Sunday, September 27, 2026

09/27 Links: IDF kills terrorist filmed abducting Noa Argamani; Israel marks two years since Nasrallah eliminated; UK police arrest several men in explosives probe near US-used RAF base

From Ian:

Deborah Lipstadt: Jews targeted by antisemitism need more than statements of sympathy from politicians
Unlike so many people who, though deeply disturbed by this development, feel helpless to make their voices heard, I have had and continue to have that opportunity. Long before, during my time in office as the United States’ Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism and since then, I have had numerous opportunities to sit with leading government officials worldwide to discuss responding to this scourge.

After impressing upon them the gravity of this situation, I have warned them not to think of this as solely an attack on Jews, Jewish institutions, and those associated with them. Antisemitism poses a multi-tiered that encompasses more than just Jews. In fact, they and the societies they lead are in the crosshairs. Those engaged in these attacks – rightists, leftists, and Islamist jihadists – are also aiming at democracy, rule of law, and international security and stability.

Some of the haters are home-grown and some are foreign. Some are ideological Jew-haters, e.g. Iran, Muslim Brotherhood, and Russia. They want to harm – including lethally – Jews, because they despise them.

But some are utilitarian antisemites, e.g., China, and Russia. (Yes, Russia falls into the ideological and the utilitarian category.) The utilitarians use antisemitism as a means of fostering rifts in society, creating dissension, and destabilizing the social compact.

The plethora of incidents of Jew-hatred rolls off the tongues of those who follow these developments, like some sort of incantation: Washington D.C.’s Capitol Jewish Museum (2 dead), Boulder, Colorado (1 dead), Golders Green (2 stabbed, 1 beaten badly), Manchester (2 dead), Ontario (2 seriously wounded), Pittsburgh (11 dead), San Diego (1 dead), and the list goes on.

But this is not what has left me sick and tired. I knew that this was the case when I entered this field of study and when I accepted the Presidential appointment as an Ambassador with the portfolio of addressing this hatred.

No, what has left me sick and tired are the pious sympathies and sincere regrets issued by government leaders, Prime Ministers (UK, Canada), Mayors (London, Manchester, New York), University presidents (worldwide) and so many others. Their aides must have a file on their computers which they can expeditiously open when something happens. Maybe it’s entitled: “Reactions to Attacks on Jews.” They just need cut and paste from previous declarations. Last year, in the wake of the Golders Green stabbing, this newspaper put those platitudes on its front page. I was exhausted just reading them. [“Our thoughts and prayers are with you”; “An attack on one of us is an attack on all of us”; “We stand with you.” And the one that I find most infuriating: “This hate has no place in our society.” Has no place? It’s already here… and it’s thriving.]

Do I think leaders should condemn these acts? Of course. They must speak out unequivocally and expeditiously and with no contextual hesitations. But those condemnations must be accompanied by action, including difficult actions, ones that might have political costs. Political leaders must be willing to name the source of these attacks, call them out specifically, and demand that the communities and political enclaves spit out the hate mongers who have taken refuge in their midst.

Leaders must do this even at the risk of losing votes. They must also recognise, as those in the United Kingdom, Canada, and France, among other places, have failed to do, that when their most energetic foreign policy actions are aimed at Israel, when they reward Hamas even when it has made no moves towards peace, the attackers are invigorated. Despite being warned, as Foreign Secretary Miliband was by Chief Rabbi Mirvis and other Jewish leaders, that this singling out of Israel motivates attackers to harass, attack, and murder Jews worldwide, they ignore the warnings.

Why, my interlocutors ask me, is this happening now? In part because the haters know that there rarely are consequences for attacking Jews. So please spare me your pious sympathies, sincere regrets, and worn-out protestations. I am not just sick and tired of them, I consider them – and you – to be hypocritical and self-serving.

I – together with so many others – have had enough.
Argentina shows that fighting antisemitism requires more than condemnation
The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Latin American office has spent years working with institutions throughout the region to promote understanding of contemporary antisemitism and provide training on how to identify it. Since the IHRA definition was adopted in Argentina, it has been applied in dozens of cases. The López proceedings demonstrated what those efforts can mean in practice.

One of us, Ariel Gelblung, testified twice as an expert witness, first during the preliminary investigation and later before the Judicial Impeachment Court. His testimony addressed the meaning and implications of López’s statements, the antisemitic tropes they invoked, and the international standards used to identify hate speech and discrimination.

The result matters beyond one judge and beyond Argentina. Judges occupy a distinctive position in democratic societies. Citizens who enter a courtroom must be able to trust that their religion, ethnicity or identity will not determine how they are treated by the person sitting on the bench. When a judge publicly traffics in prejudices about a group of people, that trust is fundamentally compromised.

The lesson from Argentina is not that every hateful statement should be prohibited by law. Different democracies draw different legal boundaries around speech, and freedom of expression remains an essential democratic principle. But freedom of expression does not mean freedom from professional or institutional accountability, particularly for public officials entrusted with extraordinary authority over the rights and lives of others.

That distinction is especially important today. Democratic societies frequently respond to outbreaks of antisemitism, racism and other forms of hatred with statements of concern. Those statements have value, but they cannot substitute for infrastructure. Fighting discrimination requires clear standards, education, training and institutions willing to enforce the principles they have adopted.

Simon Wiesenthal understood that confronting hatred cannot be limited to documenting the past. The lessons of history matter most when they equip societies to recognize warning signs in the present and act before prejudice becomes normalized in their institutions. Argentina’s experience shows that democratic institutions are not powerless in the face of antisemitism.

Removing one judge will not defeat antisemitism. But this case demonstrates something increasingly important at a time when hatred can spread quickly and become dangerously normalized: Democratic institutions can draw a line. And when they do, it matters.
Khaled Abu Toameh: Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas Tells the UN: Palestinian Reforms Are Complete. The Evidence Says Otherwise
Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on September 24, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas presented an extraordinarily positive picture of the reforms he claims his government has carried out. According to Abbas, the Palestinian Authority has fulfilled the commitments it made to the international community.

Last year alone, the United States determined that these payments ["Pay-for-Slay" rewards to the families of terrorists and "martyrs"] had amounted to $156 million — including to 5,000 families in Lebanon — much of which enabled, fungibly, from the European Union.

The US State Department, however, had reached a very different conclusion from that of Abbas. In a September 16, 2026 statement, the State Department said that the Palestinian Authority was "continuing to pay stipends to terrorists and to glorify acts of terrorism and terrorists in public pronouncements and school textbooks." The Palestinian Authority, the State Department added, had once again failed to live up to its commitments to the United States, including its commitment concerning terrorism and reform.

Last April, the State Department had already been even more explicit in a report to Congress. The report noted that despite changing the mechanism and ostensibly replacing the old system of paying prisoners with welfare system supposedly based on needs, "the Palestinian Authority continues to provide a system of compensation in support of terrorism through new mechanisms and under a different name." The report concluded that changing the mechanism did not amount to ending the payments.

In November of 2025, the European Union Commission also acknowledged its assessment that payments and benefits to terrorists and their families were continuing.

If accountability and rule of law have been strengthened to the degree Abbas claims, why are Palestinian human-rights organizations still documenting such cases?

The contradiction becomes even more disturbing when it comes to education.

Abbas told the UN that the Palestinian Authority has continued reforming its education system in accordance with international standards and in cooperation with UNESCO.

The findings of IMPACT-se's comprehensive review of the 2025-2026 Palestinian Authority curriculum tell a very different story. The organization examined 290 textbooks and 71 teacher guides and found that the curriculum remained..."substantively unchanged from prior editions and documented recurring patterns across subjects: promotion of jihad and martyrdom, glorification of terrorism, incitement of antisemitism, rejection of peacemaking and the two-state solution, and erasure of Israel from maps."

IMPACT-se also found textbooks and teacher guides that continue to present armed struggle and violent figures in a positive light.

If the international community is serious about bringing democracy and accountability to the Palestinians, it should demand verifiable reforms rather than accept declarations of success.


UK police arrest several men in explosives probe near US-used RAF base
British police declared a “major incident” near the Royal Air Force Fairford base on Sunday afternoon after five men were arrested on suspicion of offenses under the Explosives Act, Metropolitan Police said.

The suspects were also arrested on suspicion of preparation of a terrorist act, contrary to section 5 of the Terrorism Act, according to a police statement.

Police received a call relating to three suspicious vehicles that appeared to be traveling toward the air base. Police responded and arrested the five men in the Whelford area.

About 85 households were evacuated and residents taken to a recreation center as an army explosive ordnance disposal team examined a number of vehicles. Police blocked off the area but said they believed the incident was “contained.”

“We are in the early stages of an investigation, and five men remain in custody. As you would expect we are working closely with our partners to understand the circumstances of the incident,” Counter Terrorism Policing Senior National Coordinator, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Vicki Evans said.

“We continue to work with Gloucestershire Police to keep the community safe as we work to gather evidence from the scene. A 400 [meter] cordon has been put in place around the vehicles while the Army’s Explosive Ordinance Disposal unit conduct examinations,” she said.

Security at Fairford, which hosts U.S. Air Force personnel, was visibly increased on Sunday, with armed police blocking access and dozens of emergency vehicles in the area. The Daily Mail reported that the base had been placed on Delta alert, the highest U.S. force-protection level, while RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk was put on Charlie alert, the second-highest level.

“The 501st Combat Support Wing and our fellow U.K.-based wings remain vigilant and will take appropriate actions to ensure the safety and security of our U.S. service members, civilians, contractors, and their families,” a U.S. Air Force spokesman said. “We constantly assess a variety of factors that determine what measures we institute or modify to protect our installations, our people and their families.”

British Defense Secretary Wes Streeting praised the response. “I would like to thank all those emergency and specialist teams who have acted so swiftly regarding the incident in Gloucestershire,” he wrote on X. “We can be reassured that this is being dealt with, and it is exactly why our emergency response teams and Armed Forces are on standby 24/7.”

Separately, a government spokesman said British Prime Minister Andy Burnham was being kept updated on the incident.

RAF Fairford has been used by the United States for operations against Iran. Britain authorized U.S. forces earlier this year to use British bases for strikes on Iranian missile sites, and American bombers have deployed from Fairford during the conflict.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned in July that Britain would become a “definite and legitimate target” if it supported U.S. military operations against the Islamic Republic. IRGC Brig. Gen. Hossein Mohebbi specifically cited American B-1 bombers using British airbases.


‘No proceedings’ against Iranian man arrested over alleged attempt to enter British nuclear submarine base
Prosecutors say no proceedings will be taken against an Iranian man following an incident in which two people allegedly tried to enter the Faslane naval base.

