The Godfather is a classic in American cinema. The 1972 film won numerous awards including in the Best Picture category. The penultimate scene cemented the script in daring story-telling, as the leading figure, Michael Corleone, set himself as head of the new order.
While Corleone stood in church to be the godfather of a young child being baptised, his hitmen took out the heads of the competing crime families. In doing so, Corleone positioned himself to control the region without challenge.
Perhaps the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia will consider doing something similar to the warlords backed by the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism, including the Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Each group has caused death and destruction, dismantling any chance for a civilized life for residents and neighbors.
Now, as Iran attempts to stop Saudi Arabia from getting nuclear power from the United States, and establishing an alliance with Israel, it has released its dogs of war to inflict brutality and carnage.
To avert mass destruction and set a better course for the Middle East, the troika of US, Israel and Saudi Arabia could take out the leadership of Hamas in Qatar, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Houthis in Yemen. It would send a clear message to Iran that the US has not left the world to a Russia-China-Iran axis, and avert the deaths of many thousands of civilians throughout the region.
In ‘The Godfather,’ it took a “massacre” to get the families to stop killing each other, and ultimately the heads of the crime syndicates paid the price. As the Middle East prepares for a large scale war, the United States may want to send a clear and unmistakable message to Iran that the period of terrorism in the Middle East is over.
James Zogby, President of the Arab American Institute spoke at the United Nations on June 27, 2023 and bemoaned the “tragic deformity in Palestinian political culture” which has led Palestinians to reject moderate leadership and embrace terrorism. While he blamed the situation on Israelis, he was appalled at how Palestinians are overwhelmingly in favor of violence.
And that was before Palestinian Arabs stormed into Israel and burned people to death on October 7, 2023. They decapitated babies and soldiers. Raped women and slaughtered the elderly. A total of 1,300 people, killed by hand, roughly 13 times the magnitude of 9/11 attacks for small Israel. After the massacre, Zogby said that he was confident that a new Hamas 2.0 would replace the current one after Israel destroys Gaza, with the newest incarnation also ready for violence.
The toxic Palestinian desire to destroy the Jewish State is seemingly a permanent fixture; the only variable is its capabilities to inflict damage.
Which is the focus of Israel’s mission: to save 200 hostages and bring Hamas to justice to limit the group’s capabilities to do more harm. It is not trying to win the hearts of local Arabs; it is simply trying to bring innocent people back to their families and ensure that such terrorist attacks cannot be repeated for the foreseeable future.
Older people in the United States understand this. According to a CNN/SSRS poll, 81% of Americans over 65 years old think Israel is fully justified in its response. The support drops with age, with 56% of 50-to-64-year-olds, 44% of 35-to-49-year-olds and 27% of 18-to-34-year-olds supporting Israel’s actions.
That curve of support is steeper than existed before the gruesome Arab massacre. According to Pew in July 2022, 69% of Americans over 65 had a favorable view of Israel, while the figures dropped to 60%, 49% and 41% for the lower age bands.
Older Americans, who likely remember the heinous attacks of 9/11/01, had GREATER support for Israel after the attacks, fully backing the bombardment of Gaza. The groups between 35 and 64 years old saw a modest decline in support. The youngest cohort, who grew up with the wars against terror but without experiencing the actual trauma of terrorism, had a significant drop in support for Israeli actions.
It is curious. America’s youth is more liberal than older people, but still don’t support the much more liberal Jewish State over the radical Islamist Gaza Strip. Perhaps because youth read liberal papers like The New York Times which states over-and-again that Israel is led by “an extreme right-wing government” and never states that Gaza is ruled by a radical jihadi antisemitic terrorist group. Perhaps the youth read opinion pieces by Nicholas Kristof who lies that Gazans want a more moderate leadership, when even James Zogby acknowledges that Palestinians have become disgustingly blood-thirsty.
In other words, is the youth miseducated by a biased media?
America’s youth staged protests in main squares in major cities supporting Hamas in the immediate aftermath of the Hamas slaughter. They continue to chant on college campuses to end the Jewish State, and published letters that they proudly stand with the Palestinians who committed terrorist attacks. They are deliberately making young Jews on campus fear for their safety, as administrations are loathe to fight the horde.
