Why Trump Must Insist on Removing Hamas From Power - Khaled Abu Toameh

 

by Khaled Abu Toameh

Any deal that allows Hamas to remain in power would be disastrous for Israel, the Palestinians, and Arab states threatened by the Iran-led "Axis of Resistance."

 

• One of the group's senior officials, Osama Hamdan... also threatened that Hamas would not allow any non-Palestinian party to enter the Gaza Strip.

• Iran's ruling mullahs have already lost their strategic ally with the collapse of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Losing the Gaza Strip would therefore be another severe blow to the Iranian regime, whose declared goal is to annihilate the "Zionist entity."

• Similarly, Hamas's longtime patrons and funders in Qatar will do their utmost to ensure that the terrorist group remains in power.

• Hamdan's statements are a clear indication that Hamas intends to maintain its control of the Gaza Strip at any cost. They are also a sign that Hamas is determined to continue its terror attacks against Israel.

• Any deal that allows Hamas to remain in power would be disastrous for Israel, the Palestinians, and Arab states threatened by the Iran-led "Axis of Resistance."

• It would also undermine the Trump administration's credibility in the eyes of many in the Middle East. The Trump administration will appear as if it is only good at making empty threats.

• There should be no reconstruction of the Gaza Strip as long as Iran's proxies remain in power. The idea of allowing the Palestinian Authority to return to the Gaza Strip as a civilian body that pays salaries and funds projects should be rejected by the Trump administration.

• Even if the PA is permitted to deploy its own security forces in the Gaza Strip, it does not mean that they would be able to disarm Hamas and other terrorist groups. The PA did not do so when it was in control of the Gaza Strip between 1994 and 2007, and the assumption that it would do so now is catastrophically wrong.

Any deal that allows Hamas to remain in power would be disastrous for Israel, the Palestinians, and Arab states threatened by the Iran-led "Axis of Resistance." It would also undermine the Trump administration's credibility in the eyes of many in the Middle East. Pictured: Terrorists in Gaza on February 15, 2025. (Photo by Moiz Salhi/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

The Iran-backed Palestinian terrorist group Hamas has reportedly expressed readiness to cede control of the Gaza Strip and hand it over to the Palestinian Authority (PA), headed by Mahmoud Abbas.

This assurance, however, does not mean that Hamas is willing to lay down its weapons or dismantle its military wing, Izz a-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

Hamas wants the PA to return to the Gaza Strip only to pay salaries and fund various projects, including the reconstruction of the devastation. That arrangement would still exempt Hamas of its duties and responsibilities towards the two million residents of the Gaza Strip and allow the terror group to rearm, regroup and rebuild its military capabilities.

Shortly after the report surfaced about Hamas's purported willingness to relinquish control of the Gaza Strip, one of the group's senior officials, Osama Hamdan, affirmed that his group has no intention of laying down its weapons or ending its rule over the coastal enclave. Hamas leaders, in addition, Hamdan stressed, will not leave the Gaza Strip.

"The issue of the weapons of the resistance and the leaders of the resistance is nonnegotiable," Hamdan told the Qatari-owned Al-Jazeera television network, a self-appointed mouthpiece for Hamas. He also threatened that Hamas would not allow any non-Palestinian party to enter the Gaza Strip. "Anyone who wants to replace Israel, we will deal with them as if they were Israel," Hamdan said. "Quite simply, anyone who wants to work on behalf of Israel [in the Gaza Strip] would have to bear the consequences of being an Israeli agent."

The Hamas official's threat is directed not only towards Abbas's PA, but also against Arab countries that might be considering involvement in the administration of the Gaza Strip after the war, which began on October 7, 2023 when the terrorist group invaded Israel, murdering 1,200 Israelis and wounding thousands of others. Another 251 Israelis were kidnapped and held hostage by Hamas terrorists as well as "ordinary" Palestinians.

No Arab country will agree to play any role in the administration of the Gaza Strip as long as Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups continue to maintain an armed presence there. The same applies to the PA, which was expelled from the Gaza Strip by Hamas in 2007. That year, Hamas staged a violent and brutal coup during which dozens of PA loyalists were killed.

Since the beginning of the US-brokered Israel-Hamas ceasefire-hostage deal in mid-January, the PA and the Arab states, as well as the rest of the world, have seen the reemergence of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) masked terrorists on the streets of the Gaza Strip. The presence of the terrorists throughout the Gaza Strip aims to send a message to the PA and the Arab states that Hamas and PIJ remain in control despite the heavy casualties they suffered during the war.

The terror groups say they will not allow any other security forces to take control of the Gaza Strip. If that were to happen, Iran would lose one of its significant strongholds in the Middle East.

Iran's ruling mullahs have already lost their strategic ally with the collapse of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Furthermore, as a result of Israel's military and security operations over the past 16 months, Iran's Hezbollah proxy in Lebanon has been severely weakened. Losing the Gaza Strip would therefore be another severe blow to the Iranian regime, whose declared goal is to annihilate the "Zionist entity."

Similarly, Hamas's longtime patrons and funders in Qatar will do their utmost to ensure that the terrorist group remains in power.

Hamdan's statements are a clear indication that Hamas intends to maintain its control of the Gaza Strip at any cost. They are also a sign that Hamas is determined to continue its terror attacks against Israel.

As Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, a former Gaza resident and Senior Fellow at Atlantic Council, noted:

"It's official - Hamas wants war and pre-emptively rebukes Egypt and Arab proposals for [the reconstruction of] Gaza.... [Hamdan] says that:

"1- Hamas won, and the idea of the resistance was victorious.

"2- Iran helped the resistance and will have a role in the future, whereas those who didn't help the resistance can't now expect to play a role (he's talking about the Arab countries).

"3- Hamas, which brought unprecedented achievements, cannot be told that it won't be part of the Palestinian national project.

"4- Anyone who wants to act in Israel's stead and in its place will be treated as such and will have to deal with the consequences of that (he's talking about any security arrangement that entails PA forces, Arab or international troops).

"5- Hamas won't discuss disarming, the departure of its leaders [from Gaza], or disappearing from the scene and won't leave or pay any prices for reconstruction.

