Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Friday, September 20, 2024

09/20 Links Pt1: Kemp: Israel is winning its war against Hezbollah. We should celebrate; Hezbollah Radwan Force chief killed; Haniyeh rejected billions and a Palestinian state

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: An explosive moment of clarification

The Iranian war of extermination against Israel continues to be a clarifying moment for the supposedly civilised world. As this crisis continues, it is remorselessly spotlighting those who stand against such evil and those who are shamefully siding with it.

Israel’s astounding feat this week in killing or disabling thousands of senior Hezbollah operatives by causing their pagers and walkie-talkie radios to explode has sent its western enemies into a frenzy. Anti-Israel activists and the media have been falling over each other to claim that the attack indiscriminately endangered and killed innocent civilians and amounted to a reckless escalation of the war.

In fact, never in the history of warfare has there been a more precisely targeted attack against enemy combatants. The explosive devices had only been distributed to senior Hezbollah operatives. The small amount of explosive inside was designed to hurt only the carriers.

The number of civilian casualties was accordingly extremely small. All such casualties are regrettable. But those accusing Israel of recklessly endangering civilians and escalating the war fail to acknowledge the difference between deliberately aiming to kill civilians and inadvertently causing civilian casualties in a just war of defence.

They fail to register the dozens of Hezbollah missiles and rockets that Hezbollah is firing every day to kill Israelis. They fail to refer to the 12 Druze children and young people killed by such an attack in July on Majdal Shams. They fail to note that Hezbollah has been increasingly widening its target range ever more deeply into Israel.

Escalation, it seems, is a one-way street. It never applies to attacks on Israel, only to Israel when it defends itself.

The Biden administration continues to play a double game. Ever since the October 7 pogrom, it has pressured Israel not to take the steps needed to defeat Hamas, stop Hezbollah and neutralise Iran. That pressure has become frenzied in recent days as Israel has signalled it may have no alternative but to clear Hezbollah out of southern Lebanon altogether.

But at least the United States voted against the appalling resolution passed by the UN General Assembly on Wednesday — by 124-14 with 43 abstentions — demanding that Israel should end “its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory” within 12 months.

The text of the resolution was based on the advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice in July that Israel’s “occupation of Palestinian territory” was illegal. But the ICJ is a kangaroo court, relying for its “evidence” entirely on falsehoods propagated by those who want to see the Jewish state destroyed.

That includes the United Nations itself, which is institutionally programmed for Israel’s destruction by singling it out for a campaign of lies, bullying, harassment, discrimination and demonisation that it deploys against no other country in the world.

This world body is morally bankrupt. So, too, is the British government, which couldn’t bring itself to vote against a resolution demanding Israel’s withdrawal to the 1948 ceasefire lines — dubbed by Israeli statesman Abba Eban “Auschwitz borders” because their indefensibility would guarantee Israel’s extermination — but instead abstained.

Richard Kemp: Israel is winning its war against Hezbollah. We should celebrate.

In the past 11 months they have killed an estimated 20,000 terrorists against 340 IDF deaths. On probably the most complex battlefield seen in modern warfare, they have also achieved great success in minimising civilian casualties and maximising aid deliveries.

Much of this experience from Gaza will be applied in Lebanon. There are differences of scale, terrain, population and tactics, but Hezbollah is another Iranian terror proxy like Hamas, trained, armed and equipped by Tehran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Judging by events in Lebanon in the past few days, Israel’s intelligence penetration of Hezbollah is substantial, a factor that will have a major bearing on the prosecution of the war.

Severely damaging Hezbollah is not only in Israel’s interests but ours too.

In 2015, British security services, acting on Israeli intelligence, disrupted a Hezbollah bomb factory in London. Years before, Hezbollah was involved in killing hundreds of British and American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan by Iranian proxies.

Iran is the controlling hand behind the conflict in the Middle East, including Houthi attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea and attacks on US bases in Syria, Jordan and Iraq. Tehran has set itself firmly against Western interests in Europe by supplying arms to Russia for attacking Ukraine, and it is on the threshold of becoming a nuclear armed state.

Israel deserves Britain’s support as its multi-front war with Iran shifts northwards. It does not deserve our shameful arms suspension, abstention on a Palestinian initiated anti Israel vote this week at the UN, or Starmer’s hand-wringing message of “deep concern” over the pager attacks.

At a time when this country is trying to weaken Iran with new sanctions for supplying ballistic missiles to Russia, these moves have the opposite effect and show diplomatic illiteracy.

Seth Frantzman: The Israel vs. Hezbollah War of 2024 Is Getting Closer to Reality

The exploding pagers now may push the Israel-Hezbollah conflict into a new phase. Hezbollah has suffered a large number of casualties. It is not clear how many Hezbollah fighters have been impacted. However, the group announced thirty-eight fallen members. This means the group has now lost 478 members since it began its attacks on Israel. The death toll for the September 17 exploding pagers incident is now the largest single-day death toll for the group since October 2023. Hezbollah will want to respond.

Meanwhile, the IDF is preparing for this eventuality. The IDF has sent its 98th Division, which is composed of commandos and paratroopers, to the north to prepare for escalation. The 98th Division played a key role in fighting in Gaza. It was the division that took Khan Younis from Hamas in January and February 2024, in tough fighting that required the commandos and combat engineers to enter tunnels to root out terrorists. The 98th gained more experience in a number of raids into Gaza between May and July 2024. The 98th Division will join the 36th Armored Division, which the IDF had redeployed from Gaza to the north earlier this year. Along with these units, the IDF has the 91st Division, which is the main division responsible for securing the Israeli border with Lebanon. These units have reserve brigades that have been rotated into the north and also trained throughout the war to prepare for possible confrontation with Hezbollah.

