07/08 Links Pt2: Dinah Project Report Unveils the Sexual Violence of October 7th; ADL Slams Nation's Largest Teachers' Union for Banning Its Materials; On what planet is the BBC pro-Israel?

From Ian:

Andrew Fox: The Dinah Project report

Now, however, the truth is out in a way that can be shared with the world’s general audience. The Dinah Project report provides detailed descriptions and aggregated data that convey the scale and nature of the sexual violence without splashing explicit gore all over social media. It allows us to discuss the facts in a dignified manner, grounded in research and testimony. There is no longer any excuse for journalists, diplomats, or activists to parrot Hamas’s denials. The evidence is meticulously documented by a panel of legal experts and partially funded by the UK government (hardly an Israeli propaganda outfit). This report is the answer to anyone who still sneers “Where’s the evidence?” when confronted with the rapes of 7 October. Here it is, in black and white. Read it and weep (if you have a soul).

This is a personal issue for me, as it should be for anyone with a conscience. I am not Israeli, but as a human being, as a man, as a former soldier and writer about war who stood on that charred ground in the Gaza Periphery and later held back tears talking with survivors and hostage families, I feel an obligation to amplify their truth. We must ensure that the rape and sexual torture of 7 October are recognised globally for what they were: crimes against humanity. The dehumanisation that Hamas practised, in which Jewish civilians were not only to be killed, but degraded most intimately, needs to be utterly condemned by every decent person, no matter their politics on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Now the question is: what will the world do about it? Acknowledging the truth is the first step. Next must come accountability. No Hamas fighter who took part in the 7 October invasion should escape justice, even if their individual rape victim did not survive to testify against them. The patterns and evidence are enough to indict them as a group for sexual war crimes. The report also pushes for international bodies to step up: it calls on the UN Secretary-General to officially blacklist Hamas as an organisation that uses sexual violence as a weapon of war. (Incredibly, that has not happened yet; a scandal in its own right.) It lays out a roadmap for prosecuting these crimes in forums such as the International Criminal Court. In short, it demands justice.

I am outraged that it took this long and this much effort. I am furious at the chorus of denial that forced survivors to scream into a void for months. I take some solace in knowing that the facts have finally pierced the lies of denial. To those who still want to avert their eyes or peddle conspiracy theories: shame on you. To those who bravely gathered this evidence and spoke out, the Dinah Project team, the survivors who broke their silence, the first responders who testified to what they found: thank you. You have done a service not just to Israel, but to humanity.

In the biblical story, Dinah was a woman who survived a horrific rape, and her brothers sought justice (albeit violently) against the perpetrators. Today, the Dinah Project carries on that legacy in a more enlightened way, through truth and law. Now that the truth is in the open, we must not let it be ignored. The innocents of 7 October deserve to be remembered in full: not only how they died, but how they suffered. We owe it to them to be outraged and to ensure that never again will such barbarity be waved away or denied.

The evidence is here; the world must face it. For the sake of our shared humanity, we must hold the perpetrators of these horrors to account, however long it takes. Anything less would be an unforgivable betrayal of the victims and of truth itself.

October 7 and beyond: Hamas's use of sexual violence was systematic weapon of war, report finds

A new report on the systematic use of sexual violence by Hamas terrorists against Israelis in the Gaza border area on October 7, 2023, offers a framework to approach the legal monstrosity of proving and eventually indicting the perpetrators of such crimes.

The fact that the attacks were carried out by a group driven by a particular ideology is itself enough of a basis for a new evidentiary model, the report suggests, adding that there is legal precedent for this type of model.

This model suggests that when the perpetrators agreed to breach Israel’s borders on that fateful Saturday, they consented to all the crimes that would be carried out. As such, the group as an entity bears responsibility, as do the individuals within, especially given the systematic pattern of sexual violence evidenced on October 7 and by some who did them to captives later on.

The full report can be viewed at www.thedinahproject.org.

The Dinah Project, which authored the report, is comprised of five women, legal and gender experts in their own right, who came together after October 7 to form “the leading resource for recognition and justice for victims of Conflict Related Sexual Violence.”

The report finds that “Hamas used sexual violence as a tactical weapon of war,” a conclusion that carries potentially far-reaching consequences in the international realm. CRSV has been documented in other conflict zones, such as Nigeria and Iraq.

The report, titled “A Quest for Justice: October 7 and Beyond,” was authored by the Dinah Project’s founding members: Prof. Ruth Halperin-Kaddari, Col. (res.) Sharon Zagagi-Pinhas, and retired judge Nava Ben-Or. The team, led by Halperin-Kaddari, analyzed and verified what they could on CRSV from October 7, including incidents of rape, gang rape, torture, and humiliation. Other team members include Eetta Prince-Gibson and Nurit Jacobs-Yinon, the visual editor of the report.

The report documents the widespread and systematic use of sexual violence during the October 7 attacks across at least six different locations: the Nova music festival, Route 232, the Nahal Oz military base, Kibbutz Re’im, Kibbutz Nir Oz, and Kibbutz Kfar Aza.

The main issue that confronted the researchers was gathering the evidence, as “most victims were murdered; survivors and released captives may be too traumatized to come forward and testify against their abusers; and forensic evidence required for criminal convictions is difficult to obtain in crime scenes that remain war zones.”

New Dinah Project Report Unveils the Sexual Violence of October 7th & Beyond

The Dinah Project’s report takes a meticulous approach in documenting the sexual violence committed by Hamas during the October 7 assault. The initiative is named after Dinah, the biblical figure and Patriarch Jacob's only daughter, whose story of the rape she suffered in the Book of Genesis is told without her perspective ever being given a voice. Similarly, the victims of the October 7 massacre remain largely silenced, either through death or by the profound trauma that prevents them from sharing their experiences. The project’s mission is to document, analyze, and seek justice for the gender-based crimes carried out during the Hamas-led invasion of southern Israel. Key Findings

Through comprehensive research and analysis, the report confirms that:
- Sexual violence was rampant and coordinated during the October 7 assault, taking place at minimum 6 different sites, including the Nova music festival, Route 232, Nahal Oz military base, and the Kibbutzim of Re'im, Nir Oz, and Kfar Aza.

- Distinct patterns of sexual abuse emerged, such as victims found partially or fully undressed with their hands bound to trees or poles, gang rapes followed by executions, genital mutilation, and instances of public humiliation.

- Sexual violence persisted during captivity, with several returnees reporting instances of forced nudity, sexual harassment, assaults, and threats of forced marriage.

