From Ian:
Resilient and vulnerable: Jewish world in 2025
Vulnerable. That’s the word that defines world Jewry as 2025 draws to a close.
In Israel, exuberance follows stunning military victories over Iran and Hezbollah, and the joyful rescue of hostages. The return to normal has reawakened the “anyone but Bibi” camp, hoping again to unseat the prime minister. Yet Israelis remain uneasy. Hamas still lurks, armed and dangerous, in parts of the Gaza Strip; Iran continues its ballistic-missile program with openly hostile intent; and Hezbollah struggles to rebuild.
Many worry about U.S. President Donald Trump’s impulsiveness and whether he might pressure Israel politically, even though, if he were to run for prime minister, he would likely win in a landslide, even against Netanyahu. Despite the optimism, Israel remains deeply traumatized by war. Life in Tel Aviv pulses at full speed again, but beneath the surface is a yearning for quiet—and for a more peaceful normalcy. Israelis dream of vacations now that low-cost airlines like Wizz Air promise to make Ben-Gurion International Airport a global hub.
For Jews in Australia, the “Lucky Country,” that historic sense of security has been shattered. From the arrival of eight Jewish convicts on the First Fleet in 1788, Jews in Australia felt relatively safe—until now. In the past two years, that security has turned to fear. The Australian government’s recognition of a so-called “Palestinian state” was seen by many as a reward to Hamas. Massive rallies filled Sydney’s iconic Harbor Bridge with chants of “Globalize the intifada” and calls to “Kill the Jews” while participants waved Hamas flags. Some officials even joined the protests, while few condemned them. Fueled by a virulently anti-Israel policy, antisemitism erupted—a synagogue firebombed in Melbourne, physical assaults and open threats to a Zionist community.
The horror peaked on Bondi Beach on the first night of Chanukah, when Islamic terrorists murdered 15 men, women and children. But rather than respond with the familiar platitudes—appeals to multiculturalism, tolerance or reminders of Jewish civic virtue—Australian Jewish leaders did something different. They spoke with pride and moral clarity, proclaiming that the Seven Noahide Laws—the universal Jewish values of justice, decency, belief in God and kindness—could enrich the broader Australian society.
Their courage inspired a vigil in Bondi on the last night of Chanukah with as many as 20,000 attendees, many of them non-Jews, broadcast live across the country by network TV instead of the regular prime-time fare. Criss Simms, premier of New South Wales, launched a campaign called “A Million Mitzvot,” declaring that “the rabbis of Sydney are so persuasive; let me tell you what a mitzvah means.” The governor general and other national leaders echoed the call. The Bondi attack is becoming a societal turning point as Australians begin to question whether importing radicals who seek to “globalize the intifada” threatens not only Jews but the very fabric of their nation.
Jews in Canada, the United Kingdom and Europe now ask whether Bondi is a preview of what’s to come. Many of their governments mirror Australia’s troubling tilt toward Hamas sympathies, leaving local Jewish communities uneasy. Jews in Hungary and Poland, however, feel secure under governments that have resisted unrestricted immigration and rising Islamic extremism. In Ukraine, the suffering continues amid an unwinnable, grinding war. Ironically, in Russia itself, despite President Vladimir Putin’s immoral war, Jewish life remains surprisingly protected and even prosperous.
In the United States, Jews also feel vulnerable, though less so than their Australian and European cousins. Still, new threats appear on both right and left. In New York, the incoming anti-Israel mayor, Zohran Mamdani, has prompted many to consider joining the growing exodus to Florida—the “Sunshine State” that now boasts thriving Jewish communities, lower taxes, affordable housing, education vouchers and an even more vibrant Jewish life.
Yet despite mounting pressures, Jewish life in America continues to flourish. American Jewry can take pride in its overwhelming support for Israel since Oct. 7, 2023—sending billions in aid, and filling Birthright and teen Israel trips during the conflict and after it subsided. A recent Jewish Federations of North America study revealed a “surge” in Jewish engagement, with Chabad serving as a primary gateway. According to the report, 82% of those active in Chabad strongly support Israel, compared with just 32% of Reform Jews who say they are Zionist.
2025’s ‘Persons of the Year’: Israeli mothers
In 1927, when editors worried there was nothing exciting to report Christmas week, Time magazine designated Charles Lindbergh, “Man of the Year.” In 1999, it expanded to “Person of the Year.” This year, it’s a group award – AI’s architects. Let’s start an Israeli tradition, honoring Israeli mothers as 2025’s Persons of the Year.
Admittedly, 2025 was tough. Israel’s multi-front wars persisted, despite a Gaza ceasefire. The country remained divided, with leaders left to right competing in their never-ending “who’s the most disappointing politician” contest. Approximately 200 soldiers died in Gaza. Iran’s evil missile strikes slaughtered 28 civilians.
Palestinian terrorists murdered over two-dozen Israelis, including last week’s under-reported Beit She’an ramming and stabbing.
Jew-hatred kept spiking, curdling haters’ souls, Left to Right, while menacing innocents worldwide. And sinister jihadist-generated lies about Israel, Zionism and the Jews, about genocide and starvation, polluted Western discourse.
True, I keep chronicling the many blue-and-white beams of light too. Israel triumphed militarily, humiliating Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran. Israel’s economy roared, as its food-tech, pharma, and AI breakthroughs helped humanity soar. Mocking the worries about Europeans, Canadians, and even some Americans betraying the Jewish state, most Arab neighbors demonstrated growing respect for Israel because it walloped the Islamists and Iranian exterminationists.
Ultimately, Israeli mothers deserve credit for each of these triumphs. Like all mothers, they give life, the most godly act any human can perform. As Israelis, they’ve raised generations of superlative citizens, protecting their country while bettering the world. And today’s epoch-making miracles blazed the way for Israeli mothers’ longer-lasting gift to the future: launching a post-October 7 baby boom, not even waiting for postwar calm.
Israel’s mothers leading the way
Israeli mothers have been crowding maternity wards for years. Israel has long led the OECD in procreating, this key to communal happiness reflecting social strength. That’s why by late November, 2023, 17,629 babies had already been born in the seven weeks since rampaging Palestinians slaughtered 1,200 innocents. By 2024, births jumped 10% over 2023. Israel’s fertility rate of 3.1 children per woman nearly doubled OECD’s 1.59 average.
Israel’s fecundity phenomenon continued in 2025. From Rosh Hashanah 2024 to this Rosh Hashanah, 179,000 babies were born. Israeli Jews’ fertility exceeded Muslims’ rate for the first time, as Israel’s population hit 10.1 million.
Beyond the statistics, Israeli mothers’ everyday poetry and superhuman courage perpetually inspire. Imagine the bravery many needed to fight back tears while sending their children into battle October 7 – and every day since. Or the mettle required to send your 18-year-old into the army, today, after October 7, when our enemies reminded us how brutal they are and how costly our fight to defend ourselves can be.
Or the moxie required to keep working – as 70% of Israeli moms do – with husbands serving hundreds of days in reserves, understandably straining their finances, their relationship, and their children. Or the strength involved in burying a husband, a child, a grandchild, or what it’s like to feel so lucky that your child or life-partner was “only” injured catastrophically, as you pursue some semblance of normalcy while helping your loved one heal and rehabilitate.
2025: The year in which antisemitism became an algorithm of hate
As the late historian Robert Wistrich warned, the key is not asking endlessly why antisemitism exists, but recognizing how it mutates. This year revealed its latest mutation: total normalization. “Genocide” and “war crimes” are now casual labels for Israel, deployed without evidence, stripped of meaning.
The market for hatred is vast. Islamists brand Jews as white supremacists. Parts of the left cast them as colonial fascists. The populist right monetizes resentment through podcasts and platforms.
Qatar amplifies it through Al Jazeera; Iran weaponizes it for Shi’ite supremacy; Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan mirrors it from the Sunni world. China and Russia know that anti-Israel fervor weakens the West—and even undermines U.S. President Donald Trump. A hollow pacifism finds its enemy in Israel alone, absolving Hamas and Hezbollah of responsibility.
The killers at Bondi and the Hamas financiers uncovered in Italy are not aberrations. They exist within our media ecosystems, our festivals, our institutions. They are applauded, excused and rewarded.
And yet—this is the essential difference from the past—there will be no new Shoah. The encirclement has been broken. Jews are strong. They are different. And, most importantly, they have Israel behind them.
That is the paradox of the past dark year: Antisemitism has become louder, cruder, more profitable—and at the same time less capable of finishing what it begins. The hope for a better and more peaceful year ahead lies precisely there.
From Ian:
Israel emerged from war ‘stronger than ever,’ Netanyahu says at JNS event in Florida
More than two years after Hamas attacked the Jewish state on Oct. 7, “Israel has come out of this war stronger than ever before,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told attendees of a JNS event in Surfside, Fla., which drew hundreds of people on New Year’s Eve.
