Tuesday, September 01, 2026

08/31 Links Pt1: Durban’s legacy: How NGOs helped mainstream anti-Israel hatred; Protesters mark 2 years since recovery of 6 slain Gaza hostages; Egypt's Dangerous Palestinian 'Unity' Project to Legitimize Terrorists

From Ian:

Brett McGurk: No, Iran is not winning: In Act IV of the war, it’s losing its leverage in Hormuz
Tehran may seek to fight its way out of this noose. Its strategy through the first three acts was clear: threaten commerce in the Strait, raise energy prices globally and gasoline prices in the US, increase global economic pressure and ultimately force Trump to back down, particularly with midterm elections approaching.

Iran has also targeted the energy infrastructure of the Gulf states and could do so again. Its proxy force in Yemen, the Houthis, have threatened to shut down commerce through the Red Sea with Iranian missiles and drones.

All that would mean resorting to the same tactics from the early acts of the war. Strategically, it has not worked for Iran. The Gulf states are not happy with the war, but most do not support giving in to Iran’s extortionist demands in the Strait. Iran’s attempts to close the Strait with drones and mines are also now — for the first time — failing.

So, I would not discount the risk of an Iranian escalation as the economic pressure builds. But it may not be enough at this stage to reduce that pressure. Trump appears far more committed than Iranian leaders apparently presumed.

Breaking point
Iranian leaders and many Western analysts project immunity to pressure. Iran will never surrender its nuclear program or the Strait of Hormuz. Or its terrorist proxies around the region.

That’s something we all must accept as a fact of life in the Middle East, according to Tehran.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi argued last week that the blockade and sanctions pressure are “bound to fail” just as all other campaigns, he said, had failed to change Iranian policy.

I used to hear the same thing from experts about ISIS, when I was leading the campaign to defeat the group. And Hamas, when negotiating to free the hostages held in Gaza.

In fact, everyone has a breaking point. Iran thought it had found Trump’s. Trump may yet find theirs. It’s too early to call.

Not the last act
This contest in some form may last through the end of Trump’s presidency and beyond. It’s been ongoing for nearly five decades.

The earlier acts in this war were mired from the US side by shifting and ill-defined objectives, widely careening positions, and inconsistent statements.

But Act Four seems different. The US military has a clear objective as outlined this week by the commander of CENTCOM, Admiral Brad Cooper. It is enforcing the blockade on Iran and facilitating the movement of commercial traffic.

The objective for the US should be similarly well-defined. Iran must abandon claims on the Strait and give up the nuclear enrichment program. Until then, this will be the new status quo.

And that status quo — perhaps for the first time since the war began — now favors Washington, not Tehran.
No Exit, No Trap By Abe Greenwald
Via Commentary Newsletter, sign up here.
When the regime decided to hold up shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, however, the “trap” claim took off. Trump, went the argument, could neither free the strait nor leave it in Iran’s grip. He had been checkmated.

It was around this time that I began to worry, as it became clear that the administration had not gamed out this possibility before the war. And Trump had made it well known that he despised the idea of deploying American ground forces. Even with the strait threatened by Iran, the U.S. could prevail so long as the commander in chief chose to take the steps that were needed to do so.

Soon, instead, Trump decided on negotiations to end the fighting. And that’s when he really did stumble into a trap—because he’d decided that he wanted out. Trump wanted to escape the consequences of the aborted war and his responsibility to win it—and he let the Iranians know.

That was all it took. Through months of off-and-on talks, Iranian negotiators would keep the U.S. trapped by refusing to grant any American conditions that might let Trump walk away from what had become a terrible mess. So long as the U.S. was looking for an exit, we’d remain paralyzed.

If the tide now seems to be turning in the U.S.’s favor, it’s because we started looking for solutions. Currently, the U.S. naval blockade of Iran is in effect to freeze the regime’s maritime and energy exports. At the same time, we’re now only one week into Operation Economic Outcast, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s campaign to “sever every economic lifeline” that the regime has—and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has admitted that it’s already working.

