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Thursday, September 24, 2026

09/23 Links Pt1: Son of Israel’s US envoy, a soldier, seriously hurt in car-ramming attack; Rebutting ‘NAZA,’ freed hostage says he knows what it’s like ‘to be collateral damage’; Hillel Neuer: "In the Middle East, the UN is completely irrelevant."

From Ian:

Ambassador Jeff Bartos: UN must abandon anti-American, anti-Western legacy of Durban Conference
Over the course of the past half-century, virulent anti-Western ideology has become a permanent feature of our international institutions. One of the key inflection points in this transformation took place at a United Nations conference 25 years ago: the U.N.’s World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa.

The conference’s stated purpose was to confront alleged racism and bigotry. Today, the United Nations touts the Durban Declaration — the ideological framework adopted at the conference — as "the U.N.’s blueprint to combat racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance globally." In reality, it represented the instantiation of a set of radical ideas about race, history and Western civilization as the formal dogmas of our most powerful global institutions.

Since then, the anniversary of the Durban Declaration has frequently served as an opportunity for radical bureaucrats to reaffirm and double down on their anti-Western hatred. Nearly every five years since the conference, including next week, the U.N. commemorates and revels in the falsehoods and civilizational self-hatred that the conference has propagated across the international system. The United States will not have any part in celebrating this poisonous legacy. In fact, we are urging countries to join us in rejecting this propaganda and taking a meaningful step forward in repairing the rot within the U.N.

The U.N.’s embrace of racial grievance, collective guilt, unapologetic antisemitism and fervent hostility toward our shared Western heritage is fundamentally incompatible with the American way of life. It runs counter to American virtues established 250 years ago. Americans need no instruction from international bureaucracies on the principle that men are created equal. Two hundred and fifty years ago, our founders declared that our unalienable rights did not come from kings, emperors or any earthly government — least of all unelected globalist bureaucrats. They were inherent in man, endowed by God.

Because of the Durban conference, extremist ideologues who had long festered at the fringes of the international system were pulled under one tent, handed credentials and microphones and given the imprimatur of the United Nations.

The result was radically anti-American, anti-Western, anti-Christian, antisemitic and dedicated to the destruction of the very civilization that gave birth to the United Nations itself.

The Durban conference itself was a testament to the radicalism of this project. Attendees used the event as a platform to demand reparations from the United States and other Western nations for slavery and colonialism. These calls were backed by speakers such as Fidel Castro, the brutal communist dictator of Cuba, who used the conference’s stage to denounce the West for its crimes of "conquest and colonization, of slavery, of the ruthless exploitation and the extermination of hundreds of millions of people."


Son of Israel’s US envoy, a soldier, seriously hurt in car-ramming attack in West Bank; assailant shot dead
An Israel Defense Forces reservist soldier, the son of Israel’s Ambassador to the US Yehiel Leiter, was seriously injured in a car-ramming attack at a checkpoint in the central West Bank on Wednesday.

The assailant accelerated toward a police cruiser stationed at the “Bell” checkpoint — where Routes 4436 and 4437 from Beit Ur and Ramallah hit the major Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway Route 443 — running over Neria Leiter, who was operating alongside a cop, the military and police said.

The IDF said troops operating at the scene shot dead the assailant who carried out the ramming. He was identified by Israeli security officials as Mahmoud Mohammad Sliman, 29, from the nearby village of Beit Ur al-Tahta.

The Magen David Adom ambulance service said its medics treated the soldier, who was unconscious after he was hit.

Leiter was brought to Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem, where he underwent emergency brain surgery though his life was “still in danger,” according to a statement from Dr. Alon Schwartz, the head of the hospital’s trauma unit.

Schwartz indicated that the surgery lasted for hours and said Leiter’s condition stabilized, though he was still seriously injured, adding that multiple medical teams were working on improving his condition. The doctor also said Leiter’s head injury was the most severe and dangerous wound he received.

Leiter’s eldest brother, Maj. (res.) Moshe Yedidya Leiter, a father of six who was training to become a doctor, was killed alongside three other reservists in northern Gaza in November 2023.


Israeli ambassador to Washington says doctors ‘fighting to save life’ of son after car-ramming attack
Israeli Ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter said on Wednesday that his son Neria Leiter “needs a miracle” after being seriously injured in a car ramming attack at a checkpoint in Samaria.