“Stronger than ever before economically. What does strong mean? Well, we just signed a $37 billion gas deal,” Netanyahu said at the Shul of Bal Harbour, a Chabad congregation. “That’s strong. We just had Nvidia—they decided to have a massive investment in Israel, and we welcome it.”
The Israeli premier told attendees that the Jewish state made alliances and peace with strong countries.
“We have opened up opportunities for peace that have never existed before. In the first term of President Trump’s office, we did the Abraham Accords that brought four historic peace accords with four Arab states,” he said. “We’re committed to do more.”
“It’s peace through strength,” he said. “It’s prosperity through strength.”
Netanyahu spoke for about 15 minutes at the hour-long event. Sens. Ashley Moody (R-Fla.) and Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and Jay Collins, the Florida lieutenant governor, spoke after the prime minister. Alex Traiman, the CEO of JNS, was one of the speakers who introduced the prime minister.
Danny Danon, Israeli ambassador to the United Nations in New York, and Ofir Akunis, consul general of Israel in New York, also attended, as did Yechiel Leiter, Israeli ambassador to the United States, and Reps. Randy Fine (R-Fla.) and Carlos Giménez (R-Fla.).
Leo Terrell, who leads the U.S. Justice Department’s task force on Jew-hatred, and Yehuda Kaploun, a rabbi whom the U.S. Senate recently confirmed as the U.S. special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, also attended.
Netanyahu told the audience that it is important to be firm in the face of Jew-hatred.
“I say to you, members of the Jewish community of the United States, the last thing you should do before antisemitic attacks, as they attack you—the last thing you should do is lower your head and seek cover,” he said. “That’s not what you should do. You should stand up and be counted. You should fight back.”
The prime minister said that Jews ought to attack their attackers.
“You should delegitimize your delegitimizers,” he said. “Nobody will fight for you more than you fight for yourself.”
“When Israel is strong, others want to partner with us. You stand up and be counted, and you will see the difference,” he said. “Don’t be afraid.”
Jonathan Tobin:
Who has the right to judge Netanyahu for the events of Oct. 7?
Hindsight is 20/20
Such figures claimed that Israel’s defense could be guaranteed by the country’s high-tech mastery, like the Iron Dome anti-missile batteries, and that territorial depth and control of the high ground were largely unnecessary. The same litany was repeated endlessly to journalists who visited Israel’s border with Gaza. This was widely believed not just because the “experts” said it was true, but because the overwhelming majority of Israelis understood that going into Gaza to eliminate the deadly threat that Hamas posed would have required the country to pay, as it did in the two years of fighting post-Oct. 7, a heavy price in the blood of its soldiers, as well as the opprobrium of an international community that always sides against the Jewish state.
The failure here was certainly Netanyahu’s. However, it must be shared with the entire top echelon of the IDF and security services, all of whom bought into the conceptzia—or widely accepted conventional wisdom—as much as the politicians dependent upon them for advice.
Does Netanyahu nevertheless deserve more reproach because he always represented himself as the country’s leading security expert? Perhaps. Still, the notion that he should have or even could have overruled everyone in the defense establishment and pursued policies that they would have all decried as unnecessarily aggressive and dangerous is not so much foolish as anachronistic. It’s something that can be asserted with the 20/20 hindsight that those commenting on the issue only possessed after the events of Oct. 7.
What those who focus solely on the blame for that dark day also forget is that the prime minister deserves enormous credit for leading the country’s efforts to defeat Hamas and other Iranian-backed enemies afterwards, while also fending off interference from Israel’s American ally and an international community determined to let Hamas win. Judging him only on what happened on the first day of a war that lasted 24 months and ended with Israel defeating its foes in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran—and with the Jewish state in its strongest strategic position since 1973—is as illogical as it is ahistorical.
Wherever you come down on these questions, the idea that a panel to decide this complex question that was convened by Netanyahu’s most bitter foes on the Supreme Court would be impartial judges of the matter is laughable.
It’s also important to remember that the Agranat Commission that investigated the failures at the start of the Yom Kippur War, which is cited as a model for an Oct. 7 inquiry, didn’t cover itself with glory. Its decision to make the IDF Chief of Staff David Elazar the principal scapegoat for the defeats of the first days of that war was both unfair and left his political masters—principally, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan—off the hook. Meir was also absolved—a decision that 50 years later seems wiser than it did at the time—but it was rejected by an Israeli people that thought, as prime minister, she needed to be held accountable. And so, she was soon forced to resign.
History and the voters will decide
The point being that the question of how to assess decisions made by politicians, as well as Israel’s military and intelligence chiefs, isn’t really something that can be conclusively decided by a committee, even if it were composed of fair-minded and impartial judges.
Responsibility for Israel’s many failures on Oct. 7 will be debated by historians until the end of time. Even a century from now, long after the contemporary political players are dead, it’s doubtful that there will be any sort of consensus that will satisfy everyone. The idea that the answer can be arrived at through a process that is indistinguishable from the campaign of lawfare that Netanyahu’s critics have been waging against him simply doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.
Until history renders its verdict, the only meaningful jury that can have its say about Netanyahu is composed of the country’s voters. In 2026, Israelis will return to the polls when this Knesset’s term expires, after having lasted longer than most of its predecessors in the country’s inherently unstable electoral system.
At that point, the voters will have their say about Netanyahu and Oct. 7—and that will have to suffice.
That won’t placate those who will never accept any answer but to pillory, if not imprison, Netanyahu on any conceivable pretext. But that takes us back to where the debate about his current government began: with a discussion about what it means to protect Israeli democracy. Having failed to defeat him at the polls or unseat him by any other legitimate manner, the issue of a supposedly independent inquiry about Oct. 7 is just the latest effort to find a way to topple the prime minister.
In both the United States and Israel, partisans have attempted to use the judicial system to decide questions that deserve to be left to the voters. Instead of seeking yet another means by which Netanyahu’s foes can force him from office, those who claim to support democracy should cease clamoring for a commission and instead leave the decision to Israel’s electorate.
From Ian:
Stephen Pollard:
This was the toughest year in living memory for UK Jews … and there is no sign of things improving in 2026
The deaths of Melvin Cravitz and Adrian Daulby on Yom Kippur, the former killed by Islamist terrorist Jihad Al-Shamie and the latter by a police bullet as they sought to protect congregants at Heaton Park synagogue in Manchester, define not just the year 2025 but the whole period in Anglo-Jewish history since the Hamas massacre of October 7 2023. There is a clear sense in which the atmosphere of open Jew hate since then has been leading us here – and, worryingly, that what we witnessed on Yom Kippur is not its climax but rather the start of new and dangerous era for our community – a sense that has obviously deepened since the murders in Bondi.
Britain has felt different for Jews in the years since Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of the Labour Party in 2015. Corbyn’s ascendancy unleashed a torrent of antisemitism both online and in the real world, an onslaught which felt both shocking and unprecedented at the time. But while his defeat in 2019 seemed then to mark some sort of closing of the door, hindsight has shown how misguided that idea was. Far from having reached a nadir in the Corbyn years, the massacre of 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023 led to a surge in Jew-hate the like of which has not been seen since the Shoah.
In the just over two years since, we have had to grow used to the streets of London and other cities being taken over by hate marches, while the police have mainly stood and watched. Across the country, Jew haters have gathered under the guise of protesting against the Gaza war and the authorities have said and done virtually nothing. On one march, in Tower Hamlets in October, participants wore black clothes and facemasks in a seemingly deliberate echo of the Battle of Cable Steet against Mosley’s Blackshirts – only this time the fascists were the Islamist marchers. And the authorities stood and watched.
As the number of demonstrations intensified this year, we repeatedly told the authorities that their refusal to act against these open and proud displays of Jew hate was sending a clear message. Not only was that message emboldening the haters on the streets, on campus and online, we warned that it would at some point lead to violence – and tragedy. The veracity of that prediction – less a prediction than a statement of the obvious – was seen on Yom Kippur at Heaton Park synagogue. There was a similar refusal in Australia, with even more appalling consequences. And the week after 15 people were murdered at a Chanukah celebration by jihadists driven by the same extremist Jew hate that inspired the Manchester atrocity, two men in Preston were convicted of plotting to kill hundreds of Jews in what would have been the bloodiest terrorist slaughter in British history. The pace of events insistently suggests that across the world, the ancient evil of violent, insatiable antisemitism has once more been let loose.
For British Jews, 2025 has been the worst year in living memory. France and the US have endured deadly attacks in recent years. We have not. But that changed on Yom Kippur, and perhaps the worst of it is that no one seriously thinks that it will be a one-off. The issue is not whether there will be more attacks on Jews but how, when and where.
