Israel Update: July 17 (Day 286)
Situational Update
Per the Times of Israel, the families of five hostage surveillance soldiers released images on Tuesday evening from the women’s first days in captivity in Gaza, demanding a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push for the hostages’ release. In one undated image, Liri Albag, Karina Ariev, Agam Berger and Daniella Gilboa can be seen sitting on mattresses on the floor of a room. Ariev and Gilboa both appear to have bandages on their heads.
In a separate undated image, Naama Levy is seen with a heavily swollen eye and cuts on her face.
According to multiple sources, including CNN, the CIA has assessed that the leader of Hamas in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, is coming under increased pressure from his own military commanders to accept a ceasefire deal and end the war with Israel, CIA Director Bill Burns told a closed-door conference on Saturday, according to a source who attended.
According to multiple intelligence sources, the leader of Hams in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, is not communicating and can't be reached, and there is no way to get his orders and decisions regarding various issues concerning negotiations with Israel. This is according to a source familiar with the connection between senior Hams officials sitting in Doha and senior officials of the terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip. The most senior person with whom the top of Hams in Qatar was in contact was the head of the military wing of Hams, Muhammad Deif, whose fate is still not known definitively after the assassination attempt on Saturday
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah threatened Wednesday to target Israeli towns that have not yet been subjected to the terror group’s rocket and drone attacks if Israel continues to “target civilians,” noting a spike in the number of noncombatants killed in Lebanon in recent days.
The Numbers
Casualties (no change from Sunday)
***I am adding a brief note going forward to each casualty figure that indicates the change since our most previous update
1,629 Israelis dead, including 682 IDF soldiers (326 IDF soldiers during the ground operation in Gaza)
Additional Information (according to the IDF):
2,130 (+3 since Sunday) IDF soldiers have been injured during ground combat in Gaza, including at least 402 (no change since Sunday) who have been severely injured.
4,149 (-18 from Sunday) IDF soldiers have been injured since the beginning of the war, including at least 621 (+3 from Sunday) who have been severely injured.
Note: we have always included the number of casualties in Gaza, as reported by the Gaza Health Ministry. We feel it is important to include this information with the caveat that this reporting ministry is not a trusted source of data by many. Most recently, The United Nations has begun citing a much lower death toll for women and children in Gaza, acknowledging that it has incomplete information about many of the people killed during Israel’s military offensive in the territory.
According to unverified figures from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, 38,584 (+210 since Sunday) people have been killed in Gaza, and 88,881 (+483 since Sunday) have been injured during the war.
We also encourage you to read this well documented piece from Tablet published in March: How the Gaza Ministry of Health Fakes Casualty Numbers
The Associated Press, an outlet with a demonstrated anti-Israel bias, conducted an analysis of alleged Gaza death tolls released by the Hamas-controlled "Gaza Health Ministry." The analysis found that "9,940 of the dead – 29% of its April 30 total – were not listed in the data" and that "an additional 1,699 records in the ministry’s April data were incomplete and 22 were duplicates."
Hostages (no change from Sunday)
On October 7th, a total of 261 Israelis were taken hostage.
During the ceasefire deal in November, 112 hostages were released.
A total of 7 hostages have been rescued and the remains of 19 others have been recovered. Tragically, 3 have been mistakenly killed by the IDF, and 1 was killed during an IDF attempt to rescue him.
This leaves an estimated 116 hostages still theoretically in Gaza, with somewhere between (assumed) 35-43 deceased. Thus, at most, 85 living hostages could still be in Gaza.
According to an article published in the WSJ, “Of the approximately 250 hostages taken in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack, 116 continue to be held captive, including many believed to be dead. Mediators in the hostage talks and a U.S. official familiar with the latest U.S. intelligence said the number of those hostages still alive could be as low as 50.”
That assessment, based in part on Israeli intelligence, would mean 66 of those still held hostage could be dead, 25 more than Israel has publicly acknowledged.