- Most victims were permanently silenced, killed either during or after the attacks, or remain too traumatized to share their experiences, creating substantial challenges in evidence gathering that necessitate a specialized, context-driven approach to documenting conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV).

Evidence Framework

The report draws on 5 main sources:
- Survivor Testimonies: One survivor of attempted rape on October 7, along with 15 returned hostages, either having experienced or witnessed accounts of sexual violence.

- Eyewitness and Earwitness Accounts: At least 17 individuals have provided testimony regarding over 15+ separate incidents of sexual assault, including, individual rapes, gang rapes and mutilation.

- First Responder Testimonies: 27 first responders reporting dozens of cases of sexual violence across six locations, with clear evidence of assault on the victims.

- Forensic Evidence: Morgue attendants describing bodies showing signs of sexual violence, with photographic documentation supporting these claims.

- Visual and Audio Documentation: Videos, photographs, and intercepted communications provide further evidence of sexual assault and humiliation during the attacks.

Rape. Genital Mutilation.

Hamas used sexual violence as a weapon of war - on October 7 and well after.

This was not random. It was systematic. An intentional tactic of terror. A war crime.

The July 8 Dinah Report demands accountability.

We will not stop fighting for… pic.twitter.com/YXpesuK9aH

— Israel Foreign Ministry (@IsraelMFA) July 8, 2025

A message from Michal:

Six confirmed sites. Dozens of eyewitness accounts. Testimony from 15 courageous returned hostages.

The evidence is undeniable: Hamas terrorists used sexual violence as a systematic weapon of war - on October 7 and beyond.

The Dinah Report published… pic.twitter.com/Ez5QLrL7ku

— יצחק הרצוג Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) July 8, 2025

A message from Michal.

I received the harrowing report from Project Dinah, bravely detailing Hamas’s systemic use of gang rape, forced nudity, sexual torture, and unspeakable abuse on October 7 and continuing in captivity.

The report lays out clear legal evidence: Hamas used… pic.twitter.com/DPOhL0j0rL

— יצחק הרצוג Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) July 8, 2025

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07/08 Links Pt1: Five IDF soldiers killed, 14 wounded in northern Gaza; Israel Is America's Trump Card in the Middle East; The Risks of Ending the Gaza War

From Ian:

Israel Is America's Trump Card in the Middle East

Israel is the single most effective force advancing American interests in the Middle East. Iran wishes to destabilize the Middle East, and it propagates chaos through its nuclear and ballistic missile programs and its proxies in the region. Iran doesn't want a seat at the regional table; it wants to flip the table altogether.

Last month, when America actively joined Israel's response to Iranian aggression, it was a watershed moment. The U.S. attack on Iran was a strategic message to the entire world: The West still has teeth. For once, America didn't need to send in the Marines. With its unmatched intelligence, cyber capabilities, air force, technologies and spies, Israel did the heavy lifting. Iran was humiliated. The myth of its regional invincibility was shattered.

Israel has proved to be America's most reliable, efficient and cost-effective ally in the region. No other partner is willing or able to take the initiative, act decisively and serve as the West's first line of defense. Israel removes the Iranian nuclear threat against America and its allies, dismantles Iran's terrorist proxies, and protects the Gulf States, all without requiring American boots on the ground.

This is what smart power looks like. Leverage strong allies that share your interests and do the job right. America needs friends who aren't freeloaders. Israel is the one holding the line of liberty, stability, security and prosperity.

The Risks of Ending the Gaza War

Why, ask many Israelis, can’t we just end the war, let our children, siblings, and spouses finally come home, and get out the hostages? Azar Gat seeks to answer this question by looking at the possible costs of concluding hostilities precipitously, and breaking down some of the more specific arguments put forward by those who have despaired of continuing military operations in Gaza. He points to the case of the second intifada, in which the IDF not only ended the epidemic of suicide bombing, but effectively convinced—through application of military force—Fatah and other Palestinian factions to cease their terror war.

“What we haven’t achieved militarily in Gaza after a year-and-a-half probably can’t be achieved.” Two years passed from the outbreak of the second intifada until the launch of Operation Defensive Shield, [whose aim was] to reoccupy the West Bank, and another two years until the intifada was fully suppressed. And all of that, then as now, was conducted against the background of a mostly hostile international community and with significant American constraints (together with critical assistance) on Israeli action. The Israeli chief of staff recently estimated that the intensified Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip would take about two months. Let’s hope that is the case.

The results of the [current] operation in [Gaza] and the breaking of Hamas’s grip on the supply routes may indeed pave the way for the entry of a non-Hamas Palestinian administration into the Strip—an arrangement that would necessarily need to be backed by Israeli bayonets, as in the West Bank. Any other end to the war will lead to Hamas’s recovery and its return to control of Gaza.

It is unclear how much Hamas was or would be willing to compromise on these figures in negotiations. But since the hostages are its primary bargaining chip, it has no incentive to compromise. On the contrary—it is interested in dragging out negotiations indefinitely, insisting on the full evacuation of the Gaza Strip and an internationally guaranteed cease-fire, to ensure its survival as Gaza’s de-facto ruler—a position that would also guarantee access to the flood of international aid destined for the Gaza Strip.

Once the hostages become the exclusive focus of discussion, Hamas dictates the rules. And since not only 251 or twenty hostages, but any number is considered worth “any price,” there is a real concern that Hamas will retain a certain number of captives as a long-term reserve.

Israel Has Exposed the Iranian Regime as a Paper Pussycat

The debate about how long Iran's nuclear program was set back misses the point. The most significant consequence of the Israel-Iran war is the everlasting humiliation and exposure of the regime. On June 4, just before the war began, supreme leader Ali Khamenei declared: "They cannot do a damn thing [to us]."

Twenty days later he had lost six top generals, a dozen senior military and IRGC commanders (including the entire leadership of his air force), 11 of his most senior nuclear scientists, key missile production capabilities, his air defense system, and suffered damage to his most important nuclear sites. The regime took hit after hit all while fighting completely alone. Not one of its proxies or allies lifted a finger to help defend it.

Ali Khamenei rules under the doctrine that his authority is divinely ordained. Yet, Khamenei's shrinking base just watched their divine leader utterly humiliated by Israel and America, the regime's two greatest enemies. No amount of propaganda can erase that disgrace.

We Iranians are not sheep. We are known for being critical, confrontational, and proud. We know how to smell weakness. The regime knows the truth too. Should it attempt to rebuild its nuclear weapons infrastructure, it will be destroyed again. Those inside Iran feel it daily: rolling blackouts, water shortages, and billions of national wealth squandered. The supposed "axis of resistance" has collapsed, from Gaza to Lebanon, through the Assad regime's demise, and into a shattered nuclear program that delivered neither dignity nor prosperity.

