The Jerusalem Great Synagogue is one of the grandest synagogues in the world. On holidays and sabbaths, it typically has a magnificent choir which enhances prayer services. In July 2024, when Rosh Hodesh, the new month of Tamuz fell on Shabbat, the synagogue decided to have a special choir with prayers full of songs by a 50-person choir consisting of many young boys.
The Jerusalem Great Synagogue, July 2024
Shabbat Rosh Hodesh involves reading from two torah scrolls, rather than a single torah on a regular Sabbath. On this special sabbath, two men raised the torahs at the conclusion of the particular readings and sat holding the holy scrolls as Moshe Lion, the mayor of Jerusalem read the haftorah before a packed synagogue.
Before the torahs were returned to their places in the ark, the large choir came down from their podium and encircled the bima, the center of prayers in the heart of the synagogue. The two men holding the torahs rose, and the entire congregation with them, as the cantor and choir sang two special blessings, one for the government of Israel and one for the Israeli Defense Forces.
With the backdrop of the ongoing war, the choir used a variety of melodies in singing the two blessings, including Hatikvah, the Israeli national anthem, and Lu Yehi, a contemporary song of longing to arrive at the end of all wars.
For twenty minutes the choir sang the songs with the congregation’s participation. Many cried as both old and young thought about many family members who were serving in the armed forces to combat enemies in Gaza and Lebanon. Hundreds of people gathered in the centers of Israel, of Jerusalem, and of the Great Synagogue but hearts and minds were elsewhere.
A Wedding In The Jerusalem Forest
The next day a wedding was held in the Jerusalem forest. The sun was setting as the bride and groom took their places under the chuppah, the wedding canopy. Family and close friends gathered before them, watching the young couple sanctify their union.
The Jewish ritual of presenting a ring, reading the ketubah and reciting seven blessings were complete, but the happy couple was not ready to celebrate. First a friend took the microphone to recite a chapter of Psalms for the soldiers and families impacted in the current war. Everyone recited the lines responsively, and then all sang Im Eshkachech Yerushalyim, If I forget thee, Jerusalem.
The groom then crushed a glass beneath his feet, symbolizing the still unbuilt holy city of Jerusalem, before turning to hug his bride.
Groom ready to crush glass symbolizing the ongoing incompleteness of Jerusalem
Two men in a synagogue and a bride and groom under a canopy, stood at the center of attention, yet their focus was elsewhere. Thinking of young soldiers at the battlefront, hostages held in captivity and the unbuilt Temple, Jews turn their consciousness outward to the larger community beyond those present.
The focus of the Jewish gaze ultimately extends beyond line of sight.
The “Squad” of far-left American politicians pulled out all of the antisemitic dog whistles in their fight to defend the unpopular congressman Jamaal Bowman in the New York Democratic primary. In response to his resounding defeat, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez said “I think we need to have a real conversation about AIPAC,” the pro-Israel group supported by many Jews.
In truth, all the alt-left did was talk about AIPAC for the prior months and did so in the most vile and slanderous manner. As such, we must have a conversation about alt-left politicians’ repulsive antisemitism.
The smears were:
AIPAC is a bunch of White supremacist racist MAGA billionaires
AIPAC doesn’t want Black and Brown people to have positions of power
AIPAC supports genocide of Black and Brown people
The people behind AIPAC are operating in the shadows
AIPAC is buying off politicians and congress
AIPAC and backers are seeking to oppress minorities around the world
The Squad is operating to defend working class people from the AIPAC racist money machine
It’s a war of us versus them
This is repulsive and mimics Nazi propaganda against Jews in the 1930s and 1940s. These are carefully organized scripts to inflame a war against Jews in the United States and around the world.
White Supremacists and Racists
Bowman’s posts on X were replete with calling the backers of his opponent George Latimer, himself a progressive, as racists of the worst sort, who try to keep Black people down.
Comments included:
“White supremacists… targeting me, our first Black Representative with racist attacks & dog whistles… don’t want to see people like us in power.” [note that lower Westchester voted for Mondaire Jones, a Black gay progressive in 2020]
“Big-money groups like AIPAC don’t like seeing people like me in power.”
“AIPAC and their MAGA billionaires don’t want to see us in power. They don’t want to see Black and brown working class people rising up.”
“We’re fighting against AIPAC and their Republican billionaires… trying to buy NY-16… our communities are not for sale.”
Billionaires Buying Politicians
Bowman, AOC and Sen. Bernie Sanders made the fight about a handful of racist billionaires buying politicians, rather than discuss issues.