"6- Hamas and team resistance have Iran, Turkey, and Africa (mainly referring to South Africa) as allies to provide support.

"7- Hamas will rebuild its capabilities in Gaza and will expand them further, with its most crucial strength being that it can slap (attack) Israel anytime it wants.

"This is a significant development and has immense implications for Gaza's people, the region, Trump's plan, and what's going to unfold in the near future."

Sami Abu Zuhri, another senior Hamas official, said this week that his group is going nowhere. He added that Israel's effort to remove Hamas from power has failed, and he threatened to launch more attacks against Israelis:

"We say to [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu: We are capable of teaching you one lesson after the other. Hamas will stay [in power]."

The Trump administration and the rest of the international community need to take Hamas's threats seriously. The Hamas leaders (most of whom live in a number of Arab and Islamic countries) are basically saying that they do not believe the Trump administration's talk about removing Hamas from power. Ignoring Hamas's threats means that there will be more October 7-style massacres of Israelis.

Any deal that allows Hamas to remain in power would be disastrous for Israel, the Palestinians, and Arab states threatened by the Iran-led "Axis of Resistance."

It would also undermine the Trump administration's credibility in the eyes of many in the Middle East. The Trump administration will appear as if it is only good at making empty threats.

There should be no reconstruction of the Gaza Strip as long as Iran's proxies remain in power. The idea of allowing the Palestinian Authority to return to the Gaza Strip as a civilian body that pays salaries and funds projects should be rejected by the Trump administration.

Even if the PA is permitted to deploy its own security forces in the Gaza Strip, it does not mean that they would be able to disarm Hamas and other terrorist groups. The PA did not do so when it was in control of the Gaza Strip between 1994 and 2007, and the assumption that it would do so now is catastrophically wrong.

• Follow Khaled Abu Toameh on X (formerly Twitter)
  

Khaled Abu Toameh is an award-winning journalist based in Jerusalem.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/21406/remove-hamas-from-power

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

The Moral Bankruptcy and Hypocrisy of the International Red Cross - Amb. Alan Baker

 

by Amb. Alan Baker

Moral and legal responsibility lies chiefly with the Swiss government under whose auspices the ICRC functions, together with the state’s parties to the Geneva Conventions who finance its very existence and are in the position to monitor, direct, and influence the ICRC’s functioning.

 

The International Committee of the Red Cross in Gaza. (ICRC/Flickr)

Institute for Contemporary Affairs

Founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation

Vol. 25, No. 4

• The 1986 foundational Statutes of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) proclaim that it is “a worldwide humanitarian movement, whose mission is to prevent and alleviate human suffering wherever it may be found, to protect life and health and ensure respect for the human being, in particular in times of armed conflict.”
• For an organization whose sole purpose and mission is to help victims of wars and human rights violations, it is patently obvious that the ICRC has totally failed in its mission, as reflected in its mishandling of Israel’s hostage crisis.
• The ICRC failed in its most basic responsibilities to the more than 250 kidnap victims from some 20 nations taken hostage as part of Hamas’s egregious invasion, mass murder, and rape. Moral and legal responsibility lies chiefly with the Swiss government under whose auspices the ICRC functions, together with the state’s parties to the Geneva Conventions who finance its very existence and are in the position to monitor, direct, and influence the ICRC’s functioning.
• Why have they not impressed upon those elements influencing Hamas – chiefly Qatar, Egypt, the UN, and other Arab elements – that Israeli victims of terror and kidnapping are entitled to humane treatment?
• How is it conceivable that the Swiss government and the ICRC have sat idly for more than 16 months while being openly manipulated and abused by the Hamas terror organization? Rather, they have passively accepted Hamas’s refusal to allow the transfer of medications, and medical and humanitarian visits, to the sick and wounded and all illegally-held hostages.
• Moreover, it challenges all semblance of logic and moral clarity that the ICRC can countenance images of armed, masked terrorists standing on ICRC vehicles displaying the Red Cross emblem and flag while such vehicles transport tortured, suffering, and ill Israeli hostages – and its representatives participating in “release ceremonies” with terrorist leaders.

The 1986 foundational Statutes of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and Red Crescent Movement proclaim that:

International Committee of the Red Cross and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies together constitute a worldwide humanitarian movement, whose mission is to prevent and alleviate human suffering wherever it may be found, to protect life and health and ensure respect for the human being, in particular in times of armed conflict and other emergencies.¹

On issues of impartiality and neutrality, the Statutes similarly proclaim:

Impartiality – It makes no discrimination as to nationality, race, religious beliefs, class or political opinions. It endeavours to relieve the suffering of individuals, being guided solely by their needs, and to give priority to the most urgent cases of distress.

Neutrality – In order to continue to enjoy the confidence of all, the Movement may not take sides in hostilities or engage at any time in controversies of a political, racial, religious or ideological nature.

Specifically, the Statutes require the ICRC:

To endeavor at all times – as a neutral institution whose humanitarian work is carried out particularly in time of international and other armed conflicts or internal strife – to ensure the protection of and assistance to military and civilian victims of such events and of their direct results.²

For an organization whose sole acknowledged purpose and mission is to help victims of wars and human rights violations, it is patently obvious that the ICRC has totally failed in its mission, as reflected in its mishandling of Israel’s hostage crisis.

The ICRC’s abject failure in its most basic responsibilities to the more than 250 kidnap victims from some 20 nations taken hostage as part of the Iran-backed Hamas terror group’s egregious one-day invasion, mass murder, and rape is tragic in and of itself. There are even worse ramifications: The ICRC’s reasoning for its malfeasance, how it could possibly have taken place, and more far-reaching, evident lack of capability, willingness, seriousness, or even perhaps willful and deliberate apathy, neglect, and laxity on the part of the ICRC staff.

This historic dereliction is not limited to the ICRC and its staff. Moral and legal responsibility lies chiefly with the Swiss government under whose auspices the ICRC functions, together with the state’s parties to the Geneva Conventions who finance its very existence and are in the position to monitor, direct, and influence the ICRC’s functioning.