Link: Families of Hostages in Gaza Are Desperate for News but Dread a Phone Call | WSJ
(Sources: JINSA, FDD, IDF, AIPAC, The Paul Singer Foundation, The Institute for National Security Studies, the Alma Research and Education Center, Yediot, Jerusalem Post, and the Times of Israel)
Listen
[PODCAST] Call Me Back with Dan Senor: The Death of Deif – A turning point? With Ronen Bergman
Who is Mohammed Deif? Why does he matter (or why did he matter?) Is he dead?
We have often said on this podcast that Hamas long ago transformed from a ragtag militia to the equivalent of a light infantry army of a sovereign state. The architect of that transformation was Mohammed Deif. If Hamas was a terror army, its commanding general or army chief of staff was Mohammed Deif. The second intifada? Deif was central to its planning and execution. Its tunnel system and rocket arsenal? All that, too, was Deif. And October 7th? Mohammed Deif.
Israel had been on the hunt for Deif long before October 7th. In fact, he had escaped at least seven assassination attempts going back to 2001.
Today he is most likely dead, based on an extraordinary intelligence and military operation that took place on Saturday morning.
To help us understand what Hamas is, today, without Mohammed Deif, and what it means for Israel’s war against Hamas – and for the hostage and ceasefire negotiations – we are joined by Ronen Bergman, who is a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine and Senior Correspondent for Military and Intelligence Affairs for Yedioth Ahronoth, an Israeli daily. Ronen recently won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on this war and the pre-war intelligence failures.
Link: Call Me Back - with Dan Senor: The Death of Deif – A turning point? With Ronen Bergman
Watch
[VIDEO] "There is No Genocide, No Apartheid, No Occupation" with Natasha Hausdorff a barrister in London and a Director of UK Lawyers for Israel.
What We Are Reading
Hamas committed war crimes in October 7 assault on Israel, Human Rights Watch says. Article by YNet with link to full report
The 236-page report, titled “‘I Can’t Erase All the Blood from My Mind’: Palestinian Armed Groups’ October 7 Assault on Israel,” details numerous serious violations of international humanitarian law by Palestinian armed groups at almost all civilian attack sites on October 7. These violations include war crimes and crimes against humanity, such as murder, hostage-taking and other grave offenses. Human Rights Watch also investigated the roles of various armed groups and their coordination before and during the attacks.
An AFP analysis determined that 815 of the 1,195 people killed on October 7 were civilians. The armed groups took 251 civilians and Israeli security force personnel as hostages and took them to Gaza. As of July 1, 116 remained in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 42 who had been killed, according to AFP. Bodies of another 35 who were killed were returned to Israel.
Hamas authorities responded to questions from Human Rights Watch, stating that its forces were instructed not to target civilians and to abide by international human rights and humanitarian law. In many cases, Human Rights Watch investigations found evidence to the contrary.
Link to the Full Report: “I Can’t Erase All the Blood from My Mind”: Palestinian Armed Groups’ October 7 Assault on Israel
Israel’s Undercover Forces Emerge as Gaza’s Newest Battlefield Player: Last month’s hostage-rescue mission was a watershed in the country’s long history of disguising its forces as Palestinians by Dov Lieber in the WSJ
As Israel gains further control over Gaza, it is expected to become more like the West Bank, with frequent Israeli raids to arrest or kill militants, or rescuing hostages in the absence of any deal for their freedom. That means undercover operations are likely to continue inside the enclave for the foreseeable future.
“If you want to find hostages or search for senior commanders of Hamas, you have to have people on the ground, and they can’t walk around with an Israeli flag,” said a person familiar with Israeli special operations strategy.
Undercover units recruit from across Israeli society, employing operatives who might blend in as tourists, clergy, doctors or ultra-Orthodox Jews, former operatives said. More than 20% of Israel’s population are native Arabic speakers.
