Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, March 23, 2025

Looking deeper into how Christian supersessionism helped make Jew-hatred inevitable

Last week I wrote A Unified Field Theory of Antisemitism, a way to understand why hatred of Jews (and, today, of Israel) goes way beyond the more prosaic hate that is usually directed at "the Other."

My theory is that all the major strains of today's antisemitism - Muslim/Arab, progressive, and others I plan to examine - point back to updated twists of Christian supersessionism. In short, all major antisemitic groups feel that they are the rightful heirs to the Jewish people, but the actual reality and continued success of the Jews is not just an obstacle to their success but a personal challenge to their worldview. This dissonance causes hate.

Let's dive deeper into this theory, starting with the original supersessionists.

We described how the figures of Ecclesia and Sinagoga, prominent in many European cathedrals, symbolize the Church replacing Israel as God's chosen people. Where does this idea come from?

The very name New Testament implies that the old one is no longer relevant. The authors of the New Testament refer to the Torah by its literal translation, the "Law." To them, Jesus' death makes the Law no longer relevant as a means to salvation. Paul in Galatians 3 says, "Before the coming of this faith, we were held in custody under the law, locked up until the faith that was to come would be revealed," saying that faith supersedes adherence to the Torah and the Torah's laws were a temporary but insufficient means to gain salvation.

There is a clear tension here between the idea that the Hebrew Scripture is the Word of God and that it is being superseded by a new Word. Why would God create something that He knew would become irrelevant? Why would he create laws that man could not fulfill, that would be a yoke that people would be unable to bear? Jesus quotes the Shema prayer (Mark 29-30), which says how central the laws are to everyday life - how could Christianity say that faith by itself replaces the laws?

That tension is not enough to explain Jew-hatred. But two other verses can.

In Acts 15, Peter participates in a debate as to whether Gentile converts to Christianity require circumcision, and he describes the Torah as "a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear.” Here, Peter is claiming that the laws are too onerous for even Jews. In context, he was trying to attract the largest numbers of believers to the new religion, and practically speaking circumcision is not a great selling point. But Peter is couching this sales pitch that the laws no longer apply as a theological fact.

Yet Jews did manage to keep the Laws. Their existence, and continued success, threw a wrench into the truthfulness of Peter's words.

Far more starkly, we have Hebrews 8, the cornerstone of supersessionism. It describes how belief in Jesus makes the Jewish laws, especially the laws of sacrifice in the Temple, outdated. It culminates with a prediction: "By calling this covenant 'new,' he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear."

The Christians of the Middle Ages saw that the Jews and their practice of the Law did not disappear. They were not obsolete. They lived and thrived in their own communities. The words of the New Testament were proven to be untrue every time there was interaction with Jews.

That is what changes a mere theological difference of opinion into hate. If Jews continue to exist and succeed while (and by) living under the rules of the "old" covenant a thousand years after they were supposed to disappear according to the new one, the new covenant seems flawed.

Not only that, but the existence of Jewish communities following the law in the midst of a hostile gentile population supported the supposedly obsolete scriptures. "The Torah of the Lord is perfect, renewing life; the decrees of the Lord are enduring, making the simple wise (Psalms 19:8.) " The Hebrew Scriptures directly say the Laws are eternal and a source of happiness; saying that God didn't want them to be permanent is calling God a liar.

Faith is intensely personal, and the Jews' success looked like nothing less than a stab in the heart of the Christian faithful of the era. And this is what transformed Jews into objects of hate and envy.

The irony is that the Hebrew Scriptures were not written as a message to the entire world. It was written for the Jewish people. The laws are meant only for the Jewish people. Jews don't expect, or want, anyone else to follow the laws. The Torah's commandments create a high bar for the Jewish people alone. It might be a yoke for others, but Psalms 1:2 says that the Torah is not a burden but a delight (Psalms 1:2). The Jews following the Laws survived and thrived - not in spite of the Law but because of it.

Christianity adopted the "Old Testament" as theirs. They claimed the mantle of being the new Jews. Yet their adoption of the scriptures never meant for them caused a constant friction, parts of the "Old Testament" are foundational and others discarded. The Ten Commandments are important, but the Sabbath one - nah, not so much. Real Jews who manage to keep the entire set of laws were a constant rebuke to the fundamental sense of self of the medieval Christians. The contradictions between the "Old Testament" being relevant to Jews while irrelevant to the Christians who say they transcended it caused a kind of identity crisis.

That's why they created Ecclesia and Sinagoga; a way to reassure themselves that they are right. Yet the fact that they were forced to enshrine this fable is itself proof of their own discomfort at the existence of Jews.

The Christian love-hate relationship with the Hebrew Scriptures became an important part of the modern Western world. The Ralphe Bunche Park near the UN in New York has Isaiah 2:4 engraved: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares." A Hebrew Biblical reference is part of the logo of Yale University. Hebrew Biblical references abound in scholarly 18th and 19th century writings.

The Law, far from being irrelevant and obsolete, is integral to modern legal practice. John Selden, one of the most important legal theorists of the West, based his writings not only on the Torah, but on the Talmud of the hated Pharisees. Jesus taught (Matthew 5) that he extended the laws to make lust equivalent to adultery and anger equivalent to murder, but no Western court ever adopted those innovations. The Jewish legal codes are what have stood the test of time.

This underpinning of Hebrew law into the fabric of the modern West is part of the reason supersessionism has become a driving factor of today's secular, progressive antisemitism. It claims to have inherited the mantle of morality, and those morals come squarely from Jewish law and philosophy. This is a topic for future essays.

Buy EoZ's books on Amazon!

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

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

Turkish Erdoğan-aligned newspaper: Jews are subhuman enemies who must be eradicated before they destroy the world

Yeni Şafak is one of Turkey's most popular newspapers, with a circulation of about 100,000 plus countless more online. It adheres closely to the ruling party AKP's politics and is heavily influential among President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's base.

It often spreads blatant antisemitism, but one article it published last week may have hit new depths in hate and incitement against Jews.

In this case, Hüseyin Likoğlu, the newspaper's General Publishing Director who is a frequent guest on Turkish talk shows, repeatedly refers to Jews as "perverted" as he blames Zionists for the Holocaust:

Perverted Jews have always been the pioneers of discord throughout history. The evils of perverted Jews are described in many holy texts, especially the Quran...

The perverted Jews, who began their terrorist activities in the occupied Palestinian territories, were having difficulty establishing the Zionist state they dreamed of because they did not have a sufficient population, while they were slaughtering dozens of Muslims every day.

Zionist Jews found a solution to increase immigration to the occupied Palestinian territories in a disgusting plot they set up with Hitler. Zionists enabled Hitler to massacre the Jews. Following Hitler's so-called genocide, thousands of Jews from Europe, especially Germany, migrated to the occupied Palestinian territories.