For the IDF, this has been a long waiting game. The IDF doesn’t train units to sit in bivouacs and stay on the defensive. Instead, Israel had trained for years for rapid ground maneuver of forces using the latest technology to work closely with the air force and navy to strike at enemies such as Hezbollah. In fact, the main training of units such as the 36th Division was for war in the north. Its constituent units, such as the Golani infantry and 7th Armored, often trained to assault hilly and mountainous terrain, as one would find in southern Lebanon. Israel’s soldiers are well prepared for a war in the north.

The question facing Israel’s political leadership and its security establishment is what kind of strategy it has now for the Lebanon front and Gaza. In Gaza, the fighting has been reduced since its heavy clashes during the opening months of the war. The IDF has two divisions in Gaza, one on the Egyptian border and one in central Gaza. Hamas has lost many fighters and has fewer rockets than when the war began. However, the terrorist group is still deadly. On September 17, the IDF announced that four soldiers had been killed and a number wounded in southern Gaza. The fight is ongoing against Hamas, which continues to control parts of central and northern Gaza.

Meanwhile, in Lebanon, Hezbollah has suffered a setback. Nonetheless, it still has more than 30,000 fighters under arms. It has dug into areas in southern Lebanon, tunneling into the rocky countryside and preparing for a major war. With Iranian backing, the group also expects to receive support from other fronts, such as Iranian proxy militias in Syria and Iraq.

Hezbollah also has forces in Syria. Hezbollah is aware of Israel’s capabilities, and it knows that Israel is now concentrating forces in the north. However, it also believes that it has enough capabilities to pose a serious threat to Israel. If Hezbollah chooses to strike Israel, it will be unleashing a war whose outcome and dynamics neither side could possibly predict.

Times of Israel says:

The IDF confirms the killing of senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Aqil in an airstrike in Lebanon’s capital Beirut earlier this afternoon.

In a statement, the IDF says Aqil was the head of Hezbollah’s military operations, the acting commander of the terror group’s elite Radwan Force, and the head of a plan to invade the Galilee.

Alongside Aqil, the top brass of Hezbollah’s operations array and the leadership of the Radwan Force were killed in the strike, according to the military.

“Aqil and the commanders who were eliminated were among the architects of the ‘plan for the occupation of the Galilee,’ in which Hezbollah planned to raid Israeli territory, occupy the communities of the Galilee, murder and kill innocents, similar to what the Hamas terror organization carried out in the murderous massacre on October 7,” the IDF says in the statement.

The US Government has a "Rewards for Justice" page for Aqil:

Rewards for Justice is offering a reward of up to $7 million for information on Hizballah key leader Ibrahim Aqil.

Ibrahim Aqil, also known as Tahsin, serves on Hizballah’s highest military body, the Jihad Council.

During the 1980s, Aqil was a principal member of Islamic Jihad Organization—Hizballah’s terrorist cell—that claimed the bombings of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut in April 1983, which killed 63 people, and the U.S. Marine barracks in October 1983, which killed 241 U.S. personnel.

In the 1980s, Aqil directed the taking of American and German hostages in Lebanon and held them there.

On July 21, 2015, the U.S. Department of the Treasury designated Aqil pursuant to Executive Order 13582 for acting for or on behalf of Hizballah. Subsequently, on September 10, 2019, the U.S. Department of State designated Aqil as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist pursuant to Executive Order 13224, as amended.

Well, he received justice, but I don't think there will be any reward. As of this writing, I don't see any official US reaction to the killing, even though he was involved in the deaths of hundreds of Americans.

Any reaction, or lack of reaction, tells more about how the current and potential next administration feels about Israel than any number of carefully crafted "both sides" statements.

One other detail: Aqil was killed in an underground bunker or basement beneath a residential building in Beirut. And somehow most or all of the dead are Hezbollah.

Nobody takes more care to avoid civilian casualties than Israel.

Haaretz reports that Aqil was injured in a pager explosion and was released from the hospital this morning. Israel is probably monitoring the injured to track the top leaders for future assassinations.

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!

The New York Times reports:

Former President Donald J. Trump, speaking on Thursday at a campaign event in Washington centered on denouncing antisemitism in America, said that “if I don’t win this election,” then “the Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss.”

Was what he said antisemitic?

First, we must look at the entire statement, not just the excerpt. At the IAC event, he said::

I'll put it to you very simply and as gently as I can. I wasn't treated properly by the voters who happen to be Jewish. I don't know, do they know what the hell is happening?

If I don't win this election, and the Jewish people would really have a lot to do with that if that happens because at 40% that means 60% of the people are voting for the enemy, Israel in my opinion will cease to exist within two years, and I believe I'm 100% right.

At the antisemitism event, he said:

In my opinion the the Jewish people would have a lot to do with a loss. If I'm at 40%, think of it, that means 60% of voting for Kamala who in particular is a bad Democrat .

My first impression was that the statement was not antisemitic, but it could incite antisemitism. If Trump loses, he pretty much told his supporters that it would be (partially) the Jews fault. This is a breathtakingly stupid and irresponsible thing to say. It is not purposeful incitement, but the effect is the same.