Comments included:
“AIPAC and their right-wing billionaires are trying to buy this district like they bought my opponent. They don’t want to see people in power.”
“AIPAC and their Republican billionaires are spending millions to try to buy our district… their money will never defeat the people.”
“My opponent sold out to AIPAC and their right-wing billionaires. They’re spending millions to try to buy our district.”
“He’s [Latimer] so bought out by AIPAC… pawns for special interests.”
“Fight back against AIPAC and right-wing billionaires.”
“AIPAC has already spent $6 million against us. Why? because we stand for peace and justice! MAGA Republicans are trying to buy NY-16… we decide the future of our district, not them.”
“Defeat MAGA billionaires trying to buy NY-16”
AOC wrote “Big money, from AIPAC to Wall Street have poured millions to buy this election.”
Bernie Sanders wrote “tell billionaires and their corporate PACs that no, they cannot buy our democracy.”
UAW wrote “The billionairess are coming for Jamaal Bowman because he stands up for the working class… they think they can buy off Congress.”
AIPAC Supports Genocide
Bowman and friends made clear that these wealthy racists are genocidal, coming for Black and Brown people in the U.S. and Israel.
Comments included:
“AIPAC’s attack campaign against us is breaking spending records every week… Our movement is scaring their pro-genocide, pro-Netanyahu, racist MAGA donors.”
“The Israeli government is committing a genocide and OUR taxpayer money is funding it. Why do we have billions to send to mass murder”
“This election is a working class educator… against a multimillionaire handpicked by MAGA to support genocide.”
“We won’t let AIPAC stop us from fighting for peace and justice.”
“Our struggles are all connected. The same evils harming our communities here are harming communities across the world.”
Comrade Rashida Tlaib shared “Palestinian liberation and Black liberation are interconnected. From Detroit to Cleveland to Gaza.”
AIPAC Is Coming After Black And Brown Communities
Bowman framed the primary race of two progressives, one Black who is extremist and anti-Israel, and the other White and pro-Israel, as an existential battle between peace-loving working class minorities against evil nefarious forces. It’s appalling and ridiculous as Latimer has decades of strong relationships and dozens of endorsements from Black and Brown politicians, and AIPAC is focused on Israel, not local race relations.
Comments included:
“AIPAC, a right-wing lobby… don’t care about us or our communities.”
“Big money doesn’t belong in our communities Reject AIPAC”
“Black and Brown communities have been left behind for too long. We don’t need more career politicians who only cater to their billionaire friends.”
Bowman retweeted “Thanks to funding from right-wing billionaires, AIPAC is targeting progressives of color”
The Working Families Party shared the article “No One Should Be Surprised a Black Politician Is the Canary in AIPAC’s Coal Mine”
Bowman added “The people are rising up against AIPAC and their republican billionaires. We won’t let them buy our communities in NY-16 or anywhere!”
Hiding In The Shadows
AOC made clear that these racist billionaires keeping minorities down are being funded by “dark money.”
Bowman retweeted AOC comments including:
“Dark money has spent the largest sum in history to unseat Jamaal Bowman… these lobbies don’t care about the Bronx and Westchester.”
“we rallied 1200 people in the Bronx to take on dark money”
“It’s time to fight back against AIPAC and their megadonors.”
The Alt-Left Against AIPAC
The far-left wing demonized a pro-Israel group as the epitome of evil: racist White supremacists who support genocide against minorities in the U.S. and Israel and who don’t care about anyone. They are agents who do not belong in the district or to have a voice in American politics.
Rep. Cori Bush said that these pro-Israel people “meddle in our Democratic elections,” meaning that they do not belong.
As such, they all ran under a banner of RejectAIPAC; to rally against a bipartisan organization that supports the only liberal democracy in the Middle East. To demonize the only Jewish state. To call anyone involved in pro-Israel activities pro-genocidal maniacs who should be cast from society. To strip the beleaguered Jewish State of all defenses.
No lobbying group is tarnished in such fashion by politicians. We don’t call Americans who are involved with the National Rifle Association or Planned Parenthood as “genocide supporters.” Elected officials do not slam teacher’s unions as “dark money” that “meddle” in the political process.
But the far-left has called open season on Jews loudly and repeatedly. It’s us versus them.
And it’s a completely manufactured lie. A vicious antisemitic campaign attempting to vilify Jews and push them from the public square.
We need to have a conversation about the vile antisemitism that is rife at woke colleges and among far-left politicians.
