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Greta Thunberg’s moral siege of Israel This is an armada of Israelophobic activists, not an aid mission. Brendan O’Neill

By on May 8th, 2025

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/05/07/greta-thunbergs-moral-siege-of-israel/

Why isn’t Greta Thunberg sailing an aid ship to Sudan? Things are dire there. Two years of war have given rise to ‘catastrophic hunger levels’. The horrors dwarf ‘those in Ukraine, Gaza and Somalia combined’, reports Deutsche Welle. And yet the benighted Sudanese have failed to win the favour of the world’s best known eco-brat. Her boat is destined not for Africa but for the only strip of land that matters to the virtuous of the West: Gaza.

Sweden’s prophetess of doom is back in the news. She’s making waves with her plan to sail to Gaza. She and others from the turbo-smug keffiyeh classes had planned to sail on a boat called – wait for it – Conscience. Rumour has it they called it that because ‘Aren’t We Fucking Wonderful?’ was too long for the hull. But their moral expedition has been put on hold after a drone fired on their boat in waters off Malta, causing damage but no casualties.

Information is sparse. The Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) that’s organising this virtue-fest in the Med says 30 people were onboard at the time – the Maltese government says 16 were. Greta says Israel fired the drone, yet another ‘crystal-clear example’ that it doesn’t give a toss about ‘international law and human rights’; Israel is staying schtum.

Of course, no one wants to see Greta or her activist pals come to any harm. I’m glad that they haven’t. Yet it would be wholly wrong to describe this expedition as merely about delivering aid, as simply humanitarian. The aim of these seafaring Israelophobes is less to ‘help Gaza’ than to weaken Israel’s hold over the enemy territory it has seized in its bloody war with Hamas.

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BOOKS, ISRAEL Comments turned off

Democracies and Death Cults Douglas Murray emerges as Israel’s fiercest non-Jewish defender. by Mark Tapson

By on May 8th, 2025

https://www.frontpagemag.com/democracies-and-death-cults/

As faux historians, faux conservatives, and former MMA tough guys vie with each other to be the biggest antisemitic influencers in the dank sewer known as social media, one pundit stands out as the fiercest, most visible non-Jew defender of Israel’s right to exist.

Bestselling author and journalist Douglas Murray, known for his incisive observations on the embattled West, his fearlessly pro-Israel stance, and his withering verbal takedowns of Jew-hating opponents, recently released a new book: On Democracies and Death Cults: Israel and the Future of Civilization. It is both emotionally searing and intellectually rigorous, a meticulously reported deep dive into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, centered on the atrocities of October 7, 2023, and their broader implications for Western democracies. The book draws from Murray’s extensive on-the-ground reporting in Israel, Gaza, and Lebanon, offering a firsthand account of the horrors perpetrated by the terror group Hamas and a trenchant critique of the West’s largely sickening response to the conflict.

Arguably the book’s greatest value is that it underscores the clash between a thriving democracy that celebrates life, and a savage ideology obsessed with death and with the eradication of Jews and their tiny Middle East state. Murray’s ability to convey the shocking horror of Palestinian brutality with understated language, combined with his warning about the dangers of the West’s perverse sympathy for Hamas, makes On Democracies and Death Cults a vital contribution to the discourse on democracy, morality, and the future of civilization.

Murray’s restrained prose manages to amplify the visceral impact of his reporting. Rather than resorting to sensationalism, he lets the grim facts of October 7 speak for themselves. The massacre, which saw Hamas terrorists and Palestinian civilians murder, rape, and abduct over 1200 Israelis in a meticulously planned assault, is recounted through the voices of survivors, victims’ families, and even captured perpetrators. Murray’s descriptions are spare yet haunting: a mother burned alive in her home, a child witnessing unspeakable brutality, a terrorist exulting in his murderous deeds.

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FOREIGN POLICY, ISRAEL Comments turned off

Biden team sought to ‘get rid’ of Netanyahu for opposing its Gaza plans The apparent willingness of the Biden administration to consider ousting a sitting prime minister once more raises questions about U.S. interference in Israel’s internal politics. David Isaac

By on May 8th, 2025

https://www.jns.org/biden-team-sought-to-get-rid-of-netanyahu-for-opposing-its-gaza-plans/

The Biden administration considered ways to “get rid” of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he wouldn’t go along with their plans for the Gaza Strip, Channel 13’s weekly investigative news show HaMakor (“The Source”) revealed on April 27.