The start-and-stop war has been going on for six months, and the U.S. has stumbled in a number of unforeseen ways. It still can. But there’s one critical mistake that Trump should now know to avoid: prioritizing an American exit over an American victory. In order for the U.S. to prevail, we must keep up the current economic war on the regime. This means enduring the inevitable rise in oil prices and the concerted media campaign focusing on the increased hardships imposed on ordinary Iranians. Both have already begun, but neither of these are traps unless Donald Trump decides they are.
Khaled Abu Toameh: Egypt's Dangerous Palestinian 'Unity' Project to Legitimize Terrorists
The real question, however, is: Unity with whom, and against whom?

Why is Hamas being treated as a legitimate political organization rather than a terrorist group that needs to be disarmed, dismantled, and removed from power?

Egypt, a key ally of the United States, should be asking these questions. Instead, Cairo appears to be doing exactly the opposite.

The Trump Administration and the Board of Peace might make clear to Cairo that Hamas cannot be both a terrorist organization that needs to surrender its weapons and a political partner invited to negotiate the future of the Palestinians. One approach eliminates Hamas. The other rehabilitates it.

Even more alarming are reports of a possible electoral alliance involving former Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan's Democratic Reform Current, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and other factions such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – all terrorist groups that do not recognize Israel's right to exist.

What possible role should these terrorist organizations have in Palestinian elections or a future Palestinian government?

If Egypt welcomes the designation of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, why is it simultaneously trying to give Hamas – which emerged from the same organization – renewed political legitimacy?

The Trump Administration would do itself a great service to tell Cairo that Palestinian reconciliation cannot include organizations that retain weapons, embrace terrorism, and seek the destruction of Israel. There is no need to unify the Palestinian ranks around Hamas. There is a need immediately to remove Hamas from those ranks.

Egypt should be using its considerable influence not to persuade Fatah to reconcile with Hamas, but to pressure Hamas and other terrorist groups to surrender their weapons and permanently leave the Palestinian political arena. A politically rehabilitated Hamas, still armed and still committed to its Islamist ideology, will only strengthen the very ideological current that the Egyptian government has spent more than a decade trying to suppress.


Greece inks record $3.5 billion deal to buy comprehensive missile defense system from Israel
Israel and Greece on Monday signed a massive €3 billion ($3.5 billion) deal, under which Israel will build Greece a multi-tiered air defense array, as the countries continue to shore up their defense cooperation.

The “Achilles Shield” agreement will see Israel export several systems, including David’s Sling and SPYDER, manufactured by Rafael, and BARAK MX, manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries, according to the Israeli Defense Ministry.

The ministry said it is the “largest defense export deal in the history of Israel-Greece relations, and one of the largest in the history of the State of Israel.”

It also marked the first time that Israel will supply another country with a “complete defense array against a wide range of threats,” including ballistic missiles and drones.

Multiple other countries, including the United States and Ukraine, have expressed a desire to emulate Israel’s missile defense systems, including Iron Dome, following their frequent use in the country’s multifront war.

With strong economic and diplomatic ties, Greece and Israel operate an air training center on Greek territory, hold annual joint military drills and cooperate on anti-drone systems and cybersecurity. Last year, Athens bought 36 Israeli-made rocket artillery systems for about $739 million.

The deal also comes amid growing tensions between Israel and Turkey over Ankara’s push to expand its influence in Syria. Turkey is Greece’s traditional foe and the weapons systems would largely be expected to help Athens defend against its neighbor.

The deal was signed on Monday at the ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv by Defense Ministry Director General Amir Baram and his Greek counterpart, Ioannis Bouras.

“Under the deal, Israel will build Greece a comprehensive, multi-layered air defense array, drawing entirely on Israeli-made systems and on the extensive operational experience Israel’s defense establishment has gained during the war,” the ministry said.

The statement said that a supplementary deal, valued at €26 million, was also signed today for the sale of Rafael’s Drone Dome systems.

Additionally, the ministry said Israel will “expand industrial defense cooperation with Greece, including the transfer of knowledge and technology to the local industry.”

