Monday, May 26, 2025

05/26 Links Pt2: The Jews Are Jerusalem’s Only Hope; The meaning of ‘by any means necessary’; 600 days later, their absence still echoes

From Ian:

The meaning of ‘by any means necessary’
The deranged and depraved pro-Hamas constituencies on Ivy League campuses have taken many liberties with their “higher” education over the past 20 months. What tops the list is a twisted misreading of the First Amendment. The fact that constitutional law professors never bothered to set them straight says a lot about the failed integrity of the custodians of our laws.

Remember when the three university presidents from Harvard, Pennsylvania and MIT testified before Congress in response to the alarming spike in antisemitic agitation on their campuses? Negligently advised by counsel and terrified of Jew-hating students (many of whom came from Middle Eastern countries where antisemitism is baked right into the pita bread), they were unable to say with certainty that calling for the genocide of Jews violates their policies on bullying and harassment.

It was a question with an obviously simple answer: Such threats are protected by neither principles of free speech nor academic freedom. But this unholy trinity had, as their first order of business, the avoidance of no-confidence votes at home. After all, their many antisemitic colleagues—incubated in “Humanities” departments flush with Qatari money and obsessed with anti-colonial fixations that depended on the demonization of Jews—would never forgive them had they conceded in the congressional record that calling for the destruction of Israel, and blaming Jewish students for a nonexistent genocide in Gaza, were both morally wrong and outside the scope of a university education.

Instead, they comported themselves as smugly superior to congressional representatives (although ironically, their fiercest interrogator, Elise Stefanik, was a Harvard graduate). The three presidents cagily replied that the answer depended on the “context.”

Wait a minute: There’s a context in which calling for the mass murder of Jews is permissible? Does the same situational loophole exist for the nostalgic lynching of African-Americans?

Advocating for the death of a people standing 10 feet away from you is most assuredly not constitutionally protected. There is no “context” in which murderous threats are immune from governmental and university regulation.

And, yet, chants like “Globalize the Intifada!” somehow continued unabated after Oct. 7, 2023—on both campuses and city streets.

Now we have witnessed the dangers inherent in casually downplaying the felonious loose lips of terrorist fanboys: Two soon-to-be-engaged Israeli Embassy employees were shot dead outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. The gunman was apparently all hopped up on anti-American, anti-Israel animus. His social media postings were replete with “death to America,” “death to Israel” and “I voted for Hamas.”

Unhinged, yes, but still to be taken seriously.
600 days later, their absence still echoes
It will soon be 600 days since the horrors of October 7, 2023, when Hamas terrorists stormed into Israel, murdering over 1,200 innocent people and abducting 251 others into Gaza. Six hundred days.

For many, the physical wounds have begun to heal. But for the families of the hostages, and for the Jewish people, the pain only deepens. The moral wound of their absence remains unhealed, festering in the world’s silence.

Fifty-eight hostages are still in Gaza. Some are alive. Many are not. All are being held by a terror regime that violates the laws of war, scorns human decency, and glorifies death. Hamas continues to find apologists across the political spectrum, in the US and beyond.

These nearly 600 days have tested not only the resilience of Israel but the conscience of the free world.

Where are the institutions that claim to stand for human rights? Where is the sustained moral outrage? Why has the demand for their release not echoed from every capital, every campus, every pulpit?

We continue to say their names. We remember their faces. We refuse to move on.

And then last Wednesday night, that absence was joined by two more.

Two young Israeli embassy employees, Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky, were gunned down in cold blood at a Jewish American Heritage Month celebration at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC.

This was not a random shooting. It was an act of antisemitic terror, carried out at a Jewish institution, on a day meant to celebrate Jewish life in America. The motive is clear. The message is chilling.

The same hatred that abducted children and burned families alive in southern Israel pulled the trigger in our nation’s capital.

We grieve for Sarah and Yaron. Their memory now echoes alongside the hostages, the murdered, the silenced.
South African chief rabbi sides with Trump against Pretoria
In an unusual statement, South Africa’s chief rabbi on Sunday sided with U.S. President Donald Trump, defending his criticism of Pretoria in connection with allegations of anti-white racism involving deadly violence and hate speech.

