RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21506/hamas-politicians-terrorists

“They [Hamas] need to demilitarize, and then they might be politically involved in Gaza.” —US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, interview with Tucker Carlson, March 21, 2025.

“I thought we had an acceptable deal. I even thought we had an approval from Hamas. Maybe that’s just me getting duped.” — Steve Witkoff, about a ceasefire extension he thought he had just finished negotiating, Fox News, March 23, 2023.

Duped is putting it mildly. Witkoff, who doubtless has the best intentions, is sadly proving the perfect mark.

Hamas is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization that needs to be designated by the US as a terrorist group. Hamas is Muslim Brotherhood, and Muslim Brotherhood is Hamas.

[Hamas’s] politicians devise the strategy and set the goals, while its armed wing is entrusted with following them. The political leadership of Hamas ruled that Israel must be eliminated, and the group’s military wing has carried out countless terrorist attacks to achieve that goal.

The political leaders need the military wing to control the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip, as they have been doing since their violent coup there in 2007.

Hamas, which has brought death and destruction upon both Israelis and Palestinians, has no right to exist, either as a political or a military entity. Did it ever occur to anyone to allow the political leaders of ISIS or Al-Qaeda to play any role in Syria and Iraq?

If Hamas is permitted to continue its political activities in the Gaza Strip, it will comfortably continue its jihad against Israel. The group’s political leaders will undoubtedly continue to call – in Arabic — for the annihilation of Israel and encourage Palestinians to launch terrorist attacks against it.

Witkoff’s talk about a possible political role for Hamas is dangerous, mainly because it implies that the US continues to view the terror group as a legitimate player in the Palestinian arena. If the US envoy wants to see stability and security in the Middle East, he must insist on the complete and permanent removal of Hamas – all of its “wings.” Destroying “much” of Hamas’s military capabilities or disarming it is totally worthless.

US President Donald Trump’s envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, said last week that he does not rule out the possibility that the Iran-backed Palestinian terror group Hamas could be politically active in the Gaza Strip after it disarms. “They [Hamas] need to demilitarize, and then they might be politically involved in Gaza,” Witkoff said in an interview with Tucker Carlson that was aired on March 21.

Witkoff — who, thanks to his excruciating lack of familiarity with Arab assumptions apart from real estate deals, is increasingly becoming a major embarrassment to Trump — appears to draw a distinction between Hamas’s political and military leaderships. He also seems naïve enough to believe that Hamas would ever agree to lay down its weapons or halt its terrorist attacks against Israel.

https://www.jns.org/aharon-baraks-protest-gavel/

In a slew of interviews on Thursday, former Supreme Court President Aharon Barak came out swinging his proverbial gavel. His target was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—this time around for firing Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar and gearing up to get rid of Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara.

Since going after Netanyahu was what the left-wing press expected of the esteemed elder, the retired judge-turned-oracle didn’t disappoint. If anything, he went above and beyond the call of duty.

“The prime minister,” he told Channel 13, “needs to understand that the situation is very bad and that … we are heading toward bloodshed, toward a civil war.”

The schism among Israelis, he said to Ynet, “is getting worse and, in the end, I fear, it will be like a train that goes off the tracks and plunges in a chasm, causing a civil war.”

And this to Channel 12: “[T]he rift in the public is immense, and no effort is being made to heal it. … Today, there are demonstrations … but tomorrow there will be shootings, and the day after that there will be bloodshed.”

This is just a taste of Barak’s multi-media onslaught. Though described by his champions as a “warning” to the Netanyahu-led government that any moves against Bar and Baharav-Miara would rip apart the country and—ho hum—destroy Israeli democracy, his pontificating had two main motives.

The first was to threaten Netanyahu that if he proceeds with the ousters—the legality of which is indisputable—the demonstrations in the streets of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv will turn violent. Implicit in the admonition was that such a dangerous spike in societal unrest would be both inevitable and justified.

The second aim of Barak’s sermonizing was to signal support for Bar’s refusal to exit his post and Baharav-Miara’s abuse of her role, while instructing the High Court to overrule the government in each of the cases. As though it needed any coaxing on that score.

Still, a nod from the father of Israel’s “constitutional revolution”—who justified his power grab for the bench more than 30 years ago on the grounds that “no areas in life are outside the law”—is a cherished commodity among the robed elites. Though he retired 18 years ago at the mandatory age of 70, he remains a jurisprudence giant in the eyes of the legal community, at home and abroad.

https://bit.ly/4hyGCVL

In 2024, the number of Israel’s Jewish births was 138,698 – 73% higher than 1995 (80,400), compared to 42,911 Arab births – 18% higher than 1995 (36,500).

