The Islamic Republic of Iran has many proxies surrounding Israel: Hamas which controls Gaza; Hezbollah which controls Lebanon; Syria; and farther away, the Houthis in Yemen.
Does it also have cells in the West Bank?
As Iran sent over 180 missiles into Israel on October 1, 2024, two Palestinian Arabs from Hebron shot and killed seven people in Tel Aviv and injured many others. The timing was minutes apart.
This was the first time that Palestinian Arabs shot up Tel Aviv streets during the year long war against Palestinian terrorists. Is it a coincidence that Palestinian Arabs decided to blast Tel Aviv just as Iranian missiles showered from above?
West Bank Arabs have been much more supportive of the October 7 attacks and commitment to destroying Israel than their counterparts in Gaza according to Palestinian polls. Israeli activity likely prevented a two-front war on October 7, which would have resulted in thousands of additional Israeli deaths in cities like Kfar Saba and Ra’anana which are very close to the 1949 Armistice Lines.
While the world is focused on the violent storm between Israel and Iran, Israel’s security will need to investigate how deeply Iran has integrated with the newer terrorist groups in the West Bank like Jenin Battalion, Lions’ Den and Tulkarm Brigades, to clamp down on yet another front of jihadi terrorism.
ACTION ITEM
Write White House and pro-Israel members of Congress like Ritchie Torres, Mike Lawler and Josh Gottheimer or your local representative to get the State Department to label the Jenin Battalion, Lion’s Den and the branches of the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade as US designated foreign terrorist organizations.
This four stage battle plan was used by Arab nations leading up to the 1967 Six Day War. It is being used again now on a broader scale, as jihadi extremists brought in the whole world to the third stage on September 18, 2024.
Stage 1: Attack Jews As Foreigners, 1960s-
Shortly after the Balfour Declaration of 1917 become codified in the San Remo Agreement of 1920, the Arabs in Palestine began to attack local Palestinian Jews. They objected to the global powers putting forth what would become the Palestine Mandate of 1922, calling for Jews to return to their homeland. While the Arabs never much objected to Jews living in Palestine, the idea that they would reestablish their homeland was appalling.
After a decade of on-and-off again pogroms killing Palestinian Jews in the 1920s to mid-1930s, Palestinian Arabs began a multi-year riot from 1936 to 1939 which effectively got the British to stop allowing Jews into Palestine, even as the Holocaust was unfolding in Europe. While at first they simply claimed that the land was Arab, over time they developed a narrative coined “decolonization” which swept through Africa in the 1960s and 1970s, and misapplied it to the Jewish State.
Stage 2: Gather the Masses to the Cause, 1973-
The humiliating defeat of the Arab armies in the 1967 war to destroy Israel set the stage for the Arabs to go broader and enlist the world in their genocidal quest. The Yom Kippur War was accompanied by an oil embargo to force the world to bend the knee to the Arab oil kings and blacklist Israel.
The Arabs pushed through a United Nations Resolution to declare “Zionism is racism” in 1975 and slowly dripped the idea that Israel was a European invention and part-and-parcel of colonial imperialism. The notion gathered more steam at the 2001 Durban Conference and fully captured the United States’ attention in the 2014-2016 advancement of Black-Palestinian intersectionality in the wake of several Black men being killed by police. Socialists took up the banner in the cause of a broad redistribution of wealth and power from the first world Jewish State in the midst of the impoverished Arab world that surrounded it, much as people of color were aiming to tear down perceived structures of “white privilege.”
The masses somehow absorbed the lie that Jews are not native to the Jewish homeland, and the Obama Administration turned that falsification of history into antisemitic international law in December 2016 with the passing of UN Security Council Resolution 2334, making it illegal for Jews to even live in their holiest city in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Stage 3: Remove the Enemy’s Defenses, 2024-
On September 18, 2024, the UN General Assembly voted 124-14 to strip Israel of its right to self defense in Gaza, the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem. A large block of 43 countries were too chicken to vote against the absurd notion that a country cannot defend itself from barbarous murderers who killed thousands and threatened to commit the atrocities “again and again.”
UN General Assembly vote to deny Israel the ability to use self defense, September 18, 2024
The short list of Israeli friends were: Argentina; Czechia; Fiji; Hungary; Malawi; Micronesia; Nauru; Palau; Papua New Guinea; Paraguay; Tonga; Tuvalu and the United States.
