Woke up this morning to the awful news that six more hostages were found dead in the terror tunnels of Hamas, somewhere in the Rafah area. What a fucking nightmare for their family and friends, a group which by now includes all Israelis, and most sentient beings with the exception of anyone who might support the butchering sub-human captors. 

I am saddened and sickened.

Sickened by the idea that if Bibi had accepted a deal, even a less than optimal deal, that these young, beautiful humans would probably still be alive. And maybe others would be saved as well. It’s the value we/Israelis place on life that separates us from the Hamas monsters that value death and martyrdom. We need to honor that value and bring them home. Make the deal Bibi!

I am also sickened that we have to negotiate anything with these a-holes. Any concession to terrorists only emboldens them to do more of this shit, which is why we also need to continue hunting down Hamas and destroying as many of them as humanly possible. And take Sinwar alive, put him in front of the world court, and execute the murderous bastard in front of the entire world for his crimes against humanity. 

One of my favorite angry Jews is Eve Barlow, who posted the following earlier this morning:

I am enraged. And my rage is not contained to Hamas. I am angry at the US Administration who let Hersh perish. I am angry that the world shared the most popular meme of all time – “All Eyes on Rafah” – and refused for months to let Israel go into the place where these six innocent hostages were murdered and found months too late in Rafah tunnels. I am horrified by the continued cowardice of the most elite institutions of the West which allow “protests” day after day in the town squares and on university campuses, cheering on and emboldening the TERRORIST groups who are committing these atrocities. I am completely sickened by the silent majority who are too weak to speak out when never again is right now. Never again was yesterday. Never again was October 7. Only 28,217 people risked their lives to help Jews in the Holocaust. That was it. At the start of WWII there were 530 million people in Europe. Only 0.005% of the population were righteous. Almost nobody rises to the occasion. Some things never change.

I have nothing left to share.

Hersh Goldberg, 23

Eden Yerushalmi, 24

Carmel Gat, 39

Alex Lubnov, 32

Ori Danino, 25

Almog Sarusi, 26

Baruch dayan haemet. May their memories be for a blessing, because we need them more than ever.

Saddened, sickened, and angry Brad out.

Shabbat shalom!

We are on vacation this week, so I am re-posting a guest substack. But before I get to that, here is some convincing and irrefutable evidence of “apartheid in Israel”: A Jewish doctor tends to the Muslim Arab Bedouin hostage freed by the Israeli IDF, a hostage whose freedom from terrorist butchers is now celebrated by all of Israel.

The following guest post is from Nachum Kaplan’s “Moral Clarity” substack. Kaplan is a media consultant, journalist and commentator. He has 25 years international media experience and held senior international roles at Reuters and IFR.

After reading Kaplan’s short summary of Palestinian – Israeli history, I spent hours investigating his historical references and came across some interesting discoveries. The first was how dramatically different the UN, Wikipedia and Jewish Voice for Peace versions of history differ from the commonly accepted narrative of Jews and Israelis regarding “Nakba”, the founding myth of the Palestinian people. The Nakba, which means “catastrophe” in Arabic, refers to the mass displacement and dispossession of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. A little history here: the term Nakba was first used in an Israeli context in a pamphlet written by Syrian professor Constantin Zureiq on August 5, 1948, as the war was still raging. Surprisingly, in that pamphlet, Zureiq does not refer to the Nakba as something Israelis perpetrated on the Arabs, but as a self-inflicted and humiliating wound caused by the Arabs themselves! Zureiq, no Jew-loving Zionist for sure, believed Arabs should take responsibility for their own mistake. In his own words: “When the battle broke out, our public diplomacy began to speak of our imaginary victories, to put the Arab public to sleep and talk of the ability to overcome and win easily — until the Nakba happened….. We must admit our mistakes …. and recognize the extent of our responsibility for the disaster that is our lot”. It wasn’t until the terrorist organization, Fatah, led by Yasser Arafat (who overtook the PLO) in 1968, that the term Nakba was used to rebrand the Palestinian plight, leading to the declaration of May 15 as a national day of commemoration. 

Before the Nakba, Palestine was a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society. However, the conflict between Arabs and Jews intensified in the 1930s with the increase of Jewish immigration, driven by persecution in Europe, and with the Zionist movement aiming to establish a Jewish state in Palestine. To be sure, around 700,000 Arabs either left on their own accord, were told to leave by neighboring Arab countries, or were forced out by the Israeli army, and probably not treated very well in the process, leaving behind their homes and valuables. And there is some evidence that in the fog of what was a defensive war for Israel, some atrocities (Deir Yassin, eg) were committed on both sides. Many Palestinians appealed for help to the same Arab countries that told them to leave, and were denied any help, or rights, and many were stuffed into refugee camps. Lebanon denied them citizenship, and even to this day, do now allow Palestinians to work in several of their industries. What many forget, or gets brushed over, is that after the war, Jews were ethnically cleansed from Morocco, Yemen, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Iraq, and Egypt, many leaving behind their homes and possessions to find their new homes in the land of Israel. 

The UN and JVP’s distorted and often fictitious references to Nakba were not surprising, given their long history of Jew hating and blatant anti-semitism. But the Wikipedia misinformation was a bit of a surprise. The Wikipedia story relies a lot on historian Ilan Pappe’s account, who according to a New Republic article, at best is one of the world’s sloppiest and lazy historians whose narrative is usually just outright wrong, or at worst, one of the most dishonest, or a combination of both. 

I found this work by the Jewish Virtual Library to be most helpful in debunking some of the common myths perpetrated by the UN and others regarding the history of Palestinian refugees. 

Now here is Nachum’s post:

The Palestinian refusal to take responsibility for their actions and plight.

The Israel-Hamas War follows a depressingly familiar pattern. The Palestinians declare war or commit heinous acts, then pretend that they are innocent victims when faced with the consequences. This refusal to accept responsibility is why the Palestinians have nothing to show for their 80 years of conflict with Israel.

In 1948, the day after Israel declared independence, five Arab states (Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Iraq) declared war on Israel and lost. Both Israel and the Arabs gained and lost territory in this war and the borders of British Mandatory Palestine were redrawn.

It is in the fighting that about 700,000 Arabs, not yet calling themselves Palestinians, fled, and could not return because the Arabs lost the war they started. This is the so-called Nakba (Catastrophe), the Palestinian founding myth.

Some of these Arabs escaped to flee the fighting, and some were displaced, but the vast majority fled on Arab leaders’ instruction. They were told to flee and that they could return after the Arab armies had massacred the Jews and killed the nascent Jewish state, which, of course, did not happen.

The Arabs caused the Palestinian refugee crisis, first by telling them to flee and then, when they lost the war, by putting them in refugee camps rather than granting them citizenship (unlike Israel, which absorbed the 800,000 Jewish refugees expelled from Arab states in actual ethnic cleansing).

Israel subsequently made the Arabs in its state citizens, while Jordan ethnically cleansed Jews from Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem in a nasty piece of history that no one ever talks about because facts are so passe and the world does not mind crimes against Jews.

If the Arabs had not attacked Israel, there would have been no Palestinian refugees.

The Arabs have never taken responsibility for this. Instead, they built a fictional narrative worthy of Tolkien that Israel’s creation displaced them. They have been nurturing this lie for eight decades and got most of the world to believe it.

There was never a Palestinian nation, or people, just Arabs who just happened to live in British Mandatory Palestine. As those who get their knowledge from history books and not TikTok know, they never started calling themselves Palestinians until around 1968. This was when, having failed to defeat Israel at war, they developed a new strategy of pretending they were an occupied and dispossessed people.

It is fair to say that there exists today a group of people called the Palestinians, but what defines them? What makes them distinct from the people of Syria and Egypt, from where they mostly hail?

What binds them is their hatred of Israel, their desire to eradicate it, their refusal to acknowledge what really happened in 1948, and – above all else – their refusal to take responsibility for their plight since. A lack of sense of agency may be thedefining Palestinian characteristic.

While 1948 marked the beginning of this national character flaw, they have built upon it with dispiriting regularity.