“The White House got tired of Netanyahu and started to roll around a revolutionary idea … : how to get rid of Netanyahu,” said Raviv Drucker, who hosts the hour-long Sunday show.

The April 27 broadcast, titled “All the President’s Men,” involved in-depth interviews with nine members of former U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration, including former U.S. ambassador to Israel Thomas Nides, former national security advisor Jake Sullivan, former White House national security communications advisor John Kirby, former senior advisor for energy Amos Hochstein and former senior Biden aide Ilan Goldenberg.

Worth noting is that the program was an apologia for the Biden administration, and that Drucker is a long-time critic of Netanyahu. The episode criticized the prime minister throughout, portraying him as ungrateful, as torpedoing potential hostage deals for political reasons and missing a chance to sign a normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia, among other missteps.

According to the program, the Biden administration became aggravated by Netanyahu’s refusal to discuss the end goal of Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, specifically, who would take charge of the Gaza Strip after Hamas had been ousted.

The Biden team proposed handing security to a foreign force, which would then turn Gaza over to Palestinian control, Goldenberg told HaMakor.

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ISRAEL, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Does The European Union Actually Expect Radical Islamists to Reform Themselves? by Nils A. Haug

By on May 6th, 2025

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21586/eu-palestinians-islamists

The European Union’s decision to grant the Palestinian Authority (PA) a sum of $2 billion to assist them to “reform themselves” can only be the result of wilful blindness, cognitive dissonance and what by now can only be ascribed to a proud European tradition of Jew-hate.

Israel’s warnings of the PA continuing to seize Israel’s land by phases — as planned by the PLO 10-Point Program of 1974 and advanced by former PA Prime Minister Salman Fayyad’s plan — to “create facts on the ground” with illegal buildings — are largely ignored by the West. So far, the PA, with the funding from the EU, has built more than 97,581 illegal structures on Israeli land that is still to be negotiated.

The Palestinian Authority also full-throatedly incites terrorism in its education system and bountifully funds terrorist acts. The total so far disbursed as remuneration for the PA’s “Pay-for-Slay” program and acts of terrorism reportedly exceeds $1 billion. This transaction has been in place for decades.

The EU’s naiveté (to be kind) is already bringing disaster upon many of its member nations by allowing unlimited Muslim migration, presumably in an unconditional desire for every vote imaginable.

Israelis are understandably against an untenable two-state solution — which they accurately see as no solution at all.

The European Union’s decision to grant the Palestinian Authority (PA) a sum of $2 billion to assist them to “reform themselves” can only be the result of wilful blindness, cognitive dissonance and what by now can only be ascribed to a proud European tradition of Jew-hate.

The PA, despite claiming to be secular, is saturated with an Islamist mentality in support of jihadists. The PA plays the West by displaying a veneer of reasonableness, victimhood and the bogus claim that it would, in an ever-extending future, accept some kind of peace with the Jews. This fiction is supposedly backed by an equally bogus claim that it would be willing — under conditions which would always be suicidal for the Jews to accept — to establish a two-state solution in Israel’s ancestral homeland.

This romantic fantasy persists in the face of the Palestinian Authority’s elaborate, extremely concrete programs with the European Union to appropriate land which, according to the 1993 and 1995 Oslo Accords, must still be negotiated, as well as a continuing jobs program that the PA offers, similar to Murder, Inc. The PA’s “Pay for Slay” program lavishly rewards Palestinians who murder Israelis. The more Israelis they murder, the greater the sum. A 2024 report notes that the PA disburses more than $16 million each month to the Palestinian murderers and their families.

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ISRAEL, MEDIA Comments turned off

British reporter who exposed BBC documentary’s Hamas links faces vandalism David Isaac

By on May 6th, 2025

https://www.jns.org/british-reporter-who-exposed-bbc-documentarys-hamas-links-faces-vandalism/

British investigative journalist David Collier learned while in Israel last week that his car had been vandalized outside his London home.

He received a “frantic call” from his wife in the early afternoon of May 27 about the incident, in which a chemical, perhaps paint thinner, had been splashed on his vehicle in five or six places.

It’s not the first time his car has been vandalized. A few weeks ago, Collier discovered that someone had keyed the driver’s side of his car. Keying is when a sharp object is used to scratch a car’s exterior, damaging the paint.

