RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20922/israel-weaponization-of-hostages
https://melaniephillips.substack.com/p/the-oslo-effect

The demonstrators [in Israel] are backed by assorted military and intelligence types in a treasonous attempt to lever Netanyahu out of office by creating division and demoralization while Israel is fighting for its life. Their core claim is that Netanyahu is prolonging the war and condemning the hostages to death solely to appease extremists in his coalition and thus remain in power.

Of course, everyone desperately wants the hostages brought back home. But the idea that the ceasefire deal would achieve this is sheer fantasy.

Only a few of the hostages would be released in the first phase. Hamas would then use the ceasefire to regroup and rearm, spinning out the continuing negotiation farce to keep the rest of the hostages trapped and thus retain control of the Gaza Strip.

It would only ever release all the hostages (if at all) with Israel’s total surrender. That’s what those calling for an immediate ceasefire deal are actually promoting.

The only way to save the hostages is through military pressure. That’s one reason why it’s imperative for Israel to retain control of the Philadelphi corridor, the area of Gaza that borders Egypt.

The importance of this corridor cannot be exaggerated. Israel’s capture of it has uncovered deep below its surface an extensive infrastructure of giant tunnels into Egypt — thus revealing the principal route through which Hamas imported its rockets, weapons and ammunition. [Emphasis added]

Hamas needs to control the Philadelphi corridor in order to resupply itself. Without that, it will be finished. That’s why it’s insisting that there will be no deal while Israel remains in control.

The vast majority of the military and security officials who belong to the authoritative Israel Defense and Security Forum are adamant that Israel must not cede control of the corridor. The forum’s chairman, Brig. Gen. Amir Avivi, said last week that tens of thousands of rockets and thousands of Hamas Nukhbah terrorists were waiting inside the Egyptian Sinai to go into Gaza through Philadelphi.

http://’If I didn’t believe Netanyahu, I wouldn’t stay in my job for another second’ – JNS.org

I first met Tal Gilboa in July 2023. Little could we have imagined during our upbeat encounter that a mere three months later, her beloved nephew, Guy—the 22-year-old son of her sister, Meirav, and brother-in-law, Ilan—would be hauled off violently to Gaza by Hamas terrorists. That he is still there today, a full 11 months later, is even more unfathomable.

Tal is on her second stint as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu’s adviser on animal rights. She served in that role during his previous government—the one that was replaced by the rotation coalition headed by Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett.

When Bibi returned to the helm in December 2022, he hired her again. An endeavor dear to both was promoting cultured meat and lowering its cost through the use of Artificial Intelligence.

I’d been familiar with her appearances on political panels on TV, and knew that she was the winner of the Israeli version of the reality show “Big Brother” in 2014. My interest was really piqued, however, when she became a target of left-wing attacks for her refusal to toe the intersectional line of her self-described yet anything but liberal peers.

When I went to work for a brief period at the Prime Minister’s Office, I introduced myself to her by revealing that I’d written an op-ed a year and a half earlier about the hypocrisy of her critics.
Given the way she’s been treated since Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre—despite her nephew’s abduction from the Nova Music Festival—I felt it was time for another piece defending her against the slander to which she has grown so unfairly accustomed. But I opted, instead, to let her speak for herself.
The following are excerpts from our interview, though full disclosure requires that it be described as a conversation between two friends who share similar perspectives.

https://www.jns.org/a-hollow-peace-cairo-facilitated-weapons-smuggling-to-hamas/

Israel has uncovered 180 tunnels under the Philadelphi Corridor, Gaza’s strategic border with Sinai. Observers say those tunnels served as 24-hour weapons supply lines for Hamas, not just under the watchful eyes of Egypt, but with its willing assistance.

The revelation of Egyptian complicity raises troubling questions about Israel’s purported ally.

“The feeling in Jerusalem now is that Egypt is ungrateful,” Yoni Ben Menachem, Middle East intelligence analyst for the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA), said on Thursday.

Israel helped Egypt in its campaign against the Islamic State in Sinai. It allowed Cairo to double its forces in the peninsula, far more than was allowed by the 1979 Israel-Egypt peace treaty. Israel even conducted bombing raids against the Islamic State at Egypt’s request. In 2014, Israel intervened on behalf of Egypt with the U.S. to ensure American aid continued.

“Now it turns out that the Egyptians have been playing a double game,” Ben Menachem told JNS. “They’ve been letting Hamas smuggle weapons for many years, especially after [Egyptian President] Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi came to power 10 years ago,” he said.

Smuggling isn’t only through the tunnels, he added, but through the Rafah border crossing, thanks to bribing of senior Egyptian officials.