“This project marks another milestone in defense cooperation between Israel and Greece, a key strategic partner in the Eastern Mediterranean. Greece’s choice of Israeli technology as the backbone of its most ambitious air defense buildup program in the past decade reflects the depth of trust built between the two countries,” the statement added.

Defense Minister Israel Katz said the decision to deepen defense cooperation was made on his last visit to Greece.

“Israel and Greece share common strategic interests and face shared regional challenges. At a time when actors with hegemonic ambitions are seeking to expand their influence and undermine stability in the region, Israel and Greece will continue to deepen their defense and strategic cooperation, and will act with determination to preserve stability and safeguard their security and shared interests,” Katz said in apparent reference to Turkey.


Gerald Steinberg: Durban’s legacy: How NGOs helped mainstream anti-Israel hatred
Twenty-five years ago, the UN held an event that previewed today’s Israel-obsessed Jew hatred. From August 31 to September 8, 2001, the global body ran a massive “World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia, and Related Intolerance” in Durban, South Africa.

Officially aimed at celebrating the apartheid regime’s end and charting a path to a better world, the summit was hijacked into a platform for anti-Western, anti-Zionist, and antisemitic demonization – creating the foundation for the rampant hate directed nowadays at the Jewish people and the Jewish state.

Tom Lantos, a Holocaust survivor and member of the US delegation to Durban, summed it up best: “Having experienced the horrors of the Holocaust firsthand, this was the most sickening and unabashed display of hate for Jews I have seen since the Nazi period.”

This UN conference, convened by Human Rights Commissioner (and former president of Ireland) Mary Robinson, included cartoons of hook-nosed Jews with “pots of money surrounding their victims” on handouts distributed by the Arab Lawyers Union.

Copies of the infamous forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion were prominently displayed. Marchers wearing T-shirts with Nazi swastikas and blue stars threatened and intimidated Jewish participants. This travesty took place while Israelis were being slaughtered in Palestinian bombings (erroneously labeled “the Second Intifada”), including the Sbarro pizzeria attack in central Jerusalem (August 9, 2001 – 16 murdered and over 130 wounded) and in Haifa (August 12, 2001 – dozens wounded). The victims were entirely invisible in Durban.

Months before the opening, the takeover of this “anti-racism” conference was carefully planned by UN officials, Iran, the 55-member Organization for Islamic Cooperation, and anti-Western NGOs (non-governmental organizations) such as Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International.

In a series of preparatory meetings, including one in Tehran, these players orchestrated the hijacking of the ostensible “anti-racism” conference – the events in Durban were carefully rehearsed. (Prior to the Tehran meeting, UN officials, including Robinson, assured members of accredited Jewish NGOs that Iran had agreed to provide visas to allow their participation – one of many fictions during this process).

The main venue for attacking Israel was the conference’s NGO Forum, where 1500 organizations came together in the city’s central football stadium to hurl accusations of war crimes, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and genocide at Israel. This forum revived the UN’s infamous “Zionism is racism” resolution – adopted in 1975 after a campaign by the USSR and the Arab League and repealed in 1991 as the Soviet Union crumbled.

The NGO industry that claimed to promote universal human rights then picked up the antisemitic and anti-Zionist agendas, which were on full display at Durban’s NGO Forum. The leaders (especially Human Rights Watch) deplatformed delegates from Jewish organizations such as the International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists. The objective, as clearly stated in the Declaration and Plan of Action (DPOA), was to target Israel uniquely, including launching boycotts and sanctions to prevent it from defending itself.

Following Durban, the same NGOs used the DPOA template for continuous campaigns demonizing Israel with the same chorus of false accusations and claims. In March 2002, the NGOs and the UN were primary sources of the blatant lie accusing the IDF of a massacre in Jenin, as Israel responded to the Palestinian mass bombings. Amnesty International, HRW and other groups launched bogus “research reports” and pseudo-legal analyses. Many were copied by mainstream media platforms, parroted in UN documents, and quoted by politicians and academics.

