Thursday, July 30, 2026

07/29 Links Pt1: Trump’s angry words for Netanyahu reveal the strength of the US-Israel bond; Melanie Phillips: The "settler violence" libel

From Ian:

Gil Troy: Trump’s angry words for Netanyahu reveal the strength of the US-Israel bond
In his 1992 blockbuster, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, John Gray popularized another relevant concept. People apply his “rubber band theory” to all kinds of situations. The metaphor certainly explains the US-Israel dynamic. When two people, or two nations, are so enmeshed, leaders may clash, snap, even pull away, hard, fast, far, without rupture. Ultimately, the structural foundations, shared values, and overlapping needs keep them, like a stretched rubber band, bouncing back quickly.

Clinton was deeply committed to the State of Israel’s survival – and the Oslo Peace Process. When he hosted a newly elected Prime Minister Netanyahu at the White House in July, 1996, the Americans, Israelis, and Palestinians had been working the Oslo process for almost three years. Doubting Yasser Arafat – for good reason – Netanyahu promised to be far more unyielding than he ultimately proved to be.

Still, starting in the president’s own Oval Office, Netanyahu lectured his host about the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. After the meeting, Clinton fumed: “Who the f**k does he think he is? Who’s the f**king superpower here?”

Biden proudly called himself a lifelong “Zionist” and embraced Israel generously, diplomatically, and militarily after the Hamas-led massacres on October 7, 2023. Still, Biden and Netanyahu kept clashing over military strategy.

Wanting Israel to win, but worried that Israel would lose its good name, Biden became increasingly apoplectic. In July 2024, when Israel bombed Beirut, eliminating Fuad Shukur, a leading Hezbollah commander responsible for killing 12 Israeli-Druze children in Majdal Shams, Biden confronted Israel’s prime minister. “Bibi, what the f**k?” the president bellowed, according to Bob Woodward’s 2024 book, War. “You know the perception of Israel around the world increasingly is that you’re a rogue state, a rogue actor.”

Woodward reports Biden also vented to aides Clinton-style, calling Netanyahu “a bad f**king guy!” and a “f**king liar.” Although these assaults were more personal, the rubber band snapped back quickly. Biden didn’t abandon Israel or Bibi – despite growing pressure from other Democrats.

Trump's outburst was just a chapter in their relationship
IN THAT CONTEXT, Trump’s outburst, asking “What the f**k are you doing?” in June 2026, was just another chapter in a long, complex, ongoing story of a special relationship led by strong-minded leaders whose agendas will occasionally clash. Last month, Trump sought a diplomatic formula with Iran, while Netanyahu doubted Iran’s intentions.

Justifiably defending his country’s interests after Hezbollah renewed its attacks against Israel, Netanyahu approved strikes on Beirut and southern Lebanon. Trump, protecting the negotiations he still had faith in then, called Netanyahu “f**king crazy,” claiming Bibi had “no f**king judgment.”

Now, just weeks later, after hysterical cries of “rupture” on both sides of the Atlantic, and Iran’s Strait of Hormuz power play, Netanyahu and Trump seem to share a deep distrust of Iran’s leaders.

My latest e-book, The Essential Guide to the US-Israel Partnership: The 250th anniversary edition, brands Israel America’s rare DIY (Defend It Yourself) ally, and ROI (Return on Investment) ally, generating many technological, medical, cultural, diplomatic, and military dividends for the United States. But the book also traces how every president, including such “pro-Israel” stalwarts like Reagan, inevitably clashed at some point with their Israeli counterparts.

Today, with anti-Zionist obsessives like New York’s Mayor Zohran Mamdani demonizing Israel constantly, the occasional presidential F-bomb seems downright mild – and flattering. Similarly, with European diplomats claiming over the years: “All the current troubles in the world are because of that shitty little country, Israel,” or that the “f**king Israelis” should be “wiped off the face of the earth,” it’s clear how bonded America is with Israel and how most Americans are with Israelis.

Mark Twain understood the joy and power of a good tirade filled with expletives. In Pudd’nhead Wilson, he advised: “When angry, count [to] four; when very angry, swear.” That’s because, Twain explained elsewhere, “Under certain circumstances, urgent circumstances, desperate circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.”

More elegantly, Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, who won the Nobel Peace Prize, taught: “The opposite of love is not hate; it’s indifference.”

It’s impossible to predict if Trump and Netanyahu embraced warmly or crossed swords yet again. But it is highly unlikely that their encounter lacked great drama or reflected a dismissive indifference.
David Horovitz: While Trump blusters, and Netanyahu spins, is Iran already on the brink of the bomb?
This is indeed a critical period — for Israel, the region, and the free world, in the fateful battle against a demonstrably ruthless, spectacularly dangerous regime bent on destroying this country, dominating the Middle East, and exporting its extremist Islamic ideology worldwide.