The single largest issue in the Israeli-Palestinian Arab conflict is the belief among those Arabs that they have a right to move into towns and houses where grandparents lived many decades ago. They call it a “right of return” and state that it is an individual right laid out in international law.
Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
As it relates to the first point, Palestine either was or was not a country before Israel declared itself a state in May 1948. If it was not a country, the UDHR right is irrelevant as it specifically relates only to countries. If it was a state, than the Arabs living in Gaza and the West Bank are already part of such state and have no right to move based on the first clause. Their right to move to Israel under the second clause of moving “within the borders of each state” would mean negating the very existence of Israel, a member state of the United Nations, which would undermine the institution upon which the clause exists (rendering such notion impossible).
If Palestine were considered a state pre-Israel, then the descendants of refugees (DORs) in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan could relocate to Gaza or the West Bank (Palestine), but not to Israel.
So under broad international law, there is no right of return for Palestinian Arabs to Israel regardless of whether one thinks Palestine was a country in 1947.
Palestinian Arabs and their supporters therefore try to use a specific clause within a particular UN General Assembly resolution. UNGA Resolution 194, Article 11 states “Resolves that refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under principles of international law or equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible.”
This resolution has multiple legal issues regarding applicability.
UN General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, but advisory at the most fundamental. Second, Resolution 194 includes many items including Articles 7 and 8 which places holy places – including those in Nazareth and Jerusalem – under UN control, which neither Israel nor the Palestinian Authority desire. One cannot cherry-pick specific items which one side prefers to make a case; the entirety of that resolution is passed its expiration date.
Significantly, the clause itself demands that those refugees desiring to return to “homes” – which may or may not exist anymore – must live in peace with their neighbors. The many wars and pogroms by Palestinian Arabs, including their overwhelming support for Hamas and the October 7 massacre, show them to reject basic coexistence with Jewish neighbors.
Yet UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres makes a mockery of reality and destroys a pathway to peace when he says the opposite. He often states “the need for tangible progress towards a two-State solution based on 1967 lines, with Jerusalem as the capital of both States, in line with UN resolutions and international law.” That clause makes Palestinian Arabs think that millions of Arabs will get to move to Tel Aviv and Haifa. Their frustration of not moving there leads to frustration and causes massacres as seen on October 7.
The United Nations must make clear that there is no “right of return” for any Palestinian Arab to Israel, full stop. The failure to do so causes bloodshed and suffering.
The most expensive primary race in America concluded this week in New York’s 16th Congressional District with Westchester County Executive George Latimer defeating incumbent Rep. Jamaal Bowman. The narrative found in mainstream and social media would have one believe that Republican billionaires funded a random White racist to defeat a popular Black politician who had the nerve to combat the Democratic establishment’s backing of Israel in its war against Hamas.
That is a complete fiction. The reality is that:
Bowman was a very flawed extremist politician
Bowman cared little for the vast majority of his district and he was quite unpopular amongst his constituents
Latimer is a very well-known and liked progressive politician in the majority of the district
Latimer likely would have won with a fraction of the spending
Mainstream and social media picked up far-left talking points tainted with antisemitic dog whistles, rather than focus on the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates
The race is unpacked here, as some of the lessons relate to other races featuring members of the squad as well as the deeply flawed Vice President Kamala Harris.
NY’s 16th Congressional District
Bowman won his NY16 seat in 2020 when the district’s boundaries covered northern Bronx and some of southern Westchester County. When congressional district lines were redrawn in 2022 after the 2020 Census, NY16 was almost completely lower Westchester with a small nub of the Bronx.
In 2020, a good potion of lower Westchester was located in NY17, which voted for another Black progressive politician, Mondaire Jones. However, when the lines were redrawn in 2022, Jones opted to run for congress in Manhattan and left Bowman to run in NY16 with the expanded lower Westchester in the district.
Many people in the 16th district wanted to oust Bowman in 2022 for a range of actions and statements including voting against the bipartisan infrastructure bill, calling for defunding the police, his stated aims for destroying capitalism and abolishing the immigration center. At that time, some Jews in the district asked AIPAC to get involved in the primary but the pro-Israel group refused because two contenders were already facing Bowman, Catherine Parker and Vedat Gashi. As predicated, those two ended up dividing the anti-Bowman votes, and Bowman sailed to an easy primary victory with only 20,000 votes. After the primary, in September 2022, AIPAC suggested to people in NY16 that it find a single popular candidate early who would clear the field of other Democratic politicians in the next election, which they did as described below in early 2023.
