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Friday, October 10, 2025

10/10 Links Pt1: Douglas Murray: Trump’s historic peace deal brings joy and relief — but it comes with a bitterly high cost; Why Trump’s Gaza peace plan infuriates the left

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: David Is Goliath, and That’s Great
The peace process that took off soon after would lock this framing into place. Put simply, it held that the Palestinians lived on their own land, so all Israel needed to do was release that land to them and the conflict would subside. No matter that the Palestinian Arabs had always rejected statehood alongside a Jewish state or that they had become a cat’s-paw of the Arab world, whose land and population dwarfed Israel’s. The Arab–Israeli conflict was transmuted into the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. In this new framing, Israel was big and strong, the Palestinians small and weak and dependent upon the patronage of others to survive. As if to drive this point home, Hamas named its most recent war strategy in Gaza “Stones of David.”

But is this fair to David? After all, he wasn’t weak—just underestimated. The actual David became king, united the Jews, and expanded his kingdom by winning wars of annihilation that were waged against his people. David Lauter was wrong—Goliath doesn’t win 99 percent of the time. We only know about Goliath because he lost. David beats Goliath every time, otherwise he isn’t David. The enemies of Israel are wishcasting when they claim that Israel has become Goliath. They should be so lucky, because, again, Goliath loses; mere size isn’t enough to vanquish canny innovation and strategic thinking. Instead, they’re stuck with David.

This explains why anti-Zionists needed to think up an entirely new backstory for the Jews and Arabs of Palestine, one in which the ongoing presence of Jews in the Holy Land from time immemorial is a myth and the idea of Israel is simply an outgrowth of 19th-century European nationalism that used stories from the Hebrew Bible to create a false history.

This is what Yasir Arafat told Bill Clinton at Camp David, a ludicrous piece of revisionism considering that the Tel Dan Stele, a piece of carved stone from the ninth century b.c.e discovered in 1993 (seven years before Arafat’s conversation with Clinton), literally mentions “the House of David” in the Aramaic language. Pretending that the Jews are foreign colonizers was and is intended to dissociate them from the Davidic legacy and raises the anti-Semites’ hope that perhaps Israel can be defeated.

Whatever the motivation for the big lie of Israel as a European colony, the implications are unambiguous: The Jewish state must be dismantled in the name of justice. Older generations of American liberals didn’t feel this way. They still liked the Ari Ben Canaan of Exodus, the strapping Jewish man of action who sought to break bread with neighboring Arabs and simply find a place on earth for his suffering people. To them, Israel’s post-1967 expansion was the problem, but Israel’s rebirth in 1948 was still right and just.

The formative domestic experience for those American liberals was the civil rights movement. And since the large majority of 20th-century American Jews became loyal Democrats, the world of left-of-center activism contained a lot of common ground; American Jews sought full rights for American blacks just as they sought full recognition of Israel’s right to exist.

Had that tradition of American liberalism persisted into the 21st century, the aftermath of October 7, 2023, inside the United States might have looked a lot different. In an earlier era, left-wing activist groups likely would have seen it as the perfect opportunity to demonstrate that they would leap to the defense of a Jewish victim just as quickly as they would for any other victim.

But that’s possible only in a world in which Jews could, under the right conditions, be victims. That’s not something the newer generations of progressive activists believe. They had long ago internalized the concept of the irredeemable Israeli. They subscribed to the dogma of decolonization, and October 7 affirmed their worldview. Hamas’s murderous and genocidal spree was, grotesquely, proof to them that the arc of history still bent toward justice.

American Jewish organizations were blindsided by this. Suddenly their calls to other minority-rights groups went straight to voicemail. The decades they had spent building relationships in good faith crumbled overnight.

Should they have expected this turn of events? Those who cast a critical eye on the “David and Goliath” framing certainly did. In 2014, Joshua Muravchik published his extraordinary book, Making David into Goliath: How the World Turned Against Israel. What begins as a chronicle of the well-known narrative ends with a bit of foreshadowing. Muravchik wrote of the new anti-Zionist realignment taking shape on the left: “As with the proletariat under classical Marxism, the favored groups—blacks, browns, former colonials—were not merely objects of sympathy; they were regarded as the vessels of universal redemption. Not only were Gandhi and Mandela seen in this light, but even, to some, Ayatollah Khomeini. The French social theorist Michel Foucault wrote rapturously of the Iranian revolution in Le Nouvel Observateur in 1978, seeing in it an ‘attempt to open a spiritual dimension in politics,’ a ‘possibility we [Westerners] have forgotten since the Renaissance and the great crisis of Christianity.’”

Under the old regime, victimhood could be temporary. But “former colonials” are forever. One can never stop being a “former colonial,” no matter one’s current station. And the anti-colonialist takeover of American academia ensures there will always be an intellectual framework to prop up this Weltanschauung.

For American Jews, then, the days of apologizing for Israel’s strength should be over. And no matter one’s position on the settlements, the Jewish connection to the land should never be downplayed or denied. Finally, American Jews should remember the difference between criticizing Israeli government policies and painting the state or its government as illegitimate or inhuman. Today’s anti-Zionists are not arguing about what kind of state Israel should be. They want it gone entirely. The American Jewish community must adjust to this new reality and celebrate Israel as David—not the lowly shepherd, but David, the author of the Psalms, the father of a divinely inspired nation, Melech Israel.
Douglas Murray: Trump’s historic peace deal brings joy and relief — but it comes with a bitterly high cost
That deal was a bitter one for Israelis to swallow. But they did swallow it — in order to get their young man home.