It is a critical period, too, for the two warily friendly leaders. One is facing an election three months from now which could see him ousted, or triumphally returned for yet another term in which he would aim to complete his grab for all of Israel’s levers of power. The other is indirectly facing an electorate a week later who could immensely complicate his final two years in office by removing his majority in one or both chambers of Congress — including placing all manner of obstacles to his pursuit of this war.

Both these men would like nothing more than for the regime in Iran to be definitively defeated ahead of their respective polling days. Netanyahu is almost certainly more optimistic than Trump that this could yet be achieved, but then again, that’s where his personal political interests lie. Come what may, Trump will still be president at the end of this year, and can afford to think long and hard about the timing of an intensified attack on the regime; Netanyahu may be finished if the Islamic Republic is intact on October 27.

The regime, as was obvious, is exploiting the lax and lousy terms of June’s memorandum of understanding, falsely touted by Trump as the answer to a region’s prayers for peace. It is maneuvering to solidify its hold on the Strait of Hormuz, reviving its military muscle, and predictably avoiding the slightest concessions on its rogue nuclear program, as the MOU’s vaguely envisaged 60 days of negotiations are frittered uselessly away.

But what really matters is that deep underground, at Pickaxe Mountain — where the International Atomic Energy Agency has never been given access, and where the US does not have cameras and does not know “exactly what is going on” — Iran just might have sufficient quantities of 60%-enriched uranium, and the centrifuges to enrich it to weapons grade within weeks or even days. If that is the case, it would still likely be several months from a deliverable bomb, but would have completed arguably the hardest and generally the most visible step on the road to nuclear weapons.

And then, whatever anybody says or wants to believe, the war against the Islamic Republic would be anything but over.
Israel should seize Lebanon’s best chance for peace in decades
Even so, Aoun has gone further than any Lebanese president in recent decades. He has opposed Hezbollah and Iranian interference, supported dialogue with Israel, and begun translating those positions into action.

The Lebanese Armed Forces remain limited and far from fully effective, but under his leadership they are doing more than before to restore the state’s monopoly on armed force. This progress has been made possible primarily by Hezbollah’s weakness, but also by Aoun’s policy and direction.

Aoun’s caution should not be mistaken for reluctance. The devastation of the war has created an opportunity to loosen Hezbollah’s grip on Lebanon, and Aoun appears determined to guide the country through that transition.

Political necessity and Aoun’s own convictions now point in the same direction: ending Hezbollah’s domination. He understands the price Lebanon has paid for allowing an Iranian militia to operate on its soil. He also recognizes that significant sections of the public – particularly within the Christian community – are weary of Hezbollah and years of war.

That sentiment gives him room to pursue an alternative course. His challenge is to steer Lebanon forward while contending with an armed organization that still enjoys significant support among Lebanese Shi’ites.

None of this makes Aoun master of Lebanon. Hezbollah remains armed, politically entrenched, and capable of obstructing – or violently derailing – the process. Yet so far, Aoun has moved in the right direction.

Israel and and the US should act on this opportunity. Across the border is a Lebanese leader willing to take political risks in defense of his country’s interests – and to make that case publicly to his own people, in Arabic, rather than only before an American audience in Washington. Aoun’s course also aligns with Israel’s strategic interests: advancing peace with Lebanon and dismantling Hezbollah’s military power.

One of the understandable lessons Israelis drew from October 7 was to take their enemies’ declared intentions seriously. But strategic vigilance also requires recognizing when a different possibility begins to emerge.

The road to peace with Lebanon – and to Hezbollah’s disarmament – remains long, difficult, and uncertain. Yet for the first time in years, Israel may have a potential partner in Beirut.

Aoun is no Sadat, and Lebanon is not Egypt in the late 1970s. But history rarely repeats itself in identical form. With the right strategy, Aoun could become both a genuine partner for peace and an important force in restoring Lebanese sovereignty.

Israel and the United States should therefore combine incentives with pressure. Israel should undertake phased, verifiable withdrawals wherever the Lebanese Armed Forces establish effective control.

Washington should sustain military and economic assistance conditioned on measurable progress toward the state’s monopoly on arms.

Both countries should maintain pressure on Hezbollah while avoiding steps that publicly humiliate Aoun or allow his opponents to portray him as Israel’s instrument. In the Middle East, opportunities rarely remain open for long. Israel and the United States should seize this one before Hezbollah closes it.


Melanie Phillips: The "settler violence" libel
The UN “settler violence” statistics conflate Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria with Israelis living in Jerusalem and elsewhere in Israel. Apparently, they’re all “settlers”. Anti-Zionist Israeli NGOs like B’Tselem or Physicians for Human Rights, which feed the UN and western journalists with anti-Israel propaganda, explicitly equate “settler violence” against Arabs with Israeli “state violence” against Arabs.