But gut instincts are not what is needed to determine whether a statement is antisemitic or not.

This is a perfect application for the EoZ Algorithmic Definition of Antisemitism. As an algorithm, it is far more objective than any other definition out there. So let's run his statements through the algorithm:

Under this definition, Trump's statement was antisemitic. It was denigration of Jews as a group (whether he considers Jews a people, ethnic group or religion doesn't matter for this purpose.)

Even if his statement is true, it doesn't make it less antisemitic. He attacked the (overwhelmingly Democratic) American Jewish community as a whole.

One could argue that it is his respect for Jews that prompts him to say things like this, that he holds them to higher standards. But that is not a defense. Imagine if he had said that any potential loss would partially be the fault of Blacks - it is obvious that this would be considered racist.

Trump could have used the same statistic and turned it into a positive from his perspective. He could have said that only 24% of Jews voted for him in 2016 and now polls say that number has gone up to 40%, a remarkable 67% increase, and he could have used that statistic to inspire the audience to increase that number even further.

The statement was stupid, inciting and antisemitic, and although Trump would never do it, he should apologize.

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!

The world ignoring starvation in Sudan proves that racism and antisemitism are two sides of the same coin

From the BBC:

Starvation in war-stricken Sudan "is almost everywhere", the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has told the BBC's Today programme after visiting the country.

"Imagine: destruction, displacement, diseases everywhere, and now famine," Dr Tedros [Adhanom Ghebreyesus] told the BBC.

He said he had recently visited a camp for the internally displaced people and a hospital in Sudan.
"You see there many children skin and bone, emaciated."

Close to 25 million people - half of Sudan's population - "need support", Dr Tedros said.
He stressed that Sudan "is not getting the attention it deserves", and that was the case with other recent conflicts in Africa.

"I think race is in the play here. That's what I feel now. We see the pattern now."

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Dr Tedros said the world did not give “equal attention to black and white lives".

At the time, he elaborated by saying only a fraction of the aid given to Ukraine was given to other humanitarian crises, with Tigray in Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan and Syria not receiving the same treatment.

He brings pretty good evidence that race is a major factor in both the amount of media coverage and the amount of humanitarian aid being given. And he isn't only referring to Africa but also non-white people in Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan.

But there is a glaring exception: Gaza.

No one can credibly claim that there isn't a great deal of media coverage on Gaza, or that nations and NGOs are not sending massive amounts of aid to Gaza, or that the UN has spent far more time issuing statements about Gaza than about Sudan which is also suffering the effects of a major war.

If Palestinians in Gaza are the same non-white race as Syrians or Yemenis, then why does Gaza get so much more attention than crises in other Middle East countries?

If the race of the victims is the major factor behind the amount of attention a place suffering from a humanitarian crisis receives, why is there more attention on the nonexistent famine in Gaza where every photo shows kids who look healthy than for the real famine in Sudan where you see hundreds of emaciated children?

In fact, since the Gaza war started, there is far more coverage of Gaza civilian suffering than even that of white Ukrainians. If the color of the victims is the major factor behind the amount of attention given how can that be explained?

It isn't that Dr.Tedros' observations about race are incorrect. It is that there is another, much bigger factor behind the attention on Gaza: the hate of Jews.

The only reason the world is focused on Gaza is because the supposed oppressors are Jews. The suffering of the victims isn't the major factor behind the coverage - it is the religion of the people being blamed for it.

World attention to Gaza is as disproportionately large as its attention on Sudan is disproportionately minuscule. But bigotry is the reason for both. No one is talking about Sudan because the world is told to keep "all eyes on Gaza." Indeed, the much higher coverage of Gaza than even Ukraine for the past year shows that antisemitism is a far more powerful driver of how much coverage a crisis receives than race is.

Antisemitism and racism are two sides of the same coin. The same "progressive" media and humanitarians who claim to care so much about bigotry are the ones who are propagating it, both by ignoring people of color in Africa and inciting hate against Jews in Israel.

(Note: I dislike using the word "race" because the entire concept has no scientific basis. Palestinians are the same "race" as Jews and using racial terms to describe the Arab Israeli conflict is just another manifestation of antisemitism. In my opinion, using the word "race" today validates Nazi ideology that there are inherent physical differences between people of different group ancestries. The term "race" obscures more than it illuminates. But bigotry is real, both against people of different colored skin and against Jews. I strongly object to treating race as a real concept, whether from racists or self-described anti-racists: any use of the term propagates the false idea that people are biologically different. But when a WHO official uses the word, it is easier to cover the story the way he means it.)

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!

The webpage of the company that supposedly made the exploding pagers is unintentionally hilarious

The Taiwanese company Apollo whose name was on the exploding Hezbollah pagers said that the pagers were manufactured by Budapest-based BAC Consulting.

That company website disappeared on Wednesday. But the archive of BAC Consulting webpages shows a site that really looks and sounds...fake.

It is filled with jargon and very light on details:

We work internationally as agents of change with a network of consultants who put their knowledge, experience, and humanity into our projects in a connecting and authentic journey!

Seeking solutions to your business challenges revolves around "Create, Cooperating, and Conceive" authentically!

We are excited!
With over a decade of consulting experience, we are on an exciting and rewarding journey with our network of passionate experts with a hunger for innovation and discovery for the Environment, Innovation & Development, and International Affairs.