Sinwar went back to Gaza and increased his control inside Hamas. His renown among his fellow jihadists was only increased through his time in prison. And then he launched October 7th, 2023.

How will this time be different? How will the Israeli public know that the hundreds of prisoners released in exchange for their hostages will not be the next Sinwar?

There is only person who can ensure that the last two years of bloody conflict and loss is not just the latest Gaza war but the last Gaza war. That man is President Trump.

It is the president who has managed to put together the remarkable regional coalition that appears to be bringing this war to an end. The relationships he has built over many years have often been the subject of criticism, but they will have proved invaluable if this peace deal passes and holds.

And it is that second bit that will matter most. That the deal holds.

Because it is crucial that whatever happens in the next few days, Hamas or similar jihadist groups can never again control Gaza. That they are never again in a position to invade and slaughter their neighbors.

For that to happen President Trump is going to need to remain engaged in the post-war aftermath.

He has already talked of the “Board of Peace” which he will chair and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair will be on. Blair has his critics, but he also has an unparalleled contact book for the region.

With the engagement of the Arab states it is possible that post-war Gaza could indeed be rebuilt. But it must be rebuilt in the knowledge that the citizens are preparing for a life of peace — not a future of war.

President Trump has brought the people of Israel and Gaza to the brink of peace. Now he has to make it hold.
Seth Mandel: Winning a Small War Is a Big Deal
Small wars are usually insurgencies, which means they are often directed against an occupying power that will pick up and leave if the cost gets too high. Israel’s small wars are the opposite, hence that Golda Meir quote: There is nowhere to go. The Jews have reconstituted their state on the same land where they have done so for thousands of years. There’s no place for the Land of Israel to go. So it either survives or is destroyed.

The indigenous nature of Jewish sovereignty in the land, and the sliver on which Jews can live freely surrounded by the gargantuan Arab world, forecloses every option except coexistence and slaughter. Hamas, as the government of Gaza, chose slaughter, which means someone has to lose.

Hamas chose the nature of the war: the kind for which democracies quickly lose their nerve. And indeed, many democracies did: Only the president of the United States and the chancellor of Germany seemed to understand the threat that would be unleashed if they surrendered to the most evil force the world has seen since the Nazis.

In this atmosphere, Israel’s refusal to back down should be a great point of pride. Even after thousands of years, the Jews are still told by the world that they have a place among the nations only as a subservient minority population. The pressure to conform was immense, the moral and psychological blackmail was taken to obscene levels, and still the Jewish state held to its demands.

There was no honest argument against Israel’s insistence on the return of the hostages, so insane arguments were invented. The “genocide” label was perhaps the most ridiculous of all if only because it was debunked before it was even applied. Israel said “return the hostages you took and concede the war, and we’ll end the operation in Gaza.” Genocidal intent cannot be construed from this even by the cleverest anti-Semite in the world.

And now Israel has kept its word to the letter. Hamas has been defeated and Hamas’s supporters abroad have been humiliated. But you can see why they thought they might not be left looking foolish: Most of the time you can accuse a democracy of committing genocide and that democracy will back out of a small war.

Winning a small war in this environment required incredible fortitude. Israelis were up to the task.


Saul Sadka: The Gaza deal is no ceasefire – it is Hamas’s near-total surrender
So how did this all come about? It’s because everyone misjudged. When Jordan, a careless driver in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, justifies her bad driving by saying, “They’ll keep out of my way – it takes two to make an accident,” her interlocutor retorts, “Suppose you met somebody just as careless as yourself.” In October 2023, Hamas met Israel in exactly that way.

Hamas wrongly thought Israel was weak – and this was partly Israel’s fault. Internal divisions over relatively trivial matters, amplified by the media, made it appear that Israel just needed a small nudge over the cliff to fall. But Israel was – much to Nassim Taleb’s chagrin, no doubt – the epitome of antifragile. Israel, in turn, made the parallel mistake of underestimating Hamas and their intentions. Its leadership seemed to lack a theory of mind, failing to grasp that no, radical jihadists aren’t “just like us” actually – they don’t simply want a better life for their people. They mean it when they say they want to die a martyr, go to paradise, and kill you in the process.

So many stars had to align to bring all this about – weak leaders making mistakes, information asymmetries at precisely the right (or wrong) moments. Elections. Court cases. The wrong people in the wrong positions at the wrong time. The strategic victory Israel now enjoys happened despite the best efforts of nearly everyone on all sides. Two thousand Israelis died, and Gaza was wrecked. Its people will be spending a third winter in tents. The sheer scale of rubble and destruction means it will be only the third of many such winters – and that’s even assuming the latter stages of the peace plan, which Israel can live without and Hamas has no interest in advancing since they involve its total capitulation, ever come to pass.

Yet there is a tantalising hope that real peace might break out – even with the Gazans, and perhaps especially with them. They, more than anyone, have seen the cost of war with Israel. Peace in the Middle East can come quickly: one week, you and your cousins might be riding into another tribe’s village, swords drawn, pillaging and killing; the next, the blood feud is settled around a fire, and there may even be a wedding.