A 34-year-old man from Iran and a 31-year-old woman from Romania were arrested following the incident on March 19.

Prosecutors have also confirmed they decided not to bring proceedings against the woman at an earlier stage, in April.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service has now said that the 34-year-old will have no proceedings brought against him “at this time”.

The prosecution service released a statement saying: “The procurator fiscal received a report relating to a 34-year-old man and an incident said to have occurred on March 19, 2026.

“After careful consideration of the facts and circumstances of the case, including the available admissible evidence, the procurator fiscal decided that there should be no proceedings taken at this time.

“The Crown reserves the right to proceed in the future should further evidence become available.”

The Royal Navy has previously said that two people unsuccessfully tried to enter the base.

The base houses Britain’s Vanguard-class atomic submarines, which are equipped with Trident 2 missiles as part of the country’s nuclear deterrent programme.

The Royal Navy’s Astute-class attack submarines are also based there.
Ismail Haniyeh's former Hamas bodyguard arrested for planning terror attack against European Jews
A former bodyguard of assassinated Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was granted asylum and British citizenship, was arrested on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack against Jewish communities and Israelis in Europe around the second anniversary of the October 7 massacre, the Sunday Times reported on Saturday.

According to the British newspaper's investigation, the suspect, whose identity cannot be published for legal reasons and who is referred to as "Mr. X," served on Haniyeh's personal security detail in Gaza before moving to Britain more than a decade ago.

Although it was known when he received refugee status that he had worked for the leader of the terrorist organization and that he had previously been arrested in Egypt for operating a weapons-smuggling tunnel into Gaza, he was granted asylum in the UK.

Mr. X lived in England under the cover of working as an IT consultant, changed his legal name several times, and ostensibly led an ordinary life.

He now faces extradition to Germany, where he is accused of being a central figure in a plot to attack Jewish community centers, Israeli diplomats, and pro-Israel demonstrations in Germany or neighboring Austria. Officers from Britain's National Crime Agency (NCA) arrested him in central London last November after Israel's Mossad and German intelligence services uncovered the plot.

The indictment, first revealed by the German newspaper Bild, describes how Mr. X transported handguns, ammunition, and camouflage equipment from Berlin to Vienna.

He also recorded a video in advance in which he appeared masked and armed in front of a Hamas flag, describing the planned attack as an act of retaliation on behalf of the Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades. A law enforcement official described him as a "vital figure" in the plot.

Mr. X given permanent residency, citizenship by UK
Mr. X arrived in Britain in 2012, when he apparently left the Gaza Strip for the last time. In 2015, he applied for asylum, and the British Home Office granted him permanent residency while Theresa May served as UK Home Secretary. He was later granted British citizenship.

In an unusual move, a judge at a London magistrate's court granted Mr. X an order barring publication of his name for 100 years. The decision was amended only last Thursday after an application by the Sunday Times, with the court ruling that his name could be published only after the conclusion of the criminal proceedings against him being conducted concurrently in Britain.

German security officials have warned that the involvement of Mr. X, who was able to travel freely across Europe using his British passport, reflects a dangerous shift in Hamas's tactics as the terrorist organization seeks to expand the reach of its terrorist activity beyond the Middle East and into Europe.
The Hamas terrorist granted British citizenship
X certainly wasn’t the only one to take advantage of our suicidal hospitality. Muhammad Sawalha, a leader of Hamas in the West Bank, arrived in the 1990s. The scumbag is still here, despite a US indictment in 2004 alleging he never stopped working for Hamas, was involved in ‘secret talks about “revitalising” terrorist acts’ in Israel, and helped to launder money for military operations.

There’s more. Sawalha was one of the founders of the Muslim Association of Britain, one of the groups behind the anti-Israel hate marches. And the chef’s kiss? He lives in a council house in Colindale, north London, which he bought at a tidy discount under the Right to Buy scheme. No doubt we’ll soon find out he’s been coining it in from PIP too, such is the ease with which Islamofascists have been taking this country for mugs.

Mere incompetence does not explain this. It wouldn’t have taken much intel to realise Sawalha or Mr X should never have been allowed into Britain at all, let alone to make a life here. The same goes, by the way, for the Abedis, a family of Libyan Islamists who claimed asylum in the UK in the 1990s, only for son Salman to say thank you by blowing up young girls at the Manchester Arena.

The British state struggles to take Islamist ideology at its word. Hamas’s founding charter committed it to the annihilation of Israel and the murder of Jews in 1988. And yet it took the UK another 30 years to proscribe the organisation fully. Meanwhile, Sawalha was allowed to settle in the London borough of Barnet, which has the highest Jewish population of any area in Britain.

For far too long, the establishment has been making these insane decisions and evading any scrutiny. Remarkably, Mr X was originally granted anonymity by a judge for 100 years, meaning journalists wouldn’t be able to name him until 2125, until The Sunday Times challenged it. (The public will now learn his name once legal proceedings are concluded.) Who would have benefitted from this, other than X and the cretins at the Home Office who let him into our country? Thank God for the free press.

Now, let’s have a reckoning. A Britain that rolls out the red carpet to barbarians who want to kill Jews and destroy Western civilisation cannot expect to survive. The people of Europe are being forced to pay the price – some of them, the ultimate price – for decades of Islamist appeasement. If the story of Mr X – with his British passport, his Hamas flag and his guns – doesn’t rouse our elites from their moral slumber, nothing will.


Belgian intel chief: Tehran behind attacks on Jewish sites in Liège, Antwerp
Iran was behind a bombing outside a synagogue in Liège and an arson attack in Antwerp’s Jewish quarter in March, the head of Belgium’s Coordination Unit for Threat Analysis (CUTA) said over the weekend.

Gert Vercauteren told French-language public broadcaster RTBF on Thursday that the perpetrators “certainly” acted on Tehran’s orders. He said the attacks on Jewish site were part of a coordinated campaign, rather than isolated incidents.

An explosive device was set off outside the Synagogue de Liège on the city’s Rue Léon Frédéricq shortly before 4 a.m. on March 9. That same week, a car was torched in Antwerp‘s Jewish quarter. No one was hurt in either attack.

According to the report, the Belgian attacks coincided with a string of plots in the Netherlands, including a foiled bombing of a synagogue in Heemstede, a small town roughly 12 miles west of Amsterdam.

A main suspect in the network was recently arrested in Turkey. Belgian security services have recorded no attacks since, the report noted.

In a response to the report, Israeli Ambassador to Belgium and Luxembourg David Saranga called on European nations to change their policies toward Iran “to reflect the threat Tehran poses on Europe’s own streets.

“I’m surprised. Iran directing terror attacks against Jewish sites in Belgium? Who could have imagined,” he tweeted sarcastically.

Last year, the United States and 13 European nations condemned attempts by the Iranian regime’s intelligence services to kill, kidnap and harass people, including Jewish citizens, in their respective territories.

“We are united in our opposition to the attempts of Iranian intelligence services to kill, kidnap, and harass people in Europe and North America in clear violation of our sovereignty,” according to the joint statement published by the United States, the United Kingdom, Albania, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden.

The Tehran regime is “increasingly collaborating with international criminal organizations to target journalists, dissidents, Jewish citizens and current and former officials,” read the statement shared by the U.S. Department of State. “This is unacceptable.”
Prominent scholars, legal experts among 6,000 signatories to letter rejecting Gaza genocide charge
Prominent academics, legal experts, and historians are among more than 6,000 signatories of an open letter released earlier this month rejecting as a “blood libel” the accusation that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.

The letter, which launched with more than 5,000 signatories and later surpassed 6,000, argues that the accusation of genocide is contradicted by Israel’s actual conduct in the war and has been weaponized as a pretext to exclude and attack Jews around the world.

The letter was released by Creative Community for Peace in partnership with its authors: Yossi Klein Halevi, Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, Rabbi Micha Odenheimer, and Binghamton University historian Jonathan Karp.

Open letter: 'We must unite in repudiating the lie of genocide'
“There is a vigorous debate within the Jewish community over aspects of how this war was fought, and that is a sign of moral health. So is our pain over every innocent life lost. But we must unite in repudiating the lie of genocide,” the letter states.

It goes on to address the “unprecedented combat conditions” in Gaza, including Hamas’s use of “hundreds of kilometers of tunnels, thousands of boobytrapped homes [and] the conflating of combatants with ‘journalists’ and ‘human rights workers.’”

It also addresses the civilian-to-combatant casualty ratio, which it says is “considered low for asymmetrical urban warfare.”

Taking the Gaza Health Ministry’s current death toll, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, alongside INSS’s May estimate of more than 23,000 terrorists killed, the implied civilian-to-combatant ratio would be roughly 2:1.

The letter also cites “the absence of mass starvation despite repeated claims of imminent catastrophe” and “the warnings given to civilians before attack,” and asserts that “All these factors were erased in the eagerness to indict Israel for genocide.”

Meanwhile, the letter argues that Israel went to war after October 7 to break what it calls an “Iranian-led siege of terror enclaves” on its borders, while noting that anti-Zionists were already leveling accusations of genocide against Israel the following day.

Letter: In 'bitter irony,' Israel is only country to face 'sustained war of attempted genocide'
“The bitter irony is that Israel, home to half the world’s Jews, is the only country to face a sustained war of attempted genocide – from its inception in 1948 until today,” the letter states.

Prominent scholars who signed the letter include Harvard professor and public intellectual Steven Pinker. Other Harvard-affiliated signatories include Harvard Law professor Jesse Fried and visiting scholar Anat Alon-Beck, a professor of law at Case Western Reserve University.

Other notable scholars who signed on include historian Niall Ferguson, Israeli historian Benny Morris, Holocaust historian and former US Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism Deborah Lipstadt, Tel Aviv University professor emerita and former Yad Vashem chief historian Dina Porat, historian and author Simon Sebag Montefiore, UCLA professor Judea Pearl, and Brandeis University professor emeritus Jonathan Sarna.

The signatories also include John Spencer, chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point.
6,000 Leaders across Entertainment, Academia and Public Life Unite to Reject "Genocide" Accusation Against Israel
More than 6,000 leaders and public figures from entertainment, academia, literature, government, business, religion and civic life have joined an open letter rejecting the accusation that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza and warning that the charge is fueling antisemitism around the world. The authors of the letter include Yossi Klein Halevi, Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, Rabbi Micha Odenheimer, and Professor Jonathan Karp.

The letter begins: "We the undersigned are outraged and sickened by the latest blood libel to be inflicted on the Jewish people: the lie that Israel committed 'genocide' in Gaza. We reject this accusation with contempt."