They didn’t do any of this related to Russia/Ukraine, USA/Afghanistan, Armenia/Azerbaijan or any other conflict.
Those are not the actions of young adults poorly educated but indoctrinated.
James Zogby, a leader in Arab American community was saddened to admit that Hamas carried out “horrific murders” as part of the “tragic deformity of Palestinian culture,” but understood the Arabs’ goal of taking over the Jewish State. The situation of America’s 18 to 34 year-olds aligning with the killers of Jews – without a personal stake in the fight – is even more horrific.
The West is raising a dangerous generation which cannot differentiate between good and evil through their class-prism which parses everyone into the binary of minority/oppressed/victim/colonized and majority/oppressor/attacker/imperialist. That they lump the most persecuted, smallest minority group – Jews – into the camp of the oppressor, adds the stench of antisemitism to what may become known as America’s Worst Generation.
Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY16) represents the eighth largest Jewish district in Congress. He represents Americans.
And he has abandoned them all.
On October 16, 2023, while nearly 200 hostages remain captive in Gaza by the Palestinian political-terrorist group Hamas, the American far left-wing “squad” put forward a resolution which ignored them.
The “CeasfireNOW” Resolution leads that “between October 7 and October 16, 2023, armed violence has claimed the lives of 2,700 Palestinians and over 1,400 Israelis, including Israelis, and wounding thousands more.”
There was no acknowledgement of the sickening and unprovoked terrorist attack which started the violence.
There was no mention in the resolution of the hostages taken, which President Biden’s team said “are the highest priority. He [Biden] has sent hostage experts to coordinate and consult with the Israeli government on hostage recovery efforts.”
There was no statement to bring the Hamas perpetrators to justice. Quite the contrary, it called for “the Biden Administration to immediately call for and facilitate deescalation and a ceasefire to urgently end the current violence,” to allow the butchers to remain free, laughing at Israel and taunting the hostages.
Jamaal Bowman and fellow extremists Rep. Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib, have abandoned innocent hostages and are working to ensure that Hamas terrorists are never brought to justice, free to wantonly kill Jews whenever the mood strikes.
Is the squad being paid by Iran too?
ACTION ITEM
Email White House: “The CeasefireNow” Resolution put forward by the left-wing radical fringe including NY’s Bowman ignores Hamas terrorism and the hundreds of hostages held by the jihadi group. It is disgraceful and alarming surrender to violence. It must not only be rejected but the sponsors should be censured.”
The New York Times publishes a large “Opinion” section each Sunday which typically features a dozen opinions which tilt to its far-left readership. On occasion, it publishes center and right perspectives to provide readers a wider view of a situation.
In the aftermath of the worst atrocities committed against Jews since the Holocaust, the Times opted to serve up exclusively left-wing opinions which essentially offered that Palestinians really aren’t at fault for the October 7 atrocities, and even if they were somewhat to blame for the massacre, you cannot take it out on them.
The New York Times opinion section on October 15, 2023
Using Peter Beinart, an anti-Zionist as the main feature on the cover to discuss “How did we get here and how do we get out of here?” was setting the stage for a pile of bile. Another contributor listed on top of the front page was “Nicholas Kristof on how bombing civilians promotes extremism” was certainly going to be a blame-the-victim spectacle.
All this, while Israelis were still trying to identify the dead who were burned to death and hacked to pieces.
There were seven articles in all. All gave the same message of “why can’t we all just get along?” and blamed religious radicals in Israel and Palestinian territories for all the death and hatred. But especially the Israelis. As the stronger party, calling them out serves the progressive idols.
These are opinion pages, so people can repeat each other in their echo chamber to make them feel as if their opinions have miraculously transformed into facts all they want.
Alas, it is not so.
As a stark example, take one paragraph from Kristoff’s piece “What Does Destroying Gaza Solve?” He decided to veer from enlightened-snobbery opinion to give statistics from a Palestinian poll. He lied outright when he wrote:
“Gazans voted in Hamas in 2006 but have a mixed view of it, with 70 percent saying in a July poll that they would like Hamas to hand over administration of the territory to the much more moderate Palestinian Authority. Some 62 percent of people in Gaza said this summer they wanted to continue the ceasefire with Israel.”
Sounds like Gazans have moderated, right? It’s a total fabrication.