One may indeed ask where has the Swiss government been, with its unique international stature, in the context of the Israeli hostage situation?

Why have they not leveraged their historically renowned international reputation and stature – perhaps Switzerland’s outstanding capability, and international reputation – to impress upon those elements influencing the Hamas terror organization, chiefly Qatar, Egypt, the UN, and other Arab elements, that Israeli victims of terror and kidnapping are entitled to humane treatment?

This is particularly evident in light of the remarks by Swiss Federation President Karin Keller-Sutter in her February 10, 2025, Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony address. There, Keller-Sutter emphasized the crucial remembrance and lessons of the Holocaust and its commensurate total civilizational breakdown, especially now that antisemitism is reemerging in Switzerland, in some cases openly. She noted: 

There can be no tolerance of Jews being intimidated, discriminated against or threatened. Our democratic values of tolerance, mutual respect and coexistence are not compatible with signs of hatred based on race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation.³

How is it conceivable that the Swiss government and the ICRC have sat idly for more than 16 months while being openly manipulated and abused by the Hamas terror organization? Rather, they have passively accepted Hamas’s refusal to allow the transfer of medications, and medical and humanitarian visits, to the sick and wounded and all illegally held hostages, and to allow humane and respectful treatment of the dead – all this without taking requisite and vital international action in light of their unique international status.

Given the celebrated constitutional impartiality and neutrality of the ICRC, it challenges all semblance of logic and moral clarity that the ICRC can countenance images of armed, masked terrorists sitting and standing on ICRC vehicles displaying the Red Cross emblem and flag while such vehicles transport tortured, suffering, and ill Israeli hostages.

By the same token, how can the ICRC permit its representatives, its status, dignity, and presence to be manipulated into participating in staged, contrived bogus “release ceremonies,” sitting with masked, armed terrorist leaders, signing bogus “release certificates” and exchanging handshakes?

Where is the dignity of the ICRC, the Red Cross Movement, the Cross Emblem, and the Red Cross Flag?

The enormity of this intolerable and inexcusable lacuna, of this utter failure by Switzerland and the ICRC, really cannot be explained in terms of inability or incapability. It begs the obvious question as to how this could happen.

This huge lack of any genuine, serious, and sincere action by Switzerland and the ICRC is not just glaring in its enormity but defies all logic.

Furthermore, and no less pointedly, it cannot but lead to the implication and assumption that such inaction has been and continues to be beyond mere negligence or unintended error. It raises the question as to whether it emanates from a sinister and ulterior motive, something that tragically in historical context appears to be all too familiar.

The Swiss and ICRC’s failures in ensuring the provision of humanitarian succor to the Israeli hostages are not just unforgettable. They are unforgivable.

The entire credibility of the ICRC as a humanitarian organization is in tatters. It cannot recover from this.

The reputation of Switzerland as the worldwide bastion of moral rectitude and dignity is completely undermined and ruined.

Switzerland can no longer claim any element of international moral high ground. It has lost the little stature that it might have had.

* * *

Notes

1 https://www.ifrc.org/sites/default/files/2021-07/statutes-en-a5.pdf

2 Ibid. – article 5(2)(d)

3 https://www.admin.ch/gov/en/start/documentation/media-releases.msg-id-104075.html

Amb. Alan Baker

Source: https://jcpa.org/article/the-moral-bankruptcy-and-hypocrisy-of-the-international-red-cross/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

NYT coverage of war creates 'imbalanced' sympathy for Palestinian side, study finds - Mathilda Heller

 

by Mathilda Heller

The study, published by Yale professor, Edieal Pinker, revealed that "Little mention is made of Israeli casualties post-October 7 or of Palestinian acts of violence post-October 7."

 

A photo illustration shows a cozy morning scene features the international edition of The New York Times alongside a cup of cappuccino with latte art and a notebook.

(photo credit: Matteo Della Torre/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

The New York Times's coverage of the Israel-Hamas war has generated "sympathy for the Palestinian people" while at the same time "diminishing Hamas’s responsibility for their situation and the continuation of the war," according to a recently published study by Yale professor, Edieal Pinker.

With the aim of assessing imbalances in coverage that may influence readers' views, Pinker carried out a quantitative analysis of 1,561 New York Times articles published between October 7, 2023 and June 7, 2024, that referenced both “Israel” and “Gaza.”

Pinker's analysis indicated a "dominant narrative" that revolved around the number of Palestinians killed as a result of Israel’s military response to the October 7 Hamas attack rather than the losses on the Israeli side.

"Little mention is made of Israeli casualties post-October 7 or of Palestinian acts of violence post-October 7," the study added, noting as well that "very few articles mention any Israeli suffering that is not directly related to the events of October 7."

The study revealed that, in the articles studied, the word “Israel” was mentioned three times more frequently than “Hamas.” 

Al-Qassam Brigades hand over Israeli hostages to the Red Cross, as part of the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis, February 15, 2025. (credit: ABED RAHIM KHATIB/FLASH90)

Of the 1,561 articles in the sample, there were only 105 (7%) in which the number of times the word “Hamas” appeared was greater than or equal to the number of times the word “Israel” appeared. 

In total, the word “Israel” appeared 27,205 times vs 8,499 for “Hamas” across all articles in the analysis.

Pinker's study dismisses the argument that the reason "Israel" appears more is because the Jewish State has "more independence than the Palestinians and thus will have more freedom of action."

If this were to be the case, he argued, there would be less of an imbalance in the ratio of mentions of Hezbollah and Iran. However, the data indicated the imbalance was the same.

Furthermore, while personal stories of Palestinian or Lebanese suffering are generally featured on two out of every three days, "it is common to go a week at a time without a single mention of IDF deaths even when such deaths were frequent."

Pinker argued that the "net result of these imbalances and others is to create a depiction of events that is imbalanced toward creating sympathy for the Palestinian side, places most of the agency in the hands of Israel, is often at odds with actual events, and fails to give readers an understanding of how Israelis are experiencing thewar."

It is worth noting, as Pinker does, that the Times coverage of the war has been criticized from both the pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli sides. However, Pinker claimed that "academic works purporting to show an anti-Israeli or pro-Palestine bias in the media are rarer."