This cycle was repeated and expanded over the next two decades, including in the Second Lebanon War (2006) and the notorious Goldstone Report on the first Gaza war (Operation Cast Lead) – which Richard Goldstone himself acknowledged was filled with false claims.

This process culminated in the full-scale explosion of anti-Israel hate launched immediately after the first reports were posted on the Hamas massacres of October 7, 2023 – again led by the NGOs.
The Durban Conference 25 years later: A blueprint for anti-Israel demonization
“Durban was the restarting of the Zionism is Racism campaign. It was the blueprint for accusing Israel of genocide and starvation and war crimes,” Gerald Steinberg, founder and president of NGO Monitor, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.

Monday marks 25 years since the “Durban” Conference, officially the UN World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, held in South Africa from August 31 to September 8, 2001.

Over 12,000 representatives came together to forge a common strategy against discrimination.

However, ironically, the conference has become synonymous with discrimination of the anti-Zionist kind, and is considered by many the birthplace of modern anti-Israel rhetoric.

Preceding the conference was the NGO Forum, which had over 7,000 participants gather to create a pre-planned and coordinated anti-Israel strategy. It was here that the intentional use of words such as “genocide,” “war crimes,” and “apartheid” entered the scene.

UN Resolution 3379 equated Zionism with racism
Six months before Durban, a preparatory conference had taken place in Tehran, although the Islamic Republic of Iran had refused to grant permission to Israeli and Jewish organizations.

In their absence, the delegates drafted a summary document accusing Israel of “ethnic cleansing,” of implementing “a new kind of apartheid” and “a crime against humanity,” and saying Zionism was “based on race superiority” – a document that formed the basis for the NGO declaration at the main conference in Durban.

Ahead of Durban, Secretary of State Colin Powell warned the UN officials that the US would not participate if the agenda was used to restart the Zionism is racism campaign.

The UN high commissioner at the time, Mary Robinson, promised them that this would not happen, but when they arrived, they found no change. The US and Israel ultimately walked out of the conference.

The final NGO declaration called for the restoration of UN Resolution 3379 equating Zionism with racism and demanded the application of all measures used against apartheid South Africa to Israel.

Steinberg told the Post that Durban was the restarting of the Zionism is Racism campaign that had been run 26 years earlier in 1975 by the Soviet Union and the Arab League.

The language itself can actually be traced back to 1948, and the use of the term Nakba and “Israel is doing to the Palestinians what Germans did to the Jews.” However, this did not gain so much traction outside of Palestinian spheres.

The difference at Durban, Steinberg continued, was that it became legitimate, mostly due to the commandeering of non-governmental organizations under the label of human rights.

“And that has been the engine that has driven the demonization of Israel and language like genocide, starvation, deliberate killing of children, war crimes,” Steinberg told the Post.


Australian documentary on cancel culture quashing Jewish artists is itself canceled
An Australian documentary on how antisemitic cancel culture post-Oct. 7 has manifested itself in the world of art has itself been “canceled,” with the country’s major film festivals and its two public broadcasters refusing to screen the film, the documentary’s producer and director said on Sunday.

The film ‘Cancelled,’ which portrays the doxing of Jewish artists in Australia following the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel three years ago, will premiere at the Jewish International Film Festival in Australia in September after the high-profile Sydney and Melbourne film festivals both rejected the movie.

“The fact that the film itself has ironically gotten canceled vindicates the whole film in the form of a Greek tragedy,” the documentary’s filmmaker, Danny Ben-Moshe, told JNS. “At first I found it massively disappointing, but then I found it affirmative in that it proved the whole thesis of the film and left no room for doubt.”

The 88-minute documentary, which includes prominent Australian Jewish artists, was also nixed by both Australia’s national public broadcaster, ABC, and the country’s multicultural network SBS, both of which are taxpayer-funded. It will instead air on News24 Australia, formerly Sky News Australia, a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.

“I was living in that art world until Israel was the victim on October 7, and you are never supposed to stand up for Israel,” said Nina Sanadze, an Australian artist who appears in the film and was one of 600 publicly doxed Jewish creators after Oct. 7.