79% of Gazans are in favor of forming new “armed groups such as the ‘Lions’ Den’ and the ‘Jenin Battalion,’ which do not take orders from the PA and are not part of the PA security services”
55% of Gazans believe that they will “recover Palestine”, meaning take over all of Israel
78% of Hamas-supporters believe Israel won’t exist in 25 years
If presidential elections were held today, Hamas’s Ismail Haniyeh would win with 65% of the vote in Gaza
“Level of satisfaction with the performance of president Abbas stands at 17% and dissatisfaction at 80%…. Moreover, a vast majority of 80% of the public wants president Abbas to resign while only 16% want him to remain in office.”
“31% say Hamas is most deserving of representing and leading the Palestinian people while 21% think Fatah under president Abbas is the most deserving”
“63% say the PA is a burden on the Palestinian people”
“Only 28% support the two-state solution”
“53% support a return to an armed intifada”
“52% believe that armed action is the best way to end occupation”
Does that sound like a region that wants to hand administration over to the Palestinian Authority or supports a ceasefire? That has moved away from armed conflict and wants to pursue coexistence with Israel?
Even an opinion piece needs fact-checking when completely false data is presented to bolster the opinion, and the Times is either incompetent or complicit in lying about Gazans actual evil intentions.
The Beinart piece was a work of inversion of cause-and-effect. He blamed the frustration of Gazans being under blockade for causing their violence, rather than Gazans feeling that all of Israel is rightfully theirs and want to kick out the “colonial invader” Jews.
The blockade of Gaza started in 2007 when Hamas killed members of Fatah and seized the area. The formation of Hamas, with its antisemitic genocidal charter was written in 1988, roughly twenty years earlier. There’s a clear cause-and-effect and getting the sweet cover picture promotion by the Times doesn’t change facts.
To answer the question posed on the cover “how do we get out of here?” requires being honest about the situation to produce possible solutions. The New York Times believes that openly lying to its readership about a peaceful Gazan population under the domination of a handful of radical Islamists will produce a solution. It will not. The media lies will only produce more anger against Israel, especially as civilians in Gaza die in Israel’s attempt to save hostages, bring the Hamas perpetrators to justice, and end the threat posed from Gazan terrorist enclave.
ACTION ITEM
Write to The New York Times letters@nytimes.com: “The Kristof statistics about Gazans favoring the Palestinian Authority and a ceasefire are complete lies as shown in the June PCPSR poll.”
October 7, 2023 will be marked in Israeli and Jewish history as one of the most horrible days in modern times. Not since the Holocaust had such Jews experienced such savagery.
It would be hard to understand that from looking at pictures in The New York Times coverage of the Hamas massacre.
The attack was featured on the front page as well as in two other pages with many color pictures.
Front page of NY Times on October 8, 2023
Four pictures were featured under the headline “Palestinian Militants Stage Attack On Israel.” The four pictures included two of Palestinians attacking Israel, one with rockets and another with a bulldozer ripping down a fence. The other had an Israeli soldier walking past “bodies of Israelis killed by militants in the city of Sderot,” which gave no clarity as to whether the Israelis were soldiers, like the one standing in the picture, or civilians. The last picture had people in Gaza carrying “the body of a slain militant.”
From the pictures on the cover, one would imagine a battle between armed opponents, Palestinian militants and the Israeli army.
Page 12 would build on this theme.
Page 12 of The New York Times on October 8, 2023
Three small pictures on the top of the page show missile strikes and debris. One shows an Israeli town being hit and two pictures show Gaza being struck. The large picture in the center of the page has an Israeli woman, shown from the back, running for cover from a “rocket siren”, and the bottom picture has young Palestinian Arabs looking up at the sky from the “sound of airstrikes.”
The picture coverage started to move to civilians, with the war being a battle from the skies.
Page 13 of NY Times on October 8, 2023
The final page of coverage continued with the theme of rocket fire, with a large picture on top showing a strike in Gaza, then a small picture of a house in Israel with damage. Below the fold was an Israeli family running from “a site that was hit by a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip.”
This pictorial narrative is utterly and completely disgraceful.