“President Trump was right to highlight the moral aberration of the ‘Kill the Boer’ chant and the horrific farm murders,” Rabbi Warren Goldstein said in a video message. He added that Trump “is wrong that this is only a white genocide, it is a South African genocide.”

Goldstein referenced South African President Cyril Ramaphosa’s visit to the White House on Thursday, when he met with Trump in the Oval Office. A journalist asked Trump “what it would take” for him to reject claims of a “white genocide” in South Africa.

Ramaphosa said he would answer the question for Trump, saying that the American leader would need to “listen to the voices of South Africans” on the issue. Trump noted that thousands of accounts have accumulated, adding, “I could show you. It has to be responded to,” before asking an aide to dim the lights.

A montage was shown on a screen, including footage of tens of thousands of people cheering in a stadium as Julius Malema, a leader of the anti-white Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party, chant “Kill the Boer.”

Boer is a word in Afrikaans and Dutch that means “farmer.” It is used to identify the Afrikaner nation, a minority of about two million people whose ancestors came to South Africa centuries ago from the Netherlands, France and Germany. The Afrikaners were the dominant political force in South Africa during apartheid.

In 2022 and 2023, almost 100 people were murdered in 635 so-called farm attacks—the term used for raids on white-owned farms by black perpetrators—according to data compiled by the AfriForum watchdog. Many farm attacks—which often feature rape, torture and extreme violence—combine racial animosity and theft.


Seth Mandel: The Jews Are Jerusalem’s Only Hope
Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish people, and it was a Jewish city for more than a hundred years before partition—and yet the British proposal was to take Jerusalem out of the Jews’ hands and “internationalize” it. Still, the Jews accepted the partition.

That is because the two sides in the conflict in Mandate Palestine were divided between those who wanted self-determination—the Jews—and those who didn’t want the Jews to have self-determination. The Arabs of Palestine were, at the time, interested mainly in preventing Jewish liberation, not establishing a separate state of their own in the land. To the Jews, nothing was ever more important than their ability to live in their land. To the Arabs, nothing was ever more important than preventing Jews’ ability to live in their land.

The irony of Jews’ generosity—there is really no other word for it—regarding Jerusalem is that we know exactly what happens when the Jews are not given oversight of their holy places. Here is historian Yardena Schwartz, whose 2024 book on Hebron has established itself as one of the most important works of the 21st century, describing what the Western Wall area looked like in 1928:

“Residents of the Mughrabi Quarter, named for the North African Muslims who lived there, often cursed, spat, and hurled garbage at Jewish worshippers. Arab residents walked through the narrow passageway with their donkeys, which sometimes relieved themselves beside Jews in prayer. The Western Wall and the Mughrabi Quarter, like the Temple Mount, were property of the Waqf.”

Note the difference: With the waqf in charge of Jewish sites, those sites are used as a garbage dump and a place for donkeys to relieve themselves. Today, the mosque compound above it is guarded by soldiers of the Jewish state who occasionally arrest Jews for praying. The waqf has been single-minded in its ISIS-like attempts to destroy the ancient history at the site. Israel has honored and protected the artifacts there, which tell the history of civilization.

And that is the most important lesson in all of this. Jews are Jerusalem’s only hope. In the hands of anyone else, the holy places and the heritage of mankind are buried in refuse. Only in Israel’s hands is access guaranteed for everyone. Yom Yerushalayim should be a holiday observed by the entire world.


Episode 15: Jerusalem Day, a modern redemption story
Jerusalem Day falls on May 25th this year. It is the day of Jerusalem's unification in the 1967 Six Day War, and so a symbol of both Jewish rescue from the genocidal plans of its enemies, a palpable experience of strength and redemption just two decades after Auschwitz, and also a symbol of the perils and moral problems of Jewish power, the day Israel found itself ruling another people.

It is the day of the Jews' homecoming to their sacred places, but also of political grandstanding and ideological narrative-making.

Yet at its heart, Jerusalem Day is also about, well, Jerusalem, the real living city, the people who belong to it, and the grandeur of ordinary life in the shadow of great and ancient abstractions.

This episode is sponsored by Julie and Frank Cohen, who believe that this podcast is a way to teach our story, because understanding our past and present is key to building a better future.

And as has become a podcast tradition, it is dedicated to Kinneret Gat, teacher, mother, grandmother, who was killed by Hamas terrorists on October 7.