'Making the news'

Pinker told the Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that he chose to focus on the NYT because of its status as the "gold standard for reporting." "NYT doesn't just report the news, it makes the news," he said.

According to the paper itself, it is the world's most subscribed to digital media organization. As such, the paper holds significant sway over both US and worldwide public opinion, and therefore has the capacity to influence views on topics such as the Israel-Hamas war.

While the world has changed and people acquire their information from diverse sources, Pinker said the NYT has somewhat weathered that.

In its mission statement, it claims "We seek the truth and help people understand the world."

But Pinker told the Post that he questioned if the readers were being helped to understand the world, or just a narrative sold to them.

From his own experience as a reader, he felt the NYT was not capturing what the war looked like, noticing it reported much more frequently on Palestinian deaths than Israeli ones, the latter of which he felt were rarely mentioned.

While he has predicted his quantitative analysis would show a bias, he was "shocked" by how few times the NYT mentioned deaths of Hamas fighters. Israeli deaths post-October 7 were also rarely given space on the page.

"You don't need to be a statistician to see there's something off there," he told the Post.

"For most readers, it seems a war is going on and the war only involves Palestinian civilians dying, and there is no actual combat, just Israeli planes bombing Gaza," he said. As far as the reader knows, no Hamas fighters are getting killed, and no Israeli soldiers are getting killed."

Media bias since start of war

Pinker referenced a January 4 interview the Times held with former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, where he said he found it "astounding that for all of the understandable criticism of the way Israel has conducted itself in Gaza, you hear virtually nothing from anyone since October 7 about Hamas."

Blinken questioned why there has not been a "greater sustained condemnation and pressure on Hamas to stop what it started and to end the suffering of people that it initiated."

Pinker's study is one of a few submitted since the war began months regarding international media outlets' coverage of the Israel-Hamas War, several of which corroborate Blinken's statements.

A now well-known September report into the BBC's coverage, led by British lawyer Trevor Asserson, found a “deeply worrying pattern of bias against Israel” and that Israel was associated with genocide 14 times more than Hamas.

This led to the Asserson study's conclusion that the BBC breached its editorial guidelines for news coverage more than 1,500 times since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas War.

The research also showed that BBC recognized Hamas as a terrorist organization just 409 out of 12,459 times, totaling 3.2%, over the four-month period.

On the other hand, an OSINT analysis carried out by American left-wing publication The Intercept in January 2024, which has also since been cited frequently, claimed that in the first six weeks of the war, the New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times, "showed a consistent bias against Palestinians."

The Intercept's analysis at the time claimed the words “Israeli” or “Israel” appear more than “Palestinian" and that mentions of deaths of Israelis outnumbered those of Palestinians.

Mathilda Heller

Source: https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-842801

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

PMO source: Changes to Israeli negotiating team led Hamas to bend - JNS Staff

 

by JNS Staff

"The new team changed the dynamic and led negotiations instead of concessions," said an official from the PMO following Netanyahu's change-up of the team leading ceasefire talks in Qatar.

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) director Ronen Bar, April 18, 2024. Credit: Koby Gideon/GPO.

A senior official in the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office involved in the talks with Hamas on Wednesday said the removal of Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) head Ronen Bar and Mossad chief David Barnea as the leaders of the negotiating team led to the recent breakthroughs.

The statement, which was widely cited by Hebrew media, came shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement that he had changed the makeup of the team leading the talks in Qatar and Egypt.

“The achievement of the agreement to release six of our living hostages in one fell swoop, alongside the return of four dead hostages tomorrow, is the result of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to change the composition of the negotiating team,” the source was cited as saying.

“The new team changed the dynamic and led negotiations instead of concessions,” the official added, hailing the recent achievements led by Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer.

“It also stopped the practice of regular and biased briefings against the prime minister and the political echelon, which only caused Hamas to entrench its position and add demands,” the statement concluded.

However, an anonymous security source told Hebrew outlets that “the one who determined the mandate throughout was the prime minister himself.”

“The summaries and outline agreed upon in phase one were approved by the prime minister, who approved and was involved in each of the stages of the process,” the official claimed in the response.

Another anonymous Israeli source who was said to have been involved in the talks claimed that “the initiative to advance the final release and free six hostages at once is a Hamas initiative, which Israel agreed to.”

The PMO issued an official response to the latter statement, saying that “the claim by ‘negotiators’ that Hamas is the one who advanced the release is a new peak of absurdity and echoing Hamas propaganda.

“The understandings were reached as a result of the prime minister’s firm stance and his directive to increase the IDF forces around and inside Gaza, and the ultimatum of U.S. President Trump,” it added.

The PMO statement reiterated that the Palestinian terrorist group has “announced its refusal to release our hostages and thereby violate the agreement—and only Israel’s resolute stance led Hamas to fold.”

Dermer will head the upcoming negotiations for the second phase of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement, replacing Barnea, who led the current round, Israel’s Channel 12 News channel reported on Tuesday.

The Hebrew outlet reported earlier this month that Barnea would still engage with Qatari and Egyptian mediators under Dermer’s guidance.

On Monday, Kan News reported that Bar had been removed from the team. His former deputy is reportedly replacing him in the talks. Sources told the public broadcaster that he could join phase-two talks, however.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar confirmed on Tuesday that Jerusalem had decided to start talks on Phase 2 of the deal, which would see the remaining living hostages, both civilians and soldiers, released.

As part of the talks, set to begin later this week, the Israeli government will demand the complete disarmament of Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist organizations in Gaza, the minister stressed.

As part of the first phase, which is set to end on March 1, Hamas will free six more living hostages on Saturday—double the number it was to have released under the terms of the ceasefire.

In exchange, the Israeli government has reportedly signaled its willingness to allow the entry of hundreds of mobile homes into the Strip.

In addition, the bodies of four hostages murdered in Hamas captivity will be handed over on Thursday, in line with the ceasefire deal, which stipulates that the remains are to be returned on the 33rd day of the truce.

“Pursuant to the agreement, four additional deceased hostages are due to be returned to Israel next week,” the PMO announced on Tuesday.