In 2024, Jewish births were 76% of total births, compared to 69% in 1995. The surge of Jewish births has taken place due to the unprecedented rise of births (since 1995) in the secular sector, notwithstanding a rising level of education, income and wedding age and expanded urbanization. Since 1995, Israel’s ultra-orthodox sector has experienced a mild decrease of fertility, while the modern orthodox rate of fertility has been stable.

In 1969, Israel’s Arab fertility rate was six births higher than the Jewish fertility rate. In 2022, Jewish fertility rate – 3;Israeli Muslims – 2.86.Muslim fertility rate has been Westernized: Jordan – 2.87 births per woman, Iran – 1.91, Saudi Arabia – 1.87, Morocco – 2.25, Iraq – 3.1, Egypt – 2.65, Yemen – 2.82, the United Arab Emirates – 1.61, etc.Israel’s robust Jewish fertility rate reflects robust optimism, patriotism, attachment to roots, communal solidarity, frontier-mentality and less abortions. Arab demographic Westernization is attributed to sweeping urbanization, enhanced status of women (education, employment, rising wedding age, shorter reproductive period) and expanding use of contraceptives.

https://verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com/

Every week I look forward to Michael Ordman’s exhaustive compilation of positive news from Israel, the best antidote to columnists, academics, and newscasters who routinely defame, libel and slander the Jewish nation.  Israel, an embattled democracy makes more contributions per capita to the health and aspirations of humanity, than any other nation. Read it all. rsk

POSITIVE NEWS IN A WAR

$1.7 million raised for Bibas family. In a public fundraising campaign, the Lehosheet Yad (Lend a Hand) foundation has raised more than $1.7 million in 24 hours from nearly 31,000 donors. It will help freed hostage Yarden Bibas’s recovery and establish a memorial for his wife, Shiri, and two young sons, Ariel and Kfir.

https://www.jns.org/bibas-family-fundraiser-exceeds-1-3-million-in-under-24-hours/

The 10,000th Birthright volunteer. New York’s Madison Stock is the 10,000th participant in the Birthright Israel volunteer program. Activities include food rescue operations to prevent shortages in the Israeli market and supporting kibbutz restoration projects in areas hardest hit on Oct 7 2023 and the subsequent war.

https://www.jns.org/22-year-old-is-10000th-participant-in-birthright-israel-volunteer-program/

IDF soldier makes connection in Sri Lanka. A Golani soldier wounded in Gaza, was vacationing in Sri Lanka and read the story of Purim in a synagogue. He suddenly realized that the scroll he was reading from had been dedicated to the memory of 3 IDF soldiers including has own Major, Moshe Bar-On who fell in the same battle.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/405368

Syrian Druze visit sacred site in Israel. Israel opened its border to allow hundreds of Syrian Druze dignitaries and leaders to visit Israel. They the Galilee tomb of the Biblical Yitro (revered as a prophet) for the first time since 1948.  Amazing video. Useful article about the Druze at the second link below.

https://www.israelunwired.com/israel-opens-its-borders-for-syrian-druze-something-big-is-about-to-happen/

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israels-druze-honor-the-prophet-jethro-in-annual-pilgrimage-to-ancient-tomb/

Aid for Syrian Druze. 10,000 packages of humanitarian aid (including oil, salt, flour, sugar, rice, and more) have been delivered to the Druze community in the battle areas of Syria. This was coordinated with the head of the Druze community Sheikh Muafik Tarif, and the Druze Religious Council, and the IDF.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/405309

How to navigate crises. Waze co- founder Uri Levine has published a new edition of his handbook for entrepreneurs, “Fall in Love With the Problem, Not the Solution”. It now has a chapter on how to navigate crises, such as Oct 7 2023 and the subsequent war, using interviews with CEOs and their roads to recovery.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/waze-co-founder-uri-levine-has-written-the-book-on-startups-navigating-crises-literally/

Still happy despite the war. Israel remains in the top ten list of happiest countries in the world despite an anxious year with the wars against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Its 8th placed in the World Happiness Report 2025 is down from 5th in 2024 but still remarkable, considering.