BBC cited the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) which stated that the major arms suppliers to Israel were the USA (66%/ voted against the resolution), Germany (30%/ abstained), Italy (5%/ abstained) and some from the United Kingdom (abstained; figures don’t add to 100% due to rounding). It means that while some countries like Canada (abstained) may announce a halt of selling arms to Israel as it did in March 2024, the impact is limited. It is the USA and Germany that are the main suppliers to Israel.
And the anti-Israel radical left-wing in the United States is targeting those very arms.
Radical socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders was quick to advance a resolution “to stop the sale of U.S. arms to Israel.” Alt-left Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez retweeted her approval.
The situation may become more dire.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) of the Foreign Relations Committee, might be the next Secretary of State should Vice President Kamala Harris win the election in November. He has made clear that he supports conditioning aid to Israel, which would leave the Jewish State vulnerable to the many jihadist armies which surround it.
Stage 4: Assemble the Armies, ?
The Jewish State is becoming more and more isolated. Should the United States and Germany withhold arms to the country, just as the Islamic Republic of Iran obtains full nuclear weapons capability, the Jewish State will be critically vulnerable.
For the last fifty years, the Arab world convinced the world to embrace the idea that Jews have no rights or legitimacy in their holy land, capped by Obama’s blessing of UNSC 2334. That has metastasized over the past decade to bring the world to the point of trying to strangle Israel of its inherent right to self defense in the face of genocidal jihadists.
We are at a very dangerous point in history. It is now up to the United States and Germany, two foes who fought each other 75 years ago over the fate of Jews, to declare that they stand by Jews in regards to their history, heritage and human rights to live in peace and security, including having the capability to appropriately defend themselves from genocidal jihadists next door.
In a frightening spectacle of rewarding terror, a majority of countries at the United Nations voted to recognize the State of Palestine and give it a seat at the United Nations General Assembly. In so doing, there are two logical next steps for these 143 countries who claim to be supporting a two state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict: move their embassies to Israel to Jerusalem, and vote to dismantle UNRWA in the West Bank and Gaza.
Embassies to Israel in Jerusalem
For decades, many countries kept their embassies in Tel Aviv despite Israel’s capital being in Jerusalem. They did so, because the status of Jerusalem was always viewed as subject to negotiation. As originally envisioned in the November 1947 Partition Plan, all of Greater Jerusalem and Greater Bethlehem were to be held in a “corpus separatum,” neither part of an Arab state nor a Jewish State. Now, in officially recognizing Palestine as a state and deciding that eastern Jerusalem is “illegally occupied” by Israel, those countries are essentially also recognizing that the western part of the city is part of Israel.
“Corpus Separatum” in orange line of Greater Bethlehem and Greater Jerusalem as marked in November 1949 UN Partition Plan, compared to 1949 Armistice Lines between Israel and Jordan marking West Jerusalem in blue and East Jerusalem in white, a situation that existed for 18 years 1949-1967.
Norway, Spain and Ireland recognized a Palestinian State in 2024 but failed to announce that they were moving their embassies to Israel to western Jerusalem. Mexico recognized Palestine in 2023 but has not moved its embassy. Sweden recognized Palestine in 2014 but has still not moved its Israeli embassy.
If countries simply recognize Palestine in theory – without borders – than it should demand that the phrase “Occupied East Jerusalem” should be stricken from any U.N. resolution. Alternatively, if they really believe that the matter of Jerusalem and borders are already settled as indicated in their votes, than to hold back moving the embassies to western Jerusalem is a slap in the face to Israel.
End UNRWA in Gaza and West Bank
For countries that recognize Palestine as a country controlling land in the West Bank and Gaza, it is absurd to have “Palestine refugees” in “Palestine.” The U.N. special “Palestine refugee” agency’s operations should handed over to the Palestinian Authority. Almost every UNRWA employee in the West Bank and Gaza are local Palestinians, so the hand off would be simple.
Failing to close UNRWA inside their recognized “Palestine” would be an affront to the sovereignty of Israel, essentially demanding that Israel accept millions of UNRWA’s wards despite Palestinians having a state of their own.