Well over 1,000 Palestinian terrorists stormed into Israel and slaughtered over 1,000 people. They set fire to homes and burned people alive. They shot up people in the streets and in their beds. The raped women and dragged them through the streets. The Arabs chopped the heads off babies and soldiers.
It was a vicious slaughter committed by people in close proximity, mostly of armed Hamas terrorists against civilians.
All unprovoked, in an attack on the Jewish Sabbath and holiday of Simchat Torah.
The New York Times attempt at showing a similar number of pictures of damage from rockets in both Israel and Gaza right after the massacre distorts the entire narrative of the grotesque slaughter of Jewish families and young people, to warrant being called antisemitic and libelous.
Wennesland posted two statements right before and immediately after the gruesome October 7 slaughter of over 1,000 Israelis. A comparison is illustrative.
After Israelis in the West Bank attacked the city of Huwwara where Palestinian Arabs have killed many Israelis, he condemned the “attack by Israeli settlers against Palestinians and their property,” adding that he was “outraged by the continued incitement, provocations and lack of accountability for these violent crimes.” With one Palestinian dead, Wennesland demanded that “Israel must ensure that the [Palestinian Arab] civilian population is protected, and the [Israeli] perpetrators are held to account.”
Some hours later, over 1,000 Palestinian Arabs invaded Israel and butchered over 1,000 Israelis in a grisly unprovoked attack. Wennesland’s short statement said so much and so little.
“I vehemently condemn this morning’s multi-front assault against Israeli towns and cities near the Gaza Strip, and barrage of rockets reaching across central Israel by Hamas militants.
“These events have resulted in horrific scenes of violence and many Israeli fatalities and injuries, with many believed to be kidnapped inside the Strip. These are heinous attacks targeting civilians and must stop immediately.
“I am deeply concerned for the well-being of all civilians. I am in close contact with all concerned to urge maximum restraint and call on all sides to protect civilians.
This is a dangerous precipice and I appeal to all to pull back from the brink.“
Matter
1 Palestinians killed in response to attack
1,000+ Israelis killed in unprovoked massacre
Condemnation
“condemn”
“vehemently condemn”
Attack
“Israeli settlers against Palestinians and their property”
“horrific scenes of violence… heinous attacks targeting civilians and must stop immediately”
Outrage
“continued incitement, provocations, and lack of accountability for these violent crimes“
N/A
Concern
“[Palestinian] civilians”
“all civilians”
Action urged
“hold perpetrators accountable“
“maximum restraint“
Comparing the two incidents is like comparing a parking ticket to a multi-vehicle crash, facts which were clearly known to Wennesland. Yet he could not call out the “continued incitement, provocations and lack of accountability” for Palestinian Arabs who butchered people. He voiced his concern about Palestinians when one Arab was killed but was suddenly concerned for “all civilians” when hundreds upon hundreds of Israelis were tortured.
Most tellingly, the United Nations Special Coordinator for Middle East Peace only called for Israelis to be held accountable, but urged Israel to show “maximum restraint” and not pursue an entire Palestinian terrorist infrastructure that launched a war.
The United Nations has never been concerned about Middle East Peace, only the formation of a Palestinian State – even at the very moment when Palestinian Arabs clearly demonstrated to the world that they most definitely do not deserve one.
ACTION ITEM
Write US Ambassador to United Nations “Demand all Israeli hostages be returned and members of Hamas hand themselves over to Israel for prosecution for their heinous attack on over 1,000 civilians.”
It is difficult for people to comprehend the trauma felt in Israel. It goes beyond numbers as reviewed here.
The 9/11 Comparison
The Murdered. On September 11, 2001, 2,977 American civilians were killed by radical jihadists affiliated with the al Qaeda terrorist group. By comparison, on October 7, 2023, an estimated 900 people were killed in Israel. Relative to each population, roughly 1 out of 100,000 Americans were killed on 9/11 while 9.6 out of 100,000 Israelis were killed.
After 9/11, there were basically no further casualties on American soil. In Israel, several hundred additional people have been killed, with each day almost the equivalent of a 9/11. The total scale of the massacre of Israelis easily surpasses 10 times 9/11.
The Killers. There were 19 hijackers of four airplanes on 9/11, a relatively small number. The massacre in Israel involved an estimated 1,500 Palestinian Arab terrorists, about 80 times as many bent on killing civilians.
