The price of friendship with Biden’s Washington - Caroline Glick

 

​ by Caroline Glick

Hat tip: Dr. Carolyn Tal 

Leaders whose most important goal is maintaining friendly ties with Biden will be less willing to approve operations that can anger it.

 

(JNS) In a week of unprecedented political upheaval, it’s hard to pay attention to anything other than what is before our face. As Naftali Bennett and Ayelet Shaked’s voters watch in shock as they betray every single thing that they claimed to stand for and form a government that gives unprecedented powers not only to post-Zionist parties but to the anti-Zionist Islamist party, it is hard to think about larger issues—like how Israel’s posture on Iran is about to change and what it means for the country.

But on Tuesday, in the midst of everything, the key strategic difference between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and members of the camp defined by hatred of him came into full view.

In his speech at the ceremony marking the changing of the guard at the Mossad, as director Yossi Cohen transferred the baton of leadership to David Barnea, Netanyahu referred to Iran’s nuclear program as an “existential threat.” He then stated frankly, “If we must choose, and I hope this won’t happen, between our great friend the U.S. and eliminating an existential threat—eliminating an existential threat takes precedence.”

Shortly thereafter, Defense Minister Benny Gantz (long a core member of the Netanyahu-haters’ camp) rejected Netanyahu’s assertion. “The U.S. was and will remain Israel’s most important ally in preserving its security and its security superiority in the region,” said Gantz.

He went on: “The Biden administration is a true friend of Israel. Israel does not have and will not have a better partner than the U.S. Even if there are disputes, they will be solved in a direct dialogue, behind closed doors, and not with defiant statements that are liable to harm Israel’s security.”

In other words, Gantz accused Netanyahu of endangering Israel’s national security by speaking openly of the dispute with the Biden administration regarding Iran’s nuclear program.

The disparity between the two men’s views on U.S. nuclear diplomacy with Iran isn’t new. Gantz served as IDF chief of general staff while the Obama administration was negotiating what became the 2015 nuclear deal, otherwise known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA. That is the same deal that the Biden administration is now seeking to resuscitate.

Throughout his service, Gantz refused to back Netanyahu when the premier attacked the JCPOA for giving Iran the right to build a nuclear arsenal.

When Gantz completed his military service in the summer of 2015, the battle in the United States over Senate approval of the deal was at its height. As tens of thousands of American Jews took to the streets to protest the deal, Gantz flew to Washington to support it. In a speech at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Gantz said of the deal: “I see the half-full part of the glass here. Keeping away the Iranians [from a nuclear arsenal] for 10 to 15 years is a good thing.”

He also hinted that Netanyahu was “hysterical” in his response to JCPOA, saying, “I refuse to get hysterical.”

It’s important to note that the nuclear deal did not postpone Iran’s acquisition of military nuclear capability for 10-15 years. It placed limitations on Iran’s nuclear operations, but made them largely unenforceable by empowering Iran to decide which nuclear installations would be open to U.N. inspectors and which they would be barred from entering. And even with their limited access, U.N. inspectors acknowledged that Iran was not abiding by the limitations the deal placed on its nuclear activities.

Moreover, even if Iran had abided by the deal, the agreement gave the U.N. Security Council’s stamp of approval to Iran becoming a nuclear power in 2030. Then-president Barack Obama himself acknowledged that at the end of the deal’s lifespan, the time Iran would require to develop a nuclear arsenal would have dropped to “essentially zero.”

Gantz’s address in Washington poured cold water on efforts to build opposition to the deal among Democrat senators. After all, they had no reason to defy the president if Israel’s own chief of staff said the deal was a good thing.

Gantz’s position—that Israel must publicly back Washington’s approach to Iran’s nuclear program—is shared by many in the upper echelons of the IDF and in the media. It is also shared by Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett. In an interview with Israel’s Channel 20 in April, Bennett expressed full faith in the Biden administration. He referred to President Joe Biden as “a true lover of Israel.” He argued, “We need to work with the administration to craft the conditions for a return to the [2015 nuclear] deal.”

Are Gantz, Lapid and Bennett right? Is Netanyahu “hysterical?” Is this just a dispute between two friends about how to reach a common goal, or are the U.S. and Israel aiming for different outcomes?

Last week, the United States and Iran held their fifth round of nuclear negotiations in Vienna. To get a sense of whether the Biden administration shares Israel’s goals on Iran but has a different way of going about it, or whether it has a different end in mind, it is important to consider the make-up of the U.S. negotiating team.

The chief U.S. negotiator is Robert Malley. Malley is a pro-Iranian ideologue. He has never hidden his desire to replace America’s traditional Middle East alliance structure, which is based on Israel and the Sunni Arab states, with a structure reliant on Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood. And he isn’t a lone voice either in the administration or in his delegation.

Last week, a new administration official joined the U.S. delegation in Vienna. Ariane Tabatabai joined the administration in February as senior adviser to the Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security.

According to the Iranian exile group Iranian Americans for Liberty, Tabatabai’s father lives in Iran, where he serves as a member of the regime’s inner circle in the university system. The American negotiator’s family ties to the Iranian regime leads naturally to the conclusion that the Iranian regime was represented—or at least warmly regarded—on both sides of the negotiating table.

The current status of the Jewish American pro-Israel lobby AIPAC is also relevant to the question of whether Netanyahu is right to publicly oppose the deal or Gantz, Lapid and Bennett are right in claiming that Israel must follow America’s lead.

From the first days of his presidency, Obama placed AIPAC in an untenable position. For decades before Obama rose to power, Israel enjoyed robust support from both U.S. political parties. AIPAC rode the bipartisan wave to a position of power and influence in Washington. But upon entering office, Obama and his advisers worked to diminish Democratic support for Israel and undermine AIPAC.

At his first meeting in the White House with Jewish leaders, Obama stunned his guests by asking J Street to participate. J Street had been formed the previous year by Obama supporters to castigate AIPAC as a right-wing group and to provide Jewish cover for Obama’s anti-Israel policies.

AIPAC had two options for contending with the new situation—Netanyahu or Netanyahu’s haters. If it had chosen Netanyahu’s approach, AIPAC would have exacted a price from politicians who undermined U.S.-Israel ties by ending its support for them. It would have stuck to its guns, criticized the administration for adopting policies that endangered Israel and weakened the U.S.-Israel alliance and supported politicians on both sides of the aisle that stood in stalwart support for a meaningful U.S.-Israel alliance.

AIPAC, however, chose the second option. Rather than fight, it tried to cover over differences with platitudes. When Republicans sponsored resolutions and other congressional actions to oppose Obama’s policies, AIPAC tried to tone down their rhetoric and weaken their initiatives to enable less pro-Israel Democrats to co-sponsor them.