The 1967 Six-Day War is another example. The region’s Arab armies again tried to eradicate Israel and got trounced in six days as Israel achieved one of history’s greatest military victories.

In this war, Israel took Judea and Samaria back from Jordan, which – for those averse to history books – had illegally occupied and annexed the region after the 1948 War. If a country starts a war, and then loses land that it was illegally occupying, then that is too bad.

Losing is the risk you take when you start a war; one with genocidal rather than territorial gains at that. My sympathy for genocidal warmongers is in short supply. In a morally sane universe, so would everyone else’s.

The Palestinians – in a delusion worthy of a psychotherapy conference – somehow decided that they were the victims of Israeli occupying Judea and Samaria. They have steadfastly refused to accept that their plight is mostly their fault. Much of the world has enabled this delusion by agreeing that Israel is occupying Judea and Samaria illegally.

Anyone who does not know what actually happened should stop basking in their ignorance and invest in a new pair of reading glasses.

Unable to destroy Israel in war, the Palestinians turned to terror. So convinced of their own victimhood, they launched the Intifada, a bloodthirsty six years from 1987 to 1991. This prompted Israel to deploy 80,000 troops to quell the terrorist and violent unrest, about which the Palestinians then complained.

Yet again the Palestinians unleashed violence on Israel, refused to accept responsibility for it, then cried to the credulous international community that they were the victims of Israeli military aggression and occupation.

This led to the Oslo Accords in 1993, a series of agreements aimed at providing Palestinian self-determination and a pathway to a Palestinian state – the so called two-state solution.

Naturally, the Palestinians ultimately rejected this because it did not give them what they wanted, which was Israel’s annihilation. The Palestinians then launched the homicidal Second Intifada from 2000-2005, producing a fierce Israeli response, after which the Palestinians again complained about Israeli military occupation.

For the slow people in the class, Israel’s military occupation is a response to Palestinians terror, not the cause of it. The Palestinians and their dim-witted supporters in the West do not accept this because avoiding accountability is the Palestinian national trait, to the extent one can call a cluster of Islamists terrorists a nation.

Following this were 20 years of rocket attacks on Israel from the Iran-backed Hamas in Gaza, terror attacks in Judea and Samaria by corrupt, and crony-ridden Palestinian Authority (PA), and attacks from Hezbollah, another Iranian terror proxy in the failed state of Lebanon.

This culminated in Hamas’ unspeakably evil attack on Israel on October 7 – the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust in the most sadistic and psychologically disturbed ways possible – sparking the Israel-Hamas War.

True to form, the Palestinians – supported by many morally stunted governments and activists terror supporters in the West – have again managed to convince themselves that they are the victims of Israeli aggression, a precise inversion of the truth.

This is far from a comprehensive list of Arab and Arab Palestinian abdication of all responsibility. There was the Second Arab-Israeli War, the Yom Kippur War, the two Lebanon wars – every one of which the Arabs started – and too many terror attacks to mention.

Even since the Oslo Accords, when the PA gained day-to-day government of much of Judea and Samaria and Gaza, the Palestinians have messed it up and blamed the Jews.

Hamas took over Gaza and turned it into a Jihadist terror state, while the PA built a kleptocracy in Judea and Samaria and continues to fund and carry out terror as a matter of policy. Even as they were self-governing, they were blaming Israel for their woes. It is complete moral abandonment.

Imagine what would have happened if the Palestinians, instead of building the world’s most extensive and sophisticated terror network, had put their efforts into state-building and bettering the lives of Palestinians.

I jest, of course. It is almost impossible to imagine such a thing because the Palestinians’ refusal to accept any responsibility for the mess they have made, or for cleaning it up.

The obstacles to peace between Israel and the Palestinians have nothing to do with borders, states, or constitutional arrangements. It is the Palestinian refusal to live with Jews, and their pathological dishonesty about the starring role they have played in their own demise.

Western countries bear significant responsibility, too, as does the wider Arab and wider Muslim world. They have never asked the Palestinians to stand up and take responsibility for their own destiny, and they have joined them in blaming all their woes on Israel.

The West has betrayed the Palestinians with the bigotry of low expectations. Through ill-monitored aid and infirm foreign policy, they have enabled Palestinian uselessness and contributed to Palestinian misery.

If Israelis and Palestinians are ever to find peace, a Palestinian cultural change is needed. They must be willing to live with Jews, abandon their professional victimhood, and start taking responsibility for their own future.

It would help if the West recognized this, but it will not. It is too consumed by its own antisemitism, itself a sick feature of Western culture, to see what has really gone on and is going on.

Have a great weekend everyone! And hey, let’s be careful out there!

Brad out.

Shabbat shalom!

A big tip of the kippah this week to the DNC, as they planned and managed a convention that, even if you are not a Democrat, you would have to admit was a performance that exceeded all expectations. And an even bigger tip of the kippah to Kamala Harris and her speech writers and strategists. Her speech on Thursday blew me away, and I was lukewarm on her from the beginning. I must confess that I was calling for an open convention, mostly out of pure historic fascination. But boy am I glad I was wrong. Kamala killed it Thursday night, and proved to the nation that she is a presidential force to be reckoned with, and has the guts, fortitude and capability to slay the orange dragon and rid the country of his orange stain once and for all. And, she apparently makes a mean brisket!

It’s feeling good to be a Democrat in America again! The MAGA nuts, with their “America is a hellscape” narrative, left the door wide open for Democrats to appropriate the themes of patriotism and freedom, which they did with abandon. There was so much red white and blue, and talk of patriotism and freedom, you would have thought this was a Ronald Reagan Republican convention! Not only did the speakers and entertainers keep the Dem flock from bickering and on their feet most of the night, they also reached out to Republicans via Adam Kinzinger and Independents via Oprah Winfrey. In the end, Kamala’s speech electrified the party, a speech she delivered with passion, eloquence, and confidence. According to one analysis of her 45 minute speech the terms America, American, Americans were uttered 34 times; country or nation, 20 times; freedom, 12 times; opportunity, 6 times; Democrats or Democratic party, 0 times.

It’s amazing that its been just over 30 days since Biden stepped down, which is a testament to the extraordinary work Kamala and her organization have done in presenting her story, uniting a broad and diverse party, and concisely articulating a strategy of “moving forward”. They have successfully tacked the party to the center, leaving behind, I hope, the identity and grievance politics of the woke left. At least for now, Harris and Tim Walz have laid the foundations for a center-oriented, optimistic, and patriotic campaign. 

It remains to be seen if they can keep the party centered and win the election. After all, this convention has been mostly a star-studded kabuki theater, and this time, the show was pretty damn good. But the Republican and MAGA critics will have their knives sharpened, and the woke left will probably start making noise as well, so don’t expect smooth sailing ahead, but do expect there will be plenty of headwinds so tacking and keeping the boat afloat will require significant political courage and campaign skills. 

Those of us with an interest in the middle east were particularly keen on hearing Kamala’s views on Gaza and the region generally. There has been a lot of criticism so far from the pro Israel right, mostly about her and Biden’s current pursuit of a ceasefire, her snubbing of Nut-and-yahoo’s speech to congress, and a few other things, but I would say she threaded that nuanced needle pretty damn well. “And let me be clear,” she stated forcefully, “I will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself, and I will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself, because the people of Israel must never again face the horror that a terrorist organization called Hamas caused on Oct. 7. Including unspeakable sexual violence and the massacre of young people at a music festival.”

And then, to the “non committed” who were disappointed that a “pro-Palestinian” speaker was not allowed on the dais, she threw an empathy bone: “At the same time, what has happened in Gaza over the past 10 months is devastating. So many innocent lives lost. Desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, over and over again. The scale of suffering is heartbreaking. President Biden and I are working to end this war such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity. Security. Freedom. And self-determination.”

Harris, like the Democratic Platform, supports a two state solution. I think her empathy and comments on Gaza are genuine. And, more importantly, she added one other line about the Middle East. “And know this: I will never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to defend our forces and our interests against Iran and Iran-backed terrorists.” As I have written previously, we need a new strategy beyond appeasement and “Don’t” for dealing with Iran, a bad acting nation that is the bank and command center of the jihadist axis of countries that want to eliminate the Jews and the Jewish state. Hamas is a relatively small, tactical nuisance to Israel. The real enemy of the Jews sits in Tehran. Let’s hope a Harris presidency can take that threat on directly and bring some peace to Israelis and Arabs alike. 