Regavim has now been sanctioned by the EU and UK on the grounds of punishing “settler violence”. It’s not hard to spot the real reason.

The EU has been funding the building of illegal Arab settlements in Area C of the disputed territories, against the terms of the Oslo agreement under which only Israel can issue construction permits for this area. Tel Aviv University’s Begin-Sadat Centre has reported that the EU and individual European countries are funding continuous waves of illegal Palestinian settlement, which are being established without permits and often without even bothering to apply for them.

The EU and UK, among others, are using the “settler violence” libel to demonise all 750,000 Jewish residents living in the disputed areas of Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, including the Old City which houses the site of the ancient Jewish Temple. This is being done to erase the Jews’ legal and historic claim to these territories, push them out and replace them by Arab colonisers to create “facts on the ground” that make a Palestine state appear inescapable.

Moreover, the falsehood that the disputed territories are “illegally occupied” would also apply by its own mendacious and ahistorical logic to the entire State of Israel. The EU and the British government have sanctioned Regavim to prevent their populations from understanding the monstrous project now under way to delegitimise and dismember Israel itself.

The “settler violence” libel is now a strategic threat to the world’s only Jewish state.
Pro-Israel columnist Stephens condemns settler violence
Bret Stephens, the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist known as one of the paper’s most consistent defenders of Israel, used his Tuesday column to take direct aim at the country’s handling of settler violence in the West Bank, warning that unchecked attacks now pose a threat to Israel’s security and to Zionism itself.

Stephens, who has spent years pushing back on what he sees as double standards applied to Israel, wrote that he decided to speak out against what he called “Jewish terrorists” despite his reluctance to feed the volume of global condemnation facing Israel.

“That’s not only because the terrorism is a menace to Palestinian lives and property, or an affront to Jewish ethics, or a stain on Israel’s reputation - though it’s all those things,” he wrote. “It’s also a direct threat to Israel’s security and statehood, and thus to Zionism itself.”

Stephens’s column drew heavily on a public letter sent Sunday to US President Donald Trump by Matan Vilnai, a retired IDF deputy chief of staff, on behalf of Commanders for Israel’s Security, an organization representing hundreds of retired senior Israeli officers. The letter cautioned that Israeli security services have been effective against Palestinian terror groups but hamstrung when it comes to curbing Jewish extremists. The letter warned about the consequences of Israeli inaction in curbing attacks on Palestinians.

“Unless arrested swiftly and decisively, escalating violence in the West Bank is poised to ignite the region and carries severe ramifications for both Israeli security and US regional interests,” wrote Vilnai.

Stephens pointed to last week’s rampage by extremist settlers through several Palestinian villages - attacks that reportedly included arson at a home and two mosques and an assault on a stonecutting factory - as evidence the problem has become routine rather than exceptional. He cited Israeli military figures showing nationalistic and settler-related crimes climbed to 867 incidents in 2025, up from 682 the year before.

Stephens also cited Eran Shamir-Borer of the Israel Democracy Institute, a former IDF legal official, who told him the government has specifically declined to place suspected Jewish settlers under administrative detention. The practice, imprisoning individuals without formal charges, is regularly deployed against suspected Palestinian terrorists.

The columnist dismissed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s public framing of the violence as the work of roughly 150 “juvenile delinquents,” as he did in an interview with NBC earlier this month. Stephens argued that a government capable of eliminating a Hamas commander deep inside Iran cannot plausibly claim it’s unable to rein in a few hundred vigilantes.


Ask Haviv Anything: 135: Why don’t Israelis trust the UN?
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.

In our current episode we ask: Why don’t Israelis trust the UN?

Chapters
00:00 Introduction: Why Israelis Distrust the UN
00:30 The UN's Structural Bias Against Israel
01:29 Majority Rules and Israel's Exclusion
02:54 Disproportionate Focus on Israel at the UN
04:19 Resolutions Against Israel vs. Rest of the World
06:12 Permanent Agenda Item on Palestine
07:35 Inequality in UN Human Rights Bodies
09:00 The UN's Double Standards and Selective Justice
10:29 The UN Vote of 1947 and Israel's Legitimacy
12:20 UNRWA and the Perpetuation of Refugee Issues
19:05 UN Peacekeeping Failures and Israel
24:16 The 1947 Partition Vote and Great Power Politics
32:25 Israel's Legitimacy: Power, Survival, and History
33:52 Conclusion: The UN's Hostile Stance on Israel




Nearly half of Americans would have the US put Netanyahu in handcuffs, poll says
Nearly half of Americans believe that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be arrested on war crimes charges while he is in the United States, a new poll found.

Asked about the warrant issued by the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes in Gaza, 49 percent of respondents to an Economist/YouGov survey published Tuesday said the Israeli premier should be arrested. Another 27% said he should not be arrested and 23% are unsure.