To its credit, AIPAC led a significant fight against Senate approval of the nuclear deal. But when it lost the fight, AIPAC took no action against lawmakers who supported the deal. On the contrary; shortly after the Senate Democrats failed to block approval for the deal that gave Iran the bomb by 2030, AIPAC members held a fundraiser for Sen. Cory Booker despite the fact that he voted in favor of the deal.

The fallout was quick and brutal.

In the six years since the fight over the Iran nuclear deal, the position and power of AIPAC among Democrats and Republicans alike has sunk dramatically. During the 2008 presidential race, Obama himself felt compelled to attend the AIPAC annual conference and express his deep commitment to U.S.-Israel ties and appreciation for AIPAC’s work to strengthen the U.S.-Israel alliance.

Ahead of the 2020 elections, the only Democrat presidential candidate that agreed to attend the AIPAC conference was former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg. AIPAC was only able to get Biden to speak by canceling its own rule barring politicians from sending taped addresses rather than showing up in person. Five Democrat presidential candidates attended the J Street conference.

The pro-Israel lobby’s position among Republicans isn’t much better.

As one senior Republican put it in a moment of frustration, “It’s more important for AIPAC to present a false picture of Democrat support for Israel than to work with us to actually support Israel. So often, when we try to advance a significant effort on behalf of Israel, AIPAC lobbyists show up and demand that we water it down so that a few Democrats will join us. The most important thing for them is to hide Democrat hostility. The most important thing for us is to support Israel.”

It’s true that Netanyahu cannot change the Democrats’ position on Iran. But Lapid, Bennett and Gantz can’t influence it either. On the other hand, Netanyahu’s outspoken opposition to Obama’s nuclear deal with the ayatollahs empowered Republicans to oppose it as well. Netanyahu’s unapologetic stance made him a hero for Republicans who admired his courage and trusted him.

Recently, Netanyahu remarked that having political leaders willing to approve operations against Iran’s nuclear installations is no less important than having security forces capable of attacking them. Leaders who believe that maintaining friendly ties with the Biden administration is their most important goal will necessarily be less willing to approve operations that will anger the likes of Biden, Malley and their team.

 

Caroline Glick is an award-winning columnist and author of “The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East.”

Source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/307567

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Harris tells Guatemalan president that migration is a top priority, after he blames US for surge - Adam Shaw

 

​ by Adam Shaw

It is Harris' first trip to the region since being appointed to her role 75 days ago

Vice President Kamala Harris told the president of Guatemala on Monday that tackling migration is a top priority for both countries, as she made her first visit to the region -- and Guatemala’s president blamed the US for the migrant surge at the border.

"And so I am in Guatemala today to discuss and advance our shared priorities," Harris told President Alejandro Giammattei after arriving in Guatemala. "Foremost among those, as you have mentioned, is addressing migration from this region in particular."

HARRIS STAFF SAYS CLIMATE, ECONOMY AMONG MAIN DRIVERS OF MIGRATION AFTER GUATEMALA PRESIDENT BLAMES US

June 7, 2021: Vice President Kamala Harris, left, meets with Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei at the National Palace in Guatemala City. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Harris was appointed 75 days ago by President Biden to lead the U.S. diplomatic talks to solve the migration surge to the U.S. border, with a focus on what the administration sees as the "root causes" of the crisis that has seen hundreds of thousands of migrants flooding to the border since President Biden took office.

More than 178,000 migrants were encountered at the border in April alone, with officials estimating that thousands more have slipped by agents. The Biden administration has been scrambling to open facilities to house migrants, including the tens of thousands of unaccompanied children that have reached the border.

As critics have blamed the Biden administration’s dramatic rollback of Trump-era border policies like the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) and asylum agreements with countries including Guatemala, the administration has focused on root causes like violence, poverty and corruption in Central America.

HARRIS TO MAKE ANTI-CORRUPTION EFFORTS ‘FRONT AND CENTER’ OF VISIT TO GUATEMALA, MEXICO

"I’m thinking of corruption, violence and poverty, the lack of economic opportunity, the lack of climate adaptation and climate resilience, the lack of good governance," Harris said last month.

Harris, now on a two-day trip to the region that will also see her visit Mexico on Tuesday, said that her visit was "a reflection of the priorities that the president and I have placed on this region of our world."

"We are neighbors and the position of the United States is that we then are interconnected, we share familial bonds, we share bonds that are historic, and it is important that as we embark on a new era that we recognize the significance and the importance of this relationship as neighbors," she said on Monday.

Video

 

She said that both countries need to work to improve the situation in Guatemala, whose residents she said don't want to leave – but feel forced to, and called for "tangible outcomes" to convince people to be hopeful about their futures.

But Giammattei, in an interview aired a day earlier, had pushed back against the "root causes" explanation, and said that the two "are not on the same side of the coin" on the issue.

Instead, he blamed what he saw as a more welcoming message to migrants by the new administration for the surge.

"The message changed too: 'We're going to reunite families, we’re going to reunite children,'" he told CBS News. "The very next day, the coyotes were here organizing groups of children to take them to the United States."

"We asked the United States government to send more of a clear message to prevent more people from leaving," he said.

HARRIS TO MAKE ANTI-CORRUPTION EFFORTS ‘FRONT AND CENTER’ OF VISIT TO GUATEMALA, MEXICO

June 7, 2021: Vice President Kamala Harris, left, meets with Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei, at the National Palace in Guatemala City. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

His apparent criticism of the administration has been echoed by Republicans in the U.S., who have emphasized the role the administration’s policies -- such as ending border wall construction, narrowing interior enforcement, and releasing families into the interior -- in the crisis at the border.

In particular, Republicans have blasted Harris repeatedly for failing to visit the border. The White House has said her role is not the border per se, but the high-level talks in the region -- but critics have said that a border visit is important to understanding the issue.

"After 75 days in charge of the Biden Border Crisis, Kamala Harris still refuses to visit the border." Republican National Committee Hispanic communications director Jaime Florez said Monday. "Instead of addressing firsthand the human costs of the disastrous Biden administration border policies, Kamala is yet again ignoring the millions of Americans affected." 

"Kamala's meetings in Mexico and Guatemala are about shifting blame away from the Biden administration, not solving the crisis she and Biden created," he said.

Harris will hold a press conference later Monday, before traveling to Mexico where she will meet with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Harris is likely to use the visit to tout more than $300 million the U.S. has pledged in humanitarian aid to Central America, part of a proposed $4 billion package in investment in the region.