Link: Israel’s Undercover Forces Emerge as Gaza’s Newest Battlefield Player
Muhammad Deif’s death would be a turning point in the war on Hamas: by David Horovitz in The Times of Israel
The head of Hamas's military wing Muhammad Deif (left) and Rafa’a Salameh, the commander of Hamas’s Khan Younis Brigade, in an undated photo. (Courtesy)
On the morning of October 7, soon after Hamas had launched its devastating invasion and begun its slaughter in southern Israel, Al Jazeera aired an audio recording of Muhammad Deif announcing that this was the beginning of the “Al-Aqsa Flood” against Israel: “I say to our pure mujahideen: This is the day that you make this criminal enemy understand that its time is up. [The Quran says:] ‘Kill them wherever you may find them.'”
Deif, who had been wanted by Israel for three decades, was the architect of the October 7 massacre alongside Hamas’s Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar, and the “chief of staff” of Hamas’s terrorist army. And, as he made clear in that recording, he was hoping the invasion would spark a murderous uprising inside Israel, notably in Jerusalem, and an ongoing wave of attacks across Israel’s borders, leading to Israel’s destruction.
Apart from the symbolism of Israel finally reaching a monstrous figure with the blood of hundreds of Israelis on his hands, Deif helmed Hamas’s armed forces, planned October 7 along with Sinwar, and oversaw the nine months of war that have unfolded since, having spent years preparing the infrastructure, weaponry and gunmen that he hoped would vanquish Israel’s forces inside Gaza.
Had he been eliminated earlier in the conflict, the organization, coordination and tactics of the Hamas army would have been substantially undermined. Today, Hamas is degraded, but it still has thousands of armed gunmen, much of its tunnel infrastructure, and rockets and other weaponry capable of causing tremendous harm. Deif apparently broke cover to try to coordinate the maximizing of the potency that remains. His death would constitute a major practical loss.
Link: Muhammad Deif’s death would be a turning point in the war on Hamas – The Times of Israel
Israeli Victory Is So Close, Yet So Far in Commentary by Seth Mandel
So… is victory actually close, then? Israel must decide how to prioritize its three goals in the stretch run of this war: defeating Hamas, returning the hostages, and crippling the terror infrastructure underneath Gaza.
“the cost of holding the corridor, which seemed unbearable in 2005, pales in comparison to the price we paid for leaving it.” Had Israel not abandoned the corridor, Hamas would never “have been able to arm itself in the way it has, nor launch a brigade-level attack on the surrounding settlements. Those who didn’t want to see images of soldiers searching for the remains of their comrades ended up seeing images of archaeologists sifting through the remains of families from the ashes. We learned the hard way that there are prices we must pay to survive.”
Fully securing the corridor required clearing and holding enough of the area around it. Israel wanted to do this 20 years ago, but international pressure made it nearly impossible to accomplish without paying some sort of diplomatic price, at the very least. Yet what did Israel get for its sensitivity to pressure? October 7. The world will continue to push for Israel to abandon the corridor once again, so hopefully that lesson has been learned.
…no matter who ends up governing Gaza in the near or long term, that corridor has to be secured and/or neutralized. Egypt cannot be trusted to police that border crossing on its own.
The fact that the IDF is still dismantling tunnels a mile from Nahal Oz, and is finding out that some of the tunnels they’ve taken offline have been repaired, means the voices urging Israel out of Gaza must be ignored. Stay until the job is done. If it’s left unfinished, the price will be paid by Israel. Those without skin in the game cannot be allowed to do to what they did 20 years ago and allow Hamas to plant the seeds of unimaginable bloodshed.
Link: Israeli Victory Is So Close, Yet So Far – Commentary Magazine
The Lebanon War Is Coming: Whose side will America be on? by Judith Miller in Tablet
…while world attention has been focused on the Gaza war to Israel’s south, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s focus has been on the north. His government has been under increasing political pressure to find a way to allow the estimated 70,000 Israelis who fled Hezbollah’s missiles and shelling there and have been living in hotels and temporary shelters to return home. The depopulation of the north near Lebanon and parts of southern Israel near Gaza has hurt Israel’s economy and depressed morale
Even if a cease-fire is negotiated, Israeli analysts say, Hezbollah has repeatedly violated previous agreements with and commitments to Israel. Moreover, the U.S. initiative reportedly adopts the Lebanese side’s insistence that Israel stop all flights over Lebanon, hampering the IDF’s ability to monitor and interdict Hezbollah’s military buildup, something Israeli intelligence would be reluctant to do, and which would put Israel at a strategic disadvantage.
