Showing posts with label iran. Show all posts
Showing posts with label iran. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 25, 2025

Confusing Delay with Defeat: Trump’s Surprise Iran-Israel Ceasefire (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

They say the war is over. But if it’s over, why do I feel so nervous, like there’s something left undone, unfinished? Why don’t I feel safe?

I just want to feel safe—not only for myself, but for the generations that follow. Do I want my grandchildren to grow up listening for sirens, even if they rarely come? Do I want some future generation to live in fear of an Iran once again enriching uranium to the point of no return?

If Khamenei and his despotic regime remain in power, they’ll pick up right where they left off—with nuclear ambitions and terror by proxy. And when Israel defends itself, will President Trump once again scold her, as he did the other day? Iran launched missiles at Israeli civilians, and Trump called it “a little bit of a violation”—perhaps because this particular strike caused no damage. But just hours earlier, another missile killed innocents in a residential neighborhood in Beersheva.

I don’t feel safe because Donald Trump still believes—against all evidence—that the ayatollahs can be reasoned with, coaxed into peace, talked into laying down their weapons and picking up plowshares. Worse still, he seems to draw a moral equivalence between Iran—a regime that threatens Israel’s annihilation, funds terror proxies, and pursues nuclear weapons—and Israel itself. Unbelievably, he equates the victim with her abuser. He frames the conflict as playground roughhousing, erasing Iran’s aggression and Israel’s right to defend itself from a nuclear holocaust:

“They’ve had a big fight. Like two kids in the schoolyard—you know, they fight like hell, you can’t stop it. Let them fight for two, three minutes, and then it’s easier to stop them.”

If this is how Trump perceives Iran and Israel—if he truly believes Iran can be reasoned with—then he doesn’t understand the Middle East. Worse, he isn’t listening. Iran is telling him, plainly and repeatedly, that it will not stop. It will rebuild its nuclear facilities.

And they’re not even hiding it. Iranian nuclear chief Mohammad Eslami openly admitted as much: “We planned to avoid any interruption in the nuclear industry process. Preparations for the revival of the country’s nuclear program were foreseen in advance, and our plan is to not allow any interruption in the production and service process.”

Meanwhile, Iran’s parliament has announced it is suspending cooperation with the IAEA—the UN’s nuclear watchdog. Does that sound like a regime with nothing to hide? Like a nation ready to embrace a peaceful, nuclear-free future?

Why is Trump letting the Iranians get away with saying these things? And what about his betrayal of the Iranian people—those weary of living under Khamenei’s iron rule? Bibi encouraged them to be brave, reminded them that Israel has no quarrel with them, and wants them to prosper. Are we now meant to abandon them? Just as Obama did in 2009, when they rose up and the world turned its back?

And then there are the conflicting reports. Was Fordow completely destroyed, or wasn’t it? The administration can’t seem to get its story straight. Trump claimed Iran’s three main nuclear enrichment facilities were “completely and totally obliterated.” But later, JD Vance described Iran’s capabilities as merely “substantially set back,” insisting that had always been the goal.

As Vance put it: “That was the objective of the mission: to destroy that Fordow nuclear site and, of course, do some damage to the other sites as well. But we feel very confident that the Fordow nuclear site was substantially set back, and that was our goal.”

If Vance is to be believed, the goal had never been complete obliteration, but only a delay in what Iran will inevitably try to do once more. Which of course means that somewhere down the road, a new generation will have to live with the Damocles sword of a nuclear Iran hanging over their heads. And that is neither fair nor right.

And then there’s how the ceasefire came about. Trump’s surprise announcement apparently caught Israel off guard. It certainly caught me off guard—reading about the so-called truce from a safe room, while cowering from incoming missiles.

Bibi gave a victory speech, declaring that “Iran’s malicious intent to threaten Israel has been eradicated.” But has it? 

Eradicated? Obliterated, or only “significantly set back” as both JD Vance and Rafael Grossi, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), have said.

What bothers me most is the unspoken message: shut up and be grateful. And yes, I am grateful. But gratitude doesn’t mean silence, even when America deploys its bunker busters in a precision strike that was nothing short of extraordinary.