Are you ready to implement novel visions in your organization to take it to the next height?

Would you hire a company where you cannot understand what they actually do?

Their address points to a real building in what appears to be an office/ light industrial park.

There are two notable parts of their website.

One is where they elliptically describe working with telecommunications manufacturers in the far East (emphasis mine):

Vision
We develop international technology cooperation among countries for the sale of telecommunication products. This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries
Client
International Partnership
Our Work
We are currently further developing innovative telecommunication instruments. This development entails
Integrating the best past technological lessons and practices from different geographical areas
Strategizing the business Scaling up
Carrying out Negotiation and Sales
Expertise
Telecommunication, Innovation, Partnership Building, and Coordination
Current Results
Coordinated Research & Development for Instrument innovation
Developed an International Partnership via meetings
Carried out Sales

Well, it certainly was innovative, and they did add business to a new market!

The only other part of the website that said anything specific was in projects where they consulted for the European Union:

We are glad to assist the Agency with the evaluation of project proposals presented by international partners during various Calls. Our evaluation work fosters innovation, development, and transparency in line with the European Union's values and vision.
Client
European Commission

And:

We are grateful to have been chosen to join the Results-Oriented Monitoring System (ROM) system for External Aid Interventions by the EU-Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO). The monitoring system enhances the EC's accountability and management capacities supporting EU Delegation and Headquarters services.
Client
European Union

The New York Times reports that BAC was entirely an Israeli front company. The CEO is a real person who seems to do at least some of this generic consulting work described. But the entire operation, according to the report, is unbelievable.

Israel knew for years that Nasrallah didn't trust mobile phones. They sold a small batch of the pagers to Hezbollah in 2022! Then, although the NYT doesn't say this, Israel may have leaked to Hezbollah that they can turn cell phones into remote spying devices using their cameras and microphones and GPS to track everyone. Nasrallah in February told Hezbollah to get rid of its cell phones and replace them with pagers.

An Israeli company was in place for years waiting for this opportunity, and probably manipulated Hezbollah to increase its use of pagers.

WOW.

Another company that seems to be involved, NortaLink, which also had generic consulting jargon on its webpage, has also just been taken down. It has been on the web since at least late 2021 and its Facebook page, which is still up at the moment, goes back to 2017.

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!

09/19 Links Pt2: The dangerous double standards of Britain, Canada and Germany; The fundamental problem behind the BBC’s anti-Israel bias

From Ian:

Arsen Ostrovsky: From Kfar Aza to the world: A powerful portrait of Israel’s solitude

Bernard Lévy recounts his harrowing experience in Israel following the October 7th Hamas attack, capturing the deep isolation and suffering of the Jewish state and highlighting its isolation.

Though the book is titled ‘Israel Alone’, in some respects, it may as well be titled ‘The Jews Alone’. Simply put, with the exception of some heroic voices, we have been abandoned. Abandoned by world leaders, abandoned by self-righteous politicians, abandoned by civil society and abandoned by all those with whom the Jews stood with, defended and fought for.

Reflecting on this unabated unleashing of Jew-hate and abandonment after October 7th, and even downright support for Hamas in the West, Lévy comes to the painful, reluctant, yet tragically accurate realization that, “no land on this planet is a shelter for Jews.” Invoking ‘Amalek’, the Jewish people’s evil pre-cursor to Hitler and Sinwar, Lévy declares “he has come out of limbo to bang on our doors and drum in our ears.”

In short, as Lévy concludes “Yes, the Jews are more alone than they have ever been”, however, he adds an important caveat, that “tragedy is Greek, not Jewish”.

Despite taking his readers on a journey of utter despair, agony and questioning the Jews place in the world, Lévy ends with an inspiring affirmation in our faith, our history and the indispensable centrality of Zionism and Israel to our future.

Lévy understands that the Jewish people are not defined solely by heartache, loss and the pain that history’s ‘Amaleks’ seek to inflict upon us, but that our collective story is also one of unyielding hope, courage, liberation, and resilience.

Indeed, “the soul, mind, and genius of Judaism are standing firm amid tumult and torment” says Lévy, in his concluding words.

The Tradition of Jew-Hate

If the demonstrators really cared about Palestinians, as the Muslim Arab journalist Bassam Tawil points out, "they would be speaking out against the repressive measures and human rights violations perpetrated by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.... instead of improving the living conditions of their people, Hamas and PIJ leaders are imposing new taxes and leading comfortable lives in Qatar, Lebanon and other countries. Instead of bringing democracy and freedom of speech to their people, the terror groups are arresting and intimidating journalists, human rights activists and political opponents."

"Racial hatred and hysteria seemed to have taken complete hold of otherwise decent people," said an eyewitness. "I saw fashionably dressed women clapping their hands and screaming with glee, while respectable middle-class mothers held up their babies to see the 'fun.'" — Eyewitness to the November 9, 1938 Kristallnacht.

Jihadist media efforts, and especially massive donations to universities from Qatar and other oil-rich Islamic countries, have been so successful that many academics and students in Western tertiary educational institutions have been captivated by the narrow ideology of Jew-hate.

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism." — Zuheir Mohsen, PLO official, Trouw, March 1977.

In the jihadist view, Islam is the one true faith and therefore Christians, Jews, Hindus, and all other "disbelievers" are following a false religion and therefore can be righteously killed as apostates.