 

Adam Shaw is a reporter covering U.S. and European politics for Fox News. He can be reached at adam.shaw@foxnews.com.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/harris-guatemalan-president-migration-top-priority-blames-us-surge

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China's 'massive cover-up' on COVID still happening: WHO advisory board member - Megan Gallen

 

​ by Megan Gallen

'The more that China stonewalls, the more suspicious that it looks,' Jamie Metzl says

China's 'massive cover-up' on COVID-19 still happening: WHO advisory board member

An advisory board member to the World Health Organization told Fox News, Monday, that China's "massive cover-up" on COVID-19 is still happening today as the Wuhan lab-leak origin theory gains credibility.

"The Chinese have engaged in a massive cover-up that is going on until this day, involving destroying samples, hiding records, placing a universal gag order on Chinese scientists and imprisoning Chinese citizen journalists asking the most basic questions," Jamie Metzl told "America's Newsroom."

China is reportedly planning to build dozens of biosafety level three labs and one biosafety level four lab over the next five years, as investigators take another look at the possibility that the coronavirus could have leaked out of a laboratory in Wuhan, China.

"The more that China stonewalls, the more suspicious that it looks," Metzl said. "We can't give China a veto over whether or not we investigate the world's worst pandemic in a century and then do everything we can to make everybody safe."

Metzl stressed the importance of doing everything possible to have a "full investigation" into the pandemic, including the U.S. working with allies to have a "parallel" process if China does not cooperate.  

Video

 

"There's a reason why after a plane crashes, we do everything possible to understand what happened," Metzl explained. "If we don't learn those lessons, there are other planes that are in the air. For all we know, the next pandemic is just around the corner and if we don't understand and fix our biggest problems, we're going to be at unnecessary risk. We have to get to the bottom of this, which means asking that tough questions and following the data wherever it leads."

Metzl called WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus a "hero" for his handling of the investigation, which prompted pushback from anchor Bill Hemmer.

"There is good reason to be critical of the WHO in the earliest days of the pandemic," Metzl said. "But later in this phase that we're in now, Dr. Tedros basically risked his entire career to defend the integrity of the WHO, rejecting essentially the legitimacy of this joint team report and saying we need a full investigation of all origin hypotheses, including lab incident."

"But that's not what Tedros said in the beginning," Hemmer asserted. "It took some time for him to get to that point."

"You're absolutely right," Metzl replied. "But we also need to recognize that the WHO doesn't have the mandate to have its own surveillance capabilities. They had emergency responders in effect they wanted to send to Wuhan that were blocked in the earliest days of the pandemic by the Chinese for more than three weeks."

The lab-leak theory has gained credibility in the U.S. and abroad in the past few weeks after a bombshell Wall Street Journal report revealed that three researchers at a Wuhan virology lab displayed COVID-19 symptoms in late 2019—well before the pandemic. But it remains unproven, as do competing hypotheses about how the virus first came to infect a human.

Fox News' Evie Fordham, Michael Ruiz, Rich Edson and Adam Shaw contributed to this report.

 

Megan Gallen

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/media/chinas-massive-cover-up-on-covid-still-happening-who-advisory-board-member

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Arabs: Hamas and Iran Turned Gaza into Cemetery for Children - Khaled Abu Toameh

 

​ by Khaled Abu Toameh

The Egyptian expert [Muhammad Mujahid Al-Zayyat, a consultant at the Egyptian Center for Thought and Strategic Studies]... is joining other Arabs in warning the Biden administration and the Western powers against allowing Iran to be rewarded for Hamas's war of terrorism against Israel.

• The Arabs are aware that Hamas's only interest is to appease the mullahs in Tehran for the sake of milking them for more money and weapons. The Arabs understand that this just is another farce by Hamas and particularly Iran.

• It is... refreshing to see how many Arabs are aware of the dangers of Iran's involvement with Palestinian terrorist groups that seek the elimination first of Israel, then of them.

• "The Hamas militias in the Gaza Strip belong to Iran.... Iran wants to use the Palestinian issue as a winning card at the Vienna negotiations..... to force the US to lift the sanctions on Iran in return for ending the security escalation which threatens Israel.... Iran's weapons are for destruction, not construction." — Amjad Taha, prominent Arab journalist, Twitter, May 27, 2021.

• "The more killing and destruction, the more Hamas's income increases while the Palestinians continue to suffer from siege and poverty." — Saeed Al-Kahel, Moroccan writer and political analyst, Assahifa, May 29, 2021.

• "Iran exploited Hamas and the Islamic Jihad for its own benefit only, and if it wanted the interest of the Palestinians, it would have contributed to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.... Tehran has not contributed or made donations for humanitarian or reconstruction projects in Gaza...." — Samir Ghattas, former Egyptian parliament member and head of the Egyptian Middle East Forum for Strategic Studies, Al-Arabiya.net, May 26, 2021.

• The Egyptian expert [Muhammad Mujahid Al-Zayyat, a consultant at the Egyptian Center for Thought and Strategic Studies]... is joining other Arabs in warning the Biden administration and the Western powers against allowing Iran to be rewarded for Hamas's war of terrorism against Israel.

• It now remains to be seen whether the Biden administration and the Western powers will heed this warning or continue to bury their heads in the sand, pretending that the mullahs in Iran, in exchange for massive bribes from the US, will magically change their savage stripes. They did not last time; what will happen to the region if they again do not?

Hamas's claim that it "won" the last war with Israel has become the subject of ridicule and mockery by many Arabs, who are aware that Hamas's only interest is to appease the mullahs in Iran for the sake of milking them for more money and weapons. Pictured: Iran's "Supreme Leader" Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (right) greets Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on February 12, 2012. (Image source: khamenei.ir/AFP via Getty Images)

Hamas's claim that it "won" the last war with Israel has become the subject of ridicule and mockery by many Arabs who are not afraid to call out the Iranian-backed terrorist group for lying to the Palestinians and the rest of the world.

The Arabs are also not afraid to hold Hamas responsible for the massive destruction and the loss of the lives of innocent Palestinians and Israelis in order to serve the interests of its masters in Iran.

Scenes of Palestinians celebrating the Hamas "victory" sparked a wave of condemnations in the Arab world, especially in the Gulf states. The reactions of the Arabs to Hamas's self-proclaimed victory shows that many in the Arab world are not fooled by the terrorist group's propaganda machine. The Arabs are aware that Hamas's only interest is to appease the mullahs in Tehran for the sake of milking them for more money and weapons. The Arabs understand that this just is another farce by Hamas and particularly Iran.

Prominent Arab journalist Amjad Taha, an expert on international affairs and a popular commentator on the media and social media networks in the Gulf, burst into laughter when asked during a TV interview if he thought Hamas had scored a "victory" against Israel.

