Latest Analysis and Commentary
by Pierre Rehov • September 20, 2026 at 5:00 am
Every peace agreement rests on an assumption that the powers charged with enforcing it want it enforced. The current roadmap for the future of Gaza is organized around the principle of one authority, one law and one weapon. Its purpose is to strip armed factions such as Hamas of their weapons, install a single Palestinian administration and prevent Hamas from reconstituting its military machine. Whether these goals can be achieved depends less on the drafting than on those who will certify compliance. A guarantor inside that architecture is effectively a judge who confirms or denies compliance, arbitrates disputes and applies pressure to whichever party breaks its word. The relevant question is what pressure Turkey and Qatar are likely to apply to Hamas. "Qatar is at the top of funding terrorism worldwide.... Even more than Iran." — Udi Levy, former senior official of Israel's Mossad spy agency who dealt with economic warfare against terrorist organizations, YNet, April 18, 2024. "Qatar has adopted an extremely smart strategy based on the Muslim Brotherhood doctrine, which believes in gaining influence initially through financial means in order to create sympathy for them and alignment with their views... With Israel, the strategy was to develop economic, intelligence, and political relations without evolving into full diplomatic relations... It is easy to be captivated by the money, the grandeur, and the charm." — Udi Levy, YNet, April 2, 2025. Supporters of Turkey's inclusion as a guarantor on the Board of Peace appear to regard its closeness to Hamas as an asset. They argue that a government able to speak directly to Hamas is better placed to extract concessions from it. The argument holds only if one chooses not to look at what Erdogan has built at home. Since 2016, Turkey's government has closed more than 1,500 foundations and associations and replaced thousands of judges and prosecutors with loyalists. Ekrem Imamoglu, the mayor of Istanbul and Erdogan's most plausible challenger, was arrested in March 2025, days before his nomination as the opposition's presidential candidate, and was later charged with 142 offenses carrying a possible sentence of more than two thousand years in prison. A government that runs its own courts this way is an odd candidate for a supposedly disinterested judgment of somebody else's compliance. Erdogan -- who has also threatened Greece and Cyprus by announcing that "Turkey will not allow violations of its rights or what belongs to it" -- has never condemned the Hamas massacre. People who support terrorism rather than prosecute it are not likely to conclude that violence does not pay. Verification is worth exactly as much as the verifier, and Ankara has already demonstrated what it prefers to leave out. On March 22, 2026, [Ibrahim Kalin, director of Turkey's National Intelligence Organization] hosted a delegation from Hamas's political bureau in Istanbul. The published summaries of that meeting covered Israeli military operations and the rejection of any "deal" in Gaza. Disarming Hamas, the central provision of the American framework, went unmentioned. The omission is the entire problem in miniature. What the Gaza roadmap requires goes well beyond photographs of surrendered rifles and staged ceremonies before cameras of the international media. The roadmap requires the dismantling of a complete military ecosystem: command structures, logistics, financing, recruitment, weapons manufacturing, intelligence networks and the tunnels beneath Gaza's neighborhoods, schools and hospitals. Washington estimates seven to eight months for a process that will generate a dispute at every stage. When inspectors disagree over concealed weapons or continued terrorist activity, someone has to make the decision. When Hamas declares itself compliant and Israeli intelligence concludes otherwise, someone has to choose which account to certify. Turkey has spent years demonstrating which way it leans. Israel has also told the Board of Peace that it objects to Qatari and Turkish participation in verifying the roadmap's stages. An American official answered that both countries have been essential partners in holding the ceasefire together. That is a defensible claim about mediation, but quite a different claim from the one the roadmap actually advances, which is that Turkey can be trusted to certify the disarmament of a terrorist organization it has spent 15 years protecting. The plan's drafters have insisted that the framework will rest on verification rather than trust. Applied to at least two of the proposed verifiers, Turkey and Qatar, this standard should be sufficient to remove them from the panel. The first contested phase will reveal whether either country even intends to comply with the requirement, or if they see their positions as outlasting the Trump Administration to make sure that Hamas will not disarm.
For over 20 years, the governments of Turkish President (and former Prime Minister) Recep Tayyip Erdogan have functioned as Hamas's principal political protectors. Days after the October 7, 2023 massacre, he told his parliamentary group that Hamas is "a group of mujahideen defending their lands." Pictured: Erdogan (right) welcomes Hamas leaders Khaled Mashaal (center) and the late Ismail Haniyeh in Ankara on June 18, 2013. (Photo by Yasin Bulbul/AFP via Getty Images)
Every peace agreement rests on an assumption that the powers charged with enforcing it want it enforced. The 15-point roadmap announced on July 30 by the US-led Board of Peace asks the world to extend that assumption to four guarantor states -- Egypt, Qatar, the United States and Turkey -- which together are to supervise the transfer of civilian and security authority in Gaza from Hamas to a committee of Palestinian technocrats. Turkey's and Qatar's presence on that list is unfathomable. For over 20 years, the governments of Turkish President (and former Prime Minister) Recep Tayyip Erdogan have functioned as Hamas's principal political protectors. Their records have drawn less scrutiny than the plan their countries are now expected to police.