"[T]he Crusaders conquered Eretz Israel, reaching Jerusalem in 1099. Once there, they gathered all the Jews of Jerusalem into the central synagogue and set it afire. Other Jews, who had climbed to the roof of Al-Aksa mosque on the Temple Mount, were caught and beheaded." — 'The First Crusade,' chabad.org

The dangerous double standards of Britain, Canada and Germany

Williams also recalled that in March, the former U.K. government, led by Rishi Sunak, reportedly conditioned continued arms supplies to Israel on its allowing the Red Cross or international diplomats to visit the detained terrorists of Hamas’s elite Nukhba force. The foreign secretary at the time, David Cameron, had even warned Israeli officials that Europe as a whole would impose a weapons embargo on Israel.

According to Williams, the U.K.’s arms embargo “appears to represent nothing so much as pure racist perfidy.”

Lammy “completely ignores the extreme lengths to which Israel has gone to avoid civilian casualties, as well as the huge amounts of humanitarian aid it has facilitated into the Gaza Strip,” he added.

Williams quoted the chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point, John Spencer, who wrote, “Israel has implemented more precautions to prevent civilian harm than any military in history—above and beyond what international law requires and more than the U.S. did in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Richard Kemp, a former British Army officer and commander, has echoed these sentiments supporting Israel and the IDF.

According to Coughlin, Lammy’s “blatant anti-Israel agenda will place the U.K.’s long-standing strategic alliance with Israel under intense strain.”

Unfortunately for Israel, Britain is not alone. Sadly, Germany and Canada have also felt it is appropriate to sanction Israel by imposing an arms embargo exactly at a time when Israel is trying to fight Islamic extremism that is already rising in those countries.

Germany, under Chancellor Olaf Scholz, has delayed nearly all of Israel’s requests for arms sales since the start of the war. Sales to Israel in 2023 amounted to more than 300 million euros and, in 2024, they allegedly dropped to just 14 million.

But when juxtaposing these policies against Israel alongside other countries, the hypocrisy becomes clear.

Astonishingly, Germany has massively armed Qatar, which, alongside Iran, is the most significant backer of Hamas, and one of the main sources of evil in the world today.

“In the first half of 2024, the federal government approved arms sales worth just over 100 million euros to the rulers in Doha, who are probably the most important supporters of the terrorist organization Hamas,” Bild journalist Björn Stritzel noted.

Likewise, Canada has also decided to punish Israel over baseless and false accusations of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

For the past several months, Ottawa has not approved new arms export permits to Israel, halting about 30 such permits, including a deal between the Canadian subsidiary of American company General Dynamics and the U.S. government, according to a recent announcement by Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly.

“First and foremost, our policy has been clear since Jan. 8, we and I have not accepted any form of arms export permits to be sent to Israel,” she said.

She also said that she asked her department “to look into any existing permits of arms or parts of arms that could have been sent to Israel.”

Alan Baker, a former Israeli ambassador to Canada and current director of the Institute for Diplomatic Affairs at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, told JNS that Canada’s decision is “absurd.”

“I wouldn’t call the policy in and of itself antisemitic, but it is certainly misguided,” he said. “It is based on ignorance or naivete, and not on an understanding of the situation.”

Baker called out Joly, “who seems to be completely persuaded that Israel is involved in a genocide. She doesn’t want to understand the facts and get down to the true situation.”

Baker pointed to hostile anti-Israel organizations based in Quebec that “seem to be influencing her whole policy.”

“What’s sad about this is that she seems to be pulling the Canadian prime minister by the nose when he should be sufficiently responsible to rein her in,” Baker said.

“You expect someone who has been prime minister for so long to be somewhat more circumspect and to consult and take into consideration those who perhaps have a less politically driven point of view and a more facts-based point of view,” he added.

Baker noted that the previous Canadian premier, Stephen Harper, gave a speech before Israel’s Knesset toward the end of his term and said that Canada will always have Israel’s back. He said it is inconceivable that Canada could ever act against Israel’s interests.

“But here we are,” said Baker. “Canada is being held hostage by an irresponsible foreign minister who seems to have great influence on the prime minister, based on political assumptions that are fed by propaganda that has no relation to the truth.

“Rather than trying to ascertain the facts and being in contact with those elements, whether in the United States or Israel, that are conversant with the statistics and the truth and genuine data, she and Trudeau prefer to base themselves on the accusation of genocide. And they come to the wrong conclusions.”

Canadian aid organizations have called for a complete embargo on military exports to Israel, warning that it is impossible for them to provide basic support to Palestinians while Israel operates in Gaza.

09/19 Links Pt1: Operation Grim Beeper: Melanie Phillips: Hoist with their own devices; Hezbollah hides death toll from exploding devices; Hamas is an idea

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: Hoist with their own devices

Today’s developments suggest, however, that Israel hadn’t yet finished its task of disabling the enemy before any such all-out attack. There may therefore be more such disabling attacks to come as a precursor to the long-promised war to finish the job.

And then, of course, there’s Iran. The regime in Tehran must now be in a state of panic. Not only is Hezbollah, the proxy army whose missile batteries form the principal threat to Israel from the Iranian regime, now on its knees for the moment as the result of Israeli out-of-the-box thinking. The Iranian regime will be wondering that, if Israel can pull off this kind of tactic against Hezbollah, what might it be about to do to themselves and their spear-carriers in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps?

