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Tuesday, June 09, 2026

06/08 Links Pt1: US Probe Finds 101 More Staffers for UNRWA Are Hamas Terrorists From Oct7; Omer Bartov is whitewashing Israel’s enemies

From Ian:

Exclusive: US Probe Finds 101 More Staffers for UNRWA ‘Gaza Relief Organization’ Are Hamas Soldiers From October 7: Schoolteachers, Principals Exposed as Terrorists
The chief oversight body responsible for monitoring American foreign assistance has unearthed evidence that an additional 101 staffers at the embattled United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) participated in the Oct. 7 terror attacks and are affiliated with Hamas’s military wing, according to an investigatory report transmitted to the State Department and obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The U.S. Agency for International Development inspector general’s office, a law enforcement entity separate from the largely defunct USAID, determined on Friday that scores of "UNRWA school principals, teachers, security personnel, attendants, psychosocial counselors, and medical professionals" were also members of Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades or other terror factions. The inspector general determined that all 101 current or former UNRWA employees should be added to a government-wide blacklist that will prevent them from participating in all American foreign aid projects for a period of 10 years.

The latest staffers to be flagged at UNRWA—historically the primary major relief organization operating in Gaza—include a "deputy school principal serving as an al-Qassam deputy company commander in the Ain Gallout/5th infantry battalion," as well as a "deputy school principal serving as squad leader for the Khan Younis Brigade/2nd." Another teacher served as a "platoon commander of the Central Brigade/Al Quds 2nd Battalion," while a "math and computer teacher" was found to have "ties to an Al-Qassam intelligence squad." A third UNRWA instructor had "expertise as a sniper for Hamas," and a fourth served as a "Hamas soldier with orders to bring two anti-tank missiles to a prescribed location during the October 7 terror attacks." One other deputy UNRWA school principal served as a "platoon commander in Hamas’ Nuseirat battalion with communications responsibilities on October 7th."

The findings are certain to increase Congressional calls for UNRWA to be dissolved or formally designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the Trump administration. Israel has for the last 20 years claimed that UNRWA—a 76-year-old U.N. arm established solely to provide aid to Palestinian—has been fully infiltrated by Hamas, which maintains an iron grip on aid distribution across the Gaza Strip.

The Free Beacon first reported last week that the USAID inspector general’s investigation will encompass at least 1,500 UNRWA-linked individuals suspected of terror ties. As the U.S. investigation—dubbed Operation Stop the Carousel—proceeds, several U.N. organizations have already attempted to stonewall the USAID inspector general.
The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon is compromised
An independent international investigation is needed of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon, more commonly known as UNIFIL. It simply cannot be allowed to continue in its role without expert oversight. This is not just a grave concern for Israel, but for Lebanon and Syria as well.

Troubling evidence was recently revealed by representatives of the Israel Defense Forces during a confidential briefing of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. The official military session confirmed that UNIFIL personnel operating in Southern Lebanon have actively collected intelligence on Israeli troops—sensitive, operational data that has flowed directly into the hands of the Hezbollah terrorist organization. The Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee is a permanent committee.

UNIFIL has evolved from a passive, ineffective bystander into an active security liability for Israel and the region. The revelation that a U.N. peacekeeping body is collecting intelligence on a democratic ally of the United States should alarm every friend of Israel, which is acting in Lebanon to defend its sovereign borders. That this information is being funneled to Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist proxy, proves the organization is deeply flawed.

Through these actions, UNIFIL personnel have directly compromised the lives of IDF soldiers on the ground. The time has come for Washington to come to the proper conclusion: UNIFIL cannot be allowed to continue without total accountability.

The recent disclosures confirm long-standing warnings regarding UNIFIL’s compromised neutrality. Senior Israeli military officials have noted that UNIFIL personnel routinely exceed their authority by documenting IDF troop movements, rather than monitoring violations along the so-called Blue Line. Rather than serving as a stabilizing element, the 13,000-strong armed force is operating as a hostile entity under the guise of international diplomacy.
Seth Mandel: How Iran’s Global War Works: The Case of Mohammad al-Saadi
Menachem Begin and Anwar Sadat did not, with great fanfare, sign a cease-fire in 1979. They signed a historic peace treaty. The American Revolutionary War was not ended by the Cease-Fire of Paris, nor do we speak of the Cease-Fire of Versailles.