Recall about a month ago at the Republican National Convention, the crowd erupted after Republican Jewish Coalition CEO Matt Brooks began his speech by asking those who support Israel to cheer. “If someone tried that at the Democrats’ convention, they’d be booed off the stage!” Well guess what Brooks, you shithead, the Dems erupted with deafening applause after Kamala’s comments on Gaza. In fact, upon reflection, this was a very Jewish Democrat convention. The Tuesday program began with an invocation from Los Angeles Rabbi Sharon Braus. Then, on Wednesday night, the parents of an Israeli-American held hostage, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, led thousands of attendees to stand in silence, aside from when they chanted “Bring them home,” while they spoke emotionally for nine minutes about their son and the more than 100 other people Hamas is still holding captive. It continued with enthusiastic embraces of Gov. JB Pritzker, Gov. Josh Shapiro and Sen. Bernie Sanders from the tens of thousands in the packed United Center; and it featured primetime speeches from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who used the platform to speak out against antisemitism, followed by Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, who, wearing his blue “Stand Up To Jewish Hate” pin given to him by Robert Kraft, reveled in his Jewish identity and how it has strengthened since Kamala became vice president and as she now seeks one final promotion. 

Now, let’s talk Israel. I wish I had some good news to report, but at the time of this posting, Israelis continue to brace for a strike from Iran or Hezbollah or both. It’s possible that this long-anticipated attack may have been put on hold by Tehran, while Israel and Hamas have been busy negotiating the last details of a US proposed bridging offer to try and close a hostage and temporary ceasefire deal. Secretary Blinken has stated that Israel accepted the bridging offer and since Bibi has not publicly negated that declaration, it is inferred that he is on board. But apparently, that bridging offer is a bridge too far for Hamas, as they have already rejected it, and many are concluding that the deal is dead in the water, with the sticking points being Bibi’s insistence that the IDF maintain a presence in the Philadelphia and Nitzarim corridors in order to prevent Hamas from re-arming themselves for another October 7 (a position I agree with).

Meanwhile, this week the IDF discovered six more dead hostages hidden behind a fake wall in a tunnel. Early evidence shows they suffered gunshot wounds. Sadly, I am not optimistic that we will ever see any more hostages alive unless the IDF finds them sooner rather than later.

Now, here’s some news for Jews that doesn’t suck:

1. Radio Shaq –  NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal recorded a video message for Israeli kids whose relatives were killed or taken hostage on Oct. 7. “I just wanted to give you guys a shoutout and let you know I love you,” Shaq said, before ending the video with a string of Hebrew messages including “Shabbat shalom” and “Baruch Hashem.”
2. One of Israel’s flag bearers in the Paralympics is a survivor of Oct. 7 – Israeli wheelchair tennis player Adam Berdichevsky lost his leg in a boating accident in 2007, and has since won six national championships in his sport and competed in two Paralympic Games. Now, he is heading into his third Paralympics after facing adversity of a far different kind. On Oct. 7, he and his family hid for 14 hours in their home at Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak on the Gaza border while Hamas terrorists attacked the community, killing their neighbors and taking five people hostage.Berdichevsky, 41, was rescued, and his family was evacuated to Eilat. Next week, he will serve as a flag bearer for Israel’s delegation, which includes 28 athletes. He says he feels a newfound purpose after surviving the Oct. 7 attack.
3. On the DNC sidelines, a Jew and a Palestinian from Chicago are leading a daily run for a ceasefire in Gaza – CHICAGO — Richard Goldwasser and Anan Abu-Taleb have been running together for years. But this week, the pair have been getting an especially early start — commuting from their homes in the suburbs to Buckingham Fountain, a lakefront landmark here, to pound the pavement in support of a ceasefire in Gaza. Goldwasser, an American Jew who grew up in the suburb of Skokie, and Abu-Taleb, a Palestinian-American who grew up in Gaza, have been running together for five years. Introduced by a mutual friend, they discovered that they’re both avid marathoners. Now, with tensions and protests over Israel and Gaza swirling in and around the Democratic National Convention, they’ve invited others to join them on morning runs every day of the convention that, they hope, will be a small gesture to bring about a ceasefire in the 10-month-old conflict.
4. Barbra Streisand, Susie Essman and 30,000 others join ‘Jewish women for Kamala’ call – Susie Essman, the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star who has gained fame for her foul-mouthed tirades, had a message for the more than 30,000 people who tuned into a Zoom event for Jewish women last week: Embrace Kamala Harris’ laughter. “Yes, Kamala laughs,” Essman said. Then, using a Yiddish termthat translates, roughly, to “sourpuss,” Essman added, “She is not a farbissina punim. This is a woman filled with a life force and humanity.” Essman was part of a star-studded roster on “Jewish Women for Kamala,” the latest in the Democratic presidential candidate’s series of virtual rallies for specific demographics. It follows “Jewish Americans for Kamala Harris,” which was held with some of the same speakers earlier this month. Both were organized by the Jewish Democratic Council of America. The biggest name on the call was Barbra Streisand, who urged participants to be “rebellious,” citing Jewish tradition.

That’s a wrap for the week. We are off to the cape for a few weeks of family fun. I may take a break, depending on what’s going on. Have a great weekend everyone, donate to Kamala, and, hey, let’s continue to be careful out there

Brad out.

Shabbat shalom! 

Let’s begin with a great story this week from Yonit Levi and Jonathan Freedland from their Unholy podcast. It starts with Israeli Channel 12 newscaster Oded Ben-Ami, who opened one of his shows this week thanking President Biden for everything he has done to support Israel. His opening was considered by many a response to the negative things being said about Biden by Nut-and-yahoo, and those close to him, and it was translated to English. Eventually, it made its way to President Biden himself, who then called Oded Ben-Ami a few nights later at midnight and spoke with him for 12 minutes to among other things, thank him for the gesture. Biden, by the way, has had more interaction with Israeli hostage families than Nut-and-yahoo. 

Which brings me to the current mess in the middle east. Israelis were on shpilkas Monday and Tuesday, and still are, thinking the Iranian a-holes would release their missile response to the embarrassing assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a “safe house” in Tehran. So far, it seems as though diplomacy, maybe pressure from the US and others, has at least delayed the Iranian response while a hostage deal is being hammered out in Cairo and Doha. And that is a good thing, but this last gasp effort to cut a deal is likely to fail, as Hamas will never agree to anything that doesn’t leave them in power, and neither will Israel agree to anything that doesn’t secure the Philadelphia Corridor and prevent Hamas from smuggling arms through it. 

And like Ben-Ami, I was very supportive of Biden and his early support of Israel, but I am increasingly more leery, and pessimistic about our overall strategy in the middle east, which seems to me a muddle mess of a holdover from the Obama team’s predisposition to appease Iran, which has been about as successful as Nut-and-yahoos strategy of appeasing Hamas in order to prevent Abbas — or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government — from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state. 

The Iranian mullahs, with the support of the IRGC, have successfully deployed their “Ring of Fire” strategy, surrounding Israel with their proxies bent on eliminating Israel. This doesn’t get reported enough, but Israel is currently fighting battles on seven fronts. The most dangerous is from the north, where Hizbollah has fired thousands of missiles starting on October 8, decimating the northern border and forcing the displacement of over 100,000 Israelis from their homes. Add to that the attacks from the Houthis, the Iranians, Syria and Iraq, and Hamas, and you have a dangerous existential threat to the only democracy in the region. And the threat is not just to Israel. According to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy (FDD), there have been over 170 attacks on US troops in the middle east since October 7, and we have only responded 11 times. That is not a recipe for deterrence. See the stats below.

I am no expert on middle east policy and strategy, and will not attempt to pretend otherwise. But, one thing I have learned from many analysts and from recent history is that, at least in the middle east, hard power is more effective than soft power. Maybe it’s time the US started getting a bit more serious in the region and started taking Iran to task in a more direct manner. Biden’s “Don’t” doesn’t seem to be doing the trick. 