"The unprecedented combat conditions of the war - hundreds of kilometers of tunnels, thousands of boobytrapped homes - the conflating of combatants with 'journalists' and 'human rights workers,' the ratio of civilian-to-terrorist casualties, considered low for asymmetrical urban warfare, the absence of mass starvation despite repeated claims of imminent catastrophe, the warnings given to civilians before attack: All these factors were erased in the eagerness to indict Israel for genocide....Only one side intended to commit genocide, and that is Hamas."

"The massacre of October 7 has been systematically downplayed, while Israeli actions have been distorted and amplified. Israel went to war on October 8 not out of vengeance...but to break the Iranian-led siege of terror enclaves on its borders, and to restore its deterrence, without which it cannot survive in the long term in the Middle East. Thousands of rockets and missiles were fired at Israel in the weeks following the massacre, while Hamas starved and tortured 250 Israelis, some of whom were murdered in captivity."

"The bitter irony is that Israel...is the only country to face a sustained war of attempted genocide - from its inception in 1948 until today."

Amb. Deborah E. Lipstadt said: "Those who accuse Israel of genocide, a very specific crime with a legally specific definition, are fulfilling the dictum attributed to the Nazi propagandist Josef Goebbels. 'If you tell a lie and keep repeating it enough, people will eventually come to believe it.'"


Uri Kurlianchik: Understanding October 7
A lot of people don’t understand October 7.

I don’t mean from a political or a humanitarian standpoint but on a purely physical and spatial level. They cannot create a mental image of the attack, only bring up nightmarish, disjointed scenes that offer no tactical or geographical context.

All they know is that there was an attack from Gaza and a lot of people were killed or kidnapped in horrible ways. The endless atrocity videos and images tell the human story, but they provide no tactical explanation, no sense of space and time.

This is a problem because it opens the gate to absurd theories while failing to provide pro-Israel people with the tools needed to counter them. An abstraction can be twisted into any shape the narrator desires, including a shape that can be used to stab the victim instead of the attacker. So let’s make sure our understanding of October 7 is the correct size and form.

For people concerned about traumatizing content, this is a purely analytical article. It is based on the masterful British 7 October Parliamentary report chaired by Lord Roberts of Belgravia.

I will not describe any atrocities or give any gory details.

So, the first thing that’s vital to understand is that Gaza started the day in a much better position than Israel, which might seem counterintuitive since the IDF is a larger and stronger force than Hamas.

However, Hamas began the operation with thousands of attackers already organized, armed and moving according to a prepared plan. Each one of them knew exactly where he was supposed to go and what he was supposed to do.

Israel had to realize what was happening, move available forces toward hundreds of simultaneous battle sites while knowing no more than the average guy at home, then mobilize hundreds of thousands of reservists, which naturally takes hours in the best of times.

It’s equally important to understand the distances involved. This was not an invasion across an expanse of desert like some people imagine. Only a few hundred meters separated the attackers from the defenders in many places. At most, it was a couple kilometers. In some cases, they were literally a stone throw away.

An attacker from Gaza coulf be inside a home in Israel within minutes.

So let’s talk about the few hours that determined the fate of millions over the next three years.

Gaza and Israel before the war. You could walk the distance within minutes.

Why did the Arab forces that invaded Israel found the communities along the border virtually unprotected by the military?

The IDF doesn’t have tens of thousands of soldiers that can be sent anywhere at a moment’s notice. Most soldiers have specific tasks and can’t be recalled from them willy-nilly. For example, you can’t just pull forces from a base on the Lebanon border because then you’ll leave a part of the border exposed.

On the morning of October 7, the IDF force along the border with Gaza was 14 companies in four regional battalions. That is 767 soldiers, including non-combat roles. Some of them weren’t even armed. These soldiers had to face about 6,000 attackers, about two thirds of whom were heavily-armed and well-trained commandos and the rest were opportunists who saw a chance to loot and rape and wanted a piece of the action. According to Hamas, these unarmed civilians were responsible for the worst atrocities of that day since they didn’t have clear orders, only bloodlust.

That is a 7-to-1 ratio.

Notice the almost 2,200 “unarmed civilians” among the invaders.

Even where local forces weren’t overwhelmed, they were pinned down, leaving the small communities to fend for themselves until a response could be organized on the state level.

Thousands of volunteers raced to save lives and engaged the invaders almost instantly, but they couldn’t clear hundreds of homes from the occupiers by themselves, especially since they were essentially armed individuals or small groups without a clear chain of command.

The resistance they offered was sporadic and often focused on blocking roads along with the police and small number of available soldiers to prevent the invaders from moving deeper into the country.


Jonathan Sacerdoti: The world gets Netanyahu wrong – Caroline Glick explains why Israel is hated for winning
One of Netanyahu's closest advisors speaks frankly about Israel – past, present and future – and what it means to be a Jew in the 21st Century.

Why is Israel increasingly condemned abroad even as it transforms the Middle East and demonstrates its military and technological strength? Caroline Glick calls it a “diplomatic October 7” — and argues that Israel cannot make its survival dependent on international approval.

Glick, Benjamin Netanyahu’s international affairs adviser and a longtime journalist and author, joins Jonathan Sacerdoti to discuss Israel’s war, its growing diplomatic isolation and the resurgence of antisemitism across the political spectrum. She explains why she believes October 7 exposed both the dangers of Jewish vulnerability and the failure of assumptions that had shaped Israeli policy for decades.

👁‍🗨 Watch if you want to understand how one of Netanyahu’s closest advisers sees Israel’s future — and hear her challenged on leadership, accountability and the lessons of October 7.

💬 We Discuss:
🇮🇱 Israel’s resilience, economic performance and changing regional position
🌍 The “diplomatic October 7”
✡️ Why antisemitism surged after the massacre of Jews
🇬🇧 British sanctions and Europe’s relationship with Israel
🏠 Why all Israelis are 'settlers'
🛡️ The strategic case for Israeli control of the territory
🇵🇸 Rejecting the two-state solution
🗺️ Her proposal for Palestinian autonomy under Israeli sovereignty
👤 What the world misunderstands about Netanyahu
⚔️ Iran, Israeli military capabilities and Netanyahu’s willingness to act
❓ Netanyahu’s responsibility for the failures before October 7
⚖️ The dispute over a national commission of inquiry
🤝 How alliances between progressives and Islamists work
📚 Holocaust education and antisemitism beyond Nazism
🇺🇸 The history of discrimination against American Jews
🎭 Jewish humour and the power of political satire


'UNAI': It is time to rename the UN to United Nations Against Israel
For centuries, Jews were attacked because they lived among the nations.

Now the Jewish people are back in their homeland, and the hostility has followed them there.

This time, the Jewish state itself is placed in the dock.

October 7 should have been the ultimate reminder of why Israel exists: Jews were slaughtered in their homes. Families were murdered. Children, parents, and grandparents were taken hostage.

For once in Jewish history, those victims had a sovereign country capable of fighting back.

And what happened?

The world’s attention quickly shifted from the Jews who were attacked to the Jewish state defending itself.

Now return to New York.

Look at the picture again: Iran’s president enters the US and stands at the UN podium, but Israel’s prime minister comes to the same city after months of public hostility from its mayor, speaks, and leaves within hours.

Then inside the hall, country after country takes its turn attacking and condemning Israel.

Take a moment and really digest that.

The UN was supposed to represent a world that had learned from history.

Instead, one of its most consistent forms of international unity has become opposition to the one country created so that the Jewish people would never again be homeless and defenseless.

That is the eye-opener.

The nations may be divided on almost everything else. But when it comes to Israel, suddenly they know exactly how to unite.

So perhaps it is time to stop pretending the name means something else.

Call it what it has become.

UNAI, United Nations Against Israel.
Yehuda meitav: Wash your hands



UN Watch Condemns Expanded UN Blacklist of Israeli Businesses as Boycott Pressure Grows
UN Watch today condemned the UN Human Rights Office’s expansion of its Israel-only business blacklist, saying the report brands ordinary commercial activity as a human rights problem while giving boycott campaigners a list of companies to pressure.

The report released Friday adds 61 companies, bringing the list to 214 businesses in 11 countries. Five companies were removed. Newly listed firms include Israeli agricultural company ADAMA and real estate investment firm Alony Hetz.

“Read what the UN has actually put on this list,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch. “Banks, buses, water services, bakeries and food producers. These are the businesses that allow people to live ordinary lives. The UN is treating their services to Israelis as grounds for public denunciation.”

“The blacklist includes the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem within its geographic mandate. Absurdly, that means a family visiting the Western Wall, part of the holiest site in Judaism, could be impacted by sanctions on the transport that brings them into Jerusalem, the water supplied to nearby homes and businesses, and the banking services that keep those businesses operating.”

“This is not a list limited to companies alleged to have abused a Palestinian,” Neuer said. “A bus carrying passengers, a company supplying water or a bank providing loans can be listed because of where it operates.”

“Nothing in international law or practice justifies this blacklist. The UN has created no comparable company database for businesses operating in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara or Turkish-occupied Northern Cyprus. Only Israel is singled out.”

“What human rights principle says that Jews living in their ancient homeland — including the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem whose holy sites have been the object of Jewish prayer for millennia — should be denied normal transport, banking or utilities?”

“If supplying transport and utilities in a disputed territory warrants a UN blacklist, where are the lists for every other territorial dispute?” Neuer asked. “The UN demands a standard for Israel that it has never imposed elsewhere. And a double standard means discrimination.”

The consequences are no longer theoretical. As noted by Reuters, companies on the list could face boycott or divestment campaigns. Earlier this month, Britain, France and Canada announced plans to prohibit imports from Israeli settlements and take targeted action against those facilitating or profiting from them. Those governments have not said they will use this database. But the UN has now provided a public roster for anyone seeking to broaden economic pressure.

“The immediate value of this document to BDS is obvious,” Neuer said. “Its purpose is to fuel global boycotts and sanctions. It supplies names, categories of alleged harm and the UN’s seal of approval. The pressure need not stop at a shop or factory beyond the Green Line: the list includes major companies whose businesses reach across Israel and around the world.”
AG postpones tenders for E1 settlement project; Smotrich accuses her of election meddling
Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara on Sunday ordered a postponement of the tender process for the controversial E1 settlement project, citing concerns that advancing the project during the campaign could be used for electioneering. The move drew a furious reaction from far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who accused her of meddling in the vote.

Baharav-Miara ordered a monthlong postponement of the deadline for submitting bids to build 1,234 housing units in the E1 area between Jerusalem and Ma’ale Adumim, pushing the deadline beyond the October 27 national election.

Gali Baharav-Miara’s office announced the decision “to postpone the deadline for submitting bids by one month, so that this date will fall after election day” in order to “reduce concern over the tender being used for election propaganda.”