"In the war in the Gaza Strip, no one won," Taha said. "The children and women on both sides lost. Does victory mean the use of women and children as human shields? Does victory mean the death of 269 Palestinians and the injury of 8,900 in the Gaza Strip?"

Taha pointed out that some of the Palestinians killed during the 11-day war were victims of Hamas rockets: "Out of 3,700 rockets fired by Hamas [into Israel], 400 rockets fell on residential areas in the Gaza Strip and killed women and children."

"How strange. We live in an era where defeat has become victory. Bon appetite to [Qatar-based Hamas leader] Ismail Haniyeh for the Mercedes car, the Rolex watch and the Armani suit. Bon appetite to Hamas for trafficking in the blood of innocent Palestinians. As usual, Haniyeh won, the people lost."

Echoing the widespread belief in the Arab world that Iran was using its Palestinian proxies, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, to extract concessions from the US and other world powers at the Vienna negotiations to revive the 2005 Iran nuclear deal, Taha added:

"The Hamas militias in the Gaza Strip belong to Iran. What these militias recently did was serve Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps. Iran wants to use the Palestinian issue as a winning card at the Vienna negotiations. Iran wants to use the Palestinian issue to force the US to lift the sanctions on Iran in return for ending the security escalation which threatens Israel. The terrorist Ismail Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, said, 'We thank Iran for giving us money and weapons.' Iran's money is intended to help the mercenaries to continue trafficking with the Palestinian issue. Iran's weapons are for destruction, not construction."

The negotiations between Iran and the world powers over the 2015 nuclear deal resumed last week in Vienna with the goal of bringing the US back into the agreement.

Emirati journalist and writer Mohamed Taqi was even more blunt in his criticism of Hamas's alleged victory and its alliance with Iran.

"God's curse on all those who exploited the al-Aqsa Mosque, the Palestinian issue and the Palestinian people in return for personal glory and money," Taqi said in a video he posted on Twitter. "God's curse on the traitors who sold the Palestinian issue to give it on a silver platter to the mullahs of Iran."

Like many Arabs, Taqi denounced the Hamas leaders for living in luxury in Qatar and Turkey while sacrificing their own people in the Gaza Strip to appease Iran.

"Which 'resistance' are you talking about, Haniyeh, when you and your children are staying in hotels in Qatar and Turkey?" Taqi asked, addressing the Qatar-based Hamas leader who was seen travelling in a new Mercedes car in Doha during the fighting between Israel and Hamas.

"Which 'resistance' are you talking about when you are sacrificing your people while you and you children are living the good life? Then you ask the Arabs, whom you have accused of treason, to rebuild the Gaza Strip while you are presenting your 'victory' to Iran?"

Moroccan writer and political analyst Saeed Al-Kahel accused Hamas of turning the Palestinian issue into a "commercial asset."

Hamas, Al-Kahel wrote, "does not want the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to end because it wants to achieve political and financial gains. Hamas has turned the Palestinian issue into a commercial asset that generates funds from various sources and ensures prosperity and wealth for its leaders."

Al-Kahel, too, shares the view that Iran is using its Palestinian allies' campaign of terrorism against Israel to get the US to lift the sanctions on Iran. "Hamas has turned the 'resistance' into a pressure card in the hands of Iran, which is exploiting it in its conflict with the West in order to lift the sanctions over its nuclear program," Al-Kahel wrote.

"Therefore, whatever the outcome of the armed confrontation with Israel, Hamas will not declare its defeat. Rather, it will make it a victory, even if it celebrates it among the ruins and coffins. The more killing and destruction, the more Hamas's income increases while the Palestinians continue to suffer from siege and poverty. What is worse is that political Islamic organizations are proud of the illusory victory achieved by Hamas. None of these organizations asked about the nature of this victory and its gains for the benefit of the Palestinians and their cause: how much land was liberated, how many prisoners were released, and how many [Palestinian] refugees returned? None of this has been achieved, and will not be achieved as long as Hamas controls the Palestinian decision-making process. Palestinian blood has become cheap for Hamas, as well as for the Islamic Movement [in Morocco], whose leaders were quick to congratulate the Hamas leadership on a 'clear victory.'"

Samir Ghattas, a former Egyptian parliament member and head of the Egyptian Middle East Forum for Strategic Studies, also warned against Iran's attempt to use Hamas to obtain gains from the US and other world powers during the Vienna negotiations.

Ghattas noted that Iran tried from day one of the fighting between Israel and Hamas to assert its presence in the battlefield by issuing statements in support of the Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip. The statements, he said, included a letter sent by Major General Esmail Qaani, head of Iran's Quds Force, to Hamas arch-terrorist Mohammed Deif, pledging full support for the Palestinian war on Israel.

"Iran wants to achieve qualitative and strong progress in the Vienna negotiations, and is playing the card of the factions and militias loyal to it in the region, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Palestine in order to confirm its regional strength and weight," Ghattas said in a clear warning to the US administration and the world powers negotiating with Iran. "Iran exploited Hamas and the Islamic Jihad for its own benefit only, and if it wanted the interest of the Palestinians, it would have contributed to the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip," he added.

"Tehran has not contributed or made donations for humanitarian or reconstruction projects in Gaza, but rather contributed to financing the purchase of weapons and others in order to turn Gaza into a weapon center that threatens the security of the region. The recent Gaza war and the similar wars that preceded it in 2008, 2012 and 2014 were just opportunities that Iran exploited politically and militarily for its own interests only, not for the interest of the people of Palestine and Gaza, but at the expense of their blood."

Muhammad Mujahid Al-Zayyat, a consultant at the Egyptian Center for Thought and Strategic Studies, said that Iran's support for Hamas during the war with Israel was aimed at sending a message to the West that the Palestinian terrorist groups have become a bargaining chip for Iran in its dealings with the West.

The recent Gaza war, Al-Zayyat argued, is another attempt to show strength on the part of Tehran and hint that it will go to the Vienna negotiations with a Hamas "victory" in its hands in order to lift the sanctions against it and achieve what it wants from the Iran nuclear deal.

The Egyptian expert, in other words, is joining other Arabs in warning the Biden administration and the Western powers against allowing Iran to be rewarded for Hamas's war of terrorism against Israel.

Saudi political analyst Abdul Rahman Altrairi also scoffed at Hamas's claim that it won the war. He pointed out that Iran's Lebanon-based Hezbollah terrorist militia had previously declared victory over Israel after causing massive destruction to Lebanon's infrastructure during the 2006 war with Israel.

Altrairi reminded those Westerners who are working hard to appease Iran that the Iranians are responsible for "destruction and corruption" in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.

Altrairi warned the West that one of Iran's goals during the Gaza war was to destroy the peace treaties between Israel and some Arab countries and "reposition Israel as an enemy of the Arabs."