Rumor is that Sinwar now wants to make a deal for the hostages. Why is that? Because Israel has successfully crushed his terrorist army, and is about to close in on him in whatever tunnel he is hiding. And do not believe western journalist reports that there is nothing left to accomplish militarily in Gaza, as the NYT reported the other day in its story “In Gaza, Israel’s Military Has Reached the End of the Line, U.S. Officials Say”.  The Biden administration has been wrong countless times on the Gaza war, (e.g. delaying Israel from entering Rafah because Biden/Harris thought it would take 4 months to move Gazans out of Rafah, it took Israel only 10 days) Israel is probably weeks or less than months away from ending the Gaza war and flushing the rats out of their tunnels. Getting Sinwar alive and convicting him of war crimes would be ideal, but he will probably blow himself up like Hitler did before the allies could get to him. 

Having said all that, Nut-and-yahoo should take the deal on the table, and get the hostages back, sooner rather than later, since they probably don’t have much time left. Unfortunately many have already died in captivity and who knows what the murdering Hamas butchers will do to the others once they know a hostage deal or their imminent death is near. Can Israel deal with a six week withdrawal from the Rafah Crossing and Philadelphia Corridor? Probably. It would take longer than that for Hamas to restore a weapons and cash supply chain there. And will Hamas be able to re-infiltrate North Gaza during those six weeks? Maybe. But eradicating them again will be a lot easier than the initial fighting in that area. And according to reliable JNR sources, reports have indicated that all of Israel’s security chiefs and negotiators have been imploring him to seize the opportunity for a deal ever since the initial framework was laid out in May. It’s time to bring them home.

As for Iran, Biden’s “Don’t” needs to be replaced with a real strategy that is taken seriously by our partners and allies in the region and the world. Biden has time to get it right, but he needs to get more serious and stop the appeasement policy. Iran is a bad player, exporting to their proxies their policy of eliminating Israel. It’s time we, as a superpower, make them accountable for this bullshit and give Israeli’s some peace and a future without bomb shelters and safe rooms. We should continue to establish normalization with the Saudi’s and other Abraham Accord potential partners as this is one tactic to isolate and check the growing influence of Iran and their jihadist proxies. But, a broader, tougher strategy is desperately needed. I am not sure where Harris stands on this foreign policy challenge, but I hope we find out soon.

And now, without any further ajieu, here is this week’s generous selection of Jewie journalistic gems, culled and carefully curated, and copied and pasted from the likes of The Forward, JTA, The Times of Israel, Kveller, Jewish Boston, Haaretz, and other Jewish journals:

1. Mediators push updated Gaza truce offer, hope for deal next week, as Doha talks break – Biden says sides closer than ever to a deal after progress made in two days of talks, but Hamas rejects what it calls ‘new conditions’ from Israel; Netanyahu to meet Blinken Monday. Read the story.
2. More on the war….
   1. The U.S. approved $20 billion in arms sales to Israel, although much of what is being sold — including fighter jets and missiles — are part of contracts that will take years to fulfill.
   2. IDF orders central Gaza evacuations, as Hamas says optimism for deal an ‘illusion’. Terror group spokesman claims US backing Israeli efforts to sabotage ceasefire-hostage talks * Military says it is expanding offensive in Gaza’s Khan Younis.
   3. US official warns Iran of ‘cataclysmic’ consequences if it attacks Israel – The United States “would encourage the Iranians — and I know many are — not to move down that road, because the consequences could be quite cataclysmic, particularly for Iran,” a senior US official told reporters on customary condition of anonymity.
   4. Israel expects UK, France to help hit Iran if Tehran attacks, Katz tells counterparts – Foreign Minister Israel Katz made the comments as he met with the British and French foreign ministers making a joint trip to Israel, as international efforts to mediate a ceasefire in Gaza intensified, amid heightened fears in Israel that Iran and Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon could attack Israel in retaliation for last month’s killings of Haniyeh and Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr.
   5. Israeli settlers rampaged through the Palestinian West Bank village of Jit, killing one. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the incident and said those responsible would face legal consequences. Separately, an Israeli peace group claimed plans for a new Israeli settlement in the West Bank would encroach on a UNESCO World Heritage site. (Haaretz, New York Times)
   6. The Gaza Health Ministry said the war’s death toll now exceeds 40,000 people. Among them: Two 4-day-old twins killed by an airstrike while their father was procuring their birth certificates. (Washington Post, LA Times)
   7. The IDF said it has killed 17,000 terror operatives in Gaza, including members of Hamas and the territory’s separate, smaller terror groups. (Times of Israel)
   8. Some 3,700 Israelis moved back to their homes near the Gaza border, some 10 months after Oct. 7, as the government decided to stop paying for them to be housed in hotels. More than 80% of those displaced from Israel’s south have now returned to their homes. (Times of Israel)
3. Columbia University president resigns amid criticism of her handling of pro-Palestinian protests – Minouche Shafik stepped down Wednesday, bowing to pressure from faculty, students and public officials who widely criticized her handling of pro-Palestinian campus protests last school year. Shafik’s resignation — 13 months after starting her job — makes her the latest Ivy League president to step down following the wave of protests that roiled college campuses, joining Claudine Gay of Harvard, Martha Pollack of Cornell and Liz Magill of the University of Pennsylvania.
4. Barbra Streisand joins thousands at ‘Jewish Women for Kamala’ virtual fundraiser. “It’s been said that Jewish women are known to speak out and tell you what they think and I’m one of them,” Streisand said during the Thursday call, before lambasting Trump’s third presidential run as a “naked grab for power, a blueprint for dictatorship.” And she celebrated the “rebellious women” of Jewish tradition, including Esther and Miriam, in encouraging the call’s participants to support the same determined spirit in themselves, and in Harris. Read the story ➤
5. Israel, Gaza and Josh Shapiro: What to watch for during the Democratic National Convention – When Democrats descend on Chicago next week to nominate Kamala Harris, the party will be unified on much, but riven by a major issue that has also preoccupied American Jews for 10 months: Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza. Outside the convention, pro-Palestinian protesters plan to turn out in the tens of thousands for marches and protests. On sidelines of the convention, pro-Israel groups will feature prominently, and stars like Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro will likely take the main stage. Harris’ Jewish husband, Doug Emhoff, is also expected to take a primetime turn. Read the story.
6. Kamala Harris’s Hebrew merch is taking shape — in the form of a punctuation mark – JTA — Until recently, business was slow for Michael Zorek, a retired actor who hawks irreverent political buttons every Sunday to farmer’s market patrons outside New York City’s American Museum of Natural History. Some days, Zorek sold as few as five Joe Biden buttons. But when Kamala Harris became the Democratic presidential candidate last month, sales shot up. Now, he says, he sometimes sells as many as 150 pins touting Harris in one sitting. The surge in sales reflects the enthusiasm Harris’s campaign has drawn, and it extends to one of Zorek’s specialty offerings: Harris merchandise in Hebrew, specifically, a button featuring a comma, overlaid with the Hebrew letters “lamed” and “hay,” spelling “la” and providing a visual primer on how to pronounce Harris’s first name. 
7. Did you know that ice cream has deeply Jewish roots? There’s a good chance that your favorite ice cream brand has Jewish origins. Learn more about everyone’s favorite summer treat from this short video:

And speaking of ice cream, here’s a shout out to my grandson Cam, who celebrated his one year birthday yesterday with his first visit to Crescent Ridge Ice Cream! Happy birthday Cam!

A sweet way to end this week’s JNR! Have a great rest of the weekend, and remember, be careful out there, and have a scoop or two if you get a chance.

Brad out.

Shalom! And welcome to this week’s myth busting edition. This will be the last in a series based on Sam Harris’ posting. In future editions I will attempt to take on and bust the myth that Israel is an apartheid state and, finally, the myth that the United Nations is a fair and balanced organization. 