Similar figures were shown across the board when respondents were asked whether they thought Netanyahu was guilty of war crimes during the war in Gaza, which was sparked by the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, onslaught.

Netanyahu was visiting the US this week to meet with President Donald Trump. But the debate over whether he should be arrested has centered on the premier’s upcoming visit to New York City in September for the UN General Assembly. The city’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is a harsh critic of Israel and long pledged to arrest Netanyahu if he set foot in the city.

But in a recent video announcement, Mamdani acknowledged that the New York Police Department lacks the authority to do so, though the mayor branded Netanyahu a “war criminal” and said he is “not welcome” in the city, drawing outcry from a series of prominent Jewish leaders.

Netanyahu has repeatedly criticized Mamdani’s rhetoric and vowed to come to New York. On Tuesday, in a Fox News interview, he called the mayor “hate-spewing” and said, “He’s turning them against New York Jews. I mean, what are we in, the 1930s?”

The US is not a member of the ICC, and the Trump administration has flatly rejected the ICC case against Israel and has sanctioned the Hague officials involved. Israel staunchly denies the war crimes allegations.

However, the poll still offers a barometer on how Americans view Netanyahu, whose approval ratings in the US have plummeted in recent years.

Among Democrats, 68% said they backed arresting Netanyahu, compared to 24% of Republicans and 55% of independents who said the same

Furthermore, 47% of Americans think Netanyahu’s behavior has damaged bilateral relations, including 61% of Democrats and 30% of Republicans, according to the poll.

Surveys have repeatedly found that Democrats have become more critical of Israel. Several outspoken anti-Israel candidates have recently won Democratic primaries ahead of the November midterm elections in the US.


'We have special forces protection': Netanyahu tells Hannity he's not afraid of ICC arrest warrants
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday said he is not afraid of landing in a country that would enforce the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants.

“You travel internationally,” Sean Hannity of Fox News asked him in an interview. “God forbid you had a medical emergency, and you need to land, and you’re about to land in a country that recognizes the ICC. It could complicate things. Do you worry about that?”

“Yeah, I think about it,” Netanyahu said. “We have special forces. You know, I served with them for five years... let’s give them a new task.”

“It’s the corruption of the international system,” he added. “It’s an unelected bureaucracy that sits in The Hague that could [not] arrest American soldiers because you don’t recognize this corrupt body any more than we do...

“They could say that the president of the US is a war criminal, that American soldiers valiantly fight next to us, shoulder-to-shoulder against the tyranny in Tehran, that they’re war criminals. They could pick them up.”

One of the best meetings
Regarding his meeting with US President Donald Trump, Netanyahu said: “It was one of the best meetings that we’ve had. We have a common commitment. We don’t want to see this fanatic regime in Tehran have nuclear weapons to threaten every American, and to threaten the peace of the world, and to threaten the existence of Israel.”

When asked by Hannity if he believes there are competing factions within Iran’s leadership, including whether there are “moderates that would like a deal,” Netanyahu said: “Well, I’m skeptical about the deal, and I say it openly. But the only way it would be achieved is if Iran understood these various factions there.”

“I think they’re not ideological factions as much as they differ on the assessment of how tough we are,” he said. “That’s it. You know, those who think that the president is very tough, and they should, you know, they say, ‘Let’s not confront this guy.’”


Trump: US will 'beat the f***ing s***' out of Iran in retaliation for overnight strikes
US President Donald Trump warned that the US will strike Iran “very hard” in retaliation for Iranian strikes on US military assets in the region during a White House press conference on Wednesday.

"We're going to hit them very hard, because now it's our turn to hit them. They know it's coming,” he asserted. “They're asking us not to do it, but you know - they tried to fire last night.”

"They sent five 8,000-mile-an-hour missiles at us," Trump emphasized. "They've already apologized. But you know, we have to smack them a little bit."

When asked about whether he wants further sanctions to be launched against Iran as part of sanctions legislation against Russia, he stated that he would like tariffs to be imposed on Iran. "That's what Lindsey wanted," Trump added, in reference to former US senator Lindsey Graham.

Trump says US will 'beat the f***ing s***' out of Iran
Earlier on Wednesday, Trump made similar statements that the US will “beat the f***ing s***” out of Iran in retaliation for Tehran’s overnight launch of ballistic missiles towards US military bases in the region, in comments reportedly made to Fox News reporter Trey Yingst.

“We’ll be hitting them hard,” Trump continued, according to Yingst.

Trump described Iran’s strikes as a surprise attack, allegedly telling Yingst that US forces had mere minutes to intercept the incoming Iranian missiles.

He also confirmed to Yingst that joint US-Saudi Arabia strikes against Iran-backed Iraqi militias were coordinated with the Iraqi government.