Ben-Moshe said that he had made the film over the last two years for a non-Jewish audience, since the subject was all too well known to the Jewish community. Jewish leaders have condemned the Australian government for allowing a climate of incitement to violence following the Oct. 7 attacks to run unchecked, leading to a series of hate-based assaults that culminated in last year’s Bondi Beach massacre, the worst terrorist attack in the country’s history.

“This brings clarity to where we stand, and we don’t stand in a good place,” Ben-Moshe said.

He said that the fact that the country’s cultural gatekeepers and elite institutions did not find it appropriate to screen such a film even after a months-long just -concluded state inquiry on antisemitism speaks volumes for the future, and is much more concerning than the average hate-monger.

“Antisemitism is not just about hating Jews but about the inability to empathize with Jews because we are an inconvenient truth that challenges the zeitgeist narrative that they subscribe to,” he said.


‘Deranged’ comedian Bassem Youssef tried to claim Israel was behind the Bondi massacre
News24 host Sharri Markson says the “deranged” comedian Bassem Youssef tried to claim Israel was behind the Bondi massacre.


Netanyahu: Defeating Iran could lead to end of Hamas, Hezbollah
Victory over the Iranian regime could bring about the elimination of the Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist groups, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday night.

“It is clear that if this regime is defeated, the path to the final elimination of Hamas and the elimination of Hezbollah is not far off, and we will complete it,” he told Channel 14’s “The Patriots” current affairs program, speaking in Hebrew.

Netanyahu said Israel still had unfinished business in the War of Redemption, which began with the Hamas-led massacre of Oct. 7, 2023. He also pointed to dangers beyond the Iranian-backed terrorist organizations.

“There are missions to complete, and there are also new threats,” he said.

Netanyahu then turned to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, saying that the Turkish leader “does not like us and does not like me. We are in an environment that is still challenging. The job needs to be finished.”

He went on to say that Israel’s existence is at stake in the Oct. 27 election, warning that if his challengers form a government, they would withdraw the Israel Defense Forces from security zones established during the war and agree to a Palestinian state.

A coalition government led by Yashar Party leader Gadi Eisenkot would “leave Lebanon, Gaza and Syria, and establish a Palestinian state,” the premier warned. “It will be a state with the backing of great powers behind it, and that will be the beginning of the end of the State of Israel.”

Israel’s longest-serving prime minister stressed that Tehran has not abandoned its pursuit of nuclear weapons, despite the damage its program sustained during the joint military campaign launched by Israeli and U.S. forces on Feb. 28, “Operation Roaring Lion/Epic Fury.”

“Iran has not given up on the nuclear program. They were hit hard, we pushed it back,” the premier told host Yinon Magal.

Netanyahu likened the Iranian program to a disease. “We uprooted this cancer, but a cancer also has metastases, and it could develop into a renewed threat,” he said.

The prime minister said Jerusalem would have to keep acting to stop Tehran from rebuilding its capabilities. “Iran wants to renew the nuclear program. I prevented it and I will prevent it again,” he said. “Iran will not have a nuclear weapon as long as I am prime minister.”
Pipelines and ports: Iran war spurs Gulf infrastructure investment
The Iran war's redrawing of the global trade map is forcing Gulf nations to retool their investment play book, ploughing capital into infrastructure, from energy pipelines ​to ports, to weather the fallout from the conflict.

The war has highlighted the Gulf's overreliance on the Strait of Hormuz, previously a chokepoint for 20% of global oil flows ‌but also subject for decades to Iranian threats of disruption.

With the strait virtually blocked for much of the past six months, a burst of billions of dollars of investment commitments has emerged as Gulf energy exporters try to future-proof their economies now facing a severe slowdown.

Trade is being redirected to Saudi ports on the Red Sea and the United Arab Emirates' eastern ports but capacity is smaller. Gulf governments are looking at ways to create permanent, integrated solutions to get round using the Strait ​of Hormuz, said an industry source, declining to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter.