UNRWA in eastern Jerusalem (photo: First One Through)
The recognition of Palestine has one of two flavors: it is merely symbolic and the countries still want the Palestinian Authority to negotiate borders, Jerusalem and refugees, OR these countries are actively attacking Israel in denying its sovereign right to declare its own capital and admit citizens of its own choosing.
If it is the former, than Israel should ask those countries to make clear that they do not consider “East Jerusalem” to be “occupied.” If it is the latter, Israel must consider taking strong political moves against them – together with allies which have not recognized Palestine like the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Australia.
In the aftermath of the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, the United Nations decided that the killers are “peace-loving.”
On May 10, 2024, the United Nations voted and approved A/ES-10/L.30/Rev.1 which said “that membership in the United Nations is open to all peace-loving States,” and that Palestine fully qualifies. It endorsed Palestine as “peace-loving” despite Hamas committing a brutal slaughter of 1,200 people in Israel on October 7, as codified in its genocidal antisemitic charter which is embraced by Palestinians who elected the terrorist group to 58% of parliament in 2006.
The recorded vote was 143 in favour to 9 against (Argentina, Czech Republic, Hungary, Israel, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, United States), with 25 abstentions.
On September 10, 2024, Palestine took its seat at the General Assembly of the UN’s opening session. Delegates from around the world embraced the Palestinian ambassador Riyad Mansour.
Delegates of member states line up to greet Riyad Mansour, top right, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, as he arrives for the 79th session of the United Nations General Assembly, September 10, 2024 at the United Nations. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
The beheading of people is “peace-loving” if the victims are Jews. The burning of families alive is “peace-loving” if the family are Jews. The sexual abuse of women is “peace-loving” if the women are Jews. The abduction of babies as hostages is “peace-loving” if the infants are Jews.
So says the United Nations, an institution awash in moral rot which should be defunded and closed.
The UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, spoke in Geneva on September 8, 2024 and let it be known that the events of the past year in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank showed that Palestinians need to control their borders to satisfy their “causes.”
“We know that wars spill over, and into, future generations, fostering repeated cycles of hatred if their causes remain unaddressed.
Sadly, the war in Gaza is the quintessential example.
Since the horrific 7 October attacks claimed the lives of over 1,200 victims in Israel and injured many others, over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, several thousand injured, and thousands remain under the rubble in Gaza. Each day, Palestinians struggle to survive. Nearly 1.9 million people have been forcibly displaced across the strip, many multiple times. Eleven months on, 101 Israeli hostages are still held to be in Gaza. While the actual number is likely higher, almost 10,000 Palestinians are held in Israeli prisons or ad hoc military facilities, many arbitrarily, with over 50 people having died due to inhumane conditions and ill-treatment. In the West Bank, deadly and destructive operations, some at a scale not witnessed in the last two decades, are worsening a calamitous situation there, already aggravated by serious settler violence.
Ending that war and averting a full-blown regional conflict is an absolute and urgent priority. Equally, the wider situation of illegality across the occupied Palestinian territory deriving from Israel’s policies and practices, as so clearly spelled out by the International Court of Justice in its Advisory Opinion in July, must be comprehensively addressed.
States must not – cannot – accept blatant disregard for international law, including binding decisions of the Security Council and orders of the International Court of Justice, neither in this nor any other situation.“
The head of the UN Human Rights did not ascribe the murder of 1,200 people in Israel and holding of over 100 hostages to Palestinians. He did not state that Palestinians launched the war nor that they executed bound hostages. He used passive language to describe Israeli victims. Yet he did blame Israeli forces and “settler violence” for the deaths of Palestinians.
Turk ascribed the situation of the “repeated cycles of hatred” from the “illegality” of Israel’s policies regarding “Palestinian territory.”
The UN’s agenda is to fully arm an antisemitic Palestinian state next to the only Jewish State.
Gazans have had self-determination and independence since 2005 when Israel uprooted every civilian and military personnel from the area. The Palestinians had elections which brought the terrorist group Hamas to 58% of the parliament in 2006. Gazans used this freedom to build a vast tunnel infrastructure and war machine rather than build an economy, as they do not simply seek self-determination but a destruction of the Jewish State.
Gazans were able to commit a massive heinous butchering of men, women and children in Israel with a blockade surrounding the terrorist enclave. The United Nations turns a blind eye to the savagery as they perceive the Arab assailants as victims.