“I am grateful to the IDF, to the medical team at Shaare Zedek who are now fighting to save the life of Neria Dov ben Chana, and for the prayers of the people of Israel,” the envoy wrote, using the form with a victim’s mother’s name to pray for that person’s recovery.

“I believe in the power of prayer, and I believe that when the people of Israel unite, miracles happen,” Leiter stated. “Neria needs a miracle.”

The Israel Defense Forces previously said that Israeli security officers killed a terrorist who drove a car into the Maccabim checkpoint and wounded an IDF soldier, who has now been identified as Neria Leiter.

The ambassador’s oldest son, Maj. Moshe Leiter, was killed in Gaza in 2023. The Israeli representative noted that Neria continued to serve in uniform after his brother’s death.

“Since Oct. 7, he has served hundreds of days in the reserves on multiple fronts,” the ambassador said, of Neria.

“Palestinian terrorism seeks to uproot the people of Israel from their land,” he stated. “They choose death. We choose life.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he is praying for the Leiter family. “We are all with you,” Netanyahu wrote.

U.S. and Israeli officials, including U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, wrote similar statements of support.

“A Palestinian terrorist attempts to murder IDF soldiers at a checkpoint,” Huckabee wrote. “Standing with Ambassador Leiter.”


Rebutting ‘NAZA,’ freed hostage says he knows what it’s like ‘to be collateral damage’
Freed Israeli hostage Omer Shem Tov pushed back against the controversial “NAZA” documentary about civilian deaths in Gaza, in an op-ed published Tuesday based on his own experience being held captive by terrorists in the Strip.

Writing in The Wall Street Journal, Shem Tov — who was freed from Hamas captivity in February 2025 after 505 days in Gaza — said that he knows “what it is like to be collateral damage.”

“NAZA” — a documentary made by two Israeli filmmakers that premiered two weeks ago at the Venice Film Festival and won a prize there — accuses the IDF of using AI to carry out strikes in Gaza that led to mass civilian deaths. NAZA is the Hebrew acronym used in the military for collateral damage.

The film has sparked fierce backlash from Israeli officials, most of whom have admitted to not having seen the documentary since it is not yet widely available. The IDF said it “categorically rejects” allegations made in the documentary and criticized the use of anonymous testimonies in the film, which was based on interviews with 24 purported anonymous Israeli military intelligence figures.

“There was much to fear in captivity. Hunger. My captors. Never seeing my family again. But I also feared the Israeli air force. The Israeli pilots overhead had no idea where I was,” Shem Tov wrote in the WSJ.

“Sometimes when my captors expected an Israeli attack was coming, they fled and left me behind. If an Israeli bomb killed me, Hamas would win twice: I would be dead, and Israel would be responsible,” he continued.

Shem Tov, who was kidnapped on October 7, 2023, from the Nova music festival near the Gaza border, recounted an instance when the mother of one of his captors received a phone call from the IDF warning her of an imminent airstrike.

“Hamas knew where I was and left me to die. Israel didn’t know my location, but it knew where my captor’s mother was and called to make sure she wasn’t killed accidentally,” he wrote. “There I was — kidnapped, starved and tortured by her son — while my army was trying to keep his mother alive.”

He said his captors in Gaza celebrated death and destruction on both sides: “For Hamas, destruction itself could be victory. As long as there was death on either side, Hamas could win.”

Shem Tov said that “Israel desperately wanted me home. But not at any price. There were Palestinian civilians between Israel and me. So Israel dropped leaflets, sent messages, made phone calls and ordered evacuations. It tried to minimize NAZA, or collateral damage.”

The freed hostage suggested that Israel “paid a price” for its efforts to reduce civilian casualties: “They gave Hamas time. They exposed Israeli soldiers to greater danger. And they left hostages like me waiting longer.”

“If Israel had cared less about NAZA, perhaps I would have come home sooner,” he added. “Fewer Israeli soldiers might have died. Fewer hostages might have died. But more Palestinians would have.”

Shem Tov wrote that he is troubled by reports about the documentary film, which he notes that he also hasn’t seen in full.