'PORTS, PORTS, PORTS'
While most Gulf governments can tap into oil riches accumulated over decades, some may ​look to external funds as they work towards ambitious foreign direct investment targets and as big infrastructure funds and other international investors show interest in the ⁠region's assets.

Costs could exceed hundreds of billions of dollars in the coming years and Gulf sovereign wealth funds, among the biggest in the world, are already stepping in to accelerate the push. Ports have emerged as a "mission-critical priority" ​for Gulf governments, including Saudi Arabia, said a second industry source.

"If two years ago sports was the big buzz thing, I think for the time being, next year or two, they're going to say ports, ports, ​ports," he said of Saudi Arabia.

Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund L'IMAD said last week it plans to buy out the rest of AD Ports (ADPORTS.AD), opens new tab as it revamps the company's strategy.

AD Ports operates ports in the United Arab Emirates and across the globe, but its UAE container throughput, as well as bulk and general cargo volumes, dropped by around two thirds in the second quarter from a year earlier as the company said it operated "through perhaps the most significant challenge in its 20-year history."

Dubai's ​DP World, one of the world’s biggest port operators, also saw business decline in the first half. It plans to develop two container terminals in Fujairah, where the UAE is building a new oil pipeline that will ​double crude capacity to Fujairah when it becomes operational next year. DP World is also working on inland container depots in the UAE.

Zin Bekkali, chief executive of UK-based investment management firm Silk Invest, says Gulf governments have the capital ‌to fund some ⁠or most of this accelerated investment in infrastructure internally.

"So infrastructure is definitely an area which we think is going to benefit," Bekkali said.

Saudi Arabia has fast-tracked billion-dollar plans to steer oil away from Hormuz, including a capacity expansion of its crude pipeline to the western Red Sea coast, sources told Reuters last month, potentially helping neighbours transport more oil without crossing the strait.


Protesters mark 2 years since recovery of 6 slain Gaza hostages, demand Oct. 7 probe
Protesters on Monday marked two years since the recovery of the bodies of the “beautiful 6″ hostages from a Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip, with a demonstration outside the Jerusalem residence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, demanding a state commission of inquiry into the failures surrounding the Hamas-led massacre.

Netanyahu’s government has long-refused to establish one.

The activists held large images of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Almog Sarusi, Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Alex Lubanov and Ori Danino, and a banner declaring “We will not forget they could have returned alive.”

The six were abducted alive on October 7, 2023, from the Nova music festival, and were murdered in captivity in August 2024. Their bodies were discovered in a tunnel under Rafah, in southern Gaza, on August 31.

The hostages’ deaths sparked a wave of angry protests against the government, with hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets nationwide demanding a hostage-ceasefire deal. Netanyahu had been accused of holding up a hostage deal to conserve his hardline coalition.

Other posters and images at Monday’s protest featured the faces of other hostages who were abducted alive and were killed in captivity, including Shiri Bibas and her infant son, Kfir.

A state commission of inquiry is Israel’s highest investigative authority, with unique power to investigate national disasters, subpoena witnesses and issue personal recommendations that can end political careers. It is established by government decision, but acts independently of it, and comprises experts selected by the judiciary.

Critics accuse Netanyahu of seeking a politically appointed probe to shield himself and his government from responsibility over the massacre. Netanyahu has never accepted explicit responsibility for the attack, instead blaming security forces, previous governments, the judiciary and political opponents.

The opposition has demanded that an independent state commission of inquiry be established, and parties in the anti-Netanyahu bloc have vowed to establish one if they are victorious at the election.


Commentary Podcast: Getting Iran Right
The economic war on Iran seems to be working, and the U.S. has resumed targeted strikes. Does this combination of tactics at last add up to a winning strategy? Plus, DEI at the University of California, Berkeley's law journal and anti-Semites on the attack.




Sa’ar accuses Spanish PM of ‘lying shamelessly’ over Israel’s alleged role in Ceuta migrant crisis
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar accused Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Monday of “lying shamelessly” about Israel’s role in the Ceuta crisis, which broke out on July 30 when tens of thousands of migrants from Morocco flooded into the North African Spanish enclave.