In 2024, the district lines were redrawn slightly, with Co-op City swapped in for the Wakefield section of the Bronx. With the adjustment, there were roughly 252,600 voters in the district of which 41.7% were White, 26.9% Hispanic, 21.3% Black and 6.6% Asian. Jewish groups estimated that the Jewish voting age population in the district was about 25,800, or about 10.2% of the total voter universe.
Tally from the 2024 Latimer-Bowman democratic primary
Latimer won the primary with about a 17 point spread, or 13,300 votes, on the strength of his turnout in Westchester where he secured 64% of the votes. Bowman did well in Co-op City, but with a relatively small number of voters.
Jewish voters made a difference.
The Jewish Vote
Westchester Unites, a division of the Orthodox Union assembled to get out the vote effort under a tagline “Antisemitism is on the ballot.” The group stated that it brought 14,871 Jewish voters to the polls (as of 7:30pm on election night), presumably almost all of which voted for Latimer, a sum which exceeded the margin of victory. Remarkably, that figure is 57.7% of the eligible Jewish voters in the district, an incredible figure for a primary. The number also doesn’t include many of the non-Orthodox and non-affiliated Jews in the district which did not want to be part of the WU effort.
With more mail-in votes being collected in the days post-election, it is fair to estimate that Jews made up as much as one-third of Latimer’s votes.
The incredibly high rate of Jewish voters participating in a primary could not have been achieved solely with WU or AIPAC backing. Jews inside the district had been preparing for this primary battle for over two years.
The Orthodox community was particularly strong in rallying for Latimer. Estimates are that roughly 2,000 people in NY16 changed their party affiliation from Independent or Republican to Democrat to vote in the 2024 primary. Additionally, WU estimates that over 80% of the Orthodox eligible voters participated in the election, a much higher figure than for non-Orthodox.
The question is why Jews in Westchester, which had voted for Mondaire Jones, a Black progressive politician in 2020, turned on another Black progressive in Bowman a short time later, and why Jones himself opted to endorse Latimer over Bowman.
Bowman, Prioritized Blacks And Absent On Antisemitism
The press will say that Jews were offended by Bowman’s pro-Palestinian positions but while true, it misses the mark. Bowman was absent on antisemitism while he served only his preferred base of constituents in his district, the Black and Brown communities.
Instead, Bowman came to White Plains on the day he condemned antisemitic vandalism at Goldman’s office, and told a crowd that Israelis are lying that Palestinian Arabs raped and sexually abused women as a matter of “propaganda.” For some reason, Bowman believes it’s progressive to “believe women” as long as they aren’t Jewish, and to decry antisemitism against colleagues but not constituents.
Beyond ignoring Jews and Jew-hatred, Bowman stressed the Black and Brown communities.
When Bowman discussed student debt, he didn’t discuss it for all his constituents but focused on the Black and Brown communities. Repeatedly.
Similarly when Bowman discussed poor young people in his district, he focused on “Black and Brown kids,” downplaying poor Whites and Asians.
Bowman believes that “his” community is the Black community, which is not a problematic position for an individual, but deeply troubling for a politician when they ignore everyone else.
Bowman established a reputation for not serving all of his constituents during his two terms. He was noticeably absent in Westchester while his challenger, George Latimer, had decades of serving every community in the county.
Latimer secured a complete sweep of Democratic endorsements in Westchester with the sole exception of New Rochelle. Bowman had endorsed that city’s new mayor Yarida Ramos-Herbert when she ran for office, but she did not return the favor as she saw the writing on the walls that Bowman was a flailing politician. New Rochelle opted to not endorse anyone.
Bowman was so unaware of and unfamiliar with his constituents, that the day before the June 25 election, he held a rally in the South Bronx, miles away from his district, with politicians from outside the district like Sen. Bernie Sanders from Vermont. How asinine and emblematic of a failed candidate, unless Bowman had already conceded the race and was setting a stage to run in against Rep. Ritchie Torres (NY15) in two years.
It begs the question of how the narrative became so skewed. Jews in the district tried to get rid of Bowman well before the October 7th Hamas massacre. Latimer is a well-known progressive who was endorsed by Mondaire Jones, not some “random white dude.” All the Democratic committees in Westchester endorsed Latimer, not “far-right Republicans.” He got his money from inside the district while Bowman funded his campaign from outside.
Israel, AIPAC and October 7
Bowman was a poor politician who cared little for his non-minority constituents. His shenanigans of pulling fire alarms in congress made him the butt of jokes and censure in congress. His extremist rhetoric and craving of drama made him more like a 16-year old looking for likes on Tik Tok than a serious politician.