Continue Reading Article
by Amir Taheri • September 20, 2026 at 4:00 am
Time will tell, but my hunch is that al-Zaidi, indeed a whole new generation of Iraqi politicians, long to free themselves from the shackles imposed by the Khomeinists in post-Saddam times. A government that cannot prevent foreign-backed militias from firing missiles and drones at another country cannot be seen as a serious partner in defense and security matters. In that context al-Zaidi's record so far is mixed at best. That is good but not good enough because the groups concerned will keep some of their weapons and a softer version of their chain of command nominally under a larger official command and control system. Three other militia groups, in fact the wildest, have wiggled out of any accord with al-Zaidi's government using the excuse of "fighting ISIS" as a fig leaf. Their dissolution is a sine qua non for Iraq being accepted as a serious partner for the European Union. Iraq also needs to reassert the authority of the central government, ensure greater harmony between the two parts of the Kurdish Region, demarcate its continental shelf line with Kuwait, forge closer ties with the Gulf Cooperation Council and Jordan, and help open and reactivate the Shatt al-Arab without necessarily adopting a hostile posture against Iran. Apart from the quixotic operations of Tehran proxies mentioned above, Iraq has managed to steer clear of the imbroglio that has led to a senseless war in the region. Can al-Zaidi seize that opportunity? The answer is: yes, if. A big if.
A key test for Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi is whether he can deliver on the promise to disband militia groups that often act as a state within the state. It seems that both French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz spent a good part of their meetings with al-Zaidi to hammer in that "urgent need." Pictured: Macron shakes hands with al-Zaidi during at the Élysée Palace in Paris on September 14, 2026. (Photo by Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images)
"Yes, but with a big but!" This was the answer that speaking on condition of anonymity, French officials responded to our question whether they were impressed by visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Ali Falih al-Zaidi. The yes part was about finding the 41-year-old al-Zaidi, a young politician, with enough charisma to ensure a longer run in Iraqi politics where since the end of the Baathist rule meteoric rises and falls have been the norm. The but part was about whether the new boy on the block would show enough backbone to take on a motley of domestic and foreign forces determined to keep post-Baath Iraq in limbo. As is often the case, a number of gold fountain pens were used to initial a series of memoranda of understanding with both the French state and private corporations. The partly state-owned energy giant TotalEnergies agreed to increase its investments in Iraq from $12 to $16 billion without specifying a timespan.
Continue Reading Article
by Majid Rafizadeh • September 19, 2026 at 5:00 am
What Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald J. Trump have been doing is not just battling terrorist groups; they have been preventing these groups from achieving their main goal: taking over Western civilization. The core ideology of groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis -- like the Iranian regime -- is not influence, trade or partnerships; it is ideological dominance. Their efforts actually center on trying to destroy all non-Muslims, as well as other Muslims that each group considers not Muslim enough. Doctrinally, every Muslim is committed to killing polytheists (such as Hindus) and to domination over "infidels" such as Christians and Jews -- as well as the to the broader project of imposing their vision over the inferior, secular West with its man-made laws (in contrast to Islam's divine, Allah-made sharia law). Democratic institutions are an abomination to Islamists. Trump's approach — combining maximum pressure sanctions, diplomatic isolation of Tehran, and open support for Israel's right to defend itself — has sought to deny Iran's regime the resources and international legitimacy it needs to sustain its proxy network to curtail their ability to project power and ideology across the Middle East and into North America, Latin America and Europe. If there is no serious resistance, the same gradual process that transformed Iran into a hell for its people and hollowed out Lebanese sovereignty can take root in Western democracies. Demographic change, parallel legal systems, political entryism, and the systematic intimidation of critics create the conditions for a determined, incremental takeover. Even demographically, such a transformation becomes impossible to reverse. The fight that Trump and Netanyahu are presently conducting is not intended only to neutralize terrorist organizations. It is trying to prevent Western civilization, democracy, and freedom from falling under the control of an extremist ideology that openly seeks their replacement. The least that European and other Western countries can do is to support these efforts — militarily, financially and diplomatically — by refusing to disparage those countries courageously fighting to preserve their freedoms, won at the cost of so many lives, and by refusing to legitimize terror groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis, as well as the regime in Iran whose constitution and leaders have committed it to a global struggle until their vision prevails.
What Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald J. Trump have been doing is not just battling terrorist groups; they have been preventing these groups from achieving their main goal: taking over Western civilization. Pictured: Trump meets with Netanyahu at the White House in Washington, DC, on April 7, 2025. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)
What Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald J. Trump have been doing is not just battling terrorist groups; they have been preventing these groups from achieving their main goal: taking over Western civilization. The core ideology of groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis -- like the Iranian regime -- is not influence, trade or partnerships; it is ideological dominance. Their efforts actually center on trying to destroy all non-Muslims, as well as other Muslims that each group considers not Muslim enough. Doctrinally, every Muslim is committed to killing polytheists (such as Hindus) and to domination over "infidels" such as Christians and Jews -- as well as the to the broader project of imposing their vision over the inferior, secular West with its man-made laws (in contrast to Islam's divine, Allah-made sharia law). Democratic institutions are an abomination to Islamists.