Yet cease-fires—vague, temporary, and ill-defined periods in which combatants sometimes retreat to their corners and sometimes just keep punching—are the best we can do when it comes to the Middle East today.

There is no great mystery here for anyone but the willfully blind: States that won’t make peace with Israel will nonetheless make cease-fires with Israel because a cease-fire isn’t peace.

These antagonists have one more characteristic in common, and that is their primary motive. We can discern this motive by observing where else, and against whom specifically, they carry on this same war.

Last week, Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi found himself in a Manhattan courtroom on terrorism-related charges that included his alleged role in the stabbing of two Jewish men in Golders Green last month, as well as the firebombing of a synagogue on North Macedonia and plans to carry out similar firebombings in several American cities.

Saadi is, according to the evidence against him, commander of an Iranian proxy group under the aegis of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the state military organization that is likely running the country since the death of the last ayatollah and mysterious condition of the current one.

Three weeks ago, Germany charged two men for allegedly planning to assassinate Jewish communal leaders in Berlin, as well as other identifiably Jewish targets. The leader of the plot was a Danish citizen who, according to Germany, worked for the IRGC.

Two months before that was the Michigan terror attack, in which a man tried to massacre Jewish children at a synagogue. His connections were to Hezbollah, also an Iranian militia.

The Islamic State of Iran is currently waging a global war on Jews. Israel is part of that war, and so is America. But so is every other country with Jews in it. Unless I missed it, no one has yet demanded a cease-fire in this broader war, because the Jews of Golders Green and Berlin and North Macedonia and New York and Arizona and Michigan and Los Angeles are not firing at Iran. They are only being fired at—by Iran. And the campus activists and NGOs and enlightened progressive politicians don’t seem to want that firing to cease.
Omer Bartov is whitewashing Israel’s enemies
‘When someone says to you that he wants to kill you – believe him.’ Israeli novelist Roni Gelbfish was quoting her grandmother, a Holocaust survivor, during a radio interview shortly after Hamas’s pogrom on 7 October 2023. Most people would empathise with Gelbfish’s grandmother in the aftermath of the atrocities of that terrible day. Hamas had once again shown, in the most horrific way imaginable, that it should be believed when it says it wants to slaughter Jews.

But if Omer Bartov feels any empathy with Gelbfish’s grandmother, he hides it well. In his new book, Israel: What Went Wrong, the American-Israeli professor at Brown University cites the quote as an example of Shoatiyut, which he translates from Hebrew as ‘Holocaustism’. This is the tendency, he argues, to interpret and exaggerate the threats facing Israel through the prism of the Holocaust and anti-Semitism more broadly.

Although Bartov offers a cursory criticism of the Hamas pogrom, he is really interested in condemning the Israeli reaction. He claims that framing 7 October as a Nazi-like attack on Jews is little more than an attempt to justify what he calls the ‘genocidal’ assault on Gaza.

Bartov’s argument is of a piece with that of Israel’s enemies in the Middle East and beyond. They view the Jewish State as evil incarnate, a prime representative of a malign West. They claim that Israel cynically weaponises the Holocaust and the charge of anti-Semitism to deflect what they call ‘legitimate criticism’ of its actions – in this case, the ‘genocide’ in Gaza.

To make this argument, Israel’s enemies deny and downplay the very real anti-Semitic threats it faces, from the assorted Islamist groups like Hamas, hell-bent on its destruction, to their nation-state supporters, Iran, Pakistan, Qatar and Turkey. By minimising and erasing these formidable threats, Israel can be portrayed as a singularly malevolent nation, killing for killing’s sake. Anyone who has followed the conflict in Gaza and the broader Middle East – and not just on the Qatar-funded Al-Jazeera but also on the BBC and Sky – should be familiar with this portrayal. Israel appears to be fighting a war for no good reason, rather than what it’s actually doing – defending itself against an all too real, annihilationist threat.