But as extraordinary as that military triumph was, it’s not enough. This regime has a singular goal: to destroy the West. Disabling Iran’s nuclear program means little if you leave the regime intact—especially when change for the Iranian people feels so close we can smell it.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 

Wednesday, June 18, 2025

Beyond ‘Death to Israel’: Can Iran and Israel Find Friendship? (Judean Rose)



Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

Benjamin Netanyahu has often referred to a divide between Iran’s regime and its people. The Israeli prime minister seems convinced that the Iranian people, as distinct from its oppressors, desire friendship with Israel. “Israel wants peace. We want peace with all those who truly want peace with us,” said the PM in an address to the Iranian people six months ago. “And I have no doubt that you, the People of Iran, know this. I know that just as we want peace with you, you want peace with us.”


If true, it sure would be an amazing thing to get Khamenei out of the picture and watch this friendship bloom.

Cyrus II le Grand et les Hébreux, Jean Fouquet, 1470 

More recently, in his June 13 address to the Iranian people, Netanyahu said, “Israel's fight is not against the Iranian people. Our fight is against the murderous Islamic regime that oppresses and impoverishes you. The nation of Iran and the nation of Israel have been friends since the days of Cyrus the Great.”

The idea of a friendship between Israel and Iran can be hard to reconcile with years of “Death to Israel” chants and regime-backed propaganda. How do we square what we’ve seen and heard with what Bibi tells us? Is there real evidence to support his assertion that the Iranian people might want peace—or even friendship—with Israel?

Let’s take a look:

Signs of Friendship from the Iranian People

Despite decades of regime-sponsored antisemitism, surveillance, and repression, many Iranians—both inside the country and across the diaspora—have expressed admiration, sympathy, and even affection for Israel and the Jewish people.

💬 Voices from Inside Iran

As Israel’s June 2025 strikes on Iranian military infrastructure shook the Islamic Republic, some Iranians were not trembling—but cheering.

“I … lost my control and was shouting, thanking Netanyahu for killing these criminals.”
— Zahra, a 50-year-old mother of two in Karaj near Tehran, speaking to NPR

Another Iranian told Ynet:

“Iranians are not worried about Israel’s attack because we all know that the Israeli government has no problem with the Iranian people,” said “A” from Ahvaz. “This is not just my opinion. We all wish to see the destruction of the Islamic Republic as soon as possible.”

In other words, some Iranians trust the Israeli military more than their own rulers.

Just over a year ago, after an Israeli airstrike in Damascus eliminated seven Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps officers, graffiti appeared in Tehran encouraging the Jewish state to “hit them harder next time.”

'Israel go ahead and strike; they don’t have the courage'

'Hit them harder next time Israel, they’ve s*** themselves'

🕊️ Support in the Streets and on Social Media

Social media has become a powerful window into Iranian public sentiment—particularly among younger generations and diaspora voices. After Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel, many Iranians online expressed solidarity with Israeli victims using hashtags like #IraniansStandWithIsrael and #IranIsHappy.

Here are just a few examples:

Meanwhile, Iranian attorney and activist Elica Le Bon, a prominent voice in the diaspora, has called Iranians and Israelis “old friends,” echoing a shared historical bond. On June 13, 2025, she tweeted, “Praying for the safety of the people of Iran and Israel. There has never been a war between our people, only a failed attempt to divide an ancient bond between old friends.” Her words resonate as a bridge across decades of division.

🕯️ Clerical Courage 

It didn't win him any popularity contests for saying so, but former senior Iranian cleric, dissident Ayatollah Hadi Ghabel, spoke of friendship between Jews and Iranians as far back as 2021:

“Iranians and Jews have many years of friendship. I haven’t met Iranians who don’t have a positive opinion of Israel.”

As we see, even within the heart of Iran’s religious establishment, there have been flickers of goodwill.

🌺 Conclusion: A Friendship Waiting to Blossom?

There could be no more hostile regime to Israel than that of Khamenei—but these brave, hopeful, often anonymous voices through the years, suggest that the people of Iran may indeed want peace, friendship, and even cooperation with the Jewish State. Of course, most of all, they want out from under their repressive regime. And Israel is making that happen even now as you read this article.

