Friday, January 09, 2026

01/09 Links Pt1: Israel tapering off US military aid within the decade; What normalizing antisemitism looks like; Widespread Iran protests reach 13th day; rights group says at least 51 killed

From Ian:

Is This Time Different in Iran?
So after two weeks of the largest nationwide demonstrations in Iran since the Islamic Revolution, what has changed and why? It had nothing to do with negotiating tables and a lot to do with battlespace.

First, let’s note that this month’s huge anti-regime demonstrations in more than 100 Iranian cities were not ignited by a single big domestic event like a blatantly stolen election or the murder of an innocent young woman. The Iranian rial has been crashing past a million to the dollar for weeks, and inflation reached the point where the Tehran bazaar was losing money on every transaction, so it closed. Something else drove the following events such as the South Pars energy strike and reported military defections.

The battlespace started shaping up six years ago this month under Trump, with the U.S. killing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani, the second most powerful man in Iran, by U.S. drones at Baghdad Airport. He had just arrived from Damascus, where he was briefing former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on a plan to attack the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, as had been done in Tehran in 1979. Iran’s Iraqi cat’s-paw Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis and 10 senior Iranian briefers and bodyguards were also killed in the strike. After 20 years of Bush, Obama, and Biden kid gloves, Tehran was legitimately frightened.

And then after the Tehran-directed atrocity against Israel in October 2023, Israel killed Yahya Sinwar, Muhammed Deif, Hassan Nasrallah, Ibrahim Aqil, Hashem Safieddine, and Ismail Haniyeh in an IRGC safe house in Tehran, and almost a hundred more in Lebanon and Gaza. Deprived of its decapitated Hezbollah Praetorian Guard—the Syrian Ba’ath Party didn’t trust its own people any more than the Bolivarian Maduro trusted Venezuelans more than Cubans—the criminal Assad family fled to Moscow. Then, last summer, the Israeli and U.S. air forces wiped out much of the Iranian military’s general staff and key nuclear sites. The pro-Tehran, Moscow, and Beijing dominoes continued to fall with the capture of Nicolas Maduro, the massacre of his Cuban protection detail, the seizure of Russia’s ghost ships, and the spread of Starlink terminals in Iran.

Iranians have seen the regime and its backers exposed and humiliated by an American administration, and they were quick to exploit this roll of the dice. Unlike pro-Hamas nihilists from Berkeley to Dublin, they have hit their streets in millions without a single keffiyeh or “Allahu Akbar,” motivated by American successes against their regime and its feckless backers.

As of the time of writing, the regime has turned off the internet and all landlines, and Khamenei has emerged from a two-day silence to express defiance. This is no surprise to anyone who knows that Khamenei’s greatest fear is moderation that causes the regime to bend and then break. As expressed in Alex Vatanka’s The Battle of the Ayatollahs in Iran, Khamenei became obsessed with the prospect of an “Iranian Gorbachev” who would impose reforms and usher in a USSR-style collapse; the more so because this was addressed by Tom Friedman, a Jewish American journalist, in a 1996 column titled “Waiting for Ayatollah Gorbachev” after he visited Iran. That pressed all of the leader’s buttons. Expect his defiance to continue as long as he is alive or in power.

Which may not be long, because he faces two threats. The one in front of him is the unpredictable Donald Trump, who has already shed Iranian blood and has promised to “rescue” the Iranian people. The one behind him is the IRGC, which holds all the firepower in Iran and which knows—as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad knew—that the mullahs are despised by nearly the entire population. They are unlikely to lay down their guns or give up the 40% of the Iranian economy they control. They are led by Ahmad Vahidi, an internationally sanctioned terrorist.

“Terrorists are assholes” was a wise saying of one of my counterterrorist colleagues at the CIA. She didn’t just mean that terror plots ruined our weekends and sleep schedules. She meant that terrorists are psychopathic, disloyal, and venal creatures who could and did mistreat each other and turn against each other. The top ranks of the IRGC are full of them.

What might lead the IRGC to sideline or overthrow Khamenei and his weak president, Masoud Pezeshkian? Two kinds of strikes: an anti-regime blow from the United States, or the labor variety that would shut down Iran’s energy sector. If both occur, my money is on a coup, and goodbye mullahs.
JPost Editorial: As ceasefires unravel, Israel faces critical decisions on Gaza, Lebanon, Syria fronts
Doubts about Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa remain strong in Israel’s political and military echelons.