Collier dismissed the first incident as perhaps the work of a drunk stumbling through the neighborhood. The second incident left no doubt in his mind that he had been targeted. The Metropolitan Police drew the same conclusion, “logging it as a racially aggravated attack,” he said.

Collier, still in Israel, spoke to JNS while waiting outside a store selling self-defense products in the hopes of finding something he could legally bring back with him. There are strict rules in Britain against selling such products. “No self-defense equipment is allowed in the U.K. I can’t even hold pepper spray in my own home,” he said.

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ISRAEL, MOVIES AND TELEVISION Comments turned off

The Settlers: An Incomplete Portrayal By John Aziz *****

By on May 6th, 2025

https://quillette.com/2025/05/06/the-settlers-an-incomplete-portrayal-louis-theroux-settlers-israel-palestine/?ref=quillette-daily-newsletter

Louis Theroux’s new documentary suggests that he is unfamiliar with the complex history behind the Israeli occupation of The West Bank, and does not understand the political and ideological factors at stake there.

I watched the latest Louis Theroux documentary The Settlers with the same apprehension with which I approach most Western media output relating to the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. There is nothing quite like the capacity of well-meaning Westerners to grossly misunderstand and miss crucial pieces of the puzzle in regard to the history and context of why Israelis and Palestinians are fighting one another.

While the war between Hamas and Israel has dominated most headlines over the past eighteen months, this particular documentary focuses instead on Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank, and particularly on the growth in Israeli civilian settlements since 1967, when the Jewish state captured the West Bank from Jordan in the Six Day War. 

Today, there are over 700,000 Jewish Israelis living there, residing in upwards of 279 settlements, which range from what are effectively modern cities like Maale Adumim and Modi’in Illit, with tens or hundreds of thousands of inhabitants, to ad hoc hilltop encampments made up of tents, sheds, and tin-roofed shacks, housing just a few families.

I’ve had some personal experience of life in the West Bank, because the Palestinian side of my family is from there, and I have visited on multiple occasions, generally staying for months at a time. On my travels, I made excursions into Palestinian cities like Ramallah, Nablus, and Jenin.

Of course, I’ve only seen life from the Palestinian side of the fences. I have never been into an Israeli settlement. Palestinians and Israelis may live in the same land, but we inhabit different worlds, separated not only by fences but by language, religion, and culture—and that is part of the problem. By talking to each other and trying to understand one another, we might be able to build better relationships and forge connections that could transcend the conflict and ultimately end this tragic, horrific, nightmarish fight.

I would appreciate a documentary that gave me a window into a world that I have not been able to see in person and helped me empathise with the people on the other side. Louis Theroux’s documentary did not do that. Instead, it left me frustrated and deflated. Theroux’s settler interviewees were a selection of nasty extremists who lurched between denying the existence of Palestinians and expressing the desire to conquer more land and drive out the Arab inhabitants. Most bizarrely of all, the documentary contains a series of segments with settler leader Daniella Weiss which culminate in her physically assaulting Theroux by pushing and shoving him. Theroux tries to put this in context by interviewing Palestinian activist Issa Amro from Hebron, who explains, “They don’t see us as equal human beings who deserve the same rights as they do.”

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

What Are Palestinians Really Interested In? by Bassam Tawil

By on May 5th, 2025

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21589/what-are-palestinians-interested-in

“These fires put both Israelis and Palestinians at risk and are causing severe damage to the land these terrorists claim to be fighting for. These people are not pro-Palestinian, they are pro-terrorism against Jews.” — Bassem Eid, Palestinian human rights activist, X, April 30, 2025

Decades of anti-Israel propaganda by Palestinian leaders and media outlets are directly responsible for this hatred. For that reason, any talk about a peace process with the Palestinians has unfortunately become nothing but a sick joke.

Palestinians are far more interested in murdering Jews and setting Israel on fire than they are in “coexisting.” They do not want Israel “coexisting” on even one millimeter of the Jews’ own historical homeland.

The world needs to realize that the Palestinians have raised a whole generation that worships destruction and death for the Jews — and even for themselves — far more than a better and prosperous life.

As fires raged in central Israel in late April, many Palestinians celebrated, brazenly demanded more fires, and called for Israeli homes to be reduced to “ashes.”