Whether true peace emerges, or a long-term truce leaves Gazans amid Hamas-ruled ruins, the fact remains that a third wave of Arab rejectionism of Zionism has now ended in failure. The initial Arab attempts to snuff out the Zionist project in 1948, the pan-Arab bid to unite and drive the Jews into the sea that ended in 1973, and the jihadi-religious effort that has now hit a humiliating brick wall – all mean that Israel, from a strategic perspective, has earned its place in the region.

But remember who did bring peace – and who didn’t. It wasn’t the alphabet soup of international organisations; on the contrary, some, not least UNRWA, facilitated the destruction of Gaza by allowing the brainwashing of a generation of its youth for jihad. It wasn’t the centre-left European leaders – Starmer, Macron and the rest – they played no role in peace; in fact, they clearly delayed it. It wasn’t Biden – or really his staff, since it is now plain he wasn’t truly in control – who brought the war to an end; in fact, he clearly dragged it out. His administration, had it stood solidly alongside Israel as the Trump administration did, could also have brought Qatar to bear on Hamas, but it chose a different path.

All these people saw the path to peace as running through the weakening and isolation of Israel – accentuating its internal divisions – instead of weakening and dividing Hamas from its allies and itself. For this, Netanyahu, who cannot escape some blame for the war’s origins, must be given credit. He truly did stand alone against many entrenched interests at home and abroad, even within the military, and held to a consistent plan from day one – one that even his critics must now grudgingly admit was, more or less, the correct one. Peace came through strength – in fact, peace came through victory.

This is why, incidentally, the “Ceasefire Now” crowd are in mourning today, as the ceasefire is signed and the war ends. They wanted not a ceasefire, but an Israeli capitulation – the very kind the Biden administration and the Europeans were trying to cajole Israel into. They didn’t want a Trump- and Arab-brokered ceasefire, which, as they correctly note, is the opposite: it is a Hamas capitulation – and worse still, one that pulls the rug out from under all their lawfare and lies against Israel.

There is one additional blessing all Jews can be thankful for. What was for a millennium of exile the happiest day in the Jewish calendar – Simchat Torah – was turned into a day of mourning by that band of bestial marauders. Last year, few had the heart to celebrate. But if all goes to plan, the last of the hostages will be freed in time for this year’s Simchat Torah – and the day will, almost by accident, once again be a day of joy for all Jews.
Andrew Fox: The Gaza cease-fire is built on painful Israeli concessions – not total victory
What follows inside Gaza will reveal how much coercive capacity Hamas still has. Over the last year, Israel quietly encouraged local Palestinian clans and opposition networks to step forward in areas where Hamas’s grip loosened. With an end to military action, those actors must decide whether to bend or resist as Hamas reasserts control. Expect a low-key civil war of arrests, intimidation and sporadic clashes, which will represent an index of whether Hamas still commands fear and obedience after devastation and displacement. If the clans melt away, Hamas’s authority remains intact; if they hold out, Gaza could fracture further, complicating any attempt to build a post-war administration.

Celebratory videos from Gaza featuring the chant ““Khaybar, Khaybar, Ya Yahud! Jaish Mohammad sawf ya’ud!” (“Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews! The Army of Muhammad Will Return!” – a reference to the battle of Khaybar in 628, when Mohamed’s army slaughtered a Jewish community)” are a stark reminder of the distance to any genuine reconciliation. They do not represent every Gazan, but they capture a mood of triumphalism and hatred that will shape politics. These are the people who, in due course, will elect the next Palestinian leadership. Any plan that assumes swift moderation from below is wishful thinking; if change comes, it will be generational and dependent on tangible improvements in daily life, not on moral exhortation from abroad.

Meanwhile, the West Bank sits unresolved. The Palestinian Authority remains venal and hollowed‑out; it inspires little confidence among Palestinians or Israelis. Yet no stable arrangement can ignore the West Bank or Israel’s requirement for strategic depth there. That tension between Israeli security geography and Palestinian political legitimacy has been ducked again. It will return the moment diplomacy moves from stopping the shooting to sketching a political horizon, and it will be harder, not easier, after Gaza, because everyone will argue from maximalist positions etched by trauma.

We did not reach Phase Two in the ceasefire earlier this year; we may not reach it now. What is new is a lattice of external guarantees. Qatari, Egyptian and Turkish security commitments are stitched into this ceasefire’s scaffolding. That makes it harder for Israel to re-enter Gaza at will; doing so would rupture ties not only with the mediators but with Washington. It also binds Hamas to patrons it cannot afford to alienate. Guarantees cannot conjure trust, but they raise the price of cynical breaches on both sides, making a relapse into full-scale fighting less likely, at least in the near term.

This deal was not produced by force alone. Military pressure created leverage but ran into limits against an embedded movement in a dense urban battlespace. Diplomacy and economics, the other levers of statecraft, did the rest. US security promises to Qatar reassured the key mediator; prospective arms deals for Turkey brought Ankara into the tent; and Egypt’s fear of mass Palestinian flight into Sinai concentrated minds in Cairo. Add them up and you get a coalition for “enough peace”: not reconciliation, but a structured pause that swaps hostages for prisoners, halts rockets and begins reconstruction. None of it is pretty. All of it is how real-world conflicts end when decisive victory is unavailable.

Israel emerges strategically quieter on its southern border but more diplomatically isolated than at any time in recent memory; indeed, approaching pariah status in parts of the world. That is not just an image problem; it constrains freedom of action. Every future use of force will be judged against a backdrop of suspicion and fatigue.