Nevertheless, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to have accepted US President Donald Trump’s request to give Sharaa a chance. Israel should take the opening seriously and test it with hard requirements.

For Israel, a successful security understanding with Syria would preserve its ability to secure itself through control on the ground while laying the foundations for wider communication and cooperation.

The rare joint statement released on Tuesday signals Israel’s willingness to try a different approach on the Syrian front while tying any diplomatic steps to the protection of Druze minorities in the area.

That condition offers a real indicator of whether Damascus can govern responsibly and keep hostile actors away from the border.

As ceasefires in Lebanon and Gaza remain in limbo, Israel now has a rare opportunity to pacify the Syrian border and strengthen the security of its northern communities.

Jerusalem should define redlines, demand verification, and keep freedom of action intact. It must also remain wary of a weak agreement that collapses at the first test.

The potential benefits feel closer than they did a week ago, including an image that once sounded absurd: Israelis and Syrians sharing Mount Hermon in peace – even if that vision starts with a jointly operated ski resort.
Jonathan Tobin: What normalizing antisemitism looks like
In the last year, incidents of bloody antisemitic terrorism in Boulder, Colo.; Washington, D.C.; Manchester, England; and last month, on Bondi Beach in Australia have demonstrated what happens when governments are indifferent to advocacy for these smears.

Jews internalizing hatred
But the willingness of some Jews to dismiss antisemitism, even after all the horror of the last two years, is also about something else. It’s clear that a minority—albeit a sizable one in places like New York, where so much of the Jewish community leans hard to the left—of the Jews have internalized the animus directed at them and now blame the victims, whether Israelis or Americans, of antisemitism for the behavior of the antisemites.

It is not atypical behavior for victims of discrimination to look inward to find the causes of violence rather than at the perpetrators and ideas that animate them. But it is more likely to happen when mainstream discourse becomes dominated by the Jew-haters. Under those circumstances, it is far easier for those who promote this noxious ideology to get away with pretending to be an advocate for human rights, as Mamdani does, and for the Jewish targets of victimization to be told to pipe down and stop complaining.

That was, after all, just how African-Americans who protested against those who promoted segregation and discrimination during the century of Jim Crow racism in the United States. In an era where such vile bigotry was made commonplace, they were also dismissed and told they were overreacting. Now, the very people on the left who falsely analogize that dark period of American history to the Palestinian war on Jewish existence, supported by Marxists and Islamists, are telling Jews to back down in much the same manner.

The only answer to Mamdani and those promoting the idea that those who notice the antisemitism of the left and American Muslims are just partisan hysterics must be the same one given by advocates of civil rights to the racists of America’s past. Those in the media and the political establishment must be told that members of the Jewish community aren’t going to be marginalized by being told to calm down and not believe evidence seen almost daily. Decent Americans of every faith and ethnic background must make it clear that Jews will not be silent or acquiesce to a mayor out for retribution. His actions must be resisted with the same loud and determined protests and political action that Americans have eventually meted out to other types of hate-mongers.


Israel tapering off US military aid within the decade 'in progress' Netanyahu announces
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared his aim to taper off Israeli reliance on American aid, discussed Israel’s public perception crisis, and touched upon ongoing anti-regime protests in Iran during an interview with The Economist published on Friday.

For the first time in public, Netanyahu revealed that he may not seek to fully renew the 3.8 billion dollar American military assistance package that Israel receives annually. The package is due for renegotiation in 2028.

Netanyahu told The Economist that he plans to fully taper reliance on American support to zero within the next ten years, a move he claimed is already “in progress.”

The prime minister additionally assured that he “will continue to fight for the allegiance of the American people.”

Netanyahu also mentioned that he wants Israel to be “as independent as possible,” stating that reduced reliance on American financial aid may help in Israel’s fight to preserve a positive public perception.

“I’d like to do everything I can to fight the propaganda war waged against us,” Netanyahu told The Economist.

He described the uphill battle against misinformation as Israel using “cavalry against F-35s,” due to social media being “flooded… with the fake bots and many other things.”

“The vilifications that were delivered on Jewish people are now delivered on to Jewish state,” Netanyahu stated.

He elaborated on the history of the vilification of the Jewish people, recounting that since the Middle Ages, allegations that “we were poisoning the wells, we were spreading vermin, we were slaughtering Christian children for the Passover festival using their blood” have consistently proliferated.

The prime minister added that he believes Israel is held to “an impossible standard” when it comes to international judgment of the Israel-Hamas War, adding that he doubts “that Churchill could pursue World War Two if people saw what happened there.”