Smotrich, a major proponent of the settlement, demanded that Baharav-Miara retract her instructions, accusing her of interfering in the election campaign.

Smotrich also called on Central Elections Committee chairman Deputy Supreme Court President Noam Sohlberg to “ensure” that the attorney general does not become an “active player” in the election.

“I call on Justice Sohlberg… [to] ensure that the attorney general and her people do not turn into active players in the election campaign in an attempt to back up the left, prevent the right from forming a government, and to enable the establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger the existence of the State of Israel,” said Smotrich.

“Gali Baharav-Miara is trying to stop the construction in E1. She is interfering in the election campaign and working for [Yashar party leader] Gadi Eisenkot,” Smotrich claimed in a video posted on X. Eisenkot has criticized the timing of the E1 tenders but has not said he would cancel the project.
Israel revoking credentials of Dutch diplomats to Ramallah after settlement ban takes effect
Israel on Sunday gave Dutch diplomats serving in Ramallah seven days to return their Israeli-issued diplomatic credentials, retaliating after a Dutch ban on goods from Israeli businesses in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights went into effect.

Their diplomatic privileges granted by Israel will expire at the end of that period, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar announced on X.

“If the Netherlands wishes to continue representing its interests with the Palestinians,” Sa’ar wrote in his statement, “it may do so from Palestinian Authority territory, rather than from the territory of the State of Israel.”

“Israel will not ignore measures intended to harm it,” Sa’ar continued. “Any country that acts in a hostile and unilateral manner against Israel will lose influence and relevance in the region.”

Sa’ar also accused the Dutch government of failing to seriously address “growing antisemitism and incitement” in the country, and claimed its “anti-Israel policies” were fueling the phenomenon.

“It’s a dramatic step,” said an Israeli official of Sa’ar’s announcement.

The move won’t force the closure of the mission, but it will strip the diplomats of their ability to move freely through the West Bank, and will potentially expose them to prosecution if they meet Palestinians involved with terrorism.

The diplomatic move came days after the Netherlands began enforcing its new restrictions on settlement goods.

Passengers who recently arrived in Amsterdam on an El Al flight from Tel Aviv reported that Dutch customs officials searched their luggage for products originating in West Bank settlements or the Golan Heights.

The policy, which took effect on September 22, bars goods obtained or manufactured wholly or partly in what Dutch authorities classify as unlawful Israeli settlements. The prohibition applies not only to commercial imports but also to products carried by private travelers as souvenirs or gifts. Dutch authorities have stressed that the measure does not apply to goods produced or purchased within Israel’s internationally recognized borders.


UN's Albanese claims Jews in Nazi camps were called ‘Muslims,’ distorts history of 'antisemitism'
During the Holocaust, Jews being taken to the gas chambers in Nazi concentration camps were referred to as “the Muslims,” UN Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese claimed in an interview with the Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of State Workers (CLATE) published earlier this month.

“In fact, when they were being taken to the gas chambers, there are some accounts of life in the concentration camps saying that Jews were called ‘the Muslims,’” Albanese said.

The term Muselmann, German for “Muslim,” was used at Auschwitz and other Nazi concentration camps to refer to prisoners in a state of extreme exhaustion or suffering severe symptoms of starvation, according to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial. The term, whose etymology “has not been definitively explained,” referred to prisoners in this physical state and was not a Nazi racial classification identifying Jews as Muslims.

According to the Memorial, prisoners categorized as Muselmänner often died soon afterward or were chosen to be executed.

Albanese made the assertion that “Jews were called ‘the Muslims’” as part of a broader argument that antisemitism originally encompassed discrimination against the broader category of “Semitic peoples,” rather than Jews specifically.

Albanese overrides history of antisemitism
“When the word ‘antisemitism’ was coined, it referred to anyone who was not European and who came from the Middle East,” Albanese said.

While stating that “Jews were Semites,” she went on to assert that, because they were the “largest such group present in Europe,” the word evolved to “overlap with the concept of anti-Judaism” before later coming to refer specifically to prejudice against Jews.

“So there was a racist hatred of the non-white, of the non-pure, of the non-Christian, which then crystallized into antisemitism as hatred of Jews,” she said.

Albanese subsequently acknowledged that hatred of Jews “as Jews” exists and is “extremely serious,” but added that "it must not be confused with criticism of the State of Israel."


Netanyahu flew to the UAE to meet Emirati President Mohammed bin Zayed, source tells 'Post'
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with the president of the United Arab Emirates, Mohammed bin Zayed, on Sunday morning, N12 initially reported.

A diplomatic source later corroborated this to The Jerusalem Post.

The prime minister flew to the Emirates on a private flight and met MbZ, with the Prime Minister's Office refusing to comment on the details of the meeting, according to N12.

Netanyahu flew to Abu Dhabi on a private executive jet, the same one he used to visit the UAE during the Iran war earlier this year, the Post learned.

Netanyahu took off from Ben-Gurion Airport shortly after 12:00 p.m. and landed in Abu Dhabi at 3:10 p.m. After spending four hours in the UAE, the plane took off for the return flight to Israel at 7:10 p.m., the Post learned.

Visit comes amid controversy over reported previous meeting
The visit comes after Haaretz this month reported that MBZ had warned Netanyahu a week and a half before October 7, 2023, that Hamas was planning a major operation against Israel. The warning was not passed to Israeli intelligence agencies or the military, Haaretz reported.

The UAE has declined to comment on the Haaretz report but has said that the UAE and Israel have maintained "open and direct lines of communication" since establishing diplomatic relations in 2020. A UAE source previously told Reuters that the UAE discusses security matters with countries through the "relevant entities," but not "at the level of national leaders."

Earlier this year, the UAE denied that MBZ met with Netanyahu after the Israeli prime minister's office said in May that Netanyahu had "secretly visited" the Gulf country and met with the president.


How Turkey Is Forging a New Ring of Fire around Israel
On Aug. 18, the Israel Air Force (IAF) struck the Abu al-Duhur air base in northwestern Syria to prevent the deployment of Turkish air-defense systems on Syrian territory that could detect future Israeli airstrikes against Iran, allowing Tehran to be alerted to intercept the Israeli aircraft. The IAF was careful to conduct the strike before Turkish forces could establish a presence at the base and only acted after its message urging Syria not to allow Turkey to deploy its forces at the base went unheeded.

Behind the strike on Abu al-Duhur is a profound shift in Israeli perceptions of Turkey, due to Turkey's increasingly antagonistic posture and its support for Hamas. Following the Turkish parliament's closed-door "Israel session" in Oct. 2024, reports indicated that Ankara had come to regard Israel as a "national threat" to Turkey.

This shift in Ankara's threat perception prompted significant changes in Israel's own strategic thinking. In Jan. 2025, a commission headed by former National Security Council chief Jacob Nagel placed Turkey in the category of a "rival state with the potential to become an enemy state."

On Oct. 7, 2023, the Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a statement that avoided any explicit condemnation of Hamas. Ankara expressed concern over the "violence" and "tension" and strongly condemned the resulting "civilian casualties," without specifically referring to the Israeli civilians who had been targeted. The statement was issued while Israeli forces were still fighting to repel Hamas militants who had infiltrated Israeli territory.

On Oct. 25, 2023, Turkish President Erdogan declared that Hamas was not a terrorist organization, but rather a group of "freedom fighters." Senior Turkish officials have since held frequent meetings with Hamas leaders, receiving them with a level of ceremony and public visibility normally granted official delegations from foreign countries. On Oct. 28, at the "Great Palestine Rally" in Istanbul, which pro-government media claimed drew 1.5 million participants, Erdogan appeared wearing a scarf bearing the Turkish and Palestine Liberation Organization flags and threatened to declare Israel a war criminal.

A few weeks later, Erdogan suggested that Israel's military operations in Gaza could eventually reach Turkey's borders. He contended that Israeli policy was motivated by a religious belief that the biblical "promised land" encompasses parts of Turkey. Soon, Turkish media began echoing the president's demonization of the Jewish state. Israel was repeatedly described as a "terrorist state," "rogue state," and "virus."
US official gives ultimatum to nations in Middle East: Stop trade with Iran, or US will cut ties
A top US Treasury Department official, Jonathan Burke, visited countries across the Middle East, warning them that continuing trade with Iran would completely shut them out of trading with the US, according to a Friday Wall Street Journal report.

"You either trade with Washington, or with Iran," he told Iran's trade partners across the Middle East and Europe, according to the WSJ report.

Since the introduction of Operation Economic Outcast in August, the US has imposed significant sanctions on Iran. Regional partners, including Iraq, stopped Iranian flights to and from their countries in response to the US threatening to sanction any airport that services Iranian carriers.

The US campaign against Iran is especially effective due to the growing distrust between the Islamic Republic and the Gulf Arab states.

“We’re seeing a new urgency from our partners,” Burke told the WSJ. “They’re taking it very seriously.”

Burke visited Oman first, as it had often served as an intermediary between Tehran and the West. His visit showed officials that the US was serious about enforcing sanctions against Iran, and that refusing to cooperate could have economic consequences, Middle Eastern officials told the WSJ.

In total, Burke visited over 50 countries across the Middle East and Europe, warning them to cease relationships with Iran.

Flights from Iran to China and Russia remain open; however, within those countries, Iran-affiliated businesses and agents still face sanctions from the US.


Khamenei injured before Iran war, pulled from Tehran hospital rubble after strike, cleric says
Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei was pulled from the rubble of a hospital in Tehran in the early days of the Iran war, Ayatollah Mohsen Heidari Alekasir told the Qatari-owned Al Araby news outlet in a Thursday interview.

According to Heidari, Khamenei had been injured prior to the outbreak of the Israel-US-Iran war, though he did not elaborate on the supreme leader’s exact condition.

He also denied the claim that Iran’s former supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, had recommended his son to serve as his successor, adding that Mojtaba Khamenei’s election had nothing to do with his father’s position.

During his father’s reign, Mojtaba Khamenei held no exact official political position, Heidari told Al Araby.

Khamenei's lack of public appearance due to danger
He called Khamenei a “shadow man,” and an advisor to whom matters would occasionally be referred when his father did not have enough time to handle them.

Heidari also said Khamenei's lack of public appearances and meetings with Iran’s Assembly of Experts is due to the danger both he and the assembly members face.

It is in their “interest not to hold a large meeting as long as communication or individual meetings could be conducted secretly,” Heidari said.


Palestinian Authority Honors Terrorist Who Rammed Israeli Soldier
The Palestinian Authority has praised Mahmoud Suleiman, the terrorist who critically injured IDF reservist Neria Leiter, 39, in a car-ramming attack on Wednesday.