The Methodology. The 9/11 operation was clinically cold: the hijackers crashed planes into buildings. In the 10/7 atrocities, 1,500 Hamas terrorists went town-to-town hacking and shooting families to death. They raped women and dragged them through the street by their hair. They burned people alive. The butchers decapitated dozens of babies. For hours, they scoured the horizon for Jews to slaughter by hand.
Broad Local Support. The al Qaeda terrorists were a band of radical jihadists in 2001. They weren’t elected to any office. Not so for Hamas, which was elected to 58% of Palestinian parliament in 2006 with the most antisemitic charter ever written. They continue to hold that majority of the government, and according to polls, Hamas would win presidential elections if held now.
Location. The horde of al Qaeda terrorists were on the other side of the globe for the U.S.A. Hamas is literally next door to Israel – with the majority in Gaza but many in the West Bank. These Palestinian terrorists could carry out attacks against Israel from their backyards whenever they want.
The Aftermath. All 19 hijackers on 9/11 were killed in the suicide operation. They took no prisoners. However, well over 1,000 of the Arab terrorists survived and returned to their safe haven in Gaza, taking roughly 150 hostages with them. The Palestinian jihadists continue to fight on, now surrounded by 25,000 fellow jihadi terrorists, ensconced among civilians.
International Support. Al Qaeda became public enemy number one around the world after 9/11. America enlisted many countries in a fight against global terror which focused on America’s enemy. Yet now, in the immediate aftermath of the sickening slaughter in Israel, people and countries call the terrorism “resistance” and the massacre a cause for “celebration.” Israel will have a very difficult time gathering and maintaining global support to finally terminate this noxious evil.
Existential Threat. At the end of the day, while the 9/11 attacks were evil, the United States did not suddenly become really vulnerable; it was not going to disappear. But Israel is surrounded by many parties who refuse to accept its existence since its founding. The Islamic Republic of Iran, now at the cusp of nuclear weapons capability, has threatened to wipe it off the map and is actively sponsoring terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah on Israel’s borders. Israel is highly vulnerable.
As people watch the news or consider the “pro-Palestinian resistance” protests taking place in cities and campuses, it is critical that they understand the current fear of Jews and Israelis: the collective post traumatic stress disorder which echoes the wails of parents and grandparents from the Holocaust and pogroms, has emerged again as the Satan of Gaza.
Even the most persecuted people in the world can be shocked by the barbarity of antisemites, and by the people who abandon them in their time of need.
The Jewish State and Jews around the world have woken up to the fact that they are in a war, hated for who they are, where they are and what they do. It took a monstrous massacre for the reality to awaken people to the situation, and having reached this point, it’s important to know more about the haters and their intents.
The article “The Center of Intersectionality looks a lot like Adolf Hitler” listed many vile antisemites including: the Democratic Socialists of America, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Rep. Ilhan Omar, New York City Council member Shahana Hanif, Linda Sarsour and Zahra Billoo of the Council of American-Islamic Relations. There are many others like the Mapping Project in Massachusetts which is part of the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment (BDS) movement, which wants to make it easier to target Jewish organizations throughout the state, and so listed them and their addresses. Organizations included those that promote “normalization” and peace, as well as synagogues.
After the brutal massacre of hundreds of Israelis on October 7, 2023, one would imagine that even everyday antisemites would distance themselves from the carnage and attempt to not appear as Nazis bent on Jewish blood.
Alas, the bilestorm is upon us, and those celebrating the murder of Jews are out in the open. Jews should take note and be prepared in both the near- and intermediate-term.
