RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20820/kamala-harris-destroy-israel

What is insupportable is that Harris completely ignored that the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip are suffering because of a war initiated by Hamas. She could have done many Palestinians a favor had she called on Hamas to relinquish control over the Gaza Strip and stop using its people as human shields in its Jihad (holy war) against Israel.

Harris seems not to know or to have forgotten — either is not excessively impressive — that on October 6, 2023, there was a ceasefire in place between Israel and Hamas. Hamas broke it.

“Sometimes, on happier days, I like to comment on the remarkable similarities between Singapore and the Gaza Strip. Both are self-governing city-states located at key crossroads of world trade on the opposite ends of the Continent of Asia. Both combine density of population with a significant urban buildup and dramatic natural advantages, including a high-quality harbor. And yet, due to differences in civil culture and governance, Singapore has been built into the trade hub of East Asia. Gaza, as Saturday’s (October 7, 2023) events have demonstrated to the world, has chosen another path: becoming a terrorist dystopia like the benighted lands formerly under ISIS (Islamic State).” — Bassam Eid, Palestinian human rights activist, Newsweek, October 9, 2023.

The October 7 massacres, if anything, demonstrate why the creation of a Palestinian state is actually a surefire way to perpetuate the Palestinian jihad against Israel, as well as instability and insecurity throughout the Middle East. China, Russia, North Korea and Iran are watching and taking note that unacceptable behavior goes blissfully unpunished.

Hamas…. did not spend millions of dollars to boost the Palestinian economy or give young Palestinians in the Gaza Strip employment prospects. Rather than constructing a medical facilities or educational institutions, Hamas opted to build hundreds of tunnels to smuggle weapons, attack Israel, and shelter its terrorists and leaders.

[I]f and when a Palestinian state is established, as Harris and the Biden administration insist, it will be controlled by the same murderers, rapists and terrorist jihadists.

This is the time to remind Harris that Hamas’s charter views the Jihad as the way to take all of “Palestine” from the Jews and to destroy Israel. Harris sees a Palestinian state as the “only path” to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Palestinians, on the other hand, view the establishment of such a state as the first step towards eliminating Israel. The Hamas charter begins with a quotation attributed to Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan Al-Bana: “Israel will arise and continue to exist until Islam wipes it out, as it wiped out what went before.”

Harris’s remarks regarding a Palestinian state are seriously problematic: they send a message to the Palestinians and others that the US is happy to reward them for terrorism and the October 7 atrocities. Instead of talking about a Palestinian state, she should have told the Palestinians that they will never achieve a state as long as they back Hamas or vow to destroy a UN member state. Harris should also have warned the Palestinians that they will never be granted their own state unless they recognize Israel’s right to exist as the ancestral home of the Jewish people, stop radicalizing their youth, and renounce violence and terrorism.

By advocating an end to the war in the Gaza Strip, Harris is asking that Israel, by allowing Hamas to remain in power, submit itself to unending jihadist attacks. What country would do that?

Demanding a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip is comparable to calling for an end to the US war on Al-Qaeda and ISIS. Unfortunately, destroying Hamas’s military capabilities and removing it from power is the only realistic option. Failure to achieve those two goals will only embolden Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Russia, Iran and other global aggressors waiting in the wings.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/07/29/why-is-it-only-escalation-when-israel-retaliates/

The New York Times is breathing a sigh of relief. For while Israel has fired a few rockets at Lebanon in response to Hezbollah’s massacre of 12 Druze kids in the Golan Heights on Saturday, it has stopped short of launching all-out war on its unfriendly neighbour. For now, says the NYT, we’ve not seen a ‘major escalation’ in Israel-Lebanon hostilities. Yes we have. The slaughter of the Druze youths was a ‘major escalation’. Hezbollah’s firing of a missile that butchered 12 children was surely the very ‘surge in fighting’ that the NYT fears. Or is it only ‘escalation’ when Israel retaliates to the apocalyptic violence of the Islamist armies that surround it?

The media chatter in the wake of Saturday’s bloodbath has been incredibly – and depressingly – revealing. Hezbollah’s rocket hit a miniature football pitch in Majdal Shams in northern Israeli territory. That’s a village inhabited by the Arabic-speaking Druze people, who are spread across northern Israel, Lebanon and Syria. The rocket’s 50kg warhead detonated right where youngsters were taking a breather between games of footie. Twelve of them, all aged between 11 and 16, were killed. It was such a devastating explosion that the remains of one of the kids have not yet been found.