At the same time, Hamas remains in Gaza. Even if it yields front-stage administration, it will try to retain influence behind the scenes. For now, though, it is militarily neutered and unlikely to mount serious attacks any time soon.

Above all, the hostages are coming home. That sentence, more than any talking point, explains why an imperfect bargain is nonetheless the best possible outcome at this point.

The task now is not to romanticise the bargain, but to use this brittle pause to build a sturdier quiet: protecting lives while politics labours to catch up with reality.
The Trump-Netanyahu deal that rewrites Middle East diplomacy
The emerging agreement mediated by U.S. President Donald Trump and his close circle—Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and former senior adviser—signals a remarkable demonstration of strategic leverage.

Through deft diplomacy, the Trump team has drawn in key Arab states, including Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, aligning their national interests with Washington’s broader vision of regional stabilization. Each of these states—bound by deep economic and military ties to the United States—ultimately used its influence to apply sustained pressure on Hamas. It represents an achievement that has broken the terror group’s core source of bargaining power: the hostages.

The first victory is Israel’s. After nearly two years of conflict and hostage negotiations, Hamas’s central tool of extortion—its control over hostages, both living and deceased—has been effectively neutralized. Israel’s military and intelligence superiority, demonstrated through precision strikes and relentless pursuit, has reshaped the calculus of deterrence in the region.

Arab capitals now understand that Israel possesses not only the technological and human capabilities to defend itself, but also the strategic will to eliminate its enemies anywhere, at any time. That realization was most deeply felt in Doha, where Qatar—once the principal patron and mouthpiece of Hamas—recognized its vulnerability. Under immense American pressure, a symbolic apology was all that was needed for Qatar to return to the negotiating table.

The second victory belongs to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his strategic partner, Minister of Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer. If the hostages indeed return as scheduled, it will mark the fulfillment of Israel’s five unwavering conditions for ending the war.

That correlates into the demilitarization of Gaza; a continued presence on the ground by the Israel Defense Forces; a guaranteed security perimeter around the Strip; the full disarmament of Hamas; and a governing authority in the coastal enclave that is neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority, but instead managed under the supervision of a Trump-led international committee.
Ben Shapiro: THE TRUMP EFFECT: How To Win A War
Israel’s victory in its seven-front war over its enemies throws the conventional wisdom on its ear; the Left treats Marjorie Taylor Greene with Strange New Respect; and the Department of Justice indicts New York Attorney General Letitia James.


Trump to visit Israel on Monday, promised mediators fighting won't resume
US President Donald Trump will visit Israel on Monday ahead of the release of the remaining live hostages held in Gaza to speak before the Knesset and meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The US president promised Qatari and Egyptian mediators, as well as Turkey, that "Israel won't return to fighting."

Security and logistics preparations for Trump's visit will begin on Friday, N12 reported.

Trump will reportedly land at Ben-Gurion Airport and speak alongside Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog, according to N12. Following these speeches, he may meet with hostage families.

His return flight to the United States is believed to be as early as 2 p.m.


From Daylight to Daybreak By Abe Greenwald
Via Commentary Newsletter, sign up here.
The world has long passed Obama by. But a decade and a half ago, he wasn’t alone in his thinking. It was part of a conciliatory approach to the Middle East that had become conventional wisdom in certain liberal circles.

Which raises a larger point. Obama, who virtually branded the term “change,” was never a forward-looking visionary with new ideas. He was youthful and talented, and his being the country’s first black president made his election rightly historic. But he was merely a fresh vessel for theories that had been kicking around academia and liberal think tanks for ages. Those theories failed when he translated them into action, and everything began to change in earnest once Obama left office. So now, he’s left tweeting about the obligations of the “world community.”

Then there’s Trump. Before Donald Trump entered politics, nobody would have pegged him for a global change agent. He was nearly the opposite: a glitzy cultural fixture who seemed exceedingly comfortable with the status quo. And when he began to turn the world upside down, he wasn’t young. Trump was 70 years old when he was first sworn into office. In less than a year he’ll be 80. John Podhoretz often points out that reckonings and changes come from unexpected places and in unlikely forms. Trump was the change the world was waiting for, whether they knew it or not. If you’re an Obama liberal, nothing hurts more than that truth.

Because Trump, unlike Obama, has never been attached to a political school of thought, he pulls ideas out of his head and turns them into policy (for good and ill). Obama, like the rest of us, had no clue what change really looked like. But we do now. And this week, with a victorious Israel and defeated Hamas entering into the first phase of a peace plan, it looks terrific.

Of course, the failed, stale ideas still live on in irrelevant institutions and the minds of their believers. Even revolutionary change can’t rid the world of bad thinking. Which is why Obama probably has a better chance of winning the Nobel Peace Prize (again) for his inane tweet than Trump has for creating unprecedented peace.

But what does a man who’s changed the world and initiated Middle East peace on his own terms need with a medal tarnished by the likes of Yasser Arafat? That’s just a shabby symbol from a bygone age, and this is a new day.


Two Years After the October 7 Massacre, Israel Remains a Strategic Asset, Not a Liability
The results of this doctrine are now visible: A new regional order, anchored by Israeli strength, is the emerging reality of a new Middle East. Having achieved a decisive military victory over Hamas and having directly confronted the head of the octopus in Iran, has become the region’s security provider. This is not a threat to American interests; it is the fulfillment of them. An Israel that acts as a regional hegemon, projecting power to enforce stability, is the most effective and cost-efficient bulwark against the forces that threaten American interests.