According to official estimates, 73 hostages remain in captivity in Gaza after 500-plus days, including 70 abducted during the Hamas-led cross-border terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023. This figure includes the remains of at least 35 hostages.

JNS Staff

Source: https://www.jns.org/source-in-netanyahus-office-security-chiefs-gave-concessions-to-hamas/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

DOGE's first report touts $55 billion in savings, less than one month in - Ben Whedon

 

by Ben Whedon

DOGE's website now features a comprehensive "wall of receipts" to substantiate its tally, as well as a list of the top ten agencies for contract savings.

 

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) released its first savings report on Tuesday, highlighting an estimate of $55 billion in savings due to its efforts.

"We are working to upload all of this data in a digestible and fully transparent manner with clear assumptions, consistent with applicable rules and regulations," DOGE stated.

The Elon Musk-led department has in recent weeks torn through the records of federal agencies to identify waste, fraud, error, and redundancies to save money. The tally also includes "fraud detection/deletion, contract/lease cancellations, contract/lease renegotiations, asset sales, grant cancellations, workforce reductions, programmatic changes, and regulatory savings."

DOGE's website now features a comprehensive "wall of receipts" to substantiate its tally, as well as a list of the top ten agencies for contract savings.

The department's leader has previously expressed hope of finding as much as $2 trillion in possible savings.

Ben Whedon

Source: https://justthenews.com/government/federal-agencies/doges-first-report-touts-55-billion-savings-less-one-month

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

President Trump’s policy toward Israel – underlying assumptions - Amb. (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

 

by Amb. (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

Trump views Israel as an essential ally in his attempt to end wars and terrorism, which requires the obliteration – not containment – of the epicenters of war and terrorism (e.g., Iran’s Ayatollahs, Hamas and Hezbollah).

 

1. President Trump is not an impartial leader. As expected, he is driven by US interests, determining that Israel’s capabilities and track record have been a unique force and dollar multiplier for the US, commercially and militarily, technologically and operationally.

2. President Trump views Islamic terrorism as a threat to Western democracies, including the US (“The Great American Satan”) – a mutual threat to both the US and Israel. He is aware of NATO’s vacillation (No Action Talk Only), and its unwillingness to flex any effective military and political muscle against Islamic terrorism. Also, all pro-US Arab regimes have the machetes of Iran’s Ayatollahs and the Muslim Brotherhood at their throats. Thus, Israel is the most potent, reliable and experienced ally in the US’ battle against Islamic terrorism. Trump views Israel as an essential ally in his attempt to end wars and terrorism, which requires the obliteration – not containment – of the epicenters of war and terrorism (e.g., Iran’s Ayatollahs, Hamas and Hezbollah).

3. President Trump aspires to minimize US military presence in the Middle East. However, he does not ignore the critical role played by the Middle East as the main epicenter of global anti-US Islamic terrorism and drug trafficking, and the site of 48% of global oil reserves. Also, the Middle East is a junction of critical trade routes between Asia and West Europe, stretching between the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Persian Gulf and between Europe, Asia and Africa. President Trump considers Israel as the only effective ally to fill in the vacuum created by a US military withdrawal, serving as a US strategic beachhead, while not requiring US military personnel, only US military hardware – the largest US aircraft carrier with no Americans on board.

4. President Trump (just like most Americans, most Capitol Hill legislators and his entire foreign policy and national security team) identifies Israel as part of the forces of Good in their battle against the forces of Evil, which underscores Islamic terrorism.

5. President Trump realizes that Islamic (and Palestinian) terrorism is driven by a fanatic anti-Western ideology, not by despair. He has concluded that terrorism must be defeated, not contained.

6. President Trump supports Israel’s obligation to defeat terrorism, not just Israel’s right to defend itself. He is aware that Israel’s victory over Islamic terrorism is also a US’ victory.

7. President Trump realizes that Israel’s capabilities have played a key role in the defense of all pro-US Arab regimes (e.g., Jordan), which are targeted by Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood and other forms of Islamic terrorism.

8. During his first Administration, President Trump evicted the establishment of the State Department from the center stage of policy-making, because Foggy Bottom has systematically failed in its Middle East policy. Thus, it was the defiance of the State Department’s Palestinian-centered worldview, which paved the road to four additional Israel-Arab peace treaties (the Abraham Accords).

9. Unlike the State Department’s worldview, President Trump does not consider Israel to be part of the problem, but a major part of the solution. He does not believe in soothing – but defeating – terrorism, and considers Gaza as a terror-state, where the population idolizes terrorism.

10. Contrary to the multilateral and cosmopolitan worldview of the of the State Department’s establishment, President Trump does not aspire to establish a policy-common-denominator with the traditionally anti-US and anti-Israel UN and UN-related international organizations. President Trump prefers independent US national security action in collaboration with effective allies, such as Israel, rather than mortgaging US policy to the UN and ineffective Western allies.  

11. President Trump is aware that Israel’s posture of deterrence has made it a unique ally, enhancing the US’ regional and global strategic posture. He appreciates Israel as a site of an innovation center for some 250 US high tech giants, which has contributed to the US global technological edge. Moreover, he knows that Israel has been the triple-A-store and cost-effective battle-tested laboratory of the US defense and aerospace industries, yielding a mega-billion-dollar bonanza to the US taxpayer through research and development savings, enhanced US competitiveness in the global market, increased US exports and expanded US employment.

Support Appreciated

Amb. (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

Source: https://theettingerreport.com/president-trumps-policy-toward-israel-underlying-assumptions/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

Is the DOE DOA? - Larry Sand

 

by Larry Sand

The U.S. Department of Education is on the ropes, and it should be ended, not mended.

 

 

While the federal government has spent money on education and developed education policies since the 19th century, the U.S. Department of Education didn’t become a stand-alone agency until 1980 when, courtesy of President Jimmy Carter, it split off from the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare.

Carter advocated for creating the department to fulfill a campaign promise to the National Education Association. Congress passed the Department of Education Organization Act in 1979. In response, the NEA subsequently issued its first-ever endorsement in a presidential contest.