‘We will not let hatred have the final word,’ Noem says at Jerusalem ceremony honoring slain diplomats
The murder of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, is a reminder “of the dreams that terrorism seeks to destroy every single day,” Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said on Monday, standing alongside Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar at a memorial event held in Jerusalem for the young Israeli Embassy staffers who were killed last week in a terror attack outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington.

“Today, we stand together with profound grief, and our hearts are heavy with the loss of these two radiant souls that we will no longer have with us,” Noem said. “In this moment of sorrow, we also ask that you would gather with us to honor their light and the unbreakable spirit of the Israeli and the American people,” Noem continued.

Lischinsky, Noem said, “was known for his infectious smile and his unwavering commitment to peace and the vision of the Abraham Accords.”

“Friends and family shared of Sarah that she glowed with warmth and compassion, dedicating her life to fostering peace and understanding,” Noem said, mentioning ​Milgrim’s work for the Israeli peace-building nonprofit Tech2Peace and her career in public diplomacy. “Their love for each other, a bond that was so strong that Yaron had already chosen a ring to propose to Sarah here in Jerusalem reminds us of the dreams that terrorism seeks to destroy every single day — but we will not let hatred have the final word.”

“Sarah and Yaron’s lives are a testament to the power of love and service,” Noem said. “They stood for something that was much larger than themselves, and their memory calls us to do the same. They have lived a life of significance that has forever changed us. Together they embody the very best of Israel: courageous, hopeful and dedicated to peace.”

Sa’ar thanked Noem for her visit to Israel, which he said, “shows solidarity and demonstrates the close relations between our people.” He also thanked the U.S. government for the investigation into the murder of Lischinsky and Milgrim.

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee also spoke at the event, held at the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs headquarters, and said that the memories of Lischinsky and Milgrim “will not be taken from any of us, and we should always be mindful that there are people who pay an incredible price to simply be Israelis and Jews.”


Matthew Goldin, alleged SNL writer, banned after backing Israel museum shooter
Matthew Goldin, a 23-year-old who has claimed to write for Saturday Night Live, had his Instagram account suspended late last week after he posted and praised a statement by Elias Rodriguez, the man accused of executing a young couple in Washington, DC as they left an event at the Jewish Museum on May 21, according to a report on the Instagram account for Community News.

His X account has also been suspended.

Goldin, whose Substack says he is making SNL “a tad more subversive,” may have been hoping to make it a ton more hateful, if he even worked for the show at all. He has no credits on the Internet Movie Database and some now-deleted posts on X indicate both that he was fired from the show and that he never actually worked there.

Before his Instagram account was deleted, he wrote, “Elias is thoughtful and brave, and I stand with him,” above Rodriguez’s so-called “manifesto” for Jew-killing and the killer’s chilling comment, “Escalate for Gaza. Bring the war home.”

Rodriguez’s way of bringing the war home was by killing Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim as they left the American Jewish Committee’s ACCESS Young Diplomats Reception at the Capital Jewish Museum Wednesday night. After Lischinsky and Milgrim fell to the ground, he reportedly leaned over and fired additional shots, then entered the museum and told bystanders, “I did it for Palestine, I did it for Gaza.”

Lischinsky and Milgrim were staffers of the Israeli Embassy, and Lischinsky planned to propose to Milgrim soon. The event they were attending was about humanitarian aid in Gaza and Israel. Lischinsky was a Christian who moved to Israel, and Milgrim was an American Jew; the event was aimed at Jewish professionals.


Guy Christensen: The Gen-Z TikTok Star Inciting His 3.4 Million Followers to Murder ‘Zionists’
You may not have heard of Guy Christensen — but perhaps you should have. Not because he has anything remotely insightful to offer (he doesn’t), but because millions of Gen Z users do hear him, every day. And understanding who he is helps explain why so many American college campuses have become incubators for a movement that is less “progressive” than it is unapologetically pro-Islamist.

Born in 2005, Christensen is part of a growing cohort of American influencers who discovered both their political awakening — and their monetizable moment — in the wake of Hamas’ October 7 massacre. Before then, his Instagram resembled that of any ordinary teenager: fishing trips, photos of his girlfriend, the typical adolescent blend of leisure and self-regard.