A hegemonic Israel, acting as the anchor of a new, pro-American alliance of moderate states, is the most effective and cost-efficient bulwark against Iranian aggression, Russian influence, and Chinese encroachment. For an America increasingly wary of endless wars and focused on the challenge from China, this new reality is a strategic gift. It offers a paradigm for securing a vital region without the deployment of American armies. Every Iranian nuclear facility destroyed by the Israeli Air Force is a direct blow to the world’s leading state sponsor of terror, achieved without risking a single American pilot. Every Iranian weapons shipment to Hezbollah interdicted by Israeli intelligence prevents a war that could destabilize the global economy. Every Islamist leader killed by Mossad operatives is one less threat to American forces.

This new order provides a powerful counterweight to the ambitions of global rivals. As Turkey seeks to expand its influence in Syria and across the region, an assertive Israel is the only local power capable of checking its advance. As China seeks to dominate strategic waterways and economic corridors through its Belt and Road Initiative, an Israel that is integrated with its moderate Arab neighbors, as envisioned by the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, creates a pro-Western bloc that secures these routes. A powerful Israel is not a distraction from the great power competition; it is a critical asset on its front lines. It is a stabilizer that requires no American boots on the ground and no American casualties. This new framework offers America a way to secure its interests while reducing its military footprint. A victorious Israel is not a liability that drags America into war; it is an asset that secures the peace.

The argument voiced on the left and right that Israel is a strategic liability is the last, desperate gasp of a failed establishment to deflect blame for the consequences of their own doctrines. They warn of the costs of victory, but they ignore the greater costs of the perpetual, managed conflict they created. This anniversary should be a moment of resolve, a time to embrace clarity. The choice is not between war and negotiation; it is a choice between victory and perpetual violence.


Commentary Podcast: Why Israel Had No Choice But to Win
The end of the war in Gaza follows the unprecedented two-year psychological war against Zionism, supporters of Israel, and the very idea that Jews need and deserve to defend themselves. This has been an open question for us since 1948, when even Hannah Arendt opposed the creation of a Jewish state in the pages of COMMENTARY. We explain why she was wrong then, is wrong now, and why Israel's survival is important even for turncoat Jews who attack it.


Call me Back Podcast: The Gaza War is Over - with Nadav Eyal and Amit Segal
Israel and Hamas have reached an agreement tonight to end the Gaza war based on the outline of President Trump’s plan. The agreement includes the imminent release of all remaining living hostages in Gaza in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. In an emergency pod, Ark Media Correspondent Nadav Eyal joins Dan to share his initial impressions of the first phase of the deal, what this means for the short and long term balance of power in the region, and whether Hamas gets to claim this as a victory.


Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump pray for success of Trump deal at Western Wall
US Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, Ivanka Trump, and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner arrived at the Western Wall on Friday to pray for the success of the president's peace plan to end the Gaza war.

“I pray that the new chapter now opening in the Middle East will realize its full potential for peace. May leaders have the clarity, vision, and courage needed to make it happen,” Witkoff said.

“I pray for peace in the Middle East, and congratulate all involved in the efforts," Kushner said. "I wish President Trump the strength and vision to help lead to a successful solution so that lives can be saved.”

Acknowledging their work for hostage release deal
Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz, the head rabbi of the Western Wall, welcomed the three on sire. Rabinowitz thanked them for their work to release the hostages in Gaza, noting that it is "one of the most important mitzvahs in Judaism."

Together, they prayed for the completion of the deal, the return of the living hostages to their families, and for the slain hostages to be buried in Israel.

Witkoff also held the four species in honor of the Sukkot holiday.


IDF soldier killed in Gaza ahead of ceasefire
An Israel Defense Forces soldier was killed in action in the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday, hours before a ceasefire took effect as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s peace plan.

The slain man was named as Sgt. 1st Class (res.) Michael Mordechai Nachmani, 26, of the 614th Combat Engineering Battalion, from Dimona.

According to an initial IDF probe, he was killed by a Hamas sniper in Gaza City.

Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Friday: “The great achievements that were achieved are thanks to the late Michael and the heroic IDF soldiers who fought with courage and determination against a cruel terrorist organization.

“On behalf of the entire defense establishment, I send my deepest condolences to his family and friends, and strengthen the hands of all IDF soldiers and fighters,” the minister added. “May his memory be blessed.”

The death toll among Israeli troops since the start of the Gaza ground incursion on Oct. 27, 2023, now stands at 467, and at 914 on all fronts since the Hamas-led massacre on Oct. 7, 2023.


Masses begin returning to Gaza City as IDF withdraws, opens coastal road
Full of grief after two years of war but glad to be going home, thousands of displaced Palestinians set off across the Gaza Strip on Friday, as a truce between Israel and Hamas took hold.

Timidly at first, then in a huge column, thousands walked northwards in a line at least a kilometer long from the safer areas of central Gaza towards Gaza City, the scene of a grueling Israeli offensive before Friday’s ceasefire.

People chanted “God is great,” cheering and whistling in their joy as they walked on a recently opened Mediterranean seafront road, AFP journalists saw.

Ibrahim al-Helou, a 40-year-old man from Gaza City displaced in the central refugee camp of Al-Maghazi, told AFP he was excited, but remained cautious.