One response to Heaton Park was the regurgitation of the platitude that follows every antisemitic incident – that there is no place for antisemitism on the streets of Britain. It is not so much a platitude as a lie, because there are plainly many places for antisemitism on the streets of Britain, as we saw in Manchester and as is seen every time there is a so-called Free Palestine demonstration, with their cries for the murder of Jews in the guise of “globalise the intifada” and with the police standing by. Now, in the wake of Sydney, the Met and Greater Manchester Police have pledged to clamp down on that particular chant. The marchers are wasting no time in finding other words to express their wish for Jews to die.
But when it comes to the police, the events surrounding the West Midland force’s decision to make the area around Villa Park Judenfrei for the Maccabi Tel Aviv match against Aston Villa in November are something altogether new – and darker. At the very least, it seems clear that the police decided to acquiesce in the idea pushed by “community leaders” that a Jewish or Israeli presence would be inherently provocative. To that end, they pushed a fictitious account of Maccabi fans’ behaviour in Amsterdam to justify a ban on their presence at Villa Park. But this was never about a football match. As Mark Gardner, CEO of the Community Security Trust, put it at the time: “[The] Aston Villa match is about who controls the streets of UK’s second largest city. The football is a very red herring.”
This was a key moment not just in British policing but in the story of Anglo-Jewry’s place in this country, because it marked a move away from the police merely acquiescing in Jew hate on the streets to them doing the bidding of Islamists. The implications are chilling.
Spielberg Uses Schindler’s List Money to Fund Anti-Israel Protests
“Let Gaza live,” a mob of anti-Israel protesters screamed, brandishing signs falsely accusing the Jewish State of “ethnic cleansing”, “starving Gaza” and genocide while illegally blocking traffic outside the Israeli consulate in Midtown Manhattan.
The only thing more disgusting than the ugly spectacle, which had been timed around a Hamas famine propaganda campaign over the summer, was that one of the hate groups behind the anti-Israel protest, which ended in arrests, was funded by proceeds from Schindler’s List.
When Steven Spielberg created the Righteous Persons Foundation with some of the profits from Schindler’s List, he wanted to educate people about the Holocaust and build up Jewish life in America. “I could not accept any money from ‘Schindler’s List’ — if it even made any money. It was blood money, and needed to be put back into the Jewish community.”
“My parents didn’t keep kosher and we mainly observed all the holidays when my grandparents stayed with us,” the filmmaker said at the time. “I knew I was missing a great deal of my natural heritage, and as I became conscious of it, I began racing to catch up.”
The race has long since gone the other way.
The last time the Righteous Persons Foundation, named after the rescuers of Holocaust survivors, funded Holocaust programs was in 2021. Most of its funding now goes to radical social justice groups including anti-Israel organizations like those protesting Israel.
Since 2021, Spielberg’s foundation has provided $650,000 to T’ruah, an anti-Israel hate group which took part in the Manhattan street blocking and whose CEO celebrated the move and gleefully posted photos of attendees falsely accusing Israel of “ethnic cleansing”.
“We have to keep up the pressure,” urged T’ruah CEO Jill Jacobs, who had accused Israeli officials of “incitement to genocide”, and demanded an end to further Israeli attacks on Hamas. Jacobs had blasted American Jews for speaking about “Oct. 7 and the plight of the hostages without once mentioning the unbearable death toll among Palestinians” because of what she claimed was their fear of wealthy Jewish donors.
Jacobs and T’ruah had even falsely accused Israel of “war crimes” by assassinating Hezbollah leaders. “Israel, too, has already committed war crimes in Lebanon, including by exploding the beepers and walkie talkies of hundreds of Hezbollah members,” Jacobs argued.
Within a year, Spielberg had gone from funding Holocaust survivors to funding those accusing Israel of a new Holocaust while enabling Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran to perpetrate a new one.
Leading philanthropist reveals she has withdrawn funding from human rights groups over antisemitic rhetoric
One of the country’s biggest philanthropists has revealed she withdrew funding from organisations that appeared to justify the October 7 Hamas attacks in Israel.
The Sigrid Rausing Trust, led by philanthropist Sigrid Rausing, announced that it has cut grants to several human rights groups after reviewing public statements made in the aftermath of the attacks.
“We have strong clauses in our grant contract requiring grantees to abstain from incendiary language that may promote violence,” Rausing said, referencing Charity Commission guidance in an article published by The Times.
According to the Trust, five out of approximately 400 grantee organisations posted what it described as “disturbing material.”
One group in Tunisia expressed “pride” in the Hamas action.
Another called for “support for the guerrilla Palestinian people in their war against the Zionist entity,” stating that Israel “was shaken due to the action of the Palestinian resistance…invading the occupied lands and Zionist settlements.”
A Lebanese media group characterised the Hamas attacks as “resistance” to “colonisation,” referred to murdered civilians as “settlers,” and dismissed Israeli reports of atrocities as “lies.”
A Canadian group, also funded by the Trust, labeled Israel’s actions “genocidal” and described the country as a “settler colonialist white-supremacist state.”
The Trust said that, in context, this language appeared to condone the attacks.
Rausing commented, “Atrocities against civilians are obviously contrary to human rights and international humanitarian law, and we cancelled our contracts with the groups in question.
From Ian:
The mouse is really roaring
These activities all attest to the strategic centrality that Somaliland enjoys. Somaliland is sitting in the eye of the shipping hurricane that is merely 300 kilometers from Yemen.
But this centrality did not exorcise the world before Israel chose to recognize the republic. So clearly, the hot button is the connection between the two and what it might portend.
And here is where the second significant aspect of the new relationship comes into play: What benefit did Israel see coming from the recognition?
I would suggest that there is diplomatic, as well as military significance, that Israel envisions coming from an enhanced relationship with Somaliland. Israel can be proud to be bestowing recognition on a democracy, one that has spurned an Islamist agenda. Somaliland could very well join the Abraham Accords, especially because it also enjoys a good relationship with the UAE, an Abraham Accords member.
Most likely, it is the military significance that has stirred the fear and loathing of so many countries. The most obvious potential implication is for the ongoing Israeli effort to contain and to defang the Houthis. Israeli planes have had to make 2,000-kilometer flights to engage Houthi targets.
Utilizing Somaliland facilities could be a game-changer. Even the possibility of their availability could have an impact.
Much of the reaction of hostile countries must be seen as an exercise in projection. They are condemning the idea that Israel could have reach and influence, something that China, Russia, Iran and Turkey all live for.
To see little Israel extend its net in this way is galling. It is also proof positive of Israel’s standing as a strong horse—perhaps the strong horse in the region. Israel acted purely on its own, without American approval or cooperation. That, too, is impressive and of concern to those condemning the recognition.
Israel stands guilty, in the eyes of its enemies, of turning Somaliland into a passive proxy. That, of course, is ridiculous, though maybe an ally indeed.
Another possible wrinkle to the new relationship—one of particular interest to the United States—is whether Somaliland might be induced to accept Gazans seeking refuge.
Whatever the actual implications of the new relationship, it shows great promise for both countries. Israel has deftly displayed generosity, high-minded concern for a fellow democracy and a shrewd assessment of the realpolitik possibilities of the new relationship.
Those who reflexively demean the efforts of Israel to assert itself in the world must step back and see how beneficial this step is likely to be.
Journalists or Terrorists?
Allegations that Israel deliberately targets journalists in Gaza have persisted since the October 7 terror attacks in the Gaza envelope (Otef Aza) and the subsequent war against Hamas.
The Government Media Office in the Gaza Strip (المكتب الإعلامي الحكومي) and the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (نقابة الصحفيين الفلسطينيين) publish dynamic lists of individuals identified as “journalists” allegedly killed by Israel in Gaza. These names have been widely shared without scrutiny by organizations such as the International Federation of Journalists , the Committee to Protect Journalists, Al Jazeera, BBC Arabic, The Guardian, and even the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
These lists include over 250 names of “journalists and media workers” said to have been killed by Israel since October 7, 2023.
Upon examining the credentials of those listed, primarily using publicly available information from social media, we uncovered something shocking: a significant number of these “journalists” were actually active members of Hamas’s military wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades (كتائب عز الدين القسام), as well as the military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), the Al-Quds Brigades (سرايا القدس), and other Palestinian terrorist groups.
It’s important to note that terrorist organizations in Gaza run extensive media operations, primarily operated by Hamas and the PIJ, though smaller groups also have affiliated channels. Notable examples include Hamas’s Al-Aqsa TV and Al-Aqsa Radio, as well as Paltoday, recognized as the official news outlet for the PIJ. Many individuals labeled as “journalists” or “media personnel” in Gaza also serve as members or operatives of these groups, often holding military roles. Research indicates that many journalists killed in the recent conflict were affiliated with Hamas or the PIJ. This investigation aims to identify those who serve dual roles as “journalists” and military operatives.
We have not yet reviewed all the names on the lists. Among the 80 individuals we examined, approximately 40% have been identified as having roles in armed branches of terrorist groups in Gaza. For those in our database, we have uncovered clear evidence of their involvement as operatives in these organizations’ armed wings. We suspect many more will be classified similarly once our review is complete or as additional information surfaces.