But like many others, Christensen sensed an opportunity. The fusion of performative compassion for Palestinians and the algorithmic rewards of antisemitism proved irresistible. And so, in May 2025, he posted a video so brazen and grotesque that it achieved precisely what he seemed to desire: outrage, attention, and media coverage.

In the now-deleted post — eventually taken down by TikTok and Instagram — Christensen, who frequently appears on camera draped in a keffiyeh, openly endorsed the murders of Israeli embassy staffers Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim. The couple was gunned down outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., on May 21.

We are not reproducing the footage. But Christensen’s words are worth documenting — if only to illustrate the depths to which online “activism” has sunk.

“I do not condemn the elimination of the Zionist officials who worked at the Israeli embassy last night,” he declared. He urged his followers to “support Elias’s actions,” referring to Elias Rodriguez, who has since been charged with two counts of murder. “He is not a terrorist. He’s a resistance fighter,” Christensen insisted. “And the fact is that the fight against Israel’s war machine, against their genocide machine, against their criminality, includes their foreign diplomats in this country.”


Netanyahu compares October 7 hostages to girls kidnapped by Boko Haram
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew a parallel between the kidnapping of hundreds of people in Israel on October 7, 2023, and the 2014 abduction of hundreds of schoolgirls in Nigeria, in comments aired Sunday.

The remarks came during a meeting between Netanyahu and unspecified relatives of hostages several weeks ago, as the premier attempted to push back on the idea that the kidnappings of October 7 had been singular in scope or effect, according to Channel 12 news.

A recording of the comments aired by the channel picks up mid-conversation, with Netanyahu claiming that no country has gone to the lengths Israel has for its hostages.

“People are amazed that we are prepared to do what we have done, for…,” he is heard saying, before a person identified as a relative of a hostage cuts in.

“There weren’t many countries that were in our situation and abandoned [as] on October 7,” she says. A second relative adds: “When we are faced with the kidnapping of 250 people, including children, that’s something that has never happened before, so you know…”

In the recording, Netanyahu retorts that “I think what happened was a terrible catastrophe, the worst catastrophe visited upon us since the Holocaust.

“But if you want to talk about what’s happened around the world, that’s incorrect,” he adds. “It’s incorrect regarding Boko Haram, it’s incorrect about other places, many, many others. It’s just that nobody has done what we are doing. That’s the situation.”

Two hundred and fifty-one people, most of them civilians, were kidnapped to Gaza during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023. The total includes the bodies of some people killed during the onslaught.
More than 90% of Gaza border residents back home
Nearing 600 days since the Hamas-led invasion on Oct. 7, 2023, the Israeli government published a status report on Monday stating that 92% of the 64,000 residents displaced during the terrorist onslaught have returned to their homes in the “Gaza Envelope.”

The rest, some 5,000 residents, are living in temporary, state-funded accommodations, according to the report.

The “Gaza Envelope” refers to the populated area within seven kilometers (4.3 miles) of the Strip, which are within mortar range of the enclave.

Renovation and rebuilding efforts in three out of 13 communities hit the hardest on Oct. 7 have been completed, wrote the Tkuma Directorate, also known as the Rebirth Administration, which was established in the wake of the devastation wrought to the Israeli communities situated along the border from the Gazan terrorists.

In total, 1,850 residential buildings have been designated for renovation, with work completed or is in advanced stages for some 970 residences, the report read.

In addition, 110 homes have been completely reconstructed out of some 420 designated homes.

The physical reconstruction budget of the Tkuma Directorate for all communities stands at approximately 1.4 billion shekels ($390 million), with around 1.1 billion shekels ($310 million) allocated to the 10 communities that suffered the most severe damage.

The budget is four times the Israel Tax Authority’s damage assessment for these communities, the status report read.


Two Harvard students who assaulted Jewish peer receive honors, $65,000 fellowship
One of two Harvard students who assaulted a Jewish classmate during an anti-Israel protest in October 2023 has been appointed as class marshal by Harvard Divinity School at the upcoming graduation ceremony.

This comes just three weeks after the other assailant was awarded a $65,000 Harvard Law School fellowship to work at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

The Harvard Law Review website says its $65,000 fellowship goes to recent Harvard Law School graduates “with a demonstrated interest in serving the public interest through their work and scholarship.”