Hezbollah denies firing the rocket. Few are taking its denials seriously, aside from the usual Israelophobic hotheads online, who hate the Jewish State with such unhinged intensity that they hang like wide-eyed fanboys on its enemies’ every word. Israel, as Sky News reports, says the missile clearly flew the short distance ‘over the sunburnt hills’ that divide Lebanon from the Golan Heights. US intelligence officials say they have ‘no doubt’ Hezbollah fired the rocket. And yet, still, the media discussion focusses less on the horror of what Hezbollah did than on the horror of what Israel might do in response.

Everyone’s fretting over an ‘escalation’ in hostilities following the Majdal Shams massacre. ‘Diplomats [are] scrambling to prevent a surge in fighting’, says the NYT. Too late. The surge in fighting already happened. It happened on Saturday when Israel lost 12 of its children to the rocket fire of radical Islamists. There are widespread ‘fears of escalation’ after Saturday, says Reuters. That it printed these words next to a photo of a row of small white coffins containing the remains of the kids murdered by Hezbollah is extraordinary. There’s your ‘escalation’, Reuters. It has already occurred.

https://www.jns.org/en-route-to-beirut/

When 12 kids were slaughtered Saturday in the Golan Heights town of Majdal Shams by an Iranian missile supplied to Hezbollah, Israelis were horrified but not surprised. Given the incessant bombardment of northern Israel—leading to the evacuation months ago of hundreds of families from their homes—mass murder was just a matter of time.

That’s what happens with a policy of containment—a key element of the very “conceptzia” that enabled Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre. If an enemy assault fails to be as deadly as it could have been, Israel doesn’t treat it with the response it deserves. Instead, it prides itself on preventing more casualties thanks to Iron Dome defenses and public obedience to Home Front Command directives.

These include: informing us of how many seconds we have to enter a bomb shelter or safe room when an air-raid siren goes off; instructing us to exit and clear away from our cars when caught by an alarm while driving on the highway, then lie on the asphalt with our hands on our heads; warning us not to photograph interceptions, which can result in injury from falling shrapnel; admonishing us to lock our doors, turn out our lights and close our shutters at the first sign of a potential terrorist invasion; and assuring us that we’ll be the first to know if we need to stock up on supplies ahead of a greater, less temporary threat.

It’s no wonder, then, that our military is called the Israel Defense Forces. Considering the fact that we are surrounded by foes both bent on our destruction and equipped by Tehran to carry it out, one would have thought it appropriate to replace the word “defense” with “offense.”

But no. The IDF boasts of being the most moral army in the world, with a code of ethics fit for local and international kangaroo courtrooms, not soldiers risking their lives to protect the country.

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

Attitudes toward Israel in today’s world can be put into three categories:

1.       It must not continue to exist.

2.       It can exist, but it must not fight.

3.       It can exist, and it can fight.

The first category comprises much of the Muslim world and just about all of the far-left world. The second category corresponds broadly—not always precisely—with official attitudes and policies toward Israel of the United Nations and most Western governments.

The third category comprises mostly conservative governments, parties, and sectors in the Western world.

Although, at the time of Hamas’s October 7 massacre against Israel, the Biden administration seemed to be staunchly in the third category, it eventually began shifting toward the second category and now hovers between the third and the second. While Israel fights on seven fronts of the Iranian ring of fire (Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran itself), the Biden administration’s endlessly repeated mantra is now “ceasefire”—along with all other Western governments that publicly address the issue.

Accordingly, in an effort to discourage Israel from fighting and constrain its ability to do so, since February the Biden administration has been substantially reducing arms shipments to Israel.

Imagine that, say, Belgium—a country roughly the size of Israel—had in less than ten months suffered a massacre and mass kidnapping of its citizens, as well as a constant bombardment of well over 20,000 rockets, missiles, and explosive drones from six different countries. (In Israel’s case, the six countries are Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran; by June 10 more than 19,000 unguided rockets alone had been launched at Israel.)

It would be strange, then, if Belgium—not any of the countries or terror organizations attacking it—were under constant, obsessive pressure for a ceasefire. It would be even stranger if Belgium—not any of those countries or terror organizations—were being charged by two international courts with “genocide” and other severe human rights abuses.