The current stalemate suits not only Hezbollah, but also its Iranian patron. Tehran has made good use of Hezbollah and its other proxy militias to keep Israel and its allies on the defensive and to set new precedents that advantage Iran. Attacks on ships in the Red Sea by the Iranian-supported Houthi militants in Yemen have depressed shipping there, giving Iran the de facto ability to obstruct freedom of navigation and global trade.
Yet Tehran’s strategic gains are only partly the result of actions by its regionwide network of proxies. They are also a consequence of a U.S. posture that has failed to punish Iranian-inspired aggression while calling for restraint by Iran’s targets.
But there remains deep division within Israel’s national security establishment over when such a war should occur. Some analysts say that now is the right moment to strike. The threat from Hamas has been severely degraded, if not neutralized. The north is already evacuated and the Israeli Defense Forces are already mobilized and in fighting mode. Many Israelis, terrified by their country’s obvious vulnerability, favor striking Israel’s enemies sooner rather than later, suggesting that a war with Hezbollah would enjoy strong public support.
If Israel chooses to go to war with Hezbollah, it would have to strike before October and the start of the rainy season and then winter. In fact, some Israeli analysts believe that the ongoing IDF strikes in Lebanon and targeted assassinations of key Hezbollah commanders are not simply opportunistic but have been methodically shaping the battlefield for an eventual, though not necessarily imminent, ground invasion. Amiad Cohen, an IDF reservist officer who heads the Herut Center, a conservative think tank, recently described what he saw as the IDF strategy over the past eight months: “We’re crushing, mostly with airstrikes, first of all the people running the operations in southern Lebanon, and the second part of it, the infrastructure,” including underground structures.
Other analysts argue that current conditions are not ideal for a large-scale war, albeit for different reasons. “Not now,” said Tamir Hayman, the former head of Israeli military intelligence who now heads Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Hayman said it would be better to wait a couple of years. Israel, he said, now lacked the resources, international legitimacy, or Washington’s approval for such a war. Israel should strike Hezbollah “when we’re ready.”
Analysts in D.C. argue that such a war would require American buy-in. They note that Israel remains dependent on the U.S. for military supplies that would be required for such a war, and President Biden is adamantly opposed to an escalation. His administration, which has publicly criticized Israel’s operations in Gaza and withheld 3,000 bombs and 23,000 munitions, has incentivized Israel’s foes. Moreover, because of its longstanding military aid relationship with the U.S., Israel is now more dependent on American supplies than it was during the last war. The relationship also had the effect of undermining Israel’s defense industry, which has been scrambling to meet demand for ammunition and weapons systems since Oct. 7.
The Biden administration’s ongoing effort to broker an agreement between Israel and Hezbollah also risks handing the terror group a win.
While the need for security has almost always trumped the desire for economic growth for Israelis, a full-scale war with Hezbollah would come at a high economic cost. In the last quarter of 2023, Israel’s economy contracted sharply and its gross domestic product shrank by 20%. By May, however, the economy had rebounded, and first-quarter GDP grew some 14%, demonstrating its resilience.
Prepare for a Nuclear Iran, by Eli Diamond with National Review
Hezbollah, Iran’s most formidable proxy, has been willing to ratchet up attacks against Israel without the cover of an Iranian nuclear umbrella. Should a full-scale war between Israel and Hezbollah break out, Iran could threaten nuclear retaliation against Israel before it could put Hezbollah out of the fight. Right now, the Israelis would bear significant but liveable costs from striking deep into Lebanon to neutralize Hezbollah. That changes if Iran can threaten nuclear retaliation to keep its proxy from losing.
Directly or not, the U.S. is engaged in this conflict and has a significant stake in its outcome. In Europe, American and Western arms are the only things standing between Ukraine and its defeat at the hands of Russia. In the Middle East, American arms remain indispensable to Israel’s survival as it wages a defensive, multifront war against Iran and its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah. In the Indo-Pacific, China has embarked on the greatest military buildup since World War II, its eyes set on Taiwan but ultimately U.S. primacy.