All this happened on the day Israelis commemorated fallen soldiers and victims of terrorism and prepared to celebrate Independence Day.

“We ask God to protect our people and land. May these fires confuse the [Israeli] occupiers and their embattled settlers,” wrote Palestinian social media user Hana Barghouti.

“In the name of Allah,” another user, Umm Ibrahim, who posted images from of the blazes, wrote: “the Avenger, the Almighty.”

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ISRAEL, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Commons foreign affairs hanging tribunal Parliament should be investigating its own deafness to facts about Israel Melanie Phillips

By on May 5th, 2025

https://melaniephillips.substack.com/p/the-commons-foreign-affairs-hanging

A recent hearing of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee demonstrated that Israel’s defenders and its critics appear to inhabit entirely different planets.

The committee, which was taking evidence on “the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”, had invited two of Israel’s doughtiest champions, the lawyer Natasha Hausdorff and the writer Jonathan Sacerdoti, to address it.

For the committee’s chair, the Labour MP Emily Thornberry, this appeared to be not so much a fact-finding exercise as a tribunal in which Hausdorff and Sacerdoti were in the dock.

Thornberry asked Sacerdoti: “How do you see ideally Gaza in ten years’ time? What would be a good outcome?” Sacerdoti replied that this would be a de-radicalised Gaza whose inhabitants were no longer committed to genocidal acts.

But as Thornberry’s subsequent challenges to him demonstrated, the only good outcome for her seemed to be a Palestinian state.

When it was Hausdorff’s turn, sparks really flew. “What’s the optimistic future for a Palestinian mother in Gaza, what’s the best thing that could happen?” asked Thornberry.

In any moral universe, the best thing that could happen to such a mother would be for her to stop telling her children that their duty was to murder Jews and martyr themselves in the process, as so many Palestinian Arab women boast of doing.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

POSITIVE NEWS FROM ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

By on May 4th, 2025

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

There is a cliché often applied to individuals who are held responsible for the circumstances or harm they experienced, rather than the actions or responsibility of others. Israel’s detractors are a prime example. In spite of the chilling and murderous rhetoric and action of its enemies, Israel is libeled and blamed. Michael Ordman details how, in spite of war, Israel’s researchers work 24/7 to develop technologies that bring hope and succor to billions of global citizens. Read it all.rsk

 

See the remarkable resilience of war-wounded Israelis.

Israeli fraud detection techniques exposed the proteins responsible for many diseases.

Israeli neonatologists are saving the lives of babies in Ghana.

Israel is the first country to provide an AI tutor to every 16-year-old student.

An Israeli physical security system will be protecting the Netherlands.

Israelis won multiple gold medals in four different sports.

Israelis celebrated Independence Day despite massive (arson) fires.

 

POSITIVE NEWS IN A WAR
 
Wounded doctor returns to work. Seven months after being severely injured in a Gaza helicopter crash and undergoing intense rehab, senior pediatrician Dr. Eyal Hayman has returned to work at Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/406627             https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396323
 
After 16 years, wounded soldier returns to IDF.  Aharon Karov, the most critically-injured soldier in Operation Cast Lead 16 years ago, has re-enlisted in the IDF as part of a team creating the Disabled Soldiers Department. Following Oct 7 2023 he helped create the “Continuing Life” initiative, to support the injured.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/407428
 
Overcoming the odds at his wedding. Ziv, a 30-year-old Israeli engineer, overcame a Hezbollah missile attack that cost him his arm and spinal cord damage, defying odds to walk down the aisle and marry his bride Nitzan after intensive rehab.
https://worldisraelnews.com/watch-severely-wounded-idf-soldier-beats-the-odds-and-walks-down-the-aisle/
 
“Operation Hug” resumes. Operation Hug (see here previously) has restarted thanks to Nefesh b’Nefesh, JNF-USA and Friends of the IDF. It brings to Israel parents of lone IDF soldiers, to be reunited with their loved ones. The initiative aims to offer soldiers the unmatched strength and comfort of a long-awaited embrace.
https://www.jns.org/operation-hug-resumes-reuniting-lone-soldiers-with-their-parents/  https://hug.nbn.org.il/
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-851890
 