https://www.jns.org/israel-8th-happiest-country-despite-war/

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Identifying gene on / off switches. (TY TPS) Researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Hadassah Medical Center used DNA methylation (chemical tagging human DNA) to uncover insights into how genes are turned on and off. It could transform the diagnosis and treatment of genetic diseases.

https://worldisraelnews.com/new-dna-mapping-reveals-gene-on-off-switches-paving-way-for-disease-treatment/

Why people exercise. Tel Aviv University researchers used AI tools to discover what motivates people to exercise. They found that 23.9% of those who engage in sports do so to improve their appearance, 18.9% exercise to maintain their physical health, and 16.9% exercise to maintain their mental health.

https://www.aftau.org/news_item/tau-research-people-exercise-more-for-their-appearance-than-their-physical-health/    https://www.jmir.org/2025/1/e54489

More smiles soon. (TY Atid-EDI) Dror Ortho-Design has successfully completed user experience trials for its ZSmile platform (see here previously) ahead of commercial release. Feedback has been integrated for ZSmile to begin manufacture and distribution in Israel in the first half of 2025. 250 patients have already been treated.

https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2025/02/24/3031133/0/en/Dror-Successfully-Completes-User-Experience-Trial-of-its-new-ZSmile-Platform.html

Personal 3D models for pre-surgical training. (TY Atid-EDI) Israel’s Stratasys and Europe’s Siemens have used Stratasys’ RadioMatrix™ materials and Digital Anatomy® technology with Siemens Healthineers’ algorithms to produce complex patient-specific anatomical models for pre-surgery planning and education.

https://investors.stratasys.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/932/stratasys-and-siemens-healthineers-bring-a-new-era-for

Mental health tech innovation. The 2025 Israeli Mental Health Technology Landscape Map, by Startup Nation Central and the ICAR Collective and Bezyl, highlights around 120 Israeli companies leveraging AI, automation, and digital platforms to enhance mental health care access and improve treatment outcomes.

https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/syxaay0sjg

https://finder.startupnationcentral.org/reports/mental-health-2025-landscape-map

1-2-3. (TY Yanky) Efrat and Daniel Cohen were delighted when their first child was followed by twins. Now Efrat has given birth to triplets at the Kaplan Medical Centre. Says Efrat: “The staff were amazing, supportive and attentive. We have given the grandmothers a heads-up – double shifts and night shifts if needed.”

https://www.ynetnews.com/health_science/article/bj124vnj1x

Remote healthcare in Virginia and North Dakota. (TY OurCrowd) Uninsured patients in rural southwest Virginia will receive remote medical monitors from Israel’s TytoCare (see here previously) to save hospital visits. Meanwhile, medics in North Dakota with TytoCare devices will visit patients discharged from hospital.

https://wtop.com/virginia/2025/03/bringing-the-doctor-to-your-doorstep-rural-virginia-clinics-expand-telehealth-access/ https://news.sanfordhealth.org/news/hospital-at-home-program-launches-at-sanford-fargo/

https://pdavidhornik.substack.com/subscribe?utm_source=email&utm_campaign=email-subscribe&r=8t06w&next=

Today, Friday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz stated:

If the Hamas terror organization continues to refuse to release the hostages, I instructed the IDF to capture additional areas, evacuate the population, and expand the security zone around Gaza for the protection of Israeli communities and IDF soldiers, through a permanent hold of the area by Israel.

As long as Hamas continues its refusal, it will lose more and more land that will be added to Israel.

Katz added that Israel would use “all military and civilian pressure, including evacuation of the Gaza population south[ward] and implementing US President Trump’s voluntary migration plan for Gaza residents.”

Katz also

affirmed Israel’s commitment to the US hostage deal proposal put forward by President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. The plan calls for the release of all hostages—both living and deceased—in two phases, separated by a temporary ceasefire. “We are fully committed to this proposal, which does not compromise Israel’s security interests,” Katz said.

This is a dramatic declaration that is now making headlines on Israeli sites.

I would feel more comfortable if it were Katz’s boss, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, rather than Katz, making such a statement—clearly and publicly. The defense minister may be the second most powerful person in Israel, but a statement of this weight should come from the person at the helm. When it doesn’t, it creates a misgiving that Katz may be freelancing.