In What Went Wrong, Bartov lends credibility to this anti-Israel case, from the denial of the anti-Semitic threat to the accusation of genocide. After all, he’s a professor of Holocaust studies at an Ivy League university and he served as a company commander in an Israel Defence Forces (IDF) combat unit in the 1970s. His credentials have turned him into a valued guest on anti-Israel media. He’s written articles for the Guardian and the New York Times and has appeared on the virulent anti-Israel podcasts of Owen Jones and Mehdi Hasan.

But What Went Wrong is no dispassionate academic analysis. It is the work of a professor-activist who, at the very least, is willing to omit key facts to make his case.

Despite the implication of its title, What Went Wrong argues that the Zionist movement was, on balance, always wrong and deeply flawed. Zionism began, Bartov argues, as an ethno-nationalist, settler-colonial movement in the 19th century, and has only gone downhill since the establishment of Israel in 1948.

Denying the threat of anti-Semitism is at the centre of Bartov’s argument. Take his much-changed view of Hamas. In a 2004 article for New Republic, he argued correctly that Hamas poses a Nazi-like threat to Israel and the Jews: ‘The charter of the Hamas movement, issued in 1988 as the fundamental document of this Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, must be read to be believed. It contains, among its fundamentalist Islamic preachings, the most blatant anti-Semitic statements made in a publicly available document since Hitler’s own pronouncements.’

Despite occasional claims by anti-Israel activists, Hamas has not rescinded its charter. The Islamist terror group did publish a policy document in 2017, which toned down the anti-Semitic language. But Hamas has made clear the charter still remains in force. Additionally, several Hamas leaders have said they would like to repeat the 7 October pogrom.


Jonathan Tobin: What’s behind the campaign to demonize Israel inside Trumpworld?
The feigned righteous indignation about Israeli espionage ignores the fact that all nations, including the closest of allies, constantly seek to find out all they can about each other, and their intentions and policies. Indeed, it is highly likely, if not almost certainly true, that the United States is currently engaged in spying on Israel. Still, as the junior partner in the alliance, Israel should be far more circumspect about its efforts to find out what the Americans intend to do than its partners.

Yet it is equally important to remember that among the main advantages of the alliance for the United States is that Jerusalem shares with Washington vast stores of information about the Middle East and the Islamic world that American agencies have proven unable to provide for themselves. The United States derives enormous benefits from this, coupled with Israeli contributions to joint projects to invent and improve various aspects of defense technology. And the billions in military aid that Israel gets—that its critics never stop complaining about—are almost all spent in the United States and are critical to bolstering American defense manufacturing.

Why then, attempt to blow up the relationship with a country that is not only Washington’s sole democratic ally in the Middle East, but one that has the capability and willingness to fight side by side with its American partners?

Far-right elements within the administration, likely behind the leaks about an Israeli spy scare, share the paranoid hatred of Jews regularly aired on the podcasts of antisemites like Carlson, the even crazier Candace Owens, neo-Nazi groyper Nick Fuentes, and even the supposedly more mainstream Megyn Kelly. They aren’t interested in promoting American interests so much as they are sowing distrust of Israel and its supporters simply to bolster their conspiratorial worldview.

Most of all, they are hoping to seize on what ought to be characterized as fear-mongering about Israel, rather than an actual threat to American security, to undermine the defense of the West against Iran’s Islamist terrorists.

Doubtless, they are encouraged by Trump’s erratic policy statements about Iran. The president’s efforts to restrain Jerusalem’s attacks on Iran and its Hezbollah terrorist auxiliaries in Lebanon have bolstered the belief that the two allies aren’t just having tactical disagreements about the next step in the conflict, but are pursuing mutually exclusive goals. Should Trump embrace an Obama-style deal with Iran, then those who are seeking to crack up the alliance will think they have gained the upper hand.

But what shouldn’t be forgotten is that the past few months of shared combat against Iran have proven that the U.S.-Israel relationship is not a plot imposed on Washington by a lobby. Those who strive to undermine it are making America weaker, not stronger. And their reasons for doing so are rooted in antisemitic conspiracy theories as opposed to rational strategic thought. The alliance is not a matter of American charity or mythical Israeli manipulation. It is a foundational element of U.S. national security against the ongoing threat of Islamist terror that deserves the support of all American patriots.
‘Israel may not like that’: Touting potential ‘home run’ deal, Vance says key US objective is preventing Iran from getting nukes
US Vice President JD Vance says the United States and Israel “have a lot of shared interests, but we also have some situations where are interests diverge,” as Fox News host Jesse Waters begins an interview by asking him how “concerned are you about Israel spying on the United States and freelancing in Lebanon?”