Young resilience awards. 26 children and teens, age 6 – 18) have received “Resilience Award for Children and Youth” for their actions promoting strength, persistence and determination during the Swords of Iron war. Half will also receive a personal scholarship. Three youth groups were also recognized.
https://www.jns.org/wire/resilience-award-bestowed-to-young-people-for-contributions-during-the-war/
 
Robotic bulldozers deployed in Gaza. The IDF has begun limited deployment in Gaza of the Robdozer – the robotic version of Caterpillar’s D9 bulldozer. These are used to clear roads and buildings of Hamas booby traps, plus to build defensive barriers around temporary IDF camps.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israels-new-unmanned-bulldozers-changing-the-paradigm-of-war-in-gaza/
 
 
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Identifying key proteins. Ben-Gurion University researchers have developed WGAND – an AI algorithm that can detect “anomalous” proteins that are associated with tissue-specific diseases. It involves “anomalous” behavior analysis, similar to methods that identify fraudulent financial transactions or suspicious user activity.
https://www.bgu.ac.il/en/news-and-articles/ai-algorithm-spots-hidden-disease-clues-in-protein-networks/
https://academic.oup.com/gigascience/article/doi/10.1093/gigascience/giaf034/8106436
 
Defibrillators installed on 150 trains. Magen David Adom and Israel Railways are installing defibrillators, for the first time, on more than 150 Israeli passenger trains to save lives in the event of cardiac issues. They have already equipped defibrillators at all 67 active Israeli train stations.
https://www.jns.org/magen-david-adom-and-israel-railways-install-defibrillators-on-150-trains/
 
Eye doctor saves heart patient on flight from Tbilisi. Dr Eyal Aloni, head of ophthalmology at Israel’s Barzilai Medical Center, saved a young man with a medical history of heart disease, who collapsed during a flight from Tbilisi, Georgia to Israel. He used medications that he carried, plus oxygen supplied by the crew.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/407449
 
Ex-supermodel is now a paramedic. Israeli ex-supermodel Michaela Bercu featured here previously when she founded the app Tribu, which connects volunteering needs with those who wish to help. She recently completed the Magen David Adom paramedic course, and works two 8-hour shifts a week as a medical orderly.
https://www.israel21c.org/ex-supermodel-reinvents-herself-as-volunteer-paramedic/
 
Chewable gummy synbiotics. (TY Atid-EDI) Israel’s TopGum (see here previously) has launched no-added sugar, synbiotic” Gummiotics” in two natural flavors: orange and strawberry.  They comprise probiotics and postbiotics, bound together in a natural, prebiotic fiber-based matrix, to provide gut-health benefits.
https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/topgum-unveils-its-latest-gummy-creation-fruity-chewable-synbiotics-302404255.html

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

77 imperatives for an Israeli victory Ruthie Blum

By on May 4th, 2025

https://www.jns.org/77-imperatives-for-an-israeli-victory/

This year, Israel marked Yom Hazikaron and Yom Ha’atzmaut with an additional reminder of its enemies’ genocidal intentions. Before Memorial Day mourning made way for Independence Day celebrations, multiple wildfires spread across a large area between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Though an investigation into the initial blaze was inconclusive, with the conflagration being attributed to a combination of climate conditions and hikers’ negligence, there’s no question that arsonists stepped in to heighten the crisis. For one thing, some perpetrators were caught on video, and three suspects were arrested for questioning.

For another, Arab social media was abuzz with calls to go out and “burn Israel to the ground.” With jihad in the air, even the slightest desert breeze—certainly a dry heat wave with high winds—can wreak major havoc.   

And as the country’s firefighters, with the help of police and soldiers, battled the flames, the Houthis spent the days launching missiles at Israel from Yemen. Thankfully, neither led to a loss of life.

The same can’t be said about 19-year-old Israel Defense Forces Sgt. Niv Dayag from Ramat Hasharon, however. He was killed on Thursday in Gaza.

Meanwhile, the IDF was striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon; tackling hostile activities in Syria; preparing for a confrontation with Iran; taking out terrorists in Judea and Samaria; and amassing troops to step up military pressure on Hamas.

This is how Israel marked its 77th birthday. Not with quiet reflection followed by cheerful fanfare, but under attack on all fronts, including that involving civil strife.

The latter, as usual, was characterized by a media chorus, echoed by a certain vociferous sector of the public, demanding an end to the war and ridiculing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for reiterating the goal of “victory.”

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