The hard left in Israel tried, but failed, to foil Yom Haatzmaut (Israel Independence Day) this week. It held “torch dousing” instead of “torch lighting” ceremonies, and slammed Israel radio and tv for broadcasting the traditional memorial and celebratory Independence Day events.

Radical left spokespeople especially savaged the prime minister’s speeches at national events, calling him a “dictator who refuses to act according to the voice of reason and morality” and a man who operates “from a desire for revenge, oppression and power.”

Haaretz ran a sourpuss op-ed article demanding “No Celebrations!” “This year, the holiday’s very existence has become intolerable. How is it possible to cope with independence celebrations in a state that turns its back on what makes it a state and defines it as independent?… As long as Israel has not brought back the hostages, any engagement with ‘independence’ is self-deception…”

“(We must) resist celebrating a holiday that has been emptied of meaning, that makes one’s eyes sting from so much falsehood and one’s throat burn from so much insult. We are left with depression felt by every decent Israeli who doesn’t belong to the right, the Netanyahu cult, or the settler/ultra-Orthodox/religious Zionist community.”

Just to be clear who and what it was opposing, the same newspaper ran a screed from a fellow at the Harvard Divinity School which offered a near-theological justification for extinguishing Yom Haatzmaut. “In Israel, Jewish extremists worshipping a god of holy war are getting stronger,” the writer expectorated.

“Since October 7, the flagrantly anti-democratic, morally bankrupt political theology of Israel’s right-wing Jewish radicals, a worldview that justifies the death, starvation, and hunger of Palestinians, is becoming more dominant. Jews in Israel and around the world must confront this desecration of our tradition,” and certainly not celebrate Israel Independence Day.

One of the gods of the atheist, doubtful-Zionist hard left, Prof. Yuval Noah Harari, wrote in Yediot Ahronot that the dark forces of Jewish supremacy and Zionist oppression were on the ascendancy in Israel, posing a threat to Israel’s future and legitimacy. He held out hope that “classic, sane Zionism” could yet win back the country, but in the meantime found little to celebrate on Independence Day.

FORTUNATELY, most Israelis clearly rejected this rejectionist, dangerously debilitating narrative, and set out into Israel’s streets and parks to mark Yom Haatzmaut.

It was marked not as usual, not in wild fanfare or inappropriate rejoicing, not in complacency. Rather, it was marked in subdued appreciation and prayer. In appreciation of Israel’s survival and achievements, and with a prayer that brotherhood, resoluteness, and better leadership will see the country through to great victories.

Of course, Israel never has had the luxury of taking its survival for granted, and this is ever truer this year when Iran and its terrorist proxies are closing in from all directions, and the Ayatollahs in Teheran are close to producing a nuclear bomb. Woke forces are tightening a global diplomatic noose around Israel’s neck.

Also, much of Israel’s northern and southern reaches remain devastated ghost regions from which tens of thousands of Israeli residents remain internally exiled. Men, women, and child hostages are still held by Hamas in Gaza, and precious soldiers are falling in the hell holes of Jabalya. So yes, there is little immediate comfort for Israel on this birthday week.

“Beleaguered” is an appropriate adjective for the current Israeli psyche.

Nevertheless, I sense that 99.9% of Israelis upheld celebration of Yom Haatzmaut this week as a statement of hope. Hatikvah, the hope, has not extinguished. Israel can and should be able to drive beyond the current straits, repairing its internal ills and strengthening its strategic posture.

Rabbi Tamir Granot, head of Yeshivat Orot Shaul in Tel Aviv (who lost a son in the current war), said at a prayer rally this week that “When everything is good, when there is no anger or pain, one doesn’t need hope; it’s possible just to live well. It is precisely when it hurts, when we are angry, when the heart burns, when there is tension, when our children are held captive by cruel enemies, that we need and find that material called hope.”

Naturally and so very correctly, Granot pointed to the extraordinary resilience displayed by Israeli civilians and soldiers in repulsing the Hamas invasion last Simchat Torah, and to the stamina of Israeli society ever since. So very correctly, he warned against the defeatist messaging and internally vicious campaigning that is once again seeping to the fore of Israeli politics today.

He, and others, noted that cancellation of Yom Haatzmaut would have been a moral victory for Israel’s enemies, and also would have been cynical exploitation of the hostage plight to bring down the government. Indeed, the demands for cancelation of Independence Day celebrations were (unsurprisingly) like the demand that Israel unconditionally swallow the outrageous dictates of Hamas for an immediate cease-fire, complete IDF withdrawal from Gaza, and the release of all the terrorists including the Nukhba murderers and rapists.

INSTEAD of such enervating poison, the motivating music that must continue to echo in our ears can come from the inspiring speeches given by bereaved mothers and fathers at Remembrance Day and Independence Day speeches this year.

Some these speeches were based on parting letters left behind by fallen soldiers, expressing absolute faith in the wellsprings of age-old Jewish identity and the future of the State of Israel; letters that exhorted their families to stay the course and celebrate life.

Others, like the stunning speech delivered by Rabbi Menahem Kalmanson at the Israel Prize award ceremony, were based on a deep dive into “brotherhood;” a renewed commitment to national solidarity and love of peoplehood.

Kalmanson was a member of “Team Elhanan,” a family unit which bravely entered Kibbutz Beeri on Oct. 7, fought terrorists, and rescued over 100 members of the kibbutz. The eldest brother, Elhanan, was killed by terrorists after 16 hours of fighting.

Menachem: “This ceremony answers the question ‘Why are we here?’ — a question that echoed throughout the past year as dissension and dispute raged in the country and threatened to tear us apart from within. The question ‘Are we still brothers?’ continued to echo until the sirens of Simchat Torah echoed and our enemies awaiting our demise came out of their trenches and attacked.”

“We did not ask ourselves why we are doing this, settlers going out to save secular kibbutzniks. As my brother Itiel said, “When you know your brother is in danger you don’t really have a choice. ‘I seek my brothers’.”

“At the home of the Meir family in Beeri, Michal Meir refused/feared to open the door for us when we came to rescue her. She did not open the door until I yelled Shma Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echad (Hear oh Israel the Lord our God is One). This was not a prayer, it was a shout: I’m a Jew, I’m here for you, please open the door.” This call, this cry for unity, echoed around the region that day as thousands of soldiers went forward out of a sense of deep responsibility and endangered their lives for their brothers.”

Kalmanson concluded by declaring: “We cannot continue to fight without seeing the good in this nation, as the blood of our brothers cries out from the ground, and we are our brother’s keeper.”

ANOTHER theme that dominated Yom Haatzmaut discourse (about which I have written frequently) was defiance; defiance of the pro-Hamas messaging and anti-Zionist approaches that have taken root in capitals and campuses around the world.

As Prof. Gil Troy has written: “On Israel Independence Day we must negate the misleading, Palestinian-centered tale of woe, and return to the magnificent Jewish story and the Zionist tale of redemption… Our enemies want to make us miserable, to make Israel unlivable, to make Independence Day uncelebrate-able. We cannot allow that to happen…”

“We cannot afford to mourn or mope. We must live the miracle of Israel: freedom, prosperity, dignity, and power… while rejecting the poisoned ivy of the Ivy Leagues…. and we must broadcast our narrative and affirm our rights loudly and proudly, effectively, and creatively.”

To this I add: Let us count our personal and national blessings. Life in Israel is full of meaning, marked by sacrifice, commitment, achievement, and joy; the crucial ingredients that make life satisfying and exciting, and uniquely so for Jews who have long awaited a national return to Zion.

Let us remind ourselves that, until 76 years ago and for the last 2,000 years, the Jewish People had no national home. Instead, it suffered Diaspora, dispersion, degradation, and disaffiliation, even near-extermination. Attempts to annihilate the Jewish People in Israel and to persecute them abroad continue apace, but the People of Israel are no longer defenseless.

So, despite apocalyptic agonizers, demoralized doubters, devious detractors, and fair-weather friends – let us recommit to hope, brotherhood, and aptly deft defiance.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, 17.05.2024 and Israel Hayom 19.05.2024

Back in 2013, the IDF chief-of-staff promulgated a multi-year plan for the Israeli military called “Teuzah” (prowess or fearlessness). That plan accepted a significant decrease in overall funding to the IDF and shifted priorities away from the ground forces in favor of air force and cyber capabilities, intelligence, special operations forces, and stand-off precision fire. This came atop a cut of 25 percent in the ground forces budget between 2002 and 2006.