Yet as disgusting as this accusation is, Likoğlu is only getting started. He says the perverted, subhuman Jews are intent on killing every non-Jews and destroying the world, and must be eradicated before they can implement their scheme:

The genocide we are experiencing is not limited to Gaza. We are facing a planned perverted terror. Gaza is only the beginning, we are facing creatures in human form with a perverted belief that plans to destroy all Muslims and all non-Jews.

The perverted Jews, who are dragging the world into a great disaster with the support of Christian Zionist-Evangelists in the USA, are the most fundamental problem not only for Gaza, not only for Palestine, not only for the countries in the region, but for the entire world. If humanity cannot win this war, the world will be destroyed.

He is saying that every human being is obligated to kill all the subhuman Jews before the Jews kill them.

This is Hitler-level hate.

If you have ever wondered how Nazi Germany could normalize genocide against Jews, we are seeing it in real time, today, from a major media outlet aligned with a NATO member.

Buy EoZ's books on Amazon!

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

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

Iran's Supreme Leader denies Houthis are an Iranian proxy. The Houthis disagree.

The website of Iran's leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei, reports on a Friday speech he made:

He called the interpretation of the resistance centers as Iranian proxy forces by American and European politicians a big mistake and an insult to these groups, and added: "What does proxy mean? The Yemeni nation and the resistance centers in the region have an internal motivation to stand against the Zionists, and the Islamic Republic of Iran does not need a proxy, and our opinion and theirs are clear."

But the Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi admitted that his group doesn't do anything without coordination with the "resistance axis," meaning Iran.

In a speech last August he discussed why there was a delay in the terrorist response to Israel's bombing of the Houthi-controlled port in July. “The decision to respond is a decision made by everyone; at the level of the entire axis,” he said.

Iran of course provides its Revolutionary Guard as "advisors" in Yemen and it provides weapons and training as well.

Fox News reported last week:

Khamenei, according to the report compiled by the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and first obtained by Fox News Digital, personally supervises all Houthi "political and military affairs" that are first approved by his regime.
"According to reports received from within the IRGC, Khamenei has personally emphasized the importance of Houthi attacks and the necessity of sending weapons and equipment for the Houthis to IRGC commanders and regime officials," the report said.

Khamenei's denial of control over the Houthis is his panicked response to Donald Trump's statement that the US will hold Iran fully accountable for any and every Houthi attack on US forces and shipping.

He's running scared.

Buy EoZ's books on Amazon!

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

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

03/22 Links: The cancer of October 7 denial is spreading; Columbia’s Egregious Public-Relations Campaign; Unpacking Witkoff’s Tucker interview: What is the US's stance on Gaza?

From Ian:

The cancer of October 7 denial is spreading. Its antidote is this forensic account of Hamas’s crimes

I would strongly urge anyone to read this report, especially as it lets the facts speak for themselves, though the horror is too great for me to dwell on it here. I draw only on a couple of examples whose poignancy strikes me.

One tells of Aviv Kutz, a graphic designer who, following incendiary kite and balloon attacks from Gaza in 2018, had launched an annual Kites for Hope event. He, his wife and three children were all murdered in their mamad (safe room), clasping one another’s hands. In his house was found the family’s “peace kite” he had planned to launch that very day.

Another was Netta Epstein, whose mother Avelet addressed us at the report’s unveiling. Netta and his fiancée Shavit were hiding in the bedroom, having learnt that his uncle and grandmother had been killed elsewhere on the kibbutz, the latter shot on her mobility scooter. The terrorists threw three grenades into the room, the second injuring the couple. As the third grenade rolled across the floor, Netta, militarily trained, threw himself on top of it, dying, but saving Shavit. She survived by lying still under his body for five hours as terrorists returned to loot the house and shoot from its windows.

The report carries scores of such stories of courage in response to barbarism.

Reading this uniquely powerful history prompts a question which, given its carefully defined task, the report does not ask. Why do many people want both that Jews be kidnapped, tortured and kidnapped, and to deny that such things happened?

I doubt Muslim Arabs are uniquely wicked people. History everywhere shows repeatedly that human beings, in certain moods, like to slaughter perceived enemies. It also shows that, at many periods, Christians have been equally ready to kill in the name of their beliefs.

Yet ideology is in there somewhere. All the victims were innocent, but the October 7 killings were not mindless. Two sets of ideas combine. The first, mainly a Muslim view, is that white Christians, chiefly the British – with their accomplices/controllers the Jews – conspired to break the Muslim ummah (global community) by inventing the Holocaust and giving the Jews the Holy Land, thus causing suffering unparallelled anywhere else ever.

The other, mainly a white Western view to be found in places like David Lammy’s Foreign Office, the BBC and our universities, is that first the British and then the Americans (also goaded on by “Zionists”) wished – and still wish – for racist imperialist reasons to crush the wretched of the earth. And for this, we must do eternal penance.

This strange coalition of ultra-strict, pseudo-religious non-European fanaticism and ultra-liberal European guilt has a division of labour. The fanatic, usually non-white, rushes in to kill. The guilty liberal, usually white, stands ready to excuse such actions. In a free society, this is a literally lethal combination.

Exposed: Terrorist who bombed Paris lives free in the suburbs, protected by Canada's liberal politicians and gifted a quiet life... until now

Jewish advocacy organizations are fuming that the man convicted for the deadly 1980 bombing outside a Paris synagogue continues to live a comfortable life in Canada's national capital.

Beirut-born Hassan Diab, 71, is seen walking and biking in the Ottawa suburbs in these exclusive DailyMail.com photos.

'That Hassan Diab remains free in Canada is unacceptable,' said Richard Marceau, Vice President, External Affairs and General Counsel at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), in a statement to DailyMail.com on Thursday.

The government of former prime minister Justin Trudeau refused to extradite Diab to France.

But Canadians are going to the polls later this spring and a change of government could spell trouble for Diab.

Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre posted on social media last November: 'Why hasn't he been extradited to France to face justice?'

And Diab is apparently aware his fate could change, telling a Canadaland podcast: 'I just have to be careful. It's like you are living in constant fear.

'It's not easy, it's like waiting for a ghost to appear from somewhere.'

Four people were killed on the evening of October 3, 1980, when an explosive device attached to a motorcycle detonated outside of the Rue Copernic synagogue.

Diab, who has consistently claimed he was taking university exams in Beirut at the time of the bombing, was arrested in Canada in 2008 but released on bail.

In 2014, he was extradited to France, where he spent three years in pretrial detention. Diab returned to Canada in 2018 when the charges against him were dropped.

The Paris Court of Appeal reversed the dismissal in January 2021 and ordered Diab to stand trial.

