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Saturday, August 15, 2026

08/15 Links: Moderates vs. Hard-Liners; Jon Ossoff broke faith with Israel - and lost his Jewish supporters in Georgia; Man arrested for assault after disrupting NYC synagogue service

From Ian:

Moderates vs. Hard-Liners
Right from the beginning of Operation Epic Fury, after it had killed Khamenei, the Trump administration was already laying out scenarios for how to deal with the regime, including a so-called Venezuela option, which meant dealing with an IRGC regime minus those who have been eliminated. Early on, IRGC veteran and Parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf was floated as the Iranian version of Venezuela’s Delcy Rodriguez: the regime insider who would cut a deal with the Americans in exchange for regime continuity. Soon the administration began negotiating with the Iranians, led by Ghalibaf, and it immediately settled into its version of the “moderates vs. hard-liners” classification as it pursued talks over the next four months.

Echoing Obama’s aforementioned use of the Rouhani election as cover, Trump labeled the Iranians with whom he was talking as “new” and “reasonable,” contrasting them with a previous tier that was eliminated in strikes. Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed this assessment in late March but refrained from disclosing the identities of the Iranian negotiators “because it probably would get them in trouble with some other groups of people inside of Iran,” suggesting an internal struggle with a more radical “hard-liner” faction. Although, Rubio added, it wasn’t clear which of the two factions was the one running the show. “At the end of the day, we have to see if these people”—that is, the “reasonable” moderates—“end up being the ones in charge, seeing if they’re the ones that have the power to deliver.”

Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, struck a more optimistic tone, including about the so-called hard-liners, claiming a breakthrough that had supposedly eluded every previous American administration for 47 years. In June, he told CNN that “the coolest thing about the progress we’ve made of the last few weeks is that you see people within the Iranian system—senior leadership, even IRGC officials—say, ‘You know what, we may have some animosity, we may have some mistrust, but we recognize the way that we’ve done business with the United States for 47 years is a mistake; let’s try something else.’ We’re gonna verify that, of course, but we’re certainly willing to try something else if they comply.”

Of course, none of that was real. The regime’s behavior did not change, and talks broke down. So, in July, Vance pivoted from his assessment of the new and cool IRGC and reverted to a variant of the “hard-liners” as spoilers. Only in Vance’s telling, the hard-liners were going through growing pains in their evergreen struggle with the “pragmatists.” In an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, Vance offered his theory for why the deal he negotiated had unraveled: Iranian hard-liners, alarmed at how much leverage they had surrendered once the Strait of Hormuz reopened and oil began flowing again, panicked and started shooting at ships. “There was this kind of freak-out in their system. So they shot at a couple of ships,” Vance offered. “The hard-liners have really, really reacted strongly to all the oil that’s coming out of the Strait of Hormuz. … Now the pragmatists in their system are saying this was a mistake. Let’s keep on talking.”

Trump and Vance had now introduced a variant of Obama’s innovation with the “moderates vs. hard-liners,” projecting that dichotomy onto the IRGC/hard-liners themselves. In a June 12 briefing, for example, a senior administration official—likely Vance himself—offered the following assessment: “The Iranian hard-liners, some of them want to kill the deal, but I think most of them actually want the deal.”

But since nothing in Iran’s behavior had changed, with the regime continuously attacking U.S. bases, regional allies, and targeting international shipping while ignoring Trump’s threats and occasional retaliatory strikes, the U.S. president has oscillated between contradictory characterizations of the Iranians. The people he had earlier described as reasonable became lunatics and sick scum. But, now fully invested in his deal with them, Trump also leaned on one of the established functions of the “moderates vs. hard-liners” device, attributing bad behavior to the “hard-liners” and thereby justifying continued talks with the imaginary “moderates.” After a thwarted missile strike against U.S. positions in Jordan in late July, Trump attributed the action not to the reasonable, moderate pragmatists, but rather to those pesky radical hard-liners. “It was a different group than we’re dealing with,” he insisted. “They’ve already apologized.”

Similarly, and using essentially the same language as the Obama administration more than a decade ago, Vance told Fox News in early August that the Iranians “have a fractured system. So there are people within their system who want the war to be over. There are also people in their system who are crazy radicals who want the war to continue.”

In other words, as things stand, Trump has adopted entirely the framework, categories, and rhetorical devices of his predecessors, whom he had described as losers who didn’t know how to deal with the mendacious Iranian regime. And he has done so for the same reason: to justify continued talks with, and concessions to, the hard men of the IRGC.