Israel's greatest victory in this war was psychological: the exposure of the regime not as a paper tiger, but as a paper pussycat - and a badly beaten one at that.

The Iran War Scorecard

Israeli planes flew 400 sorties over Iran with 600 aerial refueling connections.

IAF attack and surveillance drones flew an additional 1,100 sorties into Iran, and only eight drones were lost.

Together, the jets and drones struck 900 targets in Iran with 4,300 munitions, including nine nuclear sites, six airports and air bases, and 35 missile and air defense production facilities.

IDF commandoes and Mossad agents operated inside Iran or from bases just across Iran's borders, launching UAVs and secret weapon systems to neutralize Iranian abilities and target Iranian military and intelligence leaders.

Not a single Iranian defensive system or force discovered these Israeli boots-on-the-ground in real time nor managed to interfere with these operations.

All undercover Israeli soldiers and agents returned home to Israel safely.

Over 14 days, Israel demolished 80 Iranian surface-to-air missile systems, 70 radars, 15 Iranian warplanes, 200 of Iran's 400 missile launchers, and 800-1,000 of Iran's 2,000 ballistic missiles.

Unfortunately, 50 missiles and one drone broke through Israeli defenses, killing 29 Israelis, wounding 3,500 more, destroying 2,300 homes in 240 buildings, and leaving 16,000 Israeli civilians homeless.

Enemy missile fire struck a central military base, a key Israeli oil refinery, and one of the country's top scientific research institutions.

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07/07 Links Pt2: World’s Jewish population still hasn’t recovered from the Holocaust; Why Australia's antisemitism problem can't be ignored any longer; 7/7 and the refusal to confront Islamist terror

From Ian:

World’s Jewish population still hasn’t recovered from the Holocaust, shocking analysis shows: ‘Reminder of how many people we lost’

The world’s Jewish population has yet to recover from the Holocaust that wiped out more than a third of its members, a stunning new analysis shows.

There were an estimated 16.6 million Jews alive in 1939 before the Holocaust killed more than 6 million of them.

The Jewish population did increase by 6.2%, going from 13.91 million to 14.8 million, between 2010 and 2020, figures show.

But globally, the overall non-Jewish population jumped 12.3%, from 7 billion to 7.87 billion, during that same time frame, the study said.

“During this time, the rest of the world’s population grew about twice as quickly,” Pew noted.

Jews account for a tiny 0.2% of the global population.

The study’s findings come at a vulnerable time for Jews, who are battling a rise in antisemitism triggered by the Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza.

“Have Jews made up for the loss of people killed in the Holocaust? The answer is no,” said Jonathan Sarna, a professor of American Jewish history at Brandeis University.

“It takes a long time to replace a third of the population. It still hasn’t happened. It’s a reminder of how many people we lost in the Holocaust,” he said.

EDI has a dark underbelly

A “diversity” expert promoting racism might sound paradoxical. But is it? In 2021, Google had to remove its diversity head over an old blogpost in which he reflected on the Jews and their “insatiable appetite for war and killing”. Now, we seem to have his British equivalent.

There are many things my childhood self never expected of modern life. That innocent young lad always knew that the flying cars and food machines of The Jetsons were probably a stretch, but even then he didn’t expect quite so much of his future day-to-day existence to instead revolve around removing neo-Nazi propaganda from his field of vision.

Regardless, this is now one of the many integral elements of the 2025 experience that we have normalised into the mundanity of our daily routine. As with charity chuggers, wasps and Hollyoaks, there is no way to actively proof oneself against bumping into examples of the most virulent kind of online antisemitism at the most inopportune moments, and for those of moral integrity there is little else to do but theatrically shoo it out of sight with a well-aimed swipe, like a cartoon washerwoman chasing away pigeons from her freshly-laundered bloomers.

Recently, my browser crash-landed into a particularly monstrous account — a real blizzard of anti-Jewish spite and approving reposts of antisemitic golden oldies. All the greatest hits were here — the “Jews did 9/11”, terrorist attacks are “Israeli false flags”, and a particularly pungent cut decrying Jewish “rat ideology.” The ambition of accounts like this one always remains consistent – pulling the present-day equivalents of Der Stürmer headlines off a set menu and lining them up like paper dollies, a curiously humdrum act of evil.

Unsurprisingly, this poisonous little piece of the internet was also doing backflips to celebrate the equally humdrum evil of Bob Vylan and the various incendiary performers at this year’s Glastonbury festival. Acres of opinion pieces have already been written about these recent developments, and how the BBC’s conciliatory statements for what they have attempted to undersell as sitcom-style mishaps don’t particularly square with the intentional, politically partisan editorial decisions they are supposed to have been addressing. The BBC’s apology insisted that Bob Vylan’s comments “have no place on our airwaves”, conveniently sidestepping the fact that they clearly do, otherwise nobody would have felt empowered to broadcast them.

It’s not for nothing that the rumour mill is currently predicting an imminent fall for Director General Tim Davie, given the Glastonbury farrago is but the latest in a very long line of recent BBC scandals. The bigger story here is just how many of these ideological pratfalls seem to involve antisemitism on the BBC itself, the overly long leash given to BBC staff accused of antisemitic conduct, or BBC News’s major impartiality breaches over the Gaza war coverage. It’s almost as if the BBC has a problem with … racism?

'Riverway to the Sea': British law firm representing Hamas rebrands, vows death to Zionism

A radical British law firm that previously represented Hamas has renamed itself Riverway to the Sea in honor of the notorious pro-Palestinian chant.

Riverway to the Sea – formerly Riverway Law – announced the move last week “in response to escalating repression and growing global momentum for justice in Palestine,” and, more specifically, the proscription of Palestine Action this week.

Riverway Law first attracted attention when it submitted an appeal to the UK Home Department’s State Secretary Yvette Cooper in April, asking for Hamas to be removed from the list of proscribed terror groups because it “poses no threat to the UK people.”

Its 106-page appeal was fronted by Hamas’s head of international relations, Mousa Abu Marzouk.

Alongside the new name, the firm announced it is undergoing a restructuring whereby it will become a fresh legal organization “committed to confronting Zionism through strategic litigation, legal education, and international coordination.”

“We have therefore taken the decision to close the practice in its current manifestation and will soon be reopening a new firm that will be better equipped to deal with the challenges of our times,” it said.

Aim of 'full liberation from Zionism for all people in Palestine'
Riverway to the Sea’s new website says its mission is to “challenge state practices that violate international human rights and humanitarian law, ultimately contributing to the liberation of Palestine and the emergence of a single, democratic Palestinian state of all its citizens in the ashes of the failed, fascist experiment currently known as ‘Israel.’”