For years, Netanyahu has spoken of Iranian-Israeli friendship—and now, for the first time, it feels within reach. From defiant graffiti and diaspora rallies to viral hashtags and heartfelt tweets, there is mounting evidence that Iranians are not Israel’s enemies. In fact, many are potential allies.

Perhaps, when the ayatollahs are gone, we won’t need to imagine peace between Israelis and Iranians.

We’ll simply watch it unfold.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 



Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Agreeing to Disagree: Israeli Americans Wrestle with Complicated Family Feelings after Election (Judean Rose)



Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

Trump trounced Harris and the next morning, she conceded. Now, all that was left was for Dems to do grieve. Except for the small matter of sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner with their Trump-happy relatives in just a little over 3 weeks—less at the time of this writing. Should Harris voters be expected to sit across the table from their cretinous MAGA cousins?

Not at all, explained Yale-affiliated psychiatrist Dr. Amanda Calhoun to MSNBC’s Joy Reid. “If you are going to a situation where you have family members, where you have close friends who you know have voted in ways that are against you . . . against your livelihood . . . it's completely fine to not be around those people and to tell them why.”


Calhoun’s advice, I’d venture to say, runs contrary to what most of us were taught by our mothers; namely that is courteous to set aside political differences at the holiday table for the sake of preserving family harmony. We can agree to disagree, because presidents come and go but family is family until death do you part. We spend time with family at the holidays not because they are entitled to our presence, but because it’s a tradition we value and cherish as a society.

In Israel, of course, there is no such November 28th conundrum to worry about. For one thing, most of those celebrating Thanksgiving in Israel are expat Americans. They left their families behind to make Aliyah, so there’s no one to argue with at table.

Then again, Thanksgiving is something expat Americans mostly celebrate for the sake of the food: turkey, stuffing, yams, gravy, cranberry sauce, and pie. And guess what? Sitting down to eat that meal will be pure pleasure not only because of the food and the lack of argumentative relatives, but because Donald J. Trump won—which means that this year, the only arguing around Israeli Thanksgiving tables will be over who gets the wishbone.

With our stateside cousins of course, it is a different story. We spend time with them only virtually in fits and starts. That makes it a little easier to avoid tense subjects. And if ever there was a tense subject it was this election, with most American Jews wildly at odds with their Israeli counterparts.

Our cousins care about the hostages, but not as much as they care about domestic issues, for example reproductive rights. They care about Iran, but they care about abortion more; they have been told that Donald J. Trump will take away their rights to their own bodies. Kamala Harris told them so.

Joy Reid told them so.

In Israel, we understand our Jewish cousins in America have domestic priorities. But we have trouble understanding how they feel about geopolitics. We don’t like to think that they are ignorant, but do they know they voted for a woman who helped fund October 7 and all that has happened in its wake?

Israelis are hyper-aware of these geopolitics. So much so that in the run up to the election, all of us were tense. I was tense. My neighbors were tense. We all knew that Israel’s enemies were watching and waiting to see who would win the election. My personal fear was that if Harris won, Hamas would take it as a green light to shoot all the remaining living hostages dead.

I did not dare tempt evil by voicing my fears, but now, in retrospect, I can talk about it because it didn’t happen—Harris lost. But it was rough. In the run-up to the election I could literally see those executions playing out in my mind’s eye. Over and over again.  It was hard to hold down food. Hard to breathe.

I don’t know if I was alone in experiencing these visions—but I know my feelings of dread and terror were not exclusive to me. Everyone around me felt the same way and we were all quietly speaking about it to each other. The election was the Sword of Damocles hanging over not just the hostages’ heads, but all our heads. This was something more than politics.

And it is that “something more” that makes it so difficult to be polite as we were taught, and set aside differences for the sake of family.

I know what you’re thinking. What’s the difference, Harris lost. But you see, it’s the vote that counts. It’s the vote that hurt and cut so deeply.

It’s hard to square it in our heads, how “family” could vote for Harris, someone who sends money to Iran and ties Israel’s hands. Someone who bears responsibility for the fact that the Jewish people are no longer safe anywhere in the world.