In regard to the status of communication with Iranian leadership after the renewed back-and-forth hostilities, Trump told Yingst that they will allow lines of communication to stay open and “let them keep talking.”

US-Saudi strikes on Iraq killed 20 IRGC operatives, Iranian advisors
Around 20 Iranian technical advisors and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) operatives were killed in the joint US-Saudi strikes on Iraq, according to a Wednesday New York Times report citing an official familiar with the matter.

According to the official, the militias were targeted in an effort to combat the missile and drone launching capabilities of Iran-backed proxies.


US CENTCOM completes strikes on Iran after explosions heard across country's south
US Central Command (CENTCOM) completed "wide, extensive, and impactful" strikes on Iran after explosions were heard in the south of the country on Thursday morning, a US official told The Jerusalem Post.

The scale of the night's bombardment was "about twice the size of the previous," the official added.

Several locations in southern Iran were targeted by US forces, with explosions heard in the cities of Bushehr, Abu Musa, Kish Island, Ahwaz, and Qeshm Island, Iranian state media Press TV reported.

CENTCOM said that US forces "successfully completed a heavy wave of strikes against Iran in response to yesterday's attempted missile attacks on US forces."

"CENTCOM assets struck dozens of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps targets in Iran, including military command centers, missile and drone facilities, coastal surveillance and defense sites, and maritime capabilities.

"The strikes aimed to further diminish threats posed by Iran and its proxies to American forces, commercial shipping, and neighboring Gulf countries." Sites across southern Iran were struck

The Deputy Governor of the Hormozgan province in southern Iran said that the US was attacking areas surrounding Qeshm Island, with Iran's semi-official Tasnim News Agency reporting that three explosions were heard on the island.

A residential area on Qeshm Island was hit by a US missile strike, Tasnim reported.

Tasnim also reported explosions in the city of Kazerun in southern Iran.

A US official told Fox News that the ongoing strikes involve "a very broad target set."

The strikes were carried out in response to "yesterday's attempted Iranian attacks on US forces based in the Middle East," CENTCOM said in a post on X/Twitter.


Drone strikes US-owned tanker in Nile Delta
A drone attack in the Egyptian city of Damietta damaged a U.S.-owned, Marshall Island-flagged floating gas storage tanker on Wednesday, marking a possibly significant escalation in Iranian-backed strikes in the region.

U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that he had briefed on the attack and repeated the threat he made earlier on Wednesday that the United States planned to hit Iran “hard” in response to the latest salvo of Iranian missile and drone strikes against U.S. forces in Jordan.

“It’s our turn to hit them,” Trump said. “They know it’s coming. They’re asking us not to do it.”

Egyptian authorities confirmed that there was a fire at the port and said that they were still investigating its causes without attributing it to a drone attack.

Reuters first reported that the explosion at the port, which caused no casualties, was the result of a drone attack, citing the maritime security firm Ambrey.

If confirmed, the attack would mark the first strike by Iran or its proxies against Egypt since the start of the conflict in February.

Ahmad Sharawi, a senior research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told JNS that Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen most likely carried out the attack, which resembles Iranian attacks on civilian infrastructure elsewhere in the region.


Iran set to receive up to 400 Chinese shoulder-fired air-defense systems within weeks
Iran is expected to receive within weeks a first shipment of up to 400 Chinese-made shoulder-fired air-defense missile launchers, as it rebuilds its defenses amid ongoing fighting with the United States, three sources told Reuters.

The purchase, valued at $60-70 million, is one of Tehran’s largest-known efforts to strengthen its short-range air defenses since the outbreak of its war with the US and Israel in late February, which exposed gaps in Iran’s ability to protect military sites and strategic infrastructure.

This delivery would significantly expand Iran’s inventory of short-range air-defense weapons and suggest deepening military ties with China.

The deal was signed with Zhongqing Baoshang International Investment, a Hong Kong-based company that the sources said was acting as an intermediary between the Iranian side and the Chinese supplier.

Under a plan agreed to by the parties, deliveries will initially be by air from Urumqi in western China, then transiting through Pakistan to Iran, according to the sources, who did not clarify whether the transfers would take place by air or by road.

China’s Foreign Ministry denied the report, calling it “completely groundless” and saying Beijing had consistently worked to promote peace and end the conflict.

Pakistan’s military public relations wing said: “Speculations of Pakistan being involved in the supply of Air Defense weapons to Iran from China are absolutely concocted and false.”


Israeli defense tech companies combine AI detection with autonomous net interception
Axon Vision and ParaZero Technologies have teamed up to build an integrated counter-drone solution aimed at protecting critical infrastructure sites where kinetic interceptions are not an option.