“I think where the president has been very clear here is that while Israel obviously has some objectives that it has, the United States’ main objective in Iran is to ensure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon,” Vance says, without actually addressing the questions posed to him.

Vance asserts that “over the last year and a half, we’ve created the space necessary where the president believes – and I think that he’s right – that we can get the long-term settlement to Iran’s nuclear deal.”

“Now, Israel may like that, they may not like that,” he adds. “But fundamentally, we think this is in the best interest of the United States of America.”

Asked if the Iranians are “trying to play” the US negotiators, Vance responds, “Everybody’s always trying to play everybody.”

He also argues that unlike the deal the Trump administration is negotiating, the problem with the 2015 nuclear agreement “is that there was not a proper inspections regime to ensure the Iranians could never build a nuclear weapon.”
Pro-Israel voices offer reassurance about Vance’s new national security advisor
Vice President JD Vance tapped Cliff Sims last month as his national security advisor last month, picking a longtime GOP operative with close relationships across the party’s ideological spectrum on foreign policy.

The hire bolsters Vance’s foreign policy operation at a time when intraparty fissures are widening over the lack of diplomatic or military progress in the war with Iran and the broader question of American engagement abroad.

Sims will be leading Vance’s foreign policy team alongside Andy Baker, one of the vice president’s closest aides and a deputy national security advisor.

Sims is a longtime political ally of President Donald Trump, a friend of several members of the Trump family — including Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. — and has longstanding personal and professional relationships throughout the president’s orbit and in Republican politics.

In addition to being a Vance confidante, Sims, 42, has advised or worked with Trump, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, most recently serving as chairman of the CIA’s external advisory board.

Sims is known in Republican foreign policy circles as a China hawk. He led several China-related efforts during his tenure as director of message strategy for the White House and deputy director of national intelligence for strategy and communications at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Sims and Ratcliffe co-authored numerous op-eds from late 2021 to early 2022 where the two claimed the Chinese Communist Party poses the greatest threat to U.S. national security.
Anti-Trump bias has blinded Britain to the real threat posed by Iran’s military regime
Rather, what we are witnessing, in line with Khamenei’s pre-war vision, is the transformation of the regime’s governance from a traditional Islamist theocracy into a militarised one: a system in which clerical authority is increasingly exercised through militarised institutions and enforced by clerics in uniform rather than in turbans. In effect, the IRGC – the deep-state long accustomed to calling the shots from the shadows – is emerging as the visible state itself. This trajectory predates the war and would have taken place regardless of it.

There is, however, one major difference from the original plan: the IRGC is attempting this transformation with significantly diminished military capabilities because of the conflict. The importance of the degradation of the IRGC’s military capabilities should not be understated.

This does not make the regime less dangerous. Rather, it is likely to accelerate its reliance on asymmetric warfare, covert operations, ideological networks, and transnational violence – areas in which the regime has long invested heavily across Europe, not least in Britain.

Sir Keir Starmer may claim this is “not our war”, but that’s not how the IRGC sees it. The Guard has been at war with Britain for almost five decades, and in recent years it has intensified its campaign. Since 2022, not only have 20 major Iran-linked terror plots been foiled, but the regime has been targeting British parliamentarians and critical infrastructure.

The IRGC has also been exploiting weak oversight of Britain’s charity system to build a soft-power infrastructure operating through charities, mosques, and schools, which it has used to nurture Islamist radicalisation and anti-Semitism. These tactics, similar to those employed by Isis and Al-Qaeda, have paid dividends for the IRGC. And things are only going to get worse.

Still, the prevailing Iran war narrative on the Left and much of the media would have you believe that Trump and the US are the pariah aggressors, and somehow represent greater threats to our security than the IRGC. This framing has, in turn, shaped our politics, with Starmer effectively boasting about “standing up” to our most important ally, instead of standing up to a regime one of whose slogans is “Death to England” and which continues to plot terror on British streets.