Emirati preacher Dr. Waseem Yousef also condemned Hamas for its hypocrisy in dealing with the Arabs:

"Hamas fired rockets from people's homes, and when the [Israeli] response came, Hamas cried and shouted: 'Where are the Arabs, where are the Muslims.' Hamas turned Gaza into a cemetery for innocent people and children. Hamas burned the flags of most Arab countries, insulted all Arab countries, and did not respect anyone."

It is refreshing to see voices from the Arab world ridiculing Hamas for declaring victory against Israel while bringing disaster to the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. It is also refreshing to see how many Arabs are aware of the dangers of Iran's involvement with Palestinian terrorist groups that seek the elimination first of Israel, then of them.

The most important message coming from many Arabs, however, is one that is directed to the Biden administration and the Western powers, alerting them to the fact that Iran is seeking to take advantage of the recent war in the Gaza Strip to intimidate them into making additional concessions to Tehran. It now remains to be seen whether the Biden administration and the Western powers will heed this warning or continue to bury their heads in the sand, pretending that the mullahs in Iran, in exchange for massive bribes from the US, will magically change their savage stripes. They did not last time; what will happen to the region if they again do not?

• Follow Khaled Abu Toameh on Twitter

 

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

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17433/hamas-iran-gaza-cemetery

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Media Suddenly Realizes Obama's Muslim Dictator in Nigeria is a... Dictator - Daniel Greenfield

 

​ by Daniel Greenfield

Biden's old boss put this "converted Democrat" into power to pander to Islamists. The end result can come as a surprise to no one.

 

The funniest and saddest thing about media outrage over Muhammadu Buhari's antics is the short memory.

Buhari was one of the beneficiaries of Obama's Islamization Democracy program. Nigeria had been run by a Christian president who was fighting Islamic terrorism. The Obama administration insisted that Boko Haram was just misunderstood and that the root cause was the Nigerian military's campaign against terrorism. 

Obama kept pressuring Nigeria to stop cracking down on terrorism and made it clear that there would be limited support without "political change".

Change came by the way of Muhammadu Buhari, a former Muslim dictator. His election was hailed as a new era for Nigeria. 

Here's the story in 3 acts.

Act I

Nigeria’s immediate past president, Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, has accused former United States president Barack Obama of playing an open and active role in the events leading to his election loss in 2015.

Jonathan who governed Nigeria between 2010 and 2015 was running for a second term bid but lost to incumbent Muhammadu Buhari who run on the ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Act II was yet another meeting between Muhammadu and Obama.

And in the meantime, I also want to thank the President for having been a great partner with us on a range of international challenges of great importance, including around issues like climate change and dealing with pollutants like hydrofluorocarbons, where Nigeria has actually been an excellent partner.

So we wish President Buhari well.  He's going to be President longer than I am.  (Laughter.) 

And now we're in Act III.

The U.S., Canada, the European Union, the U.K. and the Republic of Ireland issued a joint statement Saturday condemning Nigeria's government for banning Twitter.

Why it matters: The condemnation came a day after the country's government threatened to arrest and prosecute any resident found using the app — which has been extremely popular in Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation.

The action is in retaliation for the social media company temporarily freezing Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari's account.

Twitter removed a tweet posted by Buhari on Wednesday in which he vowed to punish people in the country's southeastern region after recent attacks on public infrastructure.

The company then froze Buhari's account, saying he violated its "abusive behavior" policy, and the government in turn banned its citizens from using the app.

I'll address Twitter's hypocrisy later, but the international community's outrage over their own pet dictator is the joke here.

Biden's old boss put this "converted Democrat" into power to pander to Islamists. The end result can come as a surprise to no one. But the media treats Muhammadu as if he emerged out of nowhere and makes no mention of Obama's role in bringing him to power.

 

Daniel Greenfield

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2021/06/media-suddenly-realizes-obamas-muslim-dictator-daniel-greenfield/

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Who -- or What -- Occupies Gaza? - Lev Tsitrin

 

​ by Lev Tsitrin

We keep hearing from them that Gaza is occupied, that Gaza is an open-air prison, that Gaza is a "penal colony." Gazans are oppressed, the theory goes, and Israel is the oppressor.

The article of faith that unites all who condemn Israel's response to Hamas rockets in the latest escalation with Gaza, from the most rabid Islamists to the hyper sophisticated (or so they think) pundits from the New York Times and dwellers of the ivory tower of academia, is captured by a single word "occupation." We keep hearing from them that Gaza is occupied, that Gaza is an open-air prison, that Gaza is a "penal colony." Gazans are oppressed, the theory goes, and Israel is the oppressor.

But let's take a closer look at the occupation of Gaza: like so much else, the term "occupation" is very relative. While under occupation, Gaza's rulers -- Hamas -- managed to amass huge military infrastructure, complete with weapons manufacturies, with thousands of trained soldiers, with a vast network of underground tunnels hundreds of miles long which the Israelis dubbed "the metro" to allow for undetected movement of weaponry and soldiers, with a huge arsenal of rockets, and even with a navy commando unit. Hamas' police control the day-to-day life of Gazans. It levies taxes and pays salaries to its followers.

Given that the "occupiers" are so lenient as to let the locals do what they want, isn't it unreasonable to ask whether the "occupation" only allows militarism to thrive? Are peaceful activities forbidden? Would the "occupation" let Gazans build houses, toil the land, educate their children if they wanted to?

Clearly, it allows that, too, as long as Gazans are willing. In fact, there are some who argue that for all practical purposes, there is no occupation at all. Gaza is self-ruled. Gaza's strategic choice of its policies -- to funnel taxes, international aid, and materiel like concrete and pipes towards military use, to pay its fighters, and to build rockets and tunnels -- is determined by Gaza's Hamas rulers. That Gaza has its own rulers is highly atypical of an occupation -- the "occupation," by any definition, being the rule by an external power, which clearly does not apply in the case of Gaza, making the whole idea that it is "occupied" suspect -- to say the least. But this is an aside. Gazans say that they are occupied, so let's take their word for it. Yet given that Gazans follow their own policies and chart their own destiny, and that it is not the Israelis who occupy Gaza, since they pulled out fifteen years ago (and besides, if Israelis occupied Gaza, none of its military development that threatens Israel would have happened), who, or what is that "occupier"?

Since, in practical terms, the "occupiers" are those who rule, and the ruling power in Gaza is Hamas, then to identify what "occupies" Gaza we should ask, what is it that drives Hamas' policies?