The two Israeli defense-tech companies aim to expand the operational reach of Axon Vision’s recently launched ForceField Counter-UAS system through a new integrated configuration that pairs ForceField’s Edge-AI detection and engagement architecture with ParaZero’s DefendAir autonomous net‑based interceptor.

The two companies have signed a nonbinding Memorandum Of Understanding (MoU) that establishes “the framework for the parties’ intention for continued integration, development and potential commercialization of the combined capability, which shall be subject to the execution of definitive documentation,” read a press release by ParaZero.

The collaboration marks the first formal extension of the ForceField family beyond its initial maneuver-force protection role.

ForceField debuted as an Edge AI-powered counter-UAS system designed to support maneuvering units with an integrated kinetic response. The new configuration shifts the system into non-kinetic interceptions by incorporating ParaZero’s DefendAir, a net-based physical interceptor intended for scenarios where neutralizing a drone without explosive or destructive effects is preferred.

According to press releases by both companies, the combined system is aimed to protect critical infrastructure, airports, energy facilities, homeland security assets, and other sensitive sites that require controlled interception options while maintaining a unified operational workflow.
Hezbollah explosive drone targets IDF vehicle in Southern Lebanon
Hezbollah terrorists launched an explosive drone at an Israel Defense Forces engineering vehicle overnight on Tuesday, in what the IDF described as a “blatant violation” of the ceasefire deal with Beirut.

The suicide drone targeted a military vehicle operating in the Ali al-Taher Ridge area inside the Israeli-controlled security zone in Southern Lebanon, according to an IDF statement.

The IDF said no soldiers were injured in the attack.

“This incident constitutes a blatant violation of the ceasefire agreement in Lebanon by the Hezbollah terrorist organization,” it stated. “IDF soldiers continue to operate in the ridge area and will not allow terrorists in the area to advance or execute attacks against IDF soldiers.”

IDF troops have seized dozens of weapons in Southern Lebanon in recent days as part of ongoing operations against Hezbollah in the security zone, the military said earlier on Wednesday.

Troops seized Kalashnikov rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, explosive devices, ammunition and other military equipment during searches targeting Hezbollah terrorist infrastructure, according to the military.

Separately, the military said soldiers opened fire at a suspect who approached an IDF position in the Ras Bayada area “in a manner that posed a threat to them.”

The troops initially fired warning shots. When the suspect ignored repeated calls to stop, they opened fire to neutralize the threat, the military said. The condition of the suspected terrorist was not immediately known.

The announcement came after the IDF last week confirmed the launch of a “Safe Zone” pilot program in Southern Lebanon that will see Israeli troops redeploy from designated areas.

The U.S. State Department said that the Lebanese military launched its first operations to take over control of villages near the Israeli security zone in Lebanon.


Commentary Podcast: Pardon My Silence
Contributing editor Eli Lake is back to discuss Anthony Fauci invoking his 5th amendment rights in Senate testimony and a revisiting of his tarnished COVID legacy, the aftermath of Netanyahu and Zelensky's Washington meetings and Trump's profane warning to the Iranians after yesterday's strike in Jordan. Plus, Eli's new piece on Laura Loomer, the rise of radical Islamist ideology through left-leaning institutions, and Eli recommends Midnight Run.


Hugh Hewitt: The stakes of the battle with Iran: VDH and Hugh discuss the importance of the outcome of the battle

Hugh Hewitt: Noah joined Hugh to discuss the response to the IRGC expected tonight



Top Saudi official greets Reza Pahlavi at Lindsey Graham’s funeral
Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the powerful head of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and a close associate of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was seen greeting and conversing with Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s former shah, during Tuesday’s funeral service in Washington for the late Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

In video footage first published Tuesday by the Christian Broadcasting Network, the two men shared an embrace and spoke briefly during the service. The interaction marked a rare public exchange between a top Saudi official and one of the most prominent Iranian opposition figures.

Al-Rumayyan holds several key leadership roles across Saudi state interests, including as governor of the Saudi Public Investment fund and chair of oil giant Saudi Aramco, English football club Newcastle United and Riyadh Air.

The meeting also comes against a backdrop of escalating regional hostilities: On Tuesday, the Saudi Arabian armed forces joined U.S. Central Command to conduct joint strikes against Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq in response to drone strikes by the militias targeting U.S. forces and energy infrastructure.

Saudi Arabia and Iran have historically had a tense relationship as competing Sunni and Shiite powers, with both nations vying for regional influence including in Yemen and Syria. Throughout the Iran war, Riyadh has faced repeated targeting by Iranian missiles and drones.

Pahlavi, a vocal opponent of the Tehran regime, has actively advocated for a transition to a democratic government in Iran. Following the onset of the war, Pahlavi asserted that the Iranian people had “called on me to lead the transition after the regime is gone.” In an interview with Reuters this week, Pahlavi claimed that Iran’s current government is “very close” to collapse.
US jury convicts man on terror charges for stabbing that gravely wounded Salman Rushdie
A man was convicted Wednesday of federal terrorism charges in the 2022 stabbing of Salman Rushdie, the author who has faced a decades-old death threat over his novel “The Satanic Verses.”