“In Venice, the film received a standing ovation that lasted more than 24 minutes,” he said. “As a former hostage, those minutes felt like a shower of knives. Not because the film shows Palestinian suffering, which is real and deserves to be seen. What hurts is that the film, as it has been reported, doesn’t seem to see me.”


UN Watch: Hillel Neuer on Newsmax: "In the Middle East, the UN is completely irrelevant."
Hillel Neuer appeared on Newsmax with Emma Rechenberg and Jon Glasgow to discuss New York City Mayor Mamdani's empty threat to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and to lend insight into the future of the United Nations and its next leader.


UN Watch: Hillel Neuer on ILTV: Guterres’ Double Standard on Gaza Exposed

Radical Academic Who Celebrated Oct 7 as Breach of 'Prison Walls' Slated To Appear at UNC's Global Education Center
A radical anti-Israel academic who celebrated Hamas's Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack as a breach of "prison walls" is slated to appear at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's FedEx Global Education Center, according to an invitation posted online.

Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism founder Emmaia Gelman's talk on her new book, The Anti-Defamation League and the Racial State, is scheduled for Wednesday evening, according to an invitation posted to Instagram by the Students for Justice in Palestine chapter at Duke University, where Gelman will speak the following night. The book, according to her website, is "a critical history of the Anti-Defamation League as a Cold War neoconservative institution" that "presents the ADL's history through its conflicts with social justice movements, illuminating the ADL's outsize [sic] role in shaping the ideas about race and rights that have underwritten US empire."

Gelman has gone far beyond criticizing the ADL. Just a day after Oct. 7, she posted photos of Hamas bulldozers tearing down the fence on the border between Gaza and Israel with a caption celebrating the attack. "Solidarity with those who break prison walls," she wrote. "Excited for millions of Americans who have nodded along with land acknowledgements to get behind this, and resist cries that actual decolonization (but not Israeli ethnic cleansing) is somehow 'too much.'"

When a follower pointed out that Hamas "murdered 250 kids at a music festival," Gelman responded, "There are very few deaths that I'd celebrate, but many uprisings against terrible, impossible conditions that resulted in deaths, including unjust deaths. We mostly celebrate those uprisings in hindsight, when it's easier. At 49, and now trained in political history, I've seen enough to feel it's wrong to wait until the dust settles."

It is unclear who at UNC was responsible for organizing the event. The university's website lists the FedEx Global Education Center under its Global Affairs department, which is led by Vice Provost for Global Affairs and Chief Global Officer Barbara Stephenson, who served as U.S. ambassador to Panama under President Barack Obama. Neither the department's calendar nor any other publicly available calendar, however, lists Gelman's talk.

A UNC spokesman said the school "is committed to protecting free expression" and "follows a policy of institutional neutrality." The spokesman did not answer the Washington Free Beacon's questions on details surrounding the event.

The event is the latest in a series of anti-Israel controversies at UNC. Earlier this year, the university gave its Edward Kidder Graham Award for "the most outstanding contribution to the university" to a student, Christina Huang, for her work leading a group called TransparUNCy. According to the university's website, TransparUNCy promoted a September 2024 anti-Israel walkout event that became destructive. Students spray-painted slogans like "BURN RIOT RESIST," "BURN IT ALL," and "ISRAEL BOMBS USA PAYS" on university property.


Former Canadian official warns about Hague court he helped create, which is trying to arrest Israeli officials
In a July 13 Wall Street Journal op-ed about how Washington is “dismantling the International Criminal Court,” U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote that the independent Hague-based court has devolved from a “narrow backstop to prosecute the gravest crimes” to a “standing world tribunal with near-unlimited reach, empowered to override the courts and constitutions of the U.S. and other sovereign states.”

Alan Kessel, a former senior legal adviser to Global Affairs Canada, which manages the Canadian government’s diplomatic relations, told JNS that he worries about the Hague-based court he helped create as a leader of Canadian negotiations for the Rome Statute, which created the court in 1998.

The court, which isn’t part of the United Nations, has sought to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“The International Criminal Court was kind of the realization of a dream of many people, who wanted to have an overarching international criminal court since after the Second World War,” Kessel told JNS. “It was supposed to deal with the most heinous crimes that occur in the world, because the court wasn’t just set up to be a small-claims court where anybody with a grievance could come.”