He was an easy target for any challenger.
While Latimer was initially approached to run for congress in April 2023, he didn’t formally announce until December as he canvassed the political landscape of the district measuring support. His timing of joining the race after a visit to Israel in November made it appear that he was coming after Bowman because of the congressman’s anti-Israel positions after October 7.
Bowman’s backers in the extreme far-left group Justice Democrats saw the antisemitic protests on American streets and leaned in. It launched a “Reject AIPAC” campaign, making the group appear nefarious, trying to serve as a red herring so people would forget Bowman’s ineptitude and make the primary race about the Israel-Hamas war.
Bowman loved the narrative, and used antisemitic language that AIPAC was “dark money” and were a bunch of “baby killers” in lines lifted from medieval blood libels (see concession speech 3:00 as an example).
AIPAC became Bowman’s boogeyman. In Bowman’s concession speech (9:28) he said “We should be outraged when a super-PAC of dark money can spend $20 million to brainwash people about things about me that aren’t true. You should be outraged when unfortunately, some so-called Democrats are aligning themselves with radical racist right-wing Republicans.” It was an echo of fellow squad member Rep. Ilhan Omar’s comments that “Israel has hypnotized the world – may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.”
Of course, every one of AIPAC’s comments about Bowman was true; he had long proven himself to be unfit for office. In facing a well-known popular progressive politician in Latimer, Bowman knew he was doomed and decided to reframe the discussion away from his incompetence to declare himself a martyr for minorities.
Bowman’s left-wing allies under the Justice Democrats umbrella took to the airwaves and declared AIPAC to be enemy number one for coming after Bowman. They slandered the group repeatedly at rallies, in interviews and on social media, in a fictitious narrative that rich racist Jews were coming after a poor Black man.
And the press bought the bait-and-switch.
The Press Ignored Bowman’s Incompetence
The press went out of its way to absolve Bowman for his years of incompetence.
The Associated Press said that Bowman had “stumbles” portraying his actions as accidental, such as pulling the fire alarm, even though videos show that he did it on purpose.
The New York Times referred to Bowman’s “clumsy and sometimes inflammatory comments about Oct. 7,” making it sound that Bowman’s intentions were noble but poorly phrased, when in fact, his comments were deliberate and abhorrent.
A Times opinion piece discussed Bowman’s vicious actions as mere “unforced errors.”
So when the polls closed on June 25, and the obvious became public, The New York Times didn’t talk about the censured eak politician who never got to know his constituents, and instead blamed Bowman’s demise on a “flood of pro-Israel money.”
As did the BBC and other outlets.
The Jewish Vote Broadly
American Jews generally do not vote in a block. Orthodox Jews tend to vote more conservatively while non-Orthodox denominations are typically liberal. Some are pro-Israel and some are anti-Zionist.
But there are moments in time and there are politicians who can galvanize this minority-minority into a voting force.
As the bad news kept coming, many woke liberals needed to turn away to protect themselves and their families. Repeated appalling comments by Jamaal Bowman made J Street rescind its endorsement in January 2024, an action it had never previously done.
And NY’s 16th district was J Street country. Non-Orthodox rabbis in the community were on the rabbinic board as well as other left-wing groups like the New Israel Fund. If Bowman could offend people who spent a lifetime looking away from anti-Zionist comments, he had lost the whole community.
Bowman was so far in the extreme, that only radical fringe anti-Zionist groups like Bend the Arc and If Not Now continued to support him through the primary season.
Ramifications For Other Members of the Squad, Kamala Harris
Bowman was deeply unpopular – not only among Jews – and he would likely have lost an online poll of the 252,000 potential voters in the district by a wide margin. All that AIPAC’s money did – much sourced from inside the district – was help get out the vote; it likely changed few opinions.
The far-left’s vilification of AIPAC is both a red herring to distract from unpopular policies like a broad redistribution of wealth and power, as well as an antisemitic dog whistle to cement the jihadi-socialist alliance.
Bowman suffered from three critical matters: 1) he was broadly unpopular in the district; 2) he was up against a single well-known and liked challenger; and 3) there were enough Jews in the district to make a difference in the vote.
As people consider Cori Bush (D-MO1), a voting clone to Bowman, in her fight with Wesley Bell, those are critical factors to evaluate, even more than the amount of money spent by AIPAC to get out the vote. Similarly, as Democrats ponder a possible replacement for President Biden, they must consider the far left extremist policies of VP Kamala Harris when she was a senator, and her terrible polling numbers.