Leiter is the son of Israel's Ambassador to the U.S. Yechiel Leiter.

The PA praised Suleiman as a "Shahid" - a Martyr who died for Allah.

Both in its official daily and on its official radio station, the PA stressed that Suleiman, who deliberately rammed his car into Israeli soldiers at a military checkpoint, died and "ascended to the heavens" as "a Martyr."

Glorifying terrorist murderers who are killed while attacking Israelis as "Martyrs for Allah" has been standard practice in the PA for decades.


Gaza: IDF slays Nukhba Force platoon commander, additional Hamas terrorist
The Israel Defense Forces and the Israeli Security Agency (Shin Bet) announced on Sunday that they had killed the terrorist who drove the motorcycle used to abduct Noa Argamani and Avinatan Or during the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre.

Saher Nidal Latfi Sakr was slain in an airstrike in the Nuseirat area of the central Gaza Strip on Saturday. The Israel Police’s Gideonim Unit 33 also took part in the operation.

Sakr was affiliated with “global jihadist organizations” in the Strip and supplied weapons to the Hamas terrorist group during the current war, the statement said.

He recently advanced attacks on IDF troops and Israeli civilians with operatives from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, it added.

On July 28, the IDF killed a commander from the Kataeb al-Mujahideen terrorist group who also took part in the abduction of Argamani and Or.

Kataeb al-Mujahideen (“the Mujahideen Brigades”) collaborates closely with terrorists from Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s armed wing, Saraya al-Quds (“the Al-Quds Brigades”).

Argamani and Or, who were a couple at the time, were kidnapped from the Supernova music festival into Gaza. Argamani was freed along with three other hostages in a military rescue mission after 245 days in captivity, on June 8, 2024.

Or was redeemed after 738 days in Hamas captivity, on Oct. 13, 2025, as part of an agreement involving the release of Palestinian security prisoners.

Also on Sunday, the IDF and Shin Bet confirmed the targeted killing of a Hamas commander involved in holding hostages in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli Air Force killed Muhammad Hamad Muhammad Gabain, a commander in the terrorist group’s “military wing,” in an airstrike in northern Gaza on Sept. 22, according to the joint statement.

Gabain was involved in holding nine hostages during the war, the IDF said, naming them as Liri Albag, Matan Angrest, Agam Berger, Gali Berman, Ziv Berman, Omri Miran, Eitan Mor, Alon Ohel and Keith Siegel.

The IDF and Shin Bet said Gabain had recently advanced attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians as he worked to rebuild Hamas’s capabilities “in systematic violation of the ceasefire.”


Israel marks two years since Nasrallah eliminated
Israel’s Foreign Ministry on Sunday marked two years since the targeted killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, calling the Sept. 27, 2024, airstrike in Beirut a “major blow” to the terrorist group and a turning point in efforts to counter Iran’s regional strategy.

“A weakened and disarmed Hezbollah means an opportunity for a sovereign Lebanon and for a new chapter of hope between Lebanon and Israel,” the ministry said.

Earlier on Sunday, Iranian propaganda outlet Press TV published footage of Nasrallah that it claimed had not previously been aired.

The footage purportedly showed the Hezbollah leader being driven through Dahiyeh, the Iranian-backed terrorist organization’s stronghold in southern Beirut.

On Sept. 27, 2024, the Israeli Air Force dropped at least a dozen 2,000-pound bunker-buster bombs on Nasrallah’s bunker in Dahiyeh. Two unnamed Israeli officials told The New York Times at the time that more than 80 bombs were dropped over the span of several minutes during the strike, but did not confirm the type of munitions used.

A week later, an IAF strike on a bunker in the Beirut suburbs killed top Hezbollah terrorist Hashem Safieddine—a maternal cousin of Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah’s Executive Council and a leading candidate to succeed the terror chief.

Nasrallah had fallen into depression in the wake of the July 30, 2024, targeted killing of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr and the so-called Operation Grim Beeper that took thousands of Hezbollah fighters out of action in two days in September, Jawad Nasrallah, the second-oldest son of the Shi’ite terror master, revealed last year.

The heavy blows that the Jewish state inflicted on Hezbollah evoked “difficult feelings” for Nasrallah personally and harmed the morale of the group’s fighters, said Jawad.
The End of Hizbullah Leader Hassan Nasrallah
Hizbullah is still struggling to rebuild, two years after Israel targeted its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in Beirut, according to an investigation by Asharq Al-Awsat. Lebanese sources and Shi'ite clerics described how Israeli targeted killings began isolating Nasrallah long before Israel reached him personally. Every time Israel killed a field commander, Nasrallah "lost an eye that helped him see clearly," one cleric said.

These commanders each held an entire world of knowledge: weapons depots, connections on the ground, methods of operation, movement routes, operational plans, and personal relationships built over years. According to Lebanese sources, when a commander was killed, his replacement did not necessarily receive all the information the commander had possessed. Sometimes, the network he had built disappeared along with him.

Then came the pager attack. Wafiq Safa, one of Nasrallah's close associates, said that when he spoke with Nasrallah that day, "It was no longer the same Hassan Nasrallah." Nasrallah saw the wounds, heard the number of casualties, and "became a different person."

IDF Col. (res.) S. said, "We followed Nasrallah for a very long time. We knew his apartments, his wife's home, his emergency locations, and the places where he hid....In every bunker he entered, we would have killed him. We had relevant attack plans for every building."

Hizbullah lost almost all of its senior security and political leadership during the war. Israeli assessments hold that between 1/3 and 1/2 of Hizbullah's operational manpower was put out of action.


BBC reviewing inclusion of 53 terrorists on list of journalists killed in Gaza during war
The BBC is reviewing the inclusion of 53 terrorists on a list published by BBC Arabic of “journalists” killed in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas war, according to a Saturday report from The Telegraph.

According to the Telegraph, the 53 alleged journalists have been claimed by Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist organizations as martyrs after they were killed.

When war broke out after Hamas’s October 7 massacre, BBC Arabic published and continually updated a list of alleged journalists who were killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza. The list, which was most recently updated in August 2025, consists of over 180 Palestinian journalists, including the 53 terrorists.

Ten of the terrorists were described as journalists by both BBC Arabic and English-language BBC, and the other 43 only appeared on the BBC Arabic list.

Twelve of them have been removed from the casualty list of the US-based organization the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which defends the rights of journalists in combat zones.

CPJ removes individuals from list after finding terror group ties
A review conducted by the CPJ found that multiple individuals on the list belonged to terror groups and some had participated in the October 7 massacre.

Abdullah Darwish, described by BBC Arabic as a cameraman for Al-Aqsa TV, was removed from the CPJ list after photos emerged of Darwish in Hamas's Al-Qassam Brigade uniform and it was revealed that he had participated in the October 7 attacks, the Telegraph wrote.

Yaqoub Al-Barsh, described by BBC Arabic as executive director of Namaa radio, was removed from the CPJ list after he too was discovered to have been a member of Hamas's Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, which lists him as a "martyr" online, according to the report.

An additional 20 out of the 53 alleged journalists were found to have obituaries published by terrorist organizations, including Mohammed Al-Zaq, whose obituary was written by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad; Mustafa Bakir, described by Hamas as a field commander; and Abdullah Iyad Baris, described by Hamas as a "knight" in its Khan Yunis Brigade, among others, the Telegram wrote.

The remaining 21 names listed as journalists appeared in pictures online carrying weapons and wearing military uniforms, including Ahmed Samir Muhammad Washah, who appeared in a post being trained to use a grenade launcher, and Amr Abu Odeh, who was hailed as a hero of the Al-Qassam Brigades, according to the Telegram.


ABC caught listing Hamas terrorists as Gazan ‘journalists’
The ABC [Australia] lists as journalists the same terror-linked Gazans the BBC in the UK is now reviewing, including 22 people the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) struck off its own register for "engagement in combat". The national broadcaster now faces the same test over two charts of its own.

When asked for comment on the matter an ABC spokesmen told Rebel News:
"The ABC is aware of the reports. Nothing further to add at this time."

The BBC moved after the Telegraph reported on 26 September that 53 people the corporation had counted among journalists killed in Gaza had ties to Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) or other armed groups. In a statement to the paper, the BBC said: "In light of the CPJ's June 2026 update, we are looking at those included in the piece." It has already quietly deleted one name, Ibrahim Sheikh Ali, from its Arabic-language roll of 179 Gaza dead.

The ABC has made no such move. Its own roll of "Palestinian journalists and media workers killed in Gaza since October 7, 2023", published on 27 August 2025 in an article by Maddy Morwood and Lewis Wiseman with wires, credited "ABC News: Maddy Morwood", names at least 171 of the BBC's 179.

Among those same journalists are 22 of the 24 BBC-listed names that CPJ has since removed for taking part in combat. The New York-based press freedom group took off seven before June 2026 and a further 17 in a review it completed on 24 September.

The ABC lists "Abdallah Darwish, photojournalist for Al Aqsa TV", whom the Telegraph reports joined the 7 October massacre alongside Hamas's Qassam Brigades. It lists "Mustafa Bakir, journalist and cameraman for Al Aqsa TV", whom Hamas itself described as a Rafah Brigade field commander, according to the Telegraph. It lists "Yacoub Bursh, director general of Namaa Radio", who the paper says appears on a Qassam Brigades "martyrs" page. CPJ has removed all three for combat.

The ABC cannot say it was never warned. On 27 December 2024, its Middle East correspondent Matthew Doran reported that five staff of Al Quds Today Television had been killed in an Israeli strike. His story carried the Israeli military's charge that they "were Islamic Jihad operatives posing as journalists", and went further: "One local journalist has told the ABC that Al Quds Today Television is associated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad."

Eight months later the ABC put all five on its roll of dead journalists anyway. Faisal Abu Al-Qumsan, Fadi Hassouna, Ibrahim Al-Sheikh Ali, Ayman Al-Jadi and Mohammed Al-Ladda each appear as a "journalist for the satellite channel Al-Quds Today", with no mention of what the broadcaster's own correspondent had been told. Sheikh Ali is the very name the BBC has now pulled from its list, and the ABC still carries him.


Hamas leader: Gaza roadmap we agreed to includes establishment of Palestinian state
Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya said on Saturday that Hamas agreed last year to a roadmap that ultimately includes the establishment of a Palestinian state.

In an interview with Qatar’s Al-Araby channel, Hayya was asked about Israel’s demand that Hamas disarm as part of the Gaza ceasefire, but did not directly say whether the terror group would agree to disarm.

