The attack in LA, the targeting of the Nova exhibit in NYC and the ripping down of posters of hostages are all part of a coordinated effort and it is linked to Oct. 7. Oct. 7 was the main attack, but it was immediately followed by coordinated extremist activism in the West targeting Jews. The way they manifested this was clear, and it is coordinated and well-funded. For instance, the activists were told that posters of hostages are "propaganda" and that images of the Nova festival massacre are "genocide propaganda."

Whenever I hear this cliche of "Hamas is an idea"....I think about all the other "ideas" that have come and gone. Nazism was also an "idea" and so was the ideology of the KKK. Lots of groups represent an "idea"...but many of them come and go or are defeated. What makes Hamas powerful IS NOT ITS IDEAS...it is its support from abroad, primarily the fact its leaders live in western ally Doha and that it gets backing from Ankara, Moscow, Beijing and other places. It also seems to have been enabled to grow more powerful via smuggling from Egypt and cash from Doha, etc.

Hezbollah reduced its attacks on northern Israel when the US envoy was in Israel...didn't it...almost like Hezbollah is very very smart and knows exactly what it is doing and it heats up the conflict when it wants and reduces the heat when it wants...everything is almost scripted....almost. That's why...I don't believe there will be a war in the north. Because Hezbollah is very thoughtful and its friends in Iran are as well. Hezbollah needs to preserve its powder. It is, in a sense, too big to fail. Iran can't sacrifice this Hezbollah "real estate" in a war.

The Middle East's ethnic cleansing and extermination of Jewish minorities in the last 100 years is one of the most complete erasures of a people in history. It should be seen that way. Jews used to be a large group in many cities in the region...and they have been SYSTEMATICALLY expelled and ethnically cleansed by various regimes (some of those regimes supported by the West too)...and this is not widely studied in "Middle East studies" and other disciplines where in many western academies today any interest in Jewish history is now called "Zionism"...which is one of the ways the ethnic cleansing and genocide is completed.

You literally have western commentators who grift off being "anti-Zionist" now who make comments trying to portray all Jews as being from Europe rather than acknowledge the truth. It's worthwhile to view it as a regional ethnic cleansing targeting Jews (and other minorities) because the complete erasure of Jews was more thorough in the long term than what Nazism did. This isn't always fully understood...but cities and areas where Jews were once a large group, now are reduced to zero.

I never understood the theory that after Oct. 7, after 1,000 people were massacred and 250 kidnapped...that the goal should be to "reduce Hamas capabilities"...so it "can't carry out another Oct. 7." What kind of war is that? An Orwellian one. Reducing Hamas "capabilities" means you defeat a few Hamas "battalions" (an illusion of victory)...and then you leave Hamas in power...and it recruits more people and stockpiled more weapons.

I watched this video several times, after the first time with the sound off, because the kids in the right side of the frame are all trying to get the attention of the camera to tell their story; they deserve a better future without Hamas and the endless wars it brings to Gaza and the suffering it profits from It’s really unconscionable that the international community has not worked to prevent Hamas from ruling Gaza and destroying the lives and opportunities of these kids. The same country that hosted the Taliban and brought it back to Kabul, hosts Hamas a

It would be interesting to see a survey asking people: if you could go back to October 6 and prevent the October 7 Hamas attack and the war, would you?

I thinking everyone in Israel would want to go back and prevent this horrid war.

But if you surveyed people in the rest of the region and world, I wonder what we would find. Let’s say we surveyed US college students and asked them if they’d like to go back and prevent this war. Would the Hamas backers who profit immensely off this want or go back? They support the massacre at the Nova festival so I bet they wouldn’t.

If Hamas believes it benefits from the destruction of Gaza and civilian suffering and it believes it benefits from a long war. And Israel also believes that a long reconstruction in Gaza somehow is a benefit and that a long war in Gaza with endless raids to “manage” the conflict “like in the West Bank”…is in Israel’s interest…clearly both cannot be correct. If Israel is correct then Hamas might have trouble growing back to Oct. 6 levels. But if Hamas is correct the repercussions for Israel are more devastating. Israel has more to lose in this war and it has less chances to “get it wrong.”

The pro-Hamas extremist crowd in the US has moved from ripping down posters of hostages…to denying Hamas sexual assaults…to targeting the Nova festival victims. Their new talking point is that any memorial for the victims of the Nova festival is “genocide propaganda” and they compare the victims of the festival to Nazis and claim that protesting the victims is “antiZionism” We have to understand that the extremists in the US not only support Hamas crimes completely but they do so with the full knowledge of who the victims are. They see the videos of young people being massacred and they support it. This is a genocidal cult.

One tragic sign of Hamas success in this war is that it has upgraded its status such that its decisions now are weighed so much by the U.S. This in essence has legitimized it and upgraded its power since Oct. 7. Rather than Hamas being defeated and destroyed in 8 months, it is now holding court throughout the region. The goal of the war should have been to ISOLATE Hamas and weaken it. But its leaders in Doha, a western ally, and its backing by Ankara-Moscow-Beijing-Tehran has transformed Hamas. This has weakened the PA as well.