This is with the aim of “full liberation from Zionism for all people in Palestine – from the river to the sea.”

“We are entering a new chapter where the law is not simply a profession but a tool of empowerment, resistance, and transformation. Riverway Law stands ready to meet this moment with clarity, courage, and unity,” said Fahad Ansari, the solicitor and director of the organization.

The organization’s other director, barrister Franck Magennis, has previously been criticized by Jewish groups for his statements about Israel and Jews. On October 7, he posted: “Victory to the intifada” on X/Twitter and changed his profile picture to Hamas terrorists breaking through the Gaza security fence.

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07/07 Links Pt1: The Trump-Bibi Bond; How Dare Israel Win a Defensive War!; The Enchantment of the Arab Mind; Tucker’s Interview with the Iranian President

From Ian:

The Trump-Bibi Bond

Trump’s opinion about the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran has been consistent throughout his political career, from his 2016 campaign through his third campaign in 2024. At virtually every campaign stop, Trump explained that Iran couldn’t be allowed to have the bomb. Once elected to a second term in the White House, he regularly warned of the dangers of a nuclear-armed Iran. He said he’d prefer to handle the threat diplomatically, but he’d do it the other way if given no choice. In either case, he’d never let Iran get the bomb.

From Trump’s perspective, the problem wasn’t just the prospect of a terror regime launching nuclear weapons at Israel, Saudi Arabia, and other U.S. allies—and in time at Europe and even the U.S. homeland. A nuclear-armed Iran threatened America’s historic position in the Gulf. After all, the chief purpose of the postwar U.S. Navy was to keep shipping lanes open and ensure the free flow of cheap Gulf oil that has given the U.S. ultimate control over global oil markets, including the energy supplies of its leading trade partners in Europe and Asia. No postwar arrangement has been more important in keeping the United States secure and prosperous than our role in the Gulf.

An Iranian bomb did not pose the same level of direct threat to the U.S. homeland as the Soviet Union’s enormous nuclear arsenal did. But it could hardly be wished away. A nuclear Iran could, among other things, close the Strait of Hormuz, send oil prices soaring, and destabilize global markets. In this framework, it would also thwart Trump’s most important foreign-policy initiative: rolling back China. What was the point of a trade war with Beijing to reshore manufacturing and fix the trade imbalance that had impoverished the American middle class if China’s main Middle East ally could close a major trade route through which one-fifth of the world’s energy passes? Iran could never have the bomb.

Then there was the not negligible fact that the Iranians kept sending hit squads to hunt Trump in retaliation for killing Soleimani. A nuclear Iran could deploy terror squads around the world with near impunity. Iran must never have the bomb.

In time, perhaps we’ll have the full story of how, when, and where Trump and Netanyahu plotted their strategy, and how they used misdirection and ambiguity to throw off Iran as well as their domestic adversaries. Like FDR, Trump also had to fight off an isolationist faction in his party, while Netanyahu has been under continuous siege by Israel’s version of the Deep State. In his June 25 post on Truth Social, Trump told his partner’s domestic opponents to lay off, because Bibi is a hero.

“Bibi Netanyahu was a WARRIOR,” Trump wrote, “like perhaps no other Warrior in the History of Israel, and the result was something that nobody thought was possible, a complete elimination of potentially one of the biggest and most powerful Nuclear Weapons anywhere in the World, and it was going to happen, SOON! We were fighting, literally, for the Survival of Israel, and there is nobody in Israel’s History that fought harder or more competently than Bibi Netanyahu.”

Soon after, Netanyahu thanked Trump on X. “I was deeply moved by your heartfelt support for me and your incredible support for Israel and the Jewish people. I look forward to continue working with you to defeat our common enemies.”

Churchill and Roosevelt’s voluminous correspondence gives us details of the relationship they forged to save the world, and the same is so with the record of Reagan and Thatcher’s secure phone calls. But these were all private exchanges made public only later. What we’re watching with Trump and Netanyahu on social media is unique: the public declaration of a friendship, its goals and commitments, between two world leaders—a bond that makes the world safer.

A White House Visit Unlike Any Before It

Today, Prime Minister Netanyahu is expected to meet with President Trump in the White House. High on their agenda will be Iran, and the next steps following the joint assault on its nuclear facilities, as well as the latest proposal for a cease-fire in Gaza. But there are other equally weighty matters that the two leaders are apt to discuss. Eran Lerman, calling this a White House visit “unlike any before it,” surveys some of those matters, beginning with efforts to improve relations between Israel and the Arab states—above all Saudi Arabia:
[I]t is a safe bet that no White House signing ceremony is in the offing. A much more likely scenario would involve—if the language from Israel on the Palestinian future is sufficiently vague and does not preclude the option of (limited) statehood—a return to the pre-7 October 2023 pattern of economic ventures, open visits at the ministerial level, and a growing degree of discussion and mutual cooperation on regional issues such as Lebanon and Syria.

In fact, writes Lerman, those two countries will also be major conversation topics. The president and the prime minister are likely to broach as well the possible opening of relations between Jerusalem and Damascus, a goal that is
realistic in light of reconstruction needs of this devastated country, all the more destitute once the Assad clan’s main source of income, the massive production and export of [the drug] Captagon, has been cut off. Both Israel and Saudi Arabia want to see Syria focused on its domestic needs—and as much as possible, free from the powerful grip of Turkey. It remains to be seen whether the Trump administration, with its soft spot for Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, will do its part.

'Partial deal would be a death sentence': Hostage families in Washington rally for complete deal

Families of hostages called for a complete deal that would see the return of all remaining 50 hostages in a rally at Washington DC on Monday, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet with US President Donald Trump in the White House.

“We are here to remind President Trump and PM Netanyahu that there are 50 hostages to be released. We cannot accept a deal for a partial release”, says Ilan Dalal, father of Guy Gilboa-Dalal.

He also added: “A partial deal would mean that some of the hostages will stay in the tunnels for more time, and this would be a death sentence. Please make a deal that will bring all the hostages home.”

Dozens of hostage relatives gathered today in Washington, DC to plead for a deal that “doesn’t leave anyone behind”.

In an official statement, families said: “At this pivotal moment, the families are calling on both leaders to secure a comprehensive deal that brings home all 50 remaining hostages held in Gaza”.

“With Hamas and Iran weakened, this is a rare and fast-closing window for a full resolution,” they said.

Seth Mandel: How Dare Israel Win a Defensive War!

Another way of saying this: How dare the Jews survive! Our survival only causes the world to keep trying to kill us!