Continue Reading Article
by Nils A. Haug • September 18, 2026 at 5:00 am
What matters most to Israelis at this time, according to Israel's former ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, is a domestic matter: that of the forthcoming October elections. While many parties in Israel criticize Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for political gain and do their best to unseat him, it is to be hoped that he will once again emerge as prime minister of a new government following the elections. There does not appear to be a candidate of his stature or experience – or Churchillian determination to protect both Israel and the West. As leader of the coalition government's largest party, Likud, Netanyahu saw that the policy of former Israeli governments towards terrorism from Gaza -- "mowing the lawn" every few years in an effort to contain constant Hamas attacks -- had proved to be a devastating miscalculation. In 1946, Israel's future founding prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, explained to a young Shimon Peres – a future prime minister and president of Israel himself: "A statesman must decide, one way or the other: to go for peace and pay the price, or to make war, knowing what the risks and dangers are." The second socio-political concern is that of applying Israel's compulsory military draft to Haredi ("ultra-Orthodox") men. Israel's Supreme Court, after decades of delay, finally ordered eligible Haredi men to be conscripted in line with those from all other eligible sectors of Israel's population.... The issue continues to divide society. The third concern pertains to the problematic omnipotence of Israel's Supreme Court, in a country where there is no constitution and no enumerated separation of powers.... A crucial doctrine of democracy -- the separation of powers between the three branches of government -- has been disregarded by Israel's Supreme Court, which does not require a plaintiff's standing to hear a case, and makes inroads into the domains of the executive and the legislature (the Knesset).
While many parties in Israel criticize Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for political gain and do their best to unseat him, it is to be hoped that he will once again emerge as prime minister of a new government following the elections. There does not appear to be a candidate of his stature or experience – or Churchillian determination to protect both Israel and the West. Pictured: Netanyahu addresses a session of the Knesset in Jerusalem on June 11, 2025. (Photo by Menahem Kahana/AFP via Getty Images)
Most Americans, particularly Jews in America, might believe that the Israelis' primary concern is the never-ending military confrontations in Iran, Gaza, and Lebanon. Perhaps, perhaps not. What matters most to Israelis at this time, according to Israel's former ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, is a domestic matter: that of the forthcoming October elections. These elections will decisively direct the future of the nation, for better or worse.
Continue Reading Article
by Khaled Abu Toameh • September 17, 2026 at 5:00 am
Dr. Fadel Ashour, a [Palestinian] psychiatrist, behavioral-science professor and political analyst, has described in unusually blunt terms the psychological, social and political damage caused by Hamas and its ideology, which is rooted in Islamist principles, rejection of Israel's existence, armed struggle and the establishment of an Islamic Palestinian state in its place. His message is urgent: Gaza cannot be rebuilt merely by putting up new buildings, repairing roads, or providing humanitarian assistance. The Palestinians' entire mindset must be rebuilt. "Over 20-25 years [of Hamas rule], a culture was established that normalized violence, legalized it, and glorified death as if it were a means of survival. This is extremely dangerous for an entire generation that grew up saturated with this culture." — Dr. Fadel Ashour, Palestinian psychiatrist, interview, Jusoor News, September 13, 2026. "A society that wants to win achieves victory through building, not through death and violence... When you open a school or a university, that is a victory. When you build a prosperous society that doesn't push its youth to flee, that is a victory. Making their lives a hell that everyone wants to escape from is a defeat." — Dr. Fadel Ashour, interview, Jusoor News, September 13, 2026. If Hamas is merely regarded as another political faction, then the international community will continue to accommodate a terrorist group, negotiate with a terrorist group, and incorporate a terrorist group into Gaza's political system. If Hamas, however, is understood from the outset as an Islamist armed organization that created a parallel society and subordinated Gaza's interests to its ideology and military objectives, the policy implications will be entirely different. "They [Hamas's leaders] took complete control of Gaza's economy. They crushed the commercial class, became the merchants, the importers, and the tax collectors themselves... They exploited society in a parasitic manner." — Dr. Fadel Ashour, interview, Jusoor News, September 13, 2026. "Hamas controlled the incoming external aid, taking it and selling it to fund itself... In the very midst of death and extreme poverty, they were looking to fund themselves from the begging done on behalf of the people.... Fundamentalist groups like this, are obsessed with two things: gaining access to money and getting that television shot for their media." — Dr. Fadel Ashour, interview, Jusoor News, September 13, 2026. What is important is the broad picture Ashour presents: an Islamist terrorist group that claims to exist for the Palestinian people has instead become an instrument for controlling, exploiting, and indoctrinating them. His assessment should be required viewing for anyone negotiating with Hamas. The question is not whether Hamas will hand over some weapons or accept a temporary political arrangement. The question is whether Gaza can ever develop a fundamentally different political and social culture while Hamas's ideology remains embedded in its society and institutions. Ashour is warning the international community not to make the mistake of believing that Gaza's problem can be solved simply by reaching an agreement with Hamas's leaders. A society cannot simultaneously teach its children that martyrdom and violence are heroic and expect these same children to build peaceful institutions, prosperous businesses, universities, and a functioning political system. That is why allowing Hamas to retain a political and military role — particularly by including Hamas-affiliated political figures in future elections — would only perpetuate the problem Ashour is describing. The members of the Board of Peace and the international community need to ask themselves a basic question: Hamas's ideology has helped produce a culture of violence, death, and destruction, so can Gaza really be successfully rebuilt while that ideology — along with its institutional machinery for perpetuating it — remains intact? The answer, it would seem, is unfortunately not.