Of course, we don’t yet know what Israel’s strategy actually is. We know that the Biden administration is putting Israel under enormous pressure not to wage all-out war on Hezbollah. Maybe Israel is buckling to that pressure. There have also been reports that the pager attack was indeed intended as a pre-emptive strike for an all-out assault on Hezbollah, but Israel was forced to make it a stand-alone event because it had become compromised by some Hezbollah operatives becoming suspicious of their pagers.

Despite all that, maybe we’ll see that all-out attack very soon. Israel has long feared such a war, though, because of the certainty of thousands of Israeli victims from enormous barrages of Hezbollah rockets and other weaponry that might overwhelm Israel’s defences. We don’t know whether the events of the past 36 hours have reduced that threat. But there may be no better opportunity than this to take that gamble.

What has long been crystal clear, however, is that Hezbollah has to be defeated once and for all. And so does Iran. The October 7 pogrom put steel into the Israeli public’s backbone. Never again must Israel face the threat of another October 7 or worse. The endless war of attrition by Hezbollah must be stopped. And the head of the snake in Tehran must itself be lopped off. The Israeli public will stand for nothing less.

What has also been clear is that the Biden administration has been doing everything it can to stop Israel from defeating its mortal enemies.

Israel has long observed that — contrary to the west’s moral cretins who so falsely claim that Israel’s responses to Hamas are themselves war crimes — it has used only a fraction of its firepower against Hamas and Hezbollah and that it has far more up its sleeve than anyone can imagine. In the past 36 hours, we’ve seen some evidence of the dramatic surprises that Israel can indeed spring.

But this has also shown us that, given what it does indeed have up its sleeve, Israel could have finished off Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran too long ago if it hadn’t been prevented from doing so by America — which has been intent instead on appeasing and empowering Iran, creating a state of Palestine in Gaza which would become yet another Iranian terror proxy, and cynically weaponising the grievous plight of the hostages to force upon Israel a ceasefire which would led to the survival of Hamas.

Jonathan Tobin: Why is Hamas so confident that it’s winning?

Claiming U.S. ‘recognition’
But above all, Hamas views American pressure on Israel as its ace in the hole. As Mashaal pointed out, the way that the hostage negotiations have been handled by Washington has amounted to American “recognition” of Hamas as a diplomatic partner as opposed to a despised and outlawed terrorist organization. He’s right about that.

While it’s not clear just how closely they are observing the presidential election or counting on one outcome over another, they obviously prefer Harris’s stand in favor of an “immediate ceasefire” to former President Donald Trump’s comments, which amount to a green light to Israel to “finish the job” of eliminating the terrorists.

Hamas’s military position inside Gaza is not completely eliminated, but it is a shadow of its pre-October self. And there are even reports now starting to circulate about Gazans drawing some obvious conclusions about the high cost of letting Hamas lead them into disaster after disaster. Even as Israel’s focus is increasingly turning towards its northern border and the imperative to stop the Hezbollah fire that has depopulated a large area in the direct line of terrorist fire, the need to continue the work of demolishing tunnels and rooting out remaining Hamas elements is not over. It may take years—something that discourages Israelis, and that infuriates Biden and Harris. But the notion that there is any realistic alternative to continue fighting that would ensure Israeli security—whether in the form of a ceasefire/surrender or bringing international forces into Gaza to stop Hamas—is a pipe dream.

The reality of Palestinian politics
As the Times article makes clear, Hamas will never budge from its demands that Israel hand back Gaza to them. And as long as they are useful to their cause, they will hold onto many of the hostages, despite the belief among some Israelis that it is Netanyahu’s stubbornness or political ambition that is the obstacle to their freedom. Moreover, Hamas leaders are right to believe, despite the understandable anger in Gaza, that the basic equation of Palestinian politics remains unchanged. Over the last century, Palestinian groups and leaders have always gained credibility primarily by shedding Jewish blood. Hamas thinks that it will eventually reap a great benefit from the atrocities of Oct. 7 in the form of broad support that will enable it to topple and replace Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah Party in Judea and Samaria as well as Gaza. All they have to do to cash in on that is to survive the war, and they think they’ve found the formula to enable them to do just that.

If left to carry out its tasks without foreign interference, the IDF will eventually eliminate Hamas, though that task will not be accomplished easily or quickly. It can certainly prevent it from returning to power in Gaza, thus ensuring that its reign of terror over Israel as well as Palestinians is over. Still, Mashaal and the rest of the terrorist group are counting on feckless American politicians, ideologically motivated leftist demonstrators and political activists, a media that is always prepared to demonize Israeli efforts at self-defense, as well as war-weariness and anguish about the hostages inside Israel to guarantee their survival. We may hope that they are wrong about that, but it’s easy to understand why the terrorist leader is confident that he can outlast the Israelis … with American help.

Clifford May: Hamas is an idea

Their goal is to kill the Zionist idea. Which is what exactly?

Prior to 1948, Zionism was the belief that Jews had the right and should have the opportunity to exercise self-determination in part of their ancient homeland.

There were reasonable arguments against this idea—not least that it would prove too arduous. For one thing, most of what was to become Israel was either desert or malarial swamp.

Following the re-establishment of the Jewish state—and a failed war launched immediately thereafter by the Arab countries surrounding Israel—Zionism took on a different meaning.

