passer-by who intervened was fatally injured, the PNAT said in a statement. According to Mulhouse prosecutors, he was a 69-year-old Portuguese national.

Macron said there was “no doubt” that the incident was “a terrorist act,” specifically “an Islamist terrorist act.”

The government was determined to continue doing “everything to eradicate terrorism on our soil,” Macron added.
Hostage documentary, Holding Liat, wins major award at the Berlinale
Holding Liat, a documentary by Brandon Kramer about former hostage Liat Beinin Atzili and her family, won the Berlinale Documentary Award at the 75th Berlinale, the Berlin International Film Festival.

The award was announced in a ceremony on Saturday night.

The film details the struggle of the Beinin-Atzili family after Liat was kidnapped by Hamas from Kibbutz Nir Oz on October 7. Liat Beinin-Atzlili, an American-Israeli born to kibbutznik parents from the US, returned home in the first hostage deal in November 2023, while her partner, Aviv Atzili, was killed. Kramer, a relative of the Beinin family, began chronicling the family’s journey shortly after he heard about the massacre. Much of the film is about how Liat’s father, a left-leaning Israeli, continued to focus on his hope for a peaceful solution to the conflict even as he reached out to leaders all over the world to save his daughter.

Kramer, accepting the award, said, “This isn’t a film that we wanted to make. After our relatives, Liat and Aviv Atzili, were taken from their home on October 7, my brother Lance and I felt a responsibility to pick up the camera and document the family’s unique experience. We witnessed up close a family wrestling with different points of view on how to return their loved ones, hold onto their values, and seek a more peaceful future for Israelis and Palestinians. In a complicated and polarized moment, telling a nuanced story about one family, navigating their differences, their grief, and their empathy felt universal and urgent to share. Documentaries can help us find each other’s humanity and the shared language of cinema can contribute to peace.”

The movie received a standing ovation at its screening, which took place in the presence of the filmmakers and the Beinin-Atzili family. Among the film’s producers is the director Darren Aronofsky, who made such films as Black Swan and Requiem for a Dream.
Israelis Poured Billion Tons of Unsalted Water Into a Desert, Few Years Later Result Was Unexpected



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This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For 20 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

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