In this post, Sam Harris makes a number of observations that many on the left have used, falsely, to accuse him of being an Islamophobe. Based on the dozens of blog postings and interviews I have personally reviewed, nothing could be further from the truth. To be sure, there are fanatic wings of almost all religions, but none in my lifetime that have committed as many atrocities as the Muslim jihadist organizations like Hamas, which Sam lays out succinctly in the essay that follows. 

There is a clearly a difference in the values and beliefs of these jihadist organizations which are built on a foundation of religious fundamentalism and nurtured, in the case of Palestinians, by the mosques and schools that teach hate and death to all Jews, schools by the way, that are sponsored and run by the UN and our tax dollars. I will have a special edition dedicated to the nonsense spewing from the UN, also known as “The United Nations Against Israel” in a future post. 

Now, play it again Sam, for the last time. 

Myth #5: The two sides in this conflict are equally civilized, equally entitled to respect, and equally worth protecting.

Well, again, if we’re talking about children dying on either side of this conflict—then yes, a human life is a human life. But Jihadist organizations like Hamas, and the wider cultures that support them, don’t value human life the way we do. Again, while this might sound like wartime propaganda, it is a simple statement of fact about how religious beliefs motivate people and constrain their thinking. There is a difference between religious fanatics who punish women with beatings (or worse) for showing their hair in public, or commit honor killings against them for the crime of getting raped, or throw acid in their faces for a perceived slight, or even, in a place like Afghanistan for the crime of going to school—there is a difference between this vicious lunacy and a modern society that treats women as equals to men. There is a difference between a society that murders gays, that literally has a policy of throwing them off of rooftops head first, and one that fully embraces them. There is a difference between religious fanatics who care only about Paradise, and most other people who take their religious beliefs much less seriously—or who have different beliefs that allow them to appropriately value life in this world.

Have you seen the crowds that cheered the capture of Israeli hostages and the mutilation of Jewish dead? Have you watched those videos? Did these people look like they have the slightest interest in avoiding war crimes? These are the types of behaviors we see all around the world in an Islamic context, even when the fighting has nothing to do with Jews or the US. Is it only Islamic? No. But Islam has more than its fair share of this kind of barbarity. We have to be honest about that. To be clear, I’m not advocating collective punishment against the Palestinians for being backward. I’m not saying that Palestinian civilians who support Hamas deserve to die. I am saying, however, that we shouldn’t lie to ourselves about the state of public opinion throughout the Muslim world. We should understand what people believe and how these beliefs affect behavior. And we have to figure out how to get 2 billion Muslims to truly moderate the religious extremism and tribalism we see throughout the Muslim world. It’s an enormous problem.

Recent polling among Palestinians, by the Palestinian Center for Policy Survey and Research, shows widespread support for Hamas, and more support for the attacks of October 7th. As I said, many of those who don’t like Hamas, for one reason or another, still like what Hamas did on October 7th.  This recent poll shows that while only around 40 percent of Palestinians support Hamas, double that support these atrocities of October 7th—the deliberate torture and murder of noncombatants, the taking of children (and even infants) as hostages. And the justification, in their minds, is explicitly religious—it was in defense of the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, which they imagine has been desecrated by the Netanyahu government. Of course, the Palestinian community and the Muslim world generally is so riddled with lies and conspiracy theories, that we might reasonably wonder what percentage of ordinary Muslims believe that any Jewish civilians were killed on October 7th. Many believe the Holocaust never happened. After September 11th, we had the impossible spectacle of Muslims alleging that it was Jewish plot, because 4000 Jews supposedly didn’t show up to work on 9/11, while simultaneously celebrating it as a great jihadist victory by al-Qaeda. There is no reconciling these beliefs. In general, we are not talking about people who are part of the reality-based community. But if we are going to maintain basic moral sanity at this moment in history, we have to acknowledge that there is a difference between those who intentionally kill noncombatants—often in the most gruesome ways possible—and those who inadvertently kill them when dropping bombs, having taken considerable pains to avoid killing them. There is a difference between a society that parades tortured hostages before jeering crowds and one that gives even its most dangerous prisoners life-saving medical care. Most people don’t realize that the current head of Hamas, Sinwar, was cured of brain cancer, while in an Israeli prison. The actual mastermind behind the October 7th attacks was someone whose life had been saved by Jewish oncologist. It’s pretty hard to overstate the disparity here. Do you understand how much this difference matters? And how it touches everything? There simply is a difference between those who are attempting to spread a cult of death to the ends of the Earth and those who are struggling to prevent this from happening, while also struggling to maintain the norms of an open society. And it is impossible to understand these differences if one merely counts the number of dead and wounded in this or any other conflict.

And this is why intentions matter. Actions matter, of course, but the reasons behind the actions also matter. What sort of world are we trying to build? What would any given person or group do if they had the power to do it? There are vast differences in what various groups are aspiring to accomplish at this moment in history. And the future of civilization depends on our being able to minimize these differences—and where they remain significant to minimize them further, through diplomacy, and economic incentives, and other forms of pressure short of violence. But there are certain groups of people that have kicked themselves loose of the Earth—and they can’t be reasoned with or incentivized. And this is where the use of force becomes necessary. Let’s hope that becomes less and less true in the years to come…  

Brad out.

Shabbat shalom! 

A tip of the kippah this week to the US Olympic athletes, as they continue to shine and accumulate shiny medals that proudly represent the culmination of their amazing training and even more amazing skills. Just looking at outcomes, the USA is leading in the overall medal count, which at this posting stands at 113, with the cheating Chinese and their steroid hamburgers in second with 84. In the run for gold, those cheating Chinese are one medal ahead, but not for long I hope. One other note for the USA is the power of “She”. Of the 33 gold medals to date, American women own 21 of them. You go girls!

And what a relief to turn off the news and spend a few hours watching these amazing athletes perform at levels that are other-worldly in a venue that is also other-worldly. Paris should also get a gold medal just for producing incredibly beautiful backdrops. USA! USA!

Meanwhile, it’s also been fun watching Trump melt down as he realizes a Black Asian woman might put an end to his monstrous ego-ride and prison-avoiding candidacy. The main stream media has been helpful in their absolute fawning over Harris (and her Walz selection), and the country has clearly bought into a campaign that is positive, uplifting and hopeful vs Trump’s dark, angry and looney one. I can’t resist the obvious reference and analogy to Dorothy putting a watery damper on the wicked witch and ending her evilness for good: “I’m melting! Melting! Oh, what a world, what a world! Who would have thought a good little girl like you could destroy my beautiful wickedness!”

This is the craziest I have seen the orange turd for quite some time. While Harris/Walz continue to win hearts and minds across the country, the turd seems otherwise preoccupied with posting unhinged rants on social media and trying to get the vaguely racist-sounding nickname “Kamabla” to take off. I think his lizard brain has been exposed to too much sun and it’s continuing to decay and shut down. 

When Walz was named the VP pick, the turd suggested the humble Midwesterner would “unleash HELL ON EARTH” and his Right-wing sycophants swung hard on the idea that Walz is some kind of radical antifa super soldier wearing a friendly 60-year-old-white-dad costume, but that pitch has been no where near the strike zone. And unfortunately for the orange turd and his fellow commode dwellers, Walz’s policies are broadly popular, and his state’s economy is one of the best. So it’s more than a stretch to claim that a guy who looks like he’d be happy to help you fix your snowblower is also a mendacious socialist tyrant. Good luck with that.

So, keep up the goofy crazy bullshit Donald. The more you spin, tweet and act out, the more votes you lose among the independents and swing voters. Just you being you is the best thing that can happen to the country. Nuf said. 

Things over in Israel are tense, to say the least. This last Wednesday marked a sad milestone, the 10th month since the October 7th pogrom started the war in Gaza, and even more sadly, Israelis are talking a lot this week about hostage Ariel Bibas turning five, captive in some horrible tunnel below Gaza. He was kidnapped with his mother Shiri and his brother, Kfir, a reminder that the monsters who did this kidnapped mothers and children barefoot from their homes. Ariel’s father, Yarden Bibas, was kidnapped separately, and there are pictures of mobs in Gaza beating him to a pulp, followed by a video that came out a few months ago of Hamas telling him that his family is dead and filming his reaction. These are real sadists. 