The IDF chief of staff at the time was Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz.

According to Amir Rapaport, publisher and editor of the military industry-leading Israel Defense magazine, Gantz accepted the relative weakness of the maneuvering capabilities of the ground forces as a given. He did not think that the IDF would need to fight conventional army forces in the foreseeable future, nor have to conduct large-scale ground maneuvers in enemy territory.

Obviously, Gantz and his predecessors and successors (Mofaz, Halutz, Yaalon, Ashkenazi, Eisencott, and Kochavi) – all of whom were party to this grand conceptual error to one degree or another – were dead wrong. It is today quite clear that Israel will likely fight several wars in enemy-held territory over the coming decade.

Responding to Gantz’s mistaken plan in 2013, Dr. Eitan Shamir and Dr. Eado Hecht of the BESA Center warned that “Neglect of the IDF’s ground forces poses a risk to Israel’s security. There are real battles ahead against well-entrenched Hamas and Hezbollah armies.” But back then nobody was listening.

Today it is clear that the IDF needs to knock-back the Iranian-proxy armies and jihadist militias camped on our borders. It needs to go house-by-house and tunnel-by-tunnel to ferret-out and eliminate terrorist cells in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza. It may need to “decommission” Iran’s nuclear enrichment and bomb-making facilities.

Consider the situation in Lebanon. To rout Hezbollah and destroy its missile stockpiles in the coming war Israel will have to reconquer southern Lebanon. Even with the Israel Air Force working intensively from above (including massive leveling of Lebanese infrastructures), Israel could be facing months weeks of real and unrelenting ground combat in the deep valleys and steep mountains of Lebanon where Hezbollah is well dug in. (The Iranian-built and -funded terror army sits on a tunnel and bunker array that reportedly makes the Hamas military infrastructure in Gaza seem like child’s play).

Given America’s stampeding retreat from overseas commitments, the creeping repeal of an American protective diplomatic umbrella for Israel by presidents Obama and Biden, and the newest restrictions on use of US weaponry – Israel may be fighting truly alone.

UNDERSTANDING THIS is particularly relevant as Israel prepares to replace its military and intelligence leadership.

Military Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva has just resigned for his role in the gargantuan failure of October 7, appropriately so. Soon, IDF Chief-of-Staff Herzi Halevi, OC Southern Command Chief Yaron Finkelman, Mossad Chief Dedi Barnea, General Security Service Chief Ronen Bar, and dozens of other senior defense establishment leaders are expected to resign or be sacked, appropriately so.

The question is not only who will replace them but what sort of operational prisms their replacements will bring to the task. And what conceptual prisms will Israel’s politicians lay out for them. (A new set of politicians is necessary too!) And what budgets Israel’s prime minister and defense and finance ministers will allocate for the defense establishment.

Here is a brief list of necessary fixes:

* Manpower: Over the past 40 years, the IDF has shrunk from 15 to 10 divisions. It now needs to grow by at least three divisions. That is 50,000 soldiers more, and tons and tons of military equipment.

* Training: A gargantuan increase in the training of front-line troops is necessary. It is a well-known secret that many of the infantry and armored forces that went into Gaza over the past half-year were insufficiently trained for combat in built-up areas.

It is actually a miracle how well the IDF has fought in Gaza, with mid-level military commanders in the field (the lieutenant colonels, battalion commanders; and the colonels, brigade commanders) learning on the go and quickly bringing their troops up to speed. They are among the true heroes of the current war.

Alas, training is expensive, especially for combined arms high intensity conflict – which involves multiple branches of the military working together. Training of the reserve forces is even more expensive. And unfortunately, budget lines for training are usually the first thing to be cut when the overall military budget is slashed – as it has been in recent decades.

* Platforms: The army needs to reverse the demobilization of armored formations and buy and deploy many more “Namer” armored personnel carriers equipped with the “Iron Fist” active defense system; “Merkava” main battle tanks with the “Trophy” system; and self-propelled artillery guns with the “Thundermaker” system. This will cost hundreds of millions of shekels.

* Ammunition: The IDF used up much of its ammunition reserves over the past six months, especially its stocks of shells for the ground forces and precision-guided missiles for the air force.

While the US has rushed tons of weaponry to Israel, Washington also has held up resupply of some of these munitions at certain times, and there is anyway a global shortage of some firepower like 155mm artillery shells (with the war in Ukraine soaking-up much of the available weaponry). As mentioned above, Israel also now faces increasing restrictions on its use of US-supplied weaponry.

The takeaway is that Israel needs to self-manufacture and the IDF needs to stockpile much larger reserves of weaponry for the lengthy wars of the future with Hezbollah and Hamas. Again, this requires more money with guaranteed funding over a multi-year plan.

Reportedly, Prime Minister Netanyahu has ordered a massive build-up, eight times over the current manufacturing capacity of the Israeli defense industries. Let’s see whether this order is implemented and budgeted appropriately by the next Israeli governments.

* Navy: Elements of radical Islam are gaining control across the eastern Mediterranean basin, from Libya to Syria and Turkey. Israel and Greece are the only Western-oriented countries in the region.

Former Israeli Naval Chief, Admiral (res.) Eliezer “Chiney” Marom, argues that Israel needs a much more powerful navy, with a long reach, to counter the strategic realignments underway, and to protect from terrorist attack the substantial natural gas fields we have discovered at sea.

The Israel Navy wants more than $5 billion in new ships, submarines, weapons systems. and personnel over the next decade for this.

* West Bank: Given that security cooperation with the Palestinian Authority essentially has collapsed, and Mahmoud Abbas’ forces are no match for Hamas and other terrorist mini-armies that have entrenched themselves across Judea and Samaria – Israel needs to pour more troops into policing the territory. This is a big drain on the military system, but without it nobody in greater Tel Aviv or Jerusalem will be safe.

The fact is that Palestinian terrorism is off the charts with organized battalions of terrorist commandoes operating openly in dozens of cities and refugee camps. Take, for example, Nur Shams, a tinpot refugee camp adjacent to Tulkarem in central Israel just over the security barrier. The IDF operated there for four days last week and was unexpectedly met by insane quantities of Palestinian firepower.

(So much for dreams of a “revitalized” Palestinian Authority that would not only truly combat terrorism in the West Bank but also assume responsibility for administering, demilitarizing, and deradicalizing Gaza. Hah!)

* Jordan Valley: Many voices in the defense establishment are calling for the building of a well-fortified security fence along Israel’s long border with Jordan, as has been done along the Sinai, Lebanese, and Golan borders; alongside the permanent stationing of more troops along this strategic seam line.

Iran is actively seeking to undermine the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and take advantage of the porous border between Israel and Jordan to ship weaponry into the West Bank. The fluidity of the political and security situation to our east requires a military buildup in the Jordan Valley, and this needs to be budgeted for expeditiously.

* Iran: If worse comes to worse (and every day indeed it seems that worse news comes from Iran about its nuclear advances and from Washington about its strategic capitulation to Iran), the IDF and IAF may have to act against Iran’s nuclear and missile facilities. Then Israel will have to deal with the fallout from Iran’s retaliation – and the country had better be ready both militarily and on the home front.

This month’s unprecedented Iranian drone and missile attack on Israel proves that Israel needs quite a few more Arrow 2 and 3 anti-missile defense arrays. A small fortune.

Israel’s independence depends on robust defense readiness. And on new military-intelligence leaders with clear-eyed understanding of the situation.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, April 26, 2024; and Israel Hayom, April 28, 2024.

Reading the Israeli and global media, one would think that this week Israel achieved its greatest victory since the Six Day War, successfully stymieing a massive Iranian missile attack. With dozens of videos and hagiographic pilot profiles, the IDF is busy pumping out its technological prowess. In religious circles, there are a thousand memes and essays circulating asserting a divine miracle, no less.

This is poppycock. At best, Israel can record a defensive tactical achievement, perhaps indeed blessed, but not a strategic win. On a strategic level, Israel suffered a whopping loss as Iran pierced, with apparent impunity, American and Israeli deterrence frameworks.