Additionally, we found that lists of “journalists” are inflated with names of individuals who are not actually journalists or media workers. Examples include:
Anas Ibrahim Hussein Abu Shamala (أنس إبراهيم حسين أبو شمالة): Allegedly a member of Hamas’s elite Nukhba unit, he was hailed posthumously as a “heroic martyr” and “lion among the elite Qassam Brigades.” In reality, Abu Shamala operated a currency exchange and money transfer business, yet he is recognized as a journalist by the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate and UNESCO.
Muhammad Fayez Abu Matar (محمد فايز ابو مطر): He reportedly died when a wall of his apartment collapsed after the bombing of the Abu Shamala house in the Yebna neighborhood of Rafah. He has been incorrectly identified as a journalist and photographer. UNESCO’s Director-General, Audrey Azoulay, condemned the killing of Abu Matar while he was allegedly covering the conflict.
It is deeply troubling that global media outlets like the BBC and The Guardian have promoted these claims without any apparent background checks. Even more concerning is that a United Nations agency, established to promote global peace and security, is endorsing individuals affiliated with terrorism as innocent journalists, effectively legitimizing these actions under the guise of defending press freedom.
‘Plainly inadequate’: Labor’s terror review under fire for failing to mention antisemitism
The review into the Bondi Beach terror attack set up by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been heavily criticised for failing to reference antisemitism.
The terms of reference for Mr Albanese’s review failed to specifically mention Jewish Australians, antisemitism, radicalisation or Islamic extremism.
The review, headed by former Defence Department secretary Dennis Richardson, appear only to investigate federal agencies, including ASIO and AFP.
Also, the Richardson Review does not mention the role of government ministers responsible for security or social cohesion.
The review appears to completely exclude the decisions of government related to antisemitism, social cohesion and national security.
It comes as Mr Albanese has flatly rejected calls for a federal Royal Commission into the worst terror attack in the country’s history, instead establishing the departmental review.
His excuses for doing so have included that a national inquiry would be too slow, that it would “re-platform” antisemitism and that “actual experts” advised him against it.
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim said the Richardson Review terms were “too narrowly focused on our intelligence and law enforcement agencies”.
“This omits the wider context in which those agencies operate,” Mr Wertheim told Sky News on Wednesday.
“To get to the heart of the matter there needs to be an honest examination of government policies and the conduct and policies of key institutions and figures in major sectors of our society.
“Their contribution to the unprecedented levels of antisemitism in this country over the last two years must be addressed.
“What might emerge could indeed be divisive and ugly but the divisiveness and ugliness is already there.
“Confronting these demons will be cathartic. It’s our only hope of establishing a new national consensus and setting clear standards.”
Australian Jewish Council CEO Robert Gregory also told Sky News that the Richardson Review terms were “plainly inadequate”.
“They make no reference to the Jewish community and exclude critical issues such as antisemitism and Islamic extremism,” he said.
“They also specifically rule out examining the actions and inactions of the Albanese government in the lead-up to the attack, something any serious review would be expected to do.
“The proposed review appears to be an attempt by the government to transfer responsibility for government failures on to Australia's intelligence agencies.”
From Ian:
Is Anti-Zionism a New Form of Hatred?
Antizionism is a hate movement that seeks to undermine and erase Jewish sovereignty in Israel and Jewish life around the globe. It perceives the State of Israel as a moral offence, targeting Jewish existence itself.
Antizionism vs. antisemitism
Antizionism can be considered a dangerous form of antisemitism, where the denial of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state is rooted in age-old hostility and hatred toward Jews. In addition, antizionism can be used as a cover for antisemitism.
However, it is important not to collapse antizionism into older categories, but to address it as a hate movement with its own narratives, libels, and mechanisms of violence. If antisemitism is the traditional hostility to or prejudice against Jewish people, antizionism may be considered a contemporary face of Jew-hatred.
Negationist anti-Zionism
Negationist anti-Zionism delegitimizes the Zionist project altogether, calling for the elimination of the State of Israel or any form of Jewish self-determination.
According to Prof. Ethan Katz from the University of California, Berkeley, this common form of anti-Zionism “ignores, downplays, or writes out from history the longstanding Jewish roots in the Land of Israel, the history and ongoing reality of antisemitism, and large parts of the history of Zionism and the State of Israel.”
Anti-Zionism: A new form of hatred?
Is anti-Zionism a new form of hatred? According to Adam Louis-Klein, founder of Movement Against Antizionism, the answer is yes.
Movement Against Antizionism (MAAZ) is a newly formed initiative aiming to confront anti-Zionism as the hate movement it is. Through education, advocacy, and professional training, MAAZ seeks to counter the spread of antizionist narratives, libels, denialism, and dehumanizing rhetoric.
At the same time, MAAZ strives to support Jewish communities at risk around the globe, form new collaborations and alliances, and advance the pursuit of peace based on mutual recognition and responsible dialogue.
The mission is “to critically examine and expose the structural dynamics of anti-Zionism, while affirming the dignity, security, and equal belonging of all communities—Jewish, Israeli, and Palestinian alike.”
Here's how to counter anti-Zionism
This interview with Adam Louis-Klein has been edited for clarity.
PodCast:
American Antizionism - With Shaul Kelner
Sociologist and Jewish studies scholar Dr. Shaul Kelner joins Dr. Rachel Fish to examine the rise of antizionism as a distinctly American political and social movement. Kelner argues that contemporary antizionism is less an intellectual critique of Zionism than a political mass movement defined by praxis: the othering and exclusion of Jews through social and institutional action.
Their conversation explores why debates over whether antizionism equals antisemitism often obscure more than they clarify, the distinction between 'anti-Zionism' and 'antizionism', how ambiguity about end goals of the pro-Palestine movement enables broad coalition-building, why higher education became especially fertile ground for this movement, and more.
Further Reading
Shaul Kelner, “American Antizionism,” Sources Journal
Isabella Tabarovsky, "The Cult of 'Antizionism'," Tablet Magazine
Isabella Tabarovsky, "Zombie Anti-Zionism," Tablet Magazine
David Hirsch, "'Anti-Zionism' and 'Antizionism'," Australia/Israel, and Jewish Affairs Council
Guest Bio
Shaul Kelner is a Professor of Jewish Studies and Sociology at Vanderbilt University, specializing in the study of contemporary Jewish life.
His latest book, A Cold War Exodus: How American Activists Mobilized to Free Soviet Jews received grant support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and won a National Jewish Book Award.
Editorial:
Albanese has no moral authority – he must call antisemitism royal commission
The belated admissions and half-hearted apologies for not doing more by the prime minister and other senior ministers are not nearly enough. A comprehensive inquiry is also needed to grapple with a broad range of issues that must be honestly confronted after the Bondi atrocity, which includes relevant immigration and multicultural policy settings.
Albanese has justified his intransigence on a royal commission by pointing to the Abbott government not holding one after the Lindt Café siege in Sydney in 2014. This justification appalled the family of Katrina Dawson, one of the two victims killed in that terror incident. The family’s statement issued on Christmas Eve called for “a much-needed royal commission into antisemitism and Islamic extremism” that has the power to get to the truth of these and related issues. The families of the people killed on December 14 have now echoed this call to find the answers and solutions by issuing their own statement urging the prime minister to appoint a royal commission.
Albanese maintains that the priority is acting quickly rather than waiting for the recommendations of a royal commission. Yet, he has spent the past two weeks engaged in political management. The national gun law reforms he has pushed are worthwhile, but do not confront the bigger issue of antisemitism and its manifestation as radical Islamist terrorism.
There is a narrative fostered by Labor that the Bondi tragedy has been politicised, after Opposition Leader Sussan Ley issued proposed terms of reference for a royal commission. Such claims are hypocritical. Labor’s ineffective response to threats to the safety of Jewish people over the past two years is due to playing sectarian politics with antisemitism. This took the form of drawing a false equivalence with Islamophobia and a preference for generalised statements over meaningful action because the government did not want to alienate Muslim voters in outer suburban Sydney and Melbourne electorates over the Gaza war in the lead-up to the 2025 election.
These failures to protect a vulnerable racial and religious minority are underscored by the fact that it has taken the worst loss of Jewish life since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, assault on southern Israel for Albanese to finally launch the crackdown on “hate preaching” recommended by the report of antisemitism envoy Jillian Segal. Having done too little too late to stem the resurgence in Australia of the world’s oldest prejudice, the prime minister has forfeited his moral authority and is unable to convincingly provide the leadership required at this time of crisis.
Both Jewish Australians and the wider public will have no confidence in Labor’s handling of the response to Bondi unless a royal commission provides the independent scrutiny, transparency, and accountability that is needed to help the nation heal.