Just what is the function of the DOE?

As former U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos explains, it doesn’t run a single school, employ any teachers in a single classroom, or set academic standards or curriculum. “It isn’t even the primary funder of education—quite the opposite. In most states, the federal government represents less than 10% of K–12 public education funding.”

DeVos adds that it does shuffle money around, adds unnecessary requirements and political agendas via its grants, and then passes the buck when it comes time to assess if any of that adds value. “In other words, the Department of Education is functionally a middleman. And, like most middlemen, it doesn’t add value. It merely adds cost and complexity.”

In 2024, the DOE employed over 4,000 people whose salaries and benefits came to $2.7 billion, and the department’s total budget for the year was $79 billion.

One of the purported reasons the DOE was brought into existence was to lower achievement gaps. But after spending over $1 trillion since its inception, it has done no such thing. The results from the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) reading and math test, given to 4th and 8th graders, were announced in January and showed that 4th graders continued to lose ground, with reading scores slightly lower, on average, than in 2022 and much lower than in 2019.

Teacher union leaders are in a massive snit over the possibility of the DOE’s dissolution. Reacting to Donald Trump’s attempt to get rid of it, National Education Association President Becky Pringle released a statement on Feb 3, in which she maintains that his “latest extreme action will hurt our students and public schools.”

American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten said on CNN on Feb. 4, “The move is not legal. There are lots of things about the Department of Education that are in statute,” she claimed, referring to funds that go out from the department to low-income families, students with disabilities, English as a Second Language learners, and to work-study programs.

Weingarten continued, “You’re talking about millions of kids. And what that department really does is it actually makes sure that the money goes out and it’s not stolen. It is actually used for the intended purposes. Those are the most important functions of the Department of Education.”

Yet in November, the same union boss acknowledged, “My members don’t really care about whether they have a bureaucracy at the Department of Education or not.”

It’s worth noting that teacher union godfather Albert Shanker was opposed to the DOE’s creation, saying, “We thought it should stay within HEW (Department of Health, Education, and Welfare) because of the whole child.”

Also, many hail the NAEP as a vital program run by the DOE, and indeed, the test is an essential tool. However, what DOE proponents don’t acknowledge is that NAEP has existed since 1969, over a decade before the DOE came into being. The early tests were held under the auspices of the Research Triangle Institute, an independent nonprofit research institute.

In any event, the shake-up is in motion. The Trump administration’s DOE is canceling more than $100 million in grants to fund diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) training as part of the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) commitment to end wasteful spending.

Most recently, DOGE also announced the termination of 89 DOE contracts totaling $881 million.

Interestingly, instead of ditching the department in its entirety, many conservatives want to dismantle it by assigning its responsibilities to other departments. For example, Christopher Rufo, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, suggests that the DOE could spin off all college student loans and grants to an independent financial entity.

1. Ronald Kimberling, Research Fellow at the Independent Institute, suggests transferring the Federal Student Aid (FSA) office from the DOE to the Treasury and merging the Pell Grant program and the $910 million Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant program into the American Opportunity Credit tax benefit administered by the IRS.

On Feb.8, the National Association of Scholars issued a new report, “Waste Land—The Education Department’s Profligacy, Mediocrity, and Radicalism,” which proposes reforming the DOE in the short term, splitting off some functions to other federal agencies and setting the stage for its eventual abolition.

While shifting DOE mandates to other government entities may yield a few benefits, I believe the DOE and all its myriad functions should be eliminated. Big government education bureaucracies don’t do much for children or taxpayers. Our country needs more subsidiarity, a principle that stipulates matters should be handled by the smallest and least centralized competent authority. As such, we should not simply merge the DOE with other departments, but rather eradicate it and all its unconstitutional programs.

One scholar who agrees with this approach is Neal McCluskey, director of Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom, who asserts, “Congress should phase out federal funding for K-12 education and end all related regulations. Policymakers need to recognize that federal aid is ultimately funded by the taxpayers who live in the 50 states and thus provides no ‘free lunch.’ Indeed, the states just get money back with strings attached while losing billions of dollars from wasteful bureaucracy. There is no compelling policy reason nor constitutional authority for the federal government to be involved in K-12 education. In the long run, America’s schools would be better off without it.”

That said, eliminating the useless and costly department won’t be easy; it needs Congressional approval. As Rick Hess, director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, wrote in November, “Even with a narrow House majority, they’d get no Democratic votes, and insiders laugh at the idea they could even keep enough Republicans on board. (It’s safe to say they’d lose at least Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins.) Unless Republicans nuke the filibuster, they’d need 60 votes in the Senate, where they’ll have 53 seats. Plus, there’s a contingent of Trump-aligned education conservatives who’d much rather use the department to promote their vision the same way the Obama or Biden teams did. There may be efforts to trim or move parts of the department, but anything more seems unlikely.”

Unlikely, perhaps, but that needs to be the goal. Write to your elected officials ASAP—especially if you live in a purple state—and urge them to eliminate this useless, taxpayer-funded

boondoggle, and return education policy decisions and financing back to the states where they belong.

***

Larry Sand, a retired 28-year classroom teacher, is the president of the non-profit California Teachers Empowerment Network – a non-partisan, non-political group dedicated to providing teachers and the general public with reliable and balanced information about professional affiliations and positions on educational issues. The views presented here are strictly his own.

Source: https://amgreatness.com/2025/02/19/is-the-doe-doa/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

Redefining Environmentalism - Edward Ring

 

by Edward Ring

Environmentalists push for denser urban areas and restricted land use, overlooking practical solutions like deregulated fire management and expanded development to address climate risks.

 

 

“I think what we can learn here is that we are guests in this landscape.”
– Marissa Christiansen, Executive Director of the Climate and Wildfire Institute, Los Angeles

If you’re looking for one sentence that encapsulates the mentality and premise that underlines mainstream environmentalism in America today, these words from Marissa Christiansen, quoted in the closing paragraphs of a recent article “The Lost City” in New York Magazine, are a top candidate.