But the push to deny arms to Israel has, by now, gone well beyond the US.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/they-should-be-ashamed-of-themselves-netanyahu-unloads-on-anti-israel-protesters-in-passionate-address-to-congress/

‘They stand with Hamas. They stand with rapists and murderers,’ Netanyahu said, even as anti-Israel protesters congregated outside the Capitol.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu had harsh words for anti-Israel protesters in his Wednesday address to a joint session of Congress, slamming the activists as “useful idiots” for Iran and other bad actors even as they congregated outside the Capitol.

“Defeating our brutal enemies requires both courage and clarity,” he said. “Clarity begins by knowing the difference between good and evil. Yet, incredibly, many anti-Israel protesters choose to stand with evil. They stand with Hamas. They stand with rapists and murderers. They stand with people who come into the kibbutzim — into the home — with the parents and the children, the two babies in the secret attic, and murder the parents, find the secret latch to the attic, find the babies, and they murder them. These protesters stand with them. They should be ashamed of themselves.”

Netanyahu referenced the claims from many anti-Israel protesters that Hamas terrorism constitutes legitimate resistance while Israel’s retaliatory war is out of bounds.

“They refuse to make the simple distinction between those who target terrorists and those who target civilians — between the democratic state of Israel and the terrorist thugs of Hamas,” he told the chamber.

The prime minister stressed in his speech that anti-Israel protesters are not just opposed to the existence of the Jewish state but are anti-American as well.

“These protesters burn American flags even on the Fourth of July,” Netanyahu said. “And I wish to salute the fraternity brothers at the University of North Carolina who protected the American flag — protected the American flag — against these anti-Israel protesters.”

After a brief round of “U-S-A” chants, Netanyahu took aim at Iran, referencing the recent revelation from Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines that the Islamic Republic has been funding campus protests in the United States.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20813/hamas-october-7-reason

The Hamas document [which purports to explain why it massacred 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023] lists a number of reasons, all of which can be easily refuted, as to why the terrorist group launched its attack on Israel.

This claim is totally untrue: there are absolutely no Israeli “plans” to split the Al-Aqsa Mosque into a Jewish and Muslim area or to convert it into a Jewish site.

The purported “plans” exist only in the imagination of Hamas and other Palestinians. It is simply part of a Palestinian campaign of defamation against Israel to try to justify the murder of Jews.

According to the “status quo,” formulated by Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan in 1967, Jews would not be permitted to pray on the Temple Mount but would be able to visit the site.

While Israel has respected the status quo, Muslims have consistently violated it in an apparent attempt to deepen their hold on the holy site.

It is also important to note that Hamas and many Palestinians consider all Jews “settlers,” regardless of whether they live in Tel Aviv, or in a settlement in the West Bank, or in New York.

Hamas further claims that it launched its attack because of “thousands of Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails who are experiencing deprivation of their basic rights.”

Most of the “detainees” Hamas is referring to are convicted terrorists who were imprisoned for murdering or attempting to murder people (usually Jews). For many years, these terrorist prisoners have enjoyed comfortable conditions, especially when it comes to entertainment and leisure. A variety of exercise equipment – including ping-pong tables, stationary bicycles and pull-up bars (in addition to chess) – is available. Each prison cell is equipped with a television, and the prisoners have access to at least 10 channels. Palestinian prisoners, in addition, are entitled to family visits and unlimited access to lawyers.

In contrast, both the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank and the Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip have been accused by human rights organizations of “systematically torturing critics” in detention. A report published by Human Rights Watch in 2022 said: “PA and Hamas security forces routinely taunt and threaten detainees, use solitary confinement and beatings, including whipping their feet, and force detainees into painful stress positions for prolonged periods, including hoisting their arms behind their backs with cables or rope, to punish and intimidate critics and opponents and elicit confessions…”

As of October 7, 2023, an estimated 18,000 – 18,500 residents of the Gaza Strip held work permits issued by the Israeli authorities to enable them to work in Israel, where their pay is five times higher than in Gaza. As noted last month: “Many of those workers to whom Israel opened its doors were apparently working in Israel by day, and by night returning to Gaza and providing Hamas with highly detailed maps and drawings of every house in Israel’s border communities, and reports about everyone in them, including the pet dogs.”

Israel can only conclude that “no good deed goes unpunished.”

Hamas also claims it launched its attack on Israel because of the “seven million Palestinians living in extreme conditions in refugee camps who wish to return to their lands.” If the “refugees” are living in extreme conditions, it is because their leaders have failed to permit the building of new homes for them or to improve their living conditions. There is no reason why “refugee camps” continue to exist under the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, under Hamas in the Gaza Strip or anyplace else.