The UN wants the Israeli blockade of Gaza lifted so Hamas can have a free flow of advanced weaponry from the Islamic Republic of Iran and other terrorist groups. With such armorment, the root “cause” of Palestinian Arabs – the destruction of the Jewish State – may be realized.
Facebook’s parent company Meta announced that it will permit the phrase “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free” on its platform despite protests from groups that it is a call for the mass genocide of Israeli Jews. Meta’s Oversight Board sided with pro-Palestinian groups which argued that it is simply an expression for equal rights for all Arabs in the region.
The decision stemmed from three situations in which the phrase was used on the platform, and concluded that “the three pieces of content contain contextual signs of solidarity with Palestinians – but no language calling for violence or exclusion. They also do not glorify or even refer to Hamas, an organization designated as dangerous by Meta,” suggesting that only when the phrase is used connecting to calls for violence will the language be banned from the platform. Or stated differently, the expression itself is benign, and it is only the calls for violence that will cause censorship, as “the phrase’s use by this terrorist group [Hamas] with explicit violent eliminationist intent and actions, does not make the phrase inherently hateful or violent – considering the variety of people using the phrase in different ways,” the board said.
In short, Meta decided to side with pro-Palestinians over Zionists and Jews who view the phrase as an open call for the genocide of Jews.
It is interesting to compare that phrase to the “N-word” which is also used a wide variety of contexts.
Many Black musicians use the word in their songs. The Black comedian Dave Chappelle uses the N-word repeatedly in his shows, both for Black people or White people. These artists are seemingly given a pass as they themselves use the derogatory term. Chappelle mocked such sensitivity openly and defiantly.
Yet the NAACP voted to ban the word in 2007 and issued a follow-up statement in 2014 which clarified the reasons to block the term, including by artists:
“the stigma of this word embodies and invokes painful memories and inhumane ill-will; and countless individuals including NAACP freedom fighters, have lost their lives due to the beliefs perpetuated by the use of this word.
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVEDthat the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People shall not condone, award, or engage any person that uses the N-word in any capacity, or in any artistic endeavor that does not allude to the historical context of the word, or that does not highlight the prejudicial nature of the word; and
BE IT FINALLY RESOLVEDthat the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People implement the following actions to reinforce its ban on the use of the N-word issued in 2007 and bolster education and awareness about the offensiveness of the word across racial and generational lines: Make the ban reinforcement a top civil rights priority for all units; and urge every youth unit in consultation with their corresponding adult branch develop a plan of action for implementation. Plan must include internal branch affirmation, public awareness, community outreach and a reporting process. In places where no active youth unit exists, the adult unit would be held to the same said requirement.”
While the corresponding derogatory term for Jews, the K-word, might be a better comparable to the N-word for Black people, it is not the antisemitic phrase that has often accompanied the slaughter of Jews.
“Free Palestine” is shouted at Jews on streets, painted on their synagogues and while they dine in restaurants. It is the placard hoisted at rallies in front of Jewish institutions and Hillels on college campuses. It is a taunt and threat, accompanied by the slogan “by any means necessary,” including burning Jews alive, as Palestinians brutality did en masse on October 7, 2023, to wild Arab support.
On October 26, 2023, not long after the barbaric attack on Israel, the Anti Defamation League (ADL), issued a statement that clearly tied the “Free Palestine” phrase to antisemitism:
“‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’ is an antisemitic slogan commonly featured in anti-Israel campaigns and chanted at demonstrations.
This rallying cry has long been used by anti-Israel voices, including supporters of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and the PFLP, which seek Israel’s destruction through violent means. It is fundamentally a call for a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, territory that includes the State of Israel, which would mean the dismantling of the Jewish state. It is an antisemitic charge denying the Jewish right to self-determination, including through the removal of Jews from their ancestral homeland.
Usage of this phrase has the effect of making members of the Jewish and pro-Israel community feel unsafe and ostracized. It is important to note that demanding justice for Palestinians, or calling for a Palestinian state, should not mean, as this hateful phrase posits, denying the right of the State of Israel to exist.”