What’s more, the administration—specifically Vance—has adopted Obama’s other malignant innovation: blaming Israel and accusing domestic critics of being warmongering agents of influence on its behalf. As the vice president told Rogan last month, he knew “beyond a shadow of a doubt” that the Israeli government was trying to keep the war with Iran going indefinitely and that it was Israeli interference that sabotaged the cease-fire he and special envoy Steve Witkoff had negotiated. Moreover, Vance added, “certain elements within the Israeli government” had funded a campaign “to try to derail the negotiation and try to derail the deal.”

Further echoing Obama’s language, in a June 15 briefing, a senior U.S. official—again, likely Vance himself—employed, verbatim, Obama’s characterization of domestic critics as a mirror of Iran’s hard-liners. “What you’re seeing now is hard-liners on both sides. In the Iranian system, they’re protesting [against the deal]. And we have certain people in the American system who say there’s no deal you could ever do with Iran ever, who are obviously making a lot of noise.”

After five decades of dealing with the regime, to observe that the theory of an Iranian moderate faction opposed to the hard-line security establishment misreads the nature of the regime is to state the obvious. The fact is, going back at the very least to Obama—that is, two of those five decades—the U.S. government has perfectly understood what the Islamic Republic is.

Israeli officials have argued publicly and consistently, since well before the JCPOA was signed, that a deal with the regime is futile not because they are uniquely hostile to diplomacy, but because they, too, have spent decades watching the IRGC’s behavior up close. But the Israelis, and American critics, are also missing the point. The function of the “moderate vs. hard-liners” instrument is not epistemological, a faulty understanding of the nature of the regime. The Americans know well what that regime is. Donald Trump certainly has known it since the 1980s. Rather, “moderates vs. hard-liners” has long ceased to be a genuine misreading of a nascent regime and is now firmly established as a rhetorical device the function of which is to justify an accommodation with the IRGC and paint domestic critics as treasonous warmongers working on behalf of the Jewish state.
Jake Wallis Simons: Israel isn’t an enemy of Christianity. It’s a sinister distortion to suggest otherwise
Don’t take my word for it; consider a remark by Abdul Azim Wadi, the mayor of Qusra, a Palestinian village between Ramallah and Nablus, where Jewish “terrorists”, as American ambassador Mike Huckabee has called them, have been laying siege to an Arab family for days.

Speaking to the Telegraph last week as troops struggled to tame the fanatics, Mayor Wadi said: “There are good soldiers sometimes, and there are bad ones.”

There you have it. To you or me, this might seem obvious; to those in the West who have appropriated Palestine as a personal totem, however, there can be no such thing as a “good” Israeli soldier on the grounds of ideology.

“Death, death to the IDF.” Remember that? Try suggesting to Western progressives that some Israeli troops are “good”. The Nazi-grade radicalism, which broke into the mainstream when the deplorable rapper Bob Vylan led the chant at Glastonbury last summer, goes way beyond the venom even of many Palestinians who live cheek-by-jowl with Israelis.

According to one poll, 50 per cent of Britons (and 67 per cent of Labour voters) now believe the lie that Israel committed “genocide” in Gaza. And what about British Christians? Perhaps the most substantial polling of that group comes from December 2024. It found that 47 per cent of believers had already swallowed the “genocide” libel.

Dig into the study and it gets worse. A quarter of believers said it was “probably true” that Jews “don’t care what happens to anyone but their own kind”; a third thought Jews talk “too much about” the Holocaust; and one-in-six claimed that Jews were “responsible for most of the world’s wars”. This is anti-Semitism and it creates fertile soil for propaganda.

I mention the Church because, judging by the responses to a story last week about the Israeli military “surrounding” a Christian town on the West Bank, many readers were imagining a Jewish version of the Siege of Constantinople, with artillery fire and waves of troops mounting an assault against the valiant soldiers of Christ.

But listen to Father Bashar Fawadleh, the priest at Christ the Redeemer Church in Taybeh, northeast of Ramallah: “A closed military zone for non-resident Israelis may be a positive step.” Turns out the army was trying to protect the Palestinians, not rout them.


‘Another chilling reminder': Man arrested for assault after disrupting NYC synagogue service
A 46-year-old man was arrested on Friday night for allegedly assaulting a Jewish worshipper and a security member at Central Synagogue, a reform congregation in Manhattan, New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said in a statement.

Named Larry Montes, the suspect was charged with two counts of assault as a hate crime and one count of criminal mischief as a hate crime, among other charges, Tisch wrote on X.

“As synagogue security was escorting him [Montes] out, he struck a member of the congregation, damaged synagogue property, and then spit at and headbutted a member of the security team,” the commissioner relayed.