The US president in Washington barked “don’t,” and Jerusalem didn’t believe that Iran would dare to attack Israel directly, but Iran nevertheless dared to do so. The ayatollahs brazenly launched a colossal Russian-style strike package intended to cause considerable damage – the largest one-night drone and missile barrage ever launched in history by one nation against another.

The fact that the attack failed – with 50% of the missiles failing to launch or crashing before reaching their target and 49% more impressively being intercepted by Israel and its allies – is irrelevant from a strategic perspective.

The screeching strategic reality is that Iran has catapulted its 40-year-long war against Israel – a war that has been underway via proxies ever since the Islamic Revolution in 1979 – to a new, stratospheric plateau (literally so, with ballistic missiles flying from Iranian soil through space to hit Israel).

When one realizes what a dramatic watershed moment this is, the fact that the strike did amazingly little damage fades into the background. It is not a pertinent consideration in determining how and with what ferocity Israel should respond.

That is why President Biden’s reported advice to Israel – to “take the win,” as it were, to suck up its indignation, to rely on Western sanctions against Iran alone as “smart retaliation,” and in general to “avoid escalation” – is outrageous and dangerous nonsense.

And compounding his failure to deter Iran from directly attacking Israel, Biden has now added to the potential further collapse of any deterrence against Iran by declaring that he seeks no confrontation with Iran and will not participate in any Israeli retaliatory strike at Iran. This is strategic insanity of grandiose proportions!

When America fears escalation more than Iran does, the path towards grand Western defeat is clear. If Israel fears escalation more than Iran does, Tehran will march all the way to Jerusalem with even greater and grander attacks.

One can be certain that Tehran can and will build more successful strike packages in the future designed to overwhelm Israel’s defenses. It will try again and again, just as Hamas has launched repeated rocket wars against Israel over the past 20 years, each time with a larger number of longer-range and more accurate rockets.

Imagine if only one of the eight ballistic missiles (out of 120) that managed to penetrate Israeli defenses last Saturday night had fallen not in and around a well-protected airbase in the barren Negev but on a high-rise building in Tel Aviv? What if that one ballistic missile had hit the nuclear reactor in Dimona, which is near that airbase? What if that one ballistic missile had been nuclear tipped? What if Israel had no advance notice of another such Iranian attack (which it did have this time) in order to mount a robust air-defense plan?

Remember that every single warplane in the Israeli arsenal was in the air for eight straight hours this past Saturday night, along with warplanes and flying intelligence platforms from four Western air forces and reportedly several allied Arab air forces, plus all reserve components of Israel’s air defense array (Iron Dome, David’s Sling, Arrow 2 and 3, and the like). This is certainly not something that will necessarily be in place every time Iran decides to take a direct, unannounced poke at Israel in the future.

DETERRENCE is a tricky task, a defense and diplomatic act that is hard to achieve. It is a construct that requires constant maintenance or else it dissipates. Psychologically, deterrence is measured by “subsequent behavior,” meaning that the Iranian attack will be considered successful if it dissuades Israel from future attacks against Iranian leaders and assets.

Conversely, the Iranian attack will be considered unsuccessful – not because the damage it intended was prevented – if Israel continues to target Iranian leaders and assets inside Iran and around the region. Such offensives are necessary to prevent Tehran’s hegemonic ambitions and nuclear military effort.

The worst possible thing for Israel’s deterrent posture is for a perception of Israel “being stuck” to take root in Tehran and/or around the world. The unhealthiest situation involves Israel being “stuck,” not moving forward, in crushing Hamas in Gaza (Rafah), in confronting Hezbollah in Lebanon, in suppressing terror cells in Judea and Samaria, in targeting IRGC emplacements in Syria, and in sabotaging nuclear facilities in Iran.

Being stuck in a situation in which Israel is diplomatically or militarily hampered in every direction by well-meaning but weak allies or by supremely confident Shiite mullahs and their Russian ally is an unacceptable and perilous position for Israel. Instead, Israel needs to become “unstuck” to free itself from stale strategic paradigms and insufferable diplomatic handcuffs that dominated before October 7 and April 14 – two dates that constitute watershed moments for Israel.

IN GENERAL, I sense that Israel’s strategic goals have become too limited in recent decades, hamstrung by the failed Oslo peace process with Palestinians and the failed Obama peace process with Iranians. These gambits emphasized quiet, co-option, deflation, and survival at the expense of principle, dominance, and victory. They brought about cowering postures instead of the appropriately necessary offensive postures.

As a result, at this very moment, Israel is being pressed by its fainthearted friends to abandon its goal of liquidating Hamas, to instead prioritize humanitarian provisions for the enemy population, to downgrade its rage over the invasion, murder, abuse, and humiliation of its citizens, including kidnapped Israelis held hostage for more than six months, and to acquiesce in the release of Palestinian terrorists and butchers (including the “Nukhba” marauders of Hamas.

Israel is also being pressed to absorb Hezbollah’s continued blows, including the depopulation of northern Israel, to settle for another worthless, airy-fairy diplomatic “settlement” that will only perpetuate the Iranian threat from southern Lebanon, and to refrain from “escalatory retaliation” for the April 14 earthquake-level Iranian assault on Israel.

Were they to be adopted, these policies, taken together, would amount to a grand strategic defeat for Israel. They would constitute a straitjacket that puts Israeli survival – yes, Israel’s very survival! – at risk, which brings into question Israel’s power to persevere as an independent nation in the Middle East. Were they to be adopted by Israel, these policies, taken together, would inevitably crash Israel as a resilient, buoyant society and a prosperous, leading economy that contributes so much to the world.

The Biden administration’s current campaign to delay, dissuade, and eventually preclude further military conquest in Gaza and to delay, dissuade, and eventually preclude further confrontation with Iran, accompanied by persistent threats to deny Israel diplomatic backing and weapons if Jerusalem does not heed Washington’s warnings, are formulas for grand defeat. As such, they must be resisted.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, April 20, 2024; and Israel Hayom, April 21, 2024.

According to unassailable and well-reported Israeli and American intelligence estimates, the monarchy of Qatar has provided at least $2 billion to its Moslem Brotherhood affiliate Hamas in recent years. The vast majority of this funding has been invested in building terror attack tunnels and manufacturing rockets and missiles for war against Israel.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post of Friday, April 5. Instead, 7,000 words of reporting from the capital of Qatar by the newspaper’s editor-in-chief (see here and here) would have you believe that “the humanitarian aid” and financial support Qatar has provided to the Gazans is “commonly misinterpreted.”

Qatar’s billions for Gaza, according to the Post, “often labeled as aid to Hamas,” has in fact “been actions taken at the request of the Israeli and US governments, targeted specifically at the poorest families in Gaza” and “meticulously coordinated” with the IDF Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories to reach them. All this is designed, so Qatar says, to “foster dialogue rather than support Hamas ideologies and actions.”

The Post even offers its readers a lengthy primer in Qatari mathematical chicanery, to wit $10 million a month flows from Doha to poor families in Gaza, $20 million a month is dedicating to purchasing fuel for Gaza, and $35 is transferred monthly to pay the salaries of supposedly more acceptable Fatah-led Palestinian Authority in Gaza (none of whom actually work in government in Gaza). The Post does not bother to do the elementary math which would expose the millions more lavished on Hamas’ military.

In the massive array of Hamas subterranean terror attack tunnels in Gaza that the IDF has entered over the past six months, Israel has found thousands of pieces of weaponry, technological hardware, and documentary evidence of Iran’s material supply networks and military training regimes for Hamas, and Qatar’s multi-layered funding channels for Hamas.

This includes full access to Doha’s banking and investment sectors for globally sanctioned Hamas operatives and money men, as well as luxurious refuge for Hamas leaders.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post last Friday. Instead, according to the JPost articles Qatar is a benevolent and honorable country “striving for a larger purpose on the world stage.”

Qatar actively backs terrorist groups across the Middle East and around the world including the Taliban, Hezbollah, Al-Nusra (Al-Qaeda) in Syria, the Houthi in Yemen, Al-Shabab in Somalia, ISIS and Iran’s man Shiite proxies in Iraq, and terrorist groups in Libya and Algeria. It also funds radical Moslem Brotherhood groups in Europe and America.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post last Friday. Instead, we are told that the al-Thani kleptocracy merely “aims at fostering stability in a tumultuous region,” almost heroically “facilitates sustainable solutions from Afghanistan to Yemen and Lebanon,” and plays a helpful, “intricate” role in global security.