In October 2023, Ibrahim Bharmal and Elom Tettey-Tamaklo surrounded a Jewish student named Yoav Segev and covered him with keffiyehs while shouting “Shame! Shame! Shame!” as he tried to free himself and said “don’t touch me.”

While Bharmal and Tettey-Tamaklo originally faced a criminal trial, Boston Municipal Court Judge Stephen W. McClenon dismissed the charges at the end of April, instead ordering them to attend “pre-trial diversion” anger management courses and perform 80 hours of community service.

Segev told the court that “they refused to take any responsibility for their actions” and that they had launched a media campaign against him in an attempt “to mischaracterize me as the aggressor.”

Monica Shah, Bharmal’s lawyer, told the judge, “It was not hands-on. It involved a scarf, and there’s no physical injuries.”

The same week as the judge dismissed the charges, the Harvard Law Review awarded Bharmal the $65,000 fellowship, and then this week it was reported that Tettey-Tamaklo has been appointed as marshal.

The Free Press obtained a letter from Segev’s lawyers, which said, “Harvard’s silence and inaction are grounded in nothing other than blatant antisemitism.”

“Segev has not only been subjected to an extremely hostile, antisemitic environment at Harvard, but he was also assaulted, battered, and harassed by a rabid mob of Harvard students and employees.”
Trump considering re-directing $3 billion in grants from Harvard to trade schools
US President Donald Trump said on Monday he is considering taking $3 billion of grant money away from Harvard University and giving it to trade schools across the United States.

His comments, which were made on Truth Social, come less than a week after his administration blocked Ivy League schools from enrolling foreign students.

Trump also slammed Harvard University last month, calling it an antisemitic, far-left institution in a Thursday statement following the Ivy League school’s launch of a lawsuit against the federal government.

“Harvard is an antisemitic, far Left Institution, as are numerous others, with students being accepted from all over the world [who] want to rip our country apart,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

“The place is a liberal mess, allowing a certain group of crazed lunatics to enter and exit the classroom and spew fake anger and hate.”

Trump said that since the administration’s crackdown on antisemitism and radicalism at Harvard, including the April 11 policy demands rejected by Harvard on April 14, the university had been acting like it was the all- “American apple pie.”


Seth Frantzman: US Syria envoy Barrack meets Syrian president to discuss path for 'peace and prosperity'
Tom Barrack, the US ambassador to Turkey, who is also the new special envoy for Syria, met with Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa on May 24.

“Today, I met with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and Foreign Minister Assad al-Shaibani in Istanbul to implement President Trump’s bold decision to provide a path for peace and prosperity in Syria,” Barrack wrote on social media.

Sharaa met US President Donald Trump earlier in May in Riyadh. Since then, the US has moved to lift sanctions, a move welcomed by the Syrian president. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has waived an important sanctions act for 180 days. Barrack said that he “reiterated the United States’ support for the Syrian people after so many years of conflict and violence and Secretary Rubio’s position that if we had not acted so promptly and deliberately to remove sanctions our partners in the region would not be able to provide donor dollars, supplies, and energy to relieve the plight and trauma of the traumatized Syrian population.”

The US envoy noted that “President Trump’s goal is to enable the new government to create the conditions for the Syrian people to not only survive but thrive.”

The US ambassador also noted that Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had hosted a meeting between the US and Syria and that the message of the meeting is that “Syria is now open for business.” This comes as Turkey moves to also quickly invest in Syria. Reports also indicate Turkey may want to expand defense ties with Damascus.

Ambassador Barrack also stressed that “the cessation of sanctions against Syria will preserve the integrity of our primary objective – the enduring defeat of ISIS – and will give the people of Syria a chance for a better future.”
Seth Frantzman: US-backed Kurds strike deal with Syrian gov't to clear ISIS camps
The new Syrian transitional government is seeking to find a way to deal with thousands of ISIS families who have been housed at camps in eastern Syria since ISIS was defeated in Syria in 2019. When ISIS was defeated in several villages near the Euphrates River in 2019, some of the terrorist group chose to surrender, and thousands of families of ISIS fighters ended up in the hands of the US-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

The thousands of families were sent to several camps and detention facilities in eastern Syria. These camps, called Al-Hol and Roj, probably had some 80,000 or more people in them at one time. By 2024, they had around 10,000 male members of ISIS as well as tens of thousands of family members, such as women and children. Al-Hol had an estimated 18,000 Iraqi citizens and 16,000 Syrian citizens, along with some 6,000 foreign ISIS supporters. There were another 3,000 estimated ISIS supporters in the Roj camp.