From Ian:
Pierre Rehov:
Palestinian Authority 'Help' Is a Trap for Washington: Trump Has the Opportunity to Break a Cycle of Defeat
The Palestinian Authority is not a neutral Muslim-majority entity seeking peace. Its doctrine has, for decades, blended conventional diplomacy with asymmetric warfare — using terrorism as an instrument of policy. In the last decade, this double game has not disappeared. It has merely learned to speak the language of Western guilt. Countries in the West have actually rewarded its terrorism, both by continuing lavishly to fund it and by climbing over one another to recognize a fictitious, nonexistent "Palestinian State."
Palestinians in Gaza might be tired of Hamas, but that does not mean they are ready to live peacefully side-by-side with Israel.
Just imagine the Palestinian Authority inside Gaza's reconstruction ecosystem, with access to donor funds, humanitarian logistics, and institutional channels. Reconstruction money is not neutral. It creates influence, dependency, and leverage. The Palestinian Authority understands this better than anyone.
The Palestinian Authority does not recognize Israel and most likely has no intention whatsoever of dismantling Hamas. For the Palestinian Authority, "reconstruction" offers laundering its legitimacy, access to institutions, long-term influence, and the chance, once President Donald Trump leaves office, of being deliciously positioned to do anything it likes.
For Israel, this scenario is existentially dangerous. Israel would be expected to tolerate a hostile foreign security architecture on its southern border while remaining ultimately responsible for the consequences of its failure. Any future escalation — rocket fire, tunnel reconstruction, arms smuggling — would place Israel in an impossible position: to act militarily and be accused of attacking "the forces for peace " or refrain and absorb the threat. Either choice is unacceptable.
For Washington, the trap is more subtle but equally severe. Once the United States endorses a framework, it becomes politically and financially invested in its survival. Billions of dollars in aid, contracts, and diplomatic capital follow. At that point, acknowledging failure becomes almost impossible. The priority shifts from solving the problem to preserving the framework — even as security deteriorates.
A post-war Gaza that is not fully demilitarized -- and remains that way -- will not stay quiet. Hostility will mutate.... Reconstruction will become camouflage. And the international presence meant to stabilize the situation will end up institutionalizing the very forces it was supposed to eliminate.
That is why this "Palestinian Authority solution" is a terrible idea for Israel — and a strategic trap for Washington: It offers the appearance of control while in fact hollowing out any real security.
Debunking Eight Gaza Fatality Myths Fueling the Genocide Hoax
Few aspects of the Gaza war have been more politically weaponized than fatality statistics. Numbers that would normally be treated with extreme caution during an active conflict have instead been elevated to unquestioned fact, recycled by media outlets, NGOs, and activists to support a predetermined narrative of Israeli wrongdoing, often culminating in accusations of genocide.
This article addresses eight of the most persistent myths surrounding Gaza fatality figures. Each has been repeated so frequently that it now functions as assumed background knowledge. Yet every one collapses under basic scrutiny.
Myth #1: Hamas has been accurate in the past, so its data is reliable now From the outset of the war, UN agencies, NGOs and much of the media treated Hamas's fatality figures as reliable, even though Hamas is a U.S. and EU-designated terrorist organization that live-streamed the murder, rape and kidnapping of nearly 1,200 Israelis on 10/7. Hamas was also actively fighting a war for its survival and therefore had every incentive to manipulate casualty figures for political and legal gain. Yet its numbers were nonetheless elevated as credible, treated as more authoritative than Israel’s and laundered through the official-sounding “Ministry of Health” (MoH).
That credulity rests on selective memory. Hamas’s casualty reporting has a documented history of false claims followed by delayed admissions once the fighting has ended and the narrative damage has already been done. After the 2009 Gaza war, Hamas initially claimed that only 48 fighters were killed out of approximately 1,300 total fatalities, implying a civilian death rate exceeding 95%. Months later, Hamas admitted that between 600 to 700 of the dead were Hamas fighters, closely matching Israel’s figure of 709 combatants. A similar pattern emerged during the 2018 Gaza border riots. Hamas initially described roughly 60 fatalities
as civilians killed during “peaceful protests," but after criticism by a Palestinian interviewer, a senior Hamas official acknowledged that 50 of those killed were Hamas members.
Such manipulations are not anomalies; they are recurring features of Hamas’s wartime casualty reporting. The notion that Hamas is not actively stage-managing fatality figures is not a serious analytical position. Acknowledging this record necessarily means accepting that the current 70,000-fatality claim cannot be taken at face value either.
From Ian:
The Global War on the Jews
Jews everywhere are confronting a period of danger and moral testing. Antisemitism no longer hides at the margins. It organizes, radicalizes, and kills. The global surge in antisemitism does not arise organically. States and terrorist organizations deliberately export violence, incitement, and ideology far beyond Israel's borders. The same actors who target Israel actively work to destabilize Jewish life worldwide. What begins in Israel never ends there.
During Israel's campaign against Hamas, calls for a "ceasefire" from anti-Israel activists exposed their true intent. They demanded that Israel should halt its defense. Hamas and its allies, it seemed, could continue attacking Israeli civilians without consequence. That same moral inversion now fuels violence across the Diaspora. Selective outrage and the erasure of Jewish vulnerability have moved from protest rhetoric to physical attack.
Since the truce between Israel and Hamas took effect in early October, violence against Jews worldwide has intensified. When the world delegitimizes Jewish self-defense, Jewish life everywhere becomes more vulnerable.
In Israel, a deeper clarity is evident. Israeli society understands that security cannot be subcontracted, that moral clarity cannot be outsourced, and that Jewish continuity demands courage. The festival of Hanukkah rejects the idea that Jews must justify their existence on terms set by others. Israel embodies that refusal.
Only in Israel do Judaism, Christianity, and Islam coexist freely and openly under the protection of law. That reality stands in sharp contrast to the regions controlled by the forces whose narratives dominate much of today's international discourse.
College Middle Eastern studies departments are broken — shut them down to end campus radicalism
Shut down the Middle Eastern studies departments in our universities. I was a student in one of these programs, and I say it plainly: shut them down.
A majority are corrupted and compromised. Through these departments, dozens of American college students have at best been indoctrinated to despise this country and whitewash the crimes of terrorists, and at worst pushed toward genuine radicalization and extremist plots.
These programs have been the soft underbelly through which universities quietly accept foreign money and, with it, foreign influence that dictates curriculum, hiring, admissions, scholarships and more. They serve as conduits that funnel cash into extracurricular groups, adding an extra layer of protection and plausible deniability while financing the encampments and harassment campaigns that have erupted on campus in recent years.
Anti-Israel protesters demonstrate outside Columbia University on Sept. 3, in New York City. (Yuki Iwamura/AP)
This influence has been seeping into our institutions for more than two decades, but it has become brazen precisely because there have been few, if any, consequences. As someone who has had a front‑row seat to the jihadification of American academia, this is where much of it begins. Shut it down.
The rot is no longer theoretical. It has names, funding streams and institutional addresses. At Columbia University, Mahmood Mamdani, father of New York City’s mayor-elect, has been criticized for presenting Israel as a purely colonial project while downplaying the terrorism of groups such as Hamas, shaping how students in African and Middle Eastern studies understand the region.
At Oberlin College, Mohammad Jafar Mahallati, a former Iranian diplomat, has faced allegations that he helped cover up the Iran regime’s mass executions in the 1980s and has spoken of Hamas "resistance" in ways that minimize its terrorism.
And at Princeton University, Seyed Hossein Mousavian, another former Iran regime official, has been accused of echoing the talking points of Tehran while appearing to legitimize Hamas and Hezbollah in public remarks, all under the banner of Middle East security studies.
When the person shaping course offerings, speakers and graduate funding openly aligns with a brutal authoritarian regime, why should anyone be surprised when students emerge hostile to Israel, sympathetic to designated terror groups and convinced America is the villain of the story?
The money behind this intellectual capture is staggering. Saudi Arabia has poured tens of millions into specific Middle East and Islamic studies hubs, from the King Fahd Center in Arkansas to Alwaleed-bin-Talal–branded programs at Harvard and Georgetown that fund chairs, research and student programming focused on Islam and the Middle East.
According to a 2022 report by the National Association of Scholars, a higher education think tank, Qatar has become one of the largest foreign donors to U.S. higher education since 2001, with several billion dollars routed through branch campuses and partnerships that shape what is taught about the Middle East on both Doha and U.S. soil.
This is not philanthropy in the abstract; it is targeted influence over who gets hired, what gets researched, and which narratives about Israel, Jews and the West are elevated or suppressed.