To be fair, nothing on Christiansen’s Climate and Wildfire Institute website is overtly calling for every wildland environment to be depopulated, or for “climate refugees” to then be relocated into mid-rise apartments where street parking has given way to bike lanes, or for every human being to have their “carbon footprint” remotely monitored in order to ration their consumption of water and energy. Much of this organization’s work appears to be focused on how to reduce the severity of wildfires by making greater use of prescribed burns.

But Christiansen stayed firmly within conventional environmentalist orthodoxy in the rest of what she told New York Magazine, saying that “the city has an unprecedented opportunity to rebuild in a more resilient manner with denser urban housing and wide firebreaks abutting the mountains.”

Denser urban housing. Wide firebreaks abutting the mountains. God help us if environmentalist bureaucrats are allowed to implement that vision. California is only 5 percent urbanized, and that is where 94 percent of the state’s population lives. California has the most densely populated urban areas of any state in America. So let’s make it even denser. The skeptics call that “stack and pack.” The environmentalists call it “smart cities.”

Redefining environmentalism must begin by changing the premises. We are not “guests” on any landscape. If you accept the premise that we are only “guests,” where do you draw the line? According to its annual report, Christiansen’s organization “received $7 million in startup funding from the state of California in 2022.” When it comes to land use, it is therefore unlikely their ultimate policy recommendations will deviate significantly from the priorities set by the state legislature. This means that an average population density for California’s urban areas of nearly 5,000 people per square mile is not enough. We need to bring everyone off those flammable hillsides and turn the state’s scattered forest communities into ghost towns. The “guests” have worn out their welcome.

Meanwhile, California’s state government has enacted regulations and enabled litigation against new housing that rewards special interests while costing taxpayers literally hundreds of billions of dollars. These policies have made housing unaffordable, leaving subsidized developers to inadequately fulfill a mission that the private sector used to do abundantly and affordably. So by all means, let’s pack the cities even more so that politically connected developers, generous with their contributions to politicians and donations to aligned NGOs, can collect additional billions in subsidies.

The logic of considering humans “guests in this landscape” invites a rather urgent question: What landscape qualifies for this designation? Landscape at risk of fire? Then why not log, graze, burn, and thin the vegetation, the way natural fires did for millennia? Shoreline at risk of storm surges? Then invest in resilient architecture and adapt. But that would be too easy. Bring on the regulations and the litigation. Permanent evacuation becomes the only option.

If humans are only “guests” on the sacred earth, why stop at canyons and coastlines? What business does the City of Los Angeles have to even exist? It used to be an arcadian paradise, a wildlife haven, routinely flooding when atmospheric rivers collided with the San Gabriel Mountains and sent cascades of runoff pouring across a verdant alluvial plain. Why not restore this natural wonderland? Depopulate Los Angeles! Evict the unwanted guests, all ten million of them!

This is preposterous hyperbole, but only slightly less preposterous is the notion that California should absorb its entire population into the footprint of existing cities, in the case of Los Angeles, surrounded by “wide firebreaks.” Urban containment, which is clearly a priority for California’s state legislature, is an extremist, special interest-driven set of policies, continuously being strengthened, that have lowered the standard of living and diminished the quality of life for every Californian that doesn’t happen to be wealthy enough to be indifferent to the consequences.

There is an alternative that might be considered common sense if, for decades, voters hadn’t been conditioned to believe that the climate is in “crisis” and that every scrap of wilderness in the entire state is in imminent threat of destruction from urban “sprawl.” Rejecting both of these premises is where sanity is restored to policy.

To begin with, if the climate is in “crisis,” then allowing logging, grazing, burning, and thinning should be a more urgent priority and not instead nearly impossible propositions thanks to layers of bureaucracy, regulations, litigation, and inflated costs that are all the result of misguided political choices and special interest corruption that feeds on obstruction and scarcity. Deregulate all four of these practices and allow the private sector to get busy. Most of these efforts would create jobs and generate tax revenue.

Prevailing environmentalist mentalities, however, prevent the deregulation that might allow this, and they are encouraged by the bureaucrats and billionaires who amass power and profit, respectively, from anything that obstructs decentralized acquisition and enterprise. Environmentalist policies centralize political power and private wealth, which is one of many compelling reasons it must be completely redefined. Which brings us to sprawl.

Current official state policy is to designate 30 percent of the state’s land area off-limits to development. Notwithstanding the fact that publicly managed land is far worse off ecologically in California than privately managed land—compare our national forests to the private timberland in the state for proof of this—why not at the least offer some reciprocity against this law? Why not remove all constraints to private development of urban adjacent areas so that the urban footprint of California is permitted to double? Why is this so unthinkable?

If this were done, the numbers do not point to an environmentally apocalyptic outcome. If California is only 5 percent urbanized, doubling would only incorporate another 5 percent of this vast state. And even developing much less would still offer a transformative improvement to our quality of life. For example, you could move ten million people onto quarter-acre lots, four people per home, allowing equal area for roads, parks, schools, retail and commercial centers, etc., and that would consume 2,000 square miles. This supposedly abominable new sprawl would only increase California’s urban footprint by 1.2 percent, from 5.0 to 6.2 percent. That’s how much room we’ve got.

Environmentalists claim we are “guests” on this land. No. We are not “guests.” And putting every single subspecies of plant and animal onto a list of threatened species to block logging, grazing, burning, and thinning, along with all suburban and exurban development, is a special interest-driven scam.

The Santa Monica Mountains, along with the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, and, for that matter, every bit of the more than 30 million acres of forest where we have now suppressed fires for over a century, are no longer historically natural environments. It is impossible to restore most of it to what it once was, nor, if you absolve yourself of the nihilistic idea that we are only “guests” on this landscape, is it even desirable to try.

What is needed in Los Angeles County is more development into the ridges and canyons surrounding the existing city, not less. This brings us to another piety of environmentalists that must be overcome, the goal of so-called “equity.” The new homes that can and should arise as Angelenos expand their urban footprint further into the Santa Monica Mountains will need to be hardened against fire, with swimming pools hooked to curbside hydrants and fire retardant stockpiled in every neighborhood, among other things. And the residents will be not only permitted but encouraged to engage in mechanical thinning and grazing on the open land around their neighborhoods.