And again, those masses gathering on college campuses around the country (and the Western world) waving Hamas and Hezbollah flags? They were mobilizing the moment—and I mean the moment, the very second—the Hamas attacks were carried and while the attacks were still ongoing and therefore long before Israel had formulated a response of any kind.

Then we’re told that Israel’s “violence has strained the good will of the country’s allies and neighbors.” Reminder that before Oct. 7, 2023, Israel’s neighbors included Hezbollah and Bashar al-Assad’s Syria. I’d love to see the author’s personal list of acts of goodwill performed by Hezbollah and Assad.

After that, the article goes back to blaming Jews for attacks on them, telling us that “many Israelis now feel threatened while abroad, even as they are more secure at home.”

Well if they just feel threatened I suppose it’s not much to worry about. But perhaps it is, in the words of the band Boston, more than a feeling? Perhaps it is, say, a pogrom in Amsterdam, the city where Anne Frank hid in an attic?

At this point we’re about a quarter of the way through the Times article. The rest is just these nonsense points repeated ad nauseum.

All of this is because Israel fought a defensive war. Well actually, it’s because Israel won a defensive war. And its enemies and critics are struggling to cope.

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07/06 Links: Can tribal leaders in Hebron bring peace with Israel?; 15 hostages break silence on sexual violence on Oct. 7; “Death to America” Doesn’t Have Another Side

From Ian:

Netanyahu departs for DC: ‘Chance to change face of Middle East even more’

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu departed Ben-Gurion International Airport aboard “Wing of Zion” on Sunday evening for his third in-person meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in the wake of “Operation Rising Lion” and amid talk of a possible hostages-for-ceasefire deal.

“In my conversation with President Trump, I will first of all thank him for his very strong support for Israel. We have never had such a friend in the White House,” Netanyahu told the press just before his flight.

“Our joint efforts have brought about a tremendous victory over our common enemy—Iran,” he said.

Israel feared for years whether it could stand up to Iran, and in the end, all branches of the IDF performed brilliantly, the prime minister said.

The success (intelligence assessments say that Iran’s nuclear weapons program has been knocked back several years) brings an obligation “first and foremost, to preserve the achievement—to remain vigilant against Iran’s attempts to renew its pursuit of nuclear weapons aimed at our destruction,” he said.

There’s also an opportunity “to expand the circle of peace far beyond what we ever imagined before,” he added, speaking of the Abraham Accords, the 2020 normalization agreements between Israel and four Arab states.

“We have already transformed the face of the Middle East beyond recognition, and we now have the opportunity and the ability to change it even further and bring a great future to the State of Israel, the people of Israel, and the entire [region],” Netanyahu said.

The prime minister also said that Israel will not let the Gaza Strip again pose a threat and that means “the elimination of Hamas’s military and governing capabilities. Hamas will not remain there.”

“I am committed to all three missions: the release and return of all our hostages—both living and fallen—the elimination of Hamas’s capabilities, and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel,” he said.

15 hostages break silence on sexual violence on Oct. 7

Fresh testimony from survivors and witnesses demonstrates that Hamas terrorists systematically employed sexual violence during their Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel, according to a comprehensive investigation that documents previously unreported accounts of rape and sexual abuse.

The upcoming Dinah Project report presents evidence from 15 returned hostages who experienced sexual violence in captivity, with only one having spoken publicly before now, the U.K. newspaper The Sunday Times revealed.

The investigation, conducted by Israeli gender and legal experts with partial funding from the British government, found that sexual violence was “widespread and systematic” during the onslaught that killed approximately 1,200 people.

According to the Sunday Times, the report establishes that rape and gang rape occurred in at least six locations, though most victims were “permanently silenced”—either murdered during the assaults or left too traumatized to speak.

The Dinah Project will be published on Tuesday in Jerusalem, representing the most comprehensive documentation of sexual violence during the Oct. 7 attack, the newspaper reported.

The report draws from first-hand testimony of 15 returned Gaza hostages, a survivor of attempted rape at the Supernova music festival and interviews with 17 people who witnessed or heard the attacks, along with therapists treating traumatized survivors.

The project aims “to counter denial, misinformation and global silence” regarding what researchers describe as “one of the most under-reported dimensions of the attacks.”

The report states its mission is “to set the historical record straight: Hamas used sexual violence as a tactical weapon of war.

“Clear patterns emerged in how the sexual violence was perpetrated,” the report documents, “including victims found partially or fully naked with their hands tied, often to trees or poles; evidence of gang rapes followed by execution; and genital mutilation.”

The documented attacks occurred at the Supernova music festival, Route 232, the Nahal Oz military base, and three kibbutzim: Re’im, Nir Oz and Kfar Aza. Sexual abuse extended beyond the initial assault locations, the report reveals.

“Sexual violence continued in captivity, with many returnees reporting forced nudity, physical and verbal sexual harassment, sexual assaults and threats of forced marriage,” the investigation adds.

Netanyahu said to receive report on medical conditions of all living hostages

Just before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu departed for Washington on Sunday to meet with US President Donald Trump, he was reportedly presented information about the medical condition of each of the 20 remaining living hostages, which is said to serve as the basis of who will be chosen to be freed during the hostage-ceasefire deal that is seen to be nearing agreement.

The medical information given to Netanyahu and some senior ministers and aides will be used in discussions, both internal and with mediators, about which hostages’ releases will be prioritized, Channel 12 reported on Sunday.

According to the report, senior cabinet ministers said after the information was presented that “we will have difficulty prioritizing [the hostages],” because “they are all humanitarian [cases].”

The outline of the deal, as it currently stands, would see about half of the living hostages and about half of the dead hostages held by terror groups in Gaza returned to Israel over 60 days, in five separate releases.

Eight living hostages would be freed on the first day and two released on the 50th day, according to an Arab diplomat from one of the mediating countries. Five slain hostages would be returned on the seventh day, five more on the 30th day and eight more on the 60th day. That would leave 22 hostages still held in Gaza, 10 of them believed by Israeli authorities to be alive.

The deal has yet to be finalized, and there has been no definitive statement on whether Israel or Hamas would be the one to determine which 10 of the 20 living hostages would be freed under its terms, and according to which criteria.

As part of the outlet’s report, Channel 12 shared excerpts from the medical files of each living hostage, to highlight the difficulty in deciding between them based on medical priority.