The prime minister shared that the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas may ease international criticism of the Jewish State, predicting that “ the ease with which propaganda takes over facts, or fact-checking,” may dissipate “the minute the intense fighting stops.”


Widespread Iran protests reach 13th day; rights group says at least 51 killed in crackdown
Protesters on Friday took to the streets of Iranian cities for a 13th day in a row, defying threats by authorities of a crackdown and despite reports that security forces had opened fire and killed demonstrators over the past day.

More than 51 protesters have been killed in 13 days of demonstrations in Iran sparked by anger against the regime and the rising cost of living, the Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights said Friday.

“At least 51 protesters, including nine children under the age of 18, have been killed and hundreds more injured in the first thirteen days of the new round of nationwide protests in Iran,” said the rights group, raising a previous toll of 45 issued the day earlier.

Protests are now marked by calls for the end of the Islamist clerical system that has ruled Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the pro-Western shah.

Internet monitor Netblocks said authorities had now imposed a “nationwide internet shutdown” for the last 24 hours that was violating the rights of Iranians and “masking regime violence.”

Despite the crackdown in communications, thousands took to the streets in Mashhad — Iran’s second-largest city and the hometown of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — on Friday night, an eyewitness told Iran International.

Unverified videos on social media also apparently showed large crowds protesting in the capital city of Tehran, including demonstrators chanting, “Neither Gaza nor Lebanon, my life for Iran.” The slogan is seen as an expression of opposition to what protesters view as Iran’s government prioritizing foreign causes over domestic needs.
Commentary Podcast: A New Iranian Revolution?
Jonathan Schanzer joins the podcast to discuss the remarkable events unfolding in Iran, with the nation possibly in full-scale revolt against its barbaric regime. And I take exception to some mail we've been getting about the goings-on in Minnesota.


Hugh Hewitt: All eyes on Iran: Hugh & Eli talk about the spreading protests & if the regime is likely to collapse



Trump says Iran in ‘big trouble,’ US will ‘get involved’ if regime kills protesters
US President Donald Trump said Friday that Washington will “hit Iran very, very hard where it hurts” if the Islamic Republic kills people protesting against the regime.

Trump has made variations of this threat several times since the protests started 13 days ago — at least 51 protesters have been killed since the start of the demonstrations, according to the Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights group.

“Iran is in big trouble. It looks to me that the people are taking over certain cities that nobody thought were really possible just a few weeks ago,” Trump told reporters in the White House when asked about the protests. “We’re watching the situation very carefully.”

“I’ve made the statement very strongly that if they start killing people like they have in the past, we will get involved… That doesn’t mean boots on the ground, but it means hitting them very, very hard where it hurts. We don’t want that to happen,” he continued.

“This is something pretty incredible that’s happening in Iran… They’ve done a bad job. They’ve treated their people very badly, and now they’re being paid back,” Trump said.

Meanwhile, the leaders of France, the United Kingdom and Germany on Friday condemned the killing of protestors in Iran, urging Tehran to “exercise restraint.”

“We are deeply concerned about reports of violence by Iranian security forces, and strongly condemn the killing of protestors,” French President Emmanuel Macron, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in a joint statement.

“We urge the Iranian authorities to exercise restraint,” they added.

The demonstrations are now marked by calls for the end of the Islamist clerical system that has ruled Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the pro-Western shah.


Ben Rhodes Heartbroken As Iranians March for Freedom
Iranians are revolting against the despotic regime that Barack Obama worked tirelessly to legitimize, and the former president's foreign policy guru is struggling to contain his despair.

Ben Rhodes, architect of the much-maligned Iran nuclear deal, hasn't posted anything on social media to express solidarity with the protesters who have been risking their lives since late December in one of the largest mass uprisings the country has ever seen. Instead, he has repeatedly denounced Donald Trump for vowing to protect the protesters from state-sanctioned violence.

When U.S. forces apprehended Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro—one of Iran's closest allies in Latin America—Rhodes was deeply concerned that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei could be next to fall. The operation took place less than 24 hours after Trump expressed support for the protesters in Iran and promised to "come to their rescue" if the regime turned violent.

"The thing that worries me is this kind of behavior can become contagious, and maybe it already has been," Rhodes said on Pod Save the World, his foreign policy podcast with former Obama bro Tommy Vietor. "It's probably not, like, entirely a coincidence that Trump is threatening Iran at the same time that he's doing this in Venezuela."