Many of us have a very hard time with this. We think of what happened on October 7, of the hostages and of the hundreds of soldiers who have been killed since, beautiful young people, older reservists with wives and children, and we can’t bring ourselves to agree to disagree and move on. It’s just too hard. We can’t look the other way and call it “only politics.”

I myself think back to certain lovely childhood memories from back when I was a toddler, and I don’t know what to do. We are family and yet this "family" prioritizes something other than me, my family here, and our people. They prioritized something other than the hundreds of Israeli soldiers who died defending our people—something other than the hundreds of thousands of Israelis who can’t go home to their homes in the north. 

How can I look the other way?

They put us all at risk.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

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Wednesday, June 26, 2024

John Kirby sneers at a woman for using the word “fungible” (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

John Kirby, though someone I don’t like, is a darned sight better at presiding over a White House presser than is, for instance, KJP. That’s about the best I have to say about him. But the way he sneered at Fox News Chief Legal Correspondent, Journalist Shannon Bream, in an April interview, literally turned my stomach.

Ugh.  It was like he was saying, “Listen little Lady, you stay in your corner, and let the big boys handle this.”

Well, like I said, this was back in April, but the subject of that interview, covert US support for Iran, remains relevant to our current news cycle, with Israel looking at a face-off with the evil Iranian proxy, Hezbollah. Biden’s support of Iran was relevant too,  in November, when I wrote about the money trail that led to October 7. It irritated me, the way the Biden administration kept saying that Iran can’t possibly use its own money to fund its war machine. I hear that stuff and say out loud, squinting my eyes at my computer screen, “You know darned well that money is fungible, you blankety blank blank.”

Fungible. It’s not that difficult a concept. When one anticipates money coming in, they risk taking it from somewhere else. Some not of my religion might call this “robbing Peter to pay Paul.”

You don’t need to be a lawyer to understand any of this, right? Yet here was Shannon Bream, a lawyer, polite, refined, asking a reasonable question, and all John Kirby does is sneer and leer at her. You can practically hear Kirby rolling his eyes.

Here's how the conversation went:

Shannon Bream: There are a number of critics, most of them on the GOP side of the Hill, who say, “We shouldn’t be in this position.”

That there are things that were done by this administration, that let Iran think it had an opening here, or others that want to go after Israel. Senator Marsha Blackburn among those, posting on X last night, she says,

“Under President Trump, Iran was broke.

“President Biden gifted them billions of dollars and then naively said, ‘Don’t.’

“‘Don’t.’ is not a foreign policy.” 

Shannon Bream: You know the conversations about unfreezing assets, about waivers on sanctions . . .

John Kirby: Yeah, Yeah. (laughs)

Shannon Bream: Could this administration [have been] tougher on Iran?

John Kirby: (shakes head) It’s hard to look at what President Biden has done with respect to Iran and . . .

Shannon Bream: (interrupts) but we’re also leaving sanctions.

John Kirby: . . . say that he hasn’t been tough on Iran, that we haven’t put pressure on them, that we haven’t—an additional 500 sanctions, additional resources in the region and let’s take a look at that ballistic missiles—okay, so they launched more than 100 ballistic missiles, and how many got through? And the reason they didn’t get through is because President Biden made sure that we pre-position forces in the region to help Israel—will shoot them down—so this vaunted ballistic missile program of theirs, last night (stutters) didn’t turn out to be so vaunted last night.

Shannon Bream: (interrupts) But why not support something that would have stopped that program or at least contained it in some way, so it’s not launching at Israel, so that we aren’t having to get involved defensively?

John Kirby: Again, Shannon, let’s look at the sanctions we put in place with Iran, the resources in the region ... it’s hard to take a look at what President Biden has done and say that we’ve somehow gone soft on Iran. It was the previous administration that promised, that promised to get us out of the Iran Deal and now Iran is so much dramatically closer to a potential nuclear weapon capability than they were before, uh, before, uh, before Mr. Trump was elected. (sneers)

Shannon Bream: Is it not fair to say though, that there have been moves by this administration that have opened up cash and other opportunities for them which we know are fungible, in ways that are not helping the Iranian people (Kirby laughs) but are benefitting the elites and people there who chant “Death to America.” And “Death to Israel.”