Jews know that extremism, whether from the left or right, is dangerous for their very beings. They see it has found a home in the diaspora and the media is loathe to call it out, instead choosing the lazy approach of parroting the antisemitic propaganda.
While AIPAC did spend millions of dollars on the Latimer-Bowman race, those who frame the primary as powerful Jewish billionaires trying to silence a poor Black man – which is the precise language of Justice Democrats – are engaging in vile antisemitism, in an attempt to dress up their policies as just and popular. Their use of Jew-hatred as a political tool should make clear that they are deeply anti-American, and should be shunned in society.
ACTION ITEM
In MO-1, extremist Rep. Cori Bush is being challenged by public defender Wesley Bell. Donate to Bell here.
In yet another disgraceful attack on Jews, Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York’s 16th Congressional District, denied Jewish history, specifically that Jews come from the land of Israel.
During an interview, Bowman said that “Israel is a settler colonial project,” an oft-used phrase by radical antisemitic Arabs to falsely tarnish Jews as foreign invaders. It is an attempt to mainstream a lie that Jews do not have thousands of years of history in the holy land with sovereignty and self-determination.
Jamaal Bowman calls Israel a “settler colonial project” in June 2024
Imagine an elected official stating that Blacks are not from Africa or were never slaves in the United States. They would either be known as a lunatic or a racist. Or both.
Bowman did not simply lie about Jewish history without a calculated reason: he did it as a pretext to defend attacks on the Jewish State as well as to appeal to Jew-haters as he runs for reelection on June 25th.
The reestablishment of a sovereign Jewish State is the first successful decolonization project in the world, yet is framed by Jew-haters as the essence of colonization. They do this, thinking that a majority of Israelis are “White” Jews, when in fact, Ashkenazi Jews account for only one-third of Israeli citizens.
And simply forget that the Old Testament is the most widely read book in the world.
Bowman again struts his antisemitic bona fides in an effort to rally the Black, Brown and White KKK to come for Jews in his district and around the world.
ACTION ITEM
Get out the vote for Westchester County Executive George Latimer and oust antisemitic extremist Jamaal Bowman. Polls are open now through June 25th.
On Saturday June 8, 2024, Israeli security forces rescued four of the Israeli hostages who were kidnapped to Gaza from the Nova Music Festival on October 7, 2023. In the action to bring everyone back to Israel, one of the Israeli vehicles got stuck and was surrounded by Palestinian terrorists. Israel called in the Air Force to provide protection and scores of Palestinians were reportedly killed.
Pro-Israel media portrayed the rescue operation as an enormous success. Israelis celebrated on the streets at the return of the seized peaceful party-goers who were held illegally in captivity for eight months by Gazans.
NY Post cover pageWall Street Journal cover page
The anti-Israel media lambasted the operation as it killed many Palestinians. It mocked the rescue as being inhumane because of the toll on Palestinians who were part of the Hamas infrastructure imprisoning the Israelis.
Pundits went on to speculate that Hamas would now likely move hostages from apartments to the underground tunnel network and embed them with Palestinian soldiers.
That is inverted logic.
Hamas has no possibility of militarily defeating Israel, a fact made abundantly clear over the past eight months. The only war Hamas is attempting to win is one of public opinion, which it tries to do by getting the woke anti-Israel media to see Israel as mercilessly killing civilians – ideally as many women and children as possible. Hamas watches the news, and celebrates the latest victory that so much of the media has not condemned it for keeping hostages in the heart of a residential neighborhood.
It will make the next attempt even more heinous.
After the daring rescue operation, Hamas is likely to move remaining hostages into nurseries, to force Israel to kill as many Arab infants as possible, should the Jewish State attempt another rescue. It would be a huge victory for Hamas, as it offers infant martyrs for the cameras.
The Israeli government and army were shocked as over 1,000 members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad invaded Israel and butchered babies, women, men and the elderly. They were totally unprepared for the abduction of 250 people to Gaza.
But the world didn’t voice shock that thousands of Palestinian Arab civilians from Gaza participated in the atrocities. The world remained silent.
The Israeli army has killed and captured thousands of Palestinian terrorists since October 7. The intelligence gathered from the Gazan soldiers provided information to launch rescue operations to free Israeli hostages.
On June 8, four Israelis were rescued from an apartment complex in the United Nations run-Nuseirat “refugee” camp in central Gaza. The camp is right next to the Izz ad Deen al-Qassam Mosque, named for a Syrian terrorist who hunted the British and Jews in Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s.