A society cannot simultaneously teach its children that martyrdom and violence are heroic and expect these same children to build peaceful institutions, prosperous businesses, universities, and a functioning political system. Pictured: A Hamas gunman stands in a crowd of human shields in Deir el-Balah, Gaza Strip on October 13, 2025. (Photo by Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images)
For years, politicians, activists, journalists and organizations around the world have claimed to speak on behalf of the Palestinians. Many have blamed Israel for virtually every Palestinian problem while treating the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas as legitimate "resistance" movements whose political and military role should be preserved. Now, a Palestinian psychiatrist who has lived and worked in the Gaza Strip is offering a rather different diagnosis. Dr. Fadel Ashour, a psychiatrist, behavioral-science professor and political analyst, has described in unusually blunt terms the psychological, social and political damage caused by Hamas and its ideology, which is rooted in Islamist principles, rejection of Israel's existence, armed struggle and the establishment of an Islamic Palestinian state in its place.
Continue Reading Article
by Grégoire Canlorbe • September 16, 2026 at 5:00 am
Stealth jihad is well advanced in the U.S., with the entire American left enabling and aiding the expansion of Muslim political power, without realizing or caring that they are supporting a radically intolerant and supremacist ideology. We see in particular [in Europe] the increase of churches being bought and transformed into mosques. Muslims in general prefer this to building new buildings: the transformation of a church into a mosque is for them a visible manifestation of Islam's victory, superiority over Christianity, and coming hegemony. Hundreds of years of jihad attacks weakened and ultimately destroyed the Roman Empire in Constantinople. The failure to get help from the West... played a large role in Constantinople's ultimate fall, as well as disunity among the leaders of the empire itself. Some were even short-sighted and self-serving enough to seek and obtain help from Muslim forces. The U.S. faces a similar threat from short-sighted and self-serving leaders of our own. The Democrats are busy encouraging the growth of Muslim political power, while insisting on ignoring the political, supremacist, expansionist and violent aspects of Sharia. Few politicians are aware of the nature and magnitude of the threat, or are resolved to do anything about it. If this continues, we will eventually face our own May 29, 1453 -- the fall of Constantinople .... [P]robably all religions are affected, even though there are some notable individuals who have not been afraid to speak out -- or prevented from doing so.
"Stealth jihad is well advanced in the U.S., with the entire American left enabling and aiding the expansion of Muslim political power, without realizing or caring that they are supporting a radically intolerant and supremacist ideology." — Robert Spencer. (Image source: Jihad Watch YouTube channel)
Robert Bruce Spencer is a Christian American scholar writing on topics including Islam, Orthodoxy, and the Byzantine Empire. The director of Jihad Watch, he is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He has led seminars on Islam and jihad for organizations like the FBI, the United States Central Command, and the U.S. intelligence community. Grégoire Canlorbe: Please tell us about the different ways of jihad. What is the extent of their work in the U.S. and elsewhere in the world? Robert Spencer: There are many forms of jihad. Besides armed jihad, there is jihad of the tongue, jihad of the pen, jihad of the pocketbook and many more. The goal of all of them is to destroy the existing order of non-Muslim states and replace that order with the hegemony of Sharia.
Continue Reading Article
by Lawrence Kadish • September 16, 2026 at 4:00 am
Pictured: US President Donald Trump displays an executive order related to artificial intelligence regulation, in the White House on December 11, 2025, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Imagine the following scenario: Albert Einstein pens his famous letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II, warning him that the Nazi Germany has the scientists and the means to produce a weapon of enormous destructive power. It would be called the atomic bomb. But, in this scenario, Einstein then says it could unleash untold devastation on humanity, so do not build it. The Nazis, under no such compunction, accomplish such a challenge and the world as we currently know it is just a lengthening shadow of what might have been. That is exactly what is occurring in the debate over whether the United States' current lead in artificial intelligence should be placed in shackles. It is also why President Donald J. Trump, a student of history, recognizes that in doing so we would be handing Communist China an enormous strategic advantage in their pursuit of global dominance.
Continue Reading Article
by Gordon G. Chang • September 15, 2026 at 5:00 am
By not adopting resolute approaches, the United States and partners have allowed bad actors to bring the world closer to global conflict. Xi is apparently trying to "encircle the cities from the countryside." Today, the Chinese leader considers places like Ukraine to be countryside and America the most important city. Xi has been busy disrupting the world. "Great chaos under Heaven achieves great order under Heaven," wrote Mao Zedong in 1966 in a letter to his wife, Jiang Qing, referring to his goal of establishing worldwide Chinese rule. Xi, throughout this century, has been making references to the imperial era notion that Chinese leaders not only had the right to rule tianxia — "all under Heaven" — but had the obligation to do so. America has to confront the Chinese state wherever the Chinese state confronts the world. Every fight — Xi Jinping is now waging proxy wars on three continents — has therefore become critical if not part of an existential struggle. China and Russia have not chosen to fight the United States directly since the Korean War, but they are getting close, in both Ukraine and Iran. Both conflicts now are proxy contests. In the late 1930s separate wars merged into what we now call World War II. "The question may therefore be not whether World War III is imminent but how many simultaneous regional wars can occur before the distinction between regional conflict and world war loses strategic meaning." — David Maxwell, vice president of the Center for Asia Pacific Strategy, to the author, September 2026.