As it became clear that Hamas was merely stalling in the negotiations and using the time to rebuild and reorganize its forces, possibly build new tunnels, set up rocket launchers, and even plan new cross-border attacks, early Tuesday morning Israel launched heavy airstrikes against the Hamas leadership and terror infrastructure. Since then Israel has continued the military pressure, and by Thursday four separate IDF forces were operating in different parts of Gaza.

https://www.jns.org/unrwa-still-operating-in-israel-despite-laws-barring-agency/

Israel’s UNRWA ban went into effect on Jan. 30 but has been only partially implemented. That worries activists and Knesset members involved in the effort to shutter the terrorism-linked U.N. agency.

To help ensure the law is applied, Likud MK Dan Illouz, who sponsored one of the two bills to bar UNRWA (full name the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East), formed the Knesset Lobby for Closing UNRWA. It held its first meeting on Feb. 20.

“We know and have experience that very often laws that are enacted in the Knesset are not necessarily applied,” Illouz told JNS.

Possible threats to the laws’ implementation aired at the lobby’s meeting included High Court interference and attempts by Israeli businesses enjoying commercial ties with UNRWA to sabotage the law.

The two bills, passed into law on Oct. 28, merged four separate private bills. “They were all put together and translated into two historic laws that are meant to put an end to UNRWA’s effective presence in any area controlled by Israel,” Illouz said.

The first law prohibits UNRWA from “operating any representative office, providing any service, or carrying out any activity, directly or indirectly, in the sovereign territory of the State of Israel.”

The second law prohibits any Israeli authority or public servant from dealing with UNRWA. “A government authority, including other bodies and individuals performing public duties according to law, shall not have any contact with UNRWA or anyone acting on its behalf,” the legislation states.

https://melaniephillips.substack.com/

Hamas left Israel no alternative but to resume the war

The resumption of Israel’s war in Gaza has produced a predictable reaction in a world that remains determined to malign the Jewish state.

Western media declared that Israel had ended the ceasefire. In fact, the ceasefire had ended more than two weeks earlier. Although Israel had agreed to a further US-brokered deal, Hamas rejected it and refused to release any more hostages.

Hamas left Israel with no option but to resume the war, which it did with an aerial bombardment of Gaza.

The terror group instantly stated that the bombardment had killed 400 Gazan civilians. This was absurd because Hamas couldn’t have known the number of casualties so fast and, as usual, it omitted any Hamas operatives in the total. Yet in typically reflexive fashion, the western media parroted this incredible figure without questioning it.

No less predictable have been the Israeli protests that by resuming the war Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has abandoned the hostages —of whom 24 are said still to be alive.

The most bitter and agonising reproach has been voiced by some of the former hostages, who have accused Netanyahu of ignoring everything they’ve been telling the world about the horrific conditions in which the captives are being held.

There can hardly be a single person in Israel who doesn’t desperately want the hostages back home. And there’s no denying the genuine anguish at the failure to get them all back. Their plight is beyond horrific, and the profound emotionalism of the public response is entirely understandable.

Unfortunately, such emotion is a barrier to clear and unavoidably brutal thinking. The only way Hamas will return all the hostages is if Israel surrenders and leaves it in power. The reason it took the hostages in the first place was to ensure that Israel could never win against it.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/03/19/israel-has-every-right-to-eliminate-hamas/

Andrew Fox is a former British Army officer and an associate fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, specialising in defence and the Middle East.

The ceasefire in Gaza collapsed this week. IDF airstrikes have now resumed, targeting infrastructure and taking out senior Hamas officials. Israel has also issued an evacuation order for the entire Gaza border area, likely signalling a renewed ground invasion. When I was speaking with Israeli insiders in Jerusalem a few weeks ago, it was suggested to me that five entire divisions may be deployed. A deployment of this scale would likely mean the seizure of all of Gaza by the IDF.

The breakdown of the ceasefire in Gaza was predictable, inevitable and solely the responsibility of Hamas. Rather than acting as a genuine partner in peace, it has become evident that Hamas used the ceasefire as a tactical pause to regroup, rearm and prepare for the next wave of violence. Israel – confronted with Hamas’s failure to negotiate in good faith for the release of hostages and phase two of the ceasefire – is entirely justified in resuming efforts to dismantle Hamas as a military threat once and for all.

US president Donald Trump’s insistence on a ceasefire in Gaza posed significant challenges for Israel. When it was agreed in January, the job was only half complete. Hamas continued to hold power and hostages remained trapped in Gaza. However, after weeks of negotiations, one positive outcome of this enforced pause has been the reuniting of many hostages with their families.