The camps have not been well funded, and what has happened is that the ISIS supporters generally keep to themselves and have a kind of internal police force that enforces their strict extremist norms. They also raise thousands of children in these conditions, essentially creating a new generation of potential extremists.

The US-led Coalition had no clear policy on what to do with these people. This is because most members of the Coalition were not involved in the Syria campaign. Many Western governments didn’t want their citizens back from Syria. At the same time, the Coalition didn’t want the SDF, which was backed and trained by the US, to release these dangerous extremists. There was no funding to de-radicalize the women and men either.

The Kurdish-led Democratic Autonomous Administration in North and East Syria (DAANES), which is the civilian authority in eastern Syria, therefore had to deal with these camps. They had special teams of SDF and security forces to secure the camps. However, it was impossible to deal with the families and change their behavior. The eastern Syria region, known by Kurds as Rojava, has no real financial resources. It is poor and isolated.
IDF enters south Lebanon, advances several hundred meters
An IDF infantry force entered southern Lebanon 200 meters east of the municipality of Mais al-Jabal, Army Radio reported Monday night, citing Lebanese reports.

Israeli soldiers reportedly advanced several hundred meters into Lebanese territory.

The IDF advanced with two bulldozers into their northern neighbor, Walla reported, also citing Lebanese reports. Soldiers were reportedly searching houses in the area using flashlights, while some reports claimed that forces were conducting excavation operations in the area. Patrols in the area due to IDF activity

Hezbollah-affiliated news source Al-Akhbar reported that the Lebanese military, in response, is conducting patrols in the Mais al-Jabal area.

Israeli soldiers were stationed near the home of a Lebanese family that decided to leave their house due to the IDF's activities, reports said.
Hezbollah leader doubles down on terror group's devotion to 'resistance'
Hezbollah chief Sheikh Naim Qassem reiterated the group’s commitment to “resistance” in a speech he delivered on Sunday. His words come as the group continues to play a role in Lebanon despite its setbacks in 2024 in its conflict with Israel. Hezbollah’s leader made comments about Israel, the Houthis, and the US.

He said that the US under President Donald Trump would need to free itself from the “grip of Israel” if it wanted to achieve goals in the region. “Sheikh Qassem made the remarks on the occasion of Resistance and Liberation Day on Sunday, where he also said that Trump should seize the opportunity and rid himself of the burden that is Israel,” Iran’s state media Press TV reported.

Qassem’s speech illustrates how Hezbollah may be down but not out; it is still trying to put on a brave face in Lebanon.

“Let it be clear to everyone: Don’t ask us for anything from now on. Let Israel withdraw, stop its aggression, release the prisoners, and fulfill all obligations under the agreement. After that, we’ll discuss what happens next,” he said, according to Al-Akhbar, a pro-Hezbollah publication.

“Lebanon must be strong... Don’t be afraid of anything. What will they do to you if you raise your voice?” Qassem said.

Hezbollah portrayed itself for years as needing a huge arsenal to defend Lebanon. Having failed in its war with Israel, it is now begging Lebanon to defend Hezbollah’s existence.

The terrorist organization continues to suffer losses. It has seen its smuggling efforts thwarted by the new government in Syria. This cuts it off from Iranian arms that arrive from Iraq via Syria.

“If America believes that by pressuring Lebanese officials and Lebanon it can achieve Israel’s conditions, I tell it: You will not achieve what was not achieved in the war,” the Hezbollah leader said.
Lebanese PM: 'Days of spreading the Iranian revolution are over'
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam asserted that his government would not be cooperating closely with Iran in a Monday interview with Sky News Arabia.

“The days of spreading the Iranian revolution are over. We will not remain silent about weapons in Lebanon that are outside the control of the government.”

He also said that Lebanon would only consider peace with Israel if it was "real peace."

“We are a peace-seeking nation, but we want a real peace. Israel is occupying territories that belong to our country.”

Hezbollah claims that it will not back down against Israel
Salam's appointment in January was widely seen as a blow to Iran-backed Hezbollah.

However, Hezbollah officials have recently reiterated the terror group's commitment to resistance, The Jerusalem Post reported on Monday.