After just a couple of hours of deliberations, a jury found Hadi Matar guilty of all the charges against him, including engaging in an act of transnational terrorism.

Rushdie, who was about to speak on writers’ safety, was slashed 15 times on an amphitheater stage in 2022. He was gravely wounded and lost the sight in his right eye.

Prosecutors asserted that Matar was motivated by the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ’s 1989 call for Rushdie’s death because of “The Satanic Verses.”

“His brutal attack on Mr. Rushdie during a peaceful speaking event is a chilling reminder of the global reach of Iranian terrorism,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Eisenberg said in a statement after the verdict, adding that “justice has been done.” Iran’s government has denied involvement in the attack.

Matar’s defense: No evidence of his state of mind Messages seeking comment on the verdict were sent to Matar’s attorneys and Rushdie’s assistant. During the trial, defense lawyer Nathaniel Barone said the government had no proof of what was in Matar’s head.

Matar himself declined to testify. Rushdie did, telling jurors: “I can’t say what his ambitions or his aim was, but the wounds were dispersed across my body.”

Matar, 28, is already serving a 25-year New York state prison sentence on an attempted murder conviction in the stabbing. His federal sentencing is set for November 3, when he faces a potential life term.

Rushdie won Britain’s prestigious Booker Prize for his 1981 novel “Midnight’s Children,” about his native India. “The Satanic Verses,” a novel of magical realism about the lives and dreams of two actors who survive a plane explosion, followed in 1988.

It drew critical acclaim in the United Kingdom but engendered protests around the Muslim world over what some believers saw as blasphemous suggestions about Islam’s Prophet Muhammad, particularly in a dream sequence. Over the ensuing years, at least 45 people were killed in riots over the book, a Japanese translator was stabbed to death, and an Italian translator and Norwegian publisher were attacked.


American journalist accuses Syrian chargé d'affaires to US of playing role in her 2016 abduction
Mohammed Qanatri, the chargé d’affaires of Syria to the United States, allegedly took part in the abduction of an American journalist in 2016, the former captive of Jabhat al-Nusra claimed in a video published on X/Twitter on Tuesday.

Lindsey Snell was abducted by the Sunni terrorist group in 2016, when she was reporting from Aleppo. She was able to escape her captors after two weeks, though was later arrested by Turkish authorities for allegedly trying to cross the border illegally, violating a military zone. After two months in Turkish detention, she was deported back to the United States.

Embedded with a faction of the Free Syrian Army, a paramilitary group aimed at overthrowing the Assad regime, Snell was assured that Nusra was aware and accepted her presence in the city where their influence and control were rapidly growing. It was during this time she met Qanatri, a member of Jabhat al-Nusra and a university student, she said.

Qanatri escorted Snell to military sites and hospitals before eventually agreeing to do a masked interview with the reporter, she claimed.

“We are Muslim groups, Muslim people trying to protect people from Assad regime, from Russian militias, to establish an Islamic country in Syria, Islamic state in Syria… an Islamic state is Islamic controlled by Sharia alone,” a masked man alleged to be Qanatri told her in the interview.

A few days after the interview, where Qanatri allegedly praised suicide bombings as “sacrificing” missions, denied that they caused civilian casualties, and claimed groups willing to accept support from Americans were “stupid,” Nusra terrorists dragged Snell out of the home she was staying in and relocated her to an isolated spot in the countryside.

“I saw Mohammed several times in the first days of my captivity. His final words to me were to tell me that the Nusra militants holding me wanted me to move from the sitting room into a jail cell in the basement. My response was not positive, and shortly after, Nusra moved me to a real prison, and then all these years later, I saw that Qanatri was appointed Syria’s diplomat to America,” she said.


James Kirchick: The American Commentator Making Excuses for Iran
Outside Busboys and Poets before Blumenthal’s talk, two young Iranian women held a banner commemorating the demonstrators who had been killed by forces of the Islamic Republic during two days of protests in January. On his way into the store, Blumenthal paused to berate them. “Zionist cuck,” “Sellouts,” and “Persian gusanas,” he shouted at them. (Gusanas is the feminine form of the Spanish word for “worms”—what Fidel Castro called Cubans who fled his dictatorship.)