Chinese Communist Party Chairman Xi Jinping has been busy disrupting the world. "Great chaos under Heaven achieves great order under Heaven," wrote Mao Zedong in 1966 in a letter to his wife, Jiang Qing, referring to his goal of establishing worldwide Chinese rule. Xi, throughout this century, has been making references to the imperial era notion that Chinese leaders not only had the right to rule tianxia — "all under Heaven" — but had the obligation to do so. Pictured: Xi arrives before the start of the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi on September 12, 2026. (Photo by Alexander Kazakov/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
"No, we are not on the eve of World War III," writes Leon Hadar in Asia Times. "What's actually happening in 2026 is not the slow ignition of a single global war," he adds. "It's the slow unwinding of the postwar America-led order, playing out simultaneously in half a dozen theaters that don't yet cohere into one fight." Whether Hadar is correct or not, a friend mentioned in June that "the world is all out of control." In our out-of-control world, the pace of change is accelerating. As Vladimir Lenin reportedly said, "There are decades when nothing happens, and there are weeks when decades happen." In this period of rapid change, Hadar admits there are regional wars but finds them "a symptom of disorder rather than a step toward global war."
Continue Reading Article
by Bassam Tawil • September 14, 2026 at 5:00 am
Both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority [PA] owe the Palestinian people – as well as Israelis and other victims – countless apologies. They owe apologies for corruption and mismanagement. They owe apologies for failing to build transparent and accountable institutions. They owe apologies for suppressing dissent and freedom of expression and for persecuting political opponents, journalists, human rights activists, and critics. They owe apologies for repeatedly rejecting compromises and peace initiatives and for policies that have contributed to decades of Israeli and Palestinian bloodshed. They owe apologies for failing to use international assistance to build a functioning economy and institutions that serve ordinary Palestinians. They owe their people an honest explanation for why Palestinians remain divided between two rival governments and without a functioning democratic political system. The timing of this latest dispute is particularly significant. Hamas has decided to participate [in the upcoming PA elections on November 28]... if true, such an arrangement would allow Hamas to re-enter Palestinian politics through the back door. So, instead of changing its goals – brutally ruling Gaza and destroying Israel – Hamas will simply change its "name, structure and framework"? Changing the label does not change the organization. A Hamas-affiliated candidate does not cease to be affiliated with Hamas simply because the word "Hamas" does not appear next to his name on the ballot. Such a maneuver would turn the election into a political fiction: Hamas would be permitted to obtain parliamentary representation while avoiding the political consequences of openly running as Hamas. Allowing Hamas— in disguise or not – to run in the election would also legitimize the terrorist group without requiring it fundamentally to change. That would be a serious mistake. The Palestinians have already seen what happens when Hamas acquires political power. Hamas is bad, but who said that the PA is any better? Palestinians have experienced corruption, political repression, and an absence of meaningful political renewal. The problem is: What if one of the negotiating parties decides never to come to the table? Is the other party just supposed to hold everything in abeyance – unsettled forever – in case one day the other party might change its mind? The Palestinians need a genuine third way – not merely another faction with a different name. They need leaders who are prepared to challenge the entrenched political culture of Fatah and Hamas. They need leaders who believe that the Palestinian national interest is more important than factional interests. They need leaders willing to confront corruption, reject authoritarianism, protect freedom of expression, build functioning institutions, and end the glorification of violence. Above all, Palestinians need leaders courageous enough to tell their people an uncomfortable truth: there can be no genuine progress so long as the political choice remains confined to Fatah and Hamas, and that the primary objective of both groups remains the obliteration of Israel.
The Palestinians remain trapped between two bad choices: the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Iran-backed Hamas terrorist group. The Palestinians have tried both. The result has been corruption, authoritarianism, political repression, terrorism, violence, division and, ultimately, immense suffering for the Palestinian people. Pictured: Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal (R) and PA President Mahmoud Abbas (L) are hosted by Qatar's then Emir Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani at a ceremony in Doha, Qatar on February 6, 2012. (Photo by AFP via Getty Images)
The Palestinians remain trapped between two bad choices: the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Iran-backed Hamas terrorist group. The Palestinians have tried both. The result has been corruption, authoritarianism, political repression, terrorism, violence, division and, ultimately, immense suffering for the Palestinian people. Yet, as the Palestinians prepare for another parliamentary election, they are once again being offered essentially the same political choice. The latest quarrel between Fatah and Hamas illustrates the problem.