Immediately after the atrocities became public, The United States Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO) threw its full weight behind Palestinian Arabs. It published a statement about the “recent unprovoked and continuous attacks by Israel on Palestinian towns, cities, and refugee camps have resulted in tragic loss of Palestinian lives. We condemn Israel’s targeted and indiscriminate killing of civilians, including innocent children, women, and the elderly, and we denounce the inhumane siege imposed on the nearly 2 million inhabitants of Gaza, a clear violation of international law and an implied declaration of open war on the Palestinians which oblige them to be in constant self-defense.” Members of USCMO are:
American Muslims for Palestine (AMP). They have a convention in Chicago November 23-5
Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) which vigorously backed Billoo’s antisemitic rant that all Jews are enemies of Muslims
Al-Awda – The Palestinian Right to Return Coalition
Within Our Lifetime
Samidoun
CUNY School of Law Students for Justice in Palestine
Decolonize This Place
Existence Is Resistance
CUNY for Palestine
Connecticut Democratic Socialists of America
Yalies for Palestine
Semilla Collective
Greater New Haven Peace Council
Wesleyan Students for Justice in Palestine
Party for Socialism and Liberation
Witness Palestine Rochester
ANSWER Coalition
Bard College SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine – Butler University
Jewish Voice for Peace – Indiana
Party for Socialism and Liberation – Indianapolis
SJP @ UC Davis
AMP Chicago
… and many more
The Democratic Socialists of America and Students for Justice In Palestine were in full force around the country backing the wanton killing of Jews. AMCHA Initiative has long tracked how the presence of SJP on college campuses results in antisemitic incidents jumping by five times.
The head of NYU Law Student Bar Association sent out a broad email about “my unwavering and absolute solidarity with Palestinian in their resistance against oppression toward liberation and self-determination.” Ryna went on to say Israel’s blockade of the terrorist enclave “made resistance necessary. I will not condemn resistance.” That such a person can be a lawyer and approve of the wanton slaughter of non-combatants en masse is terrifying. This person, Ryna Workman, should be rejected from all employment.
Ryna has company. Harvard University posted a letter signed by 30 groups supporting Hamas’s butchery. After billionaire investor Bill Ackman, an alum of the school, asked that the school release the names of the individuals behind the letter, someone posted their names.
Columbia University’s Student for Justice in Palestine produced a vile antisemite named Naye Idriss who gave a speech in Times Square in New York City the day after the massacre of Jews and called for more massacres to a reception of cheers.
Idriss was likely fueled in her hatred of the Jewish State from Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi who said that Israel’s treatment of Palestinian Arabs “will necessarily, inevitably bring a violent reaction (51:40). Another professor, Joseph Massad mocked how Jews fled on foot from their “colonies” (since he views all of Israel as an illegal colony) in the massacre. He didn’t mention a single slaughtered Jew but went on to lament Arab dead, which he hoped would be the “start of the Palestinian War of Liberation.”
Of course, this generation’s Nazis is the popular Palestinian political-terrorist group Hamas which carried out the slaughter. Its 1988 foundational charter is replete with antisemitism and the call to kill Jews and destroy the Jewish State, seemingly to the joy of Palestinian Arabs who voted the party into 58% of parliament in 2006. Its leadership calls on Muslims around the world to engage in a global intifada to support their annihilation of Israel.
Turkey, another Islamic, non-Arab country provides Hamas political support
Qatar hosts Hamas’s leadership and funnels money to it
Eugene Puryear, part of the Party for Socialism and Liberation organized rallies for Hamas and said “Palestinians are right to stand up against occupation.”
ADL has tracked many of the recent pro-Hamas protests which backed the massacre and called for the destruction of Israel. Chants included “Zionism has got to go!” and “Zionism is genocide!”, “You need to stop being apologetic about Palestinian liberation“, “Resistance is not terrorism.” Regarding the massacre of Jews, speakers said “make no mistake, we are in celebration.”
While Jews grieve and pray, they seemingly have not internalized that the pro-Palestinian community does not view this as a battle like 2008, 2012, 2014 or 2021. They don’t think it’s like the Second Intifada in which they rejected two states for two people.
Your enemies believe the war to end the Jewish State has begun. It’s 1948 Redux.
And they have called for the world to join them in their efforts to end Israel and prosecute its supporters in a “global intifada.”
Israel’s fight in Gaza is not about the terrorist group Hamas; it is about terminating Hamas’s jihadi dream of destroying the Jewish State.
Almost every Palestinian Arab is already an antisemite and this war will not make them hate Jews any less. However, it must teach them that Israel is here to stay.
Social media sites like Facebook have enabled features for people to post whether they are safe when a particular crisis hits. It is meant as a quick tool to alert friends and families in real-time that one has escaped tragedy.
When war strikes Israel – especially on a holiday – Jews around the world await the pain of loss.