The limiting factor for Israeli–Arab military coordination has been the Biden administration: Rather than putting its weight behind Israel and its Gulf allies simultaneously, Biden has tried to play them off each other — for example, dangling the prospect of Israeli–Saudi normalization in exchange for a cease-fire in Gaza and Israel’s recognition of a Palestinian state, both of which are nonstarters in Jerusalem.
To deter Iran, Trump should work to expand the Accords into an alliance along the lines of AUKUS, a security partnership between the U.S., U.K., and Australia designed to counter China in the Indo-Pacific. Militarily, the promise of such a partnership was on display when Iran conducted direct strikes against Israel in April: The Saudis helped shoot down Iranian projectiles while Jordan allowed Israel to take defensive measures over its airspace. Like the Accords, the ingredients for a security partnership already exist; they just need to be encouraged and formalized. Similar to AUKUS, the Abraham Alliance could facilitate the exchange of key technology and weapons systems between the U.S., Israel, and Gulf allies. It could also serve as an informal mechanism for defensive and offensive planning against Iran.
The Operation to Eliminate Deif: The Impact on the War and Effect on Sinwar by Kobi Michael with Institute for National Security Studies (INSS)
The results of the operation to eliminate Mohammed Deif are still unclear, but if the goal was indeed achieved (something that, according to media reports, is “highly probable”), it is a worthy and important operation that to some extent is comparable to the operations to eliminate Qassem Soleimani and Imad Mornia. All three were experienced, senior officials, very significant centers of knowledge and highly important symbols in their organization and outside of it.
The elimination of Deif becomes even more significant given the current reality of severe damage to Hamas’ military wing and its transition to terrorism and guerrilla warfare. However, it is important to remember that organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah are more than the sum of their components or commanders. Israel has previously eliminated the leaders of these organizations and other very senior military figures, and yet the organizations continued to grow, develop and become more significant security threats to Israel, while establishing their status as political players in the Palestinian and Lebanese arenas.
I believe that the elimination (if indeed successful) will definitely have an effect on Sinwar, who lost a partner and a close friend (the two are childhood friends who grew up in the Khan Yunis refugee camp, joined Hamas together and were among the founders of the military wing). On the other hand, it is far from obvious that this will lead Sinwar to significantly moderate his position due to a fear of being similarly targeted. It is important to remember—Sinwar is not afraid of death. He sees himself and the struggle through religious, historical and messianic lenses. As long as he stands on his own two feet and leads the organization in the Gaza Strip, he will remain the mover and shaker and the most influential factor when it comes to the hostage release deal.
David Petraeus Is Wrong: Counterinsurgency Won’t Work in Gaza, by Will Selber and Bill Roggio in The Bulwark
Petraeus’s vaunted population-centric counterinsurgency (COIN) strategy only had limited success in Iraq. However, in Afghanistan, it failed utterly. Both General Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal tried to implement a Sons of Iraq–type program in Afghanistan called the Afghan Local Police. While the ALP had some success, it was ultimately disbanded, leaving thousands of former allies of the United States in the Taliban’s crosshairs. Similarly, joint Provincial Reconstruction Teams served in Afghanistan’s thirty-two provinces for nearly a decade, building hundreds of schools, roads, and bridges. However, all of these programs ultimately failed to prevent the Taliban from humiliating the United States and NATO.
The IDF would be fighting an insurgency if Hamas were trying to topple a government in Gaza. But that’s not what’s going on here. Yes, Hamas is a terrorist organization. However, they do not solely operate clandestinely because they are the de facto state in Gaza. They field a terror army consisting of over twenty light infantry battalions. Similarly, in 2014, the United States and the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) fought an Islamic State terror army in Mosul. Neither the ISF nor the United States conducted COIN in that gruesome fight. Why? Because the Islamic State was the government in Mosul, so a COIN approach would be inappropriate.