Diab refused to return to France and on April 21, 2023, he was convicted of terrorism charges in absentia and sentenced to life in prison.

An international arrest warrant was issued.

'He was afforded every protection under French and European law and was found guilty by an independent court of law,' said Marceau, describing the failure to return Diab to France as 'an abuse of process.'

He added: 'Justice must be upheld. At a time of rising anti-Semitism, allowing a convicted perpetrator of a deadly anti-Semitic attack to remain in Canada is indefensible.

Bethany Mandel: Hooray: Ben & Jerry’s owner Unilever is dropping the anti-Israel lunacy

Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food got me through untold breakups in college.

Drowning my sorrows in a pint was a great consolation prize for my heartbreak.

But in 2021, I soured on the brand when it announced plans to stop selling its ice cream in what it referred to as the “Occupied Palestinian Territory.”

Its hostility to Israeli policy grew even more poisonous after Oct. 7.

The good news?

Recent pushback by critics — and consumers — prompted B&J’s parent company, Unilever, to respond, just as other companies have been shedding their DEI and woke images.

And that’s major grounds for hope.

In 2021, co-founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield defended the brand’s positions on Israel in The New York Times: “The company’s stated decision,” they said, “is a rejection of Israeli policy, which perpetuates an illegal occupation that is a barrier to peace and violates the basic human rights of the Palestinian people who live under the occupation.”

Yes, their views have always been naïve, lefty nonsense, and they’re well-known for making their political beliefs a part of their business.

In 1998, Ben & Jerry’s faced pushback when it announced it would no longer buy water from an Israeli company in the Golan Heights because of what it called an illegal occupation of the area.

In 2021, my local Kosher supermarket announced, in protest of its positions on Israel, that it would no longer carry the ice cream.

And B&J’s Kosher supervision agency debated pulling its Kosher certification.

But after Oct. 7, the board of Ben & Jerry’s actually argued that pro-Palestinian demonstrations across US college campuses play a vital role in upholding democracy.

The Vermont-based company, which sells its products at some universities, had also advocated for a lasting cease-fire in Gaza, never mind that the threat of future Oct. 7 attacks would remain.

But now Unilever, wary of its image and bottom line, has taken steps to mitigate the blowback for B&J’s appalling anti-Israel stands.

It’s now looking to sell off the ice-cream maker completely, and this month it said it would replace its CEO.

03/21 Links Pt2: The Palestinian Fetish; The pro-CCP Marxist revolutionary group behind the Mahmoud Khalil protests; Gaming the Wiki System; Columbia caves to Trump admin demands

From Ian:

Seth Mandel: An Unprecedented Moment in American Jewish History

As-a-Jews aside—that is, other than the Beinartian mascots of self-loathing—most American Jews are embracing the fight. That is because they know two things: One, that the explosion of anti-Semitism since 10/7, and the particularly sadistic nature of its bloodlust, won’t go away on its own, and may not go away at all. Two, that the community has no allies among the mainstream political “rights” groups, almost all of which are on the left ideologically. There are one or two libertarian-leaning free-speech groups that concentrate entirely on government censorship and thus would not notice if campus Hamasniks set a Jewish student on fire in front of them.

The Jews have allies here, but they are individual allies. It is outrageous that when activist groups march in defense of campus Hamasniks who have been punished and do so by co-opting the language of Holocaust victims. “First they came for the” anti-Zionists, we are told. The implication is that if the process isn’t stopped, “they” will come for the Jews, too. The proper response to such people is: They already came for the Jews, you imbeciles; you were there too.

After Oct. 7, 2023, Jewish organizations that had worked tirelessly to help other groups were abandoned in their own time of need. It wasn’t until Congress stepped in—Virginia Foxx, Elise Stefanik, with the bipartisan buy-in of folks like Ritchie Torres in the House and John Fetterman in the Senate—that the tide began to turn. Now the Justice Department wants in on the action.

Had there been one iota of institutional decency among the universities, it never would have gone this far. But now it has—because of the failures, deliberate or out of neglect, of everyone complaining that it has gotten to this point. And now it’s a matter of national concern.

It has never in American history been easier to make your voice heard on the subject of anti-Semitism. It has also, unfortunately, never been more important to do so.

Seth Mandel: Joe Lieberman and the American Dream

Centered, directed by Jonathan Gruber, had a limited opening in theaters this week. It finds the right balance between Lieberman’s spiritual life and his public life, though he never hid one from the other. His mentor in politics was Connecticut Gov. Abe Ribikoff, who was both Jewish and a bipartisan dealmaker.

After six years as attorney general, Lieberman, who died in March 2024, set his sights on the U.S. Senate. He managed to defeat Republican incumbent Lowell Weicker by running to Weicker’s right, cementing his persona as an independent-minded representative of all the voters. The win meant a great deal to Hadassah, the Prague-born daughter of Holocaust survivors. “I know I am an American citizen,” Hadassah says, “but I always think of myself as an immigrant, as a refugee.”

That would be a recurring theme for the couple. After Lieberman was chosen to be Al Gore’s vice-presidential nominee in 2000, he said at a campaign stop in Nashville: “The American dream is alive, and it is well.”

But the decade before that campaign put him in the crucible of the Senate. In 1991, Lieberman was one of just 10 Democrats to back the authorization of force against Saddam Hussein. “I think that incident set the stage for his entire career for being a different kind of Democrat,” said Michael Lewan, Lieberman’s former chief of staff.

There would be several more such moments. Lieberman was an early supporter of Bill Clinton’s winning campaign in 1992, but after the Lewinsky scandal broke, Lieberman felt it would have been hypocritical to stay silent. He gave a floor speech criticizing Clinton’s conduct.

After 9/11, Lieberman and John McCain began working together on foreign policy, eventually finding Lieberman back in Iraq. This time, however, his support for military action against Saddam Hussein would cost him dearly within his own party. In 2006, he was defeated in the Democratic Senate primary by Ned Lamont, who hammered Lieberman on his support for the war. Lieberman then registered as an independent and ran in the general, splitting the Democrats but winning statewide once again.

“I was absolutely liberated,” he said of his ability to run as an independent. “I could say whatever I wanted, I didn’t have to worry about offending the power structure in my party, which I had already nonetheless done a pretty good job of offending.”

Some of his former allies had begged him not to do it, and he would hear those same voices of disapproval from his side two years later when loyalty and honesty compelled him to support his friend and colleague—and Republican—McCain against Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election. He even spoke at the Republican National Convention. In retaliation, Democrats stripped him of his chairmanship of a Senate subcommittee.