The injured were treated at the scene and no one was seriously hurt, she said, adding that an investigation into the incident is ongoing.

“I understand the sanctity of this space and its meaning for congregants,” Tisch continued. “Central Synagogue is where I grew up. In joy and in sorrow, it has always been a place of comfort and peace. What happened there tonight is deeply painful. A place of worship should never be a crime scene.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul described the attack as “appalling,” adding that Jews in her state have “every right to worship openly, proudly, and without fear.”

Israeli ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon, in a Hebrew-language post, said the assault is “another chilling reminder” that antisemitism is not a phenomenon of the past but is happening “here and now, in the heart of New York.”

He moreover accused the anti-Israel mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, of spreading hatred that results in these types of incidents.

Mamdani, meanwhile, tweeted he was “horrified” by the assault.

“I can only imagine the pain and fear an attack like this, during Shabbat services, causes for the congregation and for Jewish New Yorkers across our city,” he said.

He added that every New Yorker must be able to observe his or her religion “without fear of violence.”

Mamdani has called Israel an apartheid state that is committing genocide in Gaza—allegations disputed by the U.S., Israel and its allies. During last year’s mayoral campaign, Mamdani repeated and defended the slogan “Globalize the intifada,” before saying he would discourage it following a backlash.

Last month, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar blamed Mamdani for “creating the climate in which Jews are targeted” following the stabbing of two people, including one Jewish man, by an assailant who reportedly shouted “Allahu akbar.”

“Appalled but sadly not surprised,” Sa’ar wrote on X. “This violence did not happen in a vacuum. Months of incitement against the Jewish state from Mamdani have helped create a climate in which Jews are targeted.”


French man allegedly pulls knife on Israeli tourist in Australia, denied bail by Cairns court
A French man suspected of pulling a 20-centimeter knife on an Israeli man in Cairns, Australia, on Thursday was denied bail by the Cairns Magistrates Court, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported on Friday.

ABC noted that the incident included verbal anti-Israel remarks, with the suspect to remain in custody by order of Magistrate Tom Braes pending his next court date on September 11.

Leo Raymund Cotene was charged with common assault with serious vilification or hate crime circumstances of aggravation following the incident, which allegedly occured at around 5 p.m. at Sheridan Street's Mad Monkey Backpackers hostel, according to ABC.

ABC cited bail police prosecutor Olivier Claes, who opposed granting Cotene bail due to "the risk of further offending and endangering other members of the public, particularly those of Israeli origin or those of Jewish faith."

Claes added that the "deliberateness" of Cotene's alleged crime would likely result in a prison sentence.
IDF strikes Hezbollah command center after attack seriously wounds three soldiers in s. Lebanon
The IDF struck a Hezbollah headquarters in the Ansar area in southern Lebanon overnight Friday, after terrorists seriously wounded three IDF soldiers in an attack near the Ali al-Taher Ridge.

Israeli forces conducted additional strikes at the ridge in the early hours of Sunday morning, according to according to Israeli media citing local reports.

The Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement, “This morning, Hezbollah violated the ceasefire in Lebanon by attacking our soldiers in the security zone, which protects Israeli communities just across the border. The Hezbollah attack seriously injured three of our soldiers. The IDF responded by striking the Hezbollah terror headquarters that ordered the attack.”

The IDF later said that the three soldiers were wounded by an explosive drone launched by Hezbollah. They were evacuated to receive medical treatment at a hospital, and their families were notified.

Additionally, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit and the PMO said in separate statements that civilians were also unintentionally killed in the strike.

The IDF said that its strike killed several Hezbollah terrorists – including Ali Samir Al-Haj Hassan, a battalion commander in Hezbollah’s Radwan Force unit. However, the military noted that, at the time of the strike, Hassan’s family was with him inside the headquarters.


Israeli strikes reported in south Lebanon after Galilee residents warned to expect blasts
Lebanese media reports Israeli airstrikes in the Ali Taher Ridge in southern Lebanon, where three soldiers were seriously wounded by an explosive drone launched by Hezbollah last night.

The reported strikes come hours after residents of the Upper Galilee were notified by local authorities that explosions are expected to be heard due to IDF activity in Lebanon overnight.


IDF: Tank in Gaza hit by explosive device in ‘grave’ truce breach; no soldiers hurt
An IDF tank was struck by a Hamas explosive device in the southern Gaza Strip, the military said on Saturday, decrying the incident as a violation of the ceasefire in the enclave.

The Israel Defense Forces said the incident took place during operations of the Givati Brigade near the “Yellow Line,” with no injuries caused.