Like Hamas, the Taliban is a terrorist organization. However, since the Taliban control the state in Afghanistan, they are now fielding a massive terror army. In essence, once terrorist organizations control the state, they start acting like a state, so they must be fought like a state.
Again, let’s play along, pretending that somehow the IDF could find a partner force. How long would it take to clear, hold, and build? A year? Maybe two? Wouldn’t the international community claim that Israel is occupying Gaza? Even Petraeus admits that this would require an Israeli occupation of Gaza.
Petraeus is right to point out that Hamas is reconstituting throughout the battlefield. The IDF contributed to this problem by not taking the Philadelphia Corridor sooner, but so did the United States by halting the IDF’s advance into Rafah for months. Regardless, the IDF never set out to kill every last Hamas fighter. They’re trying to destroy its army, remove them from power, and prevent Gaza from being used as a launching point for further attacks. While the IDF has yet to achieve its war aims and the overall success of its operation in Gaza remains in doubt, following in America’s footsteps in both Iraq and Afghanistan would be a cataclysmic mistake. We lost both wars. Israel cannot afford to lose this one.
Link: David Petraeus Is Wrong: Counterinsurgency Won’t Work in Gaza | TheWarBulwark
That Old Time Religion: The G-7 Foreign Ministers' Statement on the West Bank by Elliott Abrams in Pressure Points
Finally, the G-7 statement says that “maintaining economic stability in the West Bank is critical for regional security. In this context, we take note of the latest transfers of parts of clearance revenues to the Palestinian Authority, but we urge Israel to release all withheld clearance revenues in accordance with the Paris Protocols….” So, of course, does the Palestinian Authority urge this, and demand that the United States force Israel to do it. Why does Israel ever withhold such funds? Sometimes it is in the immediate aftermath of a terrorist attack. Sometimes it’s domestic politics.
But it’s worth remembering something else: the Taylor Force Act, which became law in 2018 and stated that “The Palestinian Authority’s practice of paying salaries to terrorists serving in Israeli prisons, as well as to the families of deceased terrorists, is an incentive to commit acts of terror.” Until those payments cease, most forms of aid from the U.S. government to the Palestinian Authority may not be made. The payments continue. It is not clear if the State Department is pressuring the Palestinian Authority to end them. As the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs noted,
In 2018, following the U.S. adoption of the Taylor Force Act, Israel also adopted legislation that punishes the PA for its “Play-for-Slay” policy by deducting the sum the PA pays to terrorists for acts of terror from the tax revenue. To date, the PA has lost over 3 billion shekels (approximately $820 million), a sum equivalent to the PA payments to terrorists from 2018 through 2022. So when Abbas urges Washington to release the “Palestinian clearance funds,” he is referring to the sums withheld by Israel from the taxes as a direct result of the PA’s “Play-for-Slay” policy.
Such moral considerations are entirely absent from the G-7 statement. The statement may be correct when it says “maintaining economic stability in the West Bank is critical for regional security,” But it should be obvious that ending the pay for slay program and rewards for terrorism is even more critical for regional security. It’s a pity the G-7 did not find time to mention that.
Antisemitism
Virginia judge rules pro-Palestinian group required to disclose donor documents by Matthew Kassel with the Jewish Insider
In a major court ruling in Virginia on Tuesday, a Richmond judge ordered that a pro-Palestinian group with alleged ties to Hamas must turn over closely guarded financial documents requested by the state attorney general as part of an investigation into its funding sources
The highly anticipated decision represents a significant setback for American Muslims for Palestine, a Virginia-based nonprofit organization that could now be compelled to turn over sensitive financial records, including donor information it has long successfully shielded from public view.
The judge ruled that AMP’s acknowledgement in its petition that it had failed to file required paperwork had justified the order, while also indicating that the attorney general’s interest in ensuring donor funds have not been misused had justified the request for documents, according to the person familiar with the case.
The nonprofit is also the subject of an ongoing civil lawsuit in Chicago, which Miyares’ office has cited in court filings, alleging that AMP is an “alter ego” of such groups as IAP and seeking to collect a $156 million judgment that has never been paid to the family of David Boim, an American killed by Hamas in a 1996 terrorist attack at a West Bank bus stop.