The four Israelis included a 26-year old woman, held hostage in an apartment for eight months. The local Gazans said and did nothing the entire time but is not flagged in the media.
Freed Israeli hostage Noa Argamani reunited with her father
It is being reported that the hostages were forced to read the Quran and learn Islamic teachings. Such activity evidences the religious nature of the war from Gaza is not a battle over land.
The Islamist war is not being discussed in the mainstream media.
It is also being reported that one of the people who kept the hostages, or lived next door, was Abdallah Aljamal, an employee of Al Jazeera, the Qatari-based media company aligned with Hamas, or more likely, Palestine Chronicle, another media outfit. Whether Aljamal was the guard overseeing the hostages or not, a journalist would certainly have known about hostages next door. And he said nothing, showcasing his allegiance to the terrorists over journalism.
The Gaza journalists complicit with terrorism is not being discussed in the mainstream media.
Polls of Gazans have long shown that they support Hamas and the goal of killing Jewish civilians inside of Israel. Recent polls show a majority of Gazans support the October 7 attack. They view the abduction of civilians as part of a war effort which they support and from which they will benefit.
And the world continues to say nothing about the desire of Gazans who want to see Jews murdered.
Many people had assumed that the hostages were being kept by the terrorist groups in underground tunnels with Gazans kept as human shields for the underground terrorist infrastructure. However, the recent rescue operation shows that assumption to be incorrect: the people of Gaza are keeping Jews as hostages in their homes and in their neighborhoods, under the watch of Hamas and the United Nations.
The Arabs of Gaza are not human shields for Hamas; they are an integral part of the infrastructure of antisemitic terror.
On May 15, 2023, the United Nations held its first “Nakba Day” event. In discussing the various activities to be held, the UN stated it wanted to “highlight that the noble goals of justice and peace, require recognizing the reality and history of the Palestinian people’s plight and ensuring the fulfillment of their inalienable rights.”
The difference in understanding those “inalienable rights” is the crux of why no solution to the conflict has been realized.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas speaks during a high-level event to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Nakba at the United Nations headquarters in New York on May 15, 2023. (Photo by Ed JONES / AFP)
At the event, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas demanded “the return of Palestinian refugees to their homeland, to their cities and villages, of which they were displaced by aggression and terror.” Abbas added “the issue of the refugees must be resolved. There are refugees and they should return. I am a refugee. I am a Palestinian refugee. I want to return to my town. I cannot live even in Paris or New York. I won’t have it. I want Safed. It is such a small town. I want it.”
Several countries sent solidarity messages to the Nakba event including: Algeria; Venezuela; Indonesia; Senegal; Tunisia; Türkiye; Qatar; Egypt; Jordan; Iran; Suba; Kuwait; Guyana; Malaysia; Bangladesh; Saudi Arabia; Bahrain; Namibia; Nicaragua; China; Syria; UAE; Lebanon; Maldives; South Africa and Mozambique.
Most of the Western countries officially stayed away but the Palestinian diaspora made itself felt.
At the evening of the launch of the event, Abbas “praised the role of the Palestinian community in the United States in supporting the Palestinian people, stressing the importance of their work in forming an American public opinion in support of the Palestinian national cause.” He was referring to groups like Students for Justice in Palestine, CAIR, American Muslims for Palestine and Palestine Youth Movement, all of which have been fomenting unrest and antisemitism on American streets.
When addressing the UN at the event, Abbas furthered the point “that the Palestinian narrative of the Nakba has begun to make its way to the awareness of the peoples, who have come to uncover the fraudulence of the Israeli narrative and listening to the Palestinian narrative and their tragedy.” The anti-Zionist and anti-Jewish talk-track is now found in California public schools and on college campuses.
The United Nations led Palestinian Arabs to believe that they will all get to return to towns where ancestors once lived inside of Israel, and the world has begun to accept that narrative as told by local Muslims living in the West. It is a bastard of the fabled “two-state solution” in which a new country of Palestine is purely Arab and Jew-free, and Israel is transformed into a bi-national state. One and one-half states for Arabs and half a state for Jews.
United Nations “refugee” camp with a key on top informing Palestinians that the key to their homes inside of Israel is via the United Nations
A few weeks after the UN’s 2023 Nakba event, Palestinians polled themselves. A majority stated that they believe that the Jewish State will cease to exist within twenty-five years. Specifically, “two-thirds say Israel will not celebrate the centenary of its establishment, and the majority believes that the Palestinian people will be able in the future to recover Palestine and return its refugees to their homes.“
The logical outcome of such thinking soon became manifest. Why should Palestinians negotiate a compromise with Israel when they believe that they will achieve all of their aims with global support?