In a separate incident, soldiers of the Paratroopers Brigade spotted two terror operatives who crossed the Yellow Line “in an attempt to sabotage weapons belonging to IDF troops,” the military said.

The IDF said the pair approached troops “in a manner that posed a threat,” and the soldiers opened fire and killed the operatives.

The IDF said both incidents are a “violation of the ceasefire,” and it views them “gravely,” indicating that the military intends to respond.

Amid efforts to advance a US-backed plan to disarm Hamas in the Strip, Israel quietly halted airstrikes in Gaza for a week before resuming them on Wednesday. Palestinians walk past tents and destroyed buildings near the beachfront in Gaza City on August 14, 2026. (Eyad Baba/AFP)

The strikes then multiplied on Thursday, with Israel said to have killed a Hamas company commander in a strike on southern Gaza’s Khan Younis and a senior Hamas police officer in a Gaza City strike. Hamas chief Hayya set to travel to Cairo, will meet Egyptian spymaster

Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya was set to travel to Cairo on Saturday evening for talks with Egyptian officials, a Hamas source told AFP, ahead of a visit by US President Donald Trump’s envoy Jared Kushner to the region.

Hayya, who will be visiting Egypt for the first time since assuming leadership of Hamas in late July, is due to meet with Egypt’s intelligence chief Hassan Rashad on Sunday morning, the source said.

Kushner will visit Israel and Egypt next week in hopes of bridging gaps on the Gaza plan, which was rejected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and will be accompanied by Nickolay Mladenov, the high representative for Gaza of Trump’s so-called Board of Peace tasked with implementing the deal.

The trip comes after Netanyahu publicly dismissed the 15-point plan announced by Mladenov. The terror group has avoided the use of the term “disarmament,” saying instead that it agrees to hand over weapons to be stored under the NCAG.

A Board of Peace official said Kushner and Mladenov hoped for “constructive conversations” on advancing Trump’s overall peace plan, which began with the October 2025 declaration of a ceasefire that has reduced but not ended Israeli strikes in Gaza.


Iran calls on Qatar to free three pilots it says were downed, captured in war
Iranian authorities on Saturday called for the release of three pilots they said were captured in Qatar amid the US-Israel war with Iran.

“Three Iranian pilots were captured alive by Qatari forces after their Su-24 fighter jets crashed during the war,” said General Mohammad Bagherzadeh of the Iranian armed forces, Fars news agency reported.

“Javad Salehi, Abdolmajid Dashtian, and Omran Behraveshian have been held by Qatari forces for six months,” he said in a letter addressed to the International Committee of the Red Cross.

In the letter, Bagherzadeh called for their release, saying the pilots had not been allowed to meet or contact their families.

Last month, Iran’s army said it had retrieved the body of Iranian pilot Majid Kazemi, who was killed during an attack on Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar in early March.

Iran had previously said the other pilots were missing but news of their alleged capture was not publicized at the time. Saturday’s announcement marked the first time in the war that Iran said a regional country was holding its fighters.

Qatar, however, denied that it was holding Iranian pilots, who it said violated Qatari airspace earlier this year and had failed to respond to attempts to contact them. A Qatari foreign ministry spokesperson said on X that search and rescue teams later found the remains of one of the pilots and that it had contacted Iran to coordinate a handover.

The spokesperson said Tehran had yet to respond to an invitation to review details of its operations.


Jon Ossoff broke faith with Israel - and lost his Jewish supporters in Georgia
Senator Jon Ossoff is easy to admire. He is handsome, articulate, disciplined, and telegenic – the kind of politician who makes supporters feel they are backing not just a candidate but a future.

I understood that initial, superficial appeal. For a long time, many of us shared it. Not anymore.

In November 2024, 13 months after October 7, the worst mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust, with Israel fighting on seven fronts at once – Ossoff joined Bernie Sanders and a handful of others to block some of the weapons Israel needed to defend itself, backing two of three resolutions to halt the transfer of military equipment.

He said he wanted to send a “message to Israeli politicians.”

But instead, he sent a message to his Jewish constituents: at the hour of maximum threat to the Jewish homeland, it was more important to “virtue signal” to the far-left than to ensure the defense of the only Jewish state on earth.

Then, hypocritically and ironically, he posed with freed Israeli hostages, smoothing over the fact he had voted to deny Israel the arms its soldiers needed to fight the very captors who took them.

His own community was loud and clear in their response – not once, but twice. Nearly 50 Georgia Jewish organizations, representing the vast majority of its engaged members, signed a formal rebuke; 22 rabbis added their own.