If you agree that Israel—the only democratic society in the Middle East, the only nation-state in the region where Jews, Muslims, Druze, Christians and other ethnic and religious groups enjoy a broad spectrum of rights and freedoms—has a right to continue to exist then, congratulations, you are a Zionist.

If, on the other hand, you demand the eradication of Israel “from the river to the sea,” if you support mass-murdering Jews or are indifferent regarding that eventually, then you may consider yourself an anti-Zionist.

Borrell has expanded upon his assertion that you “don’t kill an idea” by adding that “you have to provide an alternative that’s better.” His better idea is (did you guess?) a “two-state solution.”

As he must know, Hamas forcefully rejects such a compromise based on its theological conviction that any territory ever conquered by Muslims—as the land the Romans re-named Palestine was by the imperialist/colonialist army that marched from Arabia in the 7th century—is a waqf, an endowment from Allah to the Muslims for eternity.

I might also note that a proto-two-state solution was what existed after the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Two years later Hamas violently ousted the Palestinian Authority and seized power, tolerating no competitors or dissenters.

Huge amounts of aid poured in from “the international donor community.” The United Nations provided social services such as health care and education, which soon included anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish indoctrination.

Hamas spent its energies building a mammoth and elaborate subterranean fortress to be used for the “military solution” it was planning. Hamas leaders have sheltered in it, surrounded by hostages abducted from Israel.

Above the tunnels, Gazan civilians have served as human shields. Hamas leaders knew from the start that Israelis would be blamed by U.N. officials, faux “human rights organizations,” much of the media, and others for those human shields who were killed.

Keener minds than Borrell’s have pondered terrible ideas and what to do about them. In World War II, Churchill sought to if not kill, at least cripple Nazi ideas. He understood that required defeating Nazis on the battlefield.

Of course, there are still Nazis, neo-Nazis and Nazi apologists in Europe and America.

One of their fundamental ideas, a Europe “cleansed” of Jews, has morphed into the idea behind the Tehran-led multifront war being waged against Israel—a Middle East “cleansed” of Jews.

Borrell is neither a Nazi nor a jihadist. But he and many others are helping keep a genocidal idea alive.

Rhetoric That Inspires Violence Is Wrong! Unless It's Pro-Palestine Rhetoric, by Rashida Tlaib (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

Rhetoric That Inspires Violence Is Wrong! Unless It's Pro-Palestine Rhetoric.

by Rashida Tlaib, Congresswoman, 12h District, Michigan

Detroit, September 19 - Donald Trump and J. D. Vance have continued their irresponsible, reckless speech even after the atmosphere they created with such talk resulted in two attempts on Trump's life. Aside from being dangerous, such talk is simply wrong. Well, if it isn't in favor of Palestinian resistance it's wrong. No amount of violence on behalf of Palestine could disqualify the cause.

Republicans and conservatives in general have long resorted to inflammatory rhetoric that inspires violence. Activists such as Libs of TikTok do the same. But they refuse to take responsibility for that rhetoric, which threatens lives - even their own! - and safety. Anyone who votes for politicians who speak they way Trump and Vance speak automatically support political violence, which betrays all of our fundamental values.

That is, if the perpetrators commit political violence on behalf of ordinary causes. On behalf of Palestine, however, both the violence and the rhetoric that prompted it attain sacred, unassailable status.

Anti-abortion protesters accuse providers of murder, and then someone bombs an abortion clinic; Libs of TikTok posts a clip from a trans teacher, and the teacher's school gets bomb threats; President Biden tweets that Trump is "a genuine threat to this nation" and "a threat to democracy," and someone tries to shoot Trump.

Hmm. Maybe that last one is okay, as well. I will have to consider it. Trump is pretty pro-Israel so perhaps it counts as "pro-Palestine" rhetoric.

My point is, we must not, cannot, as a civilization, tolerate talk that calls for, or implies support for, harming people or property to advance a political agenda. Except the agenda of Palestine, which we must liberate By Any Means Necessary™. When it comes to Palestine, unleash your inner rape-apologist and Nazi-analogy-maker. Everything goes.

Journalists and politicians have a responsibility to call out and challenge talk that incites violence, wherever, and by whomever. Trump, Vance, and their acolytes must tone down their inflammatory speech, which has already raised tensions among immigrants in Ohio and sparked torrents of online harassment and hate speech. As a child of Muslim immigrants, I have developed a special sensitivity to rhetoric that makes marginalized people afraid.

It's still alright for you to make Jews afraid, though, because you're doing it in the name of a Free Palestine, through blood and fire, as the chant goes. Also the "From the water to the water Palestine will be Arab" chant, which we western Muslims sanitize as "will be free."

Stop the violent speech!

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Respected NGOs (and the EU's Josep Borrell) knowingly deceive the world in their press statements about Israeli restrictions on food to Gaza

Yesterday, 15 international NGOs including Oxfam, Save the Children and CARE International issued a press release accusing Israel of denying lifesaving food and medicine from Gaza:

15 aid organizations demand international pressure for an immediate ceasefire, arms embargo, and end to Israel’s systematic aid obstruction

New data has revealed the scale of aid obstruction, and the consequential drastic fall in aid entering Gaza. This is driving a humanitarian disaster, with the entire population of Gaza facing hunger and disease, and almost half a million at risk of starvation.

While Israeli military attacks on Gaza intensify, lifesaving food, medicine, medical supplies, fuel, and tents have been systematically blocked from entering for almost a year.