Link: Virginia judge rules pro-Palestinian group required to disclose donor documents
The war against the Jews: In Britain, France and America, the left is on the wrong side by Melanie Phillips, a British journalist, broadcaster and author whose weekly column currently appears in The Times of London.
We have to face without flinching what is now undeniable: there is a war across the globe raging against the Jewish people. It’s a war not just to destroy their national homeland but to drive them out of people’s heads, their conscience and their world.
The Palestinian flag, the symbol of the agenda to destroy Israel and erase the identity and history of the Jews in their ancestral land, is everywhere. Often-murderous antisemitism, once confined to cranks, Nazi supporters and the clinically insane, has been normalised and is surfacing in the most banal, everyday settings.
While this madness has liberals and left-wingers in its grip, its main impetus is coming from the Islamic world. US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines stated this week that the Iranian regime has been actively fuelling the Gaza demonstrations by using agents posing as activists online, encouraging demonstrations and even providing participants with financial support. In addition to Iran, the campaign has been orchestrated by Hamas and other Muslim Brotherhood operatives.
The reason the October 7 pogrom in Israel sparked immediate and triumphant Muslim demonstrations was the ecstatic belief that, having destroyed Israeli invincibility by murdering and capturing so many Jews, the way was now open to destroy Israel, wipe out the Jews and conquer the west for Islam.
Diaspora Jews ask where they can be safe. The answer is nowhere. Despite the antisemitic history of National Rally, said the French chief rabbi, the left has been antisemitic in recent times. “The Jews are in the middle because they don’t know who hates them more,” he said.
Everyone is defined by where they stand in this war. There is no middle ground. Whether you are an activist, fellow-traveller or useful idiot, whether you are a gentile or a “tikkun olam” Jew, either you stand unequivocally with the Jewish victims of this war and support their self-defence or you are on the side of those attacking not just the Jewish people but civilisation itself.
Link: The war against the Jews - Melanie Phillips (substack.com)
A Tale of Two Universities, by Washington Free Beacon Editors
At the University of Florida, where former GOP senator Ben Sasse assumed the presidency last year, dean of students Chris Summerlin rejected the recommendations of a faculty panel and opted instead to impose harsher sentences on several students arrested in April, one of whom was captured on video spitting on a police officer.
Those students are suspended for three or four years, depending on the severity of their infractions. They are banned from campus during that time and will be required to reapply for admission.
Indeed, the school’s anti-Israel radicals declared victory in a series of Instagram posts: "Harvard has caved in, showing that student intifada will always prevail," they wrote. "This reversal speaks to the power of our movement, both on campus and worldwide."
We disagree. This reversal speaks to the fecklessness of administrators at elite universities, the rampant anti-Semitism and radical politics that dominate their ranks, and the case for serious students, parents, and faculty to flee these campuses. And of the student movement itself, its chief accomplishment is likely to be the further destruction of the institutions who abide its lawbreaking. Their prestige evaporates by the hour.
US activists begin to grapple with repercussions of their anti-Israel college protests, by Reuters and TOI Staff in Times of Israel
US universities have been rocked by waves of pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests, with police and protesters clashing at times and questions raised over forceful methods used to disperse the rallies and encampments.
At the University of Texas, officers clad in riot gear and mounted on horseback swept away demonstrations in late April, arresting dozens of people days before the graduate student was himself arrested.
“The actions and stated intentions of those participating (on April 24 and 29) stand in stark contrast to no fewer than 13 previous pro-Palestinian free speech events on our campus since October, which took place largely without incident,” the university said in a statement.
“The University of Texas at Austin will continue to support the Constitutional rights to free speech of all individuals on our campus and will also enforce our rules while providing due process and holding students, faculty, staff and visitors accountable.”
The nationwide campus protests, spurred in part by encampments that began in April at Columbia University and elsewhere, have led to more than 3,000 arrests in recent months.
Even as classes wound down and many students headed home for the summer, the protests continued. More than a dozen students were arrested in June at Stanford University after they occupied the president’s office.