The Qatar-based and fully funded Al Jazeera television network is an evil empire. It glorifies Hamas, including its “heroic” massacres of October 7 and ongoing “resistance” against Israel, and all forms of Iranian proxy terrorism against Israel. It aids Hamas by reporting on IDF troop movements in Gaza and on IDF forces concentrated along the Gaza border. It actively drums-up terrorism against Israelis in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv too, with special efforts during Ramadan. Al Jazeera also is a reliable platform for naked antisemitism and explicit Holocaust denial.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post last Friday. All you would know is that Qatar is blandly “influential through its Al Jazeera Media network.” (A sidebar article by another Post reporter gently allows that Al Jazeera reports lies about Israel and Jews.)

Instead, the Post offers-up an unnamed senior American diplomatic source to tell us that Qatar “is one of the good guys,” that Qatar is “crucial,” no less, for Israel’s security and existence, and that Israel “won’t be able to survive” without cooperating with Qatar.

Wow. Good that the Post reports this, because I really did not know that Israel’s very existence depends on the good graces of Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.

In the horrible, ongoing saga of trying to obtain release of the more than one hundred Israeli hostages held by Hamas in Gaza, Qatar has acted a go-between mediator. Since it funds Hamas and hosts Hamas “political” leadership in Doha, it purportedly has channels of communication to Hamas and influence over Hamas.

But had Qatar really wanted to pressure Hamas into a hostage release deal, it might have, for example, threatened to expel Hamas leaders from Doha or cut-off their funding. There is no indication that Sheikh Al Thani has even contemplated this.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post last Friday. Instead, we were fed Qatari propaganda about a deal for the hostages that supposedly was obtainable in the first or second week of the war but was ignored by Israel.

The “viable deal” that was “missed” by Israel would have freed all (at least civilian) hostages while leaving Yihye Sinwar and his henchmen in charge of Gaza without any Israeli military action, alongside the release of thousands of Palestinian terrorists from Israeli jails. It was all in hand, thanks to the wise and so-well-meaning Qataris; just dumb Israel rejected the magnanimous deal.

The Jerusalem Post ran this Qatari fiction in its lead headline. (Again, in a sidebar article, some skepticism of this ridiculous report was allowed to creep into the newspaper, but the masthead told the Qatari tale.)

Qatar has invested many tens of billions of dollars in Western cultural, sporting, and academic institutions, and bought-up vast tracts of American and European real estate, all in a quite successful attempt to immunize itself from criticism and to very successfully distort teachings and research about the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Awash in Qatari cash, US university campuses in particular have become incubators for Moslem Brotherhood interests and radical Islamic indoctrination. The wild anti-Israel riots of recent months on these campuses are a direct result of long-term Qatari influence. The rise of antisemitic and genocidal-against-Israel rhetoric in American academia has gone hand-in-hand with Qatari funding.

But you would not know this from reading The Jerusalem Post last Friday. Not at all. None of this rated even a whisper of a mention in the profile published about Qatar. Nor were Qatar’s super-tight ties with Iran and its proven money-laundering for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and its Qods Force commandoes.

All this has been documented by the Middle East Research Institute (MEMRI), the Counter Extremism Project, the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, the Misgav Institute for National Security, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, and other solid sources. But there was no room over 7,000 words and three full pages of Post reporting to refer to this.

The bottom line: Qatar is a fundamentally dangerous and disingenuous actor which falsely presents itself as an honest broker, a moderating influence, and a friend of the West, even of Israel. Israeli newspapers ought not fall hook, line, and sinker for this sinister fairytale.

Published in The Jerusalem Post 12.04.2024 and Israel Hayom 15.04.2024

The targeted assassination this week in Damascus – allegedly by Israel – of Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi, commander of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Forces in Syria and Lebanon, was long overdue.

As part of its post-October 7 updated doctrine of security, Israel can no longer make do with fighting Iran’s proxies but rather must target Iran itself in response to Tehran’s key role in the current attacks on Israel and destabilization of the region. Israel must now strike directly within Iran, while also taking further action against the Quds Force. Iran’s self-perceived shield of impunity must be pierced.

Unfortunately, the Biden administration purposefully continues to misinterpret Iran’s proxy warfare. Blindly, willfully, and wrongly, Washington asserts that Iran “lacks full control over its proxies.” (This was said in the context of Kataib Hezbollah’s responsibility for the recent drone attack in Jordan that killed three Americans soldiers.) It refuses to finger Iran for all its escalatory muckraking, as detailed below.

Washington prefers to make nice and dream that Iran will calm down. Sure enough, the Biden administration rushed to assure Tehran this week that it had no advance knowledge of or responsibility for the hit on Mohammad Reza Zahedi.

The administration is sticking to its “strategy” (if you can call it that) of “restoring trust” with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, to smooth the way towards a return to former president Barack Obama’s rotten nuclear deal with Iran – the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action – and to avoid further conflict with Iranian-backed rebels in Iraq and Yemen who threaten both American troops and global shipping and security.

For those who have not been paying sufficient attention, here is a summary of the Iranian record.

• Iran is carving out a corridor of control – a Shiite land bridge – stretching from the Arabian (“Persian”) Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea, including major parts of Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, under the control of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and its Qods Force, various Shiite militias, and the Hezbollah organization. This corridor gives Iran a broad strategic base for aggression across the region.

• Iran is establishing air and naval bases on the Mediterranean and Red seas, and especially in Syria, to project regional power. It has also stepped-up its harassment of international shipping and Western naval operations in the Persian Gulf. Iranian UAVs and missiles endanger civilian flights across the region, too.

• Iran’s proxy army in Yemen, the Houthi rebels, seeks control of the Horn of Africa and the entrance to the Red Sea – a critical strategic chokepoint on international shipping. In recent months, the Houthis have struck more than 40 times at commercial ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Eden, through which almost 15% of global seaborne trade usually passes.

• More than 100 American service members suffered traumatic brain injuries from an Iranian ballistic missile strike on US troops in Iraq, four years ago. Last year, Tehran’s proxies in Yemen struck at a base in the UAE housing American military forces; and Iranian proxies struck at US targets in Iraqi Kurdistan and Syria. These attacks are part of Iran’s effort to evict America from the Middle East and coerce US partners into accommodating the Islamic Republic. 

• Iran is fomenting subversion in Mideast counties that are Western allies, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan. It is particularly focused on destabilizing the Hashemite regime in Jordan to gain access to Israel’s longest border (its border with Jordan) and from there to penetrate Israel’s heartland. Israel this month rushed troops to the northern Jordan Valley following indications that Iraqi Shiite militia groups supported by Iran planned to invade Israel via Jordan and conduct a large-scale terror attack against Israeli communities near the border, like the October 7 attacks by Hamas.

• Iran is threatening Israel with war and eventual destruction. The Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khomenei, regularly refers to Israel as a cancerous tumor in the Middle East that must be removed and speaks of the complete liberation of Palestine (meaning the destruction of Israel) through holy jihad.

• Iran has armed enemies on Israel’s northern border (Hezbollah and most recently, also Hamas in Lebanon), southern border (Hamas and Islamic Jihad), and terrorist undergrounds in the West Bank. It has equipped Hezbollah with an arsenal of over 150,000 missiles and rockets aimed at Israel and supplied Hamas with the arms and rockets that fueled four significant military confrontations with Israel over the past decade. Since October 7, Hezbollah has struck over 3,000 times at Israel, essentially depopulating the upper Galilee. These attacks have killed ten IDF soldiers and reservists as well as eight Israeli civilians.

• There is dispute as to the extent of Iran’s foreknowledge of the October 7 Hamas attack, but Hamas would not have been capable of the attack without the systematic assistance it has been receiving from Tehran for decades. My colleague Dr. Yossi Mansharof has exposed the boasting of Iranian leaders (like Esmaeil Kowsari of the Iranian Majles Foreign Affairs and Security Committee, and formerly a high-ranking commander in the IRGC) about the involvement of former Qods Force leader Qasem Soleimani (who was assassinated by the US in January 2020) in the planning of the Hamas attack and the build-up of its forces.