The same abuse applies to the Arab countries hosting Palestinian “refugees”: Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. What have these countries done to incorporate their Palestinian brethren? Nothing. There is no reason why a Palestinian living in an Arab country should be treated as a “refugee” or a second-class citizen.

Hamas, in its document, is actually stating that it sent its men to murder, rape and kidnap Jews because Israel refused to open its borders to millions of Palestinian “refugees” who are told to murder Jews and destroy the only Jewish state.

Finally, Hamas argues that it launched its attack because of the international community and world powers seeking to “prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.” This claim, of course, is completely false. In fact, most of the international community, including the United States, the EU, Russia and China, have long been pushing hard for the establishment of a Palestinian state.

If anyone is to blame for the failure of the “two-state solution,” it is Hamas and the Palestinian Authority. The leaders of the PA were presented with multiple opportunities to create a state of their own, but each time declined Israel’s offer of peace without so much as a counteroffer.

[I]is laughable to hear Hamas lament the failure of the “two-state solution.” This is an organization whose charter openly calls for waging Jihad (holy war) to obliterate Israel… “Resistance and jihad for the liberation of Palestine will remain a legitimate right, a duty and an honour for all the sons and daughters of our people and our Ummah.” – Article 23, of the “new, improved” Hamas Charter of 2017.

Hamas’s attempt to defend its crimes against Israelis should be seen as part of its attempts to mislead and fool the international community.

The October 7 massacre was orchestrated by Hamas with the sole intent of slaughtering as many Jews as possible as part of its Jihad to destroy Israel. Period.

https://www.jns.org/were-americans-listening-to-netanyahus-message/?_sc=

What Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in his address to a joint meeting of Congress was important. Both Americans and Israelis need to understand that the war in the Gaza Strip is just one front in a conflict with Iran that is, as he rightly said, a battle “between civilization and barbarism.” He gave the best possible argument for Americans to understand that Iran’s fomenting of terrorist wars across the Middle East was a threat to their security. The speech was also a brilliant defense not only of the justness of Israel’s war policy and tactics, but of the Jewish people’s right to live in peace, security and sovereignty in their ancient homeland. 

Far more vital than what he said is whether enough people who matter are prepared to listen to that message and draw the appropriate conclusions. And, much like the outcome of the November election that will have a major impact on the future of U.S.-Israel relations, the answer to that question is yet to be decided.

That’s not just because there were many prominent members of the House and Senate who chose to boycott the speech or the presence of angry mobs of pro-Hamas antisemitic protesters as he spoke. Rather, it is because those who have hurled libelous charges at Israel since it was attacked on Oct. 7 as well as those—in the Biden administration, the media, pop culture and college administrators—who have feared to confront or offend them, don’t understand that they are illustrating America’s most crucial problem as much as their incomprehension of events in the Middle East.

The real argument

In this war “between civilization and barbarism,” those who spread the toxic woke ideologies of critical race theory and intersectionality essentially give aid and comfort to the latter. It’s important to realize that the debate among Americans about Israel isn’t really about its military tactics or the advisability of a ceasefire agreement or even if they comprehend the threat from Iran, key as those topics may be.

https://www.jns.org/congressional-address-reinforces-us-support-for-israel-netanyahus-position-as-leading-statesman/?

Amid a disturbing leadership vacuum in the United States and international institutions, moral leadership from the Jewish state is as critical as ever.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed a joint session of Congress for the fourth time on Wednesday, one more than any other foreign dignitary, surpassing the record of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Netanyahu has reached this milestone for several reasons.

First, it’s due to the importance and strength of the alliance of two of the world’s most consequential democracies in the last 200 years. Second, such a distinction requires the longevity of a leader that has remained in power through the tenures of multiple American presidents. And lastly, a leader would not be invited to return time after time, unless that leader was an exceptional orator and statesman.

Enter Netanyahu.

He arrived amid unprecedented political chaos in the United States, days after President Joe Biden suddenly announced that he would no longer seek re-election and just two weeks after former President Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt.

He also arrived during an unprecedented crisis in Israel, nine months after the horrific Oct. 7 massacre and an ensuing regional war the Jewish state has been fighting on seven fronts. As the conflict has raged on—and even as Israel has gone to extraordinary efforts in urban warfare to reduce civilian casualties to the barest of minimums—mainstream media and international institutions have attempted to delegitimize Israel and undermine American support for Israel, particularly among liberals with libelous claims of war crimes and genocide.