The Palestinian Fetish

Has any other group in history been handed this many chances for statehood—only to throw them all away? I’ll wait. They gambled, they lost—and in any other conflict, wars have consequences. Yet the Palestinian cause remains the grift that never ends. Their leaders keep the cycle going because, let’s be honest, victimhood pays:
No other group claims ‘occupation’ while repeatedly turning down independence.
No other refugees inherit statelessness like a family heirloom.
No other conflict has its own dedicated UN agency (UNRWA) designed not to resolve the crisis, but to perpetuate it.
No other people have received more foreign aid per capita—only to squander it, fail to build a state, and still rely on their so-called oppressor for basic necessities.

At this point, it’s less of a liberation movement and more of a billion-dollar racket.

And if it’s still not obvious, let me spell it out: they don’t want a country. They want a cause—an endless cycle of grievance that keeps the cash flowing, the UN resolutions coming, and Israel in the crosshairs.

This is the real reason the ‘Palestinian cause’ has global traction—it was never about independence, self-determination, or human rights. That’s just the sales pitch. And if you bought it, congrats—you got played. Because at its core, this movement runs on the one thing that has united the world for centuries: hating Jews.

Sure, plenty of activists will swear up and down they don’t hate Jews. But if they’re marching under banners calling for the destruction of the only Jewish state, chanting Hamas slogans, and dressing up old-school antisemitism as “anti-Zionism”—they’re not exactly walking a fine line. They’ve bulldozed right through it

The obsession with “saving Palestine” has little to do with Palestine itself. For many Western—but staunchly anti-Western—activists, it’s just a convenient weapon, wielded not only against Israel but against capitalism and the very societies that grant them the freedom to protest.

For the privileged activists screaming the loudest, Palestine isn’t a humanitarian crisis—it’s a fashion statement. A trendy cause with merch, social clout, and a built-in sense of purpose for people who’ve never faced real hardship. With no real stakes of their own, they latch onto a conflict they barely understand—not to solve it, but to flaunt their moral superiority. It’s not activism; it’s a glorified hobby—one they’ve mistaken for an identity.

Beneath the hashtag sloganeering and performative outrage lies something far worse: a cause that’s given Islamist operatives a backdoor into Western academia, hijacking institutions to serve some of the world’s most repressive regimes. So no, progressives—Iran’s theocracy, which would jail or execute you for your views on women’s rights, is not your ally.

For those actually paying attention—or living it firsthand—this isn’t a slogan on a tote bag. It’s reality. Most reasonable people agree that Arab Palestinians, like everyone else (well, except maybe Jews), have a right to self-determination.

But that starts with ditching their leadership—preferably yesterday—and abandoning the obsession with Israel’s destruction. Only then can they build a culture defined by possibility, not perpetual grievance.

That means breaking free from indoctrination—one that starts in childhood, replaces hope with hatred, and builds terror tunnels instead of schools. But that won’t happen while Hamas—a literal death cult—keeps them trapped under its grip, ruling through fear and propaganda.

Norway, Spain, and Ireland—seriously? Recognising a Palestinian state post-October 7 doesn’t promote peace; it rewards terrorism. Their leaders aren’t building a state—they’re dismantling Israel, using “statehood” as a smokescreen while sacrificing their own people. And you endorsed it.

But sure, let’s keep pretending this is about “liberation.” Next time a flag-waving activist yells “Free Palestine,” ask them: from what, exactly? Because it sure as hell isn’t Israel keeping them stateless—it’s their own leaders.

And spare us the upside-down narrative of Jews as colonisers. Arab expansion through Islamic conquest reshaped vast swaths of the world—including the Jewish homeland. Meanwhile, the Jewish people are left with exactly one tiny state.

I know many activists genuinely believe they’re fighting for the oppressed. But blind empathy and good intentions won’t cut it. In the immortal words of the woke brigade: educate yourself and do better. If they actually cared about Palestinian lives, they wouldn’t be parroting Hamas’ propaganda—they’d be holding them responsible.

And yes, that can be done without endorsing every Israeli policy—or short-circuiting into a rage spiral while shrieking “genocide, apartheid, colonisation” like a malfunctioning chatbot. Because no amount of hashtags or endlessly recycled activist Mad Libs will build a school, pave a road, or free a single Palestinian from their corrupt rulers.

At some point, the moral grandstanding has to give way to reality. This isn’t just about historical truth or Israel’s survival—or even my rapidly diminishing patience. It’s about the Palestinians themselves, who deserve better than to be used as cannon fodder in a never-ending war.

Let’s be real—this was never about “saving Palestine.” If it were, these activists would be demanding better leadership, not foaming at the mouth over Israel. But they won’t—because to them, Palestine is a costume. A personality cult. A fetish. And like every performative trend before it, they’ll abandon it the moment it’s no longer in fashion.

03/21 Links Pt1: What Trump’s Latest Houthi Strike Really Means; Former MI6 chief: Iran is a ‘threat’ to British Jews; UN staffer hospitalized in Israel has Nazi tattoos

From Ian:

What Trump’s Latest Houthi Strike Really Means

For more than a year, the Iran-backed Houthis have been launching drones and missiles at ships traversing the Red Sea, as well as at Israeli territory, in support of Hamas. This development has drastically curtailed shipping through the Suez Canal and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, driving up trade prices. This week, the Trump administration began an extensive bombing campaign against the Houthis in an effort to reopen that crucial waterway. Burcu Ozcelik highlights another benefit of this action:

The administration has a broader geopolitical agenda—one that includes countering China’s economic leverage, particularly Beijing’s reliance on Iranian oil. By targeting the Houthis, the United States is not only safeguarding vital shipping lanes but also exerting pressure on the Iran-China energy nexus, a key component of Beijing’s strategic posture in the region.

China was the primary destination for up to 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports in 2024, underscoring the deepening economic ties between Beijing and Tehran despite U.S. sanctions. By helping fill Iranian coffers, China aids Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in financing proxies like the Houthis. Since October of last year, notable U.S. Treasury announcements have revealed covert links between China and the Houthis.

Striking the Houthis could trigger broader repercussions—not least by disrupting the flow of Iranian oil to China. While difficult to confirm, it is conceivable and has been reported, that the Houthis may have received financial or other forms of compensation from China (such as Chinese-made military components) in exchange for allowing freedom of passage for China-affiliated vessels in the Red Sea.

Iran is a ‘threat’ to British Jews, cautions former MI6 chief

Iranian agents represent a threat to Britain’s Jewish community as well as to critics of the regime living in the UK, a former head of MI6 has said, suggesting that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation.

In an interview with the JC, Sir Richard Dearlove said that Israeli operations against Iran and its proxies had degraded its capabilities in the Middle East and beyond, but that the nuclear issue could still trigger a crisis.

Dearlove also said he was “disgusted” by demonstrations in support of Hamas, which he said the British authorities had dealt with too softly.