The anti-Trump narrative surrounding the Iran conflict has blinded us to the very threat we face here in Britain.

As the IRGC continues its path of escalation against us, Starmer has effectively turned his back on the US, our most important strategic ally. Anti-Trump ideology has eclipsed the Government’s ability to see straight and protect Britain’s long-term interests.

Starmer has had many failings during his premiership, but his lack of strategic foresight in this instance may prove the most consequential. As the world becomes more dangerous, this may haunt Britain for years to come.
Khaled Abu Toameh: Lebanon Finally Says It Out Loud: Lebanon Does Not Belong to Iran, Iran Is the Problem
"You are not trying to help us; the people of Lebanon are paying the price for your own interests.... Our interests do not align with yours.... This is not your country, it is our country." — Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, directly addressing Iran's regime; CNN, June 5, 2026

Aoun's remarks amount to a public admission that Hezbollah has effectively created a state within a state, one that decides when Lebanon goes to war and when it agrees to a ceasefire, regardless of the wishes of the elected government of the Lebanese people.

"Spare our South, and cease treating it and its people as mere bargaining chips to improve your negotiation terms.... this war is not ours, that it is not fought for us, but on our soil and at the expense of our people." —Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, June 5, 2026.

The Lebanese leaders are finally saying publicly what many observers have argued for years: Hezbollah is not defending Lebanon. It is defending Iran's regional interests.

The tragedy of Lebanon closely resembles the tragedy of the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinians in Gaza are paying the price for decisions made by Hamas, another Islamist terrorist organization acting in accordance with Iran's broader regional agenda.

All terrorist roads lead first to Tehran.

Without Iran's interference in Lebanese and Palestinian affairs, both peoples would likely be focused on building their economies, strengthening their institutions, and improving the lives of their citizens instead of enduring endless cycles of war and destruction.

[Iran's] goal is always the same: expand Iranian influence while keeping the region in a permanent state of confrontation.

The ceasefire agreements brokered by the Trump Administration were also supposed to strengthen Lebanese sovereignty and curb Hezbollah's military power.

Why, then, is Hezbollah still armed? Why does it continue to decide matters of war and peace? Why is the Lebanese government still unable, or unwilling, to assert full authority over its territory?
JPost Editorial: Israel strikes back at Iran's attempt to shape a new reality in the Middle East
For a few hours on Sunday night, it seemed entirely possible that Israel would do what much of the international community wanted it to do, which is absorb an Iranian missile attack and move on.

After all, there were no casualties. The missiles triggered sirens across northern Israel and sent millions of Israelis once again toward protected spaces, and there were no reports of deaths or serious injuries. Just another exchange in the Middle East, and another mini-crisis to be managed.

Yet by the early hours of Monday morning, the Israel Air Force had struck targets in western and central Iran, defying what the Americans were publicly demanding they not do. It is important to note that Israel struck selected targets and refrained from launching its full potential on Iran.

The question is why.

Israel unwilling to accept a new reality in the Middle East
It is not that Israel was desperate to restart the conflict with Iran on the more drastic scale we witnessed from February through April. Quite the opposite. Israel is still dealing with the aftermath of October 7, fighting on multiple fronts, which increased yet again when the Houthis joined the fray on Monday. Reserve duty has stretched families and businesses to their limits, and a population exhausted by nearly three years of instability.

But Israel was unwilling to accept a new reality in the Middle East.

It began in Lebanon on Sunday afternoon, when the IAF struck Hezbollah targets in Dahiyeh, the Beirut stronghold of the Iranian-backed terror proxy group. The strike followed repeated Hezbollah violations of the ceasefire announced only days earlier.

Iran, however, chose to respond directly against Israel with ballistic missiles, taking it upon themselves to defend Hezbollah and strike the Jewish state. For a country that the US president claims is willing to sit down and negotiate peace, it was a demonstration of the opposite.

For decades, the Islamic Republic has invested enormous resources in building a network of proxies across the Middle East. Hezbollah remains the crown jewel of that strategy, especially since the fall of the Assad regime. The group’s value to Tehran lies in its proximity and ability to attack Israel while allowing Iran to remain one step removed from the battlefield.