• In the massive array of Hamas subterranean terror attack tunnels in Gaza, the IDF has found millions of pieces of weaponry, technological hardware, and documentary evidence of Iran’s multi-layered funding channels, material supply networks, and military training regimes for Hamas.

• Iran is sponsoring terrorism against Western, Israeli, and Jewish targets around the world, including unambiguous funding, logistical support, planning and personnel for terrorist attacks that span the globe, from Buenos Aires to Burgas. Iran maintains an active terrorist network of proxies, agents, and sleeper cells worldwide. (It again is threatening to unleash these operatives against Jewish and Israeli diplomatic targets “in response” to the strike on Zahedi.)

• Iran is building a long-term nuclear military option, with enrichment and armament facilities buried deep underground. According to the IAEA, Iran has enriched uranium to near-bomb-ready levels (84%, which is close to the 90% level necessary for a nuclear weapon) and in recent months has tripled its accumulation of weapons-grade uranium, enough for production of an estimated six nuclear weapons within four weeks.

• Iran is developing a formidable long-range missile arsenal of great technological variability, including solid and liquid propellant ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and ICBMs. The latest Iranian ICBM, called the “Khorramshahr,” seems to be based on the North Korean BM25 missile with a range of 3,500 km. The entire Iranian ballistic missile program is in violation of United Nations Security Council prohibitions.

• Like his predecessors, US President Biden has pledged that he will never allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon. But American military leaders now say only that the US “remains committed Iran will not have a fielded nuclear weapon” (– Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley to Congress in March 2023). This suggests that the Biden administration is now prepared to tolerate developed nuclear weapons in Iran’s hands, provided the weapon is not “fielded,” in other words, deployed.

• Iran is providing Russia with armed attack drones for President Putin’s war against Ukraine. Experts presume that in return Iran will be getting sophisticated Russian military technologies such as aerial defense systems and fighter jets for its wars against Israel and pro-Western Arab regimes in the Mideast.

• Overall, Iran is strengthening its ties to Russia and China, and tightening ties to Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Armenia as part of a unified front against what it calls the “Great Satan,” America, and the “Small Satan,” Israel.

Sorely missing is a US strategy to combat the evil influence and hegemonic ambitions of the mullahs. Prof. Walter Russell Mead has warned that “As Washington shrugs at challengers like China and Iran, world leaders make other plans like partnering with China and Iran.”

But Jerusalem cannot ignore Iran’s pincer war on Israel, its circling of Israel with strangulating “rings of fire,” its drive to enervate and destroy Israel.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, April 5, 2024; and Israel Hayom, April 8, 2024. 

There is a new, insidious and demeaning narrative taking root in Washington and other Western capitals, as well as in the international media, about Israelis. The storyline is that Israelis are too shocked and wounded by the Hamas attacks of October 7 to think straight; that they are too “traumatized” by the massacres of Simchat Torah to move smartly towards the “necessary and inevitable” two-state solution.

In this account, Israelis are too angry and revengeful to realize that Palestinian statehood is in their own self-interest. Accordingly, the politically correct class of international experts will have to impose Palestinian statehood on Israel for its own good, which it is too “traumatized” to clearly see.

A classic example of such patronizing, condescending analysis was the front-page New York Times story last weekend by Steven Erlanger, its star chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe, “who has reported from over 120 countries, including Thailand, France, Israel, Germany and the former Soviet Union.”

Erlanger “reported from Jerusalem, Army Base Julis, Tel Aviv, and Beersheba to try to get a sense of Israel’s mood four months into the war against Hamas.” His conclusion: Israelis are too “traumatized” to move forward. The word “traumatized” appeared no less than six times in his story.

Israelis are “newly vulnerable, traumatized, and mistrustful,” and therefore, “the idea of a Palestinian state seems further away than ever, as Israel’s Jews move rightward (and its Palestinians fear a backlash),” opined the chief European diplomatic correspondent.

A similar snooty analysis appeared yesterday in Foreign Affairs (the prestigious journal of the New York-based Council on Foreign Affairs, which reflects mainstream Democratic administration thinking). The inveterate US peace processor Martin Indyk pumps for the “resurrection of the two-state solution” as the inexorable, logical result of the latest Hamas-Israel “clash.” Sure enough, he argues that the US has to help Israel move past the “trauma that all Israelis suffered on October 7.”

Indyk’s advice to US President Joe Biden is to “make clear the choice facing Israelis.” They can continue on the road to a forever war with the Palestinians, or they can embrace a US day-after plan for solve-all Palestinian statehood and peace with Saudi Arabia. Biden, he argues, should pitch the deal directly to the Israeli public in a way that “would shift its attention from the trauma of October 7.”

So, this is all that needs doing. America and the well-meaning world, whose statesmen are thinking astutely (unlike Israel’s backwards leaders and tormented public), have to “shift Israeli attention” from the “traumas” of attack by Hamas!

They must massage Israeli feelings, give Israel a big hug, offer soothing “guarantees” of Palestinian demilitarization (even though Israel has been given such generous assurances before; remember the halcyon Oslo Accords?), and then nudge (force) Israel “forward” towards the good-old familiar and prudent two-state “solution.”

But what if Israelis are not “traumatized” by October 7, but rather animated and alert? What if they are not intellectual weaklings, wounded babies who have to be coddled and coaxed into making adult decisions? What if Israelis are thinking straight?

Could it be that after 30 years of peace process perfidies and assaults, Israelis have reached intelligent, realistic conclusions that are different than those of Martin Indyk or US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken? Perhaps they have judiciously determined that, at least in the near term, Palestinian statehood is the wrong policy; that this would only give a prize to the genocidal terrorists?

What if Israelis think that only when the well-armed (by Iran) enemies on their southern and northern borders are resoundingly defeated (and this may take a decade of warfare) can a moderate compromise peace emerge?

What if Israelis have coldly concluded that only when the Palestinian national movement is deradicalized (and this might take a decade or more of tough medicine) might a diplomatic deal be possible? And what if a grand takeaway is that less-threatening long-term alternatives must replace the so-called EKP (“every knows paradigm”) involving full-scale, runaway Palestinian statehood?

Yes, Israelis indeed are wounded and angry. However, this has sharpened their thinking, not clouded it. In my view, Israelis hold pertinent, well-rooted understandings of their diplomatic challenges and opportunities. They are informed and enlightened, reenergized patriotically, determined to defeat all enemies and to rebuild Israel more magnificently than ever. They remain ready to grab diplomatic breakthroughs where such are realistically possible.

Let us be clear: Israelis are not enfeebled, immobilized, or confused. They will not brook global contempt.

Another parallel, sinister narrative that can be heard here and there is that Israeli “rage” has dictated IDF battlefield behavior; that the Israeli military has gone berserk, bombing the hell out of Gaza indiscriminately – and committing war crimes along the way.

In the immediate aftermath of the Hamas massacres and rapes, the world “understood” this rage and swallowed the furious IDF counter-assault, but now Israeli “rage” has taken the fight too far. So goes the storyline.

This false, malicious tale must be debunked, too. The opposite is true: Israel has kept its “rage” firmly in check. Its military has fought against Hamas in Gaza with precision and professionalism, accepting upon itself restrictions and limitations far beyond that of any army in history – anywhere, under any circumstances. Unchained rage using Israel’s full firepower would have looked vastly different.

Here too, the insinuation of Israeli “rage” driving government policy and military operations is superciliousness; an arrogant attempt to paint Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his war cabinet as dangerous actors, as out-of-control lawless children that must be corralled into reason (or prison).

Again, Israel cannot brook such global contempt. By and large, Israelis say to the world: Keep your chutzpah in check. Do not try to lord over Israel with your mistaken assumptions and smug solutions. Israel more than deserves the benefit of the doubt as it fights for its long-term security and makes apt decisions about the right radius of diplomacy.

Published in the Jerusalem Post,  February 23, 2024.

From a historical point of view, the deadly drone attack that resulted in the death of three American soldiers in Jordan did not necessarily reflect an escalation in the relationship between Iran and the U.S.

 However, it did reflect the expansion of attacks carried out by pro-Iranian Iraqi militias against the U.S. in recent months in Iraq and Syria.

 Since the 1980s, Iran has been promoting a terrorist campaign against the U.S. as a central anchor in its ambition to achieve regional hegemony and push the U.S. from the region.