John Kirby: You and I have had this fungibility argument, eh, (stutters) before em, um, I obviously take a different issue, uh, take an issue with that characterization. The (gestures), the sanctions relief that has come about. . .  or it’s not even sanctions relief, but eh, (stutters) the eh, eh, additional funds which have been made available to Iran, due to the sanctions relief program that the Trump administration put in place. (shakes head) It can only be used for humanitarian goods; it doesn’t go to the regime. And the idea that the regime was somehow . . . felt like they were freed up to support these proxies because of that it just doesn’t comport with the facts that they have been supporting these proxies for many, many years.

Shannon Bream: And it comports with their language though, saying, we will use this money in the way that we want to use it.

John Kirby: They can’t (shakes head, laughs, sneers). They can’t! They physically can’t do that. 

It’s upsetting. Bream is pretty, but that doesn’t mean she is empty-headed. Rather she is fiercely smart, and a lawyer to boot, and should not be treated with so little regard. I was sickened by his insulting manner toward a lady, and an intelligent one, at that.

Aside from this, Kirby never answered her question—never managed to explain why the fact that money is fungible is something to dismiss. Why would Iran not take advantage the fact that money is fungible to build its war machine? Bream has a good question, and deserves a good answer from this administration. We all do.

But there is no good answer. The Biden administration knowingly assisted Iran in building up its nuclear arsenal, and also gave Iran the power to fuel the October 7 massacre, and the volcano about to erupt in Northern Israel and Lebanon. Shannon Bream knows this, and so does Kirby—every time he stutters, you know he’s concealing something. In spite of this, John Kirby treats Shannon Bream as though she were a simpleton. This was profoundly disturbing to me, both as a woman and as a human being.

The silky words tripping off Kirby’s tongue, brought to my mind nothing so much as the snake who used cunning words to goad Eve on to eat the apple.

In this case the snake was just another Biden hack who’d sold his soul to the highest bidder.

I think Bream did a great job of exposing Kirby for what he is, for anyone who saw the interview and noted his demeaning manner toward his host, Bream. I cannot see how any woman, Democrat or Republican, can sit through that interview and not see how slimy he is. 

And now, as June comes to a close, the United States has let slip, by way of US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Charles Brown, that America will not be helping Israel fight Iran/Hezbollah this time around, not necessarily because America doesn’t want to, but because, it claims, the US doesn’t have the capability.

“From our perspective,” said Charles Brown, “based on where our forces are, the short-range between Lebanon and Israel, it’s harder for us to be able to support them in the same way we did back in April.”

In other words, those over 100 ballistic missiles Kirby referenced back in April were one thing, but not this. “Sorry,” says America to Israel. “We can’t help you with this one. Now, you’re on your own.”

Here is the logical—the only—answer to Bream’s question, solid proof that money is always fungible, even in the case of Iran. The lifting of sanctions by the Biden administration has directly led to the current existential threat to Israel and, one might add, to Lebanon.

The Biden administration has enabled Iran, all the while doing what it can to stymie Israel. The president feeds the enemy with fungible funds while starving his ally of promised weaponry and other assistance.

Some speak of a coming world war, while people like Kirby, continue to sneer and laugh and lie to intelligent people like Shannon Bream, who see right through them. At some point, John Kirby’s act will grow old—he was never meant to be anything but mid-level management. Not to worry—they’ll find a use for Kirby somewhere. Like I said, he gives a mean White House presser.

Or perhaps they can bury him in mounds of paperwork behind a desk, hidden away from public view.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!
 

 

Monday, April 15, 2024

Again, it is all about honor. If you don't get that, you don't get anything about the Middle East.

Downed Iranian missile in the Dead Sea


From Naharnet:
Hezbollah has congratulated Tehran on its attack on Israel, saying it "achieved" its military objectives.

"Hezbollah presents its congratulations... to the leadership" of Iran and its people for the "unprecedented" attack on Israel, the powerful Lebanese group said in a statement.

Hezbollah also praised Tehran's "brave and wise decision to respond firmly to the Zionist attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus".

The Islamic republic launched more than 300 drones and missiles towards Israel from late Saturday, Israel's military said.

It achieved military objectives? How, exactly?

