I wrote about the viral TikTok conspiracy that Jews are trying to ban the platform—pushed by influencers with millions of followers with an assist from Candace Owens—and why such conspiracies misunderstand how political power works and undermine democracy. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… For decades, America has worked assiduously to prevent China from controlling technological infrastructure. Washington led an international campaign to ban Chinese telecom giant Huawei from Western markets. It forced Grindr's Chinese owners to sell it. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

I wrote about the one thing most likely to force new elections in Israel and threaten Netanyahu's reign. It's not anything Biden or Schumer might say or do, but something far more fundamental to Israeli politics at this moment: theatlantic.com/international/… Since its founding, Israel has had mandatory Jewish conscription into its army, with one notable exception: ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students do not serve. This started as 400 men. It's now 66,000. After October 7, Israeli society is no longer OK with this:
theatlantic.com/international/…

The idea that another Israeli government would have the same policies as Netanyahu is one of those fashionable takes that falls apart upon analysis. Polls show that if elections were held today, there'd be a new coalition without Netanyahu *or* the far-right parties. That's huge. A government without the anti-Arab settler right, without Bibi constantly publicly fighting with the American administration, and without the toxic far-right adjacent members of Likud would govern very differently, including in post-war Gaza.

A lot of people are unfamiliar with recent Gaza developments and so do not know that Israel accepted the Paris framework for a truce/hostage deal but Hamas has not. As a result, they completely misunderstand what Harris is saying, which is that Hamas should say yes to the deal.

https://twitter.com/yashar/status/1764403493262299269

What Harris actually said: "There must be an immediate ceasefire for at least the next six weeks, which is what is currently on the table… Hamas claims it wants a ceasefire. Well, there is a deal on the table. And as we have said, Hamas needs to agree to that deal." Quite clear!

This is a big deal. Biden just created financial risk for any institution doing business with violent West Bank extremists, and that's going to create a significant deterrent effect beyond just individual extremists who get sanctioned.

https://twitter.com/braunold/status/1753120554444329022

If you read it closely, this executive order from Biden is by far the most expansive anti-settler extremism act taken by an American president, and I don't think it's close: whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/…

Intense Biden pressure on this gets results: Netanyahu forced publicly reject Gazan displacement and Israeli reoccupation, against the far-right parties in his own coalition. This will undermine that coalition, which as I've written, is Biden's point: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

https://twitter.com/IsraeliPM/status/1745186120109846710

Obviously, Netanyahu regularly reverses course for political convenience, and one statement in English should not be taken as conclusive. The Biden administration knows this from long experience -- I'd expect the pressure on Bibi here to continue.

I normally wouldn't share stuff like this, but people should understand that the blue check here means this person is not only sharing rabid antisemitism, but monetizing it. The boosted bluecheck replies are filled with anti-Jewish invective that would fit right into Der Stürmer.

https://twitter.com/Resist_05/status/1744842724988334465

Ignoring the way medieval antisemitism has been weaponized and monetized on this platform by a large array of ideologically diverse extremist accounts won't make the problem go away. We are long past dismissing this material or hoping it resolves itself.

https://twitter.com/kneidelpig/status/1744871099672703387

My latest: Powerful and influential people have a playbook for getting away with antisemitism. I wrote about their favorite tricks for obfuscating their hate and how not to fall for them. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
1. Become too big to fail. Kanye’s mistake was that he invested his talents in producing music and sneakers rather than something more indispensable to human flourishing, like precision-guided ballistic missiles. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

This is ugly—and it isn't isolated. A London community canceled a Hanukkah lighting in front of the local town hall, claiming it risked "inflaming tensions." They reversed after people pointed out that Jews existing as Jews isn't what causes tensions—people hating Jews does that.

https://twitter.com/amyspitalnick/status/1731378015324471715

I get the appeal of cosplay and reenactment, but non-Jews trying to cancel Hanukkah is a bit on the nose.

https://twitter.com/amyspitalnick/status/1731378015324471715

Secretary of State Blinken correctly says that the Gaza truce did not collapse. Hamas broke it in multiple ways, including firing rockets into Israel and refusing to provide a list of eligible hostages to release next. The first rocket is on video, it's not a "he said, she said." Before the ceasefire was set to expire, "an NBC News team in the southern city of Sderot witnessed rockets being intercepted": nbcnews.com/news/world/isr…

This is not "support for Palestine." The word "Palestine" does not appear in this statement. It's also not what the linked article says. A reminder that if you are getting your news from viral tweets, you are not actually being informed.