 In 1983, through Hezbollah, Iran committed a deadly incendiary attack against the bases of the multinational force in Beirut, where 241 American soldiers and 58 French soldiers were killed. Its leading role in the attack was revealed by the American National Security Agency (NSA), which intercepted a transmission from the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence to the Iranian ambassador in Damascus in which the order was passed to encourage the attack carried out by Hezbollah and with the help of Iranian Revolutionary Guards Forces.

 Since Iran activated its strategy of proxy warfare, in a process spanning decades, it has established and nurtured an impressive array of militias and Shiite and Sunni terrorist organizations in the Middle East, all financed, trained, and armed by Tehran. This is how it managed to fight the U.S. (and its main rivals in the region, Israel and Saudi Arabia) while not being attacked in return, except for the assassination of Qassem Soleimani in January 2020.

 During the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), Iran used this proxy network to fight Saddam Hussein and to punish Saudi Arabia and the U.S. for their support in Iraq. In the 1990s, the network of proxies expanded to al-Qaeda, which received significant aid from Tehran for the devastating attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (August 7, 1998), in which 224 civilians were killed and 4,000 were injured.

 After the American invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Iranian terrorist sponsorship also included the Taliban (albeit to a lesser extent), which received funding, training, and military personnel to fight the Americans.

 In the Iraq War (2003-2011), Iran operated a terrorist array that included four Shiite militias and two Sunni ones; its goal was to prevent the U.S. from establishing a forward base where they could operate militarily against Tehran. According to a 2019 assessment by the Pentagon, through an activation of proxies, Iran was responsible for the killing of 608 American soldiers and contractors during the Iraq War.

 One decade later, during the Syrian civil war, Iran expanded its network of proxies and succeeded in preventing the ouster of Assad. They accomplished this by sending in a variety of Iraqi Shia militias, an Afghani militia, a Pakistani militia, and the Lebanese Hezbollah to Syria.

 In recent months, statements from Tehran and Shia militias in Iraq have asserted that attacks against Americans in Iraq and Syria will stop if the U.S. instructs Israel to stop the war in Gaza. This leaves no room for doubt about Iran’s standing behind these attacks. They are carried out by the group Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which also accepted responsibility for the attack in Jordan. This organizational framework includes several pro-Iranian militias in Iraq; chief among them is Kataib Hezbollah, the spearhead of the Iranian formation in Iraq.

 Since the drone attack, in various briefings to the American media, the Biden administration has signaled its intention not to engage in a conflict with Iran. Indeed, immediately after the attack, senior Iranian officials rushed to emphasize that Tehran was not related to the responsible organization, though it did welcome it.

 Differentiating Iran from its affiliates is an essential part of the Iranian strategy of proxy warfare. Accordingly, the American retaliatory attacks in Syria, Iraq and Yemen focus only on IRGC-backed militias, and aren’t likely to cause an escalation between the U.S. and Iran.

 Basically, the Biden administration is absolving Tehran of responsibility for its terrorist proxies. The administration still seeks to “restore trust” between Tehran and Washington, with the ultimate aim of restoring the JCPOA nuclear deal from President Obama’s time in office.

 Published by i24news 06.02.2024

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The evacuation of communities from the Gaza Envelope settlements, including the city of Sderot, following the events of October 7^th  – and the ruin left in the area in their wake – is a traumatic event for the settlers, a scar in the soul of the Israeli people, evidence to what many perceive as a disgraceful failure of the State’s systems, and no less importantly, a substantial psychological achievement for Hamas, the Palestinians, and our other enemies in the area. Every day that the Western Negev stands devoid of its residents amplifies the enemy’s achievements, provides further tailwind for its continued struggle against Israel, and further incentivizes it to continue on the path of terrorism, and to support its inciters and sponsors.

Settlement in this area, and along the Israeli border as a whole, is part of the Zionist ethos of inhabiting and defending Israel, reclaiming and making agricultural use of the land – both as a value and as a crucial component of the State’s economy and resilience. Any delay in restoring the settlements of the Gaza Envelope to their former glory – and in expanding, developing, and supporting them – further erodes the Zionist ethos.

No less importantly, though – any delay in restoring this region, returning its citizens to their rightful place, and making it thrive again serves to deepen the crisis of faith between these residents and the State and its institutions, as well as the crisis of faith between Israeli society and its leadership – all while making the physical and mental scars of the evacuated residents run even deeper. This, of course, is compounded by the economic aspects of this ongoing situation – partially due to the direct costs of hosting thousands of families in hotels, but mostly due to indirect costs from loss of income, the impaired production capability and continuous supply of agricultural produce, and the future indirect costs of the mental and physical rehabilitation of those thousands of families and of entire communities.

Thus, as the fighting in the Gaza Strip advances and operational achievements accumulate, it would be prudent to bring the residents back to the Gaza Envelope settlements. As published in early January, some of the residents at the Hof Ashkelon and Shaar HaNegev regional councils have already started returning to their homes. Now, however, is a good time to systematically act to restore the settlements in their entirety – something that harbors much significance for a variety of reasons, including reasons of state sovereignty and regional security, community and personal aspects, the psychological and national resilience element – and finally, for economic reasons.

The State of Israel must reassert its sovereignty over the entire country, including the Gaza Envelope. Reasserting sovereignty and security is fundamental to the State’s duties towards its citizens. Thus, we must act quickly to exercise sovereignty and restore our hold over the areas of the nation that were evacuated and abandoned. To this end, two fundamental terms must be met – the first of which is disrupting the capabilities of Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorist organizations to attack the settlements. The IDF’s mounting achievements and the building of a security buffer and military defense envelope will make it very difficult for the enemy to launch infiltration or standoff firing attacks in the direction of the settlements – and will eventually, through a prolonged process, negate its capabilities for massive rocket fire towards the settlements as well. The IDF had already begun implementing a broad-scope plan to defend the settlements and respond to their security needs by reinforcing the settlements’ rapid response teams, providing proper equipment and regular training, alongside integration of the IDF’s area defense into the settlements and installation of various deterrents such as indicative fences, smart cameras, Command and Control rooms, etc.

An important tool for restoring sovereignty and security would be growing the population of the Gaza Envelope area through reviving the Nahal program and establishing Nahal settlements in the Gaza Envelope area – after two decades during which not a single Nahal settlement was established and converted into a civilian settlement. Beyond increasing the population, further settlement of the area by Nahal core groups would enable reclaiming this geographical era in a productive and principled manner, serving as a lodestone for a reformed ethos of pioneering, inhabiting and working the land, alongside active defense of the area – the sickle and the sword as a foundation for volunteering and harnessing the national spirit to establish new settlements and restore security to the area.

In the personal-community aspect, keeping entire communities out of their natural environment may jeopardize their social cohesion and their ability to recover from the traumatic event. The sooner these communities return to their settlements, rehabilitate them, and establish routines of daily life, the more effective their recovery process will be.

In the national context, the settlements thriving and prospering once again will constitute a victory for the State of Israel – radiating strength both inwards into Israeli society and outwards, demonstrating the resilience of Israeli society and its perseverance in the Zionist endeavor. The residents’ return to the Gaza Envelope settlements will also boost the recovery of the area’s community and education systems – including that of schools, other educational institutions, medical services, public transport, and a variety of needful community services. This process cannot be serial – it must occur concurrently with the residents’ return and brooks no delay. In this manner, community systems could be rehabilitated in a vibrant, healthy way.

One cannot underestimate the importance of the psychological dimension. Restoring and developing settlements will necessarily radiate on the Israeli society’s sense of capability, on trust in the State’s institutions and its capability to recover from severe trauma and devastation whilst harnessing national resources and capabilities for planning and execution – and no less importantly – on the sense of cohesion, solidarity, and mutual responsibility. All these are expressions and aspects of social and national resilience. National resilience is a fundamental and essential component of national strength – and thus, of national security in its broad sense. We cannot ignore the difficulties and the trauma caused by the events of October 7^th, or their impact on our sense of capability, security, trust, and resilience. Since October 7^th, Israeli society has gone a long way in the process of rehabilitation and recovery – but the process cannot be completed without restoring settlement, exercising sovereignty, re-establishing communities, agriculture, and industry in the area – and in particular, continuing its development and expansion as an appropriate Zionist reply to the bloodthirsty destructiveness that Hamas demonstrated during the murderous terrorist attack of October 7^th. Through its communities, Israeli settlement shall set exercising sovereignty and reclamation of the land through agricultural work against Hamas’ destructive efforts. Renewing the settlement efforts, restoring them to their former glory, developing and expanding them will constitute the true Israeli victory in this war – the triumph of the Zionist ethos of building and development, reclaiming and settling the land, over Hamas’ ethos of ruin and devastation.