With major airlines cancelling all flights into Tel Aviv, and Israelis being told to stock up their bomb shelters, the country has been on edge since Iran announced it would strike back for the assassination that took place in an IRG “safe house” in Tehran, a bold and brilliant maneuver that embarrassed Iranian leaders. So, at one point this week, there were 100,000 Israelis stranded outside of Israel, fighting for El Al seats to get back into the country, a country which is on the precipice of a major war. That says something about the resilience and character of Israelis, that they’re fighting to get back to their country when it’s obvious it is about to be attacked by Iran and their murderous proxies. 

What is Iran up to? Is the current pause merely a psyop maneuver to inflict psychological anguish on Israelis even before they launch an arsenal of “retaliatory” missiles? Is there really hope for some kind of urgent cease fire that might avoid escalation? I hope it’s the latter, but history does not favor that option. For the last few decades, the Iranian strategy has long been what is called the “ring of fire”approach, surrounding Israel with its proxies that do its dirty work and trying to eliminate Israel via death by a thousand cuts, as implied in their Supreme Leader’s speech on October 3rd, where he predicted Israel would die of anger and hate. 

Since October 7th, despite Biden’s “Don’t” warning to Iran, it’s proxies have deeply wounded Israel, borders have been shrunk by pressure and violence from both the north and south, and Israel has been de-legitimized around the world with protests against Israel happening on a regular basis in the United Stats and Europe, with diplomatic and international organizations condemning Israel. Just this week, Turkey formally requested to join the South Africans in their preposterous case of genocide against Israel at the UN International Court of Injustice. But even with Israel on its diplomatic heels, I don’t think Iran will take a chance on picking a major fight. Not only are they fearful of the IDF’s intelligence and air force capabilities, but they know America will stand by their side, and the one thing they fear the most is losing their power over a citizenry that can’t stand them. 

There is still the question of what Hezbollah will do, independent of marching orders from Iran. And any strike from any proxy, if Israeli civilians are impacted, could lead directly to a full scale regional war. It’s a tinder box right now, and there are sparks and flames in all directions. Let’s hope a cease fire can help de-escalate matters, but in the long term, there needs to be some way to convince the Arab world that Israel is here to stay, and recognizing the Jewish state and living in peace is a better way forward. 

What about the rest of the news for the Jews across the Jew S of A and the rest of the world? Here is your skillfully selected sampling of semitic stories taken from the likes of The Forward, Haaretz, Kveller, Jewish Boston, Times of Israel, and other fine Jewy journals:

1. Israel/Iran: Potentially big news out of Iran – a new report in Al-Monitorsuggests Iran is moderating its threat to launch a devastating attack on Israel any day. The outlet quotes Iran’s UN Mission saying that “Our priority is to establish a lasting ceasefire in Gaza….” adding that any retaliation “will be timed and conducted in a manner not to the detriment of the potential ceasefire.” This suggests the planned attack could be put on hold until after negotiators meet on a revived hostage-for-ceasefire deal. This comes after the US, Egypt and Qatar issued a public statementtoday announcing that a hostage/ceasefire deal is ready and “called on both sides to resume urgent discussions”. They set an August 15th date to “close all remaining gaps.” Israel has agreed to negotiate, so far Hamas has not. A delay could provide Iran a face-saving way to avoid a shooting war with Israel and an opportunity to boast that they forced a deal on Gaza. Israel is still bracing for an attack — there is no indication Hezbollah is backing off. More on the war:
   1. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized for Oct. 7 in a new interview with Time, his first conversation with a major American outlet since the war began. And he repeated a line that he’s often deployed in the months since the Hamas attack, saying that an investigation into the Israeli government failures involved in the catastrophe should wait until the war is won and done.  
   2. The European Union and United Nations condemned remarks by Israel’s far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, that seemed to suggest the mass starvation of Palestinians in Gaza “might be just and moral.”
   3. The Israeli military embarked on its third offensive of the war in Khan Younis, ordering another mass evacuation of the Gazan city.
   4. New Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is fighting hardliners in the Islamic Republic to tone down the scale of Tehran’s promised strike against Israel over its alleged killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Iran last week, Britain’s Telegraph newspaper reported Friday. According to the report, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is pushing for a missile attack on Tel Aviv and other cities — though with a focus on hitting military facilities to avoid civilian casualties.
2. Hamas still hiding behind civilians – The Israel Defense Forces said Saturday it struck a command room that terror operatives set up at a school in Gaza City where Palestinian civilians were sheltering. The Gaza Strip’s Hamas-run civil defense agency said over 90 people were killed in the airstrike, describing the incident as a “horrific massacre.” The IDF expressed heavy skepticism toward the claim, saying the numbers appeared to have been inflated. The IDF said that according to its intelligence, at least 20 terror operatives, including “senior commanders,” were at the site when it was struck.
3. Pro-Palestinian vandals are painting red inverted triangles on their targets. What does it mean? “Pro-Palestinian protesters have made liberal use of the inverted red triangle,” writes Forward news editor Lauren Markoe: “They daubed it on the apartment building of a Columbia University leader Thursday, on a replica of the Liberty Bell in Washington, D.C., in July and on the home of the Jewish director of the Brooklyn Museum in June.“ Now, there’s controversy over whether the stateside popularization of the symbol — which terror groups in the Middle East have occasionally used to mark targets — should be considered threatening. Read the story ➤
4. Doug Emhoff installed mezuzahs at the Vice President’s Residence. What happens to them when he moves out, or up?  In 2021, after Harris moved into the vice presidential residence, her husband Doug Emhoff did what many Jews do when they move into a new home: He installed a mezuzah on its doorposts. The act was a first in the history of the United States, which had never before had a Jewish resident in the vice president’s mansion, and teed off four years in which Emhoff has centered his Jewish identity as second gentleman. Emhoff later cited installing the mezuzah as a high point of his year. Now, with Emhoff’s tenancy set to end Jan. 20, 2025, he will need to decide what to do with the mezuzah that hangs at its front door. Read the story.
5. Israel’s team wins silver in rhythmic gymnastics, claiming 7th medal at Games – The members of Israel’s silver medal-winning rhythmic gymnastics team at the Paris Olympics tell Israel’s Sport5 channel that they’re still absorbing their success and are delighted that they could give a boost to Israel. Speaking immediately after the medals ceremony, Romi Paritzki, 20, says the five of them “fought to the end” after being in fifth place following the first of the final’s two exercises. “We had such a great time,” she says, adding that “the crowd was fantastic.” Noting that there are lots of Israeli flags in the hall, she says they are “so proud to represent the state, and to lift it; we’re a strong people.”
6. The first trailer for Jason Reitman’s film Saturday Night, about the birth pangs of NBC’s iconic sketch show Saturday Night Live, is out and serving up a heaping dose of anxiety. The teaser features Gabriel LaBelle as show creator Lorne Michaels, trying to launch a counterculture program while network executives root for his failure and stage lights and scenery collapse around him. Complicating matters are a famously chaotic — and legendary — cast including an antic Gilda Radner (Ella Hunt), glamorous Laraine Newman (Emily Fairn), and guest Andy Kaufman (Succession’s Nicholas Braun, also doubling as Jim Henson) appearing with his Mighty Mouse record player. And, if my eyes don’t deceive me, that’s Paul Shaffer coaching announcer Don Pardo on how to pronounce “Aykroyd.”

That will do it for this week. Enjoy the rest of the weekend, be careful out there, and hope for the best for our Israeli friends.

Brad out.

Shalom. 

This post is the 3rd in a series of special Wednesday editions that will focus on myths about Israel and the war in Gaza, based primarily on Sam Harris’s essay by the same name. Last Wednesday we covered “Proportional Response”, this week will focus on the myth that the Jews are “colonizers” and the wacky notion that October 7 was a legitimate response by Hamas and the Palestinian people. But first, a few words on Kamala’s first major decision, her VP selection, Tim Walz, who some have coined, “a progressive in a hunting cap.”