Data analysis by organizations working in Gaza has found that as a consequence of the Israeli government's obstruction of aid:

- 83% of required food aid does not make it into Gaza, up from 34% in 2023.This reduction means people in Gaza have gone from having an average of two meals a day to just one meal every other day. An estimated 50,000 children aged between 6-59 months urgently require treatment for malnutrition by the end of the year.

Look carefully at the wording. It is not saying that food is not making it into Gaza, but "food aid."

Because Israel has made up for the difference by encouraging commercial food and supply deliveries.

This has advantages - the private drivers are more likely to go into somewhat dangerous areas that the professional aid workers refuse to enter, and commercial deliveries are less likely to be intercepted by Hamas which still essentially controls all the aid coming in to Gaza. And then Hamas sells the aid meant to be free to Gazans. So in the end, the aid that goes through humanitarian organizations are not any easier for Gazans to access than the commercial goods.

The NGOs know this. The press release includes a link to the UN-OCHA statistics, which mentions that they are not counting commercial goods in very tiny letters:

But when you look at the COGAT reports, you see that there is more food coming in on commercial trucks than aid trucks:

The NGOs aren't directly lying, but they are quite deliberately withholding information that makes it little different from a lie. They know that the media doesn't know enough to note these distinctions.

But speaking of liars, last week EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell claimed:

I learned that the energy bars - which is the best way of feeding, the less weight and the less volume for the same amount of calories – have been rejected at the border, because they [Israel]consider that it is a luxury product. We will see the item that has been rejected and they are still being rejected.

The COGAT site mentions specifically that "high energy biscuits" are part of the "other" category of food items entering Gaza:

Borrell may have been mislead by whoever he heard this from, but he should still tell the truth.

The people making official statements to the media about Israel are knowingly deceptive. And no one calls them out on it.

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Arabic memes mocking Hezbollah after pager attack

Here are some of the memes I'm seeing in Arabic social media.

This is very important, since Arab culture is so frightened of shame, Hezbollah losing respect is a big deal.

Text autotranslated.

An entire music video:

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Human Rights Watch again beclowns itself in its claim that Israel violated the prohibition of booby-traps

Here is Human Rights Watch's response to the incredible attack on Hezbollah's pagers:

Customary international humanitarian law prohibits the use of booby traps – objects that civilians are likely to be attracted to or are associated with normal civilian daily use – precisely to avoid putting civilians at grave risk and produce the devastating scenes that continue to unfold across Lebanon today. The use of an explosive device whose exact location could not be reliably known would be unlawfully indiscriminate, using a means of attack that could not be directed at a specific military target and as a result would strike military targets and civilians without distinction. A prompt and impartial investigation into the attacks should be urgently conducted.

HRW clearly employs teams of corrupt international law experts to twist the law in such a way.

Communications devices used by an armed group are valid military targets.

This is not in dispute. This is international law. Israel accepts the definition of a military objective from Article 52(2) Additional Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions, "Insofar as objects are concerned, military objectives are limited to those objects which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage."

Beyond the clear success of directly attacking the devices, Israel also accomplished the destruction of two entire military communications networks - the pager network and the "walkie talkie" network. Hezbollah is no longer using those networks. This is as clear a military target as one can imagine.

HRW doesn't mention these facts because HRW is not interested in international law - it is only interested in twisting international law as a weapon to attack Israel.

What about their main point that booby traps are themselves prohibited?

HRW's own language proves how absurd their interpretation of the law is. In 2024 in Lebanon, pagers and bulky radio transceivers are not "associated with normal civilian daily use" - almost no civilians use them and none of those used by civilians were targeted.

The actual Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices paragraph 7(2), when you squint a certain way, makes it appear that booby-trapping pagers is illegal: "It is prohibited to use booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material."

However, the AR-924 pager device was not specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material. It existed for years before this attack and was sold worldwide. Explosive materials were added to the device after its original design and manufacture, from all accounts so far. Hezbollah obviously chose to purchase them before anyone tampered with them.

But beyond that, the previous paragraph 7(1) of the convention gives a clue as to what the authors intended with this rule. It lists civilian objects that must never be booby-trapped, like human bodies, animals, medical equipment and food. But this one entry in the list makes the intention of the law clear: "kitchen utensils or appliances except in military establishments, military locations or military supply depots."

Innocuous objects that are used for even indirect military purposes, like kitchen utensils, may be booby trapped under this convention.

If that is true, then certainly pagers whose entire purpose is directly for military communications are allowed to be booby-trapped. The only people carrying the pagers are themselves part of Hezbollah.

What about the claim that Hezbollah has non-military members who would be considered civilians and exploding their pagers would be prohibited?

Hezbollah itself emphatically refuses to distinguish between its military and civilian functions. "We don't have a military wing and a political one; we don't have Hezbollah on one hand and the resistance party on the other...Every element of Hezbollah, from commanders to members as well as our various capabilities, are in the service of the resistance, and we have nothing but the resistance as a priority," its Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Naim Qassem said.

In Hezbollah's own self-definition, every member is considered support personnel for their "resistance," meaning that they are just as much targets as any support personnel for any army would be, such as cooks, drivers, maintenance workers, supply quartermasters and clerks.

Even though Israel haters are scrambling to find reasons to declare the attacks to be illegal, they do not have a leg to stand on.

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