When Blumenthal entered the venue, he received rapturous applause. Sitting on a stage beneath portraits of the Dalai Lama, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr., he began with a breakdown of “Operation Epstein Fury,” a nod to the claim that President Trump initiated the war against Iran to distract the American people from his connection to the deceased financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. But the actual instigator of the conflict, Blumenthal explained, was Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, America’s “real president,” who’d visited the White House Situation Room in February and taken “the unprecedented step of sitting at the head of the table, moving Donald Trump to the side.” (The most detailed account of the meeting, by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan of The New York Times, placed Netanyahu on a side of the table, opposite Trump.) It was at this meeting, according to Blumenthal, that Israel (“the epicenter of evil in the world”) ordered the United States (“the most perfidious force on the planet”) to attack Iran.

Blumenthal presents himself as a courageous truth teller whose work is too daring for the corporate media. But mainstream outlets abound with criticism of every aspect of the war, including Israel’s role in it. Indeed, outside the precincts of Trump-friendly media, the daily coverage of the conflict has been almost uniformly negative. But there’s a market for a darker and more insidious explanation as to how the world works. Blumenthal delivered just that—a conspiratorial account of Jewish power, American malignity, and the Islamic Republic’s righteousness. When he mentioned mourners at Khamenei’s funeral holding signs declaring KILL TRUMP, a smattering of applause broke out.

Blumenthal then returned to the country that Iranian leaders call “the Little Satan.” “Do we actually believe that the U.S. would be attacking Iran right now if Israel did not have full control over the Trump administration?” Blumenthal asked. He insinuated that Miriam Adelson, a Jewish Republican donor, had bribed the president to attack Iran, and he accused the Jewish state of trying to “weaponize the assassination attempts to manipulate Trump.” Israel would be “indirectly responsible” for an Iranian attempt on Trump’s life, which would be “blowback for the special relationship with Israel.” In other words, anything that happened to the president would be Israel’s fault.

Assessing the real motives and intentions of the regime in Tehran is difficult. Because Iran is a theocratic dictatorship that routinely arrests and in some cases executes journalists, Western reporters hoping to cover the country must either work clandestinely or submit to government supervision. Blumenthal sneered at his mainstream-media colleagues who disclosed in their stories that they were reporting from Iran with the Iranian government’s permission. “So they’re basically trying to say Iran is this authoritarian country that controls their coverage,” he argued. Blumenthal also defended the regime’s monitoring of foreign journalists due to “the long history of U.S. surveillance and spying and sabotaging.” Jason Rezaian, the Washington Post reporter who was convicted on phony espionage charges and jailed for 544 days, might beg to differ with Blumenthal’s analysis.

In defending the Islamic Republic, Blumenthal made one false or misleading assertion after another. He parroted the regime’s claim that 35 million people had participated in Khamenei’s funeral, “possibly the largest gathering in human history.” He said that women make up a greater percentage of the Iranian Parliament than the U.S. Congress. (In reality, only 5 percent of members of the Majlis are women, compared with more than a quarter of Congress.) He described Israel’s apparently unintentional bombing of a Tehran synagogue as a deliberate act; the presence of a captive Jewish community in Iran “discredits Zionism,” by Blumenthal’s account. The exile-staffed news network Iran International, he said without evidence, is “run by Israeli intelligence,” and “there is so much U.S. air power concentrated in Israel right now that Israel will not allow U.S. planes to be at Ben Gurion International.” In reality, the Tel Aviv airport has bent over backwards to accommodate the U.S. Air Force, at one point reducing its civilian flight capacity to about a third of normal.


‘Public Executions Are Extremely Rare’ in Iran, the New York Times Claims, Inaccurately
The Associated Press says "Public executions are not uncommon in Iran." The watchdog group Iran Human Rights counted 459 such executions between 2008 and 2025, frequently featuring large audiences, including children. United Against Nuclear Iran reports that Iran "regularly carries out executions in public. In many of these cases, the victim is publicly hanged from a construction crane, an especially slow and painful execution method." And that doesn't even mention the extrajudicial killings of pro-democracy protesters. President Trump has said between 30,000 and 52,000 of them were murdered this year by the Iranian regime, many shot in the forehead.

So how did the New York Times spin its own news article on two recent executions? With the absurd, false claim that "Iran has long been one of the world's most frequent users of capital punishment, but public executions are extremely rare."

The article appeared under a joint byline. Leily Nikounazar is, according to her LinkedIn profile, a 2010 graduate of "Tehran's Faculty of News." Sanjana Varghese's New York Times bio says she has freelanced for Al Jazeera, the Qatar-owned outlet that has harbored Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists. Her main job before the New York Times was at Airwars, which is funded by anti-Israel nonprofits including George Soros's Open Society Foundations and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Neither Nikounazar nor Varghese, who lives in London but "grew up between Canada and Bahrain," immediately returned my queries about whether they planned a correction.

Adverbs are frequently trouble in news articles. The Times might have gotten away with calling public executions unusual or rare. But "extremely rare" pushes the envelope in a way that makes the Times' extremely slanted coverage extremely obvious.





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