“It was designed for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide,” Kessel said. “It was a court of last resort, not first resort.”

Under its principle of “complementarity,” the court is only intended to engage when a country’s judicial bodies cannot address legal issues that arise. “Those of us who were in the original inception thought that there were enough safeguards,” he told JNS, but the court is “a very different animal today.”

“As a practitioner and there at the birth, I have seen it from conception, inception to fruition and have become jaundiced by what I am seeing and what’s happening there,” he said. “It’s been a whole 40 years of building international architecture in the international legal sphere, which essentially has had good guys binding themselves to treaties that the bad guys don’t actually sign on to, and so we’ve actually wrapped ourselves in a knot in the pursuit of a higher ideal of international legal jurisprudence.”


Syrian president blames Israel for diplomatic difficulties, rejects Trump push to send forces into Lebanon
Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa blamed Israel for the difficulties in the bilateral relationship between Damascus and Jerusalem, and said that Israeli operations inside Syria and elsewhere in the region are making Israel less safe.

Al-Sharaa also rebuffed President Donald Trump’s call for Syrian forces to move into Lebanon to help combat Hezbollah and the U.S.’ 2019 recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights.

The Syrian president, speaking through a translator at an Atlantic Council event on Tuesday during the United Nations General Assembly in New York, described Israel as the aggressor in the relationship, explaining that it has repeatedly attacked Syria and detained Syrians despite Damascus’ willingness to engage in diplomatic talks. He argued that Israeli policy toward Syria and other countries destabilizes Israel’s neighbors and is thereby making Israel less safe.

He said that Syria seeks mutual respect and economic and trade relations with its neighbors, including Israel, but that Israel has been unwilling to carry talks through to their conclusion.

“There were several sessions of negotiations with Israel, and we almost reached 90% of agreements. But at that point, Israel will withdraw from the agreement for different reasons that they put in place,” al-Sharaa said, adding that “we are still engaging in this track.”

Israel has described its military moves as necessary to protect Druze and other minorities inside Syria who have been attacked by government-aligned forces, protect against threats to Israel that could emanate from Syria and prevent Turkish military advances toward Israel.

Al-Sharaa said that he would not yet commit to lasting peace with Israel, and that Syria “can’t talk about peace if the rights of Syrians are usurped.”




Israel slams Jordan for denying Palestinians rights after king’s scathing UN speech
The Israeli Foreign Ministry criticized Jordanian King Abdullah II on Wednesday, following his speech at the United Nations General Assembly against Israel’s policies in Gaza and Judea and Samaria, which he claimed violate international law.

“It is particularly amusing to hear King Abdullah II of Jordan speak so passionately about international law and the rights of Palestinians in Judea and Samaria,” the ministry wrote on X, invoking the orders of his father, King Hussein, in 1988 to revoke the citizenship of Palestinians living in Judea and Samaria “overnight” and “in complete violation of international law.”

“Palestinians in Judea and Samaria lost the right to vote or run for the Jordanian parliament, work in the Jordanian civil service, or receive funding from the Hashemite Kingdom. Their Jordanian passports were confiscated or not renewed. They were classified as foreign nationals. Their entry into Jordan and their ability to remain there were restricted,” the ministry continued.

“Tell us more about international law,” it added.

Another clash between King Hussein and the Palestinians took place in 1970, known as “Black September.” The Jordanian Army was ordered to take action against the Palestine Liberation Organization, comprising of Palestinian fedayeen guerrillas that relocated to Jordan after the Six-Day War in 1967 and had engaged in terrorist activities within the Hashemite Kingdom.

Inflicting thousands of casualties on PLO forces, led by Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian militants were ultimately compelled to leave Jordan in 1971. Relocating to Lebanon via Syria, the PLO then became involved in the Lebanese Civil War from 1975 to 1990, while continuing to carry out terror attacks against Israel.

King Abdullah spoke at the General Debate of the 81st Session of UNGA in New York on Tuesday, dedicating the bulk of his address to lash out at the Jewish state.

He accused Israel of implementing an expansionist policy in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, and Syria, “testing how far it can go.”

He went as far as saying that “This Israeli government’s expansionist appetite is now a regional threat” and its “sense of impunity has reached terrifying levels.”

The Jordanian leader then told the delegates in the hall that they have tools such as “sanctions, asset freezes, embargoes, diplomatic isolation” that have been used elsewhere.

“Any threat to our northern border or our water security is a threat to our national security,” King Abdullah added, claiming that Israel has imposed “new facts on the ground,” including around “vital water resources.”


‘We did not bend the knee’: At UN, Pezeshkian says Iran and Gaza committed to ‘resistance’
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Wednesday vowed Tehran would continue its “resistance” against pressure and threats by the United States, while also saying Gaza would remain firm against what he called “occupation and aggression and injustice,” in a defiant address to the UN General Assembly.

“The resistance of the Iranian people will only increase in the face of sanctions, pressure, and increased bullying,” he said at the United Nations, his first appearance at the body since the outbreak of his country’s ongoing war with the United States, which began in late February with US-Israeli strikes.

During Pezeshkian’s speech, the lone US diplomat in the hall walked out. The US mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment

“Iran must be understood by Mr. Trump,” Pezeshkian said in reference to the US president. “We are ready for dialogue and diplomacy and negotiations without accepting the language of force.”

“The remarks made by the US president yesterday … are a sign of a bullying mentality. … The Iranian people will not bow to pressure. … Those who are terrorists and train terrorists call us terrorists,” he said, referring to Trump’s description of Iran as the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism in his UN speech a day earlier, and his comment that he might “annihilate” it.

Turning to the Strait of Hormuz, he said, “We cannot let some have free access and gain their interests from the waterway, while at the same time using that waterway to impose their aggressions upon us… to forbid us access to our own waterways.”

Tehran has conveyed its conditions to reopen the strategic waterway to the United States through mediators, Iranian sources told Reuters on Tuesday.

Pezeshkian accused the US of blocking Iranian shipping while bringing missiles through the strait to its allies. Iran has sought to obstruct the strait, a vital pathway for the global energy supply, since the beginning of the war. In response, the US imposed a blockade on Iranian ports.

Turning to Gaza, Pezeshkian said “resistance will continue” against “occupation and aggression and injustice.”

“If it is weakened in one form, it will reemerge in others, perhaps stronger still,” he said. “What other choice do they have? Succumb to bullying?”

Iran is a longtime backer of Hamas, whose onslaught from Gaza into Israel on October 7, 2023, launched the war in the Strip.

Pezeshkian accused Israel of “committing genocide by using the so-called technologies they have at their disposal, then they label others as terrorists.”

Israel denies accusations of genocide in Gaza. It says it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.

“Yes, they did hit us, but we did not bend the knee,” Pezeshkian declared, in reference to Israeli-US strikes on Iran.

“Our defensive systems have been built so that no one can think that the bombing of Iranian cities can go unanswered,” Pezeshkian said.

Israel and Iran largely stopped exchanging fire in April, but US-Iranian tensions over the Strait of Hormuz and Iran’s nuclear program continue. The Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen are also currently fighting a Saudi-led coalition.

Pezeshkian also vowed in his speech that Iran will never compromise on its right to have a civilian nuclear enrichment program.

“We will not bow our heads and give up the right that is inherently ours,” he said. “No nuclear weapons, and no limitations to new peaceful nuclear technology.”

“We seek energy for progress, not to threaten societies with weapons,” he insisted, calling peaceful nuclear technology “part of our inherent progress.”

Pezeshkian accused the UN’s nuclear agency, the IAEA, of double standards regarding nuclear inspections, referring to Israel’s alleged nuclear weapons program.

“Atomic and nuclear bombs are in the hands of the Israeli regime, but the inspectors are requested to come to Iran,” he said.

Iran has consistently denied seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. However, it enriched uranium to levels that have no peaceful application, obstructed international inspectors from checking its nuclear facilities, and expanded its ballistic missile capabilities.

Holding up an image of late supreme leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the opening strikes of the US-Israeli war with Iran, Pezeshkian said that “we have been the victims of terrorism.”


Palestinian pair charged with plot to assassinate Ben-Gvir
Israeli prosecutors indicted two Palestinians from the Nablus (Shechem) area in Samaria on suspicion of plotting to assassinate Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir with an explosive drone, the Israel Police and Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet) said on Wednesday.

According to the indictment, the pair discussed staging a “bait attack” to draw Ben-Gvir to the scene before killing him. One of the suspects later allegedly proposed using an explosive drone and tried to obtain drone parts from China.

Authorities said the two had operated together since late 2023, acquiring rifles, pistols and ammunition, conducting shooting drills and recruiting additional operatives. They also allegedly planned shooting attacks, attacks using explosive vehicles and drones and the kidnapping of Israel Defense Forces soldiers.

They two will remain in detention until the conclusion of the legal proceedings, according to the police. The indictments against them were filed by the Samaria Military Prosecution.

“This is already the 11th time they have tried to assassinate me, and the Holy One, blessed be He, has saved me from their hands!” Ben-Gvir wrote in a response on X.

“I have a message for all those enemies: This will neither deter nor frighten me. I will continue to pursue a tough policy in the prisons, continue the policy of demolishing illegal construction in the Negev, and continue to ensure that the death penalty law we passed is put into effect and enforced,” he added.
Board of Peace Will Spend a Billion Dollars in a First Pass at Establishing ‘Peace and Security’ in Gaza
President Donald Trump's Board of Peace is planning to spend just under $1 billion in funding for "peace and security" related projects inside the Gaza Strip, though it has yet to disarm Hamas, according to international officials and a funding proposal reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon.

The board, along with members of the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG)—the temporary body that is supposed to replace Hamas as Gaza's ruler—pitched their reconstruction effort Wednesday morning to a room packed with diplomats and foreign leaders during the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York City. Officials said they plan to spend approximately $2.45 billion in total over a six-month period on 66 separate projects that primarily encompass security and infrastructure, but also include line items like "human development" and "economic acceleration."

The board currently has around $18 billion in commitments that are largely unspent, and is seeking more international partners who will front additional cash for a massive reconstruction effort that is ultimately estimated to cost $71 billion and is largely stalled. Hamas remains the dominant force in Gaza, has not made good on repeated promises to disarm, and Israel continues to carry out limited military operations in response to Hamas threats.

"The scope of the problem is immense," said Major General Jasper Jeffers, who was appointed by the White House to serve as commander of the International Stabilization Force (ISF), the peacekeeping entity created under Trump's 20-point Gaza peace plan. There remain "hundreds of miles of tunnels, numerous underground facilities, [and] tens of thousands of weapons," he said, referring to the underground network of military bunkers and arms depots Hamas built throughout Gaza to fuel its war on Israel.

The ISF has yet to set foot in Gaza. Jeffers said his force of 50 international military leaders and an initial force of some 500 troops are "ready to deploy" in Gaza once on-the-ground access is permissible. The ISF is expected to grow exponentially in the coming months, encompassing thousands of soldiers from a host of nations. The future Gazan police force, meanwhile, has had over 250,000 applicants, some 19,000 of whom have been vetted and put through "initial training." That force is meant to be comprised primarily of Palestinians who are not aligned with Hamas.

Jeffers expressed optimism that Gaza—a vast network of tunnels and bunkers full of weapons and militants—could be demilitarized. "For demilitarization, we're working hard on a military technical plan that can be executed sector by sector" in Gaza, Jeffers said. Once forces enter a part of Gaza, "the weapons, the tunnels, all of the military infrastructure will be decommissioned or neutralized."

Jeffers acknowledged that in certain cases "there will be weapons that won't be able to be moved" and military leaders are currently crafting plans that will allow the new security force to "decommission" those types of arms.

"The intent," he said, "is to neutralize and decommission."

The six-month, $885 million peace and security funding proposal distributed to meeting participants requests $20 million for a "decommissioning program" that will provide "incentives for the turn-in and safe disposal of weapons and munitions."

Another $10 million is slated for a "police facility" that will support "policing and the rule of law," according to the proposal.

Another $275 million is proposed for an "interior commission facility" that will serve as a "temporary headquarters, office, and life support" for NCAG and other organizations. Another $275 million will be spent on a "mission support site" in Rafah that will become "permanent hardened infrastructure for 5,000 ISF personnel." The ISF itself is slated to receive an initial $140 million to "recruit, train, equip and deploy the multinational ISF contingent."

Hamas, however, has repeatedly signaled that disarmament is not on the table. The terror group emphasized at several junctures that it will not do so until a Palestinian state is formed, and its leader, Khaled Mashaal, said in February that armed resistance remains the priority.

"Criminalizing the resistance, its weapons, and those who carried it out is something we should not accept," he said in Doha. "As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation … something nations take pride in."

Michael Rubin, director of policy analysis at the Middle East Forum think tank, said much of the discussion about Hamas disarming is "deja vu."
Israel kills Hamas finance chief in airstrike on Gaza's Khan Yunis, Katz says
The IDF and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) killed Hamas Finance Department Chief Muhammad Abu Alwan in a joint operation in the Khan Yunis area of Gaza, Defense Minister Israel Katz announced in an X/Twitter post on Wednesday.

"We praise the IDF and the Shin Bet for the precise operation and for the aggressive activity to thwart our enemies - and we continue to pursue Hamas commanders and operatives, to strike at its sources of funding, and to destroy its terrorist infrastructure," he said.

"We will not allow Hamas to rebuild its strength, and we will not stop until there is no Hamas in Gaza," Katz added.

According to Army Radio, Abu Alwan managed Hamas's external funds in the years leading up to the October 7 massacre, including a Qatari grant.

Abu Alwan directed internal funding to Hamas via humanitarian aid, stealing from Gazans
During the war, he switched to harnessing internal funds for Hamas's operations, primarily from humanitarian aid, Army Radio reported.

In addition, Hamas terrorists stole merchandise from Gazan store owners to further fund terror activities, according to Army Radio.

At least four Palestinians were killed in the attack, local health officials claimed to Reuters.
Police say they discovered tunnel storing firearms in West Bank’s Qalqilya; four arrested
Police say they discovered a tunnel storing guns and ammunition in the northern West Bank city of Qalqilya, which abuts the territory’s border with Israel.

Four suspects were arrested on the scene and taken for interrogation, police say.

The tunnel is about 25 meters (82 feet) deep and is still under construction, police say, adding that officers also discovered “the start of an excavation of another tunnel.”

The equipment in the tunnel included an M16 assault rifle, a sniper rifle and material to produce explosives, according to police.


UKLFI: Natasha Hausdorff rebuts critics of her Spectator article on international law and Judea and Samaria
Natasha Hausdorff has challenged one of the most widely repeated claims about Israel: that Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria are illegal under international law.

In her recent Spectator article, "The Israeli settlements lie", the UKLFI Charitable Trust Legal Director argued that the prevailing interpretation of international law rests on fundamental errors concerning Israel’s borders, the status of the territories and the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Her conclusions challenge positions adopted by the International Court of Justice, the UN Security Council and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

In this new interview, we put some of the principal objections to Natasha directly and give her the opportunity to explain and defend her legal arguments in greater detail.

The discussion begins with the principle of uti possidetis juris, under which newly independent states generally inherit the administrative boundaries of the preceding territory. Natasha explains why she argues that this principle applies to Israel following the end of the British Mandate in 1948, and addresses challenges concerning Palestinian self-determination, the 1949 armistice agreements and Israel’s subsequent administration of Judea and Samaria.

She then examines Article 49(6) of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupying power from deporting or transferring parts of its civilian population into occupied territory. Natasha disputes the interpretation applied to Israeli settlements, arguing that voluntary civilian movement and government-forced population transfer are legally distinct.

The interview also addresses the significance of government assistance to Israeli communities, the Sasson Report on unauthorised outposts and the treatment of settlement-related disputes by Israel’s Supreme Court, including the Elon Moreh case.

Natasha discusses the Oslo Accords and Israel’s administration of Area C, before responding to questions about Khan al-Ahmar and her argument that Palestinian construction in the area forms part of a wider political strategy supported by international funding.

Finally, she addresses one of the most contentious aspects of her article: whether opposition to Israeli settlement policy can cross the line into discrimination against Jews.

Natasha argues that the selective application of international law is being used to justify calls for the removal of Jewish communities from Judea and Samaria. She explains why she considers this not merely a double standard, but a fundamental inversion of international law.

The interview examines the legal reasoning behind her position, the challenges raised by critics and the wider implications for future negotiations over the territories.







 


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