He said that when he began heading home, “the situation was dangerous, with gunfire, so I waited for a while.”

“Now, the road has been opened and we have all continued on our way back to Gaza to check on our homes and assess the situation.”


Shin Bet bends Hamas: Prisoner release ratio in deal is lowest in decades
The number of Palestinian security prisoners being released by Israel in exchange for the return of 48 hostages, 20 still alive, is the lowest ratio agreed upon in decades, Walla reported on Friday night.

Walla learned that the final list of security prisoners includes 195 prisoners serving life sentences and only 60 of them are Hamas operatives. Just for comparison, in the Shalit deal, 450 Hamas operatives were released, including prisoners who led significant terrorism against the State of Israel.

The 1,700 Gaza detainees who will be released will not be terrorists who raided on October 7, 2023, and the release of Hamas operatives has been limited as much as possible.

The Shin Bet managed to uphold the principles it had established at the beginning of the negotiations with Hamas regarding who would not be included in the list of those to be released:

Hamas's 25 most senior prisoners were not included in the list despite Hamas's initial demand to include them in the deal. This includes the bodies of Yahya Sinwar and Muhammad Sinwar.

Walla learned that the Shin Bet's veto list included a total of around 100 security prisoners. In addition to Hamas senior officials and sergeants, it also included Hamas operatives who were heads of infrastructure, experts in sabotage and explosives, and child murderers. For example, the terrorists who murdered the Fogel family were not included in the list.

Yoav, 11, Elad, 4, their three-month-old baby sister and parents Ehud and Ruth were murdered by PFLP terrorists in March 2011. Only the 12-year-old eldest daughter Tamar, eight-year-old son Roi and 2-year-old son, Shay survived the attack on the Fogel family home.

Excluded from the deal
Senior officials and sergeants that Hamas demanded were also on the Shin Bet's veto list and constituted a red line throughout the negotiations. Israel will not release:
•⁠ ⁠ Ibrahim Hamed - was the head of Hamas' military wing in the West Bank during the Second Intifada. Considered the mastermind behind several serious suicide attacks, in which dozens of Israelis were murdered (the attack at Cafe Moment in Jerusalem, the attack at the Sheffield Club in Rishon LeZion).
•⁠ ⁠ Ahmed Saadat - Secretary-General of the Hamas in the West Bank, who is a symbol for planning the murder of the late Minister Rehavam Ze'evi. A figure that Hamas has been trying to release since the Shalit deal and in all the deals throughout the current war.
•⁠ ⁠ Marwan Barghouti - is a leadership symbol in the Palestinian public, from the days of the First Intifada he led the Tanzim in the West Bank. He was convicted due to his involvement in attacks in which Israelis were murdered.
•⁠ ⁠ Hassan Salameh - a senior Hamas figure, was one of the planners of serious bomb attacks in which dozens of Israelis were murdered.
•⁠ ⁠ Abbas al-Sayed - Head of Hamas in Tul During the Second Intifada, Kerem was responsible for planning the attack on the hotel in the park in which dozens of Israelis were murdered.


The list also did not include security prisoners who are Israeli citizens - another clause in the negotiations on the lists that the Shin Bet insisted on.
Israel publishes list of 250 security prisoners slated for release as part of Gaza deal
Israel on Friday published the names of 250 Palestinian security prisoners it has agreed to release as part of the Gaza ceasefire-hostage deal, and Israeli authorities began notifying families whose loved ones’ killers are set to go free.

However, Hamas’s Prisoners’ Ministry said there was no agreement yet on the identities of the prisoners to be freed, and Qatari-owned network Al Araby TV cited sources saying the list published by Israel on Friday omitted some names that mediators had agreed on.

The list, published the morning after the cabinet approved the US-backed ceasefire deal, includes members of the Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Fatah and the Popular Front terror groups, responsible for dozens of deadly terror attacks, but does not include some key terror chiefs Hamas has demanded, including popular Fatah figure Marwan Barghouti.

Of the 250 prisoners to be released, 15 will be freed to East Jerusalem, 100 to the West Bank and 135, who were convicted of either murder or weapons production, are slated for deportation to Gaza or elsewhere, according to the government decision published Friday.

Some last-minute changes to the list were approved by the government in a telephone vote Friday morning, after negotiators agreed to replace 11 Fatah-affiliated prisoners with Hamas-affiliated ones, nine of whom are serving life terms while the other two are serving two-year sentences due to end in June.

In addition to the 250 prisoners, Israel will release 1,722 Gazans, including 22 minors, detained amid the Gaza war who were not involved in the Hamas-led onslaught that sparked it on October 7, 2023, according to the government decision. Of the 1,722 Gazans, 1,411 are in Israeli Prison Service custody and 311 are in IDF custody, the decision said.

Israel will return “360 Gazan terrorists’ bodies,” the decision said, without specifying if any of those Gazans had taken part in the October 7 massacre. On Thursday, Hebrew media reported that Israel had rejected a Hamas demand that it return the bodies of the brothers Yahya and Mohammed Sinwar, who successively led Hamas before Israel killed them last October and this May, respectively.

Israel will release the prisoners and the bodies immediately, and only, after Hamas releases all remaining 48 hostages, including 20 who are alive, 26 confirmed dead and two for whose lives there is grave concern, the decision said. The hostages include 47 of the 251 abducted in the October 7 invasion, and the remains of a soldier killed fighting in the 2014 Gaza war.


