“I hate the ‘to be sure’ sentences,” an Israeli opinion leader once told me, referring to critiques of the Jewish state. For instance, “To be sure, Israel is surrounded by enemies.” Or, “to be sure, Israel faces a genocidal Hamas to its south and a more powerful genocidal Hezbollah to its north.” He hated the “to …
Continue reading “Israeli-Palestinian Peace Must Reflect Reality”
After the United Nations released a 23-page report this week detailing gang rapes and genital mutilation of Israeli women and girls during the Hamas-led slaughter of October 7, the UN’s special rapporteur on violence against women and girls said she’s not convinced that any rapes took place. No one should be surprised, for at least two reasons. First, the special rapporteur, Reem Alsalem, …
Continue reading “The UN Needs To Restore Its Credibility With Israel”
European Jews are not real Jews, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas declared the other day, and Hitler killed Jews not because of their religion but because of their “social role” in lending money. David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, didn’t want Jews from Arab countries to immigrate to Israel, according to Abbas, and he attacked Jewish institutions in Arab …
Continue reading “Israeli-Saudi Normalization Won’t Solve The Palestinian Problem”
Middle-aged men finish their work for the day, overseeing exterminations at Auschwitz, and retire to the comfort of their homes, wives, and children. Young female telephone, telegraph, and radio operators who send and receive messages about who shall live and who shall die take a break to relax in the sun. It was all part …
President Joe Biden has revamped U.S. goals in Ukraine from de-escalation and negotiations to a Ukrainian victory and the “degrading” of Russia’s military, reflecting a long-overdue reappraisal of Russian President Vladimir Putin and his war aims. It is not the first time of late that Washington has come to see that conventional wisdom about a …
Continue reading “Will Russia’s Ukraine War Prompt An American Awakening On Iran?”
How to Make Russia Pay – When asked, after his speech on Thursday, why the United States and its allies weren’t then kicking Russia completely out of SWIFT, the global banking communications system, over its invasion of Ukraine, President Biden said, “[It] is always an option. But right now, that’s not the position that the …
Continue reading “How To Make Russia Pay Over Ukraine: Deploy Every Financial Weapon Possible”
This week’s announcement that a bipartisan group of House and Senate members have created an Abraham Accords Caucus to encourage more Arab-Israeli normalization agreements reminds us that the accords have the potential to reshape the region’s politics, economics, diplomacy, and military relationships. The question is whether, in the months to come, the Biden administration will …