We are going to hear a lot about reconstruction in Gaza in the coming year. The same international orgs that ignored or partnered with Hamas are going to want to get a piece of the billions that will be sent. BOOKMARK this: Notice none of these organizations, such as the UN, or the countries that historically were influential in Gaza (Egypt, Qatar etc) are talking about how to prevent the reconstruction money from being spent on Hamas tunnels and terrorist infrastructure again

One thing you'll notice after the Israeli raid that rescued four hostages is how deep the divide is on this. Many people are happy with the rescue. Then there are the voices who describe it as a "release" of four hostages and focus primarily on the claims that many people were killed in the operation Most of those who condemn the operation put up talking points such as "200 killed to release 4". These commentators NEVER condemn the taking of hostages in the first place, and they NEVER condemn Hamas for unlawfully keeping hostages in civilian areas

Do you think there is some unwritten rule (or written one that isn’t public) that every NGO and reporter and organization that works in Gaza or reports about is told to NEVER differentiate between Hamas men killed and civilians, and just deceive every death as a civilian death In NO OTHER conflict is it like this. When we report about Ukraine or the Donbas, we don’t take all the casualties and just add them up as one nunber. If 50 soldiers are killed and 12 civilians we don’t see a report saying “62 killed in shelling”.

There are some people who oppose or condemn Israel’s rescue of four hostages. Their talking point today is that civilians were harmed in the raid. But check the history of their posts and you will never find them condemning Hamas You will never find them demanding Hamas ceasefire.
You will never find them demanding Hamas stop holding hostages in civilian areas

So you understand how the West has hedged and played both sides...the US and western countries never turned up the pressure on Hamas on Oct. 7 or after. Hamas continued to enjoy all its privileges, despite the massacre and kidnapping Hamas massacred and kidnapped citizens of numerous western countries....but they didn't even work to freeze its bank accounts...and they wanted its leaders living in luxury in Doha, a western ally.

We need to talk about this phrasing. There is a tendancy among the international organizations involved with Gaza to never mention Hamas. This isn't because of lack of knowledge. Hamas has ruled Gaza for 18 years. They know Hamas is everywhere. They know it goes into schools and hospitals and uses them. There is a kind of code of silence or omerta that was clearly agreed to many years ago. When Hamas illegally took over Gaza in 2007...the NGOs and UN organizations that work there could have made a point or critiquing Hamas and calling it out when it illegally tried to use civilian areas for its "militant" activities.

There should be a mandate that the UN has to stop letting its facilaties be used by Hamas. It should be a requirement that when Hamas men illegally enter UN areas where civilians are sheltering that the UN be mandated to report the presence of these men within 24 hours and that the UN also be required to evacuate civilians from the site. Instead what the UN does is it has an omerta or vow of silence that endangers the civilians and allows the site to be used as a human shield. It's unconscionable. Think about this...in any other context if you have a school in a country and male gunmen enter....the authorities would evacuate the school. In no other context would a school be used as a shelter and also male members of the mafia or cartels or terrorist groups would also be there.

Imagine if instead of these fake negotiations where Israel got played by Doha-Cairo-Hamas in talks designed to keep Israel from defeating Hamas and make the war slow and grinding...designed to isolate Israel and to constantly "play" Israel every month...trying to make the US lose patience and blame Israel...and get the ICJ and ICC to charge Israel...if Israel had decided to dictate the tempo and initiative and kept moving forward? I remember after the first deal Israel's Defense Minister said that military pressure would bring more deals...but the US began to pressure Israel to basically stop operations in March...so there was a kind of de facto ceasefire in March and April...the IDF withdrew from almost all of Gaza and Israel got played.

The IDF, learning from the tragedy of October 7, is setting up a new unit on the Gaza border.

"The Unit’s force will consist of reserve soldiers, veterans of elite units who live in the communities near the Gaza Strip or its surroundings and will be on standby for activation in the area. The soldiers of the unit will undergo dedicated training and will eventually be trained as skilled soldiers for the area’s challenges." "The ceremony for the establishment of the Gaza Envelope LOTAR (counter-terrorism) Unit in the Gaza Division took place this week (Monday), in the presence of the Commanding Officer of the Gaza Division, BG Avi Rosenfeld, the Commanding Officer of the Gaza Envelope LOTAR Unit, LTC. (res.) A., Security Officers, Civilian Security Coordinators of the communities and the soldiers of the division," the IDF said.

Commentators who want to sound insightful say things like “Hamas exists because of the occupation.” However, the fact is that Hamas always GREW IN POWER when Israel left areas under Oslo and Disengagement. There is no evidence that the “occupation” led to October 7. In the opposite, it was Hamas that illegally took over Gaza from the legitimate Palestinian authority and Hamas sought to use Gaza as an armed base to attack Israel to try to get Israel to RE-OCCUPY Gaza

Sometimes we hear about the Israel-Palestinian conflict that it could/should be modeled on the Northern Ireland Peace Process. That sounds good in principle but the same voices who say this don’t see the elephant in the room The reason the Israel-Palestinian conflict didn’t end in the 1990s is that Hamas emerged to sabotage it. Hamas has always emerged at key points in history to destroy any chance of peace. In the 1990s it was bus bombings and mass murder and murdering Palestinians who wanted peace also