Dear Tucker Carlson: “Death to America” Doesn’t Have Another Side

Tucker Carlson has just announced his latest interview—this time with the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran. If his recent sit-down with Qatar’s Prime Minister is any indication, don’t expect hard questions about the thousands tortured, hanged, raped, or butchered by the regime. Don’t expect mention of the morality police, the murdered protesters, the jailed journalists, or the terror exported across half the globe. Expect instead softballs and sympathy, all under the worn-out pretense of “hearing the other side.”

Carlson’s interview with the Qatari PM, it turns out, wasn’t just a puff piece. According to FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act) filings, it was part of a paid, coordinated PR campaign to rehabilitate Qatar’s image in the West. The entire sit-down was Qatari state propaganda, masquerading as journalism—a slick rebranding of a regime that funds Hamas, hosts the Taliban, and suppresses free speech within its own borders.

The interview announced just days after the Iranian regime issued a new fatwa calling for the assassination of U.S. President Donald Trump. These aren’t symbolic gestures. Ask Salman Rushdie, who was stabbed on stage nearly 30 years after a fatwa was declared against him. These are not political statements. They are theological death warrants with no expiration date—waiting for a devout believer to carry them out.

Iranian officials chant Death to America and Death to Israel in Friday sermons broadcast nationwide. They openly refer to the U.S. as “the Great Satan.” They call for the destruction of Western civilization and the global spread of Islamic rule. Their proxies—Hezbollah, the Houthis, Hamas—carry that mission out in blood. Thousands of Americans have died at the hands of Iran and its network of armed proxies—from the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut to the killing of U.S. soldiers in Iraq by Iranian-supplied IEDs. Americans have been kidnapped, tortured, and murdered—all while Tehran denies involvement and smiles for the camera.

What part of this is America First? It's not contrarian truth-telling. It’s betrayal. It’s the normalization of enemies who would burn the Constitution, not quote it. The Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is very clear: "Death to America is not just a slogan. It is a policy."

Still, we are told to listen.

But to what, exactly?

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07/05 Links: Inside the ugly relationship between Islamism and the Left; Man charged over arson attack on Melbourne synagogue; Hamas grenade attack on GHF aid workers

From Ian:

Inside the ugly relationship between Islamism and the Left

Fifty years ago, much of the far-Left was inspired by the Soviet Union’s Middle East propaganda, a pro-Islamist stance in response to US and European support for Israel. That influenced Left-wing groups in the UK – such as the Communist Party of Great Britain and the Revolutionary Communist Group – who identified Arabs as oppressed, while Israel, then as now, was seen as an illegitimate “white” state. But the far-Left remains a politically insignificant force on its own. Part of the motivation for an alliance with Islamism is to harness the power of others for their own ends – which, of course, works both ways.

This is neatly illustrated in a 1994 article by Chris Harman of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) for International Socialism, “The Prophet and the Proletariat”, which advocated for a pragmatic working relationship between Islamists and revolutionary socialists. Harman is open about the areas of opposition between the two groups – over the role of women, for example – but concludes: “On some issues we will find ourselves on the same side as the Islamists against imperialism and the state… It should be true in countries like France or Britain... Where the Islamists are in opposition, our rule should be, ‘with the Islamists sometimes, with the state never’.”

In Britain, where Islamism only speaks for a fraction of the country’s Muslims, the Labour party remained a natural home for many Muslim voters up to Tony Blair’s premiership. “To put it crudely, community leaders were able to ‘deliver’ votes for Labour from within those communities in certain areas such as Birmingham or Bradford,” says Timothy Peace, a senior lecturer in politics and international relations at the University of Glasgow. “From the 1980s, Muslims themselves began to enter local councils, but the closeness with Labour continued up to the late 1990s.”

This began to break down thanks to the wars in Iraq (2003-2011) and Afghanistan (2001-2021). The establishment of the Stop The War Coalition (STWC) in 2001 was a milestone which provided Corbyn and other prominent Leftists with a forum to connect with groups such as the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB).

Last year, the then Communities Secretary, Michael Gove, alleged in Parliament that the MAB, together with Mend and Cage, which campaigns against counter-terror measures, “give rise to concern for their Islamist orientation and views”. All three groups rejected the label, with Mend’s chief executive Azhar Qayum saying his organisation was “not at all” extremist, Cage pledging to “explore all avenues, including legal” to challenge the “government’s deep dive into authoritarianism”, and the MAB accusing Gove of a “blatant effort to stifle dissenting voices”.

Britain’s action in Iraq and elsewhere gave overtly Islamist groups an opportunity to tap into the concept of the “Ummah” – the worldwide Islamic community. Shawcross’s review warned that key Islamist narratives included, “commanding that [their interpretation of] the Islamic faith is placed at the centre of an individual’s identity, and must govern all social and political decision-making”.

At the same time, a definition of Islamophobia proposed by some MPs and backed by bodies such as Mend and the MAB would prohibit anyone from “accusing Muslim citizens of being more loyal to the ‘Ummah’… than to the interests of their own nations”, raising concerns about potential limits on freedom of speech.

“The MAB were tied to political Islam and found inspiration from the Muslim Brotherhood, a powerful organisation in Arab countries,” says Peace. “The MAB were one of the key organisations in Stop the War, even though they were not very big at the time it began. The driving force were the Socialist Workers Party, and they managed to mobilise large numbers of Muslim protesters, and that overruled any ideological divisions between the two groups.”

The MAB has said it is “a British organisation operating entirely within the British Isles, with no presence elsewhere. It is not an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood nor a member”.

Britain’s new Islamo-Leftist alliance won’t last, but it might kill Labour first

In Muslim-majority democracies, the Left tends to be secular. The more religious parties, on top of being socially conservative, are the more prone to cut taxes and reduce regulations.

This should not surprise us, for Islam is the only great religion founded by a businessman – a businessman who used his last sermon to preach the sanctity of property. Jesus said some hard things about wealth, and it was not until the sixteenth century that Christians stopped holding up poverty as their ideal. But Islam never had any problem with the idea that money, honestly acquired and put to good use, was a blessing. The Prophet, after all, had established tax-free markets and rejected calls for prices to be regulated.

Across the Islamic wold, from Morocco to Malaysia, anti-Western feeling is stronger on the secular Left. But in Britain, Muslims were for a long time seen primarily, not as people who believed in the Oneness of God and the finality of the teachings of Mohammad, but as a non-white minority to be slotted into a victim role in an imagined hierarchy of oppression. That is why British Islamo-gauchism rests on anti-colonialism, and especially on the portrayal of Israel as the ultimate colonial oppressor.

George Galloway understood earlier than most how the balance was shifting. Having once won awards from Stonewall, he began to describe himself as “socially conservative”, made sceptical noises about the portrayal of gay relationships and came out against abortion and euthanasia, while at the same time growing a beard, boasting that he did not drink and littering his speech with Islamic expressions.