Book Review: “Be A Refusenik: A Jewish Student’s Survival Guide”
A delightful lithograph hangs in the Berkeley Jewish Art Museum, a block west of the University of California’s rattled flagship campus. It shows its creator, originally a Soviet underground artist, Eugene Abeshous, dressed as a Fiddler on the Roof extra, disembarking at Eretz Yisrael. The work is called Jonah and the Whale in Haifa Port because instead of a cruise liner, its protagonist exits the gaping mouth of a sea monster. Abeshous tells the story that was once on the front pages of American newspapers, but is now nearly forgotten—that of Soviet Jews leaving the belly of the beast.
In her recently released Be A Refusenik: A Jewish Student’s Survival Guide, historian of Soviet Jewry Izabella Tabarovsky used the struggle of the Soviet Jews in the 1970s and 80s as an inspiration for the young Americans facing antisemitism on college campuses. Tabarovsky put the half-century-old experiences of my and her parents’ generation side-by-side with the conflicts defining the lives of our children. Even if we are “separated by decades, borders, and ideologies,” she showed how the mindset of refuseniks can—and does—inspire the students today.
Refuseniks were the Soviet Jewish dissidents who were denied permission to make aliya. My maternal uncle, for instance, applied for his exit visa in 1980, lost his scientist job, had many unfortunate encounters with the sadistic Soviet bureaucracy, and was finally granted passage in 1987, after he made it on the Ronald Reagan list of 100 refuseniks.
My uncle was perhaps luckier than most, but this was a fairly typical refusenik fate. Yet when Tabarovsky tells American students to be refuseniks, she highlights another meaning of the word—the one who refuses to surrender to the forces of evil. Her book teaches how to dive into Jewish history to find the inner strength to resist.
In one key respect, Soviet antisemitism was similar to the contemporary American antisemitism—it sells itself as antizionism. In fact—and this is something Tabarovsky discussed in her Legal Insurrection lecture—our antizionism was invented by the Soviets; it was a product of the virtual freakout over the 1967 defeat of its Arab clients. The Antizionist tropes animating the vocabulary of American college professors are traceable to Brezhnev-era Soviet propaganda.
Antizionism, Tabarovsky shows, was something that Soviet Jews, like their contemporary American counterparts, experienced on a personal level—the hysteria whipped up in the media and echoed in local Communist meetings made Jewish existence unsafe. But the defiant Zionists inverted fear and responded with pride. For instance, when his bosses brought out Nathan Sharansky for a Soviet humiliation ritual before his entire institute and started drilling him about his Jewish ideological leanings, Sharansky responded by giving a brief lecture on modern Israeli history—and found an “intrigued” audience in his co-workers, many of whom, I’m sure, found it liberating to hear Soviet propaganda exposed.
From Ian:
Anti-Zionism is Anti-Jewish, Anti-West, Anti-America and Anti-Joy
So far, we’ve been telling the world that antisemitism and antizionism are bad for the Jews and for Israel, but with Israel becoming a pariah state, much of the world has shrugged and said: who cares?
With our backs against the wall, we have no choice but to aim high. To win the long game, we must raise the stakes and start focusing on what is good and bad for the world. Antizionism may be a singular sin and a uniquely evil expression of Jew-hatred that targets Jews as Zionists, but it’s a lot worse than that.
It’s also anti-West, anti-America, anti-truth, anti-justice, anti-joy and anti-world. Antizionism, just like anti-Judaism and antisemitism, is a movement against the common good. It has become a hater’s paradise where all haters and liars are welcome. We must invest more resources in making that case.
If antizionism is bad for the world, the corollary, as I argued recently, is also true: Zionism is great for the world. As Joshua Hoffman writes on his Substack: “The West is losing something essential that Israelis do best. While many people in the West feel embarrassed by their own countries, Israelis carry deep-seated pride rooted in history, responsibility, and a clear-eyed understanding of reality.”
Just as antizionism is rooted in Jew-hatred, Zionism is rooted in Judaism. The two are inseparable. If there is joy in Judaism, there is joy in Zionism. If there is courage in Zionism, there is courage in Judaism. By keeping these two pillars of Jewish identity tightly bonded, we can craft a winning and unapologetic Jewish message for the next century: Zionism and Judaism are great for the world.
In short, to have any chance of combatting the global evil of antizionism, we must put our best two feet forward: Jewish and Zionist.
We owe it to those decimated Jewish souls I saw in “Nuremberg.”
Palestinians must renounce culture of deception for real peace with Israel
Yet here, too, the familiar pattern emerges. This is not ideological transformation but tactical adaptation. Not abandonment of doctrine, but message management.
The phased approach has not vanished; it has simply adopted a modern suit. As fears of sanctions grow and as renewed threats loom – including the possibility of a future US administration designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization – rhetoric softens and declarations become more measured.
This does not indicate a change in essence. Political Islam, across its various branches, operates in stages: first “da’wah” – social, educational, and religious influence through nonviolent means – and only later confrontation. Those who fail to recognize this risk mistaking conciliatory statements for ideological surrender.
Israeli experience teaches that actions, not words, must be examined. Arafat spoke of peace while preparing for war. Abbas speaks of civic integration, yet has not truly disavowed the ideological foundations from which he emerged.
Formal disengagement from a Shura body or institution does not erase ideology; it is a technical adjustment designed to reassure, obscure, and delay confrontation.
The problem is not only political but also cultural – a culture in which deception is not an exception but a tool. One message is crafted for Western audiences, another for internal consumption. Peace is treated not as an objective, but as an instrument.
The Oslo Accords taught Israel a painful lesson: peace is not secured through documents alone. It is measured through sincerity, education, and genuine shifts in worldview.
As long as the Palestinian political spectrum, in its various forms, remains committed to the phased doctrine, every conciliatory declaration must be approached with skepticism.
Italian police charge nine with funding Hamas
Seven people were arrested in Italy on suspicion of raising some $8 million for the Gaza-ruling terrorist group of Hamas, police said on Saturday.
International arrest warrants were issued in connection with the case for two additional individuals located outside the country, AFP reported.
Mohammad Hannoun, president of the Palestinian Association in Italy, was among those arrested, local media reported, according to AFP.
The nine suspects are charged with financing “associations based in Gaza, the Palestinian territories, or Israel, owned, controlled or linked to Hamas,” under the guise of “humanitarian purposes for the Palestinian people,” the report continued.
More than 71% of the $8 million was directed to financing Hamas or entities affiliated with the Islamist dictatorship, the Italian police was cited as saying.
Some of the money went to “family members implicated in terrorist attacks,” the statement further read.
Italy’s ruling party, Brothers of Italy, spearheaded by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, said on X that the left should “humbly apologize” given the arrests.
The Italian government has denounced “for a long time” local associations with ties to terrorism, “but the left attacked us along with its media circus,” the party tweeted in Italian following the police’s statement.
From Ian:
When “One Religion” Becomes “Zionism”
I was listening to The Interview, the New York Times podcast hosted by David Marchese, featuring Raja Shehadeh, a Palestinian writer and activist. It was rebroadcast on The Daily’s Saturday edition. The conversation itself was interesting; I recommend it in order to understand what is seen today by Palestinians as a moderate view, one that supports peace. But there was one moment- very specific- that genuinely stopped me cold. And it came from the interviewer.
At that point in the interview, the guest, Raja Shehadeh, made an extreme claim- not about Israel as a state, and not about Zionism as a political movement, but about religion.
“Palestine has always been a place for three religions… and now one religion is trying to dominate and say it’s the only one that is going to be allowed.”
This was not a slip of the tongue. It was a clear statement. One religion. Dominating the others. Deciding who will be “allowed.”
Historically, only two political frameworks in the Eretz Yisrael/Palestine provided full freedom of religion- equal protection for Jews, Muslims, and Christians alike. The first was the British Mandate. Whatever its colonial flaws, it explicitly enshrined equal religious rights. Before that, under Muslim rule, Jews paid special taxes for being Jewish, as did Christians (jizya, poll tax), and both often paid to access holy sites.
The second polity is the State of Israel, where freedom of religion is protected by law, Arabic is an official language, and religious practice is legally safeguarded. One can- and should- report on extremist groups and Jewish far-right violence, trying to destory this legal and political framework. But those are not the law of the land.
And yet, when Shehadeh framed his argument in explicitly religious terms- about Jews as Jews- the interviewer probably panicked. Marchese immediately intervened. Not to challenge the premise, or bring facts to the discussuin, but rather to reframe it to the political code he finds appropriate :
“Well, you know, what you’re describing is Zionism.”
This was not a neutral clarification. It was a substitution. A sweeping religious accusation was hurridly converted into a political one.
In doing so, Marchese performed two moves at once. First, he corrected his interviewee- implicitly telling him that the “problem” is not Jews but Zionists. Second, he smuggled in a definition of Zionism that bears little resemblance to reality, implying that Zionism is about religious domination.