The Jewish victims of attack do not ask for “context” when people use the “Free Palestine” phrase; they know that more Jews “lost their lives due to the beliefs perpetuated by the use of this word” than any time since the Holocaust.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted on HR 883 in April 2024 to label the phrase as antisemitic by a wide 377 to 44 margin. It specifically stated that “the slogan, ‘from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’, is outrightly antisemitic and must be strongly condemned;” and “this slogan perpetuates hatred against the State of Israel and the Jewish people.” Notable anti-Israel squad members Bowman, Bush, Dingell, Barbara Lee, AOC, Omar, Pocan, Schakowsky, Tlaib, Velazquez and Waters voted against the resolution.
Society has so internalized the Black community’s objection to a hateful word that it cannot be uttered nor written. Yet calling for the genocide of Jews has been given a passing grade at universities, and a green light on social media.
ACTION ITEM
Contact ADL and your member of Congress to pressure the group to demand Meta change its policy regarding the genocidal phrase “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will be Free.” Mark the phrase with the same opprobrium as the N-word.
The Palestinian political-terrorist group continued its vile and evil actions in shooting and killing six hostages it had held for the last eleven months. The civilians lives were worthless, as were the thousands that the group has killed over the decades.
Vice President Kamala Harris issued a press release, as one of the hostages was an American citizen, and his parents had just spoken at the Democratic National Convention. Harris called Hamas “an evil terrorist organization… whose “depravity is evident and horrifying.”
VP Harris press release about the murder of six Israeli hostages by Hamas, on August 31, 2024
Harris noted that Hamas is a threat to Israelis, Americans and even Palestinians, but she did not offer a plan of action, other than that the “threat” of Hamas “must be eliminated.”
By way of comparison, Senator Tom Cotton was more clear, that not just the “threat” of Hamas must be eliminated, but the “terrorist group must be destroyed.”
Sen. Tom Cotton post after the murder of six Israeli hostages by Hamas
Former President Obama ran his administration’s fight against terror in a particularly segmented manner, placing the “evil ideology” of jihadi groups into four buckets: evil to destroy (like ISIS); evil to condemn (like Boko Haram); evil to tolerate (like Syria); and evil to ignore (like Hamas). He would only activate American arms when American lives were at stake in the first category, while providing support in fighting evil globally in the second category. Regarding Syria and evil to tolerate, he offered little more than empty words. For evil like Hamas, he ignored it as something Israel turned into a phony boogeyman.
Obama’s successor, President Trump, collapsed those four categories into “radical Islamic terrorism,” which was a problem for everyone to be fought globally. He prioritized fighting ISIS and al Qaeda but viewed all of the sister jihadi groups through a similar lens.
President Biden condemned the Hamas October 7 massacre as “an act of sheer evil” and later added that the group should be eliminated. His Attorney General Merrick Garland announced terrorism charges against the leaders of Hamas on September 3, 2024, something that had been filed in February. It is unclear what is particularly special about unsealing the complaint at this time – Israel already killed a number of the senior Hamas leaders on the list. Is the US going to take direct action against Hamas? Will it use its pull with Qatar to extradite Khaled Mashal? Or will the world see the U.S. as a paper tiger, a distracted and divided once-upon-a-time military power?
Harris, now in the position of Democratic nominee for president, is crafting her own language about evil, that it should be deprived of the capability of being a “threat” but not necessarily “destroyed” as Biden and other politicians have advocated.
Harris’s softer position is being provided cover by J Street, the left-wing pro-Palestinian marketed as pro-Israel group. In response to the assassination of the six Israeli hostages, J Street called for Biden to assert “maximum pressure on [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” rather than providing Israel full capabilities of finishing the evil group.
J Street press release after Hamas’s killing of six hostages calling for US to withhold arms and funding to Israel if Netanyahu doesn’t accept a ceasefire deal
Many Democratic members of Congress will likely push a President Harris to not only let Hamas survive but to withhold critical arms to Israel, even as it fights Hezbollah, Iran and the Houthis. A Harris administration with someone like Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) as Secretary of State, would likely condition military aid to Israel.
Harris and Trump agree that Hamas is an evil terrorist organization but it would appear that only a Trump Administration would push to destroy the group, while Harris might work to simply remove the terrorist group from power.
The current Palestinian war on Israel is much less about borders and land swaps, security matters and the status of Jerusalem, and much more about the so-called “right of return” of descendants of Palestinian Arab refugees to move into Israel rather than a new Palestinian State. Any discussions between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, as well as at the United Nations, must bring the matter to the forefront and make clear that settling that point will be done at the national level.