Continue Reading Article
by Pierre Rehov • September 13, 2026 at 5:00 am
The human rights industry's favorite kind of victim is the politically useful one: the victim whose suffering can be attached to an adversary — a designated "villain" — preferably one that Western activists already know how to hate, pressure and organize against. That is why Palestinian victims, when Israel can be cast as an alleged perpetrator of wrongs, generate an extraordinary machinery of outrage, while Sudanese victims of genocide, Afghan women under the Taliban, Iranian protesters murdered by their own regime, or persecuted Christians in Nigeria largely do not. The hierarchy is not determined by the severity of the suffering; it is determined by the political usefulness of the victim and, even more importantly, by the identity of the "villain" supposedly committing these wrongs. A United Nations fact-finding mission concluded in February 2026 that the mass executions, gang rapes and engineered starvation... in Sudan bore the hallmarks of genocide, and that genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference the evidence allowed. The finding produced -- communiqués! No American campus has been covered with Sudanese encampments. No international campaign demands that corporations prove their innocence regarding Khartoum.... No permanent encampment stands outside Harvard demanding freedom for Afghan women, no divestment movement has become fashionable, no symbol has reached a red carpet. UN Women warns that the repression is being normalized.... The women remain where they were; the audience has left. The West's response to Iran's January massacre took the form of diaspora rallies and a condemnation signed by 800 film professionals. The industry that produced five thousand signatures against Israeli film festivals produced eight hundred against a government that had just shot thousands of its own citizens in 48 hours, and its own trade press said so. The American students who occupied buildings for Gaza risked nothing worse than a disciplinary hearing and offered the Iranian protesters nothing. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, which has spent seventeen years asking Washington to treat Nigeria as a country of particular concern, counts nearly 53,000 civilians killed there in targeted violence since 2009. [A] successful cause needs more than victims. The favorite victim is not the one who suffers most, but the one whose suffering can be put to political use. A successful cause needs a usable "villain," ideally one already circulating in the narrative. Israel serves that purpose almost perfectly. It is Western-aligned, democratic, backed by Washington and permanently accessible to journalists. Its politicians answer questions, its courts rule against its government, and all of it can be pressured. Western outrage has acquired a political economy: a successful cause needs more than victims. It needs a usable villain, ideally one already circulating in the narrative. Israel serves that purpose almost perfectly. It is Western-aligned, democratic, backed by Washington and permanently accessible to journalists. Its politicians answer questions, its courts rule against its government, and all of it can be pressured. Nothing comparable can be organized against the Taliban. Dictatorships make poor targets for performative activism because dictators are immune to performance. Attacking Israel connects an activist to an apparatus of campus groups, NGOs and networks assembled over decades, with the slogans pre-written and the vocabulary standardized. A 19-year-old needs to know nothing about the Middle East to take part. He needs a placard. Sudan requires homework, and knowing about Iran's regime would require him to concede that the enemies of American power are frequently worse than what they oppose. Consistency is the one thing the machinery fails to supply. A movement that really meant what it says about universal rights would mobilize for captives whose slaveholders, such as Qatar, enjoy vast assets. It would protest child trafficking and organ harvesting, and defend Afghan women and Iranian dissidents. Palestinian civilians would be defended as civilians rather than as evidence. Such a movement would be difficult to manipulate, impossible to monetize and useless to every exploiting faction, which explains well enough why nobody has built one.
A UN fact-finding mission concluded in February 2026 that the mass executions, gang rapes and engineered starvation in Sudan bore the hallmarks of genocide, and that genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference the evidence allowed. The finding produced -- communiqués! No American campus has been covered with Sudanese encampments. No international campaign demands that corporations prove their innocence regarding Khartoum. Pictured: Sudanese Armed Forces soldiers take part in a parade on August 17, 2026, in the city of Gedaref in eastern Sudan. (Photo by AFP via Getty Images)
The human rights industry's favorite kind of victim is the politically useful one: the victim whose suffering can be attached to an adversary — a designated "villain" — preferably one that Western activists already know how to hate, pressure and organize against. That is why Palestinian victims, when Israel can be cast as an alleged perpetrator of wrongs, generate an extraordinary machinery of outrage, while Sudanese victims of genocide, Afghan women under the Taliban, Iranian protesters murdered by their own regime, or persecuted Christians in Nigeria largely do not. The hierarchy is not determined by the severity of the suffering; it is determined by the political usefulness of the victim and, even more importantly, by the identity of the "villain" supposedly committing these wrongs.
Continue Reading Article
by Amir Taheri • September 13, 2026 at 4:00 am
The commission asked why it was that terrorists especially hated America but provided no answer. The answer could be found in hundreds of books, articles and sermons that make the rounds across the globe, including in the United States itself. In fact, though you might find it odd, the bulk of what the global anti-American industry produces comes from the US itself. The US is an "evil animal" because it can bite back when bitten. The 9/11 Commission failed in its mission. The culture war between the MAGA camp and the wokeist coalition of crypto-communists and bleeding heart liberals shows that the failure has continued for a quarter of a century. The hate-America ailment has crept even into the commemoration ritual in New York.
This year, however, there was a small but significant change in the mise-en-scène of the annual commemoration of the September 11, 2001 attacks, as families of victims reportedly planned to shun Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who does not endorse the generally accepted narrative of what was the biggest terror attack in history. In other words, a tragedy that initially brought all Americans together in anger and grief may now forge into another fissure along partisan lines, at least in New York. Pictured: Mamdani arrives ahead of the ceremony at the National September 11 Memorial in New York on September 11, 2026. (Photo by Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images)
On Friday morning, the great city of New York once again held a ritual ceremony that has become a fixed part of its annual agenda for a quarter of a century. The names of the 2,977 men, women and children who died in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center's twin towers on September 11 are read aloud while millions of Americans watch the commemoration on TV with a mixture of grief and anger. This year, however, there was a small but significant change in the mise-en-scène of the annual event, as families of victims reportedly planned to shun Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who does not endorse the generally accepted narrative of what was the biggest terror attack in history. In other words, a tragedy that initially brought all Americans together in anger and grief may now forge into another fissure along partisan lines, at least in New York.