Spiked: Why Trump’s Gaza peace plan infuriates the left | spiked podcast
Jake Wallis Simons, Tom Slater and Fraser Myers on the hypocrisy of the Israelophobes, the truth about 7 October and the stain of anti-Semitism in Britain.


Why does the pro-Palestinian movement oppose Trump Gaza deal? Jonathan Sacerdoti debates on GB News



Hamas, Palestinian factions reject any ‘foreign guardianship' over Gaza
Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine rejected in a joint statement on Friday any "foreign guardianship" over Gaza, stressing that its governance is a purely internal Palestinian matter, according to Reuters.

In an exclusive interview with Sky News, Hamas official Basem Naim said that while Hamas will no longer be directly involved in governing Gaza following the implementation of US President Donald Trump's peace plan, there is no plan to fully disarm, as Naim claimed that “no one can deny us the right to resistance by all means, including armed resistance.”

When asked about the possibility of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair’s involvement in an interim post-war government in Gaza, Naim stated he was “very sad,” rejecting any involvement by Blair, citing that “Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims, and maybe others around the world have bad memories of him.”

Hamas also affirmed its determination to “continue resistance” in pursuit of “self-determination, and the establishment of a fully sovereign, independent state with Jerusalem as its capital,” in a statement on their official Telegram channel.


Babylon Bee: 10 Demands Hamas Is Making In The Peace Deal
President Trump may have finally achieved what many long thought impossible, as Israel and Hamas have agreed to the first phase of a peace agreement, but this ceasefire didn't come without conditions from Hamas.

Here are 10 demands Hamas is making as part of the peace deal:
Israel must eliminate 100% of its Jews: This is a dealbreaker for Hamas.
New pagers: The last batch had some problems.
A new fleet of paragliders: They have assured everyone it's only for recreational purposes.
Goats. Lots of goats: They won't say why.
Super Bowl tickets: They're apparently huge Bad Bunny fans.
100 virgins each: They will settle for 72, but are setting the bar high for negotiation.
Israel must continue to keep Greta Thunberg away from Gaza: The Gazans are terrified she'll eventually reach their shore.
Signed 8x10s of Tucker Carlson: Entirely not related to the goats.
A nuke: For, like, their power grid or something.
The entire land of Israel: All of it. Without all the Israelis. Is that too much to ask?


Peace deal could render US-backed aid group in Gaza defunct
Johnnie Moore, an evangelical leader and Gaza Humanitarian Foundation executive chairman, called for prayers to get the Israel-Hamas peace deal done and for the success of the negotiators in Egypt in recent days. If the peace plan succeeds, that would spell the end of the U.S.-backed foundation that Moore chairs, according to a Trump administration official.

The “overarching idea” of U.S. President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan “is that Hamas will be effectively dismantled and the looting of U.N.-delivered aid will be substantially reduced or eliminated as hostilities come to an end,” the U.S. official told JNS.

That would “eliminate the need for the GHF,” leading to the eventual closure of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, according to the Trump administration official. The foundation “was never meant to be around forever but to be a solution to the problem of mass theft of aid,” the official said.

But the foundation wouldn’t shutter right away, according to the U.S. official.

The United Nations would have to show that it could handle the large volume of new aid, the official told JNS. Israeli officials have released photos and videos documenting what they said are hundreds of aid trucks waiting inside Gaza for the global body to retrieve and deliver.

Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for António Guterres, the U.N. secretary-general, told JNS on Wednesday that the global body’s understanding of the Trump plan is that “it would be the United Nations that would be the main conduit for humanitarian aid.”

JNS asked if Dujarric’s understanding is that the foundation would cease operation.

“I think the straight answer is that nobody really knows,” he said. “If you say the United Nations will be the primary conduit for humanitarian aid, it doesn’t mean, and it’s never meant, that it’s a monopoly.” (JNS sought comment from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.)

The United Nations hasn’t “heard much” from the foundation on the subject, according to Dujarric.
Unclear what UNRWA role will be in looming surge of Gaza aid
Just as questions surround what role, if any, the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation would have in the Strip under U.S. President Donald Trump’s peace deal, the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, which Israel has accused of ties to Palestinian terror, has an unclear future.

The Jewish state has documented UNRWA’s terror ties, including staff members at the U.N. agency who participated directly in the Oct. 7 attacks. Washington and the European Union cut funding to the agency, although some states have resumed supporting it.

Israeli legislation that went into effect in late January bars UNRWA from operating throughout internationally recognized Israeli territory and bans communication between UNRWA and Israeli officials.

The Trump administration’s 20-point peace plan for Gaza states that aid distribution in the Strip is to proceed “through the United Nations and its agencies, and the Red Crescent, in addition to other international institutions not associated in any manner with either party.”

The plan doesn’t mention UNRWA specifically. Other agencies of the global body, including the World Food Programme and Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, have delivered aid, and Israeli officials have often said that those U.N. entities could fulfil the role UNRWA played in Gaza.

The United Nations has repeatedly stated that no other entity can replace UNRWA’s work in Gaza.

Tom Fletcher, U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, told reporters on Thursday that the Trump peace plan “has excellent language in it on the importance of the U.N. role at the heart of the humanitarian response.”

“We’re being guided by that,” Fletcher said. He noted what he said is the “indispensable role of UNRWA in delivering our operations across our work to support Palestinian civilians.”