The popular Palestinian Arab political-terrorist group Hamas launched a massive attack against Israel while Jews celebrated the end of their holidays celebrating the Torah. This year, the two-day religious observance of Shemini Azeret/ Simchat Torah in the diaspora outside of Israel, coincided with the 50th anniversary of the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Hamas deployed thousands of missiles and militants into Israel to mark the day in a new war.
As horrible news leaked into synagogues about the war in Israel over the holiday, many Orthodox Jews had to wait until Sunday night to learn about the status of friends and family inside the Jewish holy land, as they do not use any electronic devices over the holiday.
A friend’s son serving in the army killed.
A friend’s cousin taken hostage.
A friend’s best friend killed.
A friend’s child’s roommate killed.
Each frantic call and review of social media was one of trauma.
There are few Jews in the world. While there are 8 billion people who are at most six degrees of separation from any other person, the 15 million Jews are at most two degrees of separation for one another. When hundreds of Jews are murdered, everyone is touched. Everyone mourns.
The Hamas website, which operated openly for years proclaiming its war against the Jewish State, was blocked as it posted videos of its grisly operation killing and kidnapping civilians. Its effort to let Jews know that they are never safe was viewed as too cruel to be given air at this time.
Palestinians pose with the Palestinian flag on an Israeli tank that was destroyed in an attack launched by Hamas on October 7. Behind the tank, the fence separating Gaza from Israel can be seen as destroyed, allowing more inflitrations. Photo: Hani Alsahaer/Anadolu Agency)
But information slowly dribbles in. And it continues to be horrific.
In addition to the over 700 dead are over 100 who have been taken captive, spread throughout the terrorist enclave of Gaza. Children as young as three. Wheelchair-bound Holocaust survivors.
The scale of the loss of life is difficult to comprehend. The number of hostages taken means that the current dangerous situation will be present for a long time.
There is no hashtag for Jews to mark themselves safe, nor an emoji to relay the deep pain at the loss of life and trauma felt for friends trapped at the center of evil.
As Jews around the world wait for bad news, they assess the actions each can take to seize the day from the implacable foe.
ACTION ITEM
Write White House “Support Israel. Cut all funding to Palestinians immediately.”
Tor Wennesland, the Arab puppet who works under the title United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, gave his highly biased remarks to the UN Security Council on September 27. It showcased his protection of the increasingly dangerous Palestinian terrorist society.
During the reporting period June 15 to September 19, Palestinian Arabs in the “West Bank” killed ten Israelis, while Israeli “settlers” in the region killed two Palestinians. The whopping FIVE TIMES more murders by Arabs did not seem to register, as Wennesland voiced “I am disturbed by the high levels of settler-related violence,” but never specifically called out the more frequent and lethal Arab violence.
As alarming, for the seventh time this year, Palestinians in the West Bank launched rockets at Israelis, with the latest one towards the Israeli town of Ram On located near the 1949 Armistice Lines. Wennesland grossly minimized the attack saying Palestinians “attempted and failed to launch an improvised rocket”, making the grotesque attempt at mass murder sound like a harmless childish prank.
The rocket attacks were launched by yet another new Palestinian terror group called al-Ayyash, joining the Lion’s Den and Jenin Battalion which formed over the past two years. The number of guns and advanced weaponry now being deployed by the various terrorist groups is making 2023 the most deadly year for Israelis in several years.
Still, the UN did not condemn Palestinian actions nor call for a crack down on incitement and terror. Instead, it asked countries for donations to send to these same Palestinians, and urged for evictions of all Jewish civilians from their homes in the West Bank.
It’s working.
Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said “the sharp rise in violence by extremist Israeli settlers against Palestinians is also deeply alarming,” but didn’t similarly call out the greater number of Palestinian Arab murderers. She then added that the United States supports the antisemitic policies and desires of the Palestinian Authority to ban Jews from living in the “West Bank” and from praying at their holiest location on the Jewish Temple Mount. For good measure, she added that the U.S. is “pleased to announce nearly $73 million in additional contributions to UNRWA.”
If the UN’s vision of a peace process absolves Arabs of crimes against humanity while endorsing the ethnic cleansing of half a million Jews from their biblical homeland, the entire global body is clearly morally defective. It should be stripped of all funding and shuttered outright, not just its specialized projects for Palestinians.
First One Through 