“In an interview with Cadena SER today, he lied again, astonishingly accusing Israel of disseminating misleading information regarding the events in Ceuta,” Sa’ar wrote. “This is a brazen lie. Continuing to spread defamatory lies will not distract from Sánchez’s disgraceful failure to manage his country’s affairs.”

Sánchez, speaking to host Aimar Bretos on Cadena SER’s “Hoy por Hoy,” said the causes of the crisis remain under investigation but blamed “rumors and disinformation” spread through social media accounts “linked both to Russia and to Israel, and to an international far-right” movement that he said exploits migration to attack Spain and Europe.

The crisis erupted on July 30 and 31, when tens of thousands of migrants crossed or attempted to cross into Ceuta from neighboring Morocco. Spanish officials have put the number at roughly 70,000, with most subsequently returning to Morocco. About 5,000 migrants, including 1,200 minors, remained in Ceuta as of Monday, according to Sánchez.

Sánchez said there is no evidence that Moroccan authorities were involved in the mass crossing and credited Rabat with cooperating with Madrid during the crisis. He attributed the surge in part to false claims circulating online after a Spanish Supreme Court ruling concerning the return of migrants who enter Ceuta by sea.

The episode has fueled conspiracy theories in Spain, including claims that Israel benefited from or helped engineer the crisis. Spanish actor Javier Bardem shared social-media posts alleging that Israel and Western far-right groups benefited from a weakened Spain.

The speculation intensified after Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, criticized Spain’s handling of the crisis on July 30, writing that Madrid should explain why it maintains “colonial enclaves” in Africa before continuing to lecture Israel. Spain’s Transport Minister Óscar Puente responded, “Well, it’s all starting to become quite clear,” in an apparent reference to the suggestion of Israeli involvement.


On Iran Sanctions, New York Times Makes a Dramatic About-Face
Back in January, the New York Times was recommending tighter sanctions against Iran. Now that President Trump is taking the paper's advice, the newspaper suddenly has decided it's a bad idea. It makes the Times look silly—as if it has no principled or reasoned Iran policy but rather simply reflexively opposes whatever Trump does.

Our story begins on January 14, 2026, after Iran's terror-sponsoring regime killed tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters. The Times mustered a staff editorial with a strong headline: "Iran's Murderous Regime Is Irredeemable," that was actually fairly good for a New York Times editorial. It declared "The Iranians demonstrating against their government are displaying awe-inspiring bravery," and said "The appropriate response from the rest of the world starts with a unified expression of solidarity with the protesters. The Khamenei regime is too depraved to be reformed. It has had plenty of chances to choose a different path." It faulted Iran for its "misogyny," its discrimination against gays and lesbians, its support of "the terrorist proxies of Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis."

Among the editorial's recommendations were "diplomatic, economic and potentially military" measures that "have the best chance to strengthen the protest movement and sow division among elites allied with the Khamenei government."

The economic leg involved sanctions. Said the Times editorial, "The world can also extend the sanctions it has imposed on Iran. The Trump administration this week announced new tariffs on any countries that do business with Iran, and other democracies should impose their own economic penalties. Europe can play a vital role. European leaders have sometimes been naïve about the nature of Iran’s government, and they should step up now. Mr. Trump, for his part, should drop his thorough hostility toward Europe, including his ludicrous ambition to seize Greenland, and recognize the strength of a unified alliance."

The editorial went on, "One potential policy involves targeting all significant officials in the Khamenei government, and close to it, with individual sanctions and asset seizures. They should know that they will be isolated forever, without the ability to do the luxury shopping and tourism many enjoy, unless they break with the regime. The goal should be to create competing pressures on Iran's elites and split them. Such moves would make good on Mr. Trump’s promise to the protesters that 'help is on its way.'"

Now that President Trump and his Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, are literally doing, with Operation Economic Outcast, what the Times editorial told them to do, the Times news section is rolling out a campaign of articles explaining why it is a terrible idea that almost certainly won't work and may even be counterproductive. It almost makes you think what's driving them is not the substance of Iran policy but knee-jerk opposition to Trump.





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