The 80-year-old former spymaster, who was the Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service for five years ending in 2004, said: “there is a problem with Iran supporting radical Shia clerics in the UK and therefore there is the possibility that some of these Shia groupings may harbour extremists and terrorists.”

“Security services are well aware of this problem,” he added.

The IRGC “could be reporting on [Iranian] opposition movements” and “on people within the Iranian diaspora” in the UK, he said. “Their reach is quite significant. And the IRGC are pretty good at that sort of stuff.”

Dearlove also identified a specific threat to Britain’s Jewish community posed by the IRGC. “There is a threat, there is a problem,” he said, “whether it's the inspiration of radicals who are going to attack the Jewish community, or whether it's organising demonstrations which intimidate the Jewish community and encouraging those”.

The former spy chief said that Iranian agents may be stoking some of the more aggressive anti-Israel demonstrations happening in Britain. “I haven't got clear-cut evidence, but this is exactly what Iran would be doing,” he said.

“The IRGC has a long reach, particularly where you have Muslim Shia communities which are sympathetic and to an extent are behaving in a way which is pro-Iranian. And there are one or two mosques – certainly in London – which have been identified as having that characteristic,” he said.

He believes the authorities have been too soft on pro-Palestine protests. “As a long-serving intelligence officer, I'm disgusted by what I've seen in terms of Hamas-supporting demonstrations in the UK, which are clearly very, very intimidating,” he said. “The government hasn't nearly taken a tough enough line.

“In my view, we should have been like the French and banned them,” he added.

Dearlove described Iran as “the primary destabilising force in the Middle East” and said it was astonishing that successive British governments hadn’t proscribed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation.

“I just don't get why we haven't done so. It is the agency through which Iran has conducted what I would call ‘arm’s length warfare’. The Quds Force is part of the IRGC, and they've made an absolute fundamental aspect of Iranian policy using this agency to destabilise and interfere in the affairs of other countries.”

Where are the Christians of Bethlehem and the Middle East?

All informed opinions, however, accept that the Christian population has declined, both in absolute numbers and as a percentage of the total population of Palestinians. Palestinian Christian emigration peaked during the First Intifada (from 1987-1993) and increased rapidly at the onset of the Second Intifada (2000-2005). Between October 2000 and November 2001, 2,766 Palestinian Christians left the West Bank and 1,640 left the Bethlehem area.

Long considered a Christian city, Bethlehem exemplifies these trends of demographic and cultural decline. According to the Christian Information Center, in 1950 Christians made up 86% of Bethlehem’s population. Until the Oslo Accords, Bethlehem had the largest Christian majority of any city in the area. However, after the Palestinian Authority assumed control, the Christian population decreased precipitously.

In Gaza, the situation is even worse. Since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in 2007, the Christian population has shrunk from 5,000 to approximately 600 today. Testimonies from Palestinian Christians in Gaza, collected by Christian organizations, describe a constant threat to their lives.

What Westerners don’t understand is that in the Muslim world, religion is the primary form of self-identification. In Palestinian-administered territories (West Bank and Gaza) and, in the greater Middle East (governed by some form of Sharia Islamic law), Christians and Jews occupy the status of dhimmi, meaning “protected people,” who must pay a special tax known, historically, as a Jizya. It is intended to compel Christians and Jews to convert to Islam.

Salafi Muslims, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, seek to emulate the successors of the prophet Muhammad known as the Rashidun, an Arabic word for “rightly guided” that refers to the first four caliphs of the Islamic community after the death of Muhammad. These caliphs colonized the Middle East and were responsible for the mass conversion of Christians and some Jews to Islam—by force of the sword and through economic pressure. It is therefore not surprising that they would oppress the Christian minority in Gaza.

Whenever the opportunity presented itself, Palestinian Islamists desecrated Christianity’s holiest sites. For instance, in 2002, after a suicide bomber killed 30 Israelis and injured another 140 people attending a Passover seder at the Park Hotel in Netanya, Israel Defense Forces went into Bethlehem. Palestinian terrorists ran and hid inside Bethlehem’s holiest Christian site—the Church of the Nativity, where they were surrounded by the IDF. During the standoff, which lasted for more than a month, the terrorists reportedly also stole valuable icons and used pages from holy books as toilet paper.

Western societies, by and large, have discarded God and religion, particularly those in Western Europe. Yet, they have a reverence for Islam, which is slowly conquering Europe after a failed attempt in the 8th century C.E. The Europeans murdered their Jews, who gave them culture and Nobel prizes, and replaced them with millions of Muslims who will eventually end their “good life.” In the meantime, these same Western Christians are silent about the Muslim oppression of their co-religionists, and about the fate of the Christians in the birthplace of Jesus.

The Kotel in 1910

From the American Jewish Yearbook

September 23, 1910: Arabs assault about sixty worshippers at religious service on Rosh Hashanah at Wailing Wall.

February 2, 1911: Serious conflict between Jewish colonists in Palestine and the Arabs reported. Three colonists said to have been killed and seven wounded.

June 7, 1911: Anti-Jewish newspaper Carmel resumes publication at Haifa.

July 16, 1911: Colony Merchaviah (Phule) attacked by Arab Christians. Government takes measures to restore order

There are lots of anti-Jewish incidents in other Arab countries like Syria and Yemen mentioned as well. But I hadn't heard about the 1910 attacks before.

Incidentally, speaking of the Kotel, there was also these little tidbits:

February 2 1911: Chief Rabbi protests to Minister of Justice and Public Worship against removal of seats before Wailing Wall, Jerusalem. Protest of Jerusalem Chief Rabbi Franco ignored by Governor.

March 15, 1911: 15. Decree of Ministry of the Interior to Governor of Jerusalem permits Jews to place benches and light candles in front of Wailing Wall.

But that allowance was soon overturned - in November 1911, under pressure from local Muslims, the Turkish government issued an edict banning benches at the Wall.

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I just found an unofficial UNRWA Facebook group, UNRWA Staff News. They also appear to run a news site, Rafah Now, and a Telegram channel, Rafah News, that they advertise as "Follow us on..."

Much of the content on all three sites is consistent with what UNRWA staffers would be interested in, with lots of job postings to UNRWA and other Gaza NGOs.

So I naturally looked up what the sites had to say on October 7, 2023.

These Facebook posts say it all.

Their Telegram channel has much more, including celebrations, photos of hostages being paraded around, lurid pictures of dead Israelis - and this painful picture of Shiri, Ariel and Kfir Bibas with a most disgusting caption weeks before they were brutally murdered.

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A Unified Field Theory of Antisemitism

Why is there so much outsized hate for Jews?