From Tehran to Turning Point USA: The political utility of Jew-hatred
The threat picture: Iran amplifying far-right antisemitism through social-media operations, Qatar cultivating conservative influencers through access and economic incentives, Russia weaponizing deceptively edited content, and China bankrolling radical antisemitic campus networks. Different vectors, same target. This is antisemitism’s operational advantage: Its utility transcends ideology. A Nazi and a Marxist, a theocrat and an atheist, a grifter and a communist operative can all deploy identical conspiracy theories while advancing separate strategic objectives.
This is how institutional defenses fail—not through the initial breach but through immune system collapse. When calling out Holocaust denial makes you the target rather than the threat actor, then you’ve already lost. When boundary enforcement becomes boundary violation, there are no boundaries. The attack chain from “perfidious Jews” to “death penalty” to “Cookie Monster” ovens to mass-casualty events isn’t theoretical. We have the historical case studies. The progression is consistent and accelerating.
When this hatred achieves mainstream acceptance (amplified by podcasters with millions of followers, weaponized by hostile state actors, defended as “free speech”) and produces attacks like Bondi Beach, you’re not observing normal political friction. You’re watching the mechanics of how democracies fail to protect their most vulnerable citizens.
The threat requires decisive action. Platforms must enforce existing terms of service against coordinated inauthentic behavior. Law enforcement must treat incitement to genocide as the criminal act it is, not protected speech.
Both conservative and progressive institutions must choose between coalition maintenance and moral clarity. Right-wing leaders must decide whether platforming Holocaust deniers is an acceptable price for audience growth. Left-wing activists must confront how foreign adversaries have weaponized their movements to advance antisemitic agendas. Americans with platforms across the political spectrum must understand that silence functions as operational support.
The historical pattern is clear, and the contemporary threat indicators are impossible to ignore. Antisemitism has been repackaged as a multipurpose political and economic tool: profitable for podcasters, strategically valuable for hostile states and algorithmically optimized for maximum reach. What began as ancient hatred has evolved into modern infrastructure—and that infrastructure is producing body counts.
The question is whether American institutions, left and right, will respond to these threat indicators before the next attack, and the one after that, and the one after that.
‘Palestine 36’ is propaganda by subtraction
There’s a reason why “Palestine 36” avoids al-Husseini: His real record contradicts the film’s narrative. His worldview, which was defined by eliminationist antisemitism fused with religious absolutism, existed long before 1936 and did not end with the Arab Revolt.
During World War II, al-Husseini was a committed Nazi Party collaborator. He lived in a mansion provided by the Third Reich; met repeatedly with Nazi hierarchy; broadcast Arabic-language propaganda for Nazi radio, urging listeners to “kill the Jews wherever you find them”; blocked efforts to rescue Jewish children; and helped recruit Muslim SS divisions responsible for atrocities in the Balkans. Prosecutors at the Nuremberg trials after the end of World War II described him as a collaborator “of the highest order.”
This is not a figure who fits comfortably into a romantic narrative of anti-colonial resistance.
And that erasure is not accidental; it is political. Acknowledging al-Husseini forces recognition of the conflict’s true roots: an Arab nationalism in Mandatory Palestine shaped primarily by Islamist and European bigotry, and ideological rejection of any Jewish sovereignty, not by anti-colonial grievance. The Mufti didn’t oppose the partition of the land because of borders; he opposed granting Jews any civil or national rights whatsoever.
A film that acknowledged these truths would undercut the preferred narrative that the conflict began in 1948 or 1967, or that it is purely an anti-colonial dispute. It would reveal what has always been the case: Jews in Mandatory Palestine were not colonizers. Rather, they were a vulnerable minority facing organized campaigns to eliminate them or keep them permanently powerless and stateless.
Modern Palestinian leadership has never disavowed al-Husseini. His portrait hangs in official offices. Schoolbooks echo his rhetoric. Hamas praises him outright. The hatred ideology that he championed animated the pogroms of the 1920s and 1930s, just as surely as it animated the Hamas-led atrocities in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
This is why films like “Palestine 36” must erase him. Because restoring him to the story restores the truth—and the truth shatters too many cherished political narratives.
And here lies the film’s deeper deception: “Palestine 36” is not history. It is propaganda by subtraction—a film that invites viewers to mourn the colonized while concealing the internal purges, the anti-Jewish violence, the ideological extremism and the Nazi collaboration that shaped the entire conflict.
The war against Jewish self-determination did not begin with Israel’s declaration in 1948 or with the Arab Revolt of 1936. It began when leaders like al-Husseini chose hatred over coexistence, rejection over compromise and alliance with genocidal tyrants over peace with their Jewish neighbors.
From Ian:
Seth Mandel:
Mike Waltz on Gaza, Iran, and Keeping the UN in Check
Mike Waltz is having an unusual experience as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, a job that does not usually come with a honeymoon phase. Yet the former congressman and national security adviser took office in September and a mere two months later the Security Council gave the Trump administration a big win by passing a resolution affirming the president’s plan for postwar Gaza.
As a result, Waltz may be America’s first UN ambassador in some time to describe the atmosphere there, at least for now, as “pleasant.”
Waltz sees such support, he told me this week after wrapping up a weeklong trip to Israel and Jordan, as validation for the fact that “the president and his team are trying something very new and bold and innovative.”
Waltz visited the Keren Shalom crossing on the Egyptian border and the American civil-military coordination center in Kiryat Gat and sees Israel clearly holding up its end of the deal. Aid flow into Gaza has surged: The cease-fire plan called for Israel to allow 600 trucks of food and supplies in daily, and the day Waltz left had seen 900 aid trucks enter the enclave. “For the rest of the world that is saying the international community is not doing enough or that the Israeli government is getting in the way of basic lifesaving aid going in to the people that have suffered at the hands of Hamas, that’s just false,” Waltz says. “The data doesn’t back it up.”
There was almost a breakthrough on another front while Waltz was in Israel. Hamas recovered remains of what many hoped was the body of the last missing hostage, Ran Gvili, but it was a false alarm. Waltz did meet with Gvili’s parents and came away impressed with their son’s heroism and sacrifice. “The reason he was off duty that day is because he had a broken shoulder. And what did he do when he got the alert [that Hamas had invaded]? He threw his gear on his only good shoulder and ran towards the sounds of the guns, and over a dozen dead terrorists were found where he died.”
The search for Gvili’s body continues as all parties work toward further implementation of the Gaza plan, including, Waltz said, Egypt and Qatar. Waltz also mentioned that expanding the Abraham Accords remains an administration priority.
When calling for Israelis to be killed is deemed acceptable
For months my producers at Talk have been working with me to try to get answers out of Avon & Somerset Police about how the investigation is going, whether Pascal Robinson-Foster was ever arrested (he was not, but he was questioned) and we ran a graphic on the screen on many occasions, calculating the number of days the investigation was dragging on. On numerous occasions we asked chief constable Sarah Crew to be interviewed on Talk. She refused each time, and continues to do so.
And now we have the verdict from her and her CPS colleagues: despite televised evidence, despite months of investigation, despite 200 people being interviewed on a basis not fully clarified by Avon & Somerset Police, there is ‘insufficient evidence’ for Pascal Robinson-Foster to be prosecuted. He initially denied he was calling for the deaths of individual IDF soldiers, with evidence inconveniently turning up from a concert just weeks before Glastonbury when he had done just that. Robinson-Foster has repeated the call in other international concerts.
Free speech is a fundamental part of any free society. The free speech we enjoy in the United Kingdom is denied to citizens of most of the Arab world and it is certainly not encouraged by Hamas terrorists in Gaza. But Robinson-Foster’s call was not for the IDF to cease its activity. He was not taking issue with the IDF’s tactics, or even doing something such as calling them ‘murderers’ guilty of ‘genocide’. All of these sentiments are ones with which most Jewish News readers will disagree, but will not actively believe people should be arrested or charged for saying.
But now, as 2025 closes, we are told by both Avon & Somerset Police and the Crown Prosecution Service that in the United Kingdom it is absolutely fine to call for the death of the 169,500 active personnel in the conscript IDF army and its 465,000 reserve soldiers. Many antisemites will sleep more soundly at that.
Sir Keir Starmer lights his menorah candles, has Jewish leaders into Number 10 for a Chanukah reception and says he will do all he can to stop antisemitism. Perhaps he could start by having a word with the organisation he once led, the Crown Prosecution Service, reminding them what antisemitism actually is, if the Prime Minister himself in fact knows. It would be helpful if it didn’t take yet more years for our ruling class to work out basic facts. It may even save a few Jewish lives.
Yehuda Teitelbaum:
You Don’t Care About "Palestine" Part 1
You don’t care about Palestine.
How do I know?
One Word. Sudan.
CNN has just published a detailed, months-long investigation documenting ethnically targeted mass killings carried out by Sudan’s army and its allied militias. The reporting describes civilians being executed, bodies dumped into canals, and mass graves concealed until satellite imagery revealed wrapped corpses surfacing as the water receded. Investigators traced responsibility back to senior levels of command.