 The answer is the same as the answer to this question posed by a supposed expert, Richard Haass, on Twitter/X (and later in a more extensive interview in Politico):

At first glance reported Iranian attacks on Israel violate Napoleon's dictum "Never interrupt your enemy when he's making a mistake."  This will change the narrative and create new support for Israel.  All of which raises the question: Why did Iran widen the war at this moment?

People, even supposed "experts," still think that Middle Easterners think like Westerners. They project their own logic onto people whom they have little in common with. 

Iran's objective wasn't military. It was psychic. It needed to restore its "honor."

Just reading Iranian media shows this. They are congratulating themselves on the few missiles that made it through Israel's defenses. And now they are bragging that Israel's defenses are not "impenetrable," which no one ever said.

Honor is the coin of the realm in the Middle East. And honor, almost by definition, includes lying in order to avoid shame. 

Iran has to claim victory. Even if Israel has stopped 100% of the projectiles, today's headlines in Iranian media would be about the amount of effort and time and money Israel spent, how it relied on other allies and couldn't defend itself alone, how this was one of the biggest attacks in history. They would be trying to ascribe honor to themselves and shame to Israel. 

Facts don't matter.  The results were of little importance, as long as Iran can twist facts to claim victory.

Just like Egypt in 1973. Just like Hamas in all previous Gaza wars. The facts don't matter because honor is the point, military victory is secondary.

The entire Middle East  conflict is an attempt by Middle Eastern Muslims to erase the shame of a small number of weak, dhimmi Jews defeating them in 1948 and 1967.  If you want a root cause, that's it. 

People who do not understand the importance of honor and shame to Israel's enemies cannot possibly be Middle East experts. 

Once you understand the honor/shame dynamic, you realize that the only real solution is Israeli victory that cannot be denied. This is why Muslims are deferential to Christian-majority Europe - because they lost to them, definitively. That is the reason Bahrain and the UAE wanted peace - they realized Israel isn't going anywhere. 

Undisputed Israeli strength is the only peace plan that makes sense. Unless you want another Holocaust.



Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!
 

 

It was one of the largest such combined attacks in history. Many Iranian missiles failed. And other Day 2 observations on the weekend events.


An Israeli newspaper summed up the Iranian "Operation Truthful Promise" as "The Iranian lion roared like a cat."

As we get more information, we learn that the attack was in most ways larger than anything Russia has mounted against Ukraine. 

The extent of the attack was one of the largest seen in modern warfare. Russia's opening "shock and awe" barrage on the first day of the invasion of Ukraine, on February 24, 2022, included between 160 and 200 cruise missiles and ballistic missiles - against a country more than 20 times the area of Israel.

Russia first used Iranian-made Shahad drones in conjunction with a missile attack on October 10, 2022, a barrage aimed at Ukraine's infrastructure,. This  included a total of 84 missiles and 24 UAVs. Only about half of the Russian missiles were intercepted. 
This compares to 185 drones, 110 ballistic missiles and 30 cruise missiles launched by Iran towards Israel.

Iranian media is claiming a "clean victory," saying that their ballistic missiles landed exactly where they were intended.

So that means they wanted to create an easily repairable crater on a runway in the desert and on a road.


The attack shows that the ballistic missiles are the most difficult to defend against, since several made it through.  That doesn't detract from the amazing achievements of blocking them. The videos of missile intercepts in space, probably from an Arrow-3, are spectacular:



A surprising number of Iranian missiles failed, either exploding in Iran or en route.
Iran’s missile technology is to a great extent based on Soviet and North Korean know-how.

U.S. officials told The Wall Street Journal that half of the ballistic missiles that Iran launched either failed to launch or fell from the sky before reaching their targets.
Here's video of one that landed in Iran, this single missile causing more damage there than all the projectiles did in Israel combined:



As the Institute for the Study of War notes, however, Israel cannot afford to be complacent. The claimed "99%" intercept rate is somewhat exaggerated - it was probably closer to 97% or 98% - and the several that did make it through could have caused great damage had they hit populated areas:

Iran’s ability to penetrate Israeli air defenses with even a small number of large ballistic missiles presents serious security concerns for Israel. The only Iranian missiles that got through hit an Israeli military base, limiting the damage, but a future strike in which several ballistic missiles penetrate Israeli air defenses and hit Tel Aviv or Haifa could cause significant civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure, including ports and energy. Russian strikes on Ukraine have demonstrated that even a small number of precise strikes against key nodes in energy or other infrastructure can cause disproportionate effects. Israel and its partners should not emerge from this successful defense with any sense of complacency.
In 2022 Iran announced, to much fanfare, that it had manufactured hypersonic missiles than could not be stopped by known interceptors. They also claimed to have upgraded those missiles last year.  Iran is now claiming that every hypersonic missile it shot at Israel successfully hit their targets. 