The obvious answer is -- hate. Hamas may love Palestinians -- but it hates Jews far more. And hate is an extremely strong passion; it is stronger than love and stronger even than fear. It is, in fact, stronger than the instinct for self-preservation (and presumably, nothing in nature should be stronger.) The self-destructive power of hate has been noticed since time immemorial. Aesop told a fable of a man who, when asked by gods to make a wish on a condition that his neighbor would get twice as much, asked not for a billion dollars (or, I guess, "drachmas"), but to have his eye gouged out. A Sherlock Holmes' story, "The Problem of Thor Bridge" is about a woman who killed herself to frame the rival she hated. And the most telling and terrible example comes not from fiction, but from real life -- Hitler's hatred of the Jews so exceeded his love of Germans that, as Germany faced an ever-increasing scarcity of war materiel, he diverted it from the front to concentration camps to kill more Jews. The price -- more dead Germans -- was not too high.  

A similar hatred engulfs Hamas, blinding it to the plight of Gazans. Why use pipes to bring Gazans water when they could be used to build rockets to kill the Jews? Why waste concrete to build housing when it could be used for building tunnels? Why pay the teachers when you can spend the money on soldiers?

Hamas being the occupiers of Gaza, and hatred being the occupier of Hamas, what really occupies Gaza? Hate. It is hate that denies Gazans normal lives. I am not the first to make that observation; Golda Meir observed decades ago that peace will come only when Palestinians start loving their children more than they hate the Israelis.

The self-declared deep thinkers in the media and academia, and the Israel-hating "progressive" politicians and their followers would reply that it is Israel that causes this hate. Eliminate Israel, and there will be love and peace in the Middle East.

The argument that the Syrian civil war (which turned into a regional war and became a battlefield for Russia, Turkey, Iran, Israel, Iraqi militias, and Lebanese Hezb’allah), the rise of al Qaeda, of ISIS, of the Iranian regime, have nothing to do with Israel and that, moreover, the PA and Hamas hate each other with a deadly passion, is, though true, is I think besides the point. The point is that Palestinian hate toward Israel is utterly unfair, and is based on a deliberate, willful self-deception.

The claim that Israel occupies Arab land that animates Hamas and their ilk and pumps up their hate is a result of Palestinians deliberately ignoring their own history. Are Israelis "colonial settler-occupiers?" Sorry to ask, but what are Palestinians? And what are the Arabs living outside of Western Saudi Arabia? Didn't they hear about Arab conquests in which, after the death of Mohammed, Arabs stormed out of Saudi Arabia to conquer, and "colonially settler-occupy" half of the then-known world, from Spain in the West to the border of India in the East? Palestine came under their "settler-colonial" control in about 636 AD. The modicum of basic honesty should have made the Palestinians admit that Arab conquest justified rival claims to the land by others -- like the Jews whose land it was for well over a millennium, well before the Arabs arrived on the scene. A fair and just admission that the Jews may have a reasonable claim to the title to the land would have opened up the realization that the way forward is negotiations, not fighting. Instead, Palestinians self-righteously reject all offers of accommodation, declaring themselves to be wronged innocents, and keep pumping up the hate.

So who really occupies Gaza? Or rather, what really occupies Gaza? The answer is -- the self-righteous, self-created, self-inflamed hate that those who are in the wrong, feel towards those who are in the right. Willful ignorance, and the hate that it generates, are the real occupiers of Gaza.

Image: Guilherme Paula, Oren neu dag

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.

 

Lev Tsitrin

Source:https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/06/who__or_what__occupies_gaza.html

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Head of Kiryat Arba-Hebron Council: The flag parade must not be cancelled - Ben Ariel

 

​ by Ben Ariel

Head of the Kiryat Arba Council says flag parade in Jerusalem must take place as planned.

Eliyahu Libman

Spokesperson

The head of the Kiryat Arba-Hebron Council, Eliyahu Libman, on Sunday spoke out against any cancellation of the flag parade that is scheduled to take place in Jerusalem this coming Thursday.

Libman said that "the cancellation of the flag parade is a surrender to our enemies. Only the people of Israel should decide whether they are the sovereign in Jerusalem and in the entire land of Israel, including Judea and Samaria, or alternatively if they are physically in the land of Israel but mentally still in exile. Only we have to decide."

He pointed out that the State of Israel is strong enough to decide that it wants and can hold a parade of Israeli flags in the capital. "A united Jerusalem will forever belong to the Jewish people, this is Zionism, this is Judaism."

MK Itamar Ben Gvir (Otzma Yehudit) said on Sunday he intends to take advantage of his parliamentary immunity and march in the flag parade even if the police ban the parade in the Muslim Quarter through the Damascus Gate.

"If the police do not allow the flag dance, I intend to exercise my immunity and march happily with flags. It is not inconceivable that the Israeli government will surrender to Hamas and it let the be the one who will dictate the agenda," said Ben Gvir.

He stressed, "It is the right of every Jew to march throughout Jerusalem and that is precisely why I was elected to the Knesset, in order to preserve the right of the Jewish people in the land of Israel."

Meanwhile, the police are formulating an alternative outline for holding the flag march this coming Thursday. The proposal will be submitted to the political echelon for approval. The alternative outline will prevent as much friction as possible between the marchers and the Arab population.

 

Ben Ariel 

Source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/307583

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Author of '1619 Project' Hails Stalinist Cuba’s 'Education' - Humberto Fontova

 

​ by Humberto Fontova

Nikole Hannah-Jones confuses education with propaganda.

 

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and fellow Republicans are demanding Pres. Biden’s Education Department block a planned history education proposal that invokes the 1619 Project. "Americans do not need or want their tax dollars diverted from promoting the principles that unite our nation toward promoting radical ideologies meant to divide us," McConnell wrote. 

“In order to truly be antiracist, you also have to truly be anti-capitalist…the origins of racism cannot be separated from the origins of capitalism. The origins of capitalism cannot be separated from the origins of racism." -- Professor Ibram X. Kendi,  Big Kahuna of Critical Race Theory, which Biden’s Education Dept. wants force-fed to our schoolchildren.

"What Mitch McConnell and others like him want is for our children to get a propagandistic, nationalistic understanding of history that is not about facts...” -- Nikole Hannah-Jones, author of The New York Times' 1619 Project.

And speaking of propaganda vs facts—and of Nikole Hannah-Jones:

“'Education is the cornerstone of the (Cuban) revolution. Nearly everywhere among the magnificent Havana architecture signs speak of equality and liberation through education. An illiterate person is a person prevented from developing his human condition,' Jorge Gonzales Corona (Cuban Communist apparatchik) told us." -- A euphoric Nikole Hannah-Jones after a Potemkin tour of Stalinist Cuba.

“Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.” -- Vladimir Lenin. Appropriately enough, Castroite Cuba’s most famous “elite” high school is named for Lenin.  