The scale is absolutely staggering. More than 150,000 civilians are believed to have been killed. Nearly 12 million people have been displaced. Entire regions are facing famine. Non-Arab communities have been targeted at checkpoints, driven from their villages, and in some cases wiped out entirely. Women interviewed by investigators described watching their children executed. Weeks later, bodies were still being carried downstream by the canals. A UN investigator quoted by CNN described the campaign as a “targeted extermination of people.”
If concern for civilian life were really the driving force behind today’s activism, Sudan would be impossible to ignore. Yet there are no campus encampments demanding action, no mass ceasefire marches, no viral influencer monologues, and no celebrities posting flags or slogans.
The usual explanation is that Israel is different because the United States supports it militarily, and that protests are really about American complicity rather than the tragedy itself. I don’t buy it. If mass killing only matters when it can be blamed on your own country, that is a deeply self-centered way of engaging with human suffering.
These same voices regularly insist that silence is complicity and that there is always something one must do, even when the odds of success are low. That principle is suddenly abandoned when Sudan comes up.
No one genuinely believes that protesting Israel under a Trump administration is likely to change Israeli policy. People protest anyway because they believe public expression itself has moral value. That logic does not disappear because the victims are Sudanese, yet it is treated as if it does.
There is also a tendency to pretend that the United States is simply powerless in Sudan, which is not true. This is not an argument for American troops on the ground, and it is reasonable to oppose that idea. But the United States is the most powerful military and diplomatic actor on the planet. If it wanted to exert serious pressure, coordinate large-scale evacuations, isolate leadership, enforce consequences, or push negotiations using the full weight of its influence, it could. Even short of military action, there are many tools available.
The reality is not that nothing can be done. It is that no one wants to do anything. Sudan does not offer the emotional payoff or political symbolism that Israel does. It does not fit neatly into Western ideological narratives, and it does not allow people to perform virtue without cost.
Sudan has everything people claim to care about: ethnic cleansing, mass graves, famine, millions of refugees, and overwhelming evidence documented by satellite imagery, whistleblowers, and international investigators. Even CNN could not soften what it found.
And still, there is silence.
From Ian:
Jeff Jacoby:
Would Jesus Be Safe in a Synagogue Today?
I used to scoff when some American Jews told opinion surveys that antisemitism in the U.S. was "a very serious problem." I thought Jews had been blessed in America with a degree of tolerance and goodwill virtually unparalleled. America's story was rooted in Judeo-Christian soil. The founders of the American republic believed that they, like the Israelites of old, had been led to a Promised Land.
Jews seemed familiar - the original protagonists in the very story the founders believed they were continuing. Jews were embraced as heirs to the scriptures Americans revered. George Washington in his famous 1790 letter to the Jewish community of Newport, R.I., said that in America, every Jew would live safely "and there shall be none to make him afraid."
But the golden age has been replaced by a grim new reality in which antisemitism is being normalized with terrifying speed. Today, American synagogues and Jewish schools must spend a fortune on security. Jewish-owned businesses are targeted by antisemitic mobs, podcasters with huge followings platform Holocaust deniers, and social media is awash in anti-Jewish venom.
Rev. Daniel Joslyn-Siemiatkoski, an Episcopal priest and director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Learning at Boston College, noted the difference between synagogues with rigorous security protocols and nearby churches where people were free to walk in and out of the open doors. "Why are we Americans willing to live like this? Why are Christians, who worship Jesus the Jew, willing to stand for this? Why do we stand by as Jews in our communities are threatened by antisemitic graffiti, as Jewish children are bullied in their schools, and as more and more Jews feel they must hide their Jewish identity for fear of harassment - or worse?"
"Jesus lived as a Jew and taught as one. The gospels recount that one of the first acts of his public ministry was to teach in his home synagogue. If Jesus were to reappear today, what would he make of armed guards and locked doors at the entrance of U.S. synagogues?... Antisemitism threatens all of us. Rarely do those who target Jews with persecution, threats, or violence stop there. They come for others....Jesus would not keep silent at the sight of Jewish worshipers who need armed guards to pray in safety."
Victor Davis Hanson:
We know the reasons for violence against Jews — but refuse to say them aloud
Indeed, most polls show that 60% of Democrats favor the Palestinians over the Israelis. Translated, that means they prefer a terrorist autocracy over a Western liberal constitutional government.
The right used to be a unified corrective to left-wing antisemitism. It still polls nearly 70% in favor of Israel.
For a while longer, it is far more likely to condemn antisemitic violence than the left.
But recently, its own base, in varying degrees, has come full circle and joined the left in its distaste for Israel and Jews in general.
The new anti-Israel right despises Israel and the US support of it, either in terms that are commercial (there are more Arabs, with more money and oil), cowardly (trashing Jews does not earn terrorist reprisals; rebuking Muslims can), political (Jews more often vote Democratic), or simply antisemitic (cabals of Jews control Wall Street, Hollywood, the media, etc.).
Once-fringe antisemites like Nick Fuentes are now welcomed to air their views openly, but mostly the conspiracy venom is of the more insidious sort, like “I’m just throwing this out there. . .” or “Here is something to consider. . .”
In the last few weeks, we have been told — without any evidence — by right-wing influencers that the Jews may well have had a hand in killing Charlie Kirk, in bombing an Iranian nuclear facility, in pressuring the Maduro kleptocracy and in the 9/11 slaughter.
One hallmark of the new right-wing furor against Jews and Israel is the strange symbiosis they employ.
Formerly edgy podcasters become vicarious hosts of virulent antisemites. The partnerships are a way of not directly owning up to their toxicity but just “putting it out there.”
Candace Owens initially championed Kanye West (“I’m a bit sleepy tonight but when I wake up, I’m going death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE”).
Then she graduated to expressing her own old antisemitic tropes: “There is just a very small ring of specific people who are using the fact that they are Jewish to shield themselves from any criticism. . . . All Americans should want answers because this appears to be something that is quite sinister.”
Tucker Carlson hosted critics of the US effort against Hitler in World War II and Israel-behind-it conspiracists before escalating to inviting Nick Fuentes on in a mostly friendly manner — which might be attributed to his interview format, except he has attacked fellow conservatives far more than has odious Fuentes.
But now Carlson himself too throws out story-line hints about just maybe Jews’ involvement in Charlie Kirk’s death, or a sort of/kind of Jewish effort behind 9/11, or perhaps it was those Jews eating hummus, not the Roman prefect of Judea who ordered Jesus killed for supposed sedition — a common fate of any provincial residents who even appeared to defy the absolute authority of the Roman imperial state.
Carlson strangely categorized Israel as an “insignificant” country. But is not Israel a democratic Western outpost in a sea of Middle East autocracy, the most technically advanced and scientifically sophisticated nation for its size in the world and the ancient home of the Judeo-Christian tradition?
Somehow, many on the right forgot who funds the virulently anti-American mouthpiece Al-Jazeera, or where the 9/11 murderers came from, or who has killed Americans in Syria, Lebanon and on the Red Sea, or whom the Muslim Brotherhood, ISIS and theocratic Iran have vowed to destroy.
And as for Oct. 7 and what followed, Israel waited in vain for nearly three weeks for Hamas to give up the 3,000 terrorists who murdered 1,219 Jews, wounded 3,400 and took 254 hostages before mounting a full invasion of Gaza.
Where does it all end?
Either there will be an 11th-hour Western intolerance of antisemitism, a limit of student visas and immigration from the illiberal nations of the Middle East, a return to melting-pot assimilation, an end to DEI tribalism and a reform of the weaponized university curricula — or we will see more images of gunmen shooting Jews as if they were mere animals.
Ben Shapiro vs the crank right
If this contrarianism were simply about ‘owning the libs’, it would be of no real consequence. However, ‘just asking questions’ has become a right-wing ploy to promote conspiracy theories while maintaining plausible deniability. And in a world where clicks generate cash and algorithms favour outrage, there’s a financial incentive to go all in on the outlandish. All this matters because it’s doing significant brand damage and shattering trust in institutions.
Douglas Murray’s recent bust-up with podcaster Joe Rogan and comedian Dave Smith demarcates this new dividing line on the right. The two-hour conversation hit a brick wall over whether to trust experts or spurn them.
This schism is having real-world effects in the realm of foreign policy. Thanks to the America Firsters, Uncle Sam can no longer be seen as a reliable ally, even at a time when Europe is facing Russian aggression.
This new form of conservatism is also redrawing the battle lines of the culture war. In recent years, the right has seemed like a paragon of reason compared with the left, which has imbibed woke orthodoxies, from critical race theory to trans activism. That is no longer the case.
I don’t sign up to everything Shapiro has to offer. I part ways with him on abortion and gun control, for example. But he’s right to stand up for traditional conservatism, which approaches new ideas with suspicion and defends institutions.
What does this new intake stand for?
Wednesday, December 31, 2025