A challenger party that aims to get into double figures will, I suspect, lean more to Galloway’s approach than Corbyn’s. Which makes me wonder how many revolutionary socialists will go along with it.

Let me suggest an early test. In Apsana Begum’s Poplar and Limehouse constituency, 39 per cent of residents identify as Muslim and 24 per cent as Christian. If she is the next Labour MP to defect, it will tell us much about the likely orientation of the new party.

The Red-Green coalition, which came together in the hideous mésalliance known as Stop the War, might hold for a bit longer. But, in time, omnicause Lefties will be squeezed out – though not, one assumes, thrown off buildings like their Iranian colleagues.

The face of Britain is changing, and our parties are changing with it. Some Corbynites may live long enough to wonder, whether, in getting rid of something they disliked, they ended up enabling something worse.

‘Exasperated’ minister asked BBC why nobody was fired for airing Gaza documentary

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has said she asked the BBC why nobody has been fired for airing a Gaza documentary which featured the son of a Hamas official.

This comes ahead of a review looking into Gaza: How To Survive A Warzone, which is reportedly set to be published next week.

The programme first aired in February until it was pulled by the broadcaster after it emerged that its 13-year old narrator is the son of a Hamas official.

The review is being led by Peter Johnston, the director of editorial complaints and reviews which is independent of BBC News and reports directly to the director-general.

It is expected to determine whether any editorial guidelines were broken, and whether any disciplinary action is needed.

The BBC will also undertake a full audit of expenditure on the programme.

Speaking to The Times, Ms Nandy described feeling “exasperated” as she called for an “adequate explanation from the BBC about what has happened”.

“I have not had that from the chair or director-general yet,” she said.

She added: “I have been very clear that people must be held accountable for the decisions that were taken. I have asked the question to the board (of the BBC). Why has nobody been fired?

“What I want is an explanation as to why not. If it is a sackable offence then obviously that should happen.

“But if the BBC, which is independent, considers that it is not, I think what all parliamentarians want to know is why.”

On Alan Rusbridger: champion of an ethical press

It is no surprise that advocates for either side in the Middle East conflict try to influence the media; what is offensive is the idea promoted by Byrne and Rusbridger that pro-Israel propaganda is exceptionally nasty, illegitimate and based on falsity. Rusbridger’s contention is that pro-Palestinian propaganda, backed by an Arabia with a population 45 times larger than Israel, and by a Muslim bloc 200 times larger, and by the massed ranks of the academic Humanities, and by the political Left, and much of the Church, is innocent, truthful and reliable, albeit pushed by a weaker agent that is somehow incapable of organising or projecting its voice, and which the mainstream media is predetermined to resist.

Rusbridger’s message about shady pro-Israeli influence grows directly out of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and Henry Ford’s The International Jew, and Nazi propaganda, and the conspiracy literature of David Duke and others. It is a horrific example of the Left’s alliance with what would once have been regarded as the Left’s polar opposite. It might be capable of being explained but it is not obvious how it can be challenged. As Rusbridger says of the media he represents, “narratives are constructed and take root. And when someone comes along with a counter-narrative they are ignored. It would be unkind to call it groupthink but there is, at the very least, a lack of balance.”

There is a postscript to all of this. Having looked at Alan Rusbridger’s unedifying contribution to Prospect in its issue of two weeks ago, I have now received the following teaser for his triumphs in this week’s issue:
“As … Alan Rusbridger and his co-host Lionel Barber discuss on today’s episode of Media Confidential, there clearly was a procedural mishap [over the BBC’s coverage of Glastonbury]. Why wasn’t someone ready to press the mute button? But as Alan writes in his latest column, the furore over the incident is something of a “dead cat”—a story intended to distract from thornier questions. Such questions include: why did the BBC drop a documentary on doctors in Gaza, which aired last night on Channel Four? And did Robbie Gibb, the staunchly pro-Israel former Tory spin doctor who sits on the BBC’s editorial committee, have any say in it? Is his position tenable?”

I find this terribly disappointing. For no obvious reason, except perhaps that we attended the same Oxbridge college at the same time, I had always given Rusbridger the benefit of the doubt. Admittedly, The Guardian has slid off the scale in terms of the divisiveness of its editorial and political agenda, but I had allowed myself to feel that this had happened under him rather than because of him. I wanted to think, also, that whether or not I agreed with Leftist journalism, it was respectably constructed, evidence-based and factual, even if it used the tools of journalism to come to different conclusions from me, just as opposing lawyers might use the same tools of the law.

A closer look at Rusbridger’s writings now shows me how wrong I have been. Many of the characteristics I had associated with the gutter journalism of the rightwing press are evidenced here as well: slurs, innuendo, inconsistency, irrelevancy, false logic, guilt by association, name dropping, appeals to authority, reliance on endorsements, absence of argumentation, lack of necessary data, the invitation to take unsafe assertions on trust, and much else. I had not previously assumed that Rusbridger’s writing was cheap or that it stooped in this way; now I know. And as the scales fall away from my eyes, what I conclude is that it deserves to be studied by every media department in the country, because it’s a reversal of all the taught clichés about what distinguishes the fine journalism of the Left from the bought journalism of the Right. Very sad.

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07/04 Links Pt2: Despite the surge of antisemitism, America is worth fighting for; Murray: Will NYC fall for the selfie-entitled Zohran Mamdani?; The Case of Dr. Benjamin Bross

From Ian:

Jonathan S. Tobin: Despite the surge of antisemitism, America is worth fighting for

President Donald Trump’s campaign to punish the universities that have tolerated and even encouraged antisemitism since Oct. 7 is evidence that Jews have powerful allies, even if some in the Jewish community are so immersed in the hyper-partisan spirit of the times that they refuse to recognize it. Indeed, in much of the country outside of the deep blue coastal enclaves where most Jews continue to live, the reaction to the uptick of hated and rise of radicals like Mamdani is the sort of disgust and outrage that should reassure the Jewish community that talk of giving up on America is as wrongheaded as it is counterproductive.

If nothing else, the U.S. and Israeli military strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities that posed an existential threat of another Holocaust are evidence that America is not a lost cause.

So, as much as it may seem tempting or even rational to talk of abandoning America, that would be a terrible mistake. Though Israel and Zionism still represent the Jewish future in a way that America cannot, Jews cannot give up on this country and certainly shouldn’t even think of doing so without a fight.

We must do so not merely out of a desire to defend our lives here but because a strong America that has not abandoned the best of Western civilization and values is essential to the worldwide struggle against the forces of tyranny—both Marxist and Islamist—that threaten Israel and Jews everywhere.