Antisemitism is not like other hatreds. Most other forms of hate hinge on disliking the other purely because they are different. Jew-hatred goes way beyond that; the hate is more extreme, more personal.

What explains the obsession that so many have against Jews - and in recent times, against Israel - that goes way beyond hating the other? After all, most of the world is "other" to everyone.

Ten years ago, I wrote about how many historic cathedrals in Europe depict two figures, Ecclesia and Sinagoga, which symbolize the triumph of the Church over the Jewish people. Ecclesia is a figure bathed in light wearing fine clothing and holding a chalice, while Sinagoga is a defeated, blindfolded figure with the Tablets falling from her hand. The message was one of supersessionism, where the Church replaced Jews as the Chosen People. The churches with the artwork tended to be built in areas with larger Jewish populations: they weren't only a message of Church superiority but also an insult to the Jewish community, reminding them of their despised status.

To the Church, the very existence of Jews centuries after they were supposed to have disappeared by the sheer rightness of Christian faith was a poke in the eye. As long as Jews existed and thrived, it meant that there might be a problem with the doctrine - how could reasonably smart people not automatically flock to what is so clearly superior? One of them must be wrong, and the creation of Ecclesia and Sinagoga is itself a form of grappling with the threat to Christian certainty.

From the church's perspective, this is not just a disagreement between religions. Jews themselves were a challenge to the entire narrative behind Christianity. They are seen as a direct assault on Christians' basic faith, one that could not be adequately answered within Christianity.

This reached a peak with Martin Luther, who could not conceive how Jews would not convert on their own. This culminated in his desire to destroy Judaism itself - burning synagogues and schools, confiscating Jewish holy books, and creating a world where Jews could either convert or be driven out.

This sense of Jews' very existence being an attack on the most treasured tenets of faith explains how antisemitism goes way beyond "normal" hate. Killing Jews is almost self-defense for those with that mindset.

During the Holocaust, some fundamentalist Christians found a silver lining in the genocide, that their scripture was finally being validated. The rebirth of Israel gave these folks whiplash - suddenly, the permanently wandering Jews had a place of their own, and even worse, in the same spot that they had built a nation before.

Theologically, hating Israel is a direct outcome for age-old Christian antisemitism.

This way of thinking has been baked into the Western world. Vatican II softened supersessionism, giving Jews a covenant role within the Roman Catholic church but not other churches like Eastern Orthodox and Lutheran. Supersessionist theology persists in Catholic circles, and for tens of millions, Jews’ existence subtly challenges one of their faith’s beliefs.

We can say the same thing about Islam. Here is a faith that also is, to a degree, supersessionist. Mohammed is supposed to be the last, perfect prophet, but all of the preceding prophets were Jews. The Quran is supposed to be the perfect word of Allah that replaces the "corrupted" Torah that precedes it and contradicts it. Mohammed tried to attract the Jews to his religion (this is why he first set the prayer direction to be Jerusalem) but they spurned him.

Yet the Jews still exist. Jews who do not accept Islam, Jews who consider Mohammed to be a false prophet, Jews who study the Torah that Islam claims is corrupted.

The continued existence of the Jewish people is not as much of a theological challenge to Islam as it is to some churches, but it rankles. Jews are supposed to be second class citizens in Islamic societies, and over the centuries, while Christians gained a measure of respect when they defeated Islam militarily, Muslims could still consider themselves to be stronger than the Jews.

Until the rebirth of Israel.

Israel's victory in 1948 was no less an earthquake in the Muslim world than it was in many churches. Jews were not meant to be stronger than Muslims, who pride themselves on their warcraft. The Zionist victories were a source of intense shame, and the reason for the shame was that it violated a deeply held belief among Muslims - not necessarily a religious belief but one that was no less sacred to Arab Muslims.

The antisemitism we have been discussing so far has been ascribed to Jews' existence being a direct challenge to faith. Faith is intensely personal and seeing it called into question naturally evokes an emotional reaction. This explains why Jews and Israel are seen as actual enemies, not just different.

Today's antisemitism, however, does not appear at first glance to fit that paradigm. Most Westerners are not religious and the idea of supersessionism is not fashionable in the liberal world.

This ignores human nature. People naturally tend to seek spirituality; they want to be part of something much bigger than themselves. When the church falls by the wayside, the vacuum that results must be filled with something.

Today, that "something" is often progressivism, or socialism in general. Many have noted how this has become a creed in itself. From animal rights to environmentalism to settler-colonialism to critical race theory, each of the tenets of this modern faith must not be questioned. Like any faith, there is an orthodoxy of belief, and excommunication ("canceling") of those who disagree or question the official line.

Israel challenges the progressive orthodoxy no less than Jews challenge Christian orthodoxy.

Here is a state that is meant to be a refuge for Jews only. It is unapologetically capitalist. It is unapologetically military - by necessity. It is unapologetically particularist.

Worst of all, it is wildly successful. It has grown and thrived while breaking the rules created by today's progressives. It is an economic, military and technological powerhouse. It has even made peace by being strong.

To these people, progressivism is just as supersessionist as Christianity historically has been. Their worldview is that they are on the "right side of history," the idea that over time their ideas and theories will be proven correct. Israel's existence and success contradicts this deeply held belief.

Hence, hate. Not disagreement, not measured criticism, but obsession and visceral loathing that go beyond their opinions of any other country. Israel does not fit their belief system and therefore it must be delegitimized, and any attackers are heroes.

This theory that obsessive hate of Jews driven by faith is further strengthened by counterexamples of cultures that have no such levels of antisemitism.

Asian nations like India, China and Japan do not have the same strong feelings about Jews as their Western and Muslim counterparts. Their religions are not based on Jewish concepts of monotheism and their cultures are not based on Western values that trace back to Judaism. To them, Jews are just another people: they may disagree with Israeli policies but they lack the obsessive nature of the antisemitism of the Western and Muslim worlds. The Korean obsession with the Talmud from a few years back is not antisemitism, it is curiosity.

The hate for Jews and Israel isn't because of anything that Jews are doing. It is entirely due to Jews and Israel being an eternal contradiction to the deeply-held belief system of hundreds of millions of people.

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03/20 Links Pt2: The Chilling Truth of 7 October; Eli Sharabi: Hamas eats like kings while hostages starve’; Columbia Did This To Itself

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: The agonizing dilemma

This is the terrible dilemma Israel has faced from the start of this war. How does a nation balance the imperative to save some of its citizens from captivity, torture and death with the imperative not to sentence even more of its citizens to the same fate and, instead, ensure their security?

Taking Israeli hostages was a diabolically brilliant tactic through which Hamas is, even now, controlling the agenda, not least by whipping up overwhelming and uncontrollable emotion among Israel’s deeply traumatized population.