The United Nations handed the microphone and held a celebration for jihadists who seek to end the Jewish State, while colleges were educating their student bodies in a radical, antisemitic Palestinian narrative that Israel is a colonialist, imperialist, illegal project. The toxic belief became mainstreamed and realized in the heinous October 7th massacre, celebrated by an unholy socialist-jihadi alliance on Western campuses and streets.
News of the killing of civilians spread quickly and masses gathered in squares. They honked horns and handed out sweets to celebrate the death of their enemies.
Actually, it looks like social media got the headline wrong in click bait: it was Palestinians celebrating the deliberate slaughter of Jews in a synagogue. In the celebrations they shouted “Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar! Millions of martyrs are marching to Jerusalem! Millions of martyrs are marching to Jerusalem!”
Regarding the attack in Rafah, Israel said it is investigating how a secondary fire started from its targeted strike on Hamas commanders. No Israeli crowds gathered to celebrate the death of innocent Arabs.
Hamas leader Yahwa Sinwar issued a call for peace. Actually, no. He called for all Palestinians to use whatever means they have at hand to kill Israeli civilians.
Palestinians celebrate killing of Israeli civilians
The stock images of Israelis celebrating senseless death made the rounds. Actually, no. The distribution of candy is when Arabs kills Jews.
Arabs hand out sweets after terrorist attack
The war between Israel and Palestinian Arabs is terrible. The celebration of the killing of innocents is a tragic deformity in Palestinian culture. One hopes it does not happen in Israel.
Gazans in Rafah celebrate the attack on a Jerusalem synagogue, November 18, 2014.
Israelis protesting bombing in Rafah, May 27, 2024
Amid the current wave of Jew-hatred in the United States, there have been few incidents of violent attacks and murder thus far. But the vitriol from the socialist-jihadi alliance is still gathering steam as it tries to cement the foundation of the dehumanization of Jews by isolating and de-normalizing interactions with “Zionists.”
Ahmed Ali Alid murdered one person and attempted to kill a secondin the United Kingdom in an effort to push the UK to change course on the Israeli-Hamas war
In her sentencing, British Judge Bobbie Cheema-Grubb said (34:50):
“Those who genuinely seek refuge in this country will embrace the values we hold dear. These values include respect for the value of each person as an individual with freedom to choose their political opinions without intimidation, and whether to observe a particular faith without fear or oppression. These moral and ethical principles are based on the Judeo-Christian foundation of our social structures. Not all ideas are of equal quality or integrity, but religious and political freedom is something that generations have fought for.
“Given my findings of fact, the murder of Terrence Carney and the attempted murder of Javid Nouri were attempted to subvert those values and to lead our government to pursue a particular course concerning the situation in Palestine by force and fear rather than through democratic means. This means that those offenses were of extreme gravity, even within the context of murder.”
The judge sentenced the jihadi murderer to 45 years in prison because the context for the killing went beyond the particular crime, and was executed to undermine core Western principles of freedom for political opinions and to practice faith without fear or intimidation. People must work within democratic norms to influence governmental action, and not via “force and fear.”
In the United States, formerly “elite” university presidents failed to comprehend such notion. They said before a congressional committee about antisemitism on college campuses, that calling for the genocide of Jews may or may not go against university code of conduct depending on “context.” For the university presidents, “context” depends on whether a call to annihilate Jews is voiced generally, or directed at specific Jews, as if Jews would not be intimidated or fearful by mobs chanting for their annihilation amongst themselves.
People are free to hate; there is no law that jihadists must love Jews or vice versa. However, there are established laws regarding harassing, intimidating and discriminating against people for their beliefs. And it is precisely those laws which are being ignored by law enforcement today as it relates to targeting Jews, as universities cave to the pressure of the mob.
Some Jews are being held as hostages in terrorist tunnels of Gaza as pawns for the political-terrorist group Hamas to barter with the Jewish State to release terrorists. In the Jewish diaspora, the jihadi-socialist alliance is encircling Jews to force administrations and governments to abandon support for Israel and dismantle the Judeo-Christian foundations of their societies.
It’s a jihadi barter: ransoming Jews and Judeo-Christian values for short-term calm. All know it is a matter of “extreme gravity,” yet many leaders feel compelled to tender their values and their Jews, and to let the future address the malignancy.
First One Through 