Had Israel absorbed the missile attack without responding, a new and dangerous equation in the region would have begun to emerge. Hezbollah could violate ceasefires and attack northern Israel. Israel could respond. Iran could then fire directly at Israel in defense of its proxy. And Jerusalem would be expected to absorb that attack quietly and stand down in deference to the Americans.
Israel holding fire for now but if Iran attacks again, it will face ‘overwhelming force,’ Netanyahu says
Israel is holding its fire after responding to the Iranian attack but will bring “overwhelming force” to bear on the Islamic Republic if the regime resumes its attacks, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“After Iran attacked Israel, I instructed the IDF to attack military and economic targets throughout Iran. We did that, too,” the prime minister said in a brief address to the nation on Monday evening. “At the moment, we are holding our fire, because after we struck the terror regime in Tehran, it ceased attacking us. In the event that the terror regime in Iran makes the mistake of resuming attacks on us, we will respond with overwhelming force.”

“Israel has a full right to self-defense, and we are exercising it to the extent necessary,” he said.

Netanyahu added that he has had “good conversations” with his “friend” U.S. President Donald Trump. That statement came after some reports, which Israel denied, claiming that the U.S. president had spoken harshly to the Israeli premier.

In his address, Netanyahu reviewed the Jewish state’s successes in defanging Iran and its terror proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“A year ago, we launched a historic preemptive attack against Iran’s intention to destroy us with atomic bombs” and “thwarted this immediate threat, and we also eliminated the dictator Khamenei,” he said, of Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Iranian regime who was assassinated on Feb. 28.

“If we hadn’t acted on time and with intensity, we wouldn’t be here today,” Netanyahu said. “I pledge again: Iran will not have nuclear weapons.”

The Jewish state is acting with the same determination against Hezbollah, a terror group that planned to invade the Galilee with thousands of terrorists while simultaneously launching 150,000 missiles and rockets, according to the prime minister.

“We thwarted this threat as well, and we eliminated Nasrallah,” Netanyahu said of the assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. “I would like to tell you: our heroic fighters are tearing Hezbollah to pieces. We continue to destroy all of their terror infrastructure in the security zone, including massive underground facilities in the Beaufort Ridge.”

“So massive that they are unlike anything I have ever seen,” he said. “Iran and Hezbollah are weaker than ever, and we are stronger than ever, but our battle against them is still not finished.”


Thirty interceptions a minute: An Israeli startup's drone solution
The threat from Hezbollah's drones has aroused concern in Israel and represents a considerable challenge for the IDF in protecting its ground forces and settlements on the northern border. In addition to the Iron Beam laser interception system from Rafael that was delivered to the army five months ago, "Globes" now reveals another Israeli laser system for countering drones. This is Dronelight, developed by Omer-based Esh-Tech Systems, which up to now has operated below the radar.

Esh-Tech was founded six years ago, and deliberately maintained a low profile until it had a finished product, which is now undergoing trials in Israel and overseas. During this period, the company received three grants from the Israel Innovation Authority, the latest, described as "substantial", a few months ago, apparently when it became clear that the system was coming together.

The system emits hundreds of tiny beams the size of a coin at the target. When one beam is seen to make a hit, additional beams are directed at the target, and the focused energy rapidly shoots it down.

Esh-Tech's laser is a pulse laser and is not fiber-based. This means that a hundredth of a second is sufficient for it to score a focused hit on a target. It has an output of four kilowatts, and can destroy a target at a range of up to one kilometer.

Dronelight's output is much lower than that of Iron Beam, but that has an advantage: it can obtain energy from almost any system in the field, and there is no significant complication from the need to charge it. It therefore has an advantage against the future big drone threat: swarm attacks, against which Iron Beam will struggle, because of its serial method of operation and the transition from target to target.

With Dronelight's "machine gun method", it only takes a second or two to shoot down a drone, before moving on to the next threat. Thus 30 threats can be intercepted in a minute, instead of just four in the case of existing laser systems. The cost is also much lower, at about NIS 0.10 per minute of operation.