On the Senate floor, Ossoff called his commitment to Israel’s security “ironclad.” His community wrote back with the truth: it was not ironclad. It had rusted through.

And this week, the publisher of the Atlanta Jewish Times – who has spent years avoiding partisan fights – accused the senator, in an open letter reported by Jewish Insider, of “lying” about his support for Israel.

Criticizing this Israeli government is legitimate; Israelis do it every day, loudly. But there is a difference between criticizing a government and disarming a nation.

You do not take the shield away from 10 million people because you are angry at the man holding it.

So I would ask the senator plainly: On seven fronts – Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, and the rest – how, exactly, would you have protected a child in Sderot? With a statement of concern? With a vote to cut off the weapons?

This is not partisan noise. Esther Panitch, the only Jewish member of the Georgia legislature and a Democrat, wrote at the time that she “cannot overstate how upset Georgia’s Jewish community – especially Democrats – is with our senators.”


London man sentenced to 6.5 years for stabbing Jewish building superintendent in antisemitic attack
A London man was sentenced to six-and-a-half years in prison on Friday for stabbing a Jewish building superintendent in an antisemitic attack in July 2025, after Britain's Crown Prosecution Service insisted that the assault be treated as a hate crime.

The incident occurred on July 31, 2025, at an apartment building in a London suburb, but details were made public for the first time following the sentencing.

According to the indictment on which the resident was convicted, another tenant accused 51-year-old Alfonso Pena of stealing food she had kept in the communal kitchen. The building superintendent confronted Pena with security camera footage showing him taking and eating the food.

In response, Pena, who was heavily intoxicated, threatened the superintendent, asked him where he was from, and accused him of being a "Jewish terrorist" before fleeing the scene while shouting further abuse.

Pena later returned and stabbed the superintendent in the back, between his shoulder blades.

Following his arrest, Pena also threatened police officers and tried to bite one of them.

At his trial, Pena admitted to assault, possessing the knife and wounding the victim, but denied that he had intended to cause the injury. His defense attorney argued that he had suffered a psychiatric episode at the time of the attack.

Jury accepts prosecution's case, Pena charged with wounding with intent
The Crown Prosecution Service did not accept the qualified admission and took the case to trial to establish intent. After hearing all the evidence, including psychiatric assessments, the jury accepted the prosecution's case and convicted Pena of wounding with intent.

On Friday, Pena was sentenced at Croydon Crown Court to a total of six years and six months in prison.

Sophie Marja-Mattila, a senior prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service in south London, said: "Alfonso Pena launched a violent and terrifying attack, having immediately beforehand demonstrated antisemitic hatred towards the victim. Such deliberate violence is disgusting and has no place in our communities, and fortunately the victim was not more seriously injured.

"Following an application by prosecutors, the court recognized that the hostility towards the victim's religion was an aggravating factor, and this was reflected in the increased sentence handed down today. I hope the increased sentence sends a clear message that such hatred will not be tolerated, and that those who carry out hate-motivated attacks will be held accountable.


Crystal Palace signs Anan Khalaili in most expensive deal for an Israeli soccer player
Crystal Palace announced the signing of Anan Khalaili from Belgian club Royale Union Saint-Gilloise on Saturday, weeks after the Israel winger’s proposed move to Inter Milan broke down.

The 21-year-old Khalaili, who primarily plays on the right, signed a five-year deal “subject to international clearance,” the Premier League team said on its website. British media reported the transfer fee was 24.5 million euros ($28 million), making him the most expensive Israeli signing.

“I’m happy to be here, I’m excited, and I can’t wait to start,” said Khalaili.

“I’ve followed the Premier League –- it’s a new challenge for me –- and I’ve followed Crystal Palace for a long time. I’m happy to be here.”

“We are very excited to have completed this signing and we are delighted that Anan has chosen to continue his journey with Crystal Palace,” said Palace chairman Steve Parrish.

The transfer comes a month after Inter president Giuseppe Marotta said at a press conference that Khalaili had not been given medical clearance to join after the sides had agreed on a transfer. Marotta said: “Italy has very strict legislation protecting players’ health, with decisions made by an independent body rather than the club’s medical staff. We have to abide by this decision.”

Inter’s loss is seemingly Palace’s gain.

Khalaili developed at hometown club Maccabi Haifa before moving to Union Saint-Gilloise in Belgum in 2024.

Khalaili has made 16 appearances for Israel. He is the fifth summer signing for Palace after ร“scar Mingueza, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Dwight McNeil and Evann Guessand.





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Reclaiming the Covenant on America's 250th (May 2026)

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    

 

 

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