From the start of the war, however, Netanyahu has made a bad mistake in not being honest with the public. He has consistently declared that he will deliver the twin goals of destroying Hamas and returning the hostages.

He should have said that while no effort would be spared to return the hostages, it might not be possible to achieve both those goals; and that if a terrible choice had to be made, it would have to be to win the war and protect Israel’s population of 10 million people.

He didn’t say that. He still maintains that both goals can be achieved through military means.

What really sticks in the craw, however, is that one crucial card has not been played by either the United States or Israel. Qatar is the creator, funder and protector of Hamas; in effect, Qatar is Hamas.

If America had put significant pressure on Qatar’s rulers to release the hostages and surrender the Hamas leaders it was sheltering, the war would have ended. Instead, both the United States and Israel have used Qatar as dispassionate honest brokers in the grotesque Hamas negotiation circus.

The reason for America’s attitude is undoubtedly the vast investments Qatar has shrewdly made in the United States that have made the Gulf state an invaluable contributor to American prosperity. Indeed, the U.S. special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, reportedly has a significant financial relationship with Qatar.

There are also allegations that Qatar secretly funded Israeli officials and influencers, including some connected to the prime minister’s office. This may be propaganda. But Israel’s indulgence of the Islamists of Qatar is baffling.

Maybe, precisely because Hamas knows that if it kills the remaining hostages it will lose its only leverage, it won’t murder those who remain under its vicious thumb. Maybe the IDF will get to them before Hamas can do so. Maybe the increased military pressure will force them to release their captives. With no realistic alternative to the war, we can only hope and pray.

Jonathan Sacerdoti: The Chilling Truth of 7 October

The 7 October Parliamentary Commission Report, chaired by Lord Andrew Roberts, has now been published. It provides a meticulously researched, forensic account of the atrocities committed against Israel by Hamas on 7 October 2023. Compiled by the UK-Israel All Party Parliamentary Group, this report is an essential document, recording in stark detail the murder, torture, and sexual violence inflicted upon innocent civilians.

The idea that a massacre of nearly 1,200 people, the largest slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, might require Britain's parliament to painstakingly document it to secure belief is obscene. Yet, this is the world in which we find ourselves. A world where Jewish suffering is questioned, where atrocities against Israelis are met not with immediate, unqualified horror but with hedging, justification, or outright denial. That is why the work of Lord Roberts and his parliamentary colleagues is so crucial. It is about ensuring that history cannot be rewritten by those with a vested interest in its erasure.

Andrew Roberts is among Britain's most distinguished historians, known for his scholarship on Churchill, Napoleon, and the Second World War. Roberts understands that historical memory is not merely about what happened - it is about what societies are willing to accept as fact. His commitment to ensuring the 7 October Report is published and widely disseminated is an act of immense moral importance.

The report establishes, with irrefutable detail, the full scale of the attack. It confirms that Hamas's invasion of Israel was not an impulsive act but the result of years of meticulous planning. On 7 October, over 7,000 attackers breached Israel's defenses at 119 different points along the border. Armed terrorists used drones to disable Israel's surveillance systems, paragliders to bypass security barriers, and specialist explosive charges designed to breach the doors of Israeli safe rooms where civilians hid in terror.

The report details the full horror of the massacre of 375 people at the Nova music festival, where attackers hunted down fleeing civilians, throwing grenades into bomb shelters and shooting those who attempted to escape in their cars. The deliberate targeting of families in their homes, the use of rape as a weapon of war, the desecration of bodies. The report confirms that Hamas terrorists gang-raped women before executing them, that bodies of female victims were found stripped, bound, and mutilated.

The fact that such a document is necessary here in the UK - that Jewish suffering must be recorded in exhaustive, forensic detail to be accepted - reveals something deeply unsettling about the moral landscape of our time. This report is a testament to the integrity of those in Britain who still believe in objective truth. And that matters. Because history is not owned by those who shout the loudest. It belongs to those who tell the truth.

Britain is showing two faces to the world. One makes me terrified for our future

A moral cancer is gnawing away at our body politic, warping its sense of right and wrong and exposing its deepest, darkest prejudices. There is no better case study in hypocrisy and double-standards than the radically inconsistent way in which Ukraine and Israel are treated by the British government and the Left-wing media.

Ukraine, rightly, is portrayed as a heroic victim fighting back against a brutal invader. Israel, wrongly, is depicted as the real aggressor and subjected to relentless delegitimisation. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is lionised; Benjamin Netanyahu is demonised; Ukraine can do no wrong; Israel can do no right.

Reader, I’m pro-Israel and I’m pro-Ukraine, an unusual combination in today’s Britain or America. Jerusalem and Kyiv are both victims of fascistic military assaults and a global disinformation campaign; both are displaying extraordinary heroism to contain, respectively, Putin’s expansionism and the forces of Islamism. Israel and Ukraine are on the front lines of Samuel Huntingdon’s clash of civilisations.

Yet the same people who cheer Keir Starmer’s announcement that he will continue to supply weapons to Ukraine (a move I support) are exuberant when he announces a partial, yet despicable, arms embargo on Israel. Those who fact-check the fake history and anti-Ukrainian slanders pumped out by Russian influencers gullibly swallow the Soviet-era Israelophobic propaganda that defames the Jewish state as “colonialist”.

Commentators who have read up on Ukraine typically still know nothing about the ethnic cleansing of Jews from the Middle East, or about dhimmitude during the Ottoman days, or about the times Israel offered land for peace only to be turned down by Palestinian irredentists who will settle for nothing other than a Judenfrei single state.

Those who question Donald Trump’s Ukraine-Russia ceasefire proposal are usually the first to support every armistice proposal, on any terms, between Israel and Hamas, even if hostages aren’t released. The Foreign Office seems as determined to undermine Israel as it is to support Ukraine: our ambassador in Tel Aviv posted a patronising message this week claiming he had grown up in Northern Ireland and thus knew about these sorts of conflicts. Among other platitudes, he claimed IDF operations would neither defeat Hamas nor liberate the hostages, and that “at some point the fighting must stop and the diplomacy begin”.

Yet the Middle East is drastically different to Northern Ireland, diplomacy has failed for decades and Britain would never speak in such terms to Ukraine. We are a true ally of Kyiv; but we have betrayed Israel in its hour of need.

03/20 Links Pt1: Andrew Fox: Israel has every right to eliminate Hamas; U.S. Attacks in Yemen Provide a Security Blanket for Israel in The Hague; Netanyahu: Future Talks Will Be "Under Fire"

From Ian:

Andrew Fox: Israel has every right to eliminate Hamas

Trump’s ceasefire was never likely to be more than a temporary reprieve for Hamas. After all, the group remains fundamentally committed to the destruction of Israel – an aim baked into its founding charter. Any agreement with an organisation whose raison d’être is conflict can only ever be short-lived. Since 7 October 2023, when Hamas launched its unprecedented massacre against civilians in southern Israel, the terror group has repeatedly demonstrated that it does not recognise peace. Rather, it uses pauses in fighting to regain strength.