 “This summer [2008] I traveled to Cuba with six journalists, documenting the experiences of the African diaspora in the Western Hemisphere for the Institute for Advanced Journalism Studies in North Carolina. While there, I found a Cuba you may not know. A Cuba with a 99.8 percent literacy rate, the lowest HIV infection rate in the Western Hemisphere, free college and health care…When Castro took power, fewer than one-quarter of Cubans were literate. Many couldn't afford school. One of Castro's first acts was to universalize education…. Cuba's universal health care system is seen by many as a world model.” -- Nikole Hannah-Jones.

Fact-Check: In fact, when Castro took power, which was barely 50 years after a devastating war of independence that cost Cuba almost a fifth of her population, Cuba boasted almost 80 per cent literacy and budgeted the most (23 % of national expenses) for public education of any Latin American country.

Fact-Check: In 1958 Cuba had a higher standard of living than Ireland and Austria, almost double Spain and Japan’s per-capita income, more doctors and dentists per capita than Britain and lower infant mortality than France and Germany — the 13th lowest in the world, in fact. Today Cuba’s infant-mortality rate — despite the hemisphere’s highest abortion rate, which favorably skews the figure -- is much lower from the top. So relative to the rest of the world, Cuba’s health care has worsened under the Castros and a nation with a formerly massive influx of European immigrants needs machine guns, water cannons and tiger sharks to keep it’s people from fleeing, while half-starved Haitians a short 60 miles away turn up their nose at any thought of immigrating to Cuba.

Without Castro, Cuba’s full literacy would have come about probably as quickly and without firing squads, mass graves and a political incarceration rate higher than Stalin’s. Most countries in Latin America with lower literacy rates than Cuba in 1958 have done just that.

Better still, before the Castros and Che Guevara converted Cuba into an intellectual, moral and material sewer, Cubans were actually educated —not indoctrinated with worthless Marxist claptrap, as will many U.S. schoolchildren if Biden’s Education Dept. prevails.

Instead of being force-fed essentially the same Marxist imbecilities the 1619 Project and Critical Race Theory force-feed their hapless victims, children in pre-Castro Cuba were allowed (encouraged, actually) to read such as George Orwell and Thomas Jefferson, not just the arresting wisdom and sparkling prose of Che Guevara. A specimen:

"To the extent that we achieve concrete successes on a theoretical plane — or, vice versa, to the extent that we draw theoretical conclusions of a broad character on the basis of our concrete research — we will have made a valuable contribution to Marxism-Leninism, and to the cause of humanity."

I quote "this intellectual, this most complete human being of our time" (Jean Paul Sartre’s description of Che Guevara) exactly. Cuba’s prisons aren’t its only torture chambers. With such reading assignments Cuba’s classrooms amply qualify for an inspection by Amnesty International.

“Black Cubans especially are wary of outsiders wishing to overthrow the Castro regime,” Nikole Hannah-Jones reported after her Potemkin Cuban tour. “They admit the revolution has been imperfect, but it also led to the end of codified racism and brought universal education and access to jobs to black Cubans. Without the revolution, they wonder, where would they be.”

They would have been spared the bootheel, lash and slave-yoke of a totalitarian regime which jailed and tortured the longest-suffering black political prisoners in the modern history of the Western hemisphere, that’s where. Many Cuban blacks suffered longer incarceration in the dungeons of Che and the Castros than Nelson Mandela suffered in South Africa’s. Eusebio Penalver, Ignacio Cuesta Valle, Antonio Lopez Munoz, Ricardo Valdes Cancio and many other Cuban blacks suffered almost 30 years in the Castros’ prisons. Bloodied in their fight against Hannah-Jones’ tour guides, they remained unbowed.

But have you ever heard any of their names mentioned by the U.S. media? Eusebio Penalver became a U.S. citizen and lived in Miami for almost 20 years. He would have been a cinch for the media to track down. Has CNN interviewed any of them? Have you ever see any of them on 60 Minutes, or read about them in The New York Times? Have you ever heard of them on National Public Radio during Black History Month, seen them on the History channel or A&E? Has the NAACP or Congressional Black Caucus mentioned them?

As Ernesto “Che” Guevara wrote in his famous Motorcycle Diaries (“overlooked” in the famous movie,) "The Negro is indolent and spends his money on frivolities and drink, whereas the European is forward-looking, organized and intelligent.” And as he famously sneered at a black Cuban questioner during a press conference in early 1959 who asked him what the revolution planned for blacks: “We’ll do for Cuban blacks exactly what Cuban blacks did for the Cuban revolution. By which I mean: nothing!”

Che was much too modest. “Nothing” is not at all an accurate description of Castroite treatment of Cuba’s blacks. In fact, these lily-white European soldiers sons (Fidel and Raul) along with Che forcibly overthrew a Cuban government where Cuban blacks served as President of the Senate, Minister of Agriculture, Chief of Army, and Head of State (Fulgencio Batista, a grandson of slaves who was born in a palm-roofed shack). Not that you’ll learn any of this from the liberals’ exclusive educational source on pre-Castro Cuba: The Godfather II movie, or –gulp—if Biden’s Education Dept. gets its wish, from the writings and blathering of Nikole Hannah-Jones.

In fact: “(Pre-Castro) Cuba had probably the nearest thing to perfect equality between whites and blacks in the world.”

“Aaaaw come ON, Humberto!” some amigos snort. “Let’s not get carried away here! I mean, it’s one thing to correct the left’s historical exaggerations! But let’s not exaggerate in the other direction, for crying out loud!"

Fair enough, amigos. Fine, then don’t take it from me. Take it from Life Magazine (not exactly a bastion of “embittered-right-wing-Cuban-exiles-with-an-axe-to-grind) where the “perfect equality between the races” statement formed the headline on an article they wrote about Cuba in Nov. 1938.

* * *

Photo credit: Associação Brasileira de Jornalismo Investigativo

 

Humberto Fontova

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/06/author-1619-project-hails-stalinist-cubas-humberto-fontova/

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Understanding Israel's Destruction of Hamas' "Metro" - Seth J. Frantzman

 

​ by Seth J. Frantzman

Destruction of the Metro was a strategic defeat for Hamas, setting it back many years.

^{Originally published under the title "How Israel Targeted Hamas Underground (And What It Could Do Next)."}

Hamas built more than 100 km of tunnels underneath the Gaza strip, enabling it to move rockets around underground and coordinate mass barrages through centralized command and control. [IDF]

In eleven days of fighting in mid-May, Israel used precision airstrikes to try to damage Hamas infrastructure in Gaza and handed the militant group a blow that it will take years to recover from.