Dronelight's low output also helps to keep it small and portable. Esh-Tech is already working with armored vehicle manufacturers in Israel and around the world, and has orders worth millions from Europe and elsewhere. The company is also working on mounting the system onto a lightweight platform for Jeeps, and as a fixed system.


Call me Back Podcast: Did the Iran War Succeed? - with Tamir Hayman and Mark Dubowitz
Did the Iran war solve the problem, postpone it or make it worse?

That fundamental debate has emerged over the outcome of the war with Iran. The campaigns degraded Iran's military infrastructure, but it also ended with a new, possibly more dangerous Supreme Leader in power, Iran controlling the Strait of Hormuz, and Iran’s nuclear capability largely intact.

Dan is joined by former Israeli Military Intelligence chief Tamir Hayman and FDD CEO Mark Dubowitz to discuss whether the war was a strategic success, a missed opportunity, or an unfinished chapter in a conflict that is far from over.

In this episode:
04:51 - What is the most likely outcome of the U.S.-Iran negotiations?
08:00 - What were the tactical achievements of the US and Israeli attacks?
10:03 - Was the war strategically worth it?
19:42 - Can and will Trump still finish the job?
24:44 - Was the plan to have Kurds help topple the Iranian regime credible?
32:30 - Was Ahmadinejad a realistic replacement candidate?
35:42 - How formidable a foe is Mojtaba Khamenei?
41:48 - Is Iran more dangerous today than before the war?


Commentary Podcast: Plan Bibi
Today we discuss Israel's retaliatory strikes on Iran and reports that Trump had instructed Netanyahu to not respond to the Iranian missile salvo. Was Israel's response indicative of a smoke screen or something more serious, and how does it relate to reports that the Pentagon is concerned about a rising espionage threat from Israel? Plus, Scott Pelley's post-firing media tour, and Seth recommends Legends on Netflix.
Misgav Institute: Back to war with Iran | Saul Sadka
President Trump tells Iran and Israel to stop shooting at each other after the first direct attacks since a ceasefire was brokered two months ago Sirens sound across Israel as Iran fires more than 20 ballistic missiles and Israel responds with strikes on multiple Iranian targets, including the strategically important Mahshahr petrochemical facility.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps says it is prepared for a war on multiple fronts and claims the missile barrage was retaliation for Israeli strikes on Hezbollah's Beirut stronghold.

Meanwhile, Yemen's Houthis have announced a "complete and total ban" on Israeli maritime navigation in the Red Sea, threatening to target all Israeli-linked vessels and raising fresh concerns about global shipping routes through the Bab el-Mandeb chokepoint.

Today’s guest is analyst and Tanakh scholar Saul Sadka who tells us not to pay too much attention to reports of a spat between PM Netanyahu and President Trump, that Iran is less of a threat to Israel than to its neighbours and that today is a great time to be a Jew!

In Cairo, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey are holding talks with Palestinian factions including Hamas in an effort to advance the next phase of the Gaza ceasefire, though Hamas continues to reject demands that it disarm before a full Israeli withdrawal from the Strip.

And in Europe, Slovenia's new Prime Minister Janez Janša has lowered the Palestinian flag from government headquarters and pledged a more balanced foreign policy, reversing the strongly anti-Israel stance of the previous administration.


Ask Haviv Anything: 122: When will the war with Iran end?
Welcome to our new short-form episodes interspersed with the regular interviews and lectures that dive into an often-asked question about Israel, Jews and the Middle East.

Our current episode tackles the latest flare up between Israel and Iran. We ask the obvious question: will this war ever be over?

Introduction and Context - 0:00
Overview of recent US-Israel-Iran tensions.
Trump's Strategy - 0:26
Analysis of Trump's unpredictable negotiation tactics.
Political Implications - 1:24
The political motivations behind the US and Iran negotiations.
Israeli and US Relations - 2:49
The dynamics between Israel, the US, and Iran.
Middle East Conflict Overview - 5:11
Historical context and ongoing conflicts in the Middle East.
Iran's Ideological Goals - 9:22
Discussion on Iran's long-term objectives against Israel.
Israel's Strategic Position - 14:09
Israel's military and strategic advantages.
Conclusion - 44:43
Final thoughts on the resilience and future of the conflict.







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