Days later, Rhodes and Vietor made fun of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) for wearing a "Make Iran Great Again" hat and saying that Trump has not "turned his back on the people of Iran" the way Obama did during the green revolution in 2009. "Cool hat, dork," Vietor quipped smugly.

Rhodes, whose hatred of Israel earned him the nickname "Hamas" in Obama's White House, proceeded to play Debbie Downer by listing off reasons why toppling the Iranian regime was actually worse than the status quo. "The problem going forward is there's no clear path to, like, what would come next," he lamented. If his good friend Khamenei were to be deposed, Rhodes contended, his other friends in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) would take control and "Trump bombing them isn't going to change that."


Israel strikes terrorists in Gaza in retaliation for missile launch
The Israel Defense Forces and Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) struck Hamas terrorists in the southern and northern Gaza Strip in response to a failed projectile launch on Thursday from the Gaza City area toward the State of Israel.

As part of the strikes, the IDF and Shin Bet struck several Hamas terrorists, launch pits and additional terror infrastructure.

Thursday’s missile launch was Hamas’s second ceasefire violation within 24 hours.

The missile hit “within the territory of the Gaza Strip, near a hospital,” the IDF said. The military struck the launch site.

The IDF said it “views with great severity any attempt by terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip to carry out terror plots against IDF forces and the civilians of the State of Israel.”

On Wednesday, Israeli forces killed a “key Hamas terrorist” after gunmen from the group fired at an area where troops are operating.

The terrorist organized “attacks against IDF troops in the northern Gaza Strip,” the statement said.

“This shooting constitutes a blatant violation of the ceasefire agreement,” the IDF and Shin Bet said.

On Monday, the IDF carried out a strike on a Hamas terrorist who was planning an attack on soldiers operating in the southern Gaza Strip.

“The terrorist posed an imminent threat to the troops and therefore was precisely struck,” according to the statement.


Ask Haviv Anything: Episode 77: Did Israel intentionally target civilians in Gaza?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.

Our current question: Did Israel intentionally target civilians in Gaza?

Chapters
00:00 The Complexity of War and Civilian Casualties
02:57 Hamas and the Strategy of Civilian Harm
05:52 Israeli Military Tactics and Civilian Protection
09:16 The Narrative of Targeting Civilians
12:07 The Broader Context of Anti-Israel Sentiment




Blair’s sister-in-law could face terror law scrutiny after 7 October ‘legendary’ remarks
Lauren Booth, the sister-in-law of former prime minister Sir Tony Blair, could face scrutiny under UK terrorism legislation after describing the Hamas-led 7 October attacks as a “legendary day”, UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) has warned.

Booth, a British-born journalist who converted to Islam and now lives in Turkey, made the remarks during an interview last year with Turkish newspaper Yeni Safak. Footage of the interview resurfaced this week, prompting widespread outrage over comments appearing to praise the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

The footage was first reported by the Daily Mail, which revealed Booth describing 7 October as “a legendary day in the Ummah’s [Muslim community’s] history” and claiming that “only Allah knows” how many “millions” would pick up the Quran in the wake of the attacks.

In the same interview, Booth was quoted by the Mail as saying she had been “annoyed” with Palestinians during an earlier visit to Gaza because, she claimed, they were not determined enough to “hate all Jews or just take Jewish life”. She added: “I got a little bit annoyed with the Palestinians when I met them at first because I thought they had Stockholm syndrome.”

Responding to the footage, Jonathan Turner, chief executive of UK Lawyers for Israel, said Booth’s remarks could fall within the scope of British counter-terrorism law.

“Various terrorist offences under UK law can be committed abroad,” Turned said. “These include the offence under section 12(1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000 of expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation (such as Hamas), being reckless as to whether a person to whom the expression is directed will be encouraged to support a proscribed organisation.”

However, Turner stressed that legal action would be difficult while Booth remains outside the UK.


Top Mamdani aide praised activist who asked if US would ‘hunt down and kill’ IDF soldiers
A top aide to New York City’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, previously praised a prominent anti-Israel activist who once asked whether people would "hunt down and kill" IDF soldiers.

At an awards ceremony for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in December, during which he accepted the organisation’s “Defender Of The Truth” award, Ramzi Kassem, Mamdani's chief counsel, praised its executive director, Zahra Billoo, calling her a “gift” to “Muslims worldwide”.