If that sounds obvious, you do not understand the U.N.’s adoption of the Palestinian negotiating point, that the ‘right of return’ is for every individual to decide on his/her own about moving to Israel, outside of governmental negotiations.
US and Israel On ‘Right Of Return’
When President Bill Clinton formulated a peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians in 2000, mediator Dennis Ross summarized the working proposal as follows: “On the issue of refugees, there would be a right of return for the refugees to their own state, not to Israel, but there would also be a fund of $30 billion internationally that would be put together for either compensation or to cover repatriation, resettlement, rehabilitation costs. And when it came to security, there would be a international presence, in place of the Israelis, in the Jordan Valley.”
This was the stated policy of both Democratic and Republican parties for years. Republican President George W. Bush sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in April 2004 that stated a “just, fair, and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel.” The 2008 Democratic platform echoed the sentiment that “The creation of a Palestinian state through final status negotiations, together with an international compensation mechanism, should resolve the issue of Palestinian refugees by allowing them to settle there, rather than in Israel.“
Palestinians and UN On ‘Right of Return’
But when John Kerry tried to negotiate an agreement between the parties in 2014, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas pulled back from any discussion about refugees and said “Let me put it simply: the right of return is a personal decision. What does this mean? That neither the PA, nor the state, nor the PLO, nor Abu-Mazen [Abbas], nor any Palestinian or Arab leader has the right to deprive someone from his right to return…. The choice is yours. You want to return? You will return. You don’t? You’re free to remain; there is compensation and other details … I just wanted to remark on this point, that the right of return is a personal right. Even a father cannot forgo his children’s right.”
This ended any possibility of concluding the conflict via negotiations as Abbas handed the matter of refugees to millions of individuals.
The United Nations agrees with the Palestinian position.
In June 2023, the UN Office of Human Rights issued a report on World Refugee Day called “Right of return of Palestinian refugees must be prioritised over political considerations: UN experts.” It stated that “We urgently call upon the international community to adopt a rights-based approach that addresses the root causes of violence and prioritises the individual and collective right of return for refugees and internally displaced persons, over political considerations.”
The current formulation that Israel has no say on who it allows into its country and that 5.7 million Palestinian Arabs can unilaterally decide they can move to towns where ancestors lived will never be accepted by any Israeli government – right, left or centrist – EVER. It is a recipe for perpetual bloodshed and animosity.
To enable any chance for there to ever be a negotiated solution, the United Nations must be clear that the matter of the descendants of Palestinian Arabs who once lived in modern Israel is a matter to be handled by the PA, and not for individuals. Alternatively, the UN can state clearly that the ‘right of return’ is only limited to individuals who actually left Israel and not for their descendants.
The ‘two-state solution’ became unviable when the UN and Palestinian leadership decided that a ‘right of return’ for millions of Palestinians into Israel is an inalienable individual right. For there to be a chance of ending the bloodshed and conflict, it must be made clear that Palestinian leadership will negotiate the parameters of a “right of return” with Israel.
The parents of one of the hostages stolen to Gaza on October 7, 2023 spoke at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago last night. The parents, Jon Polin and Rachel Goldberg, hailed from Chicago and spoke in anguished voices in their hometown. They made clear that the return of their music-loving son was not an issue of politics but of humanity.
The parents of Hersh Goldberg-Polin mentioned the 22 nationalities of the hostages and their multiple religions. They made an appeal to bring all the hostages home and end the suffering of innocent people in Gaza. It was an apolitical speech.
Yet it made the anti-Israel socialist-jihadi alliance apoplectic. Why wasn’t a Palestinian invited to speak they asked?
Rep. Jamaal Bowman wanted Palestinians to speak at DNC
Members of the socialist-jihadi “squad” said that the DNC was “erasing ” and “dehumanizing” Palestinians by not giving equal time to Palestinians impacted by the war [that Palestinians launched and support].
Arab and Muslim influencers like Mehdi Hasan and James Zogby pushed for much the same.
Perhaps the DNC may have been able to find a Palestinian-American somewhere who wants to live peacefully alongside the Jewish State. Perhaps the Democrats could have given a platform to a Palestinian who would show empathy for both Israelis who were hunted and tortured, as well as Palestinians who suffer because their leaders hide like cowards in tunnels and refuse to surrender.