All of this will cost money, meaning people of modest means will not be able to afford to live in these areas. But “equity” in the form of mandated “affordable housing” is not a preferable remedy. Regulations to harden homes in fire-prone canyons—while deregulating homebuilding elsewhere—are not incompatible concepts. But they do mean communities end up stratified by income. That ought to be a natural outcome in a healthy meritocratic society, but environmentalists fiercely deny its utility in providing incentives for everyone to achieve their dreams.

What well-intentioned environmentalists ought to consider is the possibility that they are behaving as useful idiots not for communists but for monopolistic capitalists and self-serving bureaucracies. We are not guests on this earth. We are of the earth and have every right to occupy it. There is a healthy version of environmentalism that recognizes this and strikes a reasonable balance between the aspirations of humans and the preservation of ecosystems.

The disaster in Los Angeles is indeed a clarifying moment. The leaders running California today can allow a deregulated private sector to create millions of good jobs delivering abundant energy, water, lumber, and housing—including rebuilding the lost homes in Los Angeles—at a price normal people can afford, or we can ration our water and energy and land, expecting the government to subsidize millions of households that can no longer afford the essentials. We can manage our environment and expand our suburbs, redefining what constitutes a reasonable environmental impact, or we can retreat into high-density urban cores and pretend the entire earth should be turned back over to nature.

Edward Ring

Source: https://amgreatness.com/2025/02/19/redefining-environmentalism/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

'Identification may not be feasible,' says forensic chief ahead of slain hostages' return - Dr. Itay Gal

 

by Dr. Itay Gal

The identification process will be led by Dr. Chen Kugel, director of the forensic institute and a globally recognized forensic expert.

 

View of the entrance to the L. Greenberg Institute of Forensic Medicine at Abu Kabir. October 17, 2024.

(photo credit: ERIK MARMOR/FLASH90)

The identification of the slain hostages who have been held in captivity for a long time may not be feasible, Dr. Chen Kugel, director of the L. Greenberg Institute of Forensic Medicine at Abu Kabir, said on Wednesday.

His comments came ahead of the expected return of four bodies as part of the hostage-ceasefire deal with Hamas, which the terror group has held for over 500 days since the October 7 Hamas attacks in 2023.

The Institute of Forensic Medicine will receive the remains directly from the border, where they will be examined to achieve identification before being released for burial.

Kugel will lead the identification process together with a globally recognized forensic expert and a team of specialists, including pathologists, DNA analysts, anthropologists, radiologists, and forensic technicians.

“Identification is conducted using multiple scientific methods, all of which involve comparing data from the slain with records from when they were alive,” Kugel explained.

View of a sign at the entrance to Abu Kabir Institute of Forensic Medicine (credit: AVSHALOM SASSONI/ MAARIV)

“We can use X-rays, weight data comparisons, dental records, and DNA analysis. We will do everything possible, but for the slain hostages that have been held for an extended period, identification is not always feasible,” he added.

The process will begin with a CT scan to create a detailed internal image. Radiology specialists will analyze the scans and compare them with previous medical records.

An autopsy will follow, with DNA samples sent for laboratory testing. Forensic dentists will assess dental features and compare them to existing records, if available.

The full identification process is expected to take up to two days, and once confirmed, families will be notified, and depending on their wishes, the public may also receive updates.

“Tomorrow’s upcoming phase is complex and sensitive, and we will make every effort to ensure that the slain hostages are brought to burial as quickly as possible,” said Dr. Hagar Mizrahi, head of the Medical Directorate at the Health Ministry.

Mediating the event for children

Dr. Gilad Bodenheimer, head of the Mental Health Division at the Health Ministry, urged parents to limit children’s exposure to possible distressing television footage.

“We recommend that children do not watch the complex visuals from the event managed by Hamas,” he said.

“It is important to mediate the event for children and steer them away from fear. We should acknowledge our sadness while reinforcing their sense of security.”

Bodenheimer added, “We also urge people to avoid spreading rumors and to rely only on information from official sources.”

Dr. Itay Gal

Source: https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-842810

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter

Fiji deputy PM: Jerusalem embassy will ‘most definitely’ be inaugurated this year - Etgar Lefkovits

 

by Etgar Lefkovits

“We are absolutely excited about coming to Jerusalem and we most definitely will be there this year,” Fiji's Deputy Prime Minister Viliame Gavoka told JNS.

 

An anemone field with the Temple Mount and Jerusalem's Old City in the background as it seen from Emek Tzurim National Park on Feb. 17, 2024. Credit: Yossi Zamir/Flash90.

The South Pacific island nation of Fiji has approved plans to inaugurate an embassy in Jerusalem later this year, the country’s deputy prime minister said on Wednesday.

“We are absolutely excited about coming to Jerusalem and we most definitely will be there this year,” Deputy Prime Minister Viliame Gavoka told JNS in a telephone interview.

He said that the initiative—which was originally planned for last year but got delayed by the war against Hamas in Gaza—was approved by the country’s Cabinet on Tuesday.

Fiji’s Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka confirmed the plans during a meeting last week with Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.

“I commend the Republic of Fiji’s government for its historic decision to open an embassy in Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Jewish people,” tweeted Sa’ar.

Related Articles

Swastika drawn on Australian Holocaust survivors’ ex-addressFeb. 17, 2025

UN official employs word salads in defending anti-Jewish, anti-Israel vitriolFeb. 17, 2025

‘BBC’ accused of spreading propaganda after airing Gaza film featuring Hamas official’s sonFeb. 19, 2025

Six countries currently have their embassies in Israel’s capital—the United States, Guatemala, Honduras, Kosovo, Paraguay and Papua New Guinea.

All other countries that maintain ties with Israel have their embassies in Tel Aviv or its suburbs.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem in 2018 set the stage for other countries to follow suit, with additional nations expected to make similar announcements in the near future.

Etgar Lefkovits

Source: https://www.jns.org/fiji-deputy-pm-jerusalem-embassy-will-most-definitely-be-inaugurated-this-year/

Follow Middle East and Terrorism on Twitter