Did Kamala cave to the Bernie wing of the party by passing over a devout Jew, Josh Shapiro, because he might cost them, as the satirical Babylon Bee put it, the “Death To America” vote? Could be. Given the criticality of Pennsylvania, and the tremendous popularity of Shapiro in that state, it certainly makes you wonder. (On the positive side, with Cori Bush losing her primary, at least The Squad now has one less anti-semite in their ranks.) 

Political pundits make the point that a VP selection should follow the hippocratic oath: “do no harm”. And, like it or not, even though a clear majority of Americans, (even college kids!), still support Israel and the war to eradicate Hamas, in the current version of the Democratic Party, Shapiro probably harms the ticket. But as the Daily Free Press put it, “consider what this means: the most qualified person to help a major party nominee win the presidency was passed over because he’s a proud Jew with a strong connection to his heritage.” Ugh. 

As I said in my previous post, any three of the finalists would have made a good VP, and I am excited about Walz and supporting the ticket. I am not a huge Kamala fan, but she seems to have matured as a politician since her horrible 2020 campaign where she couldn’t garner more than 15% in any state, and she certainly has surrounded herself with a better team, bringing on a new echelon of senior advisers, most prominently David Plouffe, the former top political adviser to Barack Obama. And with the news yesterday from Nate Silver showing Kamala beating the orange turd in his latest model, things are looking up! 

Now for some myth busting, courtesy of Sam Harris.

Myth #3: The Jews Are Colonizers and the Palestinians are Indigenous People.

There has been a continuous presence of Jews in the land of Israel for thousands of years. The Jews, therefore, are an indigenous people of the region. They were also indigenous to Egypt, Syria, Yemen, Turkey, Iran, and other Muslim countries—before being driven out of those countries by Muslims. (Curiously, no one at the U.N. is worried about the Jews so-called “right of return.” Is anyone pressuring Muslim countries to give Jews their homes back? No. These are the sorts of asymmetries one should notice.)

In any case, Israel is not unique among states in having been created by outside powers, just drawing lines on maps in the aftermath of WW2. Pakistan was born in the same year and in the same way, and yet no one questions its right to exist. Nearly every nation on Earth has emerged from a chaotic history of conquest and the displacement of people. There are now 22 official Muslim States and over 50 Muslim-majority countries. This is the result of centuries of Muslim conquest. There is exactly one Jewish state. And yet only Israel must continuously confront charges of its illegitimacy. Only Israel must continually advocate for its right to exist. There are nearly 200 member states of the UN, and Israel has been sanctioned by that body more than all the countries in the world combined. Does that mean that Israel has behaved especially badly? No. There are countries like North Korea that have turned its entire society into a prison camp. There are countries like Sudan, that have perpetrated actual genocides. There are counties like Egypt and Somalia, where nearly 100 percent of girls are subjected to genital mutilation. There are countries, like Syria, that have killed orders of magnitude more Muslim noncombatants. As I already pointed out, there are countries like Iran that have used child soldiers, by the tens of thousands, in suicide operations. And yet the UN sits in perpetual judgment of the one embattled democracy in the Middle East that is fighting for its actual survival—against a death cult that revels in atrocities and in the martyrdom of its own civilians. I know the UN sounds like it still has some gravitas—it’s the United Nations, afterall—but on this and several other points, it has become a morally bankrupt organization. There are even reports that employees of UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees) took part in the massacre of October 7th—as insane as that sounds. And the United States has now paused funding because of this. The US alone gives UNRWA around $300M a year. And, as has been widely reported, UN funded schools teach Palestinian kids to hate Jews and aspire to martyrdom. The word “corruption” doesn’t even begin to encompass the problems here.

Myth #4: The atrocities committed by Hamas (and over one thousand Palestinian civilians) on October 7th were a legitimate response to oppression.

Israel left Gaza in 2005—forcibly removing thousands of its own citizens—and billions of dollars in international aid have since been spent there. So the “oppression” of the Palestinians in Gaza—by Israel—is at least debatable. While Israel has sought to maintain a secure border with Gaza all those years, so has Egypt—and yet no one blames Egypt for making Gaza an “open-air prison.” However, even if we accept the charge of “oppression,” it must be said that not all oppressed people respond by raping, and torturing, and murdering noncombatants.

The Tibetans have been truly oppressed by the Chinese for many decades, and yet they have never committed atrocities against Chinese civilians. When the Jews of Germany were herded into ghettos by the Nazis, those who escaped didn’t rape and mutilate German teenagers or burn German babies alive in reprisal. There are countless historical examples of real oppression, and yet very few cultures have produced a bottomless supply of suicidal terrorists. There might be many societal factors that explain these differences, but one is surely the Islamic doctrines around martyrdom and jihad. People’s religious beliefs really are motivating. We can see this with fundamentalist Christianity in the West. The fundamentals of religion matter when you’re a fundamentalist. And it matters that the fundamentals of our various religions are different. Mere religious tribalism is always a potential source of intolerance and violence—it is much worse when there are specific doctrines that advocate intolerance and violence. Again, we need the world’s 2 billion Muslims to honestly acknowledge this problem and find some way of moderating their faith, specifically around the doctrines of martyrdom, jihad, apostasy, and blasphemy–which put their faith in perpetual conflict with the modern world.  

That’s all for now. Let’s hope things don’t get any crazier in Israel and the entire region this week.

Brad out.

Shabbat shalom!

It was a week of whiplash news in Israel, VP stakes in the US, and some inspiring sporting events in Paris. But let’s start with a tip of the kippah, this time to old man Joe Biden, who in the midst of defending his ability to feed himself mashed foods with a spoon, negotiated one of the largest prisoner exchanges since the Cold War! The deal resulted in 24 prisoners being released from seven countries. President Biden and his administration worked with Germany, Slovenia, Poland and Norway to swap prisoners with Russia and Belarus. When President Biden convinced German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to free a convicted Russian hit man who killed a Russian exile in Berlin in broad daylight, Scholz reportedly told the president, “For you, I will do this.”

Way to go Joe! 

Meanwhile, “Momala” Harris continues to ride a wave of enthusiasm, ending this week with her securing enough votes from delegates to become her party’s nominee for president. And, she continued to interview six candidates for VP, with much of the focus around Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Kelly of Arizona, and Walz of Minnesota. All three would be excellent choices. On a purely tactical level, my pick would be Shapiro (a Jew), as there is probably no route to victory without Pennsylvania, but I worry that if they lose, everyone will blame the Jews. Walz is a great folksy, straight talking midwesterner, who I am liking more and more as a symbol of the ticket tacking to the center, and Kelly ticks a lot of boxes and would help the D’s expand their tent in the sunbelt. We shall soon see, as she is expected to announce her decision on VP this week in Pennsylvania.

The D’s are going to have to face the fact that, once the enthusiasm train starts to slow down, Harris will need the Etcha-A-Sketch to erase her past “woke” credentials. Andrew Sullivan’s piece this week is a telling reminder of exactly that: 

The record is somewhat difficult to ignore: Harris favored decriminalizing illegal border crossings, free healthcare for all illegal immigrants, funded bail for BLM rioters, abolition of private health insurance, a ban on fracking, and replacing ICE — “starting from scratch.” She is committed to the woke concept of “equity”, which means ensuring that all identity groups in America “end up in the same place” by government intervention. She favors what we now know are irreversible medical experiments on gay, autistic and trans children. She supports reparations for slavery. She wants to inculcate the core ideas of critical race, gender and queer theory in public schools from kindergarten onward.

The Never Trumper is thereby confronted with an inevitable tension. Not voting for Trump is an easy call, of course. But actually voting for the most left-wing candidate in US history — and one in the vanguard of the new left’s woke cultural revolution — forces us into a new, and awkward place: abandoning almost all our previous principles for the sake of preventing one man’s return to office.

Sullivan sees the bigger picture, and invokes Adam Kinzinger who put the case for Harris most succinctly: “She’s not Donald Trump.” And if you believe that Trump is an existential threat to democracy and the rule of law itself, this obviously makes sense. All policy questions should be subordinate to deeper Constitutional concerns. I get it.” Sullivan, a Never Trumper, and conservative straight shooter, is clearly having second thoughts. If he is a litmus test for the undecideds and Never Trumpers, we could be in trouble. 