It is unclear whether any of the missiles launched were indeed what would be considered hypersonic - meaning, traveling at greater than Mach-5 speeds while maintaining maneuverability. Regular ballistic missiles hit hypersonic speeds as they descend from space but that does not make them hypersonic missiles, which are usually defined as either hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs) and hypersonic cruise missiles (HCMs). Iran's so-called hypersonic missiles are medium range ballistic missiles with limited maneuverability. It is not clear at this time whether any of the missiles that made it through were the Fattah-1 or Fattah 2 "hypersonic" missiles of Iran. 

What is clear is that Israel would not be able to rely on allies being able to help them stop all future similar attacks, especially without so much advanced warning. The simple math of being able to overwhelm Israeli defenses, which are much more expensive than the projectiles being shot are, remains an issue as it does in Gaza or Lebanon. 

Saying that Israel should regard this as a victory is short-sighted. As others have pointed out, surviving someone shooting at you many times because of your bulletproof vest is not a victory. The shooter can reload and only needs one bullet to make it through. Israel cannot afford to remain in a purely defensive posture forever, especially as Iran has proven that it is now willing to directly attack Israel.

The question is not if, but when. 




Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!
 

 

Wednesday, November 22, 2023

The Partial Ceasefire Deal with the Devil (Judean Rose)




Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

                                                                     --1--

If it were you, my child, husband, brother, sister, mother, grandmother, grandfather, aunt, uncle, grandchild, friend. If it were you I would fight like hell to set you free, to bring you home and into my arms. Safe.

Then we would deal with the aftermath. The nightmares, the poisoned minds of the children raised to hate themselves and what they came from. The massive, multi-level trauma of it all, from beginning to the something that will never end.

Still, from a distance so far away that I don’t want to see it, I know that procuring your release has broader implications. You are a Hamas bargaining chip, or rather an Iran bargaining chip for use with Joe Biden, along with a cascade of other evil actors across the globe who will use human beings—use you—to get what they want. Hamas randomly keeps you alive—if you are alive—to get concessions; to retrench and regain strength to hurt the Jewish people; to score a victory; to wound Israel and live to kill, maim, and destroy more Jews another day.

                                                                    --2--

Every day since October 7th, we have heard Israeli officials say, all the hostages or no ceasefire. It was  clear from the start—Israel had been quite clear from the start.  Or rather, the objective was clear until it wasn’t, and Israel began to speak of a “partial ceasefire,” when just to speak of this even in a fuzzy sort of way, already put Israel. at a distinct disadvantage. It must be said and taken into account, that while the hostage deal may save the lives of some of the hostages, it will put an untold number of other lives at risk, for example, just now, our dear Israeli soldiers. To breathe life into Hamas is to wreak havoc with the future. This Amalek must be stopped. Hamas must be obliterated, completely.

Ain breira. There is no choice. It's all or nothing. There is no other way. All the hostages or no ceasefire, partial or otherwise. Israel must hold firm, because a deal with Hamas is Obama’s deal, Biden’s deal, a deal with the devil, Iran. For Hamas, this deal translates to Jews ceding victory and paying the jizya, even unto releasing 300 felons back onto the streets of their natural hate-infested society.

We have certainly learned something here: the going rate for a handful of Jews is 300 felons for Hamas to parade as trophies. "How stupid is the Jew?” you might hear from the laughing crowd as they watch the 300 go by, and slap each other on the back. "They turn Gaza into rubble, then cry to us, 'You won!'"

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism  today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. 

Read all about it here!
 

 

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Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون



This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For 20 years and 40,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

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