“We agreed on a draft, a roadmap that we are prepared to implement — it is a complete package. It begins with completing the first phase of the ceasefire and continues through to the establishment of a Palestinian state, including the issue of weapons. It must be implemented as a package,” he told the channel.

Last October, Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire to end two years of fighting that began with the terror group’s October 7, 2023, massacre of southern communities, including an exchange of the remaining hostages held by the terror group with Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

Along with the ceasefire, US President Donald Trump unveiled a 20-point plan for Gaza that states the conditions “may” be in place for “a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood” while “Gaza re-development advances and when the PA [Palestinian Authority] reform program is faithfully carried out.”

Israel is vehemently opposed to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Hamas accuses Israel of consistently violating the ceasefire with military strikes in Gaza, while Israel accuses the terror group of repeatedly breaching the truce by continuing its efforts to rebuild its military capabilities, saying they justify the strikes.

After months of negotiations, Hamas agreed to the US-led Board of Peace’s disarmament plan on July 30, but its implementation has stalled amid Israel’s rejection of the proposal. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted that the Israel Defense Forces will only withdraw once the terror group has been completely disarmed, rejecting the gradual and reciprocal framework envisioned in the proposal.

Board of Peace officials believe Netanyahu is refusing to cooperate due to the upcoming election on October 27 and acknowledge little progress is likely before then.

In his interview on Saturday, Hayya also made an indirect reference to the Palestinian parliamentary elections scheduled to take place in about two months, in which Hamas isn’t expected to officially participate on its own as things currently stand.

He said Hamas agreed to participate as part of a “national coalition,” without elaborating on what form that participation would take, and added that postponing the elections would constitute interference in the issue of internal Palestinian reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas.

Hayya also claimed that the October 7 attack, in which thousands of Hamas-led terrorists slaughtered some 1,200 people in southern Israel and abducted 251, was “a response to the criminal aggression of the occupation. October 7 did not create the occupation. It happened when the Palestinian cause was at its lowest point, and the world had forgotten it.”
The Brink: 'I saw the Houthis up close...they’re a danger to Europe' Middle Expert Warns
In this episode of The Brink, Jake is joined by Middle East security expert Michael Knights to explore how the Houthis have grown from a ragtag Yemeni militia into one of Iran’s most heavily armed regional partners. Drawing on his firsthand experience in Yemen, Michael describes the Houthis’ treatment of civilians, their military tactics and the Iranian support behind their rise. The conversation also examines the latest Houthi offensive, the threat to global shipping and Saudi oil infrastructure, and why Michael believes Europe could increasingly find itself in their sights.

Chapters
00:00 Inside The War Against The Houthis
02:31 From Hezbollah Sympathiser To Houthi Expert
07:20 Why The Houthis Are More Than Underdogs
09:36 The Houthis, Iran & Ethnic Supremacy
12:42 Booby-Trapped Schools, Wells & Homes
14:40 How The Houthis Control Yemen Through Hunger
17:01 What It’s Like To Fight The Houthis
22:04 Who Are The Houthis & Where Did They Come From?
30:00 How The Houthis Learned From Hezbollah
35:33 The Houthis’ Missiles, Money & Iranian Backing




Iran's Araghchi dismisses, smiles at reporter's question on regime's execution, torture of Iranians
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi smiled in response to a question asked by a reporter on Friday regarding his regime's execution, torture, and imprisonment of Iranian citizens.

Fox News Digital reporter Efrat Lachter posted footage of the interaction to her X/Twitter account, showing Araghchi smiling and ultimately dismissing her question.

In the post, she wrote: "Tried to ask Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi how he can call himself 'a victim of terrorism' while his government has executed more than 900 Iranians this year, and while thousands of others have been tortured and imprisoned?"

"What, exactly, did he find amusing?" Lachter asked in her post.

Her question pertained to comments on Wednesday by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian during the leader's speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York, where he accused US President Donald Trump of "bullying" the Islamic Republic.

“The US president described us as terrorists,” he said. “We have been the victims of terrorism.”

Araghchi ahead of UNGA: Israel given too much freedom
On Monday, Araghchi accused Israel of being given "a completely free hand to do whatever it wishes" while speaking to reporters after arriving in New York ahead of the UNGA, noting that Iran's goal in attending the event was to "defend the legitimacy, rights and interests of the Iranian people."

Araghchi further denounced other countries for not condemning alleged "atrocities" committed in Iran by the United States and Israel.

"In the face of the atrocities that occurred - where 168 innocent children were deliberately massacred in a single instant - these countries do not even issue a simple condemnation," he said.


Calls for arms embargo and genocide claim on Israel fail to make Labour Conference priorities
Delegates at the Labour Party conference have decisively rejected making Israel a priority topic of debate, turning down efforts by hard-left and pro-Palestine activists to spotlight calls for a full arms embargo and allegations of genocide in Gaza.

Jewish News understands the Middle East finished a distant eighth in this year’s Priorities Ballot at Labour’s annual conference.

CLPs and party affiliates instead voted to prioritise issues such as insourcing and public ownership, opportunities for young people, artificial intelligence in the interests of working people, rebuilding the economy, public services, and reindustrialising communities.

Labour sources confirmed that pro-Palestine campaigners made significant efforts to push the topic onto the priorities list, submitting motions that mentioned genocide and called for Andy Burnham to support a full arms embargo on Israel.

The result is seen as a strong endorsement of the approach taken by Burnham and Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband, who have adopted a tougher stance on Israel while continuing to support Israel and a two-state solution.

This shift in Labour’s position on Israel appears to have convinced delegates that domestic issues were more pressing topics for the conference.

The outcome is also a setback for organisations such as the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which have frequently claimed that Labour members support their hardline position on Israel and Palestine.
Ban academic who called Oct 7 ‘exhilarating’ from coming to UK, says Philp
Shabana Mahmood has been urged to ban an Australian academic who described the Oct 7 terror attacks on Israel as “exhilarating” for the “glimmer of hope” they raised for Gaza.

Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, has written to Ms Mahmood, saying that Randa Abdel-Fattah should not be allowed to come to the UK on the grounds that her “presence is not conducive to the public good”.

Ms Abdel-Fattah is due to visit Britain between Oct 3 and 9 for a series of public appearances promoting her book, Discipline, which coincides with the third anniversary of the attacks in which at least 1,195 people, including children, were killed.

Mr Philp said that in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, Ms Abdel-Fattah described the events as Palestinians “daring to escape Israel’s prison”.

She subsequently used an image featuring a paraglider as her Facebook profile picture and defended it as representing “a moment of freedom”.

Hamas used paragliders and motorcycles to mount the attack on the Supernova music festival and villages adjacent to the Gaza strip.

A year later, in October 2024, reflecting on Gaza and hope, Ms Abdel-Fattah wrote that “there was a glimmer on October 7” that was “palpable, real and exhilarating”.

During an appearance on Sky News Australia on Oct 31, 2023, she refused to describe Hamas as a terrorist organisation. Hamas is proscribed in its entirety as a terrorist organisation in the UK.

Discussing allegations of mass sexual violence on Oct 7, she argued that the claims had spread because of racist assumptions and described the idea of an “Arab bestial savage predatory male” as a “ludicrous fantasy”.

On the day of the attack, she criticised the characterisation of Palestinian “anti-colonial resistance as terrorism” and described Palestinian relatives as feeling “pride”.

She later described demonstrations immediately following Oct 7 as marking “the escape from the hostage situation in Gaza” and “breaking free”.
Mehdi Hasan’s hypocritical Ed Sheeran attack reveals his own double standard on Israel
“He just keeps digging his hole... Hypocrite,” Mehdi Hasan posted this week, accusing Ed Sheeran of staying conveniently silent on Gaza after speaking up for Ukraine.

The comparison itself is telling: Ukraine is an unprovoked invasion by a foreign power; Gaza is a defensive war Israel didn’t start, against a terrorist organization that murdered 1,200 people in around eight hours during the October 7 massacre. Treating the two as interchangeable moral tests is already a distortion. But set that aside – by Hasan’s own hypocrisy standard, no one has more to answer for than he does.

Let’s start with the record. In 2009, years before he became a cable news fixture, Hasan gave a series of speeches comparing non-Muslims to “animals” and linking homosexuality to “sexual deviance.” He apologized in 2019, calling it “dumb offensive ranty stuff” from his twenties. He turned 30 a few months later, but sure, people change.

The pattern of minimizing bigotry when it’s politically or ideologically convenient never really stopped. A decade later, in 2019, when Rep. Ilhan Omar’s 2012 tweet resurfaced – “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel” – Hasan defended her on air, saying she’d “maybe unwittingly echoed tropes” and insisting she hadn’t said anything about Jews.

That’s a generous read of language that does exactly what classic antisemitism has done for ages: cast Jews as secretly controlling perception itself, “hypnotizing” the world into not seeing supposed “evil.”

The mind-control framing isn’t incidental – it’s the mechanism explaining why the “evil” goes unpunished, the whole function this conspiracy theory genre has served for centuries. A sitting member of Congress reaching for it got recast by Hasan as an innocent slip. He has never extended that charity to Israel or its defenders.

The Israel-Hamas War exposed the pattern at scale. In October 2023, Hasan implied Israel was responsible for the explosion at Gaza’s Al Ahli hospital. American intelligence would soon confirm the blast came from a misfired Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket, exactly as Israel said within hours. Hasan never corrected the record or apologized for amplifying the accusation while it was doing maximum damage.

There’s also a credibility problem that should have ended his career as a serious journalist rather than launched a media company. In 2024, Hasan appeared in a video with Greta Thunberg and others reading tributes to alleged Palestinian journalists killed in Gaza. One of the men he eulogized, Hamza al-Dahdouh, was identified by the IDF – using documents recovered from Gaza command centers – as a dual-hatted Palestinian Islamic Jihad operative, not merely a journalist caught in crossfire. Hasan, who claims a brand based on “evidence-based” journalism and grilling guests over sourcing, didn’t apply that scrutiny to who he chose to memorialize.

Worse still is the line that should have put to rest any claim that Hasan’s commentary is principled anti-war advocacy rather than a singular fixation on Israel. Responding to journalist Eli Lake, Hasan argued the “Gaza genocide” was in some ways worse than prior genocides, including Rwanda and, in his words, even the Holocaust, because the perpetrators of those atrocities were eventually “shunned” and “de-radicalised,” while Israelis, in his telling, are not. He deleted the post after immediate, widespread backlash – Piers Morgan among those, asked if he’d “lost his mind. Yet Hasan never withdrew the argument, saying only he’d phrased it “clumsily.”