“Let it be clear to everyone: Don’t ask us for anything from now on. Let Israel withdraw, stop its aggression, release the prisoners, and fulfill all obligations under the agreement. After that, we’ll discuss what happens next," Hezbollah chief Sheikh Naim Qassem told pro-Hezbollah publication Al-Akhbar.

“Lebanon must be strong... Don’t be afraid of anything. What will they do to you if you raise your voice?”
Comedian-Turned-Advocate Lee Kern Confronts Antisemitism
Three weeks after Oct. 7, British screenwriter Lee Kern came to Israel.

"After Oct. 7, it felt completely natural for me to leave everything and come here to support my people," he said in an interview.

Kern, who was Oscar-nominated for his screenplay for Borat 2, has since officially made Aliyah.

"I have no doubt that we're dealing with the cruelest, most sociopathic enemies imaginable," he asserts.

"Historically, we've always faced the worst bastards. And this culture...it breeds sociopaths. It's a psychotic culture that glorifies death, blowing yourself up, becoming a shahid (martyr)."

"This concept of jihad and self-harm is so evil, it's a rewiring of human nature....People say, 'Oh, they're so angry.' So am I, just as angry as them. But do I go out and commit terrorism? No."

Kern realized that people don't just believe the worst about Jews, they want to believe it.

"Since the dawn of time, people have believed every lie and conspiracy about Jews, from spreading plagues, to poisoning wells, to drinking Christian children's blood. You have to bypass logic to believe that stuff."

"You have to want it to be true. And that continues today in the global media, where the top journalists abandon fact-checking and evidence. They want us to be guilty."

"I'm just a proud Jew. I won't let people kill us. My career isn't more important than that."

"I don't understand how a human being can see babies murdered, women raped, people kidnapped, and not do something. I just don't get it."
At event for 40th anniversary of Operation Moses, Israel’s Ethiopians share pride and pain
Thousands of Ethiopian Israelis traveled to Mount Herzl in Jerusalem on Monday to remember those who fell in 1984-85’s Operation Moses, the first covert evacuation of Ethiopian Jews to Israel.

Marking 40 years since the operation, which brought some 8,000 members of the “Beta Israel” community from a country ravaged by famine and war over a seven-week period, many arrived with their families dressed in traditional colorful clothing, holding umbrellas to shield themselves from the scorching sun.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog were among the leaders who spoke at the annual ceremony, held on Jerusalem Day to acknowledge Beta Israel’s age-old yearning to return to the Holy City.

“Generations of Ethiopian Jews prayed and swore to return to Zion, to Jerusalem,” Herzog said. “They did not forget or lose hope during thousands of years of exile, hardship, longing and yearning. And when the opportunity came, they left their homes, their possessions, sometimes even parts of their families, and set out on a difficult and dangerous journey that took a painful and heavy toll.”

“The code word for thousands of Jews who left their cities and villages was one word that said it all: Jerusalem,” Netanyahu said in his address. “This is a victory of faith, hope, and willpower. This is the victory of love for Jerusalem.”

Famine and instability forced Ethiopia’s Jews to leave the country in the early 1980s, and many walked hundreds of miles on foot to Sudan, where they lived in refugee camps under dire conditions. An estimated 4,000 died along the way or in the camps from starvation, disease, or violence.

Amos, a resident of Netanya attending the ceremony, was 18 at the time of the operation. “My family traveled through the desert on foot with a large group,” he recalled. “We encountered robbers on the way who beat us and took our possessions. We suffered terrible abuse along the way, and the challenges were severe.”

Because Sudan did not have diplomatic relations with Israel, the operation was planned covertly and involved collaboration between the Israeli government, the US, the CIA, and various Jewish organizations, with many Sudanese authorities bribed to turn a blind eye.

Between November 21, 1984, and January 5, 1985, more than 30 covert flights transported 8,000 Jews, about 200 at a time, to Israel via Brussels, before the operation had to be canceled after the news was leaked to the press. Around 1,000 to 2,000 Ethiopian Jews were left behind, many of whom would later be rescued in subsequent operations Operation Joshua (March 1985) and Operation Solomon (1991), in which over 14,000 people were rescued in 36 hours.




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2019 Nobel Peace Prize nominee

Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون



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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