To what end? The speech by the Israeli-Americans was not political so didn’t require a “balanced” counterpoint.
As it relates to politics, the DNC released its 2024 platform which reiterated “America’s ironclad commitment to the security of Israel and our unrivaled ability to leverage growing regional integration among U.S. partners to counter Iranian aggression.” The Polin-Goldberg parents speech went directly to that important point of providing the Jewish State with the means to defend itself so such atrocities would not be repeated by Iranian-backed sponsors of terror.
Israel has killed roughly 17,000 terrorists so far in the defensive war it never wanted. It has managed to do this with the support of the Democratic administration in power.
While it is deeply tragic that roughly a similar number of civilians have died according to Hamas sources, how does giving a voice to the innocent Arab victims advance the current DNC platform of peace and security? The Israeli-American parents spoke of the suffering of Palestinians, which is also part of the Democratic platform, which specifically calls out “the worth of every innocent life, whether Israeli or Palestinian.”
But the socialist-jihadi cabal wants to undermine Israel’s security. It seeks to strip the Democratic Party of its policy of supporting the Jewish State. The goal of showcasing the unfortunate suffering of Palestinians is not an attempt at balance but whitewashing the genocidal intent of Hamas.
The socialist-jihadi alliance wants to veil the wolf in sheep’s clothing. The true socialist-jihadi spokesperson is Yahya Sinwar himself, a man committed to destroying Israel and the United States regardless of cost.
Yahya Sinwar, Palestinian leader of Gaza, Hamas and orchestrator of the barbaric October 7 massacre takes the podium
Alternatively, if Palestinian voices will not be heard, the socialist-jihadi alliance demands that Zionists be silenced. They want relationships with Zionists to be “denormalized”, as showcased with greater frequency in liberal cities.
Protestors shut down Brooklyn event because liberal Jewish speaker is also a Zionist, August 2024
It is a deeply abnormal situation that parents must plead for the release of their innocent child held in captivity for nearly a year. It is also horribly tragic that Americans are attempting to normalize the deplatforming of Zionists.
Since 1993, the United States has provided more than $7.6 billion in assistance to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza—primarily through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The Trump administration suspended the program in January 2019 due to the Palestinians continued support of terrorism but it was restarted under the Biden administration in April 2021. According to the U.S. Governmental Accounting Office report in December 2023, American taxpayer dollars are currently not going to terrorism via that program.
The same cannot be said of the money the U.S. sends to Palestinians via the United Nations.
Since 1950, the U.S. has donated $7.3 billion to UNRWA, the temporary agency to deal uniquely with Palestinians who left Israel in 1948, together with their millions of descendants. The Biden administration suspended payments to UNRWA in January 2024 when it was revealed that several staffers participated in the brutal mass slaughter of people in Israel on October 7.
All that money hasn’t bought America any love.
The supposedly “moderate” Holocaust-denier President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority addressed the Turkish government on August 15, 2024. He promised “sharia law: victory or martyrdom” in the war against the Jewish State, and cursed the United States, “America is the plague and the plague is America.”
Pro-Palestinian protesters in the United States hate America too.
The negative sentiments about the U.S.A. is more prevalent among Democrats than Republicans. According to a June 2023 Pew poll, Republicans were more likely to view America as tolerant (54% to 35%) and democratic (51% to 36%) compared to Democrats. Meanwhile Democrats were more likely to find the U.S. to be dangerous (43% to 21%) and religious (35% to 26%) than Republicans. Note that these statistics were taken before the Palestinians launched the October 7, 2023 war against Israel.
Meanwhile, Israelis have a very positive view of the United States, with 77% having a positive view according to a June 2024 Pew poll. By way of comparison, Canada, the United Kingdom and France have 54%, 54% and 46% positive scores for the United States, respectively.
According to Palestinian sources, there are over 40,000 Gazans killed in the current war against Israel. Israel claims that 17,000 of the dead were terrorists. That means that the Palestinian Authority expects millions of additional dollars to support their “Martyrs Fund” / pay-to-slay program, on top of appeals to rebuild Gaza in the war they deliberately initiated.
When the leader of the Palestinian Authority declares “America is the plague” and his supporters threaten to burn America to the ground, it begs the question why America gives a single penny to people who despise the country, and whose leaders promise to give their last penny to people who slaughter Jews.
First One Through 