The ceasefire has also exposed the truly monstrous nature of Hamas. The dire condition of the returned hostages – as well as the grotesque spectacle of hostage releases, in which the coffins of innocents were paraded before crowds and cameras – served as a stark reminder of Hamas’s barbarism. Meanwhile, seeing Israel return well-fed Gazans has dispelled notions of genocide or deliberate starvation for any sane observer.

Since then, phase two of the ceasefire talks has failed (despite the White House negotiating directly with Hamas, over Israel’s head). Hamas cocked a snook at both the Israelis and the White House, having been warned by Trump what would happen if it continued to stall on releasing the remaining hostages. Now, Trump has given the Israelis the green light to resume targeting senior Hamas members.

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.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/03/20/a-savage-rupturing-of-our-civilisation/

They reduced Jews to ashes. In 2023, a fascist army burnt Jews to death. The Jews’ names were Ram Itamari, 56, a transportation manager, and his wife, Lili Itamari, 63, a schoolteacher. They were in their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza in southern Israel on 7 October 2023 when the unit of anti-Semites showed up. The gunmen saw the Jews through a window so they set fire to the house. It burned at such a scorching temperature that when the Israeli authorities finally went in, they found not one trace of the couple’s bodies. It took archaeologists three weeks of sifting through the soot to discover a sliver of bone. It was DNA-tested. It was them.

It is the 21st century and we are searching among ash for the remains of Jews. Following decades of the cry, ‘Never Again’, humanity once more found itself foraging in the blackened remains of a building for the incinerated remnants of the Jews who lived there. This detail from the new UK parliamentary report on the barbarism of 7 October should chill the blood of everyone who reads it. For it is 7 October’s clearest echo, among thousands of clear echoes, of the Nazi atrocities of the last century. This report leaves no doubt: 7 October was more than terrorism, more than a war crime – it was a savage rupturing of human civilisation itself.

The 7 October Parliamentary Commission Report, overseen by historian Lord Roberts, is a horrifying and essential document. It bears witness, in grim, meticulous detail, to the carnival of anti-Semitic violence carried out by Hamas and its allies on 7 October. It is a forensic account, over 300 pages, of every crime committed by those armies of anti-Semities on that darkest day. And it names and pays tributes to the Jews and others who were slaughtered. ‘We have done this so that future generations will not be misled about the true extent and the horror of the massacre’, says Roberts. This report is a ship of truth in the West’s frothing waters of denialism and apologism.

It lays out all the brutal facts. It tells us that 1,182 people were murdered and more than 4,000 were wounded. Of the dead, 863, or 73 per cent, were civilians. Two-hundred-and-fifty-one people were taken hostage, 210 of them alive, 41 of them dead.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21484/palestinians-dying-because-hamas

Hamas leaders have also repeatedly made it clear that their terror group has no intention of laying down its weapons.

Hamas leaders — based in luxury hotels and villas in Qatar, Lebanon and Egypt — appear in no rush to end the war. Many of them had fled the Gaza Strip together with their families during the past few years in search of a better life in Arab and Islamic countries. From their safe homes and offices, the Hamas leaders continue to issue fiery statements about their group’s refusal to make concessions to end the conflict.

“They are not the ones searching for food in the rubble. They are not the ones watching their children die. They sit in safety while others pay the price…. the suffering of Gaza has never been their concern, only their weapon.” — Hamza Howidy, Palestinian human rights and peace activist, X, March 18, 2025.

“Enough martyrs and death. Damn those who voted for you [in the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary election].” — Ranem El Ali, Palestinian journalist and author, X, March 18, 2025.

If the Palestinians living there want to end the war, they must revolt against Hamas and provide Israel with information about the whereabouts of the hostages. Sadly, most Palestinians seem unwilling to do so, either out of fear of Hamas or because they simply identify with the terror group and its goal of destroying Israel.

Palestinians are again paying a heavy price as a result of Hamas’s refusal to release the remaining 59 Israeli hostages (almost half of whom are believed to be dead) held in the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023. On that day, thousands of Hamas terrorists and ordinary Palestinians invaded Israel, murdering 1,200 Israelis and wounding thousands others. Another 251 Israelis – alive and dead – were kidnapped to the Gaza Strip.

Since then, Hamas could have avoided much of the death and destruction it brought on the Palestinians by simply releasing all the hostages, laying down its weapons and relinquishing control of the Gaza Strip.