A journalist's tip from the trenches: In general, if a person claims they were fired or otherwise penalized for being pro-Israel or pro-Palestine, you should ask what exactly they actually said. You will be surprised at how often the story is not really about Palestine or Israel.

The best defense here is that @msf could not tell the truth about Hamas operating in Shifa hospital, for fear of Hamas reprisals against their staff. But media outlets should note that problem going forward when citing groups like these. They simply aren't able to speak freely.

https://twitter.com/speechboy71/status/1726448879690998070

There is indeed many years of independent confirmation that Hamas operated out of hospitals, particularly Shifa, and intimidated people out of discussing it. It's the definition of an open secret: 🧵

https://twitter.com/philoshua/status/1727021767494115766

This is literally the conspiracy theory espoused by the white supremacist who massacred the Pittsburgh Tree of Life synagogue. Musk approves.

I have no further commentary.

If you want to see a lot of white nationalists whose Christmas just came early, see the replies here:

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1724908287471272299

Today, we will see one of the biggest rallies of Jews in Washington in a decade. You can measure an outlet's seriousness by whether it split-screens this overwhelming expression of diverse pro-Israel Jewish opinion with dissenting Jewish voices, as though they're equal factions. A big challenge for reporting on minority communities has always been accurately assessing who speaks for the majority of the community, while also giving voice to dissenters. Getting the balance right is tough! But sometimes, as here, the breakdown is obvious.

I wrote about when anti-Zionism becomes anti-Semitism, why anti-Israel movements are often coopted by anti-Jewish actors, and how an array of apologists have used anti-Zionism as a cover to justify bigotry and violence towards Jews: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… There's been much debate over whether certain anti-Zionist activists or slogans are antisemitic. I'm far more concerned about the 3 different anti-Zionist militias in the Middle East that are committed to murdering Jews and are shooting at them right now: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Remarkably disingenuous thread that blames Israel/Zionism for killing Yiddish instead of the people who killed most Jewish Yiddish speakers: the Nazis. This site always finds a way to sink to new lows for partisan ends.

https://twitter.com/dhampirbf/status/1719567616799391944

The good news is that from America to Israel, Yiddish is still alive and well. Just one recent example: tabletmag.com/sections/arts-…

Netanyahu gave an unhinged racist backbencher from his party a fake ministry called "public diplomacy" with no budget. She quit when the war started because she'd been disempowered. Now some on here are sharing her bigoted rantings as though she represents Israel's government. This is obviously an indictment of Netanyahu, whose practice of paying off extremist incompetents I've written about for years. But it's also an indictment of ideologues on this site who are presenting this person as holding a job she lost and wielding power she does not possess.

I wrote about how Benjamin Netanyahu failed Israel, by his own admission: theatlantic.com/international/…
"Americans could not imagine a coordinated mass-casualty attack on civilians; Israelis imagined it every day. Netanyahu told them that as long as he was in charge, they would not have to worry. It was a lie." theatlantic.com/international/…

My latest: Nobody expected Hamas's slaughter—not Israel, not its critics, not the experts. But they should have. Hamas has been telegraphing its intentions for years, we just weren't paying attention. I put all the evidence in one place. Please read it: theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… "What Hamas did two weekends ago was not a departure from its past, but the natural culmination of its commitments. The question is not why Hamas did what it did, but why so many people were surprised." theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

I cover antisemitism. Whenever I wrote about it on the left, particularly if it touched on Israel, I'd get pushback from some progressives, who noted it paled next to white supremacy. The celebration of Jewish death we are seeing in some left spaces now shows how myopic that was. As is now evident, certain parts of the left have bought into a permission structure in which it's permissible and even laudatory to abuse, murder, and kidnap large numbers of the "right" kind of Jews. What stops this from spreading and gaining political power is public scrutiny.

1. I want to briefly explain my process for filtering the morass of information and misinformation on here about what's happening in Israel and Gaza, in case it is helpful to the rest of you trying to sort through what's true and what isn't. 2. As someone who has reported on this region for over a decade, I know that there are many partisan actors in the media space. That doesn't mean they aren't reporting true things. But it does mean one should take their biases into account when weighing their claims.