In Israel, the news has been a week of whiplash. The war in Gaza just passed the 300 day mark, and while many were cheering the successful assassinations of some truly terrible terrorists, those targeted and strategic killings have put the Israeli people on edge, as they now anxiously await an Iranian response. While Israelis stock up on nonperishables for their bomb shelters and safe rooms, the United States just sent more warships and jet planes into the Mediterranean, and all major airlines have halted flights into Tel Aviv. Israelis are a tough people, and not shying away from the fight. But the really bad news had nothing to do with any external threats from Iran and its murderous proxies. 

The really bad news was a January 6th style attack by Israel’s radical right, led by right wing thug Itamar Ben Gvir, against their own IDF military base. The attack on the base was prompted by Israel’s military police detaining several guards from a detention facility holding Palestinian prisoners, who are accused of doing some pretty heinous things to one of the prisoners. Think Abu Ghraib. So, rather than letting the justice system process the accused, Ben Gvir inspired a mob of right wing nut jobs to storm the military base. Dozens of protesters gathered outside the base in solidarity with the detained soldiers, including at least three far-right lawmakers from the ruling coalition. Hundreds later massed outside Beit Lid, a second base in which the 10 men had been brought for interrogation. Dozens surged inside both bases, brushing aside the guards at the gates. Police were late to the scene, the police who are led by none other than Ben Gvir. Bibi’s response was tepid.

The incidents were widely broadcast across Israel, spreading an image of disunity at a time when the country is fighting enemies on multiple fronts. And while this news has been overshadowed by the coming war with Hezbollah, the wound to the Israeli psyche from this act of insurrection goes deep, and has left the country in the worst place it has been since October 7, and revived the battle over the soul of the country that began over a year ago around the proposed reforms of the judiciary. On one side were the Israelis who see their country as a liberal democracy in which the judiciary should act as a strong check on government overreach. On the other were those who feel it would be more democratic to bestow more power to the elected representatives of an increasingly conservative population than to unelected judges. “All red lines were crossed today,” Yair Lapid, the Israeli opposition leader, said on social media. “Lawmakers and ministers who participate in breaking into military bases with violent militias are sending a message to the state of Israel: They are done with democracy, they are done with the rule of law.” Ugh.

On the good news front, I’m sure most of you have read about the assassinations of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders this last week so I will not provide any details here. An awesome achievement combining the kind of cunning, intelligence, bravery and chutzpah usually associated with Mossad and the IDF, and Israel in general. What strikes me most about the assassination of Hamas’ political leader is the complete absence of any missile responses from Hamas in Gaza! My take is that the IDF has neutered Hamas to the point where they are currently incapable of such a response. And if that is true, for God’s sake Bibi, close the hostage deal! Bring them home! Follow Joe Biden’s lead on negotiating a great prisoner exchange deal. Maybe even head off any kind of Iranian response as part of the deal. You have earned more leverage with the assassinations, control over the Philadelphia Passage, and overall progress in Rafah, now get the deal done! Bring them home Bibi! And then resign, you big arrogant a-hole.

Let’s move on and get to the good stuff. Here then, finally, is your weekly buffet of baffling, beguiling, and sometimes bitter news for the Jews copied and pasted from the likes of The Forward, Kveller, Times of Israel, The Jewish Chronicle, JTA, and other reputable sources of all things Jewish-y.  

1. Jewish Olympiads – These olympics have been nothing short of awesome. Paris is beautiful, the US is doing great, every day brings more incredible story lines and performances, and the Jewish medal count is already in double figures! Israeli windsurfers Tom Reuveny and Sharon Kantor landed gold and silver, artistic gymnast Artem Dolgopyat scored silver, as Israel set a new record with 6 medals at the Games — and 3 in a single day! But the biggest Jewish story of the 2024 Paris Olympics so far may be Jessica Fox, the Australian canoe paddler who added two gold medals to her already unmatched legacy as the greatest in the sport’s history. Fox won gold in both the kayak and canoe events, bringing her career record to six medals — three of them gold — which is the most individual medals ever won by an Australian. So far, Fox has been joined at this year’s Jewish Paris podium by U.S. rugby player Sarah Levy, U.S. fencers Nick Itkin, Jackie Dubrovich and Maia Weintraub, Israeli judokas Raz Hershko, Inbar Lanir and Peter Paltchik, Australian racewalker Jemima Montag and U.S. swimmer Claire Weinstein. Together, counting team events, they have 13 medals: four golds, five silvers and four bronzes. As of Friday afternoon Eastern Time, that’s a higher medal count than all but nine countries.
2. On the war….
   1. Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordered a direct strike on Israel in response to Haniyeh’s killing. The Shin Bet, Israel’s version of the Secret Service, is on alert for potential assassinations, advising Netanyahu and other government officials both in Israel and abroad to lower their profiles.
   2. The U.S. reiterated its “unwavering commitment” to defend Israel if it’s attacked, said Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.
   3. Security has increased around the Israeli delegation at the Olympic Games in Paris. Even before the recent assassinations, the athletes received threatening “phone calls inviting them to their own funerals” and warning them of another “Munich 1972.”
   4. Several airlines are avoiding the airport in Israel. Lufthansa diverted a Tel Aviv-bound flight to Cypress. United and Delta have temporarily canceled flights to and from Israel.
3. Shapiro haters are Jew haters – Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish, is facing a campaign to keep him off the ticket because of his stance on Israel. The stop-Shapiro push includes an article in a major left-wing publication, The New Republic, and a website and Twitter feed called “No Genocide Josh.” Jewish and non-Jewish commentators, among them Democrats in Congress, say that Shapiro is being unjustly singled out because he is Jewish. That’s because all of the other candidates — Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota and Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly — also have pro-Israel records. Among those agitating against a Shapiro pick are the Democratic Socialists of America, a group that recently made anti-Zionism a litmus test in deciding whom to endorse. Jewish Insider also discovered that one of the organizers of the “No Genocide Josh” campaign is “Dear White Staffers,” a once-humorous social media feed that has been relentlessly critical of Israel since Oct. 7. The feed is run by a staffer for Pennsylvania Rep. Summer Lee, a member of the hardline left-wing “Squad” whose members are harsh Israel critics. It took Rep Adam Schiff to call a spade a spade, “Singling him out, or applying a double standard to him over the war in Gaza, is antisemitic and wrong, Don’t go there.”
4. On campus….
   1. 🎒 A federal judge ordered the University of California, Los Angeles, to craft a plan by the end of this month to safeguard Jewish students on campus. (AP)
   2. 🏫  Five major Jewish organizations — the ADL, AJC, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Hillel International and Jewish Federations of North America — issued a four-page recommendation to help universities tackle antisemitism this fall. (eJewishPhilanthropy)
   3. ⚖️  A federal court dismissed a lawsuit from a group of Jewish students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who claimed the school had not done enough to protect them. (Bloomberg Law)
5. And elsewhere….
   1. 🥪  An Oklahoma couple got lost at sea for two days, floating in the Gulf of Mexico. After they were rescued, they drove directly to a Jewish deli in Houston to enjoy a black-and-white cookie and a triple-deck sandwich with corned beef and pastrami called “Fiddler on the Roof of Your Mouth.” Said the man: “Where we’re from, we just don’t have that kind of food.” (NY Times)
   2. Bella Hadid, a supermodel and pro-Palestinian activist, said she regrets working on a campaign with Adidas in which she modeled a sneaker originally designed for the 1972 Munich Olympics, where 11 Israelis were murdered in a Palestinian terror attack. “I would never knowingly engage with any art or work that is linked to a horrific tragedy of any kind,” Hadid said. “In advance of the campaign’s release, I had no knowledge of the historical connection to the atrocious events in 1972.” She added: “Antisemitism has no place in the liberation of the Palestinian people.” Read the story ➤

Let’s close this week with a great response from Simone Biles to the orange turd’s suggestion last week that immigrants are stealing “black jobs”.

That’s a wrap. Enjoy the olympics everyone! And even if you are not a believer, let’s pray for Israel to stay safe, and let’s be careful out there.

Brad out.