If Jewish life is unsafe in America, then it will be unsafe everywhere. That’s why it is essential that, rather than giving up or giving in to hysterical talk about the end of liberty and even the end of Jewry in the States, we must recommit to the fight to roll back the woke tide and defeat it.

This may be a generational struggle in much the same way that leftist efforts to impose these false beliefs on America were. Yet it is a battle that is necessary not just to save American Jewry, but to save the canon of Western civilization on which our freedoms rest.

The quintessential American response
A year from now, this nation will attempt to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its independence, and the battle over how to commemorate it has already begun. The contempt for traditional patriotism and belief in the truth that the American republic, flawed though it might be, is a force for good in the world has already been made clear by left-wing elites. As discouraging as this discourse may be, it is a reminder that the stigmatizing and targeting of Jews is part and parcel of the same struggle other citizens are engaging in. The American republic is and has always been exceptional. But it will only remain that way so long as a broad cross-section of Americans—Jews and non-Jews, liberals and conservatives, Democrats as well as Republicans—are willing to stand up against the woke forces seeking to traduce its founding values.

The appropriate answer to attacks on Jews is not flight or a call to shelter in place. The appropriate response is for Jews to speak up and not abandon the streets to antisemites and woke mobs. The rejoinder to anti-Jewish violence is for Jews to act in the most quintessential American way possible: to arm themselves (verbally, legally and literally) and make it clear that they will not be intimidated or silenced.

Those who hate the founding principles of the United States are wrong about the end of American greatness or the need to transform it into some pale reflection of Marxist or Islamist concepts. And so, on this Independence Day, rather than writing off America, we should be embracing it all the more enthusiastically—and pledging to defend it against those who wish to tear it down.

Cary Nelson and Richard Ross: The Case of Dr. Benjamin Bross

Ever since some faculty members exulted over Hamas’s October 7, 2023, murder spree in Israel and then campus encampments began chanting for Zionists to be cast out of the community, we have worried that we would also soon see a quiet, determined campaign to deny tenure to qualified Zionist faculty. The encampments were notable for their noise. The determined assault on pro-Israel faculty would be barely audible, carried out by confidential committees and cloaked in self-righteous if deeply compromised professionalism. We have faced exactly that in our own community, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

As members of the executive committee of Faculty for Academic Freedom and Against Antisemitism, we offer this essay as a warning that it will spread worldwide.

The problem arises when radical anti-Zionists serve on tenure committees that are reviewing expressly Zionist candidates for tenure. When the faculty in both categories are known to hold those opposing beliefs, there is an obvious suggestion of bias and a clear appearance of a conflict of interest. It doesn’t matter how fair and impartial the compromised committee members may be. In the principle that governs both legal and academic professions, among others, the appearance of a conflict of interest must be “managed” by recusal. There is no accusation involved, just the recognizable fact—the appearance of a conflict. There may of course be serious conflicts of interest involved, but managing them by dealing with the appearance of conflicts solves the problem without triggering investigations and hostile confrontations.

At the core of the issue is the academy’s most intractable antisemitic problem: academic disciplines and their local departments that have embraced radical anti-Zionism as part of their core identity. Radical anti-Zionism is an ideology devoted to eliminating the Jewish state. Not to reforming it, not to changing Israeli policies, but rather to erasing Israel as the nation-state and homeland of the Jewish people through violence, boycott, and political implosion, or dissolution into a “one-state solution.” Faculty hopes of harming Zionist Jews have manifested themselves not only through teaching propaganda in the classroom, but also through discriminatory hiring and promotion decisions.

In 2021, some academic departments steeped in the belief that Israel is an unethical state—the only state in the world that does not deserve to exist—began adopting official position statements embodying that conviction. In the wake of 10/7, a still more severe conviction became the norm on the left: that Israel is unreformable, irredeemable, born in original sin. And this belief coalesced around the claim that something evil in Zionism was manifest in the very founding of the Jewish state. The key date for decades had been 1967, when Israel won authority over the West Bank and Gaza from the Jordanian and Egyptian dictators who had ruled there ever since they blocked the local Arabs from their own UN-designated sovereignty. Now the date called out in chants and scrawled on banners was 1948. One could reverse 1967 by making the occupied territories into a Palestinian state. You could only reverse 1948 by eliminating Israel.

Andrew Fox: We’ve seen this before

There are moments in history when the shadows of the past cast such a long menace over the present that they become impossible to ignore. We are experiencing such a moment now. The rise in antisemitism since October 2023 is not a collection of isolated incidents. It is a direct reflection of a darker era.

I gave a talk to Holocaust survivors last month. More than one told me that the mood in the UK for Jews now resembles Germany in the 1930s. The difference between them and others claiming this is that they remember it from the first time around.

They are right. This is no longer hyperbole; it is fact.

The Holocaust didn’t start with gas chambers. It started with graffiti, slurs, and whispers. It began with people asking Jews to account for themselves. Are you loyal? Are you one of us?

In 2025, that looks like: are you a Zionist?

I heard exactly that question last night over a pint with a friend who had attended a Jewish cultural event. The barman (in the Three Crowns in St James, if you're interested) demanded of my friend, "Are you a Zionist?" The implication was clear that support for the Jewish state now carries a moral price tag. It is a litmus test for belonging, for acceptability. That is not political disagreement; it is a modern shibboleth meant to mark Jews for social exile.

We are witnessing a global rise in antisemitism at a scale not seen for generations. Some of it is overt. It is violent, chilling, and reminiscent of the pogroms Europe once vowed never to repeat. In Amsterdam last year, what was initially dismissed as football hooliganism was later revealed, through text messages and court transcripts, to be a lynching of Jews driven by pure racial hatred. Not “anti-Zionism”; pure Judenhass.

At Glastonbury, the "singer" of British act Bob Vylan, repeating popular blood libels against the Jewish state, stood before tens of thousands and chanted for the death of every soldier in the Israel Defence Forces. Again, I’m not being hyperbolic; it was his literal demand. A call for the wholesale killing of Jewish soldiers, which in practice means calling for the deaths of the sons and daughters of almost every Israeli family. That’s not resistance. That’s incitement. When crowds cheer that on, we are no longer in the realm of protest. We are in something else entirely.

What begins as words (“Zionist,” “settler,” “coloniser”) becomes real-world violence in short order. The language matters. Words shape permission structures. They signal what is tolerated and what is forbidden. When an artist calls for the death of every IDF soldier, and the crowd cheers, it gives a green light to every unhinged antisemite listening.

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