Continue Reading Article
by Majid Rafizadeh • September 12, 2026 at 5:00 am
One of the most effective methods Israel used to weaken Hezbollah and Hamas was the systematic targeting and removal of leadership. Trump started to use the same tactic, then stopped. Reapplying it would deliver a helpful message that the regime cannot continue on its current path. If the US is concerned that then there might not be anyone with whom to make a "deal," the US should not be looking for a deal. A "deal" will not be honored by Iran, anyway. The US should be looking for unconditional surrender. Iran's rulers, who have murdered an estimated 100,000 of their own citizens, clearly could not care less if a million oil tankers are hit or if "ordinary Iranians" cannot buy food or fuel. Whatever happened to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's threat to reclaim for the people of Iran their leaders' secret bank accounts in the British Virgin Islands and $100 million villas? The United Arab Emirates, after Iran targeted its territory with missiles and drones, once again highlighted the decisive, farsighted leadership of President Mohamed bin Zayed al Nahyan to cut trade and financial relations with Iran. Severing relations with Iran's regime should become the standard. It would be a blessing to eliminate this Islamist regime – and as soon as we can. It has spread terrorism, anti-Americanism, antisemitism and the sickening repression of a great people for nearly five decades. The opportunity is here. Let us get it done.
The United Arab Emirates, after Iran targeted its territory with missiles and drones, once again highlighted the decisive, farsighted leadership of President Mohamed bin Zayed al Nahyan to cut trade and financial relations with Iran. Severing relations with Iran's regime should become the standard. Pictured: Al Nahyan meets with US President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the G7 summit, on June 16, 2026 in Evian-les-Bains, France. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
For a start, it is essential not to buy into the Iranian regime's staged display of defiant statements. They all aim to convince the world that nothing has changed and that the regime remains firmly in control. The desired audience is most likely the Iranian people being held hostage and the United States and Israel, to persuade them to abandon a campaign that, in reality, is bringing the country to its knees. Do not buy this act. The regime is fighting for its survival, presumably to outlast either the US midterm elections, or, second best, the term of President Donald J. Trump. "The main task," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu clarified the situation, "is to bring down the terror regime in Iran. We are very close to that. We know that the entire axis will ultimately collapse."
Continue Reading Article
by Robert Williams • September 11, 2026 at 5:00 am
Britain is falling – hard. Worse, the British government appears to be facilitating its fall. The tiny village of Piddington – population 350 people – is about to receive 1,250 male illegal immigrants, who will be housed at a local former military base. The village's inhabitants, who are terrified, are saying they will declare independence and have called on US President Donald Trump to support them. The results of Britain's changing demographics are available for all to see. In the working-class communities, where immigrants have historically moved, Britons such as Tommy Robinson were vilified and treated as enemies of the state for pointing out a few hair-raising facts, such as the increasing criminalization of free speech, out-of-control censorship and the mind-numbing number of rapes and other sexual attacks by asylum seekers in Britain. In 2002-03 there were approximately 16,400 police-recorded rape offenses, a number that has reached a peak of about 71,000–74,700 as of July 2026. And these are just the ones that are reported. The British government, however, does not want the public to know how many rapists are foreigners: Although the government was ordered to release statistics with offenders' nationalities, the government is fighting that ruling. The invasion of Britain is happening at multiple levels. Birmingham's city council is seeking a court injunction to ban activists from the "Raise the Colours" campaign – a patriotic movement of British pride – and others from flying British and English flags from lampposts in the city citing "public safety." They want people who defy such a potential order to go to prison. As outlandish as this sounds, they are likely to be successful.... Fly your own flag in your own country and you will be fined and sent to prison. The UK no longer belongs to its own people. In other news, since 2023, MI5, MI6 and the Government Communications Headquarters (Britain's "intelligence, security and cyber agency") have been running a Summer Intelligence Internship, a sort of recruitment effort from which white people are explicitly excluded... The authorities are not even hiding it anymore: Safeguarding Britain from threats is not even on the agenda. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is, and who cares whether those who apply are even right for the job?
The question that so many Brits are presumably asking themselves these days is not only why the British government thinks it a good idea to allow continued illegal immigration into the country, but why men from the third world in particular, who think raping women and children is normal, should be allowed to set foot on British soil at all. Pictured: Illegal migrants try to board a dinghy to cross the English Channel to Britain, on June 30, 2026 in Wissant, France. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)
"Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith," Winston Churchill wrote of Islam in the late 1890s when he was still a young man. "It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science — the science against which it had vainly struggled — the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome."
It now reads like a prophecy about the current fate of the country he led. Britain is falling – hard. Worse, the British government appears to be facilitating its fall.
Continue Reading Article
by Lawrence Kadish • September 10, 2026 at 1:00 pm
A quarter-century after September 11, 2001, it is worth remembering that the warning signs were not invisible in the years — and even in the hours — before that day. We cannot afford that strategic error a second time — not against the enemies we already know, and not against a nuclear-armed Iran we still have time to prevent. (Photo by Robert Giroux/Getty Images)
Tomorrow marks 25 years since the attacks of September 11, 2001 shattered America's complacency and changed the course of the world. A quarter-century later, it is worth remembering that the warning signs were not invisible in the years — and even in the hours — before that day. On that morning, the hijacked airliners struck the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field (a flight forced down and believed bound for Washington, D.C). Readers of The Washington Times opened an essay that began with a question that, within hours, would no longer be theoretical: Imagine a popular restaurant in Manhattan's Times Square blown to bits by a terrorist's bomb. Would Americans demand an immediate and aggressive effort to prevent the next attack — or would they prefer a wringing of hands so as not to perpetuate a "cycle of violence"?