Finally, the return of the Gaza Envelope’s residents to their homes holds economic significance of the highest order, for several reasons. First, the direct costs of hosting evacuated individuals in alternative residences and in hotels and guest houses.  An analysis of the proposal for increasing the 2023 budget suggests that the scope of addition to the budget required to support the expenditures of assisting evacuated individuals was more than ILS 6 billion. [1] This budget is expected to grow even further in 2024. Diverting funds from direct aid to the evacuated individuals into developing and rehabilitating the Gaza Envelope settlements will yield great returns and generate income for the national economy, made possible by restoring the Gaza Envelope’s economy to a functional state – albeit partially, at first. Second – bringing the residents back would necessitate the provision of economic benefits – both for individual residents and on the community-settlement level. The State is required to invest in developing the area and the settlements, and to provide a variety of economic benefits in the form of tax breaks, grants, and aid in developing settlements, in a manner that would serve all national needs. This investment should be considered a substantial part of the war costs and one of the tools for winning it.

Many residents will wish to return to their homes as soon as possible, given the right conditions. The right time is now, and we must act to return the settlers to the Gaza Envelope. Uprooting these communities from their settlements was a necessary evil at the start of the war, but now we must put our full strength behind making these settlements prosper again. The leadership of the State must take the reins on this national challenge – this national mission –through relevant government ministries and State institutions. It is also the time for local leadership and community leadership – as well as for the communities themselves and their settlers – to shine. Now is the time for pioneers to take the van – the time for the nation to step forward in its journey to rise again and make its way towards the establishment of Israel 2.0. [2]

Settlement in this area, and along the Israeli border as a whole, is part of the Zionist ethos of inhabiting and defending Israel, reclaiming and making agricultural use of the land – both as a value and as a crucial component of the State’s economy and resilience. Any delay in restoring the settlements of the Gaza Envelope to their former glory – and in expanding, developing, and supporting them – further erodes the Zionist ethos.

No less importantly, though – any delay in restoring this region, returning its citizens to their rightful place, and making it thrive again serves to deepen the crisis of faith between these residents and the State and its institutions, as well as the crisis of faith between Israeli society and its leadership – all while making the physical and mental scars of the evacuated residents run even deeper. This, of course, is compounded by the economic aspects of this ongoing situation – partially due to the direct costs of hosting thousands of families in hotels, but mostly due to indirect costs from loss of income, the impaired production capability and continuous supply of agricultural produce, and the future indirect costs of the mental and physical rehabilitation of those thousands of families and of entire communities.

Thus, as the fighting in the Gaza Strip advances and operational achievements accumulate, it would be prudent to bring the residents back to the Gaza Envelope settlements. As published in early January, some of the residents at the Hof Ashkelon and Shaar HaNegev regional councils have already started returning to their homes. Now, however, is a good time to systematically act to restore the settlements in their entirety – something that harbors much significance for a variety of reasons, including reasons of state sovereignty and regional security, community and personal aspects, the psychological and national resilience element – and finally, for economic reasons.

The State of Israel must reassert its sovereignty over the entire country, including the Gaza Envelope. Reasserting sovereignty and security is fundamental to the State’s duties towards its citizens. Thus, we must act quickly to exercise sovereignty and restore our hold over the areas of the nation that were evacuated and abandoned. To this end, two fundamental terms must be met – the first of which is disrupting the capabilities of Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorist organizations to attack the settlements. The IDF’s mounting achievements and the building of a security buffer and military defense envelope will make it very difficult for the enemy to launch infiltration or standoff firing attacks in the direction of the settlements – and will eventually, through a prolonged process, negate its capabilities for massive rocket fire towards the settlements as well. The IDF had already begun implementing a broad-scope plan to defend the settlements and respond to their security needs by reinforcing the settlements’ rapid response teams, providing proper equipment and regular training, alongside integration of the IDF’s area defense into the settlements and installation of various deterrents such as indicative fences, smart cameras, Command and Control rooms, etc.

An important tool for restoring sovereignty and security would be growing the population of the Gaza Envelope area through reviving the Nahal program and establishing Nahal settlements in the Gaza Envelope area – after two decades during which not a single Nahal settlement was established and converted into a civilian settlement. Beyond increasing the population, further settlement of the area by Nahal core groups would enable reclaiming this geographical era in a productive and principled manner, serving as a lodestone for a reformed ethos of pioneering, inhabiting and working the land, alongside active defense of the area – the sickle and the sword as a foundation for volunteering and harnessing the national spirit to establish new settlements and restore security to the area.

In the personal-community aspect, keeping entire communities out of their natural environment may jeopardize their social cohesion and their ability to recover from the traumatic event. The sooner these communities return to their settlements, rehabilitate them, and establish routines of daily life, the more effective their recovery process will be.

In the national context, the settlements thriving and prospering once again will constitute a victory for the State of Israel – radiating strength both inwards into Israeli society and outwards, demonstrating the resilience of Israeli society and its perseverance in the Zionist endeavor. The residents’ return to the Gaza Envelope settlements will also boost the recovery of the area’s community and education systems – including that of schools, other educational institutions, medical services, public transport, and a variety of needful community services. This process cannot be serial – it must occur concurrently with the residents’ return and brooks no delay. In this manner, community systems could be rehabilitated in a vibrant, healthy way.

One cannot underestimate the importance of the psychological dimension. Restoring and developing settlements will necessarily radiate on the Israeli society’s sense of capability, on trust in the State’s institutions and its capability to recover from severe trauma and devastation whilst harnessing national resources and capabilities for planning and execution – and no less importantly – on the sense of cohesion, solidarity, and mutual responsibility. All these are expressions and aspects of social and national resilience. National resilience is a fundamental and essential component of national strength – and thus, of national security in its broad sense. We cannot ignore the difficulties and the trauma caused by the events of October 7^th, or their impact on our sense of capability, security, trust, and resilience. Since October 7^th, Israeli society has gone a long way in the process of rehabilitation and recovery – but the process cannot be completed without restoring settlement, exercising sovereignty, re-establishing communities, agriculture, and industry in the area – and in particular, continuing its development and expansion as an appropriate Zionist reply to the bloodthirsty destructiveness that Hamas demonstrated during the murderous terrorist attack of October 7^th. Through its communities, Israeli settlement shall set exercising sovereignty and reclamation of the land through agricultural work against Hamas’ destructive efforts. Renewing the settlement efforts, restoring them to their former glory, developing and expanding them will constitute the true Israeli victory in this war – the triumph of the Zionist ethos of building and development, reclaiming and settling the land, over Hamas’ ethos of ruin and devastation.

Finally, the return of the Gaza Envelope’s residents to their homes holds economic significance of the highest order, for several reasons. First, the direct costs of hosting evacuated individuals in alternative residences and in hotels and guest houses.  An analysis of the proposal for increasing the 2023 budget suggests that the scope of addition to the budget required to support the expenditures of assisting evacuated individuals was more than ILS 6 billion. [1] This budget is expected to grow even further in 2024. Diverting funds from direct aid to the evacuated individuals into developing and rehabilitating the Gaza Envelope settlements will yield great returns and generate income for the national economy, made possible by restoring the Gaza Envelope’s economy to a functional state – albeit partially, at first. Second – bringing the residents back would necessitate the provision of economic benefits – both for individual residents and on the community-settlement level. The State is required to invest in developing the area and the settlements, and to provide a variety of economic benefits in the form of tax breaks, grants, and aid in developing settlements, in a manner that would serve all national needs. This investment should be considered a substantial part of the war costs and one of the tools for winning it.