Following the collapse of the ceasefire talks, Israel had little choice but to resume operations. Allowing Hamas to rebuild its infrastructure, replenish its arms caches and reconstitute its terror capabilities would only lead to greater violence and loss of life. The return to hostilities, though tragic, is not merely predictable – it is morally necessary.

Critics argue that military operations in Gaza exacerbate humanitarian crises, but ultimately it is Hamas that bears the greatest responsibility for civilian suffering. It embeds itself deliberately in densely populated areas and positions its military assets in hospitals, schools and mosques. This is because Hamas understands the ethical constraints under which Israel operates. Israel takes extraordinary measures to mitigate civilian casualties, including ordering civilians to evacuate, issuing prior warnings, employing precision targeting and aborting missions when civilians are at risk.

The international community may call for even greater restraint, but restraint cannot mean passivity in the face of an existential threat. Israel is obliged, morally and strategically, to dismantle Hamas’s capability to wage war. The recent resumption of strikes is not aggression, but a necessary act of self-defence aimed squarely at ending Hamas’s capacity to threaten Israeli lives and regional stability.

To argue otherwise is untenable and irresponsible. Israel should not endlessly absorb attacks, negotiate with a fundamentally hostile actor or accept a cycle of violence and hostage-taking as the status quo. Such a stance would condemn both Israelis and Palestinians to perpetual insecurity – and condemn the Palestinians of Gaza to life under Hamas’s ruthless Islamist regime.

Israel’s resumption of military operations is an entirely justified and necessary step towards ending a conflict that has, for too long, caused huge suffering on both sides. Until Hamas is decisively defeated, true peace in Gaza – and security for Israel – will remain tragically elusive.

WSJ Editorial: No More Free Gaza Ceasefire for Hamas

After Israel hit Hamas with air strikes beginning on Monday, the Arab mediators and terrorist echo chamber are crying bloody murder. But what did they expect when Hamas refused to release hostages for 2 1/2 weeks after the ceasefire ended?

It was never tenable to give Hamas a reprieve while it wasn't giving up hostages. Nor was it effective to let Hamas negotiate in peace and quiet while it regrouped, with every incentive to drag out talks. But it was important for Israel to give a hostage deal every chance.

Military force isn't replacing negotiations - it's Israel's best leverage. That's the theory of Israel's new campaign, which is designed to escalate steadily but stop when Hamas comes to terms.

Eugene Kontorovich: Egypt Defies Trump. Will He Cut Aid?

Egypt has stepped up its military presence in the Sinai Peninsula since Oct. 7, 2023, in apparent violation of its peace treaty with Israel. Recently, photos have circulated of rows of tanks in the desert. They aren’t there to confront Israel, which would pound Egypt in any military confrontation. The threat Cairo sees emanates from the Gaza Strip, where Egypt is determined to keep its border closed to refugees.

That puts Cairo at odds with U.S. policy. President Trump has offered a bold vision for allowing Gazans to resettle elsewhere and ultimately redeveloping the strip. But unless Gazans have a means of escape, Hamas will continue to use them as human shields and cannon fodder.

With great chutzpah, President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi is using U.S. aid to thwart U.S. policy. Egypt is America’s second-largest regular military aid recipient. Israel is first, but the $1.5 billion Cairo receives makes up nearly a quarter of its military budget. U.S. assistance to both countries flows from the 1979 Camp David Accords. Thus American taxpayers are paying to hold an iron curtain down on Gaza and maintain a status quo of war and oppression.

Mr. Trump’s plan for reconstructing Gaza is premised on allowing the population to flee the territory for a better life elsewhere. The humanitarian need for this is urgent. This week’s renewal of large-scale hostilities after a failed cease-fire will inevitably entail the dislocation of many Gazans. That isn’t Israel’s goal, which is to rescue hostages and destroy Hamas. But it’s what happens in wartime.

The flight of refugees across borders is also a regular consequence of war. Six million Syrians—nearly a quarter of the prewar population—fled their country during its civil war. Even more have left Ukraine, even though most of the country’s territory is free from active hostilities. More than 1.5 million people have fled Afghanistan since the Taliban’s takeover in 2021. Yet since Oct. 7, Egypt has locked virtually all of Gaza’s population in place.

Passover Cleaning: Bibi Finds Oct 7 Deterrent Hiding Behind Old 'Concept' (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

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Passover Cleaning: Bibi Finds Oct 7 Deterrent Hiding Behind Old 'Concept'

Jerusalem, March 23 - Israel's prime minister smacked his forehead today upon discovering the intelligence, policies, and deployments that should have been in place when Hamas invaded the country on October 7, 2023, realizing only now where he had put them: ensconced on the back of a shelf that he only got to clearing now, ahead of the Pesach festival.

Sources in the Office of the Prime Minister disclosed today that Binyamin Netanyahu participated in the launch of the office's pre-Passover cleaning, and in the process found the robust security and surveillance practices that would have either deterred or neutralized the deadly incursion from Gaza that killed more than 1200 and and took more than 250 Israelis hostage. The find took place when the premier shifted aside a package of assumptions, naivety, and wishful thinking that had sat at the front of a set of shelves for more than thirty years.

"The prime minister just had to get past the notion that Palestinian leaders have ever wanted actual peace," one aide recalled. "Attached to it was another unit that insisted the conflict with the Palestinians could be 'managed' because he never had the stomach for decisive measures that would end it. Once he got around those packages, the deterrent was staring him in the face. The prime minister facepalmed, and remarked that he knew he'd seen it somewhere, and that he's mystified why previous years' cleanings had not turned up something so obvious in an obvious place."

Witnesses say Netanyahu examined the deterrence for several minutes, then put it back behind the appeasement and kicking-the-can-down-the-road bundles.

"He's probably gambling on people forgetting by the time the next elections ever happen," surmised an observer. "It's not a horrible strategy, given how much things can shift, though it does kind of undermine the whole notion of cleaning for Passover. The idea is to get rid of the hametz, the considerations people have that are based not on the true self, but outside or ulterior motives such as how others will see them. Very much a a rejection of the honor-shame culture that spawned Hamas. Hametz, Hamas, potayto, potahto..."

Further reports from the Office of the Prime Minister indicated that Netanyahu and his wife Sarah intend to spend Passover continuing to evading any direct interactions with family members of those held hostage in Gaza, with a stringency reminiscent of ultra-religious avoidance of the slightest whiff of hametz during Passover.

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