When asked if UNRWA would operate in Gaza in the future, Fletcher said that “the whole U.N. humanitarian family is mobilized to do everything we can to get aid through.”


Gaza flotilla activist to be deported after pleading guilty to attacking prison guard
A Gaza flotilla activist accused of attacking a prison guard will be deported from Israel this weekend after striking a plea bargain with prosecutors on Friday.

Reyes Rigo Cervilla, a 56-year-old Spanish citizen who partook in the Gaza-bound Global Sumud Flotilla earlier this month, will board a flight back to Spain on Saturday after being convicted on two counts of assault.

She will also pay a fine of NIS 10,000 (around $3,055) before departing Israel.

Authorities initially claimed that Cervilla bit a guard while being returned to her cell after a medical check-up at Ketziot Prison before she was scheduled to be deported, but she has denied the allegation.

Police prosecutors from the Negev precinct later backtracked on this allegation and in an amended indictment filed with the Beersheba Magistrate’s Court said only that she scratched the officer while refusing to enter her cell.

Cervilla attacked the guard by “grabbing her by the left hand and digging her nails into her flesh,” causing her “a deep cut and redness,” prosecutors charged. The guard’s cut was disinfected and she was given a tetanus vaccine.

The Spanish activist pleaded guilty to the charges in order to return home, her lawyer Hayl Abu Gharara told The Times of Israel, though she maintains that she acted in self-defense and accused the prison guard of behaving violently toward her and her friend.
Greta Thunberg’s flotilla creates 165 tons of air pollution, same as 206 trips from Tel Aviv to UK
Greta Thunberg’s Sumud Flotilla produced a total of 165 tons of air pollution during its trip from Spain to Gaza, which the energy company Volta Solar calculated to be the same as 206 trips by plane from Tel Aviv to London.

“Over the course of 5 weeks of sailing, the almost 50 vessels in the flotilla consumed a total of about 53,600 liters of diesel,” the study from Volta Solar explained and added, “This fuel consumption is equivalent to direct emissions (tank-to-wheel, TTW) of about 144 thousand kg of CO₂ – that is, about 144 tons of carbon dioxide emitted from the engines alone.”

"It is not surprising that those who act hypocritically in the field of climate also chose the side of the forces of darkness and not the forces of light," said Eran Tal, CEO of Volta Solar and a reserve officer who founded the first solar unit in the IDF.

The analysis also points out that the main polluters were those who made the trip using only large, motorized ships, while sailboats that used their engines to a limited extent had a lesser impact.


IDF Soldier EXPOSES The Truth Behind October 7th Terror Attack: Doron Keidar
Elite soldier Doron Keidar witnessed first-hand the unimaginable brutality of the October 7th Islamist attacks on Israel. Now he's telling the world to prepare...


The Secret Society You Didn’t Know Existed | Khaled Hassan
Visegrad24 founder Stefan Tompson met the British-Egyptian counter-terrorism expert Khaled Hassan in London to ask him how the Muslim Brotherhood has been able to infiltrate the West and what danger their secret society poses to us all.

Growing up in Cairo, Khaled had an open-minded, secular, and middle class family which sent him to an American school, where his education was almost entirely in English, except for religion and Arabic studies.

“I believe having English made me who I am today because it allowed me to access narratives completely opposed to what I saw around me,” he says

Over the years, Khaled developed an interest in politics, international relations, and security, which he studied at university before becoming employed at the UN and working his way up and becoming acquainted with key personalities in Egypt's political elite.

0:00 - Intro
1:45 - The Word's Most Well-Organized Secret Group
3:50 - Political Islam
4:58 - Unlikely Allies
6:01 - Secret Cells
9:59 - Mainstreaming Islamism
11:58 - The Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan
13:48 - Muslim Brotherhood in the Middle East
15:38 - Infiltrating the West
17:16 - BBC Arabic Has Been Captured
18:08 - How Islamists Arrive in the UK
24:00 - Funding the Muslim Brotherhood
25:49 - Should the Brotherhood be Banned?
28:46 - Is Civil War Coming?
31:55 - How to Stop Islamism in the West
34:02 - Defending our Borders
34:50 - The UAE Cracking Down on Islamism




Qatar to open air-force facility at US base in Idaho
Pete Hegseth, the U.S. war secretary, announced on Friday that Qatar will gain access to facilities at a U.S. military base in Idaho.

Sitting next to Qatar’s deputy prime minister, Saoud bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, at a signing ceremony, Hegseth—whose title U.S. President Donald Trump recently changed from U.S. defense secretary—thanked the Qataris for their role in negotiating the Gaza ceasefire deal.

“I’m also proud that today we’re signing a letter of acceptance to build a Qatar Emiri Air Force facility at the Mountain Home Air Base in Idaho,” Hegseth said. “The location will host a contingent of Qatari F-15s and pilots to enhance our combined training, increase lethality, inter-operability.”

“It’s just another example of our partnership, and I hope you know, your excellency, that you can count on us,” the U.S. official said.

The deal is the latest defense agreement between Washington and Doha after Trump issued a security guarantee to the Gulf state in September.

That move followed Israel’s airstrike targeting Hamas leaders in Qatar that killed five members of the terrorist group and one Qatari security officer.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the Qatari emir that he was deeply sorry for the strike during a phone call at the White House alongside Trump.

Washington and many others have described the call as an apology, although some supporters of the Israeli premier say that it was a statement rather than an apology.




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