The goal was not to target large numbers of Hamas low-level fighters, but rather its strategic underground tunnels and infrastructure that enable it to move around masses of rockets that it has used to target Israel. More than 4,300 rockets were fired at Israel and Israel's advanced Iron Dome air defense system intercepted most of the rocket threats to Israel's cities.

In an interview with the head of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) southern command underground department, which played a key role in the recent conflict, the IDF sketched out how it went about targeting Hamas. This was a unique operation against what Israel calls the "Metro" in Gaza, a series of underground tunnels that link more than 100 kilometers beneath the Gaza Strip. It should be noted the Gaza Strip is only 41km long and between 6 and 12km wide which means that the underground tunnel system was not only extensive but crisscrossed areas underneath the civilian buildings that make up a large swath of the Gaza Strip. The area is festooned with low-rise buildings and towns and villages, making it one of the more crowded areas in the world.

While militaries in the past have faced underground tunnel networks and obstacles, from the Maginot Line to the Vietcong tunnel systems, Israel's challenge was made more complex by the presence of so many civilians. Over the years Israel has created a method for overcoming this concern, knowing that there is intense international pressure to avoid civilian casualties. These casualties occur in similar war, such as the U.S.-led Coalition bombing of the Al Jadeeda neighborhood in Mosul in March 2017 that led to more than 100 deaths.

Israel has confronted this challenge in the past and in 2009 and 2014 there are large numbers of civilian casualties, as well as large numbers of casualties among Hamas fighters. Both those wars involved a ground incursion. Israel changed tactics after 2014 and there have been fewer conflicts with Hamas. However, there were flare-ups in 2018 and 2019 that saw hundreds of rockets fired at Israel in multi-day clashes. Israel's tactic of precision airstrikes and warnings to occupied buildings reduced the casualties in those clashes to near-zero. That is also the method Israel used in airstrikes in Syria, of which there have been thousands against Iranian targets since 2015. There have been few civilian or military casualties in those extreme precision strikes. In Gaza, Israel used its JDAM munitions, acquired from the United States, as well as its extensive surveillance network of aircraft and other systems. Israel doesn't specify which aircraft or UAVs it may have used during the conflict.

"The way the Metro was built is they have logistics and through that they build the whole Metro, you can see it from visuals and every aircraft that goes into the air that takes footage you can learn a little bit about where they build," said the IDF officer whose name cannot be used for security reasons. Hamas constructed shafts into the ground with concrete to be used during the fighting. The shafts frequently are built underneath houses and Israel says that it attempted to strike the underground system usually by hitting areas that were along streets or other open areas, so as not to destroy civilian homes. Israel weighed the relative gain by hitting the buildings compared to the harm it would do to civilian infrastructure.

The underground system, according to the officer, links various villages and towns and Gaza city. "It is all connected underground," he says. "[What] we strike are the main places we know they have more military use out of it and that is the places we preferred to focus on." The Metro system enabled Hamas to launch barrages of long-range rockets, sometimes more than one hundred at a time. According to Iranian media during the recent conflict, Hamas had tried to overwhelm Israel's air defenses with these saturation rocket launches. The IDF says that after it embarked on its campaign against the Metro Hamas was less effective in targeting Israel's cities such as Tel Aviv.

The major campaign against the Metro began on Friday, May 14, with some 160 aircraft hunting down 150 targets in a night-long air campaign. As recently as February 2021, the IDF had drilled to strike up to 3,000 targets in a twenty-four-hour period. This means the campaign in Gaza was only a small example of the firepower the IDF could unleash using advanced fifth-generation jets like the F-35 stealth fighter. This comes in the context of growing tensions between Israel and Iran and Iranian proxies in the region, such as Hezbollah.

When it comes to Hamas, the decision to strike at the Metro tunnel system builds on past campaigns that confronted other Hamas threats. For instance, in 2014 Israel targeted Hamas tunnels that stretched from Gaza into Israel. Israel then constructed a unique sensory barrier underground and above ground to prevent Hamas tunneling under the border. Israel has also struck Hamas frogmen and various naval units, including an unmanned submarine in this recent war. The IDF has had to contend with Hamas ATGM units as well as cyber warfare units and now drones. The Iron Dome system downed Hamas drones for the first time in this conflict.

The importance of demolishing the Metro system was to prevent Hamas from being able to easily move rockets around underground and set up the mass barrages that can be coordinated and linked to centralized command and control. In the past, Hamas often fired several rockets at a time from less sophisticated trucks and other methods. However, Iran has perfected the use of new precision missiles and also the hiding of rockets, such as the 107mm and 122mm used by militias in Iraq, so that they can be timed and fired at a location. Hamas rockets are now much larger, including some that can reach 250km.

Destruction of the Metro was a strategic defeat for Hamas, setting it back many years.

"This [Metro] is a system they have been building for about ten years. In the 2014 war we didn't focus on this system. It wasn't as effective and they didn't have as much back then," says the IDF officer. Israel considers the system a Hamas strategy and as such demolishing it is a strategic defeat, not just a tactical one for Hamas. It sets the organization back many years.

Striking a system like this that runs throughout Gaza is possible without hitting a lot of civilian homes because if you strike to ends of a tunnel, the militants can end up being stuck inside. In addition, the strikes on the Metro appear to have specifically harmed a Hamas system. The other group in Gaza that has numerous rockets is Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Israel conducted a multi-day campaign against that group in 2019, also reducing its capabilities. It appears the groups do not share the same underground tunnels.

Israel attacked the system several days into the recent conflict. This apparently occurred when it became clear that Hamas would not stop the long-range rocket fire and Israel's political leadership took a decision to increase the pressure on Hamas. "I think we learned that Hamas counted on these tunnels and once you take it away it changes the whole fighting ground. It changed the face of these two weeks and the way Hamas uses the tools they have to fight Israel."

Hamas says that it has many more kilometers of tunnels under Gaza and Iranian media says Hamas is rebuilding its rocket arsenal already. It had some 15,000 rockets and has to replenish them. According to the IDF officer, Hamas can rebuild the system but it will take time. Hamas may have been set back ten years. "We know there are places we didn't initially strike because it is under houses and we decided it doesn't benefit us because of the damage it will cost, we know where it is and how to put it out of use in different ways," the IDF officer says.

Israel also targeted the sites Hamas uses to make the concrete for the tunnel system. "If they want to rebuild they will have harder time doing that. There are specific Hamas concrete plants they use to build the tunnels, and we struck those concrete plants in order to make them have a harder time rebuilding the tunnels if they choose to do that."

Seth J. Frantzman is a Ginsburg-Milstein Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum and senior Middle East correspondent at The Jerusalem Post.

 

Seth J. Frantzman

Source: https://www.meforum.org/62414/israel-destruction-of-hamas-metro-set-it-back

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