The comparison wasn’t just inflammatory – it was intellectually and morally bankrupt. Hasan’s casualty figure comes from Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry, a tyrannical party to the conflict whose methodology has drawn significant scrutiny. Even at face value, it doesn’t distinguish civilians from combatants, nor separate deaths from Israeli strikes, Palestinian rocket misfires, and Hamas’s own executions and purges. Before the war, this ministry counted roughly 9,000 natural deaths a year – a figure the wartime total doesn’t appear to exclude.

Based on that rightfully disputed figure, Hasan placed Israel’s conduct alongside, and beyond, history’s most infamous genocides: the Holocaust, where six million Jews were exterminated in under four years, and Rwanda, where roughly 800,000 Tutsi were murdered in about one hundred days – invoking humanity’s worst crimes in service of a political argument.

Here’s where Hasan’s hypocrisy becomes structural, not incidental. Hasan spent eight years, from 2012 to 2020, as a paid presenter for Al Jazeera English – a network wholly owned and funded by the Qatari government.


Facts Optional, Context Absent in Guardian Op-Ed
The Guardian gave New York congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier space to call Netanyahu a war criminal and invoke Martin Luther King in the process. What her piece leaves out, October 7th, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iran's own record, tells the real story.

The Guardian recently published a truly disgusting opinion piece by New York Congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier entitled “I was arrested protesting Netanyahu’s New York visit. Here’s why we took a stand.”

When Ms. Chevalier won her primary, I wrote about her anti-Israel and antisemitic rhetoric as well as her outright hostility to the United States and Western civilization more broadly.

Based on her ideological background and past rhetoric and actions, the completely dishonest and inflammatory nature of her piece shouldn’t be surprising, nor is The Guardian giving a platform to such drivel. However, even given the author and publication, some of what was included, and excluded, was a bit shocking.

Let’s start by her invoking Dr. Martin Luther King in an anti-Israel screed. For most Americans, Dr. King is an icon. I made a point of all my children watching a video of his “I Have a Dream” speech at a young age, because of the incredible way he described the dream of equality.

I find a racist Congressional candidate using his name to smear Israel particularly offensive. It also ignores the most basic fact about Dr. King: he was an unapologetic Zionist. He defended Israel and Zionism and called out rhetoric like that of Ms. Chevalier, Mayor Mamdani and others as antisemitic. He famously stated “When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews. You’re talking antisemitism.” Using his name to promote an anti-Zionist and antisemitic agenda requires an incredible lack of self-awareness, lack of shame, and lack of belief in your readers’ knowledge of history.

Ms. Chevalier also goes on to falsely list many of Israel’s “crimes,” which she claims are personally those of the Prime Minister while saying nothing of the region surrounding it.

October 7? Hamas? Hezbollah? The Houthis? None worthy of a mention.

Iran? Only mentioned to point out that Iranian families are not enemies. But the mullah regime and its numerous crimes against humanity, attacks on Israel, the United States and the broader region? Its mass slaughter of its own people? Not worth a mention.

Based on Ms. Chevalier’s understanding of the situation, the Middle East is a tranquil and peaceful region. The only exception to that rule is Benjamin Netanyahu, who, with the help and funding of the Biden and Trump administrations, decided one day to just start killing civilians for sport.

And not only is the U.S. funding what she absurdly calls a genocide, but she also bizarrely claims that funding to Israel is responsible for poverty in her district. She also doesn’t seem to understand which parts of the government fund what projects, because she claims foreign military assistance is why certain state and city-funded programs aren’t sufficient.

Ms. Chevalier is used to being just an angry, hate-filled activist. She certainly has been prolific in that regard.
Calif. Dem House hopeful endorsed by activist who said ‘evil Jews run the world’
Adina Flores, an activist and a self-proclaimed “civil rights” advocate with a colorful social media presence, is endorsing Eric Jones, the Democratic candidate for Congress in California’s 4th Congressional District.

The endorsement itself, which focuses on Jones’ promises to combat women’s sexual exploitation, is nothing out of the ordinary.

But Flores’ Facebook, Instagram and Substack pages are full of eccentric content that frames political issues as a conflict between race, sexual orientation and secretive sources of influence.

The endorsement raises questions for Jones, who has met with Flores multiple times according to social media clips, about whether he agrees with Flores’ views.

In one video, posted to Facebook, Flores stated she believed part of California, Sonoma County, was run by Jews.

“But we’re literally run by the gay Jewish mafia — the Zionists in Sonoma County. The Jews still run the world. That’s where we’re at,” Flores said. “All our money gets sent to Israel, but nobody wants to talk about that.”

“Evil Jews run the world through Masonic Lodges,” Flores said in an August Instagram post.

“Santa Rosa City Schools is always recruiting for little gay communists. Help save public school enrollment decline by sending your child off to liberal prison indoctrination centers,” she said in another post earlier this year.

When asked about Flores’ comments online, Jones’ campaign said he condemns prejudice towards the Jewish community.


Shameful, immoral hypocrites: An open letter to the Irish soccer team
An open letter to the Irish soccer team:
So you're going to wear black armbands in your match against Israel in Debrecen on Sunday?

I say good, wear them.

Wear them, because you deserve to be marked out.

Marked out in front of the world as the shameful, immoral hypocrites you are.

But you have forgotten something. The black armbands are incomplete. They are, of course, missing the swastika.

Don't worry, you still have time to sew them on. You can thank me later.

After all, don't forget your national side proudly played the Nazis in 1936 at Dalymount Park.

They didn’t consider protesting then. They even performed the Nazi salute in Germany in 1939 when everyone knew exactly what the Nazis stood for.

Today you are their worthy heirs, and you have not let them down. You share the same moral standards. You wouldn’t know that Debrecen’s almost entire Jewish community - nearly 10,000 people - was murdered during the Holocaust, but now you do; don’t let that prick your conscience while you’re running around with your little black armbands against the one and only Jewish state.

Hitler would be proud of you.

'You are totally ignorant'
Your brains are truly in your feet, because they're certainly not in your heads. You claim to be protesting against Israel's actions in Gaza, but let's face it, what your entire side knows about what's going on could fit on a postage stamp, because you are totally ignorant.

Where were you on October 7? Where were you when 1,200 innocent Israelis - including soccer player Lior Asulin, 43, murdered at the Nova festival, and soccer player Yaron Zohar, just 19, murdered fighting Hamas terrorist invaders - were slaughtered? I don't remember seeing any comparable gesture from your team for the Israelis massacred then.

So, your protest is disgusting, performative, and a national disgrace. You are cowards, and you belong in the dustbin of history, like your predecessors.

Am Yisrael chai.
After players vote, Ireland decides to play soccer match with Israel; 1 player withdraws
Ireland’s national team said Saturday it would play its planned soccer match against Israel in Debrecen, Hungary, after “a significant majority” of its players voted to move forward with the game, despite growing pressure to boycott two upcoming fixtures and despite a member of the team saying he will not play in them.

The game in Debrecen is to be Israel’s “home” game against Ireland as part of the Nations League, and will be played with a limited number of spectators.

Ireland postponed their pre-match press conference ahead of the game in Hungary, and their training session was also delayed. This was to allow talks to continue between Irish players, coaching staff and officials, after one player, later revealed to be backup goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu, announced his intention to withdraw from the squad.

“Representing my country means everything to me. I have the utmost respect for every single one of my team mates, the Manager, his staff and the Irish people,” Bazunu said in a statement.

“However I have reached a decision that I have not taken lightly. I am a man of strong faith and try my best to be a person of character and principle therefore I feel it would be wrong to participate in the upcoming fixtures against Israel.

“My decision is based purely upon my personal belief that the killing of innocent people is wrong. It is important to note that my stance is not in opposition of the Israeli people or the Jewish community but against the atrocities in the region.”

David Courell, head of the Football Association of Ireland, told a press conference on Saturday that “this morning… a player expressed their discomfort with fulfilling this fixture to the head coach and indicated their intent to withdraw from the squad.”

The player’s position led to some four hours of deliberations within the team and with management, at the end of which a vote was held.

“An extensive conversation took place, where ultimately the consensus from the group was to travel to Hungary,” Courell said.

Courell said the players plan to wear black armbands “in recognition of all lives lost in the conflict,” and will not participate in elements of the pre-match ceremony — indicating they may not shake hands with the Israeli team.

Hailing the decision, the Israel Football Association said, “What pleases us today is that soccer has won.”


Irish player of Israeli descent could retire from international soccer after match against Israel
Irish-Israeli soccer player Finn Azaz, who is part of the Irish national team and is due to play Israel on Sunday, is reportedly debating retiring from international soccer following the tensions amid his team's preparation to play Israel, Irish sports site The 42 reported on Sunday.

According to reports by The Irish Independent, Azaz made an "impassioned speech" during an Irish team meeting to decide what to do about the upcoming fixture, and whether the squad would forfeit the match, play it with a statement, or without one.

Azaz has not made any public statements regarding his international career or the situation with the fixture against Israel, with The 42 report mentioning that the suggestion of retirement could have been raised by the Football Association of Ireland (FAI).

The player has always been vocal about his Israeli ancestry, even commenting on it after his debut for Ireland's under-21 team, saying that he qualifies to play for Israel because his mother is Israeli, but that his dream was to play for Ireland, where his father is from.

In June 2025, Azaz also gave an interview with Sunday Times Ireland, where he spoke about his family's relationship with Israel, revealing that his grandmother served in the IDF.

"My grandmother was a very special and unique woman. She was in the Israeli army as a general, and then she came to England and built an extremely successful business by herself," he said.


Irish soccer team refuses handshakes, bows heads during Israeli anthem, wins the match 3-0
All of Ireland’s national soccer team bowed their heads as Israel’s anthem was played ahead of their UEFA Nations League match on Monday, and players refused to shake hands or exchange pennants, with Ireland beating Israel 3-0 at the near-empty Debrecen stadium in Hungary.

Israel’s delegation explained earlier in the day that the Irish team had informed UEFA authorities that its members would not shake hands with their Israeli opponents, and that UEFA accepted this.

Irish captain Dara O’Shea approached the center of the field for the pre-match talk with his hands still firmly clasped behind his back. O’Shea shook hands with the referee and his assistants, but there was no attempt to shake the hand of Israel captain Manor Solomon.

The Irish players wore black armbands, as promised, in what their delegation claimed was a mark of respect for “all lives lost” in the Israel-Hamas conflict in Gaza.

The game, in which Israel were the nominal hosts, had been in doubt earlier in the week until Ireland’s players voted overwhelmingly to fulfill the fixture, despite pressure from back home to boycott the match.

Only one player, backup goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu, pulled out, saying “it would be wrong to participate” in either this match or the return fixture in Serbia on October 4, “based purely upon my personal belief that the killing of innocent people is wrong.”