Many residents will wish to return to their homes as soon as possible, given the right conditions. The right time is now, and we must act to return the settlers to the Gaza Envelope. Uprooting these communities from their settlements was a necessary evil at the start of the war, but now we must put our full strength behind making these settlements prosper again. The leadership of the State must take the reins on this national challenge – this national mission –through relevant government ministries and State institutions. It is also the time for local leadership and community leadership – as well as for the communities themselves and their settlers – to shine. Now is the time for pioneers to take the van – the time for the nation to step forward in its journey to rise again and make its way towards the establishment of Israel 2.0. [2]

[1] Description and Analysis of the Proposal to Increase the 2023 National Budget and a Macro-Economic Review. Knesset Information and Research Center, December 2023.

[2] https://www.misgavins.org/siboni-michael-israel-2-0-project-launch

Critical voices have surfaced in the Israeli public and in the media concerning the goals of the war, which are presented as presumptuous and impractical, and regarding the tension between destroying Hamas as a military and governing entity and releasing the hostages. Criticism is also heard regarding the political echelon’s vacillation about deciding as to the “day after.”

This criticism, which should properly be heard and discussed even in wartime, recently has morphed into a cascade of gloom and doom on the part of some opinion leaders, culminating in appeals to “concede defeat, accept Hamas’s terms for a hostage release deal, and end the war.

This dispiriting commentary runs up against the sense of achievement felt by Israel’s troops in the field, and by the resolve of the military and political echelon to attain the war’s goals and by their complete confidence in the necessity of the war.

There is a grand incongruity between the dispiriting criticism and widespread public support of the war’s goals and confidence in the ability of Israel to attain those goals – as expressed in every public opinion poll. (See, for example, polls conducted by the Institute for National Security Studies, the Israel Democracy Institute, and others).

Without having been declared or formally organized, a new movement has effectively been founded in Israel: The Downer Movement (“Dichonistim” in Hebrew). The movement boasts members such as media outlets and opinion leaders who wield extensive influence by virtue of their prominence in public discourse. They are agents of demoralization, steadily and doggedly dripping their despondent messages into public discourse.

They do not necessarily do this maliciously; likely motivated by a profound “downer” conviction – pessimism on steroids – resulting from severe crisis of trust in the resilience of Israeli society and in the IDF’s capabilities, as well as from their harsh, even virulent, disapproval of Israel’s current political leadership.

However, regardless of the causes of such despondency and pessimism, their efforts can adversely affect the fighting spirit of the IDF, boost Hamas’s morale and that of the entire resistance axis, and invite the exertion of heavier and more significant external pressures on Israel, including by the US administration.

The pessimistic analyses and evaluations paint a grim picture of reality, which again is quite different from the situation as perceived by the majority of Israelis. This is borne-out in a study conducted by Dr. Gil Samsonov and his colleagues at Publicis, which shows an immense gap between the spirit inculcated by the Downer Movement and the spirit of Israel’s younger generation. (See: Today’s Youth Against the Background of the Iron Swords War – Among Teenagers, Soldiers and Students, A Study of Israelis 16-25; Glikman, Shamir, Samsonov – The Publicis Group; December 2023).

The study’s authors argue that Israel is undergoing nothing less than a generational upheaval, one that shatters paradigms and entrenches new perspectives: from an disconnected, global generation of Israelis to almost pioneer-like optimistic generation.

According to the study, 59% of young Israelis believe that Israel is strong, will win and has a future. 58% have a purely positive outlook, 28% have both a positive and a negative outlook and only 14% have a purely negative outlook. 70% of people aged 16-18 believe in Israel’s strength and future. Young people understand the difficulties faced by the country, with 57% saying that Israel will gradually regain its standing despite substantial difficulties posed by a hostile Middle East, relying on a strong military. 29% think Israel will quickly regain its strength and resume growing, with many immigrants making their way to Israel.

Young Israelis understand the need to party less and work more (through both university studies and military service). Finally, 57% think Israel will emerge victorious from the current crisis thanks to its strong army.

The survey’s findings indicate a strong spirit exhibited by the younger generation, with impressive optimism, a spirit of volunteering, and belief in the justness of Israel’s path as the nation-state of the Jewish People.

In an interview television, Dr. Samsonov summarized his study’s findings by stating that the younger Israeli generation is more like the rugged, realistic, and scrappy generation of Israelis in 1948 – the generation of their grandparents – than its own parents’ generation.

The Downer Movement sometimes dominates public discourse because Israeli media highlights its members and messaging. But again, the despondent messaging is not truly reflective of mainstream Israeli thinking and feeling.

Part of the despondency stems from the downers fervent and near-religious beliefs in the so-called two-state solution; from being addicted to the notion that no solution exists other than reliance on the Palestinian Authority. They advocate for propping up the PA even at the cost of compromising on critical demands for reform of that problematic body. Their inability to move beyond the PA, their reliance on failed paradigms of the past, leads them to bleak assessments regarding the IDF’s ability to attain Israel’s war goals. Alas, they don’t understand how resilient and determined Israelis are to do things differently.

Originally published in Maariv 16.01.2024

Israel can no longer remain silent in the face of Turkey’s extensive support of Hamas and its central role in building the organization’s financial empire.

With the help of its closest ally, Israel must clarify to Turkey that continuing to sponsor Hamas will have severe consequences for their relationship.

Three weeks after Hamas’s massacre in southern Israel, during a pro-Palestinian mass rally held in Istanbul, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared that Hamas is not a terrorist organization and accused Israel of committing war crimes in Gaza.

In another speech in Ankara in December 2023, Erdogan went so far as to compare Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Hitler in reference to the IDF attacks in the Gaza Strip.

Such rhetoric is not uncommon when it comes to the president of Turkey and aligns with previous antisemitic statements by Erdogan or his affiliates.

However, Erdogan’s hostility toward Israel is not confined to mere rhetoric. For over a decade, Turkey has been assisting Hamas in various ways: politically, economically, and militarily, enabling it to grow exponentially and afflict catastrophic suffering on innocent Israelis.

Turkey a safe haven for Hamas

It is no secret that Turkey provides a safe haven for Hamas leadership. Ankara regularly hosts top Hamas figures, and Erdogan himself has openly met with the movement’s senior officials, including the chairman of the political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, and the former head, Khaled Mashaal.

Ankara is also the driving force behind Hamas’s global financing apparatus. An investigation by The Wall Street Journal reveals Turkey’s primary role in constructing the financial network of Hamas, led by the organization’s financial chief, Zaher Jabarin.

According to the WSJ report, from his office in Istanbul, Jabarin oversees Hamas’ comprehensive fundraising system, which involves transferring funds from Iran to the Gaza Strip, managing a portfolio of companies that provide Hamas with annual income, among which are several Turkish firms, and managing a network of private donors.

Strong evidence supports the claim

DESPITE ITS denial, there is strong evidence to support the claim that Turkey assists Hamas militarily as well. In 2018, Israel arrested Kamil Takli, a Turkish law professor who was revealed to be a Hamas financier.

In his interrogation, Takli confirmed that Hamas operated in Turkey and that it received military aid from Ankara through a private military contractor close to Erdogan. Furthermore, in July 2023, Israel intercepted 16 tons of explosive material on its way from Turkey to Gaza to be used for rocket production.

The damage caused to Israel by containing Turkey’s extreme Islamist approach seems to outweigh the benefits of cooperation with Ankara. Thus, despite the desire to maintain close trade relations, it is time for Israel to make it clear that if Turkey continues to support Hamas, it will pay a heavy price.

The Israeli government should reject any future initiatives to normalize relations with Turkey until Hamas is defined by the Turkish government as a terror organization and Turkey fully complies with American sanctions on its funding. Israel should also freeze any potential cooperation with Turkey in the gas and energy sectors until Turkey responds to these demands.

In accordance with this hardline approach, Israel must engage the United States in its efforts, imploring Washington to exert pressure on Turkey. This pressure should include an American demand that Turkey take legal action against entities on Turkish territory that fund US-designated terror organizations.

The US should also condition any future arms deal with Turkey on the latter, cutting off all ties with Hamas and enforcing American sanctions in full.

If Turkey continues to back Hamas, the US should amend the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act to facilitate the filing of lawsuits by victims of terrorism. This has been proposed in relation to Qatar and can be applied to any other state that provides material or other forms of assistance to terrorist organizations, Turkey included.

These measures would send a clear message to Turkey that it must cease backing Hamas or suffer the consequences.

Published in The Jerusalem Post, January 16, 2024.