Continue Reading Article
by Bassam Tawil • September 10, 2026 at 5:00 am
After acknowledging the October 7 massacre, these Western governments still insist that the answer is to accelerate the creation of a Palestinian state next to Israel. This is a political fantasy. As the British journalist Jonathan Sacerdoti shrewdly asks, "What if the Palestinians do not want two states, and never have?" The planned boycott only demonstrates how disconnected these governments are from the human and economic realities on the ground. While politicians in European capitals lecture Israelis and Palestinians about coexistence, Israelis and Palestinians are already practicing it in countless workplaces. There are Jewish-owned factories, supermarkets, restaurants, wineries, and other businesses in the West Bank, where Palestinians and Israelis work together. These workplaces may not constitute a political peace agreement, but they represent something that boycott campaigns destroy: normal human contact and economic cooperation. Boycotts are not a substitute for peace negotiations. They are certainly not a substitute for Palestinian recognition of Israel. Whatever one's position on settlements, it is difficult to see how depriving Palestinians of jobs advances Palestinian prosperity or Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation. Extremist Palestinians do not regard Israel as a country next to which to they want their own state, They regard all of Israel as one big settlement — to be permanently uprooted and replaced as soon as possible. These extremists are no different from the jihadists in Europe who rape, mow down, and behead the citizens of the very countries now demanding that Israel tolerate the same terrorists that they so naively accept. Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other Islamist terror organizations do not seek more Israeli-Palestinian economic cooperation. They seek confrontation, separation, and ultimately the elimination of infidels in the very countries now working to empower them. For decades, Western governments have repeated the phrase as if saying it often enough will make it happen -- or even make it a good idea. Hamas transformed Gaza into a heavily armed Islamist war machine... The question Western leaders should be asking is not: "How can we establish a Palestinian state?" The questions they should be asking are: What kind of Palestinian state would be established, who would control it, what would its security forces look like, what would its relationship with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad be, and what guarantees would prevent it from becoming another armed base for attacks against Israel? Any territory in which terrorist groups are not totally disarmed will simply be a launching pad from which to continue attacking Israel. This goal is probably why countries that would like to see Israel eliminated — apart from those in Europe — such as Turkey, Qatar, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, are eager to be part of a Board of Peace. They would be placed right on Israel's border to wait a few months until President Donald Trump is gone. Western governments would not tolerate an Islamist terrorist organization establishing a heavily armed state or quasi-state entity on their own borders. Why should Israel? Would the British accept an Islamist army operating immediately outside London? Would France accept a terrorist organization armed and financed by jihadist-run sovereign wealth funds establishing itself on the outskirts of Paris? If Western governments genuinely want to help the Palestinians, they should stop treating a Palestinian state as the ultimate objective and start talking about the importance of freedom of speech and of the press, separation of mosque and state, a serious education system that could prepare youths for lucrative jobs, businesses that could see growth, a judiciary that delivers equal justice under the law, and a government that is actually accountable to the public and responsive to the productive lives of its citizens — not a regime promoting murder, martyrdom and death. Conditions should also include the Palestinian recognition of Israel's right to exist, the abandonment of terrorism and jihadist ideology, the dismantling and disarming of all terrorist organizations, an end to incitement against Israel and Jews in schools and mosques, serious reform of the Palestinian Authority education system, transparent and accountable government, and an end to corruption and the misuse of international aid. Above all, Palestinian leaders must demonstrate that they want to build a society rather than destroy another one. Palestinians should not be encouraged to believe that terrorism is a shortcut to statehood. Otherwise, the message of October 7 becomes dangerously clear, for the West as well: murder Jews, Christians and other infidels, kidnap them, rape them, and massacre them — and eventually the international community will reward them with a state.
There are Jewish-owned factories, supermarkets, restaurants, wineries, and other businesses in the West Bank, where Palestinians and Israelis work together. These workplaces may not constitute a political peace agreement, but they represent something that boycott campaigns destroy: normal human contact and economic cooperation. Pictured: A branch of the Rami Levy supermarket in Mishor Adumim, east of Jerusalem, photographed on February 13, 2020. (Photo by Ahmad Gharabli/AFP via Getty Images)
The foreign ministers of 12 Western countries have apparently decided that the best way to promote peace between Israelis and Palestinians is to punish businesses operating in Jewish communities in the West Bank. One can only wonder what planet these ministers are living on. On September 8, Canada, France, Iceland, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Ireland, and the United Kingdom issued a joint statement declaring that they intend to introduce, or support, restrictions on trade in goods produced in Jewish settlements. The ministers said that "Israel's actions in the West Bank are undermining the possibility of a two-State solution" and that "the two-state solution must be protected, and we will take action." They also condemned the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel and described it as "the worst antisemitic massacre since the Holocaust."
Continue Reading Article
|