At the ceremony, he said: “Alhamdulillah [praise be to God], there is no shortage of models for us in our own communities. We have sister Zahra Billoo, for example, who is a treasure, a gift – not just to the Muslims in the Bay Area, but to the Muslims nationwide, and even to the Muslims worldwide.

"What she has done here, to this CAIR chapter with her team, with all of you, is an example we can all follow as someone who has found an honest place to stand and has remained there, unwavering.”

But Billoo, a prominent activist in the American Muslim community, has an extensive history of comments expressing disdain for Zionism and justifying the actions of terrorist organisations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

Writing in 2009, the day Hezbollah fired several rockets into Israel, injuring five Israelis, she thanked God that the terror group has "the courage to do what the Arab governments won't”.

On another occasion, she tweeted: “Blaming Hamas for firing rockets at [apartheid] Israel is like blaming a woman for punching her rapist."

Often her tweets consist of comparisons between the IDF and Islamic State, claiming that the former is "more militant and murderous" than the notoriously brutal Islamist terror group.

She says that the Israeli military is a "genocidal terrorist organisation" and its soldiers are "literally just baby killers", and also questioned whether, since it is acceptable to call Isis followers "radical Islamic terrorists", it is also acceptable to call Israeli soldiers "radical Jewish terrorists".
Pro-Hamas Chants Erupt Outside NYC Synagogue at Rally Promoted by Mamdani-Linked Group
Chants of "we support Hamas" and "globalize the intifada" erupted outside a Queens synagogue Thursday at an anti-Israel event promoted by a Muslim group with extensive ties to New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani.

Dozens of keffiyah-clad activists appeared in Kew Gardens Hills to protest an event to promote land sales in Israel. Palestinian Assembly for Liberation-Awda, a virulent pro-Hamas group, organized the protest against an Israeli real estate company it claims to be selling "stolen Palestinian land." Muslim American Society of New York (MAS), one of the largest Islamic groups in the state, promoted the event on its social media accounts, and members of MAS’s Youth Center posted live videos from the protest.

"Join us today and at future protests to stop the sale of stolen palestinian land being sold right here in NYC!" reads an MAS Youth Center post.

Mamdani has deep ties to MAS New York and MAS Youth Center. After his election, Mamdani selected Hannah Towfiek, the political director at MAS Youth Center, to serve on his mayoral transition committee on youth & education and MAS New York executive director Sherif Ahmed to serve on his transition committee on community organizing. Mamdani’s transition team members "will be tasked with not only making personnel recommendations but policy recommendations."

A familiar wave of anti-Israel, pro-Hamas, and anti-Semitic chants marked the Queens protest. Videos show protesters shouting, "From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free," and "there is only one solution: intifada revolution," both widely viewed as calls to attack Israel and Jews.

"Say it loud, say it clear, we support Hamas here," protesters also chanted, according to video published by Times of Israel correspondent Luke Tress.

New York state assemblyman Sam Berger, a Democrat who represents Kew Gardens Hills, called the event a "horrific" display of "anti-Semitic" rhetoric. Rep. Grace Meng (D., N.Y.) rebuffed the protesters’ pro-Hamas chant: "No, we don’t support Hamas in Queens," she wrote.

It could mark an early test for Mamdani, who faced intense scrutiny during his campaign for refusing to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist and refusing to condemn slogans like "Globalize the intifada."
Day after pro-Hamas protest, Mamdani says terror chants ‘have no place in our city’
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Friday said support for terror groups has “no place in our city,” after a pro-Hamas protest in a Jewish neighborhood sparked outrage from other elected leaders.

Anti-Zionist activists chanted “We support Hamas,” “Death to the IDF,” “Intifada people’s war,” and other violent and discriminatory slogans during a Thursday night protest against an Israeli real estate event held at a synagogue in the Kew Gardens Hill neighborhood in Queens.

The protest also saw Jewish counter-protesters insult and taunt the anti-Zionist activists by shouting against the Palestinians, chanting in support of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and shouting “Fuck Mamdani.”

Mamdani’s initial statement did not single out either side, or mention antisemitism or Hamas.

“The rhetoric and displays that we saw and heard in Kew Gardens Hills last night are wrong and have no place in our city,” Mamdani said in a statement his spokesperson shared with The Times of Israel.

“My team is in close touch with the NYPD regarding last night’s protest and counterprotest. We will continue to ensure New Yorkers’ safety entering and exiting houses of worship as well as the constitutional right to protest,” he said.

A follow-up comment posted to Mamdani’s social media was more explicit, saying, “Chants in support of a terrorist organization have no place in our city.”




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