The Irish federation did not reserve any tickets for fans to attend the match, and public broadcaster RTÉ featured no studio panel and no analysis, and didn’t sell any advertising around its coverage.

The game unfolded in a subdued atmosphere reminiscent of the latter stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, when attendance restrictions left stadiums largely empty.

There were a few hundred Israeli supporters and a handful of Irish fans in the ground, and the shouts of coaches and players could be clearly heard throughout.

The small group of Israeli fans in the stadium were seen waving flags and sporting scarves in the colors of the national team and their favored local teams. One fan could be seen holding the Druze flag.


Portland coffee shop announces free cafe in Gaza, then drops plans one week later
A Portland coffee shop announced one week ago that it would be opening a free cafe for Palestinians in Gaza. After backlash for not sufficiently centering Palestinians on the ground, the coffee shop has canceled its plans.

Heretic Coffee Co., a nonprofit cafe in the quirky Oregon city, offers free food and drinks to “anyone who walks into our doors and orders the ‘SNAP breakfast.’ No questions asked, no proof needed,” according to its website.

(SNAP is a reference to U.S. federal government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly and colloquially still known as the Food Stamp Program, or simply food stamps.)

On Sept. 18, Heretic announced its plans to build a coffee shop in Gaza. “It will feed Palestinians every day for free, no questions asked,” the shop stated on Instagram.

The cafe accused Israel of “genocide,” adding that, in Gaza, “More than just their lives have been stripped away. Their culture, places of rest and businesses that gave them comfort and peace have been taken away. We’re hoping we can do what we can to change that.”

Heretic stated it would be partnering with Humanite Peace Collective, a volunteer group, to build a coffee shop “from the rubble of war.” It sought to fundraise $100,000 for the project.

The planned name? The Dept. of Peace.

The comments section was not pleased.

“I don’t think we need a coffee shop in Gaza,” one person wrote. “We are looking for a chance at life. I cannot even feed my cat properly and have to share my family’s food with it.”

“Why not just give money to folks on the ground in Gaza who are already doing that work?” wrote another. “People are dying and experiencing immense trauma, they don’t need a coffee shop run by U.S. citizens.”

Others asked why Heretic wasn’t working with existing groups in Gaza. “They are already there and have been feeding their own people quite well and could use the support, not development on their land by foreign interests,” one respondent wrote, tagging Gaza Soup Kitchen.

The criticism continued. “I"m almost positive there are Palestinians who would love the money to open a cafe to feed their own community,” and “Why Humanite? Why not the Sameer Project? Or other Gazan Palestinian groups on the ground there doing the work now?”

One commenter even criticized Humanite for referring to the conflict as “a ‘war’ between Hamas and Israel.”

“It’s giving liberal Christian missionary efforts,” one person wrote.

Hundreds of comments and one week later, Heretic updated its social media. “We have been working behind the scenes to sort through the responses, concerns and frustrations that have arisen following the announcement of our collaboration with Humanite Peace Collective,” an unnamed shop representative stated. “We have been paying attention, and taking the time to make sure we respond appropriately.

“To get to the point, we’ve decided to move away from this project and collaboration with Humanite. There have been valid concerns, and I’d like to take a minute to address them,” the representative wrote, pointing to poor framing of the initial announcement, not including the “Palestinian team with headshot and bios” and not getting feedback from “our community first before we went forward.”

According to the post, Humanite will continue the project without Heretic, using the $40,000 already raised by the online fundraising campaign.


Israeli envoy ‘ashamed’ of German town’s decision to ban memorial stones for Nazis’ victims
The International March of the Living on Friday called on the German town of Heidenau to reverse its decision to ban installations of Stolpersteine memorial stones for Holocaust victims, saying that its implication is to continue the effort to “erase them from history.”

A Stolpersteine is a four-inch concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the names and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution.

The decision made on Thursday by the council of the German town, situated in the state of Saxony near Dresden, must be a “wake-up call,” the March of the Living said. The nonprofit organization is dedicated to bringing people from around the world to Poland and Israel to study the Holocaust.

“The Nazis murdered Jews and tried to erase their names, their communities and their place in history. Eighty-one years after the end of the war, elected officials in Germany have voted to prevent more of those names from appearing on the streets where the victims lived,” the statement read.

The organization noted that similar attempts are being made elsewhere in Germany, which raises the question: “Are political interests being allowed to push the memory of Nazi victims out of public life?”

Israeli Ambassador to Berlin Ron Prosor wrote a German-language post on X, saying that he is “ashamed.”

“In Germany in the year 2026, a city council decides to no longer allow any new Stolpersteine. Every person has a name. A world. A story. It is precisely this memory that is being erased here. Whoever erases the victims from the past erases the past itself,” he said.

“Germany needs a clear firewall against antisemitism—from the right, from the left, and from Islamist circles. Without exception.”
Germany selects Munich for Olympics bid; would be first in country since disastrous 1972 Games
Munich was on Saturday selected ahead of the Cologne/Rhine-Ruhr region by the German Olympic Committee (DOSB) as part of a bid to host the 2036, 2040 or 2044 Summer Games.

The decision was announced by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in the south-western spa town of Baden-Baden. Launched as a race between four candidates, the DOSB was given a choice between two after Berlin withdrew on Thursday and after Hamburg pulled out in May.

If Munich is chosen by the International Olympic Committee, the games would mark the first in Germany since the 1972 Summer Games, which are notorious for the Palestinian terror attack on the Israeli delegation in the Olympic Village that resulted in the deaths of 11 Israeli athletes.

Since then, Germany has launched seven unsuccessful bids to host. Before 1972, Germany last hosted the Games in 1936, holding both the summer and winter events under Nazi leadership in Berlin and the southern resort town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, respectively. If the city were to host in 2036, it would mark the centennial of those Games.

“We’re thinking about all of Germany,” Bavarian state premier Markus Soeder said on stage after the announcement of Munich’s successful bid.

“The Cologne bid made things really tough for us and pretty tense until the end,” he said. “I want that we work jointly to bring the games to Germany. It is a chance at something historic and we want to give everything to present ourselves as a united country — from north to south and from east to west.

“That’s our goal and what we’re working towards. Thank you for the trust,” he added.

The Munich bid centers on the Olympic Park in the north of the city. Built for the 1972 Games, it has undergone extensive renovations in recent years.

In a statement issued moments after the announcement, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz congratulated Munich.

“Germany has an Olympic candidate. Munich will enter the race on our behalf, and I warmly congratulate the state capital and the Free State of Bavaria on this,” he said.

“Now, together with our Olympic candidate, we eagerly look forward to this major event… Germany is ready for the Olympics.”

In order to shore up support for the bid, Munich held a referendum in the autumn of 2025. Almost two-thirds (66.4 percent) of voters cast their ballot in support of hosting the games, on a turnout of 44 percent.
Italy charges three adults, 14 minors with neo-Nazi, white supremacist activity-linked offenses
Three adults and 14 minors were charged with training for terrorist activities, incitement to commit hate crimes, and propaganda after an Italian General Investigations and Special Operations Division (DIGOS) investigation into online neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups, the Italian state police announced on Friday.

DIGOS officers in multiple areas of Italy executed search warrants on the suspects' computers and belongings. They uncovered bladed weapons, paraphernalia with Nazi symbolism, and electronic devices used to spread propaganda.

Italian authorities launched the investigation after monitoring online channels linked to accelerationist, white supremacist, and neo-Nazi ideologies.

According to the police, the suspects actively participated in two groups on a private social network.

Suspects engaged in Holocaust denial, discussed white supremacist attacks
One group was active chatrooms tied to the “New European Order,” a movement based on Nazi propaganda, white supremacy, and antisemitism. The chatrooms focused on Holocaust denial, Nazi ideology, and the dissemination of instructions for making explosive devices.

The other suspects engaged in online communities for the Italian Fascist Front, a group that promotes hatred and violence towards Jewish people, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community, according to the DIGOS investigation.

In the online groups and chatrooms, the suspects praised Adolf Hitler and discussed details of attacks carried out by white supremacist extremists, including weapons and tactics used.

The suspects also shared instructions for handling guns and knives, as well as manuals for making and detonating homemade explosives designed to maximize lethal impact.


Nine Israeli innovations that helped shape the world, from Waze to the Iron Dome
Jews have been victimized more than any other people in history, yet have remained optimistic, idealistic, and dedicated to helping build a better world. The Jews’ contribution to the world is staggering – and up to 1948, all without political power, a country, or a shared language of everyday speech.

When the State of Israel was founded, it was a barren country with no natural resources, little water, and more than half of its landmass desert.

The only advantage the new country had going for it was the strength of will and natural creativity of its people.

Zionism challenged Jews to take the initiative, and almost eight decades later, Israeli innovations are improving the world and enriching lives everywhere. Here are nine of them:

1. Solar water heater
In the early 1950’s, Dr. Zvi (Harry) Tabor, an Israeli physicist from England, convinced that solar energy was the surest and cleanest solution to the fact that Israel has no oil of its own, invented the Tabor Selective Surface – thermal panels that could store the heat of the sun even when it didn’t shine.

Eventually, he integrated this technology with a water boiler to create the modern solar water heater, which earned Tabor the Weizmann Prize for Exact Sciences in 1956.

Today, 95% of Israeli households have solar-heated water tanks based on the Tabor Selective Surface. With over 1.4 million units installed, Israel maintains the highest per capita use of solar-powered water heaters in the world.

Approximately 122 million solar hot water systems were in operation globally at the end of 2022.

Besides simple residential units, these systems included solar power plants in remote locations not hooked up to the grid and even the solar panels built in California’s Mojave Desert, the largest solar power installation in the world – all based on Tabor’s work.

Dr. Zvi Tabor was awarded the Israeli President’s Medal of Distinction in 2014 for “being a symbol of Israeli innovation and for inspiring generations of scientists and entrepreneurs in the field of solar energy.”

2. Drip irrigation
In the early 1960s, Simcha Blass, the chief engineer and one of the founders of the Mekorot water company (established in 1937 and now Israel’s national water carrier), developed and patented the drip irrigation concept.

Friction and pressure loss allow water to drip slowly at regular intervals to the roots of plants, providing a sustainable solution to the challenges of water scarcity and climate uncertainty.

Increased water-use efficiency (up to 50% savings) and crop yield (up 30-50%), together with decreased fertilizer loss and soil erosion, have been instrumental in transforming barren deserts in the Middle East, North Africa, India, and parts of Australia into productive agricultural lands.

Netafim, the company that Blass established over 60 years ago, now operates in 110 countries and contributes to food security and